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foreign [Music] welcome to True Crime garage wherever you are whatever you are doing thanks
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for listening I'm your host Nick and getting all of his lessons for life from prison Mike here is the captain yeah
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this is how we talk in the clink it's good to be seen and good to see you thanks for listening thanks for telling
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a friend [Music] this week we are featuring rollerblade by the creative minds over at one of the
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very very best in the beer business hoof hearted this is a dry come on get it together this is a double
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dry hopped double IPA that's what Tim Duncan calls a double double blade garage grade four and three quarter
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bottle caps out of five and here's some cheers to our good friends first up thank you to Francesca and Springfield
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Illinois and a big shout out to Jennifer and Cranston Rhode Island it's neither a
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road nor an island discuss amongst yourselves next up we have Megan and Beaver Oklahoma and another shout out to
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Stitcher app and for our bonus show check it out on Stitcher premium him and that is enough of the business all right
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everybody gather around grab a chair grab a beer let's talk some true crime [Music]
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[Music] [Music] foreign I made a lot of assumptions and turned them into facts to satisfy the police
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when I did that I used the opportunity to move the blame on to Ryan and off of myself
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things happen much differently than I had previously stated when we left the club I cannot honest I
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cannot honestly remember if we had robbery on our minds I made up the statement about Ryan giving me the tire
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iron and saying that we might get messed up about it I imagine that it might have
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occurred that way because I knew I had beaten the victim with a tire iron I could not accept in my conscious mind
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that I was a sole perpetrator and aggressor so I put a lot of the blame on Ryan I don't I don't think that much of much
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of it was even consciously done it was just too hard to admit to myself and others that I had killed someone
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I could not even accept the possibility of it we had never done robberies before we
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never did them after we broke a lot of stuff which was probably what we had in mind when we left the club I believe
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that I flipped out committed the entire act alone and with little forethought I remember feeling psychotically giddy if
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that's understandable uh I did not tell Ryan what I was going to do he had no idea that I would act in
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such an aggressive manner I don't remember how much of how much of it he was there for he could not stop me
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he could not stop me though he tried at the end if he had wanted to stop me before and during much of the ACT I was
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armed with the tire tool Ryan did not say come on let's get this over with while I was stalking the
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victim he was actually pleading come on let's go he did not want to Pardon it again I turn it around because I did not
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want to accept the responsibility of the sole perpetrator I strangled Ken Idol to
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death I did not remember this until the police told me what he was strangled with when
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I said that's [ __ ] up after they told me what he was strangled with I just remember doing it I then denied
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remembering it I lied right there that was the first blatant lie it was then that I knew I had done it
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I was worried about survival it was too hard to throw away my entire life and put my head on a quote The Chopping
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Block see uh see the video the interrogation for that I tried telling the police that I might have strangled
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the victim one of the officers stopped me he got mad he did not want to hear that I might have done it I didn't see
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the video before I knew I had done it I consciously assumed it was Ryan because it was too hard to accept that I might
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have done it I made up what I said about Ryan being on top of the victim I lied about him strangling the victim to
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everyone from Nick Gilpin to the jury on a subconscious level I've always known that I did it that is a part of me
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that I have accepted I enjoy doing it at the time I was in a lot of pain and felt
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the need to take it out on someone else there is something wrong with me I regret now that I put an innocent man
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through that he didn't deserve it I don't lose sleep over it though it's more that I feel it was a sort of
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violation he had had he been my enemy I wouldn't regret it except for the prison
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time that came with it I lied at the proper about ripping the belt off pushing Ryan off of the victim and
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leaving the scene with the belt I made this up after I read Dallas Mallory statement that he had seen me with
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something in my hand there are also two unidentified Witnesses in the car who could have seen
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me with the belt I had to have an excuse for having the belt in case it came up later
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Ryan was actually the one who pushed me off of the victim he probably wouldn't have been successful except that the
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belt broke at the same time my original story didn't make sense I don't know why the police didn't
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question it why would I stop beating the victim snap out of my rage and then Ryan
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stranglin I beat the victim can't hide Holt until he was on the ground then I took his belt off and strangled him with
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it at first I said that I thought I had thrown up at the scene I did throw up but it was later I'm not sure where
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maybe at the Osco uh or Jewel or whatever it was maybe in their parking lot I'm not sure
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saying that I thought I got sick at the scene was convenient because it removed me from the situation I said I was
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sitting on the curb feeling nauseous in between the time that I stopped beating the victim and I pushed Ryan off of Kent
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Heidel that was a lie Ryan never touched the victim I lied about remembering taking items
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from the victim though I believe I did that was all assumptions in trying to pacify the police and prosecutors I lied
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about putting things in a bag in Ryan's car I didn't remember that I believe that when Ryan took the money
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out of his wallet when we were out of his own wallet and we were back at the bar and said how pointless my actions
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were he meant just that he was asking why I had done it how could he have forgotten about money in his wallet
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I'm not sure that I remember him saying that he had always wanted to kill someone before he turned 60 on the night
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of the murder if he did say it he may have just been trying to act tough the witness stated that the kid with
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highlights in their hair had told the cleaning lady to get help Ryan had highlights not me I can't remember who
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told the cleaning people to get help I remember feeling astounded when I was told by the police that it actually
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happened I still don't know where I still don't know where that memory came from
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uh what what were my out of control statements it's a Christian Blankenship and Julie Dunn in the parking lot uh I
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don't know that that's something that that I'd like to know and they should probably be
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asked about uh and finally after the murder I remember telling Ryan that it didn't matter who did what because we
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were both there I said this so he would keep his mouth shut that's it okay let me ask you just a
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couple of follow-up questions so are you saying today that you are the sole murderer of Kent heithold that's correct
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yes and are you saying that Ryan had no idea when you went to the parking lot where
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you encountered Ken Heidel what you were going to do that's correct are you saying that there was no plan between
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the two of you to commit a robbery that night I don't know I don't know do you have a recollection
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of that I can't remember what we intended to do I don't know what was the position of Mr heithold when he was
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strangled he was face down things I want to ask you again is it correct that you're the one who declined to have
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an attorney present today that's correct and are you currently on any medication
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of any type no I'm not okay do you feel that you're making this statement from your memory of the events
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of what happened that night that's correct okay I don't have any further questions
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[Music] we are joined here in the garage today by a long time friend of the show Maggie
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freeling Maggie is the host and producer of the unjust and unsolved podcast long
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time listeners of our show will know her from helping us out with our Shaker Heights project as well as her work on
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the mara Murray case as she was featured in oxygen TV's documentary The Disappearance of Mara Murray thank you
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for joining us here in the garage today Maggie please take us through and tell us about your new project hello guys
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thank you so much for having me um yeah yeah I'm you know this is really exciting because most of the times that
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we've talked and and done stuff together has been about Maura Murray but this is
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a complete 180. I'm now working on wrongful convictions you know this project we conceived it by
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we I mean Patrick Hines of True Crime obsessed um about a year ago and we just launched
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in September and each week I cover a case of a person that I strongly believe has been wrongfully incarcerated and I
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heard you talking on your podcast about the Innocence Project and there's a the rough estimation or the the low
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estimation is 20 000 individuals are in prison that are innocent yeah and I would say that's
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definitely super low I mean that's just people that we know of that have petitioned the Innocence Project I mean
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there are so many people that I've even heard from who write to me saying hey I'm innocent but the Innocence Project
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won't take my case they only take DNA cases so you know they're not going to take a case that doesn't have some sort
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of DNA evidence so that leaves out so many cases hundreds of thousands of cases and you know if you listen to my
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podcast most of my cases have not been taken by the Innocence Project they're either ballistic cases or accidental you
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know baby murders involving choking or falling so these are all cases that are very likely not even in those statistics
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and a good portion of these wrongfully convicted inmates have been convicted based off of false confessions
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and we now know from DNA evidence that even in DNA cases where DNA will exonerate the person who has been
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convicted of the murder 25 percent of the time with a false confession the DNA proves that it was in fact false
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and that we have put the wrong person in prison and those numbers alone if you carry that out further to cases with no
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DNA you would think roughly 25 is going to apply to those cases as well so yes I
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think I think the 20 000 estimate is very conservative very low and it's amazing how unfortunately yes
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these organizations have to prioritize these cases which ones they take on which ones they choose because there
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just are so many of them out there that's that's the saddest part is you know there are these ones that early on
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in this I got a couple letters from a man who had a very sympathetic story but even for me it's tough to cover it
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because I'm like have you had a private investigator have you had any of these things and he's like his niece accused
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him of sexually assaulting her in some form I don't I didn't really get into too many details with him but there was
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there was really no way of of proving his innocence in that sense and and you know
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there's so many of these out there so it's been tough it's definitely been tough hearing these stories and so many
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of them I can't even cover just just because I wouldn't have enough evidence to feel comfortable saying this is a
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wrongful conviction right because you don't want to possibly give a criminal a platform now when we started talking
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about you doing a podcast in general I mean this was probably three years ago at crime con but you were stating I
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believe on your show that that Charles's case was the first case that you actually or the first person you
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actually made contact with before you started producing your show yeah so I've reached out to a lot of people so you
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know in the intro of my show it says 20 folks which is true I did reach out to at least 20 folks and sent uh snail mail
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and he he wrote back immediately I mean Charles is a incredibly intelligent on the ball person and he just wants p
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people to know about what happened to him which is just so I there are no words to even explain what has happened
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to him and why he's still in prison and so he was you know one of the first people the first person that I really
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got to know and to this day I would say you know Charles is a friend I've put his episode out but I here I am you know
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still advocating for him you know still getting people to listen to his story to
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listen to his side of the story because to him that's really the most important he's been portrayed in the media for so
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long as this crazy person who wrongfully and knowingly put Ryan Ferguson in prison which is not the story at all so
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for me you know it was really important to talk to Charles and and hear what he has to say well in this story it
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involves the unjust convictions of two individuals and therefore leads us to the unsolved murder and can you take us
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through the attack and murder of Columbia Daily Tribune sports editor Kent heitholt so this is the perfect
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time of year to tell this story because it was Halloween night 2001 Kent heitholt he was the sports editor for
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the Columbia Tribune this is in Columbia Missouri he's leaving work super super late it's around 2 10 a.m that he says
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goodbye to his colleague near his car and he is later found sometime you know 10 minutes later around 2 20 a.m
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brutally beaten and strangled in the Tribune parking lot again this is Kent height hold he was 40 years old he's a
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family man brutally beaten and strangled in the parking lot he was leaving work but he also like stopped to feed a cat
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yeah so that's what I was reading in some of these old papers he stopped to feed a cat and that's in so Michael Boyd
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and we'll get to him as you guys know in a little bit he is a colleague I believe
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he was also a sports writer I think I think Kent was his boss he's the last person to see him alive in the parking
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lot and they were talking about you know feeding these cats and then according to
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Boyd he leaves and and almost immediately after that heighthold is beaten strangled bludgeoned and left for
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dead and two of the workers two other people working at this building they see or believe they saw something in the
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parking lot they call this into 9-1-1 to say that Kent has been attacked in the parking lot we need paramedics we need
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police yes two janitors Shayna aren't and Jerry Trump they are two janitors and so according to Shayna she has
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multiple affidavits she comes out and sees two young white folks who allegedly say someone is hurt and then they leave
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and she sees Kent heithold her her colleague and she calls the police and there's a 9-1-1 call that you can listen
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to It's her and Jerry Trump calling the police saying Kent is laying in the parking lot he's not moving we need help
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but the case doesn't really go anywhere right we have two potential Witnesses we
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have some physical evidence at the scene but this man was beat to death in the parking lot and choked and the case
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doesn't really seem to go anywhere this takes us to the two-year anniversary marker and the Columbia Daily Tribune
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they start running the story again one of their own has been murdered on their property and they're trying to get some
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answers for Ken hithold who used to work for the Tribune as far as the evidence they have they have blood evidence they
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have fingerprints they have shoe prints they have the the weapon they have obviously these two eyewitnesses that
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saw these other two individuals we don't know if they're attackers or if they were just passer buyers or if they were
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witnesses to the crime so that they do have quite a bit of evidence but like you said it just doesn't go anywhere
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part of that evidence is um Shayna does a police composite sketch so on this anniversary of the murder
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like you said two years later in 2003 the Columbia Tribune puts out this sketch from Shayna and then this is
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where we get into the entire story of Charles and Ryan this sketch comes out in the paper
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and Charles Erickson who at the time just remembers that this was Halloween night he was doing a lot of drugs
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including cocaine pills um he's going to also have ton LSD mushrooms you know he's a high school kid he's just
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experimenting this night he blacks out and so two years later he sees in the paper this sketch that he thinks looks a
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lot like him you know I would argue it looks like a pretty generic uh young white man you know buzz cut pretty
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pretty generic looking but Charles is thinking oh my gosh I was at a party mirror there it was Halloween night I
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have no idea what happened I was completely black out this looks like me hold on what's going on did I have
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something to do with this yeah which is very interesting because taking a look at Charles and looking at this sketch
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I don't think they look anything alike personally yeah I don't I don't really think so either
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but this is where I I thought it was so important to tell his story because you know not only did
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he allegedly have substance abuse issues I would say he's just a teenager just you know doing his thing but okay people
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are calling it substance abuse issues not only did he have that but he did also have you know OCD anxiety you know
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some some mental issues as well that were really causing him to think about this and overthink about this and obsess
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over this and guess without obsessing he he really thought this looked like him and he went to Ryan and said hey man did
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we have anything to do with this and Ryan was like what are you even talking about dude I dropped you off at home
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after the party around 1 30. you were home like get get away from me this is crazy
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[Music] [Music] now knowing Charles and having a friendship with him do you know if he
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has been diagnosed with any mental disorder yeah so those are currently in all of his appeals like these
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compounding factors that's with it too that that you know he was someone who was troubled did have you know some
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mental disorders and the police completely took advantage of that at the time that I spoke with his lawyer that
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appeal wasn't in yet so he didn't get too into details but now that I've read them like yes he he has OCD he has
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anxiety he does take medication for it he is in therapy for it now but back then at 17 years old compounding with
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drinking a lot doing cocaine doing LSD it was it was not a good combination this case has always been on my radar
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because when you see the I believe it was Dateline the first time I heard about it
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it's so scary to think being in Ryan's shoes and all and I've always viewed this case
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through Ryan Ferguson's lens that you're out at this party and you're drinking and having a good
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time and at some point it's time to go home I'm gonna drop off my buddy and then I'm going to go home
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and two and a half years later I am being pulled into they're questioning me now
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well one on these events and yes I mean it happened on Halloween so it's a little bit easier to remember what
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happened but could you imagine if it was not on Halloween how less of the story he would
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have known um and if you watch those interrogations it's it they're scary to watch because
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they're feeding Charles all this information and then the other interrogation you have Ryan
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going look I I wasn't even there yeah so I guess my question would be how much do
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you think time played a factor in this meaning the cops had really nothing to go off of
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for two and a half years so do you think that played into the way they handled this case I do
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um they wanted it solved and you know this case is a is a oftentimes you know when I'm looking in these cases we know
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that there's been some kind of misconduct but it could be accidental you know I was covering a case where the
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prosecution unknowingly withheld evidence because the officers never even gave it to the
00:25:03
prosecution so so that was like a complete accident prosecutor had no idea there was all of this exculpatory
00:25:09
evidence because the police withheld it but in this it is like such a clear-cut the police manufactured this conviction
00:25:18
the police and prosecutor manufactured this conviction because with all of the people who later recant Jerry Trump the
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the janitor they got to make a false statement about Ryan and Charles you know he recants and says you know the
00:25:36
prosecutor told me what to say the police were giving Charles Erickson multiple I only talk about one in my
00:25:44
podcast you know I don't have a lot of time to go into every little detail right but there are at least two other
00:25:51
manufactured alleged confessions of people saying Ryan confessed to me they showed this to Charles saying you know
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look Ryan's telling people people that you guys did this there's another one um where allegedly a girl heard Ryan
00:26:06
confessing at a party and they showed this to Charles and say look she heard Ryan confessing all of this was
00:26:11
manufactured all of this was faked by the police and it is so egregious what they did to Charles and Ryan but they
00:26:19
got Charles to confess because of all of these false police reports they were giving to him you know time I think in
00:26:26
the sense that they wanted to solve it but Ryan knew the whole time where he was what he did there were multiple
00:26:32
Brady violations in this case there were multiple people who said we saw them leave we saw them go home and that was
00:26:39
all withheld from the defense and it's weird because it's kind of if you know the details and you go through every bit
00:26:46
of it it feels like there was not so much a confession really at all and on the surface that's what we're told this
00:26:53
is how this case went wrong this kid Charles Erickson he was confused he goes in he talks to police he confesses to
00:27:00
the crime he says me and my buddy and did it why did we do it we were looking to get more money for maybe drinks or
00:27:07
some drugs or both and it was Halloween night we were up to no good this is not totally out of the blue for Ryan
00:27:14
Ferguson when he gets picked up because Charles has already contacted him and said look I'm seeing this story in the
00:27:21
news I saw this composite sketch they're saying that two people were at the crime scene
00:27:28
is this something we did the bar we were drinking at was near this area did were
00:27:34
we involved in this guy's murder and of course Ryan's telling them dude you're you're crazy I don't know what you're
00:27:39
talking about here and then a couple months go by he's picked up Ryan's picked up and what
00:27:46
we're getting here in the interrogation rooms are two very different things we have Ryan saying I did not do this I
00:27:54
don't know what this other guy is telling you but I was not there I I'm not just innocent of the murder I'm
00:28:01
innocent of even having been there I don't have the didn't have the ability to even commit this crime because I
00:28:08
wasn't physically there on the other hand in the other room what we got going on is Charles Erickson who's saying
00:28:16
he's kind of he's less confessing to it more so asking them could I have done this yeah yeah he he says
00:28:25
could I have done this and what has happened and Maggie you hit the nail you hit the nail right on the head there was
00:28:31
he saw this in the news he blacked out that night he had a history of blacking out and then he said he remembered some
00:28:41
things of that night but I think you're exactly right I think he started obsessing about this crime and his mind
00:28:47
started filling in some of the blanks on its own by the time he gets in that room
00:28:52
with police police are saying he'll walk us through the crime well he's getting details wrong and they know that he's
00:28:59
getting details wrong and they start to feed him information so whatever blanks he couldn't figure out or fill in on his
00:29:06
own they start filling them in for him and this is something I didn't get to put in the podcast either but um they
00:29:12
took him to the crime scene so he had a very clear when he's later explaining how this happened they took him there
00:29:20
and showed him where it happened and said this is where it happened this is you know where he was found and
00:29:25
strangled with the belt so he not only has been fed all this information he was taken to the crime scene to give an even
00:29:34
more accurate description of this this murder that he allegedly committed um so it's it's in really it's incredibly
00:29:42
disturbing when they pick up Brian Ferguson one of the things the detective says to him is
00:29:48
that I'm a fact gatherer which will drive you nuts in this case because if you're a fact gatherer then you would
00:29:56
have known pretty quickly that Charles knew nothing about the crime scene the victim or anything that happened that
00:30:05
night because he wasn't there the other thing in the these interrogations I think for me there's a detective that
00:30:14
talks with Ryan Ferguson and he says I have a I have a son like you so uh you can't talk to your father right now but
00:30:21
let me step in for him there's multiple times where I I think I would have stopped as a detective
00:30:28
and said this isn't making sense we need something that actually connects them to
00:30:34
the scene where we're going to have to let these guys go they knew that they did not do this none of the evidence you
00:30:40
know they tested all of the blood evidence the hair evidence all of this did not match Ryan and Charles they knew
00:30:47
they did not do this and yet they they literally concocted false statements from people
00:30:57
I mean it it is so it is just beyond police misconduct it is beyond prosecutor misconduct
00:31:06
and the prosecutor was Kevin Crane and he is now a judge so beyond like the misconduct there is no ramifications for
00:31:14
what they did putting two innocent people in in prison is just so so wild well do you know this and you might not
00:31:25
that because different departments work different ways in different cities work different ways so in some cases the
00:31:34
detectives are the ones that push the trial to the prosecutors there's a conversation that goes back
00:31:42
and forth but there's one entity normally that has the hierarchy to say no we're going to take this to trial so
00:31:50
we need you to go back and get more information I didn't know if you knew how that
00:31:55
worked in this department I don't know but um again like I was saying you know I
00:32:02
ran into these instances in other cases where the prosecution didn't know all of
00:32:06
the dirty things the cops were doing in this instance crane is part of it I mean
00:32:12
he seems like the dirty one to me he coached Jerry Trump who was the star witness who is the entire reason that
00:32:20
Ryan's case was um vacated because he went on the stand and said um everything I said was a lie prosecutor
00:32:29
Kevin crane coached me on what to say so to me it seems like all of it was was dirty um they all knew they knew that
00:32:37
the evidence was not matching them and they just took two innocent freaking kids 19 year old kids and locked them
00:32:45
away right so what we have as far as evidence that didn't match the eyewitnesses the janitors didn't match
00:32:52
they just said that these two boys were not the boys that they saw at the crime scene yeah so to clarify on that Shayna
00:32:59
Orange um this was one of the Brady one of the numerous Brady violations um she specifically told the police
00:33:07
um when they showed her photos that is not it is not them it is not Ryan Ferguson it is not Charles Erickson that
00:33:14
is not who I saw at the scene and so when it comes to trial the defense had no idea about her so
00:33:21
that's the Brady violation and of course the prosecution doesn't bring on this witness because it doesn't match their
00:33:27
story she's saying consistently for years that is not who I saw so yeah that's one of the pieces of evidence is
00:33:34
the eyewitness did not see Charles and Ryan well supposedly there was a lot of fingerprints all over the scene and none
00:33:41
of uh Charles or Brian's fingerprints match any of those or a bloody palm print or the shoe prints as well
00:33:52
none of them match I mean there is not a single shred of evidence there's not a single witness who has not
00:33:57
come and either recanted or said I was coaxed putting them there I mean there's zero evidence
00:34:04
even putting them near there well I think that that's a big thing in this trial that is not talked about enough in
00:34:12
the system is I think there was some somewhere between 10 and 15 people that came forward and said hey I
00:34:20
was interviewed and they asked me questions but I felt like I was an interrogation I felt like I was doing
00:34:27
something wrong and we they have several of them come forward and say I got to the point where I just told the
00:34:35
prosecutor whatever you want me to say I'll say it so you let me leave this is not how we should be treating
00:34:43
eyewitnesses and and the other thing too that I want to step back to for a second
00:34:48
when you were talking about um do you know how they didn't have their parents there not only did they not have
00:34:53
their parents there they weren't read any kind of Miranda rights they weren't under arrest they
00:34:59
had no idea I mean they're kids you know we work in this field so we know you know if you're taken in you're not under
00:35:06
arrest you don't have to say anything you can leave you can walk out um he has no idea what's going on he's a
00:35:14
scared kid and but when I say he I mean I'm talking about Charles specifically because he's the confused one I mean
00:35:20
Ryan is very adamant like y'all get the hell up away from me I didn't have anything to do with this but Charles is
00:35:26
like I don't know I don't know and he wanted to help so bad and I talk about this in the podcast
00:35:33
when you know now he understands he's innocent but he didn't at the time because so much evidence
00:35:40
was withheld from him he didn't know that these were all false police reports given to him he had no idea that DNA was
00:35:48
exculpatory for him and Ryan he didn't know any of this until around 2013. so he's sitting there thinking I think we
00:35:56
did this Ryan is not trying to help or be helpful and I want to help so you know what do I
00:36:03
have to do to help him a man is dead and I don't right but that's not even the story he's being told because in the
00:36:08
other room like you said if if Ryan knew hey I'm not under arrest I wasn't there
00:36:15
Fu he could have just walked out and and that's probably what he should have done and then in this other room or
00:36:24
later on when they're talking to Charles what do they do they go hey by the way your head's on The Chopping Block
00:36:35
and if you don't confess against Ryan he's going to confess against you and so for a 17 year old to 19 at the
00:36:45
time yeah or yeah 19 at the time of questioning but he doesn't know that the the cops
00:36:51
are allowed to lie to you I think most people would assume that the cops are not legally allowed to lie to you so now
00:37:00
you have somebody in the other room or nobody in the other room but they're telling you hey if you don't confess
00:37:07
uh you're going to get the the bad end of the stick and I I you know there that's something I haven't really looked
00:37:12
into like we know that's a thing that they're allowed to lie to you I didn't know they were allowed to go as far as
00:37:18
making fake police reports I didn't know that you know where is where is the line
00:37:23
on what they can do to get right you know a confession out of somebody I think that's what's so tricky here
00:37:30
because we have Charles Erickson who's saying he's asking did I do this I may have done this I
00:37:37
don't know he's flat out telling them I don't know maybe I'm crazy he says that several times when they when he can't
00:37:43
get a question right he goes well now I don't even know if I did this maybe I'm crazy yeah he gives them making this up
00:37:51
several several outs and the thing is it starts off as a slippery slope I get it
00:37:57
from the police end from the police and they're like look we we have reason to believe we might be looking for two
00:38:04
perpetrators or one attacker and one witness now we have this kid who comes forward says me and my buddy I think we
00:38:12
did this and of course you got one guy in one room and one guy in the other one guy saying we might have done this the
00:38:18
other guy's saying go to hell I didn't do this that happens in every crime that's committed by two people they get
00:38:24
one person saying they did one person saying that they did and so I get that from the police angle but the problem
00:38:31
with Erickson's confession then becomes he can't answer these questions they start filling in the blanks for him and
00:38:40
as soon as he agreed that yes it was a belt it was a belt that Ryan took off of the victim put it around the victim's
00:38:48
neck and choked him to death when he agreed that yes it was a belt their hold back information he sealed his fate
00:38:56
right then and there and it goes so far as he keeps asking them maybe I didn't do this I don't know if I did or not and
00:39:04
what you guys are talking about is they are giving outside confirmation to him to say yes you did you're right to come
00:39:12
and tell us this because we got these other people that are that are backing up portions of your story we got who was
00:39:19
it a friend of theirs named Dallas who all of a sudden says now that they saw that we we know this guy Dallas he saw
00:39:27
you near the crime scene so everything you are telling us must be true and that's where it's crazy because
00:39:36
you're not having somebody walk in and pounding their fists on the table and saying this is what I did this is how we
00:39:41
did it and this is why no you're you you have you have a guy going I'm not certain if I did this or not I have a
00:39:48
little snapshots I'm confused about that night and they're filling in the blanks
00:39:52
form and offering confirmation for him so now tell us more because you're going to fry for this and if whoever speaks
00:40:00
first is going to win in this case Ryan's going to turn on you so start telling us everything right and I think
00:40:06
the other thing that people are also confused about is um Charles didn't turn himself in it was
00:40:11
a Crime Stoppers tip because people had heard him kind of saying I don't remember that
00:40:18
night I wonder if I had something to do with it and someone called Crime Stoppers saying hey look Charles
00:40:23
Erickson is you know talking about this murder and that's when they brought him in who knows what would have happened if
00:40:29
someone didn't call Crime Stoppers but yeah that that's how they wound up in in questioning Paul is it true that once he
00:40:38
made contact with Ryan to say hey did we do this that not only were there rumors uh
00:40:46
people started circulating rumors saying that that Eric was involved but that Ryan was not involved I don't know about
00:40:54
that um I know Ryan was saying you know we had nothing to do with this and Ryan kind of went about
00:41:00
his life like just like Charles shut up like what are you even talking about I don't know if there were rumors about
00:41:07
Ryan not being involved but I know Charles was definitely talking to people he was really worried you know just
00:41:13
trying to figure out what what was going on what this ultimately leads to though
00:41:17
nobody bothers to pull the emergency brake and hit stop on this thing everybody just keeps letting it go
00:41:25
further and further and then at some point the prosecutor starts saying all right let's we're not only not only
00:41:32
we're not going to stop this train we're going to add fuel to the fire we're going to put Witnesses on the stand have
00:41:40
them say things that they know are not true because when they don't get a confession what they're hoping for
00:41:47
police is like all right we got one half of the parties confessing let's get Ryan
00:41:52
Ferguson to confess too and he doesn't he does not waver on his innocence and they have to take Ryan to trial this is
00:42:00
going to get a deal a plea deal for Charles Erickson yeah Charles takes uh 25 to Life second-degree murder for his
00:42:08
testimony against against Ryan and that's one of these things too the death penalty was on the
00:42:14
table so he was also absolutely terrified of the death penalty and you guys know we see this almost in every
00:42:20
single if not every single false confession is the death penalty is on the table and they're saying if you
00:42:26
don't say something you're going up for the death penalty if you just say something you know we'll take it off the
00:42:31
table but isn't it more likely that if he was convicted of first-degree murder that
00:42:37
death penalty would be on the table and it wouldn't be really likely that death penalty would be on the table for murder
00:42:45
in the second right well that's why he took the plea because he was up for first degree murder he took the plea to
00:42:50
get the death penalty off the table Yeah and this they're going to charge Ryan Ferguson with first degree murder
00:42:57
and they need him to testify they need Charles Erickson to testify at Ryan's trial and I'll tell you what having seen
00:43:05
portions of that trial look that the prosecutor very strategically had things laid out with different quote-unquote
00:43:13
Witnesses the defense attorney seemed scatterbrained seemed that he didn't prepare for this case he calls Ryan to
00:43:22
testify Ryan was not prepared to take the stand he was not trained on how to answer the questions but the thing that
00:43:32
was so shocking to me where you have this confused Charles Erickson when he's talking to police maybe Ryan strangled
00:43:40
the guy with a shirt oh it wasn't a shirt maybe it was a bungee cord oh it wasn't a bungee cord
00:43:46
we know it was his belt okay Ryan did it with the belt but when Charles walks into that Court
00:43:52
it is shocking it is stunning he walks right in and he throws a death stare a death glance over it Ryan Ferguson who's
00:44:01
sitting in the defendant's chair he walks up to the stand and now he it's like he's an expert on the case all
00:44:08
of a sudden he's he the script is completely flipped and he's up there with The Dramatics he's acting
00:44:15
reenacting the the murder for the jury he was extremely believable and he had this look of like anger against Ryan
00:44:24
Ferguson while he's on the stand he didn't hide his face from Ryan and shame or or or guilt or anything like that he
00:44:32
looked at him dead on and said this is what he did this is what I did I am here today because I am 100 guilty of this
00:44:41
murder yeah and and I asked him about that because it is really scary to watch um
00:44:48
and you know when you're only seeing this when you're watching you know dream killer and other things that have been
00:44:54
put out about this case I mean you're watching these clips and you are thinking wow Charles is a really messed
00:45:00
up person like what is he doing and I asked him that I said you know you looked like you know you had the fire of
00:45:07
Hell In Your Eyes like ready to go for Ryan like what was that about and he said I thought Ryan was being a
00:45:15
bad guy I thought that he was not taking responsibility for what we did and I was
00:45:20
gonna do that I was gonna be the one to you know give Kent heithold's family the
00:45:24
justice that they deserved and Ryan wasn't doing that yeah and then they bring them in and shackles and
00:45:33
of the black and white jumpsuit I mean it's very theatrical and like you said um Nick when they bring Ryan Ferguson on
00:45:41
the the stand he's very ill-prepared and just little mannerisms that he has he kind of smirks
00:45:50
and Chuckles at things and I think that made him come off uh insincere and like he wasn't taking this trial seriously I
00:45:59
think you know how it's like how could you it's like so ridiculous at least in Ryan's
00:46:06
perspective it's like this is absolutely insane it's like what has even happened
00:46:10
like I don't I can't even imagine what's going through Ryan's head at this point because he knows they
00:46:17
weren't there he's like this is absolutely Bonkers right and that's the thing is
00:46:23
that's the reason why this case always sticks with me so much is you just went out with one of your friends that night
00:46:30
a couple years later that friend's calling you going hey man were we involved in a murder I mean could you
00:46:36
imagine how much your brain would explode what are you talking about we're involved in a murder get out of here
00:46:46
months later being arrested or being pulled into question wait this this knucklehead's telling you
00:46:54
that maybe he had a dream and we murdered somebody we weren't even there and probably thinking the whole time
00:47:01
they're going to let me go and that's going to be it and nope now you're arrested now you're in jail
00:47:08
they're in jail for over two years before they went to trial I don't know if I could stand that if I
00:47:16
it's supposed to be innocent until proven guilty but you're in jail for two years before you even
00:47:22
go to trial it's and this is why you know so much of it focuses on Ryan because it it's
00:47:30
you know this poor kid was railroaded by his friend and the police and you know he is just like what is happening and
00:47:40
and you feel really bad for him but at the same time we also forget that here's Charles Erickson an incredibly
00:47:47
vulnerable 19 year old that was completely taken advantage of by the police and the prosecutor and and Ryan
00:47:54
has admit that you know when Ryan was released he I put it in the podcast a statement that he said he says um
00:48:00
Charles is a lot of things but he's not guilty of this murder naturally Ryan's going to feel a certain way towards
00:48:06
someone who put him in prison for 10 years but you know I know from that statement that Ryan knows that that
00:48:12
Charles had a lot of issues and the police took advantage of that well and his whole story just doesn't it doesn't
00:48:18
track I mean he says we left the bar in order to go rob someone to get more money for drinks and drugs
00:48:29
and this Kent height hold murder scene is a bloody mess Chuck says we return to the bar
00:48:37
afterwards and had some more drinks and we have witnesses who worked at the bar who were at the bar that said no the bar
00:48:44
closed closed before we believe Ken height Holt was even murdered because they call in the janitors call in to uh
00:48:52
9-1-1 I believe at uh 2 26 a.m and now Chuck Erickson saying we we killed this man and we returned to the bar which we
00:49:02
know could not have happened because the bar was not open and then on top of that
00:49:05
they would have been a bloody mess they're just going to hang out there that's the thing too they also not only
00:49:12
did none of the evidence at the scene match Charles and Ryan but they searched there I forget who's I think it was
00:49:17
Ryan's car because Ryan was driving but whichever car they were driving in they searched they searched Charles's you
00:49:23
know clothing from that night there's nothing nothing there's no blood there's no evidence and that's the whole point
00:49:30
they would have been a bloody mess there would have been blood in that car you know there would have been something
00:49:37
and again it's it's hard not to fault the detectives or the prosecutors but I I do feel that maybe
00:49:46
with somebody coming forward saying I don't know if I did this I possibly could have I think maybe you push
00:49:53
further than you normally would and you dig deeper than you normally would but I think at the end of the day
00:50:00
you still come to the conclusion that neither one of these boys were at the scene of the crime so they therefore
00:50:06
could have committed the class yeah and again there was multiple Witnesses you know like you said the bar saying it was
00:50:13
closed like people were alibiing for them and they just pushed ahead and I think to going back to what you said you
00:50:21
know I I feel like prosecutor Kevin crane I mean we have Jerry Trump specifically saying he was coached by
00:50:27
him I feel like he was really pushing for this conviction and again he's a judge now so this was like a big this
00:50:35
was a big win for him um in in a stepping stone in his career so you know if the whole thing was just
00:50:43
very dirty well and Shauna ort says that she told Prosecuting Attorney Kevin Crane That
00:50:51
that Ryan Ferguson is not the man that I saw in the parking lot so and he kind of conveniently leaves
00:50:58
that out he doesn't get her to change her story but he never says point to do you see the man that you saw that night
00:51:06
in the parking lot in this room at court here today he never asked that question
00:51:11
then of course Ryan Ferguson's attorney is too scared to ask that same question because he doesn't know what the witness
00:51:17
is going to say that's what's bizarre that shows you how the lack of preparedness on the defense
00:51:24
on their end there were holes to be poked in this story in this narrative and the evidence itself but he didn't
00:51:31
bother poking any of those holes because he didn't really didn't seem like he prepared much for this had he
00:51:37
interviewed Shauna art in advance he could have asked her that question in a deposition found out in advance what she
00:51:44
was going to say and realized wow that's some powerful information that this jury
00:51:49
should know about my client but he didn't know to do that because he didn't he didn't put in the work well again
00:51:56
this is so it's so bizarre and one of the reasons is because the system is set up to have checks and balances
00:52:04
and in this case it's it's such a perfect storm we have this kid that doesn't remember thinks they did
00:52:11
something bad now he's confessing against you you're uh attorney your defense attorney
00:52:17
that you hire that everybody tells you this guy's the best shows up so unprepared
00:52:24
I mean at one point he's pointing to um a reference map and talking about a restaurant and the
00:52:31
restaurant's not even on the map because because it was an old map this guy was so ill prepared and then
00:52:40
again The Perfect Storm cops that went too far a prosecution that probably said hey look if we can get the confession
00:52:48
doesn't matter if it's false or not if we can get that confession I can get it convicted well that was in his opening
00:52:53
statement in Crane's opening statement he points he says you know there's no DNA linking them to this all the DNA's
00:53:00
pointing away from them but uh he's confessing so that's all you need to worry about
00:53:05
well not even not DNA I I believe crane said there is zero physical evidence there's I mean the
00:53:14
the amount of douchebaggery he talks with I mean I wouldn't even call it a Swagger it's
00:53:22
he is so douchey at times this man is a judge now he is presiding over cases now
00:53:31
I guess on one hand people could go well he's you know taxpayers pay his salary and he he got the conviction
00:53:39
um by bending the rules right well an interrogating interrogating eyewitnesses now because of his conviction the state
00:53:48
owes 10 million dollars to Ryan Ferguson alone that not to mention when Charles gets out who's done more time than that
00:53:57
I mean what is this conviction was purely for his own political career gain it there is no way
00:54:07
to say that this helped society and it clearly did not help because again taxpayer money is now going to paying a
00:54:15
wrongful conviction settlement and the real killers are still out there Kent Hyatt holds family does not have any
00:54:21
kind of justice and who knows what these people have done in the meantime in fact
00:54:25
I I do know what two of these people have done in the meantime and there was another murder here's a couple things
00:54:31
about this case is again the focus normally goes on Ryan Ferguson he's definitely a victim in this case as
00:54:40
much so I believe Charles is a victim in this case but like you just said Kent is the victim that is most forgotten in
00:54:50
this case his family is forgotten in this case and just like the last person that saw him Michael Boyd which was a
00:54:59
sports writer which worked under Kent there was multiple things early on one he puts himself at the crime scene
00:55:12
he at one point says he left at two later says he left at 2 20 and one interview he says he drove his car
00:55:20
another interview he says he drove his wife's car there was pieces of paper that had a
00:55:27
schedule on it that would have been Michael Boyd's schedule that was found underneath Kent's car
00:55:35
there was rumors that they had an argument um the car that people believe Michael
00:55:40
was driving at the time he got rid of so uh he also said when he came back to work that there was
00:55:52
um this the Medics were still there that was a lie there's also he said um a couple different things about the
00:56:02
crime scene um that he shouldn't even he shouldn't have known uh or he changed the story about
00:56:10
so there was enough reason to look into that individual and I'm sure they did a little bit
00:56:16
but uh where where do you stand on on on Michael Boyd yeah you you just named everything that makes him you know a
00:56:24
better person of interest than Charles and Ryan I don't really know in that two-year span before Charles and Ryan
00:56:33
came on the radar how much they looked into Boyd clearly something turned them away from him
00:56:42
um you know well that I what I question is is it the the janitors are correct in their
00:56:50
eyewitness that they both saw two individuals that were caucus so I think that's what it was yeah
00:56:57
yeah Boyd is not he's not white um he's a dark-skinned man um and he was solo and the janitor said
00:57:04
they saw two young white men again though who knows if they were just pedestrians walking by because allegedly
00:57:11
they said hey someone's hurt so who knows if they were the actual Killers or if they just saw something it could have
00:57:18
been buoyed but you know in doing subsequent investigation and and talking a lot with people who know this case
00:57:26
really well there are two people that were uncovered by zellner's private investigators that are very good
00:57:35
suspects in 2005 commit another murder similar similar like a very random murder who who they were linked to this
00:57:45
murder and allegedly have said that they commit other murders like this and they
00:57:51
look very much like the sketch one of the men so personally I think they're much
00:57:57
better suspects than Boyd I think Boyd is just an odd odd duck and just doesn't remember things yeah I I don't think it
00:58:05
was Boyd but he he should have been looked into much more than he was [Music] thanks for joining us here in the garage
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