A brother and sister who survived the 1994 triple homicide that’s now the topic of Kim Kardashian‘s true crime podcast on Spotify inform DailyMail.com the star by no means bothered to contact them to examine the info of the case – and demand the person she is attempting to free is in reality responsible.
Kevin Keith, 58, was convicted of murdering his ex-girlfriend, Marichell Chatman, her four-year-old daughter Marchae, and Marichell’s aunt, Linda Chatman, at their dwelling in Bucyrus, Ohio, in 1994.
He has been in jail for 28 years however insists he’s harmless. Kim Kardashian believes him and has used his story because the launchpad for her Spotify podcast, The System.
However two individuals who survived the taking pictures and witnessed it say he’s responsible.
They’re Quanita and Quentin Reeves, Marichell’s cousins who had been six and 4 on the time.
Now of their early 30s, the siblings inform DailyMail.com they had been shocked when the podcast emerged on October 3 with out their contribution. They declare they had been by no means invited on as company, and that they’ve by no means even heard from the crusading Kardashian.
‘She didn’t contact us, not one time. If Kim Kardashian needs to become involved, she ought to come and meet us face-to-face,’ Quentin, who’s now a father-of-two, stated.
Quentin and Quanita Reeves, now 33 and 35, say nobody from Kim Kardashian’s group contacted them in regards to the podcast. They had been aged 4 and 6 after they survived the taking pictures, however their tales haven’t been included in Kardashian’s new podcast in regards to the killings
Kardashian in Milan earlier this month. The star has launched a profitable podcast on Spotify that examines what she believes to be circumstances of wrongful conviction
The siblings – who had been each shot within the abdomen by the assassin – stay adamant that Keith is the killer. They are saying they knew him as a result of he was buddies with their father, and that they keep in mind seeing him level the gun at their kinfolk.
Kevin Keith, a drug supplier, was convicted of triple homicide in 1994. He stays in jail however has the assist of Kim and different wrongful conviction activists who consider he’s harmless
‘We noticed it with our personal eyes. You do not neglect one thing like that. I don’t care what Kim Kardashian says – Kevin did it,’ Quentin added.
He went on: ‘Why doesn’t Kim Kardashian come out right here to Ohio? She doesn’t wish to hear from us.
‘She needs to get him out to make her look higher… that is the reality,’ he went on.
Quanita added: ‘We should always have been the primary name.’
‘Kevin will get to sit down in jail and turn out to be a star. In the meantime we’re out right here coping with this our total lives… it is loopy.’
She stated the primary time she heard from the group was on Monday October third, the day the podcast went dwell, and that it was a heads-up from producer Lori Rothschild Ansaldi.
Neither Kardashian nor Ansaldi responded to requests for remark.
Sources near the podcast insisted that the pair had been contacted.
‘The manufacturing group of The System made a number of makes an attempt to succeed in out to the Reeves siblings. On the time, they determined to not share their story and requested we now not contact them.
‘I don’t care what Kim Kardashian says – Kevin did it. We noticed him with our personal eyes
Quentin Reeves, who survived 1994 taking pictures when he was 4
‘We revered their choice and gave them privateness. If they’ve reconsidered, we welcome them to sit down down for the podcast at any time.’
Quentin was 4 when the taking pictures occurred however he says his reminiscence of it’s clear.
‘It’s been a very long time however I can nonetheless keep in mind what the place appeared like. I may draw it.
‘That’s what makes it appear so arduous. They don’t account for that. They do not care how this makes us really feel.
‘He did it. I used to be there. How may you neglect one thing like that?
Quanita, who was two years older, has the identical reminiscence.
‘It was Kevin. He got here in, and shot up the place,’ she advised DailyMail.com.
The siblings each say Kevin arrived on the time seeming ‘nervous’. He got here inside, requested for a number of glasses of water after which all of a sudden retrieved a gun.
He yelled for all of them to ‘get on the bottom’ and began taking pictures, they stated.
Marichell, the siblings’ 24-year-old cousin, screamed: ‘Kevin, why are you doing this?’ they are saying.
After the taking pictures, the assassin fled. Kevin was arrested days later however insisted then, and now, that he thought he was being picked up on drug fees.
The siblings say that they’ve since realized their older cousin, Rudel, was a police informant who had simply snitched on Kevin for dealing medicine. The prosecution argued that Kevin went to the house searching for Rudel to kill and punish him for snitching, and as an alternative discovered the household.
Kevin nevertheless insists that he was in a special a part of city. His alibi is that he was at his aunt’s home, and plenty of of his kinfolk say they’ll corroborate it.
Murdered: Marichell Chatman, 24, her four-year-old daughter Marchae and her aunt Linda Chatman (proper) had been all killed within the mass taking pictures
Quanita, who was six on the time, was shot within the abdomen however survived. She is proven within the hospital after present process surgical procedure. One police report that’s seized on by Kardashian reveals that Quanita known as the killer ‘Bruce’. She stated it advised them that it was her ‘daddy’s pal Bruce’ on the door. Kardashian highlighted this in one of many first episodes of the podcast and introduced it as proof of Kevin’s proof. However Quanita says she had simply come out of surgical procedure when she made the remark aged six, and that she was ‘scared and confused’. ‘I used to be frightened of being questioned, I am within the hospital, I’ve simply had surgical procedure. It was a mistake,’ she stated.
Quentin Reeves was 4 on the time of the murders. He was additionally shot within the abdomen however survived. He’s proven left, after the killings, and proper, at this time
One police report that’s seized on by Kardashian within the first two episodes of the podcast reveals that Quanita, then six, known as the killer ‘Bruce’.
She described the shooter as her ‘daddy’s pal Bruce’, and she or he additionally failed to select Kevin out of a police line-up. Kardashian highlighted these two info to reiterate why she thinks Kevin is harmless.
However chatting with DailyMail.com, Quanita says she had simply come out of surgical procedure when she made the remark aged six, and that she was ‘scared and confused’.
‘I used to be frightened of being questioned, I am within the hospital, I’ve simply had surgical procedure. It was a mistake,’ she stated.
The household’s 1994 obituaries
Her mom Joyce later defined to police that she typically confused Bruce with Keith, and that it was certainly Keith who opened hearth on them.
Warren, Marichell’s boyfriend, fled the house. He has not spoken publicly in regards to the taking pictures, and it is unclear if he can be a visitor on Kardashian’s podcast.
Six extra episodes are but to be launched.
Kardashian, who’s coaching to turn out to be a lawyer, says that police rushed to cost Keith, and that he is by no means had a good trial.
She says she first realized in regards to the case in 2018 after Lori, then a producer on Household Feud, ‘pitched’ her the story as one she may flip her well-known hand to.
Kardashian had efficiently lobbied the White Home on the time to commute the sentence of Alice Johnson and launch her from jail.
Kevin’s case, she stated within the podcast, is one in all 1000’s that individuals have despatched her since.
She tweeted about his case, claiming he was harmless.
In 2020, she inked a cope with Spotify for a true-crime podcast for an undisclosed quantity.
Whereas neither she nor Spotify has confirmed the determine she obtained, Alex Cooper, the host of the Name Her Daddy podcast, was given a $60million deal.
The primary two episodes of The System had been launched earlier this week.
They concentrate on Keith’s obvious alibi.
He stated he was at his aunt’s home and that was corroborated by a number of members of his household. It additionally centered on the truth that he was by no means questioned by police.
Keith has all the time maintained his innocence. He has the assist of public defender Rachel Troutman, who continues to battle for a case evaluate.
Keith was as a result of be executed in 2010 however former Ohio Governor Ted Strickland commuted his demise sentence on the eleventh hour, citing ‘necessary questions’ that stay unanswered.
The podcast is billed the collection as exposing a cover-up involving police corruption and one other instance of America’s failed justice system.
In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter this week, Kardashian stated Keith is harmless, and that she needed to ‘shake s**t up’ to ‘make noise’.
‘Properly, the primary factor that basically caught out was that somebody could be convicted of against the law, not to mention a triple murder, with none bodily proof linking him to the crime and he was sentenced to demise.’
‘Kevin’s been in for 28 years for against the law that I consider he didn’t commit.’
Kardashian has been in touch with Keith since 2018, when she first heard about his case. She has shared his story together with her followers, and has now turned it into the premise of her podcast
Kardashian’s new podcast on Spotify is now the third most listened to within the US
She stated she was compelled to step in by the hurt the case had completed to his brother, who additionally believes in his innocence.
‘Normally, you consider the victims and their households and the way their lives are affected, however there are different victims if somebody is wrongfully accused of one thing. It doesn’t simply have an effect on their life; it impacts their total household’s life,’ she stated.
Keith’s advocates hinge their perception in his innocence on the truth that there isn’t a bodily proof linking him to the crime, and due to how shortly he was charged and convicted.
However the Reeves siblings, who’re two of the one three witnesses to the taking pictures, say their testimony needs to be thought-about as proof of Keith’s guilt – even when they had been youngsters.
Keith has unsuccessfully appealed his conviction a number of occasions. The Supreme Court docket turned down his request for them to evaluate it.
His case has galvanized critics of the felony justice system, who say that regardless of what the siblings stated, a correct investigation was not carried out.
There are six remaining episodes of Kardashian’s Spotify podcast – for which she was paid an undisclosed quantity.
She has already teased a second season, specializing in what she believes is one other wrongful conviction.
THE 1994 MURDER THAT LAUNCHED KIM KARDASHIAN’S PODCAST THE SYSTEM: KEVIN KEITH SAYS HE’S INNOCENT AND HAS SPENT 28 YEARS BEHIND BARS… NOW THE STAR WANTS TO GET HIM OUT
Kevin Keith has been in jail for 28 years. He maintains he’s harmless
Kevin Keith was convicted of triple homicide in February 1994.
Prosecutors argued that he murdered his ex-girlfriend Marichell Chatman, her four-year-old daughter Marchae and Marichell’s aunt Linda after going searching for Marichell’s brother, Rudel.
Rudel was a police informant and had simply given details about Kevin’s drug dealing.
However Kevin maintains he’s harmless. He says he was at his aunt’s home, miles away, on the time of the murders.
The dearth of bodily proof linking him to the crime, mixed with what many have stated is unequivocal police and prosecutorial misconduct, needs to be sufficient to have the case reviewed.
His advocates say that he was by no means questioned earlier than he was taken into custody.
He was then allowed to go on tv, in 1994, and protest his innocence, nevertheless it uncovered him to the general public in a manner that was dangerous to his case, based on attorneys interviewed by Kim.
The jury was predominantly white, one other purple flag.
The trial occurred at speedy velocity, which Kim says is one other indication of wrongdoing.
In 2010, 13 days earlier than he was as a result of be killed, the governor granted him an eleventh hour reprieve, citing the issues with the case.
Kim joined Kevin’s advocates in 2018, tweeting and posting on Instagram about how she needed to assist make clear the case
She argues, and so do Kevin’s advocates, that there was nowhere close to to the ample preparation time required for a capital homicide trial.
Ultimately, after a two week trial, he was convicted and sentenced to demise.
The youngest sufferer of the 1994 killing was four-year-old Marchae Chatman
A number of unsuccessful appeals adopted.
In 2010, 13 days earlier than he was as a result of be killed, the governor granted him an eleventh hour reprieve, citing the issues with the case.
His demise sentence was commuted and he was as an alternative given a time period of life with out parole.
The Reeves/Chatman household was horrified by the choice.
In 2018, Kim Kardashian got here throughout the case. She had simply efficiently lobbied President Trump to commute the life sentence of Alice Johnson, who was serving a life sentence on a petty, first-time drug offense.
A TV producer who investigated true crime and got here throughout Kim at a Household Feud taping approached her.
Kim appeared into the case recordsdata, and determined to assist with the case.
In her podcast, she says the proof is evident that there was misconduct.
She has since spent years speaking with Kevin over video chat, and formatting his story right into a podcast for Spotify.
