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GameChanger [Music] [Music] this is true crime garage and this is part two of When a Killer
00:01:43
[Music] calls [Music] hello hurry and you listen to the recordings and there'll be a see you probably the
00:02:22
next day with pictures and detailed information from the time I picked Sherry up at the mailbox until up to
00:02:30
tonight in my departure from this Earth Sheriff me might as well call it off it's over I will not be taking Alive Don
00:02:37
told me to turn myself in or turn myself over to God or I'll never live in peace
00:02:43
and never be forgiven and go to heaven well turn yourself over to I am and this is the only way I'm not
00:02:50
going to spend my life in prison and go to electric chair Dawn knows everything and God
00:02:57
bless all those listen I want to ask you something something this got out of hand
00:03:02
this this got out of all you had to do was let her go I was scared she she was dehydrating so damn bad you could have
00:03:12
called me from medicine I would have met you anywhere well that's irrelevant now
00:03:17
oh I mean all you had to do was let her go such a beautiful young life I know that I mean that's why I have to join
00:03:23
her now hopefully and U Mrs Smith please please under okay well that's it I I got to go did
00:03:32
she know you when you stopped yeah I there'll be pictures I asked her to stand at the
00:03:38
mailbox and you'll see by the picture her car door and cars in the background and um there'll be pictures all there I
00:03:45
think there's about eight pictures and Charlie Ka will be receiving a set and a detailed letter like I told you at his
00:03:52
house and I if the mail doesn't slow it down which you probably will if you don't get it tomorrow you get it the
00:03:57
next day you'll get exact copy of pictures that he gets and uh exact letters too do you know all of us or
00:04:05
just Sherry I know the whole family unfortunately that's why I can't face you if I decide different I've already
00:04:12
told Don what's going to happen night only and it'll be collect and I'm going to allow myself enough time just enough
00:04:19
time to get back in the area to set everything up if you don't hear from me tonight and sheriff mits and Charlie K I
00:04:25
used him as a medium today because I knew the cause were being traced and they came real close to catching me
00:04:32
three or four different times and they were correct I am in a red vehicle what kind I'm sorry I don't want them to
00:04:39
catch me before I meet my maker Judgment Day you think the Maker's going to forgive you
00:04:45
now he'll he'll do that or I'll be crucified and go to hell that's right well and you need to meet with somebody
00:04:53
that can talk to you well I got a lot to think about and I'm I'm gone Mr Smith and uh please I I know this might be
00:05:01
selfish but y'all please ask a special prayer for me your your daughter said that she was not afraid and she was
00:05:09
strong welded she uh knew that she was going to heaven was going to be an angel and like I toon she was going to be
00:05:16
singing like crazy when she said that she was smiling did you tell her you were going to kill her yes I did and I
00:05:22
gave her the choice like it's on the recording I asked her if she wanted to be drug overdose shot or uh suffocated
00:05:31
and she picked Suffocation my God how could you well forgive us God God know why this
00:05:41
happened I don't know it just got out of hand I thought you you know what goodbye
00:05:45
M I thought you were consider it in loving and a kind person the day after they found the body
00:05:56
of Sher Smith the killer called the home again and this time he called collect he
00:06:03
asked to speak with Dawn he told her he would be sending the family the photos of Sherry and he asked her for
00:06:11
forgiveness and for their prayers he said he was going to commit suicide because this thing got out of hand and
00:06:18
all he wanted to do in the beginning was to make love to Dawn and that is why he
00:06:23
was watching her Dawn startled by this interrupted the man and asked the man Make Love To whom then he corrected
00:06:32
himself and he said the name Sherry and he hung up the phone later that same day
00:06:37
the killer called a local TV network and asked for a specific reporter and told that reporter he planed to turn himself
00:06:44
in at some point and he would give the reporter an exclusive interview yeah this guy's changing his stories I'm
00:06:50
going to kill myself I'm going to turn myself in he should have just killed himself yeah you wonder if it's just
00:06:57
does he need to get for forgiveness from the family for some reason or is this attention seeking it seems like a lot of
00:07:05
work and a lot of effort risky behavior for some attention yeah but he's a complete whacka do mhm and the FBI
00:07:16
didn't believe or they say they didn't believe the man would turn himself in or kill himself at any point they believe
00:07:24
that the calls were in fact seeking forgiveness from sher's family but also to manipulate and control the situation
00:07:31
as much as he possibly could and that this guy would eventually kill again yeah well this guy's a giant piece of
00:07:38
[ __ ] what what would have been nice though is if he would have put himself in a brown paper bag and then rang
00:07:44
somebody's doorbell and lit himself on fire okay so I do want to touch on this though because we do know from this last
00:07:51
phone call that he says that in the beginning all he wanted to do is make love to Dawn Dawn's 21 years old sh
00:07:59
Smith is 17 and they actually you can find there's quite a bit of uh photos and images of both of them on the Internet
00:08:10
and you can see that the two of them look very much alike okay so this is when he makes this slip when he says
00:08:18
Dawn instead of Sherry when he's on the phone with Dawn I was really curious why
00:08:23
the FBI didn't update their profile because remember they said at one point that if he h killed before his victims
00:08:31
would have been children or young girls right okay well Sher yes she's 17 and that's more closer to being an adult but
00:08:41
Dawn is absolutely an adult so you almost wonder if now at this point if you're going to say if he is killed
00:08:47
before is there a chance that Dawn was actually the intended victim you know because he he's not going to see her or
00:08:54
see a girl that he perceives to be Dawn at the mailbox and walk up and ask her if that's are you Dawn you know right
00:09:01
but he did take some pictures before so then you wander throwing it out there maybe this individual's supposed to wear
00:09:07
glasses but doesn't and so is it is it that simple of a mistake and then when he gets closer it's the wrong girl but
00:09:16
it's too late at that point I think it's I think it's very much like that I think
00:09:20
it's he the intended victim was Dawn he hoped to abduct her and do whatever he did with Sherry with her but I think at
00:09:30
some point he would accept the substitution or like you said I mean I think it's kind of too late look he
00:09:39
probably opened up the door for the person mhm and and at that point it's too late in his mind well the man called
00:09:47
Don Smith again and this time he told Don that he gave Sherry a choice of how she would be killed and the choices were
00:09:55
overdose shooting or Suffocation and Sherry chose show Suffocation he told Dawn he killed Sherry by placing duct
00:10:03
tape over her mouth and nose until she died two weeks after the Abduction of Sherry 9-year-old Deborah May helck was
00:10:12
playing with her three-year-old brother at their home in Richland County when she was abducted from the front yard of
00:10:18
the family's home a neighbor saw a vehicle pull up and a man get out of the car the man spoke with Deborah then
00:10:26
grabbed her through the screaming girl into his car and drove off now the neighbor immediately alerted Deborah's
00:10:34
father who was inside their home they called police and after the two of them jumped into a vehicle and they went
00:10:41
speeding after the abductor car but were unable to track down the vehicle well this sounds similar to is the FBI
00:10:49
immediately thinking this is our guy and sher's case yeah yeah they believe the offender is one and the same and with
00:10:57
the addition of the second victim especially a younger victim the FBI didn't really change their profile but
00:11:04
they did add to the profile they added that the Killer and abductor is a white man outwardly shy may be overweight but
00:11:15
at the very least is not attractive to women so he's no Bradley Cooper those close to him May notice one or more of
00:11:22
the following the offender is experiencing weight loss drinking heavily not shaving regularly
00:11:29
and he would be eager to talk about the crimes as he is following the investigation coverage on the evening
00:11:36
news or in the papers he's also a collector of pornography that likely focused on bondage and or is of satom
00:11:46
masochistic nature and because of the young age of the second abducted victim Deborah only being 9 years old they
00:11:54
believe the offender would be too ashamed to call or correspond with de family well this turned out to be true
00:12:02
no phone calls and no letters the killer also stopped calling the Smith house the
00:12:08
FBI believed that the phone calls would be the easiest way to trap the killer yeah I believe it would be as well and
00:12:14
since he's not calling or writing it's almost like they would want to put out a taunt to him like you know he already
00:12:21
contacted news reporters before have that same news reporter do a report on how this guy uh has become weak and
00:12:29
vulnerable because he hasn't reached out to the FBI so knowing that the Unknown Subject Was following the case in the
00:12:36
news and in the papers the FBI decided to enlist the help of a reporter of a single reporter see they wanted to force
00:12:44
this man out into the open or at the very least get him to call the Smith's home once again they wanted to use Dawn
00:12:52
Smith as bait for their trap now the Smiths begrudgingly went along with this so they held a memorial service for
00:13:02
Sherry Fay Smith they wanted the Smith family and Dawn present at this memorial service and during the ceremony they had
00:13:10
reporters Snap photos of dawn holding a stuffed animal belonging to Sherry and flowers for her Memorial meanwhile
00:13:18
undercover agents wrote down license plate numbers for all the vehicles that were present in the
00:13:24
area now this didn't seem to flush out the killer out into the open but he did once again call the Smith home this time
00:13:32
calling long distance and collect you have a collect call from a giant piece of shot well that's interesting that you
00:13:38
say that Captain because okay so in these collect calls you would if you were calling someone collect you would
00:13:45
be given a brief uh set of time there where you could announce who you are so it would say you have a collect call
00:13:51
from so and so and then the person receiving the call who would be paying for it can decide if they're going to
00:13:57
accept the call except the charges are not M so during this portion where the caller can announce their name and who
00:14:04
they are it's a man's voice but he says that his name is Sherry F Smith okay Dawn
00:14:11
does accept this call this time the man was not using the voice Distortion device he told Don that God wants her to
00:14:19
join Sherry Fay saying it's just a matter of time this month next month this year next year you can't be
00:14:27
protected forever then he asked Don if she had heard of Deborah May helmi Don said she had to
00:14:35
which he tells her listen carefully go One Mile West turn left at Bill's Grill go 3 and 1 half miles through Gilbert
00:14:45
turn right at the last dirt road before you come to Two Notch Road go through the no trespassing sign go 50 yards
00:14:55
Deborah May is waiting God forgive us all Cherry face Smith uh yes I'll take the call uhhuh
00:15:04
thank you Don yes you know this at the hoax correct right uh did you find Cherry face
00:15:12
ring uh no I didn't okay I don't know where it is okay um you know uh God wants you to join Cherry Fay it's just a
00:15:22
matter of time this month next month this year next year you can't be protected all the time and you know uh
00:15:29
have you heard about Deborah May Hammer uh no the 10y old atlm I uh Richland County yeah uh-huh okay listen
00:15:40
carefully go one North well one West turn left at Peach Festival Road or Bill's Grill go 3 and 1 12 miles through
00:15:55
Gilbert turn right left dirt road before you come to stop sign at Two Notch Road go through chain and no trespass
00:16:06
inside go 50 yard and to the your time is there God forgive us and protect us all wait a second here
00:16:18
what happened to the pictures that you said you were going to send to me what happened to those pictures that you were
00:16:22
going to send apparently the FBI must have them no sir because when they have something we get it too you know
00:16:29
are you going to send them I think you're jerking me around because you said they were coming and they're not
00:16:35
here Johnny Smith I go listen you said you were going to wait for God's Direction you did not give me
00:16:44
lat he's going hang up that's it but obviously he's using Sher Smith's name so they know who is calling without
00:16:55
him giving his name just like they keep asking him hey you got a red car is it a
00:17:01
Jetta but he can control the conversation because he can always hang up mhm and and he knows that well and
00:17:11
he's controlling the conversation too by reading from a script so you can hear anytime he's kind of sidetracked with a
00:17:20
question that's exactly what happens to him he gets sidetracked and he doesn't know he hesitates he doesn't know where
00:17:26
to pick up where he left off from the script but the script is very smart on his part
00:17:31
and it shows a certain level of organization by this killer that this is probably an organized criminal because
00:17:40
he has a message that he wants to give to the family and by creating that script in advance he is assuring himself
00:17:51
that oh if I'm going out of my way for this risky behavior of contacting the family mhm then at least it's worth it
00:17:58
because I I am I'm guaranteed to get my message out to them if I stick to the script the thing here we get to see a
00:18:07
little bit of it's either just straight up lies by the killer which we we know these types lie often but it might also
00:18:18
be some of his psychosis where he says in one of the calls that he's a family friend and
00:18:24
that's why I can't face yall and that's not true at all he doesn't know these people these people do not know him
00:18:31
right but he was also watching Don for a time period so like you said in his thoughts in his mind he might have been
00:18:40
a family friend to them in his mind right and you see this situation where he's kind of all over the shop and what
00:18:49
he's telling Don Smith and the family he's saying look I'm going to kill myself I I need to meet my maker you
00:18:56
can't take a life and continue living your life right but you know and he goes on to say that he won't live in a cage
00:19:03
and he doesn't want to go to prison and he's not going to be electrocuted yeah he's not going to be caged like a dog
00:19:09
yeah and I think the the statement of well I'll be armed but I'll no longer be dangerous when they find me meaning
00:19:17
he'll probably still have the gun in his hand from offing himself right uh he won't be using that gun on law
00:19:24
enforcement when they find him but then he goes out of his way to say Sherry Fay
00:19:30
wants you to join her Dawn and you can't be protected all the time it could be next week or next month or a year from
00:19:37
now you would think that if he's not completely gone off the rails here that he is somewhat aware that he can't both
00:19:45
kill himself or even turn himself in and then follow through on that threat that he's
00:19:51
just made to Dawn yeah I wonder because and it's your contention that Dawn was the initial
00:20:01
Target and that possibly he just took Sherry by accident or he took Sherry as a surrogate for for Dawn right and I I
00:20:10
almost wonder if he takes this 9-year-old Deborah as whatever I say to Don on the
00:20:20
call by me taking another victim makes everything I say more real this is not a hoax I mean he says it again on this
00:20:30
call you know this is not a hoax like why do you have to keep bringing that up mhm and it's almost like he's saying
00:20:38
like look what I just did and your time's coming whether it's next week next month next year your time's coming
00:20:47
it's almost like I have this victim I've been stalking and I did not take and I didn't take her to be my
00:20:56
Victim but I am not going to to stop until she becomes my Victim right and with the Deborah helmet case we're
00:21:06
probably talking about a situation that's a a crime of opportunity he sees this little girl in her front yard and
00:21:13
for whatever reason he makes a connection to his previous crimes and decides to abduct the girl I really
00:21:21
think that it's a crime of opportunity that he just happened to see her and it was a victim that he knew he could
00:21:26
easily snatch and flee with uh with very little trouble to himself but it goes against everything that he's saying to
00:21:35
Dawn in regard to the Sherry Fay Smith case right where oh this just went too far I just wanted to make love to her
00:21:44
making it sound like he loves her or or believed that he loved her and it just went too far and he didn't know that she
00:21:51
was sick she had a rare form of diabetes that required her to consume large amounts of water if she couldn't get her
00:22:00
medicine and obviously when he abducts her he's not taking her with her medicine because he one doesn't know
00:22:06
that she's sick and she's not prepared to be without that medicine so it it really flies in the face of everything
00:22:15
that he says to Dawn in regard to the Sherry face Smith case it it really makes it feel like a lot of his words
00:22:23
have no real meaning yeah well he's a ly ship ha but I almost he feel like he took Deborah to keep living out this
00:22:33
fantasy of what he wanted to do to Dawn what's up next is the final call that we
00:22:38
have and this is a call to a different person it is still from our perpetrator but now he is calling Charlie Keys who's
00:22:45
with a local news outlet and he wants Charlie keys to be relaying information from him to law enforcement TR or if it
00:22:55
are hang up no the ability to do that all right this is concerning Cherry P Smith uhhuh and I'm going to use you as
00:23:03
a medium can you handle it uhhuh okay now listen carefully uhhuh um I'm can't live with myself Charlie
00:23:11
and I need to turn myself in and I'm afraid uhh and you're very intelligent person and I want you to be there with
00:23:18
Sheriff Mets and all officers he wants and uh at his home in the morning at 6:00 a.m. and
00:23:27
you answer the phone home at whose home at Sheriff mat's home all right now don't answer any questions unless I ask
00:23:33
yes or no uh ask uh you be there and you enter the phone and his home phone is 356
00:23:44
2118 now I'll verify that when you report tonight on channel 10 TV at 7 cuz I want to make sure this is not a hoax
00:23:53
call and I'll prove it to you by after I finish talking you call Sheriff Ms and talk to him directly and tell him that
00:24:04
he received a letter from Sherry handwritten it was her wheel and last Testament and on the top page it had 310
00:24:13
in the morning and the date 6185 and on the left hand side it had God is love and it was two pages long it
00:24:22
was a legal yellow pad and he'll know this is not a hoax char and please help me now are you willing to work with me
00:24:30
yes okay now be there like I said you after the phone and reconfirm that phone number over the uh TV tonight to make
00:24:39
sure I got it right okay I don't know if I'll be able to do that you could just call me back no no just on the TV say if
00:24:46
anyone has any information call Sheriff M or well no that's his home phone well just find out if his name is James R
00:24:56
Mets and if it is it's the right number then in the phone book can you work it in somewhere another like that uh well
00:25:03
we try to do that where it's not won't stick out yeah I'll see what I can do okay now at 7:00 do that and Charlie
00:25:09
please now you call him right now and you'll know this is not a hoax and I'm going to give you an exclusive interview
00:25:15
you only and when you be there and all I expect also is to have sherry fa priest
00:25:23
be there sher's priest yeah from Lexington Baptist uh-huh I mean yeah lexingon Baptist okay uh-huh now Charlie
00:25:34
please just it just went bad I know her family and her well and uh I just made a
00:25:41
mistake it went too far all I wanted to do was make love to her and I didn't know she had the rare disease and it
00:25:48
just got out of hand and I got scared and I have to do the right thing Charlie now please work with me cuz I feel like
00:25:55
I can trust you and and I've listened to you many times and that's why I picked you as the medium 6:00 a.m. tomorrow
00:26:02
morning Charlie okay I'll see what I can do don't see please work with me right don't worry okay now as soon as you call
00:26:08
the sheriff he'll know when you tell him that information that only I will know the real person that's responsible sh's
00:26:16
death would know what was in that wheel in last Testament okay and and also in parentheses it has cast it closed is
00:26:23
there her request and also you personally tell the family for me that uh please forgive me God forgives me and
00:26:34
take care of me I need to help that and I want to do the right thing and tell them to please honor sh's request cast
00:26:41
it closed plus take her hands and fold them on her stomach like she's praying do you understand that uh okay Charlie
00:26:52
I'll be listening for 7:00 and if I don't hear the number and well I don't I can't read the number realize what we're
00:26:58
doing there well just tell them just say James are met somewhere another work James are if that's the right number cuz
00:27:06
see I looked it up and there's several Mets and okay I'll see what I can do and if not call me back okay but please if I
00:27:14
can hear it being taped or traced and don't take me L Charlie okay you what Take Me Alive oh yeah okay don't worry
00:27:24
don't worry you be the only reporter now oh I don't want to make a circus out of
00:27:29
this right I understand and I'll give you an exclusive interview from the time I picked Sherry up until her death
00:27:36
everything all right fine okay thank you very much oh Charlie God bless us do you
00:27:41
want do you want do you want to tell me where you are now Charlie I'll listen for news and be there and you R your
00:27:47
Sheriff met flone in the morning okay thank you Charlie byebye [Music] this show is sponsored by better help do
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[Music] 2023 all right we're back you filthy animals cheers to everybody cheers to
00:30:29
everyone make sure you check out our other show off the record you can find that at truecrime garage.com if you need
00:30:35
a little more True Crime Garage in your life the FBI is now worried and regretting the ploy of using Dawn's bait
00:30:43
because of the received threat uh during all of this law enforcement was still submitting the letter from Sherry titled
00:30:51
the last will and testament to every possible test the letter was drafted on yellow lined legal paper from a pad so
00:31:00
they decided to use an SD machine this device can detect even the slightest indentations on a piece of paper they
00:31:09
wanted to see if they could pull any possible information from indentations that were made from writing on pieces of
00:31:16
paper above the last will in the legal pad and they found some interesting leads they found a partial grocery list
00:31:24
and a sequence of numbers with further testing they could detect nine numbers of a possible 10 digigit sequence the
00:31:33
numbers are in this order 205 83713 blank8 this was a phone number in Huntsville Alabama so working with the
00:31:46
phone company they checked all 10 possible phone numbers for a connection to Lexington County South Carolina where
00:31:54
Sherry and the Smith family lived one of the numbers in Huntsville received several calls from a residence
00:32:02
just 15 miles from Sheri Fay's home the home belonged to Ellis and Sharon Shepard law enforcement went to the home
00:32:11
and interviewed Ellis and Sharon the Shepherds told police they had made phone calls to Huntsville where their
00:32:18
son was stationed in the Army but they were out of town when both of the murders were committed they explained a
00:32:24
man who worked for Ellis as an electrician Larry Jean Bell was put in charge of house sitting for the 6 weeks
00:32:31
that they were away Larry was in his early 30s divorced lived with his parents he was neat and orderly and when
00:32:40
he picked them up from the airport he spoke constantly about the unsolved murders that occurred while they were
00:32:47
away he had noticeably lost weight he was unshaven and he was irritable the sheriff asked Mr Shephard to show him
00:32:54
the room where Larry stayed while watching the home under the bed they found Mr Shephard's handgun jammed in
00:33:02
pornographic magazines featuring bondage on the cover now regarding the sequence
00:33:07
of numbers the couple wrote down the telephone number for their son and gave it to Larry Jean Bell before they left
00:33:14
for their vacation with instructions that if anything were to come up with the house to call their son the police
00:33:21
played a portion of the last call received by The Smiths this is the one where the killer did not used the voice
00:33:28
Distortion device right and the Shepherds confirmed it sounded just like Larry's voice armed with this
00:33:35
information they did some digging and they found that a vehicle registered to Bell was seen at the memorial service
00:33:42
for Sher Fay the officer wrote down the plate number and noted that the driver did not exit the vehicle he simply drove
00:33:50
by the vehicle was less than 3 years old early the next morning police surrounded
00:33:56
Larry parents' home and arrested him as he was leaving their home to go off to work a quick background check revealed
00:34:04
Belle was twice arrested for attempted assaults on women on both of these occasions he attempted to force a young
00:34:10
woman into his car at knife Point unsuccessfully under questioning Bell admitted to nothing inside Bell's
00:34:19
parents home in his bedroom police found hairs on the bed matching hairs from Sherry fa Smith in Larry's desk they
00:34:27
found a sheet of stamps from which the stamp used to marry Sherry's last will in Testament originated from the
00:34:34
neighbor that witnessed the Abduction of Deborah May told police after the arrest
00:34:39
it was in fact Belle who he saw pulling the screaming child into his car that day under further questioning Belle
00:34:47
still admitted nothing so they played the tape of his voice from the phone calls for him and still Bell admitted
00:34:55
nothing so they brought in the FBI to further continue the questioning they took a different approach rather than to
00:35:03
continue to question him they explained to him that they had a lot of experience
00:35:08
in dealing with these types of crimes and that the perpetrator of these types of crimes never gets the opportunity to
00:35:14
explain themselves and their side of the story often the offender is too afraid and ashamed to admit what they have done
00:35:23
and once they are in court their attorney will not let them take the stand right so this individual is then
00:35:29
trapped in a nightmare that never goes away and he goes away to a lengthy prison sentence and no one understands
00:35:37
him no one knows what the hell he was going through at that time well I like their tactic here but we could always
00:35:44
employ my scary clowns where we dress up like clowns and we beat the guy to the inch of his life to get them to start
00:35:51
confessing well as they're explaining this to Larry they notice that Larry Bell is nodding his head up and down
00:35:57
he's he's agreeing with what they have to say uhhuh and seeing that he's responding they leaned in for the kill
00:36:04
and asked him when did you start to feel sorry about the crime Larry did they whisper this I don't know okay seems
00:36:12
like it' be a powerful move you know come on Larry tell us what you know we got you
00:36:20
well they ask him when he started to feel sorry about this crime and to which he says it was when he saw a photo
00:36:27
of the Smith family right then they asked him if he could have possibly done this sort of thing and Larry told them
00:36:35
quote all I know is the Larry Jean Bell sitting here could not have done this but the bad Larry Jean Bell could have
00:36:45
so that is going to be the closest thing to a confession that Larry Jean Bell would ever give regarding both of these
00:36:52
murders so we do have a confession or a loose confession right implied confession we have some of sher's hair
00:37:01
is found in his room on his pillow in his bedroom okay and then we have eyewitness that saw him taking the
00:37:09
9-year-old girl away and the and and then the car registered the yeah so him driving by
00:37:16
the memorial is not really any evidence you know it's stacking pieces on the case right yeah but but there is a lot
00:37:25
of evidence like you said you not only do you have the hairs that match Sher F Smith's hair in his bedroom I mean how
00:37:31
the hell is that going to get there two you have the sheet from which the stamp came from that the last will and
00:37:38
testament was mailed you also have all these little connecting factors to the letter itself you know the indentations
00:37:45
that they found using that estd machine and then you have the uh Shepherds for which he is home you know he's house
00:37:54
sitting for and they say yeah that's his voice on right on that recording and this is the killer that's calling and
00:38:01
taunting the Smith family and that's not as good as picking him out of a lineup or anything but that's that's something
00:38:07
right and and to which I guess for the lineup purposes you have a bit of less evidence regarding the abduction and
00:38:16
murder of the little girl of Deborah May helmi yeah but you do have that eyewitness who says okay you know I see
00:38:25
this picture of Larry Bell on the news and he calls up police and says that's the same guy that I saw take that little
00:38:32
girl so we have all this evidence mounting up and like you said this real Loosey Goosey somewhat of a confession
00:38:40
you know he doesn't say I didn't kill these girls he says the bad Larry Jean Bell could have done this would have
00:38:48
been uh capable I guess of doing this but the good Larry you know he's serving his community and he's serving God Sher
00:38:56
F Smith's older sister Dawn she was super brave and strong during the investigation into her sister's
00:39:03
abduction and murder she went on to be crowned Miss South Carolina and the following year she was the runner up in
00:39:11
the Miss America contest in February of 1986 Larry Jean Bell was convicted of murdering and kidnapping Sherry fa Smith
00:39:21
the jury recommended the death sentence and the trial judge imposed the sentence
00:39:26
in a ordance with the jury's findings in 1987 in a separate trial Bell was convicted of murdering and kidnapping
00:39:34
Deborah May helck and again he was given a sentence of death for N9 years Larry Jean Bell filed and played the appeals
00:39:44
game trying to work the courts but on October 4th 1996 the state of South Carolina in accordance with his
00:39:52
sentences Larry Jean Bell was strapped into the electric chair and killed a large crowd cheered as the hearse
00:40:00
carrying Bell's body left the Broad River Correctional Institution one of his defense lawyers said quote we have
00:40:08
executed a sick delusional psychotic man this is one of those weird situations Captain where life kind of mimics art
00:40:16
here and things that we've seen on TV in these fictional crime stories where a town and area is aware that there's a
00:40:24
serial killer out there on the loose claiming the lives of victims and it's a race against the clock to catch the
00:40:31
perpetrator and stop the madness stop the murder Larry Jean Bell was very much that situation he terrorized this area
00:40:42
for a little less than a month and it was a situation where the police needed to bring in the Heavy Hitters the FBI
00:40:49
and sled and people that were better equipped with better resources to track down this killer before the list of
00:40:55
victims continued to grow now unfortunately as far as Larry Jean Bell is concerned these are not the only
00:41:03
cases that he was suspected of there has been some suspicion over the years that
00:41:08
he may have been involved in three cases that remain unsolved to this very day two of which are Denise Nome porch from
00:41:19
1975 and Sandy Elaine cornette from 1984 and in those two cases neither of their remains have ever been
00:41:30
[Music] recovered but wait we have more more exclusive audio content for our beautiful listeners this week we were
00:41:52
very excited to re-release our original coverage of the last whe and Testament case the Sherry fa Smith case and that's
00:41:59
because as we said earlier John Douglas well he wanted to sit down and talk about his involvement in this case and
00:42:06
his new book that's coming out that's titled When a Killer calls a haunting story of murder criminal profiling and
00:42:13
Justice in a small town for those of you that don't know of legendary FBI profiler John Douglas well he is a
00:42:22
former FBI special agent in the bureau's criminal profile F in pioneer he's a founding chief of the investigative
00:42:29
support unit at the FBI Academy in Quantico Virginia and one of the creators of the crime classification
00:42:37
manual and we were lucky to speak with him this week in regard to his new book When a Killer calls but he's been on our
00:42:44
show before and we're happy to have him on again if you'd like to check out our previous John Douglas episodes those are
00:42:51
titled the Mind Hunter episode number 302 and mind Hunter John Douglas episodes 445 and
00:43:00
446 and now here is a preview of my conversation with the great John Douglas one of the worst things about this I
00:43:08
mean it was it was horrific was that the mother uh receiv received some of the calls as well as the sister Dawn and
00:43:16
then the mother asked him the mother says that my daughter know she was going to die and Belle says yes uh you know
00:43:24
she did and I gave her a choice and she could pick uh drug overdose gunshot or Suffocation and your daughter selected
00:43:32
Suffocation and so what he did he proceeded to use duct tape while she was alive and duct taped her her head and
00:43:40
then he waits he waits days for the body to uh decompose uh before he tells us tells
00:43:47
the family through now Dawn the other the other sister where we can find find Sher F Smith and the reason that began
00:43:56
that tells you something about him too because he doesn't want to leave anything forensically for us to
00:44:01
determine like the cause of death locate any kind of hair and fiber evidence but
00:44:06
what we could see is that and we we knew about the duct tape just by the evidence
00:44:11
she uh uh her hair after he duct taped her head he removed the duct tape because he didn't want to leave any
00:44:18
fingerprints on the duct tape and he would end up cutting some of the hair on her head to to totally remove the duct
00:44:25
tape but us so it was just it was just an unbelievable case and and uh to to set up um he stopped communicating with
00:44:35
us that's that was a problem when I finally went down there he stopped communicating with with the police uh
00:44:41
with the the family I had to get him to talk I had to get him to get back on the
00:44:46
phone so I I sat down with the investigative reporter and I told the investigative reporter uh that I I
00:44:56
wanted her to uh come up with a story where Sherie Fay is uh is buried we want to have a memorial service and uh I'm
00:45:05
not going to write it for you I can't do that as an asan but I want you make it poetic and we're going to set up at the
00:45:11
the grave site we're going to put a u kind of a lecturn a white lecturn with Sher face picture on it and uh when I
00:45:19
was at the house I asked to see Sheri's bedroom and Dawn her sister showed me the bedroom and and in the bedroom were
00:45:27
were dozens upon dozens of of koala bears and I started thinking in my brain what can I what can I do here what can I
00:45:34
do and I saw a small koala bear that was hanging from a string and I took that you pinch the shoulders and it opens up
00:45:41
and I'm thinking without telling anyone I'm going to use this at the gravite I'm
00:45:45
going to have Dawn who now he was targeting Dawn uh the other sister placed that at the uh at the gravide on
00:45:54
a flower and the whole is uh Nick is that he will we will peque his curiosity because we do know from the research
00:46:01
that I conducted and my colleagues they like to collect souvenirs momentos relative to the to the crime so we did
00:46:10
all it did all those things uh unfortunately from investigative perspective had no control over this uh
00:46:17
but she was buried very very close to the road if and he would not take that kind of risk but we were monitoring the
00:46:25
vehicles and we would catch him another way but had we not caught him another way that
00:46:29
we talk about in the book we would we would have come across him eventually because we had we had his license plate
00:46:37
number he stopped along with other cars and we were recording all of those uh vehicles and from him once we would do a
00:46:46
say a criminal check you know on these people who were stopping we would find with him that he had history he had a
00:46:51
criminal history of attempted abduction early on in his life he was involved in obscene telephone calls he tried to
00:46:59
abduct a 9-year-old girl besides a uh another teenager so we would have got him sooner sooner than later but uh we
00:47:09
got him other ways [Music] forensically join the colonel and John Douglas for their interview on part
00:47:29
three until then be good be kind and don't [Music] litter [Music] Angie's List is now Angie and we've
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