Cold Case Files - REOPENED: Carol's Diary

Episode Date: November 24, 2022

A 16-year-old girl is killed and her brother is the first to come upon her murder scene. The teenager's diary leads detectives to her killer... Check out our great sponsors! KiwiCo: Get your first month of ANY crate line FREE at kiwico.com/coldcase  Progressive: Quote your car insurance at Progressive.com to join the over 27 million drivers who trust Progressive!

Hey, Cold Case fans, we have something special for you. We're bringing you double the episodes every week. We know you dedicated fans need your fix in between new episodes. So every Thursday, we are back bringing some of our best episodes from previous seasons. Let us know which classic episodes you'd like to hear again in the comments. And don't worry, we'll see you back here every Tuesday for all new episodes of Cold Case Files 2. Now, on to the episode. Carol Hutto turned 16 in 1976. She lived in Largo, Florida with her parents and her brother Jerry.

Carol was considered a friendly person by most everyone who knew her. On December 13th, she told her mother that she would be back in a couple of hours and headed to a friend's house. Carol didn't stay with her friend long, claiming she was headed to a nearby drugstore. Carol asked her friend to tell her parents that she would be back in 10 minutes if they happened to call. She wasn't back in 10 minutes, and she didn't return home in a couple of hours. Carol Hutto never came home again because the 16-year-old girl had been murdered.

From A&E, this is Cold Case Files. When Carol didn't come home, her mother Norma was understandably worried. I knew when Carol didn't come home in a couple of hours, like she said, I'll be back. I won't be gone long. I knew that something was wrong. Her brother, Jerry, had been out on the same evening and was surprised to find his parents awake and worried about Carol when he got home. He was way past curfew and was surprised he wasn't in trouble.

This is Carol's brother, Jerry. She never, not that I can really remember, ever got in trouble for not coming home or calling in when she was not going to be there when she was supposed to be. Norma and Jerry went out to search for Carol. They talked with her friends and visited the places she liked to hang out. But they didn't find her. Carol's mother, Norma, then called the police.

She said, there's nothing we can do. Girls run away all the time. I tried to tell her that Carol didn't run away. She had nothing to run away from. She was happy. She didn't have any problems. When Carol still wasn't home the next morning, Jerry walked down the street, hoping to find some kind of clue.

He walked all the way to the end where there was a house under construction with a big lake behind it. And I just kind of glanced out at the lake and I saw some clothes and a raincoat. And I believe one shoe. It was over in this area right here. They were just floating in the water. So I turned and I started looking closer. And I looked down and that's when I saw her face down in the water with cement blocks on top of her. Jerry ran back home, shocked by what he had seen.

He didn't quite know what to do or say. How do you tell your parents that their baby daughter is in a lake face down? You just can't do it. Norma could tell Jerry was upset. And I said, Jerry, what's wrong? And he just stared. And I got a hold of him and I said, Jerry, what's wrong and he just stared and I got a hold of him and I said Jerry what's wrong and he said we got to go daddy we got to get her.

Jerry's parents called the police and then followed him to the lake. 17 year old Jerry showed the police where he had found his sister's body. We went down there and I showed the officer. And that's when my world come crashing down. I mean, just totally come crashing down. The police immediately considered Jerry a suspect. He had a few prior run-ins with the law, besides being the person who found Carol's body. I wasn't a goody-goody kid.

I mean, I did things wrong. You know, all kids do stupid things. So I think maybe that's, you know, why they looked at me. Jerry told the police he had been with his girlfriend until really late. When he came home, he had gone past the lake where Carol's body had been discovered. For Jerry, it was a tragic coincidence, but the police considered it a red flag. Jerry became their number one suspect. They came right out and told me I did it. They know I did it. And it's like any interrogation. They try to wear you down. They try to make you go ahead and confess. And I didn't do this. I wasn't going to confess to something like that. I didn't do.

Jerry was taken in for questioning, and Carol's body was sent to the coroner for an autopsy. The coroner determined that Carol had been strangled. She passed out, but didn't die. She also had a large burn on her thigh. And the most sickening discovery was that Carol was still alive when she was put in the water. The coroner collected four hairs that didn't match the victim.

The hairs were compared to Jerry, but the results were considered inconclusive. Jerry was free to go. A lot of my friends quit talking to me. And I made new friends, and honestly, I did. But a lot of the people that I knew, they wanted nothing to do with me. Norma Hutto didn't believe Jerry had killed Carol. But she wasn't getting any help or answers from the investigators. I wanted answers. I needed answers. The whole family needed answers, but we weren't getting any. Every time that you asked something or you started something, it fell right back to Jerry.

And just like that, Carol's case went cold, overlooked for 20 years. In March of 1994, almost 20 years after Carol had been murdered, Officer Brad Hoyes was injured in a work accident. He was assigned a desk job that felt like he was just pushing paper around. So he asked permission to review

the cold case files. The oldest of those files was the murder of Carol Hutto. So Hoyes read through the original file and started to ask questions. This is Officer Hoyes. From what I could tell, the entire focus of the investigation was the half-brother that found Carol's body. And I really couldn't find a reason why at the time.

It's called tunnel vision, when investigators focus on a single suspect and ignore all other possible leads. While looking at the file, Hoyes found one of those leads he believed was overlooked, Carol's diary. So I open it up, and it begins about a month before her death. And I'm thinking, there's got to be something in here that tells us,

at least leads us to a suspect, because this is more than likely a crime that was committed by someone she knows and was relatively comfortable with. A few pages into the diary, Hoyes read about Carol's secret boyfriend, Jimmy Kint, her classmate. Carol also wrote that they often met by the lake where her body was discovered. I finally got to a point where it said I met Jimmy at the lake, and it just was too close to home. You know, I mean, that's where her body was found. It was right next to the house that we believe, you know, the crime occurred in. Hoyes called his fellow detective, Mike Short, and told him about the diary entries.

This is Detective Short. So it was a surprise to actually find out that she is speaking about an individual in a manner that established they had a relationship. And her desire to be with him and the fact that he treated her oftentimes not very well and how she felt about that. Places they would go, how they would meet, sneaking out, avoiding the fact that anybody knew they were meeting. The detectives believed that Carol had identified her killer,

but they didn't have any physical evidence. They dug further into the original investigation and found an interview of Jimmy Kinn done in 1976. He was identified as a friend of Carol's. Kinn denied seeing or speaking to the victim on the night she was murdered. 18 years later, though, the cold case detectives uncovered a discrepancy between Kin's statement

and the family's statement to the police. When the investigator interviewed the Hutto family, they informed the investigator that on the night Carol went missing, she received a phone call from Jimmy Kim. When Jimmy Kim was asked about that in 1976, during his interview, he denied ever calling Carol on the night she went missing.

Despite the fact that Jimmy had denied having contact with Carol on the night she was murdered, Norma, Carol's mother, distinctly remembered talking with him. I answered the phone, Carol's mother, distinctly remember talking with him. I answered the phone and he said, Mrs. Hutto, this is Jim. Can I speak to Carol? And I said, yes, just a minute. And they talked for a little bit and then they hung up and shortly, maybe 15 minutes, he called again, and she told him she was leaving. The detectives wanted to speak with Jimmy Kinn. The only issue was finding him. In July of 1994, the detectives found Jimmy Kinn on a naval base in Connecticut,

working as a petty officer on a Navy submarine. Investigator Mike Short traveled to the base to interview Ken. Here's some audio from that interview. She wasn't dating anybody that you knew of then or seeing somebody or having any interest in anybody? I don't know if she's seen anybody really steady or anything like that, you know. We used to hang around a lot, but I don't think I remember. Can you tell me anything at all about her?

I don't remember a lot. that mentioned him and the lake. The fact that she had a diary surprised him. And then to read excerpts, Carol's words, things that she wrote about him and the way he treated her obviously affected him. Then they asked if maybe he wanted to rethink his story. I don't honestly know what happened to her. What I want to know is, were the two of you together that night? And was she okay when you left?

That's what I want to know. Yes. He admitted that he had been with Carol on the night she went missing. That was a significant admission. And we knew at that time we had our suspect. Detective Short believed that Jimmy Kinn had killed Carol, but he needed physical evidence to connect him to the crime scene. He went back

through the original evidence and discovered the unidentified hairs. Even though DNA testing had developed immensely from the time of the original investigation, a DNA profile wouldn't be useful without a sample of the suspect's DNA for comparison. Detective Short asked the Naval Criminal Investigative Service, better known as NCIS, for help executing a warrant for Ken's DNA. He wanted to make the most of the time they had him in custody. If we're going to serve a search warrant on Jimmy Ken, then use that opportunity for an interrogation as well. I'm Lola. And I'm Megan.

And we're the hosts of Trust me cults extreme belief and manipulation we both have childhood cult experiences and we're here to debunk the myths about people who join them and show that anyone can be manipulated our past interviews include survivors and former members of the Manson family NXIVM MS-13 Teal Swan Heaven's Gate Children of God and the Branch Davidians join us every week as we help you spot the red flags. Get new episodes of Trust Me every Wednesday on Podcast One or wherever you get your podcasts. On July 15th, 1998, after issuing a warrant and collecting a blood sample, Detective Short was asked to wait outside an interrogation room, while NCIS investigators Tauna Simos and Dave Early interrogated Petty Officer Jim Kinn. Simos and Early started with the hard questions during their interrogation.

And Jim, not only me, but really the consensus of everyone is that really, without a doubt, you were responsible for what happened to Carol. We can place you at spots, okay, and unfortunately for you, the spots we can place you at, there's no other conclusion you can come to than you were there when certain events occurred. For half an hour, Ken sat quietly as the investigators narrowed down his options. Admit that the murder was an accident, or, by silence, admit that he had intentionally killed Carol. What I'm trying to tell you is, you're focused on the wrong thing, okay? You're focused on the wrong thing. You're sitting out in your yard, and you got this tree growing, and it looks like it's dying.

And you're saying, man, hopefully I don't wake up one day and that tree falls in the house. And I'm telling you, look behind you because there's a freaking Rottweiler, okay, and it's about to bite you in the ass. All right? You need to focus. Jim, you're ready to put this behind you. It's time. It's time for everybody. It's simple, Jim.

You're sorry, or you did it intentionally. That's all for everybody. It's simple, Jim. You're sorry or you did it intentionally. That's all I'm asking. I don't need... Jim, are you sorry you killed Carol? That's all I'm asking, Jim. You're sorry, aren't you? I can say you're sorry, Jim. That's all it's going to take. We know that you didn't mean for this to happen, did you? You didn't do this intentionally, did you? It was a mistake, right? You didn't plan it. Jim? It's a mistake, wasn't it, Jim? It's an accident. That's what we need to explain.

We just got to get it out. Despite the lack of physical evidence, the agents were able to convince Ken to confess. He wiped away his tears and explained how he had killed Carol. Okay. And it was an accident. You know the reason I went to the lake was to try to cover it up. I understand.

I understand, Jim. We understand that. How did she get hurt in the house? We were playing around and start chasing each other she tripped and fell okay what happened then she's unconscious I didn't hear a heartbeat or anything I tried to cover it up like it was something else or somebody else. What did you do then? That's when I took her clothes off. Okay.

I took her out by the lake. What'd you do with her down by the lake? Well, I put her in the water. I just put a bunch of rocks on top of her and I took off. Despite Jimmy Kinn's tears, the detectives still believed he was lying. The autopsy pointed to injuries consistent with blunt force trauma and strangulation, not an accidental fall. Kinn was charged with murder and convicted.

On case number 9812339, I do adjudicate Mr. Ken guilty. I sentence him to life in prison without the possibility of parole for 25 years. Norma Hutto doesn't think any amount of time served is satisfactory. It won't bring her daughter back. No, I don't think he should ever get out of prison. He didn't give her the chance to get out of the lake. So I don't think he should ever get out. He took my baby. He took my only daughter. And for that, I think he should stay where he is for the rest of his life.

Cold Case Files, the podcast, is hosted by Brooke Giddings, produced by McKamey Lynn and Steve Delamater. Our associate producer is Julie Magruder. Our executive producer is Ted Butler. Our music was created by Blake Maples. This podcast is distributed by Podcast One. The Cold Case Files TV series was produced by Curtis Productions and is hosted by Bill Curtis. You can find me at Brooke Giddings on Twitter and at Brooke the Podcaster on Instagram. I'm also active in the Facebook group Podcast for Justice.

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