Set free on wrongful conviction, too, Ronald Cotton elated to see Ronnie Long go home — Transcript

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1. 0:00And if there's one man who understands
2. 0:01exactly what Long has gone through to be
3. 0:04wrongfully accused, convicted, spend
4. 0:06years in jail, and then be exonerated,
5. 0:09it's Ronald Cotton. Colleen Quigley has
6. 0:12his story and message for Ronnie. It's a
7. 0:14story you'll only see on CBS 17.
8. 0:2344 years after he was convicted for a
9. 0:26crime he did not commit, Ronnie Long is
10. 0:29a free man.
11. 0:29It's a wow. He deserved to be set free.
12. 0:32Ronald Cotton watched the news of Long's
13. 0:34release on TV.
14. 0:36I knew Ronnie from being incarcerated
15. 0:38myself. You know, we was on the same
16. 0:40unit.
17. 0:41And occasionally, you know, we would
18. 0:43speak. And uh
19. 0:45working in the same kitchen.
20. 0:47And he was a very I thought he was a
21. 0:49great guy.
22. 0:49Not only did Long and Cotton serve time
23. 0:51together, both spent more than a decade
24. 0:54behind bars, only later to be proven
25. 0:57innocent. Cotton was convicted in 1985
26. 1:00for rape.
27. 1:02DNA evidence exonerated him 10 years
28. 1:05later.
29. 1:05That moment you hear him say, "You're a
30. 1:07free man." What went through your mind?
31. 1:11I said,
32. 1:12"Free at last, free at last. No more
33. 1:14shackles." And you know, I'm glad.
34. 1:16According to the Innocence Project,
35. 1:18they've used DNA to exonerate 375
36. 1:21people. Of those cases, 69%
37. 1:25were wrongfully convicted based on
38. 1:27eyewitness misidentification.
39. 1:29I knew the officer
40. 1:31and the DA had a job to do.
41. 1:34But be honest, that hurts my heart, you
42. 1:37know, honestly.
43. 1:38Yeah.
44. 1:38Because it was done to me.
45. 1:40In the years since his release, Cotton
46. 1:41says he's tried to keep to himself and
47. 1:43his family, taking each day one at a
48. 1:46time. Advice he'd share with Long.
49. 1:49And I know that it's going to be a slow
50. 1:50process. It took about 2 months for me
51. 1:52to get fully, you know, settled in like
52. 1:55I wanted it and feel comfortable.
53. 1:56For
54. 1:58the other Ronald Cotton's, for the other
55. 2:00Ronnie Long's that are in prison right
56. 2:02now and know they didn't do that crime,
57. 2:05what would you say to them?
58. 2:07Penitentiary taught me a lot all those
59. 2:10all those years that I was in there,
60. 2:12I learned something.
61. 2:14Stay strong and keep my head up and
62. 2:17don't mess with the wrong people.
63. 2:19Well, I'd tell them to hang in there and
64. 2:21don't give up.