True Crime All The Time - The Murders of Christopher Newsom and Channon Christian

Episode Date: June 18, 2018

Christopher Newsom and Channon Christian were on their way to a party on the night of January 6th, 2007 when they were carjacked at gunpoint. The couple, who had only been dating a short time, would be taken to a house of horrors. The crimes committed against this couple were extremely brutal.Join Mike and Gibby as they discuss one of Knoxville, Tennessee's most horrific murder cases. What happened to Chris and Channon is shocking. But what is equally shocking is the reason behind the crimes. 5 perpetrators would be caught and tried for the murders. And each of them would point the finger at someone other than themselves.You can support the show at patreon.com/truecrimeallthetimeVisit the show's website at truecrimeallthetime.com for contact, merchandise, and donation informationPlease support our sponsors:Simplisafe - Go to simplisafe.com/tcatt to get the security system that Gibby and I put our trust inCasper - Get the best night sleep possible, go to casper.com/tcatt and use the promo code tcatt to get 50$ off select mattressesHello Fresh - Make a great meal with your family, go to hellofresh.com/truecrime30 to get $30 off your first weekSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

and welcome to episode 83 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, Gibby, what is going on? Doing good, man. How about you? I'm doing great. Yeah? Yeah.

I mean, the weather is nice. It's going to be in the 90s. I know. This weekend coming up. Makes you just want to go ride your Harley, doesn't it? Does it? Doesn't it? Doze it?

Does it? Does it? Does it? Does it? It's Father's Day. Sunday. Yeah. So the day that this comes out will be Father's Day. So shout out to all the fathers out there. Yeah. If you're a dad. Especially the good fathers. Good fathers. I want to give shoutouts to people that are bad, neglectful dads. Yeah. And for those moms that are doing double duty,

happy pseudo-father's Day too. Yeah. You get two. You get Mother's Day and Father's Day. Yeah. All right, Gibbs. We've got some shoutouts, some Patreon shout-out. Let's do it. Yeah, Leslie Apple, Autumn, Lacasio. Lacasio. Ad Girl. Just ad girl. Just ad girl. Yep, she's busy. Mika.

Thanks, Mika. Heather Holstein. Yeah, thanks, Heather. Melissa Falkenberry. Falkenberry. That's my favorite kind of... Berry? Breakfast cereal.

Falkenberry? Falkenberry. There's a cereal called falconberry? No. There's usually some kind of... Frankenberry. Yeah, okay. Cassie Reim Kent.

Chantel will... Thanks, Shantel. Amy Bill. Thanks, Amy and Bill, or Amy Bill, or A-B. I don't know if it's two different people. Amber Way. Amber Way, like the song. There's a song called Amber Way?

Yeah. What song's that? If you don't know, I can't tell you. Are you thinking about the Star Spangled Banner or the, not the Star Spangled Banner, the Amber Waves of Grain? Maybe. I don't know what you're thinking of. I can't get in your head.

I just leave it at that. You leave it at that a lot. I know. Because there's nothing else left. There's nowhere to go. You act like you're just going to leave it at that. But you have no choice because there is nothing else. I can't go forward.

I can't go backwards at this point. I'm stuck. Yeah. I'm in my rut. We had timber diltz. Timber. Kathleen Knoble. Yeah.

John Porich. Leah. Which is Leah. Gina Pantano. Say it right, man. Patano. Patano. Christy Zalaya.

Thank you. Jessica. Hey, Jess. Aaron Follett. Ellen Wright. Yeah. Wendy Coogle. Jeffrey Blockie?

Like that character from that TV show? Blocky? It was Belke. Or Belke? Balky? Close. I don't think it was all that close. Yeah.

All right. Be a lucky. It was worth a try. And if we go back into the Vault Gibbs, This week we selected Jess Huey. You know, Jess has been a big friend of the show for a long time. She has. Been with us early on.

Yep. Great Patreon supporter. Great social media supporter as well. Yeah, she's been great. Awesome. Thanks, Jess. Yep. And a big shout out to everybody that from the new supporters to the people that continue to

support us month after month. Just love them all, man. It is amazing. We had some PayPal support too. Oh, we did. Yep, Cindy D. Francisco Johns. I'm sorry, Cindy. I was just trying to take that all away.

That one took you by somebody. It's like, when is Ferguson going to stop talking? How long is it going to go? What name do you give when you put a reservation in? There's a hyphen in there. Jessica Bernstein. Thank you. Shauna Murray.

Yeah. And May Derrup. May. May. Thank you, May. So big shout out to our PayPal supporters. Love that. Now, don't forget.

at same time this episode drops, there's an episode of True Crime All Time Unsolved. Okay. We're diving into the Kathleen Peterson case. This is the case that they made the documentary about called The Staircase. Yeah. Yep. And Netflix has recently come out with it again, added a couple new episodes on to it. So there's a lot of renewed interest in this case.

Sure. Now, we chose to put it on unsolved, even though technically Gibbs, I think it's solved, but there's so many questions out there. We just thought it would be a good case to talk about, and we decided to put it on unsolved. Yeah, that's what we did. That's what we did. So switch on over and listen to it when you're done watching, watching, when you're done watching this on your phone, spinning on that little thing, jump on over and watch the little spin thing on your other phone as you listen. What is this spin thing that you're referring? I don't know. Some people got a little spin thing.

Oh, they do? I guess. Oh, I didn't know that. I don't have a spin thing. I just plug in and listen. Why do you have to plug in? Aren't you wireless? Well, sometimes I got my wired headphones.

Oh, you're talking about your headphones. Yeah. I got you. Yeah. Are you ready to get into this week's true crime all the time? I am. We're talking about one of Knoxville, Tennessee's most horrific crimes. And this is a case Gibbs that has been one of the most,

most often requested since we've started the podcast. It really has. Surprisingly, I mean, not surprised. I mean, because it's such a lesser known, smaller area crime. It is. And we're going to get into that. I mean, a lot of that's because of how this case was covered. Yeah.

And there's allegations around how it was covered. And some of that relates to race. And we will talk about that. But, I mean, we get requests for this, you know, bigger than we, do for like Casey Anthony and some of the other. Yeah, Jody areas. There's a lot of people that have wanted this case. Now, it's been on our list from the very beginning. Yeah. Because I was aware of the case and was pretty fascinated by the details of it. So I knew we would cover it. But it's just, there's been so many requests. We just finally, we had to do it. So the case centers around

Shannon Christian, who was 21 years old and her boyfriend, Christopher Newsom. And, who was 23. They were carjacked, kidnapped, raped, and killed in January of 2007. And ultimately, there's going to be five suspects that police identify. And we're going to talk about them all. We're going to talk about the trials. We're going to get into all of that.

But first, we have to talk about Shannon and Chris. You know, Shannon was born April 29th, 1985 in Nacadocious, Texas. That's a mouthful. That is a mouthful. Nacondoscious. It is. She lived in Louisiana, ultimately moving to Tennessee with her family in 1997.

So she goes to high school in Tennessee, graduates in 2003. And at the time of this incident in 2007, she was a senior at the University of Tennessee, which is in Knoxville. She was majoring in sociology. Now, Christopher Newsom was born September 21st, 1983 in Knoxville. He graduated from Hall's High School in 2002. And the thing about Chris is that he was an outstanding high school baseball player. There were several people who said in interviews that I listened to Gibbs that he could have played at the next level. He was that good if he had wanted to, but apparently he didn't. He didn't want to go to college. Yeah, chose not to. He chose not to. He got into the trades and by this time in 2007,

it was said that he was a pretty gifted tradesman. Now, one thing to point out is that Chris and Shannon had not been dating all that long. Maybe around two months, they both still live. at home with their parents, but both families would come out and say that Chris and Shannon had fallen pretty hard for each other in this short amount of time. And from everything you read, you know, these were two good kids falling in love with each other. They're in a new relationship. They have their whole lives ahead of them. You know, really, who knows what would have happened in their lives moving forward, would they have stayed together? Would they have ultimately, you know, gotten married? Or what else would have happened? The problem is, we'll never know. Well, sure,

that was taken away from them, right? Yeah, their lives were cut short. Yeah, at such a young age. I mean, it's just not right. So at a young age, but also in what, and we're going to go into the details. Horrific. Yeah, horrific. And you'd have to say senseless. crime. Well, they're all senseless, right? I mean, but man. As you hear some of the details around why the crime happened, you're absolutely correct in that, you know, they're all senseless. But there are some crimes and murders that you can make some sense of from the standpoint of, okay, I understand why this happened. I don't condone it. It's not right. This one, It's mind-numbing, man. This one, though, is,

purely senseless in the fact that the victims weren't known to the perpetrators. It wasn't, it was just, oh, we'll get into it. So we go to the night of January 7th, 2007. Chris and Shannon had plans to go to a friend's party that night. Shannon had stayed at her best friend's place in the Washington Ridge apartment complex. She was there. She was waiting for Chris to show up. He had been playing golf all day with his best friend.

Yeah. Shannon was hanging out with her best friend. Her best friend decides to go to the party without her, and she's left there waiting for Chris. So she's doing the right, right? She's waiting for her boyfriend, like she said she would. Sure. Yeah.

Okay. He shows up. Chris does. And as they start to leave the. apartment together. They're going to head to this party. Shannon is in her Toyota SUV. Chris is leaning into the window giving her a kiss. And then he's going to get into his truck and they're, he's going to follow her to this party. Yeah. But while this is happening, they're attacked by two men with a gun. Shannon and Chris are forced into the vehicle and they're driven to. And they're driven to

a house on Chipman Street blindfolded. So this carjacking from the Washington Ridge Apartments happened around 10.30 that night. At around 1230, the people that had kidnapped Shannon and Chris forced Shannon to call her parents to tell them that she would be late. So she does. She has a conversation, I believe, with her father. And in that, she gave no information. She gave no indication that she was in trouble. So just as a little tip from Gibby moving forward with your loved ones, you should always have a code word. I knew you were going to go there. Yeah. Not the obvious, you know, help, whatever, you know, just something that. Kind of an innocuous word that you could use in everyday language, but you probably wouldn't. Right. But if you did use it, it meant, hey,

something's not right. Yeah. I like that idea. Yeah. Hey, dad, I'm going to be a little bit late. Things are bananas, you know? Right. Because besides you, who says the word bananas?

I'm just saying, you know, yeah. So I think that's a great tip. And it's easy to do. Yeah. You just need to coordinate it with your family. Yeah, just something like, you know, hey, I'm going to be late. Let Fergie know. Hey, I'm going to be late.

Let Gibby know. People will be like, it's something bad happening. Track that phone and find me. Well, it's funny that you mentioned tracking phones because it's going to come up in this case, right? The tracking of cell phones. But getting back to this situation that Shannon and Chris are in, you know, she's having this call with her father. What can she do, Gibbs? Without having this code word already developed, like you said, she probably has a gun, if not trained on her.

It's there. She knows it's there. she's probably too scared to give any real indication that she's in trouble. Yeah, I mean, not knowing what led up to that before that call, I mean, a lot of things could have happened to put a lot of fear into somebody, right? It's thought that possibly they had threatened to kill her, kill Chris. Sure. If she said anything that they didn't like.

Right. And most likely they probably did say that, you know? I mean, if I randomly kidnapped you and your wife and I had a gun to your wife's head and I said, this is what I want you to call and say to your parents, you're probably going to say exactly what I printed out to say to your parents. I would not. I would do a Jason Bourne judo chop. Yeah. Which would probably be more like an Austin Powers for me. Austin Powers judo move, but I would overpower you, kick the gun out of your hand. That's how it works in your head?

Yeah. Okay. I want to say it's Jason Bourne-like. Yeah, we know. It's probably more Austin Powers-like. I don't even know if it's that good. But Shannon was probably thinking, you know, at this point, how do I get out of this situation? And I would have to think Gibbs that, you know, one of the thoughts going through her head was,

I need to do what they're asking me to do. Self-preservation. I need to make it through this situation. And then they're going to let me go. Yeah. I mean, you could look at it that, because we've seen people that sometimes when they do cooperate and they play along, that they tend to have some better odds towards the end. But you just never know. You never know.

And it's a very fine line, right? You hear all the time. Sometimes you're supposed to go along, not put up a fight. Sometimes it's put up a fight at all costs, you know, don't get into a car, even if they're trying to get you in. I lean more towards that. I do too. I'd rather give everything I got up to the front end. And if they shoot me right then,

and at least I don't have to go through all the shit that could occur over time. But I don't know. I mean, I'd have to look at who, who what and when, you know, and analyze it really fast. Well,

and every situation's different. Yeah. And everybody that is involved in one of these situations is different from what their skill level is to what, you know, some people deal with pressure very well. Some people don't at all. They couldn't act,

even if they weren't. wanted to because they're so fear-stricken. Yeah. You're exactly right. There's no way to- That moment. Yeah, there's no way to write a manual to say, in every situation, this is what you should do. Well, that Jason-born thing goes off, you know, you think, you know. Yeah, if you had Jason Bourne's skill level training, which I know you do. Well, yeah, but most people don't. No. Unfortunately, it's not going to work out the way that Shannon probably thought it was. you know, that if she did and she complied, that ultimately they would let her go.

It's never going to happen. And like we said up front, it's going to turn out that there are five perpetrators involved in these crimes to varying degrees of involvement. But the details are horrible. And the body of Chris Newsom was found the next day along some railroad tracks near Chipman Street in East Knoxville. So very close to the house where they were taken,

forensic evidence showed that he had been raped in the final hours of his life. He was forced to walk barefoot to the railroad tracks, and there he was shot in the neck and in the back. It's thought that he was paralyzed by one of these shots to the back. So he's lying there helpless on these railroad tracks. And he is shot with a 22 caliber placed up against the back of his head. And that's what, you know, ultimately killed him. It's like an execution style shot, what you think of.

Yeah. As an execution style shot. Right. Christopher had been gagged with a sock that was stuffed in his mouth. His ankles were bound with his own. belt. His hands were bound behind his back. His face was wrapped in a bandana. His head was covered with a sweatshirt and tied, tied around his neck with a shoe string. They wrapped his body up in a comforter. They doused it in gasoline and they set him on fire. It is. It is hard to imagine.

And according to testimony of the medical examiner, at one of the of the trials. There's going to be a number of trials because we mentioned there's a number of suspects. Christopher Newsom was sodomized with an object. He was raped by a person so they could tell this through examination somehow. And they believe that these actions took place at the house on Chitman Street. They also believe, and this is horrifying in its own right, that Shannon was made to watch what happened to her boyfriend Chris. But it's important to point out, you know, Chris was killed pretty quickly, you know, within what police think was a number of hours from the time that they were abducted from the apartment

complex to when he was killed, they believe was just a few hours. And he was found not that much later on the railroad tracks. It's not going to be the same for Shannon. Christian. She was tied up inside the Chipman Street House and this house was rented by a man named Lamericus Davidson. So this is our first suspect. We're going to talk about all these suspects and in some detail. But Shannon was repeatedly attacked and raped over the next couple of days. She suffered multiple blows to the head. She was hog tied with strips of fabric from a bedding set.

And the medical examiner would conclude that, you know, she suffered injuries to her vagina, her anus, her mouth in these repeated sexual assaults. So this was a very vicious, brutal attack. At one point, they poured bleach down her throat. And they also used the bleach to scrubbing. her body while she was still a lot. So this is an attempt by these individuals to remove DNA, but pouring bleach down somebody's throat, Gibbs. Yeah, I mean, after everything she went through him, yeah, that's just terrible, man. I mean, just some sick individuals, man. I mean, everything

they did to her was just makes my stomach turn. And after all of that, they put a plastic bag over her head, they put her body in trash bags, and then they stuffed it into a trash container like she was trash. And we've heard this before, right? People treating other human beings like they were essentially trash. Yeah. Whether it's throwing them away, for the lack of a better term, in a ditch, down an embankment, or in this case, actually, putting someone in a trash can. Now, there's a thought that these individuals believe that Shannon was dead at this point, but she wasn't.

She was still alive when the bag was put over her head, when she was put in this trash can because the medical examiner uncovered evidence that showed that she slowly suffocated to death. In fact, Gibbs, she died with her eyes open. And that's a horrifying scene. Oh. To picture in your mind. Can't even imagine.

Shannon's abandoned Toyota SUV was located on Monday, January 8th. So it didn't take them that long to find it. No. But when they found it, they also found an envelope inside the vehicle. And on that envelope was a fingerprint belonging to Lamericus Davidson. so now they have a clue. They find out that he lives at this 2316 Chipman Street address. And this is just a couple of blocks from where they find her car.

When police figure all this out, they go to the address on Tuesday, the 9th. The house is unoccupied. And this is when they find Christian's body in a trash can in the kitchen. And I just can't imagine Gibbs being one of those officers on the scene. You're looking around. You open the lid off of a trash can. And you find the body of this 21-year-old girl. No, I couldn't either, man.

Be just tragic, man. So they've got a whole bunch of law enforcement personnel working this case, right? It's a big case in the Knoxville area. And it doesn't take them all that long to round up the five suspects that they believe committed these crimes. They used both the suspect cell phones as well as the victim's stolen cell phones to locate these people. So obviously these people didn't have a good understanding of how cell phone GPS triangulation, whatever, tracking, whatever you want to call it, worked. because they're just carrying around their cell phones totally oblivious to the fact that, you know what, authorities can figure out where you are.

Yeah, not the smartest crew. No, that's going to become pretty obvious as we get into who these people are. There's no Albert Einstein, Stephen Hawking, Booker T. Washington-type minds in this group. Yeah. That, I think, is pretty safe to say. I would agree. So the first person, and we already mentioned, Lamericus Davidson, he went by the nickname Slim.

He was 25 years old. He was arrested at the house because he was renting this house on Chipman Street. So he's arrested there. But Davidson had just completed a five-year sentence about five months prior to this incident for carjacking and robbery. So he did his five-year stint and came. out and went right back to it. And thought, you know what?

We better carjack someone. Now, there's a thought that he was broke. He was angry. Apparently his girlfriend had left him. Good for her. He had no car. He had no money. The only money that he did earn, I think he earned selling dope.

Because I think that's what he told law enforcement. You know, when they confronted him, his quote was, Selling dope. That's what I do. But law enforcement knew his record. Not hard at all to figure out. This guy just did five years for carjacking and robbery. They knew that this guy was not just a drug dealer. He was also suspected in a series of robberies that occurred in the days leading up to the abduction of Shannon and Chris.

in just a few days before these crimes occurred. Davidson's brother, La Talvis Cobbins, came to Knoxville from Kentucky to stay with him. And when he came, he brought along a friend named George Thomas and a girlfriend named Vanessa Coleman. None of these three had jobs or any type of money to speak of. It was said that Cobbins and Thomas were essentially homeless. Vanessa Coleman had a family, a loving family, but she chose not to reach out to them for help.

And what would come out is that Davidson, Lamericus Davidson, in the days before all this happened, he started to get angry over what he viewed as his brother and his guest, essentially living in his house, eating his stuff, being freeloaders. And he boiled over, and this is what, there was an incident that caused his girlfriend to leave. But like you said, good thing she did. Oh, yeah. I mean, it's the best moves she ever made. All right, Gibbs.

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Yeah. And I'm not sure how they get it, right? Okay, slim, I get. You're either slim or you're overweight. Yeah. And you go by slim. But Rome, I have no idea what that means. But Cobbins was 24 years old, went by Rome.

He and his friend George, Detroit, Thomas. they were arrested in Lebanon, Kentucky, which is about 180 miles north of Knoxville, just a few days after the murders. So like I said, it didn't take police long once they got the address of Lamericus Davidson to get him to figure out who else was involved

and to go get those people as well. They cracked his case pretty quickly. Yeah, they really did. I mean, thank goodness that envelope was in the car. Yeah, that really kind of led them very quickly down the right path. So they've picked up Davidson, they picked up Cobbens, and they picked up George Thomas. Cobbins would be charged with assaulting a correctional officer while awaiting trial. He had a rap sheet that included a 2003 conviction for robbery in New York.

But to catch a charge, Gibbs, while you're awaiting trial on some other charges. You know, when we talk about the fact that these people don't appear to be that bright, that's not very bright. No, that's pretty stupid. Assaulting a correctional officer when you're essentially fighting for your life and going to go on trial. Just adds to his character. Or lack of their up. No, you and I were thinking the same thing. And then we get to 34-year-old Eric E. Boyd, went by E.

he was also arrested in connection with the carjacking. Now the first three that we talked about, Davidson, Cobbins, and Thomas were indicted on 46 counts, including first degree murder. Eric Boyd was charged only with being an accessory after the fact because apparently he helped Lamericus Davidson hide out after all this happened. And then we get to Vanessa Coleman, 18 years old at the time. She was the fifth and last of this group to be taken into custody. She was not arrested until January 31st, but also arrested in Lebanon, Kentucky. So it took them a little bit longer to find her than it did some of the other. But what I found fascinating Gibbs is so they have all these people.

They have these five suspects. they pretty quickly all start to turn on each other. Well, I bet, man. When you have that many people involved? They're trying to cover their ass, minimize their involvement, point the finger at one of the other five or two of the other five. You can't have that many people involved and not have things slip up, you know? Well, because somebody's going to get a deal.

Yeah. And as soon as they get that deal, they're going to turn on the others. The only way to get the perfect murder. It has to be one individual doing it, and that person can never talk about it. And that's so unlikely with human nature. Are you letting out a little inside knowledge there? I agree with you, though. Yeah.

I mean, the more people that you have involved, human nature dictates that people talk. And the more people involved, the more people there are to talk. And eventually something's going to come out. Not telling anybody how they should plan their murders, obviously, but... No, never. Gibbs is just talking about how he operates. So I mentioned they start turning on each other. Eric Boyd tells authorities that Lamericus Davidson had recounted all of the details to him.

And he provides a pretty detailed story of what happened that night. Then you have Cobbins and Thomas. They tried to say that it was Eric Boyd who committed the rapes and murders. Now, Cobbins would admit to his role in the carjack. So this is where it gets really strange, right? They're admitting to certain things, but denying others and saying that certain people did some things and I only did this. It sounds like a bunch of CYA. and, you know, I know I'm in trouble, but hopefully I only get charged with a very minor part of this, not the rape and the murder.

Right. So if I admit to the carjacking, but say that I wasn't involved in the other stuff, in comparison, I'm going to do a much smaller amount of time. I think that's what Cobbins was thinking. Yeah, I agree. But then George Thomas, who was supposed to be his friend in his state, he said that the whole thing was Cobbins and Davidson. So it sounded to me like a real circus. And then eventually they all pled not guilty.

So we know we're going to have some trials. We have five people with varying amounts of participation in these crimes. But there's a big snag that happens early on in the process. They can't seem to find impartial jurors in Knoxville, Tennessee. because they polled over 300 potential jurors that were in the pool before the trials started and 95% of the people polled said that they knew about the case and I don't think that's all that strange. No, not just localized like that.

Yeah. In Knoxville, this was a very well publicized case. What floored me was that a whopping 66% of the people said they had already. made their minds up about what the verdict should be. So these are potential jurors in the pool that haven't heard a real piece of testimony or evidence, but based on the media coverage, they already know how they would vote. That's not good. No.

That's not the way that our jury system is supposed to work. So because of that, it's decided that jurors for these trials, would have to be bust in from other counties in Tennessee. And it's Eric Boyd that is the first to stand trial. And we talked about the fact that Eric Boyd was not charged in the same way as the others. He was only charged with being an accessory after the fact. Although authorities did suspect that he had some involvement in the rapes and murders, he never admitted to being at the Chipman Street House.

And with Christopher Newsom's body being burned, there wasn't much DNA evidence there. So they just really didn't have a lot of forensic proof at the time tying him to the crimes. So they were left with only being able to prosecute him for helping Davidson hide out. Yeah. Well, at least they got him on something. Yeah. And so it's strange because his charge was a federal charge while all of the other, while the other four had state charges. So he goes to trial in federal court. And he's ultimately convicted as an accessory after the fact to this fatal carjacking. And he's sentenced to 18 years in prison. Then come the trials of Cobbins, Davidson, Thomas and Vanessa Coleman.

And these are going to be in Knoxville in Knox County. And these were expensive trials. I mean, we're talking about millions of dollars of taxpayer funds to prosecute these four individuals. Now, we haven't mentioned race at all, but we have to talk about it because it becomes a very important part of the case. once the trials start to happen. So Shannon Christian and Chris Newsom were white.

The five defendants were black. And this caused white supremacist groups to come out staging demonstrations in downtown Knoxville. One man was arrested during a demonstration for disorderly conduct, resisting arrest, vandalism, assault on a police officer. Man, anything left? That's a bad day. That's a bad day. But he is a white supremacist, so.

Well, you have that. But we have to look at this protest. So it was said that there were about 30 protesters, most of them described as being white supremacists. There were twice as many, if not more than twice as many, people protesting the protesters. So I don't know, Gibbs. Essentially, they're protesters too, but they're protesting the white supremacist protesters.

Yeah, and that happens a lot in these kind of situations, you know. It does. We've got one group on one side, the other group on the other, and the police in the middle. Yep. But speaking of the police, so they had more than 200 Knoxville police officers and 100 more county highway patrol federal agents just to police this protest. So they had about three times as many authorities as they did protesters and people protesting

the protesters. I just found that interesting from the standpoint of how much does that cost to pay essentially 300 people to make sure that this protest doesn't get out a lot. Yeah. That's a lot of money. It is a lot of money. But obviously, they weren't taking. any chances of it getting out of hand with that amount of people. So we first talk about the trial

of La Talvis Cobbins and he makes the decision against advice of his counsel that he's going to take the stand. He's going to testify on his own behalf. And what do you always say about that, Gibby? Don't do it. Never good. Don't go against the advice of your counsel. Exactly. If they tell you not to do it, don't do it. But he does. And, you know, on the stand, he would claim that the carjacking was committed by his brother, Lamericus, and Eric Boyd. And he said that he was too scared of his brother to let Shannon Christian go from the house. All he did, this is his, in his words, was drive Eric Boyd's car following the carjacking back to the Chipman Street House. But I want to play just a quick snippet

of Cobbins on the stand. You got all us involved in this, man. You tripping. Man, look, man, I said, you know what? We're going to go. We ain't got nothing to do this. We're going to go. We're going to do what you do.

We ain't going to tell on you, man. You're going to get caught yourself. So just, we're going to go. Nah, nah, ain't nobody going to work. Ain't nobody going to world. What you mean? Anybody going on? We're going to go, dude.

You ain't talking about nothing. We're going to go. Nah, nah, he put his gun out of his pocket. He didn't point in there nobody, but he just pulls it out. I'm like, Dang, bro, you're going to kill me now? You're pulling a gun on me?

You're going to kill me? You're going to kill me? Nah, I ain't going to kill. But I'll shoot you, but I ain't going to kill. George, you know, I don't like you anyway. I'll shoot you. And Vanessa, don't make me shoot your little pretty butt. So that's actual testimony from La Talvis Cobbins.

Yeah. Sounds like he was fitting to go. That's what I got from that. Same here. Because he said that multiple times. He did. And that's just a small part of his testimony. He probably said it many, many more times.

But in that clip, he's alluding to the fact that, well, and more than alluding to it, but he's saying he wanted to get out and his brother wouldn't let him and pulled a gun. But he doesn't stop there. On the stand, he would say that Shannon Christian offered him oral sex. She asked me, why were we doing this? I told her it's not me. I don't have anything to do with this. Matter of fact, we're being held here against I will just like you are.

The only difference is that you're tied up and we're not. She started asking me, would I convince him to let her go? I said, I'll try. She said, just please. Just please. She said, please, can you just convince him to let me go? I said, I'll try. She said, I'll do anything.

Just please. let me go. She even offered oral sex. And she I had her give me oral sex. She gave me oral sex. So he knew he couldn't let her go. And according to him, he allowed her to do that anyway, thinking that she was going to be let go, if that's really what happened. Yeah, who knows if, I don't know that I can believe too much of what he says, but just

deconstruct what he did say there. He is saying that she performed oral sex on him. If he is so upset about the scenario that's going on and he wants to get out of the house because he doesn't think it's right, why would he allow that to happen? Yeah. One, why would he just leave first? And two, if he's so concerned about him and doesn't think it's right, why would he think it's okay to trade some oral sex to get her out. If he's a real man, he would just untied her,

walked her out the door and did what he needed to do to get her safety. Yeah, if he could, but if he couldn't do that and he was being held against his will, which I highly doubt, but that's what he's saying. Oh, sure. He's fighting for his life right now, so he's going to say that stuff. Yeah. Why would he even entertain the notion of doing something like that, at this point in time. I just, I don't get it at all. And I will say, and you can kind of hear it in that clip, when he said this,

it caused Shannon Christian's dad to flip out. You couldn't hear it real well on the tape. No, I could hear some commotion. Yeah, it was reported that he, he stood up and he called Cobbins a liar. But essentially, Cobbens' story was that he had no idea what was going to ultimately happen before it happened.

So a jury that had been bust in from Davidson County heard his case. They convicted him in the crimes against Shannon Christian, but they found him guilty as really just a facilitator in the crimes against Chris Newsom. But in the end, he received a life sentence without parole. So a very stiff sentence as it should have been. All right, Gibbs, let's talk real quick about Hello Fresh, the meal kit delivery service that shops, plans, and delivers step-by-step recipes with pre-measured ingredients. So all you have to do is cook, eat, and enjoy.

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Could be good stuff, man. Yeah, and it's fun to make. We usually do it as a family. So you can get delicious filling meals delivered right to your door every week for less than 10. $10 a survey and free shipping. So our listeners can get $30 off their first week of HelloFresh. All you have to do is go to hellofresh.com slash true crime 30 and enter the promo code true crime 30. That's Hellofresh.com slash true crime 30 promo code true crime 30. And then you get to Lamericus Davidson, who is really considered the ringleader of this

whole thing, right? It was his house. most of the individuals said it was his idea to do the carjacking, but he had his own ideas about the defense in his case. So what he told his attorneys was that Christian and Newsom came to his home to buy drugs and this was a drug deal gone bad. That's how he, you know, he's got to figure out Gibbs. How do I explain how these people, were in my house. Right. Because there was so much evidence against him. First of all,

Shannon Christian was found in his home, in a trash can. Hard to contest that. You're not going to be able to contest it. It for sure happened. Yeah. How are you going to explain it away? How do you explain and how that is sitting right there in your own kitchen, buddy? But on top of that, also found in that home were personal items belonging to both Shannon and Chris. They found Shannon's debit card in the house and they determined that it had Davidson's fingerprint on it. And he was also nailed by ballistics. It was concluded that the 22 caliber bullets used to kill Chris Newsom came from the gun of Davidson. So there was a ton of evidence against him. And a jury sentenced him to death. So he's the only one of the five that got a

death sentence. But he's also the only one of the five where they had this amount of physical evidence tying him to the crimes. Then we get to George Detroit Thomas. And he painted a totally different picture during his trial. So he contended that he overheard brothers Davidson and Cobbens. arguing over a plan to steal a car. He said Eric Boyd showed up later on at the house, but Thomas says that he got tired. He fell asleep. And by the time he woke up,

all three of them, Davidson, Cobbins, and Boyd were gone. The next thing he knows, Shannon and Chris were being brought into the house bound and blindfolded. So this is his story, Gibbs. He fell asleep. Just fell asleep. was asleep while all that went on. Didn't hear the screaming, all the commotion. Well, he was awake by the time they got back to the house. He doesn't have a good explanation for that part other than claiming

essentially the same thing that Cobbins claimed, which was by that point they couldn't leave. Davidson was not allowing them to leave. So he's his claiming. He was he's not part of the carjacking at this point. And didn't have anything to do with the murder. but he wasn't allowed, but he was there. Innocent bystander trapped in the house. Yes. I think that is essentially what he's claiming, but the jury doesn't buy it.

You know, this is a Hamilton County jury bust in. They convict him in both of the murders, and he's sentenced to life without parole. So that was a call between George Thomas. So that was a call between George Thomas. and someone that they played at his trial. I don't know what to make of that. I think he's deflecting there a little bit.

It sounded like it. So so far we have Thomas and Cobbins get life with no parole. Davidson gets the death penalty. And Eric Boyd, basically for lack of evidence, got some accessory after the fact, 18-year charge. Vanessa Coleman, who was 18 years old at the time of the crime, She was the last one to go on trial. And she also insisted that she was a victim,

not allowed to leave the house, not able to stop the crimes being committed against Christian and Newsome. But the prosecutors told jurors and closing arguments that Vanessa Coleman made breakfast each morning for the other individuals in the Chipman House. I guess she had admitted to serving Oateman's, meal, sausage, biscuits, eggs. So I don't know what you make of that Gibbs, other than the fact of, does that show that

maybe she wasn't such an unwilling held against her will victim? I don't know what that means, to be honest with you. I don't know what you make of that as a juror. Yeah, I mean, it just seems like somebody was pretty relaxed with the current. That's what it seems like to me. I don't know that she was saying she was forced at gun. point to make breakfast for everyone. I mean, that's a lot of breakfast to make.

And, you know, if you were upset, I mean, you might just kind of get by with minimal, you know, to make them happy. I wouldn't break out the layers of oatmeal, sausage, biscuits, eggs. I think she was just doing, making meals for her man and her man's friends. That's what it sounds like to me. I think the jury is going to take it that way, too. Now, her attorney would come. back and tell the jury that

Coleman tried to leave the house. She told the others that she was going to call the police and she was threatened with a gun saying that Davidson was going to kill her if she didn't stay put. So I mean, I said, you know,

there's a lot of idiots here. But come on. If you didn't want to be there, knowing the history of some of those men that surrounded you, I think she was probably at least street smart enough to go about her own business, why they were doing whatever they were doing,

and just simply slide on out, and not to make an announcement that, hey, I'm going to call the police. Right. It's just not what you do. You never know. I mean, you never know how the situation went, but I have a hard time arguing with you on that fact.

Obviously, these people had to sleep at some point. She probably could have slipped out then if she really had wanted to. Yeah, exactly. say the same thing for Cobbins and Thomas probably as well. I'm sure they had opportunities to leave that presented themselves and they chose not to. They chose instead to participate at some form of, you know, a level. So for her trial, they brought a jury in from Nashville. They acquitted her for the crimes against Christopher Newsom, but they convicted her as a facilitator in the crimes against Shannon Christian.

So obviously they're not saying that she killed her, but they are saying that she played a part in the crimes. She received a sentence of 53 years in prison. And I get what she's saying, right? She's saying she couldn't do anything. She was held against her will. There was never a good opportunity. But I don't know. Again, we just circle back the same thing.

There's always opportunities, just how you take advantage of those opportunities. And I think that's what the jury ultimately decided. She was a facilitator. She played a role. It might not have been directly in the murder or the sexual assaults or any of that. But she was there. And she contributed in some way to what happened. So the defendants in the state cases.

So that's all of them except for Eric Boyd. We talked about him. He was convicted at the federal level. The other four all appealed their convictions. So that's the end of the story. right Gibbs that's it this is the part where no we would normally wind down the episode but not so fast because there's a curveball in this case and it's related to the judge richard barn gardener who was on the bench for the four state trials he gets caught up in this scandal of abusing his authority

to get drugs from individuals that had come through his courtroom. This guy ultimately gets disbarred. He was sentenced to a two-year suspended sentence, but allowed to keep his pension. That seems awful nice of him. Yeah, you know, government had its best. Now, he would later lose that pension. Good.

In 2013, he got caught lying in court on a case that involved one of these women that he used his power over to get drugs. So this guy was a mess. But he resigned, stepped down from the bench. When all of these allegations first came out, the problem is when he stepped down, he had not yet fulfilled his role in affirming the verdicts in, you know, these cases. So that's a problem. It is.

So they bring in a special judge by the name of John Blackwood. and he makes a ruling that the four that were convicted in state court should get new trials. Essentially, he's saying this judge was impaired, intoxicated at the time these trials were going on. And there is definitely some truth to that. In fact, the state didn't even challenge the retrial order for Vanessa Coleman because Judge Baumgartner actually came out and confessed that he was taking Xanax during her trial. Like he was taking drugs while he was sitting on the bench. Wow.

But they did challenge the retrials for the other three, just not for Vanessa Coleman. So we fast forward to June 2012. Prosecutors filed to have Judge Blackwood recused from the case. And he was ultimately removed. So a new judge comes in by the name of Walter Kurtz, he's selected to oversee the retrials. He makes a ruling denying retrials for Cobbens and Davidson, essentially stating that there was extensive evidence, physical evidence, tying them to the murder. But he does grant the retrials for Coleman and George Thomas. So Vanessa Coleman goes on trial again.

this time the jury is brought in from Jackson, Tennessee. She's facing essentially the same charges she did in her original trial, but this jury convicted her on lesser charges. And they give her a smaller sentence, 35 years, considerably less than her original 53-year sentence. And she could actually be up for parole next year. Wow. in May of 2013, George Thomas was retried.

They brought in a jury from Nashville. He was once again found guilty on all counts. I think one of the counts was deemed to be a lesser charge than it was in the original trial. But essentially, he got convicted again. They handed down life sentence. But this time, he got the possibility of parole. So before it was life with no parole. now it's life with the possibility of parole after 51 years.

Thomas appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, but they decided not to hear his case. So Vanessa Coleman, she was the only female, charged in connection with these crimes. She is at the Tennessee prison for women. She's serving her new sentence of 35 years. And obviously, she gets credit for all the time that she's already been. that's why she's up for parole next year. And I should say Gibbs, I think this is her next parole. She's already had a couple of parole hearings, I think, at least one, where she was denied.

I think she's next up in 2019, I believe. Okay. Soon. Yeah. Yeah, very soon. So she could theoretically, you know, get out. Cobbins and George Thomas were originally sent to River Bend maximum security. then they got transferred to a new facility that opened in 2012.

We talked about it. Cobbins serving life sentence without parole. Thomas is serving a life sentence, but maybe could have the ability to get parole at some point way, way in the future. Davidson was sentenced to death. He was sent to River Bend as well. And then you get to Eric Boyd. And this Eric Boyd case was very strange, right?

the only one that was convicted on federal charges, he got an 18 year sentence and he's serving that sentence in Yazoo City, Mississippi. Yazoo. And we talk about, right, these federal cases are strange. They could send you wherever they want. Right. You know, you're not going to be doing time most likely in the same state where you were convicted or where you committed your crimes.

And he was supposed to be eligible for parole in 2000. But that may change because in March of this year, 2018, a grand jury charged Eric Boyd, who's now 46 years old with 36 counts of first degree murder, felony murder, especially aggravated robbery, especially aggravated kidnapping, and aggravated rape. And to be honest with you, Gibbs, I don't know what the difference between aggravated and especially aggravated is. Yeah. Especially must be worse.

I would think. I'm not just aggravated. I'm especially aggravated. But this is happening. I mean, this is unfolding, you know, kind of right now. But it's all in connection to the 2007 crimes against Christopher Newsom and Shannon Christian. And we talked about this. You know, authorities back then thought that he played a bigger role.

But at the time, they just didn't feel like they had enough evidence to charge him with the same things that they did the others. And unfortunately, there's just not a lot out there yet, at least that I could find, as to what the new evidence is or what's come up over the years. So it'll be something to look out for. But obviously, they've connected some dots. Well, I mean, clearly there's better DNA testing. So maybe they were able to get some.

Better readings on the DNA that they did have and his was in it. Maybe. I just don't know because of the heinous way that they set Christopher Newsom's body on fire, maybe the technology is better, but man, I don't know what you could get from. I don't know, but maybe they got something. Or maybe they got somebody that has come forward that is able to corroborate some of the stories because there were stories that Eric Boyd was directly involved. Yeah.

So maybe they got some more witnesses that have come forward. But it'll be something to look out for as we move along. So as we're kind of ending this, you know, I want to talk about this case, how it was covered. You know, we mentioned it was a big case in the Knoxville area. It was extensively covered by that media. It didn't get a lot of national press, at least in the beginning. And there were a lot of people that accused. accuse the media of not wanting to cover it because of the race of the victims and the suspects.

There was also some bad reporting early on. Someone came out with a story in print that said that Shannon Christian had been mutilated and dismembered. So somebody got some bad information. That's some really bad information, you know. Yeah, pretty rough. The police chief came out and said, you know, there were no indications that the crimes were racially motivated. There's no proof of a hate crime. And they went further.

And they said, you know, during their investigation of the people charged in this case, they found out that they had many white friends. They had white girlfriends. They had dated white people. There was just no evidence of. of the fact that they hated white people, that this crime was in any way related to that. It was just a sick, gruesome, horrific crime. It was.

It was. But that didn't stop people from, you know, commenting on the case, saying it was racially motivated, you know, on TV. There were people talking about this case saying that, you know, if this was five white people that, had killed two African Americans, a couple, this would be all over the news. That's essentially the statement that a lot of people were making, right? It didn't receive the national coverage that other cases did because people didn't want

to talk about five African Americans killing a white couple, but if it was the other way around, they would have. I don't like that argument. And I don't know if it has any merit at all, but I don't like it. I don't like thinking that that's the world that we live in. You know, it shouldn't matter Gibbs if, you know, a person of one race kills a person of another race. They kill somebody within their own race.

It just doesn't matter. It's a human being killing another human being. And it should be covered the same way. There was a reverend in Knoxville. He was actually the president of the Knoxville chapter of the NACP. He came out and said, quote, it doesn't make me uncomfortable speaking out against this crime because it was African Americans committing a crime against Caucasians. This is not a black and white issue. It's a right

and wrong issue. Those who committed this crime were unjust in doing so and they should pay the penalty. I could not agree with that guy anymore than I do. You know, I mean, it's just that he's saying exactly the way that it should work. Yeah. Yeah. It doesn't matter. Black, white, Hispanic, Asian. If you take somebody else's life, regardless of, you know, what your race is, what the victim's race is, you should be punished. To the full extent of the law. Exactly. But I don't know. Is that the society we live in? You know, are all cases covered equally? I don't think that they are. No, we know. We know. No, they're not.

But I'm not sure if it's a racial issue. You know, there are some cases that get a lot of attention. And I think there's a lot of factors that go into that. You know, if you look at, I think the media looks at what is going to appeal. And appeal is probably not the right word, but to a national audience, right? So if you're talking about national media, they're going to cover cases that they think the nation as a whole wants to hear about. So anything involving a celebrity, that becomes national news, things that cases that have kind of a strange twist or especially like if so if they involve

children. Anything that they can sensationalize? Well, I think the media can sensationalize anything. Well, that's true. I think they're pretty good at that. Yeah, that is true. But, you know, I'm just, I look back at cases like Casey Anthony, Jodi Arias, right? Jody Arias was one, white woman killing a white man. I mean, I think they had her on there because I think there's a good population that felt that she was an attractive woman that did this crazy thing, you know, of how she portrayed how the events went. But really, I think the media just loved her look.

And that's why they ran with her story. Yeah, I just think it's fascinating why some stories and why, you know, some murders get publicized. Yeah. And some don't. Think about how many murders are committed every day. And very few of them make the national news. Right. So why is that?

They've got to have some type of legs that hold them up, you know, through that process. And we know sex sells. That is true. So, I mean, that could be part of the process, you know, depending on what those individuals look like. I mean, so Scott Peterson, good looking guy. And most people's realm, they would say he was a good looking guy. Yeah. Killed his wife who was pregnant.

There was a lot there. Yeah. But it really grew and had some legs to it. And I think it was more because of how he looked. I don't know how far that would have went with, you know, somebody that was far less attractive. Yeah. You might be on to something. I just think about how many.

men kill their wives every year. I have no idea what the number is. But what percentage of them make the national news? I would say it's probably pretty small. Really small. Regional news of that too. Yeah. But there were, again, there were a lot of people that accused the media of not wanting to cover this case solely based on the racial makeup of the victims and the perpetrator. And one of the cases that they a lot of people brought in was the Duke lacrosse case. You know, look at what type of national exposure that got. It turned out those guys weren't even guilty. And I'm not blaming the media.

I don't really don't have, I don't have a stance on this one way or another. They can pick and choose whichever cases they want. I don't care. Right. I'm just commenting on what other people said at the time. And that Duke LaCross case was one of the cases that they brought up. in comparing it to this case the murder of Chris Newsom and Chan Christian and why that case was so publicized and this one wasn't. I mean, this case kind of reminds me of your case that you did months back, right?

The Wichita. Oh, a little bit, yeah. Yeah. The Carr brothers? Mm-hmm. Well, you did it too. I mean, you were on the episode. Yeah.

You acted like I did it by myself. Oh, you know what I mean? T-Cat, you know. T-Cat. You are T-Kat. I know. Just reminding you of that fact. But anyway, you know, I don't want to get into a big debate over this.

I just want everybody to be aware that it was a topic of discussion back then, for sure. But I think you and I gives are in agreement, right? Victims of violent crime should be treated. They should be covered in the same way. It shouldn't be based on race, gender, anything. else. But I'm also not naive enough to think that there are many factors that play into what cases hit the national zeitgeist. Or circuit. Yep. Yeah. Now, in 2008, golf tournament Memorial Foundation was established in Shannon Christian's memory. And it works to provide a

scholarship to a Farragut high school senior, which is where she graduated. from who's going on to attend the University of Tennessee. That's awesome. That's a beautiful thing. Yep. That is very, very cool. There's a little league baseball tournament in Chris Newsom's honor. And a memorial scholarship was set up.

It's given annually in his name to a graduating halls high senior baseball player. So I think those are all great things. Those are. That's amazing. Their memories alive. Yeah, I mean, two great young adults. And then we have to talk about this house. You know, essentially was a house of horrors.

Yeah. 2316 Chipman Street was bought by a national garbage company called Waste Collections. They demolished the house in October of 2008 with designs to replace it with a memorial. That's amazing. Dedicated to Chris and Shannon. Yeah. That's a great company then. Yeah.

And that is awesome. Number one, they had some type of facility close to where this house was. Number two, she was found in a in a waste and a garbage can. I don't know. They must have really taken this to heart and thought, you know what? We need to step up. We need to do some. Demolishing that house.

is the first step. But that's, you know, not that I'm saying they were looking for PR, but that's some really good PR right there, you know, when you come in and you remove that house of horror and just get it out of there, man. Well, I'm sure it didn't hurt. It didn't hurt that it was going to be PR, but it's a good thing nonetheless. But that's it, Gibbs. That's the case of Chris Newsome, Shannon Christian, you know, some people that made the

worst decisions that you can possibly make and they took away the lives of what appeared to have been two really great young people. Yeah. That were probably destined to go on and do great things. Do great things. And maybe they would have gotten married. Maybe they would have had a family. Maybe they would have broken up and done great things separately. The sad part is we just will never know. Just, you know, one night, one night went awry. You just never know. So love the ones you're with. If you don't love the ones you're with, go get somebody you love and love that person, man.

You can live your life. But I think it shows you what one bad decision can do, right? The decision to go out and find somebody to carjack, horrible decision leads to a bunch of more horrible decisions. And it ultimately leads to the murder of two people. All right, Gibbs. We've got some voicemails. You want to do those? Let's do it. Hi, Mike. Hi, Gibby. This is Stacey Cross from Masflin, Ohio. I wanted to say I love your podcast. I listen to it every chance I get. I binge done it for the longest time.

You guys are cool. I act. And there was a thing I wanted you guys look into. His name is Eddie Lee Sexton. It happened here in Maslin. It's a pretty twisted story. I only read a little bit about it. if you want to look into it. And God bless and keep your own time with Dickin. All right. Love it. Great voicemail. I think Sexton is on our list, Gibbs, but I have to check.

Hi, Mike and Gibby. This is Tyne from Fasnow. I just stumbled upon your podcast about a month ago playing ketchup. And let me tell you something, boys. Mm-mm, mm-mm. You guys are so add dick. I listen to you guys at their work playing ketchup right now. Well, anyway, boys, too bad you guys are married because you were single.

holla. Keep up the great work. All right, Gibbs, so that was Todd. I've never got a holla. Have you ever hollered at someone? No. I don't think I've ever hollered at someone. That's closest we ever got to having a holla. It was a holla. I think holla became a thing after I was already married. So I don't think I've ever hollered.

Oh, okay. At someone. Well. I don't even know what that means. Does that mean to call someone? I think so. Shows how old we are. Yeah. But I really got a kick out of that voicemail because

I don't know, I want to sit down and have a beer with Todd. I feel like that would be an interesting conversation. Or a martini. Or a martini or a mojito. Mojito, too. You are a mojito. Whatever it is. You're mohito kind of guy.

I really feel like Todd brought a lot of good energy to that voicemail. Yeah. I feel like he'd be a cool person to hang out with. There you go. If you're ever in Fresno. Then we're going to holla. As soon as we figure out what that means. Hi, this is Dixie from Bowling Green.

I consider myself your greatest fan, and you've done it again, as you always do. I just finished listening to the story about Robert Hanson. And, you know, I thought about one of my colleagues used to talk about child molesters. He called them a waste of human flesh, and I would say Robert Hanson was indeed one of those. But I have another question. Does the Nick River have a hard R in it? And also is our new slogan, Ride and Die. Thank you.

Hopefully, all have something more interesting to tell you the next time I call. I just want to do this because I just enjoy your podcast so much. Thank you. Bye-bye. All right, Gibbs. Dixie is awesome. She is a super fan. Yeah, she's awesome.

So two things. The Nick does not have a hard R in it, but it does have a hard K as we found out, because it's actually called the Kinnik. See? Huh? River. Never know. Kinnik.

The Kinnik. And ride and die is kind of your slogan. I still don't understand what it means, but. Ride or die, man. Or ride or die. I said ride and die. That would be, you don't want to do that. You can't do that.

Right or die. Yeah. But Gibby's got a lot of slogans. To pair it down to just one is pretty tough. It is. He's like a slogan machine. The sloganator. He's like a walking meme.

Stokester. Generator. Slugorama. Mike and Gibby, this is Jared Beanfield from Ogden, Utah again. Today is Monday, and I just listened to the episode on Keith Hunter Jefferson. A couple things for you. The song is called Mandy, only Mandy, by Barry Manil. And in the chorus, he says, oh, Mandy.

I thought that was pretty fine. The only reason I know that is because when I was 16 years old, I liked a girl named Mandy, and so I burnt a CD for her, and I put that song on the CD. But really enjoyed that case today. Recently had a dream. I very seldom get nightmares, but even when I'm listening to your cases at night and whatnot.

But I had this dream the other night where my neighbor was a killer, and they actually buried the bodies in my yard, which is probably a good idea if they're not wanting to get caught with suspicious or anything. So anyway, pretty crazy dream. Enjoying the podcast. keep up the good work and we will talk you later but all right thanks Jared so Gibbs we did hear a lot about the Mandy yeah uh in your old or old Mandy hey you sing it your way I'll sing it my way but I got a kick out of Jared because he called him Barry Manillo yeah I heard that I'm pretty sure

it's Barry Manalo I know while we're on the correction corner should we just let it go no I was going to you're gonna call it out no Jared's a cool guy he'll appreciate it yeah well he's does have some dead bodies in his backyard. Yep. I might use that in the book that I'm writing. You should. Where me and you, you and I are detectives hunting down a serial killer.

Yeah. I might use that. Do it, man. All right. Yeah. Hey, Mike and Gibby. This is Jerry. He's a truck driver again.

Basically, most all your companies now are running an ELD, which is an electronic loss device. And that device does, not only does that, advice do it, but most companies like my company included have GPS on the truck and they can look and see where that truck is at any given point. Now there is rumor that some of the older trucks don't have to run in ELD because the electronics in the truck is just not

compatible with it. And there's also rumor that some smaller carriers, you know, carriers just don't have a lot of trucks or what have you, don't have to run the electronic log devices. But still, yeah, a lot of those companies still have GPS from my understanding in their trucks. Hopefully somebody else can call in also and give you a bit more information on that. But, yeah, being a serial killer today in a big truck would be quite a chore because Big Brother is always on the lookout for where you are. So anyways, guys, be safe.

I hope that shit some light on there. Be safe and keep your own time kicking, fellas. Stop you later. So we knew Jerry would come through. Yeah, we did. And he actually left two voicemails. Yeah. The first one he wasn't happy with

because he didn't feel like he went into enough detail so he called back. So I just played that one. Well, it's good. You know, it's good to hear that. Sounds like it takes the fun out of all the trucking, though. Big Brother's always watching you. What kind of fun are you talking about?

Oh, man. You want to have some fun when your trucking. I don't understand what type of fun you're referring to. Clearly, you never did any trucking. I have not done any trucking. Yeah. Sounds like you have. I'm just saying.

And you had some sort of fun. The most fun you probably had trucking was watching Smokey and the Bandit. I do like Smokey and the Bandit. You probably, you probably did. You got a lot in common with Bert. The mustache? Yeah. The ruggedly handsome good looks.

That's it. That cracked you up, didn't it? All right, Gibbs, that leads us into our, what do we get in the mail section? What did we get in the mail? Michelle Bold Duke sent three chips in from Florida. Awesome. Harley chips. Vroom, vroom.

Dallas Kretschmar. Yeah, Dallas. He's our iron working buddy from the TCAT group. He's got some skills. He sent us some cool things. Yeah. A couple of small iron. things that he made.

Oh, yeah. One of them is T-Cat-related. Okay. And he wants it to go out to next month's Patreon merchandise winner. That's cool. On top of what we already give them. Really? Yeah.

Like a double whammy. Yeah, so there'll be two gifts next month for the Patreon merch winner. I'm going to build a barn just so he can make something for it. That seems like a sound fiscal decision. Yeah. Spend a whole bunch of money so that he can make something for your business. barn. So I can hang hang hanging in the barn. Norman B. sent in a Harley

chip for me. Yeah. From State College, PA. Cool. But he also sent in a very cool coin for you. I know. I'm sitting here flipping it in the air right now. He wanted you to have something to carry around as a good look token. Heads and tails. I'll leave it at that. Exactly. It's pretty cool. Elisa Brogden sent in a bunch of chips from North Carolina, Tennessee, a few other states. She went traveling.

She did. Roxanne Nolan sent three chips from Florida as well, but all from different places. That's cool. So awesome. And then Kendra Davidson, who had sent me some Harley chips, what, a week or two ago. Yep. Sent you in some treats from where Gibbs? Saskatchewan.

Oh, you actually said it right that time. So what she said? A key chain. Key chain, some maple syrup because, you know, that's Canada. and somebody might not have known. Somebody over and sent me some Saskatchewan. Can I say that? I can't believe you said it like 10 times before we started recording.

Choclets. Scotiawaxia. There you go. Saskatchewan chocolates with whatever Saskatchewan berries are in the inside. So you got that going for you. We got that. And then she sent me a nice little letter and print out. and stuff like that.

So we appreciate all that. And then you're probably not going to like to hear this because I got it, you know, delivered to me and I didn't share it with you. But so Kristen Smith, aka Joan, sent me my grandma's favorite potato candy. And I was so incensed when you told me because we told you said since we did that episode, that was like the Christmas episode. Yeah. That you were going to make this potato candy for me.

I know. You haven't made it. No. And then somebody makes it, sends it to you. You can't even save one piece to bring it. It was that good. She made it perfect. She made it perfect.

And I thank you and I love you. And it was amazing. And Mike didn't get any and he's going to be complaining for the next couple hours. One piece in a Ziploc bag and say, hey, here, this is that potato candy I was talking about. Try it. Yeah. It's good. I'm sorry, man. I still don't believe it exists. I think you're making the whole thing up.

It was good. You had your chance to prove it and you blew it. I know it. All right, everyone, that is it for another episode of true crime all the time. So for Mike and Gibby, stay safe and keep your own time ticking.