My name is Maggie Freeling. A majoringist and producer and this is unjust and unsolved.

A podcast about people who I believe are wrongfully incarcerated for crimes that are actually unsolved.

You've surely heard stories like these on the news, but the thing is, the ones you've heard about barely scratch the surface.

The Innocence Project gives a conservative estimate that about 20,000 innocent people are currently locked away in US prisons.

After reading some of these stories, I felt compelled to do something.

So I sent 20 letters to people who are locked up despite evidence pointing away from them.

Some responded through mail, some emailed, and some called me on contraband cell phones.

But all wanted their stories to be heard.

So I left my public radio job and decided to do just that.

In each episode, I speak with those people, their loved ones, supporters, and lawyers,

to shed light on how they wound up incarcerated for decades, despite the evidence,

and how that means the crimes they were convicted of are still unsolved.

This week, I'm telling the story of John Adrian Velasquez, or JJ, as his friends call him.

John Adrian Velasquez is doing hard time at Sing Sing.

He's convicted of killing a retired New York City police officer.

On the afternoon of January 28, 1998, retired NYPD officer Albert Ward was shot dead in Harlem, New York.

An ex-cop who ran a gambling den, gunned down during a robbery.

Despite no physical evidence in alibi and the disparity between appearance and race of JJ and the suspect,

JJ was identified in a lineup as the shooter.

Velasquez, then 21 and a father of two, was arrested after witnesses picked him out of a lineup as the gunman.

He was arrested and sentenced to 25 to life.

He's been in prison ever since.

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