Forces of Evil ////// 354 | Forensic Files

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true crime [Music] Columbus Georgia in the latter part of 1977 a series of terrifying crimes
started to occur in the Winton district this is a small very specific area for these types of extremely violent crimes
to be occurring the area itself was fairly upscale compared to some of the surrounding areas the sudden outburst
and uptick in thefts and violence was highly unusual because these crimes remain unsolved the community was on
high alert the crimes were break-ins robberies auto theft but also a very specific type of crime sexual assaults
and the rapes and murders of six elderly women the six murder victims ranged from sixty
years of age to 89 and the sexual assaults when the victims were lucky enough to survive the attacks fit the
same victimology these attacks and murders were occurring in such close proximity to one another and with such
rapid succession the Columbus PD believed that the thief the rapist in the killer were one in the same
it was as if something very evil moved into this area bringing death to town the attacks which mostly took place in
the middle of the night shared so many common elements almost all of the victims were strangled to death with
their stockings first a brutal attack with strikes to the head and/or chest and then the application of a stocking
pulled from the victims drawer and wrapped two or three times around the neck twisted and pulled tighter and
tighter until the life left their eyes the murdered victims were all single elderly Caucasian women forensic
evidence collected at some of the murder scenes told the police the killer they sought was an african-american male due
to the manner of the strangulations the perpetrator was dubbed the stalking strangler the police were having no luck
finding this killer of women despite an increase in manpower and man-hours despite the heightened awareness and the
additional patrolling and the surveillance of Winton and good old-fashioned detective work just was
not working this serial offender truly was a phantom in the night the investigation yielded only obstacles
and dead ends but then 1978 a possible major break in the case the police chief received a letter from
the chairman of an organization comprised of seven white radical vigilantes this letter was a handwritten
formal introduction to a group that called themselves the forces of evil on September 6 1977 a nude and lifeless
body was discovered near the woman's barracks at Fort Benning this is near Columbus Georgia later the victim was
discovered to be 24-year old army private Karen Hickman the victim had been beaten with a blunt object and then
run over several times with an automobile evidence at the scene told investigators that this woman was killed
elsewhere and then her body was transported and left at this location about a month later an anonymous call
led authorities to her missing clothes police worked the case and had some leads early on however nothing was
panning out this murder at the time was considered to be a one-off unfortunately
just ten days later the stalking strangler claimed his first victim and very quickly the authorities found
themselves neck deep and a whole other set of homicide investigations I do want to take a quick moment here to address
the attack on this poor woman most reports state that she was beaten and then run over several times and she was
killed elsewhere and I know there are many great TCG army armchair detectives out there thinking of the
reasons that investigators would come to these conclusions but I want to include
my own theory here plus a little more insight into the victim's injuries and what was likely not found at the body
dump site there is one rather gruesome report out there that says that the victim was not necessarily run over I
mean I guess she was technically but a report suggests that that might not be the full intent of the killer this
report states that the evidence showed that the victim was attacked this is the beating part she was knocked unconscious
and then propped up like in a sitting position against a tree and then the killer drove the car into her wedging
her between the vehicle and the tree my guess here is that this report is probably correct a portion of the body
may have been run over when the vehicle was then pulling away from the tree but I'm guessing due to this type of
specific injury and likely the lack of what should have been a lot of blood at the scene the investigators were able to
very quickly discern that the victim had in fact been killed elsewhere and then moved and dumped in this location I'm
curious though was there evidence at the location of the missing clothes that determined that she may have been killed
at that location on Friday March 3rd 1978 Columbus Police Chief Kurtis McClung received a letter the letter
read in part dear sir we are an organization composed of seven members I'm writing this letter to inform you
that we have one of your Columbus women captive her name is Gayle Jackson since the coroner said that the strangler is
black we decided to come here and try to catch him or put more pressure on you I
see now more pressure as needed at this point Gayle Jackson is still living if that
strangler is now caught by one June 1978 you find Gale Jackson's body on winning Tennille not
caught on one September 1978 the victims will double you have until Sunday for reply don't
think we are bluffing we are called the forces of evil the letter was written on
stationery embolized with the Great Seal of the United States and the paper had United States Army printed in one corner
the handwritten letter claimed to be from a group of seven people calling themselves the forces of evil as you can
see this letter was in direct response to the information released regarding the stalking strangler of Columbus in
the Winton district more specifically right police announced that the stalking murders were committed by an
african-american offender in this group the forces of evil has spelled out their
plans for retaliation in this letter and sent it to police the group claimed to be made up of seven white men from
Chicago as the Atlantic Constitution put it the writer coyly suggested to authorities that anyone could come
across such stationery and not to assume that he was a serviceman surprisingly enough or maybe not the writer supplied
a return address however it was quickly determined that this address was a fake again this it makes not much sense here
right we have crimes happening and now we have this group of vigilantes that are gonna come in and they're gonna
commit other crimes until the police solve that crime of the strangler yeah but this gives you a little bit of a
sense of what was going on in Georgia back in the late 70s remember when we watch mine hunter and leading up to the
Atlanta murder cases they talked about the the racial divide at the time in that area right and then on top of that
they were a little bit worried too there was a lot of rumblings behind the scenes
on whether to say that they believed that the offender was white or black in the Atlanta case because they were
worried what effect that would have on the general public and this case is really just echoes all those fears that
everybody had right and this this is previous we know we have the coroner who says hey there's evidence we found
evidence at a couple murder scenes of the stalking strangler and we believe our offender here is an african-american
male this letter claims to be seven white guys that are obviously full of hate and ignorance and they are going to
retaliate by killing African American women while this other killer the stalking strangler is killing Caucasian
women yeah and what's their group called again it's a forces of douchebags so the letter
writer claims to be the chairman of the forces of evil so while this letter provided a good deal of information it
did not provide any assistance toward the ongoing stalking strangler investigation this stalking strangler
investigation we're not going to get too much into it because it's a completely different story just keep in mind this
was a huge investigation this was a huge undertaking for the police department right a second letter was received a
little more than a week later this letter too contained a fake return address this letter was a little
different though it was the same in the sense that this letter too would be from
the forces of evil and again stated that a woman would be killed if police do not
catch the stalking strangler but this time the letter included a ransom proposal $10,000 in return for the
victims safety this whole Gail Jackson the the named victim in the letter this whole Gail Jackson thing is all sorts of
bad right so first we have a rapist killer of single old ladies the stalking strangler who is terrorizing Columbus
Georgia and now not connected if you believe the writer of these letters right not connected to the strangler we
have a whole nother series of murders that are going to occur based off of these threats that are in
the letters so we have what we refer to here in the garage is a double whammy situation whammy whammy well no and then
on top of that you have one strangler but you have these seven forces of evil guys from Chicago and as former FBI
criminal profiler and I will say this until my dying day friend of the show John Douglas put it this development
represented everyone's worst nightmare a brutal killer stalking Columbus was horrible enough and organized a
murderous vigilante reaction to it could tear the community apart it's not that far of a stretch to think that possibly
this forces of evil is somehow connected with the KKK or white supremacy and so I
think what law enforcement is scared of is not only do we have this strangler but now we have these white vigilantes
clean black women is this gonna create some kind of race riot now one big problem right from the start with this
investigation they did not have a missing person matching that of Gayle Jackson as stated in the letter however
what we do have is a woman named Brenda Gayle Faison who seems to have disappeared the car she was driving was
discovered on March 5th 1978 at the Sand Hill Bar and Grille in Columbus Georgia
she was last seen on February 27th of that same year just six days before her abandoned car was found her car was
found abandoned probably this probably did not raise a whole lot of red flags and soon it would be learned that Brenda
Gale Faison went by several names one being Gayle Jackson so now we have our link to the threat in the letter about a
week or so later another letter was received repeating much of what was stated in the first letter however this
time they stated that a woman named Irene no last name given have been abducted as well and would be executed a
letter received on March 27th 1978 stated that one of mrs. Jackson's arms would be broken and that there would be
a sharp blow to her head that caused death the author indicated that the authorities would receive a telephone
call to detail the location of the body meanwhile the FBI is going to get involved in this case keep in mind by
this point they have already been involved in the stalking Strangler investigation as said in the trailer the
general plan of attack in the stalking case is simple and makes a whole heck of a lot of sense the break-ins rapes and
murders are happening in such a confined stretch of land that if they increase manpower and increase hours you increase
the police presence in that immediate area since the offender just keeps returning right to that same spot the
idea being that you catch him in the act you catch him red-handed at some point once apprehended you can hold him for
the breaking-and-entering charge for which he was arrested and then from there any of the forensic material you
have collected from the previous sexual assaults and murders you can compare that to your guy and then charge him
accordingly well this is actually very similar to what they did with the Elena child murders where they go hey we know
that the perpetrator is returning to to the scene or using and then laying a child murders using these bridges to
dump the body so let's stake out and we'll catch them in that yeah let's be there so given the strategy by this
point in the investigation the FBI would still be offering up resources but pretty much reduced to more of a
hands-off role in the stocking strangler case however they will be getting involved in the forces of evil case the
hunt for the chairman and his six disciples right now so Robert K Ressler was in town and he was having dinner
with a friend who is the deputy director of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation GBI for short this is Tom McGreevy
sidenote elcapitan McGreevy passed away in 2012 if you need some inspiration anyone out there look him up that's
Thomas McGreevy McGreevy spelled M C G re evey Y as Ted Theodore Logan would say he is a most
impressive dude wrestler says McGreevy asked him to review the letters that were sent along with some voice
recordings for some of the phone calls so some phone calls went to the MPs desk the military police desk at Fort Benning
Fort Benning is a United States Army Post straddling the Alabama Georgia border next to Columbus Georgia Fort
Benning supports more than a hundred and twenty thousand active duty military family members Reserve Component
soldiers retirees and civilian employees on the Reg Ressler agreed to help now this all came about because of another
great man Judson Rea Judd ray was a shift commander for the Columbus Police Department he suggested to the Columbus
Police Chief that we should get the GBI involved the chief prior to this was reluctant to do so after Jud convinces
the chief GBI gets involved and then through the McGreevy wrestler connection the FBI's elite serial Crimes Unit gets
involved another side note el capitan Judson Ray would go on to become FBI and working at the Atlanta field office and
eventually at Quantico while in Atlanta he worked the Atlanta child killer case with Douglas Judson ray is in my opinion
the inspiration or real-life version of the character Jim Barney mine Hunter series - played by Albert Jones right so
Ressler and Douglas get to work on this case analyzing the communications from the forces of evil Ressler this
your agent has the lead on this investigation also you have to wonder if in some cases with this team
if someone may take the lead just based off of their personal life experiences or how they may have how they may be
able to apply to a particular case or the profile of the offender yeah and some people don't like to take the lead
in cases and just sit back and give their opinions is a very good possibility here in this case this is an
example of such Ressler was former military he was a military police at one time so this might give him a little
more insight into this case or the offender knowing that Fort Benning is right there that's where one of the
bodies has been found we have calls going to the military police desk so given his background Ressler might just
be the right fit to be the lead on this case the first letter received contained
the seal of the United States and had the US Army printed in one corner the writer says anyone could have stolen the
station area but right from Jump Street Ressler and Douglas noticed the choice of words in the communications
specifically noting the one June 1978 and one September 1978 this is more military lingo as most of us would just
say June 1st or September 1st next we have a phone call this call is going to tell police where to find the body of
one of the captives of the forces of evil as the police have failed by this time to apprehended the strangler or to
pay the ransom on March 30th the Fort Benning Military Police telephone operators received a
call from a man identifying himself as the chairman of the forces of evil the chairman described where Jackson's body
was located 100 meters from Fort Benning this led MPs to the discovery of a shallow grave the body was in fact found
there that same day Jackson's entire face in the front portion of her skull worse
portions of her jaw bone teeth and bone fragments were discovered at the scene her left elbow was completely dislocated
according to the medical examiner the cause of death was multiple blows to the head inflicted by a heavy metal object
likely a tire tool or jack handle simply put she died by way of savage beating [Music]
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absolute most let's go through the basics of this offender profile or their theories and thoughts as they analyze
some of this stuff we need to keep in mind Robert Ressler and John Douglas of the
FBI's behavioral science unit it's had so many different names throughout the years I always stumble when it comes to
to say what unit they're in at the time when they're analyzing the first series of letters there is no victim yet
they've not found anybody they've not found any bodies this is one of those rare situations where we have
communication from a soon-to-be offender or someone who has offended but based off of the information in the letters is
only threatening to kill and they don't actually have a body yet so some of that
stuff that they were able to deduce from those communications rather interesting
here and again let's get into this a little more into this offender profile here so when the chairman described the
location of the body now by this point we have a phone call that describes the location of where they're going to find
the first body he referenced meters to supply the appropriate distance multiple times the Chairman referenced vehicles
so what the FBI is working with here captain is the choice of words the the choosing of using the words meters
opposed to feet or yards right again this is military lingo writing 1 June in 1 September instead of June 1st or
September 1st the use of the word vehicle or vehicles rather than automobile car or truck
Resler and Douglas both thought this to be more military than citizen speak Ressler concluded the following first he
says there was no group of seven white racist radicals from Chicago seeking retaliation for the stalking murders he
felt that the sole purpose of the letters and the creation of the forces of evil was to steer law enforcement in
a completely opposite direction from the actual killer because there was some connection between the killer and the
victim or soon-to-be victims Jackson was killed before any of the communications this is wrestlers belief
she was not abducted and then held in wait for the police to catch the strangler right she was already dead and
the killer came up with this whole thing post murder simply to cover up the crimes they believe that both gail
jackson and irene were already dead there was no opportunity to save either one of them no matter what the letters
said the opposite of seven white guys Ressler believed would be a single black male operating alone and even though he
is referencing the stalking strangler Ressler believed that the strangler and the forces of evil were two completely
different killers operating independently of one another his profile goes on to say that the
offender is an enlisted man at Fort Benning he would be between 25 to 30 years of age the killer is possibly
military police or an artillery man with a rank no more than a e6 rank we are looking for a man with a modest
education and a middle rank the coroner also concluded that the body of Gayle Jackson as the caller put it was in fact
Brenda Gayle Faison and she was killed about five weeks prior to when they found her so Ressler was right she was
killed before any of the forces of evils letters started to arrive yeah before any of the
communication happened April fourth another call led military police to an almost nude headless body this was found
behind a pile of logs at a firing range located on the Fort Benning property this woman too was beaten to death this
is just this is just downright horrible but she was she was not decapitated in the usual sense she was beaten in the
face and the head so badly that the head came off and a lot of brain tissue was exposed
skull fragments were found in the area and there was evidence that the body was dragged from the nearby access road and
then concealed behind this pile of logs this turns out to be the body of Irene Thur killed the the Irene named in the
letters and in the calls right but we had no last name provided in those communications on Monday April 3rd 1978
the body of Irene Thur killed aged 32 was found near a remote fort benning rifle range authorities quickly learned
that Irene was last seen at a local bar on March 13th in the company of an African American soldier Columbus PD in
the fort benning CID put out all known and suspected information when making their rounds
questioning and looking for a possible lead in this case the profile directly led to several eyewitnesses saying on
separate occasions and in one victim's case more than one location eyewitnesses place Gayle Jackson and Irene with a
soldier and because he frequented two of the local bars as did the two ladies these witnesses could provide a name the
victims were seen either in the company of or leaving the bar with william henry
hands hands joined the Marines after graduating high school in 1971 then he joined the army in February of
seventy-six he was assigned to Fort Benning in April of 76 before that he was stationed in Indiana enhance was
recently divorced his former wife Wanda says she divorced him in 1977 because he
beat her at this time Hans's 26 years old and a specialist grade four with the 197th Infantry Brigade and one nice
thing for law enforcement when your suspect lives at a US Army post they're generally pretty easy to find
Yeah right so think about this captain this is all happening very quickly we have the
threat of there being murder victims then eventually a call comes in that leads military police to the actual
victims right and from that profile and from some of the information learned about the victims we're able to very
easily get a really big lead in this case because what that profile provides the investigators when they go out and
they start questioning people that may or may not have seen something they're saying we have reason to believe that
the suspect is 26 to 30 years old and is a soldier that really jogs a lot of memories especially when you're talking
about somebody who's disappeared five weeks before right so this is going to lead them to this 26 year-old William
Henry hands so police round up mr. hands and they bring him in for questioning during this time the FBI is consulting
with psycholinguistics FBI consultant dr. Murray Myron now I know this is going to sound strange but I can
guarantee that this is not going to be the last time you hear the name of dr. Murray Myron on the show so anyways the
doctor compares Hans's voice with the recorded calls to the military police desk and states he believes it's a match
one of the witnesses told agent Richard Fox of the United States Army Central Intelligence Division CID that
Hance was the soldier seen with Irene and stated that the two left Vice Mitchell's tavern together tape
recordings of the phone calls to the Fort Benning police which indicated where the bodies could be found were
taken by CID agent Besser to Hans's company commander and First Sergeant who they play these tapes and he goes yeah
that's a match I think that's Hans's voice on those tapes so that's two of them yeah then agents Besson and Fox
told the commanding officer that they wanted to interview hands Hance agreed to be taken to CID headquarters where he
was advised of his rights and informed that the interview concerned the murder of Irene thir killed with whom he was
the last person seen Hance was advised of his Fifth and Sixth Amendment rights and he signed a written waiver waiving
those rights the interview was conducted from about 1 p.m. until 1020 p.m. pants
was then interviewed by the FBI in the Columbus Police for another hour during the interviews hands admitted writing
the letters in making the telephone calls for the forces of evil but he says he was forced to do so by the
organization hmm yeah the racist guys sounds about right yeah the next morning he was interviewed
again and again Hance was advised of his rights which he again waived it was in this interview when faced with all of
the evidence you know by this time they have had some time to collect more evidence make some comparisons and then
present all of that evidence to hands this is the handwriting comparisons voice recordings and they also found
footprints found at the dump sites he when looking at all this evidence goes all right I did it he confesses
providing a signed written statement concerning each murder now two days of interviews is straight
and maybe a bit over the top mm-hmm but CID and the Columbus PD state that throughout the two days of interrogation
and those are their words they chose to use the word interrogation Hance was given restroom breaks food breaks coffee
cigarettes and at no time did he request a lawyer or at no time did he ask that the interview be terminated okay right
now how much is the military involved and these interrogations for the most part I believe they they
were the lead on this because Irene thir kills body was found on their property so it is a military matter what I would
think that the rules don't don't apply as much to them yeah I don't know but we have his his written statement of
waiving those rights so we know he's he's made aware of his rights and he was told of his rights and he chose to just
go along with the interview or interrogation however you choose to see it I went into that on purpose because
there are some people that believe that Hance was treated unfairly I can see I can see that argument yeah yes this
thing called waterboarding I don't know if you heard of it but technically it would have been allowed during this time
that I mean I'm not saying that there's any evidence of them doing that to him it would appear none of the right tactic
like that was not used I mean that their words are we gave him restroom breaks food breaks coffee cigarettes he was he
could have he could have asked for a lawyer he didn't plenty of water yeah they weren't they weren't torturing this
guy right I think where people called this into question is the length of time that he is being I know I don't know if
I even want to use the word held because it sounds to me like he had every right
to just walk out of there and he chose to do so well this is also where he lives
I mean they're questioning him on the base which he lives right yeah and in his confession Hance he's going
to give some detailed information regarding these murders he stated that Jackson propositioned him at the
Sandhill Bar and Grill he said the two left and got in his vehicle they only drove a short distance and pulled over
wait so he's claiming that she's a sex worker correct okay she began to disrobe enhance said he flipped out he started
yelling and screaming at her and he grabbed her he said when she attempted to escape he
struck her with a karate chop across the head she fell across the door bleeding hands then pulled her out of the car
dislocating her elbow in the process he returned to his car he got a jack handle
from his car returning to her he finds Jackson still breathing right this he says surprised him so he repeatedly
struck the helpless victim in the face with this jack handle the beating was so severe that Gail's entire face was
destroyed and bone fragments were scattered about the area this guy is beyond vicious some of her brain tissue
was literally beaten from the skull the force of the attack was so great it produced a depression in the ground
behind Gail's head hands then buried Gail's body in a shallow grave he dug the grave with an entrenching tool so
anybody that knows military you know the little like I'm guessing that's one of those the folding shovels that they put
on the backpacks hands also admitted to killing Irene thir killed but alleged that he had lost all sense of control
and that his mind flipped he accepted responsibility for the murder stating that he had begged
God's forgiveness okay now in a very big surprise to investigators hands also admitted to the murder of 24-year old
Army Private Karen Hickman remember we mentioned her at the top of the show right her body was found September 6
1977 they had some leads in that but it was considered to be a one-off at the time and then when the stalking
strangler case took off they were all wrapped up in that and her unfortunately her murder in that investigation kind of
got lost in the shuffle so as I believe that now that won't happened first and then it seems like then he can control
him flipping out he can't control himself flipping out right and if you want my humble garage opinion here I
think that this probably all stemmed with it may have started from his divorce we talk many times about a
behavior of offenders before and after a series of murders and one thing that they always point to is that there would
be some kind of stressor something happened in this individuals life that they took it something went from being a
fantasy to being a reality they acted upon their their true thoughts and feelings right and this could be someone
who hated women who just hated women and he used to beat his wife we have a divorce and now these murders start he's
beating these women to death right and well look if his wife didn't leave him she's gonna be his first victim yeah so
in a sense this isn't so much we talked so much about these type of serial offenders they're most always sexual in
nature this is just pure brutality yeah I mean like this is this is looking at someone
and destroying them and physically destroying them well like you said I mean he's pulling her arm out of the car
and just locating it in the process I mean this is these attacks are vicious and you should have gave us a warning
because I'm gonna be thinking about this when I asked mom can you pass the gravy
well according to the newspapers for the arrest as far as the papers are concerned GBI agent bruce picket and
columbus detective james jones were credited with the legwork which led to the apprehension of william
henry hands okay but question may be you know that's maybe you don't did they get
to the bottom of why he came up with this ruse or tried to come up with this ruse to to cover up his crimes as dumb
as it's going to sound he thought it would work so it was exactly they're not going to
get this straight up from him but he does say that he made up the forces of evil eventually and I think he wrote the
letters and I think what we can do here is truly believe what Robert Ressler thought in his theory his theory was
there's a connection between this killer and the victims the killer is afraid that somebody's going to make that
connection he's going to be apprehended right so to kind of cut that off at the pass I'm going to create this whole ruse
of the forces of evil are killing african-american women and it's going to be something so totally the opposite of
me is the forces of evil will be seven white supremists right from Chicago from Chicago I wonder
what he had against Chicago that's that's a really good question why would you just pick randomly Chicago so
exactly that he thought it would work he thought that it would put them off of his trail here's the crazy thing though
it's uh well right baby crazy yes why did why does that phrase even come up everything's been crazy yeah I'm not
gonna be able to get out of my head about the decapitation in a way he injected himself into the investigation
Hance wasn't somebody that they were considering for any of these murders hell at the time they didn't eat they
weren't even aware that there were murders that there were victims until he starts writing letters he injects
himself and is through this profile through the the profilers that they come up with this dude so they linked him to
this in a way you have to wonder had he never started writing those letters would they have ever caught up to him
right more than the first murder they believe is a one-off right but that was somebody that it's
thought that they may have dated at one point or had some type of make sense some kind of relation some kind of
friendship I don't want to use the word relationship because people's minds wander when you say that they they were
acquaintances or had hung out on occasion something like that is what is believed right but
next to they believe were sex workers these would have also been regulars at bars where he was a regular so yes they
according to him and according to some of the other people eyewitnesses and such they were sex workers or but
long-term I so my point being is that the first crime most people thought this is a one-off
we don't have many leads now we're not really looking into it because we have this serial murderer and serial rapist
on the loose attacking older women and now so we're not focused on that first case and and
without drawing attention to it how many times have we seen when there's rumors that somebody is a sex worker that their
their crime just does not get the attention and doesn't and doesn't get the effort put in to solving the case as
as somebody else's case would well and when people live a high-risk lifestyle or what can be viewed as a high-risk
lifestyle it makes it difficult to hone in on a particular suspect because the suspect pool could be so much larger one
look if you're spending a lot of time at a local bar whether you're a sex worker
or not you're coming in contact with a lot of people throughout your week yeah I mean like if I if I come up missing
the suspects pool is really small but if you're going to a bar that has a decent amount of regulars now it's a lot
harder to investigate but like I said when there's rumors that these women are sex workers their cases are just not
taken as serious and so if he would have never brought attention to these cases look these investigators are on high
alert and there is a small possibility even though their profile is saying that this this is this guy is different this
killer is different than the strangler mm-hmm but there's a possibility that they're connected there's a small slim
chance so when he's given us these leads saying hey we got there's this body and you're gonna find it they they took
those cases way more serious because of the letters the letter shot himself in the foot
it was the letters that made it possible for them to identify the suspect right so if I'm at a bar and I'm interviewing
people that are regulars and say hey did you know Gayle Jackson described her and
then say she's been missing we found her dead but she's been missing for five weeks or so you might get you might not
get any answers but when you have this profile and you say oh you didn't see Gayle Jackson with a 26 to 30 year old
soldier you know it's a different line of questioning and it's a different response that it's going to conjure up I
laugh kind of because the effort is made to cover up his crimes by creating this
forces of evil and I kind of believe he may not have been apprehended or at least not identified so quickly had he
not wrote the letters right but to top all of that off man he was on orders to be assigned to Korea
this guy's a military man he was going to be sent to Korea in September of 1978 so not only would he may not have become
a suspect so quickly he had a he had a plan there was a way for him to be out of the area shipped far far away right
and look chances are law enforcement and military get along pretty well law enforcement could have said okay well we
we have reason to believe that this is our suspect military reaches out questions him at the Korean base he says
I don't know what you're talking about they relay that to the police and now he's off the suspect list never caught I
haven't I think had he been shipped out in September I don't think they would ever linked it to him right if he would
have never wrote those letters but here is this monster that smashes oh he would
have somebody would have resumed killing as soon as he came back right right but
here's what's interesting to me here here's this guy that I mean just look ya yank somebody's arm
so hard that it dislocates it you can't stop beating these individuals to the point like you said it's not on
decapitation and sista it's a smash call but still has something inside him saying this is wrong there's something
inside him that he says he begged God for forgiveness so let's go into that and we're kind of skipping ahead here
but I think this is appropriate because this is kind of where its leading anyway
there are a lot of people you know last week we discussed a very controversial case that the the result was death
sentence and the appearance now is that an innocent man may have been killed not
a good man a horrible man but one that may have been innocent for the crimes that he was specifically executed for
yeah real [ __ ] princess so here is another death penalty case that is it's not without controversy there are people
that believe that the way that Hance was treated is completely unfair there are many out there that say he was mentally
ill and mentally incompetent to stand trial or at least be executed for the charges right here here's a couple
problems I have with those thoughts and those feelings first off let me just get
this out of the way the death penalty is always a touchy subject for anybody regardless of what side of the fence you
are on I am firmly straddled right in the middle but the the issue here is mentally ill and mentally incompetent to
the point that he didn't know what he was doing was wrong he says his own words I begged God for forgiveness also
the thing about being incompetent I've never believed that when we have clear-cut evidence that somebody did
something wrong and then they went out of their way to try to cover it up right he obviously knew it was wrong if he's
trying to cover it up and he went to such great lengths and efforts to do so it was just a bad
dumb idea yeah didn't work out there was also some talk of his IQ there was some
statement there are statements out there that his IQ was 70 and then he was tested again at a later time and the
number was 91 so uh either he got much smarter at some point or the the first test one of the test has to be wrong
they both can't be wrong and he got more smartest more smartest yeah yeah so it's
not without controversy but the problem the problem that I want to keep going back to on Hans's case is he killed
three people that has never been in question that has never been part of the question of was he wrongfully executed
he absolutely killed these three people we know that to be fact and if not more he is suspected of killing somebody in
Indiana and this may have happened before this would have had to have happened before he was shipped down to
Fort Benning we're talking about an incredibly dangerous man he's beating people to death yeah the the tricky
thing here in in response to the people that have bad feelings about his execution or if he was treated fairly I
I can see and empathize with some of those arguments and some points of those arguments but I think they got this one
right meaning that he was guilty he was found guilty of these three murders other people sentenced him to be
executed and they carried out that that penalty okay I'm not clear on something that's
he sentence well okay why the state of Georgia or is he is this military well good to call that into question I was
going to kind of breeze through that and gloss over it but where his case gets a
little more complicated is for two of the murders he was charged in military court court-martialed or whatever they
call that right one of the murders he was charged in our normal court our civilian court did he work for Colonel
jessep I don't know I don't know what that is I'm sorry is a few good men reference
Colonel jessep oh I actually watched that a week ago yeah you should've got the reference then the thing here though
is captain he was sentenced to life imprisonment with hard labor in the military courts and he was sentenced to
execution in Georgia so a bit of a conflict there it's just really truly in the sense that two of the bodies were
found on the Fort Benning property so it is their jurisdiction one of them being
one of the victims being an Army private herself right but yeah that that's how that whole thing went down now he did
receive a ton of Appeals one of the appeals I believe went all the way to the Supreme Court in Georgia and no time
was any of this overturned I think he may have I think something may have got commuted to a life sentence at some
point but basically I mean are they just arguing mental illness because look listen if you are beating somebody to
death there is something wrong with you mentally and but that should not change the punishment I don't know that that
would fall under the classification of true mental illness in a sense that he is not to be held accountable for his
actions or his crimes right so William Henry Hance was convicted by a jury in the Superior Court of Muscogee County
Georgia he was convicted of the murder of Brenda Gale Faison aka Gale Jackson and also convicted of attempt attempted
theft by extortion because remember he asked for a ransom during the guilt phase of the trial the prosecutor lived
up to his promise to portray the crime in vivid detail after presenting numerous photographs of Gale Jackson's
mutilated in largely decomposed body the prosecutor introduced fragments of her corpse during closing arguments he
reminded the jury that near the place of the murder were found pieces of jawbone
with the teeth attached fragments of human skull no larger than a dime individual teeth and
he said you'll have that with you to take out in evidence the jury sentenced him to death for the murder under
Georgia Code section 27 25 30 4.1 and he was sentenced to five years imprisonment
for the attempted extortion right April 3rd 1994 you mean 3 April 3 3 April 1994
William Henry hands was electrocuted in Jackson Georgia a few minutes after 10:00 p.m. just minutes before they
flipped the switch Hance maintained his innocence in a seven-minute statement he
said in part why are you executing an innocent man he asked why why why the stalking strangler would eventually be
caught and apprehended for the murders but that is another story [Music] if you have been thinking about home
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one another until next week be good be kind and don't let it [Music] [Applause]

Source: https://www.podbean.com/eau/pb-u58kn-c90c0e

Forces of Evil ////// 354 Part 1 of 1 www.TrueCrimeGarage.com What is worse than a serial killer on the loose? Two of them! Join us in the Garage as we tell the story of the Forces of Evil. Happy Thanksgiving Everybody! Beer of the Week - Luau by Terrapin Beer Company Garage Grade - 4 out of 5 bottle caps We give thanks to our awesome sponsors! www.SimpliSafe.com/Garage - get HUGE savings on the already best value on home security! www.FabFitFun.com - use code GARAGE for $10 off your first box! www.Hallmark.com/Garage - get 20% off your card purchase! Subscribe to “The Jeffrey Epstein I Knew” wherever you get your podcasts!

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Brief Summary

The episode details the Stalking Strangler case and William Henry Hance's brutal murders of women in Columbus, Georgia, leading to his execution.

Key points

Introducing the Jeffrey Epstein Podcast. A new podcast series hosted by Vicki Ward explores the true story behind Jeffrey Epstein.
The Stalking Strangler. A series of violent crimes in Columbus, Georgia, targeting elderly women.
The Forces of Evil. A vigilante group threatens to retaliate against the stalking strangler.
Simply Safe Home Security Deals. Exclusive Black Friday deals on home security systems from Simply Safe.
The Power of a Hallmark Card. A simple card can show someone how much you care.
FabFitFun Winter Box. The winter FabFitFun box is filled with full-sized beauty and wellness products.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

This serial offender truly was a phantom in the night.

Describing the elusive nature of the killer.

0:43WatchNov 26, 2019

Tension

85/ 100High tension

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