True Crime All The Time - Jessie James Cummings

Episode Date: June 17, 2019

Jessie James Cummings was a polygamist who lived in Oklahoma with his two wives and family. He kept everyone under strict control through verbal and physical abuse. In 1991, Jessie made the decision that he wanted his half-sister Judy Moody Mayo dead. He accomplished this by pressuring his wives into helping him make that a reality. Then, Jessie murdered Judy's 11-year-old daughter Melissa.Join Mike and Gibby as they discuss what is undoubtedly one of the most messed up family trees we have ever covered. This case is tragic but also fascinating for a number of reasons. How does a man get his wives to kill for him? This case came down to the testimony of Jessie's two wives, Sherry and Juanita, against him. And it was that testimony that caused him to be ultimately executed. Many people have wondered over the years if that alone was enough to put a man to death.You can help support the show at patreon.com/truecrimeallthetimeVisit the show's website at truecrimeallthetime.com for contact, merchandise and donation infoSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

everyone and welcome to episode 135 of the true crime all the time podcast. I'm Mike Ferguson and with me as always is my partner in true crime. Mike Gibson, give me how are you? Hey man, I'm doing really well. That's good. We're back from CrimeCon. Yeah. We got sick as can be. Absolutely. Somehow, either on the way back on the 13 flights we had to take to get back to Dayton, Ohio. It was rough. Or in meeting everyone, I don't know, who knows, but caught some. something both of us did. Maybe that communal cup that we passed around that everybody drank out of. Communial?

Or the communal? Communal. One of those. One of those two. One of those. Yeah, it's probably not good to just buy one beer and pass it around the whole bar. When we say, we're going to get to your beer. We should start buying our own beers.

Yeah. But we had a lot of fun, right? Met a lot of great people. Big. CrimeCon was big this year. It gets bigger every year. Yeah. Huge, man.

And some people we met for the third year in a row. Yeah, the original people, man, from day one. Oh, G's. Oh, geez. And some people we met for the first time. There were couples that, you know, drove from Jacksonville, Dallas that said they, they just wanted to meet us, which is unbelievable. People came in from Ireland. Yeah, we had people in from Ireland. So I'm not going to name any names. In past years, I've named names. And there's just too many people. And I feel like it would be a disservice. It would let some folks down. because I'm going to forget. There's no way to sit here and list everybody.

Too many. But it was great. And the people that we hung out with, they know who they are. Yeah. And I love you all. So that's it for another year of CrimeCon. And they announced that it's going to be in Orlando next year, the first week of May, I think. Couldn't believe it.

I finally got that. Did you get your tattoo also? Yeah. Okay. So you and I both got, I know we didn't do it together. No, I mean, they said that you were, they were taking you down later. and this is what we needed to get. So I thought it was different,

but I mean, I followed what they said to do. Because you do. That's just the way you do. So I haven't seen it yet. It's on my back of my, you know, lower hip. So I can't really get a good look at it yet. But I'm sure when the bandage comes off, it should be something cool,

maybe a K bar or something. All right, Gibbs, let's give our Patreon shoutouts. We had Skyler Young that came out of our highest level. Hey, thanks. Leslie Cameron. That's awesome. Joseph Frescas came out of our highest level. Freskis.

Griffin Moore. Hey, Griffin. Amelia Thompson. Hey, Amelia. Hinkle. Hey, Haley. Gina Gandy came out of our highest level. Hey, Gandhi.

Angie. Andrew. Deb Alexander came out of our highest level. Yes, she did. Thanks, Deb. Christine Weeby. Oh, hey, weby. Alisa.

Harleen Avent at our highest level. What's up, Avent? Gemma. Jennifer Haring. Hey, Jennifer. Fatima Elsa Dottie. Oh, Elsa Dati. Katie Marshall.

What's up, Katie? Greg Gad Boys. Hey, Greg. Jenny Murray. What's up, Jenny? Beth Allen. Hey, Beth. Alex Stonich.

Oh, Stonich. Kara Medina. Medina. Jamie Holmes. What's going on, Holmes? Kay Kroniski. Hey, Kreniski. Ronda Baker.

What's up, Rhonda? And David Gibson. Hey, thanks, bro. Jumped out at our highest level. And then if we go back into the vault. Let's do it. This week, we selected Jeff Cook. So, Jeff's been with us a long time.

We appreciate it. Yeah. You know, we love the new support, but we also really appreciate the long time. We do. Patreon support as well. It's amazing. It is. Thanks, Jeff.

We had some great PayPal support, Beverly Bruce. Hey, Beverly. Ben Goodrich. Thanks, Ben. Mary Ashley. That's awesome. Stephen Wills. Thank you.

Shila Green. Hey, Shela. Chelsea Camp. Thanks, Chelsea. And Jerylinson. Hey, G. So, awesome. You know, speaking of Patreon, we got some things coming up in the next couple weeks.

Next week, we have a Q&A episode. And then the week after that, we have our monthly Patreon-only episode coming out. Busy two weeks. Yeah, it really is. Right now there's an episode of True Crime All the Time Unsolved. We're talking about the Father's Day bank massacre. So timely. Perfect timing.

Being that it's Father's Day. This is a story about a bank robbery and a very, I would say a very untraditional bank robbery. Sure. You know, kind of happens. when the bank is shut down. They're processing a very large amount of money in the vault, cash vault, $2 million. Somebody eventually works the way into the bank, murders for unarmed guards, still some of the money. And it goes from there.

And we go from there. So check that out. All right. Let's get into this episode of True Crime All the Time. Are you ready? I'm ready. We are talking about Jesse James Cummings. So we're going to Oklahoma.

Okay. Small town, Oklahoma. Jesse James Cummings was a polygamist. He was a murderer. And if you believe everything that happened in this story, he was somehow able to convince his wives to kill for him. And the thing that really got me about this one, we're not talking about a guy who, you know, was out murdering strangers. Not that that's good, right? That's horrible in its own right. Jesse murdered and had a hand in the murders of his own family members. It's a very strange story, Gibbs, to say the least. I think, you know, people will see that as we dive into the details right off the bat. One of the strangest things to start off with is the fact that nobody can seem to agree on how to spell this guy's name. I've never seen or researched a case like this. you will see his name, his first name spelled J-E-S-E. Okay. You also see it spelled J-E-S-S-I-E. To me, that is the correct spelling. But, I mean, we're talking newspaper articles, you know, very big papers spelling his name incorrectly. Just all over the place. All over the place. Yeah. Why not J-E-S-Y? I don't, I don't know. I did not see it spelled that way. But, you know,

I think some of the confusion comes from this, right? Jesse James. His name is Jesse James. The outlaw spelled his J-E-S-S-E. To add to it, his dad's name is Jesse. And his dad spells his name J-E-S-S-E. Okay. But yet for some reason,

they spelled the son's name J-E-S-S-I-E. So like I said, it's just the beginning of what is a very strange case. Definitely different. I don't know why there's so much confusion. Like I said, maybe it's the outlaw thing. Maybe it's the fact that his dad's name, you know, is spelled that way. But it's a real head scratcher.

Yeah. Well, typically when you take your dad's a similar name, I mean, if you take your dad's name, you take the name the way it's spelled out. Exactly the way. Yeah. Yeah. So then you become Jesse Cummings Jr. Yeah.

Maybe he didn't want to be a junior. Maybe, hey, we'll put an eye in between the S and E and then you want to be a junior. I think he was named that way as a baby. Yeah. I don't think he, was as a baby said no what no put the eye in before the e how cool would that have been but i actually spent an inordinate amount of time researching this guy's name so you and i have researched a lot of backgrounds right for the high number of cases that we've done right i don't know

i don't know gibbs if i've ever seen the background of basically everyone involved in a case be as horrible as this one is. So we've seen a lot of horrible backgrounds for killers. This one extends not just to the killers, to the victims, to their extended families, their moms, their dads.

It was as though everybody connected to this big branched family just kind of had a very horrible childhood. And I don't think their life was that great either, to be honest with you. They definitely had a rough go at it. And obviously, we can't get into, every single detail, but some of it's very sorted. You know, talks about incest and, you know,

some things like that. But let's start out talking about Jesse James Cummings. He was born in 1955 in Modesto, California, to Marie and Jesse Cummings. Jesse had a baby sister come along six years later, but to really tell this story, I think we have to go back and dig into the parents' lives a little bit. We do this every now and then, right? Not a lot that we actually dig into the perpetrators' mom and dads and things like that. But in this case, I think it's essential because Jesse was the sixth child born to his mother and his younger sister Debbie was number seven.

So Jesse's mother, Marie, was born in West Virginia and his father was born in Oklahoma. but Marie had an interesting but very sad life before she ever met Jesse Cummings who became her husband later on she had a third grade education Marie did and at the age of 13 became pregnant after she was raped wow so had her first child at the age of 13 14 as a result of being sexually assaulted it's rough very rough so what she did was she married a local boy because she wanted her son to have a proper name. That son, his name was Eugene. He was later shot and killed in a bar fight in 1969. But this original marriage for Marie didn't last long. And when it was over, she married a man named Pete Runyon and had four children with him. And it's the

youngest of these four children, a daughter named Judy Runyon that is most central. And it's most central to this case. She's one of the victims in this case. Judy would become Jesse Cummings, half-sister, or step-sister, however you want to step-sister. Step-sister, I guess it would be. And ultimately, one of his targets. And this is where I said, Gibbs, this whole family intertwined with, you know, volatility and incest and sexual abuse. And it's really a kind of a, horrific family tree. A lot of dynamics in this relationship. Definitely. Definitely. I mean, Judy's father, Pete, molested her from a young age. And when her mom, Marie, and Pete divorced, somehow he got custody of all four kids, which is unusual, right? Very unusual, especially

in that time frame. So Marie later went on to marry Jesse Cummings. I know this is all confusing, trying to bring it full circle and hopefully we'll do that it's not a perfect circle that's for sure but you know i think we're back now around to the marie jesse cummings marriage which produced young jesse and debby right later on judy runyon having been so traumatized right by how horrible her father was to her how he is how he sexually abused her she changed her last name to Cummings and essentially viewed Jesse Senior, I'll call him that, just so there's less confusion, as her dad, which I don't blame her. Her dad was a real piece of shit. And you see that today with some families that they end up taking their stepdad's name.

Now we talk about Judy a little bit. Got married young, got married when she was 15 to a man named James Henry Moody, whose nickname apparently Gibbs was Tinky. Tinky. That seems like a strange nickname to me. Nothing, nothing is a nickname you really want to have. Hey, Tinky. It's not promoting an image of masculinity in any way. What's going on, Tinky? But, you know, everybody's got their nicknames.

Yeah. Judy had eight children while she was married to Tinky. Very fertile woman. Well, she was, but these were not all Tinky's kids. So she had a large number of kids. with various men is the way it's reported. You know, some reports claim that some of the fathers were relatives of Tinky. And like I said, I don't know how else to tell this story.

It's a very sordid, twisted kind of family tree. Yeah, the dynamics are definitely interesting. It's a sad situation. And the majority of her children were taken away from her and Tinky because they mistreated them over the years. But it's really Judy's youngest child that figures into this story. So I know we're giving a lot of background, but there's really only a handful of people that really play a big part in this story. Why do I feel like this family would have been prime candidates for the Jerry Springer show? Jerry Springer, I think a very twisted reality show that people would

have definitely watched, probably. So it was Melissa Moody? was her youngest child. She was born in March of 1980. And years later, Judy and Melissa, because Melissa was one of the children not taken away from Judy, they would end up in Tupelo, Oklahoma. Tupelo, Oklahoma. It is.

Yeah. I didn't know there was a Tupelo, Oklahoma. I knew there was a Tupelo, Mississippi, because that's where Elvis is from. But are we saying it right? Because I know every time we say, name an Oklahoma, we get in trouble. So maybe instead of a Tupelo, it's Tupelo. It's Tupelo.

Tupelo. Yeah, Tupelo. It is. I don't know what it is with town names in Oklahoma. We butcher them because they're not said the way they're spelled. Somebody will come back and say, no, it's Tuplei. It's very strange. But also ending up in Tupleau at some point is Jesse and Debbie.

So part of this family kind of all comes back together in Tupelo. Now, while she was in Oklahoma, Judy married another man. guy by the name of Eugene Mayo, 22 years or junior. Oh, wow. So she became known as Judy Moody Mayo. Judy Moody Mayo, which is very strange to say. But that was her name. But again, I think this was a strange partnership too.

You know, there were a lot of reports that Eugene was mentally disabled. He had some issues and it's thought that, you know, did she marry him for his disability? check. Again, these were not well off people. And then when you get into Jesse's childhood, right? Not great. It doesn't sound like any of the children born to Marie had a very good childhood. Jesse's dad went to prison for cattle rustling. Really? Yeah, I thought that was like 1800s, but I guess, you know, even into the 1950s and stuff, there were still some cattle rustling going on. Rex had a little bout with that. Did he? Yeah. It's hard to. get over. It is. His dad did five years. Then when he got out, he drove a truck. So I think the key here is that

Jesse's dad was not home. He was either in prison or even when he was out, he was a long-haul trucker, not home most of the time. And that left Marie in charge of the children, which was a terrible thing. Marie drank a lot. She had a bad temper and was said that she was both verbally and physically abusive to the children. I mentioned it. She only made it through the third grade. Yeah. She had a pretty rough go at it coming up.

And then she's basically left as a single mom, really. I happen to do it all. Yeah, I think she had a lot of things working against her. I mentioned the fact that she was sexually assaulted, had her first child at 13. she only had a third grade education. Yeah. You know, how many life skills did this woman learn? Yeah, probably not enough.

And then, you know, the alcohol probably helped numb the memories. No, I'm sure you're probably right. Help numb the memories. But I don't think alcohol has ever made anyone a better parent. And especially if you, if you're bringing issues into your parenting, not going to make them any better. No, not going to help. I think one thing is very clear. Marie was not ready to take care of these kids by herself with her husband off away so much.

She beat the children a lot. And it was said that Jesse had terrible headaches his whole life from an early age. But Jesse really followed in his mother's footsteps when it came to education, although he beat her by almost two years. He was in the fifth grade. As long as each generation does better than the generation before, you're eventually work yourself out of it. So by that logic in six generations, they'll have somebody that graduates from high school. Exactly. He was in the fifth grade when he dropped out. He didn't even finish the

fifth grade. So again, as we're telling this story, we're not talking about extremely intelligent people, right? Jesse was later tested in prison. His IQ was listed as 81. That's pretty low, no matter what scale you use. One story that I think really highlights Jesse's home life, you know, as a, as a kid, as a teenager, and probably for Debbie, too, for that matter, happened when Jesse was a teenager. So the story goes that his mom was drunk. And she wanted Jesse to go to the store to get her some more beer, as we all do once our kids are able to go get our beer for us. Yeah. He didn't want to go. So his mom got out the shotgun and she just started shooting at him. Oh, you're going to go get me my beer or you're going to take some lead bullet to your behind.

Yeah. Okay. That seems to be the way to motivate somebody. So he's running out of the house. His mom is firing a shotgun at him. I think Gibbs, when your mom pulls out the shotgun and starts popping off a few rounds in your direction, you start to get the hint real fast that. you may not be wanted around the house. Yeah.

You know, this may not be the family dynamic that you should be in. At the age of 18, Jesse married his first wife, a 15-year-old girl named Margaret. This relationship lasted about five years until Jesse started dating another woman, at which time Margaret left him. And again, Gibbs, I don't know how many times I have to say this. most women don't like it when a man that they're married to starts dating another woman. That's never really a good thing. For all the guys out there, let me clue you in on that.

Women don't, they don't take kindly to that. Yeah, they definitely don't want you seeing somebody else. It's kind of looked at it as a big no-no, I believe. Yeah, pretty big no-no. I think it goes both ways, by the way. It does go both ways. But in a lot of the stories that we tell, right, more often than not, it's the man who straying.

It happens both ways, but more often than not. It comes back down to just be loyal. Yeah, but this is another story where a homely looking man with an IQ of about 80 is able to essentially find love whenever, wherever he wants. And most of his life has more than one woman at the same time. Right. I mentioned polygamy right up front. But I do think Jesse learned from this experience because he seems to, from this point forward,

try to figure out how to have more than one woman in his life at the same time while both women know about it. And on top of that are okay with it. Again, I don't know how some of these guys pull this off. I mean, this is not Brad Pitt that we're talking about here. You'll see pictures of him. Maybe it was just his charm. Maybe he was funny, maybe he had a great personality. Yeah.

I don't think so. Something like that. I don't know what it was. I really don't. Maybe he was a Casanova. So Jesse married again. And just a few years later in 1983, met 17-year-old Cherry, who would become his wife in 1987 and would also give birth to

his daughter. I think he married a number of times. And I'm not going to try to keep track of them all. But he was married at quite. a few times. Two are more important than the others. He eventually married another woman by the name of Juanita in 1989. And it's Sherry and Juanita that Jesse is married to at the same time that are part,

you know, big players in this case. And like I said, they eventually moved to Tupelo, Oklahoma. So we got a big pot of gumbo here going on in Oklahoma. Nice little segue into, uh, New Orleans. I had some good gumbo in New Orleans. Gumbo. Because you couldn't really say it's getting into a big thing of red beans and rice.

It doesn't flow. It doesn't. No. It's got to be gumbo. Yeah. Judy is there with her daughter, Melissa. Jesse is there with his two wives. And at some point, he buys a house in Phillips, Oklahoma.

And his sister Debbie, too, right, is in the area as well. A lot of players here. One thing that I think is important to point out, because it's, going to come up later is Judy Moody Mayo's physical stature. It was reported Gibbs that she weighed in excess of 300 pounds. Okay. The reason I bring it up is like I said, it's going to come into play later when we're talking about the ability of certain people to move her body. So I'll just kind of preface it by saying that. Her daughter, Melissa, was described as being a very very, devoted daughter. You know, she doaded on her mom and essentially just always was with her,

always wanted to be by her side. It was a very close bond that Judy and Melissa had. Like most moms and daughters do. Yeah. All of this brings us up to 1991, right? This is where we were heading to. This is where we were trying to get to. Melissa's 11 years old. Jesse at this point is living with Sherry and Juanita, has two biological. children and one stepchild. His mother Marie has died, but his father is living with him in this house in Phillips. Jesse Cummings is a mobile home salesman. Oh, perfect.

Perfect for what? Perfect for him because he needs a lot of mobile homes of all those people, you know. But it's really his demeanor to his wives that I want to talk about. You know, Jesse Cummings was an extremely controlling individual. He kept very strict control over his entire family. And it was through intimidation. It was through coercion. He also physically and verbally abused his entire family, just as his mother had done to him so many years before.

His wives would later testify that he was not only violent, but he raped his own family members in an attempt to keep everyone under control. control. That was his method. He was a, he was a violent person. And I think we kind of mentioned it a little bit early on, but there have been many that have said that it appeared as though Jesse was trying to create this Charles Manson like scenario where he was able to control all the women in his life to such a degree that they would do anything he wanted them to do, including kill. And although it's not exactly like the Manson family, he was able to get his wives to ultimately do what he wanted. I got the impression from some of the articles that Jesse and Judy were somewhat close. While they were living in Oklahoma together in the years leading up to the murders, Jesse was said to have been a pretty decent mechanic.

He would fix Judy's car, help her out with things around the house. But at a certain point in 1991, Jesse comes. Cummings made the decision that he wanted Judy Moody Mayo dead. This is his own half sister, step sister. Stating this. Yeah, she has to die. So on September 4th, 1991, Jesse took his father, also Jesse, into Oklahoma City for a doctor's appointment.

But in the days preceding this doctor's appointment, he had been whispering into the ears of his wives that he wanted Judy dead. And he wanted them to carry it out while he was gone on this appointment with his dad. I mean, you can't make this stuff up. No. I mean, for him, he means perfect planning. He can get them to do it. He's not there. Great alibi. It's going to be the crux of this case, really. And it's exactly what happened. Right. It was Juanita, his wife Juanita that shot and murdered Judy. and then both wives tied her up in the basement. Now, it's been said that Jesse called home repeatedly to talk to his wives as though he was trying to see how they were progressing, how things were coming along.

Have you did it yet? Right. Where's the body? What are you going to do now? Plus, again, it helps his alibi. So he wanted them to kill Judy, which they did. And then he had them handcuff 11 years. old Melissa to the bed until he got home. This was his master plan, according to what comes out in

testimony. When Jesse got home that evening, he helped dispose of Judy's body near Atoka Lake. Then Jesse went back and got Melissa. He sexually assaulted her at the house. Then he took Melissa and along with Sherry drove out to a rural area in Choctaw County and he sexually assaulted Melissa again. This is an 11-year-old girl. Devastating, man. Then Jesse stabbed her to death and cut her throat. And then essentially just left her, tossed her body and drove back home. You'd have to treat somebody like that, a person, but a person that you know. A family member. Yeah. And on top of that, 11 years old. And 11 years old. I mean, literally has no morals, no, no, no,

truples, no, no, nothing like that. No. But again, go back to, and it's why I spent so much time talking about the family dynamic, the childhoods, the, the childhoods of the parents. This was a family tree that is not like most, right? It's not like yours or mine, not like most of the people that are listening to this podcast. This thing was fractured and it was jacked up going back generations. and the abuse and alcohol and all these other things kind of just kept being perpetuated, right,

throughout subsequent generations. One thing that I thought was very interesting is that, and I'm kind of getting ahead in myself, but I think this is the best place to talk about it, in a legal document that Jesse's, I believe his attorney submitted to the court years later, they actually had a document that was detailing out what it meant to be white trash. That's what the document was, it was actually called. So they were essentially saying this whole family was white trash. They called them that.

So it's just trying to wrap an explanation around. Yeah. Why they do what they do, how might, might not be normal in your society, but in this society, it's how things are done. I guess they wanted through this document to really relay to the parole board or whoever it was that was reviewing it. just exactly how bad these people's lives were. Right.

But what really got me was that the title had white trash in it. And I just very rarely see that in a legal type document. Yeah, it's definitely strange. But I mean, to me, it just sounds like trying to make excuses for their actions. Yeah, I think you could say that. I mean, I think from an attorney standpoint, they're trying to explain how these people lived, how they grew up, and the circumstances, you know, around their lives.

So a few days later, right, after all of this took place, it was September 8th, Jesse actually went to the police to report his sister and her daughter missing. So he took it upon himself to go. He told authorities that someone had told him they had seen Judy's vehicle out by a Toka Lake. And it looked like it was broken down, right? the hood was up. It looked like a car would look as if,

if something was going on with it and you were working on it. You know, for me to hear that, I mean, you would say, you heard this, but you didn't go check it out. Right.

And who did you hear it from? Yeah. Jesse gave authorities a description of what Judy and Melissa were wearing the last time that he saw them. And he added that he thought it was possible. Someone had picked them up. He also had pictures of both of them that, he gave to police. So again, he's really trying to be helpful. Yeah. At this point, he's acting like

a very concerned family member, something that you would expect a worried family member to do. But it was just the very next day that Judy's body was found floating in a pond near a Toka Lake by a fisherman and his wife. Her body was wrapped in a quilt and a mattress pad. The medical Examiner found gunshot wounds to her head and neck that were the cause of death. But it wasn't until the following month that 11-year-old Melissa was found. And by the time she was found, her body was so badly decomposed that it was to the point that it was essentially just a skeleton. It was skeletonized at that point. It was found by the side of a bridge over clear boggy river in Choctaw County. The medical examiner could not

really say with any certainty what her cause of death was. Well, when your skeleton eyes like that, how could they potentially? I mean, I guess they could see if they got like an indentation into the skull. Or if you have a bullet hole. A bullet hole. There are certain ways. Yeah, but otherwise strangulation, things like that, you never know. No, there's certain things that it would be very, very hard to tell.

Now, one thing they did note was that there were some marks on. some of Melissa's ribs that they thought possibly could have come from a blade. Could, yeah. And this will play in later on. They thought, okay, it was possible that she was stabbed, some nicks on, on some of the ribs. Police investigated the murders of the mother and daughter, but they couldn't pin them on anyone. And what was very interesting was the fact that Jesse Cummings was keeping tabs on the investigation. And apparently he even had like this little small notebook that he kept with him at all

times to help him keep his story straight when he was interviewed. So not too dumb after all. Well, for a guy with an IQ of 80, you know, that seems like a fairly intelligent thing to do. He was interviewed a number of times, right? He was interviewed. Sherry was interviewed. Juanita was interviewed over a number of years. It's going to take three years. It's going to take three years for police to solve this case. So that's a long period of time. It is a long period of time. To keep your story straight, you need a special notebook for that. The sheriff later came out and said that he was amazed. Every time that he would go and talk to Jesse, Jesse was calm, cool, collected. Now, I think they suspected Jesse in some way from the start of this thing, but they could

find anything to prove that he had anything to do with it. And like I mentioned, three years went by before Juanita finally decided that she had to tell the authorities what happened. But during these three years, Jesse Juanita and Sherry, they lived together as normal. They even moved to a different city. They bought a house in Lehigh, Oklahoma. And it was in Lehigh that Juanita began working for a pastor and eventually, I think, opened up to him about what had happened. And that led to her going to the police. And that's what she did in 1994, went to the police and basically spilled it all. Sherry followed up and told the police what she knew.

And pretty soon, all three. Jesse, Juanita, and Sherry were arrested and charged with these murders. So Juanita was charged with first degree murder for action. for actually shooting Judy Moody Mayo. Yeah. Sherry was charged with first degree murder in the death of Melissa. Both women had their charges reduced when they agreed to testify against Jesse. So ultimately, Juanita pleaded guilty to second degree murder and Sherry pleaded guilty to two counts of accessory after the fact and one count of permitting a child to be abused.

And this is really where for a lot of people, Gibbs, the story gets interesting. Not to say it's not interesting up to this point, but it's the fact that these two women are pointing the finger at Jesse Cummings and are set to testify against them. And obviously, that's what they do. Both women testified that Jesse wanted them to kill Judy. They said he actually wanted them. them to kill her prior to that day. He wanted them to take Judy out, look at some houses and kill her at one of these houses and leave her there. Wow. But that didn't happen. They told the jury

how it really happened, how they killed Judy, how they tied up Melissa, how Jesse came home and helped dispose of Judy's body. Then he came back, took Melissa and Sherry. Now, Sherry said she fell asleep on the ride out to Choctaw County, but woke up when Jesse and Melissa left the vehicle. She said it was just a short time later that only Jesse returned and they drove home. And it was on May 30th, 1996 that a Cole County jury sentenced Jesse Cummings to death for the murders of Judy and Melissa. And again, like I said, this is where a lot of people have a big problem with this case, especially Jesse, especially his supporters. Real sure.

They're going to do that. Jesse has maintained his innocence and has said repeatedly that his two wives conspired against him to get him in trouble. He's actually said, I think, that they fell in love. That's his story. Oh, that is two. Yeah. Sherry and Juanita fell in love.

They wanted to be together without Jesse. So they framed them. But the problem with that is they're admitting, it's not like, like these two women are walking away. No, I mean, they admit it their own guilt and. Yeah. Now, they're getting a reduced sentence, but they're not going to be free to live in the house by themselves. But I think one of the big problems with this case is that as you look into it, there's really nothing in the way of concrete physical evidence in this case tying Jesse to the murders. There's no smoking gun. There's no DNA. There's no hair.

samples pointing to Jesse Cummings. It's one of the reasons we're not spending a lot of the time on the trial. The trial was essentially Sherry and Juanita telling the jury this is what happened. This is how we did it. This is why we did it. And this is the part that Jesse played in it. Right. Sherry and Juanita said they did it, but they said that Jesse put them up to it, helped dispose of Judy's body. And he alone killed Melissa. And I think this is a lot of also where Judy's size comes in, right? It's why I mentioned it. The fact that she weighed somewhere around 300, 325 pounds, both Juanita and Sherry were very small. I mean like five foot tall, 100 pounds, 110 pounds. Yeah. They were small women. The thought is no way could they have

disposed of Judy's body by themselves without the help of someone big like Jesse Cummings. but again, there's no physical evidence. And I think it's the lack of that. And Jesse really being convicted solely on the testimony of his two wives that have actually drawn a lot of people to his side, especially those people that are against the death penalty. People in his corner point to the fact that Jesse was 100 miles away with his father, at least during the time when Judy was thought to have been killed. They point to the fact that the jury was made up of,

of a bunch of people that all had ties to each other, law enforcement. Some of them they said worked at diners that served law enforcement. I mean, there's, there's articles out there that break down each juror. Wow. And their ties to this person or that person. But again, this is small town, Oklahoma. I think you're always going to have that, right? To some degree.

But I do think Gibbs, you can see, right? where supporters of Jesse or people that just don't want to see him put to death can take a look at this case and say, you're putting a man to death based on what? Essentially, the testimony of his two wives. Yeah. And like, you know, his case forward, if they're lovers, if they want to be together, they could say anything about him. I mean, he said he could not done anything wrong, which I I think some of his supporters are saying, but because these women are scorning against him, they're going to take him down, make him look like he's the leader of this group, similar to the Manson family.

Yeah, similar to the way that Charles Manson directed his followers to carry out his wishes. So I think the women felt there were some brainwishing that he intimidated them. They definitely feared him from their stories. Yeah, I don't think there's any doubt about that. one of the women, and I can't remember which wife it was, said that Jesse threatened to kill her son from a previous marriage, I believe, if she didn't go along with what he wanted her to do. So much more than just brainwashing, right? I think you said the right word, intimidation, coercion. You could throw that in there. If you don't do this, I'm going to kill somebody you love.

It is, and again, this is their story. This is, and this is the reason. why people have a hard time with it, very hard to validate. Oh, if you're not there to hear it, of course, it's hearsay. It's, it's, it's, it's, he instilled fear in us, but. He said he was going to do this. Yeah. It's like me saying, Mike said he was going to get me a better chair. But he never did.

But he never did. And now people believe me because they see the bobblehead out on the line that has me sitting in a wood slat chair. But in 1998, so Jesse's in prison, right? they're actually, they're all three in prison because they all were convicted. Like I said, it's not like they just got off Scott Free, but in 1998, Jesse caught a little break when the Oklahoma court of criminal appeals drew out his conviction for the murder of his sister Judy Moody Mayo. And it goes back to all these things that we were talking about, right? It was said that

state law required independent testimony to link someone to a crime. And that didn't happen in this case. It was only his two accomplices, his two wives that could link him to the crime. So they said that can't, that can't be. You can't convict somebody when the only people that are saying you did it are the two people that also did it. And I can see why that would be a problem. Yeah. Clearly. Now, they upheld his conviction for the murder of 11-year-old Melissa. And this happened because Juanita was never charged with Melissa's death. So they were all three charged in the death of Judy.

But Sherry was later dropped from the murder charge related to Judy. When it came to Melissa, Sherry was charged. Juanita was never charged. So under Oklahoma law, she could. corroborate Sherry's story. I found that fascinating. Ah, so they, a little loophole. If she had been charged with Melissa's death and then later dropped, she, it wouldn't have worked. And this guy could have technically walked, maybe, I don't know.

So really the prosecution got a big break here because it could have been bad for them. Yeah, I think if you, if you look at it that way, they almost made a huge error. because if they would have charged all three with both deaths, then I believe based on the fact that Jesse's conviction was thrown out for the murder of Judy, it would have been thrown out for the murder of Melissa as well. Luckily, they didn't charge Juanita in the beginning for Melissa's death. If they had and then later dropped her, it could have been really bad. But stuff like that to me is fascinating.

It's all the strategies and the importance of the decisions that they make. Oh, yeah. You know, these little decision, and I don't call them little, but every decision that someone makes. Yeah. Right. Ultimately, years later, when a parole board or a, you know, a higher court is looking at these decisions, it could have a big impact. And at the time, probably people think, well, it's no big deal. let's just charge them all and we'll drop one if we don't have enough evidence to convict.

It's almost like a beautiful chess match. You know, I mean, you really have to like be so many steps ahead. I actually think that's a great analogy that, you know, prosecution versus defense is like this very intricate chess game. You know, everybody's making a move and you're reacting off of the move made by the other person. I think you could also use the analogy as kind of like a boxing match too, right? You go on the offense, you go on the defense, you counterpunch.

You can make that analogy as well. So during a clemency hearing in August 2008, Jesse Cummings continued to deny his role in the crime and he asked the pardon and parole board to give him clemency so that he could continue to clear his name. Right? This guy never once admitted to doing,

what Sherry and Juanita said he did. His attorney argued that it was Juanita and Sherry that committed unprovoked, cold-blooded, premeditated murder, but somehow they escaped the death penalty by agreeing to say that Jesse was behind it all. Right. Obviously, this is the defensive strategy. Oh, sure. Jesse never killed anyone.

It was Juanita and Sherry. And really to them, Juanita killed Judy, which she actually did. That's, that part is true. They contended that Sherry killed Melissa and then they disposed of the bodies. Jesse had nothing to do with it. Again, it's why I go back to saying, could these two women have disposed of Judy? Maybe. I don't know.

Can two, a hundred pound women dispose of a 300 plus pound person? Maybe. I'm sure it's plausible. Sure. But I understand what his defense, I mean, he's laying out there. He didn't do anything. Why would he get the death penalty? Well, they didn't.

Yeah, why they didn't. I mean, if they're the ones that actually did it. Well, he killed Melissa, I believe. Yeah. And according to them, he killed Melissa. He didn't kill Judy. But he got the death penalty for killing Melissa. They dropped the charge of killing Judy.

But like you said, I mean, the defense is going to make that argument that he didn't do any of it. Right. And you are about ready to put a man to death. And this is where the anti-death penalty folks step in. You're about ready to put a man to death solely based on the word of these two women. Right. Who, by the way, one of them killed one of the victims. Yeah.

And the other one at the very least. helped in, you know, restraining, at least Melissa. So they had a hand in the crimes. But you also can see the other frustration is they did kill somebody and they didn't get the death penalty. So why is it okay to chase after him for the death penalty? Because, and this is where this happens in a lot of cases we do, right? The person that says I didn't do it versus the people that come forward and say,

I did it, but I'm going to take a plea deal to roll over on this other person. That's exactly what happened in this case, as happens in so many cases that we talk about. The old who talks first gets the better deal. Now, make no mistake about it. I'm not a person that after going through all the research believes that Jesse is innocent. I think it is tough sometimes to convict people on this amount of evidence. And we've seen where people have come back and have been found that they really didn't do this. Right.

And if that's the case, it's horrible because this guy's about ready to be put to death. But make no mistake about it. He was a very bad guy. I can't sit here conclusively 100% and say for sure that he did this. this and this. Because like I said, there's no physical evidence to link him to the crime. But based on the totality of the research, I believe he did. I believe he had something to do with it. I believe he raped and killed 11 year old Melissa Moody. So all the sums of his sins added up leads you to believe that he probably. Yeah, it's hard to say it that way because then you're like,

well, you can't hold all that stuff, or you can't say that because he was a bad guy that he killed her. And I'm not saying that. I'm saying that the story and everything together makes me believe that he did kill Melissa. Because I go back to this, Gibbs. What did these two women have to gain by coming forward three years later when they did to say this is what happened? They could have not said anything, maybe lived the rest of their lives without ever going to prison. You know, as it stood, one of them got a life sentence. Yeah.

No, that's a valid point for sure. So why would they do that knowing that they're not going to get away Scott free? I think you have to look at that too. And the fact that a jury of his peers reviewed everything, seen everything. Yeah, saw more than what we saw. And they had to make that moral judgment decision as well. But again, people have a, they have a. they have a big problem with the people that were on that jury.

Right or wrong. Does anybody ever like, depending on the outcome of the, if it's, if the outcome is not what you wanted it to be, then you're going to have a problem. Right. So back to this clemency hearing. Jesse's attorney also tried to point out inconsistencies in the stories told by the two wives, but none of it worked, right? The board unanimously denied his request.

So he set to be executed. And like I said, you had a lot of. of anti-death penalty groups rally against his execution. There were protesters outside of the gate at the prison, which often happens. Before his execution, the attorney general came out and said, you know what? The state proved its case. Jesse Cummings was properly convicted and sentenced to death for the murder of Melissa Moody. Appeals courts at every level have upheld this conviction and sentence. So again, I think that's something else to point to. And this did go through a bunch of different appeals courts. They took a look at it. And in the case of the murder of Melissa,

they found no evidence to overturn it. Cummings was executed at 6.11 p.m. on September 25th, 2008. It was 17 years after the murder of his niece, Melissa. Yeah. About 12 years after he was was sentenced prior to his execution. Jesse ate his final meal. You and I love to talk about final meals. Final meals, man. It's kind of one of the things that we've had enjoyed throughout the run of this podcast. Yeah. His final meal consisted of a bucket of KFC chicken. The whole bucket. The whole bucket. And it was pointed out eight additional drumsticks on top of the bucket. Oh. That is a boatload of chicken. I wonder if it was extra crisp. I don't know.

I have to get extra crispy. That sounds about like 17,000 calories to me. And he washed it all down with a chocolate milkshake. Really? It's a lot of calories that burn up. But what do you care at that point, right? I mean, not to make light of it, but you are a bout ready to die. It doesn't really matter, does it?

It doesn't matter if you, you know, you've got to let out your belt, one notch at that point. Really only matters to the person cleaning you up afterwards. That's true. I've heard of worse last meals for sure. I'm not a huge KFC fan. If it were me and I was going chicken, you know, I would go Lees,

I would go Popeyes way before I would go KFC. Now that might be... I'd have like Emerald-Igossi come in with me up a chicken dish. So you think Emerald, because what, you're so famous, is going to come to death row for you.

I say, yo, Emerald, come in me get some of that Cajian chicken. Nolans down. I might have to change my last meal. I think he probably will. Some of that New Orleans food and the char broiled oysters. Oh, you were happy about those. They were out of this world.

And I don't even like oysters. I don't like raw on the half shell. These were cooked over an open flame. Garlic butter just doused on them. Oh, they were so good. You were in heaven, man. And then, you know, speaking of his last meal, where are the sides? You're just going to eat nothing but straight chicken.

I mean, you can't get some mashed taters and gravy. You need that. Biscuits? Biscuits? Butter and honey. How about some corn, some green beans? Yeah. What my green beans, man?

Southern-style green beans all day long. I picture this guy, you know, just sitting there at a table eating chicken after chicken, piece of chicken after chicken, caveman style. I guess he can delay the proceeding, you know, but hey, I'm still working on my bucket of chicken and my eight extra legs. I don't think so because I think they do that the night before. Oh, okay. It'd have to be a very long eating process.

Up all night long, just eating. But, you know, I guess, like I said, I guess at that point, what is the difference? Eat whatever you want to eat. I just, I find it very interesting what people choose. You know, I get it. You like chicken. Yeah. But you don't want a little something else to go with it.

No, I just want like 20 pieces of chicken. And I'm going to eat them one right after the other. That's right. And then I'm going to wash it all down with his chocolate milkshake. And I'm happy. Until tomorrow when I have to be strapped to the gurney. With that heartburn going on at the same time. Speaking of being strapped to the gurney, Cummings professed his innocence, even as they

were strapping him down. So his last words were, I love my family. I love my children. I love my gorgeous angel. The justice system let me down on this case. It turned a blind eye to the truth in this. You came here today to see an innocent man die. I forgive everybody involved in this.

Those were his last words. Well, the one thing that I was a little unsure of, when he said gorgeous angel, I believe he was talking about Melissa. I think so too. And there were people. that really had a very hard time with those words, because this is the part I didn't mention this after she died, right? Three years went by before he was arrested. Right. She didn't even have a headstep. These were poor people. Right. No doubt about it. She had barely a marker next to her mom.

and it was pointed out by many people that he didn't do anything to, you know, honor her or get her something a little bit nicer to, you know, as a headstone. And he could have, you know, did some little woodwork and carve something out or something. Yeah, something. It didn't have to be very expensive. But a lot of people point to that in saying, okay, you're calling her your little angel. Yeah. But for three years.

Yeah. What did you actually do for her? Yeah. And most likely we think you killed her. Yeah. Anyway. Cummings execution was witnessed by a female friend. The Atoka County Sheriff was there.

His defense attorney was there. He had some spiritual advisors, I guess. Okay. And five friends and relatives of the victims. So not a lot of people. No. Witness this execution. And then you.

talk about Juanita and Sherry. I mentioned Juanita Cummings serving a life sentence for second degree murder. Sherry Cummings got 35 year sentence on the two counts of accessory to murder after the fact and one count of permitting a child to be abused. I really tried to do a lot of research into where these women are. Right. Very hard to find. Their current status is pretty hard to determine. And I think Juanita has come up for parole. But as far as I can tell, she's still in prison, which would make sense. She got a life sentence. Sure.

So chances of her being paroled this early are not great. Pretty unlikely. But I did find something that said Sherry was paroled in 2010. Really? But not much at all out there about her. I mean, I checked every newspaper I could find. Probably changed her name. Well, there are some thoughts that maybe she got married.

in prison. Yeah. And now she's, you know, wouldn't you do that? I mean, you would figure out a way to change your identity. I mean, I've changed mine twice. I know you have. I know you have. People know you as Mike Gibson, but if they knew some of the other ones, they'd be shocked.

I know. But that's it, Gibbs. This is just a very strange case. And, you know, it caught my eye, but then it got stranger and stranger as I got into it. It's definitely bizarre. Well, it's bizarre, and it's unlike a lot of the cases we do. This is by no means a slam dunker, right? You can look at Jesse Cummings and say, this guy's a POS.

He's a terrible guy. He was a terrible guy throughout his entire life. Sure. But do I know for sure that he did what he was convicted of and what, even more importantly, he was put to death for? Yeah. I don't. I believe that he did it, but I can't sit here and say conclusively.

Yeah. But like you said, you know he was a major influencer. Sure. But did he actually do the act that they have them going down for? I don't know. Or, you know, did these two women, as it's been suggested, really get together and say, hey, we're going to do this and we're going to blame it on him. My only thing, and I go back to it, I just don't see what they had to gain.

Well, no, the fact that they weren't caught yet, you know, I mean, why I turned themselves in. Yeah. And well, what did they have to gain just by even committing the murders? They weren't going to get any money out of it. No. This wasn't an inheritance situation. This wasn't, I don't know what it would be if it wasn't Jesse Cummings orchestrating this whole thing. But I don't like it when it's not as slam dunkery, slam dunkish. You want the crystal clear look. Yeah, well, you and I talk about that, right? If you're going to put someone to death and his death happened 11 years ago, man, you really want to know for sure that that person did what it was that, you know, he was put to death for. But this is not a DNA case like some of the ones that they're now coming back and saying,

oh my gosh, there's no way that this person could have. have committed the crime and they were put to death and, you know, how horrible is that, which it is. Oh, for sure. Even if this guy didn't do it, I don't think there's ever going to be a way to prove that either because like I said, it's not a DNA case. It's not, uh, he said she said. Yeah, unless one of these women later on comes out and says, you know what, we made the whole thing up. Yeah, he never did have anything to do with it. But I don't think that's the case. And I want to that very clear. I like to tell both sides of it, but I don't, I just don't see the reason for it. Pretty sure the one that's out would never come back and say, by the way.

Yeah. I don't think so. No. That's it. That's the case of Jesse James Cummings. We got some voicemails. Yeah. And check those out. Let's hear them. What's up, Mike and Givie? This is Chris from Denver calling. Just listen to today's episode, man, that Matthew Hoffman is crazy insane stuff going on there. I'm thinking I have a great case to you guys. Historically, I named you did Jesse Palmeroy from the late 1800s. I thought it'd be kind of cool if you guys went back to even further and did Elizabeth Bathory, the Blood Countess from the early 1600.

Funny cool stuff out there around what she was doing. It's believe she may have murdered up to 600 girls. The numbers differ, but I thought that might be a really cool case for you guys. So check it out. Keep doing what you're doing. and as always keep your own time taken. Later, dudes. All right, thanks for that.

That is a big case. I have that on the list. And I like it because Gibbs, you could tell us what it was like in the 1600s. I could. As Elizabeth lived, I had some nice wardrobes back in. Being that you're immortal.

That's one thing we haven't devol. I just divulged it. Yeah, let's not go too much into it right now. Yeah. Hey, guys. My name is Jadam from Staten Island, New York. I just wanted to let you guys know that of the 50 plus true kind podcast I've listened to in the past year. I have to say your podcast is by far my favorite.

You guys are knowledgeable and informative and you have an extraordinary delivery. You're sensitive to the subject material while managing to somehow keep it light. Now, it'll last them much, but I definitely laugh out lies with you guys. My favorite comment within your Matthew Hoffman episode when you mentioned making an HGTV show about selling murder houses, I keep thinking about it and I would definitely watch. Maybe the show could be called killer real estate? you guys would definitely kill that one pun intended love you guys so much thanks for all that you do and always keep your own time taken that's cool i love it man i love the title i love everything about it's in production so Gibbs you know more than anybody i have a lot of ideas yeah i have like

you do 25 ideas a week of things that i want to do there's whiteboards all over i know so i told my wife and and my daughters about this idea and they thought it was you know pretty interesting. So the other day, I was, I brought it up again. My youngest daughter says, you know what, Dad, that's one of your ideas that actually makes sense. So it was kind of like a backhanded compliment. So she's essentially saying, hey, 95% of the stuff you say is BS, but this one, this one might work. That's the same time she, I think she, the other thing that she thought made sense when you said, hey, I'm going to do this thing with Gibby. She said, that makes a lot of sense, Dad. And she said, who is Gibby? Who is Gibby? Just kidding.

But I mean, how hard is it for HDTV or it doesn't have to be on HGTV, really? See, it could be on oxygen. Yeah. It could be on HLN. It could be on one of the crime channels. Yeah. And then you just, you're fusing all the audiences together. I'll fly out, present it to them.

Okay. But don't put me on one of those 13 to stopover flights. Just give me a direct, please. The problem is how many houses are you going to be able to find where there's been some type of murder? Well, probably not that hard. There's a lot of murders. I mean, if there's a lack of houses, you just got to kind of make up, you got to do what you got to do. Oh, you mean do what reality shows do and just make it up as you go along?

Oh, yeah, we could do that. Or make your own inventory. Hi, Mike and Giving. This is Sandra from Stockholm, Sweden. Hello. I just have to say, I love your podcast so much. I've listened to it every day, all day. Every time I'm at work or just strolling around, it's one of the most amazing podcasts as we're listening.

too. So I just introduce you to my mom as well. She loves crime podcast and she's already in love. Her name is Jessica. Well, I just have to thank you so much for your amazing work and your research and keep your own time kicking or as we say in Sweden, holding again to kick on. Goodbye. Goodbye. So awesome. Awesome. We have some great listeners in Sweden and love to hear the voicemails from over there. What was that last thing? She said, And they're all awful. Oh my gosh, they're so awful.

I'd rather listen to you guys' podcasts over and over again than listen to someone else's podcast. I'm sitting at work and just got so annoyed that I couldn't find another podcast to listen to. So I just want to say thank you. We appreciate you. I know you guys hear this all the time, but you don't understand.

It's just really bad out there. So we appreciate you guys so much more. But yeah, keep your own time ticking. Bye. All right. We appreciate you listening. Oh, big time. And I will say, I will admit, Gibbs, that some of the early episodes are a little rough as we were gaining our footing.

Yeah, you were having a rough time keeping up. Oh, sure. I was for sure. It was difficult. I hung in there. But she asked, you know, do I go back? I do not go back and listen to them because I don't. I don't want to hear them.

I don't want to hear those. But I'm glad that people were able to, you know, stick with us. And I'm sure there were a lot of people that weren't. They probably heard the first episode and we were like, ah, I'm not listening to this. There's anything to hear that second episode. The second episode I did by myself. Yeah. But we appreciate it all.

We really do. So we had mail bag. Oh, yeah? Yeah. Our good friend Tisha Wells sent us a whole mess of beef jerky. Yes, he did. I mean, this thing was, I don't know, there's like 10, 12 packages of beef jerky in this thing. We're good for a couple days.

It's all, yeah, a couple days. And they eat so much beef jerky. It's not even funny. But the sodium in my body is going to swell me up. All right. So that is it for another episode of true crime all the time. So for Mike and Givie, stay safe and keep your own time ticking.