81: "Good" Alibis Don't Exist

(WATCH THIS EPISODE ON YOUTUBE) Is an alibi defense the key to the jailhouse door, or a noose around an innocent defendant's neck?

Eric Morgan had 11 alibi witnesses to establish that he was at a two-day long sports competition—far away from the location of the crime he was accused of—supported by credit card receipts for his travel, meals, and purchases on the trip. Yet the prosecutor successfully argued that the witnesses were liars or mistaken. Morgan served 3 years in prison before DNA evidence exonerated him.

Reb pokes holes in our assumptions about seemingly "good" alibis. Find out why some lawyers say never presenting an alibi is better than having one at all. ("An alibi can only be one of two things: perfect or bad.")

Enjoy.

***

If your glasses are overdue for a refresh, now is the time! Go to www.zenni.com/podcast and use code PODCAST15 for 15% off your first order!

***

RESOURCES:

The (Un)reliability of Alibi Corroborators: Failure to Recognize Faces of Briefly Encountered Strangers Puts Innocent Suspects at Risk (2016) - https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27757984/

Memory Errors in Alibi Generation: How an Alibi Can Turn Against Us (2017) - https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/bsl.2273

Wendy P. Heath, et al., "But I Wasn't There!" The Alibis of DNA Exonerees (2021) - https://wclawr.org/index.php/wclr/article/view/52/87

David Crump, Alibi (2025) https://mississippilawjournal.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/94MissLJ411.pdf