West Memphis 3 /// Timeline & Confessions | Forensic Files

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[Applause] [Music] this is true crime garage and this is the case of the West Memphis
3 The West Memphis 3 [Music] Damen Eckles Jason Baldwin Jesse Melly the West Memphis
3 Damen Eckles Jason Baldwin Jesse missell The West Memphis Three The West Memphis
[Music] Three we've had three children missing since last night [Music] three young boys murdered in Cold
[Music] Blood it appeared that they had been sexually mutilated is it your opinion
that these crimes were motivated by Ault beliefs yes the West Memphis 3 arrested at 244 p.m. charged with 3
counts of capital murder it was like a nuclear bomb going off in the court in a statement given to the police
17-year-old Jesse Miss Kelly allegedly confesses to watching two other suspects choke rape and sexually mutilate three
West Memphis second graders in 1993 the small Arkansas town of West Memphis was robed by the
gruesome killing of three 8-year-old boys a police investigation brought murder charges against three local
teens Daman Jason Baldwin J Miss [Music] Kelly this is not just do you believe is
the real K Terry Wayne H I don't know how much clear I have to make it none of my DNA was
[Music] there none of the westmin 3's DNA was there [Music] what makes you so sure
it's what makes you so sure that it's pardon me what makes you so sure that it's Terry
hob well his DNA was found there in the lace of Michael [Music] Moore David Kobe's hair was there what'
he do fly there on Harry Potter's wand it either fell off of Terry hobs or he was there there no other two ways
about it none of the westmin 3's DNA was there this is not just Daman Eckles Jason baldwi Jessie Miss Kelly
Jessie Miss Kelly the West Memphis Damen Eckles Jason Baldwin Jesse Miss Kelly the West Memphis
3 this is [Music] not the West Memphis [Music] 3 welcome to True Crime garage wherever
you are whatever you are doing thanks for listening I'm your host Nick and with me as always the captain thank you
thank you thank you it's good to be seen and it's good to see you Captain this week our beer of the week
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send us donations whatever you want so check that out at true Crim garage.com this week we are covering the
West Memphis 3 this is part two so if you didn't tune in to last week's show stop what you're doing right now go back
listen and pick up here when we left off last week we were discussing the investigation now lead investigator Gary
gell he had a strategy for investigating the murders of these three boys now his
strategy that it was one of three circumstances that either a somebody that knew one or all of the boys
committed this crime mhm or B someone that didn't know any of the boys committed this crime or C that this
crime was committed by a gang or cult a group of people that may or may not have
known the boys so we're going to continue along that investigation and first of all I want to talk about the
families so this would be people that knew one or for all of the boys we're going to talk about their movements on
May 5th 1993 now these are coming from police reports so do from the police reports we
have information on all three families on the Moore family the branch family and the buyer's family for the Moore
family we have father and mother Todd and Dana Moore now Todd he was nowhere near the area of West Memphis on the
night of May 5th cuz he's a truck driver correct yes he he's a truck driver and he did
not return from his truck run until about 5 or 5:15 a.m. on May 6 now he did join the search when he got home he
joined the search that morning because the family members neighborhood people the police they were looking for the
boys that night well this they never found them so the search continued on on May
6th now his wife Dana Moore these are both biological parents to Michael Moore his wife Dana Moore she was one of the
people to have seen the kids last she reports having seen the kids sometime between 6 and 6:30 p.m. on May 5th now
she saw them riding bicycles she saw three boys uhhuh Chris buers Stevie branch and Michael Moore her son riding
two bicycles and they were heading north towards Goodwin now Michael Moore had a
sister Don Moore she was about 10 years old at the time and she was she was interviewed as well
and she had seen she was sent by her mother Dana to look for the boys after they went missing after they went you
know they're not technically missing at this point but after she had saw her son
and her two his two friends going north she wanted her son to come home so she sent her daughter 10-year-old donmore to
go look for the boys and tell Michael to come home which is pretty typical I mean
she's probably cooking dinner at that this point and then she says you go find him bring him back it's time for dinner
yeah and this is a fairly safe neighborhood it's a kind of a close-nit community this community uh this
neighborhood is all like three-bedroom homes kind of very middle class um and she you know you kind of know most of
the people that live on your street or in the neighborhood you've had discussions with them or met them at
some point yeah it's lower middle class probably uh Nationwide but in that area probably middle class maybe a little
higher than that yeah three-bedroom homes some of them even have swimming pools and she sent her daughter Dane
Moore who Dawn Moore I'm sorry who is 10 years old sent her off on her bike to go
retrieve Michael Moore well she comes home and she says that she never saw the boys that day couldn't find them
couldn't find them and never saw them but she also gives some more information to police she says that around she's not
quite sure what time she says about 5:30 or 6 which doesn't fully line up with what Dana Moore had said but again she's
10 years old so she probably doesn't know exactly what time it is right she could be off by 30 minutes to an hour
yes Dana said she had seen him about 6 6:30 so now the police are going to they're they they realize that Dawn
probably doesn't know exactly what time she was looking for her brother so you can tell this because they ask her well
was it still light outside and she does say yes the sun was still out it was still light outside when I went looking
for my brother she said that when she was looking for her brother that she had noticed three boys coming out of the
Robin Hood Hills now that is the wooded area that is just North of their home it's about a quarter of a mile from
their home right she sees three boys coming out of there now these look to be about Junior High maybe teenage teenager
age boys and she describes the three of them as one white male and two black males coming out of the woods and and
she stated even further that they were coming out of the Robin Hood area that that leads down near the ditch that goes
to what the kids call The Devil's Den and she had said that when she rode up by the boys and they were walking out
that one of the boys had asked her if she wanted a shot now she didn't know what she's 10 years old she doesn't
really know what this means who knows what they were talking about but she she assumed that it meant something to do
with drugs kind of scared her off and she decided to ride home home right now she would describe these boys as the the
white male was wearing yellow black yellow and black shorts and he he had a yellow and black top as well shirt and
he had striped shoes she didn't provide much information about the two black males that she had seen now again she
expected them to be about teenager age and when the police probe further she would go on to say maybe
17 she had also said that she had seen these same boys she had seen about 45 minutes later she had seen the white
male and at least one of the black males going into a house north of Goodwin that
was close to the Goodwin Avenue and this was about the fourth house off of Goodwin on the west side she stated so
what do we have here Captain we have the we have the sister who is seeing these people coming out of the woods and it
was suspected at some point that the kids had gone into the Robin Hood Hills right and so she's seeing these kids
probably if her mom says 6 to 6:30 that that she last saw them and sent the daughter off looking for them it
wouldn't take very long to ride your bike bike a quarter of a mile to get to Robin Hood Hills so what are we talking
about here Captain probably 615 maybe 6:45 yeah again it's it's tough with all this stuff cuz I mean a lot of these
eyewitness accounts they could be be off by an hour sometimes more and she's saying about 45 minutes later she saw
them go into a house now again right it could have been 15 minutes later it could have been an hour later who knows
and I'm not claiming that she's not telling the truth I'm just saying that she's 10 years old especially a
10-year-old is going to have difficulty with time management now this brings us to the buyer's family and also let's go
back for one second she's not questioned until days after the events correct it looks like the um one thing so Gary
gitchell's approach to this case was that it was either somebody that knew the boys didn't know the boys or it was
a gang yeah yeah we heard you and but one thing that I noticed when going through the police reports the
detectives Gary gell leading the the investigation they didn't seem to do a real good job of investigating the
families they didn't ask them a lot of questions and if they did they didn't they didn't put pen to paper and make
record of that right there's not enough notes on it yeah so this this police report is
actually dated many days after the discovery of the boys and it actually has a different date up at the top uh so
it was submitted later than what they're saying that the report was taken right so is this an actual is this somebody
sitting down and putting pen to paper and making this report or is this a detective's recollection of what he
discussed with Dawn yeah so I sit down I talk with Don and then a couple days later I write down so it's like it could
be a count of an account right yeah and it appears that most of the family members of the victims were interviewed
uh as far as reports were filed on the 10th of May so they disappeared on the 5th they were found dead on the 6th and
now at least four days have gone by before we're we're writing these reports yeah but and the reports they're taking
on are from 5 days ago yeah not only that there's very few notes on them so that that would make one infer that
there was probably not a whole lot of questions involved to these to this interview which I understand a little
bit because it's a sensitive subject you have three parents you know three sets of parents that lost their kids and then
you have to question them and I think that would be difficult for anybody the strange thing about Don Moore's report
is that at the bottom of the page the investigator that had discussed this with Don Moore had wrote that sometimes
people in a cult paint their people in a cult they paint their faces black so so
the investigators not fully believing that maybe this child had seen a white man and two black men coming out of the
woods that maybe it was three white men yeah I was wondering too maybe she just got confused maybe two of the suspects
were wearing black and maybe that was just enough for her to throw off her memory I it could have been could have
been but but we do or that they're that they're muddy I I like the muddy idea a little bit but that makes more sense to
me than painting your face black it also makes more sense to me than if the if the kids were wearing black because she
does state that the white the white kid was wearing black and yellow clothes um so this brings us to the buyer family
now Melissa buers is the mother of Chris buers and just to clear everything up real quick John Mark buers is her
husband uh they've both been married before and John Mark buers is technically The Stepfather of
Christopher for buyers he's one of the boys that was found dead in the woods MH uh he's also the stepfather of of Ryan
now Ryan has a different last name than Christopher buers because Christopher buers from what we have heard was
technically adopted by John Mark buers now some people have pointed out that it this is strange that he would adopt one
boy and not the other and and and we can all agree that John Mark buers is an animated character and that there is
some strangeness to him I find that this speculation is really just kind of BS when I found out the real story was that
Melissa was pregnant with Christopher at the time that she had met John Mark buers right so Christopher for the most
part for his entire life John Mark was involved not for the most part well yeah for his for the whole part yeah for his
entire life John Mark was was involved he he was they lived together and he wasn't technically his father he was his
stepfather and Christopher buers did know that he was that he had a real father elsewhere and had met him on what
sounds like just a few occasions yeah real Gem of a person well Melissa buers would state that she was home sometime
around or after 5:30 p.m. that day MH and she between 5:30 and 6:30 sees Chris come come in and out of the house
several times now she's on the phone with her boss and so she doesn't really what he's coming in and out of the house
for but you know she says he may have came in to get something to drink he may have came in to get a toy or a
skateboard maybe he came in to get a cookie or something to eat this was very common when your kids you know
especially it's May it's May 5th so it's a little hotter so you're playing outside with your buddies and your your
parents would be on the phone not all the time but you know my mother was on the phone constantly so it was
constantly like going in and out of the house and grabbing stuff and you just see her and she'd wave you off you know
and because John Mark buers we're going to get to him right now but because he was considered a suspect by some or well
he he just I just want to say he has an interesting jib yeah a strange jib but because he's a suspect in in some of the
Public's eye I do want to clear something up real quick while we're going through the events of of the
movements of of these persons the family in particular on on May 5th we are talking about what I was able to and you
were able to figure out is is multiple accounts this is not just this is not just Melissa buyer saying I was home at
this time right it's basically of all the eyewitnesses then we compile all that together and then we put a timeline
together instead of just taking your word you know and if at any time that there's one person that is by themselves
that says I was here doing this and there's no other person to to uh back that up we will let you know but all
these these accounts that we will go through that that we don't State otherwise is backed up by somebody
else's account now that might be simply a husband backing up a wife or a wife repeating something that her husband
said but it's at least two characters that are involved in this case now with John Mark buers he says that he noticed
that Chris was missing around 6:30 p.m. he had come home he had he had brought his other stepson home Ryan they were
off driving and I I believe there was a court appearance that Ryan had to attend
he had Ryan had seen like a hit and run or some kind of car accident and he was a witness in the case now John Mark had
dropped Ryan off to do whatever he had to do at the courthouse picked him up and brought him home when he had come
home he wanted to talk to Melissa he's saying you know where is Christopher right and she goes well she's you know
I'm on the phone gives him the one minute give me a minute here John uh and she she tells John personation there
that Chris is probably in his room and if he's not in his room he's outside playing well John says I know he's not
outside playing I just pulled up and when he had last seen Chris Christopher buers uh Christopher had gotten in
trouble that day John had seen him riding around he was riding you know you know when people ride on their belly on
the skateboard uh so Chris liked the skateboard and he was riding on his belly but he was just kind of riding
carelessly down the road on his belly right which a car wouldn't be able to see you no he's a little boy so John and
this is probably you know I'm this is not how you should raise children but again this is 1993 and it's and it's
West Memphis who knows uh but he he says that this upset him and he he wanted to
you know explain to Christopher that this is not how you behave this is not this is careless Behavior Reckless
Behavior and he punished him he he gave him a whack or two with his belt and see
I'd argue this is the way you raise your kid I mean because he didn't give him wax for no reason he gave him wax for
his safety yeah so what they what a lot of psychologists say is you actually punish this stuff more in children
because bad behavior yeah cuz you're teach well it's bad behavior regardless but it's a safety issue like make a big
deal about not playing in the road make a big deal about not talking to strangers make you know some of the
little stuff about cleaning your room don't just smack your kid for no reason but really harp on stuff that is when
they're putting themselves in danger oh I'm going to touch the stove or whatever
it is I'm playing on the train tracks exactly these are big issues and that's what a lot of psychologists say so you
want to do something that would make them remember this so that they don't repeat the behavior right and it's for
their safety it's not it's not like he's just be he's just whooping to whoop him
you know well when he had last seen him after the punishment was dealt he had told Christ ER that he could go play
with his friends but he wanted him to clean up the carport uh before he went and did that so when he when when John
Mark left the house he had last seen Christopher cleaning up the carport area yeah and it could have just his toys
could have just been out so he goes home and he sees his wife on the phone with her boss uh she tells
him just one minute he goes and looks in her room in Christopher's room he's not
there well they decide that they're going to drive through the neighborhood and start looking for the boy he was
supposed to be home by this time well and it's also dinner time and so you just picked up your one stepson you
probably want to eat get your whole family together start closing in for the night it's
1993 this is back in the day when by 8 9:00 towns were shutting down yeah so this is this is 6:30 or 6:45 in the
evening now here's the thing though some people have pointed out well why would why would they just jump in the car and
go looking for him and they and according to John Mark and according to his wife and the son the stepson Ryan
backs this up as well that they drove through the neighborhood asking people had they seen Christopher buers right
one person they would talk to is Dana Moore and the reason being is basically the buyers in the Moors were next door
neighbors I believe the buyers lived right across the street from the Moors and so he they knew that that Michael
Moore and Christopher buers played together played together often so they wanted to see hey was he with Michael
Moore right they asked Dana and this is where Dana says yeah I did just see them
you know just not too long ago saw them heading north towards Goodwin and they three boys three boys two bikes and she
says I believe they were with Stevie Branch because Stevie Branch's dad she's talking about Terry Hobbs is his
stepfather yep had come by the Home by Dana Moore's home and was asking about the boys he was out looking for his
stepson so the buyers would continue on they would drive around in their vehicle
and they would ask people in the neighborhood and check the streets they kept thinking that they would either see
the boys riding around on the bicycles or that maybe the boys were in somebody's home watching TV or playing
in somebody's home or backyard and that they would see the bikes out front now one thing that one thing that was a
little bit uh weird was Christopher buers was not on a bicycle he was on his skateboard and while they were out
looking for him they found the skateboard which would make sense why some people reported seeing three boys
on two bicycles well sometimes you get tired of trying to keep up with your buddies when you're on the skateboard so
you just ditch the skateboard and you jump on the back or jump on the front of the bike correct they don't end up
finding Christopher and what happens is when they're out looking Mark buers John Mark buers comes
up and he sees a police officer in the air and he says to the officer he says hey
we're out looking for our 8-year-old son we can't find him right and um you know
what should we do well the police officer says well how long have you been looking for him he says oh maybe 45
minutes or an hour right it's still a long time though and the police officer says okay what time is it John Mark says
something like it's about 7:30 or it's a little after 7:30 the police officer says what you should do is why don't you
either continue looking or go home and give it till about 8:00 if your son is not returned home by 8:00 then you need
to call the police station and file a missing person's report right very good information very good advice now here's
one thing that I've always found strange a lot of people that think that John Mark buers might have had something to
do with the missing boys is that they wondered why would he jump to a conclusion and call police so soon well
the reason reason why he's out looking for Christopher Not only was Christopher supposed to be home but they were going
out to dinner you had talked about maybe they wanted to sit down to dinner well you can't you could have brought it up
when I brought it up right but little Su could brought it up when I brought it up
little suspense but the thing is they they didn't have anything set out for dinner they Melissa wasn't preparing
dinner they were when when John Mark came home with Ryan it was planned that the four of them would go out to dinner
together well they can't go out to dinner while their 8-year-old is not at home or or not with them well they could
but that'd be question right so in the beginning in the beginning stages of looking for
Christopher buyers they're not like panicking looking for their son they're just thinking oh he stayed out longer
than he doesn't know what time it is right we'll go find him in the neighborhood somewhere he'll get in the
car and we'll all go out to we'll all go out to eat well during this search they
never find him well another thing that people point out is well why would why would John Mark buers be so quick to
call police well he was instructed by a police officer to call the police department if his son was still missing
at 8:00 yeah and if you're a parent and you actually care about your kids I mean
after an hour of not being able to find your kids I mean you'd start getting freaked out I think I would call the
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back slod 5 for 50% [Music] off so John Mark buers heads home with his family and he he gets home and he's
home just before 8:00 he sees Dana Moore one more time he he tells her I was told
to call the police if if the boys don't return by 8:00 right it's at this time that he meets Terry Hobs as you had said
Terry Hobbs is The Stepfather for Stevie Branch yeah and they've never met until
this day correct now they talk for a little bit and Christopher I'm sorry John Mark buers tells the other parents
I'm going to go into the house and I'm going to call the police station right he actually calls the County Sheriff's
Office and he makes a complaint that his son is missing and the C sheriff's office tells him you need to call the
local police department he hangs up the phone and this is when he calls the police department well shortly after
calling the police is when the officer arrives we Regina Meeks she arrives and she takes the missing person's report
from John Mark buers now one thing that some people would point out was strange was that John Mark buers had said in his
report that Christopher buers was taking uh Ridin or some kind of mood alterating
because he had that hypertension or the not hypertension but hypertension he had
hypertension 8-year-old what's that called the the add right right ADHD yeah he had
that he explains to the officer that Christopher has not taken his medication now some would point point out that this
is weird but but hopefully none of our listeners have had to place a missing person's report but what happened
typically and one thing that officers are trained to do is when they show up to take a missing person's report they
are going to ask you is this person on any medication reason being is if any of this stuff is important if they need to
take this stuff tonight or early the next morning whatever they need to know what that is because this could make an
already bad situation A concerned situation more urgent yeah yeah definitely more urgent so rather than
think that it's strange for John Mark to say that Christopher had not taken his medication I actually applaud the
officer for asking the appropriate questions anyway after giving the report John Mark buers and his stepson Ryan
they will continue their search they go out in a vehicle and they're looking the
neighborhood and they're looking in the woods they decide that they want to look
in the Robin Hood Hills wooded area now it's a bit confusing of where they searched because buyers would end up
searching quite a bit of the Woods that night and just a reminder that this it's
about four acres and so it's kind of a thin line then the pipe and then it kind of opens up and it's a little bit bigger
towards the interstate yeah yeah you have the neighborhood and just north of that you have that thin tree line that
the captain was talking about and then you have the larger wooded area that's north of that thin Tree Line yeah those
two parts of the woods are separated by the 10 m byou and there is that large pipe that you could walk across to get
to the larger wooded area yeah this is the pipe that most people know there's a famous picture and when they pulled out
the two bicycles they lay the two bicycles on the pipe and if you look it up on the internet it's a pretty popular
picture of this case yeah they found one bicycle on one side of the pipe and the
other bicycle on the other and both appeared obviously to have been thrown from the pipe anyway the uh the thing
here is buyers as well as plenty of other people would search the wooded area several times that night and again
the following morning so it gets a little confusing as to what part of the woods they were in and what part they
weren't in and at what time they could be however I do want to point out here that Mark buers was not by himself at
this time he had gone to the woods to look for his son and the other missing boys and with him he had taken his
stepson Ryan and when he's there Ryan had kind of recruited you know at this time it's a small you know it's a
neighborhood people have seen multiple sorry people have seen a police report police officers looking for
somebody in the area where's kind of gotten out that some boys are missing yeah once you in any neighborhood once
you see the cops come then like everybody looks outside to see what the heck's going on you know and then people
get nosy Nancy and they're like oh what what's happening and then so it's now it's a community search and a lot of the
parents uh Hobbs will talk about this uh I believe Myers buers talks about this a
little bit but you know it's anywhere from 20 to 40 people that are out looking yeah and and Ryan especially is
he's a teenager he's not a small boy like Christopher uh so he and some of his friends are searching too so during
during Mark byer's search of this Woods at this time also in the woods we have Terry Hobbs he comes across Terry Hobs
and he's out Terry Hobs is out looking as well in the wooded area and John Mark is uncertain if Terry was with somebody
or if he was by himself but they spoke for a little bit and and buyers had said hey I've been searching over here Terry
says I've been searching over in this area and uh they agree that they should probably just they should spread out
right and one search one side one search the other side so it's unclear what side
each person was searching on or what was the division between the two of them but
they're not the only people searching is what I'm saying there's there's 20 some
people out there 20 to 40 people out there yeah and you have you have Ryan who's with some of his other teenage
friends he's with uh Richie and a and a boy named Brett and they're kind of searching the area together now this is
after after dark time um and it's about 9:30 John markb says they searched until
approximately 9:30 he comes out of the woods because he doesn't have a flashlight yeah it's a full moon but at
9:30 especially in this dense Woods It's probably hard to see where you're walking it's probably not too safe
you're also going over areas that you probably have looked for before yeah and he gets out of the woods
and and he's going to go ask somebody if he can borrow a light knock on somebody's door that he might know right
and but before he can do that he sees a police officer and the police officer is aware that
there are children or a child that is missing mhm and he says what are you doing he goes well I'm looking for my
son I'm going to go get a flashlight the police officer says let me help you search so now John Mark buers goes into
the woods with a police officer they walk around he said he said that they went into the Treeline area that they
did go past the pipe they went up and down some trails and they even went up by the water and the police officer
shined his light into the water right but this is muddy water I mean it's you can't see the bottom through this water
it's muddy so they they searched the area until approx from from about till about 10:30ish you know is the best time
that I could put on this and John Mark Byer says to the police officer you know what what should I do you know I don't I
don't know what to do we've looked all over we can't find him right part of him probably feels like it's pointless you
know like he's a dog chasing his tail and as a parent you don't want to stop looking you know you want to
keep you you'll use as much energy as you can to to fix this problem but he's now at the point where he was going this
doesn't make a lot sense so he's asking the police officer what do I do well and
the police officer says here's what I would do we're going to keep searching we're going to keep driving up and down
the roads and we if we see bicycles or we see the boys we'll send them home or we'll call it in or whatever we're going
to keep looking but they don't want to keep looking in the woods it's late the woods are tough to look and the the
mosquitoes are bad so the police officer is going to drive up and down the roads
drive up and down the streets and he tells uh Mark buers what you should do is you should probably get in contact
with the officer that you originally filed the report with and ask ask them if there's any updates in the missing
person's report right John Mark buers goes home around 11:00 p.m. and this is when he does contact the police officers
and he calls Regina Meeks who took the missing person's report asking for if there is any update on his missing son
and she tells him no he's still missing at this time and we are still looking and that she will have the uh the
current officers that are currently working they will tell the next shift to be on the lookout for these boys as well
buyers hangs up the phone and then after that he calls the sheriff's department and he complains to the Sheriff's
Department that they should probably have search and rescue out in the area that his son is missing there are two
other boys that are missing and that he finds it absurd that there's not a search and rescue team out here other
than just these police officers and some neighborhood people looking for these boys after he gets off the phone after
he gets done complaining to the Sheriff's Department he and his stepson Ryan decide to go back out and they want
to search the woods one more time now it's pretty late at this time and they pull up by the Blue Beacon behind the
Blue Beacon and they're going to search the woods along that Blue Beacon area right now one thing that is weird here
but this also corroborates with his story he says that I'm out with my stepson Ryan we're searching the the
woods area they two of the there are two Blue Beacon employees and he kind of yells at them and he says hey have you
guys seen any uh boys and and the Blue Beacon employees say no we haven't seen any boys and there's been other people
that have come come by and asked about these boys as well he says well I just want you to know that me and my son are
going to be searching in the woods here and that's why my car will be over here right some people have pointed out that
maybe he's trying to bring up why you know maybe this is buying an alibi why his car would be seen in the area I
actually think that it's just plain and simple it's it's out of respect for the business I'm here on your property with
my vehicle it's very late at night I want you to know what I'm doing because I'm I'm not out breaking into something
or looking to make trouble I'm here trying to find my son at this time they don't actually go into the woods again
it's very late what he says is that he let Ryan kind of drive his car you know kind of let it idle along the the tree
line and keep the keep the lights shining and he walked along and just inside of the woods a bit and he was
basically just yelling out the children's names hoping to hear one of them or or hear something or see
something they don't find anything and they go home at midnight this is around midnight and when he gets home um this
is when he says that uh he tells Ryan that he should probably go to bed after sending Ryan to bed CU Ryan has school
the next day exactly and buyers buyers goes out front and he's basically goes out to the street and he's standing
underneath the streetl and he meets up with some of the other parents his wife is out there with him Melissa buyers and
they talk to Dana Moore they talked to Terry Hobs they talked to Terry hobbs' father-in-law and they also talked with
uh Terry Hobs has brought a friend with him now buyers would say that he either didn't know the name of the friend or he
did not recall the the name of the friend at the time of giving this report but we know that buyers doesn't really
know Hobbs at this point he met him that day he had met him for the first time that day you're exactly right and they
stand out there and he said they talked for quite some time they all wondered where the boys could be they all kind of
told stories of who they had talked to and what was related to them and and they even started to speculate a little
bit of what could have happened to the boys and where they could be and and and buyers goes on to express his concern to
the other parents that he was disappointed that the sheriff's department didn't show up with search
and rescue now somebody in the group it's unbeknownst to to the members of that group that was out talking that
night but at some point somebody in the group says that you know I hope that they didn't drown in the water out there
you know there is there it's that 10 Mile Bayou there's also that you know the drainage drainage ditch there is
some water out there and that was a concern amongst all of the parents yeah I mean even in pools you'd have
accidental drowning so this would be something that I think a natural conclusion that one might come to buer
says that he doesn't know how long they stood out there talking but it seemed to
be quite some bit of time and then he said after they were done talking he went out briefly and this would have
just if you put the timeline together Captain he could have only gone out for probably a half an hour maybe 20 minutes
at the most now at this point he does not have anybody else to to back up his story other than other than the parents
having said that they saw him and spoke with him out underneath the underneath the uh street light street light thank
you and that at some point they broke up and then buyer says he went out and he searched for a little bit by himself he
went home he says he was home about 2:30 in the morning but there's also reports
of just people out in general looking other people that might not just be the parents just still people in the
community out looking yeah he would say that he didn't know who some of these people were but while he was out he seen
other people that were on four-wheelers and driving around the neighborhood and kind of looking and asking for the boys
yeah nosy Nancy which I mean they're they're being um respectful of the neighborhood and and trying to find
these kids but still it's nosy Nancy he claims to have gotten home about 2:30 maybe 3: at the very latest he says that
at this time he was unable to sleep his wife was at home during this time he was
unable to sleep it was too late he was too tired and he couldn't search anymore that night but he said because he was so
stressed and so worried all he could do was basically sit and wait for daylight there was no point in searching at this
point and at that point you're so exhausted you almost get the sick feeling you know you can't sleep but you
you know but you're so exhausted he doesn't know exactly what time but he says about 5:30 maybe 6 at the very
latest some he there's a knock at his door and he opens up the door and it's some of the other parents now at this
point he sees Terry Hobs and again he believes that Terry Hobbs is father-in-law is there as well uh this
would be Stevie Branch's grandfather and at this point this is where Todd Moore has now come home he's aware that his
son is still missing and now he's going to join the search and at this point John Mark buyers as well as Melissa
buyers they go out and they continue to search for their son and the other two missing boys Along on that as well at
some point would be Pam Hobs she would either join them or she was there at the door the recollection is a little
unclear but she was involved in searching that morning now let's go through the Hobbs family so now Pam Hobs
has a little bit better of an understanding of May 5th where she actually saw some of the boys a little
bit more than the other parents may have MH so she says that you know she worked
second shift so she's at home she's alone and her husband Terry Hobbs he's The Stepfather of Stevie Branch now they
actually have a daughter together and their daughter's name is Amanda she's a she's four years old at at
1993 now Terry Hobbs is working for the Memphis ice cream company he uh you know
he goes out and he has like a sales route he goes to different stores and he checks their coolers and refills
whatever needs replenishing and sell tries to upsell and sell different items to them we need some ice cream in the
garage it's hot in the garage anyway Terry H Hobs will go in very early sometimes at 5 5:30 in the morning
and this would allow him to get off pretty early in the afternoon Pam would say sometimes he would be home at 2:30
3: 3:30 now Terry would say that he that's a tough thing when you have uh two parents even one being a step parent
but they're working opposite schedules so it helps one to take care of the kids so you don't have to get babysitting and
stuff like that but it's still kind of a odd schedule to keep the family together
well and it's something you got to do I mean Pam typically would go to work about 4:30 maybe 5:00 and she would work
sometimes a a shorter shift you know she might go in and only work for four hours
or 5 hours and then uh so they would have some time to spend together between the time that Terry got off work and Pam
had to go in and then you would have a little bit of time after Pam got off of work so there was time for family stuff
and to make sure everything was right with the household during this time Pam would cook dinner leave dinner for the
kids or sometimes they would eat dinner together and then she would go off to work on this particular day Terry has to
drive her to work and then pick her up afterwards this has been going on for some time because Pam had a DWI and was
did not have a license at the time so Terry Hobbs gets home from work and well let me back up for a second Pam sees
Michael Moore and her son Stevie Branch at the house they leave together to go off and play at some point Christopher
buer shows up to play with the other two boys but the boys have already left and
she tells Christopher they've gone well Christopher notices that one of his favorite shows the Muppet Babies is on
and he asked if he could come in and watch it for a little bit she says that Christopher comes in he watches Muppet
Babies he might have been in the house for about 15 20 minutes right and she believes that the show goes off that it
ends about 3:30 maybe 4:00 and that he had left when the show was over but you must pretty comfortable with her if
you're going to ask to stay and watch the show yeah and well and she would tell her son Stevie that he needs to be
home at 4:30 because she needs to go to work at 5:00 and Terry is going to put all of them in the they're all going to
get in the car and Terry's going to drive Pam to work well Terry comes home from work and he ask where is frog leg I
guess that's what he called Stevie branch and she says well he's out playing with his friends 4:00 comes and
funny nickname though yeah and Stevie Branch never comes home so so Terry Hobs their do Pam and their daughter Amanda
getting the vehicle together they're going to drive Pam to work but their idea is that they're going to stop by
Stevie Branch's friend's house who he left with scene left with Michael Moore they're going to swing by the mo house
and ask if they've seen Stevie or if they could pick up Stevie yeah cuz now there's some concern here because you
have to go to work you don't want to just leave your kid why you know your husband drops you off at work so so then
they go to stop by the moris house they swing by the mois house and of course the boys are not there now this would
make sense why later Dana Moore would say to mark buers that ter that Stevie Branch's father's been out looking for
him as well mhm so that's how we can back up that information they don't they don't find Stevie they go to Pam's work
he drops off Pam and he comes home and he says on his way home that him and a Anda would drive through the
neighborhood and continue to look for Stevie now one of the stops that they made he says that we stopped by the
moous again and at this point he got there and it didn't appear that anything had changed he didn't see any bicycles
in the front yard right and didn't see the boys playing so continued on he said he then says that they drove around the
neighborhood for about 30 minutes and then they went back to the house to see if Stevie Branch would be would have
returned home by this time now from my the best I can put this together Captain I believe that this would put Terry
Hobbs and Amanda at home around 6:00 p.m. Terry says that this shortly after this is when Dana Moore drops by his
house and he says you know he's talking with her and he says you know have you seen have you seen Michael Moore and
Terry says no I thought he was out with your boy I was expecting to find him at your house and at this point this is
when Terry follows uh shortly afterwards he would go back to the Moore house one more time and this
is where he would meet Mark buers for the very first time and they would figure out that both of their sons are
missing so yeah at this point is when Hobbs knows that not only is his boy missing but three boys yeah so this
would have had to taken place but sometime between 7:30 and 8 this would have been after Mark buers came home and
was waiting to call the police mhm so after he meets Mark buers uh this is where Terry says that he went to his
friend David jacobi's house and he goes there because they were good friends he was good friends with David and his wife
Bobby and on several occasions the jacobes or Bobby jacobe had watched her his son his daughter I'm sorry Amanda
and so he goes by and he asks David if he would help him search for Stevie and if while they searching if he could
leave Amanda with Bobby after searching with his friend David now David would back up some of the story his story is a
little different but David would say yes I went out with um I went out with Terry
Hobbs and he was asked specifically did did your wife or girlfriend Bobby did she watch Amanda and he says you know
now let's keep in mind David jacobe is being interviewed in 2007 this is many years after this crime has taken place
and he says I can't remember for certain if if my if Bobby would have watched Amanda but she watched that kid so many
times that it would seem likely that she probably did he states that they went out and they did look in the woods he
was with Terry and they were looking in the woods they he was asked what part of
the woods did you go to he says he says kind of like what buer said he says you know I remember looking going up and
down some Trails I remember being around the water but I can't say specifically what part or parts of the woods we were
in and if and if you watch West Memphis you can tell that this bothers him it bothers him that he can't remember and
he really start questioning his friend about his original story but we got to remember that hobbs' original story and
Pam's original story happens on the 10th 5 days afterwards not however many years later 14 years
later yeah and we should also point out here that the story that the police collected on May 10th in
1993 was an account by Pam Hobs there was no Terry Hobbs present he was not home at the time that the officer came
to intervie not just it's coming from Pam Hobs but it's also coming from all these other stories that they're piecing
together correct yeah yeah and Mark buers is a big part of this because they spent so much time talking to him well
he love he loved to talk and they were able to get a lot of different times and a lot of different details of that night
from him MH well Terry says that after they searched the woods now back to what you were saying Captain about David
jacobe and how he seemed even upset that he couldn't remember certain details yeah now he was asked specifically did
you guys search in the area where the boys were found and he flat out says I'm not certain I'm not very clear on where
exactly the boys were found all I can say is that I know that we searched in the woods we went into the woods we went
up and down some trails and we went near the water on this is when there's light
out but he does talk a little bit in the west of Memphis documentary he talks about how they didn't go searching right
away he remembers them playing guitars cuz they normally would play guitars and then at some point uh you know Terry
Hobbs showed them how to play something but again was that the fifth or was it just some other random day well it it
would have had to have been the fifth because David jacobe did go to work on the 6th and the boys were found in the
afternoon what I'm saying is were they playing guitar on some random right but what I'm saying is he's telling a story
of 14 years ago yeah so who knows I mean how many times did they sit down and play guitar it's the same thing when he
says oh yeah well we watched Amanda a bunch so I can assume maybe we watched them but it's the same thing with the
picking out a guitar and according to Terry that after they searched the woods for a while they couldn't find Stevie
that this is when he took David jacobe home and dropped him off and picked up the daughter Amanda and continued on to
pick up Pam now he says that he would have arrived at the catfish Island restaurant where Pam worked at 9 p.m.
now this is probably fairly accurate because let's look at Pam story now Pam says all of the same things up until
this point right so Pam says that he that Terry Hobbs arrived shortly after 900 p.m. and at at that point Terry had
came into the restaurant he made a phone call on the pay phone without telling her who he was calling or why and then
they go outside and Pam discovers that only Amanda is in the vehicle she expected to see Stevie Stevie still
missing she's like where's Stevie at now according to to Terry Terry says that he
told her right away or very quickly after he saw her that we were unable to find him
he's still missing right so there's a little discrepancy between the two but basically the officer was dispatched and
he he left in a and arrived shortly after 9:24 p.m. so this would back up Terry hobbs' story a little bit that he
arrived he says right at 9:00 p.m. Pamela hob says shortly after after 9:00 p.m. so we know that this is accurate
because yeah I mean but we always got to do my math add 5 to 10 minutes either way well let's say it was 9:30 when the
report was given but uh we obviously know that Pam Hobbs was present for the report and she does state that Terry
even though he's not mentioned in the report that he was present now she would go on to say that after they left the
the restaurant that on the way home that they continued to look at some point Terry Hobbs would go back and pick up
his friend David jacobe well now there now we got to go back just a little bit because there is a discrepancy here
because the police recently interviewed Hobbs cuz a lot of people based on this new evidence and stuff that comes out
that we'll talk about later there was a lot of pressure to you guys didn't really interview this guy enough you
talked to Pam Hobbs maybe enough uh but not Terry Hobbs enough and he claims that when he picks her up that her first
thing is she says he's dead and he said well that's a crazy thing to say she goes well he's dead and she wants to
know where her ex-husband is at the time now they go back and figure out that the
ex-husband was not even around that area cuz she I think her major concern I mean
she claim from what Terry hob says he says she said he's dead but I think her concern was that her ex-husband came and
picked him up and just took him away yeah and it's a mild discrepancy because he says that she said he's dead now Pam
Hobbs would report that she did immediately suspect her ex-husband may have come and abducted the boy right
because he had threatened her you know years before that it that at some point I'm going to come and get Stevie and
he's going to come he's going to live with me so uh I mean who knows who knows exactly what was said but it is it is
agreed upon by the two of them that there was very close their stories are very close exactly now they would both
agree that they went and searched for the boys afterwards um Pam said that she was in the woods very briefly that night
but the mosquitoes were so bad not only the mosquitoes were bad and other people
would report that as well but Pam went on to say further that the there was something about the area that that
really kind of scared her and terrified her and she didn't want to be in that area MH um and at this part it's it's
real dark so it'd be hard to see anything now so David jacobe as you said his his account is a little bit
different than Terry Hobs yes he says that that Terry Hobbs would have come over about 5:30 or 6:00 p.m. that day
and they would have played guitar and probably Amanda would have sat with with his with Bobby and hung out with her
while they played guitar David believes that they played guitar for about an hour so this would put it at 6:37 p.m.
and that Terry had said that he needed to go home to see if Stevie had come home right so he he leaves for a while
now he doesn't know exactly what time he sees Terry again um but what he does say
is he does recall uh searching in the woods with Terry with flashlights so this would be after dark and he also
remembers seeing Mark buers now Mark buers is what like six 465 I'm not really for sure he's tall guy though
he's a big dude and he's he's he's an unforgettable character yeah something and this is what I find
interesting though Mark buer says you know I remember meeting Terry hobbs' friend I don't recall his name right so
it kind of goes backs up the story we know David jacobe was there and he was probably that friend that Mark buers was
referring to because Jacobi says I remember meeting Mark buyers and how could you forget meeting Mark buyers he
also says that the other person that was with them for part or most of the night
was Jackie Hicks Jackie Hicks is Pamela's dad uh he did say that he had been to the pipe area that that at some
point they did go to the pipe or over the pipe um and again he was asked if he was uh if they were around where the
boys were found and he said he didn't know exactly where the boys were found right the only other discrepancy that we
should point out in this timeline here is according to Ryan now r ran is the stepson of John Mark buers now the the
first major discrepancy is that there is some dispute between the two of what time Ryan went to bed did did he go to
bed at 11: did he go to bed at midnight or did he go out and continue searching with John Mark buers it's a little
unclear but again as you had said they were both interviewed days afterwards yeah I think the kid would actually know
more because it's a school night so you know when you know maybe the kid didn't think it was super serious I'm going and
looking for my brother but I also get to stay up late on a school night and not only that he's out with some of his
friends or neighborhood kids his age and they're looking as well and the the one
thing we should point out is one thing that Ryan would report while he was searching in the woods so he says
between 9:30 and 10 that they heard he and his two friends now this is backed up by their reports as well that he and
his two friends had heard five loud splashes in the water and it was around this time that that they had heard what
he said was a gunshot what Ryan said was a gunshot now keep in mind at approximately the same time John Mark
buers is in those same Woods looking as well and maybe the police officer is left at this time we don't we don't know
exactly but there's a lot of people as you said in 20 some you know 20 people looking he
says that after the five splashes that they they started calling out who's there is there anybody there they're
getting a little freaked out and then they hear what they think is a gunshot and they decide to get out of the woods
and look elsewhere he would report this to John Mark buers uh the later that night or the next day I'm not certain
now both of them bring it up when they discuss this night with police now John Mark buers says that he had pointed out
to the boy that he thought he had heard something as well he he wasn't sure that
he had heard splashing but he thought he had heard something that sounded like a
car backfiring right and he and this guy's a Avid gun shooter yeah so he would know if it was a gunfire or if it
was something else and also around that time you know sometimes in the summer you'll just hear fireworks going off or
it could be it could also be in relationship to how your proximity to that noise you know your your opinion of
what you heard now when probed by police Ryan would say it's possible that it was
a car backfire yeah or something other than a gunshot yeah he said he wasn't certain they were already kind of scared
looking in the woods to begin with after dark I wanted to point out that discrepancy uh because I think that
might come into play later these are the police reports and the family's accounts
of what they were doing and what each other were doing at the time of the search and keep in mind you know they
they did search the next day and of course they found nothing but most of them were together for most of the
search the following day I couldn't find much time that any one of them were alone on the 6th um so basically there's
some searching going on in the morning and then the cops are now more involved and then that's where they find the
floating shoe and now they find the bodies and not only that at one point there was a meeting on the 6th where the
parents had gone they had all gone to the school or they met somewhere together with law enforcement to be
brought up to speed on what's going on and where they intended to search because on the sixth they had brought in
other law enforcement agencies we had talked about the helicopter the sheriff department but anyways we we kind of
covered that so the boys are found now the 10th they're interviewing the the family we kind of going over that but
we're talking about now it's a it's it's a town in panic right we need answers to
what happened to these three boys and who did this who is responsible and for as little amount of
time that they spent questioning the families and talking to the families about their whereabouts and what was
going on on the fifth and the 6th they ended up spending a lot of time on the other two parts of the investigation
they spent a lot of time talking to local pedophiles or people that were uh convicted or suspected of having or just
local weirdos exactly they spent a lot of time talking to those type of people and and filling out reports and asking
questions they did go and they did spend a decent amount of time uh near Michael
Moore's home and near Christopher byer's home going door too asking questions they didn't spend a ton of time going
over by the Hobs family's house though now keep in mind you so you have the area that the boys were found and just
about a/4 mile south of that is where more and buyers had lived and even further south than that is where Branch
had lived so they were they were really focusing on the buyers in more area now they spent a lot of time like
you said talking to local weirdos and part of that too though was people calling in with tips and hey we've seen
this and we've saw that uh and there were some people that were in question uh you know people were calling saying
that we had seen this or that one one thing that was in question was a a hitchhiker was a person of interest um
they had even actually sent out some some notice to area police officers to other police departments that they
wanted information if anybody had seen this hitchhiker this was somebody that was seen in the area they didn't have an
ID or identification for him at the time when police talk to these Persons of Interest now there is a lot of a lot of
people that they talk to Captain and there's very few notes on these persons and some of these notes are just a
paragraph long and a lot of times they were quickly to disregard somebody because they had said they had an alibi
or they talked to one person and they did have an alibi but on some of these people we're not talking about a huge
staff so they could figure out if all these aliis check out and they were interviewing a lot of people and with
some of these people they did request things like fingerprints or uh you know maybe a urine sample or blood sample
hair sample a lot of these people had stuff on file anyways and they were able to collect some of that information so
it's funny that they have that information but they don't have Mr Bojangle's information cuz that was lost
yeah yeah they conveniently lost the or maybe inconveniently lost the blood flecks that were found at the at the
Bojangles restaurant now they did collect some uh some of these same items from some of the family members mhm um
they were able to collect these items from uh Mark buyers uh from Melissa buyers uh from from Hobs from Pam Hobs
from Dana from Dana Moore uh I don't know I can't remember if they had if they had found if they requested these
items from Todd Moore and I I know they didn't request these items or receive them from Terry Hobs but again it's not
not through fault of Terry Hobbs it was never requested yeah you you want to see
some people would go oh well you're guilty cuz you didn't just submit this stuff all willy-nilly well if you're not
ask for it how do you know you're supposed to give it now we both agree that they could have spent more time
investigating the families and figuring out what was going on there uh I think they could have they could have dived
more into the the timeline details I mean I think they you know did some crosschecking but I think they could
have found more holes and they could have talked to all of them much sooner and recorded this information much
sooner well and they should I mean there's there's actual interviews where they're together you know it's like no
you're supposed to separate everybody you know cuz what if this person's just trying to line up their story with yours
yeah they would interview the husband and wife together right you should have separated them but again it's a small
staff and you know they probably don't see a lot of things like this I do believe that they could have spent some
more time on the weirdos and the miscellaneous tips that they were were receiving now the problem with this is
when you look at these tips some of them are complete waste of time and waste of
energy and their resources right I mean one person that they interviewed was somebody that was calling the police
department he lived in Arizona he had a dream that he was he was talking to one of the Dead Boys and that he had seen
things through one of the Dead Boys eyes and he gave his own account of what was
seen now one thing that they did spend a lot of time on was they were searching for Vans they wanted to investigate and
find out everybody in the area that had a van because they had come across when they went and did their door-to-door
searches and when they were receiving these miscellaneous tips there were several people that had reported seeing
a van now there are varying descriptions of this van sometimes it was a black van
sometimes it was a tan van sometimes it was a white van and they're looking for a creeper van basically exactly and this
the these are only reports that they're getting by people getting an uneasy feeling about seeing whatever color van
this was but one that kept coming up was a uh there there was a report of a white
van that's what they were really looking for but they were willing to investigate
is the typical creeper color they were willing to investigate any actual van but the only reports that I could find
that seem suspicious were that of a black tan or white van now there are multiple reports of people having seen a
white van some of these people saying that was was driven by a young man some by an by a young white man some by an
older white man and some saying a black man and in one occasion somebody had even gone on further to say that the van
was a white van driven by a black man that and it was an Illinois plate it was an out of out of town plate that's
what's so difficult with eyewitness testimonies is they're all over the place and some of them don't even sound
logical so but but they are looking at some weirdos weirdos and they get tip from
the juvenile officer Jerry driver is the juvenile officer in which you're speaking of shortly after the murders he
provides some of the investigators with a list now what's on this list there's a
list of eight names this and yeah it happens on the eth but probably what's going down is okay so they find the boys
on the sixth so on the seventh they're probably sitting around going okay well who are some possible suspects right off
the top of our head other than than like obviously family members and that's when
he comes up with this list now a lot of juvenile officers work closely with detectives and most branches yeah and he
provides them with this list because he has kind of told them for the last year that hey there's a lot of uh gang or
satanic activity going on amongst these teenagers in the area and you should stay aware of that because they probably
will commit crimes so after the murders he provides these investigators with the
name with a list of names that it has eight names on it now four of the names are known to us and those names are
Jesse Miss Kelly Jason Baldwin Damen eckels Eckles and Domin te now let's intro introduce these one at a time so
first we have Jesse misskelly Jr he lives with his dad he's about 17 years old at the time and he is has been held
back two grades he drops out of high school he's he's not a very well how should we say this I think
he's uh just kind of a simple person a lot of people say he has a little IQ he just comes across as pretty simple to me
a little childlike for his age yeah so he's dropped at a school and he works he does have a job he works in Roofing um
and it's maybe it's full-time who knows it's a little unclear but it sounds like
is a tough job I mean he's doing grunt work and and from my understanding is obviously there's not always work you
know you're only working that day if there's a roof to build right uh so uh he is working when jobs are available uh
he wants to be a professional wrestler uh and he knows some of the other people on the list he would go on to say that
he knows Jason Baldwin he considers Jason Baldwin to be a nice kid and a friend of his and he knows that Jason
hangs out with a kid named Damen Eckles and he describes Damian as someone who seems to be all right but he dresses in
black and he's definitely kind of weird the next name is Jason Baldwin Jason Baldwin lives with his mother his mother
has some mental issues and Jason is 16 years old but his mother works at night so a lot of times what Jason's job is is
after he comes home from school he then has to stay with his siblings and watch them while his mother is at work yeah
and Jesse Miss Kelly is known in the neighborhood to watch a bunch of the kids as well and I think it's because
you know all here's this you know sweet kind of simple kid and we'll leave our kids with him you know a cheap
babysitter and Jason is described by other kids as kind of uh I I don't not goth goth is not the right word he's
kind of one of those headbanger kids one of the heavy use the word goth but they're these kid these kids are not
goth this you might be able to use it it would be a stretch but you might be able
to use it for Damian but definitely not for Jason Jason's like jeans he's blue jeans concert T-shirt kind of guy MTV
Headbangers ball yeah and he's the type of kid he doesn't particularly love school or the other kids there but he
actually does fairly well in school yeah he seems like a smart kid yeah he completes his work and he participates
and uh a lot of his teachers had good things to say about him now it is well known to everybody in the area that his
best friend is Damen Eckles which is a couple years older Damen Eckles is 18 years old in 1993 now Damian's real name
is Michael Hutchinson he grew up up uh probably more even more poor than than Jesse Melly and Jason Baldwin uh who
they all lived in basically the same trailer park area and uh Damian he is his parents are Jack and Pam Eckles and
he has a sister Michelle um and when he was younger he was like 16ish he he became known to police because he was
dating a girl named Deanna now Deanna was a little bit younger than him okay so he had
um they were getting together and wanted to be physical together right okay so they were devising plans of how to be
physical together yeah you sneak off well he what what would typically happen is when they were supposed to be at
school they would walk back to her place and try to hook up and eventually they got caught and this was not cool with
her parents at all right her parents threw a big fit she's no longer allowed to see Daman well because he's kind of
the older kind of a weirdo in their eyes he's a couple years older now he's been held back two grades
as well now he's genius yeah it it is for different reasons I guess but but he he claims it's because he he liked going
to school but he did not want to do any of the work he makes a lot of claims though I actually believe there's
there's one point where he's talking and he talks about a kid that he there's ve
very few kids that he liked or idolized in school but there was one kid that he talked about that he seemed to idolize a
bit who was a kid that had been held back and he liked how cool and Casual that guy was and how he didn't have to
go along with the trends because he was so much older than the other cool and Casual I almost wondered that it was
calculated that he that he was held back a couple years regardless either way it's silly regardless he's no longer
allowed to see his girlfriend now this this breaks his heart he claims to have been in love with her at the time and
they do this little Romeo and Juliet routine okay where if they can't be together they're either going to run
away or they're going to have a suicide pack and so what happens is this is another genius idea brilliant brilliant
when you can't be together suicide packed works every time that's that's the way to go they come up with the idea
of let's run away okay well well that's better than a suicide pack yeah but this
presents a big problem because at the time cuz you can't even get through high school and not only that Damian is 16
but he does not have a driver's license or access to a vehicle he's he's probably only driven a vehicle once at
this point in his life and his girlfriend is not even 16 yet so again no license no access to a vehicle so
running away is doesn't work out to be driving away it works out to be walking away so they walk away and they decide
that they're going to crash for an evening in an abandoned trailer and uh that's romantic they like light some
candles and this smelly old abandoned trailer it's very Romeo and Juliet 1993 West Memphis um they they hang out in
this abandoned trailer and the cops or somehow the neighborhood kids or somebody figures out that they're there
they probably saw the candles being lit and they're like whoa somebody's there they call the police and the police come
and they find the two of them and they arrest them and basically what happens is they return the girl to her parents
and they're are they're going to press charges against the boy Damen Eckles right and which is stupid because they
both were making stupid decisions you know yeah and because he's a little bit older there the the fault is falling on
him mhm and it's disgust Now Jerry driver he's the guy that came up with this list he's aware of Damen Eckles he
was involved in arresting Daman Eckles when he was 16 years old right he would say that Damen Eckles was you know he
had he had reviewed some of journals and that he was it was clear to him that this boy was evil he was involved in
Satanism and all kinds that he probably wanted to murder people M sacrifice people well I think Daman was Daman was
interested in some spiritual stuff which to I think people in that area was just
odd and well and he said that he had threatened the father of his girlfriend yeah that sounds like something you do
if you're trying to run away with the daughter not only that I think it's probably pretty common I I I would bet
you that when the parents told her that she could no longer see Damian that that
the probably the father probably said a few bad things about Damian yeah well and they probably could have stopped the
charges and they didn't so he's going H screw you old man well what ends up happening is that Jerry driver explains
to Daman and daman's parents that Daman wouldn't have to go to jail he wouldn't have to serve any time or or be be even
presented with these charges if he would just go to a mental hospital and get checked out so they agree to this and he
goes to the mental hospital and they realize that he's probably depressed and that he's got some issues going on that
might have had something to do with the suicide pack definitely definitely and and Damian does State yeah I was
depressed I lived in West Memphis my family was dirt poor and I had just been taken away from my girlfriend the one
thing that I had that I liked and I can't see her anymore yeah well he's a little he's kind of a hopeless romantic
we could go on and on about Damen Eckles and his juvenile criminal career I guess and and
actually more not so much his mental state not so much his criminal career because there there wasn't much more
than that that's all that's all he really did yeah you made it sound like it was his big thing and it wasn't what
I meant to say was his uh character to say that in the first place but what we should say is why would J J Jason
Baldwin or Jesse Melly be on this list and why would Jerry driver know about those guys well he knew about Jesse
Melly because after Jesse Melly dropped out of school Jesse Melly wanted to build a
racetrack okay and he he thought he would build this racetrack wait so I can't finish high school but I can build
a racetrack and and you can be a professional wrestler so Miss Kelly had Big Dreams all right
and so he when he was building his racetrack he decided that he needed some Flags you can't everybody that's watch
Nascar has no you got to have Flags baby so he decides that he is going to go back to school not not actually go to
school but he's going to go visit the school because the marching band has flags and he's going to steal them so he
can use them for his racetrack well he gets caught you can't you can't steal flags and then display them and hope not
to get caught for stealing the flags mhm so that's how Jerry driver knows about J
Jesse Melly Jason Baldwin is even more innocent than those I guess he he he was charged with trespassing and vandalism
what had happened was there was an area that was frequented by a lot of kids he had went there with some other kids he
went onto the property they had some old broken down vehicles that had been there
for God knows how long busted some window and they busted out a couple of Windows and they end up being charged
with trespassing and vandalism well this and actually the area that they so-called trespassed on I could see
being charged with vandalism but the area that they trespassed there was no signs there was no chain fence there was
nothing you know if it's not your property don't break [ __ ] how about let's just start with that uh also I
think it's just some of it it's just a random list of 10 people that probably did something in the last you know
couple years well it was eight people and so eight people so but but you know what's happening is the detectives
they're going we don't have any leads we don't have anything and then they probably ask everybody in the department
to think of something so he sat down on his desk and came up with a list of eight yeah he came up with eight kids
that he believed that that were in trouble with the law before that were on his radar and he believed that they were
involved in uh heavy metal music or sat Satanism or in some kind of cult maybe a
gang but for whatever reason he deemed them to be troubled youths that he was going to keep an eye on now the fourth
name that we haven't mentioned yet was Domin te now Domin te was actually Damian's girlfriend after the girl that
he had gotten in trouble with right now she was probably I see I don't know see kids see kids you will get over the
breakup you'll move on I don't know why she was on Jerry driver radar other than
the fact that she was dating Damen Eckles they you know I couldn't find anything of her having a criminal past
and it could it be as simple as the juvenile cop goes I've been kind of following Daman what's going on with him
and now he's dating this new girl so he just knows of her so he's had uh at least an incident with his ex-girlfriend
so maybe that's going to be something that repeats itself in the future well and at some point now this would be um
July of 1992 uh Damian actually moves away from West Memphis after he got out of the
mental hospital for this problem with his girlfriend MH uh his real father returned now we didn't say why he
changed his name you know his original name was Michael Hutchinson well that that's because his father's last name
was Hutchinson and when they him and his mother had split up his mother met a man
named Jack Eckles well at that point Jack Eckles decid decided to adopt her kids and when he did so Daman changed
his name to Daman Eckles he took Jack's last name and he says that he took the name Damian because at the time he was
considering getting into Catholicism and that there was a saint Damian that he respected and he wanted to take his name
yeah and St Damian what he did was he lived on an island and he took care of leopards and he ended up getting leopard
see himself and then dying and after hearing that story Damen thought thought hey this is a good guy to kind of model
yourself after now some might find this weird but I don't I I you know was raised Catholic and anybody that was
raised Catholic knows that once you confirm your uh you know once you confirm yourself to the religion of
Catholicism that you can take on a Catholic name yeah what was your uh confirmation name Isaiah um mine was
Kanye Kanye West uh I was ahead of my time well Michael hinson's was Damien and he took
on his stepfather's last name would have been cool if he would have went with Kanye Eckles Kanye Eckles we have to
reintroduce Vicky Hutchinson remember Vicky Hutchinson she was the one that was questioned by police about the
credit card overrun at the truck stop yeah she's the credit card thief and she had her son with her who was 8 years old
Aaron and he was friends with some or all of the boys that had gone missing MH and he had told the story about seeing
the Michael Moore boy talking to a black man after work after school that the black man was coming to pick him up um
and we know that this isn't true because Michael Moore went home after school now Vicki finds out that there is
that there is reason to believe or that the police are interested in this Damian
eckl's character yeah because he's on a list two days before they even question the family not only he's on a list but
he has been approached by police and he's had some some interviews with them and a lot of them are kind of off the
Record at this time right but he is very forthcoming and he does fingerprints and
whatever they ask he's I mean he's being cooperative not only that they take a they take a picture of him a Polaroid
picture of Damien Eckles when they talk to him the first time now uh police would later say that they they don't
have this Polaroid picture they don't know what they're talking about but there was some it could just be some
[ __ ] that somebody made up there was some rumor that police were going around town and they were asking people about
what they had seen or what they had heard if they have heard anything and not only that that sometimes they were
even presenting a picture and saying do you know this person mhm um anyway this gets back to Vicky Hutchinson that uh
they would be or want to know more information about Damen Eckles well she lives in the trailer park and she lives
right by Jesse mkelly she does not know Daman or Jason Baldwin but she knows Jesse Miss Kelly pretty well because on
occasion he had watched her son he had cut the grass for you know chores yeah find the simplon and actually she would
describe Jesse Miss Kelly Jr to police as a nice boy that lived by her that was seemed like he was always willing to
help out whenever she needed it yeah yeah it's also trying to make some money she tells police that she would be
interesting in helping them now let's keep in mind remember we had talked interested yeah she's interested because
there's there's a reward there's a $35,000 reward for information right about the the murders
of these boys and she lives in a trailer park so this is her golden ticket this is like the hit in the lottery yeah this
is her Charlie in the Chocolate Factory Charlie Bucket so she tells investigator
Bray that she she would be willing to help them out and that she is going to talk to Jesse to see what he knows about
the other boys because he's the same age as Jason Baldwin and Damen Eckles they say that's fine and that she
should probably read up on witchcraft or Satanism in the meantime yeah that's what you need to do well they suggest
that you should probably go to the library and research this stuff this is [ __ ] Vicki States I don't have a
libr library card and then yeah she's a freaking genius and investigator Bray says that's fine you can borrow mine so
she does go to the library and she does study up on some of the Satanism and and
uh witchcraft stuff and she learns some of the terms and some of the terminology
and you know what to expect well she tells Jesse Melly that she would be interested in uh meeting Damien and
Jason which Jesse finds weird because Vicky is 30 she's like in her early 30s um but Jesse said you know I'll help you
out anyway cuz he's a nice kid he introduces he introduces her to them now he doesn't know them he knows Jason
pretty well but he doesn't know Damian very well but the next time that he sees them he tells them hey Vicky would like
to meet you right but don't you think that if Vicki's sitting there talking to uh Jesse Miss Kelly about this stuff and
her Main motivation is this $35,000 don't you think this is coming up in conversation at some point well
she tells police that she had arranged to go on a date with Damian what yeah well he's 18 at the time and so she's
going to go onto this date and she went on a date with him and she describes he has a girlfriend yeah and he and he's
Captain romance romance pants so well not only that his girlfriend's pregnant the time right so is it really a date or
is it just a hangout or well whatever it is I'm I'm just telling you what Vicki told the police
okay okay we don't even know if this happened okay Vicky tells the police that she went with Daman and Jesse
mkelly to what's called an esbat now what this is was this is going to be a gathering of like-minded people that are
there to worship Satan and that they're getting together in some some location that she was unsure of sounds like a
word that she read in a book and then she just made the [ __ ] up but she was picked up by Damian and Jesse she didn't
drive Damian arrived in a vehicle and he was driving M and they went to this esbat and she said that she had seen
people there that were uh painted and they were decorated and they were clearly worshiping Satan and they were
getting ready to have some kind of orgy and she said that this really really bothered her so she told Damian that she
had to leave right he says he says that that's fine I'll drive you home and they
leave Jesse there and they go home now she describes Damian as somebody who is kind of softspoken and he doesn't like
to talk a whole lot but she can kind of talk to him and pry things out of him she says when she does get him to talk
that he is talking to her quite a bit about the murders of the three boys now he's not implicating himself as being
involved in these murders but he's explaining to her that he's been questioned multiple times by police and
for some reason they think that I've done it or I was involved yeah and then once you think that the cops think you
did it guess who pays attention to the case then Vicky would bring her son in to talk to the police one more time
because she's saying that Aaron now has more information regarding what happened
with the boys she's saying that uh and Aaron's saying the same thing that that I had often gone into the the woods with
these other boys and on occasion we had witnessed some boys and some men doing some strange things said that on on one
occasion that there were five men in the woods and they some of them were dressed
up they were sitting in a circle they were singing songs about the devil and they were committing homosexual acts
upon one another um so kind of like a satanic Circle Jer well at the circle jerk Aaron would
describe what some of the some of the men were wearing and he went on to say you know what he saw they had jewelry
they had certain clothing on right well the following day Vicky showed up to the
police department and she shows them an earring now this is an earring that had like a snake or a skull or a snake
coming out of a skull or something like that but it you know kind of a devil earring yeah heavy metal type looking
earring and now this was similar to some of the jewelry that was that was described at this satanic uh
event that Aaron and his friends had seen in Robin Hood Hills now she tells police I found this in my trailer after
hanging out with Damian he must have dropped it in my trailer therefore he's one of the satanic people that are going
to Robin Hood Hills and having these meetings MH well this is very interesting to the police now isn't it
of course it is so they decide that they want to talk to Jesse Miss Kelly because
Jesse Miss Kelly is the person that was able to put Vicky in contact with Damian
and Jason police would go on and they would pick up Jesse Miss Kelly now remember Miss Kelly's only 17 at the
time it's only about 5 foot tall and so they talk to Jesse and they say you know
what we have some questions we want to ask you would you mind coming down to the police department with us and he
says I don't have any problem with that right so they're very interested in him and he's very interested in this award
money well he doesn't know reward money he doesn't know that at the time they he
he he's unclear why they even want to talk to himh what what is what when it becomes clear to him is after they go
and talk to his father because they have to ask for permission to talk to Jesse because he's under 18 his father figures
out why they want to talk to him and he tells his son you know look there son there there's reward money they want to
talk to you about what you might know about the murder of those three boys go ahead and tell them everything you know
because if you do maybe we can get this reward money right and I guess uh Jesse thought that his father would be able to
buy a new truck or something here here it is Jesse wanting to help again and so Jesse Jr and Jesse Senor both agree to
this interview Jesse Senor does not go along he doesn't tag along for the interview right uh Junior goes off with
the police officers and he goes to the police department and now they're going to interview Jesse Miss Kelly Jr okay
but we're now an hour and a half into part two so we need to wrap this up we're going to have to do a part three
you know cuz we got a lot more to cover there's a ton more to cover we're just we're just getting started really well
then that's when the garage stays open and we throw an after party yeah so now we got the after party and so for those
that need more garage to listen to we're going to put this out we're not even going to wait a week we we shouldn't
wait a week because we got to get the season 3 at some point it it was my bad picking such a huge case to End season
it's a fascinating case and so what we're going to do for it's the best case of season two yeah I think so and uh I
think everybody's enjoying it so if you want more garage to listen to we're going to release this the next day so
check that out so two episodes one week back to back so to make that less confused
how about we'll see you tomorrow in the garage and until then be good be kind and don't litter
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West Memphis 3 /// Timeline & Confessions

Garage Refill //////

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Part 2- Timeline & Confessions

We pick up right where we had left off... This week we look into the timeline of the parents of each of the victims and their movements on the night and morning of the search for the boys. We discuss some police tips and we introduce Jessie Misskelley, Jason Baldwin and Damien Echols. We will also go through not one but three confessions.

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Brief Summary

The episode discusses the West Memphis 3 case, focusing on the investigation and key suspects involved in the murders of three boys in 1993.

Key points

DNA Evidence Raises Doubts. Defense argues that none of the West Memphis 3's DNA was found at the crime scene.
Questioning the Suspect's Certainty. A critical moment in the investigation as doubts arise about the suspect's involvement.
The Search Begins. John Mark Buers and his family start searching for his missing son, Christopher.
Police Involvement. After searching for an hour, John Mark contacts the police to report Christopher missing.
Community Effort. The neighborhood comes together to search for the missing boys, creating a community effort.
Community Concern. Parents gather to discuss the whereabouts of the missing boys, expressing fears of drowning.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

This is not just the West Memphis 3.

Emphasizing the broader implications of the case

5:02WatchMay 5, 2024

Tension

65/ 100Some tension

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