Speaker 1: Welcome back to part two of our series about the
Speaker 1: unexplained death and murder of k Hall. The last time
Speaker 1: we left off, Jules was kind of having some doubt
Speaker 1: here about whether or not Bob could have killed k.
Speaker 1: But now I'm going to share some new information that
Speaker 1: casts Bob into a very suspicious light once again. So
Speaker 1: in December of nineteen eighty eight, a very bizarre incident
Speaker 1: took place where Bob suddenly decided to call up Special
Speaker 1: Agent Riley and said that he wanted to have a
Speaker 1: meeting because he quote unquote wanted a Christmas present, which
Speaker 1: is a very weird thing to say. It turned out
Speaker 1: that Bob had started a relationship with another woman, and
Speaker 1: he actually told Riley, I hope that this case can
Speaker 1: be solved by Christmas so that I can finally put
Speaker 1: this behind me and I can start my new relationship
Speaker 1: with this other woman and move on with my life.
Speaker 1: But of course, Riley said to Bob that I think
Speaker 1: you are the only logical suspect here, So how am
Speaker 1: I going to solve this case if you were the
Speaker 1: one who did it. So Bob proposed this scenario where
Speaker 1: the newspapers would publish a story stating that Kay's death
Speaker 1: was an accident and this might prompt the killer to
Speaker 1: come forward and admit to what they did. And then
Speaker 1: Bob then said that hypothetically, if I was the killer
Speaker 1: and I needed motivation to come forward, I would have
Speaker 1: some terms, which would include a legal document from the
Speaker 1: Commonwealth Attorney which declared Kay's death to be an accident
Speaker 1: and guaranteed no charges or consequences for anyone who confessed
Speaker 1: to the crime. So Riley got the sense here that
Speaker 1: Bob may have been trying to make a confession, but
Speaker 1: he was trying to get assurance is that there wouldn't
Speaker 1: be any consequences for it. So it's kind of a
Speaker 1: weird thing where Bob is tired of the pressure. He
Speaker 1: wants the case to be closed, so he thinks that
Speaker 1: if I confess to it, then I will get off
Speaker 1: scott free. But you killed your wife, so obviously that's
Speaker 1: not going to happen.
Speaker 2: Okay. This totally reminds me. I've got this friend who's
Speaker 2: got two kids and they're really close in age, a
Speaker 2: boy and a girl, and if she's trying to figure
Speaker 2: out who did something bad, like, for example, there was
Speaker 2: a cookie jar and it was smashed, and obviously one
Speaker 2: of them had tried to go up on the counter
Speaker 2: and like get a cookie out of the jar with
Speaker 2: their little hands. They weren't able to do, so jar
Speaker 2: smashes on the ground. And now you've got two people,
Speaker 2: two little people. Neither of them are copping to what happened.
Speaker 2: So they would separate them. Both parents would separate them,
Speaker 2: and then they would ask each one what do you
Speaker 2: think should happen to the guilty party? So, whoever did this,
Speaker 2: what should happen to them? And then you'd have one say, well,
Speaker 2: they should be grounded or you know, a week or whatever,
Speaker 2: and then the other one should say, well, I think
Speaker 2: that they should be forgiven because knowing what they did
Speaker 2: is punishment enough. And so you would always know who
Speaker 2: the guilty party is because they would say that whomever
Speaker 2: did this should have a very lenient sentence. And I
Speaker 2: think that applies to Bob here, because you've got Bob
Speaker 2: coming forward and being like if I did it, like okay,
Speaker 2: call back to OJ Simpson here, if I did it,
Speaker 2: I would require these things and basically it would absolve
Speaker 2: him of all legal responsibility and so it would just
Speaker 2: be closure or resolution in the sense that you would
Speaker 2: know who did it, but you wouldn't have any legal recourse.
Speaker 2: It sounds ridiculous, and I'm sorry you want a Christmas
Speaker 2: present Like you're trying to solve the potential murder of
Speaker 2: your wife. Kay. You should want that solved because you
Speaker 2: love her and you want justice for her, not because
Speaker 2: you want a Christmas present to embark on your new
Speaker 2: life with your new partner. It's just really weird.
Speaker 1: It is like, I've never heard of anything like this
Speaker 1: in a murder case before, and I think he made
Speaker 1: the perfect analogy. That's what I thought of. It sounds
Speaker 1: like kids like who have done some minor indiscretion like
Speaker 1: stealing a cookie, and they think they're going to get
Speaker 1: in trouble, but they're trying to gauge in there to see, well,
Speaker 1: I'll admit what I did just as long as I
Speaker 1: receive assurances that I'm not punished quite badly. But here
Speaker 1: you have a grown man who's under suspicion for the
Speaker 1: murder of his wife and he's acting like a kid
Speaker 1: who stole something from the cookie jar. And it's like,
Speaker 1: I think Special Agent Riley is thinking we're adults here,
Speaker 1: Like this is ridiculous. We should not be doing this
Speaker 1: in a murder case. But he decided to go along
Speaker 1: with him because he thought, if I string Bob along,
Speaker 1: maybe I can finally convince him to give a confession.
Speaker 1: So what happened is Riley asked, if I went out
Speaker 1: and got such a document and put Bob Paul's name
Speaker 1: on it, then when you like to see it, and
Speaker 1: Bob replied, quote before Christmas. And the next part is
Speaker 1: so strange that I have to read an exact word
Speaker 1: for word excerpt from an official decision that I found
Speaker 1: online from the Virginia Court of Appeals because this is
Speaker 1: just so bizarre. So here's the exact quote. Quote. Hall
Speaker 1: told Riley that if Riley really wanted to make it
Speaker 1: tempting as hell to me, he should call Hall's attorney
Speaker 1: to inquire if Hall could still collect under the uninsured
Speaker 1: motorist provisions of his automobile insurance if he had accidentally
Speaker 1: killed his wife. End quote. So yes, it sounds like
Speaker 1: he was literally inquiring, if I killed my wife, can
Speaker 1: I still collect on the insurance money from her death?
Speaker 2: Like?
Speaker 1: What the hell? Whoa Bob?
Speaker 2: I mean? Any sort of good will that he had
Speaker 2: which wasn't goodwill for Bob as a person. It was
Speaker 2: just goodwill. From the logistics point of view, it seems
Speaker 2: so difficult that he could have done this, But his behavior,
Speaker 2: his subsequent behavior after the fact, the way he's acting
Speaker 2: is very like Jewel Kaylor esque and I'm not here
Speaker 2: for it. And I think that when you're inquiring if
Speaker 2: you did it, could you still collect on that insurance?
Speaker 2: That is so bold, don't you think?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I can't think of another case like this where
Speaker 1: a suspect has been so brazen. I mean, it's one
Speaker 1: thing to try to admit to your spouse's death and
Speaker 1: not receive any punishment, but the idea that you're trying
Speaker 1: to arrange a plea deal of some sort where you
Speaker 1: will financially profit, Like, my god, did you actually think
Speaker 1: this was gonna work?
Speaker 2: I mean, I guess who knows what goes through his mind.
Speaker 2: We don't think he's got a formal education, and based
Speaker 2: on the way that he's acted, he seems like he's
Speaker 2: a little bit maybe potentially emotionally stunted. So he's thinking
Speaker 2: like that whole thing with I want a Christmas present.
Speaker 2: The way that he's interacting and communicating with law enforcement.
Speaker 2: It feels juvenile, doesn't it.
Speaker 1: It does. Yeah, Like he's sounding like a kid who's
Speaker 1: been taught stealing from the cookie jar. Like I've seen
Speaker 1: some terrible suspects in murder investigation, but I can't think
Speaker 1: of any other examples where the suspect has been brazen
Speaker 1: enough to do.
Speaker 2: This and like say less. If you did indeed kill
Speaker 2: your wife, then just say less. Don't go to the authorities,
Speaker 2: don't ask for a Christmas present, don't propose some bizarre
Speaker 2: scenario where they put out this thing in the paper
Speaker 2: and say that it was an accident, and then you
Speaker 2: get some letter from you know, legal letters saying that
Speaker 2: you're not going to be held responsible if you did it.
Speaker 2: That's what you'd need, I mean seriously, like you need
Speaker 2: to say less if you are indeed responsible, and wait
Speaker 2: until they come to you and then have a go
Speaker 2: through your attorney. I think that at the time there
Speaker 2: was a lot less knowledge of how one should behave
Speaker 2: when being confronted with the authorities accusing you, whether you're
Speaker 2: guilty or not. So at the time there was you
Speaker 2: know less of that information floating around that like whether
Speaker 2: you're guilty or not, you need to have an attorney
Speaker 2: to protect yourself and protect your rights. And we've got
Speaker 2: Bob out here just making the weirdest, most odd moves
Speaker 2: that I've seen, and I can't think of any other
Speaker 2: case that parallels this.
Speaker 1: It might be a thing where he just didn't understand
Speaker 1: how the legal process works, because he may have been thinking, well,
Speaker 1: if I kill Kay and there's no evidence against me,
Speaker 1: then the whole thing will just go away, and maybe
Speaker 1: not been aware that this is an active investigation, like
Speaker 1: they will not close it until it's solved. Then they
Speaker 1: arrest his suspect, and he's probably thinking to himself that
Speaker 1: everyone would just move on. But here he is in
Speaker 1: the community where it's no big secret that he was
Speaker 1: accused of domestic violence. There were problems in the marriage,
Speaker 1: so he's probably feeling like he's a pariah or something
Speaker 1: like that. But he just wants to move on and
Speaker 1: marry this new woman and thinks that, well, if I
Speaker 1: come here and make this quasi confession and don't get punished,
Speaker 1: they will put this behind us. But he isn't aware that, no,
Speaker 1: that's not how the legal system and murder investigations work.
Speaker 2: Bob needs some closure from the trauma of either killing
Speaker 2: his wife or being accused of killing his wife, and
Speaker 2: so that's why he's going so it will get neatly
Speaker 2: wrapped up into this little bow and filed away and
Speaker 2: then people will stop talking about it. But again, that's
Speaker 2: just such a juvenile expectation of the way that criminal
Speaker 2: proceedings of any kind would work.
Speaker 1: I mean, he has served time in prison for drug dealing,
Speaker 1: so he's not naive. He knows that if you commit
Speaker 1: a crime, you get punished in no matter if you
Speaker 1: admit to it or not.
Speaker 2: Yeah, maybe he was feeling guilty and so he just
Speaker 2: and not guilty enough that he was going to come
Speaker 2: forward and take responsibility for what he did, but guilty
Speaker 2: enough that he needed to know that nobody thought that
Speaker 2: he did it, or that somebody couldn't come after him
Speaker 2: at a later date. Because I can imagine if you're
Speaker 2: somebody that did commit murder, and even if you're not
Speaker 2: charged and you think you likely got away with it,
Speaker 2: it will like be this like brainworm where it's going
Speaker 2: to like eat away at you, wondering if one day
Speaker 2: they're going to knock on your door and they're going
Speaker 2: to charge you with that crime. I can't imagine you
Speaker 2: would ever get a full night sleep unless somebody he
Speaker 2: doesn't have the typical emotional bandwidth that a normal person
Speaker 2: does and they don't feel things the same way, and
Speaker 2: so they're able to deal with that stress or they
Speaker 2: don't even experience the stress. But it doesn't sound like
Speaker 2: that's Bob.
Speaker 1: No, definitely not like someone like Juwel Kaylor is someone
Speaker 1: that I feel like feels that he has gotten away
Speaker 1: with it, that no one will ever find his missing
Speaker 1: wife's body, so he will never get arrested. So that's
Speaker 1: why he's willing to go on national TV and like
Speaker 1: practically act so nonchalant about it, Whereas Bob is probably
Speaker 1: a lot more paranoid and has that feeling that one
Speaker 1: of these days they're going to come over and arrest me.
Speaker 1: So that's why he's wanting to get this huge burn
Speaker 1: office shoulders and hope that he can get away with
Speaker 1: it without any punishment. So this even gets weirder, believe
Speaker 1: it or not, because, like I said, agent Riley was
Speaker 1: going along with this, so he decided to give up
Speaker 1: this fake document where he was writing out the conditions
Speaker 1: of this hypothetical plea deal, which would include no criminal prosecution,
Speaker 1: no loss of Bob's driver's license, believe it or not,
Speaker 1: no loss of financial benefits, and no public mention of
Speaker 1: his name. And believe it or not, Bob was brazed
Speaker 1: enough to suggest an additional provision in which he could
Speaker 1: burn down his current house and use the insurance money
Speaker 1: to build a new house for his current girlfriend without
Speaker 1: any repercussions. And Riley says, no, I can't include this
Speaker 1: in the document because insurance fraud is a crime, and
Speaker 1: Bob flat out said, quote, I bet I could do
Speaker 1: it in such a way they'll say it was an accident,
Speaker 1: just like we're doing with this no difference end quote.
Speaker 1: And I see your eyes bulging.
Speaker 3: Oh, but I said, oh wow, this man, he's operating
Speaker 3: like you would think if a child's committed murder and
Speaker 3: they were thinking about how they could get out of it.
Speaker 2: That is exactly the way that Bob is moving right now.
Speaker 2: It all feels juvenile, it feels ridiculous. But like you said,
Speaker 2: he is a naive tor criminal proceedings or being questioned
Speaker 2: by police because you spent time in prison, So we
Speaker 2: could give him the benefit of the dot if he
Speaker 2: hadn't and be like maybe he's just unfamiliar with this
Speaker 2: and he's immature in a lot of ways. But I
Speaker 2: don't really find a I can't see a way where
Speaker 2: we can make allowances for that here, because Bob should
Speaker 2: have had some kind of experience being questioned and with
Speaker 2: legal proceedings how things go. I don't know how much
Speaker 2: his attorney has explained stuff to him, but this just
Speaker 2: feels so naive and ridiculous. You're proposing insurance fraud to
Speaker 2: the police and saying that you could get away with
Speaker 2: it or make it look like it was an accident,
Speaker 2: like we're doing with this other thing here, Like what
Speaker 2: the other thing, like the death of your wife? What
Speaker 2: is happening?
Speaker 1: I can only imagine like Special Agent Riley's reaction while
Speaker 1: he's hearing all this, because he's probably worked on a
Speaker 1: number of murder investigations and never heard a suspect say
Speaker 1: anything like this before. But in the end, he never
Speaker 1: did get an official confession to Kay's death, so unfortunately
Speaker 1: this didn't really lead anywhere, And of course they did
Speaker 1: not put together an official legal document in which Bob
Speaker 1: would be absolved from all these sins if he made
Speaker 1: a confession. But when Bob was asked about this later on,
Speaker 1: he said, Oh, I never actually meant any of the
Speaker 1: things that I said about burning down my house or
Speaker 1: collecting oncasion insurance. He said he was just leading Riley
Speaker 1: on to see where he was in the investigation and
Speaker 1: making a genuine effort to devise a strategy which might
Speaker 1: prompt the real guilty party to come forward and confess
Speaker 1: to Kay's deaths. So his explanation is this was all
Speaker 1: just an elaborate ruse, but it sounded like he was
Speaker 1: pretty much playing himself and only made people all the
Speaker 1: more suspicious of him. Sure Bob, Sure, yeah, real genius
Speaker 1: here coming up with this idea. So the case would
Speaker 1: finally receive national attention. It was featured on Unsolved Mysteries
Speaker 1: in October of nineteen eighty nine. I remember watching it
Speaker 1: on TV at the time and many years afterwards, and
Speaker 1: when I saw Bob's interview, I used to think that, well,
Speaker 1: there's a possibility that he wasn't guilty here. And they
Speaker 1: did talk about the domestic violence and Bob's troubling history,
Speaker 1: but they also did a very effective job of talking
Speaker 1: about the timeline and the logistics of committing this crime.
Speaker 1: So I was willing to believe that Bob was innocent.
Speaker 1: He didn't come across too badly when he was interviewed.
Speaker 1: He did come across better than Jewel Kaylor and a
Speaker 1: lot of the other suspicious Bowses who were interviewed on
Speaker 1: the show. But one piece of information the segment conveniently
Speaker 1: didn't mention was this whole interrogation segment with Special Agent
Speaker 1: Riley where it sounded like he was going to make
Speaker 1: a confession. So when I learned about this, like many
Speaker 1: years later, when I originally watched the segment, I was
Speaker 1: like fifty to fifty and willing to give Bob the
Speaker 1: benefit of the doubt. But once I read about this
Speaker 1: weird quasi confession, I was like, well, that looks pretty
Speaker 1: bad for Bob. And if they had included this on
Speaker 1: the show, there probably wouldn't have been as much mystery
Speaker 1: about whether or not Bob was guilty.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I feel like if they would have included that,
Speaker 2: it makes it far more compelling. I'm like, at eighty
Speaker 2: percent Bob did it, twenty percent it might have been
Speaker 2: somebody else or might have happened some other way, but
Speaker 2: strongly leaning towards Bob. The only thing he has working
Speaker 2: for him. Is the really difficult logistics with his behavior
Speaker 2: in the aftermath of Kay's death, The way that he
Speaker 2: was with authorities wanting this document, talking about having a
Speaker 2: provision put in, about burning down his house and getting
Speaker 2: the insurance money so he could get a new place.
Speaker 2: It's all just it's wild, and it makes me think
Speaker 2: that these are the actions of a guilty man, not
Speaker 2: of a man in mourning, not of a man who
Speaker 2: just isn't all that intelligent or mature. It's it seems
Speaker 2: to be guilt. It seems to be deception and guilt.
Speaker 2: And he's really trying to find a way that he
Speaker 2: can get out of this and so that he doesn't
Speaker 2: have a potential legal situation looming. And he thinks that
Speaker 2: he's smart enough that if he gets these this legal
Speaker 2: paperwork in order that he'll be able to assure that
Speaker 2: his future will be bright because nobody will be able
Speaker 2: to come after him for K's murder.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's what I'm thinking as well. And given the circumstances,
Speaker 1: actually surprising that he didn't say anything more stupid on
Speaker 1: National TV. He didn't pull a Jewel Kler and say
Speaker 1: that well, it was tough losing k at first, but
Speaker 1: ever since I moved on and got remarried, things are
Speaker 1: really pretty good. But maybe he had his attorney in
Speaker 1: the room who prevented him from saying anything incriminating.
Speaker 2: I mean, if you're going to be going on TV,
Speaker 2: you would really hope that you would have an attorney
Speaker 2: who was present to coach you with that. And I wonder,
Speaker 2: like with Jewel Kayler, if there wasn't an element of
Speaker 2: duper's delight where he was going to say just enough
Speaker 2: to like have people talking, because he knew that nobody
Speaker 2: was ever going to find Dottie and that the probability
Speaker 2: that they would ever be able to bring charges against
Speaker 2: him were so low that he could almost say whatever
Speaker 2: he wanted, veiled slightly, and he knew that they didn't
Speaker 2: really have any recourse because no district attorney is going
Speaker 2: to bring charges just because he looks like a suspicious
Speaker 2: weirdo on mysteries.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and technically, if that was his strategy, it's worked
Speaker 1: because it's been forty years and they've never found Dottie
Speaker 1: and the case is still unsolved. But that obviously doesn't
Speaker 1: work as well in a case where you have the
Speaker 1: victims' bodies like here where you could potentially find new
Speaker 1: evidence and make an arrest at any point. So the
Speaker 1: Unsaw Mystery segment brought in a whole bunch of new tips,
Speaker 1: but the most important was from a woman named Carol Vandergrift,
Speaker 1: who was a former friend of Kay Hall's. It turned
Speaker 1: out that on July the thirty first, nineteen eighty seven,
Speaker 1: just two months before Kay was killed, Carol became the
Speaker 1: victim of a violent crime herself when she was shot
Speaker 1: in the head inside her home in Middleburg, Virginia. She
Speaker 1: managed to make it to the phone and call nine
Speaker 1: to one one for help because miraculously she survived, but
Speaker 1: in case she didn't, she took the initiative to actually
Speaker 1: write the word William in blood on the floor before
Speaker 1: she crawled to the phone, and sure enough, she was
Speaker 1: referring to her ex husband, William Douglas Carter. She claimed
Speaker 1: that William broke in to her house and shot her
Speaker 1: in the head, and that he had worn rubber gloves
Speaker 1: to get his fingerprints on the gun, and then afterwards
Speaker 1: he put the gun in her hand to make it
Speaker 1: look like it was a suicide in a self inflicted
Speaker 1: gunshot wound, but because she wound up surviving, she was
Speaker 1: able to make it to the phone call for help
Speaker 1: and incriminate him. William maintained his innocence because when they
Speaker 1: arrested him, he was at his horse farm several hundred
Speaker 1: miles away in Saratoga Springs, New York, and he claimed
Speaker 1: that he was home the entire time, and actually pointed
Speaker 1: to his phone records saying that, see, I made a
Speaker 1: whole bunch of long distance phone calls from my house
Speaker 1: to prove I was there. But of course these calls
Speaker 1: took place a couple hours before Carol was shot. So
Speaker 1: the instantly assumed that he tried to fabricate an alibi
Speaker 1: for himself, and that after killing Carol, he drove immediately
Speaker 1: from Virginia back to his farm in New York and
Speaker 1: made a whole bunch of phone calls just to intentionally
Speaker 1: create an alibi and show that he was at home.
Speaker 1: And does this sound a bit familiar?
Speaker 2: Ye? Yeah, this definitely sounds familiar. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So sure enough, Carol, when she phoned the UNSAWD Mystery's
Speaker 1: tip line, said that, yes, I was good friends with Kay,
Speaker 1: and after I survived my ordeal, I spoke to Kay
Speaker 1: and Bob and told them about what my ex husband did.
Speaker 1: So Bob definitely would have been aware of this at
Speaker 1: the time Kay was killed, so they figured she probably
Speaker 1: killed her then thought of what happened with William and Carroll,
Speaker 1: and then raced back home and made a phone call
Speaker 1: to his daughter so that it would be on the
Speaker 1: record and he could establish an alibi for himself. And
Speaker 1: this made investigators think that this is finally our smoking gun.
Speaker 1: It's the one piece of evidence we need to finally
Speaker 1: indict Bob. So in January of nineteen ninety, only two
Speaker 1: months after the Unsaw Mystery segment aired, he was finally
Speaker 1: charged with second degree murder.
Speaker 2: Okay, wow, So I mean there's nothing impressive about Bob So, Like,
Speaker 2: don't take my comment here as me being impressed by him.
Speaker 2: But the fact that he was able to be very,
Speaker 2: very intoxicated and he would get dropped off at home
Speaker 2: and he comes up with this plan and he's able
Speaker 2: to find Kay and able to then have the foresight
Speaker 2: to make that call to establish an alibi. It seems
Speaker 2: far more intelligent than the Bob that we've seen in
Speaker 2: the aftermath of the crime.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's my conumdrum with this entire case is that
Speaker 1: the idea seems plausible. But I also don't think that
Speaker 1: this was a premeditated murder plot, because obviously, when they
Speaker 1: were at the country club that night and got into
Speaker 1: a fight and then kay decided to drive off in
Speaker 1: her pickup truck and leave Bob stranded, he couldnt have
Speaker 1: anticipated that. So when he learned that morning that his
Speaker 1: wife is going to get a fifty thousand dollars inheritance,
Speaker 1: I don't think he started orchestrating this elaborate murder plot.
Speaker 1: So I do think that if he killed her, it
Speaker 1: was a crime of passion, a heat of the moment thing,
Speaker 1: and then maybe at that moment he decided, ooh, I'm
Speaker 1: remembering that this friend of Kayse was murdered in a
Speaker 1: similar faction. So I'm going to drive home and I'm
Speaker 1: going to make a phone call to establish an alibi,
Speaker 1: which seems like at odds with how stupid he's asking
Speaker 1: during the police interview. And I think another conundrum with
Speaker 1: that is that well, William attempted to do that but
Speaker 1: it did not work, So how does he think that
Speaker 1: it's going to work in this case? If he just
Speaker 1: rushes home and makes a phone call, so it's kind
Speaker 1: of a weird thing where you could go either way.
Speaker 1: I wish I had more details about the phone call
Speaker 1: he made to his daughters, because if she said that, well,
Speaker 1: he had something important that we needed to talk about,
Speaker 1: and that there was a legitimate reason for him to
Speaker 1: be calling me, then it seems unlikely that he's fabricating it.
Speaker 1: But if he just decided to pick up the phone
Speaker 1: at like nine forty seven at night and say, hey,
Speaker 1: just wanted to call and see how you're doing. Just
Speaker 1: got nothing to talk about, then it looks like he's
Speaker 1: making this call just to get it on the record,
Speaker 1: to fabricate an alibi.
Speaker 2: I mean, even a broken clock is right twice a day.
Speaker 2: So I think it's possible that Bob could have decided
Speaker 2: to call his daughter in order for it to be
Speaker 2: this alibi, and that was the smartest looking move that
Speaker 2: he's made, even though it didn't work for his friend.
Speaker 2: He might have thought, Okay, well this is going to
Speaker 2: be tight. Logistically. I found her so quickly and she's
Speaker 2: so far away that if I make this call now,
Speaker 2: then it's going to be very difficult for them to
Speaker 2: prove that it was me. Who killed K. And I mean,
Speaker 2: that's what we're talking about now, That's what is the
Speaker 2: real sticking point with this case is the logistics of everything,
Speaker 2: how drunk Bob was. But I do agree with you.
Speaker 2: If he did kill K, which it seems like there
Speaker 2: is a very strong likelihood he did, I don't believe
Speaker 2: that he was a premeditated murder. I think maybe he
Speaker 2: wanted to confront K and then things took a turn
Speaker 2: and he decided to in the heat of the moment.
Speaker 2: But if he planned to do it, it just seems like
Speaker 2: there's a lot of messy elements that he couldn't control here.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I think it might have like he had
Speaker 1: like kind of a bad break when they found Kay's
Speaker 1: body at nine point fifty five, which was only eight
Speaker 1: minutes after he made the phone call, because if she
Speaker 1: had remained undiscovered out there for several hours and it
Speaker 1: was hard to pinpoint her time of death, he could
Speaker 1: easily say I was at home the entire time I
Speaker 1: made this phone call and you can't pin it on me.
Speaker 1: But because they found her body and she was still warm,
Speaker 1: and they were able to determine that she was killed
Speaker 1: a very short time before she was found, they were
Speaker 1: able to establish a timeline and realize that, well, we
Speaker 1: know Bob made this phone call eight minutes before she
Speaker 1: was discovered, but it is possible he could have been
Speaker 1: out there and gone out to kill her and rushed
Speaker 1: home in time to make the.
Speaker 2: Call, like if she was cold, or they could have
Speaker 2: checked her internal temperature and they know how much drops
Speaker 2: like per hour, and they would have checked, and maybe
Speaker 2: she was murdered a lot closer to when Bob would
Speaker 2: have been dropped off. That could have potentially cleared him
Speaker 2: because we know it would have taken in seventeen ish
Speaker 2: minutes to drive to where she was, and then you
Speaker 2: also have to carry out the act. You got to
Speaker 2: get it to that struggle which resulted in like the
Speaker 2: nails missing and everything. So I would think that that
Speaker 2: whole ordeal would take at least thirty minutes. So if
Speaker 2: she was cooler, then it would have cleared him, like,
Speaker 2: but the fact that she was still warm, it made
Speaker 2: it all very possible.
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly. And you just mentioned the nails there, and
Speaker 1: that was another issue is that there was no physical
Speaker 1: evidence placing Bob at the scene, even if they found
Speaker 1: his DNA fingerprints or his hairs inside K's pickup truck.
Speaker 1: That wouldn't mean anything because obviously she had driven him
Speaker 1: to the country club and he was in the truck
Speaker 1: all the time, so it's natural that you're gonna find
Speaker 1: his DNA and his prints and all that stuff there.
Speaker 1: And of course this was nineteen eighty seven, before they
Speaker 1: were even doing DNA testing. And I think that if
Speaker 1: there was one thing that could have linked Bob to
Speaker 1: the scene, it was the fake nails, because if they
Speaker 1: had found skin cells belonging to him underneath the underneath
Speaker 1: the nails, and that would be hard to explain. But
Speaker 1: of course this was pre DNA testing, so I don't
Speaker 1: think that they ever performed anything like that. But that
Speaker 1: would become another sticking point when Bob went to trial,
Speaker 1: is that even though we have this incriminating testimony from
Speaker 1: Carol Vandergriff and we have a lot of incriminating actions
Speaker 1: by Bob himself, there are still no eyewitnesses or physical
Speaker 1: evidence to prove he was there when Kay was killed.
Speaker 2: And I think that it makes it more difficult when
Speaker 2: it's somebody's partner and there's skin cells under the nails,
Speaker 2: it would be very easy for Bob to use like
Speaker 2: a rough sex defense, right, like, oh, you know, she
Speaker 2: was scratching at me or whatever, not enough to leave
Speaker 2: a mark, but enough to get skin cells under there.
Speaker 2: So maybe it would be if by today's technology, I
Speaker 2: think you'd be able to tell how much skin cells
Speaker 2: were under there, if there was any blood or anything.
Speaker 2: But back then, if you're looking at even a few
Speaker 2: years out from this into the nineties, you're not going
Speaker 2: to have highly sophisticated technology. It's going to be pretty rudimentary.
Speaker 2: So I would think he would be able to use
Speaker 2: that excuse, being that they were partners, they spent time
Speaker 2: physic together, and if they were together intimately, then it
Speaker 2: is possible that skin cells would end up under the nails.
Speaker 2: So I can see him using that as a defense.
Speaker 2: I mean, I don't know how well you could use
Speaker 2: that as a defense, but I think there is, Like
Speaker 2: you said, with this case, there's so much reasonable doubt.
Speaker 2: I still believe he did it, but there's a lot
Speaker 2: of reasonable bout.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, that's pretty much my mindset as well. And
Speaker 1: one detail that I forgot to mention is that Kay
Speaker 1: was not sexually assaulted and her purse was still left
Speaker 1: in the truck, So robbery did not appear to be
Speaker 1: the motive for this crime, so they figured whoever killed her,
Speaker 1: it sounded more like a personal killing. And the big
Speaker 1: issue with like trying to find it on anyone else
Speaker 1: besides Bob is that there didn't seem to be any
Speaker 1: other suspects in Kay's personal life who would have had
Speaker 1: a motive to harmer. So obviously you're going to look
Speaker 1: at the husband who stands to inherit the fifty thousand
Speaker 1: dollars life insurance.
Speaker 2: And I mean, I guess he could have said something like, oh, well,
Speaker 2: you know, maybe it was a hitchhiker somebody who she
Speaker 2: picked up and they were going to sexually assault her.
Speaker 2: But because Kate fought back so valiantly, the hitchhiker ended
Speaker 2: up killing her. She got away, and then they ended
Speaker 2: up running her over because they weren't able to finish
Speaker 2: what they'd started and they didn't want Kay reporting to
Speaker 2: the police about the situation. I don't think that happened
Speaker 2: at all, but I'm just saying that he could have
Speaker 2: raised something like that as a possibility for why the
Speaker 2: purse was still there, because somebody could panic if you've
Speaker 2: killed somebody and like that wasn't your initial intention, and
Speaker 2: then you've gone and done that. It could just be
Speaker 2: a panic sweeps over you in that moment and you
Speaker 2: forget to you know, steal the money or do anything else.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So, like you said, even though that's not really plausible,
Speaker 1: it's still reasonable doubts. So I can understand like why
Speaker 1: the defense had a lot to work with at this trial.
Speaker 1: So the trial would have another number of unusual events
Speaker 1: take place because this had been featured on Saw Mysteries.
Speaker 1: When they were doing jury selection, they questioned all the
Speaker 1: prospective jurors if they had seen the Unsolved Mystery segment.
Speaker 1: In about sixteen of them said yes, and some of
Speaker 1: them said that they had formed their own personal opinion
Speaker 1: about Bob's guilt or innocence just based on the segment.
Speaker 1: So of course they were strucken. They were not allowed
Speaker 1: to go on the jury for fear that it would
Speaker 1: taint the jury pool. But then they actually selected a
Speaker 1: guy and found out afterwards that he had actually participated
Speaker 1: in the Unsolved Mysteries reenactments. He played one of the
Speaker 1: actors who the motorists who found Kay's body beneath the
Speaker 1: pigup truck. Because back in the day, unsolved mysteries would
Speaker 1: travel to the locations where the crimes took place, and
Speaker 1: they would usually not get professional actors. They would just
Speaker 1: get locals to play the people in the reenactments. So
Speaker 1: they found this local resident named Manuel Haney to play
Speaker 1: one of the motorists who discovered Kay's body. And of course,
Speaker 1: when the defense found out about it, they kind of
Speaker 1: panicked a little bit, saying that this could taint his judgment.
Speaker 1: But they questioned Haiti and he said that in spite
Speaker 1: of the fact that I played an actor in this,
Speaker 1: I can remain unbiased and I will not let this
Speaker 1: tate my opinion. And they allowed him to stay on
Speaker 1: the jury. And I don't know if this influenced the verdict,
Speaker 1: but it's just another thing where it's like, yeah, you
Speaker 1: should probably get rid of this because this gives them
Speaker 1: grounds to appeal if Bob has found guilty.
Speaker 2: Hello, Like, how did this not come up earlier? It
Speaker 2: seems really odd that you wouldn't disclose this if you
Speaker 2: were a juror early on and say like, hey, this
Speaker 2: is a conflict of interest. You've got to wonder why
Speaker 2: does this juror have a vested interest in going forward
Speaker 2: and hearing this case. Most people are all too happy
Speaker 2: to be excused from jury duty, but you've got somebody
Speaker 2: who has something that could get them excused, but they
Speaker 2: don't reveal it, which is a little bit concerning to me.
Speaker 2: And like you said, this can be raised at appeal
Speaker 2: at a later date and saying that there's bias here,
Speaker 2: and I think it's a good grounds for appeal. So
Speaker 2: obviously I'm not a lawyer, but it sounds like good
Speaker 2: grounds for appeal to me. And yeah, I can't believe
Speaker 2: that they didn't get rid of him at this point
Speaker 2: because whether he can remain unbiased or not, it seems
Speaker 2: like a clear conflict of interest, definitely.
Speaker 1: And I'm having a feeling that the guy was probably
Speaker 1: really excited to be on the jury because this is
Speaker 1: a town that doesn't get a lot of attention, and
Speaker 1: you had now a big TV show that was filming
Speaker 1: reenactments there and you got to appear on TV and
Speaker 1: a reenactment of a crime scene, and now you're going
Speaker 1: to be on the jury for the trial. So that's
Speaker 1: probably the most excitement this guy had ever seen in
Speaker 1: his life, which is why he was more than happy
Speaker 1: to be on the jury and conveniently did not disclose
Speaker 1: that he had been an actor on the show until
Speaker 1: after he was selected, so once the trial began, the
Speaker 1: prosecution pushed forward the theory that after returning home from
Speaker 1: the country club, Bob immediately climbed into his jeep went
Speaker 1: searching for Kay, eventually found her and an argument ensued,
Speaker 1: which led to Bob going into a violent drunken rage
Speaker 1: and running over Kay with the pickup truck. And then
Speaker 1: he suddenly remembered the incident with Carol Vandergrift and William
Speaker 1: Douglas Carter and realized that if I want to clear myself,
Speaker 1: I need to fabricate an alibi. So he immediately raced
Speaker 1: back home and made a phone call to his daughter
Speaker 1: in order to get it on the record. And of course,
Speaker 1: Carol Vandergriff testified on the stand about her own personal
Speaker 1: experience with her estranged ex husband, and she pretty much
Speaker 1: confirmed that yes, I told Kay and Bob about this
Speaker 1: shortly before Kay's death took place, so Bob would have
Speaker 1: been well aware of it. But the defense tried to
Speaker 1: push forward the theory that Kay was not actually murdered
Speaker 1: and was the victim of a freak accident because I
Speaker 1: already talked about how she had a blood alcohol level
Speaker 1: of zero point twenty seven, she had a history of
Speaker 1: being arrested for DUI, and a witness had nearly seen
Speaker 1: her crashing her pickup truck into a swimming pool shortly
Speaker 1: before she was killed. So even though the transmission of A.
Speaker 1: K's truck was found in park, an engineer was called
Speaker 1: upon to testify, who claimed that he had examined the
Speaker 1: truck and discovered that the gearshift lever for the automatic
Speaker 1: transmission was faulty, and he said that the truck actually
Speaker 1: suffered from phenomenon called quote illusory park phenomenon, which could
Speaker 1: have caused it to accidentally shift into reverse from the
Speaker 1: park position and back over K's body a second time
Speaker 1: while she was already on the ground. And I did
Speaker 1: a search on this, and there is like a history
Speaker 1: of this phenomenon called illusory park phenomenon. There have been
Speaker 1: lawsuits where people have believed that they put their vehicle
Speaker 1: into park but found out that it was just an illusion.
Speaker 1: It just appeared to be that way, and then when
Speaker 1: they walked out of their vehicle, they wound up getting
Speaker 1: run over because it was not actually in park, and apparently,
Speaker 1: like some vehicles have been recalled in the past because
Speaker 1: they had faulty transmissions, So they said it was not
Speaker 1: completely impossible that the truck could have accidentally backed over
Speaker 1: K because she thought it was mistakenly in park. But
Speaker 1: the big hole in that theory is that why would
Speaker 1: K stop her truck in the middle of that particular
Speaker 1: road get out before she was run over? So that
Speaker 1: was the problem here is that it was physically possible
Speaker 1: for her to be run over, but why would she
Speaker 1: be in that position in the first place.
Speaker 2: Drunk people do some wild things. But the one part
Speaker 2: that I really can't get past is that there was
Speaker 2: a struggle in the vehicle and her nails are missing,
Speaker 2: and illusory park phenomenon does not explain.
Speaker 1: That it's true. Yeah, that was pretty much the big
Speaker 1: hole in their theory, and I almost think it would
Speaker 1: have been a mistake to like focus on this angle.
Speaker 1: I think the defense should have tried to push forward
Speaker 1: the idea that Kay was murdered by someone else. But
Speaker 1: the problem is is that they were unable to find
Speaker 1: any other persons of interest or suspects, and it's like
Speaker 1: one of the odds that K would go to this
Speaker 1: remote dead end road at like between like nine to
Speaker 1: nine thirty at night and then just cross paths with
Speaker 1: someone who was somehow lure out of her truck and
Speaker 1: then run her over. So I think that's why they
Speaker 1: decided to go with the accident theory. But it obviously
Speaker 1: did not work because the jury only deliberated for two
Speaker 1: and a half hours before they found Bob guilty of
Speaker 1: secondary murder and he was sentenced to twenty years in prison.
Speaker 2: Well, I'm not really surprised that the jury came to
Speaker 2: that conclusion because, like, like you said, this is a
Speaker 2: real rollercoaster of a case, and I'm sure that they
Speaker 2: had some really interesting deliberations when it came down to
Speaker 2: the logistics and Bob's state of mind. If he would
Speaker 2: have been able to plan to do things like you know,
Speaker 2: calling his daughter at that time in order to give
Speaker 2: himself an alibi, would you have the foresight to do
Speaker 2: something like that when you're very, very drunk, and like,
Speaker 2: what is the probability of being able to find Kay
Speaker 2: when you don't know where she is, you can't track her,
Speaker 2: and you've got this really tight time frame. But when
Speaker 2: you take everything into account, his weird interactions with law enforcement,
Speaker 2: asking for that crazy letter that would absolve him of
Speaker 2: all legal responsibility if this, if he did indeed kill her,
Speaker 2: and wanting to burn down his place as part of
Speaker 2: this agreement so that he could get a new house
Speaker 2: as part of a Christmas present. It's all so wild,
Speaker 2: and the fact that the jury's hearing this, it's like,
Speaker 2: there is reasonable doubt. But I also can understand why
Speaker 2: the jury was like, nah, and he did it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, even though there was no physical evidence placing Bob
Speaker 1: at the scene, all this stuff about Bob's weird statements
Speaker 1: during his interview with Agent Riley did get hurt at
Speaker 1: the trial in front of the jury, So I'm sure
Speaker 1: they heard that and they're like, yeah, he sounds so guilty.
Speaker 1: And even though if they haven't really established how he
Speaker 1: made it this location, the fact that he did all
Speaker 1: these incriminating stuff is the reason that we believe he
Speaker 1: did this and are comfortable finding him guilty. But obviously,
Speaker 1: if that was the end of the story, we probably
Speaker 1: wouldn't be talking about this on the episode. So there
Speaker 1: is some more twists and turns to come, yeah, believe
Speaker 1: it or not, So you might remember how Carol Vandergrift
Speaker 1: that her testimony was pretty much the primary evidence against Bob.
Speaker 1: But once Bob was convicted, his defense team filed an
Speaker 1: appeal saying that her testimony unfairly prejudiced the jury, that
Speaker 1: even though she told about this incident with her ex
Speaker 1: husband to Kay and Bob, that doesn't necessarily prove that
Speaker 1: Bob did the same thing, and that they were unable
Speaker 1: to establish this, so they feel that there should be
Speaker 1: grounds to overturn the conviction. Well, in early nineteen ninety two,
Speaker 1: about a year and a half after the trial took place,
Speaker 1: William Douglas Carter's conviction for the attempted murder of Carol
Speaker 1: Vandergrift wound up getting overturned. Because this goes into kind
Speaker 1: of batshit crazy territory. Let me just look it up here.
Speaker 1: So William, when he was arrested for the attempted murder
Speaker 1: of Carol, he wound up getting convicted of malicious wounding
Speaker 1: and illegal use of a firearm and received a fourteen
Speaker 1: year prison sentence. But then his defense team peeled his
Speaker 1: conviction and they wound up being contacted by a deputy
Speaker 1: from the Loudun County Sheriff's office named Doug pop Up,
Speaker 1: who claimed that shortly before Carol was shot, Carol had
Speaker 1: attempted to hire him as a private bodyguard in order
Speaker 1: to watch over her house because she had just gone
Speaker 1: through a contentious divorce with William and she feared that
Speaker 1: her life would be in danger, so she wanted Papa
Speaker 1: to guard the house, and she apparently made some incriminating
Speaker 1: statements saying that I'm so bitter against him that I
Speaker 1: would be willing to shoot myself and make it look
Speaker 1: like he did it, and that even if I was dead,
Speaker 1: I would take comfort in the fact that he would
Speaker 1: get arrested for I murder and have his life ruined
Speaker 1: and go to prison. Well, Papa found this pretty incriminating
Speaker 1: because William always maintained that he didn't do this, so
Speaker 1: she started wondering could have been possible that Carol actually
Speaker 1: did shoot herself and attempted to frame her ex husband,
Speaker 1: And before William's trial took place, Papa actually went to
Speaker 1: the district attorney and went to his supervisor at the
Speaker 1: Sheriff's office to share this information, but they conveniently ignored
Speaker 1: this and did not share these incriminating statements from Carol
Speaker 1: at William's trial. And when the appeals court heard about this,
Speaker 1: they pretty much said that, well, I'm not necessarily saying
Speaker 1: that William was innocent, but the fact that this statement
Speaker 1: was not included at his trial and that the district
Speaker 1: attorney in the sheriff's office deliberately withheld it means that
Speaker 1: his civil rights were violin. So he says, I have
Speaker 1: no choice but to overturn William's conviction. And as you
Speaker 1: can imagine, this decision would have a big bearing on
Speaker 1: Bob's appeal as well.
Speaker 2: Wow, yeah, I can imagine that that would have a
Speaker 2: domino effect. And so what do you think? I don't
Speaker 2: know enough details of that case, but do you think
Speaker 2: that Carol was fabricating that and she did indeed shoot
Speaker 2: herself or do you think that it was just like
Speaker 2: an offhanded comment that she made about how angry she
Speaker 2: was at her ex and how she was be willing
Speaker 2: to go to great lengths and somehow coincidentally that's what
Speaker 2: he ended up doing.
Speaker 1: I haven't done enough research to form one hundred percent
Speaker 1: complete opinion. I do am inclined to believe that William
Speaker 1: actually did this, because I do know that he had
Speaker 1: a history of violence, and it was a very tumultuous divorce.
Speaker 1: And when you look at the timeline, it does seem
Speaker 1: plausible that he could have shot her in Virginia, driven
Speaker 1: back to his form farm in New York, and made
Speaker 1: those phone calls to establish an alibi, and that maybe
Speaker 1: she just made those off and comments. But it doesn't
Speaker 1: necessarily mean that it happened. But when William went on
Speaker 1: trial again, he got a retrial. He wound up being
Speaker 1: acquitted because once they had those statements in there, it
Speaker 1: planted a lot of reasonable doubt in the jury's mind,
Speaker 1: and so they found William not guilty. But I find
Speaker 1: this interesting is that after William was released from prison,
Speaker 1: he filed a civil rights lawsuit in court and he
Speaker 1: wound up winning, but the jury decided to award him
Speaker 1: an amount of one dollar, which I have never seen before.
Speaker 1: And I kind of think that's a symbolic thing where
Speaker 1: they said that, yes, technically your civil rights were violated,
Speaker 1: Yes technically you received an unfair trial, but we still
Speaker 1: believe that you were actually guilty of this crime. Hence
Speaker 1: that's why we're only going to award you one dollar
Speaker 1: in compensation.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it sounds like a symbolic verdict, like, technically, yes,
Speaker 2: you were wronged and your civil rights were violated, but
Speaker 2: you're a horrible human, so we're only going to give
Speaker 2: you a dollar.
Speaker 1: Yeah, pretty much, that's what it seems like to me.
Speaker 1: So I think it was just a lucky thing that
Speaker 1: Carol made those statements, And who knows, if they had
Speaker 1: introduced them into William's original trial, maybe they still would
Speaker 1: have found him guilty. But because they withheld it, they
Speaker 1: knew that he had got an unfair trial and violated
Speaker 1: his civil rights, so that's the reason he ultimately wound
Speaker 1: up getting released. But as you can imagine, this played
Speaker 1: like a big role on Bob Hall's appeal because they
Speaker 1: said Carol Vandergriff's testimony against him was the primary evidence
Speaker 1: at his own trial, and now we're finding new evidence
Speaker 1: to suggest that maybe she shot herself and that attempted
Speaker 1: to frame Rex's husband, so obviously she is no longer
Speaker 1: a reliable witness. And the Virginia Court of Appeals agreed,
Speaker 1: so they decided to overturn Bob's conviction and awarded him
Speaker 1: a new trial. And this was less than two years
Speaker 1: after he was convicted, so the case against Bob fell
Speaker 1: apart very quickly.
Speaker 2: It's crazy to me that, like Carol's testimony was one
Speaker 2: of their main pieces of evidence. That seems like really
Speaker 2: wild that you got somebody saying, hey, I shared this
Speaker 2: information about what happened to me, and then he goes
Speaker 2: and calls his daughter, and like that is actual evidence.
Speaker 2: I think that, like, there's a lot of horrible things
Speaker 2: about Bob and the way that he's acted that we
Speaker 2: highlighted over and over again, but the fact that she's
Speaker 2: their main witness and that this is the best evidence
Speaker 2: that you have says to me that you've got a
Speaker 2: pretty weak case.
Speaker 1: That's pretty much. But the Virginia Court of Appeals thought,
Speaker 1: like they actually said in the decision, we're not saying
Speaker 1: that Bob is innocent. We still believe he had the
Speaker 1: motive and opportunity to kill his wife. But because he
Speaker 1: was convicted primarily on eyewitness testimony from someone who might
Speaker 1: be completely unreliable, and this was the primary evidence and
Speaker 1: it could have unfairly prejudiced the jury, we have no
Speaker 1: choice but to overturn the conviction and give him a
Speaker 1: new trial. And I think that would be pretty wild
Speaker 1: if it turned out that Carol really did shoot herself
Speaker 1: to frame Rex's husband, but it turned out that Bob
Speaker 1: was still guilty. Because that doesn't counsel each other out.
Speaker 1: It's possible that William could have been innocent and Bob
Speaker 1: was guilty, and he just happened to be inspired by
Speaker 1: a crime where the suspect was wrongly convicted but was
Speaker 1: not actually using the phone calls to establish an alibi. So, unfortunately,
Speaker 1: this case would wind up being resolved with one of
Speaker 1: our least favorite things ever, and that's the Alford plea,
Speaker 1: because unfortunately, without Carol's testimony, the state realized, we don't
Speaker 1: really have a lot of evidence to take Bob to
Speaker 1: trial again, and we're not entirely sure we can get
Speaker 1: a conviction. So they decided to offer a Bobby deal
Speaker 1: where his twenty year cents would be shortened to time
Speaker 1: served and he would receive fifteen years probation if he
Speaker 1: entered an Alford plea, where technically he would be plead
Speaker 1: guilty to Kay's murder, but he would still be maintaining
Speaker 1: his innocence. And in this particular case, I have the
Speaker 1: mindset that I don't care if Bob is guilty or innocence.
Speaker 1: Like if I was in Bob's shoes and I was
Speaker 1: in innocent, I would take that deal because you're getting
Speaker 1: fifteen years probation for murder after serving less than two years,
Speaker 1: as opposed to serving twenty years. So that is a
Speaker 1: pretty good deal. But unfortunately it's very unsatisfying for every
Speaker 1: everyone involved because if Bob is innocent, he doesn't have
Speaker 1: a chance to clear his name. But if he's guilty,
Speaker 1: then that's really bad for a Kay's family because they
Speaker 1: have only got to see this guy serve less than
Speaker 1: two years and now he's going to be walked free
Speaker 1: after receiving a sense of probation for murder.
Speaker 2: That's literally a gift for Bob. And I think that
Speaker 2: both sides made the right decision in the sense that
Speaker 2: if they took Bob to trial again, they may end
Speaker 2: up with a completely different result. If it's a situation
Speaker 2: where they could end up with Bob having some type
Speaker 2: of LEO recourse against them, this protects them from that
Speaker 2: and it also allows them to say, hey, we won,
Speaker 2: we convicted. He's taking this police So in the end,
Speaker 2: even though it's not enough and it seems pretty clear
Speaker 2: from the evidence that we have that Bob is the
Speaker 2: guilty party. It just it feels unsatisfactory, right, Like it's
Speaker 2: just like, Okay, you're taking responsibility, but not really. You're
Speaker 2: not saying you're guilty. You're just saying that with the
Speaker 2: evidence that is there, they would likely find you guilty again.
Speaker 2: So you take an Alfred plea, which, like you said,
Speaker 2: I hate an Alfred plea. I understand why they use them,
Speaker 2: and I understand why people decide to take an Alfred plea,
Speaker 2: but I can imagine for Kay's family, it's like he's
Speaker 2: only done five years and that's all that he gets,
Speaker 2: and you don't get to go after him again later.
Speaker 1: Great, and not five years, like less than two years, like.
Speaker 2: Two years, my god, that's even worse time served. That
Speaker 2: tells you how weak their case was. That tells you
Speaker 2: they've got absolutely nothing. But at the time, the same token.
Speaker 2: I can understand why Bob, guilty or innocent, would take
Speaker 2: that Alfred plea because that guarantees your freedom. But again,
Speaker 2: I don't think he's innocent.
Speaker 1: That's what's so ironic about this case is that we
Speaker 1: talked about that crazy like interrogation session he had with
Speaker 1: Agent Riley where it sounded like he almost wanted to
Speaker 1: confess to the crime as long as he didn't any consequences.
Speaker 1: And this is almost the same thing because he's pleading
Speaker 1: guilty in court, but he's mostly receiving probation, so he
Speaker 1: essentially had to serve less than two years in prison
Speaker 1: for committing murder. And I almost think that if they
Speaker 1: had offered him to that during the interrogation session, Bob
Speaker 1: would have taken it. So it's technically his weird deal
Speaker 1: wound up working for him in the long run, and
Speaker 1: that's just what's so unfortunate about this case. But like
Speaker 1: we mentioned, Alfred, please technically count as a win for
Speaker 1: the prosecution, and if you take one, you can't sue
Speaker 1: the court later on or sue the state for your
Speaker 1: wrongful incarceration, Whereas if they had taken Bob to trial
Speaker 1: and he was acquitted, he might have been able to
Speaker 1: sue later on. So you can understand why both sides
Speaker 1: agreed to this, but it's just a very unsatisfying resolution
Speaker 1: for everyone involved.
Speaker 2: I was literally thinking the exact same thing what you
Speaker 2: just said, that Alfred plea was like made for Bob
Speaker 2: because of his weird legal things that he was trying
Speaker 2: to get with that letter, and like partially take responsibility.
Speaker 2: This was made for him. He can say that he's
Speaker 2: guilty without saying that he's guilty, and then he gets
Speaker 2: to go on with his life. So Bob got his wish.
Speaker 2: All he had to do was a couple years in
Speaker 2: prison and he's off scot free with fifteen years probation.
Speaker 1: And I haven't heard anything about Bob. He was technically
Speaker 1: released from prison in April nineteen ninety two and he
Speaker 1: told the press that he was going to go live
Speaker 1: with his daughter in Maryland. But I haven't heard one
Speaker 1: thing about him since then. He pretty much just faded
Speaker 1: from the spotlight. I think one of the issues is
Speaker 1: that Bob Hall is such a common name, so that
Speaker 1: when you do a Google search, it's hard to determine
Speaker 1: if anything happened to him. But I haven't heard of
Speaker 1: him violating his probation, and I have no idea if
Speaker 1: he's still alive. If he is, he would be in
Speaker 1: his mid eighties by this point, so he pretty much
Speaker 1: just faded from the spotlight. And he obviously didn't spend
Speaker 1: any time trying to find the real killer of his wife. So,
Speaker 1: like you said, he technically got what he wanted, He
Speaker 1: got off with a very light sense, and then was
Speaker 1: able to move on with his life without any further consequences.
Speaker 2: I really feel for Kay's family here. I can't imagine
Speaker 2: what you would fin knowing that this man is out
Speaker 2: and there's a very strong likelihood that he's responsible for
Speaker 2: the death of your daughter in a very violent way.
Speaker 2: To think that she was run over, there was a
Speaker 2: struggle in the vehicle and she was run over like
Speaker 2: that is so horrific. And then he's walking free, He's
Speaker 2: getting to go live his life with his new partner.
Speaker 2: It's really gross.
Speaker 1: I'm sure there's one case that has popped into your
Speaker 1: mind will be discussing this, and that's the staircase murder
Speaker 1: with Yes Peterson. Yes because it had the same resolution
Speaker 1: where Michael Peterson had his conviction overturn not because he
Speaker 1: was proven innocent, but because one of the experts who
Speaker 1: testified at his trial turned out to be very unethical
Speaker 1: and gave a lot of bad testimony which led to
Speaker 1: wrongful convictions. So they said they had no choice but
Speaker 1: to overturn his conviction and give him a new trial.
Speaker 1: But he ultimately decided on an Alfred plea so he
Speaker 1: wouldn't have to go back to trial again and go
Speaker 1: to prison, and then went on to live the rest
Speaker 1: of his life and is still alive today. And there's
Speaker 1: still a lot of mystery this case. I've always been
Speaker 1: inclined to believe that Michael Peterson was guilty, but the
Speaker 1: big unanswered question is how did he do it? Because
Speaker 1: they were never able to conclusively establish a manner of death.
Speaker 1: I know some people have talked about a theory about
Speaker 1: her being killed by an owl which caused her to
Speaker 1: like get clawed and bang her head or something like that,
Speaker 1: but I personally don't believe it. But it's the same
Speaker 1: antality with this particular case where you can believe Bob's guilty,
Speaker 1: but there's still a lot of unanswered questions about how
Speaker 1: he pulled it off. How did he know that Kay
Speaker 1: would be at this particular spot which was sixteen miles
Speaker 1: from his home, in two miles in the opposite direction
Speaker 1: of the club they were, and why Kay traveled to
Speaker 1: this particular spot where she was killed, and how Bob
Speaker 1: would have known she would be there. So that's a
Speaker 1: frustrating thing about an alpha. Please you can close the case,
Speaker 1: everyone can remain silent, but you will never know the
Speaker 1: full truth about what happened.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's infuriating, and I tend to believe that Michael
Speaker 2: Peterson is responsible, but I don't lean as heavily as
Speaker 2: I do with Bob, Whereas with Michael Peterson, I'm like
Speaker 2: sixty percent Michael Peterson forty percent owl. But I do
Speaker 2: think there's a possibility that he didn't do it, and
Speaker 2: that those pin hairs from the owl or pin feathers
Speaker 2: or whatever that were found on Kathleen there is some
Speaker 2: significance to that because it seems to be the greatest
Speaker 2: amount of evidence. Everything against Michael Peterson kind of made
Speaker 2: me scratch my head. But with Bob, it's the way
Speaker 2: that Bob acted in interviews, the things that he said,
Speaker 2: that's what really pushed me over the edge. Whereas logistically
Speaker 2: I thought there's a strong possibility he didn't do it,
Speaker 2: I'm like fifty to fifty with the logistics and trying
Speaker 2: to do mental gymnastics for another theory that fits. But
Speaker 2: the way that he acted in the aftermath, I'm pretty
Speaker 2: secure in my belief that Bob was indeed responsible for
Speaker 2: the murder of k.
Speaker 1: I do agree, and if he did do it, it
Speaker 1: was probably a thing where he got Scott lucky that
Speaker 1: maybe he just decided, I need to go out searching
Speaker 1: for K. He drove around for a while and just
Speaker 1: got lucky that he happened to stumble across K at
Speaker 1: this exact spot a very short time later, and then
Speaker 1: was able to race home to make the phone call
Speaker 1: and narrow the timeline so that there was still some
Speaker 1: reasonable doubt about how he could have done it. Theoretically,
Speaker 1: if Bob was innocent, I don't believe that Kay's death
Speaker 1: was an accident because of the signs of struggle in
Speaker 1: the cab, and I think the only other theory of
Speaker 1: someone else killing her which would make sense is maybe
Speaker 1: if she was having an affair with someone and never
Speaker 1: told anyone about it, and maybe they lived in that
Speaker 1: particular area near Bluff Point Rose and she went to
Speaker 1: visit this person, maybe they got into an argument and
Speaker 1: that person ran her down. But if that was the case,
Speaker 1: she obviously never told anyone about this affair, since nothing
Speaker 1: about this came out. But the reason I still have
Speaker 1: a teeny bit of doubt is that I just don't
Speaker 1: know what Kay was doing when she left the club
Speaker 1: at eight and was driving into the pool nearly at
Speaker 1: eight fifty and then was killed a short time later,
Speaker 1: Like why was she driving around in this particular area.
Speaker 1: So that's why I think there's a minute possibility that
Speaker 1: maybe she went to see someone, maybe a secret lover,
Speaker 1: and that person wound up killing her. And if there
Speaker 1: was nothing else against Bob, then maybe I'd lean more
Speaker 1: towards that theory. But the way he kept lying to
Speaker 1: police and said all those suspicious statements during the interview
Speaker 1: is the main reason that I still think that's the
Speaker 1: most logical explanation that he did it.
Speaker 2: I'm with you, like twenty percent of me is like, Okay,
Speaker 2: there's a possibility that it could have been somebody else,
Speaker 2: that it's just some suspect that we aren't aware of,
Speaker 2: Like you said, somebody she's having an affair with a hitchhiker,
Speaker 2: any possibility that it could be an outside person, obviously
Speaker 2: not somebody who's trying to rob her. But I'm still
Speaker 2: eighty percent there that like, Bob, you're the guy. You
Speaker 2: did this. But because of all of these strange elements
Speaker 2: of this case, I could never be like one hundred percent,
Speaker 2: well not that we're ever one hundred percent in any case,
Speaker 2: but you know, ninety nine point nine percent.
Speaker 1: Yes, Like this is where reasonable doubt comes in, because
Speaker 1: in spite of what I said, I think that if
Speaker 1: I was on the jury for this, I would have
Speaker 1: hard time convicting Bob because I can't say with one
Speaker 1: hundred percent certainty that I believe he did it. And
Speaker 1: so that really makes me think that they were a
Speaker 1: little premature when they decided to charge him based on
Speaker 1: Carol Vandergriff's testimony, and that maybe they should have waited
Speaker 1: a longer time, maybe when there were advances in forensic
Speaker 1: like maybe many years from them, they would have been
Speaker 1: able to do DNA testing on her nails or something
Speaker 1: and find more conclusive physical evidence placing Bob at the scene.
Speaker 1: But because they jumped the gun and then they convicted him,
Speaker 1: like in unfair circumstances, they got to the point where
Speaker 1: all they could do was offer an al Ford plea
Speaker 1: and let them walk free, and no one was satisfied
Speaker 1: with the outcome. So any further thoughts on the death
Speaker 1: of k Hall.
Speaker 2: No, this was a really interesting case. I truly feel
Speaker 2: like you took me on a roller coaster ride.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this was a fun one to do, just seeing
Speaker 1: like your facial expressions with some of the stuff I
Speaker 1: told you, and seeing you gradually change your mind having
Speaker 1: reasonable doubt about Bob, but then once you heard the
Speaker 1: details of his interview you were like, yeah, I'm pretty
Speaker 1: sure he did it. But that's what's fun about feeding
Speaker 1: you details of these cases that you don't have any
Speaker 1: knowledge of them.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, Like I had no idea of this case.
Speaker 2: I'd heard nothing of it at the beginning. I never
Speaker 2: really know if I have heard of it, and once
Speaker 2: you tell me details, but this one I was completely blind.
Speaker 2: So it's always interesting when you don't know any of
Speaker 2: the details. And with a case such as this to
Speaker 2: have such crazy details, I can't think of any other
Speaker 2: case except for the staircase that would rival it with
Speaker 2: the ups and downs and the reasonable doubt, the strange evidence,
Speaker 2: the logistics of it all. So thank you for sharing
Speaker 2: the details of the murder of Unexplained death slash murder
Speaker 2: of k Hall.
Speaker 1: Yeah, my pleasure. This was a great one to discuss.
Speaker 1: So that about brings an end to our series on
Speaker 1: the death of k Hall. Thank you so much for
Speaker 1: joining us, and we'll be back again next week talking
Speaker 1: about another case.
Speaker 2: Robin, do you want to tell us a little bit
Speaker 2: about the Trail Went Cold Patreon?
Speaker 1: Yes, The Trail Cold Patreon has been around for three
Speaker 1: years now, and we offer these standard bonus features like
Speaker 1: early ad free episodes, and I also send out stickers
Speaker 1: and sign thank you cards to anyone who signs up
Speaker 1: with us on Patreon. If you join our five dollars
Speaker 1: tier tier two, we also offer monthly bonus episodes in
Speaker 1: which I talk about cases which are not featured on
Speaker 1: the Trail Went Cold's original feed, so they're exclusive to
Speaker 1: Patreon and if you join our highest tier tier three,
Speaker 1: the ten dollars tier. One of the features we offer
Speaker 1: is a audio commentary track over classic episodes of Unsaved Mysteries,
Speaker 1: where you can download an audio file and then boot
Speaker 1: up the original Unsoalved Mysteries episode on Amazon Prime or
Speaker 1: YouTube and play it with my audio commentary playing in
Speaker 1: the background, where I just provide trivia and factoids about
Speaker 1: the cases featured in this episode. And incidentally, the very
Speaker 1: first episode that I did a commentary track over was
Speaker 1: the episode featuring this case. So if you want to
Speaker 1: download a commentary track in which I make more smart
Speaker 1: ass remarks about jewel Kaylor, then be sure to join
Speaker 1: Tier three.
Speaker 2: So I want to let you know a little bit
Speaker 2: about the jewels and nashty patreons. So there's early ad
Speaker 2: free episodes of The Path Went Chili. We've got our
Speaker 2: Path Went Chili mini's which are always over an hour,
Speaker 2: so they're not very many, but they're just too short
Speaker 2: to turn into a series and we're really enjoying doing those,
Speaker 2: so we hope you'll check out those patreons will link
Speaker 2: them in the show notes.
Speaker 1: So I want to thank you all for listening, and
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Speaker 1: up because cold trails and Chili pass call for warm clothing.
Speaker 2: Music by Paul Rich from the podcast Cold Callers Comedy