even with a new judge, clive and tom knew they would have to discredit the government's witnesses, j.j. hallm facing the death penalty along with thousands of years in prison. so they're sitting there saying, hmm, on the one hand i get to die or go to prison for the rest of my life, on the other handy make up a story against smitty, who i didn't like, which one am i going to do? >> narrator: in 1990, smitty caught a break when the u.s. supreme court ruled that improper jury instructions had been given in many new orleans' trials. smitty was granted a new trial. clive and tom now had a chance to challenge the state's case. >> what i think became very clear when you saw the whole picture of all of these statements, the major informants in the case had just made it up and they were the ones who did the murder. >> now, there's nowhere in smitty's military records does it show he has any specialized training involving explosives. >> i've seen that bomb being made right there in the courtroom, and a mental midget could make that bomb. it didn't require no expert, but i never built a bomb. >> there