Timesuck with Dan Cummins - 528 - The Atlanta Child Murders (2 of 2)

Episode Date: October 12, 2026

As the Atlanta Child Murders continue, investigators finally begin uncovering physical evidence that could lead them to the person responsible—and a mysterious splash beneath a bridge puts a young Atlanta man named directly in their sights. But will he ultimately prove to be the monster who had been hunting Atlanta’s children, or will his arrest leave some of the case’s biggest questions unanswered?Merch and more: www.badmagicproductions.com Timesuck Discord! https://discord.gg/tqzH89vWant to join the Cult of the Curious PrivateFacebook Group? Go directly to Facebook and search for "Cult of the Curious" to locate whatever happens to be our most current page :)For all merch-related questions/problems: [e-mail] (copy and paste)Please rate and subscribe on Apple Podcasts and elsewhere and follow the suck on social media!! @timesuckpodcast on IG and http://www.facebook.com/timesuckpodcastWanna become a Space Lizard? Click here: https://www.patreon.com/timesuckpodcast.Sign up through Patreon, and for $5 a month, you get access to the entire Secret Suck catalog (295 episodes) PLUS the entire catalog of Timesuck, AD FREE. You'll also get 20% off of all regular Timesuck merch PLUS access to exclusive Space Lizard merch.  Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Last week, we began our two-part look into the Atlanta child murders, so let's have this week's cold open be more of a recap. Beginning in the summer of 1979, black children began to disappear from various predominantly working class and or low-income neighborhoods around Atlanta. Some vanished while running errands, some while trying to earn a little money, and over time, their bodies began to turn up across the city. At first, authorities resisted the idea that these murders were connected, but as the number of victims continued to climb, grieving and increasingly furious families put more and more pressure on city officials to take the possibility of a serial killer seriously. And in July of 1980, a special task force was finally created to investigate the growing number of missing and murdered children. And in response, the killings continued. By early 1981, Atlanta was terrified. A strict curfew had been imposed on the city's

children. Everyone 16 and younger was required to be off of the street between 7 p.m. and 6 a.m. The FBI had become heavily involved. The White House had been contacted. The murders were receiving national attention and theories about who was responsible range from the KKK to multiple unrelated killers to someone living and operating within Atlanta's black community. Investigators still had no strong suspect. But they were finally beginning to find something they desperately needed, some physical evidence.

Similar microscopic fibers were turning up on the bodies in clothing of multiple victims, suggesting that at least some of these murders were connected to, to the same person. When we ended part one at the beginning of March, 1981, the killer or killers, were still out there. Still hunting some 20 months after the killings had begun. Fortunately, the Atlanta child murders were about to enter their final and most consequential phase. The rest of the story of the Atlanta child murders on the continuation of this true crime, most people are great, but a few of them are full-on-evil edition of TimeSuck. This is Michael McDonald, and you're listening to Time Suck.

You're listening to TimeSuck. Happy Monday and welcome or welcome back to the cult of the curious. I'm Dan Cummins, the suckmaster, Dick Harp Dreamer. And you are listening to TimeSuck. Hail Nimrod, Hail, this Sveena, praise B to Good Boy, Bojangos, and GloryB, to Triple M. No fucking around this week. Let's get right back into the timeline picking up where we left off last week, right after 15-year-old Joseph Jojo Bell that disappeared on March 2nd, 191,

the 22nd victim in the sequence of disappearances and murders associated with the Atlanta child murders. The young man whose mom had killed his dad and was in prison who frequently hung out at Cap and Pegg's seafood on Georgia Avenue asking owner Dick Harp, if there was any work for him. Shrap on those boots, soldier, we're marching down a time-sunk timeline. On March 6, 1981, a DeKalb County fireman crossing the Waldrop Road Bridge over the south of the South of, River spotted a dead body caught on a log. That body was identified as 13-year-old Curtis Walker, the painfully shy kid last seen looking for work at Byron's gun shop who had went missing just two weeks earlier. Curtis had died of asphyxiation, and all his clothing except his underwear had been removed before his body was dumped into the river. Experts believed Curtis was killed shortly after

he disappeared. He's found less than a mile from the Reverend Earl Polk's church. Paulke didn't have a personal connection with Curtis, but two weeks earlier, he had gone on the radio and TV and asked the killer or killers to get in touch with him. Curtis's body showed signs of a struggle according to DeKalb County Medical Examiner, Pussy Butt, I mean Joseph Burton. There were also minimal signs of asphyxia. Those minimal signs, which we saw before with another victim made Burton wonder of, quote, something else was going on other than just asphyxia with these kids. He speculated that the killer and he referred to one killer was using some sort of martial arts technique to maneuver and

dispatch his victims. Burton noted that in several other cases, he found injuries in the upper part of the spine that seemed to support this theory. Although Curtis had been thrown into the water, investigators still found microscopic fibers on his body and clothing. Investigators believed the killer had dumped Curtis in the water to wash away this evidence. Within hours of the discovery, the Reagan administration sent Atlanta almost a million dollars in grants for education and mental health programs associated with this tragedy. Got the Oval Office's attention now. Ronald Reagan also released $1.5 million in federal emergency funds to the city, and the FBI was instructed to assign more agents to Atlanta. You know, not the biggest Reagan fan, but I appreciate what he did here.

Vice President George H.W. Bush also flew into Atlanta, I like this, met with Mayor Jackson, law enforcement, and relatives of five victims asking what else they could do to assist investigation. This has to have been the top criminal investigation in the entire nation now. Additionally, committees in the House of Representatives and the Senate passed bills, requesting $1.8 million to assist the city and starting a variety of youth programs to keep more kids off of the streets where they could be preyed upon. A week or so later, on the evening of March 16th, 1921, educator Teresa Swindle received a terrifying phone call. Teresa taught a special education class at Dean Rush School in Atlanta, and one of her students was 13-year-old Timothy Lindale Hill, who had emotional problems and a, quote, violent streak.

Timothy typically called in every day after school to talk or called her, and then, the two shared a pretty special bond. Teresa had been out of town on the weekend of March 14th. She'd gotten the call when she'd returned on the evening of Monday, March 16th, came in around 10.30 p.m. She was convinced she was speaking to Timothy who was crying. He didn't say much on the call. Mostly did just cry.

The call lasted about 30 minutes, though, while she did almost all the talking. And then Timothy eventually hung up on her. Teresa then received several unrelated calls, or at least, you know, didn't hear what the people were saying, felt like she was maybe being harassed. A friend of Teresa's then went to a neighbor's house called the police. And while she was gone, Timothy called back.

He cried into the phone for another 15 minutes, then hung up and she never heard from him again. Timothy had been missing from his home for almost six days before Teresa received these calls. Back on Wednesday, March 11th, he'd been playing in his backyard with his two-year-old niece. He had spent the next day Thursday and part of Friday at a rundown house on Gray Street, an alleged spot for quote, frequent group homosexual activity according to sources. Timothy was then seen alive

a few days later for the last time on March 15th when several people saw him at a rally for all of the missing and murdered children of the Atlanta child murders on the grounds of Morehouse College. The Atlanta police concluded that he had run away from home

and delayed turning his case over to the task force. Timothy's older sister Brenda insisted, though, that he was definitely not a runaway. The police then traced the mysterious phone call made to his teacher to a broad wedge of northern DeKalb County. But again, does not lead to any solid suspects.

And all those previous suspects, you know, investigations to them had gone fucking nowhere. As the murders just kept continuing, various groups of citizens now decided to come together to defend their neighborhoods by, quote, any means necessary. And I can't fucking blame them, right? If enough citizens stop trusting that law enforcement

is going to keep them safe, it's human nature for vigilantism to take over. One of these community safety groups developed in the city's largest housing project, the infamous Techwood Homes. Random trivia. It was the first federally funded police housing project in the U.S. with construction completed in 1936, originally intended for whites only, built over a mostly black shanty town that had been called Tech Flats. The tech and Georgia Tech comes from all this, too. The founder of Chick-fil-A, Samuel, Truitt, Kathy, actually spent a few years there in the late 30s as a teenager.

It would eventually become known decades after desegregated in 1968, thanks largely to the crack epidemic in the 80s, as the most dangerous housing project in America with the crime rate 35 times higher than the rest of the city of Atlanta when the rest of the city of Atlanta had the highest crime rate, you know, some years of murder in the U.S. So this place was fucking murder city. Some called it the murder capital of the world for a while in the late 80s, early 90s, when gangs were running it and the police stayed the fuck out of it. Techwood homes was demolished in advance in the 1996 or advance of the 1996 Summer Olympics now located at that address is the Centennial Place Apartments. In early March, 1981, when it was bad, but not like that fucking bad,

not murder capital of the world bad, Techwood residents organized into citizens patrols, which the news later referred to as bat patrols because groups armed men carrying baseball bats and also firearms, patrolled the neighborhood to protect kids against the quote, crazed racist killer. And you know what?

Fucking good on them. Some of those men claimed they had seen graffiti warning residents that the next victim would be taken from Techwood. Residents of other housing projects were also starting to create their own community patrols and the Atlanta police were getting nervous. They wanted to shut the whole movement down. Commissioner Lee Brown declared there will be only

one police force in Atlanta. And I get you know, both sides arguments on this. On March 20th, police officers went into Techwood homes, arrested two community patrol leaders, charging them with displaying a deadly weapon at a public gathering. It was during that raid when a young resident of Techwood Holmes, a man now listed as a victim of the Atlanta child murders, even though he was not a child,

thanks to the police, later linking into previous victims, disappeared. Right? Unbelievable. Went in while the police were there, snatched another person like something out of a fucking horror movie. 21-year-old Eddie Lamar Duncan this time. He went by the nickname of Bubba. He lived with his mom on Honeycutt Street. He had an intellectual disability,

a speech impediment, twisting muscular development in his hands. A neighbor described him as having the mind of a child. Right, this fucking poor guy. Eddie did not often leave Techwood homes unless he was visiting his grandma over in Cascade Heights. He'd had one brush with the law back in 1978 because of his quote, impressionable nature and the promise of easy money according to some neighbors. Eddie was stopped by police as he was walking along Techwood Drive, carrying two boxes stole the merchandise from a nearby hardware store. And he told officers that a man gave him the boxes to hold, promised him 50 bucks for doing so. And he probably wasn't fucking

line. Probably didn't even know the goods were stolen. Two reports indicated that Eddie was last seen between 1130 p.m. and midnight the night of March 20th, 1981, but the reports differed on where he was last seen. Atlanta police noted he was last seen near a game room at the corner of Techwood Drive and Mills Street. One woman claimed she saw him at Techwood and North Avenue shortly after midnight getting into a car with a man she didn't get a good look at. Earlier that day, Eddie runs some errands, told neighbors he was going to South Carolina to help somebody move, took some pants to a cleaners about 6 p.m. Back at Techwood around 7 p.m.

seen again in the complex three hours later. Eddie did not go home for lunch or dinner that day and never returned to the cleaners to grab those pants. Several residents of the Techwood community think the killer was reacting to the challenge of the citizens patrol and wanted to abduct someone right out right out from under their noses. I've been grabbing and killings for so long now. I guess he was just getting bored. Wanted a fucking challenge.

Ten days later. Another one. A 20-year-old Larry Eugene Rogers, the second adult victim, attributed to the same killer behind the Atlanta child murders. He disappeared from near his northwest Atlanta neighborhood to the afternoon of March 30th, 1981. Larry had lived on Ezra Church Drive with his foster father, 79-year-old George Hood, since he'd been 15 months old.

Man, good on George Hood. Larry also had an intellectual disability, described as short and slender, which is why he was still called Little Larry. as an adult. Neighbor Thomas Reed told investigators he saw Larry getting into a faded green Chevy station wagon with a light-skinned older black man on March 30th. The man had long stringy hair, wore glasses, had heavy brows, a thick mustache.

Larry seemed, I don't know why I said mustache that way. Who pronounces that way? Do you have a mustache? No, but I have a mustache. Larry seemed stiff. The car passed three times long Ezra Church Drive, and Larry never waved his neighbor, which was unusual for him. And in that same week, third young black man is reported missing.

Good God, right? This dude is not slowing down. But he stayed with his new trend of older victims, possibly to throw off the task force. 23-year-old Michael Cameron McIntosh now disappeared from work, March 25, 1981. Michael had grown up in the Windsor Street neighborhood of Southwest Atlanta. Three years early, 1978, he'd inherited the house he'd grown up in when his adoptive mother died. She'd passed just before he was paroled from the Clark County Correctional Institute. He'd served 16 months for burglary and armed robbery, and that was his third time in prison.

He struggled with drinking. He sometimes worked as a day laborer. Other times he would stop at the local quick stop, ask about work. The owner, Connie Taylor, told him that if he could stop drinking, she would give him a regular job at the little corner store. Connie described Michael as a quiet loner, adding he was depressed because he couldn't get a job. In 1980 and 81, Michael had briefly worked. worked a welding job with the Milton Avenue Foundry after finishing a course in welding, but then abruptly stopped showing up and dropped off the radar, which was not uncommon for him.

Sources say he also had some kind of intellectual disability. Although he had left just after a few weeks, the Foundry boss agreed to rehire Michael in March of 1981, so clearly saw some potential in him. Michael went to work on March 24th. Kept to himself that morning, ate lunch alone at 3.30 p.m. the next day, punched his time card, and left, earned $34. $0.35 cents, but did not return to get his check. Since Michael did not live with family or anybody else,

no one noticed if he returned home on March 25th or not. Police guessed that Michael was last seen near his home sometime between March 25th and April 1st. They noted that he occasionally boxed in a parking lot with someone we've met. 15-year-old Joseph Jojo Bell, right? One of the previous victims, the kid whose mom killed his dad,

who disappeared back on March 2nd, the kid who was living with his grandma on Southwest Lotton Street. And yet again, one victim is connected to at least another. Michael, the oldest victim so far, investigators learned that although Eddie Duncan, Larry Rogers, and Michael McIntosh were notably older than the other victims, they all had some level of intellectual disability and were all quite small and slender.

Around the time Michael went missing, there was, at long last, a new development in the case. After Vice President George Bush's trip to Atlanta, all physical evidence from each new crime scene would be routinely sent to the FBI's crime last. in D.C. And according to author Bernard Headley, based on their lab results, FBI agents in Atlanta concluded that the Atlanta murders were the work of a lone killer, who's probably acting

with an accomplice. The agents would go on to request in early April of 1981 that the Bureau's behavioral science unit traveled to Atlanta to update an earlier draft of a psychological profile of the person responsible for the Atlanta killings, a killer who sought out children or childlike victims. The killer, a male serial killer, was mobile. and knew the Atlanta metropolitan area very well. By the mid-spring of 1981,

the Atlanta police had, quote, made a complete about face, and following the FBI's analysis, we're now pushing the theory that there was one killer, you know, pushing this publicly. They'd privately gone back and forth on that. The Fulton County DA publicly speculated

that at least seven of the 20 murders could be tied to one killer, while the FBI believed almost all of the murders were committed by one killer. And that number is a little bit low because some of the missing people, if not, their bodies haven't turned up yet. The FBI also ruled out the possibility that the killer was somebody who was, quote, mentally deranged.

Agents had checked out local psychiatric institutions, obtained lists of people who were released into the Atlanta area since 1978. Investigators were worried that the killer was stalking and abducting children in broad daylight. Victims showed few signs of resistance indicating they might have been caught by surprise, or, you know, taken in by somebody they trusted. Also seemed that the killer knew the city very, very well, as the FBI stated, and was toying with, with the authorities. For example, when DeKalb County Public Safety Commissioner Dick fucks his hand, boasted that his men would have already solved the crimes. Two victims were then found in his county. Almost like, yeah, buddy, really? Really? You would, uh, saw these crimes? Take a shot at this, motherfucker. The FBI and GBI lab experts focused on analysis of the physical

evidence, including bloodstains and yarns and fibers found on the victims. Lab techs identified yellowish green nylon fibers and violet acetate fibers on the bodies and clothing of at least six victims. The fibers were all very similar in appearance and microscopic properties. On March 30th, 1981, a canoeist on the Chattahoochee River, a mile south of the Camelton Road Bridge, found another body. A body of a young black boy snagged on a tree limb. The next day, autopsy identified the body as 13-year-old Timothy Hill. who've been missing for two weeks. His body partially decomposed but preserved by the cold river water.

Timothy's cause of death, or Timothy's listed as probable suffocation. He was found in nothing but his underwear. And on his underwear, investigators, yet again, they find those fibers similar to other Atlanta child murder victims. Timothy's family was naturally fucking devastated, of course, by the news, especially as Sister Brenda, right? The woman who had insisted to authorities that he was not a runaway. The police had not listened to her. and the public reaction to the Atlanta police's mistake led them to implement the rule

that if a missing person was not found within 72 hours going forward, their case would automatically be reviewed for inclusion by the task force. Very next day, March 31st. A canoeist on the Chattahoochee River found another fucking body floating near the Georgia Highway 92 bridge,

exactly two miles from where Timothy Hill's body been found. The body also caught in a tree limb on the Douglas County side of the river, victim again wearing only his underwear. This victim identified as 21-year-old Eddie Lamar Duncan missing since March 20th. Eddie's cause of death could not be determined. Drowning could not be ruled out since the autopsy found. He was probably still alive when he hit the water.

There was, quote, no obvious traumatic injuries to his body. Eddie's cause of death, officially listed his unknown, but investigators believed he was asphyxiated and then put into the river just before death. Although he was in the water again, several fibers found on his body. Same fucking fibers. After police chief, George Napper announced the news, he told a crowd of reporters,

there are some similarities between the situation of Eddie Duncan and Timothy Hill. We are assuming there is some relationship in spite of the fact that he is 21 years old and falls somewhere out of the prototype of the other youngsters.

He was again, though, very small, very slender man, less than two weeks later. April 9th, 19th, these are so frequent. An Atlanta police officer checking out an abandoned car on Temple Street,

smelled a strong odor coming from an apartment in a nearby block of abandoned buildings. The officer entered the apartment, found the dead body of 20-year-old Larry Rogers, who'd been missing for over a week. Found about two miles from home. At first, investigators thought Larry had been killed in that abandoned apartment, but they later concluded he'd been killed somewhere else, brought to the crime scene after the fact, had bruises on his throat indicating he had been choked. State crime lab investigators recovered dog hairs from his body, as well as those recurring yellow, violet, and green fibers. investigators focused on questioning anyone who resembled the man Larry allegedly had gotten into a car with the day he disappeared. Then just three days after that.

The Atlanta police find the body of 28-year-old John Harold Porter in a vacant lot at 796 Northwest Bender Street. About four blocks for Anthony Carter's body had been found back in July of 1980, that nine-year-old victim. Porter had been killed by multiple stab wounds to the chest and stomach, just like Anthony. However, Atlanta authorities initially believed Porter's death lacks sufficient, quote, pattern elements to justify adding this case to the task force list, even though more fibers again found similar to the other listed victims. Investigators reason that Porter was older, not small and weak like the child victims, though, his name not added to the official list, but crime lab techs did keep specimens of his blood on file. And then a week after that, it's just fucking constant. April 19th, 19th, 9801,

a couple riding bikes off a Klondike road in Rockdale County spot a decomposing body lying in a dry area where the South River had receded along the boundary between DeKal and Rockdale counties.

Body identified as 15-year-old Joseph Bell who'd been missing for over a month. Joseph's body had injuries indicating it had snagged on the rocks as he floated downstream or downriver.

Like other victims found in the rivers, Joseph found with only his underwear on. And once again, fibers on his body. fibers, again, similar to at least 11 other victims. His cause of death, listed as asphyxia, and he had an injury to his upper spine

consistent with other victims. It's got to feel to many like this nightmare is never going to end. That a fucking uncatchable wraith that you snatch it and killing black kids and black young men all around Atlanta just with impunity. And then the very next day,

a Fulton County farmer finds another body. A new decomposing body in the Chattahoochee River below Camelton Road Bridge. Victim identified as 23-year-old Michael McIntosh missing for nearly three weeks. Authorities decided to add Michael to the task force list because, according to Fulton County Police Chief, Clinton Chafin, when you look at where McIntosh's body was found, the cause of death, the area of town where he came from, these factors lead you to believe there's got to be some kind of connection.

Task force had now grown to a full 25 murders. Investigators noted that four of the five latest victims have been found. in rivers were almost nude when they were found. A killer was disposing of victims in a manner that destroyed a lot of physical evidence, such as these fibers, which the media had now been reporting on. The killer was also disposing of bodies in the same river, but on different sides, different points downstream, different jurisdictions. Investigators believed he was starting to target older victims because of those citywide

curfews, right? They were keeping most younger boys off of the street. In the ongoing effort to catch the unknown suspect, the FBI now decided on a proactive investigative course and proposed a 30-day bridge surveillance program. And that bridge surveillance program would begin April 24th, 1981. Whole bunch of different teams of Atlanta officers and FBI agents staked out 14 different bridges nightly from dusk till dawn, a lot of fucking manpower being devoted to catching this one slippery motherfucker.

These bridges connected sparsely, traveled roads passing over the Chattahoochee and South Rivers, rewinding the timeline two days, the morning of April 22nd, 1981. 21-year-old Jimmy Ray Payne and walked his girlfriend to the Vine City Marta Rail Station then returned to his home in the Vine City Terrace Apartments

on Magnolia Street as was his routine Jimmy lived with his sister and stepfather Jimmy left home again at about 10.30 a.m. Told his sister he was going to tell to the Omni to sell coins. The Omni was a big indoor coliseum

home to the NBA's Atlanta Hawks at that time, opened in 1972 it would be demolished in 1997. State Farm Arena building this place current home of the Hawks. Jimmy failed to meet his girlfriend at the Marta station that night and his sister reported him missing the next day.

She worried something bad had happened and noted that Jimmy was quite small. He stood only about five feet tall, weighed less than 140 pounds, looked young too, could easily be mistaken for a teenager. Atlanta police waited five full days before assigning Jimmy's case to the task force. His case was not turned over to the special task force within that designated time because an eyewitness had claimed that he had seen Jimmy the previous weekend. Reports were circulating that Jimmy wanted to change his identity. people thought he might have just, you know, gone, you know, hiding on purpose

because his friends did tell investigators that a few days before he'd gone missing, he had tried to get a new ID and another name. The real reason he was having a hard time finding work because of time spent in prison for burglary and shoplifting and thought it would be easier if he had a different name to get a job. Friends, family investigators figured Jimmy, though again, you know, some of them had left to start a new life. On April 27th, five days after Jimmy goes missing, police arrested a man for slapping a woman outside of cap and peg seafood. That restaurant where a victim Joseph Bell often hung out, right, where fucking Dick Harp ran the show.

Investigators found a wallet on him with Jimmy's prison ID inside. That man could not properly explain how he found the card. Within hours of that incident, a couple fishing on the Chattahoochee then saw a body float and face down in the water. The body soon became entangled in river branches near the Fulton Cobb County line. Yet again, only wearing underwear. And that victim, of course, identified as Jimmy Payne. he had been in the water for about five days. The medical examiner ruled that Jimmy's death was a case of, again, probable asphyxiation,

but drowning could not be ruled out. His cause of death officially listed is undetermined for the time being. Investigators still decided to treat Jimmy's death as a homicide, though, because they recovered, you know, the same carpet fibers from his body. And because of that, his name added to the Special Task Force list. One thing that made Jimmy different from other adult victims was he did not have an intellectual disability. his friends noted he was actually highly intelligent. Investigators figured his small size is what made him a target.

Murders continued into May of 1981. Again, it just probably felt like they were never, ever going to fucking stop. 17-year-old William Barrett disappeared next on May 11th. William had been released from the Millageville Youth Development Center, state juvenile correctional facility the day before. He had had multiple brushes with the law over his short life. After his most recent release, he'd gone to live with his mom on second after, Avenue and Decatur was supposed to start attending counting sessions at a treatment center on Columbia Drive near Glenwood Ave.

I was also supposed to get a job. On the day he disappeared, Billy's mother had asked him to go across town to the McDaniel Glenn housing project to pay some money she owed to a man. Billy had taken the MARTA bus or AMARTA bus later returned to the general vicinity of his home, had a counting session late that afternoon. However, his counselor was sick, so no one noticed that Billy never showed up to his appointment. A neighbor recalled seeing Billy a few blocks from home, late at 6 p.m. shortly after midnight, on May 12th, federal law enforcement found Billy's body in a wooded area near I-20 in Glenwood Road along dead-end Winthrop Drive in DeKalb County. FBI agents noted that his body, quote, was in no way hidden, indicating the killer wanted his body to be found quickly. Billy had been strangled with a soft cord or cloth. It wasn't probable asphyxiation this time.

It was fucking definite. Also stabbed in the stomach after death is killing more violent, wounds made by a small knife with upward motions towards the chest. Agents recovered more of the now familiar green and purple fibers from his body as well as some white animal hairs. Those hairs have been found on several bodies. Like with all the other victims, zero indication of sexual assault, right? Very unusual with serial killers. Jonathan Jackson disappeared next May 21st, 1981. Very, very unlike any of the victims due to his age and size, the killer changing things up again, probably to throw off law enforcement.

He was 86 years old, so a lot, lot older than the other victims. He was six foot seven, the tallest victim, and the heaviest, 295 pounds. He was very smart, very muscular. He'd actually recently won an open invitation, all ages, all weight classes, judo tournament. Also an amateur powerlifter had set a world record in the over 80 age super heavyweight category for a push press of 380 pounds. His nickname was the silver killer because of his gray hair, his age, and also aggressive demeanor, overall powerful presence. A guy, you know, wasn't somebody you think a killer would fuck with. He'd killed over 30 men in World War II and not in battle, but in arm wrestling matches.

Broken their arms, clean off, and they bled out. Killed out of 40 men in battle that time. But with a fake gun, he'd made out of bamboo and mud. Didn't feel fair to him. He shoots the enemy with the real one because he was just too fucking good. And obviously, I'm being ridiculous. I needed to shake this shit up. Never ending fucking parade of dead body, starting to numb my soul.

Yeah, sadly, this shit is not over. 27 year old Nathaniel Cater Disappeared May 21st, 1981 I fucking wish I wish there was a guy named the Silver Killer and I wish he would have fucked this real killer up That'd be fucking amazing To have an 87 year old

fucking powerhouse vigilante 86 year old, I can't remember his fake age 27 year old Nathaniel Cater Back to sadness Disappeared May 21, 191, Cater Really unlike any other previous victims Because of his age and his size

He stood at 5 foot 10 He had recently moved out of his dad's apartment in the Dixie Hills Housing Project in May of 81. Dixie Hills, Nathaniel and his family lived right above Latanya Wilson. That young girl, just seven years old, who had gone missing in June of 1980.

In fact, the first place Latania's mother had searched for her was at the Cater apartment. It's another odd connection from one victim to another here. The time of his disappearance, Nathania was living at the Falcon Hotel on Northwest Lucky Street near the Greyhound Bus Station.

Although Nathania was a highly intelligent student who had even skipped a grade in school due to his intelligence. His adult life had not been as successful. He worked different odd jobs to barely scrape by on days when he didn't work, which was more often than not, Nathaniel hung out around the Silver Dollar Saloon or the Cameo Lounge, two establishments in downtown Atlanta. According to author Bernard Headley, at either place, he would hustle suckers, male and female, many of them white, well-dressed out-of-towners, seeking some cheap sexual

thrills. Nathaniel lived with the roommate at the Falcon Hotel. Manager described him as a slick hustler, but said he usually paid his rent on time and never tried to steal anything or caused trouble. Nathaniel's struggle with alcoholism was arrested several times. Manager of the Falcon recalled, after he was drinking for an hour, there was no way he could protect himself. The hotel manager and Nathaniel's roommate were some of the last people to see him on the afternoon of May 21st. He left the hotel and the manager expected him to return the next day to renew his rent, but he never did. Police believe he went missing near the bus station after going to the bar at uh going to the cameo lounge bar on nathaniel's disappearance uh coincided

with the dramatic end of the atlanta child murders investigation that's right the end they finally gave up uh they held a press conference where the mayor said uh i'm done tried our best uh he's fucking good he's too good and there's just no way to i'm gonna get him i'm not gonna get him and it's depressing so i want to move on uh no it really was the end though uh as we know the FBI had been doing a stakeout of area bridges in hopes of catching their elusive suspect, dumping bodies in the river. That stakeout had been going on now for three weeks with no luck, but that luck was just about to change.

Let's find out how right after today's first of two mid-show sponsor breaks. If you don't want to hear these ads ever again, please send out to be a space on Patreon. Help us make charitable monthly donations. Get the catalog ad free. Get episodes three days early and more. now let's return to May of 1981 when law enforcement finally gets a big break in the Atlanta child murders case. In the early morning hours of May 22nd, 1981, Atlanta police cadet Robert Campbell parked his surveillance position in his surveillance position on the West Bank of the Chattahoochoochee River, way down yonder, about 30 feet downstream from the Jackson Parkway Bridge. Chattahoochee River, way down yonder and Jackson.

that's weird right I'm having like a weird deja vu that combo it reminds me of something but I can't quite figure it out

every time I hear Chattahooch I'm like what the fuck is Chattahooch just right on the fucking tip of my tongue Chattahooch Chattahoochee Jackson

way down yonder That's it That's it right there Never knew how much that muddy water meant to me That is not the vibe Uh-uh

No Alan That is not helping anything. How many of you have been waiting for that since the very first time I mentioned Chattahoochee last week? It's a sweet song, but just, mm-mm, not good for what's happening here, though. Nothing fucking happy is happening here, Alan. For real, Atlanta police cadet Robert Campbell had parked in his surveillance position on the west bank of the Chattahoochoo River way down yonder, about 30 feet downstream from the Jackson Parkway Bridge. He was in charge of the midnight to morning shift, and thank God he actually was paying attention. At about 250 a.m. May 22nd,

Campbell heard a loud splash in the river, noise louder than the splash of an animal hit in the water, because he'd grown accustomed to that sound during the long stakeout operation. Campbell told the Atlantic Journal Constitution a decade later, quote, If I had to do it all over again, I'd jump in the water and try to get a body. But other people say if I hadn't heard a splash and put an end to that, there could be a hundred more kids dead right now. Campbell looked at the bridge, saw a slow-moving car with its headlights on, only vehicle on the bridge.

Campbell immediately radioed fellow cadet, Freddie Jacobs, who was keeping and watched between the concrete rails on the eastern end of the bridge. Campbell asked Jacobs, if anyone was up there because he just heard that splash. Jacobs had also spotted the car, quote, really close to the edge of the bridge. He could not determine if the car had actually stopped, but at the very least, he could tell it was really creeping along, quote, going really slow. The car was a white 1970s Chevy Concourse Station wagon, rolled past Jacobs, heading southeast, towards downtown Atlanta. After the car crossed the bridge, it pulled into the parking lot of a nearby liquor store turned around headed back towards the bridge.

Patrolman Carl Holden sitting in an unmarked vehicle with FBI agent Greg Gilliland at the edge of the woods behind the liquor store. They've been listening to the radio conversation between Campbell and Jacobs. Officer Holden proceeded to follow the station wagon onto a freeway ramp off a Cobb drive leading to I-285. Then he initiated a traffic stop once they're on the highway. Agent Gilliland then slowly approached the vehicle, which was driven by a young black man wearing glasses. He was trying to sink down behind the steering wheel when he was asked to step out and

produce his license and registration. The driver complied and then asked, what's this all about? His license identified him as 23-year-old Wayne Bertram Williams, who lived at 1817, northwest Penelope Road in Atlanta. He said the car belonged to his uncle, whether his dad was using it. I guess he was borrowing from his dad. That address is important. It's the address of the Williams family that I'd mentioned previously last week, is living in the Dixie Hills area of Atlanta. that came up when I was talking about the murder of 16-year-old Patrick Rogers back in November of 1980, a kid who wrote songs with a friend of his. When investigators had looked into his disappearance before his body was found,

they had learned that a young black man claiming to be a music scout had been in the Thomasville Heights neighborhood, the week before he disappeared, if you recall, a guy distributing flyers for a talent show he was organizing that announced auditions for aspiring musicians, right? The flyer with the phone number to call that number, again, belonged to the residents of Fay and Homer Williams, two retired school teachers who live in the Dixie Hills area of Atlanta.

And Faye and Homer were the parents of the guy from the bridge. This cop pulled over half a year later. And once again, this guy who just got pulled over, Wayne Williams, asked what's this all about? And Agent Gilliland responded, I can't tell at this time. Williams paused, then offered, I know this must be about those boys.

Not a smart thing to say. While Agent Gilliland remained with Williams, patrolman Holden returned to the Jackson Parkway Bridge. there he Jacobs Campbell with two other officers set up lights along the edge and scanned the water. After searching for about 50 minutes, they still couldn't find any things suspicious, though. Holden and then returned to a row of cars, pulled over along the interstate, Holden asked Jacobs if the station wagon was the vehicle he had seen on the bridge. Jacobs confirmed, absolutely it was.

Wayne Williams then consented to a search of the vehicle. On the front passenger seat, police found a flashlight, a pair of dirty gloves, a two-foot cord, you know, like the kind you might use to fucking strangle somebody. with. On the front passenger side floor was a knapsack containing some men's clothing. Clothing you might have just, you know, taken from a victim. In the back were two cardboard boxes, a large open bag of women's clothes, a white bed spread with black and green designs. Williams claimed the knapsack contained clothing he wore earlier that day at the gym and that the other clothes belonged to his mom. He was supposed to throw him out. Agent Gillland commented that William's car

was a mess and it looked like animals had been in there. William said there had been a dog in the car his parents' 14-year-old German Shepherd. Remember, animal hair has been found in numerous victims. Williams' question for about an hour and a half of the scene. Police learned he was a talent scout that he had an early morning appointment to see a woman at an unfamiliar address in nearby Smyrna. Talk about her music career.

He said he was doing a trial run that evening to make sure he knew how to get to her place, how long it would take. Uh-huh. Police had no reason to detain him legally since he claimed he didn't know the murder victims and denied stop it on the bridge or tossed anything into the river.

And they didn't see him do that. FBI agents also didn't think it necessary to seize or take inventory of his car or ask Williams to submit a written account of his activities at night, unfortunately. Hours later, officers dragged the Chattahoochee River near the bridge still found nothing. Later that day, FBI agents went to the address on Williams' license in Dixie Hills. That neighborhood spoke to him for two hours. He couldn't provide a solid reason for being on the bridge or the highway in the middle night other than that dumb fucking trial run story. Neighbors later recalled that shortly after Williams returned from his quote-unquote trial run, right? the following morning, they saw him removing boxes from the house and not suspiciously at all

burned it a bunch of shit in his family's barbecue pit. On the morning of May 24th, two boys paddling down the Chattahoochee discovered another body. They raced upstream, told the first adults they could find about this dead man in the water. Cobb County police found the new body of a black male faced down in the shallow water on the Atlanta side of the river, about 200 yards south of the I-285 bridge overpassed near South Cobb Drive. The body had floated down the stream before getting stuck in a pile of wood at almost the exact spot, a 21-year-old Jimmy Payne had recently been found. The unidentified victim was believed to be between the ages of 25 and 35, 510, 150 pounds,

pretty slender. There were no visible marks on the body, but there was, quote, neck trauma, leading to the conclusion that he had died of asphyxia, resulting from some type of chokehold, or perhaps a pillow pressed against his, you know, face and, like, mouth, he held over his mouth, maybe, you know, crushed him kind of in the neck with something, The victim was eventually identified as 27-year-old Nathaniel Cater. The most recent disappearance recovered.

He had gone missing just three days prior, May 21st. His toxicology report showed he was intoxicated when he was killed. Investigators concluded he'd been easily subdued and killed in his drunken state. State crime lab techs recovered a yellow, green nylon fiber from Nathaniel's head, right? Just like the other fibers recovered from so many other victims. Fulton County DA, Louis Slaten, or Slotten, announced that he was linking Nathaniel's death to the other cases because of the way his body was discarded, quote, the fact that he was nude and the way he was killed.

Seemed that Nathaniel's body had floated downstream from the James Jackson Parkway Bridge right where Wayne Williams was driving suspiciously two days earlier on May 22nd, right where the officer heard that splash, found less than a half a mile from where the police cadet heard that splash. And because of that, FBI agents decided to take a deeper look at Williams. A much, much deeper, very thorough look, I got to say, is impressive. In the weeks to come, FBI agents and police would interview about 400 people,

people who either knew or were associated with Wayne Williams. So now that we finally have someone who looks like our guy, let's take a second to get to know him. Wayne Bertram Williams, born May 27th, 1958. Wayne, the only child, as I think I mentioned, of Fay and Homer Williams, former Atlanta school teachers who did not start their family until they were both in their late 40s. Wayne gave off the facade of being intellectual, most likely because a grown up he was often called smart and even a genius. he was called a science wizard when he was a little guy

at Atlanta's Anderson Park Elementary School Then when he was 14 Wayne started up his own so-called micro radio station called W-R-A-Z-A-M From Home using money from his dad Station was considered a whimsical project by everyone but Wayne And the listing radius only extended a few blocks

Beyond his home Wayne took his project super seriously Even brought guests onto his fucking radio show That kills me Back of the days before you could blast it out to the whole wide world, thanks to the internet, back before anybody with a phone and access to the internet could have a podcast or shoot, edit, upload videos to TikTok, Instagram, etc. Dude was treating his radio show more seriously than a lot of modern content creators treat their careers.

Even though potentially the only people who could listen, literally the only people who could listen, lived in his own neighborhood, just a few blocks from his parents' house. Hello, you're listening to the Wayne Williams Morning Show. The only local morning show in northwest Atlanta's Dixie Hills. I'm your host Wayne Williams, right here on W-R-A-Z-A-M. And if you can hear me, you probably know me, and my mom and dad as well. Thanks for tuning in. Today we have a very special guest.

My next-door neighbor, Shalonda Tatum. She's a waitress who owns the Weeping Willow Cafe, only a mile away. She makes a mean biscuit, and she's going to share her recipe right here in a bit. I wish your employees at the cafe can be listed right now, but our signal doesn't quite reach that far. Oh, and don't mind the background noise. That's just a family dog. Or maybe my mom doing the laundry.

Washer and dryer right on the other side of the wall. Pretty frustrating. I'm not going to lie. No way I can just gloss over that. I love somebody taking a radio show very seriously that broadcasts out of their parents' basement and only makes it a few blocks. The signals like that fucking week. That's fucking awesome.

We're going to take a caller. Oh, it's Johnny across the street. He actually got some decent guests, which is wild. In 1974, he interviewed Andrew Young, who was actually campaigning for Congress. Jet Magazine, National fucking Magazine, with a huge, you know, distributorship, ran a picture of Wayne in the July 1974 issue. Oh, dude, he must have fucking bragged so hard on that. I'm sure everybody found it.

It was adorable how seriously he took a little radio show. And I bet a lot of people expected a lot of big things from him. He undoubtedly expected big things from himself. Wayne graduated from Douglas High School at the age of 18 in 1976. decided to pursue a career in unsurprisingly, radio and journalism, also dabbled in a career as a music producer. I mean, dabbled, but I think he took himself very seriously.

He built his own carrier current radio station and began to visit local stations WIGO and W-A-O-K, where he befriended the crew members. So he's like, you know, probably thinks he's a peer. Faye and Homer were way too devoted to their only son. Wayne seemed determined to pull his family out of lower-class, you know, lower-middle-class lifestyle. he thought he was going to, you know, fucking make them all rich.

Big dreamer. And his parents seemed to believe he was capable of achieving his dreams. According to author Bernard Headley, he strove to do so in a hurry, relying as much on ingenuity and craft as on show business hype. An approach to life that was light years away from his parents' humble, hardworking bungalow existence. Another one of Wayne's pursuit was freelance photography, which his dad actually did. He created the Metro News Production Company, acquired expensive professional photography equipment, most of his work focused on local news, such as fires, car accidents, shootings, and stabbings.

He did actually obtain press credentials from the fire bureau, but there were no records to show that he was ever actually paid by anyone for this. Because he spent so much time at the scenes of emergencies, he soon became pretty curious about police work, and he purchased a police scanner so we could listen to police conversations, which is how he would get to crime scenes and accidents so quickly, right, often before the police. For his music business, business and quotes,

kind of 1-800 business vibes, he created the Nova Entertainment Corporation and started recruiting, quote, musically inclined black children with the goal of creating a pop group he wanted to call Gemini. Wayne became known as a figure by the people who owned

and worked at some local recording studios because he would rent studio space and record these young people, people he would just pick up off of the street. Dude had become a real smooth talker, a known figure in a lot of different Atlanta neighborhoods. A guy known to be hustling, trying to legitimately put together a music group,

make it as a producer, a guy who four years was picking up local youth, recording with them, returning them to the street, you know, not talking to their parents beforehand to ask him if that was cool, that if he did that, he got a reputation for, you know, being somebody you could trust you didn't have to be afraid of.

In addition to renting professional studio spaces, he also would hire musicians sometimes to provide background music for the singers, strengthening a lot of children's faith in him that he was going to make them famous. A lot of local studio execs, and Atlanta has long been a city with a lot of music execs,

especially in black music, where a lot of music has been very successfully produced. They thought, you know, Wayne again, trying to put together some big pop group, maybe the next Jackson five, also noticed that sometimes he would just sit and talk to the kids and teens during studio time, which they found weird. A little puzzling to them.

Seems like some people might have had some concerns that he was given off some pito vibes. After a couple years of doing this, he was still not generating return on his investment, and the deals he spoke of with labels like Motown and Capitol Records never came even close to fruition. He was a fucking pretender.

Studio execs eventually learned that Wayne paid for all his business expenses, all his studio time exclusively with his fucking parents' retirement money. Not good. Then in 1976, Williams told one of his radio station employees. Somehow he had fucking employees

for a little bit. I doubt he was actually paying them any type of real wage. This employee told her that she was out of a job. And I say one of his radio station employees, I bet it was just one. He told her she was out of a job because the Chicago company was buying him out.

But in reality, his parents were filing for bankruptcy because of his failed business dealings. Fuck. The pressure he must have felt mounting on him. Baby boy's dreams are ruining his parents' lives. Right. He's hustled his own parents. The only financial backers he's ever had are going broke, broke. The ones he fucking lives in their basement.

The Wonder Kid, not looking so wonderful anymore. Another curious thing Wayne did was impersonating police officers. like some previous serial killers have done. Not previous ones we've covered. In 1976, as his life is falling apart, he is arrested, but not convicted for impersonating an officer and the unauthorized use of a vehicle. This weirdo had outfitted his car with red lights under the grill, flashing blue lights on the dash. Then instead of stopping after he was caught, he decided he would just have to be more careful. One night in 1980, Wayne was in one of his dad's vehicles with a local aspiring entertainer,

22-year-old Joel Bailey, speed on I-20 near downtown Atlanta. when he drove past an unmarked patrol car at 80 miles an hour, Bailey recalled that Williams then switched on a ceiling light and just casually waved at the officer. And it fucking worked. The cop continued driving. It appeared he thought he was just another plain, close police officer. So he clearly thinks he's smart, gets off on, you know, outsmarting the cops.

Joe Bailey last heard from Wayne in 1982 when Wayne told Bailey and his band, get ready. We got a big show in Chattanooga. It's going to be full of big-time producers. But then Joe never heard from him again. And that was kind of his M. Talking a bunch of shit. Seemed that despite being acquainted

with all sorts of different people, Wayne's only close friend was Willie Hunter, some mentor of his in the music business. Some of the people Williams dealt with said that he had an evil side, a dark side. One of his Wayne's associates, 19-year-old Carla Bailey, said he was fascinating and mysterious.

No one who knew him seemed to be sure about his sexual orientation, which was a topic of conversation and speculation around him. Most people seem to think he was only attracted to men, but wouldn't come out. Wayne also reported

felt negatively about black people in general, which is odd, and seemed, quote, resentful of being black, according to one police officer. An associate of Wayne's recalled that he quickly shot down the idea of trying to raise money for the families of the Atlanta child murders. A victim named Wade Marcus mentioned in early 1981 that he was considering raising money to assist in the investigation and that Wayne told him don't waste his money because those kids were, quote, just prostitutes hanging around all night long.

So that's a bit of an alarming thing to say. Okay, now that we've become a little acquainted with him, we'll get to know a little more about him later. Let's get back to the timeline. May 29th, a week after he was first pulled over, after being seen on that bridge, when an officer heard what was almost certainly a dead body splash in the water below, authorities began 24-7 surveillance of Wayne Williams

with both ground patrol and surveillance aircraft. Investigators additionally installed a car tracking device on his Chevy station wagon, by his, I mean his dad's, and by his dad's, I mean his uncles. They attempted to install a listing device in the car as well, but gave up due to difficulties with gaining undetected access.

Williams was an active subject, especially at night. However, he was aware that he was being followed, almost from the very beginning. They said he was cunning, often able to elude out-of-town agents assigned to follow him. Sometimes he would cause traffic snarls

as agents would pursue him while he was doing shit like driving down the wrong way of a one-way street. Agents rolled back to surveillance for a while, as Wayne did nothing criminal outside of traffic violations. He mostly just drove around the city, stop in at various bars, agents worried that he was also secretly destroying physical evidence right under their noses. On June 3rd, 191, five days after all their surveillance began, a Fulton County judge authorized warrants for the FBI to search Wayne Williams' person, car and residence. And by car and residence, I mean, his fucking dad's, his mom and dad's house and his dad or uncle's car.

Later that same day, FBI agents approached Wayne at a phone booth and insisted he'd come downtown for questioning. he voluntarily submitted to an interview at the Atlanta office. During Wayne's interview, agents, police officers, and crime lab tech searched his family's home and the Chevy station wagon hoping that lab testing would identify William's home as the most likely source

of the mysterious matching fibers found in the victims. FBI agents noticed that most of the furniture had been rearranged since their previous visit just two weeks earlier that there was a bunch of new carpet in parts of the house. That's fucking suspicious. Lab experts lifted fingerprints

and seized the following items from the home. Wayne's business business. this paper slash documents. Carpet samples, including the swatch of green carpet stains with green carpet stain with what looked like blood. Other fibers and debris, including animal hair taken from a purple throw rug, a yellow rug, yellow and green carpets, blue rug, green rug, green rug, red bathrobe, blankets, drapery, bedspreads, and toilet seat cover.

Wayne's father also plucked a few hairs from the family dog. Officers impounded the Chevy Station wagon after discovering what looked like dry bloodstains in the backseat. Meanwhile, back at the Atlanta FBI office, agents were busy grilling Wayne. He claimed that on May 21st at approximately 1 p.m., a little over 12 hours before he was spotted on that bridge by authorities on a stakeout when he was way down yonder by the Chattahoochee, he was in the vicinity of Fairburn and Camelton Roads in southwest Atlanta looking for a man named Thomas Johnson, but he never found him, ended up playing basketball to rec center and went home. 4 p.m. he said he'd received a call from woman named Cheryl Johnson, who wanted to audition for him because he's a fucking big time producer.

and asked to meet for an interview. He's not going to take everybody. Fucking showbiz, baby. She told him she lived at the Spanish Trace Apartments off South Cobb Drive and Church Street in Smyrna. She said she preferred to do with the interview

at her home the next morning around 7 a.m. He was like, I don't know if I can do that. I got my fucking morning radio show, you know, right then. I got to sneak downstairs and do that now. Wayne then stayed home, had dinner with his mom, per usual,

then took a nap. His parents went out and stationed wagon while he was sleeping. And sometime during the evening, he talked on the phone with his friend and mentor Willie Hunter. What kind of fucking mentor is this guy? Mentor should have been like, dude, just stop. Stop. Nothing's happening.

This is fucking crazy. You're still at home. You don't even have a fucking, you no longer even have a radio show in your parents' basement. You're just living there. And you're not a producer. You're just somebody who talks about producing. 1 a.m. that night said he drove to a lounge downtown to talk to a manager about getting back a tape recorder he had loaned him. However, the girl worked in the door told him the manager was tied up.

So he left. That sounds about right. I bet the manager was like, that guy fucking showed up again. Just tell him I'm busy. God damn, get that weirdo out of here. Then he decided he would try and find Cheryl Johnson's apartment, he said.

So he couldn't recall her apartment number. That's crazy, you know, for a fucking big time producer. He didn't write that down. He drove around Smyrne. He said, looking for the Spanish Trace apartment, which couldn't find him.

Stopped at a liquor store, tried to call the phone number he had for Cheryl, but the line was busy. Then picked up some empty boxes at the liquor store for his mom as big time music producers often do. A lot of big time music producers when they're not signed

in fucking multi-million dollar record deals, they're picking up empty boxes behind the liquor store for their mom. A lot of people don't know that. Short time later, he stopped at another location

called Cheryl again, but she still didn't answer, probably avoiding him. That was when he drove across the Jackson Parkway bridge onto Jackson Parkway. Williams claimed that four vehicles, including his,

crossed the bridge within the same time span. After these officers didn't see any of these other cars, he's just making them up. After crossing the bridge without stopping, he added, definitely didn't stop.

Didn't do that. He pulled off into a gravel parking lot, wanted to use the background lighting of the stores to check the phone number he had just called. He said he stopped at a store and called Cheryl's number. This time somebody answered, said there was no one there by that name. He then picked up some more boxes to, quote, pack some items. Got back on the Jackson Parkway, headed northwest, back to the bridge. And as he passed the same gravel parking area, he noticed he was being followed by a vehicle. Crossed the bridge, a second time, was about to get on the interstate towards Atlanta when he was pulled over.

He insists he had no reason to stop on the bridge. he may have slowed down, but he certainly didn't stop and throw anything off. He definitely didn't throw off a fucking naked man's dead body. I'll tell you that, officers. If I was throwing anything off that bridge,

literally the last thing it would be will be like a dead naked black man's body. That's literally the last thing it would be. Might be a box. I got from behind a liquor store. Might be that. Might be some of my mom's clothes, right?

Wouldn't be a fucking dead man's body because I didn't have one of those. Also maintained that he didn't know any of the murdered Atlanta children or Nathaniel Cater and if he had known Nathaniel Cater Hadn't seen him naked Definitely 100%

Never saw his naked body And that's why he couldn't Possibly thrown it off of a bridge Wouldn't have been able to And Carter was too heavy for him Right guessing he didn't know Because he didn't know because he'd never seen him in his life Definitely again had not seen his dinghling

Because he wouldn't want to see his dinghling Wouldn't want to put it in his mouth Not even for a few minutes Not even just let it get hard And then see what happens Not even as a joke Williams agreed to a polygraph Took three exams and his responses

Indicated Deception Before he was released he also provided samples of his head and pubic hairs. Strange part is they did not ask him for his pubic hairs. He just wanted to give him those, the officer's oath. Quote, as a precious gift to remember me by is what he said while he winked hard. No. No, they asked for those.

In the early morning hours of June 4, 1981, police commissioner Lee Brown, police chief, George Napper, deputy police director, and task force leader, Morris Redding, and Fulton County DA Gordon Miller all came to the FBI office for a briefing. The local lawman then shared the information by phone with Fulton County DA, Louis Slatton. No word on whether or not anybody filled in Dickhand. I got to hope so. It's never a good idea to leave Dickhand out of the loop. Although the feds decided William's story was, quote, full of holes,

DA Slate and did not believe there was probable cause for an arrest, and Wayne was released. He was also offered protective custody by Deputy Director Redding since a lot of residents finding out he was a prime suspect where, you know, thinking about fucking murdering him. But he declined. Wayne's father, who had arrived sometime after the search of the house finished, drove him home, and his poor parents. It sounds like they were just really nice people, too nice, so dedicated to a baby boy, just pouring all their energy, all their money, including retirement money into baby boy. And now not only had he not made it in the music biz, it was looking like he was a fucking pito monster who killed a bunch of kids. Truly, what a fucking complete nightmare for them. By this time, word had already gotten out that a man had been taken into FBI custody and questioned about the murders.

reporters debated the ethics of releasing William's name when he was still not an official suspect. The New York Post, long time, garbage tabloid. They didn't worry about those ethics. They published on the front page edition of their June 4th paper, Atlanta Monster seized police, nab black suspect and included Wayne Williams's name in the article. Law enforcement, not happy with the New York Post, nor with the editors of the Atlanta Constitution Journal when they chose to name Wayne Williams. Later that morning, Williams called reporters to his home for a news conference. he handed the reporters his five-page resume. That's a fucking weird thing to do.

Are you trying to get a job? So, Wayne, are you the killer? No, I'm not. And by the way, take my resume. I've done a lot of what you do. You know, a great photographer. So when this all blows over, maybe we can work together. Said he wanted the people to know,

maybe I can have you on my radio show. He said he wanted the people to know he's being harassed by the FBI for no reason. However, he also acknowledged he was the prime suspect in the murders. So, you know, that's kind of a reason. He described his recent 12-hour interview. is nothing but accusations and threats the whole time and claim the FBI was trying to pin the murders

on somebody as soon as possible. Eh, as soon as possible. Let's be going on for a long time, the investigation. He quoted an agent and saying, it's just a matter of time before we get you. He claimed an agent tried to get him to sign a statement confessing to 20-something murders. He said about the crimes,

some of these kids are in places they don't have no business being at certain times a day or night. Some of them don't have no kind of home supervision. They just keep running around the streets wild. I just feel some of the parents just need to tighten up. and get strict on the kids.

Because if I was looking for the kids, you know, I'd fucking take all the clothes off and choke him, throw them off a bridge. No, he didn't say that last part. He also warned that, quote, if all this boils out

to be nothing, I have been slandered by the police and the news media. So now for that, Williams, his family and their neighborhood overwhelmed by further media. Police continuously staked out their street, ministers,

political rights leaders visited their home constantly. Every time Wayne left, a squad of police cars followed him. Reporters were continually surrounding the front of the home day and night, again, his poor parents. How much better would their lives have been if they just hadn't had a kid later in life?

Faye and Homer Williams retained former Atlanta City solicitor, May Mary Welcome to defend their son, even though they were already fucking near bankrupt, welcome criticized the media, threatened reporters with legal action, later filed a petition asking law enforcement to restrict the release of further investigation information, alleging that Williams was the victim of a blitzkrieg of media harassment. Meanwhile, the FBI and Georgia authorities were convinced that Wayne Williams was the killer. So the state crime lab focused on building a chain of evidence that would link him to the murders. The FBI theorized that Williams' presence on the Jackson Parkway Bridge meant he was connected with the deaths of at least nine victims, the nine who had been found in the rivers, six in the Chattahoochee, way down yonder, three in the South River.

Authorities had bloodstains, fibers found on the victims, no good fingerprints, no full fingerprints, but they also had items seized from the home and the Chevy Station wagon. Within a few days, sources leaked word that the tests were proving productive. that fibers collected from Williams environment were in fact at least very, very, very similar to those found of the victims, quite possibly an exact match. According to FBI microanalyst, Harold Dedman, great last name,

all of the fiber types removed from Payne and Cater were present in debris removed by vacuuming the Williams family station wagon. Fiber types found on Jimmy Payne's body included violet and green bedspread fibers, yellowish green nylon carpet fibers, yellow blanket fibers, so many fibers, blue rayon fibers,

automobile carpet fibers also particles identified as dog hairs. Fibers found on Nathaniel Cater's head included all the fiber types found on pain, including the blue rayon and automobile carpet fibers, carpet fibers, or whatever else I said. The yellowish-green

nylon fibers were of particular interest because they had a very unusual, rare, cross-sectional pattern and shape. Several more tests performed, investigators soon certain that the violet and green bedspread fibers found in the bodies of pain and cater were consistent with that bedspread in the Williams bedroom bedroom. The yellowish green nylon carpet fibers consistent with his bedroom carpet, dog hairs also matched the family's German Shepherd. The FBI recorded the following details from additional

microscopic analysis. Violet acetate fibers recovered from 17 victims. Those fibers exhibited the same microscopic characteristics as violet acetate fibers found in the bedspread on Wayne Williams' bedspread. Or found, yeah, on the Wayne Williams bedspread. I don't need to say bedspread a million times. Light green cotton fibers found on several victims. The these fibers exhibited the same characteristics as green cotton fibers found in or on, you know, Williams bedspread, bed spread. Let me just keep saying bedspread a bunch on the bedspread of Williams bedspread. Fuck was he doing with all these victims, by the way.

They didn't show signs of being sexually assaulted, but was he bringing him to the bedroom? Was he killing him, stripping him? I don't know, jerking off while he stared at their corpses before he dumped them in the river, doing some kind of dickhand stuff. Like seriously, like lower case dick hand, but what was he fucking doing that wasn't leaving sexual assault, you know, marks, no semen. on them from everything I've read, but it feels so sexual.

Green nylon fibers found on 14-year-old victims, on 14, excuse-me, victims, and they exhibited the same characteristics as green nylon fibers from Williams' bedroom carpet, not bad spread. Dog Harris found on five victims. During the lab testing, FBI analysts realized that 28-year-old John Porter's murder

had not been added to the list, even though violet and yellow-green fibers same kind found on his body, prompted an independent investigation into his murder. By the second week of Jimenez, June 191, the FBI concluded it would have been, quote, virtually impossible for the numerous victims in the Atlanta killings to have picked up the fibrous debris recovered from their clothing and bodies without having been in contact with items from the home and or vehicle of Wayne Bertram Williams. This is the fucking guy. Skeptics wanted to know if it was possible the fibers were coming from sources besides Wayne Williams' home and car.

Laptec said they would have to do more analysis, but the testing made that look very unlikely. according to Bernard Headley again, minute objects in Wayne Williams' environmental reciprocated, wait, excuse me, minute objects in Wayne Williams' environment reciprocated at a high level of statistical significance with minute objects found on the bodies of at least two of the Atlanta victims,

Jimmy Ray Payne and Nathaniel Cater. This justified the conclusion that Wayne Williams or someone in the Williams household had murdered the two men. And of course, minute objects found on way more bodies than just those two, just not the same amount of them. them. In the days that followed, federal authorities pushed Fulton County DA Lewis Slatton

to arrest Williams, charge him with the murders, at least of Jimmy Payne and Nathaniel Cater. However, D.A. Slayton and his team, as well as several people in the task force, resented how the FBI had been doing their own investigation for fuck sake, their fucking egos, and they thought the FBI had mishandled certain aspects of the case. The DA staff believed that they had only had a circumstantial link between the splash on the bridge, the traffic stop involving Wayne that night and the body found in the river. When the FBI stopped Williams, they hadn't asked him for a statement of what he'd been doing, they'd gone to his house hours later, giving him plenty of time to come up with the story and time to destroy evidence.

They also did not take an inventory of the items they saw in his car. Despite the state crime lab testing, Slatton said an arrest was not imminent. He told reporters after one meeting, we're looking toward discovering the truth, whatever it might be. At this point, the evidence has not been shored up enough to where we can make an arrest. more than fiber evidence is needed. Fibers generally won't lead you to a suspect. They're important for the shoring up of evidence. This guy seems like somebody who doesn't understand

fucking fiber analysis. Maybe not smart enough to understand how significant that type of analysis actually is. Already probably retired. You know, later when DNA analysis showed up on the scene. DNA? Okay. DNA Shmianay. How about that?

I don't trust that witchcraft, smoke and mirrors, wizardry one bit. Microscopes. What are we doing? Are we fucking investigators or nerds? right if I can see a fingerprint that makes sense to me that's something I can see I can't see DNA can you see DNA show me some DNA around here

point it out to me what is it where is it what color is it if you can't see it's not real uh slatin still would not charge Williams after a panel of 14 fiber specialists and crime lab experts from as far away as Germany came to Atlanta and 100% agreed with the state crime labs findings dude hated fibers dude was

dude is probably waking up in a cold sweat every night having fiber nightmares. The fibers! God damn fibers! The U.S. Attorney for Atlanta and the Georgia State Attorney General discussed alternative strategies to proceed with charges.

One federal official leaked that they were considering hiring a special state prosecutor, quote, somebody who doesn't need fibers. No, some with more courage. Who's not a coward? Love that. They proposed pressing federal civil rights

and kidnapping charges against Williams so they would not have to deal with local jurisdiction. Love that too. Slatton was worried that a, quote, jury of plain Atlanta folks might not understand all the circumstantial fucking fiber talk.

Or maybe those people are smarter than you. The FBI responded that the fiber matches, I love this is all coming down to fibers, were just one part of the whole case. Enzyme analysis of the stain in the back seat of the Chevy Station wagon identified two types of human blood consistent with the blood types of victims William Barrett and John Harold Porter.

Up at the time of the blood analysis, Atlanta authorities had not included Porter's death in the list. The FBI also said that their case was strengthened when they showed, William proved a William's statement was false. The manager of San Suzy Lounge, which was a business that is no longer open, a place Wayne claimed he visited,

said Wayne called him from home on Friday, May 22nd to tell him to bring his tape recorder to the lounge later that evening. Wayne stopped by the lounge that Friday night, not Thursday, like he said. Wayne had given two possible phone numbers for the elusive Cheryl Johnson, the singer he was thinking about making a big hit record for. One of them was for the Southern Bell Telephone company

one was for a cosmetic studio in college park Georgia Cheryl Johnson, not a customer of Sutherbell or a client slash employee of the salon. The closest approximation they could find to the supposed Spanish trace apartments was the center-view terrace apartments in Smyrna. No one named Cheryl Johnson rented a unit. No one named Johnson shared an apartment

with a listed tenant either. Because he fucking made this person up. Police also interviewed teens who knew the victims. Several of them said they either knew or knew of Wayne Williams. Several witnesses said they had said they and various victims had been to Williams' home studio for auditions. Of course, he also had to home studio. The fucking home radio station that his dad paid for became the home studio that his dad paid for, that mom.

And that Wayne had taken them there in his car, right? One boy said he once saw a, quote, huge pile of children's clothing on the floor of Williams' bedroom. That's fucking creepy. Other witnesses recalled seeing Williams with Michael McIntosh, Eddie Duncan, within days of their disappearances. Another witness viewed photos said that Williams was driving the car, Larry Rogers. was riding in the day he disappeared. Witness said Wayne was the person who was, quote, hanging around Kmart, moments before Curtis Walker disappeared in that area.

Resident of Thomasville Heights identified Williams as the man who was in the neighborhood distributing flyers for that talent show right before Patrick Rogers disappeared, right? That kid interested in music, the songwriter. Police also found witnesses who might know what happened to Joseph Bell. John Laster listed in Williams' appointment book. He'd recently auditioned for Williams. He knew victims Joseph Bell, Timothy Hill and Darren Glass. He and Joseph played basketball together.

When he told Joseph about his interview with Williams, Joseph responded, yeah, I know that dude, and said he'd also auditioned for Williams as a dancer. So many fucking people. This guy never produced anything in all these people. He's such a fucking poser. Forget just outside of being a fucking murderer. He's just a fucking shitty human being.

John Laster's brother, Lou Jean, recalled playing basketball with Joseph on May 2nd, 191 at a court on the Agnes Jones School in the Westview area. Joseph brought his own ball, but he loaned it to some girls who wanted to play in another court. Joseph was ready to go before Lou Geen was. So he got his ball from the girls,

walked towards Westview Drive at that exact moment. Lou Geen chased after a stray ball. When he looked up, he saw Joseph get into a station wagon. Soon after he decided he was done playing, and then as he was getting into his car, he saw that station wagon again with Joseph inside of it. It was an early 70s Chevy station wagon, like Wayne's dad uncle, owned,

driven by a light-skinned black man, like Wayne. Lejean later identified Wayne Williams from photos. Interestingly, Williams also at the site where victim Terry Pugh's body

found was found in January 23, 191, doing some of that freelance photography, doing so much shit he never fucking got paid for. Identified himself to the Rockdale County Sheriff's Office they had no reason to doubt him

because he appeared professional with all his camera equipment. Their descriptions matched Wayne Williams. Additionally, there was evidence that the victims fought back, left their marks on the killer. Studio executive who saw Wayne regularly said that

several times he saw him all fucking scratched up. Said that in the weeks leading up to May, 1981, came in with a bunch of scratches on both arms, claimed he'd fallen. A studio assistant saw Wayne with cuts and scratches on his arm in April of 1991, when he also claimed he'd fallen. She didn't believe that.

Later told the FBI and task force, the marks went the whole length of both his arms and were very ugly. They looked like they had bled a lot and were very swollen. That's suspicious. June 18th, 191, Mayer Jackson,

went to visit Governor George Buzzy, who agreed it's fucking time for charges to be filed against Wayne Williams. That same day, acting U.S. Attorney Dorothy Kirkley, an FBI special agent in charge for Atlanta, John Glover, flew to D.C. to, quote, explained to members of the U.S. Department of Justice's Criminal Division in the FBI's case against Williams. Deputy U.S. Attorney General Edward C. Schmoltz also received a briefing. Essentially, the FBI is saying now that they have nailed Williams dead to his rights and that Atlanta's, quote, coward DA was diddling around.

These guys do not fucking like him. The Department of Justice decided to enlist Governor Busby in quote, pushing Slateen forward. Come on, fuckhead, let's go. Schmoltz called Busby to ask him to give Agent Glover an acting U.S. Attorney Kirkley a hearing. He said he would listen only if DA Slatton, Georgia AG, Arthur Bolton,

and other state and local officials were also present. The meeting was scheduled for the following morning at the governor's mansion in Atlanta started at 10.30 a.m. in what was described as an extremely unpleasant atmosphere. The meeting ended politely, but DA Slatton did not make a commitment to prosecute Wayne Williams. Good God, dude. Stubbered motherfucker.

There was a general agreement that if Williams gave indication he might flee the city, you know, then he should be arrested. On the very next night, June 20th, Wayne Williams led a fleet of officers assigned to watch him on a high-speed, dangerous chase around the city, literally drove right by the homes of Mayor Jackson and Commissioner Lee Brown. Then that evening authorities learned that his dad, Homer, was at the Atlanta airport,

to a private pilot about how much it would cost to go to South America. Are you finally ready to make an arrest now, Slateon, you fucking dipshit. Let's find out right after our second of two mid-show sponsor breaks. Thanks for listening to those sponsors. Hope you heard some deals you liked. Now, are

they finally? It's Slat and finally going to arrest, Wayne Williams. The next afternoon, June 21st, two detectives and Williams defense attorney, Mary Welcome, arrived at the Williams household to make the arrest. Wayne Williams was initially only charged with the murder of Nathaniel Cater.

The following day, law enforcement made one last search at the Williams home seizing items including some textbooks on stuff like, oh, fingerprinting and criminal investigations.

Huh. A month later, on July 17th, 1981, a Fulton County grand jury returned a true bill of indictment on two counts of murder for the deaths of both Nathaniel Cater and Jimmy Payne. The prosecution planned to pursue

a litigation slash joint trial strategy that would allow them to present evidence common to more than one victim to show that more than one murder was committed under the quote, same scheme or design. State also prepared for a speedy trial within 30 days and did not indicate they would seek the death penalty. After the arrest, parents and children were still afraid

that the crimes would continue, that more bodies would keep turning up in Erie Rivers and elsewhere, but the police were confident that they had the right guy. And then no new murders fitting the pattern occurred following Williams' arrest. None would occur going forward in perpetuity. Wayne Williams' attorney, Mary Will, Welcome prepared for a big, big trial.

Welcome was the first black solicitor in Atlanta. I had been appointed to her position by Mayor Jackson during his first term. Welcome, at a previously led a crusade against Atlanta's so-called porn row on Peach Tree Street. She wanted to shut down the city's bathhouses, which she claimed Harvard sex workers. There were nightly raids on establishments. Welcome's office managed to close 15 bathhouses deemed public nuisances. Or she just, like, homophobic. Welcome, who had become known as Wild Mary due to her passionate moral convictions.

then quit her job as city solicitor in 1978 because a private firm offered her more money. However, it was no secret, according to the Atlantic Constitution Journal, that Jackson was unhappy that she had sided with former public safety commissioner Reginald Eves, who was fired by Jackson because of his alleged involvement in a police promotion scandal. Also said that welcome loved attention,

would not shy away from media during William's trial, especially if it might help her political ambitions. Interesting that the woman who once waged war supposedly, you know, against sex workers with the bathhouses, now defending a dude who looks like a piece, Tito killer. So many people's complicated moralist stances confound me. Assisting welcome was Tony Axum, another black Atlanta attorney who was quiet and meticulous and disliked the cameras. He worked high-profile cases in the past and had worked with Welcome

in the past. In December of 1980, they worked with lead counsel Lewis Polanski, the dirty fucking pole, subhuman ape from Eastern Europe to defend three Morris Brown college football players against rape charges. been too long since Polish people caught us completely undeserved and outlandish and absurd stray on the show. Although the football players had admitted to having intercourse with the victim, they were only convicted of simple battery.

Oh, cool. So it sounds like they helped some rapists get away with rape. Wow, what a fucking good crusader. That's what this culture needs more of. Guys get away with rape. Louis Palanski credited Welcome with creating compassion for the defendants. Polanski recounted to reporters how welcome gave the jury a woman's point of view

by saying, when I was growing up, we were more cautious about getting into these kinds of situations. But times are different now. I'll tell you that my little girl would have known different. Oh, so because the woman put herself in a certain situation, she deserved to be gang-raped. Who did welcome think she was, the president of Cornell University? Andrew Tate?

The judge in Williams case was Clarence Cooper, the first black judge elected to the Fulton County Superior Court bench. He'd been randomly selected by a computer program that July. The month of Wayne Williams was to be arraigned state authorities, expressed concern over the unclear nature of Jimmy Payne's death certificate. The Fulton County Medical Examiner amended his death certificate, writing to the vital record section of Fulton County's Health Department that when he wrote the death certificate, he, quote, inadvertently,

wrote undetermined on the manner of death section, and should have written homicide. On August 17, 1981, one week after the amendment, Wayne Williams was arraigned in court and pleaded, or pleaded, and he pledged not guilty. Your Honor, I pled not guilty. I mean, he pleaded not guilty. The trial was set to begin on October 5th, 191,

just five months after the last known murder, but instead Judge Cooper met with the prosecution and defense and postponed the trial indefinitely. Damn it. The defense was struggling to get ready for trial, possibly because their man was guilty as fuck. That tends to make things harder. They had talked to only a few of the prosecution's 400 list of witnesses.

They'd spoken to some forensic experts, but none were officially recruited to look into the state's technical evidence. Wayne Williams had also fired Tony Axum, then rehired him, then fired him again because he's unstable. Mary Welcome found herself doing legal and evidentiary work rather than her preferred PR role. She convinced the Williams'es to hire Alvin Binder to help an experienced attorney who had a reputation for being sarcastic and aggressive in court. So that's great that the Williamses are for sure going to be in the deepest amount of debt when this is all over. On December 28th, 1988, jury selection began for the murder trial.

Things are still moving pretty fast. After five days of challenges, attorneys took just 20 minutes to agree in the final jury. the judge ordered their sequestration and instructed them to report to court on January 6, 1982. Open arguments began January 6, 1982, as I mentioned. The Atlantic Constitution Journal called the atmosphere of the courthouse a circus of humanity, made up of, quote, private eyes, prophetesses, cops and commies, suburban housewives, big-time journalists, the curious, and the curiosities. Sounds like some great A people watching.

The trial would last for nine weeks. opening statement, D.8, Louis Slayton, compared the case to a jigsaw puzzle. And the prosecution called on 120 witnesses to put those pieces together. Slatton portrayed William Williams as a, quote, mad dog killer who was intelligent, literate, and quite possibly talented, but also a pathological liar, frustrated dreamer and contemptuous failure. Oh, frustrated dreamer and contemptuous failure. That's a great description. Got to give Slatton credit there. Wayne was also portrayed as an ambitious businessman, always on the go. Businessman? That's the stretch. Underneath that, he was angry, didn't have any clear business goals.

Yeah, he just fucking mooching off his parents and confused about his sexuality. His anger manifested in violence even against his own parents, his fucking supporters. He once assaulted his father in a parking lot for refusing to rent a car to his business mentor, Willie Hunter, and afterwards warned his dad not to come home that night. What the fuck is going on in that house? The state had won approval to pursue their litigation strategy, allowing them to introduce evidence indicating Williams was the killer and at least 10 other murders, in addition to the ones he was on trial for. That's a huge win for the prosecution.

By the time the trial started, there were 29 murders and one missing person on the task force list. Man. That list included Nathaniel Cater, William Barrett, Jimmy Payne, John Porter, Larry Rogers, Joseph Bell, Patrick Baltazar, Terry Pew,

Luby Getter, Jr., Charles Stevens, Eric Middlebrooks, and Alfred Evans. Prosecution also intimated that they had evidence linking Williams to practically all of the Atlanta murders. Williams could not be ruled out of any of the 27 murders on the

task force list. A list that would eventually grow up to 30. According to author Bernard Headley, quote, prosecution testimony basically fell into the following pieces. The bridge incident. The defendant's credibility. Blood, hair, and fiber comparisons. I witness

identification. The defendant's habits, lifestyle, and attitude, including self-incriminating comments he had made from his parents' basement morning radio show. Hello, you're listening to the Wayne Williams Morning Show, the only local morning show in Northwest Atlanta's Dixie Hills.

I'm your host, Wayne Williams, right here on WRAZ AM. And if you can hear me, you probably know me. Thanks again for tuning in. Today we have another very special guest, my next-door neighbor and former guest, Shalonda Tatum's 10-year-old son, Carl. Carl's going to talk about how, when I pay for studio time, for him to get in there and do his best Michael Jackson, he needs to respect the pack

The fact that I've paid good money Technically my mom and dad's money But that's beside the point For him to fucking give it as all Now make me want to wring his neck Throw him off a goddamn bridge Nothing but his underroos Way down yonderance to Chattahoochee

All right maybe I made up that part About including self-incriminating comments He had made from his parents' basement morning radio show The rest of it though You know pretty legit Atlanta police officer Robert Campbell testified About hearing the splash in the river

the morning of morning hours of May 22nd, 1981, early morning hours FBI agent Greg Gilliland Greg, I want you to change

your last name I don't like Gilliland I don't care for it change it to Gilliand put an agent there and get rid of that fucking extra L you have three Ls

in your last name it's two fucking many it's stupid Greg talk to me right in the show we're going to brainstorm on a better name for you anyway this FBI agent

testified about stopping in questioning William Williams who was driving on the bridge that night a jewelry store owner Eustace Blakely. There's a fucking name, Greg. Blakely. That's nice.

Glillaland! The fuck is that? Sounds like a disease. Jewelry store owner Eustace Blakely and acquaintance Williams testified that Wayne once tried to impress him

with his resume. This guy likes to take his resume out. Wayne claimed he was in the Air Force flew F4 fighters as a Dobbins Air Force base. Yeah, just read my five-page resume. It'll talk about it right on page four. Blakely knew he was lying because he was actually in the Air Force

and had wanted to pilot at F4, but could not because he wore glasses, which Williams also wore. Blakely's wife, Sharon, testified that on more than one occasion, Williams had wanted to talk to her at length about his martial arts techniques. Anybody over the age of fucking 12,

who's like, let me talk to you about my martial art techniques? No, thank you. Did not ask. Did not ask for a reason. Don't want to. Don't care. Get away from me. The jury heard from the manager of the lounge, Williams claimed he was at

on May 21, 1981. manager testified that Williams was actually at the lounge again the following days mentioned earlier. Manager of the rec center Williams claimed he visited on May 21st also said, nope, not there that evening. Why all the lies? Right? Outside of him being guilty, of course. These discrepancies show that Williams had the opportunity to commit the crime because on May 21st, he was downtown in Atlanta or in downtown Atlanta with Nathaniel Cater, not at the lounge or the rec center.

Blood analysis experts testified that human blood stains found in a swatch of carpet taken from Williams' house and on the back seat of his Chevy station wagon stains consistent with the blood types of William Barrett and John Porter, dog hairs found on six bodies, all consistent with the Williams' German Shepherd. Did the fucking German Shepherd do it? Does anybody fucking talk to the German Shepherd?

Right? Maybe the German Shepherd should be on trial. Two head hairs, recovered from Patrick Baltazar's body, quote, were consistent with originating from the scalp of Wayne Williams. FBI and state crime lab experts testified that they had accumulated abundant fiber evidence linking Williams to numerous victims, right? More fiber talk. Up next, after the Wayne Williams

Morning Show, fiber talk. Fiber experts testified that more than 28 different fiber types from a total of more than 700 fibers were used to link up to 19 objects from Williams' environment to most of the 12 victims currently in question. It was stated that it was impossible for the victims to have picked up or transferred so many fibers

similar to those in Williams' home without them having been in physical contact with him. Of the more than 28 fiber types recovered from William's environment, 14 came from a rug or carpet in his bedroom. micro analyst Harold Deadman Again, badass name. I see you, Harold. Testified that the green nylon fibers

found on 10 of the 12 victims were so unusual, they were able to trace their manufacturer. The fibers were manufactured, get ready for more fiber talk, by the Wellman Corporation of Johnsonville, South Carolina. The company assigned batch number 181B to that particular fiber.

That batch manufactured only from 1967 to 1974, the Wellman 181B fiber sold to only a dozen carpet spinning company. companies. It gets better. The West Point Pepperell Corporation of Dalton, Georgia, near Atlanta, bought that number 181B Fiber. West Point Preparall used fiber 181B to manufacture a line of carper in 177 called Luxair, which was constructed in the same manner as the carpet in the Williams household. Fucking love in-depth analysis like that gives my brain a boner.

If I'm a juror, I'm on the edge of my seat hearing all this, wishing I had a bag of popcorn and I'd be mumbling stuff like, oh, fuck, yeah, fuck, shut out, they got him. They got him dead rights. One of the colors offered was called English Olive, which was the color of the carpet in the Williams household. Sales record showed that Faye Williams had contracted residential carpeting December 7th, 1971. Not in 1968, 68, as she would testify when she fucking lied for baby boy. Based on sales records from the West Point Peppereo Corporation, the only company that manufactured the Luxair Line, experts testified that there was a very low chance about one and eight thousand of finding that carpet in a, in a, in a, occupied Atlanta homes. It was a rare ass carpet. Also, not done with the fiber talk. Additional fibers found on some of the bodies that did not come from the Williams household. Traced to one of the carpets in one of the three cars, Wayne drove between July, 1979, and May of 1981, three types of automobile carpet fibers or trunk liner fibers found on the bodies of eight of 12 victims. If you're thinking about killing, are you ready

for fucking fibers? Have you got your fiber game figured out? The fibers recovered from Alfred Evans remains, for example, matched the trunk liner of Williams' repossessed 1978 Plymouth Fury. The fibers found in the body of Eric Middlebrooks, matched Homer Williams, repossessed 49 Ford LTD, a lot of repossessed cars, because baby boy, bleeding his family dry.

In addition to being a child killer, dude was a pathetic fucking parasite. The fibers found on seven other victims matched the family's 1970s Chevy Station wagon, primarily driven by Wayne, Margaret Carter, a neighbor of Nathaniel Cater's parents, possible frequent morning show guests, testified that about a week before Nathaniel's body was found,

she saw him with Williams on a park bench across the street with a German Shepherd dog in their immediate vicinity. Robert Henry, friend of Nathaniel's, said that around 9.30 p.m. on May 21st, he saw Nathaniel and Williams leaving the back entrance of the downtown Rialto Theater holding hands. At least two boys testified that Wayne made unwanted sexual advances towards them. A 15-year-old boy testified that Wayne sexually assaulted him

in August of 1980, said that Wayne picked him up in his vehicle during the right, and by vehicle, I always mean his dad's vehicle. Wayne put his hand into the boy's pocket and asked, do you have any money? But instead of checking for money, he blatantly touched the boy's penis. Wayne drove to a wooded area, gave him $2,

asked him to unzip his pants, then went around to the trunk of the car. At that point, the boy's fucking scared and just runs off. Smart kid. Sounds like there was almost certainly a sexual element to his crimes, despite no evidence of sexual assault. The jury heard from ambulance driver

Bobby Toland, who testified as to Wayne's thoughts on race and how Wayne once openly calculated that if he killed a certain number of black boys over time wouldn't take long to, quote, wipe out a race of poor black people. Why the fuck is a black person saying this? That's some serious self-hate. He'd probably hated himself for being black, hate himself for being gay,

hated himself for being a failure in the music business, hated himself for ruining his fucking parents' lives. The only people who ever supported him had a lot of hate. Defense got a win when Camille Bell, the mother of victim Yusuf Bell, decided to testify for them. she helped his lawyers and private investigators develop exculpatory evidence and sat with him in court once the trial started. Wayne's attorney, Alvin Binder, told the jury

in their opening statement, you don't get a killer from a boy that was raised like that boy was. You do sometimes, actually, Alvin, yeah, you do. We've covered other killers on occasion who've had a, you know, very supportive, overly indulgent parents. The defense argued that Wayne was on trial because he was in the wrong place at the wrong time, meaning he just so happened to be on the bridge late at night.

and the FBI was doing surveillance. They didn't go as far as to accuse the police of framing Williams, but they did say the police made a rush to judgment by choosing to focus all their attention on Wayne because they desperately wanted to solve the murders. Yeah, but what about all the fibers? The defense's character witnesses consisted of Homer and Fay Williams,

Wayne's business mentor, Willie Hunter. Not a good fucking mentor. Two young women who testified about their knowledge of Wayne's sexual orientation. One of them said she had once had sex with him. And that was, you know, of course, meant to counter the prosecution's suggestions that Wayne was confused about his sexuality and was a, you know, a homosexual predator. Homer Williams testified that he took Wayne on a fish and hunting trip, several of them when he was a boy. And more than once, Wayne lost interest in hunting because he, quote, didn't kill very much. But that's kind of a weird way to phrase it. Did he just not want to kill much or was he bummed because he really wanted to kill a whole bunch and didn't get to? Faye Williams told the jury, quote,

They have drugged my son's reputation through the mud. They have drugged my husband's reputation to the mud. They have drugged my reputation through the mud. A lot of mud talk. They have ruined the Williams family. They just lie and lie, but they have not produced evidence that my son's a killer. Well, they have mom.

They actually have. The defense called on a doctor who testified that he could not exclude drowning as a cause of death for both Cater and pain. Doctor also said he had a feeling. Oh, he had a feeling. That Mr. Cater died of a state which had not been adequately explained.

his state of an enlarged heart. I just have a feeling. That's how he died. I like when people say things like that. Can I talk about my feelings? Can I talk about how I feel about what may have happened? The defense also called Randall Brzee, an instructor of textile science at Kansas State University.

He conceded that he had examined the prosecution's hundreds of fiber slides just five hours before he got on the stand. But nevertheless, opined that the test done by the state were insufficient. Brzee had examined all of green carpet fibers under a microscope that were found in defense attorney Mary Welcome's office. He said those fibers were similar to the green carpet fibers in the Williams house. Yeah, but similar is not, you know, a match. Also purchased nine kinds of violet acetate fabric from a store in Atlanta,

found one type of fiber in each fabric, a somewhat similar to those in Williams' violet and green bedspread. He submerged a pillowcase way down yonder in the Chattahoochee. The Jackson Parkway Bridge concluded the river was, quote, full of fibers. Has there ever been a trial with more fiber talk? Over 500 fibers, he said, were found in the pillowcase. case after being submerged for just half an hour. He testified that if he were comparing fibers to determine which ones came from the same source,

he would have done at least eight different tests, relying mostly on a microscope, you know, not sufficient, according to him. But the prosecution argued that Brazhi didn't know what the fuck he was talking about, essentially. They said he was not an expert because he had received his, quote, doctorate in the study of clothing and textiles from a, quote, school of home economics. Prosecutor Gordon Miller made a snarky remarked to him before cross-examination saying, I'm not going to ask any questions about baking pies right now.

That's pretty funny. Then the defense tried to throw a curveball by calling on two former Atlanta police recruits who testified that their fellow recruit, Freddie Jacobs, the guy on the bridge, the night Williams was stopped, said that sometimes, after a couple of beers, well, way down yonder on the Chattahoochoo, while in the riverbank in the middle of night,

he and other recruits saw hazy white figures on top of the water. Okay, fuck, what, cop can't see a ghost now? Come on. Then it was Wayne's turn to get on the stand, according to Bernard Headley, Wayne spent, quote, several more hours portraying himself as a soft-spoken but confident man who was at peace with himself. He denied ever choking anybody to death with his hands or strangling somebody with the rope. He also testified, not a homosexual. Then under cross-examination, he got really pissed off.

Prosecutor Mallard tried to point out inconsistencies in his stories when Wayne indicated he was having trouble remember some things. You know, it's hard to remember things. Mallard suggested, rather, that it was because he was making shit up. Mallard asked him if it was true that the victim scratched his arms and face in their final moments or if he'd experience any panic while committing the murders. And Wayne fired back, sir, I'm about as guilty as you are. On a second day of cross-examination, Wayne called the ADA, fool. You're a fool.

An FBI agents who interviewed him. Goons. You're goons. At one point, his attorney came down to the witness stand, try and calm him down. It seemed like Mallard's goal was to show the jury this other side of Wayne Williams, right? A volatile side, guy who had a temper. The jury began to deliberate February. 26, 19-2, this thing goes going fast.

On the first day, they focused on Wayne's lies and inconsistencies, according to a later interview with four jurors. They doubted his story about trying to find Cheryl Johnson, that night on the bridge seemed like he made her up, also talked about discrepancies in the purchase date for the carpet when the Williams' home where the family lied about it. How William and his mom, right, said they bought it years before it even came out. There seemed to be a consensus on the murder of Nathaniel Cater, but the Jimmy Payne case divided the jury because of a lack of eyewitness testimony.

However, they agreed. that the prosecution had a very strong fiber case about pain. The jury dismissed evidence on a motive or method. One juror said, if the prosecution couldn't answer those questions, we couldn't. We were more concerned with why Williams was lying. Fair. Also agreed that since the arrest, there had been no more murders resembling the child murders. On the evening of Saturday, February 27, 82, the jury reached their verdict.

Wayne Williams was found guilty of fiber treason, of two counts of murder for the death. of Nathaniel Cater and Jimmy Payne. Williams was asked if he had anything to say before sentencing and said, I maintained all along through this trial my innocence and still do so today. I hold no malice against the jury, the prosecutors, or the court. I hope the person or persons who committed these crimes can be brought to justice. I wanted to see the terror ended. I did not do it.

That was a weird thing to say. I did not do it. Sorry, I was thinking I did not bring an end to the terror. Yeah, I get me saying. The judge sentenced Wayne Williams to two consecutive life sentences, but with the possibility of parole. On March 1st, 1982, law enforcement held a news conference and declared 23 of the

29 listed murders were now solved all attributed to Wayne Williams. Despite Wayne not being found guilty in court, they were confident. He was responsible for the murders of 13-year-old Alfred Evans, 9-year-old, Yousef Bell, 14-year-old, Eric Middlebrooks, 12-year-old, Christopher Richards,

and so many young kids, 10-year-old Aaron Witch, 9-year-old, Anthony Carter, 10-year-old Earl Terrell, 12-year-old Clifford Jones, 10-year-old Charles Stevens, 9-year-old Aaron Jackson, 14-year-old Loubie Getter, 15-year-old Terry Pugh, 12-year-old Patrick Baltazar, 13-year-old Curtis Walker, 15-year-old Joseph Bell, 13-year-old Timothy Hill, then they get a little older, 21-year-old Eddie Duncan, 20-year-old Larry Rogers, 23-year-old Michael McIntosh,

28-year-old John Porter, 17-year-old William Barrett, 21-year-old Jimmy Payne, 27-year-old Nathaniel Cater. Right, 23 victims, all but six of which were, minors as young as nine, three different nine-year-olds. I should add, suspected of up to 30 known murders. Police Commissioner Lee Brown announced that the task force would come to an end the following week. The seven unsolved cases will be turned over to local police departments. These include the deaths of 14-year-old Edward Smith, 14-year-old Milton Harvey, 11-year-old Jeffrey Mathis, 16-year-old Patrick Rogers,

12-year-old Angel Lanair, 7-year-old Daytona Wilson, and the unsolved disappearance of 11-year-old Darren Glass. Off the record, Atlanta Police believe Williams was responsible for the deaths of Smith. Harvey, Mathis, and Rogers. Investigators did not believe he was responsible for the deaths of the girls. So they thought he killed at least 27 people, maybe 28, depending on if the remains of Darren Glass were ever found. In the city, there was a mixed reaction to the verdict. Most were willing to acknowledge.

There had been no more suspicious child deaths in the six months since Williams had been in jail or on trial. But a lot of poor working class black Atlantans had mixed feelings about the verdict because of the unconventional way the prosecution proved his guilt. people, a lot of people, just could not wrap their minds around all of that fiber talk. Some argued the city was eager to close the case and gave into political pressure. Closed the case out of convenience after the trial.

Ultimately, though, most residents were eager to get back to their normal lives, right? Their pre-Atlantic child murder's lives. Former Fulton County DA, Louis Slatton, received criticism from the families of the victims and from people who said the case was never really solved. In 1996, he was asked, what about the critics to say the case was never really solved? And he answered, I would say the murder stopped. I mean, fair. Not a big fiber guy, but he's right here. November 10, 1985, Williams attorneys filed a request for a retrial, contending that he was a sacrifice for racial harmony.

In January 8, 1988, the state denied Williams' claims. The prosecutors had withheld evidence. In September of 1986, the issue, sorry, the September 1986 issue of the music magazine spin, journalist Robert Keating and Barry Michael Cooper reported that the FBI, which had been doing a secret investigation into the potential involvement of the KKKKK the murders in tandem with the special task force found that members of the KKK may have been involved in the murder of Luby Getter and may have been linked to 14 other murders. Allegedly, a family of KKK members, so you can trust them, living outside of Atlanta, had hoped to start a race war and attempted to recruit others for that purpose. Charles T. Sanders, a drug dealer and recruiter, told her criminal informant that he intended to kill Luby several weeks before his body was found. The motive? Well, Luby had backed a go-card into his car.

What a crazy way to go through the world. I have to kill him. He backed his fucking go card into my car. The bumper scratched. Who am I? Oh, just an idiot destined for a life in prison. Shortly after this, Sanders' brother Don recorded telling another KKK member he was going out to look for another little boy. Charles Sanders said to have a jagged scar matching a description given by a witness who reportedly saw Luby get into a white man's car.

Sanders also had a dog with hair similar to what was found on Luby and other victims' bodies. the article reported that in 1981, the GBI and other law enforcement agencies closed the investigation and sealed the findings. In 1985, a handwritten transcript of the conversation between Klan members regarding Luby's murder was sent anonymously to Lynn Watley, attorney who is now representing Wayne Williams. At a 1991 hearing on Williams' request for a retrial, investigators from Atlanta and other Georgia agencies testified they had little or no knowledge of this supposed GBI investigation. At that same hearing, an informant for the FBI investigation. FBI Billy Joe, just Bill Joe, actually. Whitaker reported that in 1981 Charles Sanders admitted to killing Luby Getter while Whitaker was wearing a concealed microphone. I mean, this is crazy, but you know, we have covered so many cases now where so many people have claimed

committing murders. They for sure did not commit. You know, in many cases, literally couldn't have committed. And they've done that for any number of reasons. People lie about all kinds of shit, including frequently committing murders. They never did. Williams, attorneys argued that the KKK was involved in some of the murders. The defense claimed they were not given info about the KKK investigation or supply with other evidence that might have helped them raise doubts with the jury. In June of 91, Wayne Williams did an interview with the Atlanta Journal Constitution 10 years after his arrest. He told the reporter in his first extensive interview in years or told the journalist, I'm not Ted Bundy. I didn't go out

and kill these people. I didn't feel any empathy at all with other so-called, or I don't feel any empathy at all with other so-called mass killers. I didn't do it. Wayne admitted that he was struggling in prison. He said, I cry, I break down, but you'll never see me banging my head against the wall. Not me. At that time, he was working the late shift as a dorm orderly at Val Dostate prison. I was really hoping that I was going to find out that he's working as a DJ for a prison radio station. That just didn't broadcast beyond the prison walls.

He said he lived with a convicted killer, so another convicted killer, and that they spent their time chatting about things like sports and women. Totally, dude. So much bro, sport and, you know, girl talk. Uh-huh, man shit, you know, because for sure not gay. Hell yeah, I do love this football sport team. Man, hope the cameraman spends a lot of time focusing on cheerleaders because they will be women. I'll tell you that much with boobs, and I like those.

Man, what I would give to suck a tit until it comes all over my face, right? Wow, women. Love them. Fuck, I love watching sports. I hope they hit so many home runs in this football match. Williams said, I guess one reason that I can do this time in such a content manner is because by the age I was when I was arrested,

I pretty much lived, I guess you could say, a fuller life than a lot of people do with regular 9 to 5s by the time they reached 40. I'd done a lot of things in my life, worked a lot of different careers that I enjoyed. I enjoyed that time because it was quality years. So I didn't really miss out in a lot. You are so full of fucking shit. Dude, you didn't do have a single career. You blew all your parents' money pretending to have careers, right? You never left home.

You went from having a fucking radio station, listened to by three neighbors in your parents' basement, to have a recording studio in your parents' basement that never made a fucking single album. You were just a loser. He said later in his interview, content is the wrong word altogether. Let's just face it, nobody can be content with this mess.

Okay. Williams said that he talked with the brothers of several victims who were fellow inmates. He shared his case files with the brothers of victims, Jeffrey Mathis and Patrick Rogers, and they, quote, have a good understanding. Uh-huh. He was also in contact with some of the mothers

and said, I truly hope they'd find out who killed their children. well they are in contact they have found out they're you uh Wayne ponder on his future saying that if he was released he would try to improve conditions in Georgia's correction system and also of course pursue the ministry oh fuck me he felt confident that one day he would get out

he added all I want is for society to see me for the individual I am and not the creation that was necessary for the state to get a conviction he denied knowing any of the victims before his arrest even though he certainly did so many witnesses said he did he said if you look at the case group you'll see no serial killer

You don't have one general pattern, but two or three subgroups with several suspects. Some were money for sex, Joseph Bell, Hill, Baldassart, no, they weren't. Angel Laner. Some were street crime, Middlebrooks, Porter, Evan Smith. And we'll probably find out. Pain and Cater, you know, there were some plain cycle murders. Yusuf Bell, Clifford Jones. He said the fact that he was auditioning young black performers at a time when black children were being murdered was just a very unfortunate coincidence.

He claimed that the prosecution's portrayal of him at trial put him in a catch-22 situation. you know quote well he's brilliant and he's trying to show the world that he's brilliant well that's the lie i'm not trying to show the world or prove anything to the world all you did was try to prove shit to the world fucking pathetic creep uh on may 6 2005 de cab county police chief louis graham reopened the investigation into the deaths of the five decab county victims aaron which curtis walker usith bell william barrett patrick balzazar graham was the assistant police chief in neighboring fulton county at the time of the murders his decision to reopen the cases was driven by his belief in Williams' innocence.

According to an August 2005 report, white supremacist Charles T. Sanders, who was an early suspect, once praised the murders and secretly recorded conversations, right? The guy we talked about already, not surprised, right? Praising the murders of black children and young black men as a white supremacist, of course.

As we heard, right, Mr. fucking go-kart revenge, this guy was talking all kinds of shit, and Don Sanders, his brother, was an officer for the KKK. So that's why he, He was leaning towards thinking these guys must have done it, these racist guys. The investigation started with informant, told police that Sanders claimed the KKK quote,

was creating an uprising amongst the blacks. They were killing the children. They're going to do one each month until things blow up. Sanders told the informant in a 1981 recording that the killer had wiped out a thousand future generations. As mentioned earlier, Williams had previously argued he was framed. Officials covered up evidence of this KKK involvement to avoid a race war. Williams' lawyers believe the materials released to the Associated Press and other evidence would help them get a new trial.

claimed the investigation into the KKK was withheld again. Charles Sanders, brothers Jerry and Don, their father, Carlton, fortunately, all dead by 2005, praise be. So they could not be questioned during the 2005 reinvestigation. According to documents, released to the AP after an open records request, Sanders and his two brothers passed polygraphs when they were first questioned in the 80s, in which they denied their involvement, and police later dropped the investigation. Secret investigation was called the 8100 file.

investigation lasted two months and it just one month before Williams became a suspect. Secret operation was conducted by informants and top law enforcement officials and included weeks of surveillance wiretaps and polygraphs.

Former FBI director Phil Peters asked for the investigation to be kept secret, stating that if it leaked out, it probably would cause a race right. So they have practical reasons to hide this investigation that it didn't actually go anywhere.

On June 21st, 2006, DeKalb County dropped its reinvestigation into the murders. Of course they did, because they already had the fucking right guy. Graham resigned, replaced by acting chief, Nick Marianelli, who said that until new evidence turned up, they would continue to pursue other cold cases.

Williams lost his appeal for a retrial in October 2006. Judge ruled he failed to show any new evidence that would suggest somebody else committed the two murders he was convicted for or any of the other 22 murders he was accused of. In 2007, a judge allowed two scalpairs found in the body of Patrick Balthasar to be sent to the FBI lab in Quantico, Lab found the scalp hairs had the same DNA sequence as Wayne Williams' hair. It could exclude about 98% of the rest of the world,

according to retired DNA scientists Harold Badass Last Name Deadman. Of 1,148 African American hair samples in the FBI database, only 29 had the same sequence. The report stated Wayne Williams cannot be excluded as a source of the hair. Williams' defense also raised the question of DNA testing on dog hairs, found on many of the bodies. Seven dog hairs from five cases were compared to hairs, from William the Williams family dog.

The hairs in the bodies contain the same DNA sequence as the German Shepherd, which only occurs in about one of the hundred dogs. D.A. Paul Howard said at a June 2007 news conference, this testing finally settles the debate over whether Wayne Williams

was the Atlanta child killer. He is. Exactly. If you look at any one of these things individually, maybe not 100% conclusive, but the totality, it's like, come on. Director Elizabeth Wickham told the AP that the results are fairly significant, but do not conclusively point to William's.

James Dog as a source of the hair. April of 2015 now, U.S. Department of Justice released a study that concluded that some hair analysis conducted by FBI examiners in the 80s and 90s may have failed to meet certain professional standards. Defense attorney Lynn Watley then announced the report would form the basis for a new appeal. Four years later, still haven't gotten that fucking appeal. March 21st, 2019, Atlanta mayor, Keisha Lance Bottoms, and Atlanta police chief Erica Shields announced that officials would retest evidence from the murders.

which would be gathered by the Atlanta police, Fulton County Diaz's office, and the GBI. Mayor Bottoms said at the press conference, it may be there's nothing left to be tested, but I do think history will judge us by our actions and we will be able to say we try. Mayor Bottoms was in elementary school when the killings began and remembered hearing the warnings

to not go outside alone. Her grandma and her aunt actually asked her mom to send her to Chicago to keep her safe. That's how scared they were. She recalled one incident when she and some other kids were waiting at the school bus stop and a car slowly drove by, and the kids scattered.

She said, quote, it was chaos. We all just took off running. Kids were crying. Everybody was hysterical. It was like there was a boogeyman out there and he was snatching black children. It's fucking crazy how much trauma one deranged loser

can inflict on a massive city. Five Atlanta child murder cases remained open in DeKalb County and the police department said it would cooperate with Atlanta's efforts to finally solve them. Police Chief Erica Shield said the new investigation was not about Williams.

Williams telling the New York Times this is about being able to look these families in the eye and say we did everything we could possibly do to bring closure to your case. According to Chief Shields, police established a 15-year window ending in 1985 to review crimes that might be linked to the Atlanta child murders, but were not identified as such at the time. During that time period, 157 children were killed, including the 24 Atlanta victims. My God. Atlanta police stated they would review the cases to determine the condition of evidence and whether it could be tested or retested. Bottom said during the press conference,

technology has changed tremendously, and there might be evidence that has not been tested or evidence that has been tested that would benefit from retesting. Shields also noted the fact that I had to work to find out where the evidence was is indicative that no one had gone through it exhaustively. We need to exhaustively go through it and say, could this be looked at as evidence? The team determined that the 22 cases closed after Williams trial should have remained active. Shields emphasized, I'm not judging the officers. I am saying with Wayne Williams being convicted, it allowed all those boxes. is to be sealed, even if there was nothing in them that tied the victim to Wayne Williams, I think the investigators were under such political pressure that they were not allowed to do their

job to the extent they could. A hotline was established, and within days of the press conference, authorities received 50 new tips, 16 of which were sent to investigators, but they really wouldn't go anywhere. Uh, 2019, the New York Times spoke to Catherine Leach, a mother of victim Curtis Walker. She does not think Williams is a killer, although Curtis's killing was one of 10 classified as a pattern case linked to Williams. Danny, again, and a retired homicide detective who had investigated three of the cases said he understood why people believed Williams was innocent, in part because of the African American community's distrust of the police. Again told the New York Times, quote, a lot of folks want to hinge his guilt on the carpet fiber

alone. There was other evidence. More fibers and dog hairs brought into court, along with witness testimony, and there was the inescapable fact that Wayne Williams was on that bridge. And two bodies washed up days later. Wayne Williams is a serial killer, a predator, and he did the bulk of these murders. After the announcement was made, William said he was willing to cooperate with the investigation to find the truth in what happened at Weasel. The Wayne Williams Freedom Project hosted a press conference in Atlanta City Hall to release Williams' statement, which said, I just want to express my appreciation to the mayor and the concerned citizens of the city of Atlanta for bringing this case back to light in interest of justice. And I say this not just on

my behalf, but also for the families, of course, it's always about the families, who've never received, injustice, but their due consideration and regards to the human rights of their children that he killed. I just hope that not only will some answers come forth as far as the suspects and other persons who are responsible for these terrible crimes, but I also hope that we can get to the bottom of the social

conditions that led to this type of apathy in Atlanta. Which continues today. You know, the news media painted these kids to be street kids. Thugs. That is not the case. That's actually what he said. I stand fully ready and willing to cooperate with any renewed investigation to find the truth on what happened

when the purpose of straightening up any lies and misconceptions of my unjust conviction. Any official statements regarding me will come to the Wayne Williams Freedom Project. Fucking gag me. That's a great speech about kids given by a kid killer. Founder Jimmy Howard, Williams' attorney said at the press conference, what fuck is wrong with this guy? Faulty fibers, a splash off a bridge, a car that never stops, has taken the life of a man who was trying to make a difference out here.

Trying to make a difference to what? He didn't do shit other than fucking bankrupt his parents. November of 2019, the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles denied Wayne Williams. Appeal for parole. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah, he was up for parole recently. You know, fairly recently. That's crazy shit.

The reason for denial was, quote, insufficient amount of time served to date, given the nature and circumstances of your offenses. Next parole consideration is scheduled for just a little over a year from now. November of 2007, when he'll be 69. He's in good health, in good shape. Definitely could still overpower some kids with his badass karate moves, if given the chance. On July 16th, 2021, Mayor Bottoms issued an update in the reinvestigation, noting that investigators had extracted new DNA evidence and were hoping to have additional info in the next few months,

clear that it didn't happen because that was fucking over five years ago. Investigators had gone through 40% of the evidence to identify items that could be submitted for testing at a private lab. Investigators not sharing the names of the victims that researchers extracted DNA from. Fiber evidence, not quite done with Fiber Talk, also reanalyzed in all 30 of the cases, none of the reanalysis led to an appeal for Williams, still held up. Fibers fucking stayed strong.

They were able to send DNA for additional analysis in two cases, which obviously didn't lead to anything because nothing changed. The DNA samples delivered to Sorensen Forensics, a private lab in Draper, Utah in 2022. In December that year, some of the families called in the city to release the results. The DNA testing, Atlanta's police department said the investigation remained ongoing. June of 2020, city of Atlanta, dedicated the Atlanta Children's Eternal Flame Memorial

at City Hall to honor the victims of the Atlanta child murders, which is super cool and their families. Quote, this is a really beautiful event to remember this and to keep this out front because this same thing can happen again. The Reverend John Bell, father of nine-year-old victim, Yusuf Bell,

told the Atlanta Journal Constitution. Community awareness will make it very hard for this to happen again, he said. Goes to show that they are never forgotten. June Thompson, sister of victim Darren Glass, told GbP News. Their memories are always alive in our hearts, and this eternal flame is very beautiful.

The review of the Atlanta child murders, that were never solved remains open and ongoing. Williams, of course, maintains its innocence to this day. I mean, after this many years, why the fuck change? You know, why ruin a chance of parole? And that will take us out of this, one of the longest of our time suck timelines. Good job, soldier.

You've made it back. Barely. All right, so I don't know about you. I don't know how you feel about fibers. But I feel pretty certain that they got the right guy. Wayne Williams certainly had the means An opportunity to snatch You know all those different kids

He'd been talking to kids All around Atlanta of all ages Talking him into hopping into his car Or rather, you know, his dad or uncle's car Because that motherfucker was allergic to gainful employment For a few years Been driving him to various recording studios Talking about making him next big star and whatnot

You know, came out at his trial The people who knew him or knew of him Thought it was fucking weird How he was always hanging around kids Instead of people's own age Kids he never seemed to actually make any money off of never seemed to actually get an album produced that anyone fucking listened to.

Never got a record deal for anybody. Most seem to think, you know, maybe he was trying to make the next Jackson 5 or something though, but maybe he was, maybe that was part of his motivation. So what then became his motive to kill some of them? I do think a large part of it was sexual, right?

I don't think his sexual orientation was only homosexual. He may have liked adult men, but I think he certainly liked young boys. November 17th, 1982, Georgia's crime lab director, Larry Howard, told visiting police chiefs that Wayne Williams killed his victims to achieve a sense of power

and quote sexual gratification even though there was never any evidence of sexual contact. Howard, one of the forensic experts whose lab's fiber analysis proved crucial in tiny Williams to his victims and he said, you can't separate power from sex.

Sexual gratification includes a sense of power. So in a broad sense, yes, there was sexual gratification in the killings. And he added, he was a nobody who wanted to be a somebody. But in order for him to feel he had power, he had to show others he had power. Right, very astute. And then he added, we knew he was ego deficient because he responded to the newspapers. He put bodies in the open so

they could be found. He enjoyed our puzzlement. We knew he was a loner because no one responded to a $100,000 reward. Regarding why he changed his victim type toward the end of the killing tower, said, we knew he killed from a position to trust because autopsy showed the victims were killed most by asphyxiation with very little struggle. And as a suspect got braver, he killed individuals who were stronger. We could see him, gain confidence. I mean, that analysis sounds better than anything else I could find.

Sounds pretty damn good to me. Outside of any possible sexual motivation, you know, he wanted to feel powerful. You know, not that the two couldn't coincide like we just went over, but, you know, he wanted to feel powerful because he felt, you know, so fucking weak, I'm sure, in every way. He so desperately, clearly wanted to be the big man, to be seen as strong, but he wasn't.

You know, not a big guy. Five, seven, when he was arrested, just a little over 180 pounds, but not muscular, just pudgy, wore big, thick glasses, had not taken any martial arts training or anything like that, but claimed he had.

Probably just learned some moves from fucking TV or something, shit that might impress little kids, claimed all sorts of macho shit, actually, like he was a fighter pilot, would also claim, and I didn't mention this before, in finding myself, this fucking whack-a-doodle,

unpublished manuscript, written as an autobiography while in prison that as a teenager, he had been recruited and trained for espionage at a secret government camp in North Georgia. He copyrighted this fucking manuscript. He was so proud of it. He said he was given a license to kill.

Seriously. Dude actually told people who's part of a secret CIA junior officer training program alleged that this training included firearms, explosives, military style, unarmed combat techniques. FBI noted he was prone to delusions of grandeur like this.

Excuse me. Check out him being confronted about this. This embarrassing delusional claim in 2010 by CNN reporter Soledad O'Brien. Such a good journalist, by the way. I love that it appears as if he forgot he wrote this. She seemed to have caught him completely off guard here. When we returned to prison for our final interview with Wayne Williams, we had one question he was not expecting.

What Wayne had written about being recruited for espionage training, as a teenager. At a secret government camp hidden in the woods near this North Georgia Lake, where he was given what could amount to a license to kill.

Fuck you, bro. Fucking so hard. It's called finding myself. What's finding myself? He looks so confused. It reads like an autobiography. He looks so confused. Go ahead.

I'm serious. It's a account of your CIA training. Still confused We're not going to get in there. Oh yeah, that's on the road. That bullshit. We're not going to get into that.

I got a copy of it. Yeah, but we're not going to get into that. Why not? You're just simply not going to get into that. By his account, Wayne Williams was fresh out of high school, just 18 years old when he was initiated into a secret world. So I'll do the talking part, and you can answer what part of it you want. You write how you fired rifles, submachine guns, handled assault weapons,

grenades launchers, C4, learned unarmed combat techniques through this training group over weekends. He just tears in a blank leaf. Is it true or is it false? We're not going to comment on it. When you're 19 years old. You're saying you work for the CIA. You've been recruited. I'll let the document speak for itself.

We're not going to comment on it. Copyright 1992 by Wayne Williams. Is this an autobiography? How can I comment on that? Were you trained in unarmed combat techniques? Could you grab somebody bigger than yourself, put them in a chokehold? Because that's what that is. I'm sure there are other things in unarmed combat besides putting somebody in a chokehold.

Well, when I talk to the military experts and I say to them, what exactly does that mean? That's one of the things on their list. Top two things, by the way. I wouldn't doubt that. So are you trained in that or not? Let me say this. Let's just say that I had. some experiences that I do not want to comment on today for reasons that the document says, okay?

Uh-huh. The fact is, what does that have to do with the situation today? Everything. You tell me. It has everything to do with it. A big part of the conversation when I talked to your lawyers was, could Wayne Williams grab somebody? Did he have the strength? Look how he's not a big guy?

Could he, could he, could he grab someone in an unarmed combat technique and kill them? His face is like, oh, no, I fucked up. Oh, shit. It's like it finally dawned on him, almost 20 years after he wrote that and copyrighted it, that he had made himself look so much guiltier for anybody who would actually believe that nonsense. He just fucked over any possible defense claim of, I'm not strong enough to do that. Of course you are. Dude, you're Jason Bourne, right?

And I love how we kept repeating. We're not going to get into that. Why not? Oh, to be honest, I forgot. I wrote that bullshit. My bet. Who makes outrageous claims like that? Somebody who feels small and weak. Somebody who feels like a fucking loser. And he is a loser.

But he wasn't supposed to be, right? He carried the burden of big expectations. He was supposed to be a star. He was a smart kid in the classroom. Very smart. He was ambitious. He was hardworking as a kid. He was in Jet Magazine in July of 1974 when he was just 16,

when he was already interviewing a congressional candidate back when he had a radio station in his parents' basement that I'm sure he got a lot of, you know, adulation for. Back when so many people, I'm sure, thought he had so much potential. But turns out he had peaked in high school. That had to have stung. Right? He never went anywhere without potential. He became just a fucking delusional idiot.

He kept living at home where he blew all of his parents' money on dreams that were pipe dreams, ruined the lives of his most devoted supporters, his most devoted supporters, right, his parents. he was a has been by the time he was 21 when the murder started. I don't think that's a coincidence. By that time, more and more people were starting to question his sexuality. How many people in the music business were making fun of him, do you think?

Right, disrespecting him. I bet he was angry about it because of his big ego. Why didn't they realize he was a big deal? Right? He bullied his parents. Hit his dad, had a temper, dark side, started looking at a different group for respect than his peers. Little kids. I've seen fucking weirdos do this before.

People where their friends are like, get the fuck out of here, idiot. I'm not buying your bullshit. And then they start hanging out with people like five years younger than them, right? Kids who probably thought he was a big shot producer. And kids, maybe he wanted to have sexual relationships with. And when they rejected him, maybe he fucking snapped.

Right, showed him who's boss. Who was the big man? Big tough guy. Not a necropheliac, though. Didn't assault their corpses. Did he masturbate, though? Did he touch their bodies? You know, how he wanted after they died?

Maybe the trigger wasn't even sexual. Maybe they just pissed him off. Maybe part of it was racism, right? He was by many accounts. young black man who hated black people, maybe there was no trigger. And he just went out hunting some days and trick kids and letting him show them some supposed martial art move

and then choked him out. So he could just show himself how fucking tough he was. Whatever the initial motivation, I bet over time he started to really like to kill because it did feed his fragile ego. It reinforced his belief when he killed and got away with it that he actually was a big deal because he could outsmart investigators.

He could out smart the whole city of Atlanta. FBI couldn't even catch him, right? That had to have felt good. All speculation, of course, all armchair quarterback shit. We'll never know for certain because these guys never tell the truth. He still has supporters. He's got a foundation.

The Freedom Foundation. He's got people who believe he's a victim in all this. He's not going to burn those people. They're all he has left now that his parents are both dead. Looks like his dad went back to work as a freelance photographer, largely for newspapers in Georgia because he had to because he fucking lost his retirement. Homer died in Columbus, Georgia at the age 93. Thursday, October 5th, 2006, in hospice.

Mom Faye died 16 years earlier at the age of 73, July 12th, 1990 in Atlanta, I hope they're able to escape the stigma of being the parents of a serial killer in their final years. What a crazy story. Huge thanks to all the journalists who covered it, allowing for such a thorough examination,

especially Professor Bernard Headley, who sadly passed away in his home, home country as well of Jamaica in 2018 at the age of 72 of ALS. A dude spent his life doing deep dives on the underprivileged showing how societal economic forces affect different population groups. You could tell you he was a sense.

and brilliant guy in interviews. Rest in peace, Bernard. Hate that Wayne is still around and you are not. Time now for the takeaways. Time suck. Top five takeaways. Number one. From July of 1979 to May of 1981,

30 children, adolescents and young adults went missing and were murdered in Atlanta in the surrounding area. The cases became known as the Atlanta child murders and marked an incredibly dark and terrifying period in the city's history. Number two, were not for the FBI's bridge surveillance program, which began in April of 1981. Wayne Williams might have never been caught or would have been caught much later after a lot

of other people died. On May 22nd, 1981, in the final days of what was to be a 30-day surveillance program, a police officer patrolling a bridge, heard a splash in the water. Soon after, Wayne was spotted driving over that bridge, pulled over on the highway, officers questioned why he was driving over a bridge in the middle of night. Williams claimed he was searching for a client's address. in preparation for an early morning meeting. But that client was never found, probably because he made him up.

The stop officially put him on the police radar and launched the final stages of the investigation. Number three, officially, Wayne Williams was only charged with the murders of Nathaniel Cater and Jimmy Payne, whose bodies were found way down yonder than Chattahoochee. In April and May, 1921, although investigators and prosecutors were strongly believed he was Atlanta child killer, prosecutors felt that fiber evidence linking Williams to the child victims just wasn't strong enough to convince a jury that he had murdered over 20. children and young adults. Number four, Wayne Williams has always maintained his innocence in all the murders and has filed multiple appeals over the years in the late 80s and early 90s. Williams and his attorneys alleged that the police conspired to cover up the KKK's alleged involvement in the murders to avoid racial tension in the city, painting himself

as the scapegoat for the police's alleged corruption. And number five, new info. In 2019, three Atlanta men claimed they had all survived attempted abductions by Wayne Williams. Isaac Rogers said he escaped Wayne Williams' clutches when he was just seven years old. It was around that time that a 16-year-old brother, Patrick Rogers, one of the known victims, went missing.

November 10th, 1980, Patrick had walked Isaac to the school bus. He was found a month later by the Cobb Police and the Chattahoochee. Isaac said he, too, almost became a victim while walking to a neighbor's apartment with two cousins after that incident. A stranger emerged out of nowhere. Isaac recalled, quote, as we got ready to exit her porch and walk down the stairs, that's when the guy that I now know is well.

Wayne Williams stepped forward from behind the wall to block us from going down the stairs. Rogers told people in a separate interview, I remember how vividly calm he was, like he was on a mission, which told me he had done that before. His cousins ran away, left him by himself. He said, the only thing I could do was turn back around, which is what I did. I went back, I started to beat on Miss Willie May's door to get her to open that door. Williams was still approached him when you came to the door. He said he made eye contact with the suspect, quote, I was able to tell in such detail what he was wearing.

Williams disappeared and Isaac saw him six months later when he was arrested. Isaac recalled, I told my mom, that's the guy. He suspected Williams came looking for him because he was interviewed by a magazine after his brother's body was pulled out of the river on December 8th, 1980. He said, once that magazine began circulating, that pretty much put a target on my back. And lo and behold, that's when Wayne came back. He came back to get me, try and tie up loose ends. Derwin Davis was 14 when he survived an abduction attempt. Davis went to the Atlanta Journal Constitution with his story

because with all the renewed attention, he wanted to make sure Williams was not recast as a victim. He said he didn't go to the police before because he didn't want to worry his family and he had never heard of the child murders. When Williams was arrested years later, Davis recognized him. Reporters with the Atlanta Journal Constitution could not verify Davis' account

because he didn't file a police report, but they did talk with three people who all said Davis had told them that exact same story years ago. One day in 1979, Davis was one day, walking to get a bus, go to a skate and rink where he was working. Car approached, the driver asked for directions, offered Davis a ride to work, and he accepted. On the way, the driver asked, where do you go to school?

Then asked, do you have any girlfriends? Then reached out and attempted to grab Davis' penis, but Davis elbowed him in the face. Davis not positive of the date the incident happened, but thinks it could have been July 21, 1979, when Teddy Smith last seen leaving the same skating rink where Davis worked. Also a man named Tim Thomas told Channel 2 action news in the spring of 2019 that Williams gave him a ride in the late 70s,

offered him money for sex, and also grabbed him. Thomas escaped. Dude fucking did it. They put the right sick fuck in prison. Time suck. Top five takeaways. The Atlanta child murders two-parter has been sucked. Thank you to the Bad Magic Productions team for all their help

and making time suck. Thank you to the queen of bad magic, Lindsay Cummins, give me the space to do this. Thanks to Logan Keith, helping to publish this episode, designing merch for the store at bad magic productions.com.

Thank you to Olivia Hernandez, formerly Olivia Lee, for the initial research. Sorry, I keep calling you Olivia Lee still, Olivia Hernandez. She went deeper on this one than any previous topic she's worked on. And, yeah, I've continued to forget

to update her name after her marriage. Congrats, if I didn't say it publicly here before. Also, thanks to the all seen eyes, moderating the culturally curious, private Facebook page, the Mod Squad, making sure Discord keeps one and smooth, and everybody over in the time sucks subreddit and bad magic subreddit. One important announcement

for jumping into the updates. I didn't want to put this up front to mess up the flow, but as I mentioned last week, the eighth annual bad magic giving tree is upon us. Gift card donations are open October 6th to November 16th and the name submission open October 5th through October 15th.

As a community, we will be ensuring that 35 families have a badass holiday this year who otherwise would not. Listen closely for details. If you're driving or in a place where you can't take notes, you can visit badmagicproductions.com and get all this info. This year's process will mimic last year's process. Everybody who would like their kids to be considered needs to email only your first and last name to giving tree 2026 at bad magic productions.com. Nothing else because we're just going to take those names, enter them into a random generator, and allow zero favoritism. Everybody will receive an email, regardless of outcome. Submit your name between October 5th and October 15th,

names will be accepted after October 15th. By October 24th, everybody will be notified. Those whose names were picked from the hat will be given next steps. As in years past, we will be applying the December monthly donation to this amazing giving tree, and we'll be giving this money right back to our community. We continue to ask and encourage our community to donate Amazon gift cards to the cause. After a lot of trial and error, we found out that's the most efficient way for us to do this. For every, excuse me, extra dollar donated to the cause, Lindsay and I will personally

match up to $13,000. If you have $10, you know, or more that you'd be willing to donate, please do. It all adds up. Last year, the fans sent in an additional $14,000. If you're able to help, please go to Amazon.com to purchase a digital gift card. When prompted for a recipient email, please enter GivingTree 2026 at bad magic productions.com. And again, you can go to badmagicproductions.com for all of this info. And with that, let's now head on over to this week's TimeSucker Updates.

Our first update this week. From those sent in to Bojangles at Timesuckpodcast.com comes in from wanton violence advocate, J.B. And J.B. sent in a very entertaining message with the subject line of, Punch to the face results in good behavior, but not like you'd think. J.V. wrote, good morning, Dan,

and the rest of the Time Suck team. I'm behind on the catalog, so I just listened to the Andrew Higgins episode. And at the end, he said something about how if people got punched in the face, more often, they'd be better behaved. It reminded me of a situation I encountered when I taught sixth grade a few years ago. One of my students, let's call him Andrew, decided one week to just continuously try and harass another student. Let's call him Jacob. Now, Jacob is at least four,

five inches taller it was than Andrew, and a good 50 plus pounds heavier. What made Andrew choose to poke the bear, I'm not sure, but he was doing it all week trying to rile him up. Well, Jacob had had enough. After lunch one day, he walks into the social studies class that he has Andrew and swiftly punches him in the face. A small fight ensues, but is broken up quickly. Andrew was out of school on suspension OSS for two days. Jacob got OSS for 10 days. Some backstory context.

Andrew and Jacob were both in my English class. Andrew loved to not pay attention and try to make his friend Trevor laugh across the room, but was largely not a huge challenge. Jacob spent almost every day trying to sleep through whatever we were doing. And when I could get him to stay awake, he was not interested in whatever we were doing. Flash forward to the day Jacob comes back from suspension. He is not only wide awake and energized, he's also the biggest participant in class.

At the time, I would give tickets to scholars who were following expectations and or participated in class. At the end of each class, I would collect all the tickets and draw a handful of names to get a small prize. Jacob had about five tickets to put in. Rarely did he ever earn tickets in the past. And I wanted to encourage this behavior, so even if I didn't pick his name,

I was planning to rig it so he'd get a reward. Love it. I didn't have to because he was the second one I drew out. After school, I emailed his mom the following. I wanted to let you know how proud I am a Jacob today in class. This past month, it's been really difficult to get him to buy into really anything in class, and I was getting a little worried about that since our next unit, argumentative writing, is going to be more rigorous than our last one. However, today, while we started our guided notes on a general overview of the components of an argumentative essay, not only was Jacob engaged, but he was actively participating

the whole time. I don't think it would be a stretch to say he raised his hand to answer questions more today than he has in the past few months. After class, I pulled him aside and I told him how proud of him I was. I also told him that he had now set the bar high for himself and showed me what he is capable of so he can't slip back into his previous behavior. His mom responded with, Thank you so much for sharing and your kind words of encouragement mean a lot. He needs it more than you may think.

He came home excited to tell me about what happened in class today, which surprises me because I've been on his back about his composition and science grades. I hope his enthusiasm and effort continue as these last two terms will really determine whether or not he will be going to overnight camp for the summer, his absolute favorite thing about summer. I know he's capable and I will continue to encourage him to do well. Thank you for the update. When I talked to our special education teacher about it, I said, clearly he just needed to punch Andrew in the face. And from then on, whenever we had a student acting up in class, the special ed teacher and I would joke that maybe they just need to punch Andrew in the face real quick. I'm also happy to say that he was able to go to his overnight summer camp that year.

He has also continued to be a strong scholar, even winning the award for most outstanding scholar at the end of his eighth grade year. He is currently thriving as a freshman, and I can't wait to have him as a student again when he gets to 11th grade. So moral of the story, maybe we all just need to punch Andrew in the face from time to time. Not sorry for the long email, three to five stars, wouldn't change the thing. If you do happen to read this on air, please shout out my boyfriend Josh, who I've shared time suck with. he is currently going to the back catalog.

So who knows? We know here this, but I've had shit luck with dating my whole life and I'm so genuinely happy to have met him. I truly think he's everything I've been waiting for and more. Sincerely, J.B., thanks, first off, for being a great teacher

in trying times for teachers. Thanks for sharing Andrews pain. I fucking love that story. Yeah, maybe some of us need to get punched in the face to turn things around, but maybe some others amongst us need to punch somebody else in the face, right? I like that.

You know, there are a lot of people. I would like to punch the face. But usually, uh, I only think about the potential negative consequences of doing that, like an assault charge, a lawsuit, get my ass beat. But what if punching somebody else in the face? You know, maybe after a bit of like legal punishment, just really added so much positivity to my life. Like, what if I punched some fucker in the face? It reinvigorated me, gave me a new zest for life. And then I wrote the best story I've ever written. It was turned into a movie. And then the press tour, when they asked me how it all came to be, I can be like, oh, I fucking punched Mike in the

face. I should have done a long time ago. Felt so good. Nothing's been better. You know, nothing's ever felt better than punching that motherfucker on the face. I've never been so inspired. Best of luck with your new relationship with Josh, J.B. Hope it continues to be everything you've ever wanted. And next up, some much appreciated boner talk from Boner appreciator, Ashley M. Boner, Ficciano, who wrote in with the subject line of Boner Cemetery. Greetings from St. Louis, aka the hometown of Triple M.

Longtime listener, first time writing. I love the show, this one, and scared to death. Thank you, while enjoying the recent Franklin Conspiracy Suck. what a fucking crazy episode. I was amused by the boner jokes. And remember, there was a family of boners from my hometown, West Frankfurt, Illinois. They were one of the founding families of the town.

Due to this fact, the cemetery in the town is called Boner Cemetery. It doesn't stop there. Boner Cemetery is off of Woody Road. I'm attaching the Google Map image, which you can verify it exists. It was part of the reason I moved away because if you choose interment down there,

it is just an eternal dick joke. That's it. Just a line to tell you in case you're unaware, there is a double dick joke cemetery situation in rural southern Illinois. Keep making awesome stuff and tell Lindsay I said hi, or if she sees this, hi, Lindsay, you rock Ashley. Oh, Jesus Christ, Ashley's so good.

I did verify that fucking map. And there is an eternal triple fucking boner joke there. Yeah, this is so good. I looked at the map, and I was looking around a little bit more, and I'm like, oh, there's more, right? Because there's boner cemetery. and then it's not just off of Woody Road, not making this up.

Boner Cemetery is honestly located off of Old Johnson City Road, so, you know, one might say Old Dick City Road between the cross streets of Boner Road and Woody Road. I looked up a list of the 1,400 plus people buried there.

I could not find a Richard Boner, but there is a Richard King buried there. A Dick King buried off of Woody Road and Boner Road at Boner Cemetery. The fucking Dick King, of course. course where else would be buried uh there's an olive boner kind of a funny one this one's a little bit sad but also it's been they died a long time ago like a century ago so maybe kind of funny now there's a

grave of an unnamed infant but but the grave site does say infant boner uh i'm probably a horrible person for laughing to that uh huge huge johnson nolan gets a special mention uh his first and middle name combination is literally one later away from him being huge johnson huge johnson huge johnson Laid to Rest in Boner Cemetery along Woody Road. Thank you, Ashley. We should all thank you. And finally from Caitlin, a fantastic sack,

wrote him with the subject line of The Charity MLM from hell. This cracked me up. Good morning or evening. I don't know your schedule, man. Master Sucker 3000 and the whole bad magic crew. Long time. First time, but after listening to the MLM episode,

figured you'd like to hear about my very first job as a dumb 18-year-old. Now, this was not officially an MLM job, but they structured our work this same. name was one. Now before I get into this, please understand I was freshly moved out of my family home away from a very toxic situation, willing to take any job that would have me. I'm a little more grown up now. Looking back on this crazy time, it is so crazy to me now, but you know, we live and we learn. To start my, excuse me, interview was full of red flags. So many red flags, it was crazy. Carlos, my new

boss, explained that we would be working with a charity, which I will not name because they're actually a good cause, by standing at tables, set outside of different businesses, and asking people walking by if they would like to donate. Easy, right? He spent most of the time talking about how he only wanted to hire entrepreneurs. And now anyone who quit in the winter

when business slowed down as less people went out and about were losers who were a waste of his time. Took almost an hour to get him to talk about pay, which he would just keep saying should not matter. What the fuck? But finally said it was a commission-based job

that had multiple tiers of leadership. So yeah, it does feel very MLME. Starting out, if one could get at least $700 in commission three weeks in a row, you would become a level three supervisor who trained new hires and was responsible for making sure they succeeded.

Then if three of those people under you also became supervisors, you would reach level two supervision where you could earn a percentage of the commission made by those directly beneath you. And if three of their people became supervisors each, you would reach level one supervision where you made a percentage of every person

under all of them and would get your own office and start managing from there. Are you following along? Because I was not, but I needed a job and at the time I had no better offer. to start off, it was just Carlos and I, just to do you. And when I started,

it was the middle of summer and things went great. Within my first month, I made level three. And even though my boss and I butted heads, a lot about how persistent I should be with people

as I took people's nose as the end of the interaction, he insisted, you should not stop trying until they just are too far away to continue, but it was fine. Then others started getting hired and my new job was to try and sell them

on this dumb job. Most were smarter than me, saw through the bullshit, but there were, a few that became a part of my little team, and I took my responsibility to them very seriously. Every morning we would all show up to the office and meet each other in the parking lot, talk about whatever we felt like on the way up. Carlos did not like this. He would tell us almost every day that, quote, true entrepreneurs come in early and work on their pitch. They don't

chit-chat in the parking lot. This, of course, did not stop us. We were all struggling to make sales as the weather had changed and people were going out less and less. And we'd all learned not to mention this anywhere in earshot of Carlos. Things were going downhill very fast for all of us. Each week we got a list of places where we'd be going, and Monday morning we would divide up who went where and when. And in those meetings, it was always clear who he liked and who he did not like. I always managed to get a good location, though there was a price to pay, and that was creepy comments and accidental touches. The rest would get whatever was left. Once a co-worker, a 40-year-ish man, who I had become good friends with, made a lighthearted comment about how creepy

Carlos was towards me, and spent the next two weeks outside of big lots in the middle of nowhere, that eventually closed are the only people going in being drug addicts using the bathroom to either sleep or use. The final straw for most of us came a few months later. God, he was sent to fucking Big Lott's hell. The final straw came for us a few months later. The same coworker

was sent to the hospital for a big kidney stone. I don't know if you've ever had a kidney stone, but it's not fun. He was under strict orders to sit as much as possible until it fully passed, and he was cleared by a doctor. Since sitting was a sin in customer service, this meant he could not work until that time. He tried to come in, but I took one look at his face,

dragged him back to his car and sent him home. Every day, Carlos would mock me, even saying that he was a waste of space. At the same time, another one of my team had to leave her location a few times early to pick up her daughter, which was, of course, completely unacceptable, QI roll to Carlos.

I took most of the heat for that as I was the one who told her she could go. Again, how dare I let someone put their child before work, the audacity? So we all started looking for new jobs. We had a group chat, where we would send each other different openings and help with resumes.

I'd finally found something at a gas station, put my two weeks in, which got me a very long lecture on how disappointed Carlos was. I actually left a week early after being threatened by a homeless man with a knife at the start of my day and then being told by Carlos to, quote, just keep working. Two others left a week later, after he called one some type of slur, then the rest just dropped their stuff off and never came back. There were plenty of other problems as well that I won't get into here, but you get the picture.

Six years later, I still hear him telling us, you just have to have that entrepreneurial spirit. So whenever the subject of MLMs and their structure comes up, I go back to that time in my life and feel anger. It's hard to describe why I stayed as long as I did, but I like to sum it up in one word, stubbornness. I knew I could do it, and the idea of giving up did not seem like an option. Of course, we were a bit luckier than those who joined MLMs

as we did not have to pay anything to join, but the hours spent trying every time we wanted to go home or take time a personal day for stuff was made out to be a crime, not to mention sexual harassment. But I'm older now, and to be honest, kind of nice to have things to look back on and see that I've grown, even if just a little bit. It all ended well.

I got that new job at a gas station, which also sucked in its own way, but I cannot imagine my life taking any other path because then I wouldn't have met my amazing husband and have been living my almost best life at the beach. I apologize for the length and girthus email, but I know you can take it.

I also apologize for the rambliness of it all, but I'm writing this to my day off, and I may or may not have indulged in some of the devil's lettuce because I'm a good girl who goes peepee on the potty and I can do what I want. I hope that whoever's reading this has an amazing day, and I can't wait to hear the next crazy thing. Dan decides we need to hear about your little

spaces or Caitlin. P.S., one last quick crazy story from working there. My boss found out I was bisexual and then asked me if I was planning on sleeping with his 14-year-old daughter who worked in the office sometimes. Don't ask me why that was the first thing that popped into his head, but I still think about that comment to this day. Yeah, Carlos sounds like he's fucking dumb as a rock. Katelyn, I very much was entertained by your ramblings. What an odd experience. odd experience to look back on. But glad you did that when you were fresh out of high school, right? Not decades later.

Now it'll just be an amusing story you get to carry through life. It really is crazy just how many weird people are out in the world. And it feels like right now there isn't a special, especially a lot of them, just an abundance of fucking weirdos. I think this episode with how strange Wayne was outside of the killings just has me thinking about that. Yeah, so many weird. My cousin Matt once traveled door to door for summer selling steak knives, 100% commission, no salary.

At the end of the summer, he realized if you just would have gotten a minimum wage job, he would have made so much more, right, than if he'd been paid for all the hours. He was knocking on people's door, asked him if they wanted some fucking knives. Two friends of mine in college, these two brothers worked a summer driving some sort of van around and knocking on people's doors and getting him to try and buy frozen meat. I know I've told this story somewhere before, but a good friend of mine's dad legit made hand-carved wooden dildo gear shifters for stick shift muscle cars online. Talk about niche.

actually thought there could be good money in that. Never sold a single one as far as I know. And of course not. That's fucking insane. I once worked with some women who sold their worn panties online to dudes who just wanted to sniff them. There are so many weird fucking ways to make money. So many odd people out there who think, like their way, like pressuring people for donations and a fucking big lot's parking lot, is a ticket to the good life. Why do people do that?

I think people think they can outsmart the system, right? People like Wayne, I'm not going to get a straight job. I'm going to be a big time producer, be fucking rich in family. famous immediately. People who probably get just a rush out of the chase, maybe kind of like a gambling addict, you know, chasing a big jackpot. Keep sending your strange stories in meat sacks. I never get tired of hearing them. Hail Nimrod, everybody. I'm suckers. I needed that. We all did. Well, thank you for listening to another bad magic productions podcast. Please rate and review

time suck if you haven't already. If you're feeling small this week, don't try and make yourself feel big by killing some kids. Maybe, I don't know, try volunteering somewhere. Maybe volunteer with some kids. A lot of places are always in need of, you know, more people who want to help others. It'll make you feel bigger because you will be bigger. And you'll be helping other people feel bigger too.

Doesn't that sound nice? If you don't want to do that, at the very least, could you at least just keep on sucking? And magic productions. Hello, you are listening to the new Wayne Williams Morning Show. I didn't do it. It is the only local morning show broadcast out of Georgia's Tel Fair State Prison. Oh, yeah.

I'm your host, Wayne Williams, right here on WRAZAM, and I didn't do it. Today I'll be interviewing Aiman Presley, another innocent man falsely accused and convicted of multiple murders. But we won't be talking about that. Now, we're going to be talking about our days spent being trained by the CIA in the woods when we were both given licenses to kill. We're going to be talking about how we could have killed our victims. with throne stars, nunchucks, katana samurai swords or our bare hands. We could have killed them with our bare hands

even if we've been handcuffed, blindfolded, stuffed in a sack, dropped off a bridge, thrown into a river way down yonder on the Chattahoochee. That's how lethal we are. We're so highly trained. We could easily overpower every guard in this prison right now, strutting out of here, then kill any and all cops sent to bring us back to prison,

but we won't because he didn't do it, and I didn't do it. We're not illegal killers. We're going to wait for our fair shot in court. Speaking of which, if you're a good lawyer and happen to be hearing this while visiting a client, which is the only way you would hear this, since the signal doesn't make a pass of prison walls, hit me up. 229-868-7721.

Again, that's 229-8-68-7721. That is the phone number for the Telfer State Prison, and also for the new Wayne Williams Morning Show. I didn't do it!