Believe me when I say this is one of the most egregious cases of a miscarriage of justice you’ll ever hear.

SABRINA BUTLER SMITH’s story can only be described as your very worst nightmare.  At 17, Sabrina was a young, single mother to two children including her beautiful baby boy, Walter.  When Walter was nine months old, Sabrina came home after a jog and found him in his crib not breathing. After a frantic half an hour desperately seeking help from neighbours and applying the CPR she was instructed to give, Walter arrived in the emergency room, but the doctors were unable to revive him.

Instead of consoling the heartbroken teen mother, the doctors wrongly accused Sabrina of child abuse.   And after a 4 hour brutal police interrogation, Sabrina was charged with murdering her baby boy.  In March 1990, Sabrina was wrongfully convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death.

Six and a half excruciating years after her wrongful conviction, Sabrina was granted an appellate trial with the support of her new lawyer - my former guest, Clive Stafford Smith. During the appeal, it was found that Walter had tragically died from a genetic kidney disorder. 

In 1995, Sabrina was the first woman ever in the history of the United States to be exonerated from Death Row.  

The only thing that kept this remarkable young woman going was her faith and the knowledge of one thing: she was innocent.  

They say the truth will set you free.  But even for the exonerated, hell remains a place on earth.

This is Sabrina’s story …

BUT BEFORE YOU GO…

Find out more about Sabrina here

Find out more about Witness to Innocence here

Watch “Kids Meet a Death Row Exoneree” here

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CREDITS:

Creator, Host & Executive Producer: Tammi Faraday

With thanks to my special guest: Sabrina Butler Smith

Audio Editor: Zoltan Fecso

With very special thanks to George Weinberg. 

BRAVE JOURNEYS acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the Land we record this podcast on, the Yaluk-ut Weelam Clan of the Boon Wurrung who are part of the Kulin Nation. We pay our respect to their Elders, both past, present and emerging and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures.