Off Duty: The Last Stand | Ep 7

Off Duty | The Guardian Investigates

The Guardian

Society & Culture, Documentary

4.8 • 1.6K Ratings

🗓️ 18 March 2026

⏱️ 37 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Of all the hearings Alex Villa had been through in nearly 11 years, Jennifer knew this could be the one. In her possession was the disc with the FBI cellphone map – evidence that prosecutors had never turned over. But in a system that had fought Alex at every turn, would it finally be enough to set him free? This is the final episode of Off Duty, an investigation by the Guardian’s Melissa Segura

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is The Guardian.
0:15.2	It's October 2, 2004.
0:19.4	A warm fall morning in Chicago, not a cloud in the sky, as Jennifer drives to the courthouse
0:25.3	with her radio turned up all the way. I catch her for a brief moment as she walks up the steps to the
0:31.5	courthouse. I just listen to Beyonce's freedom as loud as I could three times.
0:40.5	Yeah, I'm not going to quit on a winner because a winner don't quit on themselves. Hey, that's right. That's right. Of all of the hearings,
0:48.1	Alex had been through for nearly 11 years, Jennifer knew this could be the one, the day when the years of work finally pay off.
0:57.6	The disc that she and Eric now had in their possession, the one that contained metadata
1:02.8	showing that Alex was texting with his girlfriend at the time of Clifton Lewis's murder.
1:08.4	The disc with the FBI's cell phone map, suggesting Alex and his supposed accomplices,
1:14.0	weren't near the crime scene.
1:16.2	A map that prosecutors had failed to share.
1:19.7	That disc.
1:21.3	The one that also had a sticky note attached to it, indicating that the prosecution had this
1:27.1	information all along.
1:29.7	That disc, Jennifer thought, is finally going to set this man free.
1:43.7	The new prosecutors in the Cook County State's Attorney's Office,
1:48.2	the very same office that helped to put Alex in jail for a decade,
1:52.4	were ready to drop the case.
1:54.8	They were about to ask the judge to set Alex free.
2:00.4	But the police union isn't ready to just stand by and let that happen.
2:06.3	From The Guardian, I'm Melissa Segura,
	...

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