00:00:00
thank you [Music] [Music] welcome to True Crime garage wherever you are whatever you're doing thanks for
00:00:44
listening I'm your host Nick and with me as always is your favorite co-host and Together We Roll tonight to the guitar
00:00:51
bite here is the captain yeah For Those About to Rock We Salute You it's good to
00:00:56
be seen it's good to see you thanks for listening thanks for telling our friends
00:01:01
[Music] today we are drinking out here by mast Landing Brewing Company out here is
00:01:11
crafted to match whatever landscape you are exploring this is a medium-bodied New England style India Pale Ale brewed
00:01:20
with big notes of fresh Citrus over a tropical foundation and let's give some thanks to our good friends first up a
00:01:27
big cheers to Juliana from Chino Hills and her cousin Victoria a big we like your jib to Ashley from Manhattan Kansas
00:01:36
and it cheers to Orla in New York a big shout out to Lisa in Powell Ohio and it cheers to Gene who is coming to us from
00:01:45
Elk River Minnesota and last but certainly not least by a mile we have a double fisted shears that goes out to
00:01:53
Ashley and Larissa at Hill Air Force Base in Utah everyone we just mentioned helped us out with this week's beer fun
00:02:01
so a big thank you to all of you yeah BW bar you in beer run make sure you go to
00:02:09
our page truecrime garage.com sign up on the mailing list so you're in the know about promo codes to our store page and
00:02:18
if you'd like more True Crime Garage in your earballs check out our bonus show called off the Record that's exclusively
00:02:25
on Central premium you can find a link to that on our website at True Crime garage.com and that is enough of the
00:02:33
business all right everybody gather around grab a chair grab a beer let's talk some true crime
00:02:44
[Music] thank you [Music] foreign [Music] County 9-1-1 what's the address of your
00:03:24
emergency uh yes I need the cops yeah apparently I got your shot you should a guy just shot himself
00:03:37
yeah and that's it yeah and is that where you are yeah can you hear me yeah yeah is he
00:03:53
breathing at all yeah do you think he's been out Beyond any help do you want to try CPR
00:04:01
uh somehow got in the back of my uh okay okay you're cutting out uh all right I can't even get cancer here please hey
00:04:35
can you hear me thank you he is breathing how old is he do you know how old is he that
00:04:54
may be 20. 1920 21 somewhere like that in my head and the heads are you thank you
00:05:06
can't really change but they're is he alert it all is he conscious he don't look like it
00:05:15
when did this happen um about a few minutes ago three minutes ago okay you're hard to hear again
00:05:32
you're cutting out sir you're cutting out I can't understand you trying to find this
00:05:41
yeah hello I can hear you now oh yeah uh right now I called you what was your name
00:05:52
uh James can you hear me [Music] Durante Martin was born in St Louis where he'd lived until he was about 10
00:06:16
years old then he his mom her name is Erica Lotz and his six siblings moved to Park Hills a town of about 8 500
00:06:26
residents 60 miles Southwest of St Louis Park Hills was a very different type of
00:06:32
environment than the urban one in St Louis first of all of course it was a much smaller community in a town this
00:06:40
size most people know each other it was a much less racially diverse Community Durante and his family were very much in
00:06:48
the minority one article we found describes the old lead belt region of Missouri where Park Hills is located as
00:06:55
95 percent white durante's family is black in the spring of this year 2021 Durante was 19 years old and he had
00:07:05
graduated the year before from Central High School Durante started out at Central but then transfer to an
00:07:12
alternate School due to his less than Stellar attendance record while he was at this other school an assistant
00:07:18
football coach from Central took note of him partially because of his impressive
00:07:23
size and encouraged him to get his attendance on track so he could return to Central and play football and he did
00:07:31
durante's cousin Isaiah Welch later told nbc5 news that the two played on the team together and being football players
00:07:40
changed their lives for the better he said quote when we were kids we used to live in the same trailer park together
00:07:47
he lived right in front of me so our windows were facing each other and when our parents fell asleep we'd go to the
00:07:54
windows and open up the curtains and look at each other and sneak out of the house and do whatever we wanted to do
00:08:00
because we were bad kids football definitely changed us the coaches and stuff like that just helping us through
00:08:07
this life because we didn't have it easy growing up Durante was six foot three inches tall and 250 pounds and was very
00:08:17
athletic his cousin Isaiah said he could do a lot of things big boys like him couldn't really do he was fast and he
00:08:25
could catch the ball real good there are quite a few stories in the local papers throughout durante's High
00:08:32
School football career in which his prowess on the field is reported he was a star defensive tackle on Central's
00:08:39
Rebels football team and earned himself a scholarship to a small College in another state
00:08:45
but the school was requiring that Durante bring up his s.a.t scores so he took a year off after high school and
00:08:53
worked and studied for his entrance exams he was preparing to go to summer football camp and he held down two jobs
00:09:00
one at Walmart and one at a local restaurant until he was laid off during the pandemic then his mom bought a house
00:09:07
in Ferguson a suburb of St Louis and the family relocated again to the town of about twenty thousand people 13 miles
00:09:15
Northwest of St Louis on April 23 2021 Durante left the Ferguson house and the company of some
00:09:24
friends from his Alternative High School in Park Hills so he left the house that
00:09:29
night with people that his mother didn't know that well he told his mom that one of them would
00:09:35
drop him off at his grandmother's house this is Kimberly Robinson she still lived in Park Hills but Durante never
00:09:41
showed up this next bit of information is all from a statement released by Madison County
00:09:47
Sheriff Katie McCutchen on April 29th on the Sheriff's Department's Facebook page this is what
00:09:54
they put on there captain on Sunday April 25th at approximately 301 am Madison County dispatch received a 9-1-1
00:10:03
call from a residence located at 1773 Highway Z in Fredericktown in reference to a 21 year old male shot
00:10:13
in the head and was not conscious in the 9-1-1 call a man who identifies himself
00:10:19
as James Wade says he needs cops in an ambulance apparently a guy just shot himself he
00:10:26
says to the dispatcher he confirms the highway z address a girl in the background can be heard crying and
00:10:33
yelling something like I hate this he confirms that the victim is not breathing and then tells someone in the
00:10:41
background to check and see if he's breathing he is gasping for air it sounds like he
00:10:47
says when asked the victim's age the caller says he's 19 20 21 something like that
00:10:54
where was he shot the dispatcher asked in the head the caller says no he was not alert or conscious the sheriff's
00:11:03
statement continued Madison County Sheriff's Office Madison County EMS and Cherokee pass fire department was
00:11:10
dispatched to this location upon arrival to the scene the male subject was located in the Attic area of the
00:11:18
residence and was found to be deceased the statement said the dead man was identified as Durante Martin age 19.
00:11:27
Sheriff McCutchen's Facebook statement went on to address the autopsy of the deceased saying an autopsy was performed
00:11:35
on the deceased on Monday April 26 2021 at the Saint Francis County morgue in Farmington Missouri the initial
00:11:43
investigation was led by the Madison County Sheriffs and Madison County coroner's office with the assistance of
00:11:50
the Missouri State Highway Patrol preliminary evidence revealed the male subject died from a self-inflicted
00:11:57
gunshot wound to the head once the final autopsy results in all witness statements have been received the
00:12:04
complete report will be submitted to the Madison County prosecutor's office for further review so four days after the
00:12:11
9-1-1 call about Durante being shot the sheriff had preliminarily concluded that
00:12:19
this was a suicide and said so so publicly well we all know my feelings about them making statements too early
00:12:26
take your time say you're doing an investigation let the evidence lead you to your final
00:12:34
findings you're exactly right Captain because they are saying in their own statement this is not the final autopsy
00:12:42
uh it is an autopsy that we performed and this is what we found preliminary evidence is showing us that this was a
00:12:49
self-inflicted gunshot wound my guess is that preliminary evidence that they're talking about is less scientific and
00:12:58
more witness statements right and so you're right if this is not the final autopsy then why release anything
00:13:07
at all because you've not finished your job you've not completed the work and the other thing too if you're going to
00:13:14
make such a statement that could be found to be controversial which ends up being just that maybe release a more
00:13:23
detailed statement back it up with facts and actual evidence it's a very brief statement that says hey we reviewed it
00:13:31
this is what happened but they don't really tell you how they got to that conclusion makes you
00:13:36
question why a 19 year old is in a house that we he obviously doesn't know the house that well but why is he in the
00:13:44
Attic by himself and where did he get this firearm again that goes back to their statement we don't have much
00:13:52
information we don't know what those witness statements would be so it's hard to even say that he was in that space in
00:13:59
that Attic by himself right it gets really wishy-washy here on this whole thing and
00:14:05
that's what we're going to tear through right now because immediately durante's mother and grandmother both dispute the
00:14:14
suicide findings they're saying look this kid was not suicidal they say that Durante was a big
00:14:21
happy Jolly kid and that seems to be an opinion that's shared by his friends and
00:14:28
family as well no but we all know depression is a [ __ ] right and not always does somebody show signs of
00:14:37
depression to others you're exactly right and that's such a such a sad thing and
00:14:43
you can understand maybe Mom and Grandma have it wrong maybe that he was holding
00:14:49
on to some kind of dark secret or maybe this was something he was able to keep away from his family and of course
00:14:57
unfortunately we've all seen cases where the family is the last to know that their loved one is in fact suicidal but
00:15:05
we also have some evidence of his mindset I mean he is working two jobs that takes a lot of energy
00:15:15
motivation to work at a Walmart and a restaurant so I'd be interested to see how many
00:15:22
hours he was working but to me that that is evidence of somebody that's more motivated trying to do something with
00:15:29
their lives yeah and keep in mind this is going to be going on after everything got shut down and so he did lose one of
00:15:37
those jobs because of the shutdown I this is one thing that's going to perplex me for the rest of my days
00:15:43
Captain I don't understand why the mom and pop small stores and restaurants got closed during the pandemic but the
00:15:51
Giants that don't need any money like Walmart and Target were allowed to stay open and Shuffle in as many people as
00:15:58
they could but what I see here and this is one of these stories that look I don't love the overall story of this
00:16:06
case I love the beginning of the story because what do we see here we see a young man a teenage a teenager who is
00:16:13
not necessarily doing the right things right he's skipping out of school maybe kind of half-assing it along the way
00:16:20
yeah but the system is not set up the school system is not set up for most kids but what I love about the story I
00:16:28
think where you're going is somebody says okay well you might not like this system and this system might not favor
00:16:34
you but do you like sports do you is there some interest that I could get you involved in I mean I hated
00:16:43
school awful student but because I enjoyed the music programs that that was the gateway to try to be a good student
00:16:52
you didn't want to miss class because you're going to miss jazz band or you're going to miss Orchestra class or so you
00:17:00
went to school because those classes kept kept you coming back and so same here oh I want to play sports well I
00:17:08
have to go to school I have to do the mathematics and English and science classes in order to be able to play
00:17:15
sports well and I don't you know the system it doesn't really apply here in my opinion this is a setup where the kid's
00:17:24
just not going to school I mean it doesn't matter about the reason set up there if you don't what I'm trying to
00:17:30
attend what I'm saying is he might have gave up on school because it just wasn't
00:17:34
working for him what I love is exactly what you said you see a kid that that is presented an
00:17:42
opportunity where in kudos to this coach who went out of the his way or her way to say hey
00:17:51
look there's some here's something for you a little light at the end of the tunnel if you will if you can get your
00:17:57
attendance up and actually participate in class and attend the classes there might be a spot for you on this football
00:18:04
team and so what we're seeing here to me is a kid that can find motivation or be
00:18:11
presented with motivation right and then work toward earning a goal an achievement and he did that so much so
00:18:18
that it translated into a scholarship offer for him and now he's kind of back at that
00:18:25
step again where hey I'm out of school for a year but I'm working toward getting those SAT scores up because my
00:18:33
scholarship is still waiting for me so of course we have his family that are saying they're going to present the
00:18:39
ideas that hey there's good things going on in this kid's life that are I mean everything's moving in the right
00:18:47
direction for Durante at this time and that's why they point out that hey if he were suicidal this point in his life
00:18:55
doesn't make any sense that he would be suicidal at this point in his life because things were bad before they're
00:19:01
not so bad now and they're moving in the right direction like we so we know that
00:19:06
his mother Erica recently purchased a home in Ferguson for herself and her kids this is the first time in durante's
00:19:14
life that he has his own bedroom rather than sharing one with some of his siblings
00:19:20
and then we have video footage that shows that he was still in the process of settling into his new house and his
00:19:27
new bedroom Erica his mom bought Durante new sneakers new clothes and a flat screen TV for his room so according to
00:19:36
the family Durante was very happy Erica told the TV news reporter that Durante was so excited about their new living
00:19:44
situation that he was showing off his new room to friends on video calls even though there wasn't even Furniture in
00:19:52
his room yet right and so again they're just kind of underlining and echoing this idea that it just didn't really
00:19:59
make sense that Durante who had challenges in the past would select this time in his life when things were
00:20:06
looking up to take his own life and they'd have more evidence than anybody else in the world you know his mother
00:20:12
and grandmother yes and we have nbc5 news who interviewed durante's former High School football coach who had
00:20:20
visited with Durante just a month before his death this is Corey schweiss who said he was happy big smile on his face
00:20:29
I asked him how everything was going and he said great and he was having a good time
00:20:35
and again we also Circle back to the idea that we don't always know everything that's
00:20:43
going on with an individual if they don't choose to share once and suicide is not something that's always something
00:20:51
that's a lingering issue true I believe there's some people that are very capable on having their life go in
00:20:59
the right direction and sometimes just wake up on the wrong side of the bed and that day they make a decision that's a
00:21:07
fatal one like everything else it can be impulsive at times now there are many things that we simply do not know in
00:21:15
this case and we're not going to sit here in the garage and try to pretend otherwise
00:21:19
and what we do know in this case only raises more questions for example there are no details that
00:21:26
this is this is the [ __ ] sorry this case gets me a little worked up this is the
00:21:32
stuff that that we really really need to be told so we can make heads or tails of what the hell happened
00:21:40
here because you have a very suspicious looking situation on the surface underneath the surface
00:21:47
however you want to shake it out until we know what the heck happened so what we do know only raises more questions
00:21:53
for example there are no details about where the gun came from whether the gun was collected at the scene
00:22:00
or even what type of gun it was and Sheriff Katie McCutchen isn't talking they're not filling in any of those
00:22:08
blanks for us well that's [ __ ] another thing we do not know is what exactly Durante was doing at this house
00:22:15
in the first place what is he doing at the place where he died his family says that they have no idea how he ended up
00:22:23
where he did I have a couple of thoughts but we don't have anything that's concrete to tell us why he would be at
00:22:29
this house and there's reasons to point out and suggest that maybe this might not be the most inviting or welcoming
00:22:37
home for Durante to be hanging out at the house where Durante was shot was the location for a party of kids from a
00:22:47
different High School not Central so him being 19 years old makes some sense he ends up at a party amongst his peers it
00:22:56
was a girl's 18th birthday party at a home in Fredericktown this is a Tiny Town of about 4 000 about 27 miles south
00:23:05
of Park Hills there are conflicting accounts of how Durante ended up at this party reportedly he was brought there by
00:23:13
some friends another rumor is that Durante did not want to go to this party because he knew that there would be some
00:23:21
guys or a guy that he had a beef with according to One Source keep in mind durante's situation he's working hard to
00:23:30
and studying trying to get those s.a.t scores up because he wants to take advantage of the opportunity of that
00:23:36
scholarship this does not strike me and again 19 we're all a little dumb in different ways I certainly was super
00:23:44
dumb you and I were leading the pack of dumbness I was I was the head of the class I'm happy to knock on wood I'm
00:23:51
happy to be alive but so we know we we can factor in 19 year old male dumbness but what I see here is
00:24:01
a guy that's not going to screw up this opportunity that's being handed to him and so showing up at a place where you
00:24:08
know something might go down or police get called yeah isn't going to help you on your way to that scholarship well
00:24:14
also maybe you just don't want to fight somebody true no hey it's Friday night you're
00:24:19
working your butt off the last thing you want to do on your free time is then have a fight you know
00:24:25
you just want to hang out with people have a good night according to One Source and please take this with a shot of
00:24:33
whiskey and grain of salt as it has not been confirmed by any of the authorities again they're not really
00:24:40
saying anything but this piece of information hasn't even been confirmed by durante's family but what
00:24:47
the rumor is is that there was a white teen at this party who had been arrested for first degree assault in the past and
00:24:56
for whatever reason this guy believed that Durante had ratted him out to the cops
00:25:02
and the rumor that was going around is this dude wanted payback and he was preparing to get it aided by you know a
00:25:11
group of his friends now we were able to verify that this guy named online as Adam Rulo was indeed arrested for
00:25:20
serious assault on another guy and it involved a shooting we found this article in the Park Hills Missouri Daily
00:25:28
Journal dated April 15 2021 just three weeks before durante's death that says an area man faces felony charges in
00:25:37
Saint Francis County after allegedly shooting another man in February Adam rule 19 of Park Hills was charged on
00:25:45
Wednesday with first degree assault and armed criminal action according to a probable cause statement from the Saint
00:25:51
Francis County Sheriff's Department rullo reportedly shot a man on February 17th at a location on Route DD south of
00:26:00
Farmington the bullet reportedly hit the alleged victim in his stomach area and lodged near the man's spine the report
00:26:09
states that doctors are unable to remove the bullet from the man's body due to its location the lodge projectile now
00:26:18
reportedly prevents the man from engaging in any sporting activities court records show Rulo has previous
00:26:25
convictions of fourth degree assault stemming from a 2019 incident and he pled guilty to the charge and was given
00:26:33
a suspended sentence of two years of unsupervised probation yeah so we have this guy that this teenager that wants
00:26:41
to be a gangster and then we have this other teenager that not only is he trying to get his life together his
00:26:48
mother is a shining example of progression through life and and winning at the game of life through
00:26:57
hard work and you know this thing we review this situation from the newspaper article here and we understand it's a
00:27:05
totally unrelated incident but it does show that one this Adam Rollo was involved in a skirmish right before
00:27:12
bronte's death with a firearm exactly two he likes to shoot people no so if the rumor was that he wanted to
00:27:23
get payback against Durante this statement could hold some weight this rumor could hold some weight because
00:27:29
there is this information backing some of that thought up right and no matter if you're 6'3 250
00:27:37
you're not going to go in uh to a gunfight with fisticuffs so that might be another reason why he didn't want to
00:27:46
go to a party where this individual might be at because he knows this individual whether it's he has extra
00:27:52
friends but he knows this individual is probably carrying a gun and probably going around
00:27:57
telling everybody that he's carrying around guns again this could mean absolutely zero
00:28:04
right but what it does is it starts to piece together that we have this guy that we know to be involved in gun
00:28:13
violence that may or may not have been at this party we don't have confirmation that Adam rule was at the party just
00:28:21
allegations posted online by people claiming to be in the know saying that he was in fact there so we have if they
00:28:30
are right and he was there then we have a situation where we have a guy that we know to be involved in gun violence is
00:28:38
at the same place at the same time as someone who ends up being killed by way of gun well this along with the evidence
00:28:48
and thought process of his mother and his grandmother these are reasons that you don't come out and give
00:28:57
findings of suicide until you're absolutely 100 sure thank you foreign [Music] [Music]
00:29:41
foreign we're back cheers to the people this nasty people in the front and uh cheers to you Colonel but also look
00:29:54
we're not experts we're not Health mental health experts so anything that we're saying
00:30:01
um know that we take suicide very serious and if you are struggling with anything a number that you can call is
00:30:12
1-800-273-8255 that's the National Suicide Prevention lifeline and they will be happy to talk with you as much
00:30:21
as you need it now durante's shooting Captain took place at a home owned by a man named James Wade reportedly that
00:30:30
night was his daughter's 18th birthday party in an interview with Katie SK St Louis
00:30:38
Wade said that he got home from fishing about 30 minutes before he heard the shot he said he was downstairs and he
00:30:46
heard the gunshot from upstairs he called 9-1-1 to try to help he said it needs to be said that this guy Wade has
00:30:55
never been named by police in this case in fact some mainstream media Outlets won't even publish his name but he has a
00:31:04
public Facebook page and has posted openly about this case and acknowledged the shooting at his home in social media
00:31:11
and in interviews so we consider his name fair game durante's mother Erica Lotz says that her son had zero
00:31:21
connections to this Wade guy according to NBC 5 News Wade said that his daughter didn't know Durante well but he
00:31:30
showed up at their house with some other friends who the other party attendees were has never been released to the
00:31:39
public my guess here is Captain she's turning 18. maybe a certain percentage maybe even a
00:31:46
large percentage of these other party attendees might be Miners and that might be the thought for not releasing the
00:31:53
names and we know how high school parties go we don't know if this was supposed to be
00:31:58
this huge Birthday Bash or if it was hey we're having 15 20 people over and then
00:32:05
that turns into everybody and their brother showing up I want to throw something out here too because I think
00:32:11
this is lost in the mix here because there's a lot to get heated about in this case a lot to get worked up on and
00:32:18
sometimes we can Overlook or underthink some of the information that's provided to us
00:32:26
and you're not going to hear me come to the defense of this James Wade very often heck this might be the only time
00:32:34
in this episode that I do so but because we don't have Clarity or an understanding of like you said Captain
00:32:41
the the parameters of this party we also need to keep in mind there's a chance there's a chance that James Wade
00:32:50
may not have known this party was going to be happening in his house right high school kids I don't know if this is a
00:32:57
news flash for anybody out there if it is um you you late to the party yourself but uh news flash sometimes high school
00:33:06
kids have parties at their parents homes and the parents don't know about it and maybe they thought maybe his
00:33:14
daughter thought dad's going to be gone the whole night fishing and came home and found oh there's a party in my house
00:33:21
and for all we know he was tipped off by somebody hey do you know there's all these people at your house
00:33:27
and then we go back to something else that we again it's a lot of we do not know
00:33:34
um we don't know what Durante was doing in the Attic of this house or if anybody
00:33:41
else was with him at the time that this gun goes off well it's also not clear because
00:33:47
an addict here to me you'd have to get up into somebody's crawl space and so you'd be going
00:33:54
through a little Rinky Dink ladder through a little hole or was there addict something where it
00:34:02
was like a a third level that they just used as storage or something yeah I'm guessing this must be uh I I
00:34:09
have no idea you're right some of them are quite small and tight spaces there's other ones that uh people turn into
00:34:16
rooms right in their home heck Clark Griswold spent a whole afternoon in his attic one day so yeah we don't know what
00:34:24
he was doing up in this space of the house and if there was anyone with him at the time when this gun went off if
00:34:30
you could prove that there wasn't anybody with him then we'd have a pretty open and shut case right again
00:34:38
they've they being the sheriff's department have come to a conclusion but they're not telling us how they arrived
00:34:45
at that conclusion now on the flip side of what I said about James Wade not knowing about this party that there's a
00:34:52
small chance that that happened rumors are that James Wade was known to host these types of parties where there is
00:35:01
underage drinking going on so a responsible parent right there's also a rumor and if Mr
00:35:10
Wade wants to come out at me for some of these rumors uh this is all stuff that can be found
00:35:16
online uh this is not stuff that I'm just creating and making up so there you need to come out a lot of
00:35:25
people but there's a straw I would say there's a good rumor going around that he might be involved in some drug
00:35:34
dealing or low-level drug dealing and maybe these parties if in fact he is hosting or allowing these parties to go
00:35:43
down at his home right that maybe some of the party attendees are his customers if you want to call him that again we
00:35:51
can't verify any of this these are all rumors and accusations posted by other people on the Madison County Sheriff's
00:35:59
Facebook page and Wade's own page and there might not be customers but he might view this as a
00:36:06
business opportunity now this next bit contains information that we cannot back up we cannot find any articles reporting
00:36:14
it but many people in the area have pointed out in the wake of durante's death that there was a previous suicide of a
00:36:22
young man on James Wade's property now again we cannot verify this but in a way James Wade himself did so someone
00:36:33
screen grabbed a text response he sent to their phone we don't know what it was in response to but here's what Wade's
00:36:42
response said hey stupid ass it's only two suicides that have happened and I wasn't here for either of them you blank
00:36:51
[ __ ] it goes on but it's just more derogatory and insulting language so we'll leave it
00:36:59
out oh come on read it well the interesting thing here Captain is I don't think it's very hard for people
00:37:07
to believe that a suicide went down at someone's house now if you told me that two of them went
00:37:16
down at someone's house something's wrong right don't you start the question everything at that point you go okay we
00:37:25
need to review both of these situations in detail and really get to the bottom of what's going on because it doesn't
00:37:34
make no sense no now what makes James Wade extremely suspicious in the eyes of the Martin family and the activist
00:37:43
Community is that he is a racist and white supremacist his Facebook profile picture is not a photo of himself but
00:37:51
rather a cartoon drawing of a middle finger imposed against an American flag background with the caption
00:37:58
here's my apology for being white according to NBC 5 News in 2017 and 2018 Wade posted pictures on his Facebook
00:38:07
page including one of a black man with a chain around his neck and the words my great great great grandfather's tractor
00:38:16
oh so this guy Wade is a giant piece of [ __ ] yes yes he is you can smell the racism well and that's what we're we're
00:38:25
pointing out here is that even if Let's Pretend everything went down just as as we're told that it did right this guy
00:38:37
is not a good guy and horrible guy and even just this happening one suicide on his property of a black young male
00:38:50
should be looked at under the lens of Suspicion yes I mean look we talked about Ayla
00:38:58
Reynolds case and one thing that was local rumor that we didn't report on in that case
00:39:06
because we had a lot of facts in that case but one rumor that I believe to have been true is that when the police
00:39:14
showed up to the call of this missing little kid there's beer bottles and beer cans and
00:39:20
paraphernalia all over the house paraphernalia don't you go into that situation saying there's a missing
00:39:26
toddler and this is what I'm seeing is going on in the house when all these kids are here and you look at that under
00:39:32
a lens of Suspicion you show up to a racist home where a person of a different ethnicity
00:39:41
dies on his property you're looking at this with a suspicion with some suspicion
00:39:49
yeah because your job is to Serve and Protect every citizen no matter what race they are but on top of that you owe
00:39:59
it to this family you owe it to the community to say this Wade guy is suspicious because of his ignorant
00:40:10
um thoughts on the world and of other people and so we have to do we need to double down on our due
00:40:18
diligence and make sure that we are as transparent as possible not only with the family but
00:40:25
the community well murder and violence involves a certain level of anger and Hate
00:40:31
and you can obviously see that this man has some hate in him yes he has a motive the other thing that
00:40:40
points to him being a racist is and this again is from his Social Media stuff was
00:40:45
another picture this is of a black dog and the words I had a black dog once I named him food stamps
00:40:53
yeah so these all appear to be memes constructed by other people and and maybe Wade reposted these but it's clear
00:41:01
that he endorses the racist sentiments that they express and we don't know if Durante
00:41:08
knew hey this house that we're going to this party not only is there a guy that might
00:41:14
show up that I don't want anything to do with but hurt this girl's dad is a known racist
00:41:23
and maybe that would be another reason you wouldn't want to go to this party as for who killed Durante
00:41:30
James Wade said in one of several interviews I know that I didn't do it and I tried to help him but
00:41:37
nobody's talking about that so I guess he's looking for praise for calling 9-1-1 but there's more after
00:41:44
durante's death Wade posted the following image on his Facebook page a photo of a white man
00:41:51
a middle-class dad looking type of dude with a large handgun pointing at something off camera he's standing in a
00:42:00
home shielding a wife and baby behind him the caption says don't get it twisted I believe all lives matter
00:42:08
regardless of color however that belief is null and voided if you invade my home
00:42:15
and endanger my family I don't know exactly what message he's trying to put out with that but at the
00:42:22
very least when you're being talked about and you have someone who dies from a gun related incident inside your home
00:42:33
not only are you racist and I I know that this these words go hand in hand and are often in the same sentence so
00:42:41
I'm no genius here but not only do you come off as racist you come off very incredibly ignorant at the same time
00:42:49
no and the thing too is that we we're supposed to applaud you we're supposed to give you praise
00:42:55
because you called 9-1-1 like go [ __ ] yourself now many people online saw this statement
00:43:04
as some type of confession particularly because his daughter Carrie posted that there wasn't a party and
00:43:12
Durante was not supposed to be there her posts are clearly trying to divert blame
00:43:17
from her family here's one of the posts on Facebook quote there was no alcohol there wasn't even a party my sister's
00:43:25
celebration was over before midnight he wasn't even there or invited to our family [ __ ]
00:43:31
he was there with his friend Zach so so that's where you I sit there and go well which is it you know he's there he
00:43:41
wasn't there he was there there was a party there wasn't a party party it's almost like she's trying to imply well
00:43:46
he wasn't there and then so he was trespassing well publicly if you're stating that
00:43:51
this individual is trespassing your father is now posting uh a picture stating hey I'll shoot anybody that's
00:44:00
threatening my family or trespassing on my property so are you saying that you killed this guy and now you're you're
00:44:08
stating it's a suicide well James Wade publicly has stuck to his story uh regardless of what his
00:44:16
daughters he said that he was downstairs and Durante suddenly shot himself upstairs
00:44:23
he has not tried to portray Durante as an intruder at any time or cite the stand your ground
00:44:31
defense instead he's saying that Durante did this to himself let's get into some
00:44:37
more of the family's questions that they have in in Greater detail here we have durante's Mom Erica who has not been
00:44:46
happy with the information or lack thereof that the family has been getting or not getting from the Madison County
00:44:51
Sheriff's Office but here's my question if they ruled it a suicide then the case is closed and they would
00:45:00
have every opportunity to receive the whole case File have they been able to do this yet yes
00:45:09
they have and that's where we end up with more so they're saying we got the case
00:45:15
no they don't have the case File they don't have the case File but they we have some more information that is
00:45:21
coming from his family rather than the Sheriff's Office and she is saying that his mother has
00:45:28
said publicly that she never spoke with anyone from the sheriff's department until a month after her son died and she
00:45:38
told a reporter that she never received official word of durante's death she heard about it from someone else you
00:45:45
know they didn't show up with officers on her doorstep to inform her what happened
00:45:49
further she was never given any details or explanations of the circumstances from the sheriff's department Erica
00:45:58
recorded a conversation she had with Sheriff Katie McCutchen when she finally got her on the phone this was in May of
00:46:07
2021 the sheriff would not discuss things like the caliber of the gun that killed Durante or where the gun came
00:46:14
from which that's a big deal because there's nobody saying that it was durante's gun that he showed up at
00:46:21
the scene with a gun that he had a gun that he owned a gun yeah where that gun came from
00:46:29
they're not even telling you that they have evidence that he shot a gun and then on so then on top of that you
00:46:35
have this racist known at least low level drug dealer that might have weapons in the house
00:46:44
and if it comes from you know [ __ ] bag Wade if it's his gun well there there's more questions well
00:46:54
in the recording it can be heard that um Sheriff Katie McCutchen says that she could not discuss the ongoing
00:47:01
investigation with the the victim's mother she put Erica in touch with the Madison County Sheriff's a Sheriff
00:47:08
Deputy named Nick Adams who also gave her virtually no information and refused to discuss the gun part of the case NBC
00:47:16
5 News got a hold of that recorded conversation so you can find that if you do a little bit of digging here's a
00:47:24
piece from it that I found interesting we have Erica the mother saying do you have anybody a suspect are you going to
00:47:30
arrest anybody and the Deputy Adams replying I can't really discuss any of that but I can tell you I've talked to
00:47:37
everyone that was there that night I've taken statements from everybody and the investigation is ongoing Erica can you
00:47:44
tell me where the gun came from Adams responds I cannot ma'am here's the other difficult thing here we have within a
00:47:53
few days of them saying publicly on their Facebook page we've done a partial autopsy it's not finalized yet we have
00:48:03
some preliminary evidence they don't say what that is exactly but we've rolled this to be a suicide and
00:48:12
here you have a recorded conversation that is taking place after that information is released on the sheriff's
00:48:18
department on their Facebook page to where the deputy is clearly telling the victim's mother
00:48:25
we cannot discuss an open investigation that's them confirming it's an open investigation and if it's not then don't
00:48:33
use those words and and that is that's always the wall that some of these officers stand behind
00:48:43
when they don't want to be it's not just about being forthcoming it's they are aware they're being looked at under a
00:48:51
lens of Suspicion and so their best answer is no answer at all and another odd and concerning twist
00:48:59
Erica says she never recovered durante's personal item she has never like his clothing he was wearing his shoes his
00:49:07
wallet have never been returned to her the Madison County coroner Scott fawless has told Lots his mother all of her
00:49:19
son's belongings went with him to the mortuary which handled the funeral and the representatives from the
00:49:27
mortuary said that they never received the any personal belongings of durantes from the coroner so it's a one person
00:49:36
pointing the finger at another and then there's a finger pointing right back at them
00:49:42
now this is odd we have a situation where she does end up receiving maybe something that could provide
00:49:54
some evidence in this case and that is durante's phone and this is a few days after his death
00:50:02
one of the teens who picked up Durante from Erica's house came over to her home a few days after the death and brought
00:50:14
durante's cell phone to Erica and Erica told NBC News through tears all of his contacts were gone his text messages
00:50:22
were gone yeah that's shady I would like to know more about this phone and this is where look
00:50:30
durante's mother and grandmother and family are doing everything that they should be doing in my opinion in this
00:50:37
case they're getting answers that don't make sense that don't add up that they don't like
00:50:42
so they are going to the public and saying look there's a problem here we don't know or understand exactly what
00:50:50
the problem is but there's a problem so I applaud them for that and I want to push a little further
00:50:57
can we learn some more information about this phone about durante's phone could it be as simple as someone was trying to
00:51:06
access the phone in it and it cleared itself off you know after too many tries of the
00:51:12
wrong password or that's not what would happen you know lock your phone out but it's not going to delete your contacts
00:51:19
and I'd I'd also want to know what what was the call history do we have do we have call history do we have text
00:51:26
message history if all that stuff is cleared you have a very suspicious item well I
00:51:33
would believe that you could obtain some of that information from the service provider yeah possibly or if it was
00:51:40
backed up in some way but again we don't know the make and the model of the phone
00:51:45
but still that's very suspicious that all the contacts and everything but they cleared yeah the service provider would
00:51:53
have a call log of incoming and outcoming calls and probably incoming and outgoing text not the actual
00:52:00
messages themselves but who the numbers were going to right and so that's what I'm saying I I would like if if his
00:52:09
family is looking for a public outcry then I urge them to do what the sheriff's department is not willing to
00:52:17
do for them put out some more information let's let's really try to stir the pot
00:52:24
with some some more information because is this there are phones that are are easily wiped clean
00:52:32
more than others and it can be done unintentionally is this something that someone actually
00:52:40
had to physically go through and and clear everything out I would like a little more information on that I would
00:52:46
also especially if if Mom or the next of kin could contact the service provider and
00:52:55
try to get some information from them and I encourage them to do that because you know who's not doing it is the
00:53:00
Sheriff's Department well they're probably doing it they're just not releasing any of that
00:53:04
information because they want to only release things that fit their narrative and I I think
00:53:11
the other thing too is with this they don't even bother to collect the phone yeah the night when they retrieved the
00:53:17
body from the home so I I wasn't there I don't know if they were asking about the phone and and
00:53:24
searching for it themselves but it seems like when you show up and somebody dies
00:53:28
from a gunshot this suicide at a party which is very odd a suicide and a party at a house that there has already been
00:53:42
another suicide well and the thing here too is I wrote down you know some questions I had about
00:53:48
the case and and the the night the the scene um and some of the the things that could
00:53:56
result in evidence and one of the questions I wrote down here is now that durante's family has the phone in their
00:54:04
possession uh we know that they received it a few days after after he passed away
00:54:09
but did they at any time attempt to give it to the authorities to turn it over to
00:54:17
law enforcement and yeah but why would you turn over anything to the exactly enforcement that's not if they haven't
00:54:24
already don't do that because again it doesn't seem that the sheriff's department is overly concerned with
00:54:30
anything other than what they have already found or concluded and again I don't know much about this phone I don't
00:54:37
I don't know the bank and model but if it has a SIM card or something like that you could
00:54:44
you know all you'd have to do is get that SIM card out and then there'd be no information on the phone well and you
00:54:49
could hire a forensic technician someone that that's that has expertise in this area and they can go through but I think
00:54:57
if that SIM card's gone that there might not be a way to retrieve any of that information but again it's a t expert
00:55:04
it's a tidbit of uh it's a little knowledge nugget but we don't have the whole meal there right there's we don't
00:55:11
know if we don't know why it doesn't have any information on it is it as simple as you said that somebody removed
00:55:17
the SIM card again if durante's and this is me pleading with them if you are looking
00:55:24
for a public outcry to get the answers that you deserve us as the public we need some more
00:55:30
information tell us everything about that phone well the sad thing is there already should be
00:55:35
outcry I mean the fact that their ruling is a suicide before they collect all the
00:55:40
evidence there's two suicide at this Dirtbag at this known racist house possible underage drinking underage drug
00:55:49
use um you also have uh I don't know was he a convicted felon that was there that
00:55:56
had an issue well again I want to make sure that we're discussing a lot of rumors here in the garage today and I'm
00:56:05
separating a couple of those rumors out from the others because we don't have anything to back it up so the things
00:56:12
that we need to be very clear on is one we don't know if James Wade deals any types of any kind of drugs or
00:56:23
illegal substances at all we do we do not know that we don't have anything that that
00:56:29
really strongly points to that other than there's local rumor that that's going on
00:56:35
we also don't have other than people saying that this this uh felon was there that night we
00:56:46
don't have anything other than that where in some cases we have like James Wade himself saying there was only two
00:56:53
suicides here so that rumor seems to have some truth or at least enough that James Wade is defending himself
00:57:00
on that level uh so well and it's also the the conflicting stories between him and his
00:57:08
daughter about how many people were there when the party took place you know it's very suspicious now you
00:57:17
get his phone back and there's no information on the phone even more suspicious the fact that cops
00:57:23
are not even it's almost like we're not contacting you I mean you're again you're supposed to Serve
00:57:33
and Protect you're not serving this family even if if you believe a hundred percent
00:57:40
that it was and the evidence shows that it's a suicide sit down with the family explain it to them take the time
00:57:48
that's your job Serve and Protect doesn't matter what color the victim is well that might be the case captain
00:58:03
it either they're not they're not sharing this information or doing their due diligence because of the color of
00:58:09
the victim's family or maybe they just don't do it at all maybe they're just shitty at their jobs
00:58:16
maybe they don't do it regardless of the color of anybody that they're just bad at what they do and guess what bad
00:58:23
sheriffs don't get reelected you have you have a community that's primarily white and that Community needs
00:58:33
to stand up for all their citizens and say this this isn't right and they need to start thinking what if this was my
00:58:39
son what if this was my daughter would I want answers yes you would and you need to stand up
00:58:46
and when it's time to uh re-elect any of these Knuckleheads you say we ain't doing it
00:58:54
because they they play privilege and and and use a piece of [ __ ] if you stand by and let this
00:59:05
stuff happen this is not right what's happening to this family and again all they want is answers all they
00:59:14
want is some cooperation that's all they want [Music] thank you for joining us here in the
00:59:30
garage for everything true crime check us out at truecrime garage.com make sure you sign up on our mailing list and
00:59:38
until tomorrow so much more case to get to be good be kind and don't win foreign
00:59:53
[Music]