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Speaker 4: You are now listening to True Murder, The most shocking
Speaker 4: Killers in true crime history and the authors that have
Speaker 4: written about him Gasey Bundy, Dahmer, The Nightstalker VTK every
Speaker 4: week another fascinating author talking about the most shocking and
Speaker 4: infamous killers in true crime history. True Murder with your host,
Speaker 4: journalist and author Dan Zufanski.
Speaker 5: Good Evening. Every serial killer is a nice guy until
Speaker 5: he's found out. The shocking true account was Southern charmer
Speaker 5: who left a trail of victims in his wake. Jerry
Speaker 5: Marcus fooled them all. He was a nice guy, always
Speaker 5: helped at home, did well in school, an athlete, and
Speaker 5: always employed. When things went wrong, he was the first
Speaker 5: to help clean up the mess. He was the last
Speaker 5: person anyone suspected of being a killer. After Marcus was
Speaker 5: caught and sentenced to life in prison in the late seventies,
Speaker 5: author Linda lou Long spent years corresponding with him. The
Speaker 5: Tuskegee Strangler gives an inside look into the workings of
Speaker 5: a man who is not your typical serial killer. The
Speaker 5: book they were featuring this evening is the Tuskegee Strangler,
Speaker 5: the nicest serial killer they ever met with my special
Speaker 5: guest author and researcher, Linda lou Long. Welcome to the program,
Speaker 5: and thank you so much for this interview.
Speaker 6: Linda lou Long, thank you, thank you very much for
Speaker 6: having me.
Speaker 5: Thank you so much. Let's start off with how you
Speaker 5: came to be the author of this story.
Speaker 6: Where should I start?
Speaker 2: It just all started as a college class and I
Speaker 2: just had to write about a serial killer. And I
Speaker 2: just happened to be on the phone to some friends
Speaker 2: in the state where Jerry Marcus was finally arrested, Mississippi,
Speaker 2: and they told me about usial killer there, and I
Speaker 2: looked up the arresting officer and that's how it all started.
Speaker 5: Let's go back. You say, these murders began in Tuskegee, Alabama,
Speaker 5: where this Tuskegee University is located, and Jerry Marcus, his
Speaker 5: father was Eddie Marcus, and his mother was Ruth, and
Speaker 5: his aunt lived next door, his paternal ant live next door.
Speaker 5: Tell us about Jerry Marcus, his family life, what that
Speaker 5: looked like, and how he grew up.
Speaker 2: Well, I would say that they had a typical family
Speaker 2: as it were down south here, the street was dead
Speaker 2: end and all the neighbors everyone knew that each other,
Speaker 2: and the aunt was next door, so it was a
Speaker 2: pretty comfortable setting on.
Speaker 6: The father worked and so did the mother.
Speaker 2: The father had a drinking problem, but it was just
Speaker 2: that was partially I guess what started the one lot
Speaker 2: of everything for Jerry Marcus because he grew up seeing
Speaker 2: his mother getting abused.
Speaker 6: By his father due to the alcohol, and he just
Speaker 6: went his own way with it.
Speaker 5: You say that he was also abused by his father,
Speaker 5: and not only did he witness this and along with
Speaker 5: his siblings, but he also you say, his behavior changed
Speaker 5: around eight or ten years old, he felt the badness.
Speaker 5: With this badness, you say that he first tortured animals,
Speaker 5: and we're talking very specific. So what was that torture
Speaker 5: of animals? Like, what did he have to say?
Speaker 2: Well, it was kind of a rural area, so it
Speaker 2: wasn't like you were in the city in the city
Speaker 2: because Tuskegee is a small town even now, and so
Speaker 2: there were lots of stray animals around and Jerry had
Speaker 2: an affinity for pestering and torturing cats.
Speaker 6: He liked cats, He liked to torture them.
Speaker 2: And one in particular, which was mentioned in the press
Speaker 2: and mentioned in other accounts, is that he would there
Speaker 2: was one particular female and she was hanging around all
Speaker 2: the time, and so he dipped her. He got a
Speaker 2: whole lover and dipped her tail in I think it
Speaker 2: was gasoline and set it on fire, so she would,
Speaker 2: you know, chase her tail until she died. Practically, so
Speaker 2: he was like that, and he liked to watch when
Speaker 2: things like this would happen. Even though whether he set
Speaker 2: it up or watched it happen, you know, in the wild,
Speaker 2: he still liked to watch and like to see the
Speaker 2: animal tormented.
Speaker 5: What did he progress to when he saw the when
Speaker 5: he felt the excitement of fire and its effect on
Speaker 5: these animals.
Speaker 6: Well, early on, he.
Speaker 2: Was still really young, and he was still pre adolescent,
Speaker 2: and so he really didn't get a grasp of what
Speaker 2: these behaviors could lead to, or what he was really experiencing,
Speaker 2: or any of that. He was just experiencing a lot
Speaker 2: of different and he was usually by himself. He didn't
Speaker 2: seem to have he didn't He shied away from playmates,
Speaker 2: their kids other than he would torment them at church
Speaker 2: and stuff. But he stayed away from the other kids,
Speaker 2: and he was pretty much a solitary anyway. But he
Speaker 2: was always with the animals and all and catching them
Speaker 2: in the timber. And because the whole house was it
Speaker 2: was a real timber, large pine trees, real wooded area
Speaker 2: where they lived in, and so there was a lot
Speaker 2: of wild animals around that he had access to.
Speaker 6: Him would do things too.
Speaker 5: You write about that his fascination again with fire led
Speaker 5: to again this interesting fire and what did that lead
Speaker 5: to in terms of his behavior. What happened at the
Speaker 5: family home.
Speaker 6: Well, the family home caught on fire.
Speaker 2: Now there wasn't a police report or anything like that
Speaker 2: about it to read, And I just interviewed both his
Speaker 2: mother and his grandmother and we all talked about it,
Speaker 2: but they never really the grandmother and the mother never
Speaker 2: suspected Jerry of having anything to do with setting that fire.
Speaker 2: No one knew how it started, but they really didn't
Speaker 2: suspect him. Whereas it was probably one of Jerry's first
Speaker 2: efforts reaching out, you know, and seeing just how much
Speaker 2: he could get away with, and I think it simply
Speaker 2: got out of control.
Speaker 6: You know, he didn't really relate.
Speaker 2: Specifically what it was that triggered him, and I never
Speaker 2: could get that out of him. But he just really
Speaker 2: felt an affinity to fire and the smell of burning
Speaker 2: things and all, and like when he watched this hot
Speaker 2: his family house burn, he was sitting back in the
Speaker 2: timber and he was just really getting off on it
Speaker 2: and watching the sparks and everything in the grass, and he.
Speaker 6: Was really getting off on it. But there is a
Speaker 6: he didn't really relate.
Speaker 2: We didn't, Okay, I will say that we didn't discuss
Speaker 2: it any further than the fact that he had said
Speaker 2: that he was involved with it. And I suspect it
Speaker 2: was a couch that was caught on fire, and he
Speaker 2: thought it was more of a controllable thing, but it
Speaker 2: was not, so it caught the rest of the house
Speaker 2: on fire.
Speaker 5: Now, a person that plays into this story of great
Speaker 5: importance is Gwen. And at fourteen in grade school, Marcus
Speaker 5: and Gwen meet tell us what happens at the same
Speaker 5: time in terms of what's going on in his family
Speaker 5: between his parents.
Speaker 6: Well, I will say that I don't.
Speaker 2: I only know about Gwen as far as Jerry was
Speaker 2: able to tell me. I have not personally met nor
Speaker 2: interviewed her because that was her request. She didn't want
Speaker 2: a part of it, and I respect that, so I
Speaker 2: wasn't going to do that. But according to Jerry, you know,
Speaker 2: they just met, had a lot in common, and she
Speaker 2: really impressed him because she was really smart, and he
Speaker 2: liked that, you know, he liked having a female that
Speaker 2: he could relate to. He's so I'm not sure what
Speaker 2: that meant, but you know, that's his major interest in her.
Speaker 2: And he never was any threat to Gwynn as far
Speaker 2: as her safety or her well being or anything either.
Speaker 2: It was like their relationship was completely separate from his
Speaker 2: other personality.
Speaker 6: Which it truly was. I mean, she had no idea.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I'm sure you right. That the parents were experiencing well,
Speaker 5: the mother was experiencing violence at the hands of the father.
Speaker 5: It was progressively getting worse, and that Marcus was certainly
Speaker 5: resorted to peeping in the neighborhood. He thought that everybody
Speaker 5: knew what was going on in his family anyway, and
Speaker 5: that was his justification, you write, for him to go
Speaker 5: and peep at young women in their underwear. After that,
Speaker 5: his schoolwork wasn't affected by his behavior, but at some
Speaker 5: point he excels in sports and then tell us about
Speaker 5: the relationship as it develops with Gwynn and they get married.
Speaker 2: Well, there was a gap in there because Gwynn had
Speaker 2: another relationship before Jerry, and even believed that she was
Speaker 2: in New Orleans for a while.
Speaker 6: But I'm not sure of that, so I can't say.
Speaker 2: But they were having a relationship and seeing each other
Speaker 2: and stuff before they actually went to the courthouse and
Speaker 2: signed the papers and got formally married.
Speaker 6: You know, they had a relationship.
Speaker 2: I guess they got back together, shall we say, you know,
Speaker 2: between being young and in love and in grade school
Speaker 2: and junior high and high school and stuff, and then
Speaker 2: the breakup between the two of them, you know, just
Speaker 2: when she went her own way and then they got
Speaker 2: back together.
Speaker 6: That was difference in there.
Speaker 2: She hadn't even been around, you know, when Jerry had
Speaker 2: been starting working there at the university and all. She
Speaker 2: hadn't even been around really, But they got back together,
Speaker 2: and it was odd that there was such a stable relationship,
Speaker 2: and he still said that he respected her and he
Speaker 2: had no intention of ever doing any harm to her
Speaker 2: her family, which he adopted as his.
Speaker 5: It's interesting, You're right, before this as well, that when
Speaker 5: it was time to go to school, there wasn't any money.
Speaker 5: But when he asked his father anyway, he said, I
Speaker 5: wouldn't give you a red scent because you abandoned me
Speaker 5: and the family when the family had problems and the
Speaker 5: mother moved to New Orleans and left the family. So
Speaker 5: the father saw it as an abandonment of him and
Speaker 5: the family and said, I wouldn't give you a red
Speaker 5: cent for education. Marcus Jerry went to his aunt, and
Speaker 5: his aunt provided the tuition for him to go to college.
Speaker 5: And in college he did well enough. Like you say,
Speaker 5: he was always as you write, he was always concerned
Speaker 5: with being employed, and by all reports he was a
Speaker 5: good worker. So he was working at a hospital, the
Speaker 5: John D. Andrews Community Hospital.
Speaker 6: Right that was a Tuskegee hospital, right on the campus grounds.
Speaker 5: Now being on the campus grounds and being this person
Speaker 5: with this developing anger and hatred and obviously justification for
Speaker 5: everything he did do and had gotten away from the
Speaker 5: law and straight by with various decisions in the courts,
Speaker 5: so he was definitely confident that he could fool law enforcement.
Speaker 5: What did this lead to on the campus of the
Speaker 5: Tuskegee university.
Speaker 2: Well, you know, Jerry never had anything but a parking
Speaker 2: ticket on his record, nothing, and he was real good
Speaker 2: about skirting the law, you know, or just being on
Speaker 2: the edge of possibly being involved. And he was always
Speaker 2: seemed to be around, you know, the detective in that area,
Speaker 2: Al Kendall, out of Tuskegee. He never could quite pin
Speaker 2: Jerry because Jerry always just be on the fringe of things,
Speaker 2: always be there, always be looking, but not close enough
Speaker 2: to really pin him to anything for other issues in
Speaker 2: the future or even in the past when he was younger,
Speaker 2: because he had known him when he was really young.
Speaker 2: But I really can't say shere is just it was
Speaker 2: just an odd relationship because it was him and Gwen.
Speaker 6: They were so natural, so normal.
Speaker 2: He's back to Gwen and said, well, we should do
Speaker 2: this and we should get married now, and that's what
Speaker 2: they did and it went on from there.
Speaker 6: But it just seemed like once that happened, it just
Speaker 6: started going downhill. The relationship.
Speaker 5: Tell us about the incidents with the two student nurses,
Speaker 5: what they have to say, what he has to say,
Speaker 5: and the ramifications from.
Speaker 2: That, Well, they really didn't have anything to say since
Speaker 2: they were both dead. But it's so they couldn't have
Speaker 2: ever done. It was just like those two girls, and
Speaker 2: what happened to them dropped out of time, you know.
Speaker 2: It was almost impossible to find out and to trace
Speaker 2: this pattern all the way back to this starting with
Speaker 2: the two girls, and the one, the very first one.
Speaker 2: He was working on campus then in maintenance, and that's
Speaker 2: how he saw her and began to know who she
Speaker 2: was and follow her, follow in the sense of footsteps,
Speaker 2: not by electronic means, because there weren't computers like that
Speaker 2: back then. But he was interested in her and he
Speaker 2: followed her, and that happened in nineteen seventy one, and
Speaker 2: that was when her body, not even her body, was
Speaker 2: never recovered, you see, and so she was just reported
Speaker 2: missing and she just dropped out of society. And then
Speaker 2: the next girl was less than a year later, and
Speaker 2: of course they found Margaret's body. You know, he'd gone
Speaker 2: a step further with her. With the first girl, he hadn't.
Speaker 2: He supposedly had just strangled her by accident and dumped
Speaker 2: her body.
Speaker 6: But then no one ever found it.
Speaker 2: He never went he went back, he couldn't find it,
Speaker 2: and so no one knows whatever happened to her, and
Speaker 2: I never could find anything anything other than the small
Speaker 2: mention in the student newspaper about her in particular, so
Speaker 2: her and Margaret sturred. Event the very first two now
Speaker 2: Margaret starred event wasn't a nursing student.
Speaker 6: She was an engineering student, right, but she was getting
Speaker 6: ready to graduate.
Speaker 2: She had a family, already, was married, had a child,
Speaker 2: and so it was odd that she was the one
Speaker 2: that he aggressed against and assaulted physically and left.
Speaker 6: Her body new to be recovered. Now that was strange too.
Speaker 2: But then once those two acts were committed within practically
Speaker 2: weeks after that, he ended up getting offered by someone
Speaker 2: who had gone to school with, who now was in
Speaker 2: Tennessee and Knoxville College, and he offered him a position
Speaker 2: there if he would come and play on their ball team.
Speaker 2: And then all of a sudden, nothing else mattered anymore,
Speaker 2: and he left when this family behind and his parents
Speaker 2: and that part of the family behind, and he went
Speaker 2: to Tennessee.
Speaker 5: What I had mentioned about the nursing students was it
Speaker 5: just seemed to set up an mo where he would
Speaker 5: be on the campus. He said that he wou was
Speaker 5: working at the hospital and got some fenom barbeital for
Speaker 5: these women, they told a different story. And then I
Speaker 5: say that when he hooks up with Gwen, he marries Gwen.
Speaker 5: Then this is when he decides to go on this
Speaker 5: these murderous urges that he can to kill, that he
Speaker 5: responds to. Right, And then you say that again he
Speaker 5: leaves Gwen and is able like a true psychopath, as
Speaker 5: you call him to be able to just go and
Speaker 5: excel at school and go on this well at least
Speaker 5: go but to school on this scholarship and excel in
Speaker 5: sports as attested to this scholarship. Right, you say, he
Speaker 5: moves to Tennessee. Now, what's unusual about this serial killer
Speaker 5: is that he's a very nice guy and no one
Speaker 5: suspect him. But there is something else about the serial
Speaker 5: killer this unusual.
Speaker 2: Tell us, Well, it was almost eight years between what
Speaker 2: he did to the two students on the university in
Speaker 2: seventy one, early in late seventy one, and then his
Speaker 2: next act wasn't committed until October nineteen eighty three, So
Speaker 2: he went many years with a break before he planned
Speaker 2: to attack someone else.
Speaker 6: Because see, these weren't strangers.
Speaker 2: The next girl that he goes after he met her
Speaker 2: when he went and he applied for public aid and
Speaker 2: for food stamps. Yes, and she helped him get food stamps,
Speaker 2: and he set up a date with her and they
Speaker 2: went out two or three different times, and then I
Speaker 2: think it was the third date, he just decided he
Speaker 2: was done with her.
Speaker 6: And it kills her too.
Speaker 5: And so you're talking about Francine Davis.
Speaker 6: Yes, yes, franccene.
Speaker 5: So police have no idea again have He's never a suspect,
Speaker 5: except later we'll talk about al Kendall and his suspicions. Right,
Speaker 5: let's talk about what happens with the case of Francine Davis.
Speaker 5: How do police respond and what do they find, if anything.
Speaker 2: Francine Davis was another weird sort of thing because he
Speaker 2: completely switched over is whatever mo o he was trying
Speaker 2: to establish with those other girls, and he really wasn't
Speaker 2: you know. Both of those were incidents building up to
Speaker 2: what else was going to happen in the future. They
Speaker 2: really weren't planned and all of that. But this with
Speaker 2: this girl, he spent quite a bit of time in
Speaker 2: her apartment. They had gone to play tennis and she
Speaker 2: had gone into shower and came out of the shower
Speaker 2: and he assaulted her and he strangled her. But he
Speaker 2: didn't just assault and strangle her. He was really worried
Speaker 2: about the other girls. In the back of his mind.
Speaker 2: He never knew if someone was going to pop their
Speaker 2: head up and say hi, I'm so, and so on
Speaker 2: and so on so and you tried to kill me
Speaker 2: all those years ago. He was very afraid of that
Speaker 2: that someone was going to come back and get him someday.
Speaker 2: So he wanted to make sure that franccene was dead.
Speaker 2: So he submerged fran scene in the bathtub and held
Speaker 2: her under water until the air bubbles quit coming up,
Speaker 2: and he describes that, and then he took her out
Speaker 2: of the tub and dried her off and redressed her
Speaker 2: in a fresh set of well pajamas whatever she had,
Speaker 2: and set her up in the bed and propped her
Speaker 2: up and had a note beside her hand with a
Speaker 2: name with a pencil saying I hate you Arthur, her
Speaker 2: husband's name who she was separated from. And he really
Speaker 2: set her up. He cleaned them hire apartment, He cleaned
Speaker 2: everything up. The place looked like it was a hotel fradically.
Speaker 3: And that was what you know.
Speaker 2: The officers who came on the scene, and they thought
Speaker 2: she had had an attack related to a respiratory disorder
Speaker 2: she had, right, and that she had simply suffocated with
Speaker 2: the medication or whatever because he had laid out her
Speaker 2: medicine and all, you.
Speaker 6: Know, And that's what they thought happened.
Speaker 2: They had no idea until he confessed and they were
Speaker 2: contacted that he was the one who had killed her,
Speaker 2: and that she was a murder suspect, not an incidental
Speaker 2: death because the case had already been closed.
Speaker 5: Yeah, he was trying to frame the boyfriend. He saw
Speaker 5: a photo and then he oh forged a note that
Speaker 5: said I hate you Arthur and sort of this note
Speaker 5: that he wanted police to find and in fact they did, right.
Speaker 2: So they blame him. Yeah, Now he is a very
Speaker 2: nice person. I met him and he gave me a
Speaker 2: pretty picture of fren.
Speaker 5: Scene right now. At the same time, Marcus has a
Speaker 5: dilemma because he has been using his girlfriend Lyn's car.
Speaker 5: He's supposed to pick her up. Meanwhile he's doing this murdering,
Speaker 5: So what's the idea that he hatches in his mind.
Speaker 2: He gave her some excuse that he didn't pick her
Speaker 2: up from work, and he gave her some excuse that
Speaker 2: when he finally got home. I believe she reported him
Speaker 2: to the police missing because he had her car, and
Speaker 2: he just told her that he had been robbed and assaulted.
Speaker 2: He said sexually assaulted at first, and then he decided
Speaker 2: to just change it to assaulted because he wanted to
Speaker 2: leave the second part out. And it was it was
Speaker 2: funny the way he described it, and that's that was
Speaker 2: the excuse that he got. And he went to the
Speaker 2: police station there.
Speaker 6: And filed a report and all this stuff.
Speaker 2: About something that never happened when he slept in her
Speaker 2: car in a parking lot across the street. So you know,
Speaker 2: it was interesting in that sense that he got out
Speaker 2: of picking her up. And that was the excuse he provided,
Speaker 2: was that he had been assault to drob when he
Speaker 2: didn't have any money in the first place.
Speaker 5: And she said, so right, you're right that he knew
Speaker 5: and he had experienced al Kendall for years since the seventies,
Speaker 5: so he wanted to call somewhere else where he knew
Speaker 5: al Kendall wasn't unbeknownst to him, al Kendall speaks to
Speaker 5: the person that speaks to Marcus.
Speaker 6: Yeah, but that's a little bit later, a short while later, Yeah, anyway.
Speaker 5: He is questioned police think this story sounds cock eyed anyway.
Speaker 5: So his initial questioning began May fourteenth, nineteen eighty six.
Speaker 5: And you say he told several different stories, raising one
Speaker 5: red flag after another. But there is another person that's missing,
Speaker 5: and mister class May eighth, nineteen eighty six, you Vet Chambers,
Speaker 5: so right, tell us about this questioning and what happens.
Speaker 2: He met a VET at a local bar and they
Speaker 2: sawry each other about three different times, and he gives
Speaker 2: her or three to his ideas of what he did
Speaker 2: and who was involved, and the cars they were driving
Speaker 2: and what they were wearing, and most of it was
Speaker 2: never able to prove it. All was, you know, different stories.
Speaker 2: He told the police there in Tennessee one story and
Speaker 2: then he told everyone he got home, he told another story,
Speaker 2: and another story after that, and just changing little bits
Speaker 2: like what she wore, how she wore it, and where
Speaker 2: he saw them arguing on the bridge, and all kinds
Speaker 2: of excuses. Really didn't have anything to do with anything,
Speaker 2: but he started tangling things up. Then, you know, I
Speaker 2: guess he had tried to. He didn't have to keep
Speaker 2: anything straight with the first two individuals.
Speaker 6: They were just gone but when.
Speaker 2: He started adding more was fran scene and then with
Speaker 2: event he started getting confused and mixing up his own stories,
Speaker 2: not meaning to, but he wasn't prepared. He didn't feel
Speaker 2: like he was going to be questioned. He thought that
Speaker 2: he was going to be special and ignored like he'd
Speaker 2: been ignored in the past, back in to Ski because
Speaker 2: everyone had no idea that he would ever do anything
Speaker 2: like that, so he was never questioned or suspected. But
Speaker 2: it was different once he came back and he started
Speaker 2: killing again because he came back and started working on
Speaker 2: campus again, except this time for a construction crew, but
Speaker 2: he still had access to the campus and that's where
Speaker 2: he found the vet Chambers the first time.
Speaker 5: Tell us about this Leonora Wright, which was murdered eighteen
Speaker 5: days after your vet Chambers. Right, and this is a
Speaker 5: wild story again, so bizarre. Marcus is grocery shopping with
Speaker 5: his aunt, Missus Owens. Right, what does missus Owens do?
Speaker 5: She knows Leonora what happens.
Speaker 2: She didn't it ever dream anything like this was going
Speaker 2: to happen when she introduced them.
Speaker 6: Sure, and she just introduced them at.
Speaker 2: The grocery store and she just knew her from seeing
Speaker 2: her going in and out of church.
Speaker 6: She wasn't intimate with her, knew her mother or grandmother
Speaker 6: any of that stuff.
Speaker 2: But you know, when she introduced them and they hit
Speaker 2: it right off, she was all for it because she
Speaker 2: thought she was a nice girl and her you know,
Speaker 2: nephew was a wonderful kid, and he deserved a break
Speaker 2: and meeting someone nice. He went to her church and
Speaker 2: dah dah, dah da dah. But it wasn't that way
Speaker 2: at all, you know, it ended up being well, she
Speaker 2: ended up dead, and he didn't even hardly pause. She
Speaker 2: was a pickup date a couple of times. He picked
Speaker 2: her up at home and took her out and brought
Speaker 2: her back. And then this incident happened, and she fell
Speaker 2: and she heard herself supposedly in the stories he gave,
Speaker 2: and he gave several, you know, more than one story
Speaker 2: about her too.
Speaker 5: Now you right though that she talked. It's six days
Speaker 5: before her disappearance is brought to the attention of Tuskegee
Speaker 5: Police Department. And then they search your house and find
Speaker 5: her body. Right, no one ever but again, but again
Speaker 5: there's an autopsy. What's the cause of death?
Speaker 2: Determination strangulation was his favorite they like to strangle.
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Speaker 5: true Murder and talkspace dot com. Now, Linda, we talked
Speaker 5: about the news tightening around Jerry Marcus and beginning in
Speaker 5: June eighteenth, eighteen ninety seven. You say that Marcus gave
Speaker 5: his first confession to Captain David Linley when finally arrested
Speaker 5: for his last murder in Starkfield. Now, that last murder
Speaker 5: is a woman named Ellerby, So let's talk about wadin
Speaker 5: Braun Ellerby and where she was buried.
Speaker 6: Interestingly, well, Weadine was.
Speaker 2: Her body was recovered in April of nineteen eighty seven,
Speaker 2: but she was killed by Jerry Marcus an estimated honor
Speaker 2: before September sixteenth, nineteen eighty six, so she was in
Speaker 2: the ground for several months, but they were after she
Speaker 2: came home to his house to use his telephone to
Speaker 2: supposedly call and find stronger form of drug, not fine
Speaker 2: fine cocaine, I believe it was. And they used the
Speaker 2: phone and she supposedly faked it and held the receiver
Speaker 2: down and all this stuff, and he knew she had lied.
Speaker 2: He heard the tone and he knew she had lied,
Speaker 2: but he went along with it, you know, and played, Okay, well,
Speaker 2: let's go ahead and go and get in the car
Speaker 2: and go drive back to the bar whatever and check
Speaker 2: so and so and check it there. So they're leaving,
Speaker 2: and the house a lot of these brick houses concrete
Speaker 2: block houses in the south will have the staircases to
Speaker 2: the second story on the outside of the house, which
Speaker 2: is the way it was with this house. And he
Speaker 2: made sure she lost her footing going down, and she
Speaker 2: fell and fell all the way to the bottom from
Speaker 2: the second story to the first. Now I was there,
Speaker 2: and I took pictures and I could see us someone
Speaker 2: you know, could kill themselves falling. But we're not really
Speaker 2: sure she was dead when he drug her into the
Speaker 2: timber or not, because he drug her into the timber
Speaker 2: to sexually assault her, and he never really knew if
Speaker 2: she was dead or alive or checked anything like that.
Speaker 2: But once he was finished with her. He realized she
Speaker 2: hadn't woken up, you know, and she was probably dead,
Speaker 2: but again he's not sure, and he decides to bury
Speaker 2: her back there in the timber behind the house, you know.
Speaker 2: But the ground in the south is really clay and
Speaker 2: really hard and hard. And he was back there with
Speaker 2: sticks trying to dig out a spot to put her in,
Speaker 2: and he used whatever tools they had at the house
Speaker 2: and he made a depression deep enough to lay her
Speaker 2: body in. But he went back to the house and
Speaker 2: got the red plastic tablecloth out of the lower level
Speaker 2: they've been on table down there, and he wrapped her
Speaker 2: body and that and put her in a grave of
Speaker 2: sorts because it's still, like I said, it's impossible to
Speaker 2: dig holes in this city, you know, without major tools.
Speaker 2: The grounds really hard. And he just started covering her
Speaker 2: with debris and just kept covering her and visiting the
Speaker 2: body and recovering it and adding more stuff to break
Speaker 2: down the body because he knew by that time she
Speaker 2: was dead. She may not have been dead when he
Speaker 2: first put her under and started baring her and left
Speaker 2: her there.
Speaker 6: She may have well bled to death. Oh we just
Speaker 6: don't know.
Speaker 5: Now, right again about another murder. April fourteenth, there's a
Speaker 5: missing person's report for a Dorothy Dot. Davis tell us
Speaker 5: about Dorothy and her demise.
Speaker 6: Well, Dorothy, she went by Dot. She was the last one.
Speaker 2: And again she was someone he just met while he
Speaker 2: was using his girlfriend's car and living at his girlfriend's house.
Speaker 2: He met Dot out and started meeting Dot and going
Speaker 2: places with Dot. And why it is a good question,
Speaker 2: because it happened, you know, it wasn't it was, you know, Well,
Speaker 2: Ellerby was gone and no one knew she was just missing.
Speaker 2: No one knew she was buried in Jerry marcus backyard.
Speaker 2: And he was never he was never hooked to her.
Speaker 2: The girlfriend, her girlfriends and such said that he was.
Speaker 2: She was going on a date with somebody. She didn't
Speaker 2: really say that it was Jerry Marcus or he was
Speaker 2: the one she was meeting. And then when Dot died,
Speaker 2: when he murdered Dot, they hadn't been seeing each other
Speaker 2: anymore than two and a half to three weeks and
Speaker 2: he killed her too, So he had just he had
Speaker 2: just reached the phase where he couldn't stop killing them,
Speaker 2: and he wasn't sure why he was wanting to do it,
Speaker 2: but he just couldn't stop, right, you know, in the end,
Speaker 2: you know, I guess they all reach a peak. But
Speaker 2: it's just all you know, he went so many years,
Speaker 2: seven and a half, eight years with nothing, and then
Speaker 2: all of a sudden, he blows and he doesn't really
Speaker 2: know why. He doesn't know what happened other than the
Speaker 2: fact that he lost his job. That's the only correlating
Speaker 2: factor there is. He lost his job, and that's why
Speaker 2: he killed Francine Davis, or met Franccene Davis.
Speaker 6: To kill her. So it's interesting. Dot was an innocent party.
Speaker 6: She just met him, went out with them a couple
Speaker 6: of times, and he killed her.
Speaker 2: You know, she was They were all innocent girls, women,
Speaker 2: they were prostitutes or anything like that. They weren't looking
Speaker 2: for trouble. They were a waitress of state employee students.
Speaker 2: There were no reasons. They weren't asking to be killed
Speaker 2: or asking to become victims of a serial killer.
Speaker 5: Let's talk about his capture and then the confession and
Speaker 5: how was gained.
Speaker 6: Okay, Well, like I said, he was captured.
Speaker 2: I mean, he was questioned repeatedly over the other girls,
Speaker 2: and they just couldn't hook him. There were no witnesses,
Speaker 2: no one actually saying well, hey, I saw it, I
Speaker 2: saw them. So there was no real witnesses to tie
Speaker 2: in to any of those except for the Dot Davis one.
Speaker 2: And that's the one where he finally broke down himself.
Speaker 2: It wasn't that they had more evidence or a way
Speaker 2: to tie him or other witnesses, because that's what there
Speaker 2: wasn't was any witnesses, but they managed.
Speaker 6: He managed to lose it himself.
Speaker 2: He had reached his peak and he lost it, and
Speaker 2: he told about He gave up on the one. He
Speaker 2: told several different stories about Dot Davis, and then he
Speaker 2: finally gave up on her. He said, Okay, I did
Speaker 2: kill it.
Speaker 6: She did.
Speaker 2: And that's when he started telling about all the rest.
Speaker 2: He said, well, then I guess I'll have to tell
Speaker 2: you about the rest of them too. And these guys
Speaker 2: had no idea, David Linley, they had no idea. He
Speaker 2: had just finished a class in the FBI headquarters on
Speaker 2: Sireal homis be serial killers before he ever met Marcus,
Speaker 2: though I guess he was fresh with current data to
Speaker 2: use to follow a serial killer.
Speaker 6: But no one knew.
Speaker 2: No one knew until the very last minute when he
Speaker 2: confessed that he had killed all those girls all in
Speaker 2: the past.
Speaker 5: No one did you write about the correspondence that you
Speaker 5: have with Jerry Marcus eventually and the things he told
Speaker 5: you after you'd already read and been privy to all
Speaker 5: the confessions officially and all the information did eat imparted
Speaker 5: at those confessions. Let's talk about his justification that he
Speaker 5: talks about and that he says to these Al Kendall
Speaker 5: and David Linley and other others in his confession. What
Speaker 5: is his justification? Why does he do this? What seems
Speaker 5: to be the pattern in terms of whose fault and
Speaker 5: why this occurs?
Speaker 2: You know, I can go over a million different times
Speaker 2: and you can't pin it down to one thing.
Speaker 6: Or even two, or any instigating factors.
Speaker 2: It could be other than employment and losing a job
Speaker 2: or gaining a job, but that doesn't that's never been
Speaker 2: proven before as being a factor in someone who's a
Speaker 2: serial killer, that they are a repeat offender. For work
Speaker 2: is kind of what he is. There isn't there isn't
Speaker 2: any specific thing. He just loses control and he doesn't
Speaker 2: try to stop. You know, with the first two girls,
Speaker 2: I think he tried to stop during those several years
Speaker 2: he tried to get control of himself. That he realized
Speaker 2: that what he had done wasn't what he should be doing,
Speaker 2: and he tried to get control, but then he lost
Speaker 2: it again, and once it was gone the second time,
Speaker 2: he just started a downhill roll as far as one
Speaker 2: right after another, because he didn't, you know, once he
Speaker 2: stepped over the line. The third time, the real time,
Speaker 2: that was when he just started one right after another.
Speaker 6: And he never ask him repeatedly, why why do you
Speaker 6: do it? Why do you feel the need, And he says,
Speaker 6: I'm just that way.
Speaker 2: I just feel like I should kill that's all. And
Speaker 2: there's no other rationale for it. I mean, I'm hoping
Speaker 2: to link him what was written about in this book, right.
Speaker 5: You write that what I was getting to was that
Speaker 5: in each one of these instances, there's something that compels
Speaker 5: him in terms of his anger, and he just can't
Speaker 5: turn back. But they are very much like when.
Speaker 6: He was young.
Speaker 5: You write that there were small, insignificant, relatively insignificant events
Speaker 5: which created this murderous anger. A woman stole sixty dollars
Speaker 5: that he is driving her around, and then when he
Speaker 5: went to look for his sixty dollars. He says, she
Speaker 5: admitted that she stole the sixty dollars that would pay
Speaker 5: him back. They have sex, he said, They say they
Speaker 5: make love, describes as making love, and then he has
Speaker 5: to kill her. The other woman lied to him, The
Speaker 5: other woman possibly cheated on him. So for verrely insignificant
Speaker 5: reasons he was willing to.
Speaker 2: Kill and things he created himself. Yeah, certainly, you know,
Speaker 2: I mean, we don't know if that's even true. But
Speaker 2: the way he describes it, I mean, is insignificant. It
Speaker 2: doesn't make any sense why someone would kill someone else
Speaker 2: for such a trivial reason.
Speaker 5: And as you write, it's very unusual for a serial
Speaker 5: killer to prey on people that he's intimate with, dated
Speaker 5: played tennis with, recommended by Za knows, the family, knows
Speaker 5: the family.
Speaker 2: And yet and he went back to his comfort zone,
Speaker 2: you know, he left his comfort zone of Tuskegee and
Speaker 2: where he'd been before him, where he had felt all
Speaker 2: those initial emotions, and they went to Tennessee. But then
Speaker 2: he came back to Tuskegee, So he came back to
Speaker 2: his comfort zone. After having stepped out and killed somewhere else,
Speaker 2: then he came back.
Speaker 6: So it's interesting returning to the scene of the crime.
Speaker 5: You interestingly right again, not to look for excuses, but
Speaker 5: more so for reasons psychologically connecting the behavior at these
Speaker 5: crimes to the behavior that he witnessed from his father
Speaker 5: beating his mother. In particular, this brown belt tell us
Speaker 5: the significance of the brown belt leather belt.
Speaker 2: Well, his dad always wore it, the brown leather belt,
Speaker 2: and I have seen it, but I was not allowed
Speaker 2: to take its in the hands of the sheriff of
Speaker 2: that counting, or at least it was. He wouldn't let
Speaker 2: me have it in evidence. But anyway, when he was
Speaker 2: a kid, they would listen for the snap of that
Speaker 2: belt being pulled out, you know, when his father would
Speaker 2: pull it out of his belt loops. The snap that
Speaker 2: that belt would make would make those children jump. You
Speaker 2: know that they knew that that's what that meant, that
Speaker 2: they were going to get whipped, or mom was going
Speaker 2: to get whipped, or mam had done something. He's always
Speaker 2: Mama done something, you know. So I think it was
Speaker 2: the sound of it was just embedded in his brain
Speaker 2: from youth and the pains that that would be related
Speaker 2: to him if he didn't have his if he didn't
Speaker 2: have the belt in his hand and could control it
Speaker 2: that way that he would get struck himself, or he
Speaker 2: would be injured, or his mother would be injured. But
Speaker 2: if he could just wear the same belt and use
Speaker 2: the same belt in a different way, than he could
Speaker 2: keep from being injured by it.
Speaker 5: Again, let's use this as an opportunity to stop for
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Speaker 5: When I mentioned the belt, though, it's you have a
Speaker 5: very vivid graphics scene where he goes to strangle this woman.
Speaker 5: Unbeknownst to her, he reaches in the back seat for
Speaker 5: a leather belt and wraps it around her neck. This
Speaker 5: is one of his techniques, isn't it correct?
Speaker 2: He came at her from behind, Like I said, I
Speaker 2: believe they were drinking in the car or have been,
Speaker 2: and she was relaxed. She wasn't thinking she was in
Speaker 2: the car with a killer. And he was in tennis shorts,
Speaker 2: so it had no belt loops. So he had the
Speaker 2: belt laying in the floorboard behind her, and he reached
Speaker 2: behind her, and she wasn't sure what he was doing
Speaker 2: back there, and he's moving some stuff around to loop
Speaker 2: it and then slip it back over her neck and
Speaker 2: strangle her from behind basically, I mean when she turned
Speaker 2: towards him, he dropped it over her and he held
Speaker 2: it in his right hand, and he supposedly put his
Speaker 2: other hand on her shoulder and strangled her like that
Speaker 2: he turned her in the seat towards him.
Speaker 6: That these are just his descriptions.
Speaker 5: We didn't talk about the trial, but you briefly mentioned
Speaker 5: the trial May thirtieth, nineteen eighty nine for the murders
Speaker 5: in Alabama. And he was tested psychiatric testing, and there's
Speaker 5: some we'll talk about what those with that diagnosis was,
Speaker 5: but he was a sentence it in Alabama to a
Speaker 5: life sentence, yet he is detained. He's on a detainer
Speaker 5: for the other two states, Mississippi and Tennessee. Isn't that correct?
Speaker 2: Well, I'm not sure about the Tennessee ruling because it
Speaker 2: had already been you know, they would have to bring
Speaker 2: him out of prison to send you know, put him
Speaker 2: in court again. I mean that would have to be heard, sure,
Speaker 2: and as a different state. So the laws, you know,
Speaker 2: the rulings could be different in statute and time. But
Speaker 2: the one in Mississippi is first because that's where he
Speaker 2: was captured, right, and that is a life sentence because
Speaker 2: I believe at the time they were having some sort
Speaker 2: of a legal thing going on with the death penalty,
Speaker 2: so the death penalty was suspended at that time or
Speaker 2: frozen or whatever word they choose to use.
Speaker 6: So he got life imprisonment.
Speaker 2: But the way the judge wrote it, he said, I'll
Speaker 2: make sure that you never get out again in the society.
Speaker 6: But after when he went to jail for that, then the.
Speaker 2: Other proceedings in Tuskegee and all of that, they weren't
Speaker 2: really heard as cases because there weren't no witnesses, there
Speaker 2: were no victims, there was only him, So they weren't
Speaker 2: really heard. He was just it was just charged in
Speaker 2: the Mississippi case. Now this has just been recent. I
Speaker 2: mean he's had he's filed charges against the Mississippi Correctional
Speaker 2: System a couple of different times from Mishandledmand and that's
Speaker 2: been since he's been in the only one he was
Speaker 2: seriously tried for and convicted of was the Mississippi case.
Speaker 6: And that'd be Dot Davis, Dorothy Davis.
Speaker 5: Let's talk about your visit to the Parshman Penitentiary in
Speaker 5: Mississippi to visit Jerry Marcus and how did this come about?
Speaker 5: Whose suggestion was this? Let's talk about doctor Eeger and
Speaker 5: how he convinced you to do.
Speaker 3: This and why.
Speaker 2: Well, like I said, I met Steve Egger when he
Speaker 2: was the instructor in the class, and I had never
Speaker 2: really I'd studied a little bit about serial killers, but
Speaker 2: it wasn't on the top of my list. But I
Speaker 2: really developed an interest in it, and he helped me
Speaker 2: go through the paperwork and helped me determine what was
Speaker 2: right and wasn't, or what could be used and whatnot.
Speaker 2: Because see, initially, initially I wrote the chapter for Jerry
Speaker 2: Marcus in his two thousand textbook, and that was the.
Speaker 6: First time it had ever been in print.
Speaker 2: But it's written in a format that doctor Eger followed
Speaker 2: for each of the serial killers that were a chapter
Speaker 2: in that book.
Speaker 5: So you were went to the prison to visit him.
Speaker 5: What was that experience, like, what did you what do
Speaker 5: you expect and what did you experience?
Speaker 2: I didn't know, Steve said, doctor Egger. He said, well,
Speaker 2: you should go down and visit him, And I said,
Speaker 2: how do you do that?
Speaker 5: I didn't know.
Speaker 2: So I got a hold of the public Information officer
Speaker 2: who sent me the proper forms to fill out and
Speaker 2: I had to fill out this. They had to fill
Speaker 2: out that and all these forms. And they had to
Speaker 2: ask him because he'd never had any visitors, right, he
Speaker 2: had to consent to see me. Now, I don't know
Speaker 2: anything about I don't know anything about that prison, harsh
Speaker 2: From Penitentiary, but it supposedly is one of the strictest
Speaker 2: in the state you know of Mississippi. Sure, but he
Speaker 2: gave me permission. So I went down there and it
Speaker 2: was just it was almost I can't describe it. It
Speaker 2: was just really strange because I was, you know, I
Speaker 2: was in business clothes. Khakis and roll up sleep shirt
Speaker 2: and all this stuff. But it was like families, and
Speaker 2: you got on a bus. You went through the first
Speaker 2: level of security, and these they had these little buildings
Speaker 2: attached to each other, and you went through the first
Speaker 2: level and then practically a body search, and then you
Speaker 2: get in the bus to go. And the only thing
Speaker 2: that I had was a pad of paper and a pen.
Speaker 2: They said, can't take either once, so I had to leave.
Speaker 2: I couldn't take anything. So you go through at least
Speaker 2: five different of those little cabins for body checks and searches,
Speaker 2: and threw machines and this and that and the other.
Speaker 2: But the others were like the other people visiting were
Speaker 2: like families with little kids and everything. But the family
Speaker 2: dog and groups and big brown bags of stuff, which
Speaker 2: I didn't relate to its time.
Speaker 6: And then we finally get through all those levels of security.
Speaker 2: Then it all opens up into the first real building,
Speaker 2: real building down there in the Delta, a big concrete
Speaker 2: building like a gymnasium, and that's.
Speaker 6: What it was.
Speaker 2: And it had the pull down hoops, and it had
Speaker 2: the pullout wooden seats, the old fashioned wooden seats, and
Speaker 2: they were pulled out and there were tables and chairs
Speaker 2: scattered everywhere, and it was just like a big picnic.
Speaker 2: And they just turned everybody loose in the room with
Speaker 2: each other. So, you know, I've been expecting back in Illinois,
Speaker 2: I've been expecting a little more like maybe sheet of
Speaker 2: glass and a phone. But no, No, they turned everybody
Speaker 2: loose together, and everybody has a fine old time. And so,
Speaker 2: you know, I actually met him and sat beside him
Speaker 2: and talked to him. What was I like?
Speaker 5: You had corresponded with him for over a year, years.
Speaker 2: Years and years. Well, he said, you don't look like
Speaker 2: I thought you would. And I said, well, I can't
Speaker 2: say that because I saw your pictures already. And we laughed,
Speaker 2: you know, because that was my whole goal to get
Speaker 2: him know that he can relax and talk to me
Speaker 2: and talk, you know, And so I just made a
Speaker 2: couple of jokes. He was, he was so neat, you know,
Speaker 2: he's he has a real strong lean towards narcissism.
Speaker 6: He always has, even when he was a kid.
Speaker 2: And when he when I first met him, his uniform
Speaker 2: it was spotless. The one a thing wrong with his uniform.
Speaker 2: It was practically creased in the knees. His shoes were clean,
Speaker 2: his socks were clean, his hand looked like he'd been
Speaker 2: to a manicurist, and everything he looked really neat and clean.
Speaker 6: And I was just kind of looking at him sideways,
Speaker 6: and he said, well, what do you what are you
Speaker 6: looking for? What do you keep looking at me like
Speaker 6: that for? And I said, I said, I don't know.
Speaker 6: I guess I'm kind of disappointed.
Speaker 2: I expectedly blood dripping from your fingers or from your
Speaker 2: mouth or something. And he just thought that was the
Speaker 2: funniest thing. And he just started laughing. He thought that
Speaker 2: was really funny. And I said, there, that's what I
Speaker 2: want you to do. I want you to relax, I
Speaker 2: want you to laugh, but I want you just to
Speaker 2: talk to me. And we we just talked about stuff,
Speaker 2: you know about you know, I couldn't really say, well,
Speaker 2: can we talk about so ands over? Can we talked
Speaker 2: about songs? Because we'd already done all that. You'd already
Speaker 2: written everything out, every page and rewritten and written.
Speaker 6: So it really wasn't like that. But we just basically talked.
Speaker 6: And I said, so, what do you expect to.
Speaker 3: Do with all this?
Speaker 6: I mean, with this with here? I said, are you
Speaker 6: here like forever, and.
Speaker 2: He said, oh no, I'll be going on pictic with
Speaker 2: my kids soon with my grandkids, and we're going to
Speaker 2: meet out there and we're going to see that table
Speaker 2: over there.
Speaker 6: Da da da da da. You know, just dreamland. He
Speaker 6: has no concept that he's there forever.
Speaker 5: You know, you talk about interviews with his mother and
Speaker 5: his aunt. Yes, you say that everything that was going
Speaker 5: to be said that was said. That information about the
Speaker 5: murders expanded from those confessions he gave to you in
Speaker 5: that correspondence, so that the interview you had was anti
Speaker 5: climatic in that regard. Well, what about the interviews with
Speaker 5: the mother and the aunt?
Speaker 3: What was that like?
Speaker 6: Well, I wanted to do it right.
Speaker 2: I wanted to be respectful to these ladies for giving
Speaker 2: me the time to talk to me, because they, like
Speaker 2: everyone else, was totally shocked and really were kind of
Speaker 2: out of touch with it. I really didn't believe he'd
Speaker 2: done it right, so they were willing to talk to me.
Speaker 2: I took pictures with them. As a matter of fact,
Speaker 2: I took my mother with me on the trip down
Speaker 2: there because she's from Mississippi, and I just figured that, well,
Speaker 2: maybe they'd feel a little calmer.
Speaker 6: You know, we could all just all the old ladies
Speaker 6: having a discussion.
Speaker 2: So we sat down and there in the ants front
Speaker 2: room and we talked, you know, for a couple of hours.
Speaker 2: I brought them both a bouquet of flowers, and I
Speaker 2: brought them some sort of a coffee cake that I
Speaker 2: got down at the bakery and all this stuff, because
Speaker 2: I wanted.
Speaker 6: To be respectful to these women.
Speaker 2: But they in turn answered my questions that I had
Speaker 2: about Jerry, you know, when did he start? And they
Speaker 2: related to me about the cats with the tail on
Speaker 2: fire and how I used to torture animals and how
Speaker 2: they find animals that were dead. That they knew that
Speaker 2: Jerry had been busy again and such as that. But
Speaker 2: they said they never dreamed that that would lead to
Speaker 2: what it did lead to, and that would be that
Speaker 2: he would start killing human beings.
Speaker 6: I don't think that really. They just thought that that
Speaker 6: was a phase.
Speaker 2: You know, in the darkened room and the covered windows
Speaker 2: and the anger spurts that he used to have. They
Speaker 2: just thought that he would grow out of it, that
Speaker 2: it was just a phase. They never dreamed he would
Speaker 2: grow more so into it than he ever had.
Speaker 5: Yeah, that must have been a fascinating conversation, but also
Speaker 5: the resignment of those two people, like you say, to
Speaker 5: be inextricably involved in some of this of his murderous behavior,
Speaker 5: he introducing the one woman and burying a victim in
Speaker 5: the backyard of the home of a family home.
Speaker 2: Right right.
Speaker 6: Ye, Well, they were equally shocked about all of that,
Speaker 6: and they just they.
Speaker 2: Were just still so sure that he really couldn't have
Speaker 2: done that, you know, I mean, they just kept trying
Speaker 2: to trying to rational that somehow it just still had
Speaker 2: to be a mistake, that he couldn't have really done that.
Speaker 2: Someday they're going to find out that Jerry was innocent.
Speaker 2: He isn't and wasn't, you know, But they were just
Speaker 2: because he had always been the perfect son and always
Speaker 2: been the perfect nephew and always been there for to
Speaker 2: help everyone, and including the neighbors, and so it was
Speaker 2: just it was just these ladies tried to give me
Speaker 2: as much information. They answered every question that I had,
Speaker 2: and especially with Francina, believe you know, she said I
Speaker 2: had no idea, you know, she said, I just knew
Speaker 2: her from church. I thought that they would be a
Speaker 2: nice pair, and they were going to go out and
Speaker 2: eat out. She thought, I thought that was a good thing,
Speaker 2: but then it wasn't. But then again, that was many
Speaker 2: years later, so they she had no idea that what
Speaker 2: she had, you know, the introduction had ended up, and
Speaker 2: this is what happened.
Speaker 5: And his aunt thought he was such a fine nephew.
Speaker 5: You right at the very end with your visit with
Speaker 5: Jerry Marcus that again that he was charming, exhibited all
Speaker 5: those things you knew you would find, but you were
Speaker 5: seeing him in person for the first time, and and
Speaker 5: you saw his well manicured hands, and he was dressed
Speaker 5: well and all appearances. But you realized in the circumstances
Speaker 5: of that visiting room that he certainly could have ended
Speaker 5: your life quite easily with those bare hands that us
Speaker 5: he used to strangle other women to death.
Speaker 2: Well, now you got to remember this was in a
Speaker 2: gymnasium and we were sitting on wooden pull out seat,
Speaker 2: so it was like so casual. I mean, it was
Speaker 2: just like there were no guards anywhere around except the
Speaker 2: far doors, you know, so he could have really done anything.
Speaker 2: And that's why I told him, I guess you know,
Speaker 2: I said, well, I guess you can do about anything.
Speaker 2: You wanted now, and he said, yeah, I could kill you. Wow,
Speaker 2: he said, you're the only other woman I know now,
Speaker 2: he said, I could kill you, he said, but then
Speaker 2: he said, I wouldn't get to talk to you anymore.
Speaker 2: Admitted that he liked to talk to me, but like
Speaker 2: I said, we haven't spoken since there was the law
Speaker 2: enforcement in Tennessee who sought to talk to him directly
Speaker 2: without saying anything.
Speaker 6: To me, and he considered that offensive.
Speaker 2: And he has not spoken to me since that time
Speaker 2: or answered any letters or just for a while, I
Speaker 2: sent him, you know, occasionally I deposit money in his account.
Speaker 2: I'd send him money for personal stuff and all. But
Speaker 2: he never spoke to me again after that. So that
Speaker 2: also tells me that there's probably something else going on
Speaker 2: in Tennessee to relate him to also, since it's shut
Speaker 2: him right down and he didn't want to talk at all.
Speaker 6: So chances are there something going.
Speaker 5: On absolutely or had been something going on. Did he
Speaker 5: know that you were writing this book?
Speaker 2: Yes, he did from day one, from day one, because
Speaker 2: I started writing to him as Jane Doe, you know,
Speaker 2: and I told him, I said, I you know, it
Speaker 2: was three or four letters before I was finally willing
Speaker 2: to give him my name, and then I had a
Speaker 2: special PO box and I had that po box for
Speaker 2: all those years. And that was the sole reason for
Speaker 2: the po box was to ride him and get lettered
Speaker 2: back from him.
Speaker 5: It's very interesting your book. You we just touched on them,
Speaker 5: but elaborate detailed confessions of what he did, how he
Speaker 5: killed these people, the conversations he had beforehand, and most interestingly,
Speaker 5: his thoughts behind his behavior and his actions. I want
Speaker 5: to thank you very much, Linda lu Long for coming
Speaker 5: on and talking about the Skegee Strangler, the nicest serial
Speaker 5: killer they ever met. This is a Wild Blue Press release.
Speaker 5: But when did this book? When? Was it released on.
Speaker 2: August the second, twenty two, nineteen twenty two or twenty.
Speaker 5: Twenty two, just a few weeks ago? Yes, thank you
Speaker 5: so much, Linda lu Long, The Tuskegee Strangler, the nicest
Speaker 5: serial killer they ever met. You have a great evening.
Speaker 5: Thank you so much for this interview, and good night,
Speaker 5: Thank you, bye bye bye bye.