00:00:00
[audio logo] [unsettling music] JAMES BALDWIN (ON
PHONE): I need your help. My wife, I don't
think she's breathing.
00:00:08
Oh, God. NARRATOR: Every fraud
begins with a promise. CANDICE LIVELY:
Howard patrol was
00:00:17
immediately suspicious
that this horrible accident was not an accident. NARRATOR: A quick
fortune, easy money, or
00:00:26
a life transformed overnight. - She's bleeding profusely. Can't get the bleeding to stop.
00:00:34
NARRATOR: But behind
these illusions, lie calculated deceptions. Carefully hidden
in plain sight.
00:00:43
- There absolutely were
whispers in the community about her death. NARRATOR: Sometimes
these criminals
00:00:48
are backed into a corner
and feel their only way out is to kill. - He wanted his wife.
00:00:55
He wanted a girlfriend. And when those things
were threatened, he was unwilling to lose it.
00:01:02
[exhilarating music] [unsettling music] 911 DISPATCHER (ON
PHONE): Chester 911. JAMES BALDWIN (ON PHONE):
We ran off of the bridge.
00:01:36
911 DISPATCHER (ON PHONE):
You ran off the bridge? JAMES BALDWIN (ON
PHONE): Yes, ma'am.
00:01:39
I need help. My wife, I don't
think she's breathing. 911 DISPATCHER (ON
PHONE): All right.
00:01:43
Is she trapped in the vehicle? JAMES BALDWIN (ON
PHONE): No, ma'am. I have pulled her out.
00:01:47
Please help me. Oh, God. CALVIN RIKARD: We work
thousands of cases, and then there are
certain in cases that
00:01:59
just stick with you forever. Ms. Judy is going to be
one of those cases that I don't think anybody in
this area has ever forgotten.
00:02:09
[unsettling music] TRAVIS JENKINS:
Chester is a community where for the most part,
people still know each other.
00:02:23
People know their neighbor and
know their neighbor's neighbor. I'm Travis Jenkins.
00:02:29
I grew up in Chester. I've worked at Chester News &
Reporter full time since 2003.
00:02:35
So 22 years. NARRATOR: In the tight
knit community of Chester. Judy Orr was a much
loved figure.
00:02:45
TRAVIS JENKINS: Judy
loved her family. She was a very kind
and giving person and just
00:02:49
a very sweet natured lady. - I'm Candace Lively,
I'm the deputy solicitor in Chester County.
00:02:57
Judy was a very important
woman in the community because she was involved
with her church.
00:03:04
She knew a lot
of important people in the community just
because of her kindness,
00:03:08
she would volunteer. She was just someone
that most people knew. Judy did have quite an affinity
for the motorcycle groups
00:03:19
that she was involved with. NARRATOR: In 2004,
tragedy struck when Judy's husband,
Todd was killed
00:03:27
in a motorcycle accident. CANDICE LIVELY: Her husband
when he unfortunately passed away, she really missed
that part of her life of being
00:03:36
connected with that community. NARRATOR: After
the death of her husband, Judy continued playing a part
in the Christian biker group.
00:03:46
And around 2011,
she met 52-year-old fellow biker James Baldwin. CANDICE LIVELY: James
Baldwin is someone
00:03:55
that Judy met when
he was a dispatcher for Chester County
Sheriff's Office, and he had also
had some experience
00:04:03
as a police officer
in a neighboring county, that would be York County. - My name is Dr.
Vicky Thakordas-Desai,
00:04:11
and I am a consultant
forensic psychologist. Judy became a widow. It's only natural
for somebody to want
00:04:18
companionship and someone
to love again in their life. And she made
the decision to move on
00:04:26
after a substantial
period of being single. She was loving
and caring, and she wanted to be able to share
that with a partner.
00:04:36
She wanted to be able to enjoy
companionship once again and felt like she could
move on from her loss.
00:04:45
NARRATOR: While Judy
was financially secure after the death
of her husband, Todd,
00:04:50
James Baldwin was an ex-deputy
and local 911 operator. - Judy was definitely
better off financially.
00:04:58
Whenever she met James
Baldwin, she had the house that her husband left her. She had plenty of money
from everything
00:05:05
she received from the proceeds
of her husband's passing. Jamie is not financially
in the same situation.
00:05:13
He's always filing
insurance claims. He was always looking for ways
that he could make money
00:05:20
because he just didn't
make much money doing what he was doing as a dispatcher. VICKY THAKORDAS-DESAI:
James Baldwin
00:05:29
was somebody who was
looking for opportunities, opportunities
to further themselves
00:05:35
and their own wealth. There is evidence of him
trying to defraud insurance. CANDICE LIVELY: He's actually
waiting for financial money
00:05:45
to come in from some
motorcycle accident he had, where he was claiming that
the Department of Public Safety
00:05:54
was at fault for having
electrical box in the wrong place
on a street, and he ran into it
00:06:00
and damaged his bike
and he was hurt. - My name is Fiona
Hotston Moore, and I'm a forensic accountant
and expert witness.
00:06:11
In my experience
of fraud, they do tend to be serial fraudsters. So they do it once
and they get away with it.
00:06:18
They-- perhaps in their mind,
don't intend to do it again, but then circumstances are such
that they do-- do it again.
00:06:24
And I think you need to bear in
mind the fraud triangle, which means there needs to be
motive, opportunity
00:06:31
and rationalization. And if those three
factors are in place, then quite often a fraudster
will repeat the previous fraud.
00:06:42
NARRATOR: James Baldwin's
background as a 911 operator and ex-deputy meant he
was quickly embraced
00:06:48
by the Chester community. TRAVIS JENKINS: I
definitely think that James Baldwin's
background and
00:06:55
law enforcement would have made
other people trustful of him. And I think that that probably
just grew because, again,
00:07:02
so many people knew Judy and so
many people loved or liked her. She had a lot of friends.
00:07:09
She was very well
known in the community. NARRATOR: In March
2012, Judy and James
00:07:16
married, and Judy
was happy to spend lavishly on her new husband. - Judy really did enjoy
spending money on Jamie.
00:07:26
He was very charismatic. And at the time, she's
just such a console. I think she just loved
all the attention.
00:07:33
It had been a long
time since she had had a serious
relationship, and so she did.
00:07:38
They actually went and bought
a beautiful new Harley Davidson motorcycle for him.
00:07:44
And anything and everything he
wanted for it, she paid for it. She basically set
him up in this house
00:07:52
and paid for and did
anything that he wanted. He was living the kind of life
that he wanted to live,
00:07:59
but it was because Judy
had the money and not him. NARRATOR: In June
2016, James Baldwin
00:08:08
persuaded Judy to take out a
$25,000 life insurance policy. CANDICE LIVELY:
James Baldwin did
00:08:17
take out the accidental
life insurance policy. It just seemed like
a normal thing to do.
00:08:22
And she had unfortunately lost
a husband in her lifetime, and she understood
the importance
00:08:27
of having money
whenever you have an unfortunate loss like that. Jamie had been in some
motorcycle accidents
00:08:34
in the past and he
said, you know, these are-- having an insurance
policy is important.
00:08:40
FIONA HOTSTON MOORE:
An accident-only life policy only pays out if the
person dies in an accident.
00:08:46
So it does not pay
out if they die of natural causes, or some
terminal illness, et cetera.
00:08:52
It's much cheaper
and easier to obtain and therefore potentially
more liable to fraud--
00:08:59
fraudulent claims when
someone actually dies in an untoward circumstance. NARRATOR: In December 2016,
Judy and James Baldwin
00:09:08
were getting ready for an event
with their Christian biker group. CANDICE LIVELY: Judy
Baldwin loved Christmas.
00:09:16
That was her favorite
time of the year. They would go with their group,
their Christian biker group,
00:09:22
on different trips to raise
money for charities. They had one, that was
their biggest one each year,
00:09:28
which was around Christmas,
where they would collect toys for children who were in need.
00:09:34
They were going to go
to Kentucky actually for the 2016 Christmas. That's whenever
things fell apart.
00:09:47
NARRATOR: 11:04 PM
on the evening of December 14, 2016, Chester police
receive a 911 distress call.
00:09:58
911 DISPATCHER (ON
PHONE): Chester 911. JAMES BALDWIN (ON PHONE):
We ran off the bridge.
00:10:03
911 DISPATCHER (ON PHONE):
You ran off the bridge? JAMES BALDWIN (ON PHONE):
Yes, ma'am, I need help.
00:10:07
My wife, I don't
think she's breathing. 911 DISPATCHER (ON
PHONE): All right. Is she trapped in the vehicle?
00:10:12
JAMES BALDWIN (ON
PHONE): No, ma'am. I have pulled her out. Please help me. Oh, God.
00:10:20
NARRATOR: Highway Officer
James Calvin Rikard Jr. Was asked to respond. - My name was James
Calvin Rikard,
00:10:28
Jr. We enforce all traffic laws
and crashes in South Carolina, and we would get called out to
work more complex collisions.
00:10:39
The early hours of the 15, I
was at home, I was sleeping, I got a call from
my supervisor and
00:10:46
stated that the troop here
in Chester, South Carolina, was needing assistance
with one of the cases
00:10:52
that they had responded to. NARRATOR: The supervisor
explained, a Jeep had crashed
on Old Richburg Road,
00:11:00
just outside of Chester. CALVIN RIKARD: It's a two
lane road, but it is dark. There's no really ambient
lighting out in that area.
00:11:11
You are, as we would say,
in the country at that point. NARRATOR: The couple
traveling in the Jeep
00:11:18
were Judy Orr Baldwin and her
husband, James Baldwin. RANDY NEWMAN: I'm Randy Newman,
Sixth Circuit solicitor.
00:11:29
So according to James
Baldwin, some errant car comes into his lane or truck,
runs him off the road,
00:11:37
and he says that he
blacked out at some point. When he comes to,
he reaches over,
00:11:44
doesn't feel her in the seat,
crawls out of the vehicle and finds her lying in a creek.
00:11:51
Not underwater, just
in a couple of inches of water, unable to get her,
come to and calls 911.
00:12:01
NARRATOR: Judy Orr Baldwin was
pronounced dead at the scene. James Baldwin was taken to the
hospital with minor injuries.
00:12:10
TRAVIS JENKINS:
The news of her death actually got to us the next
day, but even at that point,
00:12:15
there were already sort
of whispers in the community that there was
more to the story.
00:12:20
-- I felt like there was
something different about this case, but I got the internal
nudge that I needed to go
00:12:26
actually to the hospital
and talk to Mr. Baldwin as soon as possible. When I first had
the conversation
00:12:34
with-- with
on scene supervisor, what he was saying that
Mr. Baldwin had told him
00:12:40
at the scene was not matching
up with what the damage was or the lack of damage.
00:12:46
So pretty close early
on in the investigation, I felt like something wasn't--
wasn't adding up with what
00:12:53
he was saying
and what was being presented at the scene itself. CANDICE LIVELY: James Baldwin,
at first, when he called 911,
00:13:05
he claimed that that
there was a car accident. He swerved to miss a truck
that had come into his lane,
00:13:11
that he went off the road and
must have lost consciousness, because he kind of comes
to when the Jeep stopped and
00:13:20
realized that his wife
was not next to him in the passenger
seat of the vehicle.
00:13:26
NARRATOR: While
James Baldwin was taken to the hospital
with minor injuries, officers began to notice
inconsistencies
00:13:33
between evidence at the scene
with James Baldwin's version of events. CALVIN RIKARD: I knew
the story that was being told
00:13:41
did not line up with what was
being presented at the scene. I spoke with
the on-scene supervisor,
00:13:49
he was telling me that he
had some concerns with what Mr. Baldwin had told him. The on-scene
supervisor was saying
00:13:57
that Mr. Baldwin
had told him he felt like Ms. Judy was
ejected out of the vehicle,
00:14:03
and that's what
caused her death. I asked him if he
could send me a couple pictures of the vehicle.
00:14:09
He showed me those
pictures, and I knew that was not
the case from the lack of damage to the vehicle.
00:14:17
NARRATOR: Officer
Rikard decided to go straight to the hospital
to interview James Baldwin.
00:14:23
CALVIN RIKARD: He
did say that he tried to get her
up the embankment, but also said that he found her
in the front of the vehicle,
00:14:31
which would have
been in the water, and she was basically pulled
towards the driver's side
00:14:37
of the vehicle, which would
not be in the direct path to try to get her to the top
of the embankment.
00:14:44
So that was a little strange,
but maybe he was disoriented. I was trying to give
him the benefit
00:14:50
of the doubt at that time when
he is telling me this story. NARRATOR: During
the interview at the hospital,
00:14:58
James Baldwin's story
of what happened that evening began to change. CALVIN RIKARD: He started
adding more stuff to it
00:15:05
to try to fill in those
gaps and those questions that he was being asked. So his story was that
back at the house,
00:15:15
there was an incident. There where Ms. Judy had
fell off of a ladder while trying to decorate
a Christmas tree.
00:15:22
He was outside at that moment. When he came back
inside, he saw that she was laying on the
floor, was bleeding a lot,
00:15:32
and decided that she needed
to go to the hospital to get stitches. RANDY NEWMAN: So according
to James Baldwin,
00:15:38
they are decorating
for Christmas. She's on a step ladder
decorating the tree. James Baldwin said, she
fell and bumped her head.
00:15:49
She's bleeding profusely. Can't get the bleeding to stop. Gotta take her to hospital.
00:15:55
CALVIN RIKARD: And as he
was traveling down Old Richburg Road, a vehicle
was in his lane of travel
00:16:01
where he took evasive
action and ran off the right side of the road. Kind of overcorrected and went
off the left side of the road,
00:16:08
down an embankment
and into a creek, where he said that he
doesn't remember really
00:16:12
what happened after that,
except when he woke up that Ms. Judy was
not in the vehicle,
00:16:17
and then he found her
outside of the Jeep itself. NARRATOR: Officer Rikard
noticed a lack of emotion
00:16:24
from James Baldwin. CALVIN RIKARD: I knew
he was a police officer. I knew he was in public safety.
00:16:31
And maybe that was just
the way somebody actually responded to that behavior. I asked him point
blank that night if he
00:16:40
did anything to hurt Ms. Judy. That was the only time that
I saw emotion out of him
00:16:46
during this interview, is when
I was accusing him of doing something to Ms. Judy.
00:16:54
NARRATOR: After interviewing
James Baldwin at the hospital, Officer Rikard
joined his colleagues
00:16:59
at the scene of the accident. CALVIN RIKARD:
This is a rural two lane road out in the country.
00:17:06
There's a bridge there that
covers the creek itself, but I was able to see
the path of travel
00:17:12
that Mr. Baldwin went off
the right side of the road. And even when I got
there, he should
00:17:18
have stayed in a straight
path, which would have taken him straight into the woods.
00:17:22
And so when he goes off
the left side of the road, he has to make
a controlled movement
00:17:27
to straighten up the vehicle,
drive down the embankment, get to the creek
bottom, and then kind
00:17:32
of angle it back to the right. And so it does not add up
with what he is telling us.
00:17:39
CANDICE LIVELY: Highway Patrol
was immediately suspicious. They see accidents
all the time.
00:17:45
Number one, they didn't
see damage to the vehicle. They thought that that
was very suspicious.
00:17:50
And the fact that
the windshield was intact, nothing was really
damaged except for just
00:17:54
the front little grill
piece on the Jeep. There was no indication
of a huge turn
00:18:01
or some type of movement
by the vehicle to avoid a truck coming into
his lane, which he claimed.
00:18:09
CALVIN RIKARD: I can see
the fresh marks in the dirt off the right side
of the roadway,
00:18:14
and I'm like, this
doesn't happen when you're traveling
at normal highway speeds of 50,
00:18:19
55 miles an hour. So just seeing the Jeep, its
location, the path of travel that it took to get
to its location,
00:18:30
the amount of blood
that was in the vehicle, and on the outside
of the vehicle just did not add
up with her getting
00:18:38
ejected out of the vehicle. NARRATOR: Despite the concerns
of the officers at the scene,
00:18:44
James Baldwin's background
as a deputy and 911 responder meant local officers
were quick to believe
00:18:51
his version of events. CANDICE LIVELY: Here
in Chester County, with it being such
a small county,
00:18:56
people are in the community
who work in law enforcement. It's hard to look
at them and think
00:19:03
that they could have
had anything to do with injuring a family member. I think that there's just
that inherent small town feel
00:19:12
that there's just no way
Jamie Baldwin could have done something to hurt
this wonderful woman
00:19:16
that everybody loved. VICKY THAKORDAS-DESAI: It
is highly likely that when James called 911 and his
colleagues responded to that,
00:19:28
that they would have
quite quickly believed his version of events. He was a trusted colleague.
00:19:34
He had worked within
the profession for as long as he did, and that
unconscious bias
00:19:40
that would have been present,
which would have rationalized their decision,
which was-- well,
00:19:45
actually, he's an--
he's one of us. He should be telling the truth. He is telling the truth.
00:19:51
And therefore, there's no need
to question this any further. CANDICE LIVELY: On the night
when the Jeep went off
00:19:59
the road, the Sheriff's
Office did send an investigator to the home. He looked in the window,
and you could immediately see,
00:20:07
there was blood on the floor
in the main area. It was a huge, wide
open main area.
00:20:13
There was a ladder
and a huge Christmas tree. Unfortunately, he
only took about 40
00:20:20
pictures, not that many more. But looking at the scene
without having anybody else
00:20:26
come in there, he went and
reported back that what he saw, and based on what Mr.
Baldwin had told him,
00:20:34
he believed that Judy had
fallen from the ladder and hit her head on the mantle
or somewhere in that area.
00:20:41
And that's what caused
her head injuries, so that fit with what
he believed at the time
00:20:48
Jamie Baldwin was
telling everyone. NARRATOR: Satisfied with
James Baldwin's story
00:20:54
that there had been
an accident at the home, the investigator allowed
the scene to be cleaned up.
00:21:01
- The only person who
walked in that home that was law enforcement was the
investigator from the sheriff's
00:21:06
office, and he also told
a friend of Jamie Baldwin, you can go ahead and clean up.
00:21:13
I'm sure you don't
want it to look like this whenever Mr. Baldwin
gets back to the house.
00:21:18
He gave a card to this
female by the name of Terry King, who said,
you can call these people.
00:21:24
They'll clean up
the-- the blood. NARRATOR: On the morning
of December 15, the community
of Chester learned
00:21:32
of Judy Orr
Baldwin's death, and there was immediate suspicion
around what happened.
00:21:39
TRAVIS JENKINS: We found
out about it the next day, word gets around very quickly
in a town as small as Chester.
00:21:44
CANDICE LIVELY: Law enforcement
had two different versions of what could have happened.
00:21:49
Highway patrol was thinking,
this is not a car accident. And then you had
law enforcement
00:21:54
with the Sheriff's
Office saying, well, it looks like it was possibly
an accident from a fall
00:21:59
that happened at the house. RANDY NEWMAN: They
took his statement, they went to the house,
and they did,
00:22:06
I guess, the bare minimum. And this guy was
a former dispatcher at the Sheriff's Office.
00:22:13
They never, at any
point, thought that he's not being truthful. NARRATOR: A local pathologist
performed an autopsy to try
00:22:23
to confirm the cause of death. CANDICE LIVELY:
The biggest issue happened whenever the autopsy was done.
00:22:30
The findings
of the pathologist was that she had died from a blunt
force trauma to the head.
00:22:38
But in their opinion,
that it was probably because of the fall. TRAVIS JENKINS:
There absolutely
00:22:47
were whispers in the community
about-- about her death. There were just
questions about, I guess,
00:22:52
holes in Jamie's story. His, I guess, connection to
the law enforcement community.
00:22:57
I think a lot of those
things were brought up as questions that people
had about whether or not
00:23:02
this was being looked
into as thoroughly as it should have been,
and whether or not there
00:23:08
was more to the story,
which most people seem to think that there was. NARRATOR: While
local law enforcement
00:23:15
were quick to believe James
Baldwin's version of events, the coroner who knew Judy
personally had doubts.
00:23:25
CANDICE LIVELY: Terry Tinker,
our coroner, and the family, after hearing
everything, strongly
00:23:31
believed that it didn't fit
with what they were actually seeing from the pictures
that were taken at the home
00:23:39
that this didn't make sense. How she could have
such a severe head trauma falling from basically
a three-step ladder.
00:23:47
So there were just
a lot of questions. RANDY NEWMAN: I think it was
just he was taken at his word.
00:23:53
They felt like they didn't have
anything to show otherwise, and so they weren't
moving along
00:24:00
the way the family
wanted them to, or the way the coroner
wanted them to. TRAVIS JENKINS: I
mean, to be honest,
00:24:06
there were a lot of people who
said that he had killed her, that they believed that
Jamie had murdered Judy.
00:24:17
NARRATOR: In early
2017, the investigation into the death
of Judy Orr Baldwin was still ongoing,
with the coroner
00:24:27
and the sheriff still
in disagreement about what happened. RANDY NEWMAN: I
started getting calls
00:24:33
early on from the community. Hey, this isn't right. Somebody needs to do something.
00:24:39
CANDICE LIVELY: This
case was very tricky, simply because we had
an initial disagreement
00:24:46
or kind of this impasse
between investigating agencies. NARRATOR: The fact that key
people investigating the case
00:24:55
knew both James Baldwin
and Judy Orr Baldwin personally complicated matters. CANDICE LIVELY: So initially,
that was hard to get
00:25:04
over that hump of thinking. We've got to look
at this as investigators and not as friends
of one another.
00:25:13
We've got to dig into this and
do what's fair for this family. VICKY THAKORDAS-DESAI:
When you're
00:25:19
emotionally involved
with anyone, whether that's the victim
or the perpetrator, it is hard to detach yourself,
especially professionally,
00:25:28
when you are being asked
to offer an opinion. And therefore, the whole
town was impacted
00:25:36
in some way, shape, or form. RANDY NEWMAN:
Then we get a call from the judge, local judge.
00:25:42
He wants to meet
with the coroner in the Sheriff's Office. So it's kind of like those
two guys are getting called
00:25:48
to the principal's office. NARRATOR: After
meeting with the judge, the coroner continued
the investigation
00:25:57
with the help of the South
Carolina Law Enforcement Division, known as SLED. CANDICE LIVELY: SLED is
a multi-jurisdictional
00:26:06
investigative agency. So most places like
Chester, who, you know, were small, rural
community, we don't have
00:26:13
our own drug testing labs. We don't have
a DNA testing lab. So whenever we have
a complex case,
00:26:19
then you want
to bring in someone who has all
of these individuals who have specialized training.
00:26:27
NARRATOR: SLED began
by reexamining the photos taken at Judy Orr's home, where
James Baldwin had told police
00:26:35
she fell and hit her head. CANDICE LIVELY: We
basically went back through every little
inch of every photo that
00:26:43
was taken by that
Sheriff investigator to try to break things down. They tried to find the ladder.
00:26:49
So he's saying, oh, I don't
have the ladder anymore. I took it to this
attorney that I
00:26:54
was going to have sue because
it was a defective model of the ladder. We wanted to measure
how high would
00:27:01
Judy have been from the ground
if she fell from this ladder. And all of a sudden,
he's just, well,
00:27:06
it's just I can't find it. NARRATOR: The SLED
team also decided to examine the data from the
Jeep's internal control system,
00:27:16
known as the black box. CALVIN RIKARD: So the black
box has been termed kind of referencing airplanes.
00:27:23
The black box
in a vehicle is designed to analyze certain
components, certain data.
00:27:30
And the sole purpose of it
is to deploy airbags. It does give us
a lot of information
00:27:37
in regards to vehicle speed,
braking, acceleration, temperature, odometer reading.
00:27:45
NARRATOR: The black box data
records any unexpected changes of speed that would
occur in a car accident,
00:27:51
which are recorded as events. CALVIN RIKARD: There has
to be a change in velocity
00:27:57
for 5 miles an hour
over a certain time frame, which I think was 150
milliseconds for an event
00:28:03
to even occur. And in this case, there
was no events recorded. If there was any
speed involved, and
00:28:14
an event would have occurred. And when it told us nothing
was on that module to us,
00:28:20
that was-- that was a red flag. NARRATOR: The data
from the black box, along with other evidence
collected on the road,
00:28:28
began to cast even more doubt
on James Baldwin's story that he swerved to avoid
an oncoming vehicle.
00:28:36
CALVIN RIKARD:
There is no doubt that they were traveling
down Old Richburg Road,
00:28:40
and we have tire impressions
where they ran off the right side of the road. But if somebody's
traveling off the roadway
00:28:46
at 55 miles an hour,
that there's going to be some tearing
into that land, that dirt,
00:28:53
especially as soft as it was,
and that was not the case. NARRATOR: As well as showing
James Baldwin was not
00:29:01
driving fast on the road,
the damage to the car suggested it was driven down
the embankment at a very
00:29:09
controlled slow speed. CANDICE LIVELY: They
were able to pull all of this data out
of there to determine that he
00:29:16
was not going that fast. He never had an impact
that would have caused the airbags to go off.
00:29:23
That was immediately
apparent to them. If all this horrible accident,
he runs off the road.
00:29:29
So the black box
ended up being super critical for highway
patrol to basically say this was not an accident.
00:29:37
I mean, they felt
comfortable saying it looked like it was a very
intentional act by the driver
00:29:43
to pull off the road
and down into this ravine in a very slow manner. NARRATOR: While SLED
continued their investigation,
00:29:52
James Baldwin moved out
of Judy Orr's family home and in with his female
friend Terry King--
00:29:59
the person police had allowed
to clean up the blood the night Judy died. CANDICE LIVELY: Whenever we
learned that Jamie Baldwin had
00:30:07
moved in with Terry
King, it was right after we started really,
really investigating
00:30:12
the case with SLED,
and Judy's family were pushing him to get
out of the family home
00:30:17
or getting out of Judy's home. So he moves in with Terry. And at first, I think
he just used it as, oh,
00:30:23
I have nowhere else to go. But of course, I was
thinking, obviously, this is his girlfriend.
00:30:29
Of course, that's
where he's going to go, but that's how he kind
of played it to everybody else.
00:30:34
NARRATOR: After James
Baldwin left the family home, SLED had an opportunity
to reexamine
00:30:39
the potential crime scene. RANDY NEWMAN: We were very
fortunate in this case that we were able to go back
to the family home after a year
00:30:49
or so Ms. Baldwin's
son had actually taken over the family home. Luckily, he had not painted
or any of that thing.
00:30:59
They found blood spatter over
the top of the fireplace, consistent with
someone thrusting or
00:31:08
hitting someone with
something and blood flying off of the object. CANDICE LIVELY:
So that shows that it
00:31:14
was more of a blow or something
of that movement that would have caused her
blood to be that high.
00:31:21
We had the DNA tested
and it was her blood, and there's no reason why a 4
foot 9 woman would have blood
00:31:26
almost 12 feet up in the air. NARRATOR: After finding
forensic evidence that contradicted James
Baldwin's story
00:31:35
of Judy falling from
a ladder, SLED made another crucial discovery. CANDICE LIVELY: One of the
items that was very critical
00:31:44
that was taken from the scene
was a Santa stocking holder. It's one of these iron
stocking holders, very heavy.
00:31:55
We took that to our forensic
pathologist, Dr. Ross. - When she saw it, she
immediately said, that's it.
00:32:04
We asked, OK, he said
she fell off the ladder, could she have
fallen off the ladder
00:32:10
and hit this because it's
a stocking holder, it would hang off the mantle. And she said, absolutely not.
00:32:17
This was blunt force trauma. She was hit with this item. NARRATOR: In June 2017, six
months after Judy's death,
00:32:29
police were called
to the home of Terry King. CANDICE LIVELY: I get a call
from York County Sheriff's
00:32:36
Office telling me that
Terry King's residence had burned down. I learned that there
had been other problems
00:32:47
going on between Terry
and Jamie at that time. Terry had actually
called the police
00:32:52
after she told him to leave. Then a knife ends up
stuck in her tree that actually had carved into it
the letters B-I-T-C-H.
00:33:02
She was terrified. She called the police. They came and took
pictures of it. They suggested police
put up some type
00:33:10
of like a deer
camera or a camera, so we can see maybe who it is. She felt it was Jamie
Baldwin, but, of course,
00:33:16
she got to have proof. She did put up
these deer cameras. She went out of town
for a weekend.
00:33:22
While she was gone, she gets a
call that her house is on fire. They look
at the camera, you can
00:33:31
see a man coming
into the property, then he walks back out, gets
in his vehicle and leaves.
00:33:39
The house goes up in flames. And they were able
to determine that this person was James Baldwin.
00:33:48
So he was arrested
for arson and fraud. Because he was
going to try to sue the insurance company
for his contents
00:33:54
that were still
inside of her home. FIONA HOTSTON MOORE:
In my experience in cases such as James
Baldwin, people
00:34:03
will undertake small frauds,
whether that's an insurance fraud or some other fraud.
00:34:07
They get away with it,
they become bolder, and they then undertake
another fraud, and so on.
00:34:13
So when insurance
companies are looking at paying out on claims,
they will look-- look
00:34:20
at previous claims to see
if there is actually a history and therefore, whether
they need to go back and
00:34:25
review previous claims. NARRATOR: While James
Baldwin was out on bond for second degree arson
and burning personal property
00:34:33
to defraud insurers, he
was indicted for the murder of Judy Orr Baldwin. CANDICE LIVELY:
By that time, it
00:34:42
was clear throughout
the community that everyone believed that
this was not an accident.
00:34:51
As a matter of fact, because of
all the community involvement and Facebook
and social media, we
00:34:58
knew that we were
probably going to have trouble getting
a jury pool that wasn't going
00:35:03
to be biased in favor of Judy. So we actually had to change
venue to another county
00:35:09
so we could try the case. NARRATOR: In October
2019, James Baldwin stood trial for the murder
of his wife Judy Orr Baldwin.
00:35:28
TRAVIS JENKINS: We were
there for every day of it. I know there were
a lot of other media,
00:35:32
TV, and newspapers
that were there. There was obviously
a lot of interest in that case for a lot
of reasons, partly, I think,
00:35:39
because people knew Judy,
but also because the arrest took so long. The investigation felt
like to a lot of people,
00:35:46
it dragged on for so long,
longer than it should have. So that kind of built
a lot of intrigue.
00:35:53
RANDY NEWMAN:
The thing I remember most is the family,
Judy's friends, they showed up every day.
00:35:59
It's just
heartbreaking for them. TRAVIS JENKINS:
The atmosphere was interesting
00:36:06
because once out
of the courtroom, you have the family
and friends of the victim.
00:36:11
And then on the other
side of the courtroom, you have the family
and friends of the accused.
00:36:15
And I distinctly remember
just being struck by the fact that the side where Judy's
family and friends were sitting
00:36:22
was filled, I
believe, to overflow. Like, they literally
had to bring chairs in and sat in the back
of the courtroom
00:36:28
to accommodate all
of her friends and family that attended. And they were there every day.
00:36:33
CALVIN RIKARD: I did
attend the trial. There was a full gallery
side of Ms. Judy every day
00:36:39
of the trial. So again, I think that goes
back to what kind of person she was and what
the community thought of her.
00:36:48
TRAVIS JENKINS:
And the most people I recall sitting on Jamie's
side of the courtroom
00:36:51
was one, one person. NARRATOR: After an intense
18-month investigation, the prosecution knew
they had to convince
00:37:04
the jury that Judy's
death was not an accident. CANDICE LIVELY: Whenever you
have a start of a case that's
00:37:12
an accident, and then you
learn as you're going on with the evidence that
an accident completely does not
00:37:18
fit the scenario, then you
have to really take your time to make sure that
you go back and
00:37:24
explain away or explain
to some extent why it was missed
on the front end. TRAVIS JENKINS:
But the most compelling part
00:37:34
was when the SLED
investigator was brought in and unveiled the findings
of the black box.
00:37:41
Jamie's story was
she had fallen. I'm taking her
to the hospital, and they were run off
the road by a truck,
00:37:48
and they swerved wildly
and plowed down an embankment and hit something hard. But when SLED got the results
from that black box,
00:37:58
it demonstrated that
the car came to a stop. It slowly turned
and drove 5 miles an hour
00:38:02
down the embankment. And at that point, his
story completely fell apart. NARRATOR:
For the prosecution, one
00:38:11
of the most challenging
aspects of the case was addressing the conflicting
opinions of law enforcement.
00:38:20
CANDICE LIVELY: The worst
part about the case for me was having to cross-examine,
or treat hostilely, individuals
00:38:28
who were typically on my side,
but the bottom line is they didn't do their job. The worst part was having
to ask that investigator,
00:38:35
oh, you actually
handed the girlfriend of Mr. Baldwin a card, letting
her know that this cleanup
00:38:42
company will come and clean up
the blood from the crime scene. That was not good.
00:38:48
That was a moment where I could
feel the jury beside me going. What? He did what-- it was just kind
of a very uncomfortable moment.
00:38:57
NARRATOR: The relationship
between James and Terry King was a key argument
for the prosecution.
00:39:04
RANDY NEWMAN: It
was very important. I think it leads us
to motive, although there's
00:39:08
several other things
that lead us to motive. But somebody who's
got a girlfriend
00:39:14
and is in a marriage, that
becomes an automatic issue. CANDICE LIVELY:
The relationship
00:39:20
between James Baldwin
and Terry King was a really big
piece of our case, because it showed
the intentions of the defendant
00:39:30
and why he would have
wanted Judy gone. So it was a big motive. Also, the money.
00:39:41
NARRATOR: The $25,000
insurance policy was a key argument for the prosecution. TRAVIS JENKINS: I
definitely remember
00:39:49
the accidental insurance
policy that was taken out before Judy's murder. That was prominently
mentioned during the trial
00:39:58
as a possible motive. CANDICE LIVELY: You know, you
think of $25,000, you're like,
00:40:03
wow, that's not a whole lot. But for someone like
Jamie, who at the time was getting ready to possibly
be out on the street
00:40:10
without a house, without a
motorcycle, because everything had been bought
for him by Judy,
00:40:16
any money was going
to be critical to him. NARRATOR:
The prosecution argued control was another
key factor in the case.
00:40:27
- James Baldwin was
definitely someone who always wanted control. Judy was someone who he was
able to manipulate and control
00:40:35
from the beginning because it
had been years since she had been in a relationship.
00:40:39
She desperately wanted
to have someone who loved her, and that she could spend
the rest of her days with.
00:40:46
She actually confronted
Jamie about this friendship he was having with Terry King
and told him, absolutely,
00:40:55
this has to stop. And if not, then you're
going to have to leave. And we believe
that's what probably
00:41:05
led to the huge argument
that happened on the night that she ended up dying. Was he wanted
to go to Kentucky,
00:41:11
she did not want him to go. And she knew Terry
King was going. So we believe that
whenever Jamie
00:41:18
felt he was losing
control, Judy was finally standing up
for herself, and she wasn't going to let it happen.
00:41:23
And that's whenever the
argument and her eventual death took place. VICKY THAKORDAS-DESAI: James
Baldwin wanted to have it all.
00:41:34
He wanted his wife. He wanted a girlfriend. And when those things
were threatened,
00:41:39
he was unwilling to lose it. So he used whatever
means necessary to get what he wanted so that he could
stay stable and sustained.
00:41:55
RANDY NEWMAN: I think he felt
like that was all his life, as he knew it was
getting ready to change,
00:42:00
because Judy wasn't going
to put up with that. She wasn't going to allow
him to live in her house
00:42:05
and have a motorcycle
and all this stuff that she's buying him
and have a girlfriend.
00:42:12
So he was going to have
to make some changes. He kind of saw his golden
egg going away, so to speak.
00:42:20
NARRATOR: On November 5,
2019, after a week long trial, the jury retired
to consider their verdict.
00:42:29
RANDY NEWMAN: It's
always nerve racking. That's something that
you never get used to.
00:42:32
You're sitting there
and you look at the family and they're on pins
and needles,
00:42:36
waiting to hear
what you've really got to think about what
that family's going through
00:42:41
and what they're thinking
during that time, because we know it
could go either way.
00:42:47
- I was so nervous
because you just never know what a jury's going to do. NARRATOR: When
the jury returned,
00:42:55
James Baldwin was found
guilty of the murder of Judy Orr Baldwin. CANDICE LIVELY:
We all broke down.
00:43:05
We could hear them
crying behind us. Tears came to my eyes from
just overwhelming emotion
00:43:12
and also just feeling like
it was the right thing. It was definitely
the right verdict.
00:43:20
RANDY NEWMAN: I don't think
he really reacted a whole lot. There was a lot of relief
from Judy's family.
00:43:28
And finally, it's over
and we can breathe. CALVIN RIKARD: I
think back now, like, I'm just so grateful and
thankful for Ms. Judy's sake
00:43:38
and her family's sake, that I
went straight to the hospital, was able to get that
statement, lock him down
00:43:45
and what his events
were, what he was saying happened that night. I think that helped.
00:43:51
And the court proceedings
during his trial and ultimately with him being
found guilty for her death.
00:43:59
NARRATOR: James
Baldwin's exploitation of Judy for financial
gain, which eventually
00:44:04
resulted in her
murder, led to him being sentenced
to life in prison without the possibility
of parole.
00:44:12
CANDICE LIVELY: Greed was
a huge motivation for him, and it was something that had
driven him for a long time.
00:44:19
And so when you
look at his decision that night to take Judy
out of the equation,
00:44:26
he clearly was
thinking about the fact that this is going
to put me in a situation
00:44:31
where I'm going to be set. He was going to have the house. He was going to keep his bike.
00:44:40
He was going to get $25,000. And he was going
to have his girlfriend. VICKY THAKORDAS-DESAI:
James has always
00:44:50
been in a position of power, so
to have been confronted by Judy would have represented
a level of threat for him.
00:44:59
He stood to lose everything. Everything that he'd managed to
gain within the relationship,
00:45:04
which wasn't his. It was hers. Her house, her finances. And so he stood a lot to lose.
00:45:12
He wanted to have
it all his way. TRAVIS JENKINS: I think you
actually go beyond greed
00:45:19
when you're willing to kill
somebody to collect money, especially a person
that you purport
00:45:22
to love and take care of. I think you've actually gone
beyond greed at that point,
00:45:28
and you've veered into either
being mentally unwell or evil. NARRATOR: The murder
of Judy Orr Baldwin
00:45:37
by her husband, James Baldwin,
was not only devastating for Judy's family,
but a traumatic experience
00:45:44
for the people of Chester. CANDICE LIVELY: Whenever I've
looked back on this case,
00:45:50
I'll be honest,
initially, I was shocked. I was like, what
have I gotten myself into coming to Chester County
because I was completely
00:45:57
blown away by the fact that
the Sheriff and the coroner were having these issues.
00:46:04
TRAVIS JENKINS: Not
every Deputy Solicitor like Candice Lively,
and not every coroner
00:46:09
like Terry Tinker,
would have been willing to buck the system
a little bit because they
00:46:14
thought there was
more going on there than they were being told. There was more
to the story than what was
00:46:19
written on incident reports. They knew that there was
something else going on, and that they didn't just
accept the pat answer
00:46:26
and say, OK, well, he's not
guilty, or it was an accident, or whatever. RANDY NEWMAN: So,
I'm a firm believer,
00:46:34
everything happens
for a reason. So have we not had a coroner
and a Sheriff bumping heads and
00:46:40
we not called in SLED,
we may have never known what really happened to Judy. [exhilarating music]