Criminal - Casper, Wyoming

Episode Date: March 23, 2018

David Dovala has lived in Casper, Wyoming since he was 19. He’s worked all kinds of cases, first as a detective and later as sheriff, but a 1973 murder stays with him. This episode contains descriptions of sexual assault and may not be suitable for everyone. For more information, check out Ron Franscell's book, The Darkest Night. Say hello on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Sign up for our occasional newsletter, The Accomplice. Follow the show and review us on Apple Podcasts: iTunes.com/CriminalShow. We also make This is Love and Phoebe Reads a Mystery. Artwork by Julienne Alexander. Check out our online shop.  Episode transcripts are posted on our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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That's BotoxCosmetic.com. That's BotoxCosmetic.com. This episode contains descriptions of sexual violence. It may not be suitable for everyone. Please use discretion. I was working as a detective and I was called, and myself and my partner went to where the girl's car was and surveyed the scene, and we could see where the tire on the car was cut purposely. And then we just started going door to door and asking questions if anybody saw anything. This is David Davala, a retired detective with the Casper, Wyoming Police Department. Around 9 p.m. on September 24, 1973, 18-year-old Becky Thompson and her 11-year-old sister Amy drove to the grocery store in Casper. When they came out of the store,

they found the right rear tire on the family's station wagon was flat. They used a payphone to call their mother. And they were in a quandary on what to do, and then these two guys pulled up and offered to help them. The men said they would repair the tire, and then one of them pulled out a knife. They took them at knife point and took them in their car, and that was the start of a trip through hell for them. The two men drove Becky and Amy 30 miles outside of Casper to a place called Fremont Canyon. Fremont Canyon is a striking, narrow, red-rock canyon with steep walls and a long bridge.

The men stopped the car at the foot of the bridge. On this day, it was really the darkest night. There was no moon or anything. And there's an area there, a rest area. It's really way off, you know, out of sight and everything, unless you're driving through there. One of the men took 11-year-old Amy out of the car. He walked her to the middle of the bridge.

Becky was told to lay down in the back seat and couldn't see anything. When the man returned, Amy was not with him. Both men then proceeded to rape Becky. And then they took her out of the car. They took her to the bridge and walked her on the bridge. And then they went to push her over, and she fought so she wouldn't get thrown over. She fought, but then they were choking her, and so she figured if she just as well let them push her over and take her chances, otherwise they were going to strangle her. So they pushed her over, and as she going to strangle her. So they pushed her over and as she, it's 112 feet up from the bottom of this canyon, she

hit the water. When she came, the water wasn't very deep then, but it was deep enough. So she stayed there. She made it to shore. And she couldn't see these guys. They were on the bridge. But she could hear them. So she made it to shore.

And she did not find Amy. She didn't know where she was. So she stayed there, fearing that they would come down and kill her if they thought she was still alive. And she stayed there and then just stayed there all night. When the sun came up, Becky began to try to climb out of the canyon. Her pelvis was fractured. She couldn't move her legs. So she moved slowly, pulling herself up the steep sides. Finally, she got to the top, to the highway.

And there was a couple driving by and saw her. And they stopped and helped her. and they took her in their car to Elkova, which was about 10 to 14 miles away. And that, where they could get to a phone, there was nothing out there. There was no phones or nothing. Anyway, they took her to the store and then they called an ambulance. An ambulance came and the sheriff came and that started the investigation. Casper Sheriff Bill Estes told reporters that you could easily see the path Becky had taken because it was covered in blood. Detective Davala was sent to the hospital

to try to speak with Becky about what had happened. She was very coherent and able to give us details on what happened. She described what the two men looked like, and she said that they called each other Jerry and Ronnie. And we were familiar with these two people. They were small-time hoodlums here in Casper, so we were familiar with who they were. So we got some photos and did a photo lineup, and she picked them out immediately. 27-year-old Ronald Kennedy and 29-year-old Jerry Jenkins

were arrested that same day. A diver was sent back out to Fremont Canyon to start searching for Becky's younger sister, Amy. Her body was found underneath the bridge in about three feet of water. The autopsy found that the impact of the fall had killed her almost instantly. News of the crime spread quickly in Casper, and while police didn't release the names of the victims or assailants right away,

it didn't take long for people to figure out what had happened to Becky and Amy and who'd done it. Casper residents began calling the police station, desperate for more information. It was pretty much a wake-up call, probably. Because, you know, we hadn't had anything like that, did I recall, before that. Any kidnapping and murder.

So it must have shook the town pretty hard. Yes, it did. Yeah, it certainly did. Detective Davala has lived in Casper since he was 19. He describes it as a good town, full of hardworking people. A little bit of that Old West feel to it. It had always felt like a friendly town. He raised his kids there, one of whom was 11 at the time, the same age as Amy.

But Casper, which had always felt so safe, now felt different. I'm Phoebe Judge. This is Criminal. In April of 1974, seven months after Becky and Amy were thrown off the Fremont Canyon Bridge, the trial of Ronald Kennedy and Jerry Jenkins began. It was held not in Casper, but in Cheyenne. The defense had argued that the two men could never get a fair trial in Casper. The case was just too well known. Ron Kennedy and Jerry Jenkins were charged with two counts of rape, two counts of kidnapping, and first-degree murder. Ron Kennedy lived at home with his mother.

He was unemployed and had been in and out of prison. Jerry Jenkins was married with a newborn baby just a few days out of the hospital when the crimes occurred. He also had a long arrest record, almost 20 arrests by the time he was 18 for public drunkenness, theft, and mischief. In the months leading up to the trial, Becky received threats. Police believed the threats were coming from the defendant's relatives. Detective Davala kept a close eye on her and when it was time to travel from Casper to Cheyenne for the trial, he escorted her and stayed

in the hotel room right next door so he could be close. I stayed with with her all the time, and we grew to be friends. Were you in the courtroom when Becky testified? Yes. Yeah, I was there during the whole trial. The defendants were in the room while she described what happened the night of September 24th in detail. At one point telling the jury that she heard one of them say, make sure she's going to die, make sure she's going to be dead. Oh, it was pretty tough.

You know, there were a lot of people in there and some of them were crying. It was, you know, pretty rough on a lot of people. But she did an excellent job. She pretty much did everything a matter of factly. An agent from the FBI crime lab testified that hair found in Jerry Jenkins' car matched Becky. He concluded it had been forcibly pulled from her head. And police officers from the Casper Police Department testified that the tire on the girl's car

had gone flat because it had been slashed. The jury deliberated for just over four hours. On April 30, 1974, Ron Kennedy and Jerry Jenkins were found guilty on all counts. They were sentenced to death. And, however, the year after that, the Wyoming legislature abolished the death penalty, so they were then resentenced to life. I liked the first verdict better.

After the trial, Becky and her mother wanted to get out of Casper. They went to Mexico, where her stepfather was working on an oil rig. They stayed for a year. Becky got a job as a teacher. And when they returned, Detective Davala took her under his wing. He helped her get a job working for the police department. She became a beater maid. She worked downtown with the police department, so I get to see her quite a bit.

She wrote parking tickets and did things like that. I talked to her on the phone, meet with her once in a while. Sometimes we'd have lunch. Becky then got a job selling advertising for a local radio station, and Detective Davala thought she seemed to be doing well, but she wasn't. She made an appointment with a doctor, and on the intake form she wrote, I want to be normal again. Once a year, she had to appear before the parole board and tell the entire story of what had happened to her and her sister.

Detective Davala remembers she was terrified that the men would somehow be released. Kennedy used to come up every year for parole, and Becky would have to say something to the parole board. She'd have to meet with them and go over the story with them every year, which was, you know, pretty tough on her also. She was drinking a lot and checked herself into a rehab facility. And when she finished treatment, she seemed to be doing better.

She was doing well at work. She met someone. She was doing well at work. She met someone. She got engaged. And in 1987, as she was planning her wedding, she asked Detective Davala if he would walk her down the aisle and give her away. She asked me if I would do that, and I did. It was nice, real nice.

I was quite honored. It was a church wedding, and she really looked great. In 1990, Becky had a baby, a little girl named Vale. Six months later, her husband left. She started drinking again, and she still, every year, had to go before that parole board and tell the whole story all over again. I think she always thought about her sister, and wondered why she died and she didn't.

And I think she had some, I don't know if it'd be guilt or what, or some remorse about that. But that was always on her mind. And I think some, you know, some people may have reminded her of that. What do you mean, who? Well, I think some, you know, I think maybe they'd bring it up and it would bother her. She couldn't have done anything different to save her sister. So what happened? She went off the same bridge where she had gone off 19 years previously. On July 31, 1991, Becky and her daughter drove out to Fremont Canyon with a friend.

She wanted to go out to the bridge. So her friend took her out there and her daughter, and it was at night. And during the time they were there, the guy was watching the child, and Becky walked out on the bridge, and she was sitting on the rail. And then her friend suddenly heard the big splash, and Becky was gone. She was in the water. And nobody knows for sure if it was on purpose or if she slipped. Anyway, she ended up dying in the water there. How did you hear? I got the word.

I was working. I was the sheriff then, and I was at the fairgrounds. They told me, and so I went out there as fast as I could. She was still in the water. You could—it had lights on her, and you could see—because she had—her hair was real, real long, and you could see her hair in the water. You know, it's pretty bad, pretty bad. I still feel bad about it. You know, then you wonder, could you have done something better for her? Becky's funeral was held in the same church where her sister Amy's had been 19 years before.

More than 500 people showed up. Her body was then buried right next to her sister Amy's had been 19 years before. More than 500 people showed up. Her body was then buried right next to her sister. They share a headstone. Do people in Casper today still talk and know about what happened to Becky and Amy Burridge? Oh yeah. Yeah, the people that were here then, yeah, they sure do. So they haven't been forgotten? Oh, no, no. Do you ever go out to that bridge? Oh, yeah, I go there a lot.

Once in a while, they leave a flower. They built a bench there with their names on it, a little place where you can sit out there by the bridge. Detective Davala spoke with Becky's daughter, Vale, a couple of years ago. She called to tell him that she was getting married. She knew he'd walked her mother down the aisle. Jerry Jenkins died in 1998. Ron Kennedy is still incarcerated at Wyoming Medium Correctional Institution.

He's 71 now. They killed her. They killed her. Maybe they killed her all the way back when she was 18. Yeah, they killed her and just took her 19 years. Thank you. darkest night. Julian Alexander makes original illustrations for each episode of Criminal. You can see them at thisiscriminal.com or on Facebook and Twitter at Criminal Show. Criminal is recorded in the studios of North Carolina Public Radio, WUNC. We're a proud member of Radiotopia from PRX, a collection of the best podcasts around. Shows like Ear Hustle, which brings you stories of day-to-day life inside San Quentin State Prison, produced by those

living it. Here's a bit of their first episode of their new season about first experiences in prison. I took a lot of deep breaths. I try to, like, choreograph my hug, because I haven't hugged my mom in a long time in the cell but how did you practice how did you choreograph a hug so I didn't know because I haven't hugged someone in a long time maybe by then it was 13 years right

so I didn't know if my hand goes around her shoulder or her neck I didn't know if it went like diagonally like 245 two 45-degree angles. And then I was like, you know what, I let her lead. Like, this is your mom, right? This is my mom.

And I don't know how to hug my mom. So I was nervous about that type of stuff. Did you actually practice hugging somebody else? No. Just like an air hug? My celly wasn't up for that, no. Go listen. Special thanks to AdCirc for providing their ad-serving platform to Radiotopia.

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