Small Town Murder - #376 - A Perverted Mind - Vinings, Georgia

Episode Date: April 7, 2023

This week, in Vinings, Georgia, screams are heard through a small apartment building, leading to several emergency calls being made, including one where the dispatcher can only hear faint moaning. Detectives arrive to find a terribly murdered woman, and a very helpful neighbor. During the investigation, a fire engulfs the building, destroying much of the evidence, except a "sex book" that they think holds the answers. But will a neighbor's curiosity/killer's stupidity lead to the whole thing being solved?Along the way, we find out that working in the neonatal unit of the hospital doesn't necessarily mean you care about other people, that fires are very noticeable to the people running from them, and the police don't give you all the evidence before they interrogate you!!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.

You're listening early and ad-free on Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. Hello, everybody, and welcome back to Small Town Murder Express. Yay and choo-choo! indeed jimmy yay indeed my name is james petrogallo i'm here with my co-host i'm jimmy wissman thank you folks so much for joining us today and another crazy edition of small town murder express yeah 10 pounds of dynamite in about a one pound bag here so it's crazy stuff this week is no different uh let's get right to it. We have some quick stuff at the top. Shut up and give me murder.com is where you get your tickets for live shows.

Whole year is on sale. Hey, they're going quick. They're selling out fast. So make sure you get in there. Next shows are may the fifth in Detroit, may the sixth in Pittsburgh. Get in there,

get your tickets. They are going fast and we cannot wait to get there. Detroit, big nice venue too. Come on. It sure is. It's beautiful. It's huge. So get your tickets. Let's do this. Absolutely. We are excited and we can't wait for that. So shut up and give me murder.com is where you get that. Also where you get your tickets to the virtual

live show April 20th the 420 virtual live show. It's also available for a week after that for to watch and to purchase and do whatever you want with but i am going to get jimmy so stoned with a number of different apparatus that i have it's going to be amazing and then i'm going to tell him a murder story and see if he can follow it so that's going to be a lot of fun it's going to be great going to be great so shut up and give me murder.com is where you get that. Patreon.com slash crime and sports.

Bonus stuff. It's all the bonus stuff. Anybody $5 or above, you got a couple hundred bonus episodes to binge on, back catalog. And then you're also going to get new ones every other week. One crime and sports, one small town murder. You get it all this week for crime and sports. We're going to talk about murder. So there you go.

The murder of Bruiser Brody, the wrestler. You get it all this week for Crime and Sports. We're going to talk about murder. So there you go. The murder of Bruiser Brody, the wrestler. We'll talk about that and try to find some sort of humor in that because that is pretty dark, man. He was so horrible. Corrupt and dark. Yeah, he was like a big, terrifying stuffed animal. He was a great guy. And then for small-town murder, we're going to talk about something very fun, haunted hotels all over the place, a which we've stayed at so oh boy we'll find out if uh now you tell me seen anything i didn't know beforehand yeah so we'll do that that's patreon.com

slash crime and sports is where you get all of that and more and keep an eye out we'll give you a date for the release pretty soon your stupid opinions our new podcast about people's reviews of everything you can imagine from the internet because the internet let's face it is just reviews so we will do all of that that said i think it's time to dive into this let's do this where are you right now what are you doing where are you uh are you down put it are you a mall easter bunny maybe let's say you're a mall easter bunny you have a little kid up on your lap, maybe a couple of them sitting all next to you. There's eggs everywhere.

They're taking a picture. I want you to rip the ears and head from yourself. Reveal yourself to be a human being. Grab the cutest of the kids. Pick them up looking dead in the face and say, Shut up and give me murder. Take that.

And then he'll hate Easter forever. Or at least Easter Bunny. He'll be terrified. I don't want to dye the eggs. It'll be much easier. No more pause kits for the rest of your life. You're set. So let's go on a trip,immy what do you say

we're going on down to georgia today going to georgia and yeah almost did a case that remember that american hollow documentary we're gonna do a bonus episode about it it's it's it's like the wonderful whites except it doesn't have near as much publicity and that one guy ends up being a murder yeah the murder isn't that he just stabs a guy in a bar so i mean it's interesting but the backstory is the interesting part so we're going to do a bonus episode on that this one where the guy visits the family that's yes out of their minds yes that's i can't wait that one where they the sister just fell out of a tree and they never took her to the doctor so she's quote special now

that's so sad it's so sad the whole thing is such a disaster it's it's crazy stuff so we're gonna go this is basically this is kind of a sort of a cheat but not really this is one of those where we're kind of in a major city but at the time this was considered its own town and it's still its own town. But now the part of this town that was its own town is actually part of the city. But at the time, it wasn't. So it's precarious. It's outside of Atlanta or almost in Atlanta. It's Vinings, Georgia. V-I-N-I-N-G-S.ining's, Georgia. And it's, I mean, it's just like northwest of Buckhead, basically, in the Atlanta area. We know because our venue that we've done there was there. We will be in Atlanta, by the way, this year. So get your tickets to that. So in all the newspapers and everything, they call them residents of Vining. But now this address where this happened is actually considered Atlanta now.

Oh. Atlanta now. Oh. Atlanta proper. But at the time it happened in 1985, it wasn't considered that. Damn, Anaheim. There you go. Yeah, a little deal there. So Vinings is a little census-designated place. It's kind of still in the city now, technically.

So we'll get to it. Population there is 12,793. So obviously way smaller than Atlanta. Median income is not that high, 58,550, which is slightly above the national average. But the median home price is outlandish. Outrageous. Because it's kind of outside the main area of Atlanta. It's $542,200 for a house there.

Holy shit. It's a lot. Now, a little bit of history. Early on, Vinings has had a bunch of names, obviously. It wasn't Vinings at first. First, it was Crossroads. And then it was Pace's after a guy named Hardy Pace. Hardy?

Hardy. And they were like, did we name the town after Hardy? We can't do that, right? Yeah. Let's change it to something else. What do you say here? So this guy operated Pace's Ferry across the Chattahoochee River in this area between Atlanta, Buckhead, and Smyrna. So that was his deal.

So they were like, man, his ferry's so good, we'll name the town after him. And then some railroads probably happened, and they were like, we don't need him, right? We don't need this. Mr. Vining. Yeah, this guy sucks. So they named it after William H. Vining as he worked on the railroad construction of Vining's Bridge. So they were very happy about that, apparently. Home Depot is headquartered here.

Is that right? Yeah, this is where Home Depot is headquartered. That's why that guy owns the Falcons, apparently. Uh-huh. Because it's from down there. He does? Yeah, the Home Depot guy owns the Falcons. I didn't know that. Yeah, yeah. Or maybe he might have sold it in the last couple years, but he owned them for a long time.

So let's do some reviews of this town. Let's find out what the people think. Here's five stars. Okay. I have lived in Vinings for most of my life, and it's just an amazing place. It is so beautiful with lakes five stars. Okay. I have lived in Vinings for most of my life and it's just an amazing place. It is so beautiful with lakes and woods. Okay. So it's kind of, yeah, outside the city here.

I had, uh, has, I has a very close community. I can think it has is what they're going for. It has a very close community slash suburban feel, but it has a lot of cute shops and amazing restaurants inside Vinings living in Vinings. You feel like you're living in the cutest small city ever. The amazing thing about Vinings is it is inside the Atlanta perimeter, and most of Atlanta's amazing attractions are less than 30 minutes away. Yeah, it's like its own little bubble in Atlanta. It's very weird.

All Atlanta's mosquitoes, no attraction. Oh, yeah. Well, it'll be there. Don't worry about that. Yeah, the Braves are that way All Atlanta's mosquitoes, no attraction. Oh, yeah. Well, it'll be there. Don't worry about that. Yeah. The Braves are that way, but the mosquitoes are right here. Right. Vinings has a special charm to it. Vinings should village is the cutest place ever. I don't know what that means. I love Vinings so much. I love being in the city without traffic and with actual actual woods and charm. Vinings is the perfect all-capital letters place. Oh, it is also so safe. We'll find out about that.

I don't believe you. We'll find out about that, sir. Four stars. Overall, Vinings is like the best of both worlds. One can experience the convenience of living just outside the city and having the peace of the suburbs at night there's a lot of places to shop dine and explore including access to the silver comet trail it's the perfect in between of the city and suburbs okay so this is kind of what we're dealing with here is three stars really has nothing to do with the town

um this i love that this is just a person's personal issue that they're putting out there i love this three stars i am a displaced graphic designer and non-traditional student college junior in parentheses finding a job has been very difficult in the five years i have been laid off that's it that's the whole review i can't get work in the very specific field that I've... I mean, this seems like the wrong place. Maybe a place where there's jobs you could post that, but not on the reviews of the town. I'll bet in Atlanta there's better work.

Probably tons of it right there. Yeah. Things to do here. Okay. The Big Shanty Festival. Festival. Festival. The Big Shanty Festival.

It's like a decibel, but a little bit different. It's joyous. Big Shanty, not the Little Shanty. That's a shit one, the Little Shanty. You want to go to the Big Shanty one, not the Shitty Shanty. This is in Kennesaw, so it's about 20 minutes away. It is host to this, which is the festival combines the best of the rich heritage of Kennesaw and the Civil War era. Oh, boy.

That terrifies me a little bit. Not a good era, guys. With today's fun-filled activities. See you dress up like Robert E. Lee and walk around and take Instagram pictures. Is that what you're saying here? Great entertainment. The Big Shanty Festival kicks off with a parade. Floats, high school bands, and marchers.

Holy Jesus, this sounds awful. and marchers holy jesus this sounds awful that sounds terrible okay this sounds better the dixie highway yard sale okay this the 90 mile dixie highway yard sale 90 miles of yard sale 90 miles of people's used shit here's all my shit everybody you can't even walk that you have to drive slowly and look out the window oh that looks like an old blender that's what i'm looking for so long uh let's see this yard sale is also a historic driving tour along the dixie highway in fact one of the frequently purchased items is a souvenir version of the dixie highway road sign well why not why not um the yard sale takes place

starting the first Friday of the first full weekend in June. Begins at 8 a.m. on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Plenty of good restaurants along the route because you're going to be tired and hungry from yard sale shopping.

90 fucking miles of it. Holy shit. Open 8 a.m. to dusk. It is ridiculous. Please note, this event takes place on the two-lane Dixie Highway, also known as Old 41, not the newer four-lane Highway 41.

Because as you're dodging 70-mile-an-hour traffic, it's a bad time to look at Grandma's tea set and see if you want to buy it for 20 bucks. It's not the same. People cruising at 11 miles an hour down the two-lane highway. That's helpful. That's better. That said, let's talk about a murder.

Let's do that. A non-yard sale murder because I think after about 40 miles a yard sale, I will kill someone. Pretty positive about that. 40 miles of yard sale where I'm trying to haggle somebody to save $1.20. I go, listen, I got 86 more miles ahead of me. You don't think someone else is going to have this? Come on. What are we talking about here?

86 miles of tchotchkes. I'm going to find this. Whatever you got, your hummels are not going to not be 46 miles down the road. You think this cuckoo clock's so specific? Got on mile marker 42's got the same one. Guess what? Your grandmothers knew each other. They're both dead. We got clocks. So let's

do this murder. We gotta go to 1985. Let's talk about us. Let's not do a murder, Jimmy. Let's be very Let's do a murder in 1985. Let's be specific about this. We were very small children. Let's do a murder. Imagine us as a four-year-old. Imagine us in 1985. Imagine us. I'm a four-year-old. Imagine us in 1985.

Picture us both, the small children versions of ourselves and me going, let's do a murder, Jimmy. And you go, yay. And then we go kill somebody as tiny as you. We may even pull it off. I had 10 fingers back then. That's true. You had 10 fingers. I think we could have got away with it.

We were cute as fuck, I think. I was just dirty. I had a big. I think we could have got away with it. We were cute as fuck, I think. I was just dirty. I had a big puffy bowl cut thing going on. Big 77 Pete Rose happening in the mid-80s there. I had a duck tail on my head. Oh, yeah, yeah. That's what my mom did to me. We would have got away with a lot.

Tall tube socks. We could have got away with everything, Jimmy. We could have did it. So March 14th, 1985, we're going to talk about here. 4 a.m. We're going to start this early in the morning or late at night, however you want to talk about it. The apartment complex is the Tahoe Vining Apartments is what it's called. Tahoe-Vining Apartments.

And it's under a different name now. You can look it up. There was a lawsuit where the Tahoe-Vining people sued the people who bought it, and there was a whole lawsuit over it. So I got to know a lot of the history of this apartment complex. Didn't help with the episode at all, but what are you going to do? Now you know there's a lawsuit. Now I know how apartment complexes fight when they buy each other. Now I know how apartment complexes fight when they buy each other.

So the people in the apartment complex, 4 a.m. heard screaming. Started hearing screaming, which is not what you want to hear at 4 a.m. Terrible alarm clock. That's why you hate living in apartment complexes, because people scream at 4 a.m. You don't want to hear that shit. So one of the guys is Martin Yabro, who's an accountant who lives in the apartment here. And he lives on the second floor. And he heard screaming above him on the third floor. Okay.

So he heard it about 4 a.m. And then he heard a thud on the floor, which in an apartment complex, someone could have dropped, you know, a can of soda. A hairbrush. It sounds like something. What the fuck's going on up there? Jesus Christ. Trying to sleep. you know a a can of soda and it sounds like hairbrush it sounds like something what the fuck's going on up there jesus christ trying to sleep uh it's just my goody comb don't worry about it it's a very light object an apartment above you and like in phoenix the shitty apartments i've had an apartment above you someone goes to take a piss at three in the morning and it's just

cinder blocks on their feet. It's crazy. You're like, God damn it. The floor sucks. Build shit out of better material. Yeah. So he hears, like I said, a scream and a thud, quote, as if something was falling on the floor. A loud thud.

So then he heard footsteps descending from the third floor to the lower level of the apartment building. So this guy kept listening. He heard, you know, thump, fucking, so he's listening for now car door shutting, you know, peeling out. These are the sounds you're expecting. But he doesn't hear that. He hears, you know, feet down, and then that's it. Gone. So whoever just took off is on foot, apparently, or their car is not parked right here.

Or they got a bicycle. Or they got a bicycle. Yeah, some quiet means of transportation. There you go. Some bigger guy to carry them on their back. Anything's possible, really, at this point. They didn't look out the window. We don't know.

Three children, maybe? Carry them at once? they didn't look out the window we don't know three children maybe could carry him at once i don't know you could put any combination of people and things that could happen here uh really but quietness is what we're saying and no door slamming so i went unicycle very silent unicycle absolutely you know how that's gonna definitely not a skateboard you'd hear that click clack on the seams of the concrete as he goes by. Yeah, he just went right in line with a mime parade. That's all it was. He didn't know. It was one walking by. Lockstep with the mime parade.

It was one walking by. He just got right in it and kept walking. That's what happened now. I think that's, is that it? I don't know what else happens. That's the story we're going with. Mime parade. Sons of bitches.

Lockstep. Came downstairs with his white face faint and here we go boom very quietly fucking walked away with his soft shoes i love that that's a good thought it said something so they were uh he didn't hear that some of the neighbors around also heard screams he's the one who heard the thud because it was above him. But other people heard these screams. A couple of neighbors called the police because they heard screams.

That's how loud it was. Scary screams. Scary. Yeah. And sustained. A couple of them. Because one scream, you go, is that a scream? Somebody scream?

And you listen and you go, I don't hear anything else. Okay. Must be fine. Yeah. Someone might have seen a mouse, for Christ's sake, and had an overre you go i don't hear anything else okay must be fine yeah someone might have seen a mouse for christ's sake and had an ovary we don't know you can't call the cops every time somebody screams but sustained screaming that might be a call for help at that point not just a surprise yeah i mean the first time i heard screams in my apartment that was that's exactly what you do you pause and then you go is that more scream oh my god those are not that's gross and then you know what it is and then it's never any good is it

fucking or murder is all those happy screams or it's the only thing yeah that's it so i mean sad screams or happy screams fucking or murder that's it do i call the cops or start getting horny? Which one? Which do I grab my phone or my pick? Yeah, what am I doing here? So they call the police. At 4.45 a.m., a 911 call comes in, a specific one. Other ones had gone in from this apartment complex. But at 4.45 a.m., at 911, the call comes in. At 911 a.m.

So this is the person who was doing the screaming calling. Oh. It's a woman. And she has, we'll get right into this here. She has dragged herself to the kitchen in a very difficult state. And we'll tell you why in a second here. To a kitchen telephone. She had to get to the, I don't know if 9-1-1 wasn't active here yet or what the deal was.

But the operator had to she called the operator who transfer who transferred her to the Cobb County Police Department. So she had to go through a, you know, a filter here. And the police dispatcher got the call and they were trying to get the address of the victim what's going on here what's going on uh so they ended up eventually the trace came into it so they know where it was but there's couldn't they couldn't figure out what she was saying um the cobb county dispatcher said they heard quote the moans and screams and they were trying to help her and uh the they patch her through and you can hear there's a tape and there's a long low moan on the tape that over the tape drowns out the voice of the operator on the police dispatcher it's a guttural

it's a moan like you know not trying to communicate it's it's almost involuntary yeah so the dispatcher's asking ma'am ma'am can you hear me and you just hear moaning and moaning and then the moaning stops and the dispatcher says i can't hear her anymore and you don't hear anything else at all um so obviously the police are dispatched to this location multiple people hear screams and then this comes in so it's pretty scary here um so they go up to the third floor which is above that guy's apartment and uh they find the victim here who was screaming and it's a 30 year old woman very young lives alone belinda wood is her name um she's in like a nightgown here um she's found near the bed on the floor which is interesting because the kid the phone was in the kitchen

yeah and it looks like the original place she was attacked was in the bedroom so and there's a blood trail so she dragged herself all the way to the kitchen, got the phone, made the call and then came on back with the phone to the bedroom. Oh, God. And died near her bed. She has there's a six inch knife is laying on the floor near her body as well. There's a lot of blood everywhere. She was stabbed in the back with a six inch blade. Good Lord.

With so much force that the blade pierced her lung and broke one of her ribs to break a rib with the blade you gotta really be that's a lot man because usually the blade will come off a bone you know what i mean yeah it'll deflect off it yeah so she was also stabbed in her lower left lung, which left a gaping four inch gash, four inch wide gash like somebody like prison shanked her, pulled up on it or something. This is horrible. But she somehow remained conscious enough. But with what her lung was so destroyed, she couldn't get any. All she could get out is moans.

Right. She couldn't really. No air. So it's fucking terrible. She's described by everybody as a quiet person who lives alone in apartment A on the third floor, keeps to herself. They find out she's from Opelika, Alabama. Okay. That's where she's from.

She has two children who live with their father, I guess, thankfully, from whatever happened here. We're happy they weren't there uh yeah she's got two children a 13 year old and a seven year old that's fucking sad so that means she had a kid when she was 17 which is tough um she worked at a montgomery ward store in columbus georgia and then she moved uh to place, to Vinings, about three years earlier. And so she'd lived here, just been quiet, lives in her apartment. Everybody remembers her as a very nice person, very caring. She's got a cousin here who gives a little anecdote about her quick. She said, last Christmas she asked me to make up a list of things I wanted to do but couldn't afford and places I wanted to go.

I told her she was crazy, but she said, maybe there's something on your list I could do for you. She rented a hotel suite and a limousine and took me to the Limelight Disco in Atlanta. Oh. So she's a nice person, essentially and eventually we find out. So it's very fucking sad. They're they're like well who wants to kill this person obviously does she have a boyfriend number one does she have an ex-boyfriend probably even more that's number one dispute with the ex-husband because she's got the ex-husband the ex-husband is always first he's in alabama with the two kids so he's he's not the one yeah he's out of it so

they're they find that out quickly so they're like well does she have a boyfriend like we said does she have an ex-boyfriend because this is uh this looks rageful right it doesn't look like something that happens to us from a stranger stranger stranger to stranger basis plus there's nothing stolen so if you're gonna break in and stab somebody like this there's no sexual assault, no sexual assault and nothing stolen. So that's the goal is to eliminate somebody. And that's been done. Yeah, that's only a why would you why would you want to just kill a stranger without taking anything?

Usually they want sexual things or physical things or both, but not nothing. So they police show up they find her lying in a pool of blood there's blood stains all over the apartment i mean fucking everywhere there's spatter there's blood from her bleeding out there's blood from her dragging herself there's bloody handprints on the wall smears it looks it's a fucking horror scene in there. It's terrible. So the homicide detectives get there about, you know, a little before 5 o'clock. They pull in. And so as they're talking as well, there's a guy downstairs on the first floor,

the resident who lives below that accountant. And he comes outside. It's a guy named Don Michael Catchings Jr. He is 26 years old. And he sees outside. It's a guy named Don Michael Catchings Jr. He is 26 years old. And he sees ambulances and police and thinks there's a medical issue. And he is a respiratory therapist at the neonatal intensive care unit at the Piedmont Hospital. One of those goddamn heroes. Those people, yeah.

Both of my kids were born at that place. And my daughter, it was very those people are wow that was uh those people are good people they're really nice so uh yeah steal those people oh jesus christ i couldn't i yeah i couldn't be in that place for more than a day i don't know how the hell they could do that so uh that's what he does though so he said hey i'm you know medically trained i can if there's anything you need helpful and they were like well we're well we're well past the point of any medical intervention being an issue here so thanks thanks anyway um he lives downstairs like we said don catcher or don catchings he's got a fiance or

a girlfriend named virginia meeker who's his girlfriend she's a nurse at the hospital and she was at work at the time so she works she working overnights tonight. And so, yeah, they both work at the hospital. Very Grey's Anatomy. Very. Yeah, these two are having a hot hospital affair. Think he looks like Patrick Dempsey? I doubt it. Yeah, I don't think so.

So he pops out. He says, yeah, I'm a respiratory therapist, blah, blah, blah. And he's watching. He is seen underneath the balcony of Belinda Woods' apartment as the cops were discussing toe prints and the track of – on the track of Belinda's sliding glass door. Apparently somebody was barefoot and stepped on the sliding glass door. Barefoot. Barefoot, and there's bloody toe prints there. So they're talking about that. Um,

also that when, when the cops are talking about the knife found near her bed and the blood stains in the apartment and a bloody handprint found on the front door. So the cops are kind of having a powwow of here's, here's the overview of all this evidence that's sitting right here. Okay. So they, and, uh, catchings is downstairs under the balcony kind of hanging out uh listening to all this so uh when they talked to him the cops uh sergeant jones said he smelled alcohol on his breath when he talked to him outside the building after about 4 30 a.m which that's fine i'd probably

need a nip if i gotta see children in pain that yeah yeah that's what i mean at the end of the day or i don't know he's off who cares it's in his own apartment drink whatever whatever the fuck you want so uh catchings though was asking jones the sergeant about the investigation and uh and all that and once he heard the information he went inside then they said he would peer out his window occasionally at the cops after he went back to the apartment, which, again, who isn't nosy about this? There's a homicide unit there. You're not nosy.

A murder just happened 500 feet from me. I want to know everything. There's like 12 feet of apartment above me, and then that's it. And then there's that murder that happened. So within five minutes of him talking to them and then going in and looking out the window and stuff, it's all happening very quickly. It's about an hour after the cops get there. It's about 6 a.m. When smoke starts coming, they start seeing smoke.

They're inside the apartment, the victim's apartment. They start seeing smoke come past the doors and windows from down. They're like, what the fuck? All of a sudden, they run out and they see the building is on fire. When the fire of people got there, there was flames shooting through the roof. I mean, it went fast. They got it under control in about a half hour. Two ladder trucks and 30

firefighters to put this fucking thing out which is wild uh some of the residents said they threw some of their shit out the window furniture whatever they could get they're tossing it out the window one of the people said a lot of people lost just about everything they owned oh my god yeah oh jesus they said the fire began on the first floor immediately below the victims huh huh where catchings lives weird right drunk fuck doing down there let's see start i don't know light this candle oh jesus christ let's do this so i'm gonna do it over an open flame like the pioneers i'm gonna cook this bacon on a stick. Yeah.

So later on, they said the fire was started in multiple locations. They said they found several hot spots later on. Oh, boy. In May of 1980, near Anaheim, California, Dorothy Jane Scott noticed her friend had an inflamed red wound on his arm and seemed unwell. She insisted on driving him to the local hospital to get treatment. While he waited for his prescription, Dorothy went to grab her car to pick him up at the exit, but would never be seen alive again. Leaving us to wonder,

decades later, what really happened to Dorothy Jane Scott? From Wondery, Generation Y is a podcast that covers notable true crime cases like this one and many more. Every week, hosts Aaron and Justin sit down to discuss a new case, covering every angle and theory, walking through the forensic evidence and interviewing those close to the case to try to discover what happened. And with over 450 episodes, there's a case for every true crime listener. Follow the Generation Y podcast on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to Generation Y ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus.

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+. Join Wondery in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Okay, now the flame spread so rapidly that the murder investigation had to be discontinued. Done. The building was on, the fucking crime scene was on fire. So they had to run out of the building and most of it burned up, including a bunch of key evidence was completely charred to shit in the building, including the fire of the fucking murder victim as well.

Also, she's still there. Yeah, she's still up there at the homicide. Detectives are processing the scene. So nothing's touched. Everything is exactly the way it was so they can process it. But before they can, it all catches on fire. Shit. Which is wild. A police officer said he saw Catchings, Don Catchings, running from his apartment at about 6 a.m. when the fire broke out. He said, quote, as he came out of his apartment, he was looking back over his left shoulder he was actually smoking smoke was coming off of him he he was not smoking a cigarette he was a cigarette yeah his shoulder is a cigarette that's crazy so they asked him they go hey guy who's got smoke coming off his

shirt do you know how this fire started what the fuck happened and the guy said quote he said he didn't know he said he was asleep when he woke up the apartment was on fire in three places the kitchen the living room and the bedroom i've got my place is so flammable that happens so often when i go to bed i really worry about like eight different hot spots that are going to burst up at any point he's got a spontaneously combustible apartment. Well, I keep my candle collection next to my kerosene backups to supply over there, number one in that corner. So that's possible. I could see that bursting into flames. And then I obviously keep my turpentine over here next to my supply of matches,

and I keep a few lit just to keep it going you know my fireworks i got a two bedroom because i i have so many yeah i keep that next to my eternal flame for my dead grandma you know what i mean so i can't help it there's a lot there's a lot of open flames in here and a lot of flammable things so you know shit's gonna happen sometimes sometimes it jumps when i sleep i don't know who knows you know most people when they're asleep sleep through that and that's why they die when things catch on fire he popped right up he's got a real sensitive schnoz well he also couldn't have been in very deep sleep because he was talking to the cops 15 fucking five minutes before that yeah so how much is how sleepy could he have been he was

just looking out the window and then passed out on his bed that's a done good for you sir i can't sleep like that that is impressive i wish i could so uh the police captain of cobb county here he interviews don catchings inside the police car while the firefighters are putting the fire out let's have a chit chat here um now the arson investigation established that the fire had been set intentionally and the point of origin of the fire was three different locations in don catching's apartment so that's kind of hard to get out of that one uh here's some of the residents what they said about the fire one person said we just ran out of the house with my purse and his wallet this is this is bunny mcmahon is her name bunny mcmahon 24 years old here uh her and her husband

were planning on moving new furniture next week into their new home they just purchased so they had a bunch of furniture they just bought that put into their new home when it closes and most of that furniture was destroyed no No renter's insurance. No, no. She said, we will have an empty house now, I think. It hasn't hit me that we lost everything. I'm just looking for my sneakers. I need to go to work.

Just I hope my sneakers aren't on fire. That'd be terrific. The last thing you think of is murder in a nice complex like this, she said. That poor accountant. a nice complex like this she said that poor accountant a nice complex that poor accountant who got woken up by the shit above him and then everything below him ruined his whole life it's like what the fuck i have nothing to do with any of this if the top floor is destroyed so's his i need a single dwelling. This is ridiculous. So the police say that they eventually remove a charred knife from the apartment. And that was obviously evidence.

The police sergeant said, when I arrived, I did not even have a chance to go in with the other officers before we saw smoke pouring out downstairs. That's what one of the cops said. They said we were on the scene when a fire broke out in an apartment just below where our officers were investigating the murder. He said that the officers helped evacuate the residents of the complex. There was no injuries, but the fire damaged all 10 units of the apartment complex. Oh, damn it. They said that evidence and the woman's body were partially burned before they can contain the blaze. And also, once they did, it was all covered in water and soot so not a lot of physical evidence is going to be left over here in terms of testable

everything's been contaminated they said our main concern was getting anyone uh who was alive out first and uh they said they have because people are saying well the guy that you said his the fire started in his apartment is he a suspect he's fire started in his apartment, is he a suspect? He's obviously an arson suspect, but is he a murder suspect, too? Did he kill that girl? And if he didn't, dude, that's attempted murder of people, right? Of a whole shitload of people, yeah. Like, this is the most people that'll ever be here. Set it.

Let's go. They said, we're not calling him a suspect. We're just trying to determine if there was any relationship between the fire and the murder. Like, do these two things go together or are they separate? So, which is a very good question. The fire ended up causing $570,000, 1985 money in damages, which is like $2.5 million now. So, they said the fire destroyed much of the evidence of the stabbing like we said and uh not great obviously for anybody if you're a homicide detective that's

the last thing you want they always they always say in the homicide book they'll say like uh they said when a guy homicide cop will answer the phone get the thing hang it up and there's one where the guy goes hey everybody what's the last case anybody here wants yeah and everyone at the same time goes arson nobody wants arson because you're just never going to solve it because it's how things get burned up it's horrible right and it's also disgusting too to sure look into nobody wants to see that so catching's here when they're talking to him they see that he's got scratches on his arms a friction burn on his back and abrasions on his toes okay so they uh he says that you know

i was just trying to get out of the fire of course i'm all dinged up look at me i always had smoke coming off of me they go you sure you didn't get those scratches in a struggle with a woman upstairs while you were killing her? Is that positive here? That's possible. And they said, maybe you hurt your toes when you were climbing into her window. And that's possible. Absolutely not. That's crazy, he says.

I don't know what you're talking about. No. They talked to his girlfriend, Virginia. She said she talked to him three times that night from work and nothing seemed out of place when she talked to him three times. He wasn't like, you know, ranting or raving or out of breath or, you know, what you up to? I just spreading some gasoline. Never came up. That's a lot of conversation.

They're talking. They're chit chatting. Well, they work together, though. So she could be like, can you believe what? Dude, this are total asshole. Listen to what Susan did now. Emiserating on the problems of the night. Totally.

Yeah, this guy said this, and yeah, you can do that. So they take him in for questioning, obviously. During questioning, he says something incredible. Again, I love it so much when people say shit this dumb while they're being. Imagine this. You're sitting in a homicide interrogation room with two detectives and they think you committed a murder possibly and an arson and attempted murders and everything else. And he says that he, quote, doesn't think he killed nobody. Okay. And his exact words.

Don't think he killed nobody okay and his exact words don't think i killed nobody but if you have prince of mine in her apartment that would help me remember you know i'm pretty forgetful like usually evidence of me being somewhere jog memory it'll help me memorize because i you stab people to death all the time who can remember an exact stabbing i remember about a month ago you know i was asked did i go to mcdonald's for lunch and i said no and turns out i did go to mcdonald's just forgot so same thing could happen yeah um don't think i killed anybody but but if you know if you can show me the evidence that you have ahead of time

all your murder evidence i can then craft my story to that would that be okay tip your hand a bit and i'll adjust it's like going to fucking go into a poker game and going you know um i don't think i won but if everybody will just turn their cards over and show me what you have, then I'll bet after that. Then I'll bet. I tend to do better when I do it that way. Annie up. How about we deal first? Let's deal.

Let's all show each other what we have. You know what? Let's put all the other cards. Let's turn them, too. Let's get them all out there. Yeah, there we go. Now let's bet. And then show me the card that's next.

But just me. Yeah. Just me. show me the card that's next but just me yeah just me so yeah they said that these all these injuries all over you it looks like you know what you would get kind of breaking into someone's apartment that's kind of a thing they also get a bunch of the neighbors saying that he was extremely agile they've seen him people have seen him on a previous occasion climb from one floor of the apartment building to an upper level floor on like the outside like a fucking monkey just yeah why would he do that

i don't know he just scaled the wall like spider-man i don't know how he does it why advantage of that is what's the advantage of of climbing the outside of an apartment building i've always wanted to feel like king kong maybe that's what it is that's interesting people shouldn't see you do that no no but multiple people have seen him do that so they're like you set fire to the place which looks bad i'm going to be real honest with you and there's some other evidence we'll talk about here but uh they go in meantime, he's suspended from his job at the hospital. Really? They're like, we can't have the murder suspect around sick babies probably, right?

These parents have enough to worry about. And even if they aren't talking about a murder suspect, an arsonist, we can't have that guy in a fucking, where these people can't escape. I can't have that guy in here. There's people just having the hardest time of their lives right now. Just the most stressful, difficult times. You can't have this guy hanging around with his book of matches dangling out of his pocket. So they're going to end up indicting him now. They charge him an indictment.

He's going to try to get it tossed out, though, which is funny. So the evidence here, they rule some shit inadmissible. Okay. Including a sex book, quote unquote, that they found on his bed that was open to a certain page where they'll say that this woman looked like Belinda Wood. That's what they're saying they're like it was open to a page of this woman of a woman who looked like belinda wood and then you know he goes upstairs and the way the the way his the way his cuts and abrasions look it looks like he went up there probably trying to rape her and she fought him off and he just started stabbing her instead he figured he had to kill

her if he yeah are we talking about the kamasutra quote unquote yeah well there's two sex books one is admissible one isn't one the one in his apartment not admissible they say because they had no search warrant meanwhile they were in there putting a fire out for christ's sake if you don't want cops and firemen to come into your apartment don't set it on fire number one i would say and i'm a huge guy with search and seizure shit like don't fucking be searching people shit unless you have a reason none of that get a warrant and all that shit but you set your place on fire you're asking for people to come in at that point the fuck close your sex book before you light your apartment on fire you fucking weirdo and right Also, a set of kitchen knives found in his apartment as well, one of which matches the knife that they think matches the knife that's burnt up next to the victim.

But they're never going to be able to admit that into court because they found it without a warrant. God damn it. That's how that goes. Like I said, that's silly. Now, the other thing, though, they find uh in his car they're gonna find some other shit here uh another thing they seize is underwear that he was wearing the night of the murder noticing that there's a drop of blood in the underwear that matches belinda woods blood type no dna blood type which is, you know, doesn't really narrow it down.

They even his attorney at the time pointed out that 46 percent of the population in Georgia had that blood type. Oh, that's not good. So, yeah, it's her and half of the population locally. That could be any of those people. They said all of the evidence they sent to the crime lab, they found one thing. This is his lawyer. A piece of old blood. That's all.

That man sitting over there is a respiratory therapist. He works in an emergency room. He works in surgery. And he has done that for weeks previous to this incident. How dare you? Look at him. It's a man. He will, period, be damned.

He will give you what you need. Give you everything. It's a hero. Now, the prosecutor, on the other hand, retorts with, quote, I've never in 20 years of prosecuting even heard of a case where officials were actually on the scene investigating a crime, much less a murder, where they were burned out by the alleged perpetrator.

Yeah. Have we ever heard of this before? No. Hmm. How can I get them to stop looking for finding all this evidence? I'll just set the place on fire. It's never happened before. They're not going to leave.

While they're here. While they're all here. Usually they don't do shit right in front of everybody. That's not a good strategy here. So that's fucking funny the car two days after the fire a patrolman at the scene of the fire was looking through the windshield of his car he left his car out there uh what catchings did this patrolman noticed ashes on the front floorboard at the time the car was located in an area of the apartment complex parking lot which

had been cordoned off as part of the crime scene. So he could have had access to that. They said that they the lieutenant said the ashes in the car of a lieutenant with the fire department said the ashes in the car could not have been physically transported from the burned apartment building. The police detective had the car door opened and he took pictures of the ashes. He wanted to take pictures because they said if you move the car, the ashes are fragile. They might collapse. Yeah, those are going away. When you tow it.

So they ended up impounding the car. They get a search warrant for the car. In the car, they find a ladies compact, which could belong to his girlfriend. I mean, that's, yeah. And papers taken from the front floor board of his car. Also, a bunch of ashes and burned paper as well. Also taken from the front floor board, the book, and they make a big deal out of this, Xavier's Super Sex.

Oh. Okay. uh xavier's super sex oh okay this sounds very like it's some sort of you know whatever like uh very filthy yeah yeah it's not yeah it's the this lady who wrote a do you ever hear of the happy hooker no it's this lady already yeah she's well she's a she's a party i'll tell you she's this lady xavier xaveria hollander and she was whatever she was doing she had some professional job where she didn't make a lot of money and so she decided to be a high-priced call girl and that's what she was and then wrote a book about it about you know all the exciting places she went all the money she made right called that the happy hooker it's called yeah. So then this book is

Xavier's, Xavier's, Xavier, yeah, Xavier's Super Sex, Her Personal Techniques for Total Lovemaking. Okay. So that's what he had on the, this is not at all,

not at all a, like, porn book. There are no, I bought the fucking book for this episode and it is like it's like a 1979 like how to fuck good book how to fuck sweet and tender at a fuck not necessarily sweet and tender because she no she wrote the happy hooker she knows dirty shit oh yeah she talks about you know stick a finger in your ass and all that shit she's's filthy, but it's not. But it's all. Here's an excerpt. Okay.

Of course, I'm going to give you a small excerpt here. This is I literally just scrolled on the bottom of the Kindle to a random page. And this is the random page. Quote. When did you have when did you last have a knee ride? The famous knee ride has long been a lesbian practice, but it's a turn on for any couple who can who can be who can between them provide one clitoris and one knee. The pressure of a woman's moist crotch pressing against and pressing and sliding on his thigh and knee can be thrilling to a man. One man I know said this practice makes up for his small penis.

Well, that's nice. You fuck my knee. I mean, why not? He said, I pretend my thigh is the biggest cock in the world, and my knee is the biggest head. Well, that's not great. Can't even get it in there. It's so big. No, it's so big.

Like, oh, my God. Look at this. This is how I give myself all the troubles of having an enormous dick. This is what Andre the Giant's woman felt like. Oh, man. He goes, I'm sorry. It's just too big. My woman goes wild mounting it, and she gets so hot that she's, Jesus Christ.

Okay. I get off on it, too, because she's so turned on that my fantasy seems almost real. It's not. Your dick is small. Sorry about your tiny dick. Congratulations on your fake sipping tip. Oh, my God. Jesus Christ.

Also, quickie ground rules. She has ground rules. This is like by women kind of for women. She's talking to women in this whole thing, so it's definitely not his jerk-off book. You know what I mean? How do you jerk off? You don't do jerk-off to that. Quickie ground rules.

Keep your shirt on. The whole idea behind the quickie is destroyed if you both get completely undressed. You can have nude sex anytime. In a quickie, the name of the game is urgency. Yeah. Yeah. So there's a whole thing about that. There's a whole thing about if she's

wearing a long robe, open it, but don't let her take it off. If she's in slacks, pull them down, but don't let her take them off. Yeah. So they'll be around her ankles and she'll fall down. She's trying to move a little and she falls over. A head injury is sexy. Yeah, that's very sexy. Contusions are hot. I like to, I'm like, yeah, I i like my i like my women bruised up nothing more sexy than a concussion and slurring yeah that's hot shit this is the kind of book this is on the front seat and they're introducing this as evidence of his like depravity his depravity and his just fucking insatiable sexual urges too that's the other i'm telling you they really is a sex thirst like you couldn't believe like you couldn't believe which is so you don't need

that that's to me is i don't like when they have to add that extra stank on it go he fucking set the place on fire while we were investigating the murder who else fucking did it that's plenty we don't need that he wants a step-by- by step or confirmation of how to please a woman. That doesn't matter in this. Yeah. You know what? We're giving him credit for this. Actually, maybe he was trying to do better.

So, you know, maybe he's just trying to fuck better. You never know. So now the defense here, his lawyers say that the seizure of these items was accomplished through the police officers opening the car door and photographing these items and that they had no direct connection with the arson in the apartment complex, thereby rendering the plain view doctrine

inapplicable. No, not applicable here. And in the exigent circumstance exception to the warrant requirement does not exist in this case because the automobile is being guarded within the crime scene area and it sat there for two days prior to its search so they said is that what he's saying he's saying that uh they it wasn't nobody could have put anything in there so that's bullshit basically um because no one could have put anything in there

it's being held you know all that stuff They could have got a warrant ahead of time before they even looked in the window. Because plain view is if they have some sort of, you know, whatever. So, yeah. Well, no, plain view, you can kind of just look around. And if it's because that's kind of visible through a window, it's visible publicly. It's not even in a private residence. It's in a car in a parking lot. it's not even in a private residence it's in a car in a parking lot so the court said we hold that the police officers viewing of the ashes in the car through the windshield does not constitute

a search that's why there's no legitimate exception of privacy shielding our expectation of privacy shielding that portion of the interior of an automobile which may be viewed from the outside of the vehicle by either inquisitive passerby or diligent police officers. So if he wanted to hide shit in his car, he could have put it in the trunk is what they're saying. Got it. There. So he asked for bond. He wants a bond.

He wants bail. He had a fucking mind? After he brutally murdered a young woman and fucking tried to kill 10 other people, burn them out of their apartments. That's wild. So. He tried to murder 10 other people out of the burn them out of their apartments that's wild so he tried to murder guys in suits the judge decides that um though it's very rare obviously to set a bond in a murder case but he said he had no evidence that catchings would flee or intimidate witnesses in this case so he sets the bond for five hundred thousand dollars in property or two hundred fifty thousand dollars cash okay are you kidding me um the district attorney said i can't remember bond being granted where the state announced that it would seek the death penalty he's like truly

yeah it's a death penalty case they're letting this guy out so um there's a cool thing here belinda's parents actually get to come and go to the trial because there's a program that pays for families of violent crime victims to be able to come for the court it's a really cool uh from alabama really cool thing no they had to come from uh indiana i believe or iowa somewhere in the midwest they came ohio ohio there we go they came from ohio and it's 11 an 11 day trial and you know hotels and travel and they didn't have the money to do this. They said, quote, or people said they were not from this area and they wouldn't they would have had to been alone sitting in a strange town with strange people. And they said that other people, they came to help them out. That's nice support group and all that kind of shit.

So he wants the indictment overturned. Of course he does. Wants it overturned. Do you know why he wants it overturned? No. Okay. Because the grand jury system in Cobb County does not have enough black people in it, which would make a lot of sense if he was black. The thing is, he's not. What does that mean?

That's the thing. What's he doing so i don't know if he just thinks he's like i get just get along with black people i don't know i feel like they would have seen through this whole thing and yeah he's not black at all so that's what's interesting so it's a very odd it's a it's an odd strategy i gotta be honest with you so they go they're like yeah this doesn't matter here with you. Yeah, this part, you're very white. This is inapplicable, like you were saying about the other things, sir.

Completely inapplicable. This is inapplicable. A lot of inapplicable things here. So the trial comes up. The defense attorney says that, quote, Don Michael Catchings did not kill Belinda Wood, nor did he set fire to his apartment. Oh. Oh, he's in there where it started in three different places, but he didn't start it. Like I said, eternal flame, fireworks, kerosene, sockpile, these things happen.

Somebody killed a woman, and then as soon as I fell asleep and dozed off, they came to my place and started a fire. Bastard. I'm looking for him as much as you are i'm pissed son of a bitch son of a bitch he said there's no evidence that don michael catchings knew this girl at all he doesn't have to know this girl it's not a thing he only knew that she was the girl that lived upstairs that's all he had to know no a girl lived upstairs uh they said that the prosecution does not have a case at all they said the one thing that mr chiron did not that's the prosecutor did not mention in his opening argument is the motive

for the killing why would don michael catchings go to belinda woods apartment and clamber around on the side of the building three floors up to get into it because he wanted to rape her probably that would be my guess just off the top of my head that's why men do shit like that if they're not stealing so don michael catchings testifies he's got to take the stand because otherwise he's got to have a convincing story here of how all of these things look that look really bad don't make him guilty um fun he said he did not stab her at all. Doesn't know her, just knew that she lived up there. Under cross-examination, he said yes. He was drinking and leafing through a sex book. Not the one we talked about, the one that's not admissible.

But they're getting some of it in. The jury's not going to be able to look through it, but they're getting the mention of it in through him. Leafing through a sex book containing pictures of acts of bondage and what he called violence to females. Oh my. So he's looking through like a fucking S&M book that had some violent images in it here. And they said, isn't it true that you were in there that night and your fiance had gone to work? You started drinking.

that night and your fiance had gone to work you started drinking isn't it true you started looking at this sex and violence book and formed in your mind an intent to commit the same violence portrayed in the book he says quote i don't remember seeing any violence in the book he he left out the whole part about the rest of it he just i don't remember seeing that not i didn't touch that girl i didn't touch that girl i didn't hurt that girl i didn't kill that girl didn't want to rape that girl don't want to rape her don't want to rape her sing a song if you have to i don't fucking care i missed that part in the book that's all he's gonna answer to yep that's it how many how i would have the flashiest fucking song and dance up there if i didn't rape anybody i would have a whole production i absolutely didn't want to yeah consent turns me on

turns me on then he just starts fucking bursts into baby i was born to rape by bruce springsteen and they're like jesus his attorney's like stop it now fuck i got carried away uh so he said that uh you didn't go up there intoxicated with rape on your mind jesus wow oh which is my least favorite ray charles song ever it really is that is like ammonia to your nose. That's rough. Rape on your mind. He said, I wasn't up in that apartment. I don't know what went on in that apartment. He said that he got scratches and abrasions on his arms and hands when he was running from the fire.

The medical examiner said that the injuries were probably suffered in a struggle with someone with moderately long fingernails, which Belinda Wood had. He became angry, Catchings did, several times during the cross-examination, pounding his fist on the witness stand here. And in a raised voice, he said, quote, there's a lot of fallacy going on here. It is wrong. I did not kill that girl. I didn't kill her. Don't use the word fallacy.

It's too fallacy. It's there's phallic things. I'm thinking about penises. Mine specifically. Friends of his testified to and the co-workers said that one person's described him as a very moral person. People said that he was the kind of guy that you want to have around during emergencies at the hospital he's steady he's can be depended on he's a nice guy um the the fiance said great guy good at work doesn't beat me everything's great at home sure no bondage

you know it's all fine yeah closing prosecutor said that it was his it was catching's perverted mind that led him to stab mrs or ms wood perverted mind his he said quote i hear i think it's pretty obvious what the motive is for arson he said uh who can doubt that the arson was to cover up a murder as for the motive for the murder he said i hardly think he crept into a woman's bedroom at 4.30 in the morning to borrow a cup of sugar, especially when he's got a pornographic book on his bed with a female in it resembling Belinda Wood. Mic drop, suck a dick. Defense attorney said,

they're just using innuendo and circumstantial bullshit to get this through. Here's a man who takes care of babies. That's what he said. Quote, Here's a man who takes care of babies. That's what he said. Quote, here's a man who takes care of babies. He takes care of babies. Is he going to go out for no apparent reason, scale up a building and stab somebody?

Maybe, yeah. He's got the book on his bed. He set the building on fire. If the building caught on fire somewhere else and they didn't think he said it, I would go, you know what? It's too iffy to tell. There's no other reason to set the building on fire. So they said, the defense attorney also said, if he was trying to hide something, don't you think he'd change his shorts, change his underwear? Maybe he's a scumbag.

What do we know? He said Catchings could have suffered the scratches in a fall as he fled the fire in his apartment. He also said the fire could have been started by any number of people who were at the scene of the crime that day in three different places in his apartment. The cop actually said,

quote, it was a Chinese fire drill out there that morning. That's what the lawyer said. You can't say that. It was crazy. They were just running around like crazy, stopping at red lights and circling each other, getting back in the car. It was crazy. He said that in court? He said that.

That was his closing. That was his mic drop. What an asshole. That was his mic drop. What an asshole. It's a six-man, six-woman jury, and they deliberated for five hours over two days, the end of one day and into another day, and they finally reach a verdict here. And they find him guilty of both arson and murder. Wow.

Oh, yeah. He cried as the verdict was read, of course. So are they going to go for the death penalty? What do you think? Because they said they might. You have to. There was cops in the building. That's crazy. And a lot of other people.

The state said they will seek the death penalty because of the slow death that Belinda suffered and because she was killed during the commission of a burglary, even though they didn't say they stole anything. He broke in. So prosecutors said that it's justified because he committed it for that. And also the slaying was wantonly vile. They said it's one thing if a person takes the life of another in combat. But to knowingly use a weapon on a person who is unsuspecting and then savagely stab her that's a consideration you have to look at that's what the da said and then i said also he could have left her to die slowly and not only did he leave her to die slowly in her apartment but then also decided to try to burn her to death

you know to burn the evidence as well his mom and dad come catching his mom and dad oh what do they say they said here's his mom i always said i I was a very fortunate person having him for a son. She said, I do not believe my son committed this act. And the father, Don Michael Catching Sr., he said, I would like for them to really consider that he's not a violent person. He's never shown a loss of temper other than the average. This isn't really a temper thing. This is a calculated disgusting thing. Horned up lust. Man, so deliberations go for that.

They deliberate for about two hours before being sent home for the night. They come back in, deliberate for another couple hours the next morning, and they come to a decision, the jury. and they come to a decision, the jury. They find that despite the killing was committed during a burglary, they decide that it was wantonly vile and showed depravity of mind, but they sentence him, you, sir, may fuck off, life in prison. They don't give him the death penalty. Yeah, life without.

Defense attorney said they were relieved. He said he still maintains his innocence and wants an appeal. Is that right? Yeah. Two of the jurors, two male jurors who told the prosecutor, quote, the ladies on the jury were just not going to give him the chair. So none of them wanted to do it. He's 25 years old, Catchings. He's a young guy. And I think they got one of those one of those yeah it's hard as a nurse and all that shit yeah i think maybe that was

possibly what it was um they uh belinda wood's mother said she was angry that the jury showed mercy toward him she said that is what upset me because he didn't show my daughter any mercy which makes sense i mean he did leave when she was still alive so i guess that's yeah i suppose i guess i mean is mercy killing her because she's so injured that i think do you know what i mean which is mercy mercy is whacking off in your own apartment and going to sleep and leaving her alone that's the most merciful thing you're going to sleep yeah because he would have lost all desire to go out and climb walls.

You're not going to come and then climb a wall. That's just not going to happen. No human man has ever done that. Once they're like, well, that's enough of that. I don't care about what's up there. Anything could be up there.

I'm falling asleep with whatever caught it laying on my belly. Yeah. Is there like some cold pizza up there maybe? If like some cold pizza up there maybe if that's what's up there i might be i might do it so uh he appeals this and his appeals are silly uh first of all one is the fact that there was an underrepresentation of black people and

young people in the jury system as well he really really needs young people and black people to judge him. He's very white, so we're going to go past that. Death penalty also. He says that Georgia's statutory death penalty provisions are unconstitutional in that they allow the death penalty to be imposed in an arbitrary and capricious manner and argues that the imposition of the death penalty by electrocution constitutes cruel and unusual punishment. The court's answer is one sentence. Since he didnosition of the death penalty by electrocution constitutes cruel and unusual punishment the court's answer is one sentence since he didn't receive the death penalty

he lacks any standing to launch these attacks it's just not has nothing to do with you inapplicable yeah you could say anything i also don't like the zoning laws well again has no nothing to do with you you're not building building anything. Don't worry about it. Yep. He also says that the indictment was wrong. It was done wrong. He argues that the indictment was vague and ambiguous and that it did not sufficiently apprise him of the charges against him. Meanwhile, it's said that he did unlawfully and with malice and afterthought caused and a forethought, sorry, caused the death of the victim by stabbing her with a knife. Count two alleged that the accused

did, by means of fire, knowingly damage the building. He said that wasn't clear to him what they wanted him for. So they were like, yeah, you can keep fucking off, mister. And then in 1988, some reporter here,

Jay Gersowitz, he's an independent reporter here. He wants all of these, all the shit to be released to him, photographs, evidence and all this, because he says that he wants to examine it because he's not sure that this guy did it. He's not sure that this guy did it. What? He's not positive. So he has to fight in court because he wants to show them to his own arson expert and see if he actually committed this murder because he doesn't believe he did. So either way, this guy's still in prison. Didn't work out. Didn't work out for him. Catchings is Christ, 25 and 85. That was three.

He's almost a 55-year-old man now sitting in jail uh with no sex books maybe i hope i hope somebody could send him uh well you can't in prison oh you can't have i don't have any idea i don't think you're allowed to have porn jesus it'd be better than the alternative probably i would say that motherfucker on fire is yeah that place could burn, man. So, I don't know. That is Vinings, Georgia, though. So safe. Weird, yes. It's a safe, nice little dreamy place. So, if you like that story, tell the world.

Get on whatever app you're on. Give us five stars. It does help a lot. Say something nice about the show. It helps drive us up the charts. Do a nice thing for us. It's a good thing to do. Also, follow us on social media.

We are at Small Town Murder on Instagram, at Murder Small on Twitter, at Small Town Pod on Facebook. Get all the updates. Also, head over to ShutUpAndGiveMeMurder.com to get your tickets for live shows. They're coming everywhere near you, all over the place. That sounds gross, but they're going to be there. Get them. A lot of shows are selling out. There's a show in November that's sold out already at the Wilbur.

It's amazing. Shows in July are sold out. August are selling out. There's a show in November that's sold out already at the Wilbur. It's amazing. Shows in July are sold out. August are sold out. Get your tickets right now. May 5th in Detroit. May 6th in Pittsburgh especially. They're coming up. April 20th, virtual live show available for seven days after that as well at shutupandgivememurder.com.

I'm getting Jimmy Stone. You're going to want to watch it. It's going to be hilarious. And it's just like a regular live show except you're in your living room and Jimmy'smy's baked so that's how that works shut up and give me murder.com go there also merch is there you also want to get uh uh head over to patreon.com slash crime and sports for everything that has to do with bonus stuff hundreds of episodes there for you to look at and binge on anybody five dollars a month above. Two new episodes every other week. This week, The Murder of Bruiser Brody

for Crime and Sports, which you get access to. For Small Town Murder, Haunted Hotels. Something very creepy and fun and a couple that we actually have stayed in. So we're going to do all of those. That's patreon.com slash crimeandsports. You're also going to get a shout out at the end of the regular shows,

Crime and Sports and Small Town Murder. And you definitely want to follow us on social media and you can do that at shut up and give me murder.com links are right there everything's right there anything you could want is that shut up and give me murder.com until next week everybody it's been our pleasure Hey, Prime members, you can listen to Small Town Murder early and ad-free on Amazon Music. Download the Amazon Music app today. Or you can listen early and ad-free on Amazon Music. Download the Amazon Music app today. Or you can listen early and ad-free with Wondery Plus and Apple Podcasts. Before you go, tell us about yourself by completing a short survey at wondery.com slash survey.

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. 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 to episodes early and ad free by joining wondery plus and the wondery app or on apple podcasts