I was watching a Court TV show last night called Wrong Man. It is a documentary type show that follows retired NY detective Jerry Palace around as he investigates cases of people who may have been wrongfully accused and convicted.

Last nights show was called “a mother’s cry” and recalls a case from the early 90’s where a mother reported her child abducted from a market and believed a police officer was the man who abducted and later killed the girl.

The mother was convicted of murder on very little evidence all of which was circumstantial and easily explained. One of the pieces of evidence was her hair found on the girls body.

The detectives went around questioning people and found witnesses who were never allowed to testify and whose testimony may have cleared the mother. One of those witnesses was the attorney for the ex cop that the mother says stalked her daughter prior to the abduction.

I say ex-cop, because James Glover was fired from the police department later for staging a shooting. Yes, the man took off his vest, shot it twice, put it back on, and reported that he had been shot. When the department found out it was all a lie, he was fired.

Anyway, his attorney, said on camera that she had knowledge that would have cleared the mother but was not allowed to testify and break attorney-client priveledge, even if the attorney-client clause sent an innocent woman to jail for life. Also, the attorney recalls that James Glover approached her and her small daughter at the time and implied a threat against the attorneys own child.

At the end of the show, the detectives were now convinced that this young single mother was railroaded and probably should never have been arrested to begin with.

The mother Teresa is in a catch 22. She is eligible for parole, but will never be paroled unless she confesses to the murder and she has already stated that she will never confess to the murder therefor never getting paroled. She’s damned if she does and damned if she doesn’t.

It blows my mind that the parole board is pushing for a confession from a woman who has claimed she had nothing to do with the kidnapping and murder from the start. If she confesses just to get out, it will give them ammunition to deny parole, if she does not confess, she will not be paroled either… try that one.

Anyway, the story is below

the website for retired detective Jerry Palace is Here

COURT TV® SHEDS NEW LIGHT ON THIRTEEN-YEAR-OLD CASE IN “THE WRONG MAN? A MOTHER’S CRY”

Former NYPD Detective Jerry Palace Returns as Lead Investigator of Network’s Ongoing “The Wrong Man” Series As It Delves Into the Mysterious Murder of Macon, Georgia Child, Taylor Fargason

New York, NY - Did a Georgia woman kill her six-year-old daughter or is the wrong person serving a jail term for the crime? A one-hour Court TV investigation raises troubling new questions about the case in The Wrong Man?® A Mother’s Cry, Court TV commissioned retired New York Police Detective Jerry Palace and his partner Reggie Britt to retrace the heartbreaking crime, pursuing leads, examining evidence and speaking with a number of the key players, including Teresa Fargason, who is currently serving a life sentence in a Georgia prison. Fargason vehemently maintains her innocence, and several others involved in the investigation concur. This fascinating one-hour documentary is part of Court TV’s continuing series of “Wrong Man” documentary investigations, which air as part of the network’s signature series, “The System®.”

Teresa Fargason’s life changed forever on a Sunday evening in June, 1991, when her daughter Taylor disappeared from a Kroger grocery store around 9:00 p.m. Police would later discover the girl’s body by the side of a road about six miles from the store. After Fargason failed a lie detector test, police became suspicious of her story. One year after the murder, Fargason was arrested and, after refusing to accept a plea bargain, she was convicted of her daughter’s murder and sentenced to life. Fargason has been incarcerated since 1993 and has already been denied parole once, in late 2000.

In the documentary, which is the only in-depth, comprehensive look at this tragic case done to date, Palace and Britt journey to the prison and speak with Fargason. She points out several key pieces of evidence that did not make it into her trial - evidence she believes could have lead to a very different outcome. Fargason reveals that a local police officer by the name of James Glover had apparently been following her and her daughter, and on one occasion he had even given Taylor a teddy bear, without her mother’s knowledge, when the two were stopped at a car wash.

Step by step, Palace and Britt take viewers through the investigation, speaking with the District Attorney who prosecuted the case, Fargason’s lawyer, a forensic expert, two witnesses who said they had seen a little girl in the store that evening but were not called to testify for Fargason’s defense. They also speak with a lawyer, Lynne Finney, who had represented former police officer James Glover and who appears to have evidence that could aid Fargason’s case. And, in an extremely explosive on camera exchange, Palace and Britt come face-to-face with Glover, confronting him about his behavior and the murder of Taylor Fargason.

Palace, who was uncertain about Fargason’s innocence until he had conducted his own hands-on investigation for the show now says, “In our opinion, the investigation was nothing more than an orchestrated witch-hunt intent on gathering enough circumstantial evidence to prosecute and convict Teresa at any cost. We think Teresa got a raw deal and should have never been convicted, let alone arrested in the first place.”

“What happened to me is irrelevant,” says Fargason, “but the person that did this needs to be punished. That’s what I want to see done. That’s what gets me through every day.”

The Wrong Man?® A Mother’s Cry is the fifth in a series of special presentations that explore cases in which doubt has been cast on the investigations, the suspects and the facts surrounding the criminal cases. The producers conduct fresh interviews with law enforcement officials and family members and, when possible, track down the person who may have been responsible for the crime.

The documentary is produced by Michael Schlossman for Court TV. Anthony Horn, Vice President, Court TV Productions, serves as the Executive Producer for Court TV. Ed Hersh is Senior VP, Documentaries and Specials for Court TV. The Wrong Man?® series was created by Award-winning documentarian Joe Berlinger.