Merged Remember the West Memphis 3?

[Vixen]

I just heard someone in the second film say, "two of the kids did die here because they were put in the water and they drowned." That seems unlikely to me given the positions of the bodies but I don't know how solid the evidence for that is.

It is an established medical fact that Moore and Branch died from drowning.

 

[Vixen]

I just watched all the films back to back and there was one short segment in one of them where it was at least hinted that Misskelly was offered or at least told about a reward. At the end of West of Memphis it's also stated that Baldwin was offered leniency if he testified against Echols and he refused.

Leaving rewards aside, Misskelly was offered a reduced sentence if he testified against the other two and allowed his taped confession to be entered in evidence against them. Baldwin was offered leniency if he explicitly testified that Echols had done it. He refused. Right at the end when they were all offered the Alford plea, Baldwin was absolutely adamant that he wouldn't plead guilty and would rather sit in jail till hell froze over. He only relented after a plea to do it for Damien's sake.

That, taken as a whole, is the behaviour of an innocent group of people. I don't know what to make of the evidence against Hobbs, particularly after all the fuss about Byers. But the entering of the Alford plea has presumably ensured that nobody is going to go after Hobbs anyway.

Misskelley was the only one who showed any remorse. He wanted to confess, but without admitting his full part in it. He said he ran away because he could bear it no longer and Baldwin & Echols rang him later to berate his leaving early.

A phone call did happen when he said it happened.

All three had fake alibis. Misskelley claims he went to a wrestling match out of town and Echols' & Baldwin's friends and families rallied to support their claim they were at home all evening. This was found to be untrue.

A fake alibi (as with Knox/Sollecito) is incriminating evidence in itself.

 

[Vixen]

I'm encouraged to note that we're now six years on from the Alford plea, and none of the three seems to have been in any sort of trouble. I seem to recall that there were suspended sentences involved that would be activated if any of them fell foul of the law in the following ten years. So far so good.

I was worried about this because they were very young when they were imprisoned and they were mixed-up kids to begin with. At least Damien was and Jesse had mild learning difficulties and this is not a good start. Then they were institutionalised with violent criminals for 18 years. It's something of a miracle they've turned out so well given the circumstances.

I also note that Life After Death is a New York Times best-seller. I hope that at least provides some income.

My heart bleeds for the little diddums.

What about the three defenceless 8-year old boys robbed of their lives and shown no mercy, by these depraved degenerates?

 

[Vixen]

Maybe someone more current on this case can help me. At one point a knife from Mr. Byers was tested for blood in some way. Does anyone know what kind of test was done? It might have been tested by a private lab in North Carolina, but I don't believe that the state's crime lab was involved. Probably because I read one of John Douglas's books, I don't consider Mr. Byers to be much of a suspect. The knife is probably a red herring, but I have become interested in presumptive and confirmatory blood tests, and this might be a good example of a misinterpreted presumptive test. A quick Google search turned up: "In December 1993, Byers gave a knife to Paradise Lost cameraman Doug Cooper as a present. After consulting with HBO, the filmmakers turned the knife over to West Memphis police. The knife had blood traces around the handle, which the crime lab tested. The tests showed the blood could have belonged to either John Mark Byers or Chris Byers. West Memphis police interrogated Byers again in January 1994".

I am continually surprised by cases in which a jury ignores strong alibi defense, but there are a number of examples of it.

AIUI the knife belonged to him and his explanation he once cut himself on it was one you could neither prove nor disprove.

 

[Rolfe]

How do you explain the ritualistic way the boys' were tied up with their own shoelaces (in as many different ways as there are perpetrators). Satanists are fixated on knots, as conferring magic powers (Echols is obsessed with 'Magick'.)

The boys were found in that state of rigor mortis, because as Miskelley confessed - and he had 'insider' information that he could not have got from the press - that was they way they were tied up by Echols and Baldwin (he distances himself, although he admits to chasing after Michael Moore, who made a brave effort to escape crying, 'help us, help us', and budgeoning him over the head). He claims they were sexually abused, and poor Byers, castrated, before they died, Byers of his immediate wounds, and Misskelley describes the trajectory of his blood on castration as being the length of one car, and the other two left to drown.

Now, given Misskelley is supposed to be this mentally retarded moron who should not have been interviewed by police because he was mentally challenged, how do account for Misskelley knowing all of these things, which turned out to be fact in terms of his description of the boys' demise?

Incidentally, an IQ of 72 is within the normal range, and Misskelley falls within the same band of IQ as 50% of the population.

All three of the accused failed polygraphs on five key questions ('Did you do it', 'Do you know who did do it', etc). Echols when asked how he'd imagine the perpetrators to feel, replied they'd feel really happy about what they did.

He knew in advance of even the pathologist that the boys had been urinated on in their mouths, and this substance was later found in their stomachs.

Animals do not behave like this, which is why as you as a vet have never seen an animal who died naturally in such a grotesque position.

You have quoted a post which I later realised was in error, once I had seen additional photos of the bodies and read one of the PM reports. I was wrong about the "tied to chairs" thing. You could try admitting you're wrong about the numerous things you're wrong about, some time. I recommend it. It's good for the soul.

I have frequently seen bodies in far more "grotesque" positions than this, I assure you. I'm not sure what "died naturally" has to do with anything, since these boys were most certainly murdered.

The shoelaces were loose, probably used to help move the bodies after death. Citation for this being any sort of "ritual"?

As far as what Misskelly said, do you have a recording of the entire interview session which demonstrates the police didn't feed him this information? No? The confession(s) is/are worthless, especially if you can't overcome the alibi evidence for Misskelly.

And polygraphs are unreliable woo.

 

[Vixen]

That's extremely helpful. I'm unclear as to how the prosecution disputes this, given that it must if it's trying to say Jesse was involved in the murders at some point. Do they simply affect to disbelieve the alibi witnesses? It wouldn't be the first time I suppose.

The wrestling match was later on that evening, a bus ride away. Misskelley's descriptions of it could have come from the press as it was well-covered. It is not believed by the police he ever did attend that wrestling match.

 

[Vixen]

Thank you and we'll say no more about it.

I saw you had posted some sensible comments about West of Memphis about the time the film came out. Actually, although I was in the thread and reading it at the time, I wasn't following the arguments because I hadn't watched the films. I have now (I'm half way through Devil's Knot) and I've got a much better grasp of the issues.

The witch-hunt against Mark Byers in the second Paradise Lost film was a bit of a shocker. I thought the film was poor and that they were in effect doing to Byers what had been done to the three teenagers - building a flimsy case against him on the basis of "he's the sort of person who could have done it." (He's a very good singer by the way.) The switcheroo to accusing Terry Hobbs in the third film at first seemed like another shot at doing the same thing - OK so going after one stepfather didn't work out let's go for the other one. It was only redeemed to some extent by its presentation as a legal ruse along the lines of a "special defence of incrimination". In that, the accused shows that there is credible evidence that someone else committed the crime, and it doesn't have to be BARD and it doesn't even have to be stronger than the evidence against the accused, it just has to be a reasonable case which is enough to throw reasonable doubt on the case against the accused.

However, West of Memphis went way further than that and started to build a genuinely fact-based case against Hobbs. I found what was presented in the film to be reasonably persuasive, although as I said I was conscious that it was showing only one side of the story, Hobbs didn't have right of reply, and we weren't shown any case for the defence. Since the Alford plea means that the state will not investigate Hobbs, I'd be quite interested to know how strong others think the case against him actually is.

He's obviously not Mr. Bojangles though, so if he was the killer and he acted alone (+/- Jacoby) then perhaps Mr. Bojangles was someone unconnected to the murders?

Damien Echols is behind the film. He first went for Byers as the 'real killer' and then Hobbs.

As Mandy Rice-Davies once said, 'He would say that, wouldn't he?'

 

[Rolfe]

It is an established medical fact that Moore and Branch died from drowning.

Yes, and if you bothered to read on you'd see I found that out and changed my mind. You could do with a bit of that yourself.

 

[Rolfe]

The murders took place in Robin Hood Hills, as broadly described by Misskelley. The three planned a Satanist murder (to gain magick power - they regularly met to flay dogs and dabble in the occult, which Echols was obsessed with, and were fixated on sucking blood, as witnessed by many).

I believe Echols and Baldwin had homosexual tendencies. The three lay in hiding and and Echols made animal noises to attract the boys in further, whereupon they were ambushed.

They had been seen by multiple witnesses on their bikes in that area, and their bikes were found there.

Misskelley was the only one who showed any remorse. He wanted to confess, but without admitting his full part in it. He said he ran away because he could bear it no longer and Baldwin & Echols rang him later to berate his leaving early.

A phone call did happen when he said it happened.

All three had fake alibis. Misskelley claims he went to a wrestling match out of town and Echols' & Baldwin's friends and families rallied to support their claim they were at home all evening. This was found to be untrue.

A fake alibi (as with Knox/Sollecito) is incriminating evidence in itself.

My heart bleeds for the little diddums.

What about the three defenceless 8-year old boys robbed of their lives and shown no mercy, by these depraved degenerates?

The wrestling match was later on that evening, a bus ride away. Misskelley's descriptions of it could have come from the press as it was well-covered. It is not believed by the police he ever did attend that wrestling match.

Damien Echols is behind the film. He first went for Byers as the 'real killer' and then Hobbs.

As Mandy Rice-Davies once said, 'He would say that, wouldn't he?'

Argument by blatant assertion doesn't get you very far.

 

[Vixen]

It seems possible, even plausible. Hobbs is easy to dislike though. As you stated, he couldn't defend himself. IF that documentary portrayed the truth, I certainly think it warrants an investigation, although as you stated, it won't happen.

Partly the desire for it to be Hobbs comes from wanting it to be solved, I think. I know I don't like an unsolved homicide. It is human to want answers, to want it solved and to want to know what happened.

Whilst Hobbs is an unpleasant character, you would have to explain how one man managed to overcome THREE robust 8-year old boys on their bikes.

Assuming his motive would be homosexual paedophile rape, why would he have any need for all the ritualistic stuff like the many knotted shoe laces, the strange cuts on one boys face, the castration (Satanists like Echols like to collect body part; Echols had the skulls of birds and dogs) and the blue candle wax.

Realistically, a psychopathic paedophile would not take such a big risk, but would go for just the one boy at a time. The logistics of raping three boys - in a time frame of when the boys were actually noticed as missing - is just not realistically feasible.

However, when you consider there were three perps, as described by Misskelley, fired up by occult jiggery-pokery - and the shoelaces of each boy was tied up differently, indicating individual differences - who prided themselves as being a gang of local bullies inspiring fear in others, then motive has everything to do with the WM3.

 

[Vixen]

You have quoted a post which I later realised was in error, once I had seen additional photos of the bodies and read one of the PM reports. I was wrong about the "tied to chairs" thing. You could try admitting you're wrong about the numerous things you're wrong about, some time. I recommend it. It's good for the soul.

I have frequently seen bodies in far more "grotesque" positions than this, I assure you. I'm not sure what "died naturally" has to do with anything, since these boys were most certainly murdered.

The shoelaces were loose, probably used to help move the bodies after death. Citation for this being any sort of "ritual"?

As far as what Misskelly said, do you have a recording of the entire interview session which demonstrates the police didn't feed him this information? No? The confession(s) is/are worthless, especially if you can't overcome the alibi evidence for Misskelly.

And polygraphs are unreliable woo.

You can read the police transcript in full of Misskelley's confession in Gary Meece's books, Where the Monsters Go and Blood on Black.

(You can read it for free with a Kindle Unlimited two-month free trial promotion.)

Yes, polygraphs are not permissible as court evidence. However, police find it useful in eliminating suspects. For example, they had a few nutters claiming to be the perps, yet they passed the polygraph and were ruled out, anyway.

I have attached the references to the 'knots' significance.

I would be wary of the documentaries, as Echols' defence team is behind them.

 

[Vixen]

Yes, and if you bothered to read on you'd see I found that out and changed my mind. You could do with a bit of that yourself.

As of the time I responded to your post, I had not reached your retraction.

 

[Rolfe]

(That was in response to the infodump of "knot".)

 

[Vixen]

(That was in response to the infodump of "knot".)

Treat it with credibility or not, you asked for the citation and I provided it.

Echols has a long history of mental illness, revolving around his belief in his satanic powers and his encylcopaedic knowledge of Aleister Crowley, police certainly took the 'satanist' angle seriously, even if you believe it doesn't exist.

Here's a picture of Echols' neck.

The murders were committed by nutters.

 

[DragonLady]

Buckland's Complete Book of Witchcraft isn't about Satanism. It's a "Bible" of sorts for the Wicca religion, which does not believe in Satan.

 

[John Jones]

Misskelley told the cops that the three victims had been 'screwed' by Echols and Baldwin because that's what the police believed. The cops thought the boys had been sodomized because their anuses were dilated (a normal consequence of death).

Everybody in Memphis and West Memphis knew the police believed this and the bit about the genital mutilation because the cops were heard talking about it over the police radio the night the bodies were discovered. It even made the papers in Memphis. I even heard about the sodomy and mutilation within 36 hours. West Memphis is one big truck stop, and prolly every household had a CB radio and police scanner in 1993. The cops were blabbing too much.

It turns out that the three murdered boys were NOT sodomized. Misskelley also got the shoelace thing wrong. He told the cops that the boys were tied up with brown rope - until one of the detectives shook his head and pointed to his shoes. So Misskelley got two critical facts wrong, and was coached about one of them.

Misskelley also listed three different times of day when the murders took place. The first two were impossible, but the third time's the charm. Misskelly's coached confession is worthless. If the cops thought Flying Saucers killed the three boys, Misskelley would have named Echols as being Klaatu.

Vixen, check your sources once in a while why don't you? It couldn't hurt.

 

[Rolfe]

As of the time I responded to your post, I had not reached your retraction.

Don't you think it might be a good idea to read through the waiting responses before you pile in with irrelevant comments?

 

[Vixen]

Misskelley told the cops that the three victims had been 'screwed' by Echols and Baldwin because that's what the police believed. The cops thought the boys had been sodomized because their anuses were dilated (a normal consequence of death).

Everybody in Memphis and West Memphis knew the police believed this and the bit about the genital mutilation because the cops were heard talking about it over the police radio the night the bodies were discovered. It even made the papers in Memphis. I even heard about the sodomy and mutilation within 36 hours. West Memphis is one big truck stop, and prolly every household had a CB radio and police scanner in 1993. The cops were blabbing too much.

It turns out that the three murdered boys were NOT sodomized. Misskelley also got the shoelace thing wrong. He told the cops that the boys were tied up with brown rope - until one of the detectives shook his head and pointed to his shoes. So Misskelley got two critical facts wrong, and was coached about one of them.

Misskelley also listed three different times of day when the murders took place. The first two were impossible, but the third time's the charm. Misskelly's coached confession is worthless. If the cops thought Flying Saucers killed the three boys, Misskelley would have named Echols as being Klaatu.

Vixen, check your sources once in a while why don't you? It couldn't hurt.

Police believe he deliberately gave them the wrong times in order to mislead.

The detail of the castration was not common knowledge 'within 36 hours of the crime'.

Echols was able to tell the police animals would have chewed the boy's genitals. There were no animals in the swamp.

Misskelley described oral sex.

 

[Vixen]

Don't you think it might be a good idea to read through the waiting responses before you pile in with irrelevant comments?

Don't you think it might be a good idea to get your facts right before posting in the first place?

 

[Strawberry]

Police believe he deliberately gave them the wrong times in order to mislead.

The detail of the castration was not common knowledge 'within 36 hours of the crime'.

Echols was able to tell the police animals would have chewed the boys, genitals. There were no animals in the swamp.

Misskelley described oral sex.

Police have nothing to back up that belief.

The notion that Christopher Byers was castrated, (he wasn't), was common currency by the time Jessie was questioned.

What swamp? The boys were in a ditch full of water which contained snapping turtles.

There's no evidence that oral sex took place during these murders.