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True Crime Bonus - Oklahoma Girl Scout Murders with Allison Dickson of Vintage Villains (Part 2 of 3)
384 Plays2 months ago
We continue with the case of the murders of Lori Farmer, Michele Guse and Denise Milner, three preteen girls killed at their Girl Scout camp in Locust Grove, Oklahoma. We pick up at the arrest of Gene Leroy Hart, a 33-year-old Cherokee man, explore the community reaction and take you through the trial and the verdict.
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Transcript
Podcast Introduction and Patreon Promotion
00:00:00
Speaker
This is a Silver Linings Handbook podcast. I'm Jason Blair. And this is the Vintage Villains podcast. I'm Alison Dixon. And this is a true crime bonus episode.
00:00:24
Speaker
So we're doing this on YouTube live. um If any of you guys want to join us in the future, you can check out the Silver Linings Handbook ah podcast ah Patreon. We'd love to have you as a part of the Patreon and love to have you as part of our lives because one of the coolest things about doing these are the interactive discussions and suggestions that people have the real time editing that we get on the lives I also love. um So, you know, this is our second episode on the Oklahoma Girl Scout
Oklahoma Girl Scout Murders Overview
00:00:57
Speaker
murders. um ah In part three, we'll be doing a consult with former FBI profiler Julia Cowley, who's the host of the console podcast, to get her thoughts on what we should look for in terms of an unknown subject or unsub, as they call them in the FBI.
00:01:13
Speaker
and and And it will also give us an opportunity to listen to julia and share our theories around the case. What i wanted to do first was just sort of give a brief recap of the first episode where we introduced you.
00:01:31
Speaker
um to the victims, nine-year-old Michelle Guse, eight-year-old Lori Farmer, and 10-year-old Denise Milner. um We told you about ah the strange events that happened on the night of the murders, including a man apparently stalking the campers and the counselors. We walked you through the evidence that was found at the crime scene, the caves that were discovered nearby, and the evidence of a flashlight at the scene and also the semen that was found. We ah also walked you through prior crimes of Gene Leroy Hart, a Cherokee former high school football player, and some of the clues that may have been in the area that night, and we took you to Gene's arrest. We also discussed some of the tensions between natives and other minorities and ah whites in the and the community.
00:02:26
Speaker
so That's basically where we, for the most part, basically where we left you off.
Racial Dynamics and Historical Context
00:02:33
Speaker
um You know, one thing we wanted to add that we didn't mention in the previous episode and that we didn't want to leave out as we discussed sort of ah the ways that race factored in this case. Denise Milner was African American. Lori Farmer and Michelle Guse were white.
00:02:51
Speaker
In fact, ah Denise was the only African-American girl at the camp, and according to the documentary Keeper of the Ashes, it was a part of the reason why the counselors especially, you know, we've got that one example of the counselor paying attention to her on the train or on the bus, it's one of the reasons why the counselors were very focused on Denise finding friendship at camp. So some of her misgivings about going to camp,
00:03:18
Speaker
may have been rooted in being different from other girls, although you know in my personal experience as someone who is African-American at that age, you probably don't even notice the differences. um Often that comes later. It's hard to say. Another thing I want to point out is that in the beginning of the episode, I mentioned you know the right date that the girls arrived. But I had said in the beginning that it was Monday. It was actually um on Sunday that the girls arrived.
00:03:46
Speaker
So I wanted to just run you guys through a couple things, and you can you you are probably familiar with some of these slides, but we've got a handful that we added to the mix that we didn't share last time. in the I'm going to jump back. you know This is the map for those of you guys who are listening on audio. This is a map that shows the high number of lynchings of Native Americans that happened ah in the Oklahoma area. And we mentioned that there's no part of the country where there are more lynchings of Native
Camp Experience and Crime Scene
00:04:16
Speaker
Americans. So that's just something to keep in mind. Also, you have to remember that this was the this area was a home to the Tulsa race massacre in 1919. So there are a lot of issues around race in this area of North Eastern Oklahoma and Oklahoma in general, really.
00:04:34
Speaker
These are the victims. That's Michelle, Denise, and Laurie. These are more pictures of them. ah Denise on this one. um This one's Michelle. This set is is Laurie. And I did want to mention real quick, Jason, um and while we were pointing out to that Denise, ah you know, was unique, ah she was the only African American girl at the Camp Lori was actually, I learned to keep her the ass as she was the youngest ah camper at the whole camp. Yeah. So it's interesting how they kind of all ended up together, you know.
00:05:09
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. And it's interesting. Well, because one of the things that um I know in the the books that we read, the part of the reason why they ended up together is because the other girls selected girls that they knew. These were these three were sort of the girls who were who were left out, but they bonded really quickly. And the counselors felt very good about it. yeah This is a map of Camp Scott in the immediate area around it. And in this zoomed up version on the southern side of the camp, the south ah western side of the camp, you can see here where the girls were staying. So this is zoomed in map of the
00:05:50
Speaker
Kiawa unit of the camp where they were located. And you can see there that it's probably one of the more isolated or perhaps the most isolated um unit within the camp. And this gives you guys an example um of of the overhead ah you know to the west, the caves are found.
00:06:09
Speaker
um to the to the east, you have Snake Creek, Spring Creek, which are relevant in the story because some of the witnesses had seen Jean Leroy Hart at ah different points there in that area. So that's just something to to to just sort of like refresh your memory. um I wanted to give you guys this cool slide that or photo I found. You can see here, this is the cookie trail coming into the camp. It's really densely packed. There's not enough room for probably two cars on it. It's a very sort of tight location. So just kind of giving you the feel that this is a really, really, really, really, really sort of secluded area. um You can imagine what it was like a night in this area. You really felt you were out in the wilderness.
00:07:00
Speaker
This one gives you a good idea because we talked through this. You can see the horseshoe ring of the camp itself. The the girls in the Kiawa unit were really in a ring and Lori, Michelle and den are ah Denise were furthest from the counselor's tent. And you can see on this map, if you go down to the bottom right side of it, 150 yards from where their tent is, that's where their bodies were actually found.
00:07:31
Speaker
um And this, this next slide gives you a really good idea of this is the tree where their bodies were found. So the road would be to the right or or to the, I guess, the left on this image. And, you know, it wasn't ridiculously far from the road, but it was very secluded and hard to see. um These are some of the investigators in front of that tree back at the time. And you can see here actually the sleeping bags themselves with the girls uh, lumped on top of each other. So you get an idea of how they were sort of discarded. Um, and I think when we talked to Julia, that's going to be a really interesting aspect of, uh, of, of the case where they ended up ultimately. Um, this is the, the six volt flashlight that was found around the scene. Um, this is, these are investigators who are 10 seven, and this is a, um,
00:08:26
Speaker
This is a close-up of ah tent seven before they pulled out the mattresses. And it's hard to see here, but you can see some of the blood that's covering the mattresses and some of the blood spray that's there. These are glasses that were found at the scene um that also end up being a clue. These are some of the girls going home um in the immediate aftermath. They're bus dropping them off in Tulsa. This is Jean.
00:08:56
Speaker
And ah this is Jean. And I think this is probably a good spot for where where we left you off other than this image of Jean's actual camp. um so So this is kind of where we're at
Law Enforcement Skepticism and Cultural Beliefs
00:09:12
Speaker
in it. And Allison, did you want to say something?
00:09:15
Speaker
Yeah, ah great, by the way, to see all the slides and a few of the new ones that you added in as well. though Seeing those visual aids just really ah brings home sort of the layout of the camp, and it really puts into mind some of the isolation elements that could have made it easier to conceal.
00:09:34
Speaker
an attacker or an intruder. so um But yeah, people head on to YouTube and check that out if if you ah if you so desire. um But yeah, I wanted to add something interesting that I also found in Jessica's research, ah just the facts, true crime research, shout out. um And it was an excerpt from the book, Someone Cry for the Children, that might provide some additional historical context around why the community remained skeptical of law enforcement. And the area ah where Gene Hart was ultimately arrested was Cookson Hills. And that was that also the childhood home of 1930s gangster slash bank robber Pretty Boy Floyd. ah He was kind of
00:10:19
Speaker
running at large you know around the same period of time as like John Dillinger. and ah you know You have your Al Capone, that that Prohibition era gangster periodit period. um and Apparently, he had so much support in the area that he was able to walk freely around in the open.
00:10:37
Speaker
ah without anybody questioning him or anybody saying anything about it. um And locals compare him to a Robin Hood type, and you're actually going to hear us talk a little bit about sort of the folk hero status around Heart that developed as we go along here. But um just to give you an idea that this well predates him,
00:10:56
Speaker
Cookson Hills had also suffered a lot during the Dust Bowl of the 1920s and the Great Depression, and Floyd represented their frustrations to sort of the wider world. ah He even apparently paid off a lot of people's mortgages ah with probably some of his ill-gotten gains. um His brother was also a sheriff in a neighboring county, and eventually the feds would swoop in and arrest Floyd and 20 of his fellow fugitives.
00:11:25
Speaker
ah But by that point, the tradition of sort of thumbing your nose at the man had been well ingrained and it would come to serve Jean Hart ah quite well some 40 years later.
00:11:36
Speaker
yeah And, you know, before we jump into the timeline, I want to jump back to the 10-month manhunt, which kind of ties into what Alison was just saying there. So, you know, back on um July 13th, so July 13th, right after the murders at the beginning of the investigation, the authorities said in a Tulsa World article that they were, quote, seeking a man with a history of child molestation.
00:12:05
Speaker
So keep in mind that while Hart did have a history of sexual assault, he didn't have a history of child molestation. Part of the reason why I bring this up, you can see some of the seeds that are going to show up eventually in the trial um that relate to the publicity in the case that begin to undermine the prosecution a little bit.
00:12:25
Speaker
um The newspaper report said that Hart was charged several days after the killings. Hart was charged with the crimes on the basis of photographs that were found that he could have developed um while he was in prison. And those were found in a cave near the crime scene. But it wasn't until 10 months after the rapes and killings that he was arrested by the Oklahoma authorities. So more than 400 law enforcement officers were said to have been involved in the search. Similar to our episode on the 1975 killings of Catherine and Sheila loin dogs were brought in from Pennsylvania also.
00:13:05
Speaker
to assist in tracking the killer. So Sheriff Pete Weaver described them as, quote, wonder dogs. The dogs were said to track the scent of the killer from cave to cave. um One of the agents joked that a medicine man had put a curse on the dogs. And we'll come back to that in a second.
00:13:24
Speaker
You know the comment might have been in jest on their part but the dogs didn't fare well in the investigation and according to the book ah someone cry for the children one dog died from heat another dog was flown in to replace that rock water.
00:13:40
Speaker
um Another dog was cut loose on a search for the trail. Soon after, there was some barking, followed by silence. The dog came back 15 minutes later, battered, bruised, and cut. Less than a week after that, after returning home to Pennsylvania, a third dog was struck by a car on the Pennsylvania turnpike.
00:14:01
Speaker
so you know We mentioned a little bit about the role that medicine men played in this manhunt back in the previous episode, but I want to delve a little bit deeper into that in the hopes of sort of further fleshing out how the cultural intersections in the case and how they might have influenced the investigation. Am I reading your section, Elton? It says my name on it, but I have a feeling this is your section.
00:14:28
Speaker
ah You know, do you want to keep reading it? Because you're doing really well. go Keep going, man, because i think i I think I might have swapped some things earlier because I had to break it up because um I take over the pretrial right after this. so ah They felt the old medicine man they believe was protecting heart had to also put a curse on them, the investigators. and That's according to Townsend Coleman, an OSPI agent. That's the Oklahoma's equivalent of the FBI. and He said, I hope the old medicine man never gets hacked off at me.
00:15:01
Speaker
Another joke that they hope the medicine man wouldn't turn them into a frog. But remember, one of the OSBI agents was also native, Harvey Pratt. And as is detailed in Somewhere across the Children, Pratt was highly respected among his peers. And he was also willing to explain the ways of medicine and medicine men in his religion and culture to anybody who is willing to listen.
00:15:28
Speaker
The men first apologized for giving offense and Pratt explained you know that it was his sincere belief that medicine was being used in the case and how it has a sort of few different connotations in native religion.
00:15:45
Speaker
you know Many people, I think many of us don't really interpret medicine as something used for, I think, healing in the same way. um you know Obviously, we we we take medicines in modern America to heal, um but we don't think of sort of medicines as supernatural powers that can be utilized to do things like hide or or protect people or for evil reasons.
00:16:13
Speaker
um And that's something just to keep in your keep in your mind. um And one of Pratt's quotes was, medicine to an Indian is power. And he went on to explain how medicine men are formally trained over many years, not unlike our doctors today, even with their own sort of sort of residency and internship program.
00:16:34
Speaker
and you know it's In a similar vein, you know doctors, there are many different specialties of medicine men. and you know I think we're speaking to the way that the Cherokee approach it because I don't think you can put any broad blanket application to all native cultures because they show up in very different ways. so Pratt also said that the older a medicine man gets, the more powerful he becomes.
00:17:00
Speaker
And he also sincerely believed that a heart was using powerful medicine or was receiving powerful was receiving medicine from a powerful Cherokee medicine man in order to hide from investigators. And so he urged the other investigators to take it seriously. you know Even if a man can't use medicine to, let's say, shapeshift, let's say that's gone away, that power, there's still a lot of power in it. So Pratt originally snuck outside or or went outside that night on his own to perform a smoking ceremony to help sort of cleanse his mind and find clarity on the investigation. His fellow investigators asked with sort of proper respect if they could join him. As Pratt sort of like pushed the the smoke from the burning cedar boughs and the cigarettes and he passed cigarettes around,
00:17:55
Speaker
teach man, and let me guarantee you, they rip the filters off as it goes, he he sort of prayed that they would only seek the truth and purity, not falsehoods, and that the pursuit of justice would sort of lead them to be objective and that the forces of good would aid them on their search.
00:18:13
Speaker
you know He then pulled out his medicine bag, which was given to him by his own medicine man, and removed some of the contents to toss into the fire. Soon afterwards, the smoking ceremony was over. Heart was able to hide for 10 months. um But whether one believes in the power of native medicine or not, major leads broken the case after Pratt received medicine from his own medicine man.
00:18:39
Speaker
as well as the smoking ceremony Pratt conducted with his colleagues. Part of why Pratt went to his medicine man was not just actually wasn't primarily originally to catch him or for justice. It was really to protect Pratt and his brother who was another investigator from the powerful medicine that they believed was being used against them. So one of Pratt's other colleagues had asked whether there's any punishment for medicine being used for evil. And Pratt said something really important that I want you guys to all keep in the back of your mind. One of two things will happen. Either the medicine won't work or an ill fate will befall the person who uses the medicine. But then this next thing,
00:19:25
Speaker
I think is one of the most relevant things to the entire case and the attitudes of the communities. He said, when you're talking about right or wrong, we're talking about red and white. So native and white. And he said, we're talking about the difference between Indian law and white man's law.
00:19:45
Speaker
what may be a crime under white man's law may be a bold and heroic act under red man's law. And you know what comes to mind when I think about this, if you think of many of the great native warriors and you go throughout our history, they may have been fighting against the Americans and we viewed them in a very negative way, but they were viewed within their culture as heroes. Think of Geronimo as another example. You can also think of ah modern day terrorists. And I am sure somewhere in the Middle East, in Iraq, while we think of soldiers in Delta Force as heroes, they think of them as absolute terrorists.
Media Portrayals and Racial Dynamics
00:20:26
Speaker
So you have to keep in mind that when you're talking about what Allison was getting at before, about this idea of a culture hiding people that you feel may have done heinous things, you have to realize that that's embedded
00:20:42
Speaker
in a system and a process in a history where people feel they were wrong leak they were often wrongly accused or that people had done good acts and they were punished for them. So that's just a lens to think about this when you think about why people would be willing to hide heart given his background allison any thoughts on that nerve Well, first of all, um I like all the points that you're bringing up here and that's points that, you know,
00:21:17
Speaker
having to take into consideration a lot of the things that affect a culture, uh, in general, uh, and you know, you have the situation, uh, in Oklahoma where, uh, natives and whites are, you know, living together in this clash of cultures is clash, not just from like religious beliefs or anything, but law and order systems and, and values and things like that. And so I, I think you're, this is all intended to sort of set up, um,
00:21:47
Speaker
what what we're going to find later on here as to how this case turned out. In addition to that, just also some classic you know American Justice foibles you know that that find their way in there. Well, I can think of a i can think of it just a very simple example from Black culture too.
00:22:07
Speaker
who probably plays a huge role in that. You know, like i I had Julie Murray on the podcast recently. The episode will actually come out next week, but it'll be ah out by the time this comes out. And Julie Murray is the sister of more and more. And one of the things that she said, we were talking about the different reasons for Morris Case got publicity. She said, well, you have to keep in mind, she was you cannot ignore the fact she was an attractive young white woman. Right.
00:22:33
Speaker
And she got a lot of attention. And I think sometimes when I see those cases like Morris or Brianna's two cases I care deeply about, I also think about all the missing black girls and all the bad things that have happened to them. So sometimes when people get really righteous about a particular case, I i really will turn to all the cases of people of color that they're not paying attention to.
00:23:00
Speaker
And I think, you know, I mentioned this to you before, it reminds me of that video from Minneapolis where during the George Ford like riots, there was that woman who was like, burn the whole place down. Like when your community is constantly going through things like black women or native women are being raped by whites and it's really hard to get, not that it's not tragedy and sad, it's really hard to jump behind the train of paying attention to a big case just because it involves white people. Because the natural first reaction is to say, well, what about us?
00:23:40
Speaker
Like, right where are you guys? And I'm wearing right now like missing murdered native women shirt. And, yeah you know, I talk about this all the time. If I do an episode on somebody like more Murray or Brianna Maitland or Jennifer Keese or.
00:23:55
Speaker
or other people like that, I get an enormous amount of reaction, but when I do Native Franc, a Native woman, or I do Melissa Montoya, another Native woman, or I do Zach Randall Shorty, a Native man, those episodes get much less attention. So you have to keep in mind that if you put yourselves in the shoes of the Natives and other minorities in the area,
00:24:18
Speaker
not only do they have the history of things like natives and blacks being accused of things like rapes that and other crimes that they didn't commit and being lynched for that, they they have a hard time when you're getting righteous only about the cases that involved a race. so That's so so beautifully said and also I think this is, you know if you look around to ah ah cases all over the world, you know but um or all over this country, and how every single one of them is sort of anchored to its local tapestry and the things that happened there
00:24:55
Speaker
in decades before, centuries before sometimes, um that and it's going to affect the outcome in a lot of ways. And so I think nothing none of this happens in a vacuum. you know When we talk about the particulars of this case, we'll be able to draw straight lines between you know the outcome and how we got there as a result of some crazy stuff that went down you know, 50 years prior. And so I think we lose sight of that. And that's usually why I really focus on what was going on in the world at the time that this was happening, what was going on in history at the time this was happening, because I guarantee you, it might seem tangential talking about what was coming out of the radio or the TV back then. But you know, everything sort of contributes to that mishmash, because humans are a big, you know, we're a soup. but
00:25:44
Speaker
and Also, i mean I think an important thing too to keep in mind is we're in the late 1970s, we're coming out of the Civil Rights Movement.
Pre-Trial Evidence and Testimonies
00:25:52
Speaker
so it's It's a much larger group of whites are concerned about the way that minorities are being treated and we'll see this show up in the case.
00:25:59
Speaker
Yeah, I noticed that too. Yeah, that, that element is something to hold true. And it's something I wonder would even be there today. And, you know, um something to discuss later, but we are getting on to that pre-trial hearing, which is where we did um pretty much leave off in the previous episode. um So Jean Leroy Hart he was an immediate suspect for several reasons he had escaped from prison for years before the murders he had committed sexual assaults in his past and he was widely believed to be staying in the area.
00:26:36
Speaker
In addition to the other evidence that pointed toward Hart as a strong suspect, there were hairs that were found in one of the caves that were considered consistent with hair taken from Hart. And by the way, that's evidence that probably would not hold up in today's court at all, um but it also wasn't all that convincing then either. We were kind of coming out of hair evidence as being considered ironclad. um But his blood type was type O, and saliva was found on discarded cigarettes at the caves that were alleged to be used for the smoking ceremonies, as we described here earlier, um and matched Hart's blood type.
00:27:15
Speaker
um and If you're curious, I know a lot of you true crime junkies probably already know you know that there is a possibility that about 80% of people can secrete their blood type into other bodily fluids. Not everybody does, but a good number of people do. so That's how we know he had type O blood based on his saliva.
00:27:34
Speaker
But the problem with that evidence in this case is typo is in fact the most common type in the United States. um And then any of you international folks out there know whether or not that's also the most common type in your country. I'm really curious about that.
00:27:48
Speaker
And so that that doesn't hold a whole lot of water ah in terms of you know pointing to it, although ah heart does have type O blood. um But Anne Reed, a forensic chemist, testified in the pretrial hearing that she was a quote, very good, consistent comparison, or there was a very good consistent comparison between the hairs from the second cave, tent number eight, and gene and Again, that often means you're just putting that under a microscope slide and you know do some of those microscopic elements match. i mean The only way hair is useful, I think, these days, and do not quote me on this, is if they have a root attached to it that they can run maybe DNA on or something. That's the only time I think hair evidence could be useful. Although when the Kristen Middleton episode comes out, you will find that, and this happened in Long Island Circular, they can now pull DNA without the root.
00:28:44
Speaker
Ooh, well, aren't we getting fired? Oh, mitochondrial. Okay. Yeah. And we're going to talk a little bit about mitochondrial DNA later on here. um Law enforcement also tested ah ah testified that one of the caves was on a ridge that overlooked the home of Ella Mae Ruskin, Hart's mother.
00:29:04
Speaker
um larry dry we mentioned him in the last episode he was the man who had escaped jail with heart uh testified about heart stating he wanted to sexually assault one of the young girls that they had seen playing at a local park i think that was spring creek park um If I'm not mistaken, ah Dry also testified that he had lived with Hart in the woods at times, including one of the caves. He also said that Hart had problems with his eyesight, particularly at night, and he would seal glasses when he committed burglaries. um One or two pairs of stolen glasses belonging to ah camp counselors were found either at the scene or the cave.
00:29:45
Speaker
um Dry also tested to the fact that they both used to cover up their flashlights with plastic in order to get around without being seen, which again correlates with some of you know what we what the evidence was found and what some of the white witness testimony um with the dem light. andly Yeah, the dem light. Dry also said that he had received letters from Hart in August, October and November of 1977 after the murders, which had occurred in June.
00:30:14
Speaker
where Hart threatened Dry's daughter if Dry told the police where he was. um According to Dry, the letter said it would be easy to hurt his daughter. He knew the letters were from Hart, even though they were not signed because they recounted crimes that they had committed together.
00:30:31
Speaker
ah The defense suggested Dry was lying to get out of going back to prison, although he had a little time left to serve. um Not very much time left. The defense also argued that a prison officer had gone to see Dry to convince him to testify that Hart had confessed.
00:30:49
Speaker
So they put on testimony also from OSBI agent Harvey Pratt, who identified as Choctaw, um said there was evidence of what he called, quote, four sacred fires at the entrance of the cave closest to Hart's mother's house. Remember up there on that ridge.
00:31:06
Speaker
And there was a tattered cigarette on but with the filter torn off, which is what Pratt said many natives utilize at smoking ceremonies like the one I described earlier, or that Jason described earlier. um One of the caves was stuck on ah Jack Schruff's property.
00:31:23
Speaker
And he lived about one mile from Camp Scott. And detectives found, after receiving a tip from an inmate in jail named Darren Creekmore, he said that he met with Hart at that cave after the murders. Creekmore tried to lead officers to the cave, however, but was unable to find it. I mean, I don't know what that points to, whether he was being dishonest or if he just couldn't find the cave because it's out in the middle of the woods. I wasn't able to... What do you think about that, Jason? Yeah. I mean, looking at the map area, it doesn't look like a super easy place to navigate. Navigate. Yeah, I agree.
00:32:07
Speaker
um Although, eventually ah officers did eventually find it on Shroff's property. Creekmore, though, did deny at the pretrial hearing ah that he saw Hart at that cave. So if he he yeah he buckled. He flip-flopped on that one.
00:32:24
Speaker
um The sheriff testified that he had spoken to a woman who said ah she had spoken to Hart at a cave in that area on a mountain there around July of 1977, so about a month after the murders. There were other witnesses who testified that Hart said that he lived in caves ah from the areas and stole but from local homes.
00:32:49
Speaker
and The sheriff testified about the cave on the mountain, saying that he took, quote, ink scrapings from a sign on the cave wall, and that the sign read, it read the date, 77-6-17, which is I know will make some of our UK and European friends happy to see that they wrote it the correct way. But the sign itself said, the killer was here by by fools.
00:33:15
Speaker
um Law enforcement discussed- So June 17th, 1977 for all you Americans. Yes, exactly. Thank you. ah Law enforcement discussed um using the dogs to track ah the suspect back to Hart's mother's house. However, the defense pointed out that Hart had more than 250 family members living within they're a square mile half mile of the area. So we're talking you know aunts, uncles, cousins, cousins, cousins, you know people by marriage. He had a lot of ah relations in the area. Yeah, well, and you also have to think of that native concept of family as really your whole clan. That's true. Or even beyond your clan. They're considered all relatives, so we're not exactly entirely sure, but we're seeing what you're saying,
Community Perceptions and Racial Tensions
00:34:00
Speaker
Alison. I'm like, this is a pretty damning set of evidence against him, which makes the next part to me, I think, fascinating.
00:34:09
Speaker
you know Despite Hart's history ah criminal history and evidence that was sort of mounting against him, when he was named a suspect, many in the area refused to believe his guilt. ah People remembered Hart as a soft-spoken football player, and just it just didn't jive with this hideous ah ah set of crimes. A Tulsa newspaper headline said, quote, Locust Grove residents remember Hart, their football hero.
00:34:38
Speaker
And the subtitle on that article read man charged in triple Myrtle called good looking kid. It's interesting that that's what they focus on. But the picture under the headline was taken from a high school yearbook and it showed sort of a handsome clean cut man of about 17 years old.
00:34:55
Speaker
You know, one person quoted in the article said it took five guys to bring him down. So they're really focused on his athletic powers. Another in the article said he was a fullback. He gained two thousand two hundred yards for the team. And the only thing I could think of when I read that I was having like OJ Simpson flash. I was just about to interject that and I'm so glad you went talking about his commercials and his other piece, you know, so in the article, one person said, quote, When the killing happened, a lot of people said that poor old gene will get it. They'll blame gene.
00:35:31
Speaker
And I think there's some reasons for that, but you have to keep in mind that Hart was convicted for crimes in 1966 and that was a kidnapping and I believe it was a rape of one woman he was convicted for accused of both.
00:35:47
Speaker
um And you know when that happened, Hart claimed that they had come to come with him voluntarily. He said that he had only sexually assaulted one of the women and didn't so sexually assault the other woman.
00:36:03
Speaker
And there are a lot of factors that could have gone into this decision that you're about to find out, but he had had 10 years consecutive. He was released after 18 months by the Pardon and Parole Board. And we don't know much about the politics of the Pardon and Parole Board at the time. We don't know whether getting inmates out, but I did a little research. And it looks like in the two day hearing where they let Hart out,
00:36:30
Speaker
they consider parole applications of 60 inmates, and they selected 15 of the 60. What sort of makes me wonder you know when they're reviewing that number and that's what they said, and then the board voted unanimously, was there something that Hart said or did or some factor that was going on that led them to release him?
00:36:58
Speaker
Now, Alison, I know we had a great discussion about this. It could have simply been that they diminished it because of the way Americans have treated rape in general. But 60 convicts, 15 released, and he's one of them in the unanimous vote,
00:37:18
Speaker
makes me wonder. So I went, I dove back into the old newspaper clippings to see what was the rationale. Like, you know, was there, were they trying to get people out of prisons at the time or was it something that he said when he talked about how essentially, uh, You know the reality of the crimes he didn't actually kidnap him them. They went voluntarily with him There was just the one sexual assault like I i could not get a grip from the Articles about what really factored into their decision, but they certainly quoted Hart in that article sort of alluding to the idea that
00:37:59
Speaker
that in his trial, that was not a realistic view of of what had actually happened. so given this like it's and And I think there's an underlying element here that I get the vibe that many people in the community didn't necessarily believe that he was guilty of the original 66 crimes. They already felt like it was a railroad job at that point.
00:38:21
Speaker
And so you know when the community is reacting and they're saying they're going to go after Jean who, by the way, escaped prison and had been on the run for a while. So he was like the neighborhood fugitive.
00:38:32
Speaker
and so you know Given all of this, it's easy to see how the perception on the locals became that heart their former football star player was being persecuted by law enforcement. So this may seem really incredulous to most of you guys, but you have to keep in mind the United States has a long history of minorities being lynched for sexual assault allegations that were by this time, by the time we're in the 1970s, we just know we're not true.
00:39:01
Speaker
So another person in the article said, I don't believe he did it, and most people around here don't believe he did it. A half-brother of hearts told another Tolson newspaper that authorities always blamed Hart whenever something happened in the area, and a cousin said that she believed he was being blamed and charged because he was native.
00:39:24
Speaker
A man who was once who once employed Hart as a farmhand said Hart was intelligent and not half as bad as they make him out to be. I don't think he did it. He's not sexually oriented to that kind of business. And another person on a broadcast station said, quote, he was just a scapegoat. Another said that the sheriff It was his sheriff's way of getting back to him for escaping from jail. um They discussed the pressure on investigators. They suggested that it led to a rash conclusion and tunnel vision at best and framing of heart at worst because the public was sort of demanding that they find a suspect. And one native man said, quote, he won't get justice. There's no justice in white man's law.
00:40:11
Speaker
So this gets back to Allison's point where many of these people viewed heart as a bit of a folk hero but dry the man who escaped with heart twice said over the years heart had changed.
00:40:27
Speaker
He said, quote, Jean was not the person he used to be, that the people in town remember him to be. When we escaped, he was unbelievably bitter. On many occasions, he planned to go kill his son and wife. He felt that the whole world had betrayed him and he was gonna get him back. it's ah It's interesting to see how ah that image of him builds over time. And that was one thing I was was curious about, actually. um And I know in our rush up to get um fully brushed up on this and um in time, i one thing I wanted to really look at more closely was the previous trial and anything that might have gone down and you know to see if
00:41:15
Speaker
there were some interesting elements to it that could point to maybe the conviction wasn't as solid. I don't know. So I do know that you know maybe the people out on the Facebook group or um if Jess has found anything and a additional that could contribute to that, I don't know. But that was one stone that I felt like, oh yeah, that's an interest there could be something interesting under that.
00:41:37
Speaker
But you know in regards to race, it's really hard to underplay the role that it played. And I know you're already you've heard this a bunch already, but it's always worth bringing back up because you're going to have a lot of questions, and anybody listening to this right now might have a lot of questions. um Locust Grove had a substantial native population, and because of checkerboarding, that's the the way the splitting of the native land, um there were reservations in every direction. and At the time, Hart was identified as a suspect but not captured. um Tulsa's American Indian Movement, or AIM, was concerned that there might be vigilante committees sent out to bring Hart in dead or alive.
00:42:26
Speaker
um Tulsa was also home of the 1919 Tulsa Race Massacre that Jason mentioned earlier. I would love to do that with you at some time um if you're interested um because that's quite a topic.
00:42:40
Speaker
um
00:42:43
Speaker
he's He's just giving me a look right now. Let's jump on the third rail. Oh, man, let's do it. Let's do it, buddy. um But in the mascot for, you know, 150, 200 blacks killed, Black Wall Street destroyed the local authorities firebombing the blacks, these innocent blacks by plane. You have to understand that, you know, I was talking to um former CIA agent who worked in the 90s and 2000s in the Philippines. He's like, most Americans who know about the philine Philippines know about the Bataan Death March of American soldiers.
00:43:28
Speaker
But the atrocities that Americans committed in the Philippines, we know nothing about. But he said, you know we're talking 1940s, 1950s, it's fresh on the mind of everyone in the Philippines in 2000. These things do not die fast. It's easy to say it happened in 1919, but it's still affecting the relationship with law enforcement now. I was in Tulsa last year.
00:43:53
Speaker
or is it two years ago? And the last child or the oldest woman who remained from the race massacre ah was having a hearing on the day that I was there to receive compensation and they denied it. And I can tell you in the community, there is still animosity toward the prosecutors, law enforcement and the local government over that and the lack of trust that persists. And and I'll just say when that's your jury pool, you're in trouble.
00:44:22
Speaker
very, very true. And I will say as well, when it comes to to memory, um and would put away I think it becomes very important to trial strategy late like later. Oh, yeah. And it's part of the reason why I suspect the prosecution was very focused on having no natives on the jury.
00:44:41
Speaker
yeah Yeah, then that's an interesting thing that will also involve some Supreme Court decisions we'll talk about later as well that not affecting this case, but we will learn a lot about law in this one.
00:44:53
Speaker
um but But the interesting thing, though, bringing ah back that whole like things that people don't forget, i would I would say that a lot of that is in the memory of Black Americans because it wasn't until, I think, 2020 or 2021 when HBO's Watchmen series came out, their adaptation of Alan Moore's comic, that show um featured or spoke of or depicted the 1919 Tulsa race massacre. I can give you a hundred examples.
00:45:25
Speaker
married, the murders, the massacres in Florida, that right most Americans know nothing about. and Right. kill oh Well, we even talk about in Oklahoma, killers of the flower moon. A lot of people didn't know about the Osage. Which is not far from here. Yeah. And so those things don't often come to our knowledge. I never learned about these things in history class. um And that's all honestly part of why I love doing the vintage villain stuff because the same you don't I never, I never learned them in class either, but I learned them around ah my grandparents kitchen table.
00:45:58
Speaker
yeah Yeah, and that's just something that, yeah, I definitely would not have learned that at my grandparents' kitchen table, I tell you.
Trial Preparations and Challenges
00:46:05
Speaker
But generally, agents of the OSBI and the FBI who were working on the case were met with hostility by Hart's relatives and friends, ah most of whom denied they had seen Hart since his escape. And you know that's expected, I think, um especially given this area as well.
00:46:23
Speaker
um Some in the community suggested, though, that Hart possessed supernatural powers given to him by a powerful medicine man. However, investigators believe that many of these people, including Hart's mother, had harbored him up to a week before the murders. um And some of the investigators, at least two of them who worked with the who worked the case, were Native. um But the vast majority were not.
00:46:49
Speaker
As illustrated earlier, though, with the interaction between Harvey Pratt and his OSBI colleagues with the smoking ceremony and everything, a number of stereotypical views about natives were held by many of the investigators of the case. Like, oh, he could turn me into a frog, that kind of stuff. um But during Hart's and interrogation, the county attorney said,
00:47:10
Speaker
said they had, quote, fallen into the Indians trap of letting the white man do the talking while he merely acknowledged whether the statement was correct. um Sheriff Pete Weaver testified about a cave in this yeah saying he took ink the ink scrapings of the sign on the cave wall. ah The killer was here by bifools. In pretrial, another witness ah noted that there was a writing instrument utilized related to this piece of evidence. um The surface that it was ah written on was a rock and that suspect
00:47:47
Speaker
um and that the suspect was a native, he said, quote, I am familiar with Indian and I know that they do have the majority of them and innate artistic ability, which just made me want to like scream when I when i read that. um Just how many racial stereotypes, you know? ah It's it's words written on rock. This is not a cave mural. This is you know, well because really that But also even even if it had been a cave mural like it yeah suggestion that yeah, we have evidence that a native is responsible because there's a drawing on the wall like I have
00:48:29
Speaker
a painting from a Native behind my head right now, that does not make me think, even though it's a talented artist, that all Natives are talented at art, therefore, if there is art found at the crime scene, it must be a Native. That, to me, seems a little absurd. Yeah, I did. I even put their... It would be like saying, like, there was fried chicken at the crime scene, therefore a Black person had to do that.
00:48:52
Speaker
i Yeah, I mean, exactly. That's exactly what that sounded like in my head when I read it. Well, I put raisins in the potato salad as a white lady. So here we go. You know, we're just like... Mayonnaise might be a clue.
00:49:09
Speaker
um Heart supporters who included natives and others ah protested outside the courthouse every day during the preliminary hearing. um The Cherokee Tribal Council donated $12,500 to Heart's defense fund and I'm thinking in 1977 dollars that's a a pretty 12,500 wouldn't get you very far in 2024, I don't think. um Although they insisted that this was to ensure that he got a fair trial, ah not because they necessarily believed he was innocent. And I firmly believe that. Like I said, there were
00:49:42
Speaker
plenty of people on the um in in the Native community that were ready to haul this guy in. so it is not i always I was telling Jason, I'm like, I don't want to paint this as, well, of course they're going to defend one of their own. It was not like that. No, because you know I think there's a difference between defending someone because you believe they're innocent, but also believing, hey, maybe they're guilty, but I'm pretty sure they're not going to get a fair trial.
00:50:08
Speaker
Right. Right. and And that's important. You know, ah they should get anybody to get a fair trial. ah Right. Where the innocent and the guilty don't get a fair trial. Sorry, Baltimore. I love you. but You know, the truth is the stats don't lie, right? but um And this is where it starts to get kind of interesting. i Well, it's always been interesting, but interesting. We were having a conversation with Brett of the prosecutors where I was showing him the percentage of, I cannot remember what it was, but the conviction rates. Yeah, the conviction rate. It was like under 5% of people are convicted in Baltimore murder trials. That tells you that there is something going on there.
00:50:50
Speaker
Yeah, and and I'm just going to remember your line if I invite you to Baltimore for no apparent reason. Yeah, look out. Look out. If I'm not saying we're going to an Orioles game, I'm like, hey, you just want to meet up in Baltimore? yeah You know You could tent me up there with some offers of baseball and and maybe some some crab. you know But at the time though, Sid Wise, the district attorney- You see those Marylanders in the chat, they know. All right. Go. The DA for Mays County, he was running for Attorney General and the protesters made shirts that they wore outside the courthouse that read, Jean Hart for Attorney General or Jean Hart says, stop the Mays County Railroad, which was of course referring to being railroaded.
00:51:42
Speaker
um But keep in mind, ah as I said, this is not just natives who were concerned about how heart was being treated. This was a large group of people who were concerned about the way minorities were treated by law enforcement in the community. ah We can put ourselves in these shoes to this very day with some some cases. this isn't So just ah to say, you know,
00:52:04
Speaker
this This is an issue that goes way back, you know? um And I think it's an important thing to keep in mind, like when you're thinking about, you know, we run into this over immigration all the time, where because of the threat that the immigration and naturalization service is going to come and deport you, people will not report crimes.
00:52:29
Speaker
You run into the black community and i i remember this when i was reporting in new york where. Little old ladies would be afraid to call the cops for some legitimate bad thing that was happening because they worried that as the cops are gonna come blazing and shoot some innocent person.
00:52:47
Speaker
So it really does affect, I think, the the relationship of law enforcement and how you interact with law enforcement really affects your trust and what evidence that other people put um in front of you. And that the thing that I talk about, I talked to you about this, Alison. I've talked to Brad about it. I think I've talked to Alison from the press here about this. And, you know, when you go to a place like LA,
00:53:14
Speaker
and where they had the rampart scandal, where the cops were involved in selling drugs, where they were beating people, or Chicago, where they were taking people out into warehouses, like, and this is only a few years ago, taking people out into warehouses and torturing them, then bringing them in, doing the confessions, or Baton Rouge, Louisiana, where Alton Sterling happened. Like, when you have that lack of trust in law enforcement, and the that's the community that you're getting your jury pool from,
00:53:43
Speaker
You know, so let's say the average citizen who trusts law enforcement says cop comes in, I give him like 75% credibility out of the gate.
00:53:54
Speaker
Well, when when you're coming in and the jury's giving you 30% and you have that hurdle, they instantly already don't trust you, all of a sudden the burden you have to reach to get to reasonable doubt becomes much higher. So you really have to throw a touchdown. And I think in reality, like a lot of prosecutors think about it in a very black and white way, which is like, I'm just presenting evidence in a case.
00:54:19
Speaker
But really, for your who your jury is is going to depend on how much of a hurdle you're going to have to jump. Are you going to have to just jump or are you going to need to jump into a triple double? And I think that's something a lot of people.
00:54:33
Speaker
And another thing too, as we're talking about a lot of this, I have things that are coming loose in my own brain about my own personal encounters with my own distrust of authority in law enforcement. And, you know, I won't go into to those particulars, but I will say how I can see how a whole community can sort of influence or band together against that sort of distrust. i mean ive And I've lived in places where, for instance, um my neighbors were immigrants. And I don't know enough to know whether they were here legally or not. That was not my concern. And at one point, I remember getting ah ah a knock on my door from a border um patrol or whatever asking questions about ah these people. And I was just very much like, I don't know anything.
00:55:22
Speaker
you know? And so, because I'm not going to be responsible for ruining someone's life that way, you know, or knowing that what they could be subjected to. um So I can imagine now on a much grander scale of of people who are looking with a lot of skepticism at the law enforcement apparatus in this area and going, nope, we're not, you know, we're not goingnna we're not going to participate in any he kind of, you know,
00:55:49
Speaker
renegade law enforcement coming down on minorities, you know? um So yeah, it's one of those things that I, to this day, can very much see myself in a situation where I can now very much understand ah why um that this happened. um but Dick Wilkerson, an investigator in the case, and he was actually one of the men who participated in the smoking ceremony with Harvey Pratt,
00:56:13
Speaker
He said in the documentary, Keeper of the Ashes, um that this was the OJ trial before the OJ trial in terms of race and other factors in the community. um Similar sentiments were expressed by the victim's families following the trial. um And that makes a lot of sense when you really break it down. I'm going to actually break down a little bit about those similarities. And we're going to talk about OJ a little bit here. So some of you OJ, people who love to talk the OJ case.
00:56:40
Speaker
ah get ready. um But here are some of those similarities. One, a long history of tension between whites and minorities in an area that includes ah riots or lynchings, and that's before you include the literally checkered or checkerboarded history of the way ah reservations were distributed on the lands there. um A long history of tension and distrust between all the citizens and law enforcement, which I mentioned at the top of the episode with the area's history of harboring other futures from the law,
00:57:10
Speaker
The defendants are well-known. Jason commented on this earlier about Hart and his football. Hart wasn't a celebrity at large, of course, like O.J. Simpson was, but he was popular in the area and liked enough that people were even willing to look past some of the bad things that he had done. Similarly, O.J. had a history of domestic violence that was known or became known. That happens with a lot of athletes, I think, in particular.
00:57:38
Speaker
um But they were willing to look past some of the bad things he'd done and believe that those in power wanted to take him down, um which was also argued with the OJ trial. um Both had trials filled with a lot of circumstantial evidence that a skilled defense was a favor able to effectively poke enough holes in to let some reasonable doubt through. And that included claims of contaminated evidence and problems with witness credibility, among other things.
00:58:04
Speaker
um And then there was a problem of personalities with those involved in prosecuting the case. um In Hart's instance, we had a DA that folks didn't think too highly of um and who had political ambitions and was trying to make a name for himself. um And so And we'll talk more about OJ in a bit, but District Attorney Wise's campaign literature talked about the murders and how we solved them with the officers. But one investigator said, I don't think the people have the trust in CID that is needed in this case. And that's where we're going to have to pick a jury.
00:58:42
Speaker
ah Wise was in charge of prosecuting Hart during his 1979 trial. ah He soon came under fire ah when he lied under oath, committed perjury, and denied sharing OSBI reports with sources outside of law enforcement. It was found that he had been sharing reports with journalists and that he'd had a contract to do a book about the case.
Trial Proceedings and Acquittal
00:59:05
Speaker
so The DA had actually a financial incentive ah for his prosecution of this case. Call me crazy, but I think we call that a conflict of interest.
00:59:17
Speaker
A little bit. um And this, by the way, reminds me, and I'm going to talk about this on a future episode. I had to put it postpone it, but it's coming, guys, about Vincent Bugliosi. That was the first person I thought of when Jason mentioned this tidbit in our research. um And he was the prosecutor behind the Manson murders. He also had a book deal at the time. He also committed perjury and tampered with witnesses and other evidence. um But again, we'll talk about that in more detail later. um But it goes is to show how one man or woman, whomever, um with a really big ego can cast a very long shadow um over something like this. um Eventually, Wise did why Wisely, um after his namesake, opt out of the case. And it was passed over to SM Buddy Fallis,
01:00:05
Speaker
ah He's the district attorney for Tulsa County, who eventually took the case to trial. um In this case, in an investigation would be all the more complicated today because the Supreme Court of the United States ah ruled in a groundbreaking 2021 decision, McGirt versus Oklahoma,
01:00:24
Speaker
which stated that Native tribes had jurisdiction over crimes committed by Natives on their historic lands. and so This means that this decision, ah had it been handed down prior to 1977, the Cherokee Nation would have had jurisdiction over the investigation, and as of right now, they do.
01:00:45
Speaker
Yep. Yep. Yep. So, um, we're kind of previewing and a lot of what we're saying, what's about to happen. So I will take us to the trial. So Jean Leroy Hart was first named as a suspect in 1977 and stood trial two years later. By March, 1979, Oklahoma's Oklahomans almost had two years wrap their heads around the story of the case.
01:01:09
Speaker
But with the most anticipated trial in the state's history finally set to begin, they found themselves going back over the twists and turns. um This was a capital murder trial, so he was facing the death penalty. um It began in a third floor courtroom in the Mays County Courthouse in Pryor, Oklahoma, with Judge William J. Whistler presiding. S.M. Buddy Falls, the Tulsa County District Attorney,
01:01:37
Speaker
was in the first chair, so the big city guys there, along with Assistant District Attorney Ronald Schaeffer. On the opposite side, leading the defense team was an ah attorney named Garvin Isaacs from Oklahoma City. um He was a former public defender who was now in private practice. He had been recommended to Hart's family through an acquaintance who had first met him in his jail cell. So Isaacs remembered and he said,
01:02:04
Speaker
The first thing he said to me talking about heart when I walked in was, I want you to know one thing. I didn't kill those girl scouts. Those were the first words out of his mouth. I believed him when he said it. So following a month's long preliminary hearing, which was the pretrial hearing we were talking about in June 1978, and it ran into July 1978, where sort of support for heart in the community seemed to increase.
01:02:33
Speaker
The trial began on March 5th. Newspapers called it, quote, a carnival and quote, a circus atmosphere. And the major media across the state and actually across the nation flocked to Pryor.
01:02:46
Speaker
900 potential jurors names were drawn for jury selection. Jury selection was supposed to take a week, took 10 days, with about 110 prospective jurors. Question, that's a part of it. A member of the defense team said they did extensive research on all the jurors.
01:03:04
Speaker
um The defense hired a woman named Kathy Bennett, a psychologist and jury consultant from California, to suggest questions. She had worked on trials involving Wounded Knee incident in 1973. Really um quick, that's where around 200 native activists from the Lakota tribe had seized the town of Wounded Knee, South Dakota, in protest of the 1890 massacre there where Hundreds of Lakota men, women, and children had been slaughtered by American troops. um So the 12 jurors, six men and six women were chosen. There were no natives on the jury. And the prosecution used their preamptory challenges, which are like the free passes where you can remove somebody without cause. um They used them consistently to strike native jurors. So the journal was the jury was sequestered in a hotel and prior.
01:03:59
Speaker
So one of the things I ah want to point out and pause and say here is that could have never happened today because of a case called Batson. So today an appeals court would have thrown any conviction based on that out the window because of this 1986 Supreme Court decision Batson versus Kentucky. And that's where the court held that it violated the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment to exclude jurors solely based on the race. So that's called structural error.
01:04:28
Speaker
So when an error happens like that, it does not matter whether the judge can cure it or fix it or not, it would automatically be thrown be thrown out. So that ruling, like I said, came down in 1986. But the standard at the time was set by a 1965 case called Swain versus Alabama, which held the defendant prior to Batson had to show that the prosecution demonstrated a pattern of racial discrimination over multiple cases.
01:04:57
Speaker
So they would have had to go back and find a bunch of other cases where they demonstrated um racial bias and it was almost impossible to do so.
01:05:09
Speaker
Yeah, that's um I remember making a comment to you on that, like, wow, we had to get all the way to 1986. But I mean, it's interesting that they already did have a standard set. But it was yeah, it was a very unrealistic standard. So I'm glad they finally got their heads wrapped around um that one.
01:05:27
Speaker
um So, a Tulsa World reporter, ah Doug Hicks, he said that some murder suspects clean up, but they do not look right in their suits. And I i fully agree with that unless you're you have a celebrity on trial um where they're accustomed and to wearing suits and probably have them in their wardrobe already.
01:05:47
Speaker
a defendant, ah maybe who, you know, has never worn suits. They often do look like they're just kind of dumped into him, you know. um But he said that Hart wore a ah dark blue three-piece suit and looked like, quote, somebody you'd see on a college campus teaching English. And I think we have a slide for that. So you can kind of really get a look of, here we have Hart at his initial arrest. I think that was the 1966 arrest. Is that right, Jason? yeah If you're on YouTube right now. He's a young man, 25 years old here. And then ah the middle picture shows him immediately after his arrest, ah after the Girl Scout murders. Not looking great. Not looking great. He's in a tank top and looking very bedraggled. um But then you see him in the far right. He actually looks, I told Jason, he looks about 10 years old.
01:06:40
Speaker
He really does look 10 years older, but he does look like the guy who should be teaching my English literature class. He really does. He's got the glasses. He's got his hair nicely combed, but he he does. He's wearing the vest with the tie and the jacket. So um a definite change in him. um And the state's case ah seemed to hinge on two types of evidence, biological, including sperm and hair samples found on the girls, which prosecution experts said was linked to heart and physical evidence that was made of items that could put heart at or near the crime scene. So some of that evidence included
01:07:17
Speaker
um photos that they said were linked to her. That was where ah Jason mentioned that um there they could have he could have developed those um when he was in prison. There was like a Photoshop situation there. um so They think those were photos that came from that, I believe it was. um There were also a pair of glasses that they said were stolen from a Camp Scott counselor. um There was a roll of duct tape that- The glasses were, were they found in the cave or were they found on- They were found at the cave.
01:07:47
Speaker
um Yeah. A roll of duct tape that matched tape found at the crime scene, which again, duct tape is duct tape. so it's a little That's a little iffy. I think they said that there were tear marks that matched up. but Yeah. that um yeah and Again, I would have to see it. um But the quote deformed sperm, ah that that was brought up um as evidence. And what that means is that they found in these sperm samples, um both at the scene um and also gathered from Hart's clothing, um that indicated the appearance of the sperm scene to indicate that ah the individual had had a vasectomy.
01:08:29
Speaker
um and that it's, I think, heart was believed to have had a vasectomy as well. um But there was a lot of technical testimony on that and it got a little contentious between the expert and the defense um on the standard. And I sure was really boring.
01:08:45
Speaker
Yeah. yeah um and But I can kind of see why in in the absence of being able to use blood typing or anything else to really link this sperm to him, that it's like, oh, if this sperm looks a little funny and he's out of a sec to me, I think they're trying to strengthen that link. substantial um It's very circumstantial. And I think also it's not it's still rocky. um Yeah. And I think it's important to point out the prosecution was really honest. like you know yeah they were admitted yeah that the The experts admitted that those tests couldn't possibly identify the source of the hair. yeah just like with the They didn't even bring up the blood typing because that was one thing I i asked was like was blood typing out any part of the presentation and they really didn't. and they They had to know that that was useless. and Again, the hair evidence, you can say it's consistent with, but you cannot say it's a match.
01:09:42
Speaker
um And you know that's also the case in like bite marks and you know a lot and fibers, like carpet fibers, anything like that. It's just not really strong evidence, ah especially by modern day standards, but it was starting to become that way at that point. And I think we're saying essentially that the the prosecution thought there circumstantial case is fairly strong. like you know A case is like painting a mosaic and you know where you're painting this mosaic and the piece that fits in the middle of it, and hopefully it's only one person, you know is one particular person. i so and but I'll be completely honest when looking at this list of stuff and the stuff that we've been talking about, i firmly, I'm like, this this looks pretty solid ah you know on on its face.
01:10:30
Speaker
Well, you but as as our friends in the defense bar like to say, the defense has not spoken yet. No, well the defense in turn um put the law enforcement and other authorities in their investigation on trial. They even went as far as holding a news conference right before the trial where Hart appeared and engaged in a brief set bit of self analysis.
01:10:50
Speaker
ah that tells you a lot about how far the pendulum had swung and shifted in its direction. His only comment was, quote, I'm not a hero. I have no desire to be a hero. Maybe I represent the fears and doubts that many people have about a case like this and the system we have.
01:11:07
Speaker
So think about that. A press conference before trial and the defendant saying, I'm not a hero. So Isaac's echoed community sentiment when he said in his opening statement that the case was all a part of a grand design to convict an innocent man. So the defense suggested items from the cave could have been planted.
01:11:28
Speaker
You know, some of this was bolstered by the idea, you know, just taking a simple example. There was a pipe that was linked, ah found in the cave. um A Girl Scout had later mentioned, ah the investigators gone to cave, Girl Scout later mentioned that there had, a pipe had disappeared.
01:11:47
Speaker
you know Months later, they go back to the cave and find the pipe. right That provides some room for the defense to suggest that that pipe was planted. It's not exactly the the the best in terms of evidence collection. So the defense also said investigators' strong focus on heart led them to ignore more likely suspects, including a convicted rapist and ah but named Bill Stevens, who was serving time in Kansas.
01:12:13
Speaker
The defense put on a witness that said that Stevens was a better suspect. um Among others, the defense put on two witnesses at trial, Joyce Payne and her son Larry Short, who said Bill Stevens came to their home in Oklahoma the day the girls' bodies were found and had scratches on his face and red stains on his boots. So that would be the day that the girls were found.
01:12:38
Speaker
So Payne also testified that the flashlight at the scene was one she saw Stevens with a few weeks before the murders. They also cast a lot of shade around a man who had received $8,000 lead officers to heart, and that was a confidential format. um Denise Milner's mom said it seemed like both sides were performing and it was one It was the one who gave the best performance that was the winner. um What had become really clear during the beginning of the trial was that Hart, as the Tulsa World Herald put it, quote, captured the hearts and the minds of his hometown friends in Locust Grove, where the collective opinions seemed to be that Hart was a scapegoat, a victim of racial racial pre prejudice.
01:13:30
Speaker
Let me say, if I'm the prosecution, that is those are not words I want to see in the newspaper. so The world said in an article that, quote, supporters of america of minority causes rallied around heart and the trial captured the attention of lawmen and laymen nationwide.
01:13:49
Speaker
Yeah, it's interesting to see that a case when a case from these days does go nationwide ah because I feel like it takes a little more to get something to get that kind of exposure. And there's and there's no doubt to me that it was very painful for Denise Melner's um mom to sit there and see that you know, the best narrative was ultimately going to win, win the case. But that's the reality of work. That is all the best story. Yeah. Yeah. I once had a friend who was arrested for drunk driving and I was like, man, it was a woman. I was like, you should plea. Just get this over with and plea. And she's like, it's not what happened.
01:14:38
Speaker
It's what they can prove. yep And whoever tells the best story one and ask me whether she was convicted, the answer is no. um so she had a good lawyer. um and a good story And that is very much the case of when I was mentioning to Jason today about how you know the the truth of whether or not this person committed this crime exists in its own box separately. And by the way, I think it can happen both ways. I think a prosecutor could convict like my stack of paperclips over here if they have a really good story. Right. But that's what right I mean. like Whether or not that is true is separate from the stories that are told on either side of it. yeah and you know so It's like the reason that you can say, ah this person was acquitted, doesn't mean they're innocent. It just means they were acquitted because the evidence wasn't strong enough to convince the jury or they just had enough doubt to say, oh this isn't quite cutting it for me. You could still very well have done it. It doesn't mean
01:15:36
Speaker
that it was good enough to pass that bar to, say, put someone in prison for the rest of their lives or kill them, um you know, by lethal injection or electric chair or whatever. um So the standard has to be high. And I imagine this being a death penalty case probably did weigh a good bit on that.
01:15:54
Speaker
But observers did say that the trial was interrupted from beginning to end by outbursts between ah falls isaac's and judge whistler um so and we can all imagine we've all seen those trials right um we're seeing a lot of them these days.
01:16:10
Speaker
and Denise Milner's mom told the Tulsa World years later um that the sentiment supporting Hart was so strong that there were times where it was easy to feel alone and that it while it was not hostile, nobody gave her you know a hard time ah super hard time. People would come up to her on the street and say, Hart didn't kill your daughter, which is very hard to hear. um She described walking into local restaurants and seeing the donation jars for his defense.
01:16:40
Speaker
But Hart decided not to take the stand, as per his right, and ten days after arguments began, closing arguments had been completed. In the close, defense said that Sheriff Weaver had been hunting Hart for four and a half years since his escape, and that he personally hated Hart.
01:17:01
Speaker
The prosecutor, meanwhile, walking to the jury box said the mothers and fathers sitting in the courtroom were, quote, creators of children. And then he turned to face heart and said, the destroyer is sitting right there. And jurors deliberated for six hours on Thursday, March 29. Sheriff Pete Weaver said, this is hell, as he waited on Thursday, adding, I'm satisfied that we have done everything humanly possible.
01:17:28
Speaker
The jury resumed Friday morning and then a half hour and a note was brought to the judge that the jury had reached a decision and Jean Hart was acquitted by the jury. Yeah, wow.
01:17:41
Speaker
And so newspapers described heart supporters as almost hysterical and that investigators were dumbstruck with bitter disappointment. Sheriff Weaver said, quote, I don't intend to reopen any investigation. We had our man. We are. We had the man we were after.
01:17:58
Speaker
One juror who was asked to remain anonymous told the Tulsa world that the panel had made up its mind five minutes after deliberations began. the he And he added that the reason why Hart was acquitted were many, including there was an excellent defense strategy. So Hart was acquitted in 1979, primarily due to insufficient evidence, procedural issues, and the strong defense strategy during the trial. And so here are some of the key reasons that are cited afterwards.
01:18:28
Speaker
They what cited whether this is true or not is a lack of direct evidence. The prosecution really struggled to present their direct evidence linking Hart to the crime scenes. And one of the real tough things about this case is you've got the crime scenes, the caves and then Hart himself and connecting all those things together. There are arguments that the defense made about contaminated evidence, um you know, how things were handled. There were also arguments about the reliability of the forensic evidence itself.
01:18:58
Speaker
There are some questions about inconsistent or reliable testimony. Remember we had the two witnesses also who said that Bill Stevens was seen with them with red stains on his ah with on his boots and scratches on him the day after. He also had the public sentiment, right? Hart had significant support from the local community that all these jurors are going back into, both natives and non-native communities. And there were claims of unfair treatment, racial bias. They had been hunting him after his escape. So all of those things may have played a factor in it. And then just the defense strategy, right? Hart's defense team had effectively cast out
01:19:44
Speaker
on the prosecution's evidence and highlighted the lack of sort of concrete proof and suggested that investigators had tunnel tunnel vision that really pointed them away from other suspects like Stevens. It's also worth noting that the jury knew that Hart was going back to prison to serve at least 305 years for a sentence for the home invasion, first degree burglary charges.
01:20:10
Speaker
So on some levels, the jury had an out right because ah they didn't they they knew he was going to be locked up one way or the other, or or they at least suspected it. Who knows what the Oklahoma parole and pardon board at that time, but they could ah sort of satisfy their desire to sort of handle loss to the prosecution and law enforcement um that they clearly had issues with while not having to worry about a potential murderer being set free.
Impact and Civil Trial
01:20:41
Speaker
So all those things to me really really do smack of what we see in some of these cases where there's a lack of trust in the community um around law enforcement.
01:20:50
Speaker
Yeah, and you know we mentioned OJ all over, i mean even with the verdict. you know When the OJ verdict was announced, and I remember being in high school, I think I was a sophomore in the high school when that verdict was hand down, and we were all gathered in the lunchroom waiting for it. And yeah, it was a huge thing. And so um and in this case, I think, yeah yeah, they were all waiting on pins and needles for this verdict to come down in the shock.
01:21:17
Speaker
When the acquittal came, you it could almost probably be mirrored on a lot of sides, especially for the prosecution and the families and things like that. they They really did think they had their guy. I don't think that this was a ah case, I think in a lot of ways, of white we're just going to pin it on anybody. I think they really believed that they had him.
01:21:37
Speaker
um so but Following the murder trial, ah Hart returned to prison to serve out the rest of his ah up to 308 year or 305 year ah sentence ah for his other crimes. And a month after his acquittal, ah Gene Hart gave an interview to his tribal newspaper, The Cherokee Advocate, where he said, mainly, I just want to be left alone.
01:22:02
Speaker
The advocate also transcribed and published the text of a two and a half hour interview with him. He said, quote, I feel like the world has been lifted from my shoulders when the jury returned the not guilty verdict.
01:22:15
Speaker
When asked whether he was living in the rugged countryside, Hart said, that's not possible. Nobody can live out there that long. the as the As cold as the winters are and what ah with the parasites in the summer, I think he's referring to the ticks. um And in fact, the book Someone Cry for the Children mentioned, ah um Harvey Pratt had encountered a lot of ticks. um around ah the areas of the caves, except in the areas where he found evidence of ah smoking ceremonies, which I found fascinating. um Texts run from smoke. They do, yeah. i was like but he like his He talked about how his hands were covered in them. It was a ah visceral scene to read.
01:22:57
Speaker
But Hart said that he deliberateed he deliberately hid once he heard he was charged with these murders, but he was still trying to avoid capture um for the original reason he escaped jail. But Hart believed the Oklahoma State Bureau investigation agents regarded him as, quote, a trophy they could parade around in front of the TV cameras, adding, by all rights, had it been any state but the State of Oklahoma and had it been any case without as much publicity it would have been dismissed and Jason and I were batting that one back and forth a bit today in our discussion cuz I part of me that thinks well I think he could have been convicted in another place without maybe the um the tensions involved here but
01:23:39
Speaker
When you look at some of the evidence and you made a great point, and I don't know if I want to say it here because you probably have it stored up already. sure say Okay, because I really liked it. and It was what kind of flipped a switch in my head when we looked at some of these alternative suspects um for the case for the murder. And you said you could slot any of those guys in.
01:23:59
Speaker
and it would be a trial. You could have arrested that, yeah. Yeah. You could have had the trial, right. That points to some issues while on the inverse you could say nothing's pointing away from Hart. There's nothing in there to specifically say it's him. That's where the problem lies here. But the interview ended with Hart saying, I fought it and I won against all odds. I fought it and I beat them.
01:24:28
Speaker
Of course, the irony being that he had to go back on his other prison sentence, but two months after the trial, ah Gene Hart died in prison of heart attack on June 4th, 1979. He was 35 years old. ah Some people put the estimates of the number of people who came to his funeral at 2,000. There's this whole crazy story that we're not going to get into about how poison was found in the prison afterwards, and it led to a whole another thing.
01:24:57
Speaker
There are so many rabbit holes in this that we're not going down. But but you're right. um If you want to explore that angle, like we mentioned the Facebook group um earlier in the last episode, I'll have that link in the show notes. If you want to keep traveling down that rabbit hole,
01:25:14
Speaker
But despite the sheriff believing they had the right man ah the murders of Denise lori and michelle remain officially unsolved. um but Similar again another similarity to the oj trial it did not end at the criminal trial there was a civil trial except it was not against gene heart.
01:25:33
Speaker
It was against the Girl Scouts Magic Council, and they were already preparing for civil suits in this matter, of course. ah Three little girls were murdered at a camp that they sponsored. Some people say um from day one. Yes, yes. Remember the last episode we discussed the the the question about whether they call whether the camp director called the executive director of the Girl Scouts or the parents first.
01:26:03
Speaker
Right. And there was also some changed testimony about things that couldn't insinuate that the Magic Council... How much Congress gives your testimony? Yeah, that they had a little bit of influence there. But the Magic Council disavowed reports of hearing the screams or the noises according to an article in the Oklahoma City Times.
01:26:25
Speaker
And they stated that a camp employee said at the time that girls often hear things and scream and giggle during their first night of encampment, which is true enough. But but the goal there is something in mind, the idea that there weren't 40 signs before, which there easily were, 40 signs before that somebody who wasn't supposed to be there was there and that the girl's got Very much. Very much. And just looking at the layout of the camp itself. To me, you're looking at that camp map just kind of makes alarm bells go off in my head. But then again, I'm a of a person of the modern age. I wasn't a 1970s parent. So ah you know back in the days when we used to let our kids just be outside and you know not near us all day long um until it was dark. i don't say modern I don't think modern camps are all that different.
01:27:13
Speaker
they're not. Yeah, to me, tens are so far away from the counselors, you know, it just, and to me, they they were just a little too cut off for how young they were. But and according to the Oklahoma and the daily newspaper, they're a jury ah ruled in March 1985, that the Magic Council and its insurance company were not responsible for the murders because of negligence.
01:27:37
Speaker
ah The lawsuit had been brought by the parents of Lori Farmer and Denise Milner, and and it accused the Girl Scout Council of failing to provide adequate security measures at the camp that would have prevented the murders.
Unresolved Murders and New Suspects
01:27:49
Speaker
Following the murders, Camp Scott was shut down, and in 1988, the Magic Council sold the property. ah Today, it is ah hunting grounds.
01:27:59
Speaker
um according to People Magazine. And actually, you can see the state of the camp area as it exists today and the keeper of the ashes documentary. so um And it's it's very dense and very foliage, a lot like it looked in the 70s, actually.
01:28:18
Speaker
And so I want to just jumping back or not jumping forward, ah there are a couple of post trial things I want to point out. um Several despite what Sheriff said about not investing in in case post trial, several suspects, in addition to Bill Stevens, popped up. A man named Ricky Green, who was white, he confessed to OSB agents in 1977. A man named Stephen Lewis Comby also confessed to the murders, although you know authorities determined he was in prison at the time. And by the way, let's just note that a single confession to a crime without some really good details doesn't mean anything because you would be surprised at how many cases multiple people confess. I mean, yeah, John Bonnet Ramsey has had how many? or It's not even John Bonnet. I mean, like right your average average case that gets attention is going to have three or four or five people who confess to the crime just because it's getting media attention. So Jack Shroff, who owned the property nearby, testified that he was an early prime suspect.
01:29:23
Speaker
um While Semen being involved ruled out women, there were some women who were investigated as particular accomplices because of the tennis shoe and, you know, even in the pretrial motion, the defense tried to ask about who is a lesbian or LGBTQ, essentially, um to kind of allude that they may have someone, one of the counselors may have done it. A man named Ben Warbird popped up as an early suspect. He was one of the few men working on the property, but he had an alibi. The sheriff also received a confession from another man named Buddy Bristol, who said he had gone to the campsite in the middle of the night with several others. and
01:30:06
Speaker
and one of the other men murdered the little girls and that's something we'll probably tackle tomorrow. Julia, is this likely to have been committed by one perpetrator or more? so Here's some aftermath after the trial that really sort of add some nuance. so Later, a kidnapper named Dwayne Peters admitted he was lying to defense attorneys about Stevens confessing to him at one point, but said the defense attorneys hadn't known that. Peters claimed, and Peters never testified at trial because he admitted that it wasn't true, but Peters also claimed that his former girlfriend, Joyce Payne, had come up with a lie about Stevens in an effort to get Peters released from a Kansas prison.
01:30:51
Speaker
So Peters backs off before the trial, but Joyce Payne does testify. So two witnesses at trial, Joyce Payne and her son Larry Short, if you recall, the ones who testified that Bill Stevens, the defense's leading suspect, came to their home in Oklahoma the day after the girls' were bodies were found. Both Payne and Short were charged with felony perjury.
01:31:12
Speaker
The defense had given both of them lie detector tests repeatedly. ah Both of their trials for perjury ended up in missed trials after the juries became hopelessly deadlocked. Eventually, Joyce would plead no locutendry, essentially a concession of the guilty plea without an admission of guilt.
01:31:30
Speaker
um When Peters was asked at the perjury trial of Payne and Short why Payne would falsely testify, if he was no longer going to get Peters any help from the defense attorneys, he didn't have an answer. So in 1980, Dr. David A. Jones, the University of Pittsburgh Professor of Justice Administration, discussed his study of the case and called it a, quote, unwinnable case.
01:31:55
Speaker
because there simply wasn't enough to convict Hart. He said that the prosecutor was excellent, but that he was resented in that area of Oklahoma because he was seen as a, quote, big city boy come to a small town. He said that the prosecution went too far in its descriptions of the sperm results and other forensic evidence and called it, quote, overkill because the testimony was technical and there seemed to be serious doubts about the validity of his approach.
01:32:22
Speaker
But perhaps more importantly, he also said that it's just not going to land with a less educated jury. He said the fact that OSBI agent found trinkets that supposedly connected heart to the crimes three months after they searched the shack, he was found and strained.
01:32:40
Speaker
credulity He said the time lapses between many of the first, second, and third searches created credibility problems. He gave the example of the pipe that I discussed before, found in one location that investigators said they did not realize had significance until one of the Girl Scouts later reported it had gone missing. And then going back several months later to get it allowed the defense to suggest that it was planted.
01:33:07
Speaker
Yeah, these are all the holes, right? And you know and it's one of those things where, and to to take that quote from the movie Clueless, where this case, it's a Monet. ah From far away, it looks a certain way, and then up close, it's a big old mess. And that's kind of what we're looking at here. You could just see all these little areas where it would have been very hard to convict him, um despite how it might look on the surface.
01:33:37
Speaker
hes you know ah But uh, but I also wanted to note too, you know, they were screwed with the prosecutor either way because you have uh falls who yeah casino is the big city out of towner who was coming in to replace uh district attorney wise who had to step down Because he had his book deal and his big celebrity. So they didn't have a a hope I don't think a prosecute but you know what they could have brought an investigator, you know but Investigators blamed the switch and prosecutors for harming the case as well.
01:34:12
Speaker
Yeah, so it it looks bad. And another thing that looks bad when you're in a town ah that already has deep distrust of authority and law enforcement and courts and all that, and you're a citizen and you're watching this trial happen and in a and they're using things like circus and the you know prosecutor defense and the judge are having regular outbursts and arguments in the courtroom. And it just gives you this impression, probably as a juror, that these people don't have their shit together.
01:34:39
Speaker
and That, to me, is like probably, again, another strike. If they had been maybe a little less contentious in the courtroom, and maybe, but I don't think it helped them though.
DNA Testing and Jurisdiction Shift
01:34:51
Speaker
But thanks to advances in DNA, ah this case was reopened in 2016. And that's when Mays County Sheriff Mike Reed was able to raise $30,000 in donation. That's from the community members. They all pulled together that money um to carry out new DNA testing, according to People magazine.
01:35:12
Speaker
Well, I think we could also jump back, though, because it was really open and oh reopened in the late 80s. Yes, there was a very early DNA testing that showed that one in 7000.
01:35:31
Speaker
um Only 7,500, yeah. 1 in 7,500 Native men, it could have been, only, I guess, 1 in 7,500 Native men would have similar DNA. And thinking of millions of Natives in the US, that's a pretty big pool of people. It is. Maybe 400,000 Cherokee.
01:35:57
Speaker
That's still a big pool. You're still talking around 30 people, if half the population is men and half the population is women. But it's not a, it's not, you know, it's not one in quite a quadrillion, but it's also not one for one.
01:36:12
Speaker
When you look at the DNA results in a lot of of these kinds of cases that, you know, talk about, yes, it's, it's ah you know, you're talking one in millions or one in, yeah, one of these huge numbers. When you get to one in 7,500, eke, that's not a three-month eke. Well, especially when you have 400,000 natives in one state, so. Right, and, you know, so that created a thing. And now, keep this in mind, we know this number from 1989.
01:36:41
Speaker
Okay, keep that in mind as i as I go into the rest of it because they decided, yeah, all right, there's a big difference between nineteen what was available in 1989 and what we have in 2016. So we're going to do another test. And you have to think, by this point, so we're going to get a much better result, a much more illustrative result, right? Well,
01:37:02
Speaker
Nah. So after they took that ah raised that money in May of 2022, the Hays County authorities announced more DNA tests that took place in 2019 strongly pointed to Hart's involvement in the killings. But again, we're not being given numbers here. We're not being given any real DNA information here um to tell us, like, is it better than what we had? I mean, they're just saying, like, we were able to rule some people out with this information that were on our list previously, but, you know, we weren't able to rule like ah Gene Hart out.
01:37:39
Speaker
um But the Oklahoma ah Bureau of Investigation ah conducted the testing and additional evidence was sent to Parabon Nano Labs, an independent forensics lab in Reston, Virginia, that specializes in mitochondrial DNA analysis. And of course, mitochondrial DNA is used when you don't have um like the nucleus available to distract that that main DNA. The mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell, as we learn in science class, and you can use that um to compare familial ah DNA. ah but Maternal. Maternal, that's right. um and i've and i yeah think Has there been some cases where it's also used sibling? um I can't remember, but yeah, that's I'm pulling for my old forensic files watching days um on that. but ah
01:38:28
Speaker
The 2019 lab ah stated, the lab report stated, quote, for 45 years, the OSPI has devoted countless hours in the pursuit of justice for Denise Milner, Michelle Guse, and Lori Farmer, three little girls whose lives were ended much too soon.
01:38:45
Speaker
The OSBI agents have followed every tip, every theory, every lead, and OSBI criminalists have processed all the evidence possible. The result is that every person of interest is excluded with the exception of Jean Leroy Hart. The DNA from a hair found on the floor of the tent and a semen stain found on the pillowcase of one of the girls exclude all of the persons of interest except for Hart.
01:39:08
Speaker
Reed, Sherrod, Mayes County Police, um had questioned over 130 potential suspects since the case and other names have surfaced over the years and DNA collected. Reed said- I was here to say I found that really odd that 130 suspects would Uh, you'd question 130 suspects and you had 130 suspects. So you mean like nobody wouldn't talk to you, but anyway. Right. Yeah. I mean, that's the thing is when you're reading through all of this, it's, you know, for the mass media consumption for people that are not from this area or invested in this case, you're going to read that and you're going to go, Oh, okay. They figured it out. It's good. Well, moving on. But if you are from there or you're familiar with this case and the intricacies of this case, this is going to look like a whole lot of throwing spackle.
01:39:57
Speaker
apply critical thinking skills to it because you know I read that report and i you know when I read it at first blush, I was like, wow, this is much stronger than the than the previous DNA report. And then I realized the report is so vague. I can't tell whether it's stronger than the previous report.
01:40:17
Speaker
Yeah, that was one thing they didn't make clear. I know that they said that he was the only one left, but I i remember seeing some ah language in another article ah that Sheriff Reed was ah also talking in and quoting in, and and I don't think that they had said that they are all of them.
01:40:35
Speaker
well What he said was that the dna of that that the only one was ah that wasn't ruled out of their suspects was heart, but that the DNA testing was inconclusive, strongly suggested heart's involvement, um and eliminated ah several other suspects from involvement.
01:40:55
Speaker
um you know What Reed, the sheriff at the time, said was, unless something new comes up, something brought to light we are not aware of, I'm convinced where I'm sitting of heart's guilt and involvement in this case. And so Reed spoke to ABC News and said the latest DNA testing produced, quote, several partial profiles.
01:41:18
Speaker
and that no full DNA profile had ever been obtained in the case. And I find that fascinating because our DNA tests only use a limited number of markers, you know not many markers. So if they couldn't get a full profile for CODIS, they were operating off of very few markers, which suggests that that number was probably closer to that one in 7,500 than it was to one in Quadruin. So. Yes, yeah.
01:41:48
Speaker
I agree. The Girl Scout Murders had haunted Oklahoma for 45 years. Reed said that he had proven a theory that two different knots tied on the girls, ah that that two different kinds of knots, which suggested a second suspect was wrong. But after nine years of investigating, Reed thought he had his man, but he still said that there was one fact that he still could not explain.
01:42:15
Speaker
that there was a military-style boot print and a tennis shoe footprint found in the bloody in the blood in the tent. He said there could have been somebody who innocently walked into the scene, but that person hadn't come forward yet. um All this is complicated by the fact that Mays County no longer has jurisdiction over the case.
01:42:35
Speaker
In 2020's McGirt decision that Allison brought up before the case transferred to the Cherokee Nation, who have opened a fresh investigation of the case now being led by the Cherokee Marshals, who have jurisdiction over crimes committed by natives on historical lands, which includes Locust Grove and Camp Scott. I'm going to pull up.
01:42:58
Speaker
another slide that was really, really, for me personally, very powerful, if I can get it up here. And it's a picture of Clara, Clara Wilhite, the camp counselor, as a camper, and then later as a counselor.
Ongoing Trauma and Reflections
01:43:18
Speaker
Summers at Camp Scott used to be a time of leisure and enjoyment for Carla Wheelittle.
01:43:24
Speaker
A powerful 2020 article in the Tulsa world talks about the trauma that the counselors experience following the murders. They sat down with Carla, who said she had often she would often dream about taking a certain walk and seeing the same steely blue-gray sky that she calls the, quote, 8 a.m. color. She says the air always has that same heavy human feel that follows an Oklahoma summer rain. She talks about the scent being of that same sweet, woody sycamore tree.
01:44:01
Speaker
And in the end, she says, she always ends up discovering the bodies of three young, dead girl scouts. The walk, she says, is always the same. And I wanted to end on that note to make the point that this is something that traumatized so many people, and it's still unresolved one way or the other. And I'm looking forward to the next episode where we have Julia walk through what we should be looking for in the suspect, and we get a chance to share our theories. And just to let you know, as much as Alison is trying to get my theory out of me, we do not know each other's theories.
01:44:44
Speaker
We do not. and and I told you earlier earlier today, i didn't think i I didn't have a theory theory as to like what actually happened that night, but I have some things to say. um and i'm so yeah I'm looking forward to seeing ah how that shakes down. and I also want to um welcome people to either reach out ah to either of us on um my Vintage Villains Soiree page on Facebook or Jason Silverlinings handbook page,
01:45:13
Speaker
or you know reach out to us personally. From joint Patreon for some LaDonna, how can Julie Murray fund? Because I want to hear um if you have any questions or also ah not just questions about the case, but questions for Julia um ahead of tomorrow's episode, if you want to drop those in Jason's Silver Linings Handbook Patreon. or you know anywhere that you see us on social media. because um yeah We'd really like to know, and I would love to know any theories that you guys have as well. In the chat when you show up tomorrow. and Anybody listening right now that is from this area that has that local insight would love to hear from you big time because I really think that this is the kind of thing. and As I said in our last episode, ah we're outsiders here. you know We're not from this area. We do our best to understand it. but
01:46:02
Speaker
You have to live in it i think to truly see and appreciate and get a lot of that detail in context it's a little bit like when just reaches out to me she's been researching some cases local to me. I lately and she's asked me some local questions and it feels good to be able to provide ah some of that information for somebody that you know doesn't live around here.
01:46:22
Speaker
So that's really important. Anyway, folks. Yeah, we did it. Some of you. I like some of you. I don't dislike any of you. um You guys are great. I don't know who's all in the chat, but I am out of gas and I need to prepare for our time with the loveliness Julia Callie. Hope you guys all join us. Yeah. You soon. Thanks for showing up, guys. peace out for All right. Bye. Take care.
01:46:50
Speaker
I want to take a moment to thank some of our Patreons for their contributions, which help us continue to do the work that we hope brings good into the world and delivers those silver linings. For this episode, I'd like to thank some of our newer members, Alyssa, Missy Anne, Laura V, Lydia, Sadie J, Shay L, Lauren A, Nay H, Grassy Noel, and Mallory B.
01:47:16
Speaker
Not only does your support help us make a difference by helping us tell these stories, you're an inspiration and have also come up with some of our best episode ideas. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. If you'd like to join us for more discussions with me and other listeners, we can be found on most social media platforms, including a listener-driven Facebook group called the Silver Linings Fireside Chat.
01:47:41
Speaker
for deeper conversations with our guests and live conversations with other listeners like this one. You can also join us on our Patreon at www.patreon dot.com forward slash the Silver Linings Handbook. I'm Jason Blair and this is a Silver Linings Handbook true crime bonus episode. We'll see you guys all soon.