Lee Jones

Just before Mr. Jones was arrested early in 1998, Mr. VanMeter traveled to North Carolina to interview Michael. Though the State Police attorneys have refused requests for access to their files on Lee Jones (they say they've turned over everything to the new prosecutor handling the case, who didn't respond to requests for comment), Where Doubt Remains obtained a copy of the interview tape.

On it, Mr. VanMeter asks Michael if he knows of any other boys that Mr. Jones may have abused.

Michael answers “I think,� and then turns to his mother, who is sitting behind him on a couch. “Mom, didn’t you say my cousin Adam?�

“I didn’t say. You did,� Mrs. Roop answers.

“Somebody said,� Michael replies, “you said that they visited Adam because Lee did this to Adam, too, didn’t you?�

“I didn’t say nothing,� his mother says.

“Uh-huh, because you were talking about—“

“Just answer his questions,� she snaps, cutting him off.

A red truck

In addition to arguing with his mother about where the information he was giving police came from, Michael also got some details key to the state's charges against Mr. Jones wrong.

At trial, Michael told the jury that in 1996, Mr. Jones molested him in a red, Dodge Ram truck that he had recently purchased. The state indicted Mr. Jones for raping Michael in that truck, but according to the title documents, the truck wasn't purchased until just a few weeks before Michael left for North Carolina—in 1997. Ms. Keller told the jury that Michael was probably wrong about the red truck. She suggested that Michael's age made it difficult for him to remember exact details.

However, when it came to Mr. Jones’ cars, Michael was something of an expert. At trial, he accurately recalled the year, make and model of each vehicle Mr. Jones owned since the two had met in the early 1990s. On the taped interview he did with Mr. VanMeter, he's sure of the details--noting that Mr. Jones often let him drive his cars when the two were alone.

None of it mattered to the jury, though. They still convicted Mr. Jones for raping Michael in a truck that he didn’t own.

The truck wasn't the only thing that Michael got wrong. During the investigation, he told the police, at least according to police reports and affidavits, that he and Mr. Jones stayed on the fifth floor—room 505—of the Tropical Seas South, a motel in Myrtle Beach (at trial, he denied ever telling the police that). But Michael never stayed in room 505.