Small Town Murder - #342 - Horror In The Hills - Hensley, West Virginia

Episode Date: December 10, 2022

This week, in Hensley, West Virginia, it's a strange day up in the hills, as a man gets so angry, that he needs to fire off his shotgun, in the trailer's front yard, before noon. This day gets even crazier with weird daytime hill party, getting punched by his daughter, and a whole lot of drinking. By the end of the day, someone has been killed in a quite imaginative way, leaving not much left behind. The cops think they have their man, but did they get the confession because of the suspect's guilt, or is it because they beat him unmercifully for 7 hours? This is one truly twisted little tale!Along the way, we find out that this county seems like a disaster, that a train is a crazy murder weapon, and that if you beat someone long enough, they're likely to admit to anything... even if they did do it!!Hosted by James Pietragallo and Jimmie WhismanNew episodes every Thursday!Donate at: patreon.com/crimeinsports or go to paypal.com and use our email: [e-mail] to shutupandgivememurder.com for all things Small Town Murder & Crime In Sports!Follow us on...twitter.com/@murdersmallfacebook.com/smalltownpodinstagram.com/smalltownmurderAlso, check out James & Jimmie's other show, Crime In Sports! On Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, Wondery, Wondery+, Stitcher, or wherever you listen to podcasts!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can listen to Small Town Murder early and ad-free right now. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. What if you married the love of your life and then stood by them as they developed 21 new identities? What would you do? This Is Actually Happening is a weekly podcast that features extraordinary true stories of life-changing events told by the people who lived them. Listen to the newest season of This Is Actually Happening on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. Hello, everybody, and welcome back to Small Town Murder Express. Yay! Choo-choo!

Ha-ha! Yay, indeed, Jimmy. Yay, indeed. My name is James Petrigallo. I'm here with my co-host. I'm Jimmy Witzman. Thank you, folks, so much for joining us all aboard the murder train, pulling away from the station. Let's do this. We have a crazy episode today, as usual, as it's usually a nuttier one that we pack into an hour. But today we're in West Virginia, so you are getting 100 pounds of dynamite in a two-pound bag.

It's amazing. You know how West Virginia goes. So very quickly before we get started, tickets on sale right now. Live tour 2023. We'll run down the dates at the end of the show quickly, but the first half of the tour is on sale right now. Live tour 2023. We'll run down the dates at the end of the show quickly. But the first half of the tour is on sale right now. I think it goes right up to San Diego.

And then, I believe, or something like that. And then after that, Pittsburgh. I don't know. Whatever. And then the beginning of 2023, the rest of them will go on sale. Cleveland, St. Louis, the first two. They're going fast. Get your tickets now.

They're selling very fast, so don't wait on those, definitely. Get in there. Shut up and give me murder.com. Merch everything else there as well. In addition, you want to go to patreon.com slash crimeandsports is where you get all of your bonus materials. Anybody $5 or above, you get

everything, the whole back catalog of bonus material. Every other week, you're going to get two new episodes, one Crime and Sports, one Small Town Murder. You will get access to it all, of course. This week for Crime and Sports, some crazy stuff, very fun stuff. We're going to talk about the ABA, American Basketball

Association, and not about the league and all. We're going to just tell some very crazy stories from that era of guys doing insane things, 60s, 70s basketball. It's so much fun. Then for Small Town Murder, we're going to get back into this. We talked about books and music being blamed for murders.

Now we're going to talk about video games being blamed for murders, all the murders blamed on video games. This has been a big thing for the last 30 years, so we can't wait for that. Patreon.com slash crime and sports is where you get all of that and more. I'm telling you, the bonus stuff is worth it. And that said, I think it's time. Let's get right into this, man. Let's get cooking. Let's dive in. Yeah. I think it's time to sit back, everybody. Clear the lungs. I don't care where you are. Forget it. Never mind keeping it under wraps. Make it dangerous. Shout it out the car window. Stand atop your cubicle desk and scream it to the manager's

office. I don't give a shit. Let's all shout, shut up and give me murder. Let's do this, Jimmy. Shall we? Let's go on a trip. Let's go. Let's go on a trip. Let's go. Let's go.

We are coming from Mississippi on the Express last week, and we are coming up to West Virginia. Yikes. Oh, man, are we in the hills this week. Boy, this is Hensley, West Virginia. Oh. And you've never heard of it because no one's ever heard of it because these are just little speckle towns in the hollers up here, man. Forgotten West Virginia. This is crazy.

This is in severe southwestern West Virginia, I like to call it. Right in the chicken's ass. If you look at West Virginia like a chicken pointed to 2 o'clock, it's right in the chicken's ass. It's about an hour and a half to Beckley, West Virginia, which was our last episode. It's about an hour and a half to Beckley, West Virginia, which was our last episode. The county that it's in, McDowell County, only has 19,000 people in it, the whole county. The whole county. In 1950, there was 99,000 people in this county.

Oh, wow. That's what's happened to this place. Holy shit. Picture what that looks like. Abandonment. Abandoned, dilapidated shacks on the hillside because it was a coal mining town. And once all that went away here, it all fell apart. They left and everything went away. 80,000 people gone in 50 years.

It's crazy. It's insane. It's abandoned the place. In 2020, McDowell County was the third poorest county in the united states in the country 3143 counties this country is made up of at the time and this is the third poorest so this is bad this is this is a bad place virginia also probably probably one's in mississippi one's probably in the woods in mississippi and the other one's probably across the street in West Virginia. It is absolutely bonkers.

The estimated number of people living in poverty at that point was 32 percent of 19,000 living in poverty in this. Yeah, that's crazy. It's absolutely it's usually 11 percent in the rest of the country. So that's crazy. It's absolutely, it's usually 11% in the rest of the country. So it's crazy. Population of this town, a cool 42. 42 people live here, Jimmy. And all the towns are like that. One's like 78, one's 36.

All these little towns have less than 100 people in them. It's insanity. Median household income here hold on to your hats everybody help put put your shoes on tight so your socks go don't get blown through nine thousand six hundred fifty nine dollars is the median household income here household yes median household yearly income the average is it feels like you can you can scrap more than that that is nine grand in a year nine that's like ginseng hunting that's what that is that's because that's what they do there i've seen that a lot ginseng yes to supplement the the like the

assistance payments they get they go out and they pick ginseng and and roots and shit like that and there's some hillbilly that's taking the ginseng and selling them to these companies to make ginseng pills and all that shit. Yeah. So that American Hollow documentary covers this very well. A bunch of those people. That's how they supplement their income. What the fuck, man? It's wild.

Median home cost here, $77,500, which is nothing. But if you make $10,000 a year, I don't know how you afford that. I don't even know how you afford that. The motto of this town, and this is right on their website. It's shocking that 42 people have put a website together, but they did. The motto is, quote, step outside. Yeah, because you can't afford a house. So just step outside because you live there now.

Holy fuck. Wow. They literally say, I'm outdoors now. I'm outdoors now. Yeah. Come on out with us. It used to be, it's had several names before. First it was Claren.

Then it was Claren Station. Then it was Hensley Claren. And then they just called it Hensley after that. So, yeah, you could see that. It became part of West Virginia in 1863 because it was one of the several union-affiliated counties during the Civil War. West Virginia broke into West Virginia and Virginia because of the Civil War. They were the ones. A lot of it was West Virginia people were union people, and a lot of the Virginia ones were obviously Confederate because that was Robert E. Lee's place for Christ's sake. So it was described by a lot of newspapers as the free state of McDowell because it was basically an ungovernable – no one knew what the people wanted there.

It was just a bunch – it was a bunch of crazy son of a bitches that lived there. So they were like on their own. It's an interesting place. We'll just say that. By the first half of the 20th century, dominated by coal mining. In 1950, it was the leading coal-producing county in the United States. In 1950? Yep.

16% of the county's population in 1950 was employed employed in the coal sector and then it went downhill and they draw in 1960 they dropped the workforce from 16,000 to 7,000 people it's a disaster from there it just started plummeting yeah uh john f kennedy while he was president or when he was running for president was here uh in welch which is a town next door a couple miles he said quote i don't think don't think any American can be satisfied to find in McDowell County in West Virginia 20 or 25 percent of the people of that county out of work, not for six weeks or 12 weeks, but for a year, two, three or four years. That was in the 60s.

And it's only gotten worse. The rates of drug abuse, poverty is hugely high. Life expectancy well below the national average. Wow. This is not good. JFK was going to fix this. Thanks a lot, fucking Texas. No one's going to fix this ever.

There's no way. No. Unless you drop a fucking – tell everybody there's going to be a bomb drop, so you have to leave. There's no way to fix it. There's no way to fix it. They have to leave here. You can't live in the mountains where there's no jobs. I understand why they're there because the families were there because there was jobs and now they're stuck there. So it's different.

What do you do? That's why there's no fixing it. Do they stay because it feels like home you think? You think that's what it is, keeping them there? I don't think they have a choice. You watch American Hollow, this documentary, and it's about this family that's stuck there and one kid wants to leave and all this shit and their basic thing is they're stuck there they can't go anywhere so they go like i'll never go anywhere this is my home this is the greatest place in the world because what else are you

gonna say i have no agency over my own shit it's it's just mentally a better way to cope with it i think and it's pretty country but country, but if you have no food, who cares what you're looking at? If you look up and out, it looks great. But when you look down and around, it looks like shit. It looks like shit, yeah. The schools here, I found the rankings from USA.com have them a one star and 779th.

I don't know what that is. just terrible the school's here as well there's no reviews for this town here um so i found i i made my own review of the town this is based this is what i would imagine the your average review would be you don't think it's because they couldn't write i don't know if the internet gets here we'll put it that way yeah three stars not much to do in this town seeing there's only 42 people oh wait billy joe just died of the black lung combined with scurvy so 41 dang we used to go fishing together well now there's even less to do in this town i guess it's just me and jim billy at the old fishing hole from now on unless the gangrene spreads from his legs that that it's looking like

it wants to anyway nice town people really care about each other update jim billy just died taking it down to two stars and 40 40 people now 40 things to do in this town gangrene stepping on a fishing that That's what happens. It happens. Yeah. Around here. Things to do? Go outside. That's it.

There's nothing to do. The only thing I could find even close to here is the Appalachian series. It's like a jog run thing. This is day six. It's in a bunch of little towns all over the South.

Multiple days of this shit? In different places. They'll do one. It's basically part six not day six is how it should be but no time limit they have a no runner left behind policy and will happily stay until the final finisher crosses the line walkers are always welcome because what else are we gonna do that's what i mean we got nothing going on shit um there you go so there's what's to do this town is bonkers

obviously this is fucking crazy so that said let's talk about a murder if we want to even get crazy you know it's gonna it's gonna get there with this kind of lifestyle happening this is how long till a murder happens that's what i mean this is why we set the tone with the town stuff because you have to now you know the people who live here you can you know who they are and you need to know who they are to understand this story and understand how it goes so it's different here like if anyone's listening and like you're sitting in like england or australia or something it's so different here you have no idea i can't even explain this to you they are missing imperative body things like oh yeah or eyes i was gonna say like eyes and things like that and it and it didn't get

taken out in a fight they weren't born genetically it just done fell out one day and they don't know why i lost it i don't know what happened that's the type of weird shit that goes on here place my eyeball i'd misplaced it so we have to go back to 1988 for this one so not not any better basically at that point in time it was still you know the population had gone to basically nothing and it's it's been kind of the same since the late 70s so february 16th 1988 well post valentine's Day here. Oh, yeah. It's all just wearing off. It's all wearing off. The afterglow.

You're still in the afterglow of Valentine's Day. Let's talk about a man here. Paul David Thompson is his name. Paul David Thompson is 34 years old here in 1988. He was born in Davie, West Virginia. His parents are Lydia and Jess Thompson, and they now live in Tazewell, Virginia. Which one's his mom? Lydia.

Oh, okay. His dad Lydia and his mom Jess. It's interchangeable. I don't think Lydia's interchangeable. Have you ever met a man named Lydia? I don't think I've met a man named Jess. I guess Jesse is a man named lydia i don't think i've met a man named jess i guess jesse is jess yeah jess jess is uh isn't that uh it's short for jessica but also jesco also white that's what i mean jess they call him that just jess is a no it's that's the

they can't they gotta shorten it though hillbillies can't call you jesse it's got to be jess it's two syllables man get to work nope jess but then they'll add another name to it jess bill you'll be jess bill and you're like wait a second why not just jesse just use the whole name nope jess bill so uh old day paul david thompson here paul he is employed by the gilbert lumber company that's where that's where he works here uh He goes to the old Baptist church once in a while. But he's also, his life is a little more complicated than that. His life definitely is West Virginia also. He has a job and things like that. He also has a wife and a daughter as well here uh he's got a daughter one i guess one of his uh i guess two of his daughters two of his kids died oh my god yeah his daughter and then his son paul jr also died yikes so and this is we're talking in the 80s this isn't like you know oh pre-penicillin and shit and it was like oh no the kid got the you know this is an 1880 thing happened back got the kid got the, you know. This is 1880. Things happened back then. He got the dropsy and died.

You know, like, that's not what happened. The horse kicked him in the head, and six days later, he died. These children probably died of West Virginia, which is sad. It's fucking sad. That's depressing. That's depressing.

He's got a wife named Elizabeth and a daughter named Deborah Sue, who's still alive. So, I don't know about now, but she's still alive in 88 anyway. She's hanging on by a thread, but she's around. I'm sure she's very ill. Don't get me wrong. I'm sure she's got some sort of terrible.

Lost an ear. Lost an ear. It's just like an environmental thing. Well, what happens with the coal mines is after a while, they just they deteriorate and degrade in the ground makes your ears fall off up above dna kind of mixes with a dog uh and and dogs shed and your your body just starts shedding things like ears and eyelashes and part gecko lizard because you grow them back though that's the thing takes the ears a while to grow back but

they grow back they regenerate they do grow back now paul has like six brothers and sisters also really yeah and those are the ones that were alive so i don't know how many he must have had before that what they start with 18 19 to get to six in this area so many kids with so many kids in west virginia uh he lives in uh westchester West Virginia, which is right near this town. All these little towns are just these little hollers that really should all be one town probably, but they're just these little specks of 50 people around. So it's a couple miles down the road. So Thompson, I'll give you a little background on him now that that's over with here.

Let's talk about his February 16th, 1988. What did he do that day? Well, he spends a lot of the day in the company of another man here we'll talk about. We'll get to how he gets here, but he ends up hanging out with a guy named James William Smith, who's 28. And I'm absolutely calling him Jim Willie. I was thinking Jim Billy, but same thing. I don't know why Jim Willie popped into my head. Sounds good. Yeah.

Cause there's a, they already know a Jim Billy, by the way, my review. I think I named the guy Jim Bill. Didn't I? The other guy, I think it called him Jim Bill,

the second dead man, Jim Billy. So this is, this is Jim Willie over here. So Jim Willie, um, he's going to hang out with, but Paul David Thompson earlier in the day before

he ends up with jim willie who's 28 he gets in a huge argument with his wife now as you will yeah as you will i don't know i say a huge argument because i'm trying to put this into perspective of how big of an argument you'd have to have to do this, what he does. OK, now, this can't be like a small thing. You know, we are we going to go here? Are we going to go there? What do you want for dinner? Got an argument with the kid's teacher.

It can't be one of these things because this argument deteriorates into or not even deteriorates. this argument deteriorates into or not even deteriorates it it swells into and by the end of it paul is in the front yard outside of the trailer of course standing in the front yard just firing his shotgun into the air into the air so angry the only way to express it is to through gunpowder and you need to expel bullets and buckshot and fucking pellets into the air talking to me like that i'm on a white shell fucking bitch fucking son of a what the hell kind of argument escalates to that what'd you call me buckshot have you we've both been divorced yeah at no time in any of the arguments i had with my ex did i ever want to grab the nearest firearm head out in the front yard and just shoot shots into the

fucking air that's a that is a different level of that's uh is that frustration or is that anger is it a combination is he is he not good at talking maybe and that's the way he expresses himself like use your words not boom boom then my words now just i don't know what's going on but wow that's gotta be a scene and he's got kids in the house oh there's kids yeah there's kids well one of them the other two are dead now i'm dead. Now I'm starting to be less of a mystery probably would kill these kids. Perhaps some of those bullets came down. If every argument causes gunplay in the front yard, you can't. It's a numbers game.

You're going to lose a kid or two. It's a numbers game eventually. Something bad is going to happen is all I'm saying. Fuck, man. Imagine being his neighbor too. It's Paul outside the trailer shooting again. They must have gotten an argument and you go back to TV. Let's see what's on the family feud.

7 a.m. Jesus, Paul. What the fuck? Yeah, this is like early in the day. This is like mid-morning this is going on, which doesn't seem like enough time to build up that kind of animosity. But either way, that's what goes on. And he ends up calling Jay Willie over here, Jim Willie. I don't know if he calls him.

I don't know if there's some sort of like holler. He heard the shotgun. That's how he calls people. That's his bat signal. Boom. Paul's arguing with his wife again i better go get him so three rounds i'm on my way that's three if it was four it's for david now that's our other friend if it's davy it's that's four for davy now he's an emergency we all go five means you know

any any emergency personnel in the area. We know how it works. Five is an emergency and he's out of rounds. We better hurry. One's just having a good time. That's a birthday. Two means I got to kill this man. And three means I'm fighting with my wife. Pick me up to go fishing.

That's what that means. So he does. James or Jim Willie picks him up and they take off. Jim Willie's 28 and Paul's 36. 34, 34, 28, 34. There's only 42 people here. Yeah, I guess it's close. Anything in the ballpark. 10 years either direction?

Your taste doesn't matter. 10, 20, who gives a shit? Ten years either direction? Your taste doesn't matter. Ten? Twenty? Who gives a shit? Anybody who does anything slightly close to what you do, you hang out with them because when there's this little people, you don't really have a choice. Imagine what the dating scene is like. I don't want to. I don't know. She's got a head.

I guess that'll do. Last girl didn't even have a head on her. She's just wandering around bumping into walls and shit. what's your last name again yeah now hold on you ain't from the ones from that holler are you because that's oh shit we can never mind we can't do it we can we can't do it so as they leave they take off the wife now elizabeth paul's wife she also takes off not to follow him to go to the magistrate's office to swear out a warrant for his arrest for general domestic fuckery, I would imagine. I can't imagine there was no violence inside the house if outside the house there was gunfire in the front yard. You know?

He had to have done something in there. Yeah. It rarely starts in the yard. He had to have done something in there. Yeah, it rarely starts in the yard. And it's, I don't know, rather threatening to go out into the front yard with a high-powered weapon and start fucking bucking shots off while you're arguing with someone. That's for sure. It's definitely like, oh, wow, I bet this fight better end now type of thing.

That's involving the neighbors for sure. That seems abusive. And so when Paul David Thompson enters Jim Willey's car, first thing he does, old Paul Thompson, pulls out a bottle of Valium. You betcha. Of Valium. Got a bottle of Valium he pulls out and he, you know, shakes it. And obviously that gets Jim Willey's attention, Boone County mating call and all. Yeah, his dick starts dripping.

So there's another guy in the car, too. I don't know his name, but there's another guy in the car, I assume, sitting. I don't know what seat they're all in, but they're there. So Paul hands some pills to both the man in the passenger seat and to Jim Willey, too, the driver. I mean, he done picked him up. You know, you should share your pills with him. So he shares his pills. You know, you should share your pills with him.

So he shares his pills. Paul Thompson's an epileptic. And Valium's one of the medicines prescribed to him to control his epilepsy. I know nothing about epilepsy or medicine. So I assume there's probably a better medication now because this was 35 years ago. I mean, obviously I'm not a doctor. But epilepsy is like, I imagine, over, I'm not a doctor, but really is epilepsy is Jesus Christ. I imagine overactive firing of the brain. So a volume volume seems like that would be logical.

That's a lot. There's nothing logical in medicine, though. That's not. Yeah. The other point is, I'm probably right. That sounds it sounds a lot right. But who knows? But it also treats fucking anxiety.

So who knows what this shit is, if he is prescribed this or if he's just doing it. Yeah. Apparently he's prescribed this. He has a bunch of medicines prescribed to him for his epilepsy, apparently, prescriptions. So the three of these guys drive around for over an hour and take more Valium. Oh. for over an hour and take more Valium. Oh.

And this is all while they're consuming what's described as sizable quantities of beer in the court documents. I want to slow down. Now, by West Virginia McDowell County standards, that was probably a lot. I feel like this is a... Sizable feels like more than we're capable of. More than we're capable of. And if you add valium to the mix too i don't think you're supposed to mix those two right that doesn't

seem like you probably shouldn't it's probably fun for a little bit but one drink maybe two that's what i'm saying yeah pretty solid uh white girl wednesday night probably not sizable quantities though while you're driving also probably isn't a great thing. I love how everybody there goes out to drink. They go out to I'm gonna go drive around and drink for a while. Every case we cover in the hills, they drive around to drink. That's an activity. Let's go drinking and driving tonight. All right.

I watched plenty of it as a kid. But like it wasn't going. We weren't driving. It was just we happened to be driving and this person on the wheel is an alcoholic you're on the way somewhere and an alcoholic is driving that's different than what do y'all want to do tonight i don't know drive around and drink all right that's what goes on here this is nuts this is fucking nuts so they're drinking they're driving they're taking pills so a little bit later when they're done driving or i guess when they're drinking, they're driving, they're taking pills. So a little bit later when they're done driving, or I guess when they're tired of driving,

they stop on by to Fan Rock. Fan Rock is the town, which is another close area, to the home of Johnny Cook. Yeah. Johnny Cook, who's a friend of Paul's. So Paul said, we can go to Johnny Cook's house. Let's do that. So while they're at the house, there's like a party going on i don't know if it's a party or just a normal tuesday afternoon probably always a party there's people

there drinking now judging by just hanging out drinking in the yard and shit so that could be a party that could just be like when we did groundhog for breakfast there was a bunch of people at 10 in the morning sitting in a parking lot drinking and they all had homes and they all had homes these people right so it could be that either way paul gets noticeably shit-faced at this party well he's also on pills so it's probably and he's been drinking the whole ride there so it's probably happening fast he keeps doing it he keeps fucking drinking drinking uh jim willie gets two more Valiums from Thompson as well. It's been like two hours since his last Valiums, but he's going to take these on top of the booze. So Paul Thompson is overheard telling Jim Willie that Jim Willie owes him money for the pills that he gave him.

By the way, I've been giving you a bunch of pills now all day. You do owe me money. They're not free, you know. Those are not donations. Those are not free. So they leave leave the party the two of them um just uh jim willie and paul they leave the party and they travel in the direction of paul's trailer i'm going to drop paul off while they're on the way their car jim willie's car passes paul thompson's wife and daughter in their car, Jim Willie's car, passes Paul Thompson's wife and daughter in their car. That's how small it is around

here. They pass each other on the road all the time. Well, she's going to swear out a warrant. I think she might be coming back from swearing out a warrant or going somewhere else because she swore out a warrant a couple hours ago. So, if you got to swear out a warrant on your husband, things have gone awry.

So, they pass in another car. They stop cars to talk to each other. They get out of the car. That's the other reason. There's nobody on these roads. You can just get out of the car on the road and talk to people, which is crazy. The exchange is allegedly a heated exchange between, which makes sense. They were in such a heated fight.

He's got gunfire going off an hour two hours ago you know the magistrate's been notified right during this whole thing some violence breaks out among the the trio of the mother daughter and the husband but not in the way you'd expect maybe he hit her maybe the wife slapped him. Maybe he hit his daughter. No, no. His daughter hit him. His daughter beat him up. That's what happens now. He's had enough of his shit. She punched him in the face, causing his nose to bleed.

Oh, my God. In the hills of West Virginia, 16-year-old girls can throw a punch, period. She rocked him. Yeah, she fucking threw a punch at him. Yeah. She's like, God damn it. That knocked out that fella at the bar last week, too. He ain't going to fuck with me neither.

Oh, the shame. He is having an embarrassing day. Just can't get out from in front of himself here. He's tripping over his own feet every step of the way. His daughter has beaten him up now. His only living child has beaten him up. Popped him in the nose. Popped him in the nose and made him bleed so that's that's wild they'll later both of them will later deny that that happened by the way okay the women will deny that that happened so but somebody says that happened somebody says

that happened well paul tells somebody and also j also Jim Willie also will end up saying that that happened. He saw it, yeah. So the – He ain't going to let you live that down. No. He's like, I just saw his daughter kick his ass. Is that your baby girl? She smacked you.

That's a good punch on her. I'll tell you what. You done taught her well anyway. You raised a strong one. Bet you wish you hadn't. I know, right? Shit. Jesus Christ. You done taught her well anyway. You raised a strong one. Bet you wish you hadn't. I know, right? Shit.

Jesus Christ. I think whatever happens in her life, the daughter's going to be okay, I think. She's going to be fine. She's going to be fine. So that I'm happy about. So at that point, Jim Willie drives away there. It was about 9.45 p.m. that they drove away. So this has been all day. They picked him up in the morning.

Drinking and pilling and everything. Now, Jim Willey says about 9.45 p.m. He let Paul out of the car about 20 feet from Paul's trailer. Just parked outside. Paul got out. See you later. And went inside. It's all a lighthearted nightmare on our podcast, Morbid. We're your hosts. I'm Alina Urquhart. I'll see you later. And went inside. It's all a lighthearted nightmare

on our podcast, Morbid. We're your hosts. I'm Alina Urquhart. And I'm Ash Kelly. And our show is part true crime, part spooky, and part comedy. The stories we cover are well-researched. He claimed and confessed to officially killing up to 28 people. With a touch of humor. I'd just like to go ahead and say that if there's no band called Malevolent Deity, that is pretty great. A dash of sarcasm and just garnished a bit with a little bit of cursing. This mother****er lied.

Like a liar. Like a liar. And if you're a weirdo like us and love to cozy up to a creepy tale of the paranormal, or you love to hop in the Wayback Machine and dissect the details of some of history's most notorious crimes, you should tune in to our podcast, Morbid. Follow Morbid on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to episodes early and ad-free

by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Welcome to the small town of Chinook, where faith runs deep and secrets run deeper. In this new thriller, available exclusively on Wondery Plus, religion and crime collide when a gruesome murder rocks the isolated Montana community. Everyone is quick to point their fingers at a drug-addicted teenager, but local deputy Ruth Vogel isn't convinced. She suspects connections to a powerful religious group. Enter federal agent V.B. Loro, who has been investigating a local church for possible criminal activity. The pair form an unlikely partnership to catch the killer, unearthing secrets that leave Ruth torn between her duty to the law, her religious convictions, and her very own family.

But something more sinister than murder is afoot and someone is watching Ruth. With an all-star cast led by Emmy nominee Sanaa Lathan and Star Wars Kelly Marie Tran, Chinook is available exclusively and ad-free on Wondery Plus. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. So Jim Willey says that he drove to a local convenience store and got some gas. He's going to the town store there. And he met some cash back, sir. Pay me back for my pills. No shit, right?

You going to stop and get me some? So he meets a guy named Tommy Brooks there. He doesn't meet him. He knows him, but he runs into him there, I should say. Hangs out with him for a sec, yeah. Well, for more than that, they end up chit-chatting. And like I said, not a lot of people if you run into anybody you just see if they want to hang out because what else is there to do want to spend some time so he does brooks he says you want to come back

and hang out and drink some beer so brooks says sure and they go back to jim willie's house to drink some beer together wow that's what a day there's a lot of beer drinking but i get it so while going to j willie's house he apparently jim willie runs into thompson's wife again paul thompson's wife again so he's this is twice now and the daughter as well and told them uh you know i dropped him off at the trailer because they're like, where is he? I'm going to take another shot at him. My left hook is feeling itchy. And he's like, he's at the trailer. No, he's back at the trailer.

I got a little ADD. I can't go to sleep without hitting him twice. I just need to hit him again, damn it. One more thing I want to tell him. So Jim Willey and Brooks, the guy he hung out with at the convenience store they drove on to Jim Willie's house and they went over there to hang out right and drink some beer at one point Brooks after they're drinking a while asked if Jim Willie would drive him back to the convenience store and you know will you take me on down to the convenience store back there because I guess

that's his base of operations. That's my home. Yeah. I don't think he has a car. I think he was just hanging out there and he's like, well, I guess I'll go back and hang out there more. Holy shit. Which is interesting. So on the way there, Jim Willie stops at the top of Hensley Mountain to take a leak. Okay.

This is the top of a holler is what it is. So all these houses up the holler and then it's up there at the top to take a leak. Okay? This is the top of a holler, is what it is. So all these houses up the holler, and then it's up there at the top to take a leak. Now, at that moment, Brooks heard Jim Willey open the car's trunk, heard the hatchback open up, and turned to see, and if you know a hatchback, an 80s hatchback, you pop it open from the front seat, you can see out the back, like a little SUV, essentially, on a hatchback.

So he turns, and when he turns, Brooks, the other guy, when he turns, he sees Jim Willey with a bumper jack in his hand. Yeah. So, you know, big fucking metal jack thing. Right, a big fucking lumber jack. Yeah, he's got one of these big jacks in his hand. And so Brooks says, what you doing? you doing well you know fuck's going on i thought you were pissing what are you gonna you know change a tire now what's what are you doing so jim willie said that he was quote throwing out the garbage okay i'm throwing out the garbage and then brooks got out of the car

and walked back to where jim willie was and he was like hey you know what's what's happening need some help or you know i don't know i'm just sitting in the car in the woods and he said when he got there the bumper jack was nowhere to be seen jim willie didn't have the bumper jack anymore and it wasn't in the trunk so it's gone apparently the garbage was the jack yeah this thing doesn thing doesn't work. I had to piss. Maybe I should throw this out. Yeah, which is a strange thing to do. While I'm pissing, let me get this piece of equipment out of my trunk and throw it out.

So while this is all going on, as they went to the house, Brooks and Jim Willie, they passed Paul's wife, we were talking about, right? Paul's wife we were talking about right so Paul's wife saw I guess Paul's wife ended up seeing Jim Willie's car at a distance as it traveled toward the railroad tracks at one point all right so

during all this at some point Jim Willie's going toward the railroad tracks and Paul's wife sees this everybody can see everybody and run into everybody this is the smallest place ever and this is different towns that's how close they are cameras and you can still get all the footage you get everything yeah you just stand somewhere so she assumed that oh it's probably because this is before she hadn't seen Paul yet back home. So she assumed, oh, it's probably Jim, Willie and Paul.

They're probably going. They're probably, I'm sure, going to drink at the softball field. Yes, you do. Because, you know, when you're a 35 year old man with a home and a wife and a child, you go to do your recreational drinking just at a softball field with your buddy. Can you imagine what the fuck kind of life is this what is this let's go pretend to be winos and hobos all right you want to jump a freighter afterwards sounds good you make a bindle it is nice to getting fucked up outdoors is so fun

oh yeah it's so great but it's also it's illegal. Yeah, you're going out in public to drink. You can't be on public property drinking booze. Yeah, and it's nighttime. Let's go down to the softball field at night and get shit-faced. What are we, 12? Yeah, I have a house. I bought lawn furniture for this very occasion. Yeah, when I was doing that, it was because I wasn't allowed to have it,

and I had to do it sneakily. We were hiding when we were drinking outdoors. Hiding. That's what that is. You're either hiding or paying a lot to camp or something. One of the two. That's why it's exciting as an adult, because it feels fucking dangerous. Yeah, it's a sense memory, probably, of being a teen.

There's too much of being an adult that this is legal. I don't like the legality. I got to break yeah i gotta break the rules now she and her daughter looking for paul were like well we'll go to the field i don't like i said they're hunting him down i don't know why they're trying to find him i don't know if they're trying to find him to tell him he's going to get arrested or if they're trying to whatever it is or whatever they're trying to find him so when they drive to the softball field mom and daughter here they see the railroad tracks and lying across the railroad tracks is paul and he's dead he's already dead dead on the railroad tracks and he looks like he's been through the ringer a bit i mean it doesn't look good so he's dead on that's how they find him on the railroad tracks. And he looks like he's been through the ringer a bit. I mean, it doesn't look good.

So he's dead. That's how they find him on the railroad tracks, dead, from what they say. So that's their story. With the body nose. Yeah, wow, you punched him good, honey. You got some kind of right cross on you, darling. Jesus. He hit him in the nose and he bled out.

Holy shit. Now, how did he die is a good question it's a great question this is fucked up okay prior to him being dead and i only know this because he was alive so he must be that's everything prior to death is generally alive alive he was found by other people who were walking the railroad tracks drinking. This town is a fucking mess. He was found unconscious on the railroad tracks. Lying on the railroad tracks by a few

people. Okay? He's lying. Listen to how he's placed. How these people found him. On the tracks, lying face down. Face down with his like, with his waist area over the one track so his ass is sticking up in the air. You know what I mean?

Because the track is under it. There's a lump there, yeah. And his pants are pulled down to his ankles. Face down, ass up, and ass up. Face down, ass up on the railroad tracks this sucks that's what's going on right now this is fascinating yeah but he's unconscious but alive okay he's breathing so this sounds like how you would find like a prisoner who's been or or a man that stumbled trying to take a piss trying to take a piss and fell over yeah and then just fell over and his pants come down and his pants fell down and yeah exactly one or the other yeah so

these people approached him yeah to go is that a man alive or not when they approached him he he couldn't move all he was doing all he could do was make gurgling sounds. That's a death rattle, my friend. He's making gurgling sounds, and he's got a big gash on his head, and there's a pool of blood visible on the ground. Let's get out of here, y'all. This looks terrible. So these passersby, these people go, oh, shit, we better help him. They leave him on the track and run to call for help. They didn't just grab his ankles and pull him off the track while they were there. They were like, fuck, don't move him, Jesus.

So they ran to get help. While they're calling, the cops go, and there's a man on the track. The fucking train comes by. No! And runs Paul over and fucking hits him they let imagine being on the phone hi yeah uh is this the police yeah i would like to report never mind click like what i would like to report don't tune y'all better hurry i'd like to report an unconscious i mean dead man on the railroad tracks i mean it's the man's dead i'm not trying to but this that's fucking crazy that is and that's

how much of an asshole would you feel like do you do you credit that to like when they always tell you don't touch the body but like yeah but barring the tracks if he But like, barring a life-threatening situation, get him the fuck off the tracks. If they're alive, touch them. Try to save them at that point. Don't just go, well, he's going to die, so leave him be. Try to save him if he's alive. If he's dead, don't touch him. That's when you don't touch him.

But if he's alive, Christ, pull him off the train tracks. But he's gurgling. I don't want to move him and make it worse yeah so you leave him on the train track imagine how that felt being on the phone and you just hear the fucking train horn that has to feel like like you got into a van and you're sitting in the back of it and you just realized oh shit there's no candy in here that's the same feeling you have at that moment fuck i fucked up bad that was bad. I should have probably done that instead of, yeah, that's my, there I went wrong. There's no candy.

What the fuck is that? Where are all your windows? What's going, oh, oh, wow. Oh, that's nice. You got, oh, handcuffs are fun. Oh, shit. Handcuffs, no candy. It's dark in here.

It's real dark in here. Why is that? This Kool-Aid is making me feel just – it's making me feel, like, tired, but also, like, I don't know, like my buttholes open more. I don't know what – is that a thing that happens from Kool-Aid? My feet are asleep. I can't move them. Uh-oh.

Uh-oh. That's not good. So that's what these people fucking left him on the tracks. Can you imagine? He's hit by a train and killed. And then his wife and daughter find him. Found that after that. That's how they found him.

Pants around his ankles, hit by a train. Which is not even your daughter who punches you, I'm sure. It's not how you'd like your children to find you dead. They likely found half of him with the pants down,'s what i mean he's he's in he's in bad shape um so that's what's going on there now jim willie later that night he after he dropped brooks off and everything he's taken out the garbage thrown the bumper jack away he drives to the home of edward lane jr ed lane jr uh junior here ed lane said that they arrived about 10 he arrived jim willie about 10 10 p.m okay he knew he looked at the clock 10 10 p.m but insisted that repeatedly apparently um, that it was 9 p.m.

That's what he kept saying. Jim Willie kept telling him it was 9 p.m. It's 9 p.m. He goes, it's 10, 10. I'm like, I ought to watch on it. He goes, it's 9 p.m. Maybe there's a clock right there. Look.

Little hand. Who are you going to trust, big timekeeping or your friend? What is that, big quarts? Big Swiss? No, I ain't going to trust that. You're going to trust big timex or your friend what is that big quartz big we could try big swiss no you ain't gonna trust that big time x i don't i don't trust big swatch i'll tell you right now you trust your buddy i know what the moon position is it's 9 p.m son bitch your clocks are bad so and uh edward lane jr also said that uh jey was nervous and, quote, not satisfied about the stated time. Like he was acting all jittery. And then like when he kept saying it's 10 o'clock, he wouldn't accept it as 10 o'clock.

It's 9 o'clock, he kept saying. See, that's what he's trying to do. But the more you say it, the more I remember this. The more I remember you saying that. Exactly. If you wouldn't have said anything and then later on you said, I got there at 9, he'd go, I thought it was 10, but who knows. But if you kept saying it's 9, you went, I looked at my watch 14 fucking times. It's 9, fucking 10, 10.

So about midnight, a trooper, a police officer, M.A. Smoot is his name. Wow. Trooper Smoot contacts Jim Willie around midnight and talks to him. He finds him and knocks on the door and talks to him and takes a statement from him because Paul Thompson's dead, and the wife said, well, last I saw him, he was with Jim Willie. So the cop went, well, I'll go talk to Jim Willie see if he knows anything about how he got a big head wound and

bisected by a train so while Trooper Smoot is talking to Jim Willie he notices what appears to be blood stains on Jim Willie's pants and boots now in this area that could be anything who knows, that could be anything.

Who knows what that could be? I mean, you never know. Your kids die every other day. Who knows? One of them got taken in a thresher, blown up in a mine. He also had a friend in his car with a nosebleed from his daughter. That's true, too. So he requested, the cop requested, hey, can you give me them shoes and pants so we can make you look nice and

innocent in this whole thing? So he notices that, asks him to hand over, and Jim Willie says, no, I'm not giving you my pants and boots. Hell no. These are mine. That's all I got. So you can be walking around in my underwear. So after talking to the trooper, Jim willie goes back inside changes his clothes and comes

back out but not like to give him his pants and shoes just comes back out and and has the intention of visiting he's gonna walk across the highway to visit his in-laws who live right across the road of course obviously at midnight he's gonna go visit his in-laws, shit-faced and on Valium, hiding pants from an interested police officer while your friend was killed on the train tracks. This is so West Virginia, this fucking whole thing. So he says, I ain't giving you nothing. Fuck you.

My pants are inside and you can't have them. You ain't got no warrant. I'm leaving. And he starts walking across the street to go to his in-laws house so trooper smoot waits until he walks takes two steps out into the road and goes and arrests him for public intoxication that's a public road there jim willie can't be drunk on that buddy now you're coming down to jail so that's what he does he takes him into the police barracks where he's processed and then uh he's there for seven hours before appearing before the magistrate which is a long time there's nobody else here if you get arrested they just take you

right in because it's not like it's you know this isn't fucking new york city where they have a a docket that's lined up and they have to have night court. That's a fucking shift of work for Christ's sake. Yeah, it is. So after he appears before the magistrate for his public drunkenness, he's taken to the hospital, the Welch Emergency Hospital. And the records show that Jim Willie had a raised bruise on the lower part of his chest and a ruptured left eardrum. Almost like he's been hit or something. Yeah.

In a fight of some kind. They also indicate that Jim Willie complained of soreness and explained it to the doctor. They said, well, what happened? How did all this happen? That he said he'd been hit and kicked by the police officers. He said, the cops beat the shit out of me. That's how this happened. So after treating him, the physician there referred him to another physician who is an ear guy, basically an ear specialist.

It's for the ear injury. And he said that it was this doctor, his opinion was that it was freshly ruptured. Just happened that day. Brand new. It's a brand new rupture. This isn't an old thing. They said that the rupture is consistent with being hit with an open fist, he said, which I don't know what an open fist is. That's a slap.

That's a slap. I don't know if you have your hands. An open fist makes no sense. That's getting your ears boxed. That's an open fist? What is that? Open fist is a slap, right? It's like a closed slap.

Otherwise, it's a bear paw. Yeah. If you ball them up, it's a bear paw. That's what I was doing. Yeah. You put your hands on the egg. It's got to be a slap. I guess. Why do they say it like that?

But if you hit him, pocketed him on the ear, that could tear the eardrum. They said that the injury was not consistent with, because the cops will later say, well, he had an ear infection. That's what must have done it. And the cops say that that, or the doctors say that this rupture did not come from an ear infection. It was definitely a contact wound. It was a pressure thing yeah there so um now jim willie's parents they'll say that they saw jim willie shortly after the release the police released him for the public drunkenness and that he was bleeding from the mouth had blight dried

blood on his nose and that when he combed his hair chunks came out came out. He got his ass kicked. He got his ass whooped. So they said what happened, and he said he was beaten by Trooper Smoot, Trooper Steve Copps. Steve Cox, I mean. That would be amazing if his name was Steve Copps. Trooper Smoot, Trooper Steve Cox, and a civilian friend of Trooper Smoot. Just some guy that was hanging out there like, you want to kick his ass too? His name is Doug West. Hey, Doug! Doug, you want to whoop this guy's ass?

Come on, it's fun. Come on in here. Smoot, what are you doing? Oh, can I get a lick? Let me pop him on the eardrum. Pow, there he goes. So literally, not only they beat him, he claims that they let their friend beat him up too, who's not even a cop. The town joins in. Just some other guy who hangs out holy shit west virginia what this is the 80s

not the 20s what's happening he claims that he asked to see a lawyer numerous times but that the police officers refused to allow him to call one and uh the cops deny using force at all and they say he never asked for a lawyer. That's their thing here. We never put our hands on him. Now, during his, quote, processing here, as they apparently beat him and questioned him, allegedly, he gave two statements to the cops. In one of those statements, he admitted to being an accomplice to Paul's murder. Oh, what the fuck, man?

Yeah, he admitted that. He claims later on, though, he only gave the statements only to make the cops stop beating him. That was you can beat a confession out of anybody. I suppose. Remember Reservoir Dogs? Yeah. When Chris Penn walks in, he's like, what the fuck are you doing?

He goes, you're going to get him to admit to lighting the Chicago fucking fires. It doesn't mean he fucking did it, though, does it? Yeah. You can torture a guy into saying anything. He's cutting ears off and shit. Yeah, make that stop. You'll say anything. That's what happens all the time.

It's not a good technique. So it's a good way to get him to lie to you. Here, get what you want to hear. So he says that. And then he also said after he was released, Trooper Smoot returned to his trailer and went inside. And he said at that point, Jim Willie gave his bloodstained trousers to Trooper Smoot, I guess, under some sort of threatening cloud. So the next day, early the next day, Jim Willie returns to the house with Trooper Smoot and retrieves the trousers and the fucking boots or shoes. And the blood found on the pants and boots was consistent with Paul Thompson's.

Consistent. Not DNA. Same blood type. And, yeah. So the next day, or this is the same day, the day after the murder, Brooks, the guy who was in the car with him when he took out the garbage, he called Trooper Smoot and told him about the bumper jack. He said, I saw him with a fucking jack saying he got rid of it, and then he got rid of it.

And then you hear about Paul Thompson had a big gash on his head hanging over the railroad track. So that could have been made by a jack. So that's what they're they're talking about. So they said they went. Brooks said, I know where the area of where he put it. If you want to go, I'll help you take a look for it. Watch out. The underbrush is soaked with piss. It's there's a there's much that's all piss right there. So they go to the location where the car was stopped and they find the bumper jack. go to the location where the car was stopped and they find the bumper jack they actually find it and trooper smoot said that there was blood and hair particles visible on the jack oh my god but

none were found by forensic experts so i don't know what that means i don't know if they handled it poorly and knocked it off or if he's full of shit who knows we don't know or if smoot wiped it off because that's gross, we just want the back. Ew, gross. I could use one of these. Mine just broke. So the doctor, the state's medical examiner, said that Thompson's cause of death was injuries he received from the impact of a train, obviously. They said one wound, a laceration over the right ear, appeared to have been inflicted prior to the train impact. So that's the one, the gash. He also

said the position of the body on the tracks was inconsistent with an epileptic seizure as well. You rarely lose your pants in an epileptic fit. Well, thinking maybe he's taking a piss, has a seizure as he said, but he said that's not what happened here. That's not the case.

He was whacked on the back of the head and fucking went over. Somebody probably pulled his pants down to make it look like he was taking a piss and got hit by a train. That's what it seems like. So they charge him with second-degree murder, J. Willey. Second. Jim Willey gets charged with second-degree murder here based on the guy seeing the bumper jack, the laceration over his ear,

and a little bit of blood that's consistent with the other guy. Not a DNA match. And a confession. They do have his confession. But he's going to definitely say they beat that out of him. Of course. But the trial is pretty, I mean, they make it sound like he's a monster, open and shut.

We got a confession. Here it is. This is what he he's a monster, open and shut. We got a confession. Here it is. This is what he told us. It's open and shut. They come back on March 18th, 1987 with a verdict of guilty of second-degree murder. So guilty of second-degree murder. He's sentenced to, you, sir, may fuck off five to 18 years in jail. It's pretty light for second degree murder right you just murder people and get maximum 18 years fuck five he could do two and a

half and go home that's crazy it's almost like the judge was like i'm not sure he did it so i'm gonna hedge my bet like you know what i'm saying i'm i'm a godfearing man. I don't want to go to hell for giving this man too much. I don't think this boy did this. Or maybe he did, but shit, he covered it up pretty well. So he's going to appeal it, obviously, on insufficient evidence. He says the state's evidence is wholly circumstantial. And, you know, they said to the statute says, or they're talking about the statute of the Supreme Court talking about it now. We've held that to support a support, a conviction in a circumstantial evidence case, the state's evidence must exclude every reasonable hypothesis of innocence.

It's if it's circumstantial, it's almost like you need you need a huge pile of circumstantial. It can't just be one thing, one person, one way. It has to be a giant pile of circumstances equals physical evidence, a fingerprint, a DNA match, something of that nature. So they said the weight of the circumstantial evidence is a question for jury determination and whether such evidence excludes to a moral certainty every reasonable hypothesis other than that of guilt is a question for the jury. That's a way to put it. They said, we find in applying these standards, the evidence in this case was sufficient. Under the state's theory, the motive for murder was theft of Thompson's Valium pills. So under the state's theory, though, is that he owed money for four pills and he just said, fuck it, I'll kill my friend so I can take the rest of the bottle,

which is a very short-sighted murder. But that's their – That's what – Yeah. That's what they put forward, that he wanted those Valiums so bad he's willing to kill his friend for it. That's literally their case. That's your motive and that little evidence and you're're gonna convict a man i guess that's why

you've got no time at all for it that's tough um they said evidence also connected the defendant to the time and place of the discovery of thompson's body stains of blood found on the defendant's boots and trousers were consistent with thompson's testimony by thompson's wife affirmatively placed the defendant in the vicinity of the railroad tracks at the time of the death. That's the other thing. She saw the car, so she went over there, and then he was laying there. So he probably did do it. I mean, don't get me wrong.

Why else are you throwing out your jack? Yeah. You know what I mean? Why else are you just stopping to piss and throw out garbage at all? Yeah, he did do it, I'm pretty 99% sure, allegedly. But he's – I don't see how you can convict on this evidence. This isn't a court's worth of evidence here. So he said testimony by the wife.

Also, furthermore, the weapon presumably used to strike Thompson was shown to be in the defendant's possession and disposed of by him under suspicious circumstances. So there's that. Now, he also says ineffective assistance of counsel. He says, first, the counsel failed to move for the suppression of certain statements made by him to the troopers, and second, failed to move for the suppression of his bloodstained pants because they didn't have a warrant. According to Smith, they beat the shit out of him for a few hours, got a confession. Then he basically took him, the trooper basically took him back to his house by the ear and made him give him his pants.

Warrant free. So that's his assertion here anyway. So Trooper Smoot took a statement from the defendant immediately prior to his arrest and two further statements within a few hours afterwards. statements within a few hours afterwards and none of these statements was mentioned made of thompson's bloody nose a fact used by the defendant at trial to explain the presence of blood on his boots and trousers so we don't know if his daughter really punched him in the nose or if that's just his explanation or if most of this evidence a lot of it's coming from the wife seeing him maybe the wife and fucking daughter killed him and who knows knows? Yeah. We don't know. It's probably him.

I'm going 95 percent. Jim Willie. The daughter saying she and the mom are saying that she did not punch him. Never punched him. That's what they're saying. He did. OK. That's how the blood got on.

That's a problem. That's a problem. In cross-examination, the state brought that up to him. Like, why didn't you say that at first? And he's like, oh, I don't know. So that's the thing. He didn't bring that up to him like why didn't you say that at first and he's like oh i don't know so that's the thing he didn't bring that up till trial he didn't figure he didn't figure out a way to account for the blood make him leak yeah how do i make him leak oh his daughter punched him that's how it happened yeah which was really a terrible story anyway so um and uh they also said

why he wouldn't sign any of his statements. And he said because none of his statements are signed. When you write a statement, you sign it. Show that it's you that fucking made the statement to police. None of them are signed. And he said none of them are signed because Trooper Smoot physically coerced them out of me. So I'm not signing them. I told him this.

He wrote it down and told me to sign it. And I wouldn't sign it. So there's that. So they say, quote, ordinarily, we would not inquire, this is the appeals court, into the tactical trial decisions by lawyers in criminal cases because lawyers face difficult choices during trials. We will not find ineffective assistance of counsel because 20-20 hindsight shows a lawyer's choice to have been the wrong one. This case, however, involves no such choice. And no is underlined, which I never see in these. They're like, it's serious.

Mr. Smith's trial lawyer did not move to suppress the bloodstained pants at trial. The state suggests that this was an appropriate tactical decision. Huh? Question mark. That's in the court document, Jimmy. That's the fucking, that's the court's judgment they wrote that. Huh? They wrote huh. Huh?

Question mark. And they wrote this in the 80s. This isn't like, huh? Like it's some sort of social media response. They really don't understand why they would do this why wouldn't he call this that's a bit the state suggests that this was an appropriate tactical decision huh the state claims that mr smith's trial lawyer wanted to have the blood-stained pants admitted i'm gonna say it huh why the fuck would the defendant want the only physical

evidence there is against him to be in the trial what what advantage would that be to him wow uh he said that they they wanted to have the bloodstained pants admitted so that he could use them as a part of an elaborate explanation of the evening's events one part of which was the victim being struck by his wife or daughter causing a nosebleed that dripped on a on his pants so that's what they're talking about But it'd be much easier just to not have the pants in there at all. Then you have no blood to explain. With a crazy story. Then your only thing is a guy saw me throw out something that I didn't want anymore. And the wife, who would be, I guess in this case, would be the other suspect, quote unquote,

saw me by the railroad tracks. That's the only evidence otherwise. No. So they said in determination, in the determination of a claim that is accused, that an accused was prejudiced by ineffective assistance of counsel, he says courts should measure it against all this. We find that a lawyer with the normal and customary degree of skill would have moved to suppress. And in this lawyer's failure to do so, it was not harmless.

Now claims he was beaten into a confession as well. Trooper Smoot testified that he did not think he needed to get a warrant for the pants because of Mr. Smith's, quote, voluntariness. Because of Mr. Smith's, quote, voluntariness, the court says, while Trooper Smith does know the proper buzzwords to use, we question how voluntary Mr. Smith's release of the pants could have been after seven hours of, quote, processing. Right. So they're saying, did they beat the shit out of him and go, now we're going to go down to your house and get them pants, boy? And he was like, OK. I'm very voluntary about it. It's super voluntary.

and get them pants, boy. And he was like, okay. I'm very voluntary about it. Super voluntary. The trial court also found that Mr. Smith's confession was voluntary, the original trial court, and that even if it was, this is what the trial court said,

even if it was coerced, its use at trial was harmless error. That's what the trial court originally said. Holy shit. Courts do not allow the use of coerced confessions in trials. We have not, this is like 19 fucking 10 mountain justice.

And this is in the 80s. We have not developed such a rule to protect those guilty of crimes, but to protect those innocent of crimes who may be wrongly suspected. If coerced strongly enough, even innocent people will confess to crimes. True. Beaten in a room. Much of the evidence offered in the circuit court was provided by interested parties. The wife, this other guy who's also possibly a room. Much of the evidence offered in the circuit court was provided by interested parties. The wife, this other guy who's also possibly a suspect. The police officers had

strong incentives not to admit to beating the defendant, and the defendant had an even stronger incentive to claim that police officers beat him. So, how do you believe either of them? The objective evidence, however, strongly supports Mr. Smith's claim. Mr. Smith was uninjured when taken into custody at midnight.

He was with another guy, remember? He wasn't injured. Totally uninjured when taken into custody. But the next morning when he was taken to the hospital, he had cuts, bruises, and a ruptured eardrum. Yeah. They beat the shit out of him. The state claims that whatever the police officers may have done to coerce Mr. Smith

into making statements does not matter because these statements were used only minimally at trial. To me, they're the whole everything. The confession. Although coerced statements may not be used by the prosecutor in his case in chief, this court allowed the use of involuntary statements to impeach a defendant's false or inconsistent testimony. statements to impeach a defendant's false or inconsistent testimony. So a confession that's found to be involuntary in the sense that it was not the product of free will of the defendant cannot be used by the state for purposes of trial. We find the statements made after he was taken into custody were not the product of his free will. And similarly, the consent exception to the Fourth Amendment about the search and seizure, he said he did not want to be processed further, therefore gave the pants over.

So they're saying you can't do that. This is reversed and remanded for a new trial. And then? 1992, the Supreme Court, he's trying to get it blocked so they can't retry him. The Supreme Court- He wants it overturned with prejudice, right? Yeah, and the Supreme Court unanimously, the Supreme Court of West Virginia,

unanimously, which is like four raccoons and a possum, I believe. The possum's the chief justice. And they slap trash can lids together. Yeah. Gah, gah, gah, gah, gah. They said that they unanimously refused to block the retrial. Smith said that they intend to use the testimony of two state policemen whom he alleged perjured themselves in his original conviction.

He contends his confession in the case was coerced and blah, blah, blah. So they said it's obvious that the case that the state trooper in this case gave false testimony under oath in the felony trial of State versus William Smith. The petition said the physical evidence is overwhelming that he was severely beaten, blah, blah, blah. They said they could try him again, but I don't think they ever did. Wow. Because if you can't use the confession, you don't have a case. It's over. Yeah, it's over. You can't even get an indictment with that.

There's nothing. And today, there's going to be DNA used to try again, and that may blow up in your face. That's the other thing. By the 90s, because that was 92 by the time the appeal came around. So from what I understand, he went home. He probably served his five years, and then he went home, and I don't think anything ever happened. I do think he killed him, though. So that's what happened in Hensley, West Virginia.

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