00:00:00
I'm Lester Holt. Tonight on Dateline, in a story that began with two tragic accidents, would truth be the ultimate casualty?
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They told me that this vehicle had gone off the road into this creek bed. She was face up in about ankle-deep water.
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She's got severe injuries to her head. Little did you know the mystery that was about to unfold.
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I go into the living room and I see blood all over the place. Went into the bathroom. There's more blood.
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The whole time we're thinking it was a car wreck, and now what happened? I told my brother this is how people get away with murder.
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The rumor mill is in overdrive. In overdrive. There was gossip that there was an affair.
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Sex lies in a Christian bike club. Who would have thought? Exactly. This was just tearing her apart.
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You really can't make this up. There's no other way to describe a human being like that.
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Satan spawn. Here's Andrea Canning with The Black Box. Station 8-5-7-4 alert. They will have a bad wreck on Old Richburg Road.
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Got one day at the call for the corner. The slow-moving water, chilled by the December air, trickled over her lifeless body.
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She was one of my biggest supporters, and she's not here anymore. How this wife, mother, and grandmother ended up in this creek would consume her family for years.
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I'm not going to give up until I find what really happened. Do you get a lot of car crashes as the coroner?
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We do. Terry Tinker, the coroner for Chester County, South Carolina, had been called here to the site of a fatal traffic accident.
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It was right before midnight on December 14, 2016. A husband and wife were in their Jeep when it ran off the road,
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ending up down by this creek. And when it got to the bottom, the nose of the Jeep was right here.
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He was told the 53-year-old woman had been ejected. And I saw that lady laying in the creek. I knew who she was.
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Who was it? Judy Baldwin. Your? My friend. Terry had known Judy or Baldwin most of his life.
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That must have been just such a shock to the system to see that. It was. A longtime friend laying in a creek.
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The coroner noticed some unusual markings on Judy's face. Deep, dark, blackened circles around her eyes.
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I'm seeing a lot of bulging eyes, what a lot of people call raccoon eyes. How do you get those raccoon eyes? Is there one kind of way?
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From probably brain injury. Driving the Jeep was Judy's husband, Jamie Baldwin. He suffered minor injuries.
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Jamie told first responders they were traveling down this dark, rural road when he swerved to avoid hitting a truck.
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His out-of-control Jeep then careened down a side embankment and crashed into the creek.
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He said he was knocked out, and when he came to, Judy's limp body was in the creek a few feet away.
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He called 911. Do you want to try CPR? You've already tried? Jamie had already been taken away in an ambulance
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when Detective Chris Reynolds with the Chester County Sheriff's Office arrived on the scene.
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I actually took my flashlight. I looked in. I saw a cloth with blood on it, blood on the seat.
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The detective saw the Jeep's door open, where Judy apparently had been ejected. What's your first instinct of this scene?
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It's an accident. until it's proven something else, it's an accident. That same night, Judy's two sons, Josh and Chris Orr, each got late-night phone calls.
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They were only told their mom had been in a car crash and they needed to get to the hospital right away.
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I was the first one there, and I, you know, run into the emergency side, and I was like, you know, where's Judy Orr Baldwin at?
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And I was like, we don't have a Judy Orr Baldwin. I was like, they've been in a reg. I was like, is Jamie Baldwin here?
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Josh found his stepdad Jamie in a hospital room. I was like, where's my mom at? He was like, she didn't make it.
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I was like, what do you mean she didn't make it? And he said, she's dead. Chris arrived shortly after and got the terrible news.
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He asked his stepdad what happened. And all he said was, I wish it would have been me.
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It felt like a dream. I was like, I cannot believe we're going through this again.
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Yeah, because your dad died. Yeah, tragically. Their dad, Judy's first husband, died in a motorcycle accident 12 years earlier.
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It just seemed unbelievable to now lose their mom, also in a crash. So here you are having to say goodbye to your other parent, your mom.
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That's really a hard thing to do, to lose both of your parents at such a young age.
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I know nothing's perfect, but our family didn't have any problems. and we were all happy and you know our parents are gone around 6 30 that morning
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Judy 23 year old niece Jesse McWatters was sound asleep when her phone rang her dad gave her the tragic news that her aunt known as little Judy because she was just 4 had been killed And he said Little Judy dead And I was like what are you talking about
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He said, Little Judy is dead. I just started screaming and crying. I woke up everybody in the house.
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When Judy's nephew heard the news, he realized his aunt's beloved Yorkie was all alone.
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So early in the morning, he headed over to Judy's house. The whole time I'm thinking, I'm just going to the house to get the dog.
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Rodney Wright wasn't prepared for what he saw once he walked inside that house. It was a shock. I couldn't believe it.
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I go into the living room and I see blood all over the place. Blood in the floor.
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Went into the bathroom. There's more blood. I mean, the whole time we're thinking it was a car wreck.
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And now what happened? A family horrified and mystified. When we come back, what Jamie says happened to Judy.
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When I came back in, she was there too. Fireplace in the floor. And then the clue that baffled the coroner.
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So this was going to be the key area in the autopsy. Right there. Just a few hours after Judy Orr Baldwin was found dead at the scene of a car crash,
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her nephew was stunned to find blood in her house, a lot of it. He had no idea what was going on.
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It was so confusing. Stuff just didn't add up. Turns out there was an explanation.
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Judy's husband told investigators there had actually been two accidents that night.
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Judy had taken a terrible fall at home, the reason for all that blood. They were on their way to the hospital when they crashed.
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I was in complete shock that she was gone. Now Judy's family, including her niece, was grieving.
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She was the bright light in a dark room. She really was. Was Judy a romantic? Did she believe in true love?
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She did believe in true love just because she had experienced it. Todd was her one true love.
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Todd was her first husband who died in that motorcycle crash. I think after he passed, she was kind of longing for that love.
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And she wanted to be loved like that again. Was Judy lonely? She was lonely. She wanted somebody for sure.
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So Judy's family was happy when she started dating Jamie Baldwin, a former police officer and 911 operator.
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The couple had a whirlwind romance, and after just eight months, they married in 2012.
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How did you feel that your mom was with a former police officer? Safe, you know, protected somebody that would help her if she was in need, you know, somebody that had her back.
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Did they seem happy? Oh, yeah, that was extremely happy. And, you know, her being happy, I'm extremely happy.
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Detective Chris Reynolds, who knew Judy personally, was looking into her death as part of a routine investigation.
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I knew Miss Judy for a very long time, ever since I was a child. Did you like her?
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Oh, yes. Everybody liked her or loved her. The detective had never met Judy's husband, but wanted more details on what happened that night.
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So about a week after her death, he asked Jamie to come down to the sheriff's office.
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Why do you bring him in even though you believe that this is an accident? We're crossing our T's and darken our I's. I want to make sure I have everything covered.
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I mean, she was just one of those people that as soon as you met her, you were a friend of her.
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You loved her. That spiral. She was just bigger than life. Jamie said he had mostly recovered from his minor injuries.
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Emotionally, though, he said he had a lot of healing to do. That's got a million times.
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Why you just didn't take me? Why did you have to take a woman right now? She didn't think I could have done this.
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I hurt. Oh, God. Jamie said the night Judy died, he and his wife were decorating their Christmas tree.
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He then briefly stepped outside to put some tools away in his shed. When I came back in, she was there at the fireplace in the floor.
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I don't know if she decided to fix something on the tree. I don't know. I was in the shop.
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And I never even asked her what she was doing. Jamie said he assumed Judy fell off the ladder and hit her head on the mantle.
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On the floor were two stocking holders. One of them was broken. Jamie told the detective he grabbed a washcloth from the bathroom and put pressure on her wound.
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But the bleeding didn't stop. He thought Judy needed stitches. Although Chester Hospital was a few minutes from their house, he said the couple got into their Jeep and started driving to a bigger hospital 30 minutes away.
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quarters of the way in our lane. And I mean, if I wouldn't have swerved to the right and
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miss it, we'd have hit head up. And that's when he said they went flying down that embankment, ending up in the creek.
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Jamie said the impact of the crash knocked him out. We hit something And then it was a big just gigantic just like a stop I reached out for Judy
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She's in there. And I finally found her. She's laying here at a creek. I don't want you back in.
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I don't want to hear her. After about an hour, the interview was finished. Jamie's story seemed to match what the seasoned detective had seen for himself,
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like that bloody washcloth in the Jeep. And when he went to the house the night of the accident.
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I see blood around the mantle and blood on the floor. And I did see the ladder leaned up toward the Christmas tree at the time.
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Does the blood look consistent with a possible fall from the ladder? Yes. It's an accident. As of right now, it's an accident.
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While Detective Reynolds was continuing his investigation, the coroner was still trying to figure out what caused Judy's death.
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He wanted to know more about the large wound on her forehead. There was no damage to her legs, to her arms.
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All of it was concentrated around her head. So this was going to be the key area in the autopsy.
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He concluded Judy died from a skull fracture caused by some sort of blunt force trauma to her head.
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And those raccoon eyes were the result of a large amount of blood accumulated in her skull.
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But the coroner struggled to figure out what caused that fracture. I need to know what do you think she fell against,
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what was told by Mr. Baldwin. She struck her head on the mantle. She might have fallen on the stock
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and hold her. But all this stuff's got to be added up. He had to determine if the fatal injury
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happened during that fall at her house or during the car accident. Even though Judy had two autopsies
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before she was buried, the coroner couldn't reach a conclusion. So her death certificate read,
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Pending investigation. Coming up, Jessie becomes suspicious about her aunt's death and takes matters into her own hands.
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You decided to record the call. I did record it. And then, was someone in this family harboring a secret, an eye-popping story?
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Sex lies in a Christian bike club. Exactly. When Dateline continues. It appeared Judy or Baldwin had been involved in two accidents on the same night.
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Most people, including Detective Reynolds, seemed to agree. Sadly, it looked like Judy was the victim of bad luck.
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One person, however, wasn't buying it. Judy's niece. When she thought about what happened, it seemed suspicious.
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I had a very weird feeling in my stomach. Although Jamie had an explanation for why he took his wife to that faraway hospital,
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it didn't make sense to Jesse. I'm like, why would you not go to Chester Hospital?
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It's so close to the house if she just bumped her head, you know. And why did Jamie take a dark, rural back road to the hospital
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when he could have taken a much faster nearby highway? Do you think that was odd?
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That was super odd to me. So Jesse decided to take a bold step. She put her amateur detective hat on and called Jamie.
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You decided to record the call that you had with Jamie. I did record it. What in your gut was telling you to record this call?
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I'm not sure what exactly told me to do it. I'm surprised I did it because I was in such shock,
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but I knew in my heart that something else had happened, and I wanted to hear what he had to say.
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Hey, Jesse. She asked Jamie how he got knocked out when the Jeep crashed. But Jesse was most concerned about her aunt's final moments.
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Yes, sir. How would you describe his demeanor? I would simply say he had zero remorse.
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He was talking just how we're talking. No emotion, really. She's inherent. We both know she's inherent.
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Yeah. So, that's good news. One thing that struck me was he said, that's the good news.
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Yeah. Which seemed a little, like the language was a little odd. Yeah, it didn't make any sense to me either.
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And it was just like an eerie feeling. Like, kind of, why would you say that in this phone call?
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Jesse couldn't get the phone call out of her head. I sat there and I replayed that recording so many times.
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Are you expressing your concerns to Judy's sons, your cousins? I let them listen to the phone call.
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And I told them, I was like, y'all, this just isn't sitting right with me. After Judy's sons started to think about it, they too had serious doubts.
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We're sitting there trying to figure out what really happened to our mom. Yeah, because nobody would tell us anything.
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But soon, one of Judy's friends would tell the brothers more than they ever wanted to know.
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Kay Black and Judy were nearly inseparable and shared their most personal secrets with each other.
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You said you were like sisters. We were. I miss her a lot. A whole lot. Kay and her husband Randall considered themselves Judy and Jamie's best friends.
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The four belonged to a biker group called the Carolina Thunder Christian Motorcycle Club, helping Hans and Harleys.
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They spent nearly every weekend with the couple, and Kay knew something about Judy and Jamie that almost no one else did.
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Talking with Judy I knew their marriage wasn like he was making everybody believe Jamie told others including Detective Reynolds in that interview He had a strong happy marriage
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Is there anything that I need to know about that may come up in the future? Like what?
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I mean, just anything that I need to know about. No. No. Okay. Nothing. We had a great life.
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Did you? We never got an argument. Everybody has disagreements. Please go talk to some of my friends.
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You'll find out that you're perfect. I mean, we're just perfect. Everybody's perfect, right?
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Everybody has issues. As bad as perfect as you could get. I mean, we had a great relationship.
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Kay says a few months before her death, Judy confided in her that her marriage was on the rocks.
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She thought something was going on with Jamie and another woman. A single mom named Terry King, who also happened to be the bike club's treasurer.
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She started having her suspicions. What is she thinking? She was thinking Jamie and Terry were having an affair.
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The club treasurer? Yes. And Jamie? Jamie. If one went to smoke, they would look at the other one and say, come on, let's go smoke.
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Judy didn't like that. Little things like that Judy had started picking up on. Yeah, we'd seen a lot of touchy-feely stuff that didn't quite look right.
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And Judy would ask me about it. And I'd say, maybe, maybe not. Nobody knows for sure, but everybody's talking about it.
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So Judy decided to find out for herself. She even confronted Terry. And what did Terry say?
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Terry said, we're not doing anything. She confronted Jamie. And he told her the same thing.
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She said, but Kay, they're so calm about it. She said, I know they're doing something.
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Within about a week of Judy's death, Kay sat Judy's sons down and told them everything.
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As they absorbed it all, they remembered something strange. Terry King was at the hospital the night their mom died.
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In fact, she got there before they did. Why are you here before us? I mean, this is our mom.
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Our question, boy. We're talking about 1 or 2 o'clock in the morning. And there was another, even more awkward story Kay felt she needed to share with Judy's sons.
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I don't want to tell you all this, but I'm going to tell you. Your mom, she said that Jamie's been trying to get your mom to have a threesome with him and Terry.
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What? Yeah. This is not something your mom wanted? No. No. Or something that you want to think about?
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No, I don't want to think about either. Sex lies in a Christian bike club. Exactly.
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Who would have thought? Exactly. Soon after Kay opened up to Judy's family, she called Detective Chris Reynolds.
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I said, Chris, I have some texts from Judy. I said, and I think you need to see them because she tells in there that she suspected Jamie and Terry.
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He said, I'll get back with you, Kay. I said, okay, and I never heard from him again.
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The brothers and Jesse also felt they weren't getting anywhere with the detective.
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We've got to find somebody to help us, and we've got to, you know, get some answers.
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I'm like, why? Why is nobody doing anything? Just didn't make sense. But soon, it would all start to make sense with some bombshell news.
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Coming up, a disturbing revelation about Jamie's alleged girlfriend and important evidence.
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What happened to the blood at Judy's house? What we found out was that Terry went to the house and cleaned it up.
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Two months had passed since Judy's death, and her family was questioning Jamie's story about what happened.
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Then they heard something stunning about Terry King and Jamie. They moved in together.
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So what are you guys thinking? He's moving in quickly with her. Yeah. That's when we're thinking, okay, the police is going to hit on this something.
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I mean, somebody's looking into this. The brothers had been pushing the Chester County Prosecutor's Office to look deeper into their mom's death.
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In fact, Deputy Prosecutor Candace Lively was keeping tabs on the sheriff's investigation.
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We were just being told through the sheriff's office that they were doing what they were supposed to do.
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Turns out they weren't. The prosecutor would learn there were serious problems with the sheriff's investigation.
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They're basically saying, we got this. We don't need your help right now. Exactly. And we were hearing from the family that people hadn't been interviewed yet.
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They were concerned that evidence hadn't been collected. Chris Reynolds said that he truly believed it was an accident.
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And so he just didn't feel that need to investigate this as a crime, a potential crime.
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Right. And that is something that with his experience, he should have known that you don't make those kind of assumptions up front.
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When someone dies, you treat it as it's a murder until you know otherwise. We asked Detective Reynolds about how he handled the investigation.
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Did you collect Jamie's clothes? Did you take Judy's clothes? Did you take her cell phone? Did you take Jamie's cell phone?
00:23:18
No, ma'am. Why not? We didn't collect anything at the house. That was just a judgment call.
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Some considered that a questionable call because there was something else. Early in the investigation, the coroner told the detective
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he thought Judy's death looked suspicious, that it might even be a homicide. Wouldn't you, as just being overly cautious as a detective,
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say, we should do a little more here. We should get evidence. And even if it's not a murder, at least we have it.
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We did our job. I agree 100%. We don't need it, maybe, but let's get it. I agree 100%.
00:23:58
And those photos were the only one that was The detective took inside Judy's house?
00:24:02
This is how a number of them came out. Some of them were so blurry and bad. Yeah, the camera we had wasn't good at the time.
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But I mean, even if a camera's not that great, you could still take still shots.
00:24:13
I struggle with that camera that we have. He also failed to collect critical forensic evidence.
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Did you say to your supervisor, I think we should have someone come in and look at this blood?
00:24:25
No, I didn't. Do you think you should have done that? Absolutely. I've never denied that.
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Reynolds never sealed the house after he photographed it so anyone could go in. And someone did. Terry King.
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Remember, she was in Jamie's hospital room the night in question. What happened to the blood evidence at Judy's house?
00:24:42
Well, according to what we found out in our investigation was that Terry left the hospital and she went back to the house and cleaned it up.
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With permission from Detective Reynolds? Yes. Not only did he give her permission to clean it up, he offered help.
00:24:58
I even gave her a number to a company. They specialize in crime scenes and disaster restorations.
00:25:06
I said, somebody has to clean it up. So you're giving her advice about how to clean up a potential crime scene?
00:25:12
No, she asked. She asked for help. And that's with anybody else in the case. If they ask,
00:25:17
you know, advice on how to... Right, but you're giving her advice on how to clean up a potential crime scene.
00:25:27
Yeah, but at the time, the crime scene, we were done with. So she's literally erasing the crime scene.
00:25:34
That's exactly what happened. Whether she was intentionally erasing a crime scene or not.
00:25:39
Exactly. Is this the most bungled evidence collection, handling of a scene that you've ever seen?
00:25:46
Yes, and I think bungled might be being a little nice because there was no evidence collection.
00:25:53
Even though there was a lack of evidence, the prosecutor spoke to the coroner about Judy's severe head injuries
00:25:58
and came to the conclusion this was no accident, but a murder. At some point, I'm going to have to look at this family
00:26:05
and possibly tell them that we're not going to have what we need to get justice for your family member.
00:26:12
Judy's family was losing hope. And weeks are going by. Months are going by. Then, a breakthrough.
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Eight months after Judy's death, the sheriff's office agreed to allow SLED to take charge of the case.
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That's South Carolina's top law enforcement agency. What does SLED do now that they're taking this over?
00:26:33
They jumped in. Agents went to Judy's house and took hundreds of photos, detailed measurements,
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took another look at the vehicle and re-examined the autopsy findings. They came to the same conclusion as the prosecutor.
00:26:46
It all added up to homicide. We said we definitely have enough to present to a grand jury at this point.
00:26:54
And true build indictment for murder. For Judy's family, it was a long time coming.
00:27:01
In August of 2018, a year and a half after her death, Jamie Baldwin was arrested for the murder of his wife.
00:27:09
You get a call, finally, that Jamie has been arrested. Were you shocked? Hey, you can breathe a little bit.
00:27:20
I mean, he's arrested for the murder of my mom. But now came the hard part, how to prosecute a case with little physical evidence.
00:27:29
This was no slam dunk. It was far from it. And the family knew going in that we had a real battle.
00:27:40
Coming up, the jaw-dropping story told by the Jeep. Most people are aware that planes have black boxes. Vehicles have them too.
00:27:51
And in this case, Judy's Wrangler had a black box. It did. When Dateline continues.
00:28:09
October 2019 It was a story that gripped the people of Chester County South Carolina It had been almost three years since the death of Judy Orr Baldwin
00:28:19
and now her husband was about to go on trial for murder. Were you worried that because the investigation wasn't handled the way it should have been,
00:28:28
that that could impact the trial? I thought it'd get thrown out or, yeah, I thought it was going to have a huge impact.
00:28:34
We are from a plea deal. There was a plea deal? There was. He turned it down? He turned it down.
00:28:40
Jamie Baldwin pleaded not guilty. It was probably the most substantially circumstantial evidence I've ever tried in a murder case.
00:28:51
With what little evidence the prosecution had, Candace Lively set out to prove that Jamie killed his wife and then tried to cover it up.
00:28:59
He faked that car accident. This is unfortunately simply about someone who wanted to get rid of his wife,
00:29:07
who wanted to have control of what he wanted to do when he wanted to do it. Lively told jurors the couple had argued multiple times about Terry King.
00:29:17
And on the night of Judy's death, she believes Judy demanded her husband end his relationship with Terry.
00:29:23
He got extremely angry. He has a temper, and he attacked her at that mantle. The prosecutor alleged that in a fit of rage,
00:29:36
Jamie took one of those stocking holders from the mantle and hit Judy so hard, it caused her brain to bleed, leaving her with those raccoon eyes.
00:29:45
When I actually hold it in my hands, this thing is heavy. Yeah, it is very heavy.
00:29:50
The stocking holder's shape closely matched the irregular cut on Judy's head. Whenever you look at the picture of that Santa stocking holder, it really fit the ridges in that unusual laceration.
00:30:03
A medical expert for the prosecution testified that after Judy was attacked, she probably died within five minutes.
00:30:11
Lively argued that's when Jamie came up with his elaborate plan to cover up his crime.
00:30:16
He comes up with this idea of, you know, maybe her falling off the ladder isn't going to be a good explanation as to why she has these horrible injuries.
00:30:25
So she said Jamie took his wife's dead body, put it in the Jeep, and then took that dark, rural road so he wouldn't be seen when he staged the accident.
00:30:33
He comes up with the idea that she was ejected from the vehicle. He pulls her out and stages her.
00:30:42
To prove the car crash was staged, the prosecution relied on Lance Corporal Brian Trotter.
00:30:47
He's an accident reconstruction expert with the State Highway Patrol who was on the scene that night.
00:30:53
He testified and showed us how a device in the Jeep recorded the last seconds of the vehicle's movements.
00:31:00
Most people are aware that planes have black boxes. I personally wasn't aware that vehicles have them too.
00:31:07
And in this case, Judy's Wrangler, like this one, had a black box. It did. So I took this one out of a retired police car to show you what they look like.
00:31:17
In simple terms, when there's an accident, a car hits something. It triggers the black box to start recording information.
00:31:24
What did you learn from Judy's black box? Well, the one for this case came back with no data.
00:31:31
So no data is actually really important. In this case, it is. No data means no crash.
00:31:40
The corporal's theory is that Jamie slowly and purposely drove his Jeep into the creek.
00:31:47
The most surprising witness was Terry King, the woman at the center of the alleged love triangle.
00:31:53
I was hoping that when she finally was put under oath in court that she would come clean.
00:31:59
Terry was no longer living with Jamie. Are you wanting to be here today? Yes, ma'am.
00:32:05
Even though she was a witness for the state, the prosecutor immediately faced a big challenge.
00:32:11
Terry flat out denied having a romantic relationship with Jamie. Is it fair to say that you were both in love with each other No that is no fair Was it in love with him I did love him You were in love with him but you did But the prosecutor did have text messages sent between Terry and Jamie
00:32:46
I'm going to show you this highlighted portion here. The judge ruled she couldn't show them to the jury, but she could question Terry about them.
00:32:55
What kind of things would y'all say to each other about how you felt about one another?
00:33:01
I would say I loved it. Okay. He would say the same to me. He would say the same to you.
00:33:07
Not only did you say you loved each other, that you missed each other? Yes. And did you ever tell them, you can tell me a thousand times a day and I'll never get tired of hearing it?
00:33:26
Terry testified she and Jamie were just platonic roommates, nothing more. You felt that Terry was misleading the jury?
00:33:34
Absolutely. And she had tried to mislead us for months as well. Lively said she had suspicions Terry may have played a part in the murder, but never found any evidence to prove it.
00:33:45
Terry denies any involvement. The defense was up next, and they were ready to exploit all the holes in the prosecution's case.
00:33:54
Would it be enough to set Jamie free? Coming up, an expert witness says Judy's blood in the Jeep proves the prosecution is wrong about when she died.
00:34:07
If she's actively bleeding, she is technically alive. After she left the house. After leaving the house.
00:34:13
And then the verdict. And you can just hear everybody gasp. Jamie Baldwin, the former police officer, was facing life in prison for the murder of his wife.
00:34:36
His attorneys, Philip Jamison and Brad Jordan, argued Terry King's testimony undermined the state's entire case.
00:34:48
The defense asked Terry to further explain her living situation with Jamie. And she said there was an innocent explanation for those text messages between her and Jamie.
00:35:05
the ones where she said she loved him. Not only that, but she told jurors she would never betray Judy.
00:35:35
Was Judy always there when you stayed? Yes. Most importantly, the defense insisted, there was no crime, just two tragic accidents.
00:35:47
And they said the state didn't have any evidence to prove otherwise. There was no DNA. There were no fingerprints. There was no weapon.
00:35:56
They called Detective Reynolds to the stand and attacked his investigation as shoddy.
00:36:05
But the scene at home should be processed. How does that all play into your defense?
00:36:12
Had they done a better job, we probably wouldn't find ourselves in this situation.
00:36:16
They would have cleared up all those questions at that time. And this would have gone down as an accident, which is what it was.
00:36:22
The defense did agree the stocking holder may have caused Judy's fatal injury, but not because Jamie used it as a weapon.
00:36:29
We believe that what happened was she was on a ladder at the mantelpiece she fell and struck the ornament which was sitting on the mantelpiece and then fell to the floor Ross Gardner a crime scene analyst for the defense testified and told us all the blood
00:36:45
found in Judy's Jeep proved something crucial, that she was alive when they crashed.
00:36:51
He pointed to the blood on the bumper, the passenger door and the saturation of blood
00:36:55
on her seat. So we're looking at the passenger seat, and what we can see is there's saturation throughout.
00:37:03
Gardner says, contrary to the prosecution's theory, that Judy died within five minutes at her home,
00:37:09
the evidence in the Jeep proved that was impossible. If she's actively bleeding, her heart is beating.
00:37:15
She is technically alive. In the Jeep. In the Jeep. After she left the house. After leaving the house, literally this tells us that she was bleeding while in the Jeep.
00:37:26
The defense also pointed to several experts, including the prosecutions, who all agreed Judy's injuries could have been accidental.
00:37:35
Having three medical experts who can't say, hey, this is definitely not an accident.
00:37:43
In my mind, there's reasonable doubt. We only had to convince one person. After seven days of testimony, the case went to the jury.
00:37:52
The prosecutor felt there was a good chance Jamie could walk. So she turned to the family for support and Judy herself.
00:38:01
I really felt like I had Judy on my shoulder. I really did. I felt that family just really gave me a lot of hope and faith.
00:38:11
Less than three hours later, there was a verdict. We were all, everybody was holding hands as tight as we could.
00:38:18
And when they read that verdict, I mean, you could just hear everybody gasp. We, the jury, found defendant James Harold Baldwin Jr., guilty of murder.
00:38:30
Dead in the 15th of 2019. I just broke down crying. I just couldn't believe it. We finally got justice for mom.
00:38:43
Detective Chris Reynolds was in the courthouse that day, too. He believes the jury made the right decision, and he wants the public to know
00:38:50
he did more than they think to look into Judy's death. Still, he realizes because of his incomplete investigation,
00:38:58
a killer might have walked free. You get emotional over this. I do. I take it personal.
00:39:04
This case was a big learning experience for me. I never dropped a ball on anything.
00:39:10
And that night I did. And I'm sorry for it. Jamie never took the stand, but he did speak at his sentencing.
00:39:19
She fell for my lap. I was the kind of killer. I love my wife. I mean, more than anybody in this room.
00:39:29
I mean, we had a great relationship. The judge sentenced the 60-year-old to life in prison without the chance of parole.
00:39:37
But there's more to the saga of Jamie and Terry King. Whatever their relationship was, it didn't end well.
00:39:45
After living together for several months, Terry says she asked Jamie to move out.
00:39:49
Soon after he did, her home mysteriously burned down. Police said Jamie torched it and charged him with arson.
00:39:57
Those charges were eventually dropped. Is he evil? Yeah, he 100% evil. Satan spawn.
00:40:06
100%. Thank you. Thank you. Judy's family says they can finally move on with their lives.
00:40:14
And there's one thing that brings them peace. You're religious. Does that give you any comfort to know that your mom and dad are now together?
00:40:22
Oh, yeah. I mean, they're in a better place than we are. What would you say to Judy if she could hear you?
00:40:29
I would just tell her I love her, and I would give her the biggest hug. That's all for now.
00:40:38
I'm Lester Holt. Thanks for joining us. you