Free The Short and Tragic Life of Robert Peace by Jeff Hobbs Page A

respect my lawyers and I have a lot of respect for them and I think they’re fine gentlemen, but as far as in a professional capacity sometimes, well, from my understanding a crime is committed, the police reports are taken and all investigations go at that point and from that point and if those police reports are erroneous then people are going to have erroneous investigations and they’re going to try to defend based on that. I have a lot of respect for Mr. Lechliter, I know he’s just doing his job, but he wasn’t there and if they say this is the designated defendant then it’s his job to win the case, you know, but the truth never came out. It’s win or lose and unfortunately my lawyers lost, but justice wasn’t done and the truth never came out during that trial and I think a better effort could have been put forth . . . From the beginning, as I said, I did not commit this crime. I know the jury has determined that I’m guilty of the crime. I really don’t know anything about what happened in that room. I was not there. I did not commit the crime. I was arrested and unfortunately the only gentleman that could really tell the truth, since I did not take the stand, under the advice of my attorneys, was Mr. Irving Gaskins and he died. I did not have the weapon on me, that’s completely fabricated . . . [Gaskins is] the only one that could tell what happened at the time of my arrest, that I did not have a weapon on me . . . I don’t know why I’m accused of this and I never saw the photographs of the actual crime scene until court. I don’t understand how a person could come in a doorway and shoot someone whose right side is facing the doorway and she is shot on the opposite side and there was no testimony elicited from the medical examiner as far as the person that’s supposed to have fired the shots. Someone evidently fired the shots, but where they could have been standing for this lady to be shot from someone coming from one direction and the entrance wound, contact entrance wounds are coming from the opposite direction. I just don’t understand that and it was never brought out in the trial . . . I mean it seemed like Miss Broadway was laying on that side and that’s the side where the shots came from. I mean, something is not right here and I’ve been convicted of this—
    At this point, the judge stopped him and said, “I know that you have sustained throughout the trial and today your innocence and as you can see I’m struggling. I really don’t know. I’m sitting here with the verdict and I don’t know . . .”
    Skeet finished by saying:
    I have a ten year old son. His mother has been very gracious. He’s been coming to the jail every week for three and a half years. This whole thing is unbelievable. I know I’ve been convicted. As I said from the beginning, as God is witness, I’m innocent of this crime. My heart goes out to the family of Charlene and Estella Moore . . . but I have a family and my son’s a beautiful child and when I was out there I spoiled him. I was with him everyday. I thank God that he’s a very brilliant child. He’s a straight-A student and he sings in the choir at church and . . .
    Finally, Skeet trailed off, shook his head, and sat. Rob and Jackie were not in the audience, and hadn’t been at all throughout the trial. This, like the prison visits, had been Skeet’s decision. He hadn’t wanted either of them to see him in this most vulnerable position. After gearing his entire existence and child-rearing philosophy around friends, Skeet’s fate ultimately lay at the mercy and judgment of strangers.

    J ACKIE CONSIDERED THAT maybe it was a good thing Skeet would be gone for a while, considering that the Mt. Carmel uniform would have given him an aneurysm: pink shirt, brown slacks, with a