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Wayfair specialty brand at birchlane.com. Heat. [music] Hey, Heat. [music] Welcome to True Crime Garage. Wherever
00:01:26
you are, whatever you are doing, thanks for listening. I'm your host, Nick. And to my immediate left or to my extremely
00:01:33
far right, [music] the one, the only, the captain. >> Either way, I'm here in the garage with
00:01:38
you. [music] It's good to be seen. Good to see you. Thanks for listening. Thanks for telling
00:01:43
a friend. This week and once again, we are very happy to be drinking Truth IPA by the
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awesome folks down at Rygeist Brewery. For some, and especially for the folks at Rygeist Brewery, Truth is found in
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aromomas. We have grapefruit, we have mango notes, and a dry finish. ABV 7.2% garage 4 and a half bottle caps out of
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five. And let's give some thanks and praise to our good garage friends for helping us out with this week's show.
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First up, a shout out to Tanya from Cincinnati. >> And a big we like your jibby [music] jib
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jib goes out to Karina in Copenhagen. >> And here's a cheers to Roxanne who says
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she's in the middle of nowhere, Georgia. And last, but certainly not least, I want to send out a very special Ron
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Swanson. Please and thank you to one of my favorite listeners, Janelle from Round Lake. And here's another thank you
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that goes out to all of our great first responders and er personnel. [music] Everyone we just mentioned went to true
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crimegar.com and helped us out with this week's beer fun. And for that we thank >> yeah bw
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beer run. [music] Make sure you check out true crimegar.com. And while you're there, sign up on the mainland [music]
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list. And Colonel, that's enough of the B has nas. >> All right everybody, gather around, grab
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a chair, grab a beer. Let's talk some true crime. >> [music] [music] >> The devil's going to get you in your
00:03:30
sleep. [music] The devil's going to get you in in your sleep. The devil's going to get you in your
00:03:42
sleep. >> [music] >> you in your sleep. [music] This week's true crime story is one that
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is as scary as any true crime case. In fact, in many ways, it is far more scary than any other unsolved murder
00:04:04
case that we have covered. This true story at its core is about double murders committed
00:04:12
seemingly at random and in the dead of the night by a phantom killer. This is the eerie tale of the Tex Arcana
00:04:22
moonlight murders. A case that resulted in several double homicides and multiple attacks that left a town in
00:04:32
fear for decades. The murders were committed by a mass gunman. The killer remains unidentified
00:04:41
to this day. Who was the man stalking his prey in the night? And will his real identity ever
00:04:50
be revealed? This is the story of the town that feared sundown. A series of homicides
00:04:58
today referred to as the Tex Arcana Moonlight murders committed by the one that they call the Phantom Killer. This
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is True Crime Garage. >> [music] >> The devil's going to get you in your [music] sleep.
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The killer [music] >> known to those of Tex Arcana and the surrounding towns and cities in both
00:05:43
Texas and Arkansas as the Phantom Killer was responsible for multiple attacks. He
00:05:50
was never caught and the case remains one of America's most chilling and haunting mysteries. This case is not
00:05:57
just incredibly frightening and undeniably chilling, but a truly haunting mystery that has taken hold of
00:06:06
many over the decades. This is the absolute triple threat of a real life true crime story. It's a slasher film, a
00:06:14
ghost story, and a murder mystery all wrapped up into one homicidal maniac with a hooded mask and a gun.
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But with this one, it's not so easy to say when the murders began or when they ended. For us, we will start where most
00:06:32
folks do when discussing the Tex Arcana Moonlight murders or the Phantom Killer.
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We will start on a dark night and Tex Arcana back in 1946 when, as they say, the Phantom Killer
00:06:46
struck for the very first time. So, let's go to Tex Arcana, Captain. This is a twin city. There is Tex Arcana in the
00:06:55
state of Arkansas and just across the state line you will find Tex Arcana in the state of Texas. How cute. How cute.
00:07:02
Together they are the principal cities of the Tex Arcana metropolitan area. Carlton Stoers a great writer for the
00:07:11
Dallas Observer called the story the Phantom Menace. And as he writes, the enduring legend began not with death,
00:07:20
but with a frightening and vicious attack on two young lovers. This attack took place on a February night in 1946,
00:07:29
when two young romantic partners, 24year-old Jimmy Hollis and his girlfriend Mary Jean Laray, aged 19,
00:07:37
attended a downtown movie. After the movie, as sometimes young folks do, they decided to prolong the evening with a
00:07:45
romantic visit to a secluded lane on the edge of town. They stopped off at, according to legend, a lover's lane not
00:07:54
far from a neighborhood. In fact, it is stated that the two were parked approximately 300 ft from the last row
00:08:02
of city homes. Now, in that spot today sits a mall. According to police reports, they had
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been parked for no more than about 10 minutes when a man, his face hidden beneath a white hood, approached the
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car. This terrified the two. Obviously, the victims were caught off guard. The masked man was pointing a flashlight and
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pistol at them. The attack occurred in a very dark and seemingly quiet area. The
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day and date, it's Friday night, February 22nd, and the time is just shortly before midnight. Jimmy Hollis
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and Mary Jean Larie are parked on a secluded road just outside of Tex Arcana, Texas, terrified and alone and
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at the mercy now of this masked man with a gun. And they're trying to understand
00:08:55
exactly what is happening. So neither of them could grasp the reality of the unknown asalant approaching their
00:09:02
vehicle in the dark. And it was only when the figure got closer that they could tell it was a man physically fit,
00:09:09
menacing, and wearing, as we said, a white cloth mask. The record states that the cloth mask resembled a pillowcase
00:09:19
with eye holes cut out and a slit for the mouth. But because our victims are seated and the aggressor standing, even
00:09:26
with the holes for the eyes and the mouth, they could not make out a single detail beyond the mask. This is in part
00:09:34
due to the shadows and the darkness. Of course, the masked man quickly made his way to the driver side door of the
00:09:42
vehicle. He's blinding Jimmy Hollis with the beam of his flashlight. >> Complete boner killer.
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>> Jimmy could hardly see the man at all. The attacker is all but a silhouette at
00:09:55
this point. But what he could make out very clearly was the barrel of a gun pointed directly at his face.
00:10:03
So Jimmy tries to tell this guy, the mass man, "Hey, you've got the wrong guy." To which the Phantom responded, "I
00:10:12
don't want to kill you, fella. So just do what I say." Now, this mass man captain gave loud, clear, and direct
00:10:20
orders. He demanded that the two of them get out of their vehicle, and he growled
00:10:26
at Jimmy commandingly, telling him to take off your goddamn britches. Then, with Jimmy standing now only in
00:10:35
his boxer shorts, the mass man, the phantom menace, struck Jimmy in the head, fast and ferocious with a solid
00:10:42
and likely metallic object. Jimmy stepped back, stunned and phased, unassure of what he was hit with and
00:10:52
wondering what had what he had said or did to provoke such a violent strike. But before he could sort that out, sort
00:11:00
that equation, he was hit once again in the head and this time even harder than the first. So
00:11:07
instantly, Jimmy, everything goes black. His body goes limp. He collapsed. He didn't even feel
00:11:14
his body and his head hit the ground as he fell face first into the pavement. Right. So now, Captain, we have a very
00:11:21
bad situation here. The young woman, Mary Jean, just 19 years old. It's midnight. She's now alone. Her boyfriend
00:11:30
knocked out lying helpless in the street. And now making his way from the driver's side of the vehicle over to her
00:11:38
is a man in a mask with a gun. and what he wants and expects of her is unknown, right? She tries to get in front of it
00:11:48
maybe if she could just communicate clearly to the man that she might be able to deescalate this situation, stop
00:11:57
the violence, and get the man to spare them and leave so she can get medical help for her boyfriend. So, she's
00:12:05
thinking, I've got to get to Jimmy. She needed to know if he was still breathing. I would think that she has to
00:12:13
be hoping, right, that the man is just an armed robber. All he wants is money with the mask hopefully being some form
00:12:22
of confirmation that he gets what he wants and you get what you want, right? He gets the money, can't be identified,
00:12:30
and you get to keep your life. >> Well, if you're planning on killing them, there's no need to wear the mask.
00:12:37
The mask is almost a a a hopeful sign. >> Do you have any thoughts on why he would
00:12:43
have Jimmy take his pants off? I guess if you're going to rob somebody, hey, just give me your pants and your wallet
00:12:50
and everything's going to be in there as well. I think often times when I've seen
00:12:56
when a perpetrator, regardless of what the motive is or what they're they're attempting to achieve, a lot of times
00:13:03
when they're having a victim remove their clothing, it is to deter them from fleeing,
00:13:10
>> right? >> So, that could be the situation here. I have a lot of thoughts about this killer under the
00:13:20
hood here. a lot of thoughts that we can get to once we get through the different
00:13:26
crimes that are going to take place because this is our first crime scene. So, right now in this very scenario, if
00:13:33
I'm Mary Jean, I have three goals. One, check on Jimmy. Two, distance myself from the man with the gun. And three,
00:13:42
give him money or prove that we have none and send him on his way. Hopefully, this is just an armed robber with poor
00:13:51
targeting skills as these are young folks parked. Not much reason to assume that they would have a large sum of
00:13:58
money on them or even in the vehicle. >> Right. >> So, Mary Jean makes her way over to
00:14:04
Jimmy and she tells the gunman, "We don't have any money." And by this time, she's so terrified and afraid for
00:14:13
her boyfriend that she is crying. She even pulls Jimmy's wallet out from his his trousers to show the man, look,
00:14:21
there's no money. >> Yeah, but this phantom menace doesn't make a lot of sense cuz he says uh what
00:14:27
was the quote again? Did he say I don't want to kill you. >> I don't He says, I'm don't want to hurt
00:14:32
you or yeah, I don't want to kill you, fella. So, just do what I say. >> Right. But then
00:14:37
>> then but then he beats him over the head. >> Right. And in a lot of these reports
00:14:41
that you'll read, it's Jimmy says he doesn't know what he was hit with, but we can we have to make the assumption,
00:14:48
right? It's either the butt of the gun or the flashlight. The the phantom is could be a lot of things, but he doesn't
00:14:55
have three hands or three arms. And he's holding a flashlight and gun when he approaches the vehicle and when the two
00:15:02
step out of the vehicle. >> And let me tell you something that you might not know. Both of those items
00:15:07
would hurt. So, at this time, Captain, she's showing him, "Look, we we don't have any money, right? He's she's got
00:15:12
the wallet." And then the attacker, he then hits Mary Jean very hard, seemingly with probably the same object. She falls
00:15:22
to the ground. The attacker then orders her to stand up. She believes that the man told her to run, so she does.
00:15:31
She's running, fleeing from the scene. And now Mary Gene Larie, she spots an old car parked off of the road. So she
00:15:42
runs up to this vehicle, but unfortunately she finds the car empty. Before she can make her next move, she's
00:15:50
caught by the attacker. He seems even more angry and unsettled than before. He says to her, "Why are you running?" When
00:15:58
she said that he had told her to do so, he calls her a liar. He then forced her to the ground, down to the ground, and
00:16:05
then he sexually assaults her with the barrel of the gun. Some accounts of this portion of this story say that that
00:16:14
assault happened in a wooded area or some nearby woods. After the assault, Mary Jean, she flees on foot. We can
00:16:24
surmise that the attacker likely is making his getaway at the same time. All right. Do we have any thoughts on how he
00:16:31
got there? Did he walk there? Did he motorcycle car >> fall from the sky? I think I think the
00:16:39
most likely scenario is the the empty vehicle that she ran up to was probably his.
00:16:45
>> That makes that makes a lot of sense. >> I think he saw the vehicle. I picture
00:16:49
this a couple ways because it's it's reported this story. I think because it's sort of and forgive
00:16:56
me for saying so because this is a true story. These are real victims here that were terrified and came very close to
00:17:04
death. >> That's your spoiler alert. They both survive. But >> well that's how we have an account of
00:17:10
what happened is they survived. >> This story is so action-packed that I think that we get many different
00:17:20
tellings of this story. I think that a lot of it's based in fact. But one thing that I find
00:17:29
interesting is that in some of the versions of the story, keep in mind we're talking about 1946. So there's
00:17:38
been a lot of years, a lot of decades that have passed. And that probably plays to why we have
00:17:44
slight variance with with the different stories here, the different versions, >> right? Some of those versions include
00:17:51
that headlights, somebody was driving, a vehicle showed up in the area and that is what spooked that's what they believe
00:17:59
may have spooked the attacker. So, he may have carried out if his intent was to murder, he may have carried that out
00:18:07
that night, but because of the vehicle showing up on the scene, he didn't. Other versions of that story leave the
00:18:15
vehicle out, the headlights out. A lot of the people at the time, Captain, the law enforcement seemed to be of the
00:18:23
belief that either the attacker didn't really want to kill the couple, >> right? Mary Jean, her statement and her
00:18:35
opinion of the events and what maybe the killer was thinking, attacker was thinking was that she thinks that the
00:18:45
mass man thought that Jimmy was dead. >> Yeah. And in fact, she thought that Jimmy was
00:18:53
dead because she said when he hit Jimmy the second time, struck him over the head. He was hit so hard that she
00:19:02
thought that the man shot him. She thought that the gun went off that that he shot Jimmy in the head.
00:19:09
>> That's brutal. >> And he had some severe severe skull damage. >> Yeah. >> Head trauma. it. I mean, it was it it
00:19:20
basically cracked his skull open. And and I don't know. I think the noise that she heard was a combination of the butt
00:19:27
of the gun striking his head and his head popping at the same time. >> But I think it makes these cases more
00:19:35
haunting when there's survivors because we get to hear the details of the attacks. You see this in Zodiac and Ted
00:19:44
Bundy and and so many others where there's a survivor, John Wayne Gasey. There's a survivor and they tell you
00:19:53
what happened that was basically leading up to their death and they were lucky to survive.
00:20:00
>> Well, and you bring up a interesting question. I was glad that you asked about how did the attacker get there
00:20:06
because they don't see a car, right? They never reference a car in their statements that they end up giving to
00:20:12
police. We got to keep in mind here though when we examine Jimmy Hollis's statement,
00:20:19
>> right, >> that he while he does come to. So, let me give you the the rest of the story
00:20:26
and we'll circle back to this. So, >> okay, >> Mary Jean, she says that she ran or at
00:20:32
least the report says that she ran about a half a mile to a nearby home. I think
00:20:36
that that might be that distance might be exaggerated because remember we had said earlier that they were only 300
00:20:43
feet or 300 yards depending on the reports you read from the last row of city homes. So I don't think she had to
00:20:50
run half a mile to a nearby home. But we do know that she did run to a home and she pounds on the door. She's wakes up
00:20:59
the folks that live there and the people there call the authorities. Meanwhile, Jimmy Hollis, he managed to regain
00:21:07
consciousness. He's able to get back to his feet or at least kind of pull himself up a bit. And he alerted a
00:21:16
passing motorist who would also call the police. That's some grit, right? >> True, true grit. I like the cut of that
00:21:25
guy's jib. to have the grit to to pull yourself up like the Undertaker rising up.
00:21:33
>> But he's hurt so badly that once the police we we have the Bowie County Sheriff's Department, they arrive on the
00:21:40
scene. The the officers there said that Jimmy was in such bad shape that he was going in
00:21:49
and out of consciousness. Like he kept he kept falling out. He kept falling out and falling out and coming to and
00:21:54
falling out and coming to. Right. >> And so I I wanted to make sure we included that
00:22:02
when we are talking about Jimmy's statement because how much anybody that's been knocked out or even hit on
00:22:10
the head real hard, fainted, I think most folks would tell you about the same thing. like I don't know that I
00:22:18
fully trust my memory or I have there's there's black spots there's blank spots in my memory of what led up to that.
00:22:26
Mary Jean's going to be able to give us a better idea of what happened. But again, she was hit too over the head.
00:22:34
So, both of these folks are in bad shape. The police are on the scene. The sheriff's department's on the scene, but
00:22:40
of course, the masked gunman is nowhere to be found. Both victims were sent off to the hospital. Mary Gene for an
00:22:48
overnight stay and Jimmy Hollis was in far worse shape and forced to be hospitalized for an extended stay to
00:22:56
recover from multiple skull fractures. Jimmy was hospitalized for several weeks and he was in and out of a coma during
00:23:05
that time. We talked about this part in our coverage back on True Crime Garage episode one, the Phantom Killer. That
00:23:14
are two victims, Jimmy Hollis and Mary Jean Laray. I keep saying Larie Laray. I've heard it pronounced about three
00:23:21
different ways, so I apologize to >> and we pronounced it five different ways on episode one.
00:23:27
>> We'll put our own spin on it. >> Yeah. The two victims, as we said, gave what authorities would later say is a
00:23:36
slightly different description. Right? They're giving slightly different descriptions of their attacker. So,
00:23:42
let's start with what they both agree on. They agree that the asalent was about 6' tall and thin. So, athletic
00:23:53
build, 6 foot tall. Neither of them had recognized his voice, right? And what they mean by that is it wasn't a voice
00:24:01
that they had heard before. They couldn't place the voice. It wasn't somebody that they believed that they
00:24:07
knew. And both of them did say, "Look, we didn't see the face hidden behind the mask." Some reports say that they both
00:24:15
believed the attacker to be approximately 30 years old. Now, here's the differing accounts, right? We have
00:24:24
Mary Jean claimed that she could see under the mask. And I'm guessing when she says this that it might be through
00:24:31
the the eye holes in the in the mouth, the slit for the mouth. And and I don't want to go too far down this road
00:24:39
because it the brutality of the attack, but obviously by our description of the events that took place, she was would
00:24:49
have had a better angle uh a better vantage point to at a chance of seeing who this guy was,
00:24:57
>> right? She says that she thought the man to be a light-skinned Africanamean and Jimmy Hollis says that he thought
00:25:06
the attacker was a tan white man or a dark complexed white male. Again, it would be hard to tell in the dark and
00:25:14
and and plus, you know how your eyes have to readjust when you see a bright light and then you look into the
00:25:22
darkness. >> And that's part of what Jimmy says too here, Captain. He says he did say like
00:25:28
look this is my opinion. This is what I think that I saw but conceded that he could not distinguish the features of
00:25:36
this man and that for the majority of the time when he was being attacked or was face to face with the attacker he
00:25:43
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[music] you in your sleep. [music] >> All right, we are back. Cheers, mates. Talk hands in the air. And cheers to the
00:32:13
people in the back. Talks in the air. And dear God, fix the internet. Please, God. That's all we ask of you. And happy
00:32:22
Thanksgiving to everybody out there, too. Please have a a wonderful Thanksgiving, a safe Thanksgiving. It's
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my favorite long weekend of the year. I mean, food, family, friends, football. Doesn't get any better than that, my
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friends. So, make sure you you you soak it all in and and enjoy every second of it.
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This is I always catch myself when I have to say this, Captain. I always go, this is the strange part of the story.
00:32:52
But they're true crime stories, Nick. every part of it there. There's all there's strange business strewn
00:32:58
throughout these stories, right? >> See, after the Phantom Menace said he didn't want to kill me, and then he hit
00:33:05
me really hard with a gun or a flashlight, I would have replied, "I thought you said you didn't want to kill
00:33:12
me." >> Mhm. Yeah. And I think that was a clever play on words by that writer uh Stowers
00:33:19
because he wrote an extensive article for the Dallas Observer on this case. His article came out around the time the
00:33:28
Star Wars Phantom Menace movie had come out. So I think he was doing a clever play on words there with with titling
00:33:36
the the article. But one thing that is regularly reported in this story, regardless of where you get your
00:33:43
information from, is that it seems like law enforcement didn't fully believe the
00:33:50
couple's account of the events and the attacker. In fact, they publicly said that they
00:33:58
believed that the couple that was attacked, Jimmy and Mary Jean, knew the identity of the attacker and were
00:34:07
covering for him. >> That's odd. >> Yes. That's a whole lot of crazy right there. So, let's try to un to unpack it.
00:34:15
Let's try to get into this bundle of crazy and unbundle. A guy cracks my skull open and I'm covering for him.
00:34:25
>> Well, okay. So, part of this does make sense once we get some more of the facts. Both Jimmy and Mary are married,
00:34:33
not to each other. >> Oo. >> So, from my understanding vu >> Well, from my understanding, they were
00:34:40
both well along their way into getting a separation, a legal separation. I don't
00:34:46
think that they were doing anything behind anyone's back, but that doesn't mean that they wouldn't be upsetting
00:34:51
someone or aggravating somebody. Maybe to the point where there would be a threat or even an attack.
00:34:57
>> Well, not all separations are amicable. Maybe Jimmy's spouse is upset. Maybe her
00:35:04
spouse is upset. Who knows? >> I think that that was it would appear to me, Captain, that that is the suspicions
00:35:12
of law enforcement at the time, right? They dig into the background of these two and they're like, "Oh, these two are
00:35:18
out fooling around." Mary Jean's husband, even though might soon to be the ex-husband, he found them in this
00:35:27
car together and he attacked Jimmy. And I think part of that thinking, too, is that Mary Jean's injuries are far less
00:35:37
severe than that of Jimmy's. So, that probably plays into it a little bit for law enforcement. And guess what? It
00:35:44
wouldn't be the first time that a member of law enforcement has been lied to. I firmly believe that both of these two
00:35:50
are telling the absolute truth. I I I I've looked at this a million ways and I'm sitting here thinking like, who
00:35:57
cares if it was my ex who attacked my boyfriend? Even more reason to say that I knew who the guy was,
00:36:05
>> right? >> That's where my mind goes. To me, it's more I could see if I as law
00:36:10
enforcement, I'm I'm talking to the these witnesses. They've just been and they're not really just witnesses.
00:36:17
They're they're survivors, >> right? >> So, there would be a part of me that's going, "This is a vicious, violent,
00:36:24
brutal attack. Is there a possibility they're not saying something?" Not because they're covering, but because
00:36:31
they're afraid that this son of a [ __ ] is going to come back after them and to
00:36:35
finish the job. Because this attacker that shows up on this lover's lane might not know who these individuals are, but
00:36:45
this is not a giant town. >> There's about 40,000 people back there. >> That's not giant. And
00:36:51
>> well, no, it it doesn't matter either. Their names are in every newspaper. >> Exactly.
00:36:56
>> You don't have to know who they were when you attacked them. Their names are in every newspaper. Now,
00:37:02
I think though, and let's not stay on this too long because we have a lot to get to here in this case, but can you
00:37:09
imagine if you have if you are in one room or you're at the hospital with Jimmy, interviewing him, and I'm at the
00:37:16
hospital and I'm interviewing Mary. We're in separate rooms, I presume. And then we meet up after we've talked to
00:37:22
both of our victims, our survivors here. And you go, "Hey, he said the guy's white." And I said, "Well," she said,
00:37:28
"the guy's black." Right? Then I feel like our like the wheels are going to start turning and we're going to start
00:37:35
trying to piece this thing together and sort out, well, why do we have that conflict? That's a major conflict in
00:37:42
your witness statements. The reason for that conflict is simply they're terrified, they're afraid, the
00:37:47
flashlights in their faces, and the guy had a freaking hood over his head. >> But also, you don't know what you don't
00:37:54
know. That was a lover's lane attack. And as we said, thankfully Jimmy Hollis, age 25, and his girlfriend, Mary Jean
00:38:02
Laray, 19, parked on a secluded stretch of road after a movie, they survived. Now, in the wake of the traumatic
00:38:10
attack, Mary Jean, her attempts to sleep are routinely interrupted by horrible nightmares.
00:38:18
She was afraid, just like you had suspected here, Captain, she was afraid that the Phantom attacker would seek her
00:38:25
out. And I saw some reports stating that she'd left. Reports of her leaving Tex Arcana to go for an extended stay with
00:38:34
relatives in the state of Oklahoma. So, she left the state. Now, just after one month, just one month after Mary and
00:38:42
Jimmy were assaulted, the legend of the Phantom Killer began to take its ugly form. Jimmy Hollis warned police,
00:38:51
saying, quote, "If you don't find him, he's going to kill someone." End quote. And unfortunately, Jimmy was right.
00:38:58
Carlton Stoers writes in part, "More than a half century later, that event is looked back on as the precursor of a
00:39:08
nightmare that would long terrorize this quiet East Texas railroad center. In the
00:39:15
weeks following the attack on Hollis and Laray, five murders would occur in its rural shadows, prompting one of the most
00:39:25
intense manhunts in the state's history. Twice on moonlit nights, an unknown asalent interrupted young lovers,
00:39:34
leaving them brutalized and dead. On another evening, a farmer sitting in his living room was shot through a nearby
00:39:42
window. So, let's go to March 24th. This is March 24th, 1946. The Phantom killed for the first time.
00:39:52
We have a heavy rain that was falling early that Sunday morning when a motorist nearing the Tex Arcana city
00:40:01
limits noticed an Oldsmobile sedan parked on a dirt lane near US Highway 67. So thinking that someone was just
00:40:12
stuck in the mud, this vehicle stuck in the mud, the driver slowed and got close
00:40:17
enough to see that two people were in the vehicle and it looked as if they might be asleep. So again, the date was
00:40:25
March 24th, 1946. And on this day, Richard Griffin, 29, and Paulanne Moore, 17, were found dead in Griffin's car.
00:40:37
Parked on another lover's lane. Griffin, his body lay awkwardly slumped between the seats, pockets turned out as
00:40:46
if robbed. Polyanne Moore lay in the back seat, but investigators suspected that she had been killed outside. So,
00:40:55
they actually suspect that both were probably killed outside of the vehicle, >> then placed back into the vehicle.
00:41:02
>> That the killer managed to place them back into the vehicle. >> That takes some strength.
00:41:07
>> Both have been shot in the head with a 32 caliber Colt pistol, and this would
00:41:12
end up being the same weapon that would be used in a later attack. The Phantom had escalated from assault to murder and
00:41:21
now fear was spreading faster in Tex Arcana than the ink in the headlines. And again, it goes back to the idea in
00:41:29
the first attack. If these two attacks are in fact connected, committed by the same attacker,
00:41:36
what was his intent in the first attack? Was it his intent to commit double homicide? Because that's the result
00:41:44
here. A little background here, Captain Richard Griffin was recently discharged from the Navy. Polyanne Moore, a
00:41:51
17-year-old employee at the Red River Arsenal, as said, they're both found dead. The way that they're positioned in
00:41:58
the vehicle, I apologize, but it's reported all over the shop, especially with Richard Griffin's body. Some of the
00:42:05
reports state that he's in the front seat, some state that he's uh between the seats, and then others state that
00:42:13
he's in the back seat. But with Paulam Moore, every account I could find, she's in the back seat. Griffin had been shot
00:42:21
twice in the head. And some of this might be a bit repetitive, but it adds some context to the double murder scene
00:42:27
and fleshes it out a bit. This says Moore's body lay face down on a blanket in the back seat. her open purse beside
00:42:36
her, a ring signifying that she had recently graduated from Atlanta High School, which is it's in Texas, is still
00:42:45
on her finger. Investigators noted a pool of blood about 20 ft away from the vehicle. So, investigators concluded
00:42:54
that she had likely been killed there and her body placed back inside the car. And then again, some reports state that
00:43:00
they believe both were killed outside of the vehicle and placed back inside the inside of the car. I wonder if the
00:43:06
placement of the victims in the car matter. And what I mean by that is, like I said, to put a victim back into the
00:43:14
car, that would take some strength. But if you're trying to set a scene or trying to stage the scene in some
00:43:22
manner, you'd think that you'd put both of the victims back into the front seat.
00:43:26
So that makes me wonder, did he just open up whatever door that they were closest to? And then again, that would
00:43:33
make me question how strong this individual was. I don't know how the vehicle was positioned in relation to
00:43:39
the the road that the motorist that eventually finds them because it may the the strategy there captain might lie in
00:43:49
the idea of if I'm going to take the time to put place them back in the vehicle. I'm doing that for very for a
00:43:56
very strong purpose, right? I'm not just doing that just for for the fun of it. I
00:44:00
think it may have been an attempt to conceal the bodies and delay discovery of the bodies. And if how many times do
00:44:09
we drive down a road and we see a vehicle that's just sitting off to the side of the road and nobody's in it and
00:44:13
we just keep driving. I think in this time >> Yeah. In this scenario, I think that the
00:44:20
the gentleman that approached the vehicle only did so because he assumed due to the rain that was falling that
00:44:27
they were stuck in the mud. He was just attempting to help some people. And then when he gets close, realizes,
00:44:34
"Oh, there's people in here. They look like they're sleeping. Wait a second. No, they're not. They've been shot and
00:44:39
they're dead." Aside from several shell casings from a 32 caliber pistol located
00:44:45
near the murder scene. Investigators found little evidence. Uh they had stated that the heavy rainfall that
00:44:51
continued throughout the day that the bodies were found had washed away, footprints that they were hoping to
00:44:57
find, shoe prints that they were hoping to find, and tire tread as well. >> And it made made it all but impossible,
00:45:05
they said, to locate any fingerprints on the exterior on the exterior of the vehicle.
00:45:10
>> But how do we know it's the same person? >> Well, that's a great question. I don't
00:45:14
think that we can 100% say that it is because again it goes back to intent. Do what was the intent of the first
00:45:22
attacker? Was he spooked? Was he scared by the car that was passing by as some of the reports say and then he flees the
00:45:30
scene? And and who's to say what he would have done had he not been spooked? Or did he just leave like some of the
00:45:37
reports state? Cuz some of the reports do don't have a mention of the vehicle. But also, it seems like there was a lot
00:45:42
of violence going on in this town. Anyways, >> like like what >> I think when we first covered this, it
00:45:50
seems like this sleepy no nothing town. It seems like there was criminal activity happening. Wasn't like this was
00:45:58
like Mayberry. Yeah, I I don't see any Look, this would be certainly be an uptick in violent activity, especially
00:46:09
of an extreme nature. And we don't know if it's the same attacker. We have this couple that was attacked, but they were
00:46:16
both Indian marriages, which was a way bigger deal back then. So, that could incite violence towards
00:46:27
the two individuals that were attacked. And then these two individuals, we we don't know who they were connected to
00:46:35
either and who who in their life did they possibly upset to incite violence against them.
00:46:43
>> Well, of course, and that's that's how any good detective would look at any scene. You don't go in there going,
00:46:49
"Hey, um, this you don't arrive on the scene going, "Hey, this attack is probably connected
00:46:56
to the one that the call that I got a month earlier." Right. >> And but >> but it's very similar.
00:47:04
>> Oh, it's it's extremely similar. >> And like you said, it's not a major road, but it's uh it's a it's a more
00:47:11
traveled road than the lever's lane attack. >> Oh, absolutely. This is near So this is
00:47:17
near US Highway 67 when the where the vehicle was spotted. Now, if you look at US Highway 67 on a
00:47:27
map, especially an old map, this is kind of heading out of town. So, it's look at
00:47:32
it like it's the opposite of the first attack. And what I mean is not the opposite of how things went down. It's
00:47:38
opposite in where that it falls on a map. So, if you have >> if you have the uh edge of town, this is
00:47:45
the opposite edge of town. both both on the edge of town, both of them in these lover lanes as reported. But one thing
00:47:56
too, and I I want to kind of point this out, and I know this might be difficult for some folks to wrap their heads
00:48:02
around with the regarding the statement from police about, oh, we don't fully believe their
00:48:09
story from the survivor story from the first attack. I have a suspicion that that not only
00:48:16
has to do with their marital status, that would make the most sense. But what also would make sense to me is if you're
00:48:23
saying, "Hey, you got to keep in mind this is 1946." All right, that that has to be in your
00:48:30
mind the entire time you examining examine this case. It's 1946. News flash, it was a different world back
00:48:38
then. segregation was alive and in most cities and Tex Arcana was no different. And I think that it would have been wise
00:48:49
because one thing that gets lost in the sauce in true crime stories is that the purpose of law enforcement, the police,
00:48:57
is to protect and serve. What is the first part of that? Protect. Protect. Their their number one job is not to
00:49:05
solve crimes. Yes, that's what they do. That's but if you can protect and set up
00:49:10
every scenario where a crime is never committed, >> you don't have to solve the crime.
00:49:14
>> You don't have to solve the crime, right? So their number one job is actually public protection to protect
00:49:19
the public and keep everybody in the public safe preventing anything from happening.
00:49:23
>> My number one job is public erection. But if you are keeping that in mind at all times that my number one job is to
00:49:31
protect the masses, it's beneficial to that goal that maybe, hey, I don't jump out in front of the public and go, guess
00:49:40
what, 1946 Tex Arcana, a black guy attacked two young white people in a parked car. That's not going to go very
00:49:48
well. That's not going to that's going to create other problems. And further, I don't think that this guy was
00:49:55
African-American at all, if in fact all these attacks and murders are connected.
00:50:01
>> Well, Colonel, let's get into the third crime. >> The third in the series here, Captain,
00:50:07
is on Sunday, April 14th, 1946. We have Paul Martin. He's 16 years old. He was found dead on North Park Road, shot four
00:50:16
times. His date from the previous night was Betty Joe Booker, age 15. She's discovered nearly two miles away. Shot
00:50:26
twice in the head and chest. She was actually shot in the heart and in the head. Betty Joe had been playing
00:50:35
saxophone at a local dance the night before. So, her plan here, Captain, was she was going to go to this dance
00:50:42
>> and perform, play the saxophone, >> and Paul was going to meet her at the dance, and he was to be her ride home.
00:50:51
So, this obviously happened as planned. However, before the young couple could get to their destination, someone, the
00:50:57
Phantom, had intercepted them, attacking, killing them, shooting them both. They
00:51:05
discover Paul Martin's body. So, his body's found around 6:30 a.m. that morning.
00:51:12
>> Yeah. What we do know is Betty Joe Booker, her parents did report her missing and
00:51:19
they were out actively looking for their daughter that morning. And it was during
00:51:25
that time that somebody else found Paul Martin's body. He's, you have to picture
00:51:30
this, he's essentially laying on the side of the road. So, he's found around 6:30 a.m. lying on the side of the
00:51:38
northern edge of North Park Road. Police say, the investigators say, "We found a
00:51:45
bunch of blood on the other side of the road by a fence." [snorts] And our victim here has been shot four
00:51:50
times. Once in the back, once in the hand, the right hand, right? Once in the back of the neck,
00:52:01
and then through the nose, through the center of the face. >> So, chances are he's not moving after
00:52:06
being shot. So, he's possibly moved by the killer. >> Well, that's that's interesting to
00:52:13
ponder here because I I think we could have a couple of different scenarios. So, we get that description of there
00:52:20
being blood on the road by a fence on the other side of the road, but what I think we're not getting is the full
00:52:27
description of the scene because I think a couple things could have happened here. either I think the the shot I want
00:52:34
to know with the hand if they were able to determine what position they think the hand was in when he was shot. So
00:52:41
what I mean by that is you say he shot four times. You tell me the locations of these four shots, but a hand is one of
00:52:47
those appendages that you could you could be you could place it up as kind of to block yourself to shield yourself.
00:52:54
Could could the shot to the face had simply was he trying to cover his face and he was shot in the hand through the
00:53:02
hand? I want to know was that a through and through shot with the hand. We don't
00:53:06
get that description, but what we do get is that he's shot also shot in the back
00:53:10
and the back of the neck. So, it could be he's facing his attacker when he's first shot. The the attacker thinks he's
00:53:18
dead and then now my victim starts to move and I plug two in the back. Another scenario is he's gunned down from
00:53:27
behind, shoots him in the face just for good measure, and then after the killer left
00:53:32
the scene, this young man somehow had the strength to try to pull himself to safety and he
00:53:41
kind of dragged himself across the street. I think either could play out and I think without more information, we
00:53:48
don't know exactly what happened. The strange part of this particular double homicide is the locations of the
00:53:58
bodies. Right? So, in the last scene, we are told that police have a lot of reasons to believe that the two victims
00:54:05
were killed outside of the car and then placed into the car for whatever reason,
00:54:09
>> right? So, victims were moved. >> You know what's think about this though? What does our attacker do in the first
00:54:16
case? He commands the two folks that are in the vehicle to get out of the vehicle.
00:54:23
>> Yeah. >> In the in the second attack, whether connected or not, what happens? The
00:54:29
victims are believed to have been killed outside of the car and then placed back
00:54:32
in. Now, the blanket, with there being a blanket, that throws a whole other wrinkle in it because I I kept examining
00:54:41
this and going, "Well, no shit." He commanded them to get out of the car, decided to shoot them outside of the
00:54:46
car, and then places them back in the vehicle for whatever reason. But the blanket being involved, I wonder if in
00:54:53
the second scene if the attacker arrives on the scene and finds them outside of the car. He didn't have to command them
00:55:00
to get out. They're out on a blanket fooling around. >> Yeah, because some cars are hard to fool
00:55:05
around in. >> But not blankets, my friend. Hey, you get on that blanket. It's easy to touch
00:55:10
the bathing suit areas. >> It's a ma It's a magic carpet ride. >> So, he places him back in the car to
00:55:18
conceal the bodies. This is a completely different scene. We have a victim lying
00:55:24
on the side of the road. And then we have the other victim who's found a great distance away, a mile and a half
00:55:32
to two miles, depending on on what reports you read. But also the victim, Paul Martin, his vehicle's found in a
00:55:39
completely different location. >> But it's the girl sexually assaulted. >> Well, try to follow me on this. So, the
00:55:46
young couple's driving home. We know that. What we do know that happened is Paul Martin successfully picked up Betty
00:55:52
Joe Booker at the dance and we can assume that they were in route to either go park somewhere, but being as late as
00:55:59
it was, they might have been in route to to go home and decided I'm guessing they
00:56:05
probably stopped for a bit and that's when the killer encountered them. So Paul Martin's body is found around
00:56:13
6:30 a.m. Later that morning, we have Betty Joe Booker's body is found by a second search party.
00:56:24
This is just before noon. So at 11:30 a.m. approximately, 2 miles from where Martin's body was found. And her body,
00:56:32
it's reported, was behind a tree. She's lying on her back, fully clothed. And in
00:56:38
fact, the killer had put her coat or at least buttoned the coat up that she was wearing. She had been shot twice. Once
00:56:48
in the chest, once in the face, as we said, heart and face. Paul Martin's car was found about three miles away from
00:56:55
Betty Joe Booker's body, and a mile and a half away from Paul Martin's body. The
00:57:01
vehicle was parked outside of Spring Lake Park with the keys still in the ignition. I I've tried to make heads or
00:57:09
tails of this. The best I could come up with is today, and I'm assuming it's very similar back
00:57:16
in 1946, that park is surrounded by neighborhoods. Would would it be so easy for me to drop
00:57:26
the vehicle there and walk to my home? Police said that they couldn't figure out who was shot first,
00:57:35
who was killed first. They did say, this is the one where we do get confirmation
00:57:41
when we have no survivor, that there was a sexual assault. Investigators did openly say that they believe that Betty
00:57:48
Betty Joe Booker had been sexually assaulted. I say that because in the second case, in the first double
00:57:56
homicide, they weren't real open about if there a rape had occurred. Now, that might be
00:58:04
that they do not know. So, the the first double homicide, they're they're not firm on their statements of if a sexual
00:58:14
assault had occurred in that one. Now, I that could be for multiple reasons. As I
00:58:18
was saying, it could be because either they don't know, they can't confirm it 100%. Or two, it's simply holdback
00:58:25
information that they don't want to put that out there in case they have to interrogate
00:58:33
someone or they get a confession. But this movement with the vehicle in the bodies here, we don't see this in the
00:58:41
other scenes. I've heard people come up with great, and I want to be clear here,
00:58:46
I think a lot of the theories I've heard on why the bodies were found where they
00:58:50
were found and the vehicle found elsewhere, I've heard great theories on that. I've heard theories to suggest
00:58:55
that maybe he he was hunting, that the killer was hunting and wanted to hunt Betty Joe Booker down, like in the first
00:59:04
attack where Mary Jean believed that she she was told to run and then the guy tracks her down. But I don't know that
00:59:12
Booker ran this distance. I think whatever happened to Paul Martin happened first.
00:59:20
Just like telling Jimmy Hollis to take off his goddamn britches. I think that the attacker
00:59:28
took out Paul Martin first, either killing him or believing that he left him dead, and then he was going to do
00:59:37
whatever he was going to do to the female victim. Well, you have to eliminate the threat first and but also
00:59:45
all these old cases of Lover's Lane and maybe there's just not as many Lovers Lane anymore. But or maybe
00:59:53
there's just so much >> now the kids are smoking dope. >> Well, they're smoking dope and, you
00:59:59
know, jerking off. >> They're parking they're No, they're parking to smoke that. But but no, I
01:00:05
think you're on to something here that with with especially with the first attack. If you're aware of these lovers
01:00:12
lanes or this particular lover's lane and you're looking for some kind of sexually motivated homicide or attack,
01:00:22
>> right? >> And you're hoping to find a young woman to victimize. Well, you're going to go
01:00:27
there. I mean, that's one of that's going to be a place where you would go, you know what? probably on a Friday or
01:00:33
Saturday night I might be able to find someone. And and that's another thing that's interesting about this case with
01:00:39
the Phantom Killer. All of these attacks take place on a weekend. Be it a Friday
01:00:45
night, Saturday, Sunday, they all take place on a weekend. [music] [music] The devil's going to get you in your
01:00:58
sleep. >> [music] >> Want to thank everybody for joining us here in the garage. Stick around for
01:01:09
part two. >> And until then, be good, be kind, and don't [music] [music] >> [music]
01:01:41
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