Richard Speck: The Night Eight Nurses Died
In March 1963, 19-year-old Carl Junior Hackathorn from Akron, Ohio, shot 20-year-old Dallas mother Bobbie Jewell Smith three times above the left ear, killing her instantly. He fled south, crashed near the Mexican border, and confessed within hours, claiming he “didn’t know what he was doing.”
A Texas jury rejected his insanity defense and sentenced him to death. What followed was a years-long legal battle over the voluntariness of his confessions in the pre-Miranda era.
Host Alexander Lawson examines the killing, the flight, the confessions, the trial, and the constitutional fights that kept…
The skinny
The skinny isn't ready yet — notes appear once the transcript is processed.