Our Connections Sustain Us: Thanksgiving Reflections on Five Years of Friendship

November 25, 2024 

In 2019, a few days before Thanksgiving, MAIP client Ransom Watkins and his co-defendants Andrew Stewart and Alfred Chestnut were exonerated after each man had spent 36 years in prison for a crime he did not commit. This month, the men are celebrating five years of freedom. In honor of this milestone, MAIP Paralegal and Investigator Emily Heun Pate reflects on her five years of friendship with Ransom.

I feel blessed that I may call Ransom Watkins a friend. Ransom’s grin is infectious and his talent for storytelling unmatched. The friendship we have cultivated over the last 5 or so years is rooted in the delicate art of listening. Over and over, Ransom has shown me a vulnerability that is rare – even in friendships that span decades. He entrusted me to help guide him through one of the most stressful, and potentially traumatic times a person could ever experience. Our friendship did begin out of necessity; I stepped in as a friendly face and confidant as Ransom stepped out of a literal cage, into a world (seemingly) limitless with possibility and opportunity.

Around Thanksgiving 2019, Ransom and his co-defendants Andrew Stewart and Alfred Chestnut, collectively known as the Harlem Park Three, exited the side door of the Baltimore courthouse on Fayette hours after the judge declared them innocent. Their loved ones and legal team waited in the cool autumn air, pacing to stay warm and to still nervous energy. Side by side we huddled with family members who had been waiting for over thirty-six years for this moment. And then they emerged – smiles bright, steps hurried – eager to meet the open arms greeting them. Folks were teary eyed yet hopeful and joyful sounds of “I love you!” and “You did it!” circled the three men.

Four years earlier, nearly to the day, my mom died of a massive heart attack. It was sudden and quick and I was not by her side.

I’ve discovered that grief is not linear. It is isolating and lonely. It can come in spurts – rushing over you like a wave, engulfing you with sadness. Some random observation – like a bush of bright bluish-purple hydrangeas, or the discovery of a small sandy plastic bag of seashells – floods your mind with memories you’d stored way back in the corners of your heart. So works the trauma and grief our clients experience, thrown back into a world they were kidnapped from decades prior. Loud noises can be jarring – blast one’s thoughts back to the sounds of an angry corrections officer ordering men back in their cells for count. Crowds can be overwhelming, the uncertain intentions of strangers, pinning you in on all sides. It can be debilitating, embarrassing, all consuming.

Much of innocence work is fraught with bittersweet heartache, emotions that seem to contradict one another. When an innocent client is released after 30+ years of incarceration, we are overjoyed at this step toward justice. Yet we cannot help but look back in anger and sadness at the decades of missed experiences and milestones – high school prom; winning the big game senior year; a college crush; annual holidays catching up with loved ones not seen since last year’s Thanksgiving feast. The annual “My, have you grown” from great aunts whose corn pudding and sweet potato pie recipes span generations. No one can give those missed years back, a sort of grief I cannot fathom.

For the Harlem Park Three, memories surrounding Thanksgiving are extreme. Their freedom was both snatched and restored around a holiday focused on gratitude. For me, the holiday stirs up mixed emotions. I always enjoyed the simple idea of sharing a warm meal with friends and family; I appreciated the focus on giving thanks.

And now, with the Harlem Park Three freedom anniversary again so close in time, I realize how grief, trauma, and memory together can shape identity. And through my friendship with Ransom I see how exonerees’ resilience shines as they create new memories and forge new paths – marriages, partnerships, friendships, children and grandchildren, volunteer work in their local community.

Winding our way around Baltimore’s bureaucratic landscape, trying to get Ransom health insurance, winter clothes, a state ID, we laugh at my poor navigation, share simple meals long missed like cheeseburgers and fries. We connect in friendship. Ransom helps me understand how our hearts can hold so much – joy, grief, and gratitude. The human spirit is messy. But our connections and resilience buoy us; our shared stories and friendships sustain us.

For this, and for countless other reasons, I find gratitude in this work.