You could just look at a William Thomas Zeigler, Jr. court opinion if you wanted the scoop on a minuscule portion of the case and legal aspects pertaining to it, but we all know that there is always more behind the scenes than that which makes it into a legal case, because of procedures, human err or human intervention. That would be like just rereading the APs report on an event without having the benefit of the background or context of the event. That is a lot of trust in a particular reporter
and we know that every reporter always does a bang up job
uh-hem.
I have written a paper on the evidence for this case for a college class. I read Finchs book. I met in person with another journalist, who writes under a pseudonym because she still gets death threats for writing in support of WTZ. I looked over the legal docs. I watched the Unsolved Mysteries and A&E Investigates. I visited the sites. I am persuaded by the evidence to believe that more than likely he is innocent. However, I feel so strongly that even if he did do this crime, he should walk, purely based on the reprehensible behavior of the officials involved in this case. Our justice system deserves that much.
Examples:
THE JUDGE did not recuse himself, when four months earlier he was a character witness in a hotly contested liquor license case, where WTZ was the defenses cw. This was the case of a black man being wrongfully accuse, so that a white man could rightfully have the liquor license instead only a set number of liquor licenses in the State of Florida. THE JUDGE ordered a doctor to give the last holdout jurist valium. THE JUDGE gave everyone else latitude except the defense, showing extreme prejudice. THE JUDGE ring-leaded an exparte meeting (defense excluded) where he told THE PROSECUTOR and LEO officials present that if they got a conviction, hed make sure the guy [fried]. The LEO officials planted evidence (bullet in the orange grove) and removed evidence (tooth in picture, not in evidence; files on local corruption WTZ had at the house, now missing). The PROSECUTION WITNESS who was allowed to leave and turn in his clothes from that dreadful evening for GSR two days later with price tags still on them obviously new and not from that evening. THE JURISTS who held the guns (from evidence, which were allowed in with the jury during deliberations then) and dry fired them against the head of the last holdout jurist (later given valium). THE JURISTS later said that they were not sure if he did it, but just wanted to go home for the 4th of July holiday weekend. They said they voted guilty just to get out of there. They also maintained that they recommend Life in Prison, knowing that it would probably be overturned on appeal. THE JUDGE who then, fulfilling his exparte meeting promise, upped the sentence from the jury recommended Life to Death. THE PROSECUTION who tuned over the Jellison tapes after the appeals deadline for them had passed. The Jellison tapes are a recording of a DETECTIVE asking the Jellison family teenage son to recount the events from his next-door hotel vantage point. The son said that as the family returned to their room after dinner, they saw the police out back and then heard the gunfire. The detective then said that the adult sons report would not help their case, but that if the son could remember it that they heard the gunfire and then later saw the police arrive, then the department would pay for another trip back to Disney for them. It has been six years since I wrote the paper and looked into this case, but I am sure there are more examples that I am just not thinking of now. This case is riddle with them.
I would think that any of these matters would be enough on appeal to get a new trial or just overturn the whole thing. So why isnt it happening? THE APPEALS SYSTEM is flawed. With every matter brought before the appeals judge, there is a specific question on a specific matter. With tunnel vision, the question is answered without prejudice of the rest of the case or other questions already answered. So then, time and time again, the appeals judge has found in favor of the trial judges behavior, stating that each decision was within the scope of the trial judges latitude. When you look at the big picture, the prejudice is obvious.
Barring the appeals justice from viewing the big picture is were the flaw lies.
It doesnt help matters that every witness coming forward with information on the corruption of this case is himself stained with corruption: The LEO who came forward later about the exparte meeting at which he was present, or the prison inmate who saw the LEO find a bullet in the area of the orange grove they just searched. Their testimony is not to be believed because they have been found guilty of other crimes.
This case is really just waiting on powerful people to die of old age. The trial judge is now at the federal level in the courts and the Prosecutor is now at the State level. They still wield an enormous amount of power. Furthermore, you cannot separate the hostile climate (Winter Garden in 1975 was a KKK hotbed). As stated before, the journalist I met with still flies under the radar due to death threats.
I have a friend whos parents lived in Central Florida when the crime took place and still believe after all these years that WTZ is guilty, because they saw the evening news who said he did it (before any trial took place). They have no recollection of any trial, just the news reports right after the crime, because the LEOs had their man!
When I finished the paper for my class, the unnamed journalist asked me who my teacher was. When I told her that he was a retired FHP officer, she advised me to proceed with caution. Interesting.