>>This week on NewsNight, a judge rules Crosley Green, a Titusville man who served three decades for a murder he says he didn't commit must return to prison after two years of freedom.

We'll take an in-depth look at the case.

Plus, Eatonville residents weigh in on what they'd like to see happen now to the Hungerford School site.

After an agreement reached by Orange County public schools to sell the land to a developer fell through.

NewsNight starts now.

[MUSIC] Hello, I'm Steve Mort, and welcome to NewsNight, where we take an in-depth look at the top stories and issues in central Florida and how they affect all of us.

First tonight, the case of Crosley Green.

The 65 year old Titusville resident has been ordered to return to prison for the murder of Charles Flynn, who was shot to death in Mims in 1989.

Green's conviction was overturned in 2018 amid questions over the prosecution allowing him to walk free after 30 years behind bars.

But the state appealed, leading to his conviction being reinstated last year.

The US Supreme Court declined to hear the case, and a court in Orlando this month ruled Green must return to prison by this Monday, April 17th, to resume his life sentence.

The PBS NewsHour has been following this case closely and spoke with Green recently.

>>Im an innocent man.

I didn't commit no crime.

So I'm not going to take no plea deal or I really wasn't hoping to spend the rest of my life with anyone else who committed that crime.

But the ball fell where it fell to.

No, I would never take a plea deal on something I didn't commit or do.

I wouldn't care if it paid off for me.

Five years, three years?

I wouldn't took that plea, you know, because I didn't do the crime.

>>Crosley Green.

Well, to discuss the case, I turn to John Torres, a journalist with Florida Today.

>>Crosley Green was arrested and convicted for the 1989 murder of Charles “Chip ” Flynn in Mims, a crime for which many people feel he did not have anything at all to do with.

He was sentenced initially to die and spent 20 years on Florida's death row.

And this is when we have the electric chair.

And he was waiting for that.

In 2018, a federal judge ruled that a Brady violation had occurred.

Saying that prosecutor Chris White did not properly share evidence that could be exculpatory or favorable to Green with his defense attorneys back then for his trial.

But there were so many problems with this case.

There is no physical evidence.

There are no fingerprints.

You know, Crosley Green was supposedly he was driving a pickup truck that he carjacked the night of the crime, which is a stick shift.

He can't drive stick shift.

The four witnesses against him were people that he knew and who all had problems with the law.

And they all have recanted.

There's just a lot of problems for this case.

It's very curious why Florida seems intent on following it through.

>>John, what was the most recent case in the middle district about and does it mean the end of the road for Green, or does he still have avenues that might keep him out of prison?

>>Well, all all avenues as far as being in a courtroom are exhausted by the latest ruling earlier this year from the middle district was just basically that he had to turn himself back in because the case reverted back to that court.

So he's been home in Titusville on house arrest for about two years now, and he has to turn himself in April 17th.

His only hope, really, I believe Steven, is clemency or parole.

>>Green been offered deals in the past, which would have allowed him to admit to the crime and leave prison.

Why would he not do that?

>>He feels that he he shouldn't have to admit to something that he didn't do.

And he's very steadfast in that.

And, you know, I would be surprised if that changes any anytime soon.

>>When I spoke to Green myself before the most recent ruling, he seemed stoic.

How does he seem to be taking the news that he'll have to return to prison?

And does he want to continue to try to clear his name from behind bars?

>>Absolutely.

He wants to clear his name.

And incredibly, he still has a lot of hope and faith in the justice system.

He he says that that his name will be cleared.

You know, stoic is is exactly who he is.

He's very humble.

He's very down to earth.

He went to work all that week, last week, even after hearing the news that he would have to go back to to prison.

You know, the only time I've ever seen Crosley upset is when his family is upset.

And so his family is very saddened by this.

You know, and so it affects him as well.

But he says he has no problem in going back in that, you know, he says that that it's it is perhaps just one more step in the journey that he has to take.

>>What got you interested, John, in following this case?

>>I had already followed and written about two wrongful conviction cases in Brevard County, Wilton Dedge and William Dillon.

You know, each, you know, spent more than 20 years in prison for crimes which they did not commit at all because DNA exonerated them completely.

And I had noticed a pattern and the Juan Ramos case, which happened before I started at Florida Today was also exonerated.

And I saw the same pattern, the same names as the prosecutors, the same use of a dog handler, the same use of jailhouse informants.

And this pattern of choosing people that were sort of easy targets, you know, Wilton Dedge was a high school dropout.

William Dillon was sort of like a beach bum, you know, Crosley Green, already known to the cops.

You know, Juan Ramos, an immigrant who didn't speak English, you know, just easy people to just go after and close out cases.

And so, you know, when I started at Florida Today in 2001, a lot of people were already talking about Crosley Green.

But I didn't really know the case well.

But after he left but but after covering those wrongful convictions, he soon came on my radar.

>>John Torres from Florida Today.

Well, in reinstating Crosley Green's conviction, the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals last year agreed with the lower court that prosecutors had improperly withheld evidence suggesting police initially suspected someone else to be the shooter.

But the court said that evidence would not have affected the outcome of the trial.

Meanwhile, be sure to check out the PBS NewsHour's coverage of Crosley Green's case on air and online at PBS.org/newshour.

Well, let's bring in our panel now.

And joining us in the studio this week, coming back to the program, Danielle Prieur, 90.7 WMFE News.

Good to see you again, Danielle.

Thanks for being here.

And Desiree Stennett from the Orlando Sentinel, thanks for coming in, Desiree.

Really appreciate you guys sparing your time today.

Desiree, let me start with you on this one.

John Torres told me that the original trial in 1990, it was 1989 case, had a lot of sort of racial overtones, like many in the history of the South.

I guess.

Green was sentenced by an all white jury, for example, you cover the criminal justice beat.

Is the sort of composition of juries still an issue in the criminal justice system today as it was then?

>>Well, it shouldn't be even for for Mr. Green before the before his trial ever happened, the Supreme Court did decide to make a decision that said that you can no longer exclude someone from a jury based solely on race, and that should have been in place and effective for Mr. Green.

Unfortunately, that wasn't the case.

And we see modern cases even as recently as just last year with cases like that of Kyle Rittenhouse from Wisconsin and even Ahmaud Arbery in Georgia.

The the men who were convicted of his killing, both of those juries were predominantly white.

Each jury only had one person of color represented in each one, and they did come up with different outcomes.

But I think there's many people who would argue that if, for example, Kyle Rittenhouse had a more diverse jury, they would have been less likely to believe a self-defense.

>>So even though the Supreme Court has weighed in on this, it remains like a systemic issue, I guess, in the criminal justice system.

>>Absolutely.

And it came up specifically in the Ahmaud Arbery case, because the judge in that case actually said in court that he felt that the the jurors, the way that the jurors were chosen was intentionally discriminatory.

But the problem with that 1986 decision is that what it says is that jurors can't be excluded solely based on race.

So what we see often is that a defense attorneys or prosecutors can often find reasons not explicitly related to race.

But then we see the outcome and we see juries that are either all white or predominantly white quite often.

>>Is it fairly common for failings in the prosecution cases to be found many years later as they were in the Crosley Green case?

>>It's common for people who have been convicted of crimes to say that they did not do it, and to say that there were failings either from prosecution or from juries or even from law enforcement investigations that led to this.

But unfortunately, they don't win often.

But they do win sometimes.

I think in the past nearly 4-8 years since it's been tracked, we've had about 3,200 cases of people who were convicted of a crime and then later exonerated.

And the overwhelming majority or black people who have been convicted of crimes are overrepresented.

>>Yeah, well, you can find a link to John Torres's reporting on the Crosley Green case on our website, wucf.org/newsnight.

Well, next tonight, a fascinating story that both our panelists tonight have been covering a lot recently.

The plan to develop a part of the storied central Florida town of Eatonville was recently shelved after the development team that had planned to buy the land from Orange County public schools pulled out of the sale.

Some residents say the site of the former Hungerford School is significant in Eatonvilles Black History and efforts to build homes and retail outlets there would have dealt a blow to the town's African-American community.

Well, I spoke this week with John Beecham, who runs the Land Back campaign to return the Hungerford land to the town.

He's also a member of the Association to Preserve the Eatonville Community.

>>This was a place and a town that freedom built, and someone is going to take that freedom away.

You see sweat out here.

You see love out here.

You see family out here.

This land that we're looking at the Hungerford properties where I have my sweat.

My parents have their sweat.

All my ancestors, uncles, cousins, grandparents, all have their sweat here.

Eatonville was a community where we did everything as a community.

So if there was like a special holiday, it was all established right here on this land.

We all met here.

This is where my brothers played football.

This is where Deacon Jones played football.

This is where a lot of greats came.

Was all called the Hungerford Bobcats.

So we're all bobcats through and through.

This is where Robert Hungerford died.

He was out here as the indigenous people have their relationship with their land.

Thankfully, we have a relationship with this land.

We are.

I'm a steward of this land and that's why the fight is so heavy and so hard is that it's a stewardship, its a relationship is more than just an empty land to me or just a school existed here.

This is this is Eatonville.

This the oldest black municipality in the nation.

George Washington Carver came here.

Booker T Washington came here.

President Roosevelt and his wife came here.

It was a town that freedom built.

This is the Living Museum.

This is the oldest black municipality in America.

Nowhere else in America can they say that.

Eatonville has a display in the Smithsonian.

In the Smithsonian.

And I think when you look at what they're going to build apartment complexes, homes for the wealthy, people in Eatonville can't afford it.

They won't be able to live here.

A return to segregation.

That was my first reaction.

They'll come in and build their product.

They'll sell it.

Theyll move on.

And then the town of Eatonville will be forced to raise taxes so enormously that it pushes the people out.

We have people come in OIA every day, but Mickey Mouse and Universal Studio, which was a good thing.

Eatonville is a place where tourism comes everyday also.

We want to build this town around tourism culture, heritage and the arts, and we can achieve that.

That's already here.

But it just takes a bit more investment when you're talking about the black people.

The mountain gets a little rugged and the hills get go to decline.

And it's accepted because because of mindset, right?

Their mindset is that they're trying to do something to help poor Eatonville.

Theyre trying to give us taxpayers what they're doing to evil is demolishing Eatonville to turn it into, again, another segregated town.

They're not helping us.

If they want to help Eatonville.

Well, let us tell you what we want and then invest.

I grew a plan we would put first we put this land either a land trust or a land patent.

So that way this crime never happen again.

Then we would build around destination.

What does that look like?

A school hub out here.

So we can teach culinary skills.

We can teach hospitality skills so the people in Eatonville can work and get the economic impact and raise income.

And then what I'd like to see on Main Street, kind of like Nashville.

So and that would be built around tours, cultures, culture, heritage and arts.

And so we'll get like chef inspired restaurant, not just anything.

We'll have an amphitheater so people can come to Eatonville and do a concert.

So we can have for more than 5,000 people.

Then we're build Zora Neale Hurston Museum.

For those tourists that come here every day, we'll build a green space for our kids, Parks and recreational hub.

And we're going to we're not only going to win, but we're gonna get our land completely back and we're going to put it in the right context so that this will never happen again.

>>Eatonville resident John Beecham there.

Well, this is a really interesting story that you guys have been following closely.

Desiree, let me start with you on this one before we get to the details specifically of this development that that fell through, just remind us about the historical significance of Eatonville to the African-American community not only in central Florida, but also beyond nationally.

>>Absolutely.

Eatonville was one of the very first black communities that were there was created after slavery.

It was.

There were many black towns that that were or black communities that were created immediately post-slavery but this was one of the first one that was incorporated that was able to create their own town and their own government.

And and then it was even more catapulted into fame because of the renowned writers, Zora Neale Hurston, depicting Eatonville in her in her writing.

>>The folklorist.

>>Yeah, exactly.

And and really creating this or really sharing this beauty that this town was this black town that had really managed to thrive against so many different circumstances that could have made it not exist today already.

>>I guess that's where the phrase the town that freedom built came from, right?

Because it was such an early example of that.

>>Absolutely.

And that's literally like freedom from slavery built this town.

>>Yeah.

Danielle, I mean, the hunger for the land was the location of that.

The Robert Hungerford Normal and Industrial school, correct?

That was established in 1889.

Just describe the intention behind that school and sort of how OCPS came to own that land.

I think what, in the 1950s.

>>That's right.

So as we've both written about, it was the first school for black children in this area.

And that was the the whole goal of donating this land to the stipulation was it could only be used to educate black children.

And so that's what it did.

When it was started, it was kind of modeled after Booker T Washington's Tuskegee Institute, which is now the Tuskegee University.

And it was a boarding school, but also a day school.

And kids would come from all over Florida and Alabama, Georgia, North and South Carolina, not just to learn vocational skills, but also to receive a really solid liberal arts education.

And so generations of kids were were brought up and went to school there and have wonderful memories of going to school there.

And teachers also have great memories of teaching there.

In World War Two, I think it was the enrollment kind of dipped a bit, and that was when the trustees decided to sell the land to the district, and the district demolished the old buildings, built the new buildings, and the school continued for many, many years after that.

But it is a school that was really built on a dream and a promise of equality.

>>Desiree, I mean, this recent controversy was over the last 100 acres, I think, of this vacant land.

But what happened to the land over the sort of 70 odd years of OCPS stewardship?

>>And I think what's important to understand is that when OCPS took over the school, I think up until now, the understanding of that was that this was a school that was struggling, that they had no money, they couldn't get students.

And when OCPS took over in the fifties, it was really written about at the time as a friendly lawsuit because the courts just had to decide because that's how it was meant to this, how the trust was set up.

But we were able to look back at it documents from the time, and we really found that a lot of the things that were used to explain why the school needs to be sold, for example, low enrollment in reality, they had been working with OCPS for about ten years to bring day school students there and had all but stopped trying to get boarding school students.

And I was in the documents that I read in the last ten years, I'm sorry, in the last year before OCPS took over the school, they had about 33 boarding school students, which doesn't sound like a lot when we think about the school today.

But at the time, 60 or 70 students was more than enough to run a school and they were still able to get about half that without even trying for students.

So I think it's important to know that the school itself was doing okay and had options outside of the OCPS purchase.

But but you ask what happened once OCP took over and in the 70 years and first because this was the early fifties before schools were legally segregated, it was transformed into a public segregated public school for black students when there were basically no options available.

And then when schools were desegregated, which it took Orange County a while to catch up, but when schools were desegregated, it became a desegregated high school that was still predominantly black.

And it had some transformations over the years.

It became a technical school at one point, I believe, before it was finally torn down in 2009 for similar reasons that it was sold with the blaming of low enrollment again.

And and right now, during the pandemic, that's when the school was torn down and we see the empty 100 acres that we see now.

>>And a lot of people in that community say they were incredibly shocked that that school was was torn down in the middle of the pandemic when many of them had no notice and they weren't aware that it had happened.

>>Right.

And that actually came up just briefly at the at a town council meeting in February where the former mayor who did support the land being sold and did support this project, sort of said, well, the reason there's no school there is because the community didn't support it.

But he was shouted down pretty quickly when the community said that they started to send their kids to different schools because they had no other choice, that the school was not getting the investment that it needed.

And then it was closed.

>>Yeah, I mean, Danielle, I mean, the Eatonville town leaders, right, voted against the zoning plan for the residential retail space.

But I mean, as Desiree alludes to, that the council hasn't always opposed.

>>No, but the council, at least at the meeting we were at in February when all the residents were there and it was like standing room only.

And we were there listening to comment for hours and hours, really voted for and with the people and they voted against rezoning.

And then I was just at a League of Women Voters mayoral forum yesterday and the new mayor, Angie Gardner-- >>Wednesday night.

>>I'm sorry.

Yes.

And she was speaking about the fact that basically she really wants the land to be returned to Eatonville and she supports the association to preserve the Eatonville community in their lawsuit against the district and would like to see the land returned in a trust.

She's for development, but she said it has to be the right development and she really didn't feel like this was the right development.

And so it was exciting to see the hope again in her eyes.

The idea that this would be land that would be there for future generations, many, many more generations.

And the descendants of those original people that attended the Hungerford School.

>>What were the plans for the land before they fell through?

And I'm also intrigued to know why OCPS, why it thought that the sale would be beneficial for the school district but also for the community.

>>So I think we alluded to this before, but basically it would have been used for apartments and single family home dwellings and townhouse but it would also have been this kind of mixed development area where there would be retail spaces and grocery stores.

We've all kind of seen those sort of developments in the central Florida area and the district was really for it because they would have made $10 million off the sale.

They wanted the money and they said that they would have added on to schools that were already in operation and maybe even built some new ones.

But, you know, the sale and the profit was really their main interest.

And I think they felt like the town of Eatonville could have benefited because the town would have gotten $4 million.

>>Desiree, I mean, N.Y. Nathiri, she runs the Zora Festival.

I think she's also in charge of the association preserve the Eatonville community.

Right.

She's described this as an economic justice issue.

I mean, why do people in Eatonville feel that this just would not have benefited them in the in the way that they were told it might?

>>I think the the number one fear was that the housing that the developers intended to build, though we did not get breakdowns of exactly how much rent would be, they did say that it would be market rate which residents were worried that all of the apartments that were would be built would be way too expensive for anyone who who currently lives in the town, which many of the people who live in the town currently have, their families have been there for generations.

>>Yeah.

>>So it was sort of a double whammy of rent being way too expensive.

And then the town feeling like the grocery store, which is something the town needs.

It doesn't currently have one, but that would be almost the way that they described it was creating a city within a city that it would create apartments that were beautiful, but not for the people who live in the town.

It would create a grocery store that was needed, but not for the people who already live in the town.

So I think the fear was truly that this would welcome all of these new people who don't either don't know or don't respect the history of Eatonville, and they would be the only ones to benefit from all of the development that would come.

>>It's interesting you mentioned the grocery store part of it because so many minority communities in central Florida are what it classifies as food deserts and this was sort of no exception there.

I mean, why did so many people in this community fight these plans?

I'm interested in the outside support that they got, particularly from Southern Poverty Law Center and others.

>>Well, I think to go back to the question of economic justice as well, that was why the Southern Poverty Law Center got involved, because they have a they have an arm that focuses on economic injustice.

And and their concern was truly that these people who had been in this neighborhood for generations would not get to benefit from growth in the neighborhood.

And and I know and I talked a little bit about the history of how the Orange County public schools got the land.

But I think the history is important to this question as well, because one of the most interesting and surprising things that came from the documents was that there was almost a chance for the original Hungerford School to create a partnership with Bethune-Cookman University.

And Mary McLeod Bethune herself would have sat on the board of the Hungerford School and would have landed her expertise in creating educational institutions with lasting power right there in Eatonville.

And I think the residents first.

Many people didn't know that this when when we learned that when we were able to get the documents in the fifties, we were the ones telling both people on the school board and the people in the town, including the mayor, about this history.

And I think that history really spoke to the need for economic justice, because when you hear something like that, when you hear that this school could have been a preparatory school in partnership with one of the prominent black universities in the state, you can't help but wonder what Eatonville could have been today.

And would it be a town where the average income is less than $30,000 a year?

Would it be a town that didn't have a grocery store?

Would it be a town needing resources if they were able to really set the education foundation that they needed 100 years, 50, 70 years ago?

And I mean, we don't know the answer to that because we can't change history.

But I think for many people in the town, based on what they have told me, that plays a big role in this, that they want to get as close as possible to the Eatonville that could have existed if Orange County Public School did not buy the land so many years ago.

>>Well, there's just so many questions unanswered.

And I and I know you guys will we'll stay on the story going forward.

And we really appreciate your reporting on it for sure.

You can find a link to the reporting on the Hungerford School land by both Desiree and Danielle on our websites at wucf.org/newsnight but that is all the time we have for this week I'm afraid.

My thanks to Danielle Prieur 90.7 WMFE News thanks for coming in and Desiree Stennett from the Orlando Sentinel.

We'll see you next Friday night at 8:30 here on WUCF.

In the meantime, from all of us here at NewsNight, take care and have a great week.