maybe less high-tech, if you want to call it that, than dna testing to solve the crime. >> without science and the new technology that's available, both these homicides would remain unsolved and probably remain unsolved forever. when a ship's captain turned up dead after a raging storm, some said his death was a tragic accident. an eyewitness told police it was murder, but something on this videotape raised questions about who was telling the truth. venice, louisiana, like its namesake in italy, is a place where life revolves around the water. the small town marks the spot where the mississippi river empties into the gulf of mexico.

locals call it the end of the world. >> everybody knows everybody's business pretty much, good and bad, and some people like it and some people don't. i tend to like it. >> many people in venice make their money trawling for shrimp. it's hard, dangerous work. the sea can either be friend or foe. >> it's rough, and the people there are rough. it's not a genteel community. there's friction there. there's friction there between the pleasure fishermen and the work-a-day fishermen that do it for a living. >> in july of 2000, a storm battered the louisiana coast while the fishing boats were still at sea. all the boats somehow made it back safely, all except one.

captain raymond leiker, otherwise known as tinky, and his deckhand alvin latham were missing along with their shrimp boat named "the bandit." the coast guard was notified. they searched the area in the gulf where tinky had made his last radio transmission but found nothing. 14 hours later, a vietnamese fishing trawler picked up a man in the gulf clinging to a piece of wood. it was alvin latham, the deckhand. he was exhausted but unharmed. when interviewed by the coast guard, alvin told a horrifying tale. alvin said the storm came up so fast that he and tinky were unprepared. >> the wind just picked up, and we was bouncing all over the place. >> with five-foot waves crashing

over the bow and the fishing nets full of shrimp still in the water, the boat started to list. >> it seemed like it was just sinking, and then he reported mayday, mayday! >> when they tried to pull the nets into the boat, tinky's foot got stuck. alvin said he tried desperately to get tinky's foot out of the net, but he was unsuccessful. >> he said he wasn't going to make it. he had asked god to take care of his son. >> tinky told alvin to try to save himself. >> so i told him i was going to go try to get some help. that's when i started swimming. >> just moments after alvin jumped into the water, the boat slipped below the surface. >> like that, the boat was just gone -- down. >> alvin said he managed to grab hold of a piece of wood and swam

for 14 hours until he was rescued. >> i was doing everything i could to try to catch my -- keep my head above the water. you know, it seemed like i was swimming forever. >> he's told his story. he tried to save his captain. it was tender. it was endearing. it could have happened to anyone. >> but alvin didn't want accolades. >> i don't see myself as -- i feel that what i was doing, i couldn't get no help to get him. >> several days later the coast guard found tinky's body floating in the gulf of mexico, and the body told a story that was very different from alvin's story. [ male announcer ] this is the story of the dusty basement at 1406 35th street the old dining table at 25th and hoffman. ...and the little room above the strip mall off roble avenue. ♪ this magic moment

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the coast guard found tinky leiker's body in the gulf of mexico five days after the storm. the only other person on the boat, alvin latham, said he tried to save tinky's life but was unable to free his foot from the fishing nets. >> he was going around talking about how he was a hero. he had survived the storm and all that type of thing. >> but when the local coroner

performed a routine autopsy, the findings contradicted alvin's story. >> he had trauma to his head. his left arm was partially amputated. >> the coroner also found five stab wounds on the arms that would be considered defensive wounds as if the victim was fending off a knife attack. >> someone trying to defend themselves would raise their arms in front of their face and in that way, they would catch the stab wounds at about the forearm, and that's where they were on raymond leiker. >> and the coroner found evidence of blunt force trauma to the head. tinky leiker's death was ruled a homicide. >> someone killed raymond leiker. alvin latham was the only one on the boat that we knew of. his own self said he was the only one. >> when the coast guard interviewed alvin just after his rescue, he said nothing about tinky being stabbed or struck in the head. so police asked alvin to come to headquarters and explain the

discrepancies. >> so we started him en route to the jail, and he said, well, you found the body? and i said, yeah, we did, and he said, well, i guess i'm in trouble. >> investigators videotaped the interrogation. >> his original story when we first picked him up, he said the captain was caught in the trawl net, the boat was sinking and he swam off from the boat and watched it go down. >> he was underwater, and i started swimming off for the first platform i could get to. >> police informed alvin latham that the story he told didn't match the forensic evidence. >> he had several stab marks on his body, and we just need to know why you stabbed him. >> i didn't stab him. >> if raymond leiker's foot was caught in the net, he would have went down with that boat, okay? >> did you murder him? >> no. >> did you murder him? >> no. >> well, then i don't have to lock you up. but i want to know what happened. >> i'm trying to tell you, that's the best that i can. >> who murdered him, then, if

you didn't? >> i don't know. >> after five hours of questioning and three more on the following day, alvin gradually began to change his story. >> alvin started saying things like he felt uncomfortable with raymond leiker. he didn't make him feel comfortable. he was coming up with things that happened to him on that boat as saying that raymond touched his leg, made him feel uncomfortable, that type of thing. i'm thinking finally we're getting somewhere with him, you know? finally, we're starting to get the truth, and that's when he came around, started telling us what he told us, you know, about the stabbing. >> alvin now said that when the boat took on water, he feared for his life, and there was only one life jacket on board. to get the life jacket, alvin waited until tinky's back was turned, grabbed a pipe and struck him. >> how many times did you hit him with that pipe? >> just once. >> alvin said when he tried to grab the life jacket, tinky came after him.

alvin used a knife to defend himself. >> i guess i stabbed him in the arms five times, and he fell overboard. >> are you telling me the truth? >> yeah. >> and with his confession, alvin latham was charged with murder. >> you have the right to remain silent. anything you say can and will be used against you in court. >> not many cases you begin with someone being a hero and then in a matter of two or three days he was a villain. he was a killer. [ as schwarzenegger ] show me the movies with the arnold schwarzenegger

with the stunts and loud explosions and all the muscles. [ as cosby ] i want to see the comedy programming with the children. [ british accent] watch bravo! yeah, i want to see "the real housewives." rewind! yeah! jimmy? it's been hours. we told you the x1 entertainment operating system show me "the tonight show starring jimmy fallon."

that's what i'm talking about right there. [ cheers and applause ] [ female announcer ] control your tv with your voice. the x1 entertainment operating system. only from xfinity. as alvin latham sat in jail on a murder charge, everyone in venice, louisiana, was talking about what happened or didn't happen the night tinky leiker died. >> everyone debated it. two people, one life jacket. what would i do? would i share it? you'd like to think you'd share it. but would you? >> since alvin was a man of limited means, the court appointed attorney peter barbee to defend him. barbee couldn't understand why alvin would have killed the captain over a life jacket, yet,

wasn't found wearing it when he was found floating in the water the next day. >> i told alvin, i said, whatever you do, tell me the truth. i said, if you did it, that's all right. we'll figure out how to handle it, but, i said, whatever you do, tell me the truth. >> alvin now told his lawyer that he didn't kill tinky. he reverted to his original story, the one he told the coast guard the day after the storm, that tinky's death was an accident. >> i had to prove to a jury that he was vulnerable and very capable of confessing to something he didn't do. man, you would not believe how strong there is amongst people and the public that you wouldn't confess to something you wouldn't do. why would you confess to something you didn't do? >> to find out, barbee showed the entire eight hours of alvin's police interviews to dr. jill hayes-hammer, a forensic psychologist from the lsu school of medicine. >> come on, alvin. what happened? >> everything you say -- do you

know anything? >> you couldn't swim for 14 hours, alvin. >> i was very annoyed, actually, because it was obvious to me as a professional that alvin was incredibly slow and that he was being taken advantage of. >> dr. richard leo, a professor of criminology and psychology at the university of california at irvine, agrees. >> this is an awful, awful interrogation. i think this is shoddy, poor police work, and i think these, the detectives who conducted this interrogation should be retrained, and until they're retrained should not be permitted to do another interrogation. >> during the first day of police interrogation, alvin denied he killed tinky. >> never. >> come on, alvin. what are you going to do? say something. explain it. >> what you saw was an incredible amount of intimidation. over 100 times alvin said that he did not do it. he was emphatic in saying that he did not do it. >> why did you stab him? >> i didn't. >> why did you stab him? >> i didn't.

>> alvin, the autopsy shows you did. you hit him in the throat with something? >> no. >> you hit him in the head with something? >> no. >> you didn't do nothing? >> no. >> i don't believe that. >> the police continued saying, alvin, until you tell us what we want to hear, you will not be able to go home. >> but during the second day of interrogation, alvin started repeating what the investigators were telling him. >> that's one of the most hostile interrogations i've seen. >> there's only one life jacket. you wanted it. you didn't give a [ bleep ] if he lived or died. you didn't say no damn prayer. you're a liar about that. >> interrogators are trained across the country not to be hostile. they're going against the standard training that interrogators receive. >> experts say another sign of a false confession is when the suspect's story doesn't match the physical evidence. >> the part about the hammer don't sound right. you sure you hit him with a hammer? >> i don't know what i hit him with. >> yes, you do. he was in that water and you hit him with something. what did you hit him with? >> maybe a board. >> maybe a board?

did you hit him with a board or you didn't hit him with a board, alvin? >> i don't know. >> what they failed to see is he doesn't have any memories of doing the things they're accusing him of doing, that he then caves in ultimately and passively accepts and that's why he's using that language. >> dr. hayes-hammer discovered that alvin's iq was 74 and that he had dropped out of school in the ninth grade. >> you have many people with low iqs who have had rap sheets as long as my arm. alvin did not. so, he was very naive to what was going on in the criminal justice system and he also did not have the intelligence to be able to cope with the questioning by the police officers. >> false confessions do occur. one of the most famous cases happened in england when a teenager, richard buckland, confessed to the rape and murder of a young girl, but dna testing proved he didn't do it. >> most people don't understand how someone can be made to falsely confess, but as an empirical matter, the fact is

that they occur and they have been documented, so many have been documented. the question should not be do they occur, but rather, why do they occur and what can we do to minimize them? >> most people who are questioned by police don't realize that they can leave the interrogation any time, meaning they don't have to put up with relentless questioning. but trying to explain to a jury why someone would confess to a crime they didn't commit is always difficult. >> confessions override lack of evidence, improper searches and everything else. so, if you want to prosecute somebody, what's the best thing in the world? you have a confession. >> it just got to where i just agreed with what they said just to get them off my back, because i know they would have stopped the questions after i agreed with them. >> life has been very hard to alvin, and i will be damned if i was going to sit back and watch

the system steam-roll him out of convenience to cover for corrupt, stupid cops, and that's the only way to describe it. >> but there was still the matter of the coroner's report, which had ruled tinky's death a homicide. ♪

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convinced that alvin latham's taped confession had been coerced, but why did the coroner rule tinky's death a homicide? in looking at the autopsy findings, barbee discovered that the coroner did not know the depth of the so-called knife wounds. >> the coroner never measured them, never dissected them, never checked them for the angle. >> from the photographs, dr. cyril wecht, an independent forensic pathologist, didn't believe these were stab wounds at all. >> you'd expect all or at least some of the bones to have had some significant depth of penetration. we do not have that in this case. hence, i do not believe that these were stab wounds. >> but if they weren't stab wounds, what were they? >> when you think of a propeller and a portion of it as striking some part of the body, then it is easy to understand how you

can get these kinds of injuries. >> dr. wecht thinks this is also what caused tinky's fractured skull, that his body was accidentally run over by a passing ship while floating in the gulf. >> i believe that it is most plausible to infer that those areas of apparent trauma to mr. leiker's body were sustained postmortem when his body was floating for about five days in the gulf. >> interestingly, the tugboat captain who picked up tinky's body agreed. >> he says, i've been a boat captain a long time, and this is not the first body i've seen, and he says, that man was run over by a boat. >> and the tugboat captain told peter barbee something else, something which hadn't been made public. >> he said he had one boot on and one boot off. well, the lights went off on that one because that was alvin's basic story, was that on the boat, at the end of it, tinky had gone down with the

ship because he had a foot stuck under a cable. >> it correlated with the story that the foot was caught in the trawling net. that is as good a reason as any and better than most to explain why one boot was on and one boot was not on. >> with these new findings, peter barbee believed the coroner's ruling was inaccurate. >> you have an incompetent coroner. and that's being polite. >> so these wounds tell me that the story that mr. latham originally gave was the correct one and that there were no injuries inflicted on mr. leiker's body by alvin latham. >> when alvin latham went on trial for the murder of tinky leiker, prosecutors played alvin's confession for the jury. but later, the jury watched the entire eight-hour interrogation. >> you did it! how you did it? >> i don't know.

>> you hit the man and covered his mouth with duct tape? what did you do? >> i didn't hit him. >> well, how'd it happen? >> i don't know. >> anyone that watched the tape, that saw what happened, any intelligent person couldn't help be convinced that this was a blatant case of police brutality. >> the jury also heard from the defense pathologist who concluded tinky's death was an accident. and alvin latham took the stand in his own defense and told the same story he told to the coast guard after the storm, that tinky's foot got stuck in the fishing nets and that his death was an accident. after six hours of deliberation, the jury came back with their verdict, not guilty. >> with modern technology today,

with all the learning people got, i knew i had a chance. >> when you look at the evidence and you look at the forensics and what it shows us, alvin was telling the truth. unfortunately, just nobody wanted to accept it or believe it, so they just kept pushing him until he came up with something that they wanted to believe. and they wanted to believe it because they fed it to him. >> today alvin works at the local supermarket stacking shelves. the man who conducted alvin's interrogation thinks the jury made a mistake. >> everybody can't be the good guy or no one would confess to a serious crime. in all my years of experience i've never known anyone who comes to say i committed this crime without interrogation. and that's just tactics you use to get confessions. >> but peter barbee thinks interrogation should be about getting the truth, not getting a confession.

>> he wanted to pick on alvin. i'd like to see him come pick on me. and you can print that one. that's how badly i feel about what he did to that man. what he did to that man. he's a bully and a punk. -- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com happening now, severe storms creating big problems across the country. roofs caving in, trees crashing down on roads. no long safe travel for anyone from the blizzards to the thunderstorms to tornadoes. indra petersons is tracking the damage and what's coming up. indra? breaking news overnight as ukraine's president reached peace with protesters after days of demonstrations on the streets. the country's leader promising the violence will end this morning. we are live with the latest. new information this morning on the terror threat facing millions of americans at the airports. why homeland security is once again worried that terrorists are hiding bombs