Latest / Bless This Mess: A Southern True Crime Podcast / [Georgia] The Body in the Burn Pile

Transcript

[Georgia] The Body in the Burn Pile · Bless This Mess: A Southern True Crime Podcast

• 0:10
  Speaker 1: Hey everyone, welcome to Bless This Mess and the True
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: Crime Podcast.
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: I'm Kara, here with Stu. Say hey, Stu. Hey. Alright,
• 0:26
  Speaker 2: we are back this week and we are going to Georgia.
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: Good old Georgia. Oh my, is that what that, is
• 0:32
  Speaker 2: that the.
• 0:33
  Speaker 3: Yes, would you like me to sing that? No.
• 0:36
  Speaker 2: No. But you know what it reminds me of is
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: he was singing that in Practical Magic, and Practical Magic
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: 2 comes out now.
• 0:42
  Speaker 3: Willie Nelson was singing that?
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: No, the dead guy. It's a song he sings in
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: the movie, him with Nicole Kidman, the boyfriend that they killed,
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: the abusive boyfriend. Anyways, Practical Magic 2 comes out now,
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: but I am upset because they didn't use the original... daughters.
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: They got new people to play, I guess, the daughters.
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: I don't really know the premise of it all. The premise.
• 1:11
  Speaker 3: Did they generate AI characters?
• 1:13
  Speaker 2: No, it is not like our... AI has completely taken
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: over because we called Sam's Club. Well, our favorite activity
• 1:21
  Speaker 2: right now is getting things delivered via drone. So that's
• 1:25
  Speaker 2: our new thing right now. I posted a video of
• 1:27
  Speaker 2: our first one. It was like, I don't know. We
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: were just like, what? It's so crazy.
• 1:31
  Speaker 3: Yes, it said for 99 cents, we can ultra fast
• 1:34
  Speaker 3: deliver it to you.
• 1:36
  Speaker 2: Steve's like, I ordered a drone delivery. I'm like, okay.
• 1:39
  Speaker 3: Let's see what this is.
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it was crazy. It's like well worth the 99 cents.
• 1:45
  Speaker 2: And then we called, they delivered our Sam's Club today
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: and like most of it was missing. So like a human,
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: not a drone. The drone would have gotten it all here,
• 1:55
  Speaker 2: I'm sure.
• 1:56
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: The human delivered it and- Most of it was missing.
• 2:00
  Speaker 3: Two out of eight items arrived.
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: Yes. And so Stu tries to do the chats. Like,
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: the chat's not available. You need to call. Because they
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: always make it so difficult when you want to fix
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: a problem. So he calls, and it's like, hi, I'm
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: Sam's Club new AI assistant.
• 2:17
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: Or something like that. But what was creepy is it
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: wasn't like a robotic voice. She was coming on to me.
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: It wasn't a robotic voice. It sounded like a real human.
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: I mean, they even had her saying, like, uh... um
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: okay let me see is it this but then you
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: started getting into the you could tell she was ai
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: because then stew started telling her thank you and i
• 2:36
  Speaker 2: was like stop thanking the road so i think he
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: was doing it on purpose because he felt she was
• 2:41
  Speaker 2: flirting with.
• 2:41
  Speaker 3: Him i was doing it to agitate you and it worked.
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: But our son did did think the drone whenever he's
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: like thank you it's like no we can't be thinking
• 2:50
  Speaker 2: the robots we.
• 2:51
  Speaker 3: Can't humanize them you gotta be nice to the robots
• 2:53
  Speaker 3: when they take.
• 2:54
  Speaker 2: Over This is true. So, yeah, that's our current fixation.
• 2:57
  Speaker 3: That way we're the last to be killed.
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: The drone. We're in big city now. We're not in
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: the little cities anymore. We can get drone delivery. But anyway,
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: so back to our case. So pull up your rocking
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: chair and listen to this quick little reminder. So this
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: is our weekly schedule. So on Mondays, if you're new here,
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: on Mondays, we step outside the South for our Little
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: Less Mess mini-sode. So that'll come out, like I said,
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: on Mondays. And that's just me telling a story. I
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: really enjoy doing those because there's a lot of cases
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: I like to cover that are outside the South. So
• 3:31
  Speaker 2: that gives me the opportunity. And then on Thursdays, this
• 3:35
  Speaker 2: is our regular fooling cases right here on the main feed.
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: That's what you're listening to now. And so if you
• 3:41
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• 3:44
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• 3:47
  Speaker 2: Patreon family. We even have like little text message threads.
• 3:51
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• 3:53
  Speaker 2: them and respond back. It's like a direct message type thing.
• 3:58
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• 4:00
  Speaker 2: our Buy Me a Coffee page to treat us to
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: a sweet tea. Now while you're at it, make sure
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: you're following us on TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube. There
• 4:08
  Speaker 2: you can catch my true crime and dinner time videos.
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: Which is what I'm going to do. So my Sunday soup,
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: that will already have came out. I'm doing a True
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: Crime and Dinner Time once a week now for Sundays.
• 4:21
  Speaker 2: I go back and forth because I do like sharing
• 4:24
  Speaker 2: our dinners, but it's too much. I don't want to
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: record anything in the moment. I don't like doing that
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: because it takes away from living life. So I'll be
• 4:31
  Speaker 2: doing True Crime and Dinner Time, and then I also
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: do a weekly True Crime Documentary Recommendations And like I
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: mentioned last time, I also started a cozy mystery movie club,
• 4:41
  Speaker 2: so I posted our second meetings due.
• 4:43
  Speaker 3: Oh my goodness.
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: Yes, so you can go check those out.
• 4:45
  Speaker 3: As per usual, I was not invited.
• 4:47
  Speaker 2: You were not invited. It's something I do alone. It's
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: just like you do some things alone.
• 4:53
  Speaker 3: I do things alone without you as well.
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: And as always, the best free way to support the
• 4:58
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• 5:00
  Speaker 2: subscribe wherever you're listening right now. All right, so grab
• 5:03
  Speaker 2: your mason jars and let's get into it.
• 5:06
  Speaker 3: As always, Kara puts in little landmines to trip me
• 5:08
  Speaker 3: up as we go through the case. And today, it
• 5:11
  Speaker 3: happens in our first paragraph. Today, we're heading into Cherokee County, Georgia,
• 5:15
  Speaker 3: just northwest of Alpharetta. Alpharetta.
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 5:19
  Speaker 2: Alpharetta. I don't feel like that's that hard. It's spelled A-L-P-H-A.
• 5:24
  Speaker 3: Alpha. Uh-huh.
• 5:25
  Speaker 2: R-E-T-T-A.
• 5:26
  Speaker 3: Okay. Retta.
• 5:27
  Speaker 2: Alpharetta. Uh-huh. If you're from Alpharetta out there, then get Stu.
• 5:33
  Speaker 2: It's Leviosa.
• 5:36
  Speaker 3: Yes, I think I did mess up Georgia last time
• 5:38
  Speaker 3: as well.
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: It was.
• 5:39
  Speaker 2: Well, maybe Georgia needs to get some easier names.
• 5:41
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 5:42
  Speaker 2: Well, they're easier than, they're right up there maybe with
• 5:45
  Speaker 2: some of those with the Louisiana names.
• 5:47
  Speaker 3: Yes, but I know how to pronounce those because I
• 5:49
  Speaker 3: grew up there.
• 5:49
  Speaker 2: But I don't. Malankin.
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: Malankin.
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's how I thought you pronounced it. Malanson was
• 5:55
  Speaker 2: Malankin because it's spelled M-E-L-A-N-C-O-N. Malanson. And I was like, Malankin?
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: Mm-hmm. Hey.
• 6:03
  Speaker 2: Listen, I'm better with like.
• 6:04
  Speaker 3: You know what the one had me until I was
• 6:07
  Speaker 3: an adult was Swallow. S-O-I-L-E-A-U.
• 6:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that one is crazy.
• 6:13
  Speaker 3: I was like, Soiloo? They're like, no, it's Swallow.
• 6:16
  Speaker 2: But you know what? I'm better with the more Hispanic,
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: because growing up in East Texas, I'm better with those
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: names and rolling my R's and things like that than you.
• 6:28
  Speaker 2: If I do say so myself.
• 6:30
  Speaker 3: Well, that's you saying so yourself. Anyway, getting back to
• 6:34
  Speaker 3: our case at hand. If you've never spent time out
• 6:38
  Speaker 3: that way, it is an area where suburban Atlanta wealth
• 6:42
  Speaker 3: is right next to rolling rural acreage.
• 6:46
  Speaker 2: You got that word, too. I hate that word.
• 6:48
  Speaker 3: Yep, that one will get you with the R's. Rural, rural, rural.
• 6:53
  Speaker 3: You'll have multi-million dollar estate on one side of a
• 6:56
  Speaker 3: two-lane road and pastures full of cows and John Deere
• 7:00
  Speaker 3: tractors on the other.
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: I feel like that's like Karen Crow.
• 7:04
  Speaker 3: Yeah. Well, I mean, them John Deere tractors, the bigger
• 7:08
  Speaker 3: they get, the more they are as expensive as a mansion.
• 7:10
  Speaker 2: Well, I know that, but what they're trying to say
• 7:12
  Speaker 2: is that there's country houses and big old mansions.
• 7:16
  Speaker 3: Country mice and city mice living together?
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: Yes, because what happens is the rich people want those
• 7:20
  Speaker 2: views of all that pretty space out there and then
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: come build their mansions. And then Karen crows like that.
• 7:26
  Speaker 2: It seems like there's, you know, on that one side
• 7:28
  Speaker 2: of the road when you're driving to our old house,
• 7:30
  Speaker 2: there's those big old properties with them big old houses,
• 7:32
  Speaker 2: like six chimneys and all this stuff. And then on
• 7:36
  Speaker 2: the other side, there's like trailers. Us. Or us.
• 7:42
  Speaker 3: Out on Purcell Lane. Sitting on about 10 rolling acres
• 7:47
  Speaker 3: was the Ferris family farm. This wasn't just a house
• 7:50
  Speaker 3: with a manicured front yard. It had a main house,
• 7:53
  Speaker 3: a detached barn with an apartment upstairs, fence pastures, farm equipment,
• 7:58
  Speaker 3: a pond, and a large outdoor burn pile down the
• 8:02
  Speaker 3: slope from the house. For anyone living on a piece
• 8:05
  Speaker 3: of southern acreage like that, a burn pile is not
• 8:08
  Speaker 3: suspicious in the slightest.
• 8:09
  Speaker 2: Yes, you've got to have some place to burn things,
• 8:12
  Speaker 2: you know.
• 8:12
  Speaker 3: Yes, bodies.
• 8:14
  Speaker 2: I guess some people would be like, what? If you're
• 8:16
  Speaker 2: not from, I guess a lot of people, if you're
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: not from the country and never lived there, you would
• 8:21
  Speaker 2: never see a burn pile. You know, I guess. I
• 8:24
  Speaker 2: grew up with a burn. We had a burn pile.
• 8:27
  Speaker 3: Out in the back.
• 8:28
  Speaker 2: We weren't even in the country. Well, I guess we were.
• 8:30
  Speaker 2: We were in a small town, but we lived on.
• 8:31
  Speaker 2: That was back when we had the neighborhoods. A lot
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: of the neighborhoods were on an acre or whatever. And
• 8:36
  Speaker 2: now they're on like postage stamp.
• 8:39
  Speaker 3: Yeah, we used to. We didn't have trash service out
• 8:41
  Speaker 3: there for the longest time.
• 8:42
  Speaker 2: Oh, Lord, you're the reason this planet's going under.
• 8:46
  Speaker 3: So we had burn barrels. So we'd burn our trash
• 8:48
  Speaker 3: with a barrel.
• 8:49
  Speaker 2: Okay, we did not have to burn our trash. We
• 8:50
  Speaker 2: burned yard clippings, things like that.
• 8:54
  Speaker 3: Well, that's what we had to burn pile for, but
• 8:56
  Speaker 3: we also had to burn barrel for the trash. Wow.
• 8:59
  Speaker 3: So we put it all in the trash, burned it
• 9:01
  Speaker 3: all down for however many weeks until it was full.
• 9:03
  Speaker 3: Then you would take the barrel, empty it.
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: That's crazy. That's so bad for the environment, though.
• 9:10
  Speaker 3: Well, my stepdad was working seven and seven, so he
• 9:13
  Speaker 3: wasn't able to haul the trash once a week or
• 9:15
  Speaker 3: whenever it got pulled to the dump.
• 9:19
  Speaker 2: I guess back then it was more the norm, though,
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: out there. Like, now everybody knows better, and you probably
• 9:24
  Speaker 2: get fined.
• 9:25
  Speaker 3: And we have trash.
• 9:27
  Speaker 2: Trash service.
• 9:27
  Speaker 3: Trash service now. Anyway, that's the purpose of a burn
• 9:31
  Speaker 3: pile if you're like, what the hell is a burn pile?
• 9:34
  Speaker 3: From an area.
• 9:35
  Speaker 2: It's a burn body store.
• 9:36
  Speaker 3: Yes. I got to guess you're from a large city
• 9:39
  Speaker 3: and never been outside the large city. If you don't
• 9:41
  Speaker 3: know what a burn pile is or it's foreign to you. Yes.
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: That's what I was saying. To me, it's just like
• 9:47
  Speaker 2: a normal thing, but it's like you have to, somebody
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: that has never lived in the country or anything that
• 9:53
  Speaker 2: may not know that you can have a, everybody had
• 9:56
  Speaker 2: a burn pile.
• 9:57
  Speaker 3: Yes. Now, as we were saying, this is where the
• 10:00
  Speaker 3: tree limbs, old cardboard boxes, household trash, and like I said,
• 10:05
  Speaker 3: we did the burn barrel. Some people threw it on
• 10:07
  Speaker 3: the burn pile. And scrap brush would go. So basically
• 10:11
  Speaker 3: anything that you didn't want to take to the dump
• 10:12
  Speaker 3: because it was going to be whatever. If it would burn,
• 10:15
  Speaker 3: you would just take it out to your burn pile,
• 10:17
  Speaker 3: set it on fire. And....
• 10:20
  Speaker 2: Toast a marshmallow.
• 10:21
  Speaker 3: And if you got it, if you build it big
• 10:23
  Speaker 3: enough and it wasn't like full of trash and stinky stuff,
• 10:25
  Speaker 3: you'd invite the neighbors over and y'all drink beer around
• 10:28
  Speaker 3: the burn pile.
• 10:29
  Speaker 2: Yes, we had, we would invite the, sometimes we would
• 10:32
  Speaker 2: build a big enough burn pile and it wasn't inviting
• 10:35
  Speaker 2: the neighbors to have a beer around. We would invite
• 10:37
  Speaker 2: the church group over and have like a big burn
• 10:40
  Speaker 2: pile in the back. Everybody hung out around the burn pile.
• 10:44
  Speaker 2: Like it's, somebody out there listening to this is like,
• 10:46
  Speaker 2: what the fuck were you people doing?
• 10:49
  Speaker 3: You know, Your cult would show up?
• 10:52
  Speaker 2: Yes, our cult.
• 10:52
  Speaker 3: Your progressive guitar church?
• 10:55
  Speaker 2: They would.
• 10:55
  Speaker 3: Somebody would show up with a guitar and y'all would
• 10:57
  Speaker 3: sing songs around the burn pile? They would, yeah. Oh,
• 10:59
  Speaker 3: my God. I know. It's a miracle I'm here. Y'all
• 11:02
  Speaker 3: would sing hymns and read verses out of the Bible
• 11:04
  Speaker 3: while y'all did this?
• 11:06
  Speaker 2: No, we did not sing hymns. That's the Baptist.
• 11:08
  Speaker 3: Oh, okay. Yes, that was me and my grandma. I'd
• 11:12
  Speaker 3: go see her at the church.
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: Anyway.
• 11:14
  Speaker 2: Anyway.
• 11:15
  Speaker 3: The head of this household was a 58-year-old fellow by
• 11:18
  Speaker 3: the name of Gary Wayne Ferris. Gary was an attorney
• 11:22
  Speaker 3: in the Atlanta area specializing in corporate and real estate law. Professionally,
• 11:27
  Speaker 3: he was known as a sharp, quiet, and extremely successful fellow. Financially,
• 11:32
  Speaker 3: Gary was the breadwinner who paid the bills, funded the farm,
• 11:35
  Speaker 3: and kept the entire engine running. He was a large man,
• 11:39
  Speaker 3: and he was over 6 feet tall, weighed approximately 315 pounds,
• 11:44
  Speaker 3: And by all accounts, he kept pretty long hours at
• 11:46
  Speaker 3: his practice.
• 11:48
  Speaker 2: As they do, Stu, as they tend to do.
• 11:50
  Speaker 3: Got to get them billable hours in.
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: Yep, got to get billable hours. So Gary had been
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: married to Melody Walker Ferris for nearly 38 years. They
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: met when they were young, built a life together, had
• 12:01
  Speaker 2: four children who were all grown adults by 2018. And
• 12:04
  Speaker 2: then they also had a couple of grandchildren run around
• 12:08
  Speaker 2: occasionally at this point. On paper, it looked like the
• 12:12
  Speaker 2: quintessential successful Southern... country estate they got the beautiful home
• 12:17
  Speaker 2: beautiful family he's successful and everything but as we know
• 12:23
  Speaker 2: behind closed doors this marriage had been running on fumes
• 12:27
  Speaker 2: for over a decade that's a long time to hate
• 12:30
  Speaker 2: each other it is by the summer i mean i
• 12:34
  Speaker 2: go one day hate and stew i'm like i gotta
• 12:36
  Speaker 2: get out this.
• 12:36
  Speaker 3: Bitch i'm like call the divorce attorney then let's do
• 12:40
  Speaker 3: this i'm ready uh.
• 12:43
  Speaker 2: So by the summer of 2018, Gary and Melody were
• 12:48
  Speaker 2: basically roommates who just pretty much actively avoided each other
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: under the same roof. I mean, the house was big
• 12:54
  Speaker 2: enough so they could do this. Gary lived entirely in
• 12:57
  Speaker 2: the downstairs basement area of the house, which was set
• 13:00
  Speaker 2: up with a bedroom, a rec room, a television, and
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: his home office. Melody stayed entirely upstairs on the main
• 13:07
  Speaker 2: and upper floors. They rarely cross paths unless they had
• 13:10
  Speaker 2: something to argue about. It's like, let me march my
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: ass down this basement. I got to talk to Carrie.
• 13:16
  Speaker 3: So you acknowledge it was probably her wanting to argue.
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: Probably because he did something stupid.
• 13:21
  Speaker 3: Like what?
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: I don't know. Hookers and blow? I don't know.
• 13:25
  Speaker 3: What does she care?
• 13:27
  Speaker 2: We got to keep up appearances, Stu.
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: Okay?
• 13:29
  Speaker 3: Okay.
• 13:30
  Speaker 2: As long as he ain't.
• 13:32
  Speaker 3: Doing it on the 50-yard line at the Super Bowl
• 13:33
  Speaker 3: at halftime.
• 13:34
  Speaker 2: No, you can't be that guy over there in Ohio
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: at the trailer park with the hooker or whatever. That's
• 13:40
  Speaker 2: worth $ 500 million.
• 13:41
  Speaker 3: You call that girl to come to your hotel room.
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 13:44
  Speaker 3: What is wrong with you?
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: I know.
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: And what they argued about consistently was money and family.
• 13:50
  Speaker 2: Always money. Gary had actually filed for divorce back in 2010.
• 13:55
  Speaker 2: though they eventually dismissed the case and decided to keep coexisting.
• 13:58
  Speaker 2: Probably when he saw how much money it was going
• 14:00
  Speaker 2: to cost him. And he's like, I ain't even gonna
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: be able to live in this house at all. Let
• 14:03
  Speaker 2: alone the bait. Let's all just take the basement. I
• 14:05
  Speaker 2: guess Gary's main complaint was Melody's spending habits, which he
• 14:10
  Speaker 2: thought were out of control. Melody's main complaint was that
• 14:13
  Speaker 2: Gary was constantly opening the checkbook to financially bail out
• 14:17
  Speaker 2: and support their adult children, particularly their son, Scott, who
• 14:22
  Speaker 2: lived right on the property and, in that apartment that
• 14:25
  Speaker 2: they had built above the barn.
• 14:27
  Speaker 3: So everybody's just blowing money.
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: Yes, that is frustrating. I mean, in my opinion, if
• 14:35
  Speaker 2: you're going to be spending money, it better be your
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: wife spending money rather than you giving money to your
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: unappreciative deadbeat child that needs to go out and make
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: their own money.
• 14:45
  Speaker 3: Yes, who's already got free housing.
• 14:46
  Speaker 2: Melanie had to be under that 315-pound man at least
• 14:49
  Speaker 2: four times.
• 14:51
  Speaker 3: Was he 315 at the time? Or did he pack
• 14:54
  Speaker 3: on the pounds later?
• 14:55
  Speaker 2: She's done her part, okay? And probably burned his big-headed babies.
• 15:00
  Speaker 3: Oh, Gary grunting and sweating on top of old Melody
• 15:02
  Speaker 3: like that.
• 15:03
  Speaker 2: Okay, we can't speak ill of the dead, Stuart, okay?
• 15:06
  Speaker 3: Both Gary and Melody had also engaged in extramarital affairs
• 15:11
  Speaker 3: over the years, so any romantic illusions in that house
• 15:15
  Speaker 3: were long dead and buried. They were just two people
• 15:18
  Speaker 3: trapped in a 10-acre standoff, basically. They're living on sepulchre floors,
• 15:23
  Speaker 3: they're keeping track of every dollar that the other person
• 15:25
  Speaker 3: is spending, and they're just.
• 15:29
  Speaker 2: This seems exhausting.
• 15:30
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 15:31
  Speaker 2: To sit there and be... Maybe they need some Zoloft
• 15:35
  Speaker 2: or something.
• 15:35
  Speaker 3: They're just boiling in this resentment and just letting it simmer.
• 15:38
  Speaker 2: And every time one of them buys a Starbucks or
• 15:40
  Speaker 2: something or sends old Scott some money or some DoorDash.
• 15:44
  Speaker 3: He goes to Academy and buys a new rifle or something.
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 15:47
  Speaker 3: Some ammo.
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: Just anger just festering in you.
• 15:50
  Speaker 3: Mm-hmm. Sounds like you have some personal experience with this.
• 15:54
  Speaker 2: I think I've chilled out a little bit, Stu. Yes,
• 15:59
  Speaker 2: I have.
• 16:01
  Speaker 3: Have you chilled out? Oh, no.
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: Sometimes. Sometimes. I think I've learned to not... Not every
• 16:09
  Speaker 2: battle is worth fighting. I've learned that. When I was younger,
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: me and you, I used to pick every battle, too,
• 16:16
  Speaker 2: so don't even start with me. Well, I used to
• 16:18
  Speaker 2: pick every battle. I think before we met, you used
• 16:20
  Speaker 2: to pick every battle. You had toned down by the
• 16:23
  Speaker 2: time you got to me, and I was still revved up.
• 16:25
  Speaker 3: You mean fight every battle. I pick my battles now.
• 16:28
  Speaker 2: Okay, whatever.
• 16:29
  Speaker 3: Whatever. Yeah, you're ready to fight at the drop of
• 16:32
  Speaker 3: a hat. I'm like, whatever.
• 16:34
  Speaker 2: It pissed me off, too.
• 16:36
  Speaker 3: Because I was nonchalant about it.
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: Yes, roll over and go to sleep. I just wanted
• 16:39
  Speaker 2: to stab you. You're lucky you're here.
• 16:41
  Speaker 3: I would, right in the middle of an argument. I'd
• 16:44
  Speaker 3: just go to sleep on you.
• 16:45
  Speaker 2: Yeah, he would just go to sleep. It pissed me off.
• 16:48
  Speaker 3: Gary was also dealing with some bizarre physical symptoms in
• 16:51
  Speaker 3: the spring of 2018. He had experienced several unexplained medical
• 16:55
  Speaker 3: episodes where he would suddenly get violently sick break out
• 16:59
  Speaker 3: in sweats, suffer nausea, and feel completely drained.
• 17:03
  Speaker 2: I've been there.
• 17:03
  Speaker 3: Wait a minute. I've been there.
• 17:05
  Speaker 2: Well, I'm either hungover or pregnant. Those are the two times.
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: Or just had a baby and all of a sudden
• 17:11
  Speaker 2: you just wake up in the night sweating to death. Like,
• 17:13
  Speaker 2: what's wrong with me?
• 17:14
  Speaker 3: Wanting to stab your sleeping husband? Mm-hmm. Doctors ran tests
• 17:18
  Speaker 3: but could not pinpoint a clear medical condition in Gary.
• 17:22
  Speaker 3: During one of the bouts in April of 2018, Gary
• 17:25
  Speaker 3: went to his adult children, and told him point blank
• 17:28
  Speaker 3: that he suspected that Melody was slipping something into his food.
• 17:32
  Speaker 3: He specifically pointed to a batch of homemade cookies she
• 17:35
  Speaker 3: had baked right after a huge argument.
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: Well, why the fuck would you eat those, Gary? I
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: ain't eating... If you guys really have this, like.
• 17:43
  Speaker 3: Separate life.
• 17:45
  Speaker 2: It's not like if me and you fought and then
• 17:46
  Speaker 2: I made some cookies, you would be like, okay, I'll
• 17:48
  Speaker 2: eat the cookies. Because it was, like, probably a normal argument.
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: This is like, you are, like, hate each other. Yes.
• 17:55
  Speaker 3: You have for 10 years. And you just.
• 17:57
  Speaker 2: Had an argument. Yes, you've had 10 years of built-up resentment.
• 18:00
  Speaker 2: Don't eat the cookies. I know you wanted a snack.
• 18:04
  Speaker 3: Come on, Gary. Don't do it.
• 18:07
  Speaker 2: He's like, they were double fudge brownie cookies.
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: I had to.
• 18:09
  Speaker 3: Toxicology tests later would not show any evidence of a
• 18:15
  Speaker 3: fatal poisoning in Gary Therese. But the fact that a
• 18:19
  Speaker 3: grown man and practicing attorney was telling his adult kids,
• 18:22
  Speaker 3: I think your mother is trying to poison me, Tells
• 18:25
  Speaker 3: you exactly what the daily vibe, as the kids would say, Kara,
• 18:29
  Speaker 3: was inside the house leading into July of 2018.
• 18:34
  Speaker 2: Yes, so that brings us to Tuesday, July 3rd, 2018,
• 18:37
  Speaker 2: the night before the 4th of July.
• 18:41
  Speaker 3: Not before the best holiday ever.
• 18:42
  Speaker 2: Well, I don't know about that, but... Our kids are
• 18:46
  Speaker 2: very into America right now.
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: They are into American flags. Ever since the 4th of July,
• 18:52
  Speaker 2: it's like they caught the bug. They're just like, America flags.
• 18:55
  Speaker 3: What's wrong with you, Commie?
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: So everywhere we go, they see, and our street's very patriotic,
• 19:01
  Speaker 2: I will say that. So there's flags painted on the curb.
• 19:04
  Speaker 2: There's flags in the yard. Some people have two flags.
• 19:07
  Speaker 2: And so every time we walk, and then we have
• 19:09
  Speaker 2: to stop and talk about the flag every time, especially
• 19:12
  Speaker 2: the two-year-old. She's like, America flag, America flag. Anyways, it's
• 19:17
  Speaker 2: a lot. It's great. It's the greatest thing ever. Next
• 19:22
  Speaker 2: Fourth of July, they're going to be losing their minds.
• 19:24
  Speaker 3: Ever-loving minds. Fireworks, everything happening.
• 19:28
  Speaker 2: Flags everywhere.
• 19:29
  Speaker 3: Oh, this whole neighborhood. I'm going to have to get
• 19:31
  Speaker 3: me some more.
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: Some flags?
• 19:33
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I've got to get more flags.
• 19:35
  Speaker 2: We don't have a flag out there at all right now.
• 19:36
  Speaker 3: I have one. I just haven't put it up. I
• 19:38
  Speaker 3: didn't have a flag holder in Midland. I never put
• 19:40
  Speaker 3: the flag holder up.
• 19:40
  Speaker 2: Well, it would have probably just blown away anyways. There
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: weren't a lot of flags on people's houses there.
• 19:44
  Speaker 3: No, a lot of things blow away there.
• 19:46
  Speaker 2: Yes your will to live yes your groceries uh cell
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: phone records and business receipts give us gary's exact movements
• 19:56
  Speaker 2: that evening so around 8 28 p.m gary left the
• 19:59
  Speaker 2: farm on purcell lane and drove to a local restaurant
• 20:02
  Speaker 2: in town to grab dinner he ate by himself oh
• 20:06
  Speaker 2: gary what paid his bills Oh, Gary, that's a lucky guy.
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: walked out around 9.21 p.m. His phone connected to cell
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: towers tracking his drive straight back toward the farm between 9.26 p.m.
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: and 9.32 p.m. And when Gary pulled into his driveway
• 20:23
  Speaker 2: and walked into the basement rec room around 9.35 p.m.,
• 20:27
  Speaker 2: that was the last time anyone outside of that house
• 20:30
  Speaker 2: ever saw him alive.
• 20:37
  Speaker 3: A little over an hour later, at 10.52 p.m., Melody
• 20:40
  Speaker 3: placed a phone call to their son, Scott, who was
• 20:43
  Speaker 3: off the property running errands at 11 o'clock at night.
• 20:46
  Speaker 3: Was he dealing drugs?
• 20:47
  Speaker 2: Listen, Scott is mooching off his family. You think he's
• 20:50
  Speaker 2: up doing anything positive? He probably just started his day
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: around 6 p.m. that day.
• 20:55
  Speaker 3: He's got to go run some errands. He's got to
• 20:57
  Speaker 3: pay my light bill. No, he didn't. Melody told Scott
• 21:01
  Speaker 3: that some of the farm animals had gotten loose and
• 21:03
  Speaker 3: broken out of their fencing. and that she needed him
• 21:06
  Speaker 3: to come home right away to help her round them
• 21:08
  Speaker 3: up in the dark. Scott drove back out to Purcell Lane,
• 21:12
  Speaker 3: arriving at the farm at about 11.30 p.m. When he
• 21:16
  Speaker 3: got there, he saw that the animals were already back
• 21:18
  Speaker 3: inside their enclosures. There was no livestock running loose. But
• 21:23
  Speaker 3: as Scott walked toward the barn area, he looked down
• 21:25
  Speaker 3: the slope toward the property's burn pile. It was a
• 21:28
  Speaker 3: blaze in the middle of the night. Large flames were
• 21:31
  Speaker 3: shooting up into the trees. Scott did not inspect the
• 21:34
  Speaker 3: fire closely, however, at this point. In the country, people
• 21:38
  Speaker 3: do light their piles at all times of the day,
• 21:41
  Speaker 3: even in the middle of the night.
• 21:43
  Speaker 2: Like we said, if you want to go, I'm surprised
• 21:45
  Speaker 2: he didn't crack one open and go sit by the fire.
• 21:47
  Speaker 3: I mean, I might have. Scott went up to his
• 21:51
  Speaker 3: barn apartment. That's the first time many of you have
• 21:54
  Speaker 3: probably heard those two words together.
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: No, barn-a-miniums are real big right now, though.
• 21:58
  Speaker 3: But a barn apartment? Good.
• 22:01
  Speaker 2: Probably a nice barn.
• 22:02
  Speaker 3: I'm sure it was. He went to sleep and figured
• 22:05
  Speaker 3: his parents were just handling some farm chores.
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: Farm chores. The next morning was Wednesday, July 4th. Early
• 22:14
  Speaker 2: that morning, Scott came down from his apartment, stopped by
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: the main house to grab his debit card, or his
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: dad's maybe.
• 22:20
  Speaker 3: Maybe.
• 22:21
  Speaker 2: And left around 6.30 a.m. for a 7 a.m. holiday
• 22:25
  Speaker 2: golf tea time with friends. Later that morning, Melody packed
• 22:30
  Speaker 2: up and left the farm to spend Fourth of July
• 22:32
  Speaker 2: at Lake Lanier with family members. But as the afternoon
• 22:36
  Speaker 2: rolled on, Gary's family and friends started noticing something very odd.
• 22:41
  Speaker 2: Gary wasn't answering his phone, Stu.
• 22:43
  Speaker 3: He was not.
• 22:44
  Speaker 2: No. Gary was an attorney who answered calls. Like, he's there.
• 22:49
  Speaker 2: He already said he's a workaholic. He's long hours trying
• 22:52
  Speaker 2: to get away from Melody. Mm-hmm. He's there. He always
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: responded to text messages, and he always checked in with
• 22:58
  Speaker 2: his family, because remember, he's giving them money and stuff,
• 23:00
  Speaker 2: so he obviously cared about his children.
• 23:01
  Speaker 3: More than Melody did. They're checking in with him, and
• 23:03
  Speaker 3: that is.
• 23:05
  Speaker 2: Yeah, Dad, I need 20 bucks. His phone showed internal
• 23:08
  Speaker 2: movement pinging around the farm property throughout the morning until 6.24 p.m.,
• 23:14
  Speaker 2: but Gary himself never picked up a single call or
• 23:17
  Speaker 2: returned a single message. Melody came home from Lake Lanier
• 23:22
  Speaker 2: just before dark, bringing her step-granddaughter with her to the house. Now,
• 23:27
  Speaker 2: when relatives asked where Gary was, Melody claimed she hadn't
• 23:31
  Speaker 2: seen him since the previous night and assumed he was
• 23:34
  Speaker 2: out running errands or dealing with the client matter. But
• 23:37
  Speaker 2: by the morning of Thursday, July 5th, nobody had heard
• 23:40
  Speaker 2: from Gary for over 36 hours.
• 23:45
  Speaker 3: On Thursday morning, July 5th, Scott and other family members
• 23:48
  Speaker 3: began physically walking the 10-acre property looking for any sign
• 23:52
  Speaker 3: of Gary or his vehicle. Gary's truck was parked on
• 23:55
  Speaker 3: the property. His belongings were in the truck. Scott walked
• 23:58
  Speaker 3: down toward the burn pile, which had been smoldering continuously
• 24:02
  Speaker 3: since Tuesday night. As he got closer to the ashes,
• 24:05
  Speaker 3: at about 100 yards away from the main house, he
• 24:09
  Speaker 3: saw something that he said was horrifying sticking out of
• 24:12
  Speaker 3: the burned debris and brush. It was unmistakably charred human
• 24:16
  Speaker 3: skeletal remains. Cherokee County Sheriff's deputies and detectives immediately rushed
• 24:23
  Speaker 3: out to Purcell Lane. What started as a missing person
• 24:25
  Speaker 3: check instantly turned into a major crime scene investigation.
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 24:30
  Speaker 2: So when detectives first stood over that burn pile on
• 24:33
  Speaker 2: July 5th, the immediate question was, what on earth happened here?
• 24:37
  Speaker 2: Did Gary have another one of his unexplained fainting spells
• 24:41
  Speaker 2: from Cherokee? possible tainted cookies while tending to a brush
• 24:46
  Speaker 2: fire and accidentally fell into the flames right could this
• 24:50
  Speaker 2: have been an accident did he have a massive heart
• 24:52
  Speaker 2: attack next to the burn pit like what how could
• 24:55
  Speaker 2: gary had was.
• 24:56
  Speaker 3: There a medical emergency and he just tipped over into.
• 24:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah i guess it could happen well melody she's right
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: there on the property and she's telling detectives I mean,
• 25:06
  Speaker 2: they got the idea from somewhere. She's like, hey, you know,
• 25:08
  Speaker 2: he wasn't in the best of health. He's having some issues.
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: He can eat some cookies, get sick, faint, and things
• 25:13
  Speaker 2: like that.
• 25:14
  Speaker 3: Go talk to his doctor.
• 25:15
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I bet he fell into the fire. And so
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: she said that Gary had been the one who lit
• 25:22
  Speaker 2: the fire earlier in the week, too. She stated he
• 25:25
  Speaker 2: was the one that did that. She brought up his
• 25:27
  Speaker 2: medical history, telling police that Gary had been having dizzy spells,
• 25:30
  Speaker 2: fainting episodes, and unexplained illnesses. I feel like she could
• 25:35
  Speaker 2: probably explain some of those illnesses. And suggested that he
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: would have collapsed while working outside, just rolled right into
• 25:42
  Speaker 2: the fire.
• 25:43
  Speaker 3: His whole body. Whole body. Nothing hanging out.
• 25:45
  Speaker 2: Six feet, over six feet tall, 315 pounds, just rolled
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: right into the fire.
• 25:51
  Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: Detectives collected the burned remains and sent them to the
• 25:55
  Speaker 2: Georgia Bureau of Investigation, GBI, if you're feeling fancy. Mm-hmm.
• 26:00
  Speaker 2: crime lab for a full forensic examination and DNA confirmation,
• 26:05
  Speaker 2: and it didn't take long for the medical examiner to
• 26:07
  Speaker 2: blow Melody's accidental collapse story completely out of the water.
• 26:13
  Speaker 3: Yes. During the autopsy, forensic pathologists were carefully sifting through
• 26:18
  Speaker 3: the charred remains when they made an undeniable discovery. Lodged
• 26:22
  Speaker 3: tightly inside one of the ribs of Gary was a.
• 26:25
  Speaker 3: 38 caliber lead bullet projectile.
• 26:29
  Speaker 2: I don't understand why people think that shooting someone and
• 26:33
  Speaker 2: then putting them in a fire or setting the house
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: on fire, that they're not going to figure out that
• 26:37
  Speaker 2: there's a bullet still in the person.
• 26:39
  Speaker 3: I guess they think that the fire's going to melt
• 26:40
  Speaker 3: the lead and it's just going to.
• 26:42
  Speaker 2: Or they're just going to get lucky and... Well, I mean,
• 26:44
  Speaker 2: that one guy killed his fiancée, remember, in that apartment,
• 26:47
  Speaker 2: and they just said she's committed suicide by stabbing herself
• 26:50
  Speaker 2: 27 times. In the back?
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 26:53
  Speaker 3: So, I mean.
• 26:54
  Speaker 2: Crazier things have happened.
• 26:56
  Speaker 3: Or maybe he had somebody inside the DA's office that
• 26:58
  Speaker 3: was like, eh.
• 27:00
  Speaker 2: This family's prominent, let's... I got you, buddy. Yeah, that's
• 27:04
  Speaker 2: the Ellen Greenberg situation, if you're wondering.
• 27:07
  Speaker 3: That one is very suspicious. A man does not suffer
• 27:11
  Speaker 3: a medical dizzy spell, fall into a bonfire, and accidentally
• 27:14
  Speaker 3: land on a fired. 38 caliber bullet that burrows itself
• 27:18
  Speaker 3: into his ribcage. Gary Ferris died from a gunshot wound
• 27:22
  Speaker 3: to the torso... The coroner officially ruled his death a homicide.
• 27:27
  Speaker 3: Once that bullet was identified, the Cherokee County Sheriff's Office
• 27:31
  Speaker 3: secured a comprehensive search warrant for every square foot of
• 27:34
  Speaker 3: the 10-acre farm. The main residence, the basement, the upstairs,
• 27:38
  Speaker 3: the barn, the outbuildings, the vehicles, everything basically, including the
• 27:42
  Speaker 3: heavy farm equipment.
• 27:43
  Speaker 2: Man, I would just be like, if I got to
• 27:46
  Speaker 2: work with him, I'm like, oh my God, we're going
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: to search this whole fucking property. This is too much.
• 27:50
  Speaker 3: I mean, if you've got to be somewhere, you've got
• 27:51
  Speaker 3: to be somewhere.
• 27:53
  Speaker 2: I know that, but it's just overwhelming. I'd be like,
• 27:56
  Speaker 2: I could never do this. I can't even clean our
• 27:58
  Speaker 2: house without breaking it up into 15-minute increments because I
• 28:00
  Speaker 2: get overwhelmed very easily.
• 28:01
  Speaker 3: Well, you complain about going to the office. See, these
• 28:04
  Speaker 3: people get to go to a different crime scene all
• 28:05
  Speaker 3: the time.
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: I know.
• 28:06
  Speaker 2: I'm just saying, even though they probably get to go
• 28:11
  Speaker 2: all different places. Well, I complain about going to the office,
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: but I don't want to go. I mean, I had
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: a job where I went out in the outdoors.
• 28:18
  Speaker 3: You only worked six months out of the year.
• 28:19
  Speaker 2: And I didn't want to do that either, so.
• 28:21
  Speaker 3: You're like, man, I just want to get into an office.
• 28:23
  Speaker 3: I come to find out.
• 28:24
  Speaker 2: I just don't want to work. No, I do enjoy
• 28:25
  Speaker 2: the office life because I have a coffee shop right
• 28:27
  Speaker 2: down from me. So I go walk over and I'm like,
• 28:30
  Speaker 2: fuck my finances. I'm just going to.
• 28:32
  Speaker 3: Air conditioning.
• 28:32
  Speaker 2: Don't I deserve this?
• 28:34
  Speaker 3: I work hard.
• 28:35
  Speaker 2: No, I'm just saying like I would be overwhelmed because
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: I get overwhelmed very easily with tasks. So I have
• 28:41
  Speaker 2: to break things up and talk myself down. Be like, okay,
• 28:43
  Speaker 2: just pick up. Just load the dishwasher. Just fold this
• 28:49
  Speaker 2: thing closed. Just put this stuff away. Because when I
• 28:53
  Speaker 2: look at the larger thing, I become overwhelmed and then
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: I just shut.
• 28:56
  Speaker 3: Down and say, F it. Happened like right after we
• 28:59
  Speaker 3: moved here and all these boxes are.
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: Just sitting there. No, Stuart. You were supposed to break
• 29:04
  Speaker 2: down the boxes. You're not breaking down the boxes.
• 29:06
  Speaker 3: I'm saying when the boxes arrived from the movers, you
• 29:08
  Speaker 3: were overwhelmed.
• 29:10
  Speaker 2: Oh, I'm still overwhelmed. Oh, I'm talking about we would
• 29:13
  Speaker 2: have our living room cleaned out if you kept loading
• 29:16
  Speaker 2: stuff into the car for me to drop off at
• 29:18
  Speaker 2: Goodwill or take it to Goodwill. And if you would
• 29:23
  Speaker 2: break the boxes down. All right.
• 29:25
  Speaker 3: So this is the pilot we're going to have? Yes.
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: Inside the main house, detectives focused heavily on the basement
• 29:31
  Speaker 2: living quarters where Gary slept and spent his evenings. And
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: the physical evidence told a very clear story of what
• 29:37
  Speaker 2: had happened when Gary walked into the basement... on the
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: 9th of July 3rd. Down on the floor of the
• 29:43
  Speaker 2: recreation room, right near an ottoman and an area rug,
• 29:47
  Speaker 2: investigators found a spent. 38 caliber bullet lying on the floorboards.
• 29:54
  Speaker 2: When the GBI ballistics experts compared the spent bullet Found
• 29:58
  Speaker 2: on the basement floor with the bullet extracted from Gary's
• 30:00
  Speaker 2: ribs in the burn pile, the striations and rifling matched.
• 30:06
  Speaker 2: Both bullets had been fired from the exact same firearm.
• 30:09
  Speaker 2: Investigators also found droplets and spatter of Gary's blood on
• 30:13
  Speaker 2: the basement floor. leading toward the walkout doors and traces
• 30:29
  Speaker 2: of blood on the stairs. Upstairs, detectives located a red
• 30:33
  Speaker 2: shirt belonging to Melody that had visible soot and ash
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: embedded into the fabric fibers.
• 30:41
  Speaker 3: So she got him outside on the burn pile. Didn't
• 30:44
  Speaker 3: think to burn any evidence. Or clean up.
• 30:49
  Speaker 2: We don't know that she did it, Stu. They don't
• 30:51
  Speaker 2: know that's who did this, okay?
• 30:53
  Speaker 3: We don't.
• 30:54
  Speaker 2: But there's only one bitch that hates Gary right now.
• 30:56
  Speaker 3: That much? Yes. To either do it or have somebody
• 30:59
  Speaker 3: do it?
• 30:59
  Speaker 2: Or poison him.
• 31:01
  Speaker 3: Now comes in the heavy farm equipment. We've got to remember,
• 31:05
  Speaker 3: if you haven't, that Gary was a big fella. He's
• 31:08
  Speaker 3: over six feet tall and over 300 pounds. Moving a
• 31:12
  Speaker 3: dead person who weighs this much down a dirt hill
• 31:15
  Speaker 3: to a burn pile 100 yards away isn't something that
• 31:20
  Speaker 3: an average person can do with their bare hands. Parked
• 31:24
  Speaker 3: near the outbuildings was a commercial Kubota tractor equipped with
• 31:27
  Speaker 3: a front-end loader, which is the bucket on the front,
• 31:30
  Speaker 3: if you're not familiar. Detectives went over the tractor with
• 31:33
  Speaker 3: forensic lights and chemical reagents, and sure enough, they found
• 31:37
  Speaker 3: reddish brown stains.
• 31:40
  Speaker 2: Across multiple operational points of the machine. On the hydraulic pump,
• 31:42
  Speaker 2: around the gear shift.
• 31:42
  Speaker 3: Lever, on the operator's footstep and inside the bucket. DNA
• 31:55
  Speaker 3: swabs from those stains on the tractor confirmed the presence
• 31:58
  Speaker 3: of Gary Ferris' blood. The physical puzzle was coming together
• 32:03
  Speaker 3: piece by piece. Gary was shot in his basement, loaded
• 32:06
  Speaker 3: into the front bucket of the Kubota tractor, driven down
• 32:09
  Speaker 3: to the pasture to the burn pile. Then he was
• 32:13
  Speaker 3: dumped onto the brush and set afire using accelerants.
• 32:18
  Speaker 2: While forensic techs were processing the basement and the tractor,
• 32:22
  Speaker 2: detectives were digging into Melody Ferris' personal life and financial records.
• 32:27
  Speaker 2: And what they uncovered was an elaborate web of secrets
• 32:30
  Speaker 2: that went far beyond everyday marital bickering.
• 32:33
  Speaker 3: Really? Is that what I'm going to find out about you?
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 32:36
  Speaker 2: First, there was a man named Rusty Barton.
• 32:38
  Speaker 3: What was his name?
• 32:39
  Speaker 2: Rusty Barton.
• 32:40
  Speaker 3: What was his first name?
• 32:41
  Speaker 2: Rusty.
• 32:43
  Speaker 3: Was it Roy? Roy.
• 32:45
  Speaker 2: What is wrong with you?
• 32:47
  Speaker 3: What is wrong with you that you can't say Roy?
• 32:49
  Speaker 2: I feel like now that I'm a mother and I
• 32:51
  Speaker 2: have a child with a speech issue, I feel like
• 32:54
  Speaker 2: I have a real big gap in front of my teeth.
• 32:56
  Speaker 2: I feel like I probably had a lip tie and stuff,
• 32:58
  Speaker 2: and I feel like I probably should have gone. But
• 33:01
  Speaker 2: I was born too early. They didn't care about your
• 33:03
  Speaker 2: speech back then. Unless you had a full-on, I guess,
• 33:07
  Speaker 2: lisp or something. But I have a hard time saying
• 33:10
  Speaker 2: that name.
• 33:11
  Speaker 3: What name?
• 33:12
  Speaker 2: I'm not going to say it. R-O-Y. But he goes
• 33:17
  Speaker 2: by Rusty, so we're going to go with Rusty.
• 33:19
  Speaker 3: They gave you an out? Yes. Can you say Leroy?
• 33:23
  Speaker 2: Stuart, just leave me alone. I'm not going to say
• 33:26
  Speaker 2: it on the thing and embarrass myself. When detectives first ask,
• 33:29
  Speaker 2: my biggest fear is ever getting a boss, and that's
• 33:32
  Speaker 2: his name, because I'm going to have to go to
• 33:33
  Speaker 2: speech therapy as an adult so they can teach me
• 33:35
  Speaker 2: how to say it. I'm going to say, oh, R-Dog.
• 33:40
  Speaker 3: Big R.
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: Big R.
• 33:44
  Speaker 2: The R-Meister. Okay, so when detectives first asked Melody about
• 33:52
  Speaker 2: her relationship with Rusty, she completely downplayed it. She claimed
• 33:56
  Speaker 2: Rusty was just a friend and then admitted they had
• 33:59
  Speaker 2: an affair years ago, but swore the romantic relationship had
• 34:02
  Speaker 2: ended more than a year before Gary died. Phone records,
• 34:07
  Speaker 2: cell tower pings, and the text messages proved that was
• 34:10
  Speaker 2: flat out a lie. Melody and Rusty were actively, heavily
• 34:14
  Speaker 2: involved with each other right up through July of 2018.
• 34:18
  Speaker 2: In fact, Melody had secretly taken an entire vacation to Jamaica. Jamaica, man.
• 34:24
  Speaker 2: You're making me crazy. With Rusty Barton while telling Gary
• 34:28
  Speaker 2: and her family that she was visiting an old girlfriend
• 34:31
  Speaker 2: in Minnesota.
• 34:32
  Speaker 3: Oh, geez. To pull off that fake Minnesota trip, Melody
• 34:37
  Speaker 3: went to wild links. She actually mailed her personal bank
• 34:41
  Speaker 3: debit card to her friend in Minnesota and asked her
• 34:45
  Speaker 3: friend to make physical purchases at local Minnesota gas stations.
• 34:49
  Speaker 2: Are you really going to say that? That doesn't even
• 34:51
  Speaker 2: sound Minnesotian or whatever, however you say it.
• 34:54
  Speaker 3: How to Speak Minnesotan? There's a book called How to
• 34:56
  Speaker 3: Speak Minnesotan. That's exactly right out of that book. Asked
• 34:59
  Speaker 3: her friend to make physical purchases at a local Minnesota
• 35:02
  Speaker 3: gas stations, grocery stores, coffee shops, and on specific days.
• 35:07
  Speaker 3: That way, when Gary checked the joint online banking statement
• 35:10
  Speaker 3: back home in Georgia, the bank charges would show that
• 35:13
  Speaker 3: Melody's card was being swiped in Minnesota while she was
• 35:17
  Speaker 3: sitting on a beach in Jamaica with Rusty. That is
• 35:21
  Speaker 3: some planning right there.
• 35:22
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a good friend, too.
• 35:27
  Speaker 3: See, I don't even understand Melody.
• 35:29
  Speaker 2: Why?
• 35:29
  Speaker 3: This level of planning and then the crime scene cleanup
• 35:33
  Speaker 3: and everything is like, I haven't talked to Rusty. old
• 35:37
  Speaker 3: Roy Rusty Barton in a year. And they're like, well,
• 35:41
  Speaker 3: we got all these.
• 35:42
  Speaker 2: Bitch, he was in Jamaica with him.
• 35:45
  Speaker 3: We got all these text messages and everything up to
• 35:47
  Speaker 3: this day. How can she be so on point on
• 35:50
  Speaker 3: this Minnesota trip?
• 35:51
  Speaker 2: All she did was mail a debit card to a friend.
• 35:54
  Speaker 3: Didn't matter. It was like some forethought, some planning.
• 35:57
  Speaker 2: Well, she tried to poison him and it didn't work out.
• 35:59
  Speaker 2: So then she had to go with plan B.
• 36:02
  Speaker 3: Detectives also uncovered text messages Melody had sent to a
• 36:05
  Speaker 3: close neighbor prior to Gary's death. In those messages, Melody
• 36:10
  Speaker 3: was venting about her hatred for Gary, explicitly texting that
• 36:14
  Speaker 3: she hoped Gary would die alone and have a gruesome death.
• 36:18
  Speaker 2: Wow, Melody.
• 36:19
  Speaker 3: Wow. It's okay to think it.
• 36:22
  Speaker 2: Just don't put it down.
• 36:24
  Speaker 3: Don't tell anybody.
• 36:24
  Speaker 2: No, it's the famous words of Sonia Morgan. I think
• 36:29
  Speaker 2: it was Sonya Morgan.
• 36:30
  Speaker 3: I don't know who that is, but okay.
• 36:31
  Speaker 2: Say it, forget it, text it, regret it.
• 36:36
  Speaker 3: Or tell another person.
• 36:38
  Speaker 2: No, say it, though. You can't use that's hearsay in
• 36:41
  Speaker 2: a court of law, but text is written. You can't say, no,
• 36:44
  Speaker 2: I didn't say that.
• 36:45
  Speaker 3: As people do, lots of people say angry, ridiculous things
• 36:51
  Speaker 3: when they're trapped inside a miserable marriage. But when your
• 36:55
  Speaker 3: spouse ends up with a bullet in their ribs inside
• 36:58
  Speaker 3: a flaming burn pile two weeks later, those texts stop
• 37:02
  Speaker 3: sounding like hyperbole and start looking like intent.
• 37:08
  Speaker 2: The Rusty Barton, then Rusty Barton, the Rusty Barton. I
• 37:12
  Speaker 2: was going to say the Rusty Barton.
• 37:14
  Speaker 3: Get it together.
• 37:15
  Speaker 2: He's like Madonna. Then Rusty, you couldn't say hyperbole, so
• 37:19
  Speaker 2: don't start with me.
• 37:20
  Speaker 3: Hyperbole.
• 37:22
  Speaker 2: That's what you were going to say was hyperbole.
• 37:24
  Speaker 3: Every time I read it. Whenever I read rural, it's
• 37:27
  Speaker 3: a hard word to say. But whenever I just say it,
• 37:29
  Speaker 3: it's fine.
• 37:30
  Speaker 2: I know when you're listening to this and you hear
• 37:32
  Speaker 2: us talking and reading and stuff, you're like, wow, those
• 37:34
  Speaker 2: two are real dumbasses. How are those kids even going
• 37:36
  Speaker 2: to make it in this life? And they should not
• 37:38
  Speaker 2: homeschool them. But I just want to say, it's funny speaking,
• 37:42
  Speaker 2: but when you read words that you don't normally see,
• 37:45
  Speaker 2: and I read a lot too, but sometimes there's words
• 37:48
  Speaker 2: you don't see a lot, and then you read them
• 37:49
  Speaker 2: and you're like, that's a weird way they spell that.
• 37:53
  Speaker 3: Hero, that's not a word. Hero, H-E-R-O, that is not
• 37:57
  Speaker 3: a word.
• 37:57
  Speaker 2: Where's that from?
• 38:00
  Speaker 3: My mom was playing Scrabble against somebody. She played the
• 38:03
  Speaker 3: word hero and the lady across from her said, Hero,
• 38:06
  Speaker 3: that's not a word. So she challenged her in the
• 38:09
  Speaker 3: Scrabble game, but that's one of my mom's favorites. The
• 38:11
  Speaker 3: story's probably 40 years old, but she loves to tell it.
• 38:14
  Speaker 2: No, okay.
• 38:16
  Speaker 3: So yes, the lady thought hero was, she was like,
• 38:19
  Speaker 3: that's not a word.
• 38:20
  Speaker 2: My favorite was this guy that I knew growing up,
• 38:23
  Speaker 2: and he thought he was being fancy, and he thought
• 38:26
  Speaker 2: he was, like, uppity, and he called it a bunty cake.
• 38:30
  Speaker 3: A bunty cake?
• 38:31
  Speaker 2: Because butt cake has a T at the end. He
• 38:34
  Speaker 2: wasn't the smartest at all.
• 38:36
  Speaker 3: Like being suave and debonier?
• 38:38
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 38:38
  Speaker 3: With some caviar and some Corvus air?
• 38:40
  Speaker 2: Although I thought premise was premise, but I feel like
• 38:44
  Speaker 2: that's how the Europeans say it, so whatever.
• 38:46
  Speaker 3: Yes. So you're very European. You're chic.
• 38:49
  Speaker 2: I'm chic. Then Rusty Barton himself entered the picture as
• 38:52
  Speaker 2: the state's key and most chaotic witness. Detectives brought Rusty
• 38:56
  Speaker 2: in for questioning on July 24, 2018. During that recorded interview,
• 39:02
  Speaker 2: Rusty dropped a bombshell. Rusty told detectives that in the
• 39:05
  Speaker 2: early morning hours of July 4, hours before Gary's remains
• 39:09
  Speaker 2: were discovered by Scott and before the police even knew
• 39:12
  Speaker 2: Gary was dead, Melody called him in a panic. According
• 39:16
  Speaker 2: to Rusty, Melody told him directly, Gary is in the
• 39:20
  Speaker 2: burn pile.
• 39:21
  Speaker 3: Oh, Jesus.
• 39:22
  Speaker 2: Think about that for a second. On July 4th, as
• 39:24
  Speaker 2: far as the rest of the family in the world knew,
• 39:26
  Speaker 2: Gary was just a missing or running errand. The only
• 39:30
  Speaker 2: person on earth who could have known Gary was dead
• 39:33
  Speaker 2: inside that smoldering pile of brush was the person who
• 39:35
  Speaker 2: put him there.
• 39:37
  Speaker 3: Indeed. However, Rusty was not exactly the pristine choir boy witness.
• 39:43
  Speaker 3: Rusty was juggling relationships with multiple women at the same time,
• 39:47
  Speaker 3: including Melody. After giving that statement to detectives, Rusty got
• 39:51
  Speaker 3: cold feet, realized that he had put himself dead center
• 39:55
  Speaker 3: into a capital murder case, and spent the next several
• 39:58
  Speaker 3: months trying to recant, hedge, and waffle on what he
• 40:01
  Speaker 3: had told detectives. Detectives had Rusty wear a wire and
• 40:05
  Speaker 3: place recorded phone calls to Melody, but Rusty playing both
• 40:09
  Speaker 3: sides actually warned Melody that the cops were listening. He
• 40:12
  Speaker 3: even went out and bought a pre-made burner flip phone
• 40:16
  Speaker 3: so the two of them could talk privately. without law
• 40:18
  Speaker 3: enforcement monitoring the line. During a recorded phone conversation after
• 40:22
  Speaker 3: Melody was in custody, Melody didn't know the call was
• 40:25
  Speaker 3: being taped by the jail system. On that recording, she
• 40:29
  Speaker 3: snapped at Rusty, telling him to keep his mouth shut, saying,
• 40:32
  Speaker 3: you are going to single-handedly hang me. Detectives also pulled
• 40:37
  Speaker 3: Rusty's digital search history around the time of the murder,
• 40:40
  Speaker 3: which included bizarre internet searches asking whether police could retrieve
• 40:44
  Speaker 3: deleted text messages, if they had a phone number and
• 40:47
  Speaker 3: search warrants regarding the sale of gold rings.
• 40:52
  Speaker 2: Armed with the ballistics match, the blood on the Kubota tractor,
• 40:59
  Speaker 2: the soot on Melody's clothes, the phone records, and Rusty
• 41:02
  Speaker 2: Barton's statements, the Cherokee County Sheriff's Office secured a grand
• 41:06
  Speaker 2: jury indictment. Melody wasn't even in Georgia when the warrant
• 41:10
  Speaker 2: came down. She was across state lines in Tulomah, Tulahoma?
• 41:16
  Speaker 3: I'm glad you're going to be getting these messages and
• 41:19
  Speaker 3: not me.
• 41:20
  Speaker 2: Tulahoma, Tennessee. Spending time with Rusty Barton. None other than
• 41:24
  Speaker 2: Rusty Barton.
• 41:26
  Speaker 3: Old Rusty's dipping his wicks in so many candles. Ew.
• 41:31
  Speaker 3: And she's still with him.
• 41:32
  Speaker 2: Why do you say it like that, Stu? In June
• 41:35
  Speaker 2: of 2019, nearly a year after Gary's murder, deputies arrested
• 41:38
  Speaker 2: Melody Ferris in Tennessee. She was extradited back to Georgia
• 41:42
  Speaker 2: and formally charged with malice murder, felony murder, aggravated assault,
• 41:46
  Speaker 2: concealing the death of another, and making false statements to
• 41:49
  Speaker 2: law enforcement.
• 41:51
  Speaker 3: Once Melody was charged, the Ferris family shattered completely, and
• 41:55
  Speaker 3: Melody made a calculated defensive maneuver that turned the entire
• 41:59
  Speaker 3: family into open warfare. She pointed a finger directly at
• 42:04
  Speaker 3: her own son, Scott Ferris.
• 42:07
  Speaker 2: She's been wanting to take down that deadbeat guy there.
• 42:10
  Speaker 2: Because remember, Gary was the one giving money to specifically
• 42:14
  Speaker 2: Scott and probably coddling him. And Melody's like, I want
• 42:18
  Speaker 2: that money.
• 42:19
  Speaker 3: She's like, why are you giving all that money to
• 42:21
  Speaker 3: that deadbeat? Melody claimed to anyone who would listen that
• 42:24
  Speaker 3: she was innocent and that she was a petite woman
• 42:27
  Speaker 3: who couldn't possibly move a 300-pound body and that Scott
• 42:30
  Speaker 3: was the real killer. Her defense team pointed out that
• 42:33
  Speaker 3: Scott lived right there on the property in an apartment
• 42:37
  Speaker 3: above the barn. that he had access to the. 38
• 42:40
  Speaker 3: caliber ammunition, that Scott was the one who allegedly had
• 42:43
  Speaker 3: financial disputes with his father over that money, and that
• 42:47
  Speaker 3: Scott was the person who originally found the remains in
• 42:50
  Speaker 3: the burn pile.
• 42:51
  Speaker 2: Which I could see that being an argument, too. I mean,
• 42:54
  Speaker 2: the dad was giving him money. Melody didn't want to
• 42:57
  Speaker 2: give it to him, but I'm sure it was never enough.
• 43:00
  Speaker 3: Well, I'm sure that they would have to have, I'm
• 43:02
  Speaker 3: cutting you off stuff.
• 43:04
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 43:04
  Speaker 3: Like he was sending, like, I'm cutting you off, and
• 43:06
  Speaker 3: then an argument ensued.
• 43:07
  Speaker 2: And then Scott being like, well, if he was dead,
• 43:10
  Speaker 2: I could have access to money, and then I just
• 43:11
  Speaker 2: got to take out that bitch mom of mine.
• 43:14
  Speaker 3: But I guess they don't have any connection between him
• 43:16
  Speaker 3: cutting him off or anything.
• 43:18
  Speaker 2: No.
• 43:18
  Speaker 3: The defense also hammered the police investigation, pointing out that
• 43:22
  Speaker 3: detectives never processed Scott's barn apartment for blood evidence, never
• 43:26
  Speaker 3: tested his clothes. from that night, and they zeroed in
• 43:30
  Speaker 3: on Melody from day one without thoroughly vetting Scott as
• 43:33
  Speaker 3: a viable suspect.
• 43:35
  Speaker 2: Well, maybe they should have looked at Scott, though. I mean,
• 43:38
  Speaker 2: it does.
• 43:39
  Speaker 3: Did they, or is the defense just saying they didn't
• 43:40
  Speaker 3: look at him hard enough? We don't feel the investigation
• 43:43
  Speaker 3: that Scott went far enough.
• 43:45
  Speaker 2: Oh, this really goes right along the lines with something else.
• 43:49
  Speaker 2: Current news matter that I'm not going to get into,
• 43:53
  Speaker 2: but they should vet all of the viable... people because
• 43:58
  Speaker 2: we all knew for 10 years melody was like hated
• 44:02
  Speaker 2: gary and her sons and but we don't know if
• 44:06
  Speaker 2: she hated him but uh for 10 years she hated
• 44:08
  Speaker 2: gary and they never but they never could prove he
• 44:11
  Speaker 2: was actually poisoned so there's not that and then um
• 44:15
  Speaker 2: she could have gotten rid of him at any of
• 44:16
  Speaker 2: this time but it sounded like she just kept on
• 44:18
  Speaker 2: with her life like she was with rusty going to
• 44:20
  Speaker 2: jamaica you know things like that so i mean scott might.
• 44:23
  Speaker 3: Have had more i mean Right around then, though, Rusty
• 44:26
  Speaker 3: might have been like, hey, I'll leave these other five
• 44:27
  Speaker 3: or six women for you, baby.
• 44:29
  Speaker 2: Well, Scott also, if he took his dad out, any
• 44:36
  Speaker 2: connection he had to money would have been gone because
• 44:38
  Speaker 2: his mom wasn't the one giving it to him.
• 44:40
  Speaker 3: Exactly.
• 44:41
  Speaker 2: All right, the lead detective on the case took the
• 44:42
  Speaker 2: stand and testified clearly that they thoroughly investigated Scott's timeline,
• 44:46
  Speaker 2: checked his phone data, confirmed his 7 a.m. golf outing
• 44:49
  Speaker 2: on July 4th, and never considered him or his brother Chad... Oh, Chad.
• 44:53
  Speaker 2: Suspects in their father's murder. There was zero physical evidence
• 44:58
  Speaker 2: connecting Scott to the shooting in the basement, but the
• 45:01
  Speaker 2: damage was done. You had adult children having to take
• 45:04
  Speaker 2: the witness stand under oath, looking across the courtroom at
• 45:07
  Speaker 2: their own mother, having to testify about their father's violent
• 45:10
  Speaker 2: death while their mother was actively trying to send her
• 45:13
  Speaker 2: own son to prison to save herself. Yes. She's like,
• 45:16
  Speaker 2: why do I have you? I birthed you.
• 45:19
  Speaker 3: I birthed you. I brought you into this world. I
• 45:22
  Speaker 3: can murder your dad, pin it on you, and go
• 45:26
  Speaker 3: to Jamaica with Rusty.
• 45:28
  Speaker 2: I had four of you. I don't need you.
• 45:30
  Speaker 3: I got some spares.
• 45:31
  Speaker 2: I got some spares. I'll still be able to have
• 45:34
  Speaker 2: some people at the Thanksgiving dinner.
• 45:36
  Speaker 3: With stepdad Rusty. Because of pandemic delays, the old faithful pandemic.
• 45:43
  Speaker 3: I know.
• 45:43
  Speaker 2: I'm so sick of... We're far enough away from it
• 45:47
  Speaker 2: now that I understand it's still... recent history in the
• 45:52
  Speaker 2: grand scheme of things.
• 45:53
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 45:53
  Speaker 2: But I can't wait till I'm old enough where we
• 45:55
  Speaker 2: stop talking about the motherfucking pandemic. Let me tell you what,
• 45:58
  Speaker 2: if I read a book and they start off by
• 46:00
  Speaker 2: talking about the pandemic or it's set in the pandemic time,
• 46:03
  Speaker 2: I'm like, can we just all pretend that this didn't
• 46:07
  Speaker 2: happen and move on with our lives?
• 46:08
  Speaker 3: What? No. It happened.
• 46:13
  Speaker 2: I know that, but when I'm reading a book, no,
• 46:14
  Speaker 2: I don't want to read.
• 46:16
  Speaker 3: You don't want to rehash it?
• 46:17
  Speaker 2: No. And... Yeah, the only one that sometimes they'll briefly
• 46:23
  Speaker 2: talk about, like, when the pandemic and the housing prices
• 46:26
  Speaker 2: or something, referencing it to get to a point, I'm like, okay,
• 46:29
  Speaker 2: I can deal with that. But I don't need your
• 46:34
  Speaker 2: apartment living lifestyle that you were doing when you were sequestered.
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: What is it?
• 46:39
  Speaker 2: Whatever the word is. Yes. Isolating.
• 46:41
  Speaker 3: Isolating. Self-isolating. Then you go out in public and you'd
• 46:45
  Speaker 3: whip that mask out of your back pocket, stick it
• 46:47
  Speaker 3: on your face, put your hands all over it.
• 46:49
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 46:49
  Speaker 3: Okay, anyways. Grab it all, stick it in your pocket.
• 46:50
  Speaker 2: My point is also that I get annoyed still whenever
• 46:55
  Speaker 2: I look down on the ground and I see those
• 46:57
  Speaker 2: six feet away, standing six feet, because they never pulled
• 46:59
  Speaker 2: them up, you know, and they're probably never going to.
• 47:01
  Speaker 3: No, until they replace the floor.
• 47:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah, just like at the library, the kids were, like,
• 47:05
  Speaker 2: touching the things, and now they're, like, this attraction for
• 47:08
  Speaker 2: the kids to, like, touch these dirty-ass stickers. Like, this
• 47:12
  Speaker 2: is just.
• 47:13
  Speaker 3: Ridiculous.
• 47:13
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I just want to move on.
• 47:15
  Speaker 3: Because of the pandemic delays, Karen, forensic testing backlogs, and
• 47:21
  Speaker 3: endless pretrial motions, the case took more than six years
• 47:24
  Speaker 3: to finally go to trial. Jury selection finally began in
• 47:29
  Speaker 3: October of 2024 in Cherokee County Superior Court.
• 47:32
  Speaker 2: So recent.
• 47:33
  Speaker 3: It is. That is recent. The trial lasted 18 grueling days.
• 47:38
  Speaker 3: The prosecution called 36 separate witnesses. and introduced over 1,200
• 47:46
  Speaker 3: individual pieces of evidence. These included cell tower mapping showing
• 47:51
  Speaker 3: Melody and Gary's phones, forensic ballistics matching the basement bullet
• 47:56
  Speaker 3: to the rib bullet, DNA reports from the Kubota tractor,
• 48:00
  Speaker 3: bank statements showing the fake Minnesota trip, and the recorded
• 48:04
  Speaker 3: jailhouse phone calls. The defense focused on reasonable doubt. They
• 48:08
  Speaker 3: hammered away at the fact that the actual murder weapon, the.
• 48:11
  Speaker 3: 38 caliber revolver, was never recovered by police. If Melody
• 48:16
  Speaker 3: did it, where did the gun go? They argued that
• 48:18
  Speaker 3: the state could not prove Melody had the physical strength
• 48:22
  Speaker 3: to single-handedly maneuver a 315-pound man into the bucket of
• 48:27
  Speaker 3: the tractor.
• 48:28
  Speaker 2: That is the big question, Stu.
• 48:29
  Speaker 3: It is.
• 48:30
  Speaker 2: That is the big question.
• 48:32
  Speaker 3: We just don't know how she done it.
• 48:34
  Speaker 2: No, but there are.
• 48:35
  Speaker 3: I'm guessing Rusty helped her.
• 48:36
  Speaker 2: I think Rusty probably helped her, yes. And then Stu
• 48:39
  Speaker 2: was also talking about, because we were saying, like, how
• 48:41
  Speaker 2: did she move this? And he was saying it's similar to, like, hospitals.
• 48:46
  Speaker 2: They're able to move people with sheets and rolling things,
• 48:50
  Speaker 2: and there's ways to do it.
• 48:51
  Speaker 3: Yes, if you get into the physics of it all,
• 48:53
  Speaker 3: you can.
• 48:53
  Speaker 2: Stu said, well, there's a will, there's a way.
• 48:55
  Speaker 3: There is. And they argued that Rusty Barton was an
• 49:00
  Speaker 3: admitted liar who changed his story whenever the pressure got
• 49:03
  Speaker 3: too hot. Right. Right.
• 49:10
  Speaker 2: Jury out to the out of the courthouse on a
• 49:12
  Speaker 2: field trip to the ferris farm on purcell lane the
• 49:15
  Speaker 2: jurors walked the property in person they stood in the
• 49:17
  Speaker 2: basement walked out the doors looked at the distance to
• 49:20
  Speaker 2: the barn walked down the grassy slope to the burn
• 49:23
  Speaker 2: pile and saw the exact layout for themselves because it
• 49:25
  Speaker 2: probably just got too if you overwhelm people too much
• 49:28
  Speaker 2: it's like me i'm like i can't even imagine picture
• 49:30
  Speaker 2: this anymore this is too much it's just easier just
• 49:33
  Speaker 2: to go out there and be like here it was
• 49:34
  Speaker 2: here was the body was found here's where they got
• 49:36
  Speaker 2: and here's how she had to move.
• 49:37
  Speaker 3: It and blah blah blah Yes, you want the government
• 49:39
  Speaker 3: to control how many items of a certain kind are
• 49:42
  Speaker 3: in the store for you.
• 49:43
  Speaker 2: Yes, I do.
• 49:44
  Speaker 3: You don't want a large selection of pastas or anything.
• 49:47
  Speaker 2: I don't need, I get easily overwhelmed. I need someone
• 49:50
  Speaker 2: else to make a decision. Although, today we got our
• 49:55
  Speaker 2: new rug in for the front room. And if I don't,
• 49:57
  Speaker 2: I don't know if we talked about this on Sit
• 49:59
  Speaker 2: and Sip and Bullshit or we mentioned it on, we
• 50:01
  Speaker 2: did mention it on the podcast last week. So I gave,
• 50:05
  Speaker 2: because Stu didn't want the rug. He's like, is there
• 50:07
  Speaker 2: any other options? Because he didn't like my original rug.
• 50:10
  Speaker 3: Exactly.
• 50:10
  Speaker 2: So I gave him two other options and I said,
• 50:13
  Speaker 2: you pick one. And so I was saying it was
• 50:14
  Speaker 2: a surprise to me. Well, guess what, folks? I didn't
• 50:16
  Speaker 2: like the surprise.
• 50:18
  Speaker 3: And it was one of your choices.
• 50:19
  Speaker 2: Yes, but you picked the wrong one that I wouldn't
• 50:21
  Speaker 2: have picked.
• 50:22
  Speaker 3: Then why would you give it to me as one
• 50:23
  Speaker 3: of your choices?
• 50:23
  Speaker 2: Because I was so annoyed because I picked, I originally
• 50:26
  Speaker 2: picked one and you said, are there more options? I'm like, well,
• 50:29
  Speaker 2: fuck it. Here, you pick one.
• 50:31
  Speaker 3: I did.
• 50:31
  Speaker 2: And then you picked the wrong one, so now we've
• 50:32
  Speaker 2: got to send it back and get the car.
• 50:33
  Speaker 3: What, this was just a test? This is one of your.
• 50:36
  Speaker 2: You failed.
• 50:36
  Speaker 3: You bitches sent out these tests.
• 50:38
  Speaker 2: I've got to go call Rusty.
• 50:42
  Speaker 3: Or Scott. We don't know.
• 50:43
  Speaker 2: We don't know. Scott could have helped, you know. In
• 50:48
  Speaker 2: closing arguments, the prosecution laid it out plain. Gary Ferris
• 50:52
  Speaker 2: came home on July 3rd, walked into the basement he
• 50:55
  Speaker 2: called home, and was shot in cold blood by his
• 50:58
  Speaker 2: wife of 38 years. She loaded him onto the tractor,
• 51:02
  Speaker 2: dumped him into the burn pile, lit the fire, and
• 51:04
  Speaker 2: called her son with a fake story about loose animals
• 51:06
  Speaker 2: to establish an alibi. Because remember, there were no loose animals.
• 51:09
  Speaker 2: He came home, he's like, all the animals are in
• 51:11
  Speaker 2: the barn. The barn. You got your ducks in a row.
• 51:15
  Speaker 2: The jury deliberated for three full days. They asked to
• 51:18
  Speaker 2: re-listen to the recorded phone calls and re-examine the cell
• 51:21
  Speaker 2: phone timeline. So at that point, three days is a
• 51:23
  Speaker 2: long time.
• 51:24
  Speaker 3: For a jury. It is. So as a district attorney,
• 51:27
  Speaker 3: you're like, um... I wonder if this is going my
• 51:30
  Speaker 3: way or the defense's way.
• 51:31
  Speaker 2: Well, I would think at that three days, you're starting
• 51:33
  Speaker 2: to be concerned about a mistrial, like the Lindsay Clancy thing. Yes.
• 51:37
  Speaker 3: The one hero held out, though.
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: Stuart.
• 51:40
  Speaker 2: What? What is wrong? You're going to piss me off, okay?
• 51:45
  Speaker 1: And?
• 51:46
  Speaker 2: I have questions, still. I'm not going to get into it.
• 51:50
  Speaker 3: Are you going to Melody Ferris me?
• 51:52
  Speaker 2: I'm not going to get into.
• 51:54
  Speaker 3: It, though. On November 4th, 2024, the jury came back
• 51:57
  Speaker 3: into the courtroom with their verdict. Guilty of malice murder.
• 52:02
  Speaker 3: Guilty of felony murder. Guilty of aggravated assault. Guilty of
• 52:06
  Speaker 3: concealing the death of another. Guilty of making false statements.
• 52:11
  Speaker 3: Melody Walker Ferris was found guilty on every single count.
• 52:15
  Speaker 3: In December 2024, the judge sentenced Melody Ferris to life
• 52:19
  Speaker 3: in prison with the possibility of parole after serving 30 years.
• 52:25
  Speaker 3: Along with consecutive and concurrent sentences for concealing the death
• 52:29
  Speaker 3: and lying to police, Melody was 64 years old at
• 52:32
  Speaker 3: the time of sentencing. She will be in her 90s
• 52:35
  Speaker 3: before she is even eligible to go before a parole board.
• 52:40
  Speaker 3: Even at sentencing, Melody took the stand and continued to
• 52:43
  Speaker 3: claim that she was innocent and that her son had
• 52:46
  Speaker 3: framed her.
• 52:47
  Speaker 2: You know, I saw this TikTok or whatever, this reel
• 52:53
  Speaker 2: or something, And they were like, you know what? Instead
• 52:56
  Speaker 2: of planning for retirement, I think just around the age
• 52:59
  Speaker 2: of like 70 or something when I'm about to run
• 53:01
  Speaker 2: out of money, I'll do like a somewhat mild crime
• 53:04
  Speaker 2: to get me and put in like a real lax prison.
• 53:07
  Speaker 3: Minimum security? Yeah. Like where old what's-her-face went? Martha? Martha.
• 53:11
  Speaker 2: Yes, and then just live out my days there. That's
• 53:14
  Speaker 2: my retirement plan, because I provide a bed, meals.
• 53:18
  Speaker 3: Three hots and a cup.
• 53:18
  Speaker 2: You probably can go, like, who knows, at one of
• 53:21
  Speaker 2: those minimum security prisons, it's probably just like, you could
• 53:25
  Speaker 2: probably do gardening, reading. It's not a bad plan. If
• 53:30
  Speaker 2: I was down and out and I was older, I'd
• 53:31
  Speaker 2: be like, fuck it, I'm just going to commit a crime.
• 53:34
  Speaker 2: I'm going to go to jail, and I'm going to
• 53:35
  Speaker 2: tell the judge, don't be lenient on me. I need
• 53:38
  Speaker 2: you to put me in there.
• 53:39
  Speaker 3: For the max.
• 53:40
  Speaker 2: Yes. Or just find like a really bad person and
• 53:42
  Speaker 2: like kill them or something. Like someone you know is
• 53:45
  Speaker 2: like a child molester or rapist or something. Kill them.
• 53:50
  Speaker 2: So you're still going to need to get punished. But
• 53:52
  Speaker 2: people might send money to your commissary and then you
• 53:54
  Speaker 2: got your retirement plan for the next 30 years. Not
• 53:58
  Speaker 2: a bad plan.
• 53:59
  Speaker 3: I guess.
• 53:59
  Speaker 2: Not a bad plan. That's better than being destitute and
• 54:03
  Speaker 2: dying because you got no air conditioning down here in
• 54:05
  Speaker 2: the south and you need somebody on mills on wheels
• 54:08
  Speaker 2: to bring you a fan.
• 54:08
  Speaker 3: Or you're up north and you freeze to death.
• 54:10
  Speaker 2: Yes, I mean, it's hard, okay? Yeah, that's not a
• 54:15
  Speaker 2: bad way to go out, I figure. But not this lady.
• 54:21
  Speaker 2: She had enough money, so she's going to be miserable
• 54:23
  Speaker 2: in prison.
• 54:23
  Speaker 3: Yes, yes.
• 54:24
  Speaker 2: Without Rusty.
• 54:25
  Speaker 3: Without Rusty. Slinging her some... Okay, stop. Loving.
• 54:30
  Speaker 2: Anyways... All right, that is our case out of Georgia. Stu,
• 54:33
  Speaker 2: do you have a y'all need Jesus?
• 54:35
  Speaker 3: Of course I do.
• 54:36
  Speaker 2: Okay, let's go. Sorry, we had to interrupt. We had
• 54:39
  Speaker 2: a pretzel emergency, or as they call them, princels. They
• 54:43
  Speaker 2: needed more. Come running up the stairs.
• 54:46
  Speaker 3: Trying to give them activities and snacks.
• 54:48
  Speaker 2: Yeah, we gave them colors and stuff, and he needed,
• 54:51
  Speaker 2: so we're like, oh my God, what's wrong? So Stu
• 54:53
  Speaker 2: jumps up. He's got the big bowl. I need more princels.
• 54:57
  Speaker 2: And now Stu's out of breath because he had to
• 54:59
  Speaker 2: go downstairs.
• 55:00
  Speaker 3: Then back up.
• 55:01
  Speaker 2: And then back up. And then I was like, and
• 55:03
  Speaker 2: then he's starting to talk. I'm like, you ate a pretzel,
• 55:05
  Speaker 2: didn't you?
• 55:06
  Speaker 3: I did. I did eat a pretzel while I was
• 55:07
  Speaker 3: down there.
• 55:08
  Speaker 2: All right. So do you have, or y'all need Jesus?
• 55:11
  Speaker 3: I do.
• 55:11
  Speaker 2: Okay.
• 55:12
  Speaker 3: Let's go. Man accused of killing wife, driving body to Memphis,
• 55:19
  Speaker 3: agrees to extradition count. Florida or not Florida?
• 55:27
  Speaker 2: Not Florida. Okay.
• 55:29
  Speaker 3: Action 5 News. August 17, 2026. Memphis, Tennessee. It's fresh.
• 55:38
  Speaker 2: Like the body, it's fresh.
• 55:40
  Speaker 3: The man accused of killing his wife in Baton Rouge
• 55:46
  Speaker 3: and driving her body nearly 400 miles to Memphis appeared
• 55:49
  Speaker 3: in court on Monday. Tyrone Brazil, 50, appeared in a
• 55:53
  Speaker 3: Shelby County courtroom in a blue jumpsuit and handcuff. The
• 55:58
  Speaker 3: judge shared Brazil's options of obtaining an attorney or consenting
• 56:03
  Speaker 3: to extradition to Louisiana. He consented to being sent back
• 56:07
  Speaker 3: to Louisiana and signed his extradition papers inside the courtroom
• 56:11
  Speaker 3: on Monday. Brazil is charged with murder and the death
• 56:14
  Speaker 3: of his wife, Lanessa Bradford. Court records show the two
• 56:18
  Speaker 3: married in 2003. According to the Memphis Police Department, the
• 56:24
  Speaker 3: death investigation began when Bradford's body was discovered in the
• 56:27
  Speaker 3: passenger seat of a car that was pulled over for
• 56:30
  Speaker 3: a traffic stop on Thursday night. Baton Rouge police said
• 56:34
  Speaker 3: that Brazil and Bradford got into an argument at a park.
• 56:38
  Speaker 3: Police allege Brazil shot his wife during the argument, then
• 56:41
  Speaker 3: drove off with her in the car and continued driving
• 56:43
  Speaker 3: until he was stopped by police in Memphis.
• 56:47
  Speaker 1: How you doing?
• 56:52
  Speaker 3: What?
• 56:53
  Speaker 2: Were you hoping I would interrupt you at some point?
• 56:55
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I gotta take a breath. I'm dying from running
• 56:57
  Speaker 3: up and down the stairs.
• 56:59
  Speaker 2: Again, I'd love to see the stats on people with
• 57:02
  Speaker 2: two-story houses.
• 57:03
  Speaker 3: I got to be getting it. My health app has
• 57:05
  Speaker 3: got to show an increase in health.
• 57:07
  Speaker 2: I am guilty of like, I never take the stairs
• 57:10
  Speaker 2: if I can avoid them. That one time you made
• 57:13
  Speaker 2: me walk up the Eiffel Tower, I'll never forgive you.
• 57:16
  Speaker 1: Oh, yeah.
• 57:17
  Speaker 3: You're still complaining about that?
• 57:20
  Speaker 2: That was the second time. The first time I walked
• 57:22
  Speaker 2: up the Eiffel Tower, though, I was in much better shape,
• 57:23
  Speaker 2: and then you nicked my fat ass up there because
• 57:26
  Speaker 2: we couldn't get tickets to the elevator. The thing is
• 57:29
  Speaker 2: that you can't always get tickets up, but you can
• 57:31
  Speaker 2: always ride back down.
• 57:32
  Speaker 3: Yes, you can always ride back down. But, I mean,
• 57:34
  Speaker 3: you can get there. You just got to stand in
• 57:36
  Speaker 3: line for an hour.
• 57:37
  Speaker 2: Yes, so the option was to either just go take
• 57:40
  Speaker 2: the stairs up the Eiffel Tower, or that time you
• 57:43
  Speaker 2: made me climb up Arthur's Seat in Edinburgh. That was also.
• 57:49
  Speaker 3: I just was like, hey, let's go for a little walk.
• 57:51
  Speaker 3: And then it just kept getting longer and longer and longer.
• 57:53
  Speaker 2: No, and what I was mad about, I can't even
• 57:55
  Speaker 2: remember what I was saying. I had like a distinct
• 57:57
  Speaker 2: argument with you on that one. And I was like, oh,
• 58:01
  Speaker 2: I was like, sorry, your wife's so fat.
• 58:04
  Speaker 3: I didn't say that.
• 58:06
  Speaker 2: No, I said that. I was like, I know what
• 58:08
  Speaker 2: you're thinking.
• 58:10
  Speaker 3: Just admit it.
• 58:11
  Speaker 1: Just admit it.
• 58:13
  Speaker 2: Anyways, yeah, so Stu was hoping I'd save him. At
• 58:17
  Speaker 2: some point, he had to take a deep breath. After
• 58:19
  Speaker 2: reading that.
• 58:20
  Speaker 3: Yes, our picture at the top of Arthur's seat was
• 58:22
  Speaker 3: not one of a happy couple.
• 58:24
  Speaker 2: No, we appeared to be.
• 58:25
  Speaker 3: It was of two people that were dying. Appeared to be.
• 58:29
  Speaker 2: Because he started getting, you started getting ahead of me.
• 58:32
  Speaker 2: I think. You'd get ahead of me.
• 58:33
  Speaker 3: You were like, go on without me. I'm like, all right, bye.
• 58:35
  Speaker 2: I was like, go on without me.
• 58:39
  Speaker 3: Well, I was going to make sure we're going the
• 58:40
  Speaker 3: right way. So then I would walk back if we weren't.
• 58:43
  Speaker 2: Because we went a different way than everybody else. Then
• 58:45
  Speaker 2: we found out there was a trail.
• 58:47
  Speaker 1: Remember?
• 58:47
  Speaker 3: Well, we were following other people.
• 58:49
  Speaker 2: Well, we were, but that was, I think, the harder.
• 58:51
  Speaker 2: It was a shorter time period, but it was directly
• 58:54
  Speaker 2: up as opposed to the walking path that was like.
• 58:57
  Speaker 3: Yes, we were going up the north face of Everest.
• 58:59
  Speaker 2: Yes. We were on the Tibetan side.
• 59:02
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 59:04
  Speaker 2: Anyways.
• 59:05
  Speaker 3: Yes, good times, good times. Okay, so he killed his girlfriend.
• 59:10
  Speaker 2: And drove her to Memphis.
• 59:11
  Speaker 3: Yes, that's where we were. Bradford was pronounced dead at
• 59:14
  Speaker 3: the scene of the traffic stop, and Brazil was taken
• 59:17
  Speaker 3: into custody as a fugitive. Bradford was an employee of
• 59:21
  Speaker 3: an elementary school in Louisiana.
• 59:23
  Speaker 2: Oh, my God.
• 59:24
  Speaker 3: The school district shared a statement saying she will be
• 59:27
  Speaker 3: missed and that her dedication to students and staff was unmatched.
• 59:31
  Speaker 2: Oh, I thought you meant he was an elementary school teacher.
• 59:34
  Speaker 2: I'm like, oh, my God.
• 59:35
  Speaker 1: No.
• 59:36
  Speaker 2: Oh, that's sad. All right. Well, that is our case
• 59:39
  Speaker 2: for this week. We better go before someone else needs
• 59:41
  Speaker 2: more princels.
• 59:42
  Speaker 3: Or something. Baby starts crying.
• 59:45
  Speaker 2: Yeah, something wakes up.
• 59:46
  Speaker 3: We're out of ink. Somebody draws on a wall. Mm-hmm.
• 59:49
  Speaker 2: Those are washable.
• 59:50
  Speaker 3: It doesn't matter. It's like a half-hour cleanup every time
• 59:52
  Speaker 3: they do something like that, though.
• 59:53
  Speaker 2: I know.
• 59:54
  Speaker 3: It's like.
• 59:55
  Speaker 2: It's like you try to get things done in like
• 59:56
  Speaker 2: the Sam's, take for instance the Sam's Club thing. Like
• 59:59
  Speaker 2: we order things to be delivered to save time, but
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 2: then it takes more time because you have to call
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 2: and talk to them about the things that didn't arrive.
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 2: And it's like, and then all of a sudden it's
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 2: not convenient anymore. I'm starting to get concerned about this
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 2: AI though. I was watching this thing and these people
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 2: that own the AI are starting to get concerned that
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 2: the machines could take over.
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 3: It happened in Terminator. How will we survive? All the
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 3: movies from the 80s are starting to happen. Robocop, Demolition Man,
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 3: Running Man, Terminator movies, Spider-Man.
• 1:00:37
  Speaker 2: Okay, well, I'm starting to get concerned. We were just
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 2: talking about the baby. You were like, you're never going
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 2: to know probably a human delivering a package by the
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 2: time he gets that old.
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 1: No.
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 2: Because he's watching a package be delivered via drone. And
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 2: we're part of the problem because we ordered it. The
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 2: drone's not so bad, though. I don't feel like it.
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 3: It's like those people that were born whenever the Orville
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 3: brothers did their first flight. And they were like five
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 3: or six years old when flight began. And lived through
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 3: people landing on the moon. If they, in fact, landed
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 3: on the moon.
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 2: That's questionable.
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 3: No, it's not. Stop all these conspiracy theories. That's how
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 3: you people got to where you are today.
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 2: Well, I got a lot of conspiracies.
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 1: Yes, I am.
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 2: All right, well, we're going to go. So you guys
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 2: stay safe, lock your doors, and keep that porch light on. Bye, everyone.
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 2: Say bye, Stu.
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 3: Bye, Stu.
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 2: Don't you know it's bad luck to be superstitious But nothing.
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 3: Else is working.
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 2: And my head is really
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 1: Hurting And I'm sick of all this worrying About things
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 1: I can't control