Latest / NO FILTER / Episode 12_ The Party Hostess(M4A_128K)

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Episode 12_ The Party Hostess(M4A_128K) · NO FILTER

• 0:09
  Speaker 1: Jimmy Clark told us that his brother Lee is far
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: from the only person he's seen Floyd Counties into prison
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: on false charges.
• 0:17
  Speaker 2: They could put whoever they wanted in that seat and
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: get them sent to prison and forget about it, because
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: once they got them sent to prison, that's done with.
• 0:26
  Speaker 2: I mean, when you're in prison, you ain't got no
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: you ain't got no phole unless you've got a lot
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: of money. And the people they were getting in trouble,
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: they knew they didn't have a lot of money.
• 0:36
  Speaker 3: Do you think anybody will ever come forward and say
• 0:39
  Speaker 3: you were wrong about this one.
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: I kind of feel like maybe somebody like that Angela
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: Bruce girl that testified, I kind of feel like maybe
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: she'll want to write her wrongs and say, hey, look
• 0:51
  Speaker 2: this cop told me I better do this or I
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: was gonna get in trouble for something I done.
• 0:57
  Speaker 4: Being they spent twenty.
• 0:58
  Speaker 5: Years later, she might want to get that offer because.
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: I promised you one hundred percent that cop made her lie.
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: Just before Christmas in nineteen eighty six, thirty one year
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: old Angela Bruce moved to Rome, Georgia with her two
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: young children. She found a trailer in the Mechinic trailer
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: Park and started settling in. About a month later, on
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: a random Friday night, she threw a party, just a
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: casual get together. About fifteen to twenty people were there
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: in all, and then one night, three months later, two
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: Food County police officers showed up on her doorstep. They
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: asked her about that party and what Angela Bruce told
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: them would lead to the arrest of Kin's story and
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: Lee Clark and what she testified to a trial would
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: form the bedrock for their conviction. But Lee and Kin
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: and their families all say that Angela Bruce was lying.
• 1:46
  Speaker 4: I don't think she made it all up.
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: I think Dallas Battles is the one who had made
• 1:50
  Speaker 2: it up. I think Dallas Battles is the one had
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: made the story up. Told her what she's gonna say,
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: and that was that she was just she was in
• 1:59
  Speaker 2: a pickle with a minute that was our way out.
• 2:09
  Speaker 5: Hi.
• 2:09
  Speaker 4: My name is Susan Simpson.
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: I'm an attorney and podcaster and previously I hosted the
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: Undisclosed podcast.
• 2:16
  Speaker 3: Hi, I'm justin to Davis and I'm a true crime
• 2:19
  Speaker 3: TV producer. Last year, Susan and I decide to team
• 2:23
  Speaker 3: up and reinvestigate the murder of Brian Bowling. Along with
• 2:27
  Speaker 3: Kevin Fitzpatrick, president of Red Marble Media, we decided to
• 2:31
  Speaker 3: launch Proof. You can listen to Proof like you would
• 2:34
  Speaker 3: any podcast, and you can follow us everywhere with the
• 2:37
  Speaker 3: handle at proofcrime pod and on our website proofcrimepod dot com.
• 2:44
  Speaker 3: Thanks for listening and welcome to Proof.
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: The state's case against Liam Kaine was built on Angela Bruce.
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: At trial well, she testified that Lee and Kane had
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: confessed to her, in exhaustive detail, how they had murdered
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: Brian because he had broken the rules of the Freebird Gang.
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: Without her, the prosecution wouldn't have had a case. Her
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: testimony was the only admissible evidence that the Freebird Gang
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: had even existed. In closing arguments, the prosecutor told the
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: jury that there was nothing whatsoever to discredit her. She
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: had no feud or axe to grind with either of
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: the defendants, and King told me that much at least
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: was true. He'd been shocked when we learned that the
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: state planned to call Angela Bruce a trial.
• 3:32
  Speaker 4: So y'all were y'all were friendly?
• 3:35
  Speaker 6: Yeah, that's why I moved my mile.
• 3:41
  Speaker 5: O man learn the land and.
• 3:45
  Speaker 6: I'm like, okay, this was really happenings and doesn't want
• 3:50
  Speaker 6: to go on really okay ya, that's what I was
• 3:58
  Speaker 6: playing at.
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: Angela testified that Kane had attended the party with his
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: uncle Phil and Phil's friend Smitty. Later on, another boy
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: had knocked him the door, and that boy she identified
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: a trial as Lee Clark. When Phil's group arrived, Angela
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: had been playing cards in the kitchen with four of
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: her friends. The trouble started with comments made by Phil
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: and Smittie. Angela said, Phil announced, I got a nephew
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: here that'll blow anybody's brains out, and Smitty had told
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: everyone I got a gun right here where he can
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: shoot someone else. That's about when Lean Kine began to
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: confess to murder. The boys explained to the group in
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: the kitchen that they'd killed Brian because they were in
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: a gang and Brian had known too much. They shot
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: him execution style after putting a pillow over his head.
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: Both Lie and Kane had explained to the others that
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: their gang had some important rules, like once you're in
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: the gang, you can never get out of it, and
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: also don't talk to pigs.
• 4:53
  Speaker 4: If you do, you don't make it alive.
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: The boys also said they had gang nicknames, call me Ace.
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: Kana told Angelo and Lee had a gang name too,
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: Spikey or Spanky or something like that, Angela testified. Eventually,
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: Angela said she made Lee and Kine leave the party,
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: but two blonde girls had been waiting outside for them,
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: and blew our black car and they all drove off together.
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: On the witness stand, Angela identified Brian's girlfriend, Caprice Hyatt,
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: as one of the blonde girls who'd driven away with.
• 5:22
  Speaker 6: Lee and Kin.
• 5:24
  Speaker 3: Some parts of Angela's story are undoubtedly true. There really
• 5:28
  Speaker 3: had been a party at her trailer, and Cain had
• 5:31
  Speaker 3: been there. And what Angela said about both Phil and
• 5:35
  Speaker 3: Smitty making comments about Kin, well that seems to.
• 5:39
  Speaker 4: Be true too.
• 5:41
  Speaker 3: Phil's story told us something similar.
• 5:45
  Speaker 7: When we walked in the house, Smitty you just have
• 5:47
  Speaker 7: to know him. But he shaid, I got to kill
• 5:50
  Speaker 7: her with me, you know, just being stupid, comical.
• 5:55
  Speaker 8: You know.
• 5:57
  Speaker 3: At trial, Phil said he'd explain to everyone that his
• 6:00
  Speaker 3: nephew was the one they accused of killing the boy
• 6:03
  Speaker 3: down there on the Rockmart Road. But this story about
• 6:07
  Speaker 3: Lee and Kane confessing to murder, that he said never happened.
• 6:12
  Speaker 3: Kane says the same thing, because.
• 6:17
  Speaker 6: All that wasn't me that I was there tonight, okay, Lee,
• 6:20
  Speaker 6: Clara wasn't there. Back the next day, I came back
• 6:23
  Speaker 6: to her house, but I left my lner down there.
• 6:26
  Speaker 6: I'm m I left my yesterday. Hear you, thank you?
• 6:31
  Speaker 6: And I hope, you know, I hope everything works out
• 6:33
  Speaker 6: more you go well your legal trouble. I don't think
• 6:36
  Speaker 6: you need everything.
• 6:38
  Speaker 5: I hope.
• 6:38
  Speaker 4: So, you know, so you talked to her the next day.
• 6:41
  Speaker 5: Yeah, the next day, I left my lner down there.
• 6:44
  Speaker 5: I had to go down and.
• 6:45
  Speaker 6: Get to go clean and I and everything else. You know,
• 6:49
  Speaker 6: somebody you know, saying all these things, and all of
• 6:53
  Speaker 6: a sudden, I was I was in the world, okay,
• 6:55
  Speaker 6: all right.
• 7:00
  Speaker 3: Cain had only met Angela a handful of times, and
• 7:04
  Speaker 3: he told Susan that the only time he'd talked to
• 7:06
  Speaker 3: Angela about this case, she had been supportive. She told
• 7:10
  Speaker 3: him she believed him. She'd believe that Brian had died
• 7:13
  Speaker 3: playing Russian Roulette. When we talked to Caprice, who the
• 7:17
  Speaker 3: prosecution says was part of the conspiracy to kill Brian,
• 7:21
  Speaker 3: she told us that Angela's story about her and another
• 7:24
  Speaker 3: blonde girl picking Lee and Caine up from the party
• 7:27
  Speaker 3: just wasn't true. And we talked to Caprice who says,
• 7:32
  Speaker 3: no way, Nope, she was not at any party.
• 7:36
  Speaker 9: She had no idea what we were talking about.
• 7:40
  Speaker 3: Also, Angela describes the girl as having blonde hair. Caprice
• 7:45
  Speaker 3: does not have blonde hair and told us she has
• 7:47
  Speaker 3: never had blonde.
• 7:48
  Speaker 4: Hair except for one brief phase many many.
• 7:50
  Speaker 3: Years later, right, but not as a you know, fourteen,
• 7:54
  Speaker 3: fifteen to six year old girl. Lee Clark also told
• 8:01
  Speaker 3: us that he hadn't been at this party and he
• 8:04
  Speaker 3: doesn't know why Angela Bruce would say that he had been.
• 8:08
  Speaker 3: He could only assume that she'd made some kind of
• 8:11
  Speaker 3: deal with the state. His attorney thought the same thing,
• 8:15
  Speaker 3: but they hadn't been able to prove it at trial.
• 8:19
  Speaker 10: When we try to go digging in her background about
• 8:23
  Speaker 10: her being pusta cut a deal, Oh, they.
• 8:25
  Speaker 6: Shutn't that down?
• 8:26
  Speaker 11: How they shut it down?
• 8:28
  Speaker 10: Oh they went old, Well, miss Bruce is not on
• 8:30
  Speaker 10: trial here, and I can't prove this, but I think
• 8:33
  Speaker 10: that they was printing to take her kids or something.
• 8:37
  Speaker 10: There had to be something going on her, so she
• 8:39
  Speaker 10: got called a bit something with the police and they
• 8:41
  Speaker 10: cut her some kind of deal, and I put money
• 8:44
  Speaker 10: on it. Dallas Bidos cut her some kind of deal.
• 8:46
  Speaker 10: You come in here, say it is, and we gonna
• 8:49
  Speaker 10: draw charges or we're gonna get help keep the kids
• 8:52
  Speaker 10: or something to that.
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: Histin great I hadn't seen that. I do lot cases
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: in Baltimore, and I hadn't seen that exact scenario several times.
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: So is that just guessing or is that what you know?
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: What happens there?
• 9:05
  Speaker 10: That's just mating and Rik Zabranad you were gissing on him. No,
• 9:08
  Speaker 10: we don't know what happened.
• 9:13
  Speaker 3: On the witness stand, Angela testified that the year before
• 9:16
  Speaker 3: Lee's and Kine's trial, she'd been in jail twice, but
• 9:20
  Speaker 3: twice the juvenile court judge had arranged for her to
• 9:23
  Speaker 3: be released. At least one of those times she'd been
• 9:27
  Speaker 3: in jail was because of her failure to show up
• 9:29
  Speaker 3: for a custody hearing for her daughter. When asked about
• 9:33
  Speaker 3: her children, Angela's responses had been terse and defensive, but
• 9:37
  Speaker 3: the judge hadn't allowed the questioning to go too far.
• 9:41
  Speaker 3: He thought the defense was using it as a way
• 9:43
  Speaker 3: to attack her character.
• 9:45
  Speaker 10: They wouldn't let us dig into it. They wouldn't let
• 9:47
  Speaker 10: us get into her background to see if that was
• 9:49
  Speaker 10: going on.
• 9:51
  Speaker 3: There are some good reasons to be skeptical of Angela's testimony. First,
• 9:56
  Speaker 3: there's the pillow. Angela says Lee and Kine confessed to
• 10:00
  Speaker 3: putting a pillow over Brian's head before shooting him, but
• 10:05
  Speaker 3: the forensic evidence was conclusive that no pillow was used. Second,
• 10:12
  Speaker 3: Angela says Lee confessed to being in the bedroom when
• 10:15
  Speaker 3: Brian was shot, but that's impossible. There simply hadn't been
• 10:19
  Speaker 3: time for him to have escaped out the window before
• 10:22
  Speaker 3: Brian's family rushed in to see what had happened. Third,
• 10:27
  Speaker 3: Angela's statements should have been setting off alarm bells for
• 10:31
  Speaker 3: everyone who was working on this case. The way her
• 10:34
  Speaker 3: story changes and twists on important points, first claiming one thing,
• 10:39
  Speaker 3: then the opposite, and then another thing entirely, and how
• 10:43
  Speaker 3: Angela provided no new information about the case, yet she
• 10:47
  Speaker 3: was able to confirm all the precise details that investigators
• 10:51
  Speaker 3: already believed but needed a way to prove, like the pillow,
• 10:57
  Speaker 3: the gang rules, the gang nicknames, caprices, and but the
• 11:02
  Speaker 3: biggest reason of all to doubt Angela Bruce's story is this.
• 11:07
  Speaker 3: If Kane and Lee confess to murder in front of
• 11:11
  Speaker 3: Angela and four of her friends while they were all
• 11:13
  Speaker 3: sitting together around the kitchen table playing cards, then how
• 11:18
  Speaker 3: come the police never spoke to any of her friends
• 11:21
  Speaker 3: about what they heard.
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: This case has been a challenging one to investigate. Most
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: of the records have been lost for reasons that the
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: DA's office can't explain. So a lot of what we
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: have to go on are random notes jotted down in
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: the police file where we had it noe, uh something
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: Crockett earth around the name M's away.
• 11:52
  Speaker 3: This is someone who's just a name is written in
• 11:55
  Speaker 3: a file. There's no other information.
• 11:57
  Speaker 5: They got much more to go on.
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: Great, yep, a lot of fun witnesses like that in
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: this case. Or you just show up and be like, hey,
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: hey there was a murder twenty five years ago.
• 12:10
  Speaker 4: You may or may not do something about it. Can
• 12:12
  Speaker 4: you have Phil.
• 12:12
  Speaker 9: Sins saw your name handwritten?
• 12:16
  Speaker 8: You? Oh?
• 12:18
  Speaker 4: My god?
• 12:19
  Speaker 3: Well, so there's a sign that says private property, no
• 12:25
  Speaker 3: trusts passing. I don't call him nine one one, you
• 12:28
  Speaker 3: will be shot.
• 12:29
  Speaker 4: It almost looks like snot Yeah, you're right.
• 12:32
  Speaker 3: Does look like snot, but I think he.
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: Meant shot well, Jimmy Crocker, what if we were selling
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: gross cut cookies.
• 12:42
  Speaker 4: I kind of believe he chewed. I don't know if
• 12:44
  Speaker 4: I believe him, but I'm not gonna call his bluff.
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: Because we were going in blind from many of the witnesses,
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: we often didn't know what to expect when we showed
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: up at someone's door. Now we're going on to Gore Street,
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: six minutes away for Mark Champion. Again, don't really know
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: why he's a witness, what his name's in the file.
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: So it'll be a fun surprise to find out what
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: the police wanted to talk to him about. Hi, there,
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: we said, when Mark Champion came to the door, we're
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: looking at the murder case from two and a half
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: decades ago. You wouldn't happen to know anthing about that,
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: would you. Mark's response, not unasonably, had been WHOA. Then
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: after a moment, he added, I was there at a
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: party one night. Is that what you're talking about?
• 13:33
  Speaker 5: Yep?
• 13:33
  Speaker 4: We said, that's probably it, all.
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: Right, So Mark champion story is that he's never been
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: talked to police, but she was at a party.
• 13:42
  Speaker 4: He seemed to think Angela Bruce was the one who
• 13:43
  Speaker 4: had a party.
• 13:44
  Speaker 3: So he said it was Angela Bruce's place, but he
• 13:46
  Speaker 3: was there with a friend who brought him.
• 13:49
  Speaker 9: Jessica was his friend.
• 13:50
  Speaker 4: And there was him the only time he'd been to
• 13:52
  Speaker 4: a party in Angela Bruce's place, so it's got to
• 13:54
  Speaker 4: be the same night he was mistaken.
• 13:56
  Speaker 3: He said that Phil's story was Josh's grandfather, which he
• 14:02
  Speaker 3: is a lot older.
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: Mark Champion remembered the party, but barely. He'd been there
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: with a girl named Jessica, said, and another friend of
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: his as well, a guy named Chris West, and he
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: remembered Phil's story being there too. Philip been talking to
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: Mark's friend Chris, but Mark himself hadn't been part of
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: the conversation. He had just overheard Phil saying something about
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: how his grandson had killed another boy.
• 14:25
  Speaker 9: Say so, what was the name of the man who
• 14:30
  Speaker 9: was with Phil's story?
• 14:31
  Speaker 8: Who?
• 14:31
  Speaker 4: Phil Smitty? Howard Smitty, the guy we just talked to,
• 14:34
  Speaker 4: said he was in the back room. He just overheard Phil.
• 14:37
  Speaker 9: It's very possible he actually overheard.
• 14:39
  Speaker 3: Smitty saying, you know that the killer, I've got the
• 14:43
  Speaker 3: killer here, And once you say I'm here with the
• 14:46
  Speaker 3: killer everybody.
• 14:47
  Speaker 4: People are going to start talking. What are you talking about?
• 14:49
  Speaker 9: He was like, Oh, didn't you hear his friend?
• 14:51
  Speaker 5: Yeah?
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: Shot, and like it makes sense maybe, But Mark Champion
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: had never heard anyone confessing to this murder. I told
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: Cain's story about our interview with Mark.
• 15:04
  Speaker 4: Mark Champion, he didn't know you either. He was there
• 15:09
  Speaker 4: that night, Okay. He did remember an older guy coming
• 15:15
  Speaker 4: in and saying something about I'm with the killer, or
• 15:21
  Speaker 4: like the old guy you were with made a comment
• 15:23
  Speaker 4: about the.
• 15:23
  Speaker 5: Murder, name the killing that long Crane road.
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: Mark Champion told us he'd been in the back room
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: of the trailer of much of the party, so he
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: wouldn't have heard everything that happened, and most of what
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: he knew it had come from his friend Chris West anyway.
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: In fact, Mark said Chris is the one who actually
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: contacted the police about it.
• 15:51
  Speaker 3: Chris West was one of the four people Angela Bruce
• 15:54
  Speaker 3: identified as being at her party that night. He was
• 15:58
  Speaker 3: actually one of Brian Bowling's close friends, and when Cain
• 16:02
  Speaker 3: had shown up, Angela said he'd been upset and told
• 16:05
  Speaker 3: her that Cain had killed his friend. And even though
• 16:09
  Speaker 3: there's no record of the police actually interviewing Chris West.
• 16:13
  Speaker 3: We think they must have talked to him at some point.
• 16:16
  Speaker 3: After all, someone had given Mark Champion's name to the police.
• 16:22
  Speaker 3: They had written it down on a page of notes
• 16:24
  Speaker 3: that has Chris West's name, address, and phone number. There's
• 16:29
  Speaker 3: a short note below that that says fifteen Dashed twenty
• 16:33
  Speaker 3: people at party Cain, Phil Smitty together. The note does
• 16:39
  Speaker 3: not mention Lee Clark being with them, though, which is
• 16:42
  Speaker 3: interesting because if these are notes from when the police
• 16:45
  Speaker 3: spoke to Chris West, that suggests Chris had not told
• 16:49
  Speaker 3: them anything about Lee. Unfortunately, Chris West passed away in
• 16:54
  Speaker 3: twenty fifteen, we aren't able to ask him about it,
• 16:58
  Speaker 3: but that left three other part already attendees that Angela
• 17:01
  Speaker 3: Bruce identified by name in her first statement to the police,
• 17:06
  Speaker 3: Pa Lampkin, Chance Lampkin and Katrina Thomas.
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: It turned out that Pa Chance at Katrina were all siblings. Unfortunately,
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: Chance died in twenty ten, and during our first trip
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: to Rome to talk to witnesses, we learned that Katrina
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: had died in a tragic accident just a few months earlier.
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: That left only one other party attendee that Angela Bruce
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: had named in her statement to the police.
• 17:34
  Speaker 4: That the guy I really want to find is a
• 17:36
  Speaker 4: guy named p. A.
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: Lampkin, and I know he's in Rome. I know he's
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: there somewhere. I just got it is.
• 17:42
  Speaker 6: One of the guys that were talking about it at
• 17:44
  Speaker 6: what's your ninth party?
• 17:46
  Speaker 4: Yeah, Angela Bruce's party.
• 17:48
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I'll remember from the draw was making that name.
• 17:57
  Speaker 3: Pa Lampkin proved hard to find, but there had been
• 18:00
  Speaker 3: approximately fifteen to twenty people in all at the party.
• 18:04
  Speaker 3: Maybe there were other attendees we could locate. We asked
• 18:08
  Speaker 3: Phil's story if there was anyone else he could remember
• 18:11
  Speaker 3: being there.
• 18:12
  Speaker 4: Who else was there at the party? Anyone?
• 18:14
  Speaker 8: You know?
• 18:16
  Speaker 4: No, but there were others there.
• 18:17
  Speaker 7: There was others there, Yeah, But faith like, I didn't
• 18:20
  Speaker 7: go no further than to kitchen I was paid for
• 18:22
  Speaker 7: back there in.
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: The right, on the same page of notes with Mark
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: Champion's name on it, there had been another name as well,
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: Lee Mobs, and after learning that Mark Champion had been
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: an Angela's party, it seemed possible that Lee Mobs's name
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: had been listed there for the same reason. Dan the
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: cameraman and I went to speak to him.
• 18:42
  Speaker 4: So Lee Mob's very friendly, very helpful. Those are reject shit,
• 18:45
  Speaker 4: but very helpful.
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: Otherwise, I mean, at least you know you have possibly
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: Pierre Lampkin.
• 18:53
  Speaker 12: Yeah, you know that's big.
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: I've got a Facebook in. His account is locked down,
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: so I couldn't message him.
• 19:00
  Speaker 7: Yeah, I mean, if he gives that in, that would
• 19:02
  Speaker 7: be cute.
• 19:03
  Speaker 4: It's really what I need.
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: Lee Mob's new Pa Lampin. And he remembered going to
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: parties at Angela Bruce's trailer, but this specific party not
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: so much.
• 19:14
  Speaker 7: Even if he had said he would talk, or if
• 19:16
  Speaker 7: he would be agree rather to be recorded, he's just like,
• 19:20
  Speaker 7: I don't remember anything.
• 19:22
  Speaker 4: I do believe if you remember the party and tell.
• 19:24
  Speaker 12: Us, you know, I fully believe above.
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: Maybe he's just like and the way you put it,
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: it makes sense like this was not a party party.
• 19:32
  Speaker 4: This was not like a planned event. This is not
• 19:33
  Speaker 4: something you got invited to.
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: It was that this woman had a trailer and younger boyfriend,
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: and people knew they could go.
• 19:39
  Speaker 5: There, Yeah, just to hang out and smoke of drenth And.
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: And he didn't say this, but I feel pretty confident
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: that if he had been in a party where someone
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: confessed to a murder, especially someone he knew and already
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: didn't really care for Yeah, he had recalled Yeah, I
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: think so. Lee Mob's knew Lee Clark, and he didn't
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: recall ever seeing Lee Clark at any Angela Bruce's parties.
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: And he definitely didn't recall either him or Kine ever
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: confessing to murder while that one. So when our quests
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: attracked on people who had been at this party, that
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: left us with two teenage girls that Mark Champion told
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: us have been there. He'd forgotten the name of the
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: younger one, but the older one, he said, had been Jessica.
• 20:17
  Speaker 9: You know what, we should go to the library and
• 20:19
  Speaker 9: get a.
• 20:20
  Speaker 5: Ye year book.
• 20:23
  Speaker 4: There's gonna be so many child blonde girls in nineteen
• 20:25
  Speaker 4: ninety seven.
• 20:26
  Speaker 9: Yeah, and probably a lot named Jessica. Yeah.
• 20:31
  Speaker 4: Anyway, white ning the Angela Bruce story, I mean, why
• 20:35
  Speaker 4: didn't Lee are Kine's attorneys go talk to these people?
• 20:40
  Speaker 6: Yeah?
• 20:41
  Speaker 9: They could have talked to them and called anyone.
• 20:44
  Speaker 3: Jessica would not have been hard to find if either
• 20:47
  Speaker 3: Cain's or Lee's attorneys had tried. She'd gone to the
• 20:51
  Speaker 3: same high school as Lee and Kin, and Lee thought
• 20:53
  Speaker 3: he knew who she was, a classmate of his named
• 20:57
  Speaker 3: Jessica Smith. She had red hair. He told us. Susan
• 21:02
  Speaker 3: and I managed to track her down.
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: We just spoke to a Jessica Smith. So who I'm
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: pretty sure is the Jessica Smith that we're looking for?
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: Right age knew some of the right people had red hair.
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: I think it's got to be her.
• 21:19
  Speaker 9: I think it was definitely her. She said she was
• 21:22
  Speaker 9: in a back.
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: Bedroom a party that sounds an awful like like it
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: was this party, but she does not remember much beyond that,
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: did not remember a confession whatsoever, didn't remember the murder,
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: had never been talked to about this.
• 21:39
  Speaker 3: Jessica Smith actually remembered the party at Angela's trailer, though
• 21:43
  Speaker 3: her memories of it were pretty vague, But.
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: It all winds up she was at the party for
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: hours and nothing about it it had there actually been
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: the murder confession there that night or altercation because of it,
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: one would think that might have made an impression, and
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: it did not. But damn, it's kind of hard to
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: track down people from a party happened twenty five years
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: ago where we're pretty sure nothing actually happened, and ask
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: you remember that party remembers because nothing happened. I gave
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: Lee Clark an update on our efforts to track down
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: people who'd been at this party.
• 22:26
  Speaker 4: Well, we talked to three.
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: People at the party, Mark Champion, Jessica Smith, and Lee Mobs.
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: We did. So we go to her and she was
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: really confused. It's like, why we want to talk about
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: this party from you know, when she was a teenager.
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: And then she kind of clicked and she actually did
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: remember the party, but she doesn't remember much of it,
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: which is not surprising. Okay, but she did. What she
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: did not remember is anything about a confession for murder?
• 22:55
  Speaker 5: Might know?
• 22:56
  Speaker 4: She did not really you know, I remember, Okay, I surprised.
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: It was one of those things where she was like,
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: that's want to sound familiar, like maybe I went to
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: high school with him, but I don't remember.
• 23:08
  Speaker 6: Yeah, I guess I didn't make it good a depression?
• 23:11
  Speaker 4: Yeah, how well do you know her?
• 23:14
  Speaker 5: What?
• 23:17
  Speaker 6: I was trying to pull them around with her for
• 23:18
  Speaker 6: a minute, but it didn't make a good oppression.
• 23:21
  Speaker 4: I mean, he didn't make a bad one either.
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: So but if she'd seen you there that night, obviously
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: she wouldn't recognized you then. So so she was with
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: Mark Champion, who I don't believe.
• 23:33
  Speaker 4: You knew or no, no, I don't know him.
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: And he did recall someone coming to the party and
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: talking about how their grandson like what a killer or something.
• 23:46
  Speaker 6: Yeah, that sound like I'm crazy she'd feel with, say,
• 23:49
  Speaker 6: when he's drunk.
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: There was at least one person at Angela Bruce's party
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: that night who back in twenty seven had Knownly Clark,
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: and possibly a second as well if Lee Mobs was
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: there that night. So if Lee Clark really had been
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: at this party, it seems very likely that either one
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: or both of them would have recalled it, especially if
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: he'd been there confessing to murder. They would have been
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: important witnesses for the police to speak to.
• 24:15
  Speaker 3: But that's the thing, like, why didn't the cops talk
• 24:17
  Speaker 3: to any of these people at the.
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: Time unless they did and didn't record it.
• 24:21
  Speaker 3: Well, even if they had talked to people, how cooperative
• 24:24
  Speaker 3: do you think people would have been.
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: Well, Chris West, for instance, would have been super cooperative.
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: He was a friend of Bryan's, I mean Angela Bruce's story.
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: They should have attempted to corroberate it, and they just
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: didn't it all And how do you disprove something that
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: like this, I mean, even back then I guess how
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: you disprove it If she's six door a story, they
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: just say everyone else is lying. But why on earth
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: when you're determining guilt Beyondrey's more doubt? Would you give
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: Angela Bruce the benefit of all doubts and everyone else
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: benefit of none.
• 25:00
  Speaker 3: There was one last person at Angela Bruce's party. We
• 25:03
  Speaker 3: needed to talk to Angela Bruce herself. Susan and I
• 25:07
  Speaker 3: packed up the car and headed out of state to
• 25:10
  Speaker 3: where she is now living. When we got to her house,
• 25:13
  Speaker 3: we didn't even get a chance to knock on her door.
• 25:16
  Speaker 3: She came out and met us in the front yard.
• 25:19
  Speaker 3: Are you Angela Bruce? We asked, who wants to know?
• 25:22
  Speaker 3: She responded. We told her why we were there and
• 25:26
  Speaker 3: that we were hoping to hear from her about the
• 25:28
  Speaker 3: party where she told police she'd once heard two boys
• 25:31
  Speaker 3: confess to murder. I'm not going to get involved in that,
• 25:34
  Speaker 3: she said, I don't remember it. It was so long ago,
• 25:38
  Speaker 3: and besides, I don't know anything about it. Anyway.
• 25:45
  Speaker 4: She was a little bit She wasn't friendly at first.
• 25:47
  Speaker 9: No, she was definitely a little skeptical.
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: She was talking to us at the gate of her porch,
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: and then I pulled a pregnancy car and like, oh,
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: I can't stand up for long it would be over.
• 25:58
  Speaker 4: I'm so sorry. I'm true, we'd bill right if we
• 25:59
  Speaker 4: sat down. She couldn't say no. Also, it's kind of true.
• 26:04
  Speaker 3: So and I'm glad she agreed to let us record her.
• 26:09
  Speaker 5: It was important.
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: It's been two decades since Angela Bruce lived in Floyd County,
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: but she does not have fond memories of the place.
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: What's the first thing you said to us about Floyd
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: County we walked up, we were like, Floyd County as
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: hell or something.
• 26:33
  Speaker 8: Yeah, that's walking in hell because the police wants to
• 26:37
  Speaker 8: get you for anything. They'll charge you just to get
• 26:40
  Speaker 8: you to get money off of baby boyd County is crooked,
• 26:44
  Speaker 8: and that's made me have a bad outlook on police
• 26:47
  Speaker 8: because the way I was done.
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: Angela Bruce moved to Floyd County a few months after
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: Brian's death, but it wasn't too long after she'd arrived
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: that she first heard about it. Some of her neighbors
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: at the mckenry trailer Park had known the Bull family,
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: and they told her about a boy who'd been killed
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: playing Russian roulette. Then a little later on she found
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: out that the boy's family thought his death hadn't been
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: an accident at all. They thought he'd been murdered. When
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: you first heard it was a suicide, then you heard
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: it was a murder. Yeah, And then this party happens.
• 27:22
  Speaker 8: And then the party happens, and Bill's story comes. And
• 27:26
  Speaker 8: let me make this clear. There was a young guy
• 27:30
  Speaker 8: with him when he had like like brown hair or
• 27:33
  Speaker 8: something brownish fellar hair with blonde streaks in it. Back
• 27:37
  Speaker 8: then he was just he was like seventeen or eighteen
• 27:42
  Speaker 8: years old. And I told him, I said, you're gonna
• 27:44
  Speaker 8: have to leave because this is an adult party, not
• 27:49
  Speaker 8: a child's party. I remember him leaving.
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: We were there because we wanted to talk to Angela
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: about whether anyone had ever confessed to murder at a
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: party she'd hosted. But what Angela want to talk about
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: was how there had definitely not been any teenagers drinking
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: any alcohol at this party.
• 28:05
  Speaker 8: And Smittye and Phil came and I told Phil, I said,
• 28:10
  Speaker 8: I don't know who this young man is, but he
• 28:12
  Speaker 8: needs to go home because this is an adult party.
• 28:16
  Speaker 8: There's no alcohol allowed to be given to children. On
• 28:20
  Speaker 8: my watch.
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: It was a few months later that two cops had
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: shut up at a door and asked her about this party.
• 28:27
  Speaker 8: And remember the cops coming and telling me that there
• 28:33
  Speaker 8: was a murder that happened. I said, and they were
• 28:38
  Speaker 8: at your house? I said, who was at my house?
• 28:42
  Speaker 8: And that's when they said, these two I can't remember,
• 28:46
  Speaker 8: you said one of them's names King. Okay, I remember
• 28:50
  Speaker 8: the name Cain Caine's story.
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: So the police were the ones who told you they
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: were at the party? Yeah, how they know they were
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: the party? That's just I think that's what they said.
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: Keen story. Angela Bruce did remember a little bit. But
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: this other boy, Lee Clark, No, Angela told us he
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: hadn't been there.
• 29:11
  Speaker 3: Sometimes it's hard to know, like what you know now.
• 29:13
  Speaker 9: Versus what you know that because you certainly Lee wasn't
• 29:17
  Speaker 9: even there.
• 29:18
  Speaker 3: Did you believe that then as well when you were
• 29:21
  Speaker 3: talking to the police or.
• 29:22
  Speaker 8: No, they told me he was there.
• 29:24
  Speaker 4: Yeah, they're telling you this stuff.
• 29:26
  Speaker 9: You're you at first you believe what they're saying.
• 29:29
  Speaker 8: Yeah, they must they must know stuff.
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: So the other boy, Lee, he was not charged for
• 29:35
  Speaker 1: like until the end of May ninety seven.
• 29:38
  Speaker 8: Why would he be charged with some if he wasn't there.
• 29:40
  Speaker 4: You told the police he confessed the murder.
• 29:44
  Speaker 8: I know, no, police.
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: It was so that, according to the police, you're you're
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: the evidence against him.
• 29:50
  Speaker 8: Well, they didn't have anything else. I don't know why
• 29:54
  Speaker 8: they use evidence that I had said he'd take us out.
• 29:57
  Speaker 8: Don't remember saying that online app. I don't remember them
• 30:05
  Speaker 8: bragging about killing somebody, y'all.
• 30:08
  Speaker 4: Do you think if you would remember if it had happened.
• 30:10
  Speaker 4: Oh yeah, that wouldn't have slipped your mind if they did.
• 30:13
  Speaker 4: Two boys come in.
• 30:14
  Speaker 8: If two boys come in my home telling me supposedly
• 30:18
  Speaker 8: that they murdered somebody, you think I'm gonna forget that.
• 30:21
  Speaker 13: No.
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: Angela still had strong feelings about both the police officers
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: who interviewed her in this case. She had disliked them both,
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: though for very different reasons.
• 30:35
  Speaker 8: And the crooked like I said, and it's a good
• 30:39
  Speaker 8: thing that Dallas is dead because he got what he
• 30:43
  Speaker 8: got coming to him. The other police officer was just
• 30:46
  Speaker 8: a hateful man, cocky, I'm the police. He wore his
• 30:53
  Speaker 8: badge on his side like he was some kind of
• 30:56
  Speaker 8: hot rod detective when all he was was a blue collar.
• 31:01
  Speaker 8: He was really angry. You know about the situation. He said,
• 31:07
  Speaker 8: you need to kill us. What's going on.
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: Angela told us that Dallas Battle and the other officer
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: whose name she didn't recall but who must have been
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: investigator David Stewart, had explained to her why Kane's story
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: was guilty of murder.
• 31:25
  Speaker 8: They didn't believe the Russian roulette, saying they believed that
• 31:29
  Speaker 8: that cause they were in a gang, that they shot
• 31:32
  Speaker 8: and killed him. That's what the police said. Dallas has said.
• 31:37
  Speaker 8: I said, well, I don't know about all that. I
• 31:39
  Speaker 8: don't know. I wouldn't there, you know, I can't speak
• 31:43
  Speaker 8: on nothing like that.
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: The thing is, though Angela Bruce did speak on something
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: like that. She had testified that can and Lee had
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: confessed to this murder, though she told us she didn't
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: recall doing so.
• 31:56
  Speaker 4: You were kind of the critical witness in the case.
• 32:00
  Speaker 8: I don't understand why they would just go on my
• 32:05
  Speaker 8: what'd I say if they had other witnesses. Well, there
• 32:09
  Speaker 8: were other witnesses who testified at court.
• 32:13
  Speaker 4: There's a lot of people, but but n the for
• 32:16
  Speaker 4: Lee Lee Clark.
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: You were the evidence that got Lee arrested because no
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: one else had come forward at that point.
• 32:23
  Speaker 4: They found you.
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: According to the police file, the first time anyone ever
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: tells them Lee was involved.
• 32:28
  Speaker 4: Was when you talked to them.
• 32:30
  Speaker 8: I don't believe that.
• 32:31
  Speaker 4: I I don't necessarily believe that either. But according to their.
• 32:34
  Speaker 8: Records, well their records is wrong.
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: You said, according to the transcript, you said that, well,
• 32:39
  Speaker 1: that's awful, sorry to shoot someone like that. And came
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: Bragg and said he didn't shoot him and he didn't
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: care who didn't like it, and that they walked in
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: there for a pillow over his head. There was a
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: scuffle or something and they were arguing and scuffling and
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: they fell in the bad They put the pillow on
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: his head and shot him in the head.
• 32:57
  Speaker 8: I didn't say no that he didn't say that. No,
• 33:00
  Speaker 8: I don't remember saying none of that.
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: I mean, so, your testimony is pretty detailed.
• 33:07
  Speaker 4: Yeah, you're pretty descriptive.
• 33:10
  Speaker 8: Well as being a witness of something, You're not gonna
• 33:13
  Speaker 8: be that descriptive because you don't really know you're saying.
• 33:16
  Speaker 4: The description is a saying that you know.
• 33:19
  Speaker 8: It was so in depth to where I believe there
• 33:25
  Speaker 8: was words added to my testimony because I remember talking
• 33:32
  Speaker 8: to the police and I told him, I said, I
• 33:34
  Speaker 8: had a party. Bill's story came and some short guy
• 33:38
  Speaker 8: with a beard came. I didn't know his name, and
• 33:42
  Speaker 8: his nephew came, and I told him that he needed
• 33:45
  Speaker 8: to tell his nephew to go home, that there was
• 33:48
  Speaker 8: no children allowed at the adult party.
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: Finally, since Angela kept bringing this issue up, I asked
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: her a question I already knew the answer to, were
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: there are teenagers were partying?
• 34:01
  Speaker 8: Or I don't remember teenagers per se except for an
• 34:07
  Speaker 8: eighteen year old girl and she would straw every blonde.
• 34:11
  Speaker 8: But there was another female there and she was under
• 34:14
  Speaker 8: age and I didn't allow it.
• 34:17
  Speaker 4: And did Stewart talk about the under his drinking.
• 34:19
  Speaker 8: Or yeah, what did he tell you about that? That
• 34:21
  Speaker 8: it it was against the law. And then he said
• 34:25
  Speaker 8: that he could call the DSYS and get my children
• 34:28
  Speaker 8: taken away. And when he said that, I said no,
• 34:32
  Speaker 8: he said no, that ain't gonna happen. It was like,
• 34:36
  Speaker 8: either you tell us what's going on, I remember him saying,
• 34:40
  Speaker 8: or we're gonna get you and put you in jail.
• 34:42
  Speaker 8: Group given alcohol to minors, I said, I didn't even
• 34:45
  Speaker 8: know alcohol, No, didn't know mine.
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: So there he was applying early night, applying our stating
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: that if you.
• 34:52
  Speaker 4: Tell us what we wanna hear, then we will not let.
• 34:55
  Speaker 8: The departments sat.
• 34:57
  Speaker 4: Yeah, you know about the party.
• 34:59
  Speaker 1: Right, Despite Angela Brusus denials, I knew that there had
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: been underage teenagers at this party.
• 35:06
  Speaker 4: I had spoken to at least two of.
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: Them, and evidently Sergeant Battle and mister Kirstewart had known
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: they were minders at this party as well.
• 35:15
  Speaker 8: It's important for you all to know that I was
• 35:17
  Speaker 8: threatened and I had to say what I had to
• 35:20
  Speaker 8: say to protect my children. And as a mother, I'm
• 35:23
  Speaker 8: gonna protect my children to the day I die, and
• 35:27
  Speaker 8: then thereafter I'll haunt whoever's bothering them. But the Floyd
• 35:32
  Speaker 8: County police officers are very crooked and they get you
• 35:35
  Speaker 8: to say things that they threaten you with things, so
• 35:38
  Speaker 8: you'll say what they want you to say. And that's
• 35:41
  Speaker 8: the truth. If you know anybody anything about Rome, Georgia,
• 35:45
  Speaker 8: Floyd County, you'll know that's the truth.
• 35:48
  Speaker 11: So the testimony that we read to you earlier, the
• 35:51
  Speaker 11: statement we read to you earlier where you say they
• 35:54
  Speaker 11: came in and they if they were bragging about shooting.
• 35:58
  Speaker 8: I wasn't told to say that.
• 36:01
  Speaker 4: You never heard anyone confess to any murder.
• 36:04
  Speaker 8: No, nobody said at my table and talk about any murder.
• 36:08
  Speaker 9: Looking back, now, do you feel like.
• 36:12
  Speaker 11: Something you said may have let them put them on
• 36:16
  Speaker 11: the pythens and being convicted.
• 36:19
  Speaker 8: I believe that what I was forced to say did
• 36:23
  Speaker 8: But the truth of the matter is is that they
• 36:25
  Speaker 8: didn't sit at my table talking about a murder. Kane
• 36:29
  Speaker 8: said that they him and Brian Bowley playing Russian Roulette
• 36:35
  Speaker 8: and he got shocked. And I just I feel like
• 36:44
  Speaker 8: that they shouldn't have depended on my statement because I
• 36:48
  Speaker 8: was forced in saying something I didn't want to say.
• 36:55
  Speaker 3: So if kanaan Lee didn't confess to this murder, where
• 36:58
  Speaker 3: had Angela gotten all the details that had been in
• 37:01
  Speaker 3: her statements? Why did she say, for instance, that canaan
• 37:05
  Speaker 3: Lee had shot Brian through a pillow.
• 37:09
  Speaker 8: No, they did not sit around no table confessing no
• 37:12
  Speaker 8: murder by using any kind of daggum pillow. I kept
• 37:16
  Speaker 8: hearing about a pillow, but I never seen a pillow.
• 37:19
  Speaker 8: I mean, you know, if they're gonna use a pillow,
• 37:21
  Speaker 8: they need to show me what was a pillow didn't
• 37:24
  Speaker 8: have blood on it? It would have blood on it
• 37:26
  Speaker 8: in a bullet hole.
• 37:27
  Speaker 4: You said.
• 37:28
  Speaker 8: You kept hearing about the pillow the police. The police
• 37:35
  Speaker 8: kept saying there was a pillow. The pillow was what
• 37:37
  Speaker 8: muffled the shot. There was no muffling those shot. It's
• 37:42
  Speaker 8: gonna go pow and ain't gonna go It's gonna go pal.
• 37:49
  Speaker 3: From the police file, we knew that Dallas Battle and
• 37:52
  Speaker 3: David Stewart had gone to Angela's trailer on two separate
• 37:55
  Speaker 3: occasions to get statements from her about the bowling case.
• 38:00
  Speaker 3: But Angela said she'd seen Dallas Battle on more occasions
• 38:04
  Speaker 3: than that.
• 38:09
  Speaker 4: We you know that he interviewed you twice. Do you
• 38:10
  Speaker 4: think it was more often than that?
• 38:12
  Speaker 8: Oh, he interviewed me twice. But he came over more
• 38:14
  Speaker 8: than twice cause he was really interested in me. I
• 38:18
  Speaker 8: don't I don't date married men. And I told him, man,
• 38:23
  Speaker 8: I said, you got a ring on your finger. You
• 38:25
  Speaker 8: need to go home to your wife and get her
• 38:27
  Speaker 8: in bed, I said, cause you ain't getting me.
• 38:29
  Speaker 1: You d you think, but you felt pretty sure he
• 38:31
  Speaker 1: was trying to sleep with you. Yeah, you would not
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: be the only way. She spoke to him and said that, yeah,
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: he was one crooked police.
• 38:40
  Speaker 4: What was was he like being like? Was he trying
• 38:43
  Speaker 4: to be charming.
• 38:44
  Speaker 8: He was, you know, he was really charming and and
• 38:49
  Speaker 8: telling me, you know, you know if you just say this,
• 38:51
  Speaker 8: it is d D. I don't take you out to
• 38:54
  Speaker 8: dinner da DA. I said, you know what, I could
• 38:56
  Speaker 8: take myself out to dinner.
• 38:58
  Speaker 4: So he was never he was persis.
• 39:00
  Speaker 8: He was really persistent. But he kept coming over, you know,
• 39:06
  Speaker 8: checking and he said, I'm just checking on you. Are
• 39:08
  Speaker 8: you okay? Do you need anything? I said, I don't
• 39:10
  Speaker 8: need nothing on great, So he just spurted and his
• 39:13
  Speaker 8: very charming and flirtatious. He thought he was God's gift
• 39:17
  Speaker 8: to women, okay, and he wasn't ashamed that he was
• 39:20
  Speaker 8: married neither. He came over more than once and it
• 39:23
  Speaker 8: was always like almost dark thirty. It was really weird,
• 39:29
  Speaker 8: you know, like he was wanting something to happen.
• 39:33
  Speaker 4: So you thought you're impression with He was wanting you
• 39:35
  Speaker 4: to invite them in.
• 39:36
  Speaker 8: Yeah, and I have sex. To be honest with you.
• 39:39
  Speaker 9: Was this before the trial or after?
• 39:41
  Speaker 8: It was before and after and during during Yeah.
• 39:48
  Speaker 3: Angela told us that Dallas Battle never threatened her. If anything,
• 39:52
  Speaker 3: she claims it was the other officer, investigator Stewart, who
• 39:56
  Speaker 3: had been the threatening one. He threatened to get her
• 39:59
  Speaker 3: kids te in a way, but even those sergeant battles
• 40:03
  Speaker 3: demeanor towards Angela had been outwardly friendly. She told us
• 40:07
  Speaker 3: his continued visits to her trailer had begun to feel
• 40:10
  Speaker 3: like harassment.
• 40:12
  Speaker 8: You know, I can understand interviewing a witness once maybe twice,
• 40:19
  Speaker 8: but why would you come singlely by yourself to my
• 40:23
  Speaker 8: home at ten eleven o'clock at night when I'm in bed.
• 40:29
  Speaker 8: You know, I had two children I had to get
• 40:31
  Speaker 8: up to go to school.
• 40:33
  Speaker 4: Was battle explicit not what he was looking for?
• 40:35
  Speaker 8: Or was he just oh, it was clear as a woman,
• 40:38
  Speaker 8: as a female, you know when a man wants you okay,
• 40:43
  Speaker 8: and he was nothing but a whore, a perverted horror
• 40:47
  Speaker 8: male horrd. It would cop that had a badge, and
• 40:51
  Speaker 8: he used that badge as getting his way, and you know,
• 40:56
  Speaker 8: things like that will scare you to where you got
• 40:59
  Speaker 8: to do it. That what you got to do for
• 41:01
  Speaker 8: your babies. That's even when you're even if that means
• 41:04
  Speaker 8: sleeping with the police or telling them what they want
• 41:07
  Speaker 8: to hear.
• 41:13
  Speaker 3: Angela Bruce acknowledge giving a false statement to the police
• 41:16
  Speaker 3: about Lee and Kan But like other witnesses we have
• 41:20
  Speaker 3: spoken to. She insisted that she did not remember testifying
• 41:24
  Speaker 3: against Lee and Kane at their trial.
• 41:27
  Speaker 4: And for how long did Dallas battle keep come by
• 41:30
  Speaker 4: your house?
• 41:31
  Speaker 8: He came by my house with a lot, even after
• 41:35
  Speaker 8: the tribe, and I remember telling him, you know you,
• 41:39
  Speaker 8: you don't need to come to my home no more.
• 41:40
  Speaker 8: There's this harassment.
• 41:46
  Speaker 3: So there are a few times and I didn't want
• 41:49
  Speaker 3: to call her out where she's like, I don't remember
• 41:51
  Speaker 3: any trial. I don't remember the trial. And then then
• 41:54
  Speaker 3: she would say, oh no, he continued to come to
• 41:56
  Speaker 3: my house after the trial. I'm like, mmm, so you
• 41:59
  Speaker 3: do remember there was a trial.
• 42:01
  Speaker 9: The trial's over. You don't have to come by anyone.
• 42:05
  Speaker 9: So she remembers the child. Does she remember what she
• 42:08
  Speaker 9: testified about?
• 42:09
  Speaker 3: Maybe not.
• 42:09
  Speaker 9: Does she feel so bad about what she testified that
• 42:12
  Speaker 9: she just wants it to be a buried memory.
• 42:18
  Speaker 3: The other possibility, of course, is that Angela denied any
• 42:21
  Speaker 3: memory of testifying at trial for the same reason she
• 42:24
  Speaker 3: denied any memory of serving alcohol to minors at her party,
• 42:29
  Speaker 3: Because both of those things would technically be crimes, and
• 42:33
  Speaker 3: Angela did not want to admit to perjury.
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: It wasn't until you talked to the police that they
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: re arrested Caine and arrest me for the first time,
• 42:45
  Speaker 1: in charge them with the conspiracy can mem murder?
• 42:48
  Speaker 8: See, yes, it's Shane.
• 42:51
  Speaker 6: You know.
• 42:51
  Speaker 8: I was forced to say and stuff. Why if I
• 42:55
  Speaker 8: was in his courtroom, I didn't adjudge see through me
• 42:59
  Speaker 8: if he was such a good judge, because the judges
• 43:04
  Speaker 8: and the police are together. All of it was Russian
• 43:14
  Speaker 8: roulette and Lee Clark was not even there and I
• 43:18
  Speaker 8: don't know. And the only reason why he got brought
• 43:20
  Speaker 8: up in it is because police mentioned him.
• 43:23
  Speaker 9: You mentioned to us earlier that the police didn't like
• 43:26
  Speaker 9: these boys.
• 43:27
  Speaker 8: No, they didn't like them.
• 43:29
  Speaker 4: Did they tell you why they didn't like them?
• 43:30
  Speaker 8: No, they never told me why. They always thought that
• 43:33
  Speaker 8: they were in a we call it some kind of
• 43:37
  Speaker 8: thieving ring, stealing stuff, and that's what they told me.
• 43:44
  Speaker 3: This thieving ring was called the Freebird Gang, or at
• 43:47
  Speaker 3: least that's what Angela Bruce testified to at trial. After
• 43:51
  Speaker 3: talking to Angela Bruce, we began to understand how many
• 43:54
  Speaker 3: of the confusing details in her statements came to be.
• 43:58
  Speaker 3: Like Angela's story about Thees showing up at this party
• 44:01
  Speaker 3: to pick up Cain and Lee.
• 44:05
  Speaker 1: And your When you went at trial, you mentioned the
• 44:07
  Speaker 1: blonde girl strawberry blonde.
• 44:11
  Speaker 8: She was there that night and Caine was there, but
• 44:16
  Speaker 8: I don't remember seeing Lee Clark at my party.
• 44:21
  Speaker 3: When Angela clarified that the blonde girl, the one she
• 44:24
  Speaker 3: identified at trial as Caprice, had not just been blonde,
• 44:28
  Speaker 3: but rather strawberry blonde, it suddenly clicked for us who
• 44:32
  Speaker 3: she was talking about.
• 44:35
  Speaker 8: I can't even remember the female's name because she was
• 44:37
  Speaker 8: Pretie Mandia. I remember.
• 44:41
  Speaker 4: I asked, was there a Jessica there? That's her name,
• 44:44
  Speaker 4: Jessica Smith.
• 44:50
  Speaker 3: Angela Bruce told us that Jessica Smith and another blonde
• 44:53
  Speaker 3: girl had come back to the party later that night
• 44:57
  Speaker 3: and picked up Phil's story.
• 44:59
  Speaker 8: They cou in a front stat because they couldn't get
• 45:01
  Speaker 8: him in a vaccinat he was too drunk.
• 45:03
  Speaker 4: What were they driving?
• 45:04
  Speaker 8: A little car? I believe it was a black car,
• 45:10
  Speaker 8: a dark colored car, black, dark blue, purple, something like that.
• 45:13
  Speaker 8: It was not dark, and they put him in the
• 45:16
  Speaker 8: front seat. That the girl that was in the front
• 45:17
  Speaker 8: seat got in a back saint because Bill couldn't get
• 45:21
  Speaker 8: in a back saint.
• 45:21
  Speaker 4: As how drunk, he was and you think it was
• 45:23
  Speaker 4: Jessica's car.
• 45:27
  Speaker 8: And they drove him home.
• 45:30
  Speaker 3: In nineteen ninety seven, Angela Bruce gave two statements to
• 45:34
  Speaker 3: the police. In the first statement, she doesn't mention any
• 45:37
  Speaker 3: teenage girls. In the second statement, she suddenly recalls two
• 45:42
  Speaker 3: girls picking up Lee and Kane and Caprice was driving.
• 45:46
  Speaker 3: The investigators asked her what kind of car she'd been in.
• 45:50
  Speaker 3: It was a little car. It looked like it might
• 45:52
  Speaker 3: have been a blue or black little car.
• 45:54
  Speaker 1: So the part of uh Angelo Vere's story that was
• 45:58
  Speaker 1: always very weird. It was her claim that Caprice Hyatt
• 46:00
  Speaker 1: showed up like this blonde girl showed at the party.
• 46:04
  Speaker 1: And I think that mystery has been resolved.
• 46:07
  Speaker 9: Yeah, it's Jessica Smith.
• 46:10
  Speaker 4: The blonde girl's never the price. It was Jessica.
• 46:20
  Speaker 3: At the end of our interview with Angela, I asked
• 46:23
  Speaker 3: her if she had anything to say to Cain and Lee.
• 46:27
  Speaker 8: Lee. I'm so sorry that I was forced into doing that,
• 46:32
  Speaker 8: and I hope you can understand that I was a
• 46:34
  Speaker 8: single parent with children that threatened my children against me,
• 46:39
  Speaker 8: And I feel like you deserve to be set free
• 46:41
  Speaker 8: because he wasn't there, and Kin Joshua, I want to
• 46:48
  Speaker 8: tell you, son, I'm sorry, y'all you should have never
• 46:54
  Speaker 8: had the gun that now you've got in trouble for
• 46:56
  Speaker 8: the gun, but you didn't commit the murder. Please forgive
• 46:59
  Speaker 8: me because I was forced in to say stuff by
• 47:03
  Speaker 8: the police. And you know as well as I do,
• 47:05
  Speaker 8: the four Counties messed up and crooked, and I feel
• 47:10
  Speaker 8: that both of you need to be separated, And from
• 47:13
  Speaker 8: the bottom of my heart, I'm so sorry. I'm really
• 47:17
  Speaker 8: so sorry, and I feel like they need to be separated.
• 47:34
  Speaker 3: It was because of Angela Bruce that the Supreme Court
• 47:37
  Speaker 3: of Georgia upheld Lee and Kaine's conviction, despite the trial
• 47:41
  Speaker 3: court having mistakenly allowed an evidence that should never have
• 47:45
  Speaker 3: been let in. But the erroneous admission of this other evidence,
• 47:49
  Speaker 3: the court concluded, had been made harmless by the testimony
• 47:53
  Speaker 3: of the party hostess. So what does it mean for
• 47:56
  Speaker 3: Lee and Kane that Angela Bruce recanted her testimony. Well,
• 48:01
  Speaker 3: this is something Susan and I had discussed even before
• 48:04
  Speaker 3: we talked to her.
• 48:07
  Speaker 4: But witnesses that recan don't matter.
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: Usually you'd need to have like something that like she
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: got a deal or got money.
• 48:14
  Speaker 9: Continue on us twenty seven North.
• 48:16
  Speaker 1: The recanting is meaningless. But her having something that should
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: have been disclosed it wasn't. That's what matters.
• 48:23
  Speaker 9: If she were canceled, there's doudy zero.
• 48:26
  Speaker 1: No waitness is changing stories doesn't mean jack shit. Courts
• 48:32
  Speaker 1: do not care. You can have every single witness in
• 48:35
  Speaker 1: the case saying, oh, yeah, I totally lied.
• 48:37
  Speaker 8: I passed westby pass.
• 48:39
  Speaker 4: The defendant didn't do it.
• 48:40
  Speaker 1: I made it all up, and the court is not
• 48:43
  Speaker 1: gonna hear a thing. I'll tell you to get the
• 48:46
  Speaker 1: hell of that court round doesn't matter.
• 48:49
  Speaker 5: Now.
• 48:49
  Speaker 1: What matters this is they're like, yeah, I made the
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: whole thing up, and I got paid ten thousand dollars
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: to say it.
• 48:54
  Speaker 9: I got my kids back.
• 48:56
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 48:57
  Speaker 3: But a case like this, there's no DNA, there's no
• 49:00
  Speaker 3: like solid evidence against.
• 49:02
  Speaker 4: League or Kane.
• 49:03
  Speaker 9: Yeah, that's their problem, only eyewitnesses.
• 49:05
  Speaker 4: That's their problem.
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: They should have proven she was a liar back then,
• 49:10
  Speaker 1: and they failed to do so. Our criminal justice system
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: has set up so that both the defense and the
• 49:15
  Speaker 1: prosecution are supposed to prove a trial whether or not
• 49:18
  Speaker 1: a witness is lying. Once the trial is over, the
• 49:21
  Speaker 1: question of whether the witness is lying doesn't really matter,
• 49:24
  Speaker 1: not by itself. Anyway, When we told thee's father, Glenn Clark,
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: about our interview with Angela Bruce, he didn't have much
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: of a reaction. He was glad someone had finally spoken
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: to her, but he had known she was lying for
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: a long time and that had never changed anything before.
• 49:43
  Speaker 6: So you all.
• 49:43
  Speaker 3: Along you thought Angela was lying?
• 49:46
  Speaker 9: Oh yeah, and now that feeling you had is confirmed.
• 49:50
  Speaker 12: Yeah. I mean there's look, they with a whole bunch
• 49:54
  Speaker 12: of people in this trial lying. I mean, it's just obvious.
• 49:58
  Speaker 12: I tell y'all a long time. I'm not an educated man,
• 50:01
  Speaker 12: but I got a degree in common sense. But common
• 50:03
  Speaker 12: sense don't mean nothing in court, it don't. It don't
• 50:07
  Speaker 12: mean nothing in court.
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: What Angela Bruce told us may or may not mean
• 50:10
  Speaker 1: anything in court, but it does mean something to.
• 50:13
  Speaker 4: Leave Clark here, Let's see if I can find the.
• 50:18
  Speaker 5: Thank you.
• 50:22
  Speaker 4: Can you hear that?
• 50:24
  Speaker 5: God?
• 50:24
  Speaker 8: Now, I'm so sorry from the bottom of my heart.
• 50:27
  Speaker 8: I'm so sorry. I'm really so sorry, and I feel
• 50:32
  Speaker 8: like they need to be set free.
• 50:35
  Speaker 5: Did you hear any of that? Yeah? I heard it.
• 50:39
  Speaker 5: Fact broke me down right there.
• 50:42
  Speaker 6: I've been waiting for twenty five years.
• 50:46
  Speaker 5: God, yeah, Oh man.
• 50:52
  Speaker 6: M m I'm gonna tell you something soon. Regardless how
• 50:57
  Speaker 6: regardless how all this right here turns out, I'm indebted
• 51:01
  Speaker 6: to you for the rest of my life. You brought
• 51:04
  Speaker 6: me a lot of George. You really have you realize
• 51:09
  Speaker 6: what you just did? You realized that the weight of
• 51:13
  Speaker 6: what you just lifted off me?
• 51:17
  Speaker 4: I don't think I can.
• 51:20
  Speaker 6: I don't find a sayson. You're just listen, the weight
• 51:22
  Speaker 6: off my shoulders, the crushing me for a long time, lad,
• 51:29
  Speaker 6: people looking at me, looking down and nosing me for
• 51:33
  Speaker 6: a lot of years, believing this stuff in her kitch
• 51:37
  Speaker 6: the morning, by itself was the reason I couldn't get
• 51:39
  Speaker 6: my stuff over turned in court. That's all I've been
• 51:43
  Speaker 6: asking for over twenty five years.
• 51:47
  Speaker 1: Next time, on proof, Can you think of another homicide
• 51:55
  Speaker 1: case where there was not a referral for an autopsy?
• 51:59
  Speaker 5: Oh?
• 52:01
  Speaker 6: Independently, Independently, I cannot.
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: And he's the one who ordered that they're not be
• 52:08
  Speaker 1: an autopsy.
• 52:09
  Speaker 14: And every single person we have talked to who's closely
• 52:13
  Speaker 14: related to Brian, his sister, his brother in law, his uncle,
• 52:17
  Speaker 14: his aunt, they are one hundred percent convinced that Brian
• 52:22
  Speaker 14: had an autopsy and was sent to Atlanta or somewhere.
• 52:28
  Speaker 2: I wanted to go today Maximum Divider, just to see
• 52:32
  Speaker 2: the process in.
• 52:33
  Speaker 4: Case I did, but I did it for some reason,
• 52:35
  Speaker 4: I didn't get to go.
• 52:39
  Speaker 5: She did kept saying there's there's a gun buried or
• 52:42
  Speaker 5: a funder Josh's trailer.
• 52:45
  Speaker 13: And I swear she used to try to get made
• 52:47
  Speaker 13: to go crawl up under that trailer to dig for
• 52:51
  Speaker 13: this guy.
• 53:00
  Speaker 1: You've been listening to Proof, a podcast by Red Marble Media.
• 53:04
  Speaker 1: We're off next Monday for Memorial Day, but we're back
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: on June sixth with episode thirteen. Send us your questions
• 53:10
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• 53:14
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• 53:17
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• 53:21
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• 53:25
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• 53:29
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• 53:48
  Speaker 3: this week. Thanks for listening.