He sat down, typed a letter to district judge George Allen, and faxed it to him the next day. We have a better shot at freeing Tony now than ever before, he told me. Almost five months after the final conviction in the lake murders, at around noon on March 2, 1986, Price got a call about a questionable death at a house on North Fifteenth Street. At Reavess request, the DAs office arranged for four envelopes from Whites rape kit to be sent to the medical examiner; to Dannens horror, they were empty. This is very important. Before that happened, you never locked your doors, you left your car keys in the car and your shotgun in the window. The discovery of the three victims from Hawkins, about 100 miles east of Dallas, and subsequent arrest of McFadden, on parole after three rape convictions, made the former telephone cable installer one of the regions most notorious criminals. In early January, the deputys patience paid off: an inmate named Kevin Mikel told him that Spence had bragged about killing the teenagers. He wore a pair of half-tinted aviator glasses, which were slightly cocked on his face. Gilbert had initially brushed the incident off. I think its going to be an unsatisfying ending., Unsatisfying for some, perhaps. Now 24, Spence had become more and more unpredictable and violent. In January 1985 Gilbert wrote out a sixteen-page confession, pleaded guilty for two life sentences, and agreed to testify against Deeb. This is where they say those three teenagers were killed, he said Spence told him. Theyd killed Kenneth and Raylene to prevent them from talking. Former Wood County Sheriff's Deputy and retired constable David Barber is pictured where he worked a roadblock on Farm-to-Market 2659 during the manhunt for Jerry McFadden in Hawkins. I know theyve spent time and money on the case, and they keep telling me theyre confident they can prove I wasnt there. He sent gifts to Russ Hunt, including an elaborate stagecoach made out of popsicle sticks and a clock made of matchsticks. He tried to interest national media outlets in the story, even sending a pitch to 60 Minutes, but every journalist passed. Theres not a day that goes by when I dont think about it. Salinas, one of the officers to first discover the teenagers bodies, still wrestles with his memories. His tenacity, in fact, was about to pay off in other ways. I dont trust Reaves or Dannen, he told me. Failed to report flower. David was kind of a braggart, Hunt told me. But the case went nowhere. Both appeared to have been shot, the male multiple times and the female once, but little else could be immediately determined. See pricing and listing details of Hawkins real estate for sale. The next day he spoke with Jills mother, Nancy Shaw, and her aunt, Jan Thompson, and revealed a theory that was beginning to take shape in his mind. Now Driggs asked Krauss to set up the study. Schonemann and Schwartz had no time to lose. After Jills parents divorced, when she was in middle school, the girl spent a lot of time at her aunts house. He was obsessed, remembered Thompson, whom he talked to almost every week. While CODIS had failed to find Hlavkas murder, she realized that if any of the mans relatives had submitted DNA information to the public sites, they might find a link. He likes to brag a lot, he told his lawyers, and I just thought he was just trying to brag about that because he thought it was something cool.. Hed driven that road many times, and as he crossed the reservoir, he looked out over the water. Though no one has ever been held accountable for Gena and Bryan's deaths, McFadden is guilty in the court of public opinion. A word about the reporting. Paul Owen Beasley Jr. also was sentenced to two 30-year terms Tuesday after he pleaded guilty to charges of wounding two nephews during the family gathering. During an interview with investigators, she had fingered a man named Muneer Deeb, who she said didnt like Kenneth and became angry at the mere mention of his name. But at the end of the hearing, she walked up to the DA and gave him a message. The two friends quickly got to work, furiously reading through thousands of pages of transcripts from Spences two trials and numerous files from the McLennan County DAs office. State District Judge Richard Davis ordered the terms to be served concurrently. Is this what had driven Franks out on a desperate search for his son that night, well before the murders were reported? At a quarter before six, Governor Bush, Spences last hope, also denied a reprieve. The fight for Spences life was back on. Brooklyn Nets +11 Boston Celtics -11 1 -110. There is a problem with your email/password. Afterward, Deeb had confessed. The purpose of one of Prudhomme's moves was to escape an abusive relationship and she arranged for her two sons live with their grandparents, Bluffington said. For Fred, Texas was as exotic as a foreign country, remembered Lawrence Wright, a staff writer for the New Yorker (and a former TexasMonthly staffer), who hosted Dannen and Blum in his home, in Austin. According to TDCJ records, McFadden was executed for the abduction, rape, and murder of 18-year-old Suzanne Denise Harrison. But Schonemann felt strongly about Spence, and the lawyer made frequent visits to the Ellis Unit to interview the convict. Authorities currently do not have any information about Prudhomme's employment, Bluffington said, adding that she was a "frequent patron" of several of the local bars in the Seabrook and Nassau Bay areas. He was awarded a Soros Justice Media Fellowship a year later; in its commendation, the foundation wrote that Dannens would be the first book to prove a wrongful execution has taken place in America. But the manuscript was not, in Dannens opinion, ready to publish. In October 1979, he was arrested for violating his parole and later sentenced to a life term, but again paroled early in 1985. A mold was promptly made of Williamss teeth too. Hunt even got an insurance salesman to explain that Deebs insurance policy on Kelley was the kind often used to cover employees in case of accidents. 'We are not certain of the cause of death,' he said. Evans changed her name to Jan Price, and after several dedicated years on the force, she became a detective. But "they just kind of lived different lives," Bluffington said. On the morning of April 3, Spence met with his loved ones, including June, one of his sons, and his brother. cemeteries found in Yoakum, DeWitt County, Texas, USA will be saved to your photo volunteer list. There had indeed been bad blood between Deeb and Kenneth, they learned; Kenneth had shouted obscenities at Deeb inside his store, called him Abdul, and made fun of his limp. Yet Dannen remained thoroughly excited about the case. She still had on a Waxahachie High School class ring. Dannen, on the ground in Texas, immersed himself in the case. Shes gotten me through the last year or two, he told me. HAWKINS, Anthony Cardell The parolee agreed initially to follow the rules, which amounted to the obvious: get a job, save money, report in, attend counseling and stay out of trouble. He accepted it and said, Im going home. Every now and then I think I should not have gotten this personally involved, but I felt like Tony needed to have someone on his side, she told me. There was never any link to him coming up here. Furthermore, although forensic odontology was admissible in court, there was no established science behind it, and allowing Campbells testimony would be a travesty of justice, argued the lawyers. If Simons had a job at the jail, he could get close to Spence and use him to solve the lake murders. She asked Dannen to make a presentation, and she set up a meeting at Nancys house. At 41, Dannen had built a formidable writing career, publishing a best-selling nonfiction book about the music business, Hit Men, before joining Vanity Fair and then the New Yorker as a staff writer. Id heard he was claiming he did it. Teenagers would gather each weekend by the dozens at the point to enjoy the freedom of youth lazing on the sandy beach listening to music on car radios and rubbing a baby oil-iodine blend on sun-drenched skin. He needed to be arrested at once. According to Price, she tried to share this development with Simons, but the deputy was too busy gathering information on Williams, who was arrested the following month for burglary. Her sister knew she was living in the Seabrook area and the two had communicated a few times by mail. Others contacted through friends, relatives, electronic media or traditional mail choose not to talk about the painful chapter in their lives. In fact, she told Dannen, though she had felt immeasurable gratitude to Simons and was convinced Spence was a low-life, she had harbored doubts about the case from the beginning. Their primary person of interest was the jailed McFadden, already under scrutiny for the unrelated robbery attempt the same evening the friends disappeared. GUTIERREZ, Jessie Resend Activation Email. The states case was based on the theory that Deeb had hired Spence and the Melendez brothers to kill Kelley for insurance money, but that Spence and the brothers had mistakenly killed Jill because she looked so much like Kelley. I heard Truman Simons say to Gilbert Melendez, Gilbert, were going to turn the recorder off now and get our story straight, and then well turn the recorder back on, he said in an affidavit. Portland police announced Thursday that improbably intact DNA saved from under Anna Maries fingernails had at last pinpointed her killer, a man police had never suspected: Jerry Animal McFadden, a notorious serial rapist and murderer from Texas who once inspired one of the states biggest ever manhunts. At 6:32 p.m., Spence was pronounced dead. ", Former Wood County Sheriff's deputy and retired constable David Barber, a 38-year lawman. She was devastated. Year should not be greater than current year. GONZALES, Cornelius Alan Feazell eventually gave Dannen access to hundreds of tapes he had made of the many conversations in his office about the lake murders. Lying in the grass was the body of a young blond woman. Judge Black didnt address anything we had done.. Some reports noted that several people had seen Tab Harper, one of the polices early suspects, at Koehne Park the night of the murders; witnesses also said he had bragged about killing three people. In the eyes of the law, the two murder cases remain open, essentially unsolved. I remember thinking that that was the stupidest thing I had ever heard an investigator say. (Simons later said in a deposition that [Hortons] whole affidavit was a lie.) Even Butler seemed to have sensed the unsoundness of Gilberts statements. The case was quickly assigned to WPD lieutenant Marvin Horton, who headed up a special investigative force of seven full-time officers. She used to find notes and letters from Jills old friends. Had Frueh called Franks because he had seen Kenneth in trouble? Suzanne loved her new hometown and the opportunities it provided, her aunt said. Hunt and Fuller pointed out that none of the hair or blood found at the crime scene tied Spence to the murders, and they insisted that Deeb had been joking about getting rid of Kelley and that Spence knew it. Im not a forensic expert, but I feel the case has taken a turn, he said. Now she hoped she could help free Washington and Williamsand cast some light on the DA and his investigator. Simons, walking among the bodies as he searched for clues, was shaken. For Hlavkas family, the news is bittersweet. Hawkins: Created by David Karp. I dont have the authority to do anything.). No, Melendez said, flashing a rare smile. Low 51F. A Town in Terror Part II: Hawkins mourns three young victims, as law enforcement searches for their killer, By JACQUE HILBURN-SIMMONS, jasimmons@tylerpaper.com, A Town In Terror: How Jerry McFadden's 1986 crime spree stole the lives of Hawkins' best, brightest, Police say executed East Texas killer Jerry "the Animal" McFadden killed Oregon woman, A Town in Terror Part III: Accused murderer Jerry McFadden takes hostage, escapes jail and sparks Texas-sized manhunt, A Town In Terror Part IV: A look into the legal challenges that freed serial rapist Jerry McFadden to commit murder, A Town in Terror Part V: Former hostage shares story of new life, healing power of giving back, A Town in Terror: Reporter recalls covering one of the most tragic, terrifying stories of his career, Chapel Hill High School hosts Donuts with Dad, Smith County moving tax foreclosure auctions online, East Texas tree business shifts focus from removal to revival, With 'Dilbert' discontinued, we want to hear from you. Reaves, who had also represented Joe Sidney Williams, suggested that Dannen take a look at the Juanita White case. The 16-year-old's remains were found in the Calder Road oil field in 1986, two years after she went missing. Franks had originally told a newspaper reporter that when his son didnt return home, he became anxious that Kenneth might be in trouble and went out looking for him at four-thirty in the morning. I did it, he said. The incident was confirmed to have taken place at JJs Fast Stop. The sponsor of a memorial may add an additional. I know that we didnt do this, he cried out in exasperation at one point. He took a female jailer hostage and for three days evaded one of the most intense manhunts in Texas history. Then the two set out to attack what they saw as the most powerful element of the states case: the accomplice testimony of the Melendez brothers. Thompson tidies the grave and inspects the mementos left by visitorsflowers, coins, ceramic unicorns (Jill loved unicorns, she explained). There is 1 volunteer for this cemetery. Dannen is full of crap, Simons told the Tribune-Herald in 2011. PEREZ. Name: Date: Victims: Location: Sada ABE: May 18, 1936: 1: Japan: Kristi Anne ABRAHAMS: July 18, 2010: 1: Australia: Nicole M. ABUSHARIF March 15, 2007: 1: Illinois . League City Police detectives "worked diligently" since the bodies were discovered to identify Jane Doe and Janet Doe, Ratliff said. Not a shred of doubt., For almost thirty years now, Tony Melendez has sat in a Texas prison cell and considered his life. They had come to distrust the sergeant for his tendency to build cases on his own; in a vocation that valued teamwork, being a loner didnt win him any friends. He was so obsessivehe would never be satisfied until he had proved the case, nailed the story. Nonetheless, Spence was set to be executed in four days. They were just going riding around. Though other people they spoke to said the two New Yorkers were overreacting (I kept telling Fred and Pete, Thats just how these guys talk, said Bernadette Feazell, Vics ex-wife), the exchange nevertheless made them nervous. Photo by Ben. She was really excited, he recalled. Local newscasts repeatedly showed images of ambulance workers and police officers, including Simons, carrying three body bags out from the brush. They met with Lieutenant Horton, who stated in an affidavit that the medical examiner had initially told him that marks on Jills breast were definitely not bites; it was only after she reexamined the photos and talked with Butler that she changed her opinion. cemeteries found in Yoakum, DeWitt County, Texas, USA will be saved to your photo volunteer list. So the Portland Police Bureau sent the crime-scene DNA to Parabon NanoLabs, a Reston-based firm, which used a database with more than a million profiles from people who have submitted their genetic information from companies like 23andMe or Ancestry.com, the Oregonian reported. Melendez pleaded guilty to the savage 1982 murder of three teenagers in Waco; he also testified against another man, David Spence in 1985. Despite some qualms about Simonss methods, he included the deputy on his team, along with the two cops most familiar with the case, Salinas and Baier. . According to the report, Franks had become extremely upset toward the end of the test. As she would later testify, she had checked with the courthouse records and found out that many of the jailhouse informants were getting their cases dismissed by the DAs office. I believe Raoul Schonemann made a legal case that should have prevented Spence from being executed. When Melendezs mother died of cancer a couple of years ago he became even closer with Thompson. "I asked them to parole him back to West Texas, where the officials there knew his habits and could better keep an eye on him.". After the phenotyping was completed, investigators began working with GenMatch to use genetic genealogy to compose family trees for both of the victims. Spence insisted he couldnt remember murdering anyone, but he began to wonder if it was possible that he had really done it. Dannen and Reaves, as Williamss lawyer, arranged for all the evidence to be tested at a lab in California named Forensic Analytical, and the DNA results came back in November 2000: the semen did not belong to either Washington or Williams. Because Melendez pleaded guilty, the burden to prove his innocence is especially great. Her name was Juanita White. After three hours of testing, the operator delivered his opinion: no deception. Are you sure that you want to report this flower to administrators as offensive or abusive? He eventually has an affair with a woman named Ann Kurth. Dannen would have to find evidence to support his ideas in other ways. White had struggled with her attackerher nose was broken, her ear torn, her body battered. I cant say for certain he was innocent, but I know that he was wrongly executed. Three years after her murder, Jills remains lay in an unadorned grave in a country cemetery just north of Waxahachie. The call was urgent: a body had been discovered at Speegleville Park, near Lake Waco. But their curiosity had quickly turned to horror: a young man, in jeans and an orange shirt, lay gagged, his hands bound behind him. I dont know if Calvin Washington or Joe Sidney Williams Jr. killed Mrs. White, Miles told Price. In 1991 Texas was carrying out more executions than any other state. The young woman they were standing over had been brutalized in unspeakable ways in an isolated roadside park, strangled and then tossed over an embankment. Jan Price was arresting our witnesses on the Juanita White case and holding them in the city jail, incommunicado, without access to a magistrate or attorney, trying to pressure them to change their stories, he wrote in an email.). The shocking announcement of McFaddens role in a crime 2,000 miles away from his usual territory brought an unexpected end to Hlavkas mysterious killing. His mother, Juanita White, whod attended every day of the trial, burst into tears. Even Hunt, who never believed the jailhouse informants, remembers speaking at trial with a bailiff at the courthousewhom he did consider a credible witnesswho told him, I know you dont think Spence did it, but he told me he did. Other lawyers also still wonder about the incriminating things Spence said over the years. Schonemann remembers that Spence was encouraged by his new, unlikely ally. Feazell, who is back to being a lawyer, in Austin, still considers the lake murder convictions one of his biggest triumphs. It had been created in 1930, when engineers dammed the Bosque River, and now there were six parks along its edges, with pretty white-sand beaches. He began working on a proposal for a book about the lake murders, and in September 1998 he sold the book to Simon & Schuster. The run-up to Spences trial was particularly contentious. The rest of her remains were located in a wooded area near the home, Ratliff said. Now, Dannen told Williams, DNA testing might prove irrefutably that he had not been Whites assailant. Public beaches in Wood County, like this one at Lake Hawkins, are temporarily off limits. By the time she was a senior, her path in life was paved with optimism and opportunity. 'We're not certain what the argument was about,' he said. I asked him if it was a snake. It belonged to a housewife from Phillipsburg, Kansas. That same month, after succumbing to complications from HIV, Gilbert Melendez died in prison, a development that only fueled Dannens determination. Authorities and scores of volunteers joined in the effort. The writ was full of typos but also cogent arguments; Deeb was granted a new trial when the court ruled that the jailhouse informants testimony that had been used against him was hearsay. If they execute me on April 3, he told the camera, it will be a cold-blooded, calculated murder. Dateline would eventually follow with an hour-long show, in January 1998, that questioned Spences guilt. HAYNES, Ramiro She was active in several organizations, including band, National Honor Society and Future Teachers of America, acquiring a job later at a local pharmacy. A few days later I called Dannen again. MARTINEZ, Ireneo He signed the paperwork for disposition of his personal property and recited the 23rd Psalm, saying it gave him peace. $54,900. Honestly, I have not killed anyone. Cliffside Path LOT 384, Hawkins, TX 75765. Sitting in his cell, he writes a letter every few weeks to Jan Thompson. After all this time, I still think about it.. He and Blum met with Vic Feazell, who had gotten divorced and started dabbling in the film business. Price continued investigating too, but she became increasingly frustrated with her partner. You don't sleep your children are scared.". I wasnt a saint, my brother wasnt a saint. Then there was the report detailing a bizarre polygraph test taken by Kenneths father, Richard Franks. He probably thought that a credible investigation would show he didnt do it. Owen concurred. Cold Cases, Missing and Unsolved Crimes. Ex-Inmate Now Free as a Bird read the front page of the Waco Tribune-Herald. Winds SE at 5 to 10 mph.. Clear skies. But they were running out of time: Spence had been convicted of murder twice, which meant the lawyers had to file a habeas writ in two trial courts, and it had already taken a month just to read all the documents. Blum was there to help with research but also I think to act as a bodyguard., The two began to make daily trips to Waco, Blum at the wheel of the rental car because Dannen hated to drive. The contents of Whites purse were strewed across the floor, and her car was missing; the vehicle was found several hours later at an apartment complex about fifteen blocks away. Some are in new places in their lives; others are still unable to conquer the despair that arises after such senseless acts. Soon after Simons began his new job as a sheriffs deputy, working the graveyard shift from midnight to eight, he and Spence began having regular conversations, often about the Lake Waco case, which the inmate clearly enjoyed discussing. He also has been named a suspect in the slaying of. In January I went to see Melendez again. Jerry McFadden, 51, made no final statement. His shirt was stained with blood, his chest full of stab wounds. Since returning to Waco, Dannen had spent a lot of time with Reaves, Spences attorney in the abuse case and in his second murder trial. There is far too much doubt to carry out an execution. Dannen had a sample of the carpet sent to the Tarrant County medical examiner; the lab, Dannen told me, was unable to exclude its gold fibers from the gold carpet fibers found on Kenneths body. Dannen also managed to locate the two men he believed were with Harper that night; they were in prison for other crimes. The evidence is telling us things it never could tell before because the technology wasnt there, he said. William Porter, 51, has been charged with the 1986 murder of . We were pulling out all the stops, Schonemann explained to me. And You Thought Feral Hogs Were Bad. "Before that happened, you never locked your doors, you left your car keys in the car and your shotgun in the window. When she didnt show up for church the next morning, her Sunday school teacher stopped by the house and found her. Authorities were eager to locate the unkempt man. Nothing like this had ever happened in Waco, Officer Dennis Baier would remember years later. Hawkins, TX 75765 Century 21 First Group - Lindale 0.35 ACRES $25,000 169 W Holly Trl, Hawkins, TX 75765 0.5 ACRES $20,000 W Bent Bow Ln, Hawkins, TX 75765 Keller Williams Realty-Tyler 0.5 ACRES $20,000 Saddle Horn Ln, Hawkins, TX 75765 Keller Williams Realty-Tyler 0.26 ACRES $22,500 Lot 6 FM 2869, Oops, some error occurred while uploading your photo(s). In fact, it was standard practice for judges to set death dates before inmates had even filed these appeals.