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[Music] [Applause] thank you welcome to True Crime garage wherever you are whatever you are doing thanks
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for listening I'm your host Nick and with me as always is a man that spent the weekend playing reindeer games
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ladies and gentlemen the man that is guiding our flying garage ship he is the captain it's good to be seen and it's
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good to see you thanks for listening thanks for telling my friend [Music] tonight we are drinking circus City IPA
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by Big Top Brewing Company garage grade three and three quarter bottle caps out of five hoppy multi and smooth and I
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would say it's a little sweet as well 6.8 ABV check out big top Brewing Company and this week's beer is brought
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To Us by our good friends first up we have Megan Colchester UK Nova in Brooklyn we have our buddy Scott next we
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have John and Cudahy Wisconsin John says The West Memphis Three did it well I guess everybody has an opinion next up
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we have Nell from Hayden Lake Idaho I want to give a shout out to our friend Sarah P and her husband two Buckeyes
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down in Benton Kentucky and last but not least a shout out a long distance shout
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business everybody gather round grab a chair grab a beer let's talk some true crime
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[Music] [Music] yes beaten if we found this road here by the bridge and just going around here
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and he brought him out of there and they started dragging him drug moved down the
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road lost his keys down there that's what he got all these circles in the road and
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lost piece of finish there and all down this road all the way to the graveyard just waiting on hooked me
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lost the head before he got to the graveyard on the right that's all I said well I didn't see that
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but I saw a little flesh out there [Applause] [Music] on Saturday June 6 1998 49 year old
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James Byrd Jr he spent the day hanging out with his friends and family he attended two different parties and after
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the second party he left there quite late that night about one to 1 30 a.m that evening now he was
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walking home his apartment was on the other side of town and this is when he encountered three men in a pickup truck
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who had offered him a ride the next day at 7 A.M on Sunday his body was found located on the road
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and in very bad condition his head and his shoulder were found almost a mile away where we left off we were in the
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middle of the investigation and they were getting ready to bring in the FBI and this is when they are talking to
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Sean Berry now Barry was one of the three men believed to have been in the pickup truck that evening
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Jamesburg Jr had been spotted by eyewitnesses in a pickup truck matching that description well when the sheriff's
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department when they have Sean Berry and the other two men in custody and they're
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talking with them remember we said that they were probably trying to get them to
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turn on one another right it was it was becoming clear to this to the sheriff that these three men were very likely
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involved in this murder and that they had committed it together if you can get these guys to start turning on each
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other you're going to get information that can help you put together a case and take these dirt bags to trial yeah
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and they believed that this was a hate crime and that's why they wanted to get the FBI involved and once once they
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started telling the suspects that that's when we get Sean Berry who gets the encouragement that he needed to tell us
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what he what happened according to him his side of the story as to how this murder took place
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well Barry states that they saw he was traveling with the other two men Bill King and Russell Brewer and that they
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had saw James Byrd walking that night and this was like we said in the early morning hours this would be about 1 32
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a.m right and he was heading across town back to his apartment Sean Berry says that it was he in fact that had offered
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James Byrd a ride James Bird accepts the ride there's a little bit of the communication between
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the two that seems a little strange to me um the way that Barry puts this years later is that
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he offered he said hey do you want us to drive you home and to which he says James Bird Jr said
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well I'll ride around with you guys for a while and we talked about James and his character and who he was he was he
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was a happy guy he was in a good mood he liked to socialize with people he was known for being kind of a good timing
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guy right and sometimes you you have individuals you're one such individual that sometimes when you get going in
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your party mode you're not going to stop you know so it could have been as simple
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as yeah you could drive me home or what are you guys up to so Sean Berry said that he had stopped and offered the ride
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to bird early reports speculated that uh James bird and Mr Barry may have known each other because I guess they had the
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same parole officer the Associated Press reported that this was a possibility now
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Sheriff rolls I believe it was he that that said at one point that the two could have seen each other at you know
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when they have to go visit their parole officer um according to Sean Berry he claims
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that he did not know James Bird but he did in fact recognize him as someone who frequently walked around the town of
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Jasper Texas Bill king after James Byrd is in the truck Bill king became upset and became
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he began cursing so bill is upset with Sean for giving James Byrd a ride the man stopped at a convenience store
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and this is when Bill King is going to take over the driving so he drives the men down a dirt road
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all four men are back in the truck at this point during this short drive Bill King says
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to Barry that he is about to scare Mr James Bird so instead of taking Jamesburg Jr home
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Barry Brewer and King they drove East out of Jasper and they stopped at a small clearing in the woods
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now this is where investigators believed that there was some kind of fight in this clearing because of the upturned
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grass the Disturbed dirt the broken beer bottles right according to Sean Berry Bill King and
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Russell Brewer opened up James Bird's door and they were trying to pull him out of the truck
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James was hanging on to the door with both hands trying to keep himself inside the truck right I won't repeat all that
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was said according to Sean Berry as far as you know what what the other two men were saying
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at this time but at some point Bill King has announced to the group that he would
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like to kill James Byrd right the group according to Sean Berry's story at this point should be well aware of what very
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likely could happen next and even more horrifying and terrifying is that James Byrd is now aware of what
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this guy's intentions are barry says that he was he was horrified and he was helpless
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and he sat there and he watched as the two men pulled James bird from the truck once James was out of the truck Sean
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Berry he got he got between Bill King and James Byrd telling Bill King to stop what they were doing
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Bill King then threatens Sean Berry's life Sean Berry says that at this point in
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the story James bird is very intoxicated he's he's very drunk the other two men took James Byrd to the
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back of the truck Sean Berry says there was no problem getting bird to the back of the truck I mean he's once I get him
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out he's being overpowered by two people and according to Barry James bird is very intoxicated
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so this this would make sense that they're able to easily overpower the man Sean Berry does not explain how the men
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got James Byrd to the ground I don't think he knows for certain but he does say it was no trouble for the men to get
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him to the ground so there's a possibility it's not just two-on-one it's it's good possibility
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there's three on one and we're just not getting the full story so James bird is now he's on the ground now and Bill King
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is stomping him and we have Russell Brewer is kicking him like straight on right and Sean
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Berry says the two men are laughing while they are doing this James bird was now trying to get he's attempting to get
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up so he's like on all fours but he's still down and Russell Brewer got a can of spray
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paint out of the back of the pickup truck he then sprayed James bird in the face
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with it James Bird said nothing when this happened he he almost didn't even react
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to it right Russell Brewer then kicked him in the head very hard and it was at this point that Sean Berry says that
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this was the last time that he saw James Bird move Sean Berry says he was petrified to the
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point that he wet his pants this next part is a bit unclear but at this point either one of two things
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happened and and I'll explain this Sean Berry is either inside the truck or Sean Berry had run off
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but for whatever reason he is not he's not in a location where he can see what's going on at this point in his
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story right okay again what he is claiming yes this is what he's telling the investigators
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so he says that he at this point this is when they must have chained James Byrd up to the truck because
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he for whatever reason did not see this take place so let's go through this statement a
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little bit here um not not this direct one but but all parts of it okay so so this statement is
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backed up with some of the evidence that we spoke about with some of the evidence
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that was found and we spoke about in the clearing the investigators found several
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items that could have um let's say fallen out of a truck maybe while someone was trying to be pulled
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out of that vehicle right um we also saw evidence of a struggle that took place so Sean Sean Berry does
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tell us these things in his story and some of the evidence that was found backs portions
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of this story up and we also have the witness statements saying that they saw James Byrd in the
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truck as well okay so at this point the unfortunately James Byrd is has been he's been beat up
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and he's been chained to the back of this truck they started dragging him down a dirt
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road now Sean Berry says that the truck was so loud that he didn't hear anything so
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so now he's back in the truck with the other two individuals correct he says that at one point Russell Brewer
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looked back behind the truck and he said look he's rolling and he said look he's bouncing up and
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down referring to James Byrd behind the truck right Sean Berry says that the other two men
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seem to be having fun at pointing out what was going on he said the the truck then careened
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around a bend and James Bird's body swung off the road this must be when it when his body struck the the Ragged edge
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of this culvert this is what severed his his right arm his shoulder his neck and
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head from his body Sean Berry says that King continued to drive for a little ways and then he
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stopped the truck he got out of the vehicle and he untied Bird's lifeless body he then threw the chain in the back of
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the truck so Jamesburg Jr he was dragged to um Huff Creek Road which would be roughly about three miles
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approximately from the location where police believe that this this fight had had ensued
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so we have King Barry and Brewer they they dumped James Bird's mutilated remains and apparently they went to a
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barbecue of some sort I don't know if this was at the the girlfriend of uh Bill Kings you know at her house or what
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but this would be pretty late yes well or early depending on how you look at it but so they they go to a party
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afterwards yeah this this could be you know you never know with with some of these
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stories you may when you have somebody say yeah they showed up here at four in the morning right well what was it well
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it was a barbecue at one point or it was a party at one point and now it's just four in the morning left over you know
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flops on the floor right well okay so there was a lot of questioning going on early in this
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investigation at this point in the investigation one it was not known how long James bird was alive during the
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dragging but Brewer claimed that Bird's throat had been slashed before he was tied to
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the truck and then dragged later we would learn that forensic evidence suggests that bird had been
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attempting to keep his head up um when he was being dragged trying to keep his head up off of the road
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uh and autopsy suggested that James bird was alive for much of the dragging and died only after his head shoulder and
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right arm were severed from his body from hitting the culvert at this point you know the the investigators are not
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only shocked at what they've heard but it's also backing up kind of what their theory was from early
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in the investigation as to how this went down not no not necessarily that um Sean
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Berry you know he didn't participate in this thing he just happened to be there and
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pee his pants not that part of it it's just backing up their thought that these three are the ones that are in fact
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responsible for this horrible crime yeah and these three alone well with that information now they're
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going to have Sean Berry lead them to the chain he will take them that day on that
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Monday to find the chain that was used to tie James Byrd Jr to the back of that truck right the one that the possum King
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put back into the truck yes and I guess they find this chain in the in someone's
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backyard that they must have they must have drove around afterwards and dumped it somewhere right
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um but he with his help they are able to locate this chain so think about this for a second here Captain we have
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Jamesburg Jr 49 full of life out with friends and family on Saturday a good a good guy
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just regular good dude walking home gets offered a ride and within hours his body's found you're
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talking about 7 A.M on Sunday morning people were getting up and they're they're starting their day they're
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cooking breakfast they're they're going getting dressed and going off to church you know they're starting their day and
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people people found this body people found his body these people that were getting up to start their day the last
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day of their weekend well right and if if James doesn't get in that truck maybe he's waking up and getting uh going to
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church himself and just and just within hours of the location of this of finding
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the body we have our first suspect rounded up his two Idiot Friends Are gobbled up by police quickly after that
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they're interrogated for quite some time which they have a bunch of evidence at the scene yes we've located a bunch of
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evidence and then by Monday morning we have a confession and by by I believe it must have been around noon on Monday
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one of the suspects took them to find the chain so that was happening very quickly right which but that's the
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murder weapon basically yeah and this is why you know I was I you know in in the
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last episode I kept saying how much I like this Sheriff roles um and this is why
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he is dealing with think about this for a second small town right small Sheriff's Department
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according to his interview this might have been only his second murder investigation in his tenure right
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you know these things murders don't happen very often in this town this type of crime doesn't happen that
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often in the entire nation in the world yeah and so we're talking about a guy that really could have
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you know when you want to when you want to talk about experience and sometimes we talk about in these cases where well
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they they botched the investigation and they bungled the investigation because they're not experienced because they're
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just some small town Keystone Cops well that's not the case here and that's why I love the sheriff roles he's
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dealing with something that no Town should ever have to experience a crime that never should have happened right
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and he's and there's no textbook on this and he's investigating this thing and things are happening very quickly and I
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think they're handling it yeah I mean this they they could write a textbook on this yeah and the the
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problem here is the if you don't get this right if you've messed this up um this is this is very bad if you mess
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this up you know it's one thing if you you know botch uh something here and or here or there but this is a horrific
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crime these are horrific individuals and you need to make sure that you cross every T dot every eye to make sure that
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these guys uh never see the light of day ever again and Sheriff rolls when asked
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you know why did you contact the FBI he said very bluntly you know I I didn't know the definition of a hate crime
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right but I knew this was one right he didn't have to to know that to get the FBI involved yeah so after all this goes
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down after the questioning and after locating the chain and the evidence that you spoke of the sheriff's department
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they do charge Sean Berry uh who is 23 years old Bill King who's 23 as well and Lawrence Russell Brewer 31 at the time
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with murder now the district attorney called for adding kidnapping charges to these
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charges this would make it a capital crime so once we have we know the chain was involved we know that they're
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chaining a man up and they're taking him away that's kidnapping and now we have it we
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have the situation where we have kidnapping and murder charges facing these three guys
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thank you foreign all right we're back cheers mates cheers Captain while holding three capital
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murder trials is a costly Endeavor for any County but keep in mind we're talking about a small County in this
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particular case yeah this forced officials to raise local property taxes by 12 percent
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that's a that's a huge hike when you think about that well this results in Mr Bill King's lawyers asking that his
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trial be moved arguing that the tax increase would make it impossible to draw an impartial jury
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Bill King is going to be the first of these three guys that is brought to trial regarding The James Bird Junior
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murder possum King and it was Judge Joe Bob golden of State of the State District Court that ordered that the
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trial go ahead that we're not going to move it to another venue there's not going to be a change of venue we're
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going to continue with it here in this County and the prosecutors they said publicly
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that they were confident that they would be able to get an impartial panel uh of
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jurors that could be found for this trial they were able to come up with a jury of 12. this ended up being seven
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men and five women and it was 11 of these members were white the sole black member of the jury was a corrections
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officer and in fact a strange thing here is he would have been about the same age
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as Bill King and I believe that they may have attended one of the same schools together at some point in their lives
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here's a weird thing here captain and I don't know that it I don't know that it weird is the right term it's more that
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just I think this is something that's lesser known or maybe lesser accepted there's no way of me saying this without
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getting somebody sending me a rotten email but um I'll send you one look here's the
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thing I'll send you a nice one when we do these shows when we sit here in the garage and we and we retell these
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stories when we when we pull together all this information and we're telling you about these cases about these real
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life events that happened we can't sit here worried about whether what's how it's going to be
00:25:23
received what we say we can't sit here and worry about okay somebody's going to come down upon us for saying this or
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they're going to come down upon us if we say it this way so really what you just do is you just
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report the truth okay so when you send a rotten email keep in mind that we're reporting the truth to you first of all
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and second of all these are not the captain and I did not drive to Jasper Texas interview a bunch of people
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and put this story together to report it back to you no we are piecing the story
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together through you didn't want to go with me so we're piecing this story together through court documents as well
00:26:03
as newspaper articles that were written by other people and some of them being local reporters now this is something
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that I have heard and read before in other cases but it certainly translates to this one
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you know we said that they wanted to get impartial jurors obviously on this panel
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well a problem that you have when you have a case of this magnitude and it's this is a death penalty case okay let's
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be very clear about that what you tend to see happen is when you're trying somebody and the penalty
00:26:41
the possible penalty is death well you have to interview these potential jurors and you have to decide if they fit on
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the panel what tends to happen in a lot of these cases you know you ask well why is is 11
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members of the jury white and only one of them African-American well one it just may so have happened to work out
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that way you know we don't we don't know the details but in a lot probably what the prosecution wanted us well in a lot
00:27:09
of these cases what ends up happening is they dismiss a lot of African-American potential jurors
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because what tends to happen is they don't they're not as um let's say enthusiastic about the
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death penalty as as uh white people may be okay um and this could be this is due to
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several factors um one one it's the religious aspect and two um unfortunately in this country
00:27:46
predominantly when we see somebody that is has been charged and convicted wrongfully of a crime
00:27:54
it tends to be African-American people so they they have a better understanding that it's not a perfect system it
00:28:04
doesn't work 100 100 of the time therefore unfortunately you know we know this has happened and it breaks your
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heart but there has been at some point some innocent person wrongly convicted and then sentenced to die and They
00:28:21
carried out that sentence right and I think that that's something that um can get lost on some people and
00:28:29
that's why you see in these death penalty cases that it tends to be a little more white people on the group
00:28:37
now the soul the sole African-American member of the panel was actually elected as the foreman of the jury okay now some
00:28:47
things that came out in trial here keep in mind this is Bill king that's being tried first
00:28:52
one thing that came out was the the forensic pathologist Tommy Brown he he brought to court and testified as an
00:29:02
expert witness stating that James bird was alive and writhing in pain until he was struck
00:29:08
till he struck that Culvert that decapitated him yeah um he stated that there was evidence
00:29:14
that proved that James Byrd had fought to survive while he was chained by the ankles to the truck and being dragged he
00:29:22
said this would have taken place for about two miles along that paved Country Road
00:29:28
stating he was attempting to keep his head off of the pavement and he was cautious he was conscious during this
00:29:34
time now brown was the one that performed the official autopsy on bird and he said
00:29:41
that Bird's elbows and knees were Ground to the bone as he tried to prop himself
00:29:47
up off of the road he stated that the victim would have been very tired uh very worn out trying to do a lot of
00:29:55
things trying to keep the pain from being so severe he probably would have been swapping one portion of his body
00:30:03
for another trying to get pressure off of other areas bird's head and right arm and shoulder
00:30:11
were torn from his torso when he struck that concrete drainage Culvert as the truck swerved from side to side the path
00:30:18
pathologist said it's his opinion that bird was alive up until that point so one thing I want to point out here
00:30:27
that the pathologist said they're dragging this guy and they're they're they're they're weaving this truck as
00:30:35
they're doing this going down this street they found remains of James Byrd in 81 places along that stretch of road
00:30:44
Bill King's defense well it was a little different than the other two defendants that would later
00:30:51
have their trial dates his defense was basically that he wasn't there that this crime went down and it was not
00:30:58
committed by him because he was not there his evidence to prove that is he states that there was a phone call he
00:31:06
was during this time that Jamesburg Jr was killed that he was on the phone with his girlfriend making arrangements so
00:31:14
that he would end up there later that that you know we keep saying later but it's so early in the morning it's
00:31:20
confusing if you're saying the right terms there so that's his statement um well that does not go with the
00:31:29
evidence they've that they've found they determined that he was on the phone closer to around like four in the
00:31:36
morning and this would have been well after James Bird Jr had been killed so the timeline's not matching up to start
00:31:44
with other evidence against Bill King is obviously we have Sean Berry's testimony
00:31:52
we also have a cigarette butt that was found at the location where the body was eventually located right on that DNA DNA
00:32:04
evidence this cigarette butt uh was it was Bill Kings and we have the lighter that was Bill Kings yeah the possum King
00:32:13
lighter so his defense regarding those two items was simply this one that the lighter had been stolen from him about a
00:32:21
week before the murder had been committed yeah and two that the the truck if if it was in fact Sean Berry's truck
00:32:30
that was used and he was not present with Sean Berry that it's likely that he had put out a cigarette at some point in
00:32:39
Sean Berry's ashtray and that when these men were removing James bird from the truck when that struggle went down that
00:32:48
the ashtray would have been kicked and knocked to the ground leaving cigarette butts and leaving this uh evidence
00:32:55
behind at the scene right what police and what the prosecutors were able to lay out to the jury is that
00:33:04
there's some other problems with this story because remember we said that they were at a party before they got angry
00:33:10
about somebody being at the party and they left right well people at that party said no we saw Bill King using
00:33:18
that lighter that night so he had it with him during this party so so days after he says it was stolen from him and
00:33:28
then second of all we have um Sean Berry's he we have his statement and we have this backed up by some other people that
00:33:38
the truck had been recently cleaned it had been recently cleaned out and Sean Berry's statement was that the ashtray
00:33:45
had been emptied and cleaned out prior to that day's events right so it'd be a cigarette from at least that day yeah
00:33:54
and here's the other thing okay let's say bear let's say Bill King you were able to confuse us and and convince us
00:34:02
that you weren't there using these these other stories which we know are not true
00:34:06
right remember we said that he had been kicking James Bird Jr right and he had also walked and trampled all over the
00:34:16
the crime scene yeah they found DNA evidence they found DNA evidence of James Byrd Jr on his
00:34:25
Footwear on Bill King's Footwear right so let me just go over this real quick so we have eyewitnesses put in them all
00:34:32
three together that night uh just a little bit before James would have been picked up we have DNA evidence of the
00:34:41
cigarette butt yes uh that was found there we have the lighter that was found there
00:34:48
um which probably has his DNA evidence on it too and now we have James Bird's DNA evidence on
00:34:56
um possum King's shoes correct or boots so it only took the jury of 12. it only took them it was like two and a half
00:35:05
hours mostly white people yeah that decided that uh Bill King a white supremacist should die by lethal
00:35:14
injection for the murder of James Byrd Jr so found guilty and sentenced to die and after the death sentence was
00:35:22
announced um there was a priest that had read a statement from the this is from Bill
00:35:30
King's father okay that said please pray for the bird family who have endured an unimaginable
00:35:38
pain and loss please pray for these jurors who have shouldered a terrible burden
00:35:44
please pray for our town of Jasper a community that remains strong though scarred by this unspeakable Act
00:35:53
now the younger Mr King Bill King who was on trial also left a written statement behind and as he was taken
00:36:02
away to prison he left this statement that said though I remain adamant about my innocence it's
00:36:10
been obvious from the beginning that this community would get what they desire so I close with the words of
00:36:18
Francis Yaki the promise of success is with the man who is determined to die proudly when it's no longer possible to
00:36:27
live proudly and it was signed sincerely John W King and that was from Francis bukaki yeah
00:36:36
yeah well on his way out of the courthouse when they were taking Bill King out of the courthouse and on to
00:36:42
prison um he okay so he's asked by reporters if he has anything to say to the bird family
00:36:50
at this point Bill King smirked and he responded with an obscenity um what do you say
00:36:59
um I would prefer not to say it myself if you want to you can go ahead the thing
00:37:05
is I don't know what he said well then you'll have to locate that he said something extremely rude to the family
00:37:12
of of a murder victim whether he's guilty or not okay um well let me stop that and you tell me
00:37:20
all right we're back magic of podcast uh so what he said when asked if he had anything to say to the bird family he
00:37:29
said um you can suck my dick is what he said yeah and you know I hesitated to tell that story in its entirety because
00:37:38
because of this um look because you're a good boy well Bill King is is a horrible man and if
00:37:45
there if there is a hell I hope he gets there okay but the thing is Captain I you know we got to tell the whole story
00:37:53
like we just said we got to tell the truth and to be perfectly clear he was in an interview and I think this would
00:37:59
have been two or three years after the crime or two or three years after he was sentenced anyway during this interview
00:38:08
he was asked why he would say that to his victim's family right and he stated that he had while he had nothing nice to
00:38:18
say to the bird family in this interview he was clearing up that that was not he was not directing that comment to the
00:38:26
bird family right they were escorting him and as they escort such a pile of dog [ __ ] that people in the crowd are
00:38:35
going to yell stuff at him yeah they're the the crowd is taunting him he's just been sentenced to death he's being
00:38:40
walked off to prison and they're taunting him they're saying horrible things to him he was responding with
00:38:46
something horrible back at one of those persons to which then a reporter jumps in front and right has a microphone and
00:38:53
says you got anything to say to the bird family and it that's how according to Bill king that's how it went down who
00:39:00
knows again but this this is very similar to him explaining away like pieces of evidence I'll just a
00:39:08
happenstance you know yeah like now you're you're a giant pile of [ __ ] well the thing is if you if you want to look
00:39:16
at it from the opposite direction and say that that's what his intentions were that he did intend to say that
00:39:23
um you you obviously have plenty of evidence to believe that he would have said that right because of we've we've
00:39:30
seen look and when we say there's some people that are hearing about this case for the first time today and they're
00:39:35
going well white supremacist how do you how do you know he just said some things
00:39:39
how do we know what really happened no they found plenty of evidence in his dwelling that he was not only a white
00:39:46
supremacist but he was wanting to start an organization that was going to do horrible things to African Americans
00:39:54
um we have tattoos all over your body about it yeah there's no question of who this guy was and so when you see how
00:40:01
dumb and ignorant he must be to have those beliefs and to want to organize such a group then it's very quick and
00:40:10
very easy to believe that he would have been dumb enough as he's being carted out of court to say something that
00:40:16
stupid to the public regarding his victim's family knowing that he would have appeals to face knowing that you
00:40:24
know know what in the in the in the end the people that that sentence you to death is the community
00:40:30
yeah in the end and if if you upset them and if you piss them off and you do a crime this bad and you show No Remorse
00:40:39
absolute absolutely no remorse for what you've done this community is going to make sure
00:40:45
that death sentence gets carried out one this is not the sentence he should have
00:40:51
got anyways I mean if you're going to have the death penalty right then I say go full out now
00:40:58
I don't believe in the death penalty because of the idea that there could be an innocent person that is uh tried and
00:41:07
sentenced to death and then that's carried out and just one innocent person dying from something is too much in my
00:41:14
mind but if you're going to have it it's the idea of eye for an eye and so if you're going to do that
00:41:23
then the possum King you know uh let me get some guys from Jasper or let's round up some of my buddies and
00:41:33
let me stop and kick the [ __ ] out of this guy and chain him to the back of a truck that's what should happen to this
00:41:40
individual we still have two trials to get through and as I said Bill King's defense was a little bit different than
00:41:46
what Sean berries would be and Russell Brewers would be let's go over Brewers first yeah because he was actually tried
00:41:52
second so Bill King's defense was he was innocent he was not there he didn't he didn't you know right liar he didn't
00:42:00
have anything to do with this murder well Russell Brewer his statement is going to be that well
00:42:06
yeah he was there but he didn't take he didn't participate in any of the actions
00:42:12
that led to James Byrd's death so it's going to be similar that he was just yeah that he was just there he was he
00:42:21
was in a situation that he couldn't control and things got out of hand and he was a witness to this not a
00:42:28
participant right but we've heard this story before haven't we yeah and so let's go let's go into that now we're
00:42:34
going to kind of mesh these other two trials together because they're very similar in this sense okay Sean Berry
00:42:41
his defense was pretty much the same thing yes he was there he was a witness to this situation he was not a
00:42:48
participant in this situation so in both trials what you end up having Captain is
00:42:54
you have Sean Berry repeating the story that I told you earlier that he told two
00:42:59
investigators right uh he's going to put the blame on Russell Brewer and Bill King and then you want to flip that over
00:43:07
in the other trial you're going to have Russell Brewer who's going to put all the blame on Sean Berry and Bill King
00:43:13
right right so the only difference between the two that I noticed right away uh would be that that Russell
00:43:20
Brewer did get a change of venue for some reason um and then Sean Berry did not so two of
00:43:27
the trials were held in Jasper and the other one was not well it could have had something to do with those two guys were
00:43:33
Jasper residents for a while so maybe that's what it was and maybe because Brewer was from a different County he
00:43:41
could have a different address or something and maybe the lawyers could do some wiggling or
00:43:48
finagling so they could get to a different venue I think that in Brewer's case and I'm going off of memory this
00:43:55
didn't make it to my notes here but I think a Brewer's case the reason why they were able to get the change of
00:44:01
venue was because it was the trial that immediately followed Bill Kings right where and because Bill King was guilty
00:44:09
and very obviously guilty um I think Brewers attorneys were able to present that it was going to be very
00:44:16
tough for him to get a fair trial there now with Barry's case with Sean Berry's case I think because he was whether he's
00:44:24
telling the 100 truth or not we will probably never know however he was the one that showed some
00:44:34
ability of helping out and assisting the police in their investigation by telling
00:44:39
them some kind of story by Leading them to the chain where I think because of those actions the judge was pretty
00:44:46
certain he was going to get a fair trial well the conclusion to these trials Russell Brewer he was found guilty of
00:44:53
murder and kidnapping and he too would be sentenced to death now Sean Berry the jury decided that
00:45:02
they were not going to uh they were going to spare him the death penalty in his trial we had the situation where we
00:45:10
have Russell Brewer who testified that Sean Berry had cut James Bird's throat before bird was tied to the truck right
00:45:18
the jury decided that there was not a lot of evidence to support this claim so therefore you know like we said we have
00:45:28
each guy basically painting the same picture they're just taking themselves out of the picture yeah I don't know one
00:45:35
thing I could not get to the bottom of in this case Captain was was his throw actually cut because this was this was
00:45:43
kind of a big deal in the trial whether that it pointed towards more guilt by Sean Berry than than what he came
00:45:51
forward with I couldn't find anything that definitively said that that had happened now unfortunately
00:45:58
um as we know given the the factors of the crime they may not have been able to determine that right and I think a
00:46:07
couple things here I think one it's possible that uh Brewers defense basically just mimicked what they could
00:46:15
get from Barry's defense um and if that's the case then they're just gonna you know
00:46:22
um Barry's saying that the throat was cut so therefore we're going to say that it was Barry yeah um who knows I
00:46:29
wouldn't and this is going to sound awful but uh there's a part of me that doesn't
00:46:34
want to believe um and I it I don't want to believe that he was alive when he was being drunk right
00:46:42
right right yeah it sounds awful but when you put thought into it it's it's a thought of Mercy in a way
00:46:50
um the thing here is they found you know whether you want to believe Barry's story or Brewer's story or whatever
00:46:58
I do believe without Sean Berry caving like he did in telling them what happened or at least his version of what
00:47:07
happened I think it would have been a little tough to have been harder yes it would have been harder to get Bill King
00:47:13
convicted it would have certainly been harder to get Russell Brewer convicted now however I say that but they did find
00:47:21
DNA evidence of all three of these guys at the crime scene and this would have been on cigarette butts and and beer
00:47:30
bottles 98 right I mean our our understanding of DNA technology was wasn't that great then so as far as the
00:47:40
jury was concerned maybe they want it and indict these guys they were also able to prove that tire marks found in
00:47:47
the area did in fact come from the tires on Barry's pickup truck so there's a lot
00:47:53
of evidence that that points to the guilt of these guys yeah unfortunately we only get get berries version and
00:48:01
Brewer's version of what actually happened in all likelihood you know I I they did present people at Barry's trial
00:48:08
that said he wasn't a racist I don't believe that maybe he wasn't at one point in his life I don't know how that
00:48:16
works to be honest with you um but I think that I think all three of these guys were absolutely involved in
00:48:25
this horrible crime I think we're not getting the full story from either Barry or Brewer right King's not talking I
00:48:32
mean it's it's a mixture you know in every one of these cases that we cover Captain they they break your heart okay
00:48:39
they break your heart first and then after that they break your brain they break your brain because you're trying
00:48:45
to figure out how are people even capable of doing such horrible things to one another and in each one of these
00:48:52
cases because of of the Heartbreak and because of of the pain that that I have to take in from from looking at these
00:49:01
cases I'm looking for I'm looking for a little tidbit a little morsel of something that can make me
00:49:08
smile at some point during this case I was able to find a big one of those later and we'll talk about that a little
00:49:15
bit later but while we're on our way to that the the first tidbit that I found that made me smile was that when Bill
00:49:22
King was transported I don't know how many facilities actually handled the executions of these inmates in Texas
00:49:29
right it may be more than one but the facility that he was transferred to there is an intake facility for all of
00:49:37
the death penalty uh death row inmates and the name of that intact um the name of that facility is James Byrd
00:49:48
Jr it would have a different middle name but there's a little bit of a that's odd it's odd and it has the the
00:49:57
name has no relation to our victim right um but it it kind of I don't know it's it's almost a wink
00:50:05
it's a little wink a wink and a nod yeah yeah it's almost but it's almost a little wink from uh James
00:50:11
you know in heaven looking down and and going hey I got you you know so so two of these guys were sentenced
00:50:20
to death uh one of them has actually been executed his appeals ran out um and this was Lawrence Russell Brewer
00:50:29
he was killed in September 21st of 2011. um he he is known for something else as
00:50:37
well as committing this horrible crime he listen well listen to this this is you know where we had that wink and Nod
00:50:44
to feel good about for a second there right he he gave an interview shortly before he was sentenced before he was
00:50:52
put to death and in this interview Brewer expressed No Remorse for his crimes and in fact he
00:50:59
told a Houston newspaper or Houston News Channel I'm sorry that as far as any regrets I have no regrets no I do it all
00:51:10
over again to tell you the truth yeah so he just took away our wink and our nod but but know that his sentence was
00:51:19
carried out before his execution though Brewer ordered a large meal you know we've talked about this before you get
00:51:26
your last meal when you're on death row and he ordered a large meal that included get ready for this I'm ready
00:51:34
um it included two chicken fried steaks a triple meat bacon cheeseburger a large
00:51:42
bowl of fried okra a pound of barbecue three fajitas a meat lover's pizza a pint of ice cream and a slab of peanut
00:51:54
butter fudge with lots of crushed peanuts in it however he did not eat any of this he
00:52:01
ordered all of this food and ate none of it just when you think you couldn't dislike a guy anymore well what this
00:52:10
prompted was the Texas prison prison officials they ended the 87 year old tradition of giving special last meals
00:52:19
to condemned inmates so look I'm not gonna lie as a true crime fan uh I enjoy talking about the last meal yeah it's
00:52:28
weird it's one of those guilty pleasures where you're like I shouldn't enjoy this
00:52:33
enjoy it but I do but I find it fascinating what people would come up with their last meal but but there's a
00:52:38
part of me that just goes hey you know these animals don't deserve to pick their last meal you know their last meal
00:52:45
they should go hungry let them feel hunger for a while and nothing against the Texas prison officials but
00:52:51
with an order like this come on we know something's up here you know like shouldn't it be like okay you get this
00:52:58
you get this plate and it's 15 by 12. and whatever you can fit on it that's it you know yeah or you have a dollar
00:53:06
amount right so now nowadays the um before an enemy is executed in the state of Texas now they just eat whatever the
00:53:14
other inmates eat right whatever the meal is yeah right wise why should they treat you any different
00:53:22
the other two guys are still in prison we have uh Bill King who at some point will be executed for this uh murder he
00:53:30
still has some pending appeals um he's running out of them we have Sean Berry who is in prison life in prison
00:53:39
um but he is he's actually eligible for parole and this won't be until June of 2038. you're not getting out no no no
00:53:50
he's not getting that if you get out somebody's gonna kill you I I wouldn't I wouldn't and well you you talk about
00:53:57
somebody killing him he's actually in protective custody in prison I don't know if it's still to this day but for a
00:54:04
lot of the early portion of his sentence uh he was spending 23 hours per day in an eight by six foot cell with only one
00:54:14
hour a day for exercise uh and this is obviously to protect him against like you said Somebody's somebody he's got a
00:54:22
Target on him for the rest of his days yeah as well as he should there was a moment of reconciliation for the town of
00:54:30
Jasper and this came when they they knocked down a rickety old fence that for more than 100 years had separated
00:54:38
the black Graves from the white graves in the Jasper City Cemetery yeah so this was a segregated cemetery and they
00:54:48
finally removed that they they did have a little ceremony and they had a prayer that went along with this ceremony to
00:54:55
you know to to mark this occasion I do want to point out however that James Byrd Junior's gravesite it does have a
00:55:03
fence around it and that's not to keep him segregated from anybody else in the cemetery it's because of this disturbing
00:55:11
fact that at some point some teenagers they desecrated the grave you know they I believe they kicked over The Headstone
00:55:19
and there was some kind of damage done to the Grave I think they even spray painted some things on the stone itself
00:55:26
so that that fence was simply put up to protect that memorial for that man for James and to stop people from doing that
00:55:36
type of behavior well because you know this is a this is a hate crime and this was done by three racist individuals and
00:55:44
uh ignorance will breed ignorance and there will be some [ __ ] out there that will go to James Berg's grave and
00:55:55
desecrate it and the in the name of white supremacy you know so Captain you've been you've been calm you've been
00:56:02
pretty good uh trying to be in the garage I know you you might be holding back a little bit is there anything you
00:56:08
want to add uh well I think it's sad that if that this case isn't as known as you know maybe it should be I think
00:56:20
to shed a light on something this is these kind of murders took place very often
00:56:29
for a long period of time and I think this is a reminder of that and it's a horrific crime
00:56:40
especially to somebody that seemed to be a good guy that lived by the Golden Rule
00:56:46
he treated others like he wanted to be treated and then you get these weak minded and weak individuals that
00:56:55
come along with these weak and um ignorant ideas on how the world should be and they carry out this horrible crime
00:57:06
and then they go on and they lie about it or some of them lie about it and the fact of the matter is that
00:57:14
whether it's Brewer or Barry win somebody is trying to pull out James from the truck
00:57:22
if one person jumps in now it's two against two at least it's a fair fight but you didn't want it to be a fair
00:57:31
fight because you're weak and and then if both of them are claiming was the other guy or this well
00:57:39
but if you both jump in to help James out now it's three against one and this murder never takes place but you're weak
00:57:48
and your giant pile of [ __ ] and like I said if if you're gonna have the death penalty then these guys should have been
00:57:56
tied up to a truck and Drug down the street for miles and that's what should happen and if
00:58:03
you're in that situation you know I look the captain's absolutely right each one of these people are weak
00:58:11
they're they're weak together as a group they're weak as individuals but even in this situation if you're in this
00:58:19
situation and you're afraid or you're scared at least go and get help at least go and
00:58:25
get somebody at least go and tell somebody what is happening or what may be about to happen yeah so that you can
00:58:33
put an end to this somehow in some way and save a good guy's life this was a guy that was about the community this
00:58:41
was he was somebody that was known he was a fixture in the community well he's human and it doesn't matter if you're
00:58:48
black white yellow or red he's a human right and and the fact of the matter is you either stand for something
00:58:56
but or you fall for anything is that what it's called right something like that but it's like
00:59:02
you gotta stand up and and I think this should be a lesson to all of us I mean it's not just
00:59:09
when a crime is going down or some uh brutal beating is happening that's not when you need to stand up you need to
00:59:17
stand up every time there is ignorance and anytime that you see ignorance because if you don't if you don't say
00:59:24
anything if you just turn the other cheek that is that is one of the lessons here the here's these two guys that put
00:59:31
the blame on other people I I think they put the blame on other people because they wanted to save themselves I wanted
00:59:37
I think they wanted to think you know maybe more so uh very then Brewer because Brewer had no remorse and you
00:59:47
know didn't want you know you're not even going to apologize yeah you want to change anything
00:59:52
you know uh I think that what I'm trying to get at is it doesn't matter if it if
00:59:59
it's a violent attack or just a violent attack with words it is your duty or at least I think it's our duty as uh
01:00:07
humans to speak up and protect others and and it's just um it's just a horribly sad case and
01:00:18
it's just not one that has been talked about enough uh in the True Crime community
01:00:24
I do want to talk about what I thought was that tidbit of of joy and peacefulness that I needed when looking
01:00:33
at this case and that was the bird family I mean I cannot say enough good things about these people regarding
01:00:42
their their their class their um their integrity just who they are as people as individuals and as a group and
01:00:52
I'm talking about James Bird's parents I'm talking about his ex-wife I'm talking about his children Renee Ross
01:01:00
and Jamie I see I see a group of people that are they don't they're not looking for
01:01:09
revenge for their loved one's death right they they are looking to be strong and to try to heal from this and try to
01:01:20
this this is what makes them such great people even during their grieving process they
01:01:26
were trying to help their town and their Community heal from this as well and I think we could all learn a lot from the
01:01:34
bird family from from his parents from his children and how we should carry ourselves in our everyday lives because
01:01:43
I tell you what you know a person's character is best judged in the time of tragedy and I can think of no bigger
01:01:50
tragedy than what we talked about today and then how this family conducted themselves afterwards yeah because it'd
01:01:58
be easy to take um you know the hatred and the ignorance of these three individuals
01:02:06
and then take that and internalize it and then release that back onto the world and and you know the bird family
01:02:14
decided not to do that and to be above that I don't I don't know that I could and
01:02:21
that's why I look at I look at the bird family and I remind myself these are people that are
01:02:28
they're smarter than me they're better than me they're they're good people and there's things that I
01:02:34
can learn from them ah you don't give don't don't beat yourself up so no but you know you're not that bad I mean
01:02:41
you're pretty bad but here's where I will Pat myself oh funny here's where I will Pat myself on the back and this is
01:02:47
what I hope everybody else does just accept that there's things that you can learn from good individuals like this
01:02:53
except that and try to learn from these people that's what you do that's what a good person does we all have flaws we we
01:03:00
can all work on them yeah one of the things for me is um and and I think we both heard about this
01:03:07
case back in 1998 uh but I was listening to I want to say Like This American Life
01:03:14
and um this case was just briefly mentioned uh in a rap lyric which reminded me of the case and then I
01:03:24
dove a little bit back into it and just felt that it was important like I said to cover but one of the things that
01:03:31
yeah I was talking about a positive moment was for whatever reason like it's like I
01:03:40
didn't know James Bird but I but I know James Bird if that makes any sense I worked at a recording
01:03:47
studio for many of years and there was multiple artists that would say I'm going to put
01:03:57
you on the map you know not not that they're going to put Columbus on the map or anything but
01:04:02
they're going to put me as a producer on the map and uh so when you hear over and
01:04:07
over um these stories of James Bird telling everybody I am going to put Jasper on
01:04:16
the map and I just wonder if there was just some intuition that he had and his death doesn't have to be in vain
01:04:25
and it's up to us to carry on not the legacy of his murder but what he was in his life and that would be treating
01:04:36
people the way you would want to be treated foreign I want to thank you for everything this
01:04:49
week thank you Colonel all right everybody thank you for joining us in the garage until next time be good be
01:04:56
kind and don't litter [Music] [Applause] [Music]