Carter knew firsthand about the plight of the wrongly accused because he had spent 19 years behind bars for crimes he did not commit. He and co-defendant John Artis were charged with a triple murder at the Lafayette Grill in Paterson, New Jersey in 1966. There was little physical evidence in the case, and the so-called eyewitnesses who testified against them were two convicted felons. And Carter and Artis maintained their innocence and passed a lie detector test. However, an all-white jury found them guilty. Carter was sentenced to three life sentences.
