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[Music] welcome to true crime garage wherever you are whatever you were doing thanks
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today and that is enough of the beers mess all right everybody gather round grab a chair grab a beer let's talk some
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true crime [Music] Columbus Georgia in the latter part of 1977 a series of terrifying crimes
00:04:23
started to occur in the Winton district this is a small very specific area for these types of extremely violent crimes
00:04:34
to be occurring the area itself was fairly upscale compared to some of the surrounding areas the sudden outburst
00:04:45
and uptick in thefts and violence was highly unusual because these crimes remain unsolved the community was on
00:04:53
high alert the crimes were break-ins robberies auto theft but also a very specific type of crime sexual assaults
00:05:05
and the rapes and murders of six elderly women the six murder victims ranged from sixty
00:05:16
years of age to 89 and the sexual assaults when the victims were lucky enough to survive the attacks fit the
00:05:25
same victimology these attacks and murders were occurring in such close proximity to one another and with such
00:05:33
rapid succession the Columbus PD believed that the thief the rapist in the killer were one in the same
00:05:43
it was as if something very evil moved into this area bringing death to town the attacks which mostly took place in
00:05:54
the middle of the night shared so many common elements almost all of the victims were strangled to death with
00:06:02
their stockings first a brutal attack with strikes to the head and/or chest and then the application of a stocking
00:06:11
pulled from the victims drawer and wrapped two or three times around the neck twisted and pulled tighter and
00:06:20
tighter until the life left their eyes the murdered victims were all single elderly Caucasian women forensic
00:06:30
evidence collected at some of the murder scenes told the police the killer they sought was an african-american male due
00:06:38
to the manner of the strangulations the perpetrator was dubbed the stalking strangler the police were having no luck
00:06:49
finding this killer of women despite an increase in manpower and man-hours despite the heightened awareness and the
00:06:58
additional patrolling and the surveillance of Winton and good old-fashioned detective work just was
00:07:05
not working this serial offender truly was a phantom in the night the investigation yielded only obstacles
00:07:15
and dead ends but then 1978 a possible major break in the case the police chief received a letter from
00:07:26
the chairman of an organization comprised of seven white radical vigilantes this letter was a handwritten
00:07:36
formal introduction to a group that called themselves the forces of evil on September 6 1977 a nude and lifeless
00:08:10
body was discovered near the woman's barracks at Fort Benning this is near Columbus Georgia later the victim was
00:08:19
discovered to be 24-year old army private Karen Hickman the victim had been beaten with a blunt object and then
00:08:26
run over several times with an automobile evidence at the scene told investigators that this woman was killed
00:08:33
elsewhere and then her body was transported and left at this location about a month later an anonymous call
00:08:41
led authorities to her missing clothes police worked the case and had some leads early on however nothing was
00:08:49
panning out this murder at the time was considered to be a one-off unfortunately
00:08:54
just ten days later the stalking strangler claimed his first victim and very quickly the authorities found
00:09:02
themselves neck deep and a whole other set of homicide investigations I do want to take a quick moment here to address
00:09:11
the attack on this poor woman most reports state that she was beaten and then run over several times and she was
00:09:18
killed elsewhere and I know there are many great TCG army armchair detectives out there thinking of the
00:09:26
reasons that investigators would come to these conclusions but I want to include
00:09:31
my own theory here plus a little more insight into the victim's injuries and what was likely not found at the body
00:09:38
dump site there is one rather gruesome report out there that says that the victim was not necessarily run over I
00:09:47
mean I guess she was technically but a report suggests that that might not be the full intent of the killer this
00:09:56
report states that the evidence showed that the victim was attacked this is the beating part she was knocked unconscious
00:10:04
and then propped up like in a sitting position against a tree and then the killer drove the car into her wedging
00:10:13
her between the vehicle and the tree my guess here is that this report is probably correct a portion of the body
00:10:23
may have been run over when the vehicle was then pulling away from the tree but I'm guessing due to this type of
00:10:30
specific injury and likely the lack of what should have been a lot of blood at the scene the investigators were able to
00:10:38
very quickly discern that the victim had in fact been killed elsewhere and then moved and dumped in this location I'm
00:10:47
curious though was there evidence at the location of the missing clothes that determined that she may have been killed
00:10:55
at that location on Friday March 3rd 1978 Columbus Police Chief Kurtis McClung received a letter the letter
00:11:06
read in part dear sir we are an organization composed of seven members I'm writing this letter to inform you
00:11:15
that we have one of your Columbus women captive her name is Gayle Jackson since the coroner said that the strangler is
00:11:24
black we decided to come here and try to catch him or put more pressure on you I
00:11:31
see now more pressure as needed at this point Gayle Jackson is still living if that
00:11:39
strangler is now caught by one June 1978 you find Gale Jackson's body on winning Tennille not
00:11:50
caught on one September 1978 the victims will double you have until Sunday for reply don't
00:11:59
think we are bluffing we are called the forces of evil the letter was written on
00:12:04
stationery embolized with the Great Seal of the United States and the paper had United States Army printed in one corner
00:12:13
the handwritten letter claimed to be from a group of seven people calling themselves the forces of evil as you can
00:12:20
see this letter was in direct response to the information released regarding the stalking strangler of Columbus in
00:12:28
the Winton district more specifically right police announced that the stalking murders were committed by an
00:12:34
african-american offender in this group the forces of evil has spelled out their
00:12:39
plans for retaliation in this letter and sent it to police the group claimed to be made up of seven white men from
00:12:47
Chicago as the Atlantic Constitution put it the writer coyly suggested to authorities that anyone could come
00:12:55
across such stationery and not to assume that he was a serviceman surprisingly enough or maybe not the writer supplied
00:13:03
a return address however it was quickly determined that this address was a fake again this it makes not much sense here
00:13:13
right we have crimes happening and now we have this group of vigilantes that are gonna come in and they're gonna
00:13:19
commit other crimes until the police solve that crime of the strangler yeah but this gives you a little bit of a
00:13:28
sense of what was going on in Georgia back in the late 70s remember when we watch mine hunter and leading up to the
00:13:35
Atlanta murder cases they talked about the the racial divide at the time in that area right and then on top of that
00:13:43
they were a little bit worried too there was a lot of rumblings behind the scenes
00:13:48
on whether to say that they believed that the offender was white or black in the Atlanta case because they were
00:13:55
worried what effect that would have on the general public and this case is really just echoes all those fears that
00:14:03
everybody had right and this this is previous we know we have the coroner who says hey there's evidence we found
00:14:09
evidence at a couple murder scenes of the stalking strangler and we believe our offender here is an african-american
00:14:14
male this letter claims to be seven white guys that are obviously full of hate and ignorance and they are going to
00:14:24
retaliate by killing African American women while this other killer the stalking strangler is killing Caucasian
00:14:32
women yeah and what's their group called again it's a forces of douchebags so the letter
00:14:37
writer claims to be the chairman of the forces of evil so while this letter provided a good deal of information it
00:14:45
did not provide any assistance toward the ongoing stalking strangler investigation this stalking strangler
00:14:52
investigation we're not going to get too much into it because it's a completely different story just keep in mind this
00:14:58
was a huge investigation this was a huge undertaking for the police department right a second letter was received a
00:15:07
little more than a week later this letter too contained a fake return address this letter was a little
00:15:15
different though it was the same in the sense that this letter too would be from
00:15:19
the forces of evil and again stated that a woman would be killed if police do not
00:15:24
catch the stalking strangler but this time the letter included a ransom proposal $10,000 in return for the
00:15:34
victims safety this whole Gail Jackson the the named victim in the letter this whole Gail Jackson thing is all sorts of
00:15:43
bad right so first we have a rapist killer of single old ladies the stalking strangler who is terrorizing Columbus
00:15:52
Georgia and now not connected if you believe the writer of these letters right not connected to the strangler we
00:15:59
have a whole nother series of murders that are going to occur based off of these threats that are in
00:16:06
the letters so we have what we refer to here in the garage is a double whammy situation whammy whammy well no and then
00:16:13
on top of that you have one strangler but you have these seven forces of evil guys from Chicago and as former FBI
00:16:22
criminal profiler and I will say this until my dying day friend of the show John Douglas put it this development
00:16:32
represented everyone's worst nightmare a brutal killer stalking Columbus was horrible enough and organized a
00:16:39
murderous vigilante reaction to it could tear the community apart it's not that far of a stretch to think that possibly
00:16:46
this forces of evil is somehow connected with the KKK or white supremacy and so I
00:16:52
think what law enforcement is scared of is not only do we have this strangler but now we have these white vigilantes
00:16:59
clean black women is this gonna create some kind of race riot now one big problem right from the start with this
00:17:07
investigation they did not have a missing person matching that of Gayle Jackson as stated in the letter however
00:17:14
what we do have is a woman named Brenda Gayle Faison who seems to have disappeared the car she was driving was
00:17:24
discovered on March 5th 1978 at the Sand Hill Bar and Grille in Columbus Georgia
00:17:30
she was last seen on February 27th of that same year just six days before her abandoned car was found her car was
00:17:39
found abandoned probably this probably did not raise a whole lot of red flags and soon it would be learned that Brenda
00:17:47
Gale Faison went by several names one being Gayle Jackson so now we have our link to the threat in the letter about a
00:17:58
week or so later another letter was received repeating much of what was stated in the first letter however this
00:18:04
time they stated that a woman named Irene no last name given have been abducted as well and would be executed a
00:18:12
letter received on March 27th 1978 stated that one of mrs. Jackson's arms would be broken and that there would be
00:18:21
a sharp blow to her head that caused death the author indicated that the authorities would receive a telephone
00:18:29
call to detail the location of the body meanwhile the FBI is going to get involved in this case keep in mind by
00:18:37
this point they have already been involved in the stalking Strangler investigation as said in the trailer the
00:18:46
general plan of attack in the stalking case is simple and makes a whole heck of a lot of sense the break-ins rapes and
00:18:54
murders are happening in such a confined stretch of land that if they increase manpower and increase hours you increase
00:19:03
the police presence in that immediate area since the offender just keeps returning right to that same spot the
00:19:10
idea being that you catch him in the act you catch him red-handed at some point once apprehended you can hold him for
00:19:19
the breaking-and-entering charge for which he was arrested and then from there any of the forensic material you
00:19:26
have collected from the previous sexual assaults and murders you can compare that to your guy and then charge him
00:19:34
accordingly well this is actually very similar to what they did with the Elena child murders where they go hey we know
00:19:41
that the perpetrator is returning to to the scene or using and then laying a child murders using these bridges to
00:19:50
dump the body so let's stake out and we'll catch them in that yeah let's be there so given the strategy by this
00:19:57
point in the investigation the FBI would still be offering up resources but pretty much reduced to more of a
00:20:04
hands-off role in the stocking strangler case however they will be getting involved in the forces of evil case the
00:20:12
hunt for the chairman and his six disciples right now so Robert K Ressler was in town and he was having dinner
00:20:22
with a friend who is the deputy director of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation GBI for short this is Tom McGreevy
00:20:32
sidenote elcapitan McGreevy passed away in 2012 if you need some inspiration anyone out there look him up that's
00:20:44
Thomas McGreevy McGreevy spelled M C G re evey Y as Ted Theodore Logan would say he is a most
00:20:55
impressive dude wrestler says McGreevy asked him to review the letters that were sent along with some voice
00:21:03
recordings for some of the phone calls so some phone calls went to the MPs desk the military police desk at Fort Benning
00:21:11
Fort Benning is a United States Army Post straddling the Alabama Georgia border next to Columbus Georgia Fort
00:21:21
Benning supports more than a hundred and twenty thousand active duty military family members Reserve Component
00:21:29
soldiers retirees and civilian employees on the Reg Ressler agreed to help now this all came about because of another
00:21:39
great man Judson Rea Judd ray was a shift commander for the Columbus Police Department he suggested to the Columbus
00:21:50
Police Chief that we should get the GBI involved the chief prior to this was reluctant to do so after Jud convinces
00:21:59
the chief GBI gets involved and then through the McGreevy wrestler connection the FBI's elite serial Crimes Unit gets
00:22:07
involved another side note el capitan Judson Ray would go on to become FBI and working at the Atlanta field office and
00:22:18
eventually at Quantico while in Atlanta he worked the Atlanta child killer case with Douglas Judson ray is in my opinion
00:22:27
the inspiration or real-life version of the character Jim Barney mine Hunter series - played by Albert Jones right so
00:22:38
Ressler and Douglas get to work on this case analyzing the communications from the forces of evil Ressler this
00:22:46
your agent has the lead on this investigation also you have to wonder if in some cases with this team
00:22:54
if someone may take the lead just based off of their personal life experiences or how they may have how they may be
00:23:02
able to apply to a particular case or the profile of the offender yeah and some people don't like to take the lead
00:23:09
in cases and just sit back and give their opinions is a very good possibility here in this case this is an
00:23:16
example of such Ressler was former military he was a military police at one time so this might give him a little
00:23:25
more insight into this case or the offender knowing that Fort Benning is right there that's where one of the
00:23:31
bodies has been found we have calls going to the military police desk so given his background Ressler might just
00:23:39
be the right fit to be the lead on this case the first letter received contained
00:23:44
the seal of the United States and had the US Army printed in one corner the writer says anyone could have stolen the
00:23:52
station area but right from Jump Street Ressler and Douglas noticed the choice of words in the communications
00:23:59
specifically noting the one June 1978 and one September 1978 this is more military lingo as most of us would just
00:24:11
say June 1st or September 1st next we have a phone call this call is going to tell police where to find the body of
00:24:22
one of the captives of the forces of evil as the police have failed by this time to apprehended the strangler or to
00:24:29
pay the ransom on March 30th the Fort Benning Military Police telephone operators received a
00:24:37
call from a man identifying himself as the chairman of the forces of evil the chairman described where Jackson's body
00:24:44
was located 100 meters from Fort Benning this led MPs to the discovery of a shallow grave the body was in fact found
00:24:54
there that same day Jackson's entire face in the front portion of her skull worse
00:25:00
portions of her jaw bone teeth and bone fragments were discovered at the scene her left elbow was completely dislocated
00:25:08
according to the medical examiner the cause of death was multiple blows to the head inflicted by a heavy metal object
00:25:16
likely a tire tool or jack handle simply put she died by way of savage beating [Music]
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today it's like a Hawaiian party here in the garage with our luau beer yes everybody out there have a great and
00:30:01
very happy and safe wonderful Thanksgiving and make sure you spend it with the ones you care about the
00:30:08
absolute most let's go through the basics of this offender profile or their theories and thoughts as they analyze
00:30:15
some of this stuff we need to keep in mind Robert Ressler and John Douglas of the
00:30:21
FBI's behavioral science unit it's had so many different names throughout the years I always stumble when it comes to
00:30:28
to say what unit they're in at the time when they're analyzing the first series of letters there is no victim yet
00:30:38
they've not found anybody they've not found any bodies this is one of those rare situations where we have
00:30:45
communication from a soon-to-be offender or someone who has offended but based off of the information in the letters is
00:30:54
only threatening to kill and they don't actually have a body yet so some of that
00:30:59
stuff that they were able to deduce from those communications rather interesting
00:31:04
here and again let's get into this a little more into this offender profile here so when the chairman described the
00:31:12
location of the body now by this point we have a phone call that describes the location of where they're going to find
00:31:19
the first body he referenced meters to supply the appropriate distance multiple times the Chairman referenced vehicles
00:31:29
so what the FBI is working with here captain is the choice of words the the choosing of using the words meters
00:31:36
opposed to feet or yards right again this is military lingo writing 1 June in 1 September instead of June 1st or
00:31:45
September 1st the use of the word vehicle or vehicles rather than automobile car or truck
00:31:52
Resler and Douglas both thought this to be more military than citizen speak Ressler concluded the following first he
00:32:02
says there was no group of seven white racist radicals from Chicago seeking retaliation for the stalking murders he
00:32:11
felt that the sole purpose of the letters and the creation of the forces of evil was to steer law enforcement in
00:32:19
a completely opposite direction from the actual killer because there was some connection between the killer and the
00:32:28
victim or soon-to-be victims Jackson was killed before any of the communications this is wrestlers belief
00:32:37
she was not abducted and then held in wait for the police to catch the strangler right she was already dead and
00:32:43
the killer came up with this whole thing post murder simply to cover up the crimes they believe that both gail
00:32:52
jackson and irene were already dead there was no opportunity to save either one of them no matter what the letters
00:33:00
said the opposite of seven white guys Ressler believed would be a single black male operating alone and even though he
00:33:11
is referencing the stalking strangler Ressler believed that the strangler and the forces of evil were two completely
00:33:17
different killers operating independently of one another his profile goes on to say that the
00:33:25
offender is an enlisted man at Fort Benning he would be between 25 to 30 years of age the killer is possibly
00:33:34
military police or an artillery man with a rank no more than a e6 rank we are looking for a man with a modest
00:33:43
education and a middle rank the coroner also concluded that the body of Gayle Jackson as the caller put it was in fact
00:33:53
Brenda Gayle Faison and she was killed about five weeks prior to when they found her so Ressler was right she was
00:34:01
killed before any of the forces of evils letters started to arrive yeah before any of the
00:34:07
communication happened April fourth another call led military police to an almost nude headless body this was found
00:34:18
behind a pile of logs at a firing range located on the Fort Benning property this woman too was beaten to death this
00:34:26
is just this is just downright horrible but she was she was not decapitated in the usual sense she was beaten in the
00:34:36
face and the head so badly that the head came off and a lot of brain tissue was exposed
00:34:43
skull fragments were found in the area and there was evidence that the body was dragged from the nearby access road and
00:34:52
then concealed behind this pile of logs this turns out to be the body of Irene Thur killed the the Irene named in the
00:35:02
letters and in the calls right but we had no last name provided in those communications on Monday April 3rd 1978
00:35:11
the body of Irene Thur killed aged 32 was found near a remote fort benning rifle range authorities quickly learned
00:35:19
that Irene was last seen at a local bar on March 13th in the company of an African American soldier Columbus PD in
00:35:29
the fort benning CID put out all known and suspected information when making their rounds
00:35:37
questioning and looking for a possible lead in this case the profile directly led to several eyewitnesses saying on
00:35:47
separate occasions and in one victim's case more than one location eyewitnesses place Gayle Jackson and Irene with a
00:35:55
soldier and because he frequented two of the local bars as did the two ladies these witnesses could provide a name the
00:36:04
victims were seen either in the company of or leaving the bar with william henry
00:36:09
hands hands joined the Marines after graduating high school in 1971 then he joined the army in February of
00:36:19
seventy-six he was assigned to Fort Benning in April of 76 before that he was stationed in Indiana enhance was
00:36:28
recently divorced his former wife Wanda says she divorced him in 1977 because he
00:36:34
beat her at this time Hans's 26 years old and a specialist grade four with the 197th Infantry Brigade and one nice
00:36:46
thing for law enforcement when your suspect lives at a US Army post they're generally pretty easy to find
00:36:54
Yeah right so think about this captain this is all happening very quickly we have the
00:36:59
threat of there being murder victims then eventually a call comes in that leads military police to the actual
00:37:08
victims right and from that profile and from some of the information learned about the victims we're able to very
00:37:16
easily get a really big lead in this case because what that profile provides the investigators when they go out and
00:37:25
they start questioning people that may or may not have seen something they're saying we have reason to believe that
00:37:32
the suspect is 26 to 30 years old and is a soldier that really jogs a lot of memories especially when you're talking
00:37:40
about somebody who's disappeared five weeks before right so this is going to lead them to this 26 year-old William
00:37:48
Henry hands so police round up mr. hands and they bring him in for questioning during this time the FBI is consulting
00:38:00
with psycholinguistics FBI consultant dr. Murray Myron now I know this is going to sound strange but I can
00:38:08
guarantee that this is not going to be the last time you hear the name of dr. Murray Myron on the show so anyways the
00:38:18
doctor compares Hans's voice with the recorded calls to the military police desk and states he believes it's a match
00:38:27
one of the witnesses told agent Richard Fox of the United States Army Central Intelligence Division CID that
00:38:36
Hance was the soldier seen with Irene and stated that the two left Vice Mitchell's tavern together tape
00:38:44
recordings of the phone calls to the Fort Benning police which indicated where the bodies could be found were
00:38:51
taken by CID agent Besser to Hans's company commander and First Sergeant who they play these tapes and he goes yeah
00:39:00
that's a match I think that's Hans's voice on those tapes so that's two of them yeah then agents Besson and Fox
00:39:07
told the commanding officer that they wanted to interview hands Hance agreed to be taken to CID headquarters where he
00:39:15
was advised of his rights and informed that the interview concerned the murder of Irene thir killed with whom he was
00:39:24
the last person seen Hance was advised of his Fifth and Sixth Amendment rights and he signed a written waiver waiving
00:39:33
those rights the interview was conducted from about 1 p.m. until 1020 p.m. pants
00:39:41
was then interviewed by the FBI in the Columbus Police for another hour during the interviews hands admitted writing
00:39:48
the letters in making the telephone calls for the forces of evil but he says he was forced to do so by the
00:39:57
organization hmm yeah the racist guys sounds about right yeah the next morning he was interviewed
00:40:04
again and again Hance was advised of his rights which he again waived it was in this interview when faced with all of
00:40:12
the evidence you know by this time they have had some time to collect more evidence make some comparisons and then
00:40:20
present all of that evidence to hands this is the handwriting comparisons voice recordings and they also found
00:40:28
footprints found at the dump sites he when looking at all this evidence goes all right I did it he confesses
00:40:38
providing a signed written statement concerning each murder now two days of interviews is straight
00:40:46
and maybe a bit over the top mm-hmm but CID and the Columbus PD state that throughout the two days of interrogation
00:40:55
and those are their words they chose to use the word interrogation Hance was given restroom breaks food breaks coffee
00:41:02
cigarettes and at no time did he request a lawyer or at no time did he ask that the interview be terminated okay right
00:41:10
now how much is the military involved and these interrogations for the most part I believe they they
00:41:19
were the lead on this because Irene thir kills body was found on their property so it is a military matter what I would
00:41:27
think that the rules don't don't apply as much to them yeah I don't know but we have his his written statement of
00:41:37
waiving those rights so we know he's he's made aware of his rights and he was told of his rights and he chose to just
00:41:45
go along with the interview or interrogation however you choose to see it I went into that on purpose because
00:41:51
there are some people that believe that Hance was treated unfairly I can see I can see that argument yeah yes this
00:41:59
thing called waterboarding I don't know if you heard of it but technically it would have been allowed during this time
00:42:06
that I mean I'm not saying that there's any evidence of them doing that to him it would appear none of the right tactic
00:42:13
like that was not used I mean that their words are we gave him restroom breaks food breaks coffee cigarettes he was he
00:42:20
could have he could have asked for a lawyer he didn't plenty of water yeah they weren't they weren't torturing this
00:42:25
guy right I think where people called this into question is the length of time that he is being I know I don't know if
00:42:35
I even want to use the word held because it sounds to me like he had every right
00:42:39
to just walk out of there and he chose to do so well this is also where he lives
00:42:45
I mean they're questioning him on the base which he lives right yeah and in his confession Hance he's going
00:42:52
to give some detailed information regarding these murders he stated that Jackson propositioned him at the
00:42:59
Sandhill Bar and Grill he said the two left and got in his vehicle they only drove a short distance and pulled over
00:43:07
wait so he's claiming that she's a sex worker correct okay she began to disrobe enhance said he flipped out he started
00:43:16
yelling and screaming at her and he grabbed her he said when she attempted to escape he
00:43:22
struck her with a karate chop across the head she fell across the door bleeding hands then pulled her out of the car
00:43:31
dislocating her elbow in the process he returned to his car he got a jack handle
00:43:37
from his car returning to her he finds Jackson still breathing right this he says surprised him so he repeatedly
00:43:46
struck the helpless victim in the face with this jack handle the beating was so severe that Gail's entire face was
00:43:54
destroyed and bone fragments were scattered about the area this guy is beyond vicious some of her brain tissue
00:44:00
was literally beaten from the skull the force of the attack was so great it produced a depression in the ground
00:44:09
behind Gail's head hands then buried Gail's body in a shallow grave he dug the grave with an entrenching tool so
00:44:17
anybody that knows military you know the little like I'm guessing that's one of those the folding shovels that they put
00:44:25
on the backpacks hands also admitted to killing Irene thir killed but alleged that he had lost all sense of control
00:44:34
and that his mind flipped he accepted responsibility for the murder stating that he had begged
00:44:41
God's forgiveness okay now in a very big surprise to investigators hands also admitted to the murder of 24-year old
00:44:51
Army Private Karen Hickman remember we mentioned her at the top of the show right her body was found September 6
00:44:57
1977 they had some leads in that but it was considered to be a one-off at the time and then when the stalking
00:45:05
strangler case took off they were all wrapped up in that and her unfortunately her murder in that investigation kind of
00:45:13
got lost in the shuffle so as I believe that now that won't happened first and then it seems like then he can control
00:45:22
him flipping out he can't control himself flipping out right and if you want my humble garage opinion here I
00:45:32
think that this probably all stemmed with it may have started from his divorce we talk many times about a
00:45:40
behavior of offenders before and after a series of murders and one thing that they always point to is that there would
00:45:47
be some kind of stressor something happened in this individuals life that they took it something went from being a
00:45:54
fantasy to being a reality they acted upon their their true thoughts and feelings right and this could be someone
00:46:02
who hated women who just hated women and he used to beat his wife we have a divorce and now these murders start he's
00:46:08
beating these women to death right and well look if his wife didn't leave him she's gonna be his first victim yeah so
00:46:16
in a sense this isn't so much we talked so much about these type of serial offenders they're most always sexual in
00:46:23
nature this is just pure brutality yeah I mean like this is this is looking at someone
00:46:30
and destroying them and physically destroying them well like you said I mean he's pulling her arm out of the car
00:46:36
and just locating it in the process I mean this is these attacks are vicious and you should have gave us a warning
00:46:44
because I'm gonna be thinking about this when I asked mom can you pass the gravy
00:46:49
well according to the newspapers for the arrest as far as the papers are concerned GBI agent bruce picket and
00:46:58
columbus detective james jones were credited with the legwork which led to the apprehension of william
00:47:06
henry hands okay but question may be you know that's maybe you don't did they get
00:47:11
to the bottom of why he came up with this ruse or tried to come up with this ruse to to cover up his crimes as dumb
00:47:21
as it's going to sound he thought it would work so it was exactly they're not going to
00:47:29
get this straight up from him but he does say that he made up the forces of evil eventually and I think he wrote the
00:47:36
letters and I think what we can do here is truly believe what Robert Ressler thought in his theory his theory was
00:47:45
there's a connection between this killer and the victims the killer is afraid that somebody's going to make that
00:47:53
connection he's going to be apprehended right so to kind of cut that off at the pass I'm going to create this whole ruse
00:48:00
of the forces of evil are killing african-american women and it's going to be something so totally the opposite of
00:48:08
me is the forces of evil will be seven white supremists right from Chicago from Chicago I wonder
00:48:15
what he had against Chicago that's that's a really good question why would you just pick randomly Chicago so
00:48:23
exactly that he thought it would work he thought that it would put them off of his trail here's the crazy thing though
00:48:29
it's uh well right baby crazy yes why did why does that phrase even come up everything's been crazy yeah I'm not
00:48:37
gonna be able to get out of my head about the decapitation in a way he injected himself into the investigation
00:48:47
Hance wasn't somebody that they were considering for any of these murders hell at the time they didn't eat they
00:48:53
weren't even aware that there were murders that there were victims until he starts writing letters he injects
00:49:00
himself and is through this profile through the the profilers that they come up with this dude so they linked him to
00:49:08
this in a way you have to wonder had he never started writing those letters would they have ever caught up to him
00:49:15
right more than the first murder they believe is a one-off right but that was somebody that it's
00:49:21
thought that they may have dated at one point or had some type of make sense some kind of relation some kind of
00:49:29
friendship I don't want to use the word relationship because people's minds wander when you say that they they were
00:49:33
acquaintances or had hung out on occasion something like that is what is believed right but
00:49:39
next to they believe were sex workers these would have also been regulars at bars where he was a regular so yes they
00:49:48
according to him and according to some of the other people eyewitnesses and such they were sex workers or but
00:49:55
long-term I so my point being is that the first crime most people thought this is a one-off
00:50:00
we don't have many leads now we're not really looking into it because we have this serial murderer and serial rapist
00:50:08
on the loose attacking older women and now so we're not focused on that first case and and
00:50:16
without drawing attention to it how many times have we seen when there's rumors that somebody is a sex worker that their
00:50:24
their crime just does not get the attention and doesn't and doesn't get the effort put in to solving the case as
00:50:34
as somebody else's case would well and when people live a high-risk lifestyle or what can be viewed as a high-risk
00:50:44
lifestyle it makes it difficult to hone in on a particular suspect because the suspect pool could be so much larger one
00:50:53
look if you're spending a lot of time at a local bar whether you're a sex worker
00:50:59
or not you're coming in contact with a lot of people throughout your week yeah I mean like if I if I come up missing
00:51:06
the suspects pool is really small but if you're going to a bar that has a decent amount of regulars now it's a lot
00:51:17
harder to investigate but like I said when there's rumors that these women are sex workers their cases are just not
00:51:24
taken as serious and so if he would have never brought attention to these cases look these investigators are on high
00:51:34
alert and there is a small possibility even though their profile is saying that this this is this guy is different this
00:51:41
killer is different than the strangler mm-hmm but there's a possibility that they're connected there's a small slim
00:51:48
chance so when he's given us these leads saying hey we got there's this body and you're gonna find it they they took
00:51:56
those cases way more serious because of the letters the letter shot himself in the foot
00:52:03
it was the letters that made it possible for them to identify the suspect right so if I'm at a bar and I'm interviewing
00:52:10
people that are regulars and say hey did you know Gayle Jackson described her and
00:52:18
then say she's been missing we found her dead but she's been missing for five weeks or so you might get you might not
00:52:26
get any answers but when you have this profile and you say oh you didn't see Gayle Jackson with a 26 to 30 year old
00:52:35
soldier you know it's a different line of questioning and it's a different response that it's going to conjure up I
00:52:43
laugh kind of because the effort is made to cover up his crimes by creating this
00:52:49
forces of evil and I kind of believe he may not have been apprehended or at least not identified so quickly had he
00:52:57
not wrote the letters right but to top all of that off man he was on orders to be assigned to Korea
00:53:04
this guy's a military man he was going to be sent to Korea in September of 1978 so not only would he may not have become
00:53:14
a suspect so quickly he had a he had a plan there was a way for him to be out of the area shipped far far away right
00:53:23
and look chances are law enforcement and military get along pretty well law enforcement could have said okay well we
00:53:30
we have reason to believe that this is our suspect military reaches out questions him at the Korean base he says
00:53:40
I don't know what you're talking about they relay that to the police and now he's off the suspect list never caught I
00:53:46
haven't I think had he been shipped out in September I don't think they would ever linked it to him right if he would
00:53:52
have never wrote those letters but here is this monster that smashes oh he would
00:53:58
have somebody would have resumed killing as soon as he came back right right but
00:54:01
here's what's interesting to me here here's this guy that I mean just look ya yank somebody's arm
00:54:08
so hard that it dislocates it you can't stop beating these individuals to the point like you said it's not on
00:54:17
decapitation and sista it's a smash call but still has something inside him saying this is wrong there's something
00:54:29
inside him that he says he begged God for forgiveness so let's go into that and we're kind of skipping ahead here
00:54:37
but I think this is appropriate because this is kind of where its leading anyway
00:54:41
there are a lot of people you know last week we discussed a very controversial case that the the result was death
00:54:50
sentence and the appearance now is that an innocent man may have been killed not
00:54:55
a good man a horrible man but one that may have been innocent for the crimes that he was specifically executed for
00:55:03
yeah real [ __ ] princess so here is another death penalty case that is it's not without controversy there are people
00:55:12
that believe that the way that Hance was treated is completely unfair there are many out there that say he was mentally
00:55:21
ill and mentally incompetent to stand trial or at least be executed for the charges right here here's a couple
00:55:30
problems I have with those thoughts and those feelings first off let me just get
00:55:35
this out of the way the death penalty is always a touchy subject for anybody regardless of what side of the fence you
00:55:41
are on I am firmly straddled right in the middle but the the issue here is mentally ill and mentally incompetent to
00:55:52
the point that he didn't know what he was doing was wrong he says his own words I begged God for forgiveness also
00:56:00
the thing about being incompetent I've never believed that when we have clear-cut evidence that somebody did
00:56:08
something wrong and then they went out of their way to try to cover it up right he obviously knew it was wrong if he's
00:56:15
trying to cover it up and he went to such great lengths and efforts to do so it was just a bad
00:56:21
dumb idea yeah didn't work out there was also some talk of his IQ there was some
00:56:29
statement there are statements out there that his IQ was 70 and then he was tested again at a later time and the
00:56:35
number was 91 so uh either he got much smarter at some point or the the first test one of the test has to be wrong
00:56:46
they both can't be wrong and he got more smartest more smartest yeah yeah so it's
00:56:52
not without controversy but the problem the problem that I want to keep going back to on Hans's case is he killed
00:57:01
three people that has never been in question that has never been part of the question of was he wrongfully executed
00:57:08
he absolutely killed these three people we know that to be fact and if not more he is suspected of killing somebody in
00:57:16
Indiana and this may have happened before this would have had to have happened before he was shipped down to
00:57:22
Fort Benning we're talking about an incredibly dangerous man he's beating people to death yeah the the tricky
00:57:29
thing here in in response to the people that have bad feelings about his execution or if he was treated fairly I
00:57:37
I can see and empathize with some of those arguments and some points of those arguments but I think they got this one
00:57:44
right meaning that he was guilty he was found guilty of these three murders other people sentenced him to be
00:57:52
executed and they carried out that that penalty okay I'm not clear on something that's
00:57:57
he sentence well okay why the state of Georgia or is he is this military well good to call that into question I was
00:58:08
going to kind of breeze through that and gloss over it but where his case gets a
00:58:14
little more complicated is for two of the murders he was charged in military court court-martialed or whatever they
00:58:22
call that right one of the murders he was charged in our normal court our civilian court did he work for Colonel
00:58:29
jessep I don't know I don't know what that is I'm sorry is a few good men reference
00:58:40
Colonel jessep oh I actually watched that a week ago yeah you should've got the reference then the thing here though
00:58:47
is captain he was sentenced to life imprisonment with hard labor in the military courts and he was sentenced to
00:58:55
execution in Georgia so a bit of a conflict there it's just really truly in the sense that two of the bodies were
00:59:05
found on the Fort Benning property so it is their jurisdiction one of them being
00:59:10
one of the victims being an Army private herself right but yeah that that's how that whole thing went down now he did
00:59:17
receive a ton of Appeals one of the appeals I believe went all the way to the Supreme Court in Georgia and no time
00:59:24
was any of this overturned I think he may have I think something may have got commuted to a life sentence at some
00:59:31
point but basically I mean are they just arguing mental illness because look listen if you are beating somebody to
00:59:39
death there is something wrong with you mentally and but that should not change the punishment I don't know that that
00:59:48
would fall under the classification of true mental illness in a sense that he is not to be held accountable for his
00:59:55
actions or his crimes right so William Henry Hance was convicted by a jury in the Superior Court of Muscogee County
01:00:04
Georgia he was convicted of the murder of Brenda Gale Faison aka Gale Jackson and also convicted of attempt attempted
01:00:15
theft by extortion because remember he asked for a ransom during the guilt phase of the trial the prosecutor lived
01:00:22
up to his promise to portray the crime in vivid detail after presenting numerous photographs of Gale Jackson's
01:00:30
mutilated in largely decomposed body the prosecutor introduced fragments of her corpse during closing arguments he
01:00:40
reminded the jury that near the place of the murder were found pieces of jawbone
01:00:44
with the teeth attached fragments of human skull no larger than a dime individual teeth and
01:00:51
he said you'll have that with you to take out in evidence the jury sentenced him to death for the murder under
01:00:58
Georgia Code section 27 25 30 4.1 and he was sentenced to five years imprisonment
01:01:07
for the attempted extortion right April 3rd 1994 you mean 3 April 3 3 April 1994
01:01:16
William Henry hands was electrocuted in Jackson Georgia a few minutes after 10:00 p.m. just minutes before they
01:01:25
flipped the switch Hance maintained his innocence in a seven-minute statement he
01:01:32
said in part why are you executing an innocent man he asked why why why the stalking strangler would eventually be
01:01:42
caught and apprehended for the murders but that is another story [Music] if you have been thinking about home
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01:03:04
I am thankful that everybody got together and joined us in the garage this week and I'm hopeful that everybody
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comes back and joins us again next week yeah gobble gobble ghee you filthy animals I'm thankful for you be kind to
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one another until next week be good be kind and don't let it [Music] [Applause]