Ryan Ferguson /// Part 1 /// 116 | Forensic Files

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changer 911 what is your emergency um we need someone here at the con Daily Tribune
what's going on I'm I'm not sure I was just told to call 911 there's somebody hurt outside is there anybody who can
tell me what's going on there I here we at the main building at the Tribune and what's going on the parking lot the
sports editor Kent laying on the ground pool of blood looks like he've been shot
or something okay he's on the parking lot behind the Tribune on the KFC side yes
yes who did you see in the area I saw two guys in the area were they white or black white I'd say 1920 what were they
wearing I I don't know this C she saw them she walked out to smoke a cigarette saw them duck down behind the car okay I
looked out and saw them and I said what's going on I knew it was Kent's car and I said Kent and they didn't look up
nobody did anything somebody's been hurt man okay so you saw them duck down behind his car yes okay and then where
did they go after that I don't know up up towards the new building uh towards Fourth Street I guess that's fourth so
just to make sure though he's down on the parking lot yes at all on these guys I don't well they they were close to 6
fet uh thin one of them had blond hair really really short blonde hair they either one of them have hats or caps
they were headed towards four street so that would have been East or I'd say Southeast but I don't know that for sure
because they took off you know and they went up that Alleyway towards fourth all
right we've got officers on the way over there right now all right we'll be out there okay
[Music] [Applause] bye welcome to True Crime garage wherever you are whatever you are doing thanks
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gather around grab a chair grab a beer let's talk some true [Music] crime this is true crime
garage and this is the case of Ryan [Music] Ferguson how many times did you think
you hit him all together just once just once the only problem I have with that is I know that he hit more than once I
just hit him once you just hit him once you didn't hit him more than like because I distin remember the first time
that I hit him I remember hearing this noise and it just and just seeing his face and it just made me sick if you
only hit him once turn away and got sick you had to hand the thing off to Ryan because this guy's got head rooms all
over his head we're talking minimum 15 strikes I must have done I mean I don't either that or I stopped and he did I
don't know did you ever drop the pipe probably did you hand it off to Ryan I don't I don't know I don't think so
let's go back to when you were talking about how you saw Ryan strangle this guy now we know what the guy got strangled
with that's kind of the thing I've been holding back to all right is it possible that you know what
he was strangled with and just didn't want to tell you cuz I I know know like I think it was a shirt or something well
I know it wasn't a shirt it's like maybe a bungee cord or I don't something from
his car I don't see why it have brok his car well we know for a fact that his belt was ripped off of his pants and he
was strangled with his belt really yeah do you see a belt in Ryan's hand something look like a rope maybe or a
bungee cord I don't know so it's possible Ryan could have strangled this guy with his belt got the keys and you
not the GU the man's belt yeah his own belt yes is that ring a bell not at all like I but you saw Ryan strangling
though I thought yeah yeah okay you said earlier something about Ryan's Ryan want
wanted to choke him down to make sure he was dead is that true I think that he was like
[Music] yeah Ryan Ferguson was convicted of the murder of Kent height Hol Kent's murder
took place in the early morning hours of November 1st 2001 in Ryan Ferguson's hometown of Columbia Missouri at the
time of the murder Ferguson was only 17 years old he was a junior in high school
Kent heol was found beaten and strangled shortly after 2 a.m. on November 1st 2001 in the parking lot of the Columbia
Daily Tribune Kent worked there as a sports editor the murder went unsolved for 2 years until police received a tip
that a man this is Charles Erikson he was was extremely drunk that night and he could not remember some of the events
that took place that evening mhm and most of what took place around the time of the actual murder after reading
newspaper articles Charles Ericson was having dreams about the murder he told a couple of people that he had concerns
that he may have been involved in the actual murder well and Chuck had a drug problem as well correct Charles Ericson
was partying with Ryan Ferguson on Halloween night October 31st now this would be Wednesday night but we all know
how much Everyone likes to party on Halloween Charles and Ryan they were doing quite a bit of underage drinking
at a bar that night M and a party that had started in the evening earlier turned into partying into the early
morning hours Charles or Chuck Ericson would later confess to the murder of Kent heol and implicate Ryan Ferguson in
the murder as well Ryan Ferguson was convicted in the fall of 2005 and what you can hear in that trailer is the
interrogation of Chucky mhm yeah and that was kind of a what we just went through is a summarized version of the
case which we usually don't go through that and summarize the case for you before we go so now they can just stop
listening yeah you now you know everything done all right see you guys next week well we usually don't do that
before we go through it in detail but we wanted to do that because with this case
it's it's actually very important that persons not familiar with this case have that information because when it comes
to Ryan Ferguson Not only was his innocence or guilt called into question before he was convicted but both were
called into question years after his conviction which ultimately would lead to appeals trials and then Ryan
Ferguson's conviction was vacated in November of 2013 so I just wanted everybody to be
aware of that situation fully before we go through the detailed account of what took place the evening of October 31st
and the early morning hours of November 1st 2001 so each of you can make a little mental note of when you think of
you know at some points some things might Point towards Ryan's guilt or if it would Point towards his innocence
yeah don't don't you tell me what to do okay let's go through a detailed account
of that night and first we'll go through the police SL prosecutor story of that evening as what they piece together off
of eyewitness accounts and the Confessor this is Charles or Chuck Erikson and we'll call him Chuck from now on I'll
call him Chucky there you go on the evening of October 31st 2001 as we said many people were out celebrating
Halloween this including students from both of the city's two high schools we will start the evening off roughly in
the time frame of about 9 to 10 p.m. there are several Halloween parties going on and the ones we are talking
about have both High School age kids and young adults just out of high school at
these parties Ryan Ferguson is party hopping that evening and as the night goes on he's getting ready to leave a
party and he sees Chuck Erikson who as we said he knows him from school right some have reported that Ryan and Chuck
were hanging out that night together others report that Ryan offered Chuck a ride as he was leaving the party I think
either way actually works uh it's not really important so however it comes about they are riding together in Ryan's
car Ryan tells Chuck well and let's get this clear too because a lot of people report like that they're buddies kind of
like in the west Memphis 3 case where it's like yeah they're you know two of them were buddies and one was just kind
of acquaintance in this scenario uh Ryan and Chucky they're just acquaintances yeah they know each other from school
they're the same age they probably have a couple classes together but from everything that I could gather you're
exactly right Captain they that doesn't sound like they were they were not best friends they they really didn't even
hang out a whole lot together almost opposite sides of the track I mean we have an individual with Ryan that seems
to be heavily involved in sports um you know involved with his family and a lot of friends and it seems like Chucky is
uh kind of on the slacker side mhm and they ran in the same circles but the circle wasn't just the two of them it
was you know many friends that they had right anyway so regardless of how they end up in Ryan's vehicle but they're in
his car and at some point either before the ride or during the ride Ryan says to
to Chuck you know hey uh let's go to this club my older sister is at a club and she can get us in and we can
continue to party you know we'll go there and have a few drinks right okay sounds great so the two underage
17-year-old boys out looking for a good time they meet up with Ryan's sister well and they're going to meet up at a
bar called uh by George mhm and such a dumb name for a bar sorry if you own that bar and I'm talking about it but or
if your name is George I I don't mind the name George I'm just saying by George is kind of a dumb name for a bar
Chuck Ericson states that the the two spent up what money that they had once they were at the bar okay uh and then
Ryan's sister bought a drink or two for them and then the two left you know because they were out of money once
outside Ryan is calling people on his cell phone now I couldn't gather why Ryan was calling a bunch of different
people but I'm going to guess that Erikson that chuck would have said possibility that that that Ryan was
looking for someone with money to either join them at by George's or looking for
another place to go party because what Chuck Ericson would say is that Ryan Ryan said next would imply that Ryan was
not done partying for the night so with with no one left to call Ryan tells Chuck hey man let's go rob some someone
so we can get enough money to get back into the bar and have some more drinks all right okay yeah here's a plan
yeah I mean you it happens every weekend how many times you're at a bar and your
buddy says let's go rob somebody so we can drink more well before they leave Ryan's car they take a like a tire iron
or one of those tire changing tools that come in the trunk of your car uh they take this item and so they walk to find
their potential robbery or mugging victim uh well they spot 48-year-old Kent he hole Kent as we
had said Kent is working late at the Columbia Daily Tribune uh this would be approximately at 2:15 a.m. or so now I
do want to point out here that several people were working at the Columbia Daily Tribune that night uh early
morning hours whatever you want to call it and the the times well most of the times we give during this detailed
account are going to be more approximate times uh for most of this stuff we do not have exact times for one reason we
have our main witness which is Chuck Erikson who ends up confessing to being a part of the crime implicating Ryan
Ferguson chuck had fully admitted he was so drunk and high that night uh that that he had been drinking doing Aderall
and cocaine that night so quite the concoction inside of him well damn Chuck he slow down and well he admits to being
so messed up that he cannot remember most of the night so there's one reason of not having exact times but what we
will figure out here is that almost you know almost in the same breath that I say that I'll point out that we do know
that these times from the other eyewitnesses are close or somewhat accurate because we are dealing with
such a small window of time that they have to be close Okay MH so how do we know Ryan and Chuck spot Kent at
approximately 2:15 a.m. well Michael Boyd he is another employee of the Daily Tribune he's working he's a writer a
part-time writer he says he left work sometime before Kent height hold did and he knows this because he left around 2
a.m. and on his way out he stops and he has a short conversation with Mike Henry
he's a night custodian at the at the Tribune Michael Boyd walks the parking lot and he gets to his car he will have
to actually pass Kent's car to get to his own car then he goes out to his car and when he's out there he sits there
for a little bit of time listening to some music when he sees Kent leaving work and going out to his car to leave
for the night all right why would you just get in your car and listen to music for a while before you leave it seems
strange to me at that hour right you know especially at that hour uh Michael pulls his car up alongside of Kent and
they have a discussion according to Michael Boyd this conversation it's a work conversation it takes place
sometime between 12 2:12 a.m. sorry and 2:20 a.m. mhm Michael Boyd says after the conversation he leaves in his car
and he's he goes to drive home as he's pulling out and into the alley he says that he nearly hit someone he sees two
people in the parking lot right uh this is not Kent Kent is not one of the people that he's describing here he he
younger people right well uh or does does he not make that claim to be clear all he says is that he sees Michael sees
two people and he cannot tell if the people are male or female so basically no description of the people anomalies
almost yeah so these two people could be Chuck and Ryan because they would have to have have arrived sometime in this
time frame to the parking lot at the Columbia Daily Tribune and you'll see why here in a minute so the attack would
go something like this Kent would be hit in the head or neck area about 11 or 12
times with some unknown object or the Tire Tool as chuck had said all right then as the victim Kent is down on all
fours from the blows he just took someone you know and that someone according to Chuck is Ryan pulls the
victim's belt off now he would have had to have done this according to the police by pulling by pulling up from the
leftand side you know from from like reaching around from behind Kent on the left side and grabbing the belt and
pulling it up and off right they came to this conclusion because two of the belt
loops on the left side of Kent's pants were ripped or torn off then using the victim's own belt
Ryan Ferguson strangled okay hold on a second so you're saying that they believe that the belt was ripped off of
him because there was two cuz the belt loops were broken two two of his belt loops were were ripped okay then using
the victim's own belt Ryan Ferguson strangled Kent height Holt a very short time before 2:26 a.m. a custodian this
is her name is shaa ort she stepped outside for a cigarette break or to walk some trash to the dumpster now or both
yeah my understanding is that sometimes a smoke break and walking trash to the dumpster are the same
thing anyway great reporting there there you go happen at the same time right anyway
she is out there and she she sees two shadowy figures near Kent's car she ran back inside to get her co-worker this is
Jerry Trump she's telling him that there is something going on in the parking lot
and she wanted him to go out there and see what it was he doesn't really want to do this but he gives in and he agrees
to go check it out so now the two of them well they are standing they're standing at one of those like um you
know kind of like a large overhead door you know they're standing just past the opening of that okay and at first they
don't see anything you know you know Jerry Trump's probably like oh great I agreed to come out here and check out
this thing you're just you're just freaking out for nothing there's nothing going on out here they don't see
anything yeah but sometimes that's scarier is when somebody says I see somebody outside and then you go and you
start looking and you go I I see nothing but sometimes that the the you're not as
relieved mhm well they see nothing at first they hear nothing at first M so Jerry Trump decides he he yells out
something like you know I see you you might as well come out you might as well stand up or something like that put your
hands up yeah and two individuals stand up and one of them is at the front of Kent's car near the front of the vehicle
MH the other one is at the rear of the vehicle so both both custodians witnessed two what they what they report
as white college age men now standing near Kent height Holt's vehicle they also both said that the man at the rear
of the vehicle he walked to the front of the car and said something to the effect
of you know this guy is hurt out here or you better call someone you better get call an ambulance something like that
that this this guy's hurt and he needs help so what you're saying is the these two two employees of the newspaper see
these two individuals in the parking lot ducking down possibly hiding behind Kent's car and then one of them kind of
Walks from the back of the car to the front and then says hey you better call ambulance this guy's hurt out here yeah
he says something like get help this guy's hurt now that's something you probably wouldn't say if you hurt the
guy um yeah I I don't know it's it's a it's a strange sit situation regardless right if you but if you're going to take
somebody's belt off put it around their throat and pull as hard as you can so they stop breathing I don't think you're
asking somebody to call ambulance no you want that guy dead for some reason yeah
you don't want him to be able to come to and and give information about you right
uh according to the police report the employees called 911 at 226 a.m. right which we heard that uh 911 call at the
beginning so if you want to hear it again go back to the beginning some of the other uh sport reporters working
that night uh came running out to see what was going on and they found 46-year-old Kent heol lying face down at
the rear of his car now they rolled him over and they tried to resuscitate him and of course unfortunately it didn't
work uh the police department was within just a few blocks of the newspaper parking lot in the newspapers building
so they arrived very quickly um when they got there they saw Kent had been severely beaten with some kind of blunt
object and he was strangled and dead at this point well we we both took a look at the autopsy but and we're not going
to go over in a bunch of details cuz it's pretty simple to summarize but they keep talking about this blunt object and
being hit well over 10 times um you even hear this in the interrogation with the
police and and Chucky mhm but they keep talking about a blunt object but there's
no skull fracture correct there's they don't find any skull fractures on Kent High hold um so
so it's death by strangulation as hyid bone is broken yeah and there's a little there's a little conjecture there's a
little back and forth on uh the hyoid bone being broken as well there's one expert that says that he believes the
hyoid bone was could have been broken because of he because he was hit he was hit about the the head and neck area um
but the original the original expert believes that the hyoid bone was broken during the strangulation process I don't
think that that is necessarily important I think the most important thing that I
see in the autopsy itself is like you said the number of times that that Kent is hit with they keep referring to it as
a blunt object right uh but like you said no skull fractur so to me it's more of uh he's hit 11 or 12 times with an
unknown object right but what was that expert telling you that one time uh like a you take a 10-year-old girl with a bat
or something and and there's going to be skull fractures actually this is it wasn't something that somebody told me
it was um a comment that was made to Ryan Ferguson's father to Bill Ferguson uh that he reported elsewhere stating
that you know it it was strange that there was no skull fractures because an expert quote unquote an expert according
to Bill Ferguson had told him that a 12-year-old girl with the baseball bat if she hits somebody 11 12 or even 15
times you're going to have several skull fractures not just one you're going to have you're going to you're going to get
a a few out of that so he's hit with some kind of unknown object we we'll call it that right and he doesn't so
he's not going to make it right and at this point Chuck Ericson claims that he and Ryan after having murdered Kent that
they take this kind of this very kind of roundabout way of walking back to the bar but before they get there this is at
approximately 2:30 a.m. they are at an intersection and there is a car there stopped at a red light uh and inside the
car well this this is somebody uh that the two boys know and his name is Dallas mallerie Dallas is in a car with two
young ladies Dallas is actually about 2 years older I believe than play play off
thanck ran well Chuck Erikson has a short conversation with Dallas mallerie at the at the red light yeah and Chucky
says how are you in the truck with two women that's all he asked well the the the light eventually turns green and
Away Dallas and the two girls go right so so now it's back to by George's for Chuck and Ryan and we'll get right back
to the case of Ryan Ferguson after this quick beer break this show is sponsored by better help do
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so after Ryan and Chuck Commit This murder they according to Chuck they go out with the motive of robbery they
attack Kent heol uh and they kill him in the parking lot now they've taken this roundabout way of making their way back
to the bar and they're back at by George's according to Chuck they get back to the bar around 2:45 a.m. and
they stay there drinking dancing having a good time until about 4: to 4:15 a.m. in the morning well these bars are open
pretty late and this only makes sense right cuz we we saw this with uh with the Casey Anthony thing right right you
know when when you kill somebody uh the best way to celebrate is to go to a bar and dance and party and have a good time
you know so now now now while the two of them are off having a good time right the police have a murder and a crime
scene to deal with here so the police are going to do a can9 search and I won't go through all of the street names
but basically the police dog is going to track slf follow the trail of the perpetrators and the dog leads them in
the opposite direction as to where Chuck Ericson says that they are going to go of course the dog the dog chase does not
turn up the perpetrators and we do have another problem here with this crime scene the
Tribune's parking lot well it has two two security cameras and these security cameras are very obvious you know
they're the type that would be up on the building and if you were walking by they
weren't hidden cameras you know you would you would notice them from the street and be aware that the parking lot
is under surveillance right however you know we unfortunately we see this time and time again in these situations the
these cameras are not working on this night oh really yeah so the police really have no leads other than the
description that they're given from the two custodians that they are looking for
two Caucasian College age dudes uh per the description given to them short hair one maybe blonde spiked up in the front
they do a uh they do a drawing of the this at least one of the individuals well yeah this is shaa ort and Jerry
Trump the the employe employes at the Daily Tribune um we should point out here that early in the investigation
Jerry Trump's statements were deemed as useless by the police okay as his description that he gave to them it was
so vague that it really provided them nothing of value you know he basically says I I I really couldn't see anything
I really couldn't see anything to describe these guys now as you had mentioned shaa ort uh on the other hand
uh with the with the police department's use of what they call like an identic Kate or an ID kit right uh they come up
with a composite sketch of the guy uh who walked from the rear of the vehicle to the front of Kent height hold's car
you know the the guy telling them to get help well right and shaa is she's younger and so we let's just assume she
has better eyes and uh I think she was what 18 or 19 at the time when she saw the saw she was pretty young and and
Trump and Trump was quite a bit older at the time yes um now basically the way that they come up with this composite
drawing it's it's that old school identic kit um and in some places they may call it something different but
basically what they do is Captain they'll show you they have like a flip book and they're like they'll show you a
bunch of different sets of eyes and you're like oh that looks like his eyes and they're like okay they they set
those eyes on the face and then they flip through the book more and they show you a nose like oh yeah that looks like
his nose and and so you piece together the person face well the problem with this drawing is again it's happening
very late at night or in the early mornings it's very dark out very low lighting so and then if and actually I
would say you know like during if it was during the day obviously you'd be it'd be easier to identify somebody I think
it would be way harder to do this identic kit when there's heavy Shadows from the street lights well I agree and
I don't know that it was fully like as as far as the way I heard the parking lot described I'm sure there are dark
spots and dark areas um Shauna states that when she saw the the man that she was able to come up with a composite
drawing of that that was she believed to be a what she considered a well-lit portion of the parking lot right again
but you're going to have these hard Shadows of course cuz all the lights are coming from above and if you watch any
of the documentaries on on this case it's you know you can see how dark that that area would have been
yeah and to go with the composite drawing um you know she describes the guy as a Caucasian male about 6ot tall
200 lb uh muscular build wearing a white T-shirt and has possibly has short blonde hair now some other things while
we are talking about the crime scene there was a blood trail which makes sense because we have a victim that was
beaten in the head you would expect a certain amount of of blood so there was a blood trail but this went in again in
a different direction than what Chuck said he and Ryan had fled the scene police found a hair either in or on the
hand of the victim this would be collected uh and later tested they did not find the blunt object or as chuck
had said the Tire Tool uh used to beat Kent uh they did not find that at the crime scene they did find the belt
buckle Kent's belt buckle it had broken off and was lying there near the uh near
Kent M they found fingerprints not matching the victim in and on the victim's vehicle uh and and one more thing though
the the police found no evidence to suggest Kent had been robbed um so keep in mind you trying to find the
motive yeah they're they're going to check the victim and try to come up with why would this guy be attacked well they
don't see any obvious signs that that robbery was the motive for this this attack or murder so at this point they
are looking for two young white dudes and they don't have a motive to go on at this point in their investigation well
and so we go to the following day the we I call this The Hangover day I mean we got two individuals that were 17 years
old they went partying uh Chucky was doing a blow drinking doing some Aderall uh and he claims that he doesn't
remember anything of the events the night before yeah he has no memory of Halloween night uh and also you know as
we said there there was nothing other than probably one heck of of a hangover like the captain pointed it out that
anything had went wrong or anything terrible had happened that night Chuck did not notice anything unusual he he
didn't have any injuries uh he didn't have any blood on his clothing um let's talk about let's
talk about Chuck for a minute though okay um you know as we had said earlier he's the same age is Ryan 17 at the time
of this murder and a high school student uh but but one big different thing here
is you know Ryan liked the party obviously like like some high school students do however chuck had a bit of a
history he had a he had a reputation for blacking out right and a history and a reputation for getting
really blitzed you know whether it being drinking or drugs or both um and he would from time to time do something bad
or embarrassing you know he would destroy he was known to destroy property or to get in fights right um and then
typically the next day he would have little to no memory of these events or the things that he had did well then
people would tell him what he had done and sometimes these memories well they would start to come back to him and
maybe sometimes they would not but it's my understanding that he had such a reputation for this kind of behavior
that often he was not invited to parties because nobody wanted him around nobody
wants the nobody wants the douche canoe breaking Furniture right you don't want you don't want that guy at your house
yeah cuz you're going to get busted by your parents if this guy destroy something second of all you don't want
him there if he's going to pick fights with your friends uh getting you know getting drunk destroying stuff and just
being basically a walking party Foul is is what Chuck Erikson would be Chucky Chucky AKA party Foul ericon so
let's okay before we fast forward let's go through what happened that night according to Ryan now of course this is
Who who okay so what we need to be clear about this okay all the reports that you
were just giving to fine beautiful people listening to the show all the reports that you're giving are are just
from from Chucky but also from the police correct it's basically the the the the general story that the
prosecutor SL police piece together about what took place that night right but like we all know there's three sides
to every story well according according to Ryan um you know and I didn't want to
mix the two stories because not only are they very different but um well let's say uh the night and the way things went
down according to Ryan let's say it was much less eventful um according to Ryan Ferguson he and Chuck did go to the bar
they went to by George's uh they met his sister there they had drinks um they left the bar at 1:30 a.m. so we're
already seeing a difference in time here right Ryan drove Chuck to Chuck's home and then Ryan continued on to his own
home arriving at his family's house around 1:40 a.m. so very a very quick drive from by George's to get Chuck home
and then Ryan takes himself home then in the early morning hours after he gets home uh from
1:41 a.m. to 29 a.m. Ryan calls several friends and then he goes to bed he's having murdered no one that evening uh
being and actually being according to his account he's at home at his family's home during the time of Kent height
Holt's murder yeah okay so we got two completely different stories mhm one story we got two murderers in the other
story we got a guy dropping a you know I dropped my buddy off we had a couple drinks dropped him off and dropping his
really drunk buddy off yeah um yeah not just drunk but high too so how about how
about we fast forward here Captain so let's let's fast forward to DeLorean 2003 Now by this time the murder it
remained an unsolved mystery you know in October of 2003 the local media again began they were covering the story they
were covering the murder and Chuck Erikson reportedly had several dreams about the crime after seeing an an
article in a newspaper and he couldn't get over the fact that he had been so close in proximity to where someone had
been murdered at about the same time right and he had almost no memory of that night well right because he has
that history of blacking out mhm and about a month later or so Chuck he he he read another article in the in the local
newspaper but this one included a sketch the sketch of the possible suspect in the case uh remember this was the one
given to police by the eyewitness shaa ort working at working that night at the Tribune mhm Chuck thought that the
sketch looked like himself now he now he's really starting to get concerned that he was somehow
involved in this murder now when when he's at this point when he gets really drunk he starts telling some people that
he thinks he's committed a murder or was at least involved in the murder of Kent
height hole well part part of this is you know you're not fully developed your your frontal cortex and all that stuff
I'm not a doctor so but you taking all those drugs right it's going to mess up your brain a little bit and I I think
this guy took so many drugs he fried his damn brain and maybe too often you know
is it is it the same thing are you beating your brain the same level as like getting multiple concussions over
and over again with what he's doing he's blacking out yeah and how many times is
he hit in his head when he's drunk too I mean that's that's another good point MH
so now he's getting really drunk and he starts telling people that he thinks he may have committed the murder or he's at
least involved in in the murder well he this is definitely not helping you know you with your friends there Chucky yeah
you already had this bad reputation now this guy gets drunk he breaks Furniture he he tries to fight people and then now
he's confessing to murders don't invite this guy to your party rule number one it's not going to be a good time it's
not going to work out well for you you're not going to be the popular kid in school stop inviting Chucky to the
party it sounds like he only told two people these were his friends this is only two people people would hang out
what the crazy dude this is Nick Gilpin and art figuro and the thing is I don't know if the he told these these two guys
on separate occasions or you know if he told them together on several occasions I'm not certain but as as I've heard it
he's only told two people I I'm assuming that he told Nick Gilpin the story one time and then old Captain Gilpin was
like I'm not hanging out with you no more Chucky uh well it's through these two friends uh that Chuck is is you know
that it's later let's hold on for a second just think about this way you're Nick Gilpin right mhm you're hanging out
with Chucky so you don't have a lot of options right this guy breaks stuff gets in
fights and then he tells you he tells you he murdered somebody right mhm or he thinks he did what how low do you have
to be how bored how lonely do you to be to pick up the phone and say call him up
again I'm going to call Chucky up and see if he wants hang out you got to be pretty lonely right we
get some more details about that murder uh well it's through these two friends that the police are later notified and
told that Chuck Erikson uh was one was the one who killed the newspaper reporter or that was involved in the
newspaper reporter's death that took place two years ago so in are you still with me so far in March
of 2004 okay well okay so we have we have the the event happens on Halloween mhm two years later Chuck is having
these dreams he starts telling people starts telling people they contact the cops and even if the look if if somebody
gets drunk and starts telling you they murder somebody call the cops that's what you do mhm um so they call the cops
now the cops need to talk to Chucky yeah so in March of 2004 the Columbia police
department they pick up Chuck Erikson and they question him mhm well not too long after and in fact I believe it was
later that same day they call another Police Department because by this time Ryan was off at uh junior college and
they have Ryan Ferguson arrested as well well these two questionings by police uh
go very differently um and let's talk about this uh let's talk about this starting with Chuck okay so you played
uh some of that interrogation for us right and you know you see in the questioning there's there's a couple
different levels of questioning that take place here first off there's some questioning that goes down off camera
there's some that goes down on camera and there's also a questioning period that takes place on camera where they're
driving him to the crime scene and they're driving him around the area so he can you know they can point things
out to him and they can kind of ask him where did you guys come from uh did you enter the parking lot this way which way
did you exit where did you go after the murder you know uh can you tell us where
his car was parked things like that you know they have to take him there well regarding the questioning or SL
interrogation of Chuck Ericson it's what would you say it's disconcerning Captain it's unethical so
we have a guy here the problem is though they picked this guy up and he's saying
you know I maybe maybe I was involved in this thing I I don't know it's it's I I
blacked out that night I have very little memory he says something like uh he he's seeing almost snapshots uh of of
the of the night well they're going to they're going to it looked to me Captain like it started off like kind of a
friendly questioning period and at some point they start getting you know we see
the typical well here's what the detectives do they like to spread their legs very
wide mhm and they like to get in a little tiny baby chair and then they scoot up really close you know so their
whole you know cocking balls and everything are right on the guy's knee and then they're looking deep into their
eyes and they start saying stuff like you need to tell me the truth you're not telling me the truth
so that yeah starts off friendly then they do the whole let me get right in your grill two CP little bit later they
back up they also once things are going their way they like to do do the lean back mhm you know what I'm talking about
where they they are starting to get answers so they do the lean back well and they keep you they keep you
positioned back in the corner and they they stay right in front of you in your face right but once they start getting
answers they like to back up and do the lean back you know like oh let's make this more comfortable for you and when
you're not telling me the truth I'm going to make it uncomfortable for you well and they're also constantly
reminding that reminding you that you did this that you are guilty they they will emphasize that word you and they
will often point at you when they do that or or touch you in some manner to remind you that it that it is you that
is under the microscope right it's not it's not a whole bunch of other people that they're looking at they have
circled and on you yeah so a couple things one I feel for the detectives because there's no real leads they had
nothing to go on all of a sudden two years later you have this guy Chucky coming forward saying I'm having these
dreams I have a history of blacking out I might have been involved mhm okay so yes the cops need to get to the bottom
of this so I I look I I normally would say no way shape or form should you ever feed
details but I think in this case I'm going give him a little bit of a pass because this guy is saying I don't know
I don't know a bunch of the details where I'm not going to give you a pass is once Chucky brings somebody else into
the equation and once he brings up Ryan Ferguson into the equation your job now is to if you want to find out if he's
telling you the truth you need to focus on trying to prove him wrong mhm and that's what they should have done first
I I'm going to halfway agree with you because it sounds like you're saying if if it were just Chuck that was that was
implicating himself and no one else that it's fine to give up the details not not
fine to give up all the details right because the problem I have with that is the whole purpose of withholding those
details is that so you avoid false confessions and if you start just giving away information that's really going to
help this person whether they did it or not uh get the right answers let's right
so where do we have a problem with some of these things well but what I'm saying
though is you could drive him to the scene you could do certain things uh may you know maybe try hypnosis or whatever
just to see if you can get these memories to come back to the service but I'm not telling them I'm
not saying that you should say uh what the guy was strangled with or details like that no definitely not right and
and in the beginning of the questioning or interrogation it it appears uh and we
we can see it on TV we see it on the camera footage uh it appears that Erikson that Chuck has little knowledge
of the crime um and at one point he tells the police I could be sitting here fabricating all of this right now as the
captain was hinting towards there uh they want some detailed information you know they want to know what did you what
was Kent strangled with okay um how many times was he hit what was he hit with okay so let's go through that as such he
he states that they they took something from Ryan's car and that's what they are
going to attack Kent with and he assumed like a tire iron yes again now if you hit now he was hit about 15 times if you
hit somebody 15 times in the head the tire iron there's going to be a skull fracture MH and maybe not Chucky cuz
Chucky's a small guy but you give a a pretty good athlete and Ryan Ferguson a tire iron there's not going to be skull
fractures it's going to be a mutilated skull one thing we should point out too though to paint a bit of a better
picture for everybody is uh I would actually I would actually consider both Chuck and Ryan to be smaller dudes um
you know I think what Ryan was 5'8 5'9 uh and we have Chuck who's who's about 5'7 um and and and the reason why I say
smaller dudes is that in comparison to Kent heol Kent heol was well over six foot and he he was a large dude he he
played offensive line for for some college before he became a sports writer so yes I understand that they might be
armed with this tire iron or some blunt object or unknown object but it it does seem strange to me that these two
teenage boys would pick a very large male victim to to attempt to Rob yeah but Ryan Ryan was you know he's
athletic um yeah I don't know uh I don't know exactly what his height is but he he he definitely looked very athletic MH
um anyway so as we were stating they need to know what he was hit with and furthermore who hit him and how many
times was he hit with this object well here's one thing that I found really strange about that interrogation you saw
this you know he says how many times was did was Kent hit did you hit Kent uh once he's like no come on we know we
know Chuck that he was hit a lot more than one time mhm and then he throws out some other number that's not correct and
then the the uh detective corrects him and he says now we know that Kent that you hit Kent 15 times is that right and
eventually Chuck gives into this and says yes I hit him 15 times right and this is what I find is so unethical well
not only that the strange part of this thing here is Captain is first of all it's incredibly unethical second of all
the detective fed him information but fed him wrong information he says 15 times the the autopsy report States 11
or 12 times the detective didn't even bother to get the wrong you know the wrong information right right right and
and so he feeds him some bad information and we have Chuck valid that andate with
that and says yes you know yeah 15 but there's a couple times that Chuck is going you know what but I don't really
know I don't really know if I'm telling you the truth or not right and then then
they want to know okay what what did you use to strangle Kent I don't know his T-shirt yeah and actually I I thought
when I viewed the the the full length of the of the questioning the interrogation
yeah I I thought that I saw him almost react he didn't verbally say it but it looked like his his U his body language
was suggesting that he was about to say his hands you know what I mean like yeah
CU he said you know did did Ryan how did Ryan choke him like again implementing Ryan and not Chucky and and he makes I
saw Ryan uh hands you know kind of the symbol he makes a gesture about choking with his hands the Homer Simpson I'm
going to choke Bart Type move so yeah and and they were like no that's not right and he's like well maybe a t-shirt
yeah cuz he states that the officer would tell him you know it might have been something of Kent that was used to
to strangle him and and as you said at first he says a T-shirt and he said no it wasn't his T-shirt and then you hear
this is like questioning like a five-year-old you know that like took a crap on in the family room that that
that's what what this question reminds me of well and then you you hear him say so he says no it wasn't a t-shirt Chuck
then Chuck says maybe it was a bungee cord I don't know because I couldn't see him having a rope in his car right
doesn't Mak any sense to me why he would have a rope in his car yeah so so all right well let's examine that it
obviously wasn't a t-shirt no no start with it wasn't with his hands right wasn't strangled with his hands he
wasn't strangled with a t-shirt wasn't strangled with a bunch cord wasn't strangled with a rope and it wasn't
something that was taken from the victim's car it was something that was taken off of the victim right right so
after five wrong answers after five wrong answers maybe you as a detective should go hey this guy doesn't
know jack [ __ ] yeah right yeah he does he doesn't know what's going on yeah but
right so at what point does the does the detective say hey this is ridiculous this is is nonsense not
only and here's what they do they feed him all this information they feed Chucky all this information they get a
tape confession they think maybe this can hold up and then they pull Ryan Ferguson in well you know and I'm not
even ready to go that far yet because I'm still on the Belt thing here you know we the the officer tells just
outright tells him yeah he was strangled with his own belt no no he sits back with just this cocky son of a [ __ ] type
attitude he's just sitting back and he goes I'm I was kind of holding this from you I was keeping this back from you I
didn't want to tell you but it was a belt that's pretty much exactly what he says right mhm and Chuck says something
like well I don't remember that at all like he seems surprised like that that's the murder weapon like like shocked um
no no he he doesn't even understand what he's saying mhm because CU all of a sudden then Chucky says wait a second
his with his own belt right not Ryan's Belt but his own belt mhm oh like flabbergasted like like this is the
first time he's thinking somebody pulled up on Kent knocked him in his head 10 times 11 times pulled this dude's belt
off of him strangled him with his own belt you have to be a vicious SOB to do that
well and like you said it's he's his reaction is almost like getting fired up man well Chuck's reaction is almost like
I'm trying to help you out here guys but I would not have guessed that you know on my best day I would not have guessed
his own belt on my best day right so anyway then now they got to figure out what is the motive why would you guys go
and attack this large man uh that you don't know in the middle of a parking lot you don't know did nothing to you
and here's the answer that you get after all after you go through all of these details the answer that you get is well
I guess if we killed him then I assume we would have done it for money right but no sign of robbery mhm
right right this is this is unethical horrible horrible police work MH and and I believe just like and we'll talk about
this later you know a a prosecutor for example can't just make up fake evidence right and there's laws against that and
you can face jail time just like I think you know now that we require people to tap these
interviews they need to be well aware that if you cross the line or you do some ridiculous dumb [ __ ] that you can
face jail time MH and I believe in this case that these detectives doing the interrogation they deserve jail time cuz
these interrogations were so unethical you signed up to Serve and Protect not to make up [ __ ] lies and put
innocent people behind bars well the thing here is when they're talking to Ryan Ferguson it's a much different
story you know uh we have we have Ryan Ferguson basically denying everything well do you you want to just hear that
clip yeah [Music] I did not do anything I did not see anything but and I'm here for murder like I
didn't do Chuck says that he got kind of sick to his stomach after you hit this guy during that time uh he looks over
and sees you on top of the the guy who's down and you're choking him out he says
strangling you you believe this I I I believe Chuck probably had something to do with it he said
all right well I mean he could very well been a part of it I'm not you were Cal as up when we come down there we start
talking about the murder you like I do it wasn't there don't know what you're talking about if Poli pull me and say we
want to talk about a murder I'm going to be get about half crazy I am half crazy
dude I'm sorry I'm good at hiding my emotions I'm shaking like here I didn't do anything about to get in trouble for
something I didn't [Music] do all right so that's uh little pieces of the Ryan Ferguson interrogation I got to
tell you Captain I watched that thing and I thought that Ryan actually held it together pretty well um not in a way
that would imply to me that he's guilty like the detective was trying to point out um you know stating that oh if
somebody pulled me in for murder I'd be mad as hell well what's crazy to me is he does appear to be mad as hell to me
yeah but and um and a I think a mature way I mean one you're getting in question about a night that happened two
two years ago so think about that night might be very insignificant to you and then somebody's questioning you about it
and you're going well I I don't really remember cuz and the reason why I say that he appears to be mad at times you
know but but but controlled right is that you see him at times where there's like a split second where he'll he'll
smack the table and he's like man I'm telling you I've told you a hundred times I didn't do this I wasn't there I
don't know what else I can say MH and then second of all you'll see a couple times where he will raise his voice to
the detectives basically making the same argument I don't know how to tell you this any differently than I was not
there right but but what drives me nuts and I I've said this I think since we started looking into this case is when
you watch these these tapes uh Chucky doesn't make any damn sense right mm uh the detectives make no damn sense at all
the only one that's not in this crazy make believe world is is Ryan he seems like the only one that is
is speaking with any logical sense right so I mean just like with the detectives
if you can't get Chucky to remember anything or if all of his details are different and conflicting of the
evidence that you know that you have studied he's not your guy you know what I mean mhm so it makes zero logical
sense to keep pursuing down that road and I like that he says you know at some point he kind of gives in because he
says you know every time he says I didn't do this I wasn't there well then at some point the police start coming
back with the argument well well Chuck was there and we know Chuck did this and you were with Chuck and his his answer
is the same every time he goes okay well fine maybe Chuck did do this maybe Chuck
was there I was not right I didn't do this and then you know he he's asked you see that part where the um the one
detective comes in and he tries to play the good cop you know oh I have a son your age and when I when I look at you
I'm seeing my son so I'm here to I'm here to help you get this off your chest and I'm here to help you talk about this
you know sometimes we do things that we don't mean to do right and for whatever reason we don't know why we do them you
know but he sticks with it you know Ryan is STI with it he says I would have said
hey sorry I'm I'm sorry I'm not a douche like your son but I didn't do this the the thing here is you know not only did
I not only only am I innocent of the murder I'm innocent of having even been there yeah and never was even there now
the police they're stuck in this bad situation okay you know it obviously looks like Ryan's in a bad situation and
Chuck is in a bad situation but the police unbeknownst to the two boys the police they need something because as we
pointed out earlier you know they don't have a lot to go on other than this confession that they've got from this
Chuck Ericson MH and then the person that's supposedly with him Ryan Ferguson is saying the exact opposite I was not
there I I'm not guilty of anything they need someone to somewhat back up Chuck's
story okay so who who would well and also their story it's a collaborative story at this point you're exactly right
who would have seen you there that night oh well you know Chuck points out that at some point after the murder while we
were leaving and going on on our way back to the bar at this intersection we saw this guy that we knew and his name
is his name is Dallas mallerie we saw him he was at a red light in a vehicle with two girls I had a brief
conversation with him at the intersection before the light turned green and he took off well they bring in
this Dallas mallerie and he says I did not see those I did not see Chuck I did not see Ryan I saw neither of those guys
at an intersection in the early morning hours of November 1st he goes on to say I didn't see those guys on Halloween
night either MH well the police keep coming back to him and they say well we know Dallas we know that you saw them
because Chuck keeps saying that he saw you that he had a conversation with you and at some point Dallas is saying you
know like you pointed out Captain this is at least two years ago so Dallas is like he's confused he's like
well how about this if Chuck says he saw me then what was I wearing that night well they go to Chuck and they talk to
Chuck and Chuck says well Dallas was dressed up for Halloween to go to the Halloween parties he was dressed up as a
police officer mhm and of course the uh the detectives go back to Dallas mallerie and they say he says he saw you
you were dressed like a police officer and Dallas mallerie says H I was I was wearing a police uniform that night that
was my character for the Halloween parties uh then then I must if he says that that's what I was wearing then I
must have seen those guys that night right cuz how would he know mhm so now that they have somebody backing up
Chucky's story and their story they're combin efforts to create this elaborate story they're going to charge Chucky and
then they're going to go on trial to charge Ryan Ferguson yeah and and I think let's cover that in tomorrow's
episode we we should talk about how this gets to trial talk about the trial itself the things that they got right
the things they got wrong and where this ends up getting us in the end well yeah
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Ryan Ferguson /// Part 1 /// 116

Part 1 of 2

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We all know that a lot of crazy things can happen on Halloween night but maybe none as crazy as this. In 2001 a couple of High School students were out enjoying several Halloween parties. The partying took them into the early morning hours of November 1st. One of them was so intoxicated he could not remember what took place Halloween night. In the same area of town a man leaving work after 2am was beaten and strangled to death in a parking lot. Several dreams about the murder and one phone call led to the arrests of the teenagers. One of them confessed and the other was convicted of murder.

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Brief Summary

Ryan Ferguson was wrongfully convicted for the murder of Kent Heitholt, based on a flawed confession from Charles Erikson.

Key points

Rosetta Stone Holiday Deal. Get 50% off a lifetime membership for unlimited language access.
Confession and Conviction. Charles Erikson confesses to the murder, implicating Ryan Ferguson.
Murder of Kent Heitholt. Kent Heitholt was murdered in 2001, leading to a wrongful conviction.
Witnesses Report Strange Behavior. Witnesses describe two individuals acting suspiciously near the crime scene.
Murderers Celebrate at the Bar. After committing murder, the suspects return to the bar to party.
Police Find No Evidence of Robbery. Despite the violent murder, police find no signs of robbery as a motive.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

I just hit him once!

A suspect's claim about an altercation.

6:27WatchNov 16, 2023

Tension

75/ 100High tension

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