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Shooting has been a a hobby for me for at least the past 33 years. It helps you think in a way that is
00:00:31
tactical and practical as well. Personal security of course has always been a concern,
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especially as a prosecutor. All rise. My name is Ron Dur. I'm a deputy prosecuting attorney for Snowish County.
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I'm trying the Jerry Jones case now for the third time. The case has spanned approximately 17 years of my career.
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This is um a shocking scene, I think, even to the veteran police officers who responded.
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I'm Joe Ward. I'm a homicide detective for the Snowomish County Sheriff's Office, and I was here 17 years ago to
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investigate the murder of Lee Jones. Mrs. Jones had received a lot of injuries to her body. She had over 60
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wounds, slashes, stabs. She's in the bathtub while she is being killed. And she is vocal. She is yelling. She is
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screaming. She is battling her asalent. It looked like she had fought for her life in that room and lost.
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[Music] Jerry Jones says he heard a noise and responded and found his wife stabbed.
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And as he found her, someone brushed by him and pushed him against the wall and cut his hand. Jerry's story is
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unbelievable. [Music] Detective Ward begins to realize that it just doesn't add up and that he has the
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the murder suspect right in front of him. It was a great relief to to get that first guilty verdict in this case.
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We have the Ninth Circuit deciding that it was a weak circumstantial case and uh
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that it should be retrieded. It's 2001 we did it the second time. The jury find the defendant Jerry Har Jones
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guilty of the crime of murder first charge after that jury. A ver that was extremely satisfying. One that uh I
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hoped meant the end of the case. The court of appeals of the state of Washington reverses us. Again, I'm quite
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angry and embittered by what the court of appeals has done. As a prosecutor, there are certain cases
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that resound in your consciousness that that affect you on some emotional level.
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This was one of them. So, I was not looking forward to visiting that place yet again.
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I came the dawn. Round three. Opening statement from the defense, Mr. Jones. Thank you, your honor. This trial had a
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strange twist as the murder defendant acted as his own attorney. I've decided to represent myself. He just keeps
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coming back. Nobody knows the case better than I do. It's almost as though he and I were
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meant to show up in the same courtroom and fight this thing out. Defending your life.
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[Music] I love my mother very much. And if I had any doubt whatsoever that my dad might have done it, I
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wouldn't be standing by him like this. For almost 17 years, my sister and I can come down this evening. Kim Jones and
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her younger sister, Beth, our other interview starts at about 6, have been on a mission. There's no way that he did
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this. Trying to prove their father, Jerry Jones Jr. No, this is wrong. Is innocent of brutally killing their
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mother, Lee. Has there ever been a moment where you've said, "Maybe dad did do this." No. No. You have to know my
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dad. No. My dad is a very peaceful man. He never even raised his voice at anyone
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in the family. Jerry, how you feeling? I'm feeling great. 48 Hours began following this story in 1999 when Jerry
00:05:03
Jones was released from prison for the first time. This is a dream come true after an appeals court ruled his lawyer
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was ineffective. My dad deserves freedom just like everybody else. His release marked the beginning of an incredible
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legal drama. In 2001, Jerry Jones was retrieded and reconvicted. And then remarkably, an appeals court reversed
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that conviction because the jury didn't hear crucial evidence. Now Jones and his
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daughters are back for round three. And this time, Jones will be represented by the man he says knows this case better
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than anyone himself. All rise. Court is again in session. Do you have any legal training at all? No, I don't.
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Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, if they can get a feel for me as a human being, then they'll be convinced that I
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am not capable of murdering anyone. The evidence will tell you that I loved my wife. He'll be going toe-to-toe with the
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man who has prosecuted him twice before. Please listen carefully to the evidence
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in the case, Ron Dersh. We do our best to make sure that murderers don't get away with murder. The prosecutor will be
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unable to prove to you that I murdered Lee for one very simple reason. I did not do it. And to ensure a fair
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verdict, this jury won't hear about Jerry Jones's earlier trials or convictions. I'm not perfect. I've made
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mistakes, but I'm not a murderer. I'd give anything if I could have her back right now.
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[Music] It was Lee's beauty that first caught his attention back in 1970. I encountered the most gorgeous creature
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I'd ever laid eyes on in my life. When Jerry was stationed in Vietnam, serving in the Air Force, she had these
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beautiful brown eyes and the most gorgeous smile you've ever seen. And for me, it was just love at first sight.
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They married in Vietnam and their first child, Kim, was born there. Within months, Jerry's tour ended and
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Lee left her family behind and moved to the US to start a new life. Two more children are born. Mhm. Beth and Thomas.
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Yes. Jerry retired after 20 years in the Air Force and the family moved to Buffalo, Washington, just outside
00:07:37
Seattle. They were just in the prime of their marriage. Look at those love birds. Oh, sweet. They were always
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hugging each other. They were always kissing and just they were very close and very happy. Jerry became a
00:07:50
successful pharmaceutical salesman. Lee was a busy housewife raising three children. Everything in our home was
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encouraging and positive. These are the last pictures of Lee taken at a Thanksgiving celebration.
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Nine days later, she would be stabbed 63 times in the family bathtub. When my wife needed me the most,
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I couldn't do it. I couldn't help her. On the night of December 3rd, 1988, Jerry and Lee were at home with
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four-year-old Thomas. According to Jerry, Lee had put their son to sleep. then went to the hallway bathroom to
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take a bath. Jazz music was playing from a radio in Jerry's study. He was across the hall in
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the master bedroom. His shower was running in the adjoining bathroom. I heard this horrible scream,
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one loud, piercing scream. I'd never heard anything like that before in my entire life.
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Jerry says he raced towards the bathroom door. This is happening so quickly, so fast. You start perceiving that
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something is coming out. And as I'm moving closer to the doorway, you see more and more. And it's a knife. Jerry
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remembers colliding with an intruder and reaching for the knife. And in the process, I suffered some cuts. I'm
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knocked back. I hit my head against the wall. Boom. Fall to the floor. And I'm seeing these black and white flashing
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lights. And when I got up, there was nobody in the hallway any longer. They immediately went into the bathroom.
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And I encountered the most horrible situation I've ever seen in my life. 911. What do you have? Hurry. Uh, my
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wife. She has been stabbed repeatedly. I find my wife in the tub and she is struggling. I said, "My godly, what
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happened?" She was trying to speak. I'm convinced of that. I can recall this this chattering sound of her teeth. Can
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you tell me where she stabbed? All over. Okay. Is there a knife in her anywhere?
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Do not remove the knife. Her eyes were wide open and she was looking right at me and I realized that she was losing
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her physical life very rapidly. Will you help me help her? I'll try. What can I do? Is she breathing? I don't
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think so, ma'am. I think she's dead. Amid this blood and chaos, Thomas woke up. I went upstairs and I found my
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mother. She was in the bathtub and uh was bloody. No father on this earth would want his
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son to see his mother in that condition. It was one of the most violent murders I've ever seen. She was viciously
00:11:09
attacked and she fought for her life. These are all scene photographs taken the night of the investigation.
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Detective Joe Ward was the lead investigator. All I could see was that I had a wet and bloody man with a hand
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wrapped in a towel and a dead wife in the bathroom. I think they had already made up their mind. Lee is dead. Jerry's
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at home. Case is closed. We don't have any witnesses that saw anybody run from the house. We don't have any DNA.
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There's really an absence of any evidence of an intruder. Jerry, did you murder your wife, Lee
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Jones? No, I didn't, Peter. They didn't do an investigation that night, and within two hours, I found myself under
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arrest for something I didn't do. Making an arrest that night without talking to anybody else other than my
00:12:02
dad was a very big mistake. I'm the one who knows what happened on that December
00:12:08
night better than anyone else. As daughters Kim and Beth listen to their father's opening statement, they know
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this third trial may be his last. There was no reason, no motive and his best chance to prove. It was an intruder who
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did it. Someone else murdered Lee Jones. You will hear that a disturbed teenage neighborhood boy committed this awful
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crime. I think he's desperate. Too sure the finger is pointed elsewhere. [Music]
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[Music] I lived in the shadow of the L, the uh the J train. It ran about 10 ft from my window.
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My mom and dad owned a delicatess there for about 35 years. This Queens, New York neighborhood is a
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long way from Everett, Washington. But for prosecutor Ron Dur, there's a close connection.
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I think that Ron saw Lee Jones as someone similar to his mom. Mara Rosano is Ron's wife and also a
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prosecutor. His mom was someone very special in his life. My mother was an immigrant and she
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always spoke with heavily accented English. She was about 5'4 and uh her name was Elizabeth and everyone
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called her Leah. and he's determined to get justice for Lee Jones. Here's the old case file,
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even after all these years. This is all Jerry Jones. These are all his. Well, there's no doubt I'm sick of the case.
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Not sick enough to let him go. [Music] As prosecutor Ron Dur begins his case, he's feeling the pressure. He's won
00:14:15
hundreds of trials, but now faces the possibility of professional humiliation. What if Jerry Jones, a self-taught
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lawyer wannabe who Dur has convicted twice before, wins this case? That'd be a hard one to swallow, would
00:14:31
it? That'd be tough. Is Jerry a good attorney? I think he is. He's He's done a lot better than all I
00:14:40
have on occasion. Let's take you back to December 3rd of 1988. Dur believes his opposing council is in
00:14:49
fact his best evidence. The strongest piece of evidence is Jerry Jones. He is still here. He is still alive. Her
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autopsy will show that. He tells the jury about Lee's defensive wounds, the blood spatter in the bathroom, and the
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cuts on Jerry's right hand that Jerry says were caused by the intruder. They're consistent with a defensive move
00:15:15
on my part to knock the knife out of his hand when I encountered him in the hallway. Showing you exhibit number 121.
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But a forensic expert testifies the cuts more likely occurred when Jerry's hand slid off the knife handle. How? Blood on
00:15:32
the hand of the asalent can be transferred to the handle of the knife, making it slippery. As he allegedly
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stabbed Lee dozens of times report, Jerry counters with his own expert. It's a cut. That's all you can say. My
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fingerprints were not on the knife. My blood was not on the knife. and my DNA is not on the knife. How on earth is it
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possible to stab someone 63 times and yet leave no physical evidence whatsoever? I think that he rinsed off
00:16:09
the handle of that knife. I think he was fully aware that uh there would be some
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testing, fingerprint or otherwise. The jury also hears that Jerry let crucial minutes pass. 3 5 minutes. 911.
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Where do you hurry? Before calling 911. Let me give you a Jerry Lee is in the tub bleeding to death. And you still
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haven't called 911. I don't get it. I don't get it either. But Ron believes he knows why. In the midst of
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everything, four-year-old Thomas comes upstairs. And not just once, but several times, as far as we're able to tell. And
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at this point, uh, Jerry's hands are already full. He's got a dying woman. He's got cuts on his hands. And here
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comes his kid. Jerry takes Thomas back to his bedroom. If you didn't kill Lee, why in the world would you have taken
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your young son, back downstairs, and left him there when you don't know whether or not the killer is still in
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the house? Well, Peter, you're presuming, of course, that I'm thinking clearly, coherently, and logically at this point
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in time. There is no intruder in the home, and there never was. The killer is Jerry Jones. He knows
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Thomas is safe downstairs. Thomas comes upstairs again. This time, Jerry takes his son to Graham Smith, his next door
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neighbor. As I open the door, uh Jerry was there on the porch. The judge has asked us to not show the faces of some
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witnesses. Jerry said that he was watching TV. He was hit over the head and when he came to he found Lee leading
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and stabbed. You tell your neighbor that you were struck on the head while watching TV. You tell the police that
00:18:04
you collided with the intruder. Two separate stories. I didn't tell two different stories. My response to him
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was, "I hit my head and when I got up, I found Lee bleeding all over." It is only after he returns home that
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Jerry finally calls 911. Yes, my wife. What's the address? 190 160. But he gives them the wrong
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address. You're going to have to help me because we have a conflict with your address. Lead investigator Joe Ward
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believes Jerry's mistake was intentional. I think that's just another part of his plan to delay the response
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to the house just to make sure that his wife was dead. It took the police 10 minutes to find the house. And when they
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went inside, they discovered Jerry wet and bloody. A forensic scientist testifies to scenarios of how the crotch
00:19:03
area of Jerry's jeans became stained with Lee's blood. One potential would be if the rail of a bathtub in this crime
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scene had been saturated with blood and an individual sat on that rail. The other object that I know is long and
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narrow and bloody is the limbs, the arms and legs of Lee Jones. I think at some point he is sitting on her to hold her
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down. sitting on her while he's stabbing her. Yes. Not true, says Jerry Jones. I loved her. I did not murder my wife. I
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could not do it. There was no reason for me to do it. In fact, Jerry says if he wanted Lee dead, he had his chance right
00:19:47
here in their bedroom. It was during a rough period in their marriage when the couple separated, Lee attempted suicide,
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overdosing on sleeping pills. Jerry found her and rushed her to the emergency room.
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Their separation was the best thing that ever happened to them. They really realized how much they appreciated each
00:20:10
other. Look at those love birds. Oh, how sweet. The couple soon reconciled. In the last
00:20:17
year um before my mom died, they were very close. Marriage was perfect maybe for him. But Lee's friends,
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Barbara Sleeper and Mary McNotton, say right before she was murdered, Lee was looking for a way out. Jerry and his
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daughters can say anything they want to. He can talk about how in love he was and
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that they, you know, were reunited and everything else, but I knew that she wanted to get divorced. Isn't it
00:20:44
possible that Jerry Jones is innocent? I I don't see how it's possible. But Jerry Jones insists he knows who
00:20:56
really killed Lee. President, if you would raise your right hand, and he's about to put him on trial.
00:21:03
[Music] You think you'll see Busby today? Probably. You looking forward to that? Not looking
00:21:24
forward to that. No, Paul rise calls Daniel Busby. We're not allowed to show his face. Do you solemnly swear to
00:21:35
tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? So help you God. I do. But for more than 16 years, Jerry
00:21:41
Jones has insisted this man is his wife's real killer. Danny Busby did it, Peter. There's no doubt in my mind about
00:21:50
that. Do you have a mouth on you back there? Yeah, you wise ass. Yeah. Prosecutor Ron Dur says there is no
00:22:00
evidence that Danny Busby, then a 15-year-old teenager, was involved. On December 3rd of 1988,
00:22:08
did you murder Lee Jones in her house in Boston? No. There is no connection basically between Danny Busby and the
00:22:16
crime scene that night. All the DNA evidence tends to exclude Danny Busby, but Ron knows Danny's tough guy presence
00:22:24
will vastly complicate his case. Chew a gun there. Yeah. Can you swallow that? No. He's kind of a loose cannon and I'm
00:22:31
concerned about that. At the time of Lee's murder, Danny was a friend of Beth Jones. I knew he had a
00:22:41
crush on me, a neighborhood loudmouth. He was always the one that would initiate something troublesome who liked
00:22:49
to tease Thomas, growling at him like a lion or tiger and just scaring him and antagonize Lee. He appeared to us to be
00:22:57
just an obnoxious teenage boy. We know that he has grown and developed into a very disturbed, vicious, uncaring,
00:23:06
brutal person. Now, for the first time in three trials, Jerry Jones is allowed to tell the jury about Danny Busby's
00:23:15
troubled past, a history of violence that Jerry says began the night that Lee died. He'll directly confront Busby
00:23:23
about his assaults against ex-girlfriends, and threats to kill people. It's evidence that Jerry Jones
00:23:31
hopes will convince the jury that Danny Busby is capable of murder. Mr. Mr. Do, do you have any questions, Mr. Busby? I
00:23:38
do. I think we're going to be allowed to paint him as the monster that he is. Would you describe yourself as prone to
00:23:47
violence? I have been in the past. Was it common for you to become so angry that you would lose control and black
00:23:54
out? Slightly. What's it like for you to look into Danny Busby's eyes? I see a disturbed person, a violent person, a
00:24:02
person almost without a soul. And would you describe yourself as having an uncontrollable temper at times? Yeah.
00:24:11
Jerry says it was that uncontrollable temper that exploded after Lee banned Danny from visiting and calling Beth.
00:24:20
But you continued calling Beth, did you not? Probably. You continued to come to the house asking for Beth, didn't you?
00:24:27
It's quite possible. Jerry claims that an enraged Dany was looking for Beth the night of the
00:24:34
murder, but found Lee instead. And he viciously stabbed and slashed and attacked her over and over and over
00:24:45
again that night. The problem with your allegation is that there's no physical evidence that Busby was at your home.
00:24:52
There's no witness that places him there. I think there is. I think there is. I think
00:25:00
Thomas was awakened by a growling sound. Do you recall ever growling at Thomas like a lion or a tiger to frighten him?
00:25:09
I don't recall. Are you saying that never happened? No. Saying I don't recall. Danny Busby growled at Thomas
00:25:19
prior to going upstairs and murdering Lee. And he is the only person who ever growled at Thomas. Ron Dur believes if
00:25:28
there were any growling sounds that night, they came from Jerry himself. Is there growling going on? Is Jerry Jones
00:25:35
grunting or growling while he's stabbing Lee? This is hard work. You take a look
00:25:40
at those autopsy photos. This is hard work. This is not easy stuff to do. Then there's Busby's long history of
00:25:47
violence against his girlfriends. Did you begin physically abusing Crystal? Yeah. Did you punch Vandra on the
00:25:54
shoulder numerous times? Yeah. Did you throw Joey to the ground? No, I pushed her. Your honor, I have no further
00:26:03
questions at this time. Things get even worse for the prosecution as those former girlfriends take the stand. You
00:26:11
solemnly swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. So help you God. We can't show their
00:26:16
faces. He was both verbally and physically mean. He could be kind and fun one minute and then freak out. He
00:26:25
would just kind of snap and change personalities. He'd be so furious. They're very sympathetic people. There's
00:26:32
just no question that he has put them through hell. He gave me a black eye. He started kicking the crap out of me.
00:26:38
Pretty much attacked me and spit in my face. But Ron Durst says Jerry is using Danny Busby as a convenient scapegoat.
00:26:46
Remember that when we look at what Danny Busby's done as an adult, he has not attempted to murder anyone on any
00:26:53
occasion. Did he, in your opinion, seriously try to kill you? No. He has not physically stabbed or assaulted
00:27:00
anyone in the way that we have in this case. Danny never threatened you with a knife or any kind of weapon, did he? No.
00:27:06
And the challenge is going to be to draw that line between Danny Busby as a 15year-old and Danny Busby as an adult.
00:27:14
Did he once tell your mother that she was dead? Yes. And has he also threatened to rape your mother? Yes.
00:27:23
If the jurors decide that Danny Busby is volatile enough to have done this, then
00:27:28
the case is lost. All rise. The defense may call the next witness. [Music] Do you solemnly swear to tell the truth,
00:27:46
the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? So help you God. Yes, I do. All of them wanted to be there. I do. All of
00:27:54
them wanted to testify. Yes, I do. All of them wanted to tell their stories. And all of them want to help free their
00:28:01
father. To do that, Jerry is counting on their testimony to put then 15-year-old
00:28:07
Danny Busby at the crime scene in December 1988. Were you ever present when Danny Busby
00:28:15
would growl at Thomas like a lion or a tiger? Yes, he did that very frequently. Did he ever growl at you? I think so.
00:28:27
Yes. What asked Jones, did Thomas hear on the night his mother was murdered 16 years ago when he was just four years
00:28:36
old? I remember it being more animallike than that. He said he woke up when he heard
00:28:44
growling noises and that a lion or a tiger got mom. He was repeating a lion or tiger had gotten mom. While I'm
00:28:52
watching them testify, I'm thinking, you know, this is amazing. These people are
00:28:56
flawless. They are polished. They are rehearsed. You think to yourself, "Damn it, wise
00:29:03
up." While Beth, Kim, and Thomas lovingly stand by their father, Jerry Jones knows that it is his testimony and
00:29:11
not his children's that jurors really want to hear. So, as his own attorney, he decides to take the stand and come
00:29:19
face to face with Ron Dur. A confrontation 16 years in the making. [Music] Once I knew that the case was coming
00:29:32
back, it was clear to me that there would be some sort of face off. I don't look at it as a match between Ron Dur
00:29:40
and myself. The defense would call Jerry Jones, your honor. I look at it as an opportunity to present the evidence to a
00:29:48
jury of 12 people. Solemnly swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and prove my innocence.
00:29:54
But before Ron faces Jerry, Jerry, did you kill your wife? I did not kill my wife. A public defender assigned by the
00:30:02
court to advise him asked Jones to explain his bizarre behavior after he discovered Lee had been stabbed. Did you
00:30:10
at any point that evening go and get wet? Yes. How did you do that? I ran into the
00:30:20
master bedroom and heard the water running in the shower and I went to turn it off and I felt a
00:30:27
sting on my hand and I looked and saw that it was bleeding and I just ran back out.
00:30:36
That's not the story Jerry told at his first trial. Cross examination. Yes, sir. Thank you. Ron believes he's caught
00:30:44
Jerry in a lie. He whips out the transcripts and reads Jerry's own words back to him.
00:30:52
I open the shower door and instead of reaching in and turning the shower off, I step inside.
00:30:58
Clothes and all, I let the water run from the top of my head down the front of my body. You're called testifying to
00:31:05
that effect in 1989. If if that's what it says, that's obviously what I testified to.
00:31:12
I have no further questions. After just a handful of questions, Dur retreats. I was amazed at how few questions Ron
00:31:22
Dur asked me. I believe he was fairly convinced that he had lost the trial. I expected you to take off the gloves that
00:31:30
this was going to be a bare knuckle confrontation with Jerry and it seems like he played a little patty cake. Was
00:31:36
that a strategy? Were you Did you choke? I couldn't get mad at him at that point. Just because I
00:31:45
have a stick to hit him with doesn't mean I'm going to hit him with it. But Ron uses that stick in his closing
00:31:52
statement. Exhibit one for the state is Jerry Jones because he is still here. He is still
00:32:03
alive. Danny Busby is as subtle as a brick through a plate glass window. Do you think having listened to Danny Busby on
00:32:10
the st, having seen his behavior here, he could keep his mouth shut, Danny Busby is offered up as the boogeyman?
00:32:17
And he was not. And he did not kill Lee Jones. We know who did. And it's Jerry Jones.
00:32:28
For Jerry and his family, their long battle to win his freedom comes down to one final argument.
00:32:37
The prosecutor has failed to prove that I murdered my wife, Lee Jones, for one reason. I did not do it.
00:32:46
As you know, I'm on trial here. You're going to go into that room soon and deliberate, and you're going to vote
00:32:58
either guilty or not guilty. Jerry Jones's name is on that ballot. Danny Busby's name is not there.
00:33:10
It's outrageous. Just it doesn't add up. I had no motive. I was not a violent person. I was not an explosive person.
00:33:23
I'm the person you see standing before you today. I think what the jury got to see was Jerry Jones acting in closing.
00:33:33
The crying. Yeah. rehearsed. Absolutely. Yeah. Genuine. No. For the third time, Jerry Jones fate is
00:33:45
in the hands of a jury. In a scant four and a half hours, the jury reaches a verdict.
00:34:06
All rise. Court is again in session. After a grueling 3-week trial, all parties are here. We have a verdict.
00:34:18
Please bring in the jury. Jurors reach a verdict in just 4 and 1/2 hours. I'm thinking they came back too soon.
00:34:24
They're going to walk it. It's a joint. If you please stand for the reading of the verdict. Oh, I'm expecting a
00:34:29
not-uilty verdict. We all took it very seriously. Just the weight of it. It was almost overcoming. Jurors remember a
00:34:36
tense courtroom as they filed in with their verdict. I looked at Jerry Jones and I looked at Ron Durst. I think both
00:34:43
of those guys have had a very personal role in this thing for the last 16 years. We the jury find the defendant
00:34:49
Jerry Bartlett Jones Jr. guilty of the crime of murder in the first degree as charged
00:34:57
when you hear the word for the third time guilty. What was that moment like for you? You just shake your head in
00:35:05
disbelief and um what on earth are they thinking? When I hear the word guilty, I'm
00:35:15
thinking this is over for now. This is over. For prosecutor Ron Dur, winning a third conviction is a tremendous relief.
00:35:24
Was justice served here today, Ron? Absolutely. It was served in 2000. It was served in 1989.
00:35:31
It's the right verdict. All right. Yeah. 36 jurors from three trials have now heard the evidence in this case and not
00:35:45
one believes that you are innocent. Yeah, that's very disappointing. I don't have an explanation for it. Do you think
00:35:52
you should have done anything differently? I think I did everything humanly possible. I can't imagine
00:35:58
anything more I could have done. Tell me what the evidence is that convinces you
00:36:03
that I murdered my wife. We went through everything and it just didn't fit. A lot of us look through
00:36:11
every single piece of evidence, including the clothes, the knife, every single picture, making sure there wasn't
00:36:16
something that we were missing. That's why we took 4 and 1/2 hours, or else we could have came out of that jury room in
00:36:21
45 minutes. Jurors didn't buy Jerry's version of events. He had a lot of inconsistencies with his stories or his
00:36:30
explanation for the cuts on his hand. It looked like there was at least two contacts with a knife that we could
00:36:36
tell, which didn't match up with him telling us that he had a runin with an asalent and knocked that knife out of
00:36:41
his hand. They also didn't believe Jerry's story of only hearing a single scream as his wife was being stabbed 63
00:36:51
times in the next room. I've lived in a split level house myself. I could be downstairs and hear stuff going on
00:36:58
upstairs in the bathroom. I think there was a terrible struggle and I think you would have heard that all over that
00:37:05
house. Can you tell me where she's stabbed? All over. And after listening to the 911 tape several times on the
00:37:12
whole 911 tape, he never cried. No, never. I thought that was odd. And then he would put down the phone and run and
00:37:19
go do this. Sir. Sir. And put down the phone and run and go do that. Hello. When you're on the phone with 911, you
00:37:25
stay on the phone. He solemnly swear to tell the truth. And what about Danny Busby? The person Jerry Jones claims is
00:37:33
the real killer. There was no evidence that Danny Busby was in that house that night. There was no DNA evidence. There
00:37:39
was no blood evidence. Right. There was nothing that put Danny Busby in that house except Jerry Jones wanting him to
00:37:44
be in that house and he wasn't. Jurors found Danny Busby unlikable. Busby is a really nasty human being, but
00:37:52
believable. He was being very honest about the fact he had hit the woman. He had pushed her head into the steering
00:37:57
wheel. He had admitted to everything, but when it came down to did you kill Lee Jones? No, I did not kill Lee Jones.
00:38:04
It was Jerry Jones they didn't believe. Every move, every emotion he made seemed
00:38:10
planned out. I'm sure he's loving with his children and his grandchildren, but I think his wife was a whole another
00:38:16
matter. He looks nice on the outside and he speaks with a soft tone, but he gives me
00:38:21
the creeps. He could not hide himself from the jury. I did not murder my wife. They saw through to him to his essential
00:38:30
core. All rise. 5 days after being convicted, state versus Jerry Bartlett Jones. Jerry
00:38:39
Jones is back in court for sentencing. He is present. He is in custody. And for the third time, we stand up for him
00:38:46
because we believe in his innocence. Absolutely. His daughters ask for compassion. Everyone talks about how
00:38:52
much we love our dad, but they seem to forget how much we loved our mother. You can send him to prison, but prison
00:39:03
isn't going to make us suffer any more than we already have in these last 16 years. But for Pam O'Keefe, Danny
00:39:11
Busby's mother, Jerry Jones doesn't deserve any sympathy. The evil started the night Jerry Jones murdered his wife.
00:39:20
and the next day when he accused my son of doing it. No one knows how years of being vilified affected Danny Busby's
00:39:29
life. But his mother believes Jerry Jones needs to be punished for all the lives he's damaged. I hope a day doesn't
00:39:38
go by for the rest of your life that you don't think of your wife and how you took her life away from your
00:39:47
children and then you accused a 15-year-old innocent boy. You have ruined so many lives.
00:39:54
[Music] When it's Jerry's turn, he seems remorseful. Wish Danny Busby's name had
00:40:04
not come to mind. I have no reason to bring his name into these proceedings. Stop
00:40:15
damaging Danny Busby. Jerry is chastised one last time and let him heal and grow
00:40:22
the best he can before Judge James Allenorfer sentences him. I'm going to sentence you for the third time in your
00:40:31
life to 25 years in the penitentiary. got anything in your pockets at all? But just a few months later, back in prison,
00:40:44
Jerry Jones is defiant once again. Do you owe Danny Busby an apology? No, I do not owe Danny Busby an apology, and none
00:40:54
will be forthcoming. I think it's entirely likely that at this point he's managed to convince
00:40:59
himself that he did not commit this this murder. For Ron Dur, the battle against Jerry
00:41:06
Jones is finally over. He's moving on, but not to another case. I, Ronald Dersh, swear that I will support,
00:41:14
defend, and obey. Instead of prosecuting, he'll be enforcing the law. You sure you want to do this? Yes, sir.
00:41:21
Welcome aboard. As a deputy sheriff, but the case that has consumed his life for so many years will be much more
00:41:30
difficult to leave behind. I don't know that anything we can do in in a courtroom can really put the dead to
00:41:38
rest. Clearly, the family has been damaged, I think, beyond repair by what Jerry Jones
00:41:45
did. So, in terms of whether Lee Jones can rest, I hope she can rest. The rest of us, I don't think can
00:41:57
[Music] Before [Music] we begin, just a trigger warning. The following episode contains references to
00:42:46
graphic physical violence. Please listen with care. [Music] Jerry, did you take a filet knife and
00:42:56
inflict 63 stab wounds on your wife Lee and kill her? I did not. And you swear on everything you believe to be holy
00:43:05
that that's true. Everything I can imagine to be holy. I would swear to that effect. Yes.
00:43:11
[Music] That is the sound of Jerry Jones being interviewed by 48 Hours correspondent
00:43:18
Peter Vansand about the 1988 murder of his 41-year-old wife Lee. My name is Judy Ryback. I'm a longtime 48 Hours
00:43:28
producer and this is Killer Conversation, a podcast about what we at 48 Hours have learned about the criminal
00:43:36
mind after years of interviewing convicted killers. In this episode, Peter Vansent will take us behind the
00:43:44
scenes of two conversations he had with Jones, one of the killers who still haunts him to this day. We'll hear never
00:43:52
before heard, revealing exchanges between a highly skilled interviewer and a man convicted of killing the mother of
00:44:00
his three children. Peter, thank you so much for being here today. I really appreciate you taking
00:44:07
the time. It's great, Trudy, to be working with you again. We've done this many times, so it's a pleasure. So,
00:44:13
Peter, about how many killers do you think you've interviewed for 48 hours? Kind of a strange question, isn't it? I
00:44:20
mean, I don't get asked that very often, but you know, I did some digging and uh
00:44:25
cuz over the decades, actually, and it's over 20 killers. They've strangled, shot, stabbed, blown a husband up in a
00:44:34
car bomb, cut throats, tortured, beaten, poisoned, dismembered, burned, and buried their victims. They're all scary
00:44:41
people. But the man we're going to talk about today, Jerry Jones, he's from my home state of Washington. And in fact,
00:44:48
this murder case was just about 8 miles from where I grew up. And he still has me looking both ways when I leave the
00:44:56
office. When I leave the broadcast center where we are recording this, I always check to my left and right
00:45:03
because it's the way he murdered his wife Lee that really haunts me to this day. That is incredible, Peter. You told
00:45:12
me that over dinner one night while we were on the road and I was just blown away. And that's because Jerry Jones is
00:45:18
a free man today. He was parrolled from prison in 2008 after serving only 16 years of a 25-year sentence. That's not
00:45:28
unusual in my home state of Washington. Um the system there, they've always taken a a European view of incarceration
00:45:35
and they see it as a time of rehabilitation that people can change. And Jerry, after 16 years in prison,
00:45:43
he's he got that second chance and he's now living peaceibly, as far as I know, in rural Washington state in Western
00:45:50
Washington. A as someone who believes in second chances, I have mixed feelings about that. But I really want people to
00:45:57
understand the brutality of this crime. The lead investigator who I interviewed,
00:46:04
who'd been in many, many homicide situations, had never seen anything like this.
00:46:10
Keep in mind, you know, with a typical murder on a 48 hour show, somebody shoots someone or if they're going to
00:46:17
use something like a knife, they get a butcher knife, they go for the heart, they go for the jugular for a quick
00:46:22
kill, right? It was just the opposite in the way that Lee Jones died. She wasn't
00:46:29
stabbed as much as, this is difficult to listen to, as she was sliced. This was a
00:46:36
fililet knife uh that had a curved end to it. It's a kind of knife that that you might have to cut your steak, right?
00:46:43
It was not a butcher knife. And she was cut at least 63 times. And the forensic expert said that there may may have been
00:46:54
40 different attempts to to cut her and that the this movement of the blade if he was going left to right or right to
00:47:01
left uh would sometimes give her two or three wounds. So that at least 40 different
00:47:09
thrusts at her with this knife, but they were not designed to kill her right away. She suffered minute after minute
00:47:18
after minute. This woman bled out. That's how she died. So when you first met Jones, he had been convicted. He had
00:47:27
served 10 years. The conviction was overturned and he had been out for 2 years. He was about to go to trial a
00:47:34
second time. Um, what what was that like interviewing a man who you knew had been convicted and
00:47:45
was most likely lying to you? Well, what was fascinating about Jerry's case is that it became a bit of a media
00:47:53
sensation when he got out. He has two daughters, um, beautiful, intelligent, articulate, and they had been
00:48:00
campaigning on television in not only in the state of Washington, but on a talk show called Liisa, where, uh, the three
00:48:07
of them were on the show and saying, "Our father is innocent. We're convinced of it." And they were so convincing that
00:48:14
I thought to myself, could they be right? Right? Could Could they be right? And keep in mind, as a journalist, you
00:48:21
don't begin an interview with a suspected killer and say, "Jerry, look, I know you did it. The evidence is
00:48:27
irrefutable. You murdered your wife. You tried to manipulate people. You are a killer." You don't do that, right? You
00:48:34
want to get into their mind. You want to This is a This is a a journey you're going to take with them. And so, the
00:48:40
initial parts of these interviews are always friendly. I want to hear their story and I do because I want to see can
00:48:46
he convince me. And so we met over and over again to talk about his relationship, how they met, their life
00:48:54
together, their ups and downs, the evidence, and he was open to any question that I wanted to ask. And
00:49:02
that's what a journalist dreams of. [Music] How did you first meet Lee, Peter? As I
00:49:10
recall it, uh I was stationed in Vietnam at Bentoule Air Base, which was down in
00:49:16
the Meong Delta. And I had been there for several months, it seems. And I I'm almost convinced it was on New Year's
00:49:25
Day of 1970 that I encountered this the most gorgeous creature I'd ever laid eyes on
00:49:32
in my life. And for me, it was just love at first sight. When you speak of Lee, I
00:49:39
mean, your eyes really brighten. You have a smile on your face. Sounds like a sounds like a Disney
00:49:45
movie, but it's more like a Hitchcock film, right? Like a Hallmark film. Yeah. It's But again, for our audience
00:49:52
listening to this, that gentle manner he has now. He sounds like a romantic and u
00:49:59
and he's in Vietnam. He was serving our country. And when you see a picture of them back in the day, there she's
00:50:04
beautiful. He's a very handsome man, an authoritative figure to her and um probably seemed like a a match made in
00:50:12
heaven for the two of them. Jerry sounds like a light-hearted teenager in love when he talks about Lee. Do you think
00:50:19
that was real or smoke and mirrors? Uh a communications professor of mine in college once told me, he said, "Uh,
00:50:28
Peter, words don't have meaning, people have meaning." Just the thought of her still warms your
00:50:35
heart. Absolutely. She's still very much a part of my life. There's I don't think
00:50:39
there's a day that goes by that I don't think about her and and think about her warmly and affectionately. And you know,
00:50:47
I still wish that she was here to um be a part of my life and and and me to be a
00:50:53
part of hers and to enjoy our grandchildren and and and look at our children and how they've grown and
00:50:59
developed into such fine young people. So, it's been a big loss for us all. You miss her? Absolutely. I'd give anything
00:51:09
if I could have her back right now. My goodness. Um, yeah. So, he thinks about her warmly and affectionately. He
00:51:19
didn't even say he missed her until you asked him. He's speaking these words, but sitting across from him, he doesn't
00:51:28
seem, in my opinion, to mean them. He has this soft presentation. I do miss her, Peter. And he and and but it the
00:51:37
the the emotion is not there. So just before her death, how would you describe their relationship?
00:51:46
From outside appearances, here is a very successful pharmaceutical salesman. Lee
00:51:52
is the mother of three beautiful children, two girls and a boy. They live uh in a lovely suburban neighborhood.
00:52:01
But according to two of Lee's friends, she was talking about divorcing Jerry. Look, after her death, investigators
00:52:08
found legal separation papers in their bedroom. Right. Friends say that the marriage was near a breaking point. Lee
00:52:15
was miserable. She feared him. Uh Lee's friends, she had a couple who testified in the course of these trials, said that
00:52:24
uh he was a absolute uh control freak with her, that he dominated her in this relationship. Every day she had to lay
00:52:33
out his socks he was going to wear that day on the bed in a certain way. If she didn't, he got very angry with her.
00:52:40
These friends say according to Lee, he was becoming physically abusive, that he had struck her a number of times. they
00:52:47
would see her wearing sunglasses and ask her to take them off and they'd see a black eye or bruising and and ask about
00:52:54
it and he'd say, "Well, I didn't do what he wanted last night." So, um there's a
00:53:00
belief that there was escalating violence toward Lee uh prior to this terrible, terrible murder. And Jerry,
00:53:10
you know, there are people who are so skeptical of you. They don't think what you just said is genuine. What do you
00:53:16
say to those people? It's hard to answer somebody like that because they've come to that belief for
00:53:23
reasons that I can't understand or explain myself. To the best of my knowledge, everyone who actually knows
00:53:32
me, Jerry Jones, as a person knows that I'm absolutely incapable of murdering anyone and certainly not Lee.
00:53:47
[Music] This is what Jerry Jones says happened on the night of December 3rd, 1988. He
00:53:57
and his wife, Lee, were home with their 4-year-old son, Thomas, watching television. Their oldest daughter, Kim,
00:54:04
had moved out, and their middle child, Beth, was at a party. Jerry says Lee put Thomas to sleep in his basement bedroom
00:54:11
and then went upstairs to a hallway bathroom to take a bath. Jerry says he then went across the hall to their
00:54:18
primary bathroom to take a shower. He says the water was running when he heard Lee scream.
00:54:25
I heard this horrible scream and I just I'd never heard anything like that before in my entire life. I was
00:54:34
just I was petrified just just from the scream. One loud piercing scream. One loud piercing scream
00:54:42
that and that's what I heard. And and I froze for a second or two or three. And the floor plan of the house where your
00:54:51
shower was running. Mhm. And where her bath was running, there's a common wall there. Yes. She was in the fight of her
00:54:59
life. Yes. She's a strong woman. and the amount of the just the volume of that battle, the thumping around that was
00:55:05
going on in there. Didn't you hear any of that, Peter? I did not. No, had I heard it, I certainly would have run to
00:55:13
her aid sooner than that. Uh, and you understand how for some people that's hard to believe. Well, you know, I I
00:55:21
don't know if it's pos I'm I'm going to say this. It might be possible to do a reenactment.
00:55:30
You and your producer Anthony Batson actually did do an experiment in that house. Tell us about that. I was in one
00:55:37
bathroom and Anthony Batson was in the other. Right. We could talk to each other as I'm talking to you right now
00:55:43
and hear every word. I took out like a dime and I dropped it on the bathtubing. You could hear it as if we're both in
00:55:52
the same room. It is impossible for this battle to have gone on. Impossible. and
00:56:00
not hear it. Um, I'm telling you the amount of noise that you could hear through that common wall. It's almost
00:56:07
like as we are speaking right now and his story is just ridiculous. But Jones kept insisting to you that he
00:56:16
only heard one story and then ran toward the bathroom and on the way he bumped into a man with a knife. This is
00:56:26
happening so quickly, so fast. you start perceiving that something is coming out.
00:56:32
And as I'm moving closer to the doorway, you you can see more and more. And it's
00:56:39
a knife that my my vision, my focus, my attention was just riveted. It's a knife. And I'm continuing forward. And
00:56:49
this person, it's just a figure is con moving. and we just more or less meet in the doorway and collide right there in
00:56:59
the doorway to the bathroom. I'm not thinking that I need to deflect that knife. That never entered my mind. It's
00:57:05
just a the fact that it happened was just a reflex action. You see a knife and my hand went in the direction of
00:57:14
that knife and dislodged it from his hand and in the process I suffered some cuts.
00:57:21
Let's talk about those cuts on Jerry's hand. Um, he says he was defending himself, but the prosecutor has a a
00:57:29
different story, right? Absolutely. The prosecution and their forensic expert says the wounds that that jury has are
00:57:37
consistent with cuts. While you're you're you're stabbing or cutting someone with a knife, you've gotten that
00:57:44
knife bloody from from your victim. And blood is a very slippery substance. And this is something that that has occurred
00:57:52
in a number of cases that I have covered where someone has used a knife, particularly in murders of rage where
00:57:58
they stab multiple times, is that the hand will slide down the handle onto the blade. And so if you're holding it like,
00:58:10
you know, try to imagine now you're holding a a knife handle with the blade below your fist and it slides down.
00:58:17
where you get the cut is on the inside of the upper parts of your fingers. That's where his cuts were, right? So,
00:58:24
he's gets cut. He's bumps into this guy. This is what Jones says happened next. In the process of the collision, I was
00:58:32
forced back and I bumped my head against the wall and fell to the floor. I saw stars. I I'm convinced that I did
00:58:43
not lose consciousness, but I saw stars and I was dazed. And uh I think I was not down for more than a second or two.
00:58:52
And when I got up, there was nobody in the hallway any longer. He saw stars. Was there any evidence that he had been
00:59:04
knocked out? No. And if he saw stars, that was only because he stepped outside and looked up into the night sky. Uh,
00:59:12
that again is another ridiculous story. There's no evidence of any concussion. There was no bump on his head, no
00:59:20
bruise, nothing whatsoever to support this. This is someone who is um making a story up. I immediately went into the
00:59:31
bathroom and I encountered uh the most horrible situation I've ever seen in my life. I I
00:59:40
I could see blood on her body and she is struggling. She's trying to push with her feet back into
00:59:51
the corner of the bathtub. She's throwing her hands about in front of her as if fighting off an attacker.
01:00:03
Uh the closer I got to her, I I I reached the side of the tub and I reached in almost immediately and I
01:00:11
said, "My godly, what happened?" And in the process of doing that, um, I was reaching in to try to lift her to me,
01:00:22
and my feet literally just flew out from under me. Did she speak to you? She was trying to
01:00:30
speak. I'm convinced of that. Her her jaw would fall open as as if she was trying to speak and then it would snap
01:00:38
shut just repeatedly like that. But I can recall this this chattering sound of her
01:00:45
teeth. It's most under the circumstances. I mean, it's it's just like it's a crescendo
01:00:56
of noise and yet it's just the chattering of teeth. That chattering sound he makes with his
01:01:04
teeth made me think of Hannibal Lectar in Silence of the Lambs. Do you recall what you were thinking in that moment?
01:01:12
takes a lot to shock me and freak me out. I was completely freaked out. It sent a chill down my spine and it takes
01:01:19
a lot to do that. Carrie, help me out here because this this is where a lot of people it doesn't make sense. You're a
01:01:26
bright, articulate man. You've had military training. Why haven't you gone to that phone and dialed 911?
01:01:33
I don't have a good answer for you, Peter. Had I to do it over again and had I been completely in control of my
01:01:41
faculties, that certainly is what I would have done first and foremost. Did you to just lose it? Yes.
01:01:49
Yes. That's that's what happened. That's the truth. That's the way it happened. had
01:01:56
you come to my door that day and had you said, "Jerry, there's going to be an emergency in the neighborhood tonight
01:02:05
and we need somebody who can do the right thing under pressure." I would have said, "Peter, I'm your man. I
01:02:14
can do it." when it happened in my old home and when my wife needed me the most, I couldn't do
01:02:30
it. I couldn't help her. Watching this clip, I literally leaned into the monitor to see if there were
01:02:41
any tears coming out of his eyes. There was not a single tear. He's crying. It's
01:02:47
so dramatic. Not a single tear. Completely manipulative, a completely disingenuous.
01:02:56
Um, disgusting. Jerry Jones says that instead of calling 911, he decided to take matters into his
01:03:06
own hands and tried to wrestle his bloody wife out of the bathtub. Then things got even more complicated, he
01:03:13
says, when their four-year-old son Thomas woke up, climbed the stairs, and walked in on what must have been a
01:03:21
terrifying scene. And Thomas comes into the room. And Thomas, you've got to go back to bed.
01:03:29
Your mom's hurt. I'm trying to help her. I've got to call 911. Please go back to
01:03:35
bed. and he very dutifully turns and and leaves. What happens then? Well, I resume my efforts to get Lee out of the
01:03:46
tub. And again, every time I I reach in and grasp her, she slips out of my hands. And and after two or three
01:03:54
additional uh attempts in this direction, I I'm just so frustrated. I I I don't give up, but I I hear Thomas
01:04:04
calling for me downstairs. He's scared. He knows something has happened. He's apprehensive.
01:04:11
I run down to him. Jerry says he decided to put on his boots and take Thomas to a neighbor's
01:04:19
house. The thought that enters my mind and controls what I do next is I've got to
01:04:28
get Thomas to a safe place. At this point, is Lee still alive? At this point, I think she is
01:04:37
completely non-animated, probably alive, but her last breath is in her at this point in time.
01:04:53
Um, this is several minutes later, 3 5 minutes, and life is I mean, when I first
01:05:02
encountered her, she's still struggling. And this quickly with within 3 to 5 minutes, she's at the point where if
01:05:10
she's breathing at all, it's very shallow, very sporadic. Um, not much life left.
01:05:23
That just takes my breath away every time I hear it. He is calmly sitting there telling you that with precious
01:05:30
minutes ticking by, he has decided to leave his dying wife and take his son next door. Why didn't he just call the
01:05:38
neighbor and ask him to come get Thomas and then call 911? You know, the the thought is is that that would have made
01:05:45
covering up this murder much harder. If the if the neighbor had come over to get
01:05:49
Thomas, right, he might have insisted on entering the house. He might have and calling 911 from there, maybe he would
01:05:56
have spoken to Lee. Maybe she would have cried out if she realized another man was in the house and and and maybe he
01:06:02
would have attempted to try to help save her. It would just mess up what he had set in motion and likely lead to his
01:06:10
arrest. Right. Right. This next clip really stood out to me. You pushed him hard and he just smiled
01:06:18
and once again calmly said some of the most shocking things I have ever heard. You know, there are some who believe you
01:06:27
took your son over to your neighbor so you could go back and finish off late. Well,
01:06:36
that has never been expressed in those exact words. I I would say this that while I've in the Air Force I was never
01:06:45
really trained to kill anybody, I I have had some training in self-defense techniques and and there was a brief
01:06:54
period when I went to a school in Florida prior to going to Vietnam where they they taught us some rudimentary
01:07:03
techniques for attacking another person. some basic training w with a knife. Some
01:07:08
some basic training. Um if if I were going to kill Lee or you or anyone else and I I had an opportunity
01:07:22
to pick my time and my place, I would just cut your throat. I I know that there is a jugular vein there. I know
01:07:31
approximately where it's located. And if and that would be very silent. There wouldn't be a scream.
01:07:38
Uh if if you did get that jugular vein, the the fight would be out of the individual within seconds.
01:07:47
And the allegation is this was a crime of passion, of hatred, and that if you did it that these wolves were done in
01:07:56
such anger to punish, to inflict a cruel death. Mhm. That there was no anger and there was
01:08:07
there was none of that. At best, your behavior at this point has been bizarre. You agree with that? I would agree with
01:08:15
that. Yes. And your explanation for this bizarre behavior is what? I was in shock. I was scared.
01:08:28
I'd never encountered anything like that before in my entire life. I wish I had done
01:08:37
the right thing. I wish I'd done the things that would have been in Lee's best interest.
01:08:44
I I look back I had I called immediately it could have made a difference. Others though who medical experts who
01:08:54
have examined the autopsy report have told me that it probably wouldn't have made a
01:09:01
difference. Those of us who've been through military style first aid training and I've done
01:09:08
that twice now. pack, wrap, elevate. You pack these wounds quickly in that room with with toilet paper with if there's
01:09:18
Kleenex in there, you put them inside all the wounds. It stops the bleeding. You use your clothing, use towels to
01:09:24
wrap if he was and and she had none of that on her. You know, when the authorities arrived, she didn't have um
01:09:32
evidence that he was stop he was trying to stop the bleeding. Oh, that's so interesting. And that's the part of his
01:09:38
story that just drives me crazy is that there should have been evidence of him doing everything he could to stop this
01:09:45
bleeding and there was none. And the and the truth is is that through their investigation, authorities believe that
01:09:52
he took at least 6 minutes from the time he discovered put quotes around that her
01:09:59
body before he called 911. 6 minutes passed. I did not realize that. That is truly stunning. And speaking of stunning
01:10:08
evidence, let's get to that 911 call. 911, what do you have? Hurry. Uh, my wife and I Let me give you a dispatch,
01:10:17
sir. Hurry, please. A dispatch. Yes, my wife. What's the address? 9 um 615. Um uh
01:10:31
190 160 9th place. Hurry, please. Okay. What? 615 169th place. Say again. No, you repeat it to me, sir. 6151
01:10:46
169th. Hurry. He's given this operator in the course of this two different addresses. They can't find the house.
01:10:55
Um, this is I've never heard of this. You know, I've covered Judy, you too. We've covered dozens and dozens of
01:11:02
murder cases. How many 911 calls I've heard, I've never heard of somebody not knowing where they're where they live
01:11:08
and making this kind of mistake. That just feels um like a manipulation. The dispatchers were confused because
01:11:18
they couldn't find Jerry in the phone book. The ambulance was having trouble finding his house and he kept walking
01:11:25
away from the phone. And in that time, the dispatchers realized that he had given them the wrong address.
01:11:34
All right, sir. You're going to have down the road. You're going to have to help me because we have a conflict with
01:11:40
your address. Please give me your address again. What is your address? Let me go look. I'll write down. He's going
01:11:46
to go look. This is the most uncooperative trauma victim I've ever had. The most uncooperative trauma victim
01:11:59
I've ever had. Jerry walked away from the phone a fourth time for about 20 seconds and then returned with a new
01:12:06
address. Okay, Peter. All I can say is what the fudge. I don't buy it. The prosecutor said um
01:12:16
he believed that that Jerry was stalling to make sure that Lee was dead. Le let's
01:12:21
listen to you uh ask him about that. The prosecution alleges that this was part of your
01:12:30
diabolical plot that you were letting Lee bleed to death. You didn't want the aid car to get there right away. And if
01:12:38
that were the case, I would have just waited and waited. And I might still be waiting. I may never have called 911 and
01:12:45
I would have just I would have made up a story. Well, I didn't think about calling 911 or I I don't know what I
01:12:53
would have done. I'm not good at making up these stories, unfortunately or fortunately, whatever the case might be.
01:13:02
Well, he's right about one thing. He is not good at making up stories. He could have transported her body
01:13:10
somewhere, but the fact that Thomas walked in on the scene screwed up. If that was his plan, screwed everything
01:13:15
up. He then had to call 911 because or eliminate his own son. And he'd made a decision obviously not to do that. And
01:13:24
so this to me is a meticulous plan by someone who has this controlling personality that goes ary and then he
01:13:34
tried to tried to compensate with with delaying tactics and everything else. But Thomas walking in on that scene I
01:13:42
believe just messed everything up. So a little over 14 minutes have elapsed from
01:13:48
the time Jerry dialed 911 to the moment help arrived. Lee was pronounced dead on
01:13:54
the scene with no CPR even attempted and Jerry was arrested that very night. In 1989, Jerry Jones faced a jury of his
01:14:04
peers. They found him guilty of first-degree murder and he was sentenced to 25 years in prison. In 1998, just
01:14:12
over 10 years after Lee was murdered, a judge set aside Jerry's conviction, ruling that in the first trial, Jerry's
01:14:21
lawyer should have been able to present evidence about a possible alternate suspect,
01:14:27
a 15-year-old boy who lived in the neighborhood named Daniel Busby. [Music] Who is Daniel Busby?
01:14:45
My knowledge of him on a firsthand basis is of a obnoxious teenage boy who lived in our
01:14:55
neighborhood. I think I first heard his name mentioned probably in the spring of
01:15:03
1988. As the year progressed, I heard the name mentioned more and more frequently,
01:15:12
usually in a negative uh connotation. Um Lee particularly uh didn't like him. And saying that of
01:15:24
of Lee is saying a lot because I don't think I would have to really really search my memory to give you the name of
01:15:33
anyone else that Lee did not like. So, a 15-year-old snuck into his house and sliced up his wife. What evidence is
01:15:44
there of that? There's no evidence whatsoever of that. There's no evidence of an intruder. There is no fingerprints
01:15:52
in that bathroom. There is no DNA. Uh there are no eyewitnesses. Um it's simply he would have had to have
01:16:02
levitated into that house and committed this murder. And think about this. A 15-year-old comes in to do this
01:16:11
murder, but he he would have been aware of Jerry in the other sha in in the other because of that common wall that
01:16:18
you can hear anything that Jerry was in the house in the other room and he's committing this vicious horrible
01:16:25
physical battle. It's it's just simply ridiculous. And this poor kid um Busby uh endured these accusations over the
01:16:36
years. He gets reported over and over in the papers. Just destroyed his life. No
01:16:41
evidence whatsoever. And I I find that story uh preposterous. Yes, preposterous is a good word. Busby also had an alibi.
01:16:50
His mother said he was at home with her that night. So, what evidence was there to justify a second trial?
01:16:58
Well, uh there are letters. First off, it seems that Busby was obsessed with Jerry and Lee's youngest daughter, Beth.
01:17:06
And it seems he may have also been obsessed with Lee. And he would be a bit of a pest around the house. He liked to
01:17:14
drop by. And and I know that Lee had expressed to a friend that that that he kind of creeped her out a bit the way he
01:17:22
would stare at her in a in sort of a longing way. And then there's this crazy story about
01:17:29
the fact that the four-year-old Thomas, who was in bed downstairs from where uh the murder was, that he heard somebody
01:17:38
growl. And uh and that woke him up. And apparently the only person who ever growled at four-year-old Thomas was this
01:17:47
Busby character. So, it's the letters, the obsession with Lee and Beth, and this one growl that Thomas heard. That's
01:17:55
the evidence that he has. So, as we know, Jerry was found guilty a second time. His conviction was
01:18:04
reinstated and his sentence remained the same. So, they didn't re-sentence him. And just when you thought this case was
01:18:12
over, you get a call that a judge decided jury still hadn't gotten a fair trial. So, he was getting a third. And
01:18:19
he was once again released and wanted to talk to you. And this third trial, what are you going
01:18:26
to be able to bring in to this courtroom that you haven't been able to do in the
01:18:31
past? Well, we'll be allowed to uh bring in the fact that Danny Busby has a 16year history of violence against
01:18:40
women, both psychological and physical attacks on every woman he's ever had a relationship with. Uh I think we're
01:18:51
going to be allowed to paint him as the monster that he is. And I believe the evidence will convince the jury that he
01:18:59
indeed is the person responsible for Lee's death. Why is Danny Busby's conduct after Lee's murder relevant to
01:19:07
the murder itself? Because it it's a pattern of behavior. So Jerry acting as his own attorney
01:19:15
actually called Daniel Busby to the witness stand and questioned him about all that same stuff that they went over
01:19:23
in the second trial, the letters to Lee, the the growl, whatever, but also about
01:19:29
his record with women, what he did to women as an adult. Well, Busby was not a cooperating witness. He was annoyed. Uh
01:19:40
this is the man who who had ruined his life in many ways by getting his name into the public for a crime that
01:19:47
authorities believed he did not commit or have anything to do with it. The police and the prosecutor says
01:19:55
there's no evidence against Danny Busby. The jury set aside Danny Busby in their
01:20:00
deliberations immediately saying there's no evidence he did the crime. If he didn't do it and you didn't do it, who
01:20:07
had the motive, the reason to murder Lee? Well, it's no third mysterious person. Either I did it or Danny Busby
01:20:16
did it. Obviously, 36 jurors have come to the conclusion for reasons I can't explain that I did it. But I can look
01:20:25
you or anyone else in the eye and tell you I did not murder my wife. And all I can ask you or these jurors, they they
01:20:35
saw the evidence in the courtroom, but I don't know, look at it in a little more
01:20:40
depth. What on earth is required to prove reasonable doubt? You know what's interesting? The judge
01:20:50
even scolded him after he was convicted and sentenced for dragging Daniel Busby repeatedly through the mud for nearly 17
01:21:00
years. And the jury felt he owed Daniel Busby an apology. Do you owe Danny Busby an apology? No.
01:21:10
Danny Busby cannot look me in the eye and ask me for an apology. He knows what he did. He
01:21:18
knows who he is. He knows that he murdered Lee Jones following the second trial. He became
01:21:28
emboldened and he has told several people, "I did it and I'll do it again." He has told several people, you know,
01:21:41
they have the wrong guy in prison because I did it. He thinks and I believe he knows in his
01:21:51
mind that he has gotten away with murder and that he can say whatever he wants to
01:21:57
say and and he has told people that he murdered my wife. Okay, so for the record that is
01:22:05
absolutely untrue. Daniel Busby testified under oath that he never told anyone that he killed Lee and no one has
01:22:12
ever testified that he did tell them he killed Lee. when you listen to him, um, he has a gentle sound. When you look at
01:22:21
him, when you're talking to him, he has a a gentle face. But behind that, to me,
01:22:26
it's a mask. Behind that is is a is a coldhearted uh killer and and one who deserved this
01:22:35
uh this verdict of guilt. I think justice was served. It took three bites of the apple to have it happen, but he
01:22:43
is a man who murdered his wife. I have no doubt of that. No doubt. So, I love that you asked
01:22:50
Jerry at the end of the interview if he was going to try for a fourth trial, and
01:22:56
his answer just made me laugh out loud. I'm not interested in a fourth trial. I'll do the ballots of the three years I
01:23:06
have on my sentence. When I'm released, I will move to Southeast Asia. I will work with orphans.
01:23:15
I will do what I can to keep young ladies out of the sex trade. And I will work with those who are disabled as a
01:23:26
result of the Vietnam War. Oh my god, I can't take it. I will work with orphans, keep ladies out of sex
01:23:34
trade, save the whales, feed the hungry. Holy cow. Yeah. and he lives off of a country road near u Arlington,
01:23:42
Washington today in a in a small house. He never went to Southeast Asia. He never helped ladies out of the sex
01:23:51
trade. He didn't do any of those things. Well, Peter, this case is so fascinating
01:24:00
from start to finish, and your interviews are just a masterclass in how to question a killer. I am so grateful
01:24:07
that you took the time to join us on this podcast. Well, this was your idea, this wonderful podcast, and I think it's
01:24:14
fascinating to try to get into the minds of these killers, which is a very frightening place to be.
01:24:21
[Music] On the next episode of Killer Conversation, Aaron Morardi will join me to discuss Brian Stewart, also known as
01:24:29
Rick Valentini, my first killer. He's a guy who changed his name illegally, lied
01:24:35
about who he was, and murdered his 32-year-old girlfriend, Jaime Ley. You're not really Brian Stewart at all,
01:24:44
are you? To me, I am, but not legally, are you? Well, legally, I'm not anything. That's the problem. You're
01:24:51
Rick Valentini. [Music] 48 hours Killer Conversation is hosted and produced by me, Judy Ryback. Our
01:25:05
story editor is Mora Walls. Alan Pang oversees recording, mixing, and sound design, factchecking, and additional
01:25:14
production support from Rebecca Laflam. And special thanks to 48 hours executive
01:25:19
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01:25:27
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Podcasts or Spotify. Tune in next Tuesday for an allnew episode of Killer Conversation. Follow Killer Conversation
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