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hey weirdos I'm Elena I'm Ash and this is [Music] morbid you were juny about that hay I
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know I was maybe it's the ey shadow of it all it's the ey Shadow you're great you've never looked better one of my
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daughters while we were getting them ready for dance decided to give me a makeover cuz while you're waiting you
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know might as well and she grabbed a Halloween palette yep a Halloween palette that I have and I actually kept
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that palette haven't used it cuz I wanted to wait for Halloween we and I figured they could use that palette cuz
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I'm sure they're going to want to be something fun and fancy and you know all that fun stuff did they use there is
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pumpkin orange glitter and glitter glitter in this palette like drag queen glitter like so glitter so glitter yeah
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so glitter and she said mom close your eyes and I said Okay and she she did it she lipsticked you too but thatp sticked
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me too but that would way but the ey Shadow remains it might remain until the day I die because it's really it's
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really embedded in there but I feel uh spooky ooky and you look great you know what she gave me a gift she gave you her
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all she did they were like what did they say oh the other one wanted to do mine and I was like I already have makeup on
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and elen goes you can never have too much and I was like nope you can less is more bye have fun at Dan so here I am
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here I am sitting with with my fancy eyeballs okay I got out I'm sorry that you feel inadequate I don't I don't I
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feel safe over here I've been you feel safe because of this disco ball you know on Facebook when people are like I've
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been marked safe from like safe from glitter I was it was I to was you know what I wasn't mark saer my the bottom of
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my hair is so crusty wow okay like dry what's so funny over there glitterhead that made it sound weird the
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fact that you had to like like clarify what you meant you were like you like dry dry like not just crusty like these
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crusty crusts I got on the bottom of my hair for gazelle it was her lips for me it's my ends there you go that speaks to
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someone I'm sorry about that but Summer's almost over everybody so don't worry about it yay because spooky season
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is coming is upon us it's here as far as I'm concerned yeah and I have a hair appointment tomorrow so party oh my God
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for I I saw I was really trying to connect that you're like what does that have to do with spooky season but it
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started with hair I was still on my hair I see it's called being self-centered look it
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up um so I guess there's no better way to go into no a case than that yeah what better way um this I have a bummer one
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today obviously um and it's it's interesting I was reading like articles to try to find my next couple of cases
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and I saw a book pop up and I was like whoa that looks interesting and that's how I discovered the rainbow family I
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don't think I have ever heard of this one nor had I yeah so it all starts with a girl named Nancy okay and from a very
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early age Nancy Santo knew whatever she ended up doing for her career she wanted
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it to be something that helped people and I think that automatically is just really [ __ ] sweet yeah her mother
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Jean told reporters in 2000 she had such promise such a free spirit she wanted to
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be a forest ranger it was the end of the 1970s and she was non-materialistic she
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just wanted to improve Society oh Nancy it was almost like Nancy was born a couple years too late in the late 70s
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her love of Nature and you know her deep feelings of empathy and compassion for others reminded most people of the
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hippie subculture that had recently kind of been left behind now most people were
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going on to a period that was you know maybe a bit more self-centered and definitely a whole lot more
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materialistic but nany's family always encouraged her interests and respected the kind of hippie ass culture that she
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felt so close to that's a good family it is they just supported her and loved her
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for who she was and she had a lot to offer her mother later said I didn't even worry when she was hitchhiking
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because her family and her mother included knew she had a close-knit group of girl friends and just friends in
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general who could very much hold their own in a potential conflict I love that she was like I wasn't worried like
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they're boss [ __ ] I'm not worried about them at all no she's like they got this awesome now one of those girls was
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26-year-old Vicky durian Vicky was known to her friends as bright star stop it like immediately I was like I love Vicki
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I was just going to say this like I just want to be around these people right and
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so Vicky being also known as bright star you can see why she and Nancy H it off immediately they both had very free
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Spirits they were open people friendly people Vicki was born and raised in actually a very rural area Wellman Iowa
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it was a town where there were only about a thousand people whoa yeah but like Nancy Vicki had a strong sense of
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empathy and compassion she really liked helping people what a Duo I know after high school she became a licensed
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practical nurse so she was also like like a multifaceted chica there oh yeah and it seemed like a natural fit for
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somebody with her SK skills and personality now even though she had a wellestablished career and she was very
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much professionally trained Vicki still identified it seemed even more so as like a free-spirited person who wanted
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to get out and experience the world yes I love it I it starts off so beautifully now Vicki and ny's friend
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Liz johnra told reporters bright star was a loving person she was real open to everybody even if they weren't like her
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oh I love that yeah that's like the kind of people should be yeah that's the kind
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of people you want to surround yourself with yeah just be open to people yeah so
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Liz actually had met Vicki outside of a food co-op and Tucson in the late 70s and the two of them became really fast
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friends because Vicky let then teenage Liz stay at her apartment when she had nowhere else to go now it was through
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Vicky that Liz eventually met Nancy and then the three girls bonded together over their increasingly uncommon
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interest of the hippie lifestyle which is crazy that like like even the even like at the end of the 70s it was pretty
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much done yeah like that it it changed over so quick it seems like it was just all of a sudden like oh nope that's not
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okay yeah like we're on to new things on to material items but look the hippie like you know look at least and like
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aesthetic is still it's constantly in style I feel like some ways yeah and I think there's like a lot more music
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festivals now that kind of try to like borrow from the ones back in the day yeah but yeah so they were there were a
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couple of hippies and they loved hitchhiking okay it was just a good way to get around now as we all know it was
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obviously wildly popular in the 70s to hitchhike the in the early 70s but by the end of the decade most of the
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general public kind of realized how dangerous it could be like accepting a ride from a stranger it's so sad which I
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think the the reason a lot of people started to realize that is because the news and the Press started covering more
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serial killers and more instances of violent crimes from hitchhiking yeah you're never hearing about like like I'm
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a like I would never hitchhike just because I'm scared of everybody but well now it's now it's so different but like
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you also back then were not hearing about the millions of successful hitchhiking that happened every single
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day where somebody was brought to the place they were looking to go and had a nice conversation and met somebody kind
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and great and Y was better for the experience like you didn't hear about any of that you only it's like a plane
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crash exactly only hear about the bad ones you're not hearing about the thousands that take off a day that
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successfully get where they need to go precisely look at you just you get it yeah the girls that get it get it that's
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me now but listen even with that awareness there were still people who felt like the benefits like we were just
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saying outweighed the risks and they were comfortable taking rides from strangers Liz would later tell reporters
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hitchhiking is a cheap easy free way to travel we could get off anywhere we wanted no worries about gas or cars you
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meet people who are just interested in hearing about your travels we were no strings attached people and wouldn't it
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be nice if that's all it was you just meet people get a little different perspective on stuff yeah hear about
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their fun trip they're taking and then be like bye and like you said like maybe leave better for it you know like oh
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what a cool guy what a CO that was just the way it was and we could be that way as a species it would be so sick it
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would be but we're one of the most terrifying species ever yeah sure are so in June of 1980 Vicki traveled from
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Wisconsin where she had recently moved for work to her family home in Wellman because she was attending her brother's
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graduation and Nancy planned to meet Vicki at Vicki's parents house in Iowa after the grad party was over and
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together with Liz the three of them were going to hitchhike their way to the rainbow family's Fourth of July
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celebration in marlington West Virginia otherwise known as a rainbow gathering this sounds adorable oh it's it's just
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so pure like I could see myself wanting to go to this when I if I like lived back then you would have been all over
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this 100% now the rainbow family was started in 1971 it's like very interesting reading
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about it because you're like who exactly started thisen there's a couple people that started it but they're like we're
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pretty informally led oh so they started by an informally connected group of mostly young people with pretty
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Progressive ideals and they're known for organizing really large Gatherings that
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are just supposed to celebrate the spirit of the counterculture movement from the 70s oh that's fun hippies yeah
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they don't really have any specific agenda there's not really any organizing principles they're mostly understood by
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the public as a well-intended group Who quote are out to seek a little Earnest spiritual fulfillment learn a thing or
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two and have a good time in the process that seems wonderful like who the [ __ ]
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doesn't want to go to that yeah now their annual Gatherings were pretty free form they included events and activities
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that Drew from spirituality like new age spirituality and the Back To Nature movement and they also uh Incorporated
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cultural elements of the 1960s like music and sexual Freedom oh lots of stuff going on it's [ __ ] awesome yeah
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it's like very Woodstock it sounds like yeah you know we loved it we loved it as
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the Washington Post described it it was a it as if the rainbow people had slipped through a Time Warp a slice of
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the 60s suddenly wedged into the 80s that's interesting sign me up yeah let's do the time warp again yeah I mean I'll
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watch from far away yeah I'll I'll make sure you have like Po I'll support you okay I I'll write you a postcard from
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there cool now while the attendees of the rainbow family gatherings may have been mostly well- intended it seems
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their annual convergence on very very rural locations had a tendency to worry local law enforcement over what they
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referred to as quote the high potential for user conflict essentially they were worried
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about the largely Progressive counterculture attendees coming up against the largely conservative locals
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eek who really resented public nudity the like flagrant drug use and what they felt was a general disregard for
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Authority okay just two different sides of a coin coming together very opposite ends of the spectrum here luckily the
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troublemakers seem to be pretty few and far between and most attendees overall were like Vicky Nancy and Liz just
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free-spirited people trying to keep up the ideals of hippie culture alive in a very different world mhm but still in
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the weeks before this Gathering was set to begin in marlington West Virginia the
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Secretary of State James mansion um excuse me a James mansion actually filed a suit to against the group in an
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attempt to stop this Gathering from happening allog together he told reporters West Virginia didn't need this
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bunch of derel Misfits I mean that was a choice having it in West Virginia I will
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say that it was a choice I'm not saying it was a bad choice I'm not saying it was a good choice it was just a choice
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it's simply a choice Choice derel Misfits I mean I think they're just trying to Vibe that's what I think it
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sounds like they're not doing anything like let them hang let them V let them hang let them just do their thing it'll
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it'll end and then they go home and then that's it who cares now his suit was unsuccessful at keeping the rainbow
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family from coming to West Virginia I figured but that specific instance definitely highlights the tensions that
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we building over before the event had even begun you can see that it was clearly like an issue and and people in
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town were not excited about it in a big issue this isn't like a bunch of people just being like oh this is annoying it's
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like the secretary of state is trying to see them that's a lot that's pretty big
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now when Liz Nancy and Vicky left from the durian house on June 20th their plan was to hitchike to the Gathering which
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was going to be held and I looked this up so I'm going to do my best West Virginia's mananga hila for National
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Forest wow yeah impressive very cool you're talking about my pronunciation right thank you very impressive so that
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was the plan they were going to hit Chik there and then when they got there they
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were going to meet up with Nancy's sister Kathy who was also going to be going to the festival okay Cathy's plan
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was to drive herself down a few days later okay however their plan changed just a few days later when they reached
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Richmond Virginia on the 24th of June the day before the three friends were picked up in South Carolina by the
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driver of a commercial bus and Liz later told reporters it was raining and as I stared out the window something told me
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not to go to the rainbow gathering ooh she just had like a premonition oh always listen to your gut man and she
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did so many times I have not listened to my gut and I regret it every time yeah she said it was just something like
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telling her not to go wow so instead she placed a call to her father in Connecticut and she arranged for
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transportation to get back home she really listened mhm she's a spiritual girlly of course she did and actually
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her dad was going to be getting married the next weekend so going home seemed like the right thing to do anyways even
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despite her feeling and like there was a lot of convergence of some signs there that she was like you know what yeah
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that's the thing and I wonder if she just kind of like kept the feeling to herself and was like it's about me like
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not about them kind of thing so they the three of them made plans to get together
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in Vermont later that summer and they were they totally understood that Liz didn't want to go anymore and the last
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thing Vicky and Nancy said to Liz was be careful and then they proceeded on their
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way to West Virginia to the rainbow gathering oh boy now around 900 p.m. on June 25th so just 1 one day after Vicki
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and Nancy parted ways with Liz a student walking back to his leant to in Bri knob
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near droop Mountain Park discovered two bodies lying face down in the woods both
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dead from apparent gunshot wounds oh now they were nearly 40 mil from the rainbow
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family gathering but police immediately believed that these two women had attended the Gathering due to one of
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them wearing a shirt with a rainbow Motif Motif similar to emblems used by participants of the Gathering ing okay
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now other than that neither woman had any identification or other clues about their
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identities so the news of the two murders excuse me came as a shock to some but not all attendees at the
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rainbow family gathering one of the organizers of the Gathering Tony Crow told reporters about an unrelated
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instance he said quote there were 11 shots fired into the site it looks like some of the locals have gone a little
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gun crazy oh so basically people were targeting this event wow and like the site where the Gathering was actually
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taking place that's what had happened people shot into it now but like I said unrelated inance or incident excuse me
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that's scary but despite the deaths the event continued without a second thought
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one attendee told reporters it's a really bad thing that it should happen but I know that those two sister who
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have passed on to another realm would be very unhappy if they saw that it affected the energy of this
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Gathering no comment I'm just going to stay here I don't know how they would feel I have no idea I yeah we'll leave
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it at that yeah but since the deaths did not affect the Gathering the identities
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of the victims were still unknown and ny's sister Cathy had no reason to change her plans so at the end of the
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excuse me at the end of June she and some friends traveled to West Virginia to meet up with her sister oh mhm years
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later Cathy told reporters when I arrived no one knew where Nancy was that week I heard two girls were killed in
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the country but there were no photos I was a little worried but someone said the victims were American
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Indians now when Kathy still hadn't been able to locate her sister after several
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days she just figured that Nancy had found something that interested her more so she left the area oh she said that
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would have been pretty typical of her cuz again like very free spirited people say that's the thing and she I mean this
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is like in your wildest nightmares you couldn't imagine that this happened to your sister
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no of course not and nothing in your brain wants you wants to believe exactly so it's going to tell you no way there's
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no way right so Cathy and her friends drove back to New York on July 5th but when she got home some friends had
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received a copy of the Pocahontas times and showed Cathy the pictures of the two
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young women who had been killed now at first Cathy wasn't sure the girl in the photo was her sister there definitely
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was a resemblance but she couldn't be sure so she drove back down to West Virginia to see if the girl in the photo
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really was her sister I wonder if it's one of those things where she was pretty sure but like again her brain didn't
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want to be like no that's definitely her yeah so as she made her way back to West
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Virginia investigators continued to struggle to make any kind of Headway in this case and like I said a minute ago
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neither girl that was found had any identification and the only personal items found with them were a Swiss army
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knife and a pocket comb and then the postmortem exams were just as unhelpful the cause of death was gunshots this is
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horrible Vicky had been shot twice in the chest Nancy had also been shot twice in the chest but also once in the head
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jeez with what the technician believed was a high-powered rifle wow now although they hadn't identified the
00:19:15
bodies yet local authorities felt confident that the killer was local quote because of the rural area in which
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the bodies were found and they were also pretty certain that the girls had been killed in one location and then dumped
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where they had been found because there was no blood pooling around the Exit Wounds okay now Kathy
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reached Pocahontas County on July 8th and immediately went to the local police who took her to see the bodies she later
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recalled quote my girlfriend knew right away but I could not believe it was Nancy then I saw that she was wearing
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the silver bracelet I had given her like that's an awful way I can't imagine having to identify no a family
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member let alone like your sister yeah so after identifying the bodies Kathy was able would to help the investigators
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get in touch with Vicky's family and then she got in her car and drove back to New York to deliver the news to her
00:20:06
mom in person she said I didn't want to have to tell her about Nancy on the telephone wow that's yeah can you
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imagine just having to like it's just you in your driving knowing what you have to do after just seeing what you
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saw like that's your sister and her friend who you probably knew and you're showing up at your mom's house she's
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probably going to answer the door being like Oh my God hey girl you know like so
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happy to see you like blah la la like Mom stuff MH and this is what you have to and to think too that like you were
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at the Gathering and you like you had no idea yeah it's awful oh so a couple days
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after Nancy and Vicki were identified the state police held a conference a press conference to announce the
00:20:49
identification other information about the investigation was still really scarse investigators didn't believe that
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the motive was robbery and actually sometime later nany's backpack was found about 50 miles from where the two bodies
00:21:03
were discovered and this is strange nothing appeared to be missing but strangely a Confederate flag was found
00:21:10
among the possessions and like neither one of them would have had that Vicki or Nancy that's strange and when Liz was
00:21:17
asked about it she said she didn't remember Vicky or Nancy being in possession of one and she elaborated
00:21:23
that it would have been very odd given who they were and what they believed in yeah that seems to go against so it
00:21:28
seems like whoever did this to them left that there as like a [ __ ] you wow mhm
00:21:34
now as far as motives went though there was no evidence that either had been sexually assaulted so that was ruled out
00:21:40
as well and in fact aside from the murders there had actually been no reports of violence in the area so
00:21:46
investigators had no suspects what the [ __ ] like nothing now the biggest and most unexpected information revealed
00:21:53
during the press conference was that in addition to the murders Vicki and nany's
00:21:57
friend Liz who had been traveling with them was still missing ah because obviously nobody knew that like only
00:22:04
Vicky and Nancy knew what had happened that she had gone off so it took nearly a week before West Virginia authorities
00:22:11
were actually able to track Liz down she was in Vermont vacationing with her family and had no idea how close she was
00:22:18
to becoming the third victim of this wow now unfortunately while Liz was able to
00:22:24
fill in the timeline between when they left Iowa and got to Richmond there really wasn't much else she could
00:22:30
do or provide Beyond hitchhiking from one destination to the other now when reporters asked her whether she would
00:22:36
continue hitchhiking she said right now I don't think I'll do it again it's kind
00:22:40
of scary I guess not all the good rides make up for the one bad one exactly which like what a haunting statement I
00:22:47
know for the one B one like oh I it gives me like chills cuz usually that's all you get is one bad one yep oh so
00:22:55
local authorities investigated the case for two 2 years but they kept hitting dead end after dead end after dead end
00:23:02
they weren't able to turn up any leads any additional evidence nothing of course they had some theories due to the
00:23:09
remote location in which the bodies were found I think I said this earlier they definitely suspected that a local was
00:23:15
responsible but who and why completely with them and then their investigation was further hindered by the fact that
00:23:23
most local residents were pretty tight lipped when it came to talking to law enforcement m and especially when the
00:23:29
crime was committed against two quote unquote Outsiders they're not going get involved they're not going to concern
00:23:35
themselves which is really [ __ ] up cuz it's like these are two young girls two
00:23:39
people no one in this town had like teenage sisters teenage daughters teenage cousins like Jesus
00:23:45
Christ but the first break in the case finally came in July of 1982 when Vicky's family reported that they had
00:23:53
received several anonymous calls from a man who seemed to know something about Vicki's murder whoever was calling
00:24:00
refused to identify himself but claimed the local police police excuse me quote were not doing their job when it came to
00:24:07
the investigation and this caller said as somebody who had a daughter himself he was really sympathetic to the family
00:24:13
suffering huh but it was odd like they were they were turned off by these phone calls so later that month the police put
00:24:20
a tap on Vicki's family's phone and that led them to 36-year-old West Virginia tractor salesman and F
00:24:28
and father Jacob beard now in 1982 Jacob beard he was actually already pretty well known to
00:24:35
the police due to a few charges of animal cruelty he was facing at the time and he was facing those charges at the
00:24:42
time that he was making the calls to Vicky's family trigger warning here I'm just going to quickly tell you what
00:24:48
those call those um charges were about so if you want to skip forward I would do that now according to the charges he
00:24:54
had killed his girl his former girlfriend's cat and left it in in her bed for her to find and he had also been
00:25:00
accused of trying to kill her dog but luckily the dog was able to be saved oh he also did this on Christmas Eve what
00:25:09
mhm now because the charges were still pending the County prosecutor actually offered to dismiss those animal cruelty
00:25:17
charges in exchange for Jacob Beard's cooperation in the case holy [ __ ] and they also offered to Grant him immunity
00:25:24
for any after theact involvement that he may have had in Vicki and ny's deaths damn crazy I know they were desperate to
00:25:34
get this solved now but if it was found that he was directly responsible for the
00:25:38
deaths immunity would be off the table wow okay yeah so according to Jacob beard he had left for work about 5:15
00:25:47
that night the night that Vicky and um Nancy were killed then he said he went home to eat something for dinner and
00:25:54
then headed off to a school board meeting with his wife he told author authorities that he and his wife were
00:25:59
returning from that meeting around 9900 p.m. that night when they saw three local residents Christine cook Palmer
00:26:06
Atkinson and William McCoy entering into the woods near Dro Mountain park with two women he said resembled Vicki and
00:26:14
Nancy oh now he also claimed that there was actually a third victim from the rainbow family killed by Palmer Atkinson
00:26:22
and he knew that because Palmer and another local resident Arnold cutlip had brought the body back to his own
00:26:30
property Jacob's property and disposed of the body by putting it into his corn chopper what so this is like a very
00:26:39
Fantastical tale if this is all true o yeah so the police arrested the men that Jacob claimed were responsible for
00:26:47
the murders but after 2 months of Investigation they determined his story was a hoax what and all three men were
00:26:54
released from custody so he just just came up with this entire story and named random
00:27:01
people involved supposedly wow maybe it gets hairy just wa okay so the shift and focus away from
00:27:10
those suspects coincided with suspicions falling on two new suspects 42-year-old
00:27:15
Gerald Lee Brown and 20-year-old Bobby Lee Morrison now according to Morrison he had been out driving around with
00:27:22
Gerald Lee uh Brown Excuse me on the night of June 24th and he said they picked up Nancy and Vicky who were
00:27:29
hitchhiking and then he claimed the four of them spent some time drinking he passed out in Gerald Brown's van and
00:27:35
when he woke up Morrison claimed he witnessed Brown shoot both women and then he said he helped Brown move the
00:27:41
bodies out to Brier knob before returning to town why are so many people admitting to having some kind of part in
00:27:49
this oh so many people you're barely at the tip of the iceberg right now what the [ __ ] it's w this case is one of the
00:27:56
craziest ones when it comes to the investigation I think that I have ever personally researched like wow it's wild
00:28:03
now both men were arrested in April 1983 bail was set at $100,000 for brown and 50,000 for Morrison and in a press
00:28:12
conference prosecutor J Steven Hunter told reporters he quote in all probability would try to seek Morrison
00:28:18
as an adult or excuse me would seek to try Morrison as an adult even though he was a juvenile at the time of the
00:28:23
murders so this is public now wow now while the arrest of Morrison and brown seemed like a pretty positive turn of
00:28:31
events in the case a lot of people in town were pretty confused or weary about how investigators actually became
00:28:37
suspicious of those to in the first place prosecutor Hunter told reporters quote at the time he meaning Morrison
00:28:44
wasn't a suspect it just happened that this turned out to be the lead that led to an arrest but he would never say what
00:28:51
the lead was that led them to Morrison and brown yeah because there wasn't one in all reality Morrison himself went to
00:29:00
the police out of nowhere to report himself and brown as the men responsible for Vicki and nany's murders what so
00:29:08
strange okay but a few weeks later during the I can never say this preliminary hearing Morrison recanted
00:29:16
his initial confession and told the judge and prosecutor that Jacob beard had manipulated him into confessing in
00:29:24
order to take the heat off of himself so Jacob beard is back back again what the [ __ ] Moran claimed
00:29:30
that beard told him quote something would happen to his family if he didn't make the statement and that was the only
00:29:35
reason he made up the story about picking up The Hitchhikers in the first place wow so under those circumstances
00:29:41
the prosecutor had to drop those charges against Morrison and brown and the case
00:29:46
went cold again this is a whirlwind and this is barely even the beginning jeez it didn't
00:29:52
take long before investigators had a new suspect though on March 1st 1984 while being interviewed by Special
00:30:01
by a special agent from the Wisconsin Department of Justice for unrelated crimes I feel like they should shorten
00:30:06
their name maybe convicted serial killer Joseph Paul Franklin confessed to murdering two white female hitchhikers
00:30:15
near droop Mountain Forest and he even provided a crudely drawn map of the location where he left the bodies what
00:30:22
now I just want to give a trigger warning probably I would say for racism here because this guy is a racist piece
00:30:29
of [ __ ] so skip forward if you don't want to hear about him I feel like his name is familiar yeah you probably know
00:30:35
about him he's he's a Monster yeah so Joseph Paul Franklin had actually been born James Clayton Von Jr but changed
00:30:44
his name to honor Benjamin Franklin and a Nazi leader named Paul ysep GBL I think is how you say it uh it sounds
00:30:53
right to me he's pretty terrible so I don't actually care how to pronounce his name yeah uh Franklin himself was a
00:30:58
[ __ ] deplorable monster he was a member of the American Nazi party a member of the KKK an avowed white
00:31:06
supremacist and a serial killer oh he checks all the the really bad guy boxes all the deplorable boxes at the time of
00:31:14
his confession he was already serving multiple life sentences for murder uh he mainly targeted black men and
00:31:21
interracial couples and he would eventually be convicted of killing eight people but suspected of killing more
00:31:27
than 20 wow he confessed to over 20 murders but they were never able to completely pin them down wow so this
00:31:35
would be out of his victim profile it would be but when you hear his quote unquote motive or what at
00:31:44
least what he says it is not necessarily so according to his confession he picked
00:31:48
Vicky and Nancy up in West Virginia and the three had been just engaging in small talk and the subject of
00:31:55
interracial dating came up I'm sure he was the one to bring that up and he was disgusted when neither woman objected to
00:32:01
the idea of dating a black man he said one of them said she had and the other said if the opportunity arose that she
00:32:07
would yeah now it was then he claimed that he decided to quote waste both of them right there jeez he's a disgusting
00:32:15
human gosh in a prison interview he said it only took one shot for the first one
00:32:21
then I just turned real quick over the seat and shot the other one okay later that's awful horrible and just like to
00:32:29
think that one question and then that's it but later he said he regretted killing Nancy because according to him
00:32:37
it was Vicky that was the one who had an interracial relationship before and he said when he asked Nancy if she would
00:32:43
consider it she said she would but he said he still wished he didn't kill her what the [ __ ] he it's he's I don't even
00:32:50
know if he did this like I don't really know what my opinion is because it get it gets so convoluted along the way but
00:32:56
I'm like either either way like you're a [ __ ] [ __ ] yeah you're disgusting so Franklin's confession would seem to
00:33:02
have brought the mystery to an end but there were more than a few unanswered questions and a lot of people suspected
00:33:09
he wasn't telling the truth because after his initial confession he refused to discuss the murders with law
00:33:15
enforcement again and while he may have confessed to these murders he actually seemed to have very few details about
00:33:22
the crime and some of them Stu wrong right exactly for one thing you you probably noticed he said he only shot
00:33:29
each girl one time before dragging their bodies out to the woods when like I said
00:33:34
earlier the technican who had performed the examinations the postm modum examinations was clear that Vicki had
00:33:41
been shot twice and Nancy had been shot three times yeah and then in addition to
00:33:46
that it was believed that the um a high-powered rifle was the murder weapon that's what I didn't get a gun like that
00:33:53
would be very awkward to use in the close confines of a car and and it it just didn't make a lot of sense none of
00:34:00
it lines up so finally there was also the fact that he had a history history of making supposedly false confessions
00:34:07
there you go so they were like I don't know about this what kind you I I'm like you monstrous like truly monstrous to
00:34:15
try to take credit for this kind of stuff it's like my goodness and by the time he was executed by lethal injection
00:34:21
in 2013 oh like not that long ago he had confessed to more than 20 murders across
00:34:28
the country wow including the shooting of Hustler magazine founder Larry Fint in
00:34:33
1978 and Urban League president Vernon Johnson in 1980 oh so he was just like taking credit for everything MH they
00:34:41
were never able I guess to prove that he like didn't uh do either of those shootings yeah but but they weren't able
00:34:47
to prove he did either correct exactly correct correct I always sound very condescending when I say that corre
00:34:54
correct now given the questionable validity of his claims authorities in West Virginia declined to prosecute
00:35:01
saying that the confession quote lacked the requisite guarantees of trust it doesn't line up for me no now in the
00:35:07
context of West Virginia law the confession fell into the category I thought this was interesting of what's
00:35:13
known as a statement against interest or a statement that is so contrary to the declarant interests that it's unlikely
00:35:20
to be true huh yeah now because they're mostly determined to be false a statement against interest is typically
00:35:27
not admissible in court oh okay and without any more corroborating evidence West Virginia prosecutors were like yeah
00:35:33
he's not a viable suspect would be Supreme waste of time that's basically how they felt now I don't know I'm not
00:35:39
sure what I think about it because when you think about the fact that a Confederate flag was left with their
00:35:44
belongings oh yeah but I mean he's not the only and that's what I was just going to say like he that seems like
00:35:50
something he probably would have done but again he's not the only person that would do that I don't to me I don't just
00:35:58
from hearing that I would say no but yeah the fact that he didn't know how many times each was shot and I guess and
00:36:04
it was a high powerered rifle that would be very difficult to do in a car in a car right and um the map he drew was not
00:36:11
it was like all right but they were like I don't know like you could have got that from Reading different sources
00:36:18
about this case nope don't buy it yeah well you're not the only one and law enforcement officials were not the only
00:36:24
ones who considered this confession self-serving wildly inconsistent with the details all
00:36:29
of the above a lot of people including actually ny's own family found these claims hard to believe and like many
00:36:36
investigators Nancy's sister Cathy believes Franklin had picked up a few details from magazines or news reports
00:36:43
which would account for the lack of spec specificity in his claims cuz he gave no
00:36:48
details that would be something only the killer would know exactly and if you can't give me that then you weren't
00:36:54
there exactly that's the thing if you can read it in a magazine azine or a newspaper I don't I don't trust it
00:37:00
that's the thing and actually at the time he was arrested he supposedly I couldn't like totally pin this down but
00:37:06
I read in a couple sources that he was said to have a magazine in his possession that laid out a couple of the
00:37:12
key details from the case and those were the ones he pointed to there you go so authorities in West Virginia they shared
00:37:18
Cathy's Theory an anonymous source from the prosecutor's office told reporters his story has evolved over the years
00:37:25
when he when he began this scenario he really knew none of the details he did not know how many times the women had
00:37:30
been shot he did not know what areas of areas of the body the wounds were sustained and he could not accurately
00:37:35
describe his roote before and after the murders Yeah by so [ __ ] yeah now after the quick collapse of his
00:37:43
confession the investigation into Vicki and ny's murders went inactive yet again
00:37:48
getting you know the occasional review every so often but other than that remaining mostly cold and it wasn't
00:37:55
until late 199 when a new group of investigators decided to give the case a second look
00:38:01
now in that review this is so interesting detectives or at least to me detectives found a note from
00:38:07
1985 regarding a local woman named Alice Roberts who had contacted them and they
00:38:13
had never followed up with her initial like reaching out to them what so when detectives got in touch with Alice these
00:38:21
new detectives she redirected them to her daughter Pam Wilson saying that she actually knew her daughter thought or
00:38:28
she believed that her daughter knew something about the murders oh wow so and they just ignored her the first time
00:38:33
around just never got back to her cool right so according to Pam Wilson she had been in town on the day that the murders
00:38:40
occurred and she said she saw two quote unquote hippie type women get into a blue van belonging to a man named Richie
00:38:47
Fowler and she said Richie Fowler wasn't alone that afternoon he was in the company of two other local men Winter's
00:38:54
Peewee Walton and Willi William McCoy William McCoy had previously been arrested say that rings a bell yeah um
00:39:03
and that he was arrested alongside Jacob beard so the tip was definitely of Interest yeah so around the same time
00:39:10
investigators were also contacted by an inmate named Keith CER I believe is how you say his last name he was serving a
00:39:18
10-year prison sentence for forgery and he said that he was willing to trade information about the murders in
00:39:24
exchange for better prison condition going to pause there better prison conditions just saying I'm like if you
00:39:32
got something gain I don't know if I but he claimed that he had actually been at Gerald Brown Gerald Brown's home
00:39:39
several months after the murders and while he was there he overheard Gerald Brown confess that he Richie Fowler and
00:39:47
two other men had been responsible for the murders and that quote everyone should just keep their mouth shut whoa
00:39:54
so that's pretty interesting interesting jeez this is like set of people number four the amount it got so confusing at
00:40:02
the end because there's going to be even more players and a bunch of them have the same last name or like one has a
00:40:07
last name that's somebody else's first name I was getting really confused but after investigating Pam's tips as well
00:40:14
as Keith's investigators learned of more eyewitness accounts who had spotted a group of men including peeee Walton
00:40:21
William McCoy and Richie Fowler together on the day of the murder oh now one Tipper claimed they actually saw three
00:40:28
of the men hosing out the back of the van on the same night mhm that's chilling now based on the and remember
00:40:36
they had said they didn't believe that they had been killed there they believed that they had been killed elsewhere and
00:40:40
dumped there so that's interesting that they maybe were posing the van out allegedly now based on the tips arrest
00:40:49
warrants were actually issued for a man named Richard Lewis who also eventually was brought into the equation Gerald
00:40:54
Brown Peewee Walton and Arnold cutlip all of them denied any involvement but still obviously they were not like yeah
00:41:02
your word's the best ever yeah they're like oh sounds good oh okay never mind you're free to go so they were held on
00:41:06
$100,000 bond all of them now in his statement to the Press prosecutor Walt wayford refused to speculate on any kind
00:41:13
of motive but he said the arrests to date are the result of an intensive investigation conducted by Sheriff Jerry
00:41:19
Dale and Sergeant Robert a alire they worked a lot of long and hard hours now Sheriff Dale was also pretty vague about
00:41:28
what led investigators to these four men who had been arrested and all he really
00:41:33
said to the public was people got older and became less intimidated and frightened about the subjects who were
00:41:39
responsible for the murders okay which like sure okay he declined to add any additional details but to me it sounds
00:41:47
like they probably um should have listened should have listened to the original tip from six years ago yeah you
00:41:54
know but like okay maybe just call her back just call her back call her back she reached out for a reason and it
00:42:00
looks like she had some valuable information you've just arrested how many people so within a few days
00:42:05
actually additional charges were brought against three other men believed to have
00:42:09
been involved in the crime Johnny Lewis Jaa beard yet again and William McCoy now all three of them had been suspected
00:42:18
of some involvement at some point as we all know at this point in the previous decade how many men were involved in
00:42:24
this jeez I think seven total wow one resident told reporters a couple of those are very surprising and then
00:42:30
there's a couple of people that's not so surprising o now within a few weeks of the arrest people in town were talking
00:42:37
and they had their own theories about the motive of The Killers most people agreed that it was anger surrounding
00:42:43
this supposed hippie invasion of the rainbow family but the prosecutor's office had yet to make any formal
00:42:48
statement as to what they believed was the motive Gerald Brown's defense attorney Paul DCH was suspicious though
00:42:55
when it came to the evidence that led to the arrests and he told reporters it's a
00:42:59
bunch of police officers who are on a Witch Hunt they've got people held on paperwork that wouldn't hold an assault
00:43:04
and battery case whoa so it was it was shaky grounds here that they were holding them on and Arnold cut lips
00:43:11
lawyer Martin safer agreed saying they're going to have to flush out the allegations of the Warren if they can EK
00:43:17
so he was like I don't know now DCH safer and many others in town actually suspected that the prosecutor's office
00:43:25
didn't really have any new information about the case but they just wanted to clear the notorious Cold Case to make it
00:43:32
seem like they were getting [ __ ] done I mean and that does happen of course it
00:43:35
does and the County prosecutor on the case Walt wayford wasn't doing much to stifle those suspicions he wasn't
00:43:42
talking a lot yeah he which you can look at two ways one he's not talking cuz he
00:43:46
barely has anything or he has a [ __ ] ton and he's keeping it close to the chest
00:43:50
exactly we said that how many times all he would say to the public was that the evidence would be presented at the Grand
00:43:56
Jury hearing but other than that nothing okay so by the time the case did reach the grand jury things did not appear to
00:44:04
be going smoothly for the prosecutor's office the charges against Peewee Walton had been dropped for lack of evidence
00:44:10
William McCoy was already serving a sentence in Nevada for an unrelated crime Jacob beard was living in Florida
00:44:16
at this point and fighting extradition and the two others who were involved were invoking their Fifth Amendment
00:44:22
rights and refusing to cooperate cool in fact by May 1992 only two cases Arnold cutlip and Gerald Browns were Bound for
00:44:30
trial wow two months later the cases against the seven men charged with these two murders had pretty much Fallen apart
00:44:39
wow and the prosecutor Walt wayford had no choice but to drop the charges what he told reporters I'm sitting here with
00:44:46
a case that's been torpedoed now what he was referring to was some new information that had come
00:44:52
to light about investigation procedures uhoh according to the prosecutor's office Trooper Michael Jordan of the
00:44:59
state's Bureau of Criminal investigations had used improper investigation procedures and quote
00:45:05
unquote seriously compromised the case oh no wayford said he still planned to present the case to a grand jury in
00:45:12
August of 1992 but he wasn't hopeful that it would go anywhere oh man now he was right to
00:45:19
be discouraged by the time the grand jury did review the evidence and considered the accusations of uh police
00:45:26
misconduct all the charges were dropped oh man and in the weeks that followed they kept on trying new indictments were
00:45:33
issued against Jacob beard Richard Fowler Fowler William McCoy and Arnold cutlip but of all of those new
00:45:41
indictments only Jacob beard would end up going to trial I mean he's been a consistent name in all of this for sure
00:45:47
he has now his trial started in late May of 1993 and he was facing first-degree murder charges for obviously the murders
00:45:55
of Vicki and Nancy from the moment the trial began the prosecution's case seemed pretty flimsy they relied on
00:46:03
hearsay testimony from some of the men that had previously been charged alongside Jacob beard oh boy and they
00:46:09
alleged the prosecution that after picking up Vicki and Nancy Jacob beard attempted to convince one or both of
00:46:15
them to have sex with him and when they turned down his advances he shot them both and dumped their bodies in the
00:46:21
woods that was their Theory their quote unquote evidence against him included one statements from that previous inmate
00:46:29
that we talked about Keith um and Pam Wilson which placed him at Gerald Brown's house on the night that the men
00:46:35
were heard confessing okay two a statement from a man who claimed he saw beard quote driving at a high rate of
00:46:42
speed away from droop Mountain which was where the bodies were found on the night
00:46:46
of the murders and three statements from Johnny Lewis and peeee Walton that implicated Jacob beard as the killer it
00:46:54
should be noted that these two men men had actually been beaten by investigators previously and that's why
00:47:00
they had confessed previously that's what I meant earlier by improper investigative procedures oh yeah that
00:47:06
would be improper mhm and actually one investigator previously stated that Johnny Lewis quote could be talked into
00:47:14
saying anything wow Lewis only this is like sad that they went after him if he had nothing to do with this he only had
00:47:21
an education up to the third grade and he didn't even know who the president was at the time he was being
00:47:27
interrogated oh man that gives me Jesse muscelli Vibes that is immediately what I thought of and I knew you would too
00:47:33
and the same investigator he didn't have something to do with this of course the
00:47:37
same investigator I don't I I don't know if I think he did the same investigator
00:47:42
said Lewis only gave the confession because he was scared and he had previously been hit he actually I think
00:47:47
the direct quote was that he was so scared he felt like he was going to pee Oh which is like heartbreaking again if
00:47:52
he had nothing to do with this yeah but both of those men had been beaten previously into confessing so yeah I
00:47:59
don't really know how we're going to believe their testimony either way not great now Jacob Beard's defense attorney
00:48:05
Steven framer of course claimed his client's innocence but he and he noted that the cases there excuse me the
00:48:11
States's case relied almost entirely on testimony from known liars and accusations from two men who had only
00:48:18
recently been given immunity in exchange for their testimony against Jacob beard
00:48:23
again not great not great the defense also made several motions to introduce evidence that maybe wouldn't necessarily
00:48:30
prove innocence but at the very least would have cast doubt on these charges against Jacob beard and that evidence
00:48:37
included uh ysf I guess Paul Franklin's confessions from years earlier but the trial judge refused to admit any of the
00:48:44
defense's evidence calling it hearsay and unreliable o but it's like I think it's hearsay that all these other people
00:48:52
who were previously accused and unreliable that we would believe them too this is a mess like I'm not saying
00:48:58
that Jacob beard didn't have anything to do with it because I don't know one way
00:49:02
or the other but I mean this is who we have testifying against him yeah I mean this is what what's really sad about
00:49:11
this whole thing is that Vicky and Nancy are just at the center of this chaos but
00:49:17
got like completely lost in this Bullit we don't even know anything about what happened to them and it sounds like
00:49:28
the it in my opinion it sounds like the investigators didn't even really care to
00:49:32
find out what happened to them they just wanted to close the case that's the thing that's what it kind of feels like
00:49:37
it became less about let's get Justice for these two young girls who were just going to a music festival yeah like some
00:49:43
little get together [ __ ] rainbow gathering right instead of really focusing on that part of it they're
00:49:50
really just focusing on clearing their books and it's like doing it quickly and they're not even doing it prop like
00:49:56
beating people to confess you really feel good about that it really it like West Memphis 3 Vibes because in that
00:50:03
case it's the same thing they grabbed the three kids who they could pin this on yep because they needed to clear this
00:50:09
off the books and it's like that never works man like nobody wants you to just [ __ ] everybody into into thinking
00:50:18
it's been solved right cuz eventually we're going to find out that people are going to find out no it wasn't and
00:50:22
they're going to find out that one you didn't care about the actual video victims and two that you put everybody
00:50:27
in danger by letting the real people get away with it exactly it's it's really honestly this is like a tragedy in so
00:50:34
many different ways I mean I can tell you right now I have no [ __ ] clue who is innocent here and who isn't I have no
00:50:40
idea I have no opinion on it cuz I it's all lost by the end of this I had read so many different things to try to
00:50:46
convince myself whoever did it yeah or whoever had done it did but I'm still at a loss I have no idea so far I'm I have
00:50:54
no opinion I just just think it's a mess to be quite honest with you by the end I
00:50:58
don't think you'll be convinced probably not either way so in his closing statement Steven framer reminded the
00:51:03
jury of the unlikely scenario presented by the prosecutor and he told them if the state is Right Jacob beard would
00:51:10
have had to kill two girls in front of a group of people he mostly did not know that's true it's pretty weird framer
00:51:16
also reminded the jury that his client actually had an alibi that contradicted the statements made by the men formerly
00:51:22
accused alongside him and this included evidence showing that Jacob was almost certainly at work the night like that
00:51:30
night and around the time that the murders were committed however that's interesting I did read that his time
00:51:36
card was handwritten so that could easily be changed all right and I just will say that now in hiso in his closing
00:51:43
arguments prosecutor Walt wafer told the jury quote the only person who has testified here who can tell you where
00:51:48
Jake beard was between the hours of 3:15 and 8:00 p.m. that day is Jake beard implying that the accused can't be
00:51:55
trusted which is fair even though most of his key Witnesses had actually been the Accused at one point or the other
00:52:01
legitimately no one can be trusted here none now on June 4th 1993 the jury deliberated for 6 hours before returning
00:52:10
with a guilty verdict on both counts of first-degree murder and Jacob beard was sentenced to life in prison without the
00:52:18
possibility of parole otherwise known as life without Mercy damn yeah now we're not done
00:52:26
because what should have been a moment of relief for you know Poss I know you can't necessarily get closure but some
00:52:31
kind of closure for Nancy and Vicky's friends and family was instead completely suspicious and most people
00:52:39
were still skeptical about all the details involved nany's own mother Jean spoke to reporters about the conviction
00:52:45
later saying you should have heard the testimony I didn't think there was enough evidence and I wasn't convinced
00:52:50
he was the one wow so like that tells you something one of the victim's own mothers is like I this evidence was Wild
00:52:57
and the testimony was insane and I don't think he did it because I wasn't convinced he did it as a loved one of
00:53:03
somebody who this happened to like you would want to be convinced that they have the guy who did it to your child or
00:53:11
your loved one like you don't want to just go okay I guess like you want to you want to walk out of there being like
00:53:18
yes they convince me that is him right cuz that's the thing essentially if you're not convinced then the question
00:53:23
on your mind is like well is this another life lost in this case like is is this it or like are there more that
00:53:31
we don't know about like yeah you know there's just a lot here I feel really bad for the family members here they did
00:53:37
not get that moment of at least for a minute Justice being served and unfortunately I don't think they ever
00:53:43
did I think that this family was left with more questions than they probably had even in the beginning of wow the
00:53:49
tragedy that happened to again I have no idea if this man did it or not I really
00:53:54
don't feel com thing either way nor do I so in January of 1995 this is where things get a little bit complicated
00:54:01
there's a lot of legal jargon here but I did my best to kind of I looked into it
00:54:06
myself and I was like I am not quite sure what that means so then I kept looking into it and I broke it down in
00:54:10
an ashway for you okay cool so in January 1995 Jacob beard appealed his conviction to the Supreme Court of
00:54:18
Appeals of West Virginia among other things the appeal cited the refusal to admit key pieces of the defense's case
00:54:25
like Franklin's confession the result of Beard's polygraph test the fact that he
00:54:30
had actually been granted immunity from prosecution in 1983 oh yeah and the fact
00:54:35
that 11 years had passed between his arrest and his conviction wow now the appeal also cited numerous errors
00:54:42
supposedly committed during the trial those uh errors were allegations of police misconduct to what was considered
00:54:50
credible evidence everything in between now regarding the claim of immunity Beard's attorney acknowledged that the
00:54:56
1983 deal didn't necessarily protect him if he was the principal actor that's true however his role in the crime was
00:55:03
supposed to be determined in what's known as a cagar hearing well and that never occurred now a cagar hearing is
00:55:10
based is excuse me a hearing based on a 1972 Supreme Court case and essentially it states that a witness who is
00:55:18
compelled to testify after they've been given immunity but then is later prosecuted has a right to this hearing
00:55:25
where the state has quote the heavy burden of proving that all evidence it propo it proposes to use was derived
00:55:32
from legitimate independent sources okay now that makes sense right I thought so
00:55:37
in their decision the justices wrote the state argues that the failure to Gran a
00:55:41
castigar hearing is harmless where it is otherwise evident that any immunized evidence admitted at trial did not
00:55:48
Prejudice the accused and that's where things get hairier because in order to invoke this harmless error rule there
00:55:56
would have had to have been a cagar hearing so it all goes back to the castar hearing right yeah so after
00:56:02
reviewing the evidence and the trial transcripts the justices upheld the lower Court's conviction but they did
00:56:08
remand the case for a review in the L lower courts quote to determine whether any prosecution evidence had been
00:56:14
developed from leads beard provided after being granted limited immunity okay because if he provided those leads
00:56:22
that like led to him it would [ __ ] things up from my understanding it wouldn't necessarily be derived purely
00:56:29
that makes sense right yeah it's very convoluted but you made it easier to understand okay I hope so thank you for
00:56:35
that you're welcome so Jacob beard finally did get his cagar hearing which was held in early September 1996 in the
00:56:43
Circuit Court of Greenbrier County the judge in that case ruled that the evidence was properly obtained he wrote
00:56:50
that quote the state had not violate excuse me violated the use of immunity agreement and entered to with beard okay
00:56:57
but undeterred Jacob beard and his attorney appealed the lower Court's decision again in
00:57:03
1998 but again the Supreme Court of Appeals upheld the lower Court's conviction okay now with no additional
00:57:10
errors to claim in the trial Beard's lawyer lawyer filed a petition for a writ of habius Corpus MH now that is the
00:57:20
fundamental instrument for safeguarding individual Freedom against arbitrary and
00:57:24
Lawless estate action okay so the argument there was that certain evidence mainly the sworn deposition from ysf
00:57:31
Paul Franklin's confessions was barred at J uh Jake Beard's original trial now the petition also included the earlier
00:57:40
testimony from Arnold cutlip which had also been barred from evidence at trial in which he admitted he had actually
00:57:46
been with Richard Lewis on the day of the murders and contrary to what he said at trial the two men actually had not
00:57:53
seen beard that day that previously wasn't allowed in court so in layman's terms Beard's defense attorney Steven
00:58:01
framer was arguing that this was crucial evidence that should never have been withheld from the jury and that with his
00:58:07
this evidence his client could likely be proven innocent yeah so that makes sense
00:58:13
basically saying I have evidence here and it wasn't allowed and that's why we should retry this yeah cool so in a
00:58:20
statement to the Press Steven framer indicated his intent to request a retrial saying Franklin certainly has
00:58:26
the resume to have done what he uh done what he says he's done so talking about that original confession serial killer
00:58:33
the serial Killer's confession that we weren't so sure about yeah I don't know about that one but again that all I have
00:58:38
to go on is very little information so right and it's valid to bring up in in that trial I would say because I would
00:58:45
it's a valid argument to be like well multiple people have confessed to this so look at these people also doing the
00:58:51
same yeah and he also talked about the seriously question able sources that the prosecutors used as evidence for their
00:58:58
conviction specifically peee Walton who like I said earlier only accused Jacob beard after he had been wildly
00:59:05
intimidated which is a new legal term that I made look it up freemer told the Press quote he didn't remember anything
00:59:11
about this until he was beaten by State Police talking about Arnold cutlip now in January of 1999 the RIT of habius
00:59:19
Corpus was granted and Beard's conviction was vacated with orders for yet another new trial wow now Jacob
00:59:28
Beard's new trial began in May 2000 this time in Braxton County because there had
00:59:33
been so much press coverage and public awareness in Pocahontas County that he was never going to get a fair trial
00:59:39
there yeah now in this trial he actually testified on his own behalf admitting he
00:59:44
couldn't remember his actions the night of June 25th 1980 but he maintained that
00:59:49
he had never met and definitely did not kill Vicki and Nancy yeah which I think is a fair thing to say who the hell
00:59:56
would remember what they were doing on June 25th 1980 but you can definitely remember if you killed someone 100% Fair
01:00:03
statement to me yeah now also testifying now in his defense remember a man previously testified against him was
01:00:11
Arnold cutlip oh [ __ ] he told the jury he had lied in his earlier testimony and
01:00:17
that he had in fact had not seen beard on the day of the murders instead Steven framer told the jury it was you uh Paul
01:00:24
ysf Franklin who had committed the murders and this time his confession was entered into evidence okay now nany's
01:00:34
mother Jean actually also wrote a letter for the defense stating she believed Jacob beard was innocent wow yeah now
01:00:40
when it came time for the prosecution's case the most damning evidence they still had were the two calls that Jacob
01:00:47
beard had placed to the durian home Vicky's family home two years after the murders I actually forgot that that was
01:00:53
him I don't believe glad you brought that back a lot of characters now that had actually gone a long way in his
01:01:00
original trial to convince the jury that he was guilty yeah but he didn't he didn't say any it's weird that he called
01:01:07
them in my opinion but wasn't he just saying I have a daughter and it bothers me that you are not getting the
01:01:13
information that you should be getting yeah he was sympathizing them which again I understand why the family
01:01:20
members were like this is strange and freaking me out definitely but it sounds like if you look at it just purely from
01:01:28
what it is it's like okay it doesn't look like he if he's innocent then it looks like he just didn't have any
01:01:34
malicious intent and literally was just trying to share information or sympathize that's the thing because I
01:01:41
can't tell I I think I would feel differently if he had been like calling them in heavy breathing on the other
01:01:48
line hanging up like a creep exactly like harassing them I mean he he did refuse to identify himself which was
01:01:55
strange but maybe it was like him just being freaked out cuz he was under those animal cruelty charges charges at the
01:02:02
time so not great which Al that's not a good thing he maintains he had he didn't
01:02:07
do anything to do with that and those charges were dropped so okay we don't necessarily know say he maintains he
01:02:13
didn't do it and the charges were dropped then we'll negate that and the charges were dropped again because of
01:02:18
these new charges where he was granted immunity it's all very complicated but it makes sense not to even go there at
01:02:24
this because let's just look at the information we have and then you think he was criticizing the police in this
01:02:30
case yeah he sure was and that's just a statement that's that's that's just a statement that he was and yeah and I
01:02:37
mean I'm just the fact that ny's mother Jean wrote a letter for the defense stating she believed he's innocent that
01:02:45
compels me to stand more on her side right not only that but even when he had been
01:02:51
previously uh convicted of this crime she spoke to the press and was like yeah I wasn't convinced and the evidence and
01:02:57
testimony at that trial was insane and now she I mean if she's willing to have this guy out that tells you a lot really
01:03:03
doesn't believe that he did it no like there's no way you're going to want the somebody who killed your daughter in
01:03:09
such a callous and awful way just walking around if you don't truly believe in your heart that he didn't do
01:03:15
it m exactly so this is very interesting I will say that Nancy sister Cathy wasn't so sure she didn't it doesn't
01:03:22
seem like she thought did it but I don't think she thought that he didn't do it she wasn't convinced either way she was
01:03:27
like us I have no idea what happened here and it's a tragedy either way this is awful for this these families it's
01:03:35
horrible because I'm frustrated right now I can't even begin to Fathom how they feel exactly now again just going
01:03:44
back to the prosecution's main case here again was those two phone calls that he
01:03:47
made to the durian family in his defense beard said he read an article in 1982 about how the murders remained solved
01:03:54
and as a father himself he was sympathetic he told the jury I was sorry the police hadn't followed up the way
01:04:00
many people in the area thought they should okay you know when you hear that you're like okay that makes sense yeah I
01:04:05
don't know if you necessarily need to like call a grieving family I do not agree with your methods here sir but but
01:04:12
okay if you're if you're saying it's pure I'm hoping the thought was pure behind it correct correct correct now
01:04:19
the jury deliberated for Less Than 3 hours this time and came back and acquitted
01:04:24
jacard on all charges on May 31st a year later Jacob beard filed a wrongful conviction lawsuit against the
01:04:32
Pocahontas County Police Department and in January 2003 the county agreed to settle the case awarding him $2 million
01:04:40
wow yeah I will say I saw $2 million in some sources and 1.3 million in other sources still a lot of money either way
01:04:47
he got millions he got a lot of money yes I think he said he bought a new tractor but he wasn't about to buy like
01:04:52
a bunch of other [ __ ] okay that's what he said all right now I don't I don't know I don't I just don't know how to
01:04:59
feel about any of this so neither do I I'm just going to say okay I know that Kathy nany's sister didn't love that he
01:05:06
was awarded that money because she again she still wasn't convinced that he was innocent or that he was guilty and in
01:05:12
her mind if he was guilty he just got awarded millions of dollars absolutely that's why I'm going to stay over here
01:05:17
and just and then I think Jean was just like good for him like I I can't like whatever yeah which is awful so the
01:05:23
rainbow family continues to hold annual Gatherings around the United States actually incidents of violent crime
01:05:29
remain low at the Gatherings but murders continued to occasionally take place at
01:05:34
the events with the last murder as recent as 2021 oh I'm going to look into some of those and potentially update if
01:05:41
it's got enough for a full case wow but interesting very interesting and sadly as of today the murders of Vicky durian
01:05:50
and Nancy sanero remain unsolved that that's awful that's honestly the biggest thing in this case is I can't
01:05:59
believe that just they got lost in it and I I blame the investigators in this case you can't intimidate people into
01:06:06
confessing because it muddies the waters yes you've lost all your credibility any
01:06:12
trust any kind of anything professionalism whatever you have going in it's taken all out and you [ __ ] up
01:06:18
the case and it's like if you have if you do your job then you and you are good at your job mhm then you will
01:06:24
convince somebody to give you information or you will have evidence to keep them exactly like you don't need to
01:06:30
beat it out of them I really hope that like someday there's some form of you know DNA that gets found or I I think
01:06:39
they would have found it at this point you I guess you would assume but I just hope somebody talks I want someone to
01:06:44
talk somebody to make a real confession like like you just said actual meat like
01:06:51
somebody can sit there and go this is what I saw this isly who I saw there and you they can put the pieces together but
01:06:56
now there's so much information out about muddled the case exactly it's so muddled but I just feel bad for their
01:07:03
families like their their brothers and sisters just not having any idea what happened and like their parents and to
01:07:09
be like conflicted on whether this guy is really innocent or not or guilty or not it's like that's really hard it is
01:07:17
you don't know and for him it's like if he's guilty walking around with that much money it's like Jesus [ __ ]
01:07:22
Christ dude but if in but if he's innocent then and he got lamb basted like that yeah then he lost like you
01:07:30
know years of his life and everything really you know yeah it's it's really tragic all around it is and to think
01:07:36
that again if he's innocent to think that he spent that much time in prison holy [ __ ] yeah so that wow is UN a very
01:07:44
unfortunate case that's a sad one it is I mean they're all sad but that one's just like you don't get that sense of
01:07:49
like at least we know who did it yeah no justice and just a very layered case like LED with tragedy yeah but we hope
01:07:57
you keep listening and we hope you keep it weird not so weird that not so weird not that weird don't keep it that
01:08:07
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