The Murders of Billy Payne & Billie Jean Hayworth | Morbid: A True Crime Podcast | Forensic Files

hey weirdos I'm Ash and I'm Elena and this is morbid [Music] [Music] from the sounds of it it's morbid yeah
we were talking about this earlier it's uh [ __ ] crazy this case is berserk berserk berserk this case as Caleb would
say goes crazy I love when Caleb says that something goes crazy he's like that's the way he says it that's fine
it's like a face that he makes when he says he's like that was crazy yeah but it's better it's way better actually
it's just a it's a way yeah it's a way it's a Vibe it's a feeling it's an emotion it is is what it is it's snowing
here it is it's like uh it's like sleeting it's like fat snowing like big fat no coming down from like fluffy snow
it's flowing it's snowing it's for knowing no you slowly slowly lost it well because I added an L where
one didn't couldn't be yeah no no flowing sounded good but snow and fat does not have is it Fallen it would be
foan if anything yeah guys we're a little tired today it's it's Friday it's Friday it's fry easel there you go
you're like I'm not saying that's all that it's all the bag of chips okay yeah but we we gotta get into this
my coffee has weaned the [ __ ] off yeah it's just one of those days you know it's after the holidays
getting back into it it's a lot of recordings I'm gonna use you're getting the like crazy Punchy us yeah I'm gonna
start using like you know it's after the holidays I'm gonna start saying that in
like July because 100 it still happens after the holidays I'm just gonna say that to [ __ ] with people or you could
say it's almost the holidays you know it's almost the holidays yeah you can just rest the [ __ ] out because it's
always either after the holidays or almost the holidays at some point pretty much so I think it's valid I like it I
think it's pretty valid I am into it uh do it I don't have anything else all right so
my case my case is like I said it's pretty [ __ ] out there we are heading over to Mountain City Tennessee which is
one of my favorite states to spell it's actually my favorite state really smell spell and smell I bet I've never smelled
it I've never barbecue I would I would assume would smell really good there yeah probably yeah the whiskey yeah
Nashville's gotta smell great yeah I want to go to Nashville me too I think everybody does we should do that yeah
totally just let's just go to Nashville I think I've said this on the podcast before but
I got to do a project about Tennessee once and it made me happy like in school you remember the state project I do
remember mine was Tennessee and ever since then I was like I like Tennessee mine was Wisconsin
boring it sure was loses entire Wisconsin listener base I love you guys and ninja
proud I'm just kidding no Wisconsin is there like cheese yeah cheese is a very big part of us not boring at all yeah I
love cheese yeah worked out for me I love it there all right well yes so we're going to
talk about a case that became known as the Facebook murders oh yes I don't know if I know this I don't know if you will
but I think you'll start if you do know it I think you'll know pretty early on that that you know it if you know you
know it kick there you go so this case has like a little bit of everything it's a little Smorgasbord if you will there's
a family murder plot oh a CIA agent oh Facebook Facebook manipulation catfishing and conspiracy theories galoa
wow everything after Facebook is all describing Facebook yeah of course manipulation catfish and conspiracy
theories yeah so it's just like what what will I find on Facebook well I think I still have a Facebook I gotta
get rid of that mine's gone mine is gone um I want to like download my picks yeah
and smart eat it into it when they get out of there yeah but sadly this case back to it sadly in January of 2012 two
bodies were found in Mountain City Tennessee they were the bodies of 36 year old Billy Bill Payne and his 23
year old girlfriend Billie Jean Hayward Earth cheese for the sake of the story I'm gonna refer to Billy Payne Morris
Bill and Billie Jean as Billie Jean okay so Bill Payne's throat had been cut and
the couple had both been shot in the face wow when they were found their seventh month seven month old son was
still in his mother's arms luckily found alive and unharmed oh my God that's awful but found sleeping in his mom's
arms still oh horrible it's it's that's the worst part of this entire thing oh my God now it only took the police a
week to arrest the men responsible for these murders they were Jamie curd Bill Payne's second cousin what and Marvin
better known as buddy Porter the latter man's daughter Janelle had originally been friends with the couple but more
recently they had become her mortal enemies now the case seemed pretty simple at
first seemed like a father seeking revenge for his daughter who claimed that the murdered couple had been behind
a string of online bullying and threats directed at her but this case would turn
out to be incredibly more convoluted and so much more bizarre than anyone could have ever expected by the time the
detectives got to the truth an entire family would be behind bars and the small Serene town of Mountain City would
be absolutely gobsmacked whoa you really set that up I did damn I feel like like
I felt like I was entering into a dateline episode well Keith is over there and you know what he's looking at
me all proud he is yeah Keith is standing next to us with his hands in his pockets Keith Morrison is standing
next to us yeah Converse on he's just here in the in the Pod lab all the time yeah I always and he's standing there in
his Converses with his hands in his pockets and he's looking at you like good job gobsmacked nice yes of it yeah
yeah I like it well at the center of this case is a young woman named Janelle Potter excuse me she was in her late 20s
to early 30s during the time that we're going to talk about today but there are a lot of different ideas
and arguments about if Janelle was really operating with a 30 year old's brain according to her mother she had
the brain of an elementary school child but obviously looked to be a grown woman
Janelle was born to parents Barbara and Marvin like I said better known as buddy
Potter and she was born in Pennsylvania in 1981. according to her sister Christine
Janelle was quote a little bit slower in learning and in developmental capacity meaning she struggled academically she
had some uncomfortable moments with her peers throughout teenage years especially yeah and she was also
managing type 1 diabetes she had been diagnosed when she was younger and it was something that really affected her
self-confidence she was said to have many health issues in addition to diabetes but it doesn't
seem like those were ever elaborated on or specified okay to many she came off as quote a little bit odd especially
when it came to reasoning and interactions with others so yeah yeah since she had her fair
share of struggles she wasn't always comfortable in social situations and she spent a lot of time either by herself or
just hanging out with her parents her sister Christine said that Janelle was very coddled she used the word
coddled by her parents and said that the parents never really taught Janelle how
to deal with her problems directly and instead most of the time they would resolve issues that she was having for
her instead of showing her like this is how you can take care of that she felt like her mother Christine felt
like her mother in particular emphasized Janelle's social physical and intellectual disabilities and it seemed
like this really fed Janelle's negative self-image and exacerbated her inability
to develop any kind of healthy relationship or any kind of really social skills yeah now at the same time
Janelle's sister wasn't solely placing the blame on their mother she also felt like Janelle knew how to manipulate
manipulate her parents as well as other people into doing what she wanted them to do and because Christine didn't
really agree with most of what was going on and how it was being handled it put a
strain on her relationship with her family especially Janelle these two sisters did not get along at all okay
now in late 2004 their father buddy decided that it would be a good idea to relocate the family from Philadelphia to
Mountain City Tennessee Christine and Janelle's relationship at this point had become so deteriorated that Christine
actually decided not to go with her family she ended up moving in with her grandmother and at this time she
actually took out a restraining order on her sister due to her sister's harassing
and threatening behavior what yeah I don't know if the move was like solely to help Janelle like if her parents
thought a change of scenery might help her struggles or if it was like for various reasons but it really didn't
seem to help her in any way she felt like it was even harder to make friends out in Mountain City she said because
she wasn't born and raised there and that the people there didn't like Outsiders this was really also like
around the boom of social media so that became Janelle's like cocoon if you will
instead of having to go out and make friends and make connections face to face she could log into the internet
craft any Persona she wanted and communicate to anybody anywhere from the comfort of her own home yeah and that
and that is the first step into why social media is terrible is a farce yeah I like that word so that was pretty much
the only way Janelle communicated with the outside world until like 2009. wow now at some point in 2009 she ran out to
the Local Food Lion to pick up a prescription and a woman named Tracy Greenwell was working there and she
could kind of recognize that Janelle was a bit awkward and didn't necessarily have fantastic social skills but instead
of avoiding Janelle she decided like why don't I try and befriend her she doesn't
seem like she has a lot of friends and she has like she's kind of not new here but she's been here a while and hasn't
made friends with anybody Tracy went out of her way to call Janelle she would invite her out with
her own friends so that she wouldn't be cooped up at home all the time with like
just her parents as companions I say in a world full of [ __ ] be a Tracy oh there you go so Janelle's parents who
have been described many many times over as very overprotective they wanted Tracy
to come over to the house for a couple times before they allowed to Janelle to go out with her okay now remember she's
in her 20s 30s so yeah so that's like a different different scenario because at first I was like I get that but then
she's not a teenager she's not a child yeah according to her mother she is a child but yeah and it's very convoluted
yeah exactly so once they were confident though that Tracy was good company they
did allow Janelle to go out with her and it wasn't long before Janelle bonded with Tracy's group of friends she was
regularly hanging out with them they took her rock climbing there's like pictures of them hanging out together it
looked like they all had a great time yeah now part of the friend group was Tracy's brother Billy Payne Janelle
immediately took a liking to Billy who like I said was also referred to as Bill whenever the group would go out both
Tracy and Bill would also Bill too went out of his way to include Janelle he was
like a good guy just like his sister the district attorney who would later become involved in this case Dennis
Brooks felt like it was during this time that Janelle developed feelings for Bill
Payne oh he quote included her in Social occasions like I said going rock climbing or just hanging out to someone
like Janelle who led such a boring and sheltered life that must have seemed like something special yeah that's what
he said and he's just a nice he's a nice guy exactly sounds like he's just like a
very very decent very nice guy the way he was described was a nice guy who had time for anyone
I of course I'm looking at pictures and he just has like a very kind face he does and say both Billy's do I was gonna
say Billie Jean and Billy Payne and so cute so the thing was it wasn't long before Janelle's feelings turned into an
obsession with Bill oh no even though she kind of seemed to be able to hide it from her friend group for a little while
things would not remain that way eek now like I said even though Janelle was in her late 20s by this point in time she'd
never had any kind a romantic relationship or relationship at all with anybody before
and since she wasn't upfront about how she felt about Bill Payne he didn't know and neither did Tracy
so instead the brother sister Duo thought it would be a great idea actually to set Janelle up with a great
guy that they knew yeah their second cousin Jamie curd okay Jamie had grown up in Mountain City just like his
cousins and shared a lot of the same friends he was a big part he was a part of the larger friend group that Janelle
was now in at this time okay and Jamie and Bill also worked together at the Parkdale Mills okay Jamie and Janelle
hit it off instantly but like I said Janelle's parents were very overprotective so Janelle thought it
would be a better idea if she kept this relationship a secret from them at first
her and Jamie would just have quote 30 to 45 second phone calls with each other and on one of those phone calls Janelle
mentioned to Jamie that her computer seemed to be having some kind of issue lately like she couldn't get it to work
so he offered to come by and fix it and he came to the house several times a week to keep working on this computer
and Janelle told her parents that she just knew him through a friend or she made up some kind of story yeah but the
whole time he was fixing her computer which took hours and hours days and days she would sit with him and they would
just chat until he was finished for the day yeah so they were you know it sounds
like a me cute like a very cute look you know yep me cute yeah good exactly now once the computer was
finally fixed though Janelle and Jamie needed a new way to keep in regular contact without being caught by
Janelle's parents so Jaime came up with the idea to get Janelle a separate prepaid cell phone that she would only
use for calls to him Janelle agreed she was like this is a great idea and to add to the thrill of
the secret she quote instructed Jaime to hide the cell phone in a bush at the corner of her front yard where she could
retrieve it see that just sounds like a girl like a young woman who has been sheltered her whole life
this is very exciting and she's like I'm gonna live out my like you know book fantasy totally by like leave it in the
bush in the corner of the yard and I'll go get it she was and she ends up being described as very like very into fantasy
it makes sense like I see that like that that excited her that she was like oh I
get to do this like little mission to go get it I love that yeah like my yeah it's like it's exactly what I thought of
because it's like this like clandestine thing like I get to go get it from the bush in the corner of the
leave it for me you know what I mean and I'm sure she's seen like a million [ __ ] movies at this point in a
million TV shows and she's like all that I have to do it who doesn't want to be a
book character I who does me I want to be a book character all the time yeah you know you know
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so the couple's plan worked for a few weeks but eventually Janelle's mother Barbara which I'm just now realizing is
very teen mom-esque oh yeah Janelle and Barbara I forgot I'm done about the phone and she got rid of it no more
making calls with your boyfriend wow I love that show all right at least wow so she she found the phone she was like
goodbye but Jamie actually just ended up getting Janelle another phone which he again hid in the front bushes they
didn't come up with a better idea I was gonna say you gotta move it she didn't find it in the bushes I think she just
found like Janelle using it he's like what the [ __ ] is that yeah but I'm like you had a second opportunity to like do
something even cooler yeah put it somewhere else yeah you know but anyway she she continued to use that
phone strictly to calls to Jamie so things that went on like this for about six months with Janelle and Jamie
sneaking around behind her parents back but by early 2010 a lot of Janelle's friends kind of noticed a shift in her
behavior it was a bit a pretty big change in her personality and it seemed her personality seemed to shift right
around the time that bill Payne started dating Billie Jean Hayworth she was a local girl who he and Jamie
actually both worked with at the Mills Jamie said that bill and Billie Jean quote hit it right off and Bill just
fell head over heels in love with her oh and they look like they love each other
so much in all their pictures yeah I want to take like a little time to talk about the two of them before we get back
to the story they seem to be meant for each other the two of them had a lot in common and they like I said seemed to
bring out the best in each other Billie Jean Hayworth had been born in Mountain City Tennessee on March 19 1988. her
parents were Carl and Martha Hayworth she had two sisters Janie and Beverly and two brothers Greg and Daryl and when
she was growing up she really loved to be outside she loved to play volleyball and the older and older she got
especially when she was a young adult and kind of making her own money one of the things that she loved to do was go
to different like flea markets yard sales auctions and just see what treasure she could find she looked like
that loved a good flea market flip oh hell yeah which is one of my favorite shows
now Bill Payne had been born in Boone North Carolina on July 10 1975 to parents Billy Ray Payne he was named
after his father I love all the bellies here I do too I love it and Beverly Duggar his wife just like Billy excuse
me his life just like Billy jeans was average he got along with his parents got along with his sis his siblings he
had the sister Tracy that we know about and also a brother named Josh okay and just like Billie Jean he also grew up
loving to go to the flea markets the auctions the yard sales only he had a thing for Rare Coins oh that's like a
really cute Niche like having to love [ __ ] cute it's just like I like Rare Coins yeah I loved collecting a rare or
even just like looking at them just yeah that's just so actually you know what my
brother used to JP used to yeah collect Rare Coins yeah they're very neat things but they're
funny that's adorable that's adorable JP now as he got older Bill he unfortunately suffered with an addiction
to opioids and he was also known at this time to sell drugs when things were bad
but at the time of his death he was getting treatment at a local clinic and he was working hard to become sober good
for him he wanted to be the best father that he could be to his kids because in addition to the young son that he had
with Billie Jean he actually also had a son Justin that lived in Florida with his mother okay unfortunately he
couldn't really see Justin very often because he lived in Florida yeah but he was trying for his sons yeah and for
Billie Jean and by all accounts Billie Jean was one of the best things to happen to Bill Payne and she was a
really good influence on him since she'd come into his life his friends started to notice he was drinking less he was
shown up to parties less he wanted to get off drugs and completely away from them for good he wanted to make a life
with this girl I love that but remember Bill wasn't the only person in a state of change Janelle was too but hers was
not for the good Tracy Greenwell noticed the shift and said that Janelle seemed to become mean around the time that bill
and Billie Jean got together she'd make comments about Billie Jean and how much she disliked her when Jaime would tell
Janelle that she shouldn't be so hard on this girl because Bill Payne was really
in love Janelle would just made comments about their relationship not lasting she
was like I give it this amount of time okay or like it's not gonna last like blah blah blah it's like why are you
being a hater yeah that's bad energy it is yeah and she got even nastier when Billie Jean became pregnant with her and
Bill's baby Janelle would comment that neither of them deserved the baby oh and she she would say things that I'm not
even gonna repeat about the baby oh my gosh she was horrible ew horrible you can look it up oh her comments became
worse and worse and worse over time but her mean Spirit wasn't just directed toward Bill and Billie Jean a lot of it
was but not entirely it was even directed at her own boyfriend Jamie on one occasion in February Jaime had
gone to a party at Bill Payne's house and he had too much to drink so he ended up passing out there he woke up at some
point to his phone ringing off the hook and had been ringing all night I don't know if like the phone uh will come up
or if somebody there was like Jesus Christ answer your [ __ ] phone yeah but when he answered it it was Janelle's
father buddy on the other line oh and he told Jamie a quote Janelle had left the
house and they found her in a ditch what he went on to say that Janelle didn't love Jamie and he needed to stay away
from Janelle from that point forward and then Janelle got on the phone and told Jamie for herself that she didn't love
him and she never wanted to see him again what the [ __ ] out of [ __ ] nowhere but then three days later Jamie
got a call from Janelle telling him that she did love him and she did want to continue on with their relationship and
it was her dad that made her say those awful things to him from that point forward she told them that she should be
the one to initiate phone calls I I don't know what that was about I think like like you initiated that phone call
yeah but anyways I think what happened the night of that party in my personal opinion I think Janelle was upset for a
number of reasons I think one of the main ones was that she couldn't go to parties like that yeah her parents
wouldn't allow her to even though she was a grown-ass woman and I think the other thing that she was pissed off
about was that this was Bill Payne's party she wouldn't have wanted to miss that and I think since she was so angry
at him now she felt like Jamie going to that party was him going against her betrayal in some way by being cordial
with his own cousin okay and because of that I think she wanted to punish him and make him feel like something
terrible had happened to her because she was so upset over this which is why her
parents found her in a ditch yep I also don't know if they like actually did find her in a dish or did she just made
that up or did you just completely make that up I could see it being the latter honestly I could see it being the former
too actually to release families wild this is a wild family yeah like I'm a little scared to see what's happening
now you absolutely should yeah yeah um I just honestly overall I think this was like a weird strange Ploy for
attention but Jamie of course didn't realize that he liked Janelle I think she kind of stroked his ego he was a bit
older than she was and she was kind of infatuated with him and vice versa so they continued dating
even though their conversations were limited to really odd hours of the day and night because Janelle didn't want to
be caught by her mom talking on the phone with him that's wild and they weren't able to go on dates because her
parents disapproved of him now over time Jamie's feelings toward his cousin Bill and Billie Jean also
shifted most likely due to Janelle's manipulation Bill and Jamie had worked together like I said at the Mills for
years and they had always been close they'd always gotten along remember bill was the one to set Jaime and Janelle up
in the first place yeah but now Jamie was suddenly pulling back from his cousin and was becoming distant and
actually went as far as to request a change in his work schedule so that his hours wouldn't line up with bills or
Billy jeans what because she also worked at the Mills now since Janelle wasn't able to see
Jaime very often and by this point her parents had pretty much forbidden her from seeing any of the rest of the
friend group she poured herself even further into social media now it was late in 2010 and it was around this time
that Janelle started to mention a man named Chris to Jaime and a lot of her other friends
she told Jamie that Chris was a family friend a neighbor back in Pennsylvania she said he grew up in the house next to
hers he was really more like a brother to her all throughout high school and he always watched out for her
and now he worked for the CIA and she was super super excited because he was actually going to be transferred to
Tennessee soon and he would actually be buying a house in Mountain City and she was super super stoked about it and like
I said Jamie wasn't the only one to hear about Chris this Chris character one of
Janelle's friends online strictly online they never met in person Bob Meehan also
remembered that right around mid to late 2010 Janelle kept bringing up Chris more
and more frequently Bob also lived in Pennsylvania where she was from and though he'd never met Janelle in person
he actually thought that they were in a long distance relationship oh they texted they exchanged emails they were
social media friends oh boy he thought they were in a relationship okay I don't know what she thought that's that but
that's that about that and that's the T on that now other friends of hers online
remembered her bringing up Chris too and most of them remembered that she described him as a family friend not
like Allah love interest or anything like that just an old friend who now worked for the CIA
which we all have one of those aren't you like not supposed to tell people if you work for the CIA I'm pretty sure I
feel like can you tell people that you do I don't know I don't know what the protocol is I'm pretty sure like the
whole point of the CIA is to be pretty secretive about it like I just thought that too and pretty
secretive whereabouts but right but sure it's like tell everybody tell everybody the CIA agent is moving
in yeah via Facebook too Facebook via Facebook Messenger I don't see this happening it seems legit Chris is real
guys this seems real he is yeah this really is he is he's a real character yeah emphasis on the character exactly so
this sudden mention of Chris seemed to happen right around the time that Janelle found out Billie Jean was
pregnant and also right around the time that Janelle started complaining to Jamie that she was being bullied and
harassed on all of her social media platforms oh all of a sudden these Anonymous users started posting all
these terrible things about her and on her wall and messaging her all Anonymous users okay on Facebook I was just gonna
say on Facebook yeah I thought that was hard and also um another social media platform she used was topics
the [ __ ] is that I've never heard of that in my life neither had I I don't know if it just
like didn't get big over here like you don't know if it didn't get me because it didn't get big over here like do any
of you use topics I don't know if it's around anymore but did you use topics guys answers it's topics with an X too
topics me let me know it like um it it uh news based on like where you were and you could also interact with people
in your area again oh okay I've literally never heard of it sounds like fascinating then neighbor app I don't
know what oh it's called but the neighbor app I know what you mean you know you know what I'm talking about the
one where you can be like hey did you see that person driving down the street I never interact in there but I'm
always reading I love a neighbor app we love we do be loving those are my social
media apps the neighbor apps where we can all Spy on each other you know what my favorite social media app is doordash
hell yeah I communicate with one person and one person only and they always bring me food I shouldn't say always
actually sometimes I was gonna say sometimes they steal not very frequently but anyways at the same time uh that
Janelle was getting harassed and bullied and I do Jamie started getting texts from Chris
so he is real oh he's getting texts from him yeah yeah you can't fake that he's like no not at all he's like Janelle is
getting bullied mercilessly and it needed to stop I feel like you're the CIA and you figured it that's what he's
that's what he's saying yeah So eventually Chris started emailing Jamie telling him more and more about the
Relentless online bullying and how he needed to put an end to it being her boyfriend but strangely the emails were
coming from Janelle's email account they're coming from inside the house they literally are coming from inside
the house yeah and when Jamie asked why that was Chris told him that he had a phobia of phones and didn't like using
them apparently he was also against having his own email address as well he has a phobia of phones like sir you work
I mean sexual intelligence I don't I don't like answering a phone call like a cold call is pretty don't ever [ __ ]
call it's a severe violation in my book if we're friends and you cold called yeah that's gonna be a problem but I
would definitely not classify it as a phobia I don't even know if there is a phobia I don't know I think you might
have a photo of like texting but even I don't say yeah does anyone else get like I'm sorry
I'm gonna take you out no no just really quick because I just need to know does anyone else get severe anxiety about
texting and does anybody else prefer to answer text messages on their laptop yeah I don't like typing on my phone and
then I I get anxious when I get text messages and then I don't answer them right away because like I am who I am
and then I keep thinking about it and days go by and I go oh no I'm a week past this text message that I didn't
answer and then yeah or anxiety and then I just it's so I hate it it's the one thing that I get a lot of anxiety about
you're waiting on a text back from Elena it's come on it's coming I'm just real anxious about it okay it's coming up
yeah she's just really anxious she'll get back to you soon oh yeah that's that's my theme song
but yeah I just had to throw that out there if you feel that way as well you're not alone well Chris felt that
way he said no phones that way yep the CIA doesn't make us use them nope it's also like okay you're gonna have a
phobia of phones but where the [ __ ] is your email address oh that's the thing you have one you have not explained all
of this sir I have no idea but Jamie would later say that he could tell the difference between an email or a text
that came from Chris because Chris was way more intense than Janelle Janelle quote never cursed never called people
names or spoke hatefully to people what a kind soul yeah but Jamie said that Chris's Communications were full of
obscenities ranting and harmful wishes toward others specifically Billie Jean and Bill Payne
and he's a CIA agent okay I'm just putting together the pieces here that's probably great quality staff at a CIA
agent wouldn't you also think like in my opinion I would think that like even somebody's monitoring the cia's
communications yeah I mean this is adding up this is legit yeah I feel pretty comfortable with this you know
anyways but when Chris wasn't going off about the couple he would give Jamie advice on how to better his relationship
with Janelle you know because like the CIA also doubles as your own personal therapist absolutely yeah so when Jamie
asked Janelle about what was going on online she told him that this harassment really came out of nowhere and like I
said was I said like I said so many times during this like I said sorry I will come up with something else but was
a slew of anonymous comments to her Facebook page telling her she was a bad person and this is intense that they
were gonna have her raped oh my God yeah that's horrific the comments had escalated so much over the course of a
couple of weeks that Janelle's mother Barbara actually ended up posting her own comment to Janelle's wall begging
the anonymous comment commentators to stop and not please not do this to her daughter that's awful like Barbara was
really distraught over this yeah of course but just delete your Facebook exactly yeah that was happening again
we're just like make a new one with like a different name but so Barbara was really really concerned but this was
interesting because Janelle's friends didn't really seem to be too concerned about this they felt like there was
something really suspicious about all of this yeah and they didn't really seem to
think any of it was real Tracy Greenwald yeah Tracy Greenwell later said quote Janelle was always saying that somebody
was mad at her somebody hated her somebody wanted to kill her she was paranoid about it ah so Janelle was
frustrated that her friends didn't believe her and she insisted that the danger she was facing was very real and
over weeks the tension was building and building and Janelle was starting to point the finger at four people within
her very own friend group hmm a girl named Lindsay Thomas the girl the first girl who had ever befriended her in this
town Tracy Greenwell Tracy's brother Bill Payne and Bill Payne's girlfriend Billie Jean ah come on now within this
same time period Janelle called the police to her home and reported that a rock had been thrown into her front yard
and it had the names Billy Payne and Billie Jean painted on it and she felt like this was proof that they were the
ones behind all the harassment okay so to retaliate she started posting on Facebook calling Lindsay Thomas and
Billie Jean mean girls and sharing screenshots that were clearly doctored and manipulated to seem like these girls
were harassing her wow doesn't seem like they were wow but because of this sudden
shift in her behavior and resulting turmoil pretty much everybody in the friend group ended up unfriending her
yeah of course and they all removed themselves from her orbit to kind of save themselves from the drama of it all
and the rest of them were like Jesus Christ one is she gonna turn on me of course yeah so Janelle just kept on
posting about them though Lindsay Thomas actually called Janelle on the phone on
one occasion when she found out that Janelle was writing about her on Facebook and she was like please can you
just like stop this like you gotta stop girlfriend what a terrible era we live in oh my God I know where these things
are like this person wrote this about me on Facebook oh God high school and so the pendulum has to
swing the other way eventually seriously and mind you these are people in there like like 20s and 30s yeah it's like
what what are you doing it's still happening I mean there being these other people are being dragged into this yeah
it's crazy but some of them some of them kind of start to partake a little bit I think they
start getting pissed off that they of course people get sucked into that exactly no anyways according to Lindsay
Janelle told her when she called her that she had no idea what she was talking about and she said she wasn't
posting anything about Lindsay or Billy or Billie Jean nobody yet right after this exchange Lindsay started getting
calls from The Potter's home line where the caller would just breathe heavily but other than that say nothing at all
like girly star 69 it seriously come on but there were a couple of instances though where a man got on the phone
Lindsay said she believed this man was Janelle's father buddy and he would demand that Lindsay and her friends
leave his daughter alone stop calling his house like end the nonsense even though she was the one getting the phone
calls she did not call them wow like what wow so in May 2011 shifting gears a little bit Jamie kurd's mother passed
away and it was around this time that Janelle's Family actually started being more welcoming toward him they still
didn't want Jamie and Janelle to have a relationship with each other but they were like you know you fix our computer
computer you're decent enough you can be Janelle's friend but like you can't date
her you can be around you can be around now he got an invite for family dinners holiday celebrations and strangely
enough actually in no time at all he and Janelle's father buddy were like thick as thieves they really hit it off
now that same month May of 2011. Lindsay Thomas ended up filing a telephone harassment or multiple telephone
harassment charges against Janelle who still seemed to be calling ever so frequently God give it up even though
Lindsay knew that it was Janelle who was responsible for the calls since there were two other adults that lived in the
home she couldn't prove it and because of that there really wasn't a lot that law enforcement could do yeah and
because she wasn't being stopped by anybody Janelle continued her social media escapades and now she was trying
to bring more and more of this group of friends and even people outside of this group of friends into her Feud with
Lindsay Billie Jean Bill Payne and Tracy one acquaintance of all these people including Janelle Tara Osborne would
later end up testifying that when she tried to remove herself from the drama she got an email from a Facebook account
linked to Janelle she answered the email saying that she wasn't interested in having any part of this she was like
please God just leave me alone yeah and she she was like Janelle please don't contact me again and then she blocked
the user okay she then started getting phone calls similar to the ones that let me tell Lindsay Thomas was getting but
the and these calls were also from the part Potter household except this caller quote tried to make noises from a horror
movie and had an insanity laugh tried to make noises from a horror movie unfortunately no further elaboration on
that damn it I really want to know what that entails what would those like do you think she'd just been heavy
breathing Maybe I always noises from a horror movie make me think of those like really like like
the strings that are like you know maybe some some heavy piano wow oh oh maybe she did like a ch
maybe that'd be fun or she was like don't do that to people Freddy's coming for you three yeah
what's your favorite scary movie that kind of thing oh my God yeah I wish that I
um was like a real person in the 90s and I could have pranked College people and
been like what's your favorite scary movie that was literally the most amazing thing to do yeah for years to
come fun I love it but yeah I don't I don't know yeah I don't know also an insanity laugh I don't really know
Insanity laugh either yeah I don't know I I just hear the wicked witch yeah yeah like a cackle yeah well anyways
um Osborne also tried to file telephone harassment charges against Janelle but a
clerical clerical error caused her case to be dismissed okay I love those clerical errors yeah I don't know now
while everybody was getting more and more concerned about the situation that Janelle was creating for them Janelle's
CIA buddy Chris he was getting pissed the [ __ ] off about the way she was being
treated and now Janelle's parents were hearing about Chris too and anytime Jamie curd would come over he and
Janelle's parents would talk about the latest ongoings in the feud and how concerned they were about their sweet
precious janelli Janelle's mother Barbara commented to Jamie that Chris was quote angry and firing back at
Thomas and Hayworth with emails and it was like a war hmm yeah neither of Janelle's parents
really understood what was going on probably because they were getting skewed information from Janelle yeah and
really they just wanted all of this to stop they were like what the [ __ ] is going on and like where did this come
from seriously the drama was affecting Janelle's Behavior with them too and it just felt like a constant barrage of
negativity coming at them from all angles yeah so this seems to be the Tipping Point in the story according to
Jaime buddy Potter talked a lot about his quote missions and other countries during his time in the CIA
Yes you heard that right Chris was not the only secret agent in this town baby what
buddy Potter also claimed to have worked for the agency huh uh-huh okay yeah okay that's that really that's
the that's the bet on that that's about that there you go but Jamie knew that buddy Potter was also an avid gun
collector not only were there tons and tons and tons of guns in the home but buddy Potter kept two strapped to him at
all times okay he would have one in a shoulder harness and another in a holster that he kept strapped around his
ankle there's actually a picture that I saw of him and Barbara gardening together and he has a gun strapped on
him and a um a sling of ammunition oh yeah I saw that in their gardening they're just
gardening I saw that and he is [ __ ] packed stacked uh yeah Pat he's packing he's packing
yeah whacked like let's go I am not a little innocent girl don't know how to say it
I'm like he has guns don't know how to say it he there was guns everywhere in this house he actually had to carry like
an oxygen tank around with him just he had like some medical problems of his own and there was ammunition slung
around his oxygen tank wow okay like a choice and a half a bold Choice bold move
but but Ian Barbara both seem to be getting more and more aggressive about the situation with Janelle and eager
Jamie felt to do whatever they needed to end it themselves and I think he was kind of starting to get a little bit
freaked out by this but at the same time Jamie would later say that when buddy and Barbara were getting aggressive
Janelle would just stay quiet and he was like I was really confused by this because whenever we talked about it
Janelle had no problem sharing her opinions freely discussing the whole entire Feud at length with me but around
her parents he put it that she quote acted like a needy kid to a parent manipulation at its finest as the
situation intensified Barbara actually started getting messages directly to her email account from CIA agent Chris
with no last name Chris Chris agent number zero zero zero one he seemed to be really serious when it
came to the threats being made against Janelle and he emphasized to Barbara that everybody should take them
seriously but also noted that he was monitoring this situation very closely and he was ready to jump in and take
care of things whenever it became necessary well thank goodness we have Chris I'm saying and Barbara was
terrified for her daughter which makes me sad and even though the Chris emails were still coming from Janelle's email
account she fully believed that this online bullying had reached the point where this CIA agent felt like he needed
to get involved oh man it's never been made clear whether or not Barbara was diagnosed with any kind of mental
illness or if she struggled cognitively but there are more than a handful of instances where family friends and
authorities have referenced her as being delusional and needing functional assistance okay so I think that's
important to keep in mind well that's sad it is exactly and I I wanted to say that part of it because you might be
sitting there being like Jesus Christ how does she believe yes but but like we don't know for sure but it's been
implied there's possibly more at play exactly now even before Janelle had moved to Mountain City and gone through
this falling out with her friends Barbara was almost overprotective to a fault remember what Christine said she
was like she was always going out of her way to solve things for Janelle like it wasn't good
but once this whole debacle intensified it kind of seemed to reach a point where
Barbara was paranoid like really intensely paranoid and the emails from Chris were only feeding that paranoia
more and more yeah and unfortunately in the summer of 2011 Janelle actually needed to be hospitalized this was due
to poor management of her diabetes but I think her family felt like it was brought on by what was going on this
actually wasn't uncommon for her to end up in the hospital because of the way she managed her diabetes or put the
timelines but the timelines yeah worked exactly [Music] thank you now while Janelle was
hospitalized the number of emails from CIA agent Chris to Jamie and Barbara reached a new level there were tons and
tons of emails being received daily almost like he got like a week off from work or something wow about the online
issues and Janelle's current situation with being hospitalized again all of these emails were coming from Janelle's
account but they knew that they were from Chris yeah one from Chris to Jaime rad quote I hope Janelle doesn't excuse
me I hope Janelle don't think about killing herself and Jamie responded saying I think that
if it wasn't for us she might have thought about it didn't say it but I can tell she has just took all she can from
these [ __ ] they won't let up and they're crazy hell I don't know why they have to do this I don't know I
don't know their life has to such at the point that they see this as a sick joke
or something dumb bastards and here's the thing if like like just stop being on social media at
the end like you're grown adults yeah just interact in life and cut those people out of your life if you want like
go play a video and now if you really have to like that's the thing go on Club Penguin like you don't nobody needs to
like because even if she was being bullied it's like you don't need to stand for that you can just go turn it
off yeah exactly the computer get a [ __ ] me like what the [ __ ] I'm saying well anyways Chris wrote back seemingly
trying to comfort Jamie and telling him that he wasn't alone in the fight against Janelle's bullies Chris was here
for Jamie and he even said that he had Lindsey Thomas under 24 7 surveillance at this time and that he had shot her
black girl a back glass out of her car which like I don't know if the CIA like shoots people's cars for you if you're
being bullied online I've never had that experience I've never had a friend who had that experience but this is an
interesting use of the cia's time and resources One mic that's what I'll say one might
say interesting now I don't think that actually happened to be honest I don't either it's like I I don't know wow I
don't know if anybody followed up on that they were just like buying her car or if you just took Chris's word for it
they they took Chris's word many many times over it seems like they lived for Chris's word they they did his word and
his word alone they lived and died by Chris's word but to be honest even though there were pending telephone
harassment charges and from time to time rebuttal posts on Facebook from the people that Janelle was pointing the
finger at they were all just going on with their lives and doing the best they could to avoid the drama and avoid Jamie
and Janelle they were like I I can't this would be so scary that someone to focused on you like that and you're like
I just want to live my life and like without you in it like please just go away when you never bullied them in the
first place I as we all know at this point I'm thinking this came from pure jealousy on
Janelle's part to Billie Jean yeah because Janelle had feelings for Bill Payne she never did anything about it
but because she liked him she felt like Billie Jean was in the wrong for dating him and it's like he's allowed to not
like you to not be attracted to you he might he might have even if he expressed those feelings but also
he's allowed to not be attracted to you yeah you can just be friends he doesn't have to like you just because you're a
woman right Jesus not everyone is attracted to everyone exactly you find people hot that I'm like I don't think
so and vice versa yeah you know it's like everybody has a different type exactly it's ridiculous
freaking ridiculous freaking ridiculous but everybody's trying to move on with this and Tracy Greenwell Bill Payne
Billie Jean and Lindsey Thomas were really specifically trying to rid themselves of this situation
but at that same time Chris was making sure that Jamie curd buddy and Barbara Potter were heavily immersed in this it
was consuming their lives at this way to live consuming it sounds like a [ __ ] nightmare it is now in late October of
2011 Lindsay Thomas actually um her telephone harassment case against Janelle went to court and unfortunately
was dismissed pretty quickly because again there wasn't a lot of proof I was gonna say those things are so hard to
prove exactly now this dismissal though seemed to embolden not only Janelle but Barbara Potter in the weeks that
followed they stepped up their harassment and actually just a few days after the court appearance Billie Jean
Hayworth was at a local gas station filling up her car with her baby in the back seat oh God and Janelle and Barbara
were in the car behind Belize and so they followed her into this gas station and they started screaming at her that
she was white trash and that she didn't deserve her son oh my God in like a slew
of other threats ew according to her close friend Linda who was actually working inside in the gas station at the
time Billy raced into the store with her baby and she was quote crying trembling
and shaking oh my God she was terrified of holding her baby just filling up her car yeah going about her day living her
life and there was also tension between Jamie Kurt and Bill Payne at this time the
cousins like remember their family yeah though they didn't have to work together
very often at the Mill anymore since Jamie had requested not to be scheduled at the same time as either person the
the couple there were instances where it was inevitable they were like you gotta
[ __ ] work together because that's the schedule yeah that's a schedule I'm still touring some of his work yeah
exactly during some of those instances there were arguments between the cousins especially over the fact that Jaime had
blindly taken Janelle's side without even hearing his own cousin's account of what was really going on
and Bill also knew that Jaime was going back to Janelle and telling her everything that had been said during
these arguments because then Janelle would take to social media and air everything out oh my God so he's like
I'm trying to talk to you like human to human man to man yeah this is so pathetic yeah exactly truly exactly now
finally there was one night where Bill actually called his cousin Jamie in an attempt to end the feud once and for all
he was like me and Billie Jean started keeping a record of emails and social media posts and comments directed at us
by Janelle and Barbara and he told them the file was now more than two inches thick she they have that much but agreed
that it wasn't just Janelle and Barbara involved in this fight he said there were hurtful remarks made on both sides
now that they were in the thick of this but this had all started with Janelle and now they were reaching a point of
being threatened and it needed to stop he was like you gotta do something dude as my cousin like you gotta stop yes
and he also told Jamie that there was no way an actual CIA agent was involved in
this and that Chris was clearly Janelle yeah I mean the emails were literally coming from her email account guys
they're coming from inside the house but Jamie did not believe that Janelle was capable of doing something like that and
so it seems like the call really ended with no resolution between the cousins wow and as the virtual Feud was making
its way into the real world the tone of Chris's emails to Barbara Potter was getting graphic and dire he kept urging
her that if she didn't stop all of this soon then quote all of this crap might kill her daughter
he told Barbara that he was ready and willing to kill Billie Jean Hayworth and Bill Payne and anybody else who posed a
serious threat to Janelle and Chris also kept mentioning that he wished buddy Potter still had his ID from his days in
the CIA because then they would be able to work together to quote neutralize this threat
wow as if the CIA wouldn't have a record of everyone who ever worked for them yeah
it's like what yeah so as Barbara buddy and Jamie were dragged further and further into this
strange fantasy-turned conspiracy that Janelle and this Chris character had created Janelle was still posting under
fake names across several social media platforms she was constantly calling Lindsay
Thomas and Billy Jane Billie Jean Hayworth mean [ __ ] saying that they should be punished and making vaguely
threatening comments toward the entire group that she considered to be her bullies
Chris actually started using Janelle's Facebook account during this time as well and really amped up in the last
months of 2011. in a post from December 14 2011 quote Chris posted a status on Janelle's account saying to Bill Payne
Billie Jean Hayworth Lindsay Thomas and Tara and Brad Osborne and Etc please leave l-e-v-e Janelle alone and stop
with the harassment and stop trying to run her life look at your own lives and work on that BC you are all just a bunch
of white trash no good ugly people that love to hurt others well you need to think of this take care of your kids
Billy and Billie Jean and Lindy get off your meth drugs and stop going after my sister and my family thank you or you
can just go jump off a mountain MTN for all I care you all need to get out of my
sister's life you know CIA things that's very CIA very see much CIA either every CIA a lot of
very professional yes so these posts were commented on over and over again by Barbara who started calling Chris her
son at this point Chris had started calling Janelle his sister so he she was like all right well he's my son then oh
there's a lot going on here there's a lot yeah of untreated mental illness in my own personal opinion yeah
but pretty much all of these posts just had a slew of comments from Barbara Chris and Janelle they were all talking
to each other back and forth and now Chris was saying that there were not only Janelle excuse me not only threats
to Janelle's life but to Buddy and Barbara's as well he had found evidence that people were after them now
I don't even know what's happening right now like this is wild wild.com now by the new year 2012 buddy believed that
Janelle's former friends were working on plans to quote take Janelle and cut her
head off and then kill him and his wife because that's what Chris had said he found he found my story God
so on the evening of January 30th 2012 Barbara called Jamie curd and asked if he would stop by the house to take a
look at their computer while Jaime was alone with Buddy Buddy asked if Jamie would quote do him a
favor he wanted Jaime to take him down to Bill Payne's house and quote let him out and
go down the road and come pick him up okay Jamie would later say that buddy wasn't being very specific about why he
wanted to go out to Bill's house that night so he left and went back to his own home
he was like I don't know about this but very early the next morning like first couple hours of the morning of January
31st 2012 Jamie missed a call from the Potter household and then he got a text from Janelle saying that Buddy was on
his way to his house Jamie's house when buddy got there they drove in buddy's car to a church parking
lot near the paint house and Bill shared the house with not only Billie Jean and
their son but his father as well now Jamie and Buddy waited in in the car until they saw paw bill which is Bill
Payne's Bill Payne senior okay until they saw him leave for work then they got out of the car
walked through a small field that was adjacent to the pain household Jamie later said that he explicitly told buddy
as they were crossing this field but he couldn't kill anybody but buddy told him
all he needed to do was stand out the door while buddy himself went in but if that was the case then why did Buddy
provide Jaime with a gun now when they reached the front door they found it unlocked and both men
entered the home Jaime stood by the front door he said this is Jamie's account and waited while buddy Potter went to
the first bedroom Jamie would later testify that he heard Bill Payne yell what the hell and then he saw Billie
Jean run out of the room down the hall Jamie then heard a gunshot and saw buddy Porter exit the room where he had
clearly just shot Bill Payne oh my God he was now looking for Billie Jean and he looked to Jaime to find out which
direction she'd gone in Jaime said he pointed in the direction where he saw Billie Jean run and while
buddy went in that direction Jamie looked into the first bedroom and saw his cousin lying dead
what the [ __ ] as he looked he heard another gunshot and at that point he said he ran from the house which I don't
buy back across the field and into buddy Porter's truck excuse me Potter's truck
[ __ ] autocorrect buddy returned to the car several moments later if Jamie said and Jamie
gave him his gun back and they silently drove back to Jamie's house where buddy dropped him off at the end of his
driveway Jamie said he vomited in the street before going inside and once he was inside he received a text from Chris
saying that the problem was now over wow so that's horrific it's it's insane like it was Jamie it
was um was Billy Jean was she holding her son when she was shot yeah that's why he was still in her arms oh it
seemed like she was taking him out of his crib like she was running with him to run with him she was standing in
front of his crib or when she was shot and fell in front of the crib and luckily somehow the baby wasn't harmed
and he was just sleeping just sleeping when they found him oh that breaks my heart yeah and that she was going to
like to save her to save her baby I think she probably was gonna run out the back but obviously was taking the baby
first oh so at 6 30 that same morning Brad Osborne who I think was like a bigger
part of the friend group because um I don't know if he was related to the woman from earlier who had gotten
involved in all of this or if he was dating her or married to her but he'd been involved in this whole Saga he knew
what this what was going on yeah he arrived at the pain house to pick Bill up for work one bill didn't come outside
after a few minutes Brad tried to give him a call but due to a quote unquote disruption in his cell service he wasn't
able to connect the call okay he either didn't have service or his phone had been turned off for some reason
he didn't want to leave without Bill though he was like let me go in and see what's up and he decided to go inside
and check on his friend so he entered the home through a sliding glass door at the rear of the house because he knew
that door was usually left unlocked and once he got inside he said he heard an alarm clock going off over and over
again but when he called out to Bill he got no response he used the house phone to call Bill's
cell phone again but he couldn't hear it ringing so he was like I don't really know what to do here I
don't think he wanted to venture more into the home because I think he maybe he felt like he was doing something
wrong but being there so he called a couple more times didn't hear anything so he decided to leave
now around 10 a.m just a few hours later the Payne's old neighbor Roy Stevens stopped by the house to pick up some
mail that they'd been holding for him and he noticed that both cars were still in the driveway and he was like that's
kind of weird like they should be at work or at least one of them should be yeah and he knocked on the door and got
no response though he's like all right well that's even weirder both cars are here why is nobody answering the door
yeah and he also knew that the pains usually left that back sliding glass door unlocked so he ran around went
around back to get in that way once he was inside he called out telling whoever was home that he was there but
he got no response he thought this was weird so he walked down the hall to the front bedroom he poked his head inside
and he saw Bill lying on the bed there was blood pooling around his head and his throat had actually been cut open oh
my God mm-hmm Roy ran out of the house and told his wife who had come along for the ride
what was going on and urged her to call 9-1-1 but his wife Linda was CPR certified and he wasn't sure whether
bill was still alive or not he couldn't tell how would you know exactly so Linda
tried to perform CPR but she found sure she was going to but she found Bill to be quote very stiff and ice cold oh so
she knew CPR wasn't going to do anything yeah and she picked up the house phone to call 9-1-1
as Linda was on the phone with the 9-1-1 operator Roy heard a noise coming from the end of the hall
I think it was the baby he followed the noise and found Billie Jean lying on the
floor in front of her son's crib with the baby still in her arms oh that just kills me luckily like I said unharmed
when he found Bill Payne's body like I said he thought there was a chance he was still alive but when he saw Billie
Jean he knew she was not alive he said that he saw the hole in her head a pool of blood around men and he saw a quote
fragments of Billie Jean's hair and stuff on the carpet oh God like absolutely I can't imagine finding
somebody you love like that no now once the bodies were taken into custody it was obvious that this was a
homicide and thus an autopsy was required by law so the coroner was able to determine that even though Bill had
that deep gash in his throat in both cases the cause of death was a gunshot wound to the head from a 38 caliber
revolver okay so the case was assigned to Johnson County Sheriff's Chief Deputy Joe
Woodward and he was to get assistance from a real special agent Special Agent Scott lot of potential Bureau of
Investigations or the TBI I also love that his name is Scott Law Scott Law that's [ __ ] awesome Scott agent Scott
Law is on the case so the duo started off by questioning friends and family of the murdered
couple and pretty instantly they heard about the social media war going on between them and a few other people in
town and Janelle Porter or Potter I keep wanting to say Porter I know they did however learn that bill Payne
had been using and dealing drugs at the time of his death through interviews and
they also had found a small amount of meth within the home and a pipe okay so they were like oh like like this could
be a lot of things exactly it complicated things for just a minute really yeah investigators were like is
there some kind of connection between this these deaths here in a local drug scene but they were quickly able to
learn that bill was not a major player in the scene at all he was a small time dealer he really only dealt to his
friends and none of those people had any reason to want him or Billie Jean yeah um so that kind of fizzled out pretty
quickly and the only other lead that they had to follow up on was the ongoing social
media Feud so on February 1st the day after the couple had been murdered Woodward and lot went out to the Potter
household to interview the family about their relationship with the murdered couple
they acted like they were in shock and told both investigators that they had just heard about the murders on the news
that morning and when the investigators asked about the issues that Janelle had been having
with the murdered couple and the other former friends she told them that Lindsay Thomas and Billie Jean Hayworth
had been unhappy about telephone harassment cases having been dismissed but since then there hadn't been any
further problems between them okay lies yeah she did say though that both women had hacked her Facebook account and
created a ton of fake profiles oh and for months they harassed Janelle and other friends that she'd made virtually
they just went out and harassed everybody she ever knew on her friends list yeah it's like weird that that
happened on your iPad Woodward and law asked why the other members of the group would say that
actually she was the one doing the harassing and she told them quote no no I'm not that mean I just tell people to
leave me alone and she said she thought the woman were jealous of her because she was too
pretty Janelle said this about herself okay which is like that's great that you have
a good self-image like you've Got Confidence but but that's not it also like we're talking about a murdered
woman here and you think she was jealous of you because you're too pretty like let's let's come back down to earth I
was just gonna say come on down to earth exactly like sure you're pretty but okay
like what so she said they also she also felt like they didn't accept her because she
hadn't been born and raised in Mountain City and they didn't like Outsiders that
was her excuse for everything that had ever happened to her in Mountain City it was everybody else in Mountain City's
fault yeah of course because they don't like Outsiders mean well they seem to be
pretty [ __ ] welcoming yeah it seemed like it Tracy went out of her way to introduce Janelle to her entire friend
group yeah they introduced her to her boyfriend yeah exactly geez but she explained that no matter how much she
begged them to stop they just wouldn't they terrorized her they told her they were gonna kill her kill her parents
they said they were gonna rape her and they repeatedly told her that they hoped she would die
on these fake accounts and Buddy and Barbara sat alongside their daughter and confirmed everything she'd told them
they added that there had been people shooting at the house recently throwing rocks in the yard with weird names
printed on them and that one day when Janelle was Home Alone somebody had come by and kicked in
the garage door oh yeah crazy look at that crazy crazy he's a crazy girl you crazy girl the more and more they heard
the stranger this all sounded this is an agent for the the Bureau of Investigation and he's like what the
[ __ ] he's like I don't think so and what stood out as particularly strange to agent law in particular was that Janelle
seemed to be minimizing Jamie kurd's involvement he was like I thought he was a bigger part of this whole friend group
like so why and he's he didn't know that Jamie curd was Janelle's boyfriend but he suspected it ah because Janelle
actually remember her parents still didn't know they were oh yeah because they're just supposed to be friends she
denied that she and Jamie were romantically involved I'm yeah and she seemed to be stirring any questions they
had about him in the opposite direction like any time they asked about Jamie she
danced around it okay and it's like why are you trying so hard not to talk about
Jamie hmm she was like nope we're just friends and sometimes he comes by to help the computer the end okay
she was going out of her way to talk about anything and anyone other than Jamie which only made investigators want
to talk to him even more yeah of course it was a horrible idea so the first interview they had with
Jamie was two days after this it was a pretty unproductive meeting other than the fact that he agreed to take a
polygraph test other than that he claimed he knew nothing about the murders he really
didn't have anything to say but then he was picked up again for an interview on February 6th and this time
investigators would get the break in the case that they'd been hoping for in his previous interview Jamie had
failed that polygraph test miserably of course he did miserably not one part of me believed he
was gonna pass that or even slightly past that which like again who knows if they're even exactly they're not like
wolf this one works for this one he specifically got like really bad reviews I guess I don't know how to pick up bad
reviews and when he responded no to whether or not he knew the identity of pain and hayward's killer he got bad
reviews he really flunked that question like a whole group of people a home group of internet trolls came in and
were like once I wish I could give this zero Stars zero stars and this answer I would give it zero Stars if I could we
were all rooting for you it's not funny but but that part's funny that part's funny exactly but he did
really bad on that question he got bad reviews overall not when the investigators told him this that he had
gotten such bad reviews he finally said that he did play some role in The Murders oh he confessed he was just like
you know what he's like you know what yeah but that it was Buddy Porter God damn it Potter Jesus Potter
uh autocorrect messed me up once and then like and that's it the rest is history
um buddy Potter had pulled the trigger both times Jamie said he also asked while he was in his interview if anybody
from the CIA was there which greatly confused the detectives they were like no they're like no we're local
detectives they don't usually come around for this type of thing no but like why do you ask yeah and he was like
no no just wondering no it's nobody from the same important Chris secret stuff Chris are you there yeah and they were
like oh so it's like [ __ ] you Jamie you pointed in the direction of Village going to save her child eight pieces 23
year old mother like piece of sugar you're all your cousin's like probably soon to be wife yeah like what is the
mother with his child exactly the mother of your third cousin is that how that works I don't know how that works
um but yeah family like just yeah the mother of your family and your family but anyway the detectives asked Jamie
after he confessed to call up buddy Porter and see if he could get him to talk about what had happened that way
they could try to get a taped confession So Jamie called the house that same night February 6th and there was some
small talk between him and Barbara at first because she was the one to answer the phone
during this little small talk Barbara said that she'd gotten an email from Chris telling her that Jamie had been
arrested and she asked him Point Blank have you taken a lie detector test and if you did did you pass it he lied
to Barbara and he said I did but I passed it no no and he was like can I talk to buddy so she puts him on the
phone but he gets on the phone and immediately asked Jamie if he quote got rid of everything from bills wow Jamie
responded telling buddy that he had and buddy said okay that makes me feel a lot
better I'm so happy that he's a [ __ ] idiot that's great I'm really glad he's a [ __ ] idiot seemsies so now
investigators were able to get an arrest warrant for Buddy Potter based on Jaime's confession and that phone
conversation and they were also able to get a warrant to search the Potter home for evidence good yeah we're winning but
he was taken into custody without incident and the authorities who searched the home were able to seize a
[ __ ] ton of potential evidence including but not limited to the family computer a
spiral notebook containing the passwords to a large amount of social media accounts ah two guns which I'm like
that's it one of which was a 38 caliber pistol and as one investigator approached a stack
of papers next to the couch where Barbara and Janelle were sitting Barbara started grabbing the papers and ripping
them in half are you [ __ ] me as if there were multiple officers and agents sitting
there right in front of her they're like gal man you can't do that you've pressed
an incorrect key wow so agent Woodward was like what the [ __ ] are you doing like stop and give me those so she had
to hand them over she had no choice and what those papers were were a large number of printed emails and screenshots
from social media which included several photos printed out of Billie Jean Hayworth one of which had been labeled
Billy [ __ ] oh my God like they're just living in this house with [ __ ] printed out screenshots of social media
yes the most pathetic group of human beings I have ever heard of like this is wow and it's just like Twisted this 23
year old woman this 23 year old mother yeah you're sitting there writing Billy [ __ ] like oh go [ __ ] yourself like what
is wrong with you it's giving like if the fire five Firefly family was like really invested in Facebook honestly the
Firefly family is so much [ __ ] cooler than this absolutely but way cooler than
these you know what I'm saying it's just like it's yucky oh it's dirty honestly they're like the Texas Chainsaw Massacre
family yes to be quite honest like just sitting in a house like the fireflies are at least fun filled with guns and
ammunitions and social media printouts and pictures of victims yeah instead of like raw meat like the Texas Chainsaw
Massacre family they have social media printouts everywhere in the original one it was all real yeah they all sit in
that really hard for like a long ass time listen to scream but yeah that's they're they're that family yeah for
realsies so during Buddy's interrogation he decided uh excuse me he denied having
any involvement in the murders and said that Jamie was just throwing him under the bus oh shut up he reiterated that
Janelle was being harassed by these people and he actually added his own account into the mix telling both of the
investigators that one time he had been in a public bathroom and he heard people
quote talking about kidnapping Janelle from this bathroom taking her to a field raping her because she was a virgin and
murdering her and they were like wow yeah that sounds legit wow like what no that didn't
happen yeah no that's no yeah no [Music] so Woodward and lot then shifted the conversation because they were like I
don't really know where to go from here I guess we'll turn all the lights down now but uh wow look at you but anyways
they switched the topic of conversation to Janelle's relationship with Jamie but
buddy insisted that they were just friends and that any feelings either of them had toward the other had been quote
straightened out a long time ago ew like what like what what are you why can't you just have feelings for this
man you're just like you're so gross he said that Jamie would never have been capable of taking care of his daughter
and that was why he and Barbara wouldn't allow the relationship man weird so Buddy's interview went on
for hours he repeatedly denied having any involvement in the murders he said he knew Bill Payne was a drug dealer and
that this whole thing was probably a drug deal gone bad but this all changed when the agents
brought his wife Barbara into the acacia equation they were like well does Barbara know that you did this does
Janelle know that you did this and he broke down whoa the bringing his wife and his daughter into it somehow
broke him wow and I knew they did they always know so as they saw that he was breaking down
they were like why don't you call Barbara you gotta let her know like wow they were playing like that's high level
like irrigation [ __ ] give her a call wow you know so he gets Barbara on the phone
and he confesses telling her that he killed Billie Jean and Bill quote because of what they tried to do to her
and Janelle wow and Barbara kept trying to save face though and she sat on the phone multiple times no you couldn't
have been involved quote you were here on the night of the murders I saw you you're not guilty because you were here
you have to say that see to me that sounds like there's there's something going on there
like the way the way she said that seems like she's like like we said there seems
to be some undiagnosed mental illness happening definitely and that response to me is like no you told me that I was
supposed to say this yeah like you know what I mean like no like this is the story I was like wait you mean you don't
think he did it oh no I do I was like no he definitely did it but like I think she her response is very telling of
where her uh her eyes I agree totally it's also like ma'am this is a recorded line don't say you have to say that yeah
I don't know that's why but buddy wouldn't and he'd already confessed anyway and then this phone call was even
more damning yep so remember how I said that Jamie had asked about the CIA in his second interview and the cops were
like what yeah he explained to them then that there was the CIA agent named Chris that was a
family friend of the potters and that it was his duty his assignment to keep Janelle safe wow and they were like I I
think this is all random nonsense like I don't know what you're talking about but
like I don't have time to to deal with that right now but as they continued to search the Potter household they would
find out just how serious Jaime was being and just how scared he was they took into custody multiple trash bags of
shredded paper that had been found in the back of buddy's truck it took them about a month but they were
re they were able to reassemble the over 100 pages that had been shredded what like imagine holy [ __ ] and when they did
they realized that this entire case was a very strange conspiracy theory involving someone who claimed to be a
CIA agent that had been quote corresponding with Barbara and warning her about threats to her daughter's life
that was like the theme of those emails that they were able to put together so they tried and tried and tried to
locate a CIA agent with the description of Chris um but they were never able to find anybody
who slightly resembled that description uh in the CIA what I know I really buried believe holy [ __ ] talk
about a plot twist they couldn't find him it was like he didn't even work there it's like he doesn't even exist
it's like that oh my goodness so the Deep gracious and deeper you said gracious that they dug they realized and
I'm sure you'll be shocked to hear that Chris was just one of Janelle's online personas it was her all along oh I had
no idea but to Barbara Chris was very very real they had exchanged a myriad of emails and texts and Barbara even shared
pictures of him on social media saying Chris our son oh that is that's very sick what's even sicker what's even more
[ __ ] up is that those pictures were of a man named Chris a guy that Janelle had gone to high
school with oh my they weren't friends this random guy named Chris who she went to high
school with yes can you imagine being Chris he ended up being called to testify in this case oh my God poor
Chris I know oh that sucks I would be so [ __ ] angry I would be pissed I'd be why everybody should go delete Facebook
right now go delete your Facebook [ __ ] that can you imagine she just took them
off of his account oh my God I would be irate just like I would be on that stand
being like I'm gonna [ __ ] kill everybody because are you kidding well and then they're like okay do you have
any connection to her and he was like no we went to high school together oh but I
don't it's not it doesn't even seem like they were friends in high school that sucks yeah poor Chris poor Chris wow so
once investigators reassembled the shredded Communications and looked at them with more context D.A Dennis Brooks
developed his own theory about the origins of this Chris character he said quote social media allowed Janelle
Potter to be somebody that she wasn't she invented Chris so that she could be as hateful as she wanted to be yep and
Chris had entered the picture right around the time that Billie Jean and Billy and excuse me Bill Payne started
dating and it was clear reading through the communications that this man was not
a CIA agent yeah he focused on how pretty and sweet Janelle was not at all your typical Behavior
and then they realized that all of the communications from Chris and anyone he spoke with whether it be through mail
social media or text all came from Janelle's accounts the fact that that was just overlooked
like it was her phone number come on like when she was when these people were getting texts from Chris it was coming
from Janelle's phone yeah her Call's coming from within the house also when they compared Chris's writing
with Janelle's it was identical she had a very specific style of writing she often made spelling mistakes and grammar
mistakes and coincidentally Chris made those exact same ones particularly um like she spelled worry w-o-r-r-i-e
um those are very specific um like there were there's a few others but like they're all very specific yeah
it's very specific words there's a few more I wish I'd written them down but um but yeah yeah so buddy Porter and Jamie
kurd were indicted for the murders and while some Mountain City citizens were shocked many who worked in law
enforcement or law administration were not at all shocked by this really they had become familiar with Janelle and her
parents throughout the years that they'd lived in their own City the Mayor Mike Reese put it this way to the Press once
you've crossed Janelle you've crossed her father too oh even the stranger aspects of the case actually sounded
familiar to anybody who had a quote unquote run in with Janelle the mayor like this girl was on the mayor's radar
yeah that's pretty big he actually said this is wicked bizarre yeah he said that a year or so earlier The
Potters were upset specifically buddy like had called him and said that quote the 9-1-1 director had taken Janelle off
his list what the Mayor literally had no idea what this meant but knew that Janelle
Potter was always up to some kind of Schemin and telling her mom and dad that she was the one being schemed so Janelle
is just like oh just manipulating her [ __ ] up oh it's just like her sister said her sister was like she manipulates
you guys into doing whatever she wants you to do including [ __ ] murder holy [ __ ] so Buddy's trial began in October
of 2013 and there was obviously a [ __ ] ton of evidence and uh taped confessions
going against him although the motives and the events leading up to the murders were like kind of complicated I guess
the prosecutor's argument was pretty straightforward they put it like this quote Barbara buddy and Jamie are not
sophisticated people they were easily misled by Janelle who knew which buttons to press Jamie was lonely and vulnerable
to a younger woman stroking his ego he'd never been out of Mountain City never been popular Barbara also had some kind
of mental disorder in which there always has to be a controversy or conspiracy going on she was fixated on conflicts
buddy liked to think of himself as a government operative most people figured Janelle out that she was a bit of a
fantasist that's why she struggled to make and keep friends but not these three it was The Perfect Storm Jesus
so Janelle that's why I was so excited when you said like oh it's like the fantasy yeah I was like yeah I know I
was like you got it you got it Janelle knew that her parents were incredibly overprotective and also knew that they
didn't really understand social media so she used Chris to amplify fake threats against her and eventually threats to
everybody else in the family making them feel like they were unsafe yeah she was
manipulating everybody around her to murder these people that she perceived to be her enemies for some reason or
another she also knew that Jamie's week what Jamie's weaknesses were and she exploited him
she knew he was in love with her and that he was desperate to be accepted by her family so she inserted him right
into the drama had him get buddy buddy with her dad and figured out a way for the two of them to want to protect her
and be willing to murder to protect her wow and when he asked why he why would he believe that he was talking to a CIA
agent without any evidence of it at all Jaime answered well I mean I thought Chris was real I mean I thought there
was a you know someone that I was talking to there and that Janelle the way she would talk to me it was like
bonding like a family wow like I think he she just she just manipulated the [ __ ] out of the
thing like she meant this is wild how she was able to manipulate these people I think that they
just blindly believed her like I don't I don't know what it was about her story I
don't know what it was about their relationship with her wow this is like really sick yeah all the way around it
is so needless to say in October of 2013 buddy was found guilty on two counts of
first-degree murder and he was sentenced to two life sentences oh damn good Jamie
curd pled guilty but since he agreed to testify against buddy Potter he was given a lesser sentence and he got 25
years in prison damn yeah I'm actually surprised he got that I was hoping you would get that I am too you know how
these things usually shake out because while they weren't able to prove who had really done the killing that's the thing
you know like yeah still to this day Nobody Knows the story but that's the story and still to this day nobody knows
who was the one to slash Bill Payne's throat I was gonna ask that because I didn't hear that come up so it's like no
what the hell happened it's just it's Buddy's word against Jamie's nobody else was there are they are both of them
saying that the other one did it yeah uh buddies Buddy says that uh I'll get there but but uh Jamie said
that buddy did everything okay he said he he was just the look he was there the lookout now obviously there was no doubt
that Jamie and buddy had been the ones to go out there and Kill Bill and Billie Jean regardless of who pulled the
trigger yeah but investigators also at the same time knew that Barbara and Janelle played a key role in
orchestrating this entire thing to work for them this wouldn't have happened absolutely but the problem was that it
was going to be kind of difficult to prosecute a person for murder if they weren't actually present for the
killings yeah of course but this D.A was willing to try and just a few months after Buddy's conviction a grand jury
did end up indicting both Janelle and Barbara Potter for murder and for tampering with evidence good there was a
lot of hold up going into trial I think so many technicalities and like this is a very unprecedented thing to try two
women who for a murder who weren't actually at the murderer site but eventually they got there and the double
trial began May 2015 they were being tried at the same time okay D.A Dennis Brooks was facing multiple hurdles but
made pretty much the same case to the jury that he had in Buddy's trial even though neither women before the jury had
pulled the trigger the murders just like I said a minute ago would not have happened if it weren't for them the way
that the D.A put it to ABC News Janelle kind of spurred it and Barbara got it to
happen yeah now the evidence presented to the jury was damning to say the least it showed them exactly who Janelle was a
woman caught up in some kind of fantasy turned conspiracy that eventually ended up in Murder
and it never seemed like either one woman was unaware that their implications could have led to murder
and it really didn't seem like they gave a [ __ ] about the consequences of those
implications yeah they both wanted these people dead and knew how and knew they would get there
so it took about a week to get through testimony and all the evidence and at the end of the trial
both of them were found guilty on all counts damn and both were sentenced to life in prison holy [ __ ] really Janelle
will be 80 years old before she's eligible for parole and if Barbara and Buddy were to serve their full sentences
they'll they'll die in prison wow but after being sentenced Buddy started claiming he was innocent and then in a
2021 appeal he told the court right now Barbara and my daughter both know that I
did this so first he was maintaining his innocence then he said that now they know I did it but like I was saying
earlier he alluded that it was Jamie curd who had killed Billie Jean he said I killed Billy Payne he killed Billie
Jean okay and Jamie kurd said I didn't kill either of them I was just the lookout yeah now this 2020 uh 2021
appeal case was actually an attempt by Barbara and Janelle's lawyers to get both women a new case these lawyers
argued that the court had denied them crucial information that would have aided them in the defense but the appeal
ended up being dismissed and the verdict was upheld because neither lawyer could
actually produce any evidence of that crucial information yeah I [ __ ] love when people can't back up their
arguments that's my favorite thing ever unfortunately everything is when somebody's like no no like this you did
this you did this and then you're like okay can you can you just like show me a piece of thing that says that and
they're like no no I can't so it's like why'd you even bring that up because before you you were dumb but like now
you look dumb right so like now I've proved that you're done now I've proved you so that's what's not good for you
that's what's proven here redonkulous so unfortunately though the court did find evidence supporting a
claim made by Barbara that since she was tried in the same trial as her daughter
there was a conflict of interest that may have impacted her soul case so because of this she was granted her own
new trial but the D.A didn't want to go through with another trial and I I think
they probably thought like it wasn't going to happen two times that they found her guilty when she wasn't there
yeah so instead they offered her a plea deal if she pleaded guilty to two counts
of facilitation of first-degree murder she would get a lesser sentence okay she took the deal and she was re-sentenced
to 25 years in prison wow with a requirement that 30 of the time be served before she's eligible for parole
Wow since she had already served eight years at this point she will be eligible for parole this year 2023.
oh [ __ ] and that is the story the tragic story of the Facebook murders wow that is so sad and just on every level
senseless so senseless like these this like young couple he seems like really trying to get his life together yeah
trying to get on a good track they have a little baby yep how old was the baby again seven months old seven months
never will never know his parents no oh and finding out later the trauma of what
happened oh my God now you were asleep in her arms like that's that's like Dexter literally like literally
literally the storyline of Dexter that's actually crazy holy [ __ ] they found him
like covered in his mother's blood oh that's awful that's awful and thank gosh he was unharmed like I know oh if that
baby had been harmed I honestly don't think I would have been able to tell that story but holy [ __ ] but all because
this girl had feelings for Bill that she never even voiced yeah that's I mean wow so uh like we always say I'm like
speechless social media is the root of all evil it really and this proves it it's just become a thing where it's like
what's the [ __ ] point anymore honestly what's the point legit get an email address
get an email address that's it don't even get a new address just have a phobia phones I just have a fabophobia
phones like a CIA agent Chris no one just Chris it's just Chris it's like Madonna it's just Chris everybody knows
me CIA Christian Chris so hot right now wow well guys we hope you keep listening
and we hope you keep it weird but that's a word that you catfish your own parents
and that this happens because wow that would be so tragic and you shouldn't ever do that don't lie to people it's
rude don't it's horrible [Music] foreign [Music]

The murders of Billy Payne and Billie Jean Hayworth were incredibly senseless. The case would end up being dubbed ""The Facebook Murders"" because of an ongoing feud between the victims and a woman named Jenelle Potter who had moved to their small town years earlier. Strangely enough, all three had been part of the same friend group at one time, but unreciprocated romantic feelings would tear the friend group apart. The case would involve catfishing, manipulation, Facebook.... and even the CIA.

Thank you to the astounding David White for research assistance

References

Diaz, Joseph, and Alexa Valiente. 2015. ""How a Social Media Feud Led to the Murder of a Young Tennessee Couple."" ABC News, October 9.

Ghianni, Tim. 2012. ""Handguns Found at Home of 'Facebook' Murder Suspect."" Fort McMurray Today, February 15.

Lee, Murry, Ashley Sharp, and Slater Teague. 2021. Daughter, mother convicted in ‘Facebook murders’ case asking for new trials. July 12. Accessed December 23, 2022. https://www.wjhl.com/news/local/mother-daughter-convicted-in-facebook-murders-case-to-appear-in-court-tuesday/.

Schoals, Gayle. 2016. ""Tricked Into Murder: Obsession, CIA Conspiracies and Shocking Killings."" The Sun, September 4.

Sharp, Ashley. 2021. Attorneys respond to ‘guilty’ plea, reduced sentence of Barbara Potter in 2012 ‘Facebook Murders’. November 11. Accessed December 26, 2022. https://www.wjhl.com/news/local/attorneys-respond-to-guilty-plea-reduced-sentence-of-barbara-potter-in-2012-facebook-murders/.

State of Tennessee v. Barbara Mae Potter. 2018. E2015-02262-CCA-R3-CD (Court of Criminal Appeals of Tennessee at Knoxville, September 26).

State of Tennessee v. Marvin E. Potter. 2016. E2015-00013-CCA-R3-CD (Court of Criminal Appeals of Tennessee at Knoxville, March 8).

Thompson, John. 2012. ""Slaying Suspect's Daughter Interviewed ."" Knoxville News Sentinel, February 10."

Connect with Wondery http://wondery.com/shows http://facebook.com/WonderyMedia http://twitter.com/WonderyMedia http://instagram.com/WonderyMedia

Brief Summary

The episode details the Facebook murders in Tennessee, driven by Janelle Potter's obsession and manipulation, leading to tragic consequences.

Key points

The Facebook Murders. A case involving family murder, manipulation, and conspiracy theories.
Secret Romance. Janelle's secret relationship with Jamie unfolds amidst her sheltered life.
Bill Payne's Flea Market Passion. Bill Payne loved flea markets and rare coins, which shaped his childhood.
The Mysterious Chris. Janelle mentioned a man named Chris, claiming he worked for the CIA, raising suspicions.
Janelle's Accusations. Janelle pointed fingers at friends, claiming they were behind her harassment.
CIA Involvement. Chris, a CIA buddy, claims to monitor threats against Janelle.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

What? I don't know if the move was solely to help Janelle!

Questioning the family's decision to move.

9:30WatchJan 26, 2023

Tension

85/ 100High tension

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