Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - 3 Girl Scouts Raped, Murdered in Tent #7, DETAILS EMERGE

Episode Date: October 11, 2022

As our investigation into "The Girl Scout Murders" continues, evidence points to Gene Hart as the person who murdered three little girls, but not everyone thought so. In fact, a jury acquits the convicted rapist and prison escapee. Why? Part two of  "The Girl Scout Murders" today on Crime Stories.  Joining Nancy Grace Today: Kent Frates - Attorney (Oklahoma City, OK), Former Minority Leader Oklahoma House of Representatives, Author: “Oklahoma’s Most Notorious Cases" Shawn Roberson, Ph.D. - Licensed Psychologist (Edmond, Oklahoma), Forensic psychologist for over 20 years, Conducted thousands of criminal-forensic evaluations across Oklahoma, including Oklahoma State Penitentiary (where Gene Leroy Hart died), drshawnroberson.com, James Powell - Former Senior Agent, Oklahoma State Bureau Of Investigation, Former Air Force Office of Special Investigations Agent, Former Senior Intelligence Security Advisor for the Office of Military Commissions at Joint Task Force Guantanamo, Owner: "The Investigator, LLC" Joe Scott Morgan - Professor of Forensics: Jacksonville State University, Author, "Blood Beneath My Feet", Host: "Body Bags with Joseph Scott Morgan" Faith Phillips - Cherokee Screenwriter, Author: “Now I Lay Me Down”, Website: ReadBooksBy.Faith, Twitter: @phillips_faith, Facebook: “Faith Phillips” See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

You're listening to an iHeart Podcast. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Summer camp in the middle of nowhere. Fun times, swimming in the lake, arts and crafts, new friends sitting around a campfire, childhood memories that last a lifetime, right? Wrong. Oklahoma, rolling hills and forests, 400 densely wooded acres turned from campsite to crime scene. Three little Scouts, ages 8, 9, and 10, murdered. I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us here at Fox Nation and Sirius XM 111.

We follow the exclusive new Fox Nation series, The Girl Scout Murders, all week on Crime Stories. First of all, take a listen to this. These woods in northeastern Oklahoma are the site of one of the worst crimes imaginable. Two busloads of Girl Scouts left Tulsa headed for Camp Scott, a Girl Scout retreat located on the Cherokee Reservation some 50 miles away. Among the girls were 10-year-old Denise Milner, 9-year-old Michelle Gouzet, and 8-year-old Lori Farmer.

What happened next is unthinkable. Three young girls, beaten, sexually assaulted murdered their children's names you always remember lori and denise and michelle they're there and they're never going to go away we left off this story where about a mile away from the camp, this camp is about an hour outside of Tulsa, and about a mile outside of the camp is found a cave of sorts. It's been referred to as a cave. It's actually an unusable root cellar that once went with a home. And apparently somebody is living in this cave slash root cellar and that someone leaves behind clues. Take a listen. Immediately, Sheriff Pete Weaver identified Gene Leroy Hart, who was a Cherokee Indian, as the prime suspect.

Gene Hart was a local. He only lived within a mile of the crime scene. He had been convicted of two previous rapes earlier on. He had escaped from the Mays County Jail several times. So there was some history there between Mays County Sheriff's Office with Gene Hart. The sheriff at the time, Pete Weaver, didn't particularly care for Gene Hart, and he was identified early by Pete Weaver as being the primary suspect. It was just assumed he was guilty. And if people are assuming he's guilty, then the thought was they're not going

to treat him fairly. They've got the bodies of three little girls to worry about. I want to go straight to Faith Phillips, Cherokee screenwriter and author of Now I Lay Me Down. Could you describe the injuries to these three little girls? Horrific. Beyond really anything that I'd ever learned about in my true crime writing, I had never seen anything like it. Two of the girls were struck immediately in the head, and one died immediately, and the other apparently survived at least for some time because she had some swelling in her eye and she was beaten several times in the head. Then the third girl, Denise Milner, she was, according to the information I found, she tried to make a break for it out of the tent and was caught. And they put a rope

around her neck. And she was also beaten terribly about the head. And all three of them were sexually assaulted. And it was just the nature of what happened to these little girls was absolutely brutal. Joining me is Kent Freitas, the former minority leader in the Oklahoma House of Representatives and author of Oklahoma's Most Notorious Crimes. Intimately familiar with this case in particular, the Girl Scout murders. Kent Freitas, thank you for being with us. We keep saying sex assaulted. I mean, that could be a number of things. That could be fondling a little girl through her clothing. It could be anything. Brushing up against her rear end. These three

little girls, ages eight, nine, and ten, were raped. Brutally raped. And I'm not going to airbrush what happened to these girls, Kent. Well, it was terrible. The crime was terrible, and it was a premeditated crime. The evidence led to that, and the evidence led to the prime suspect being Gene Leroy Hart. You know, James, I'm going to follow up on what Kent Freitas just said to James Powell, former senior agent, Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation, former Air Force Office Special Investigations. It goes on and on and on. And he is the owner of The Investigator LLC. James Powell, thank you who's been convicted of rape and many other crimes living one mile from a Girl Scout camp.

Well, his mother, Ella Mae Buckskin, it's actually her house. And he was just about a mile from the crime scene. It's kind of a mystery how he got out. He was previously convicted of a double rape of two pregnant women. Whoa, wait, wait pregnant women whoa wait wait wait wait wait stop what did you just say yes he was previously convicted of a double rape two pregnant women okay wait wait wait wait james you know what i like you because you've got an incredible and pristine reputation but i don't like the way that trips off your tongue. Wait a minute. The double rape

of two pregnant ladies. You know, you think, is there anything as bad as raping an eight, nine, 10 year old little girl? I still say no, but raping two pregnant women is a very close second. James Powell. I mean, you just kind of ran through that. Okay, it's soaked in now. Go ahead. For whatever reason, he only served about 28 months on that sentence. You know, I don't like anything you just said. Now, I'm not going to blame the messenger. Please don't. Okay, James Powell. Yes, ma'am. The investigator, LLC. Is there anything else you want to tell me other than the double rape of two pregnant women?

And he's out in 28 months. Correct. He also, once he was out, he started committing burglaries. He was caught and convicted of a burglary. They sentenced him in part because of a probation violation on the rape case to over 300 years. That's what he was doing back in Mays County is he had come back from the state penitentiary to Mays County to have a hearing on a post-conviction relief on the amount of years he was sentenced to for the burglary. While there, he did his escape,

which led to the rest of what we're talking about. You know, James Powell, it takes a lot to make me feel nauseous. I can go through autopsies, full autopsies. I can go to crime scenes. I can smell blood. I can see it all. You actually just made me nauseous. I'm sorry. So there's your badge of honor. So a guy out on a double rape of pregnant women, a string of burglaries. He escapes. How did he escape? Anybody on the panel that knows, please tell me.

Don't hold back. Well, he actually escaped twice to make it worse. I just keep feeling like I'm getting hit in the face. He escaped twice. Twice from the same jail in prior he escaped once uh for about 10 or 11 days and some of his family convinced him to turn himself in then he not too long later he escaped by sawing through the bars when someone had given him the saw to saw through the bars. And at the time of the murders, he had been a fugitive for over three years, going on four years. What a-hole, that's a technical legal term, gave him a saw?

Who, Kent Freitas, who gave him a saw to get out? Unknown. It's unknown who gave him the saw. I guarantee you it was a woman. I know it was a woman. Who would even think? Probably in a cake or something. Okay, let me get past the double rape of two pregnant women and the double escape act. And here we are. Here's this guy living one mile. Like they couldn't figure out he's at his mother's place. That's the first thing I say on a bond calendar. What lawyer do I have on me? Ken Freitas, attorney. That's the first thing you do at a bond hearing

when the defendant doesn't show up. You're like, go to his mother's. That's where he is. Go look under the bed. He's there or in the closet behind the dirty laundry. Go there. It always happens that way. Well, what you got here, though, is you've got somebody you can't find. And even after the murders and after he was a suspect, it took nine months. And Agent Powell can tell you about this, but it took him nine months to find and locate him. Part of it was the nature of the country that he was hiding in. He was no longer hiding in the cave.

He was hiding elsewhere, but he was being assisted by a Cherokee in the backwoods. Hey, you know, that reminds me of Eric Rudolph, the Olympic bomber. I was there that night. I went from enjoying the Olympics to questioning witnesses till 4 a.m. And then the same guy, Eric Rudolph, blew up an abortion clinic. And my investigator, Ernest, was there looking at the first abortion clinic bomb when he had rigged another bomb to go off. And my investigator was hit with debris. And then he hid out in the woods, Eric Rudolph, for years before they could catch him.

Okay, guys, I'm getting really bogged down with this guy who I, we't use the h word in our home but I'm going to say it I hate I hate this person um okay let's move forward listen to this it was rumored Gene Hart had support from local Cherokee families Hart was staying with an old Cherokee named Sam Pigeon in a remote cabin in the Cookson Hills in eastern Oklahoma. It was about 50 miles south and a little east, I think, of where the crime took place. On April 7th, 1978, an army of agents from the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation moves in and surrounds the shack. Hard to not put up a fight. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace Dr. Sean Robertson is joining us.

He's a psychologist. He has conducted thousands of forensic evaluations across Oklahoma. You can find him at drshawnrobertson.com. Dr. Robertson, thank you for being with us. What kind of person would give a double rapist a saw to get out of jail? What person would hide him out in their remote cabin? Forget about the three dead Girl Scouts. Forget about the two pregnant women that were raped. And God knows how many other victims are out there. But yeah, you can stay in my mountain cabin and I'll protect you.

Who? Well, it's pretty amazing, but even serial killers have fan clubs. People can conduct the most heinous crimes and still be cared about, supported by their community, sometimes even characterized as victims. I mean, you look at Hart's family that reportedly celebrated the end of the trial with champagne. Who would celebrate that when the suspect is a known sexual psychopath? You know, Joseph Scott Morgan joining me, Professor of Friends at Jacksonville State University and author of Blood Beneath My Feet. He's a host of a new hit series, Body Bags, with Joe Scott Morgan on iHeart and many other venues. Joe Scott, I heard Faith Phillips, who I have so much respect for,

the Cherokee screenwriter and author, say, you know, when I asked her to describe what happened to these three little girls, and I'm asking this for a reason, Joe Scott, it's the dichotomy of what we were hearing Dr. Robertson say about wanting to protect someone, identifying with them. They turn into kind of a hero. You tell me. Fate said, well, I've never seen anything like it because she is a screenwriter. You and I have actually seen the real thing.

And a triple child murder. The three little girls were brutally raped and then murdered. You know, yesterday we talked to the camp counselor that found their bodies. I can't even imagine how that haunts her to this day. So just give me a reality check, Joe Scott. We've got this guy, Sam, hiding him out, Sam Pigeon in a remote house. I guess he didn't see the dead bodies. No, he probably didn't. But you have to think that on some level, he had some understanding of the level of violence this person was capable of, given his history and what he did to these aforementioned women when he raped them and he when you as an investigator began to assess the scene and the level of brutality this rose to you know he had several choices here as to the way he was going to bring

about the end of these little angels lives and he decided to beat them to death. And in one instance, not only did he bludgeon them, but he also utilized the cord to strangle them. And as horrible as that is, these things that you and I have borne witness to over the years, you have to be able to cut through the horror of that and get right down, just bore down to the evidence here. Exactly.

And try to figure out what happened. Another thing that's so startling, I guess I can use that word, you decide for yourself, is that there were warnings. This was going to happen. Listen. Pre-camp, there only were counselors and myself and someone found a cut and I think it was in the body of the tent and maybe at the back of the tent. A long cut about three feet big enough for anybody to crawl in or out of.

There were also some other things missing. There was one of our axes or hatchets was missing from the unit kitchen. I decided to sleep in the staff house. I was the only one in there. It was dark. There's a vapor light out in the front, but in the back, it's just woods. I heard somebody walking behind the staff house.

I was like, what the hell? And then somebody scratched on the window screen. I yelled, you know, yeah, who's there? Because I was still thinking it could remotely be somebody just trying to scare me you know and haha you did so it's time to come out and laugh at me but it didn't that didn't happen they knew things were being stolen they had signals that there was someone there intruding, encroaching in the camp. They felt afraid, but yet no flag of alarm was raised.

Okay, I can understand it so far, but listen to this. We got into our tent. The tent was just in disarray. There's stuff everywhere. And clearly our things have been gone through. So we were like, what the heck? And I remembered that my mom had bought me a big box of Post-Its donuts. And I saw the donut box sitting to the side of the trail. All the donuts were gone, but inside the box was a note. And was you know those little bitty memo pads that reporters often use. So it was like four or five pages of that had

been ripped off. The paper was dirty like it had been carried around. And on this front one it was in really big letters. It was a spunky K with loops. And on the front page, it said, kill, kill, kill. And then there's a bunch of scribble on the second or third pages. And occasionally we say God, you know, just scribble. And on the last page it said,

We're on a mission to kill three girls. What we don't account for are the monsters. We don't expect them. Even today we don't expect them. The feelings of fear, things being stolen, slashes in tents, which is a big no-no if you're a veteran camper. You never, ever harm somebody else's tent in that way. And then this note that shows up, we're on a mission to kill three girls. James Powell with Oklahoma Bureau of Investigations, if as a camp counselor, which I was in a national forest,

if I had gotten a note, our mission is to kill three girls and I'm at a Girl Scout camp, oh yeah, that would have closed down the camp and everybody would have gone home right then until that note had been investigated. Well, I don't think we'll ever really know the answer to that. The only thing I can offer is a lot of the counselors were probably not a whole lot older than some of the students that were there, some of the TNDs. They were pretty young. You're right. A lot of them were teens themselves. You're right. They're one that you might want to keep in mind. Oh, wait a minute. Wait a minute. Hold on. What faith? I'm so sorry to speak over you, Detective Powell,

but I would like to hop in here and talk about some of the things we have going on. So a lot of this information, I was born the year after the crime happened. And the way I got a lot of this information was I approached every party with nonjudgment and just allowed them to tell their story. And so all of these pieces of the puzzle started coming together. And in hindsight, I was able to see the big picture, which was there were multiple incidents of stalking leading up to the murders, including that kill note. But in the days after the murders and all the way up through the trial and after the trial, those things were dismissed. So one of the things that was dismissed about that kill note was that there was a Boy Scout camp on the other side of the highway. And so they were able to dismiss this as a teenage prank.

But when I saw it in hindsight and I was able to look at that and I say I see there's a note that says we are on a mission to kill three Girl Scouts. And that happens before the murders and then that's exactly what happens in my mind there's no way you can dismiss that as a teenage prank. Faith how old were the counselors? We have a range of counselors from 15 up to 18 and 19 we have very very young inexperienced women. So James Powell, you're absolutely correct. You've got teen camp counselors, and I can see what Faith Phillips says as explaining why it was discounted as a hoax. One of the shortcomings, I would say, is that the authorities had not notified everybody in the area that they've got a sex offender on the loose. I mean, if you put that in light of the fact that there's a sex offender running around

that area, it puts it in a very different light. You're right, Sean. That's Dr. Robertson speaking. Guys, they managed to get Jane Hart. Take a listen to what happened at the preliminary hearing. At the preliminary hearing, the prosecution presents a number of pieces of evidence that they say connect Jean Hart to the murders and which the judge admits into trial.

Among them are items authorities said were found in the cave where Hart supposedly hid out after the murders, the first of which are professional photographs of women. The photographer that Gene Hart had worked with at Granite State Prison confirmed that he had developed those photos with Gene Hart when he was an assistant while he was working in jail. Prosecutors also claim that sperm found on a pillowcase at the crime scene matched sperm found on Gene's underwear from prison,

and that hairs found on the duct tape at the crime scene were tested and determined to be from a Native American. But what does that actually mean, Joe Scott Morgan? You're the forensics expert. They were not using DNA at this time, but they matched sperm found at the crime scene where the three little girls were murdered to sperm found on gene's underwear in prison isn't that enough back then it was it predates obviously predates dna technology but the one thing they had

going for them in this particular case is the fact that heart was what was what is referred to as a secretor so when you think about saliva you think about uh semen for instance what you will have are red blood cells that will show up it's only a very small percentage of the population you know what you're gonna have to dummy down Are you trying to say in scientific talk that there was a blood type match? Well, there was. And what makes it significant is the fact that they were able to blood type match that to an individual that actually has this feature physiologically where they secrete these blood cells into these various fluids in their body. And so that narrows your, it funnels it down, and it's all pointed back to him.

So you're saying the most that they could show from the semen is it is Gene Hart's blood type, which is like, what, 30% of the population, and it is an American Indian. That's what we can show. The hair, the hair. Yeah, that shows he's an American Indian. That's what we can show. The hair. Yeah, that shows he's an American Indian. I mean, when you get a hair sample and you don't have DNA, you can say

it's a white person, it's a black person, it's an Asian person. I think you can say whether it's a Hispanic person. I'm not sure about that. Or an American Indian. You can tell that from hair, but it's not DNA. So now, what am I looking at? No but it's not DNA. So now what am I looking at? No, it's not. I'm not. I don't have that much. Oh, no, you don't. You don't have that

much at that particular time. But Nancy, that's that's what they had to work with at that particular time. You're right. I mean, but you put that in conjunction with him living in a cave one mile away. I don't know if they even tried to do a handwriting analysis on that note. And then hiding out. Hiding out. If you didn't do anything wrong, why are you hiding out in a remote cabin? Okay, take a listen to more. You'd have to live there to understand the dynamics between the Cherokee Nation and local law enforcement at the time.

It kind of split the community into two sides. Gene Hart was a local. A lot of citizens of the Cherokee Nation, as well as some of the folks in Cherokee County and Mays County, thought Hart did not do it. It seems patently obvious that Hart was a violent individual based on the crimes that he committed previously.

But if you're a Cherokee living here, there's an established history of the state acting sometimes as judge, jury, and executioner. Sometimes the state lied, sometimes the state framed people, and sometimes the state manufactured evidence. So it really wasn't that much of a stretch for Cherokees to believe that perhaps the state had framed Jean Lerner. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Let me go to Faith Phillips Cherokee screenwriter, intimately familiar with this case. Isn't it true that U.S. and state local governments have no jurisdiction in Indian reservations?

Is that true? That is true. That was a landmark Supreme Court decision. Okay, so we don't have any federal, state, or local law enforcement framing anybody on an Indian reservation because even if they know about crimes happening on an Indian reservation, there's nothing they can do about it because they don't have jurisdiction, right? The federal government does have concurrent jurisdiction in the tribal nations but this this wasn't determined until 2020 so at the time this crime occurred the the only party to prosecute crimes here in this

area would have been the state and local government so let me ask you what you believe there have been a history of american indians getting framed by law enforcement. Well, there's absolutely an established history of injustice toward the Cherokee people. I can't speak for all Cherokee people. I can only speak for myself. But we're patently aware of the removal that happened on the Trail of Tears. And so then we came here. Wait, are you actually going to bring in the Trail of Tears as a reason to believe that Hart didn't commit triple murder?

No, no, I think it's an important factor in a number of other events that have happened in addition to. So on the actual day of the murder murder we have the local sheriff walking up to the crime scene before he ever looks at anything we have multiple witnesses hearing him say looks like gene hart did this then we also have people who testify saying that the sheriff's instructions were to shoot gene hart on site so you have to understand these are the things that the community is hearing because people have witnessed it themselves. And so you have this established history of where the state had acted as judge, jury, and executioner.

And so it's not that hard to believe for Cherokee people who are intimately familiar with our history. Does that excuse harboring someone that you think could possibly have murdered these three girls? Absolutely not. But I think it's an important thing for people to understand and a part of the story that's never been told before. Well, let me jump in here too. And I seem to always try and get ahead, but there was evidence to prove that Hart didn't do it as well. There was a bloody footprint on the floor of the tent that wasn't his. There was a fingerprint on the flashlight they found at the scene that wasn't his. So it wasn't as though this was an

open and shut case against Gene Leroy Hart. Well, corroborating everything you just heard Kent Freitas say, listen to this. It's very important to understand this trial was before DNA. DNA had not become a tool that could be used either to prove innocence or guilt. There were hairs found on the duct tape that the girls had been bound up with that was what was described as Native American hair. They used that to try and implicate Hart because, of course, he was a Cherokee. That was not good science to believe that Eric could be matched. Though DNA testing is not yet available, the prosecution also claims that sperm samples

taken from Gene Hart's underwear were similar to the sperm found in one of the girls. There was important evidence on the scene which tended to exonerate Hart. There was a bloody footprint on the floor of the tent, and it was not Hart's footprint. It was the wrong size. There was a thumbprint found on the flash home, and it was not Hart's. So there was exonerating evidence found there, as well as evidence that implicated it. There was things there that would lead you to believe

that someone else either involved or did the crime. The case heads to trial. Listen. The entire trial spans 11 emotional days. But the all-white jury spends just five hours deliberating before making their decision. The Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation was

shocked when the verdict was read that their work was not sufficient enough to get him convicted. Jurors make it clear that the shoe size and thumbprint that did not match gene hart is a major factor in their decision to acquit to faith phillips joining us are you surprised at all by the acquittal i'm not surprised at all particularly considering what the evidence that

i found in the pre-trial when i was going through everything that had been presented. The standard is beyond a reasonable doubt. And there's no doubt that these 12 jurors looked at everything that the state presented. And if they were doing their job, which I believe they did, they had to come to the conclusion that the state did not meet its burden. What do you make of that, James Powell? I would tend to agree with that, that the state didn't meet its burden. There were, I don't know how much detail you want to go into, but there were a lot of factors that resulted in that verdict, at least from what my investigation has shown. Explain. There was

some testimony by some of the state's witnesses that the jury found that they felt they didn't believe. Specifically, there was a photograph that was taken at the time of Gene Hart's arrest where several of the agents were depicted in a photograph, either standing with him or just walking him out of the cabin. One of the witnesses was asked about that photograph, and the witness denied that photograph ever being taken. But it was my understanding that at the same time, the jury already had copies of those photographs. So they felt that if the witness was not truthful about that,

what else were they not being truthful about? Okay, to me, that's irrelevant. But I do see what you mean. Did the witness say that wasn't him? They said there was no such photographs ever taken. Okay, well, possibly the witness didn't know the photograph was taken? No, he would have known. The witness is in the photograph.

Basically, what happened was an OSBI agent perjured himself on the stand. He's in the photograph, and he's testifying to the jury that there wasn't a photograph taken. Gotcha, gotcha. Other than the photograph evidence, James Powell, you believe the verdict was correct. Faith Phillips, you're not surprised at the verdict. To you, Joe Scott Morgan, what do you think? You are often to say, Nancy, that, you know, you talk about lying eyes. You've got to convince me. And so if you think about this case and you think about what they had at that moment in time, it's really hard for the jury to get past that bit of it

as passionately as we want the jury to understand and maybe come to a conclusion from a prosecutorial standpoint, from an evidentiary standpoint. When you have a piece of evidence like this and they bear witness to it, it's really hard to get over that hurdle. To Kent Freitas joining us, former minority leader in the Oklahoma House

and author of Oklahoma's Most Notorious Crimes. Agree or disagree? Well, I agree that there was reasonable doubt. I have a perspective on one thing that nobody else does, and that it was not an unreasonable decision under the evidence that was admitted. He also thought Gene Leroy Hart was guilty. And the reason he thought he was guilty was because of some evidence that would have put on a prior, that would have shown that he had committed prior crimes, which was properly excluded unless he took the stand. What evidence is that? One of these little girls, at least one, was tied with a cord as well as with duct tape. And that cord was tied in a very peculiar knot of some kind.

And it turned out that the two women that Hart kidnapped and raped from Tulsa were tied up with that same knot and he thought that was unusual enough and to given given the other circumstances and that he thought Hart was guilty but once again he said once the evidence was in and there's there's all it also should be mentioned that the defense put on evidence that some of the prosecutorial as evidence was planted. Now, whether that was correct or not at least raised a doubt about it. Guys, take a listen to this. So my students decided that they were going to research the Girl Scout murders for their podcast.

And I posted about it. And I got this really kind of cryptic message that said if you're looking into the Girl Scout murders there's someone that you really need to meet and so I was curious but also a little freaked out. I'd been contacted about Paul Smith who was the sheriff of Mays County in 1980. He was elected after Pete Weaver left office. He was 97 years old, living in a retirement home, and he had some story he wanted to talk to me about.

I knew he was about to drop some truth on me. I was not prepared, though though for what I heard. It was one of the most extraordinary stories I've ever heard and still to this day it still boggles my mind. Faith, what did he tell you? Well, I went into that room and considering myself someone who was familiar with the case and what he told me was the story that I'd never heard anywhere in the press or any in the community no one had ever said this story to me and he told me that he had obtained a confession from someone who was a known pedophile and torture of animals in in the locust Grove area, and that he had obtained a confession from,

an oral confession from this man, naming himself and two other people that had committed the crime that night. We follow the very latest developments in the brand new Fox Nation series, The Girl Scout Murders, here on Crime Stories All Week. Tomorrow, a very unlikely source reveals never-before-seen evidence hidden in an ice chest for decades. Plus, new suspects? We wait as justice unfolds. Crime Stories' Nancy Grace signing off. Goodbye, friend.

You're listening to an iHeart Podcast. Goodbye, friend. You're listening to an iHeart Podcast.