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A
This is exactly right.
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Hey, everyone, it's Kalpen.
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I'm inviting you to join the best sounding book club you've ever heard with my podcast, Hearsay, The Audible, and iHeart Audiobook Club. Every episode, I nerd out with amazing guests and dive into the best new audiobooks available on Audible. It's the book club for your ears. Listen to earsay, the Audible and I Heart Book Audiobook Club on the iHeartRadio
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app or wherever you get your podcasts.
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A
There's a difference between liking a house and actually getting it. Redfin is built to make up that difference and close the gap between finding and owning the home for you. Redfin agents close twice as many deals as other agents, so when you find a home you love, you're not a step behind when it comes to making an offer. That means less watching great homes disappear and more focus on the one you'll call home. Redfin helps turn saved listings into real addresses. Get started@redfin.com own the dream. Aging is real, and so are the benefits of new vital proteins. Collagen, sparkling water. Because around the age of 30, your body needs backup to keep your collagen up. So get your daily glow up now in three fresh flavors. Strawberry blossom, lemon, lime and blood orange. Improved skin health in as little as 30 days, thanks to collagen peptides. Cheers to that. So you can stay vital. Stay you. Visit vitalproteins.com to learn more and where to buy. These statements have not evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease.
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B
I'm Kate Winkler Dawson. I'm a journalist who's spent the last 25 years writing about true crime.
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And I'm Paul Holes, a retired cold case investigator who's worked some of America's most complicated cases and solve them.
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Each week, I present Paul with one of history's most compelling true crimes.
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And I weigh in. Using modern forensic techniques to bring new insights to old mysteries.
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Together, using our individual expertise, we're examining historical true crime cases through a 21st century lens.
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C
Some are solved and some are cold. Very cold.
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B
This is buried bones.
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C
Hey, Kate. How are you?
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B
I'm well, Paul. How about you?
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C
I am doing great.
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B
So we have deep burning questions from viewers and listeners.
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C
More questions, huh?
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B
We have an endless supply, which I think these are fun and. And, you know, sometimes I think, oh, I have to ask him about his fish. And I know that, you know that we kept up. We keep up with your fish a lot. But I like to hear what other people think, too, other than what pops up in my little head. So this is not a question, this is a suggestion. And the suggestion from a viewer listener is I suggest Paul considers magnesium glycinate to improve the circulation in his hands. And then I have to say, I remember we talked about your hands, but remind me and then tell me if you have actually ever taken this.
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C
So I didn't realize I had this condition called Raynaud's syndrome. And so this is where circulation in my extremities, my feet, and my hands, shuts down prematurely in the cold. Of course, you know, spending most of my adult life in the Bay Area, California, I never really experienced anything that was. Anybody would ever consider cold, though. I remember standing in the ocean at Santa Cruz, and my feet would ache like crazy. And my first wife thought I was the biggest wimp in the world, but moved out to Colorado. And, you know, you start getting shoveling snow, and then the hands would just start turning purple and go numb. And then when they get the circulation back, it can be quite painful. And it turns out, you know, I've known my mom has had Raynaud's syndrome. She, you know, ended up moving to Hawaii to avoid any type of temperature that would cause it to kick in. And it turns out three of my four children have Raynaud's as well.
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B
Really?
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C
I end up doing things like wearing heated gloves when I'm out there shoveling snow. I have to get, you know, well, insulated boots, and it still doesn't prevent that from. From kicking in, the Raynaud from kicking in. And there's almost a psychological aspect. I can be sitting in my office, like, where I'm at right now, and if it's cold enough outside, my feet will start to shut down. It is so weird.
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B
Is that. Is that like people who can feel rainstorms coming in their knees?
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C
I. I think it's like that. Yeah. I think it's like that. So I often. I have a little space heater underneath my. My primary desk in my office, and in the winter time, that thing is blowing on my feet, and even my lower legs will still feel cold to the touch because the circuit just. There's a psychological aspect where my, you know, my body just knows it's cold.
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B
Well, what do you do if you're at the gym and it's too cold and you're lifting or doing something that involves grip strength for you? Does that ever happen?
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C
Not. Not inside the gym, but throughout my career with the sheriff's office or the DA's office. I either worked out at home in my garage in California or I worked out at the jail. So I thought, well, I'll just work out in my garage in Colorado. And I set it up that way. And then it got to where I couldn't grab the barbell because it was fro. So I, you know, I, I ultimately did move the gym into the basement, but now I, I go to a gym, you know, and I, I've actually enjoyed the gym just because I have all the equipment available.
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B
Well, this person says try magnesium glycine, and you have not. Is that right? Do you treat it with anything other than your space heater and trying to stay warm? Okay.
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C
No, I've never heard of that, actually.
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B
Well, magnesium glycinate for me has been great for sleep. It's good for sleep, helping you relax. I know there's a whole host of other things and I know that there are different kinds of magnesium, so I had to look it up, but our doctor suggested that I do it. And it's been really helpful, you know, for me. There were kind of big horse pills and there are different ways to take it, but. Yeah, try it and then maybe we'll report back in a, in a, in a few months to see if it makes a difference or not.
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C
Well, I'll add it to my supplement stack.
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B
Well, there you go. I know you have a lot of those.
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C
You know, I've really cut back, actually. But yeah, I still have a, you know, I take a few pills in the morning and, you know, just my. As you get older, you got to kind of keep just adding things to, you know, the nutrition that you're pulling in.
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B
Yep, Same. I hear you. Okay. We are going into a big case that seems simple, I think, at the start, but there are a lot of twists in it and it'll be a fairly well known case once people hear it. Maybe. I guess we'll see. We're going to the Pacific Northwest. I don't know if we've done much in Washington state.
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C
Okay.
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B
But we've gone everywhere together. Paul. I don't know. I don't know.
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C
No. But I've been consulting on a case out of Washington state now for, I don't know, over a year, year and a half, and also did a podcast. Yeah. So actually I've consulted on multiple cases out of Washington state now. I think about it.
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B
Okay, well, there you go. Maybe this will be helpful. Maybe not. We don't know. Let's set the scene. Okay. We like to give credit where credit's due here. And there is a fantastic multi part blog. The person who wrote the blog is Brianna Audrey Wright. And so there's a lot of nice backstory that she's put in there. So we appreciate her help with the research. We are in Tacoma, Washington. So it is October 30, 1947. And this is after the World War II boom. And so this is kind of a. The city is transitioning and shipbuilding had been a really big thing obviously for world war war II and in Tacoma. And now it's on the decline. And so that means the economy has slumped and we have a lot more people moving out to the suburbs. So just trying to set the historical scene with this here. Okay, we're going to kind of jump right into this. So it is 2:22 in the morning on this day, October 30th, the day before Halloween. And there are screams coming from the central Tacoma hilltop neighborhood. And there is a woman who phones the police. Her name is Mrs. Steinserfer. And she says that she can see a six foot tall black man standing in her neighbor's dark kitchen. And you know, there's a, the neighbor has a porch light outside and so she feels like she could see this clearly. So she screams and then calls the police. So we have a couple of police officers who show up and this is 1007 South 21st Street. And they are just in time to see a 45 year old 6 foot tall black man run out of the back door and break through a picket fence. Now, I want to pause here because there's an interesting note. He is barefoot. And we talk about this sometimes where when we read notes, particularly in history and they say shoe prints and footprints, what do they mean? And so, you know, I, I would think the obvious question of course, or the obvious assumption for me would be that he is barefoot because he's trying to sneak around and stay quiet. This sometimes does not seem like a great idea to me, but I mean, have you encountered a lot of cases where the people remove their, their shoes and even their socks? To do this, I would have to imagine their socks.
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C
I can think of a case in which the, the offender removed his shoes and is walking through the house in his socks and ultimately left a bloody sock print behind. And it wasn't one of my cases from my jurisdiction, it was a case I covered for a TV show. When you said, well, obviously he's doing it to move around quietly, that's a possibility. But I've also got cases that I've either worked or I'M aware of where offenders, they remove their clothing before they commence with sexual assault. And sometimes they remove their clothing outside before going into the house. And so when things go sideways, now they're running down the middle of the street nude or nude from the waist down. So there's, you know, depending on how this develops, that's, that's, you know, kind of like, well, is this guy somebody who's removing his shoes and his pants before he goes into the house and sexually assaults somebody?
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B
Mm. Okay. Well, we'll see how this unfolds. So they don't explicitly say that this neighbor who sees this is a white woman or that the people inside the house are white. But the fact that she is saying there's a black man standing in my neighbor's house is alarming to her. So they chase this guy. He hurls himself over several backyard fences, and the officers are hot on the trail there. They finally corner him in an alley and he pulls out a jackknife. So before the officers are able to subdue him, he slashes one of the hands of one of the officers and he stabs the other one in the back of his shoulder. So they still catch him. And he is put in the hospital first because he has a lot of cuts on his face and around his mouth. I have to assume that's from the fight with officers, but it doesn't have to be, depending on what happens inside that house that he just broke out of.
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C
Yeah. Or even during the pursuit, you know, is he getting hit in the face with branches? You know, so that it could be a combination of all of that.
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B
Mm. He is treated at this hospital, and then he is sent straight to jail in Tacoma. And we have a detective lieutenant who shows up, and he is investigating the house. His name is Earl Cornason. And he finds the victims. So we have two. One is a 52 year old baker, and she's a Russian immigrant, and her name is Bertha. And he also finds her 17 year old daughter, Beverly June Kloot, both lying in pools of blood. And it looks like both of them have been bludgeoned repeatedly with an axe. And again, we kind of come back to the bludgeoned part. Their throats are slit, there is blood and bloody fingerprints all over the walls, and there's blood on the ceiling, too. So already this seems pretty open and shut, I would think. But, you know, kind of give me your impressions first. First blush here.
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C
Yeah, on the surface, it seems very straightforward. You have a witness who sees this black male standing in the Victim's porch area. Right. And then law enforcement responds and this guy is now bursting out of the house and a pursuit ensues. So it appears that he does go into the house. Now you have these two women that have been killed. It's interesting that they've been killed with an ax. The witness who saw him on the porch didn't describe him holding an ax, entering the house. Right.
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B
She saw the porch light was kind of. The light from the porch was pouring into the house. The neighbor could see him standing in the kitchen.
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C
Oh, okay.
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B
She does not identify an ax in his hand or anything like that.
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C
No. Well, I would just say, you know, that's even better than what I initially thought, because now he's somebody. She sees him. You have a witness seeing him inside the house. Now, you know, whether or not he brought an ax with him or he used the victim's own ax, you know, that right now is not anything that I'm considering. But again, it's white. You know, why do these offenders choose axis, especially if he's armed with a knife? You know, so there's, you know, that's just an interesting dynamic in terms of the choice of weapon, you know, so now the question is, is that are one or both of these women, are they sexually assaulted? You know, what is his motive? Going into the house is a ransacking in the house? Does there appear to be any financial motive to this? Is there any interpersonal aspects? So need more details in order to try to get a better sense of what's going on here.
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B
So the note is that Bertha, who is the mother, the 52 year old, that her body is on the ground floor bedroom where she would sleep. And they said that her assault was so savage that her head had been hacked nearly completely off with this ax. And it appeared that the killer had attempted to sexually assault her. So I'll tell you, they find no evidence of that. We know about evidence of sexual assault and the caveats that come with that, but I think that probably meant like her skirt was pulled up or something. They discovered the daughter's body in the adjacent kitchen. And the detective thinks that Bertha was attacked and maybe there was gonna be an attempted sexual assault, but then her daughter hurt her. And the daughter came downstairs after hearing her mother's screams. That's where, you know, she met the killer and then she died, too. And then, yeah, over the next few hours, they find an ax, knife, a cap and a pair of shoes in the house and also strewn about the Cluditz yard. And the neighbor's backyard. So, you know, he's tossing them, obviously, as he's running out.
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C
I'm surprised at how quickly law enforcement arrived, you know, so that's, that is of consequence in terms of, you know, the, you know, the veracity that they're not just, you know, chasing a random guy that's, you know, walking down the middle of the street. They literally are going after a guy that was seen inside the house, is emerging out of the house and then puts up significant resistance. Quite frankly, with this guy pulling a knife, I'm surprised the officers didn't shoot him. Yeah, you know, so he's lucky on that front, you know, but he's obviously, you know, looking at significant charges if they're, you know, let's say some of these bloody prints inside the house can be matched to him, you know, and there's nothing better than having the offender's fingerprints and the victim's blood at a homicide scene. That's pretty good. This episode is brought to you by IQ Bar, our exclusive snack, hydration and coffee sponsor. IQ Bar Protein Bars, IQ Mix Hydration mixes and IQ Joe Mushroom Coffees are the delicious low sugar brain and body fuel you need to win your day.
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B
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C
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B
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- [18:38]
A
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- [19:40]
B
Well, let me ask you. You know, I. In this list of things, they found ax, knife, cap, and a pair of shoes. Okay? So all of that stuff. And he has the jackknife in his pocket, too, so all of that makes sense. And he's tossed this stuff. And I. I was just thinking about what you were saying about how quickly they responded. I didn't read this, but I have to imagine, wouldn't you think they must have been on patrol in the area? Because if you think about the sequence of events, she, you know, looks through the window. She sees this man in her neighbor's kitchen, and it's dark. She screams, picks up the phone, calls the police. And then what? They show up just in time to see him leave? Is he not leaving for a few moments, or. I don't know how that works. It just seems kind of quick.
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C
So having worked cases that predate 911, which this most certainly does. So the witness is dialing the operator. The operator will then transfer the call to law enforcement. And then now law enforcement dispatch can dispatch the closest cars in the area to this location. He's inside the house, oblivious. He's been seen, right? He is attacking Bertha, he's attacking Beverly. And then possibly after he has completed his attacks on these two women, he looks outside and he sees a patrol car. Now, he is in a panic, and he's trying to get away, and that's why he's ditching the axe. You know, first, that's just going to slow him down. But it's also the murder weapon. He doesn't want that on his person when he's arrested. So that seems to be the logical thing of what happened here.
- [21:37]
B
Okay. And the kitchen where the neighbor saw him is where Beverly was murdered. So he's at the tail end of these events, and then he runs out and they catch him. So he's in the jail, and and he's been identified as somebody named Jake Byrd. He's a 45 year old transient man. He has on his clothing, blood, brain tissue. His fingerprints match the prints at the crime scene. And the detectives confirmed that the shoes left at the street outside the house belonged to him. And you know, then they start trying to figure out who this guy is. He was a railway worker and a section gang laborer since the age of 19. Laid and maintained track across the US and he had been known for a string of burglaries and assaults and attempted murders and murders across the US when they finally catch him here, he, he
- [22:41]
C
was previously known to be this serial killer.
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B
Well, he was previously convicted of one murder I believe. But there is a string of all of these other things, attempted murderers, you know, that, that are following him. And the issue that we'll have because he is guilty of this crime, there's no getting around it. The issue that we're going to have a little bit with Jake Byrd and what I need your help with is that he turns a little Henry Lee Lucas on us. And you, you remember Henry Lee Lucas and what he's most well known for.
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C
Yeah, to confessing to everything across the United States. And then turns out he was just lying about it.
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B
Yeah, he killed, he did kill some people, but certainly not the 600 or whoever, you know, it was that he confessed. And Texas Rangers got into big trouble for it for Henry Lee Lucas because they just took all of it in essentially, you know, and, and they were closing cases left and right when it, you know, really you go back and it turns out that, that this was not the case. And so there is the complication of Jake Byrd and why this case is pretty well known. But, but in Jake's case, he is apparently totally, totally capable of doing all of this stuff that he's going to talk about. And so this is not a whodunnit, it's a like multi step. What do you do when you have someone who, you know is confessing to all of these different crimes and is capable of it and is he telling the truth or not? How do you kind of sort that out?
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C
Fundamentally it does come down to how you conduct the interview, the interrogation. It can come down to forensics. You know, 1947, you're going to be limited on the forensics part with Henry Lee Lucas. One of the issues with the interviews is they were asking leading questions. They provided Lucas with details about the crime that only the killer would know. That is completely opposite of what you do, you know, so this is where I. I'll be curious to see how they approach Jake Bird in terms of, you know, seeing what other crimes, you know, he's committed and, and is he being truthful or are they, you know, feeding him, you know, information to where they can just close a case and now they're done, you know, so the railroad side is interesting. I've, of course, am familiar with multiple railroad serial killers, but I did a deep dive in Golden State killer, a railroad suspect. And I got to know the culture from the 1970s, but the culture of the railways pretty well to understand the freedoms these guys have as they move around the country.
- [25:31]
B
Yeah, yeah. And that's what I meant when I said transient doesn't mean then what it can sometimes mean today. And so transient for him was he would move obviously from place to place, but it sounded like he was picking up and leaving work. Work with the. With the railway system. But he was a leader on laying track in certain places. So this is, you know, somebody who is. Is capable of holding employment, obviously. Okay. He's in the hospital because he's got cuts and bruises and all kinds of stuff all over his body. We don't know if, as you said, that's from the escape. We don't know if that's third degree from the police because he stabbed them, you know, stabbed one person in the shoulder and the other guy in the hand. We don't know if it's from the women. So, you know, he's in the hospital. He then gets sent to the Tacoma jail, and he confesses fairly quickly to murdering the two women to the Klutes. But he says that it was not premeditated. He said it was a botched robbery. He says he picked up an ax from a nearby shed to. And he says to bluff off anyone who tried to bother me. He says that he entered through the unlocked back door, slipped off his shoes, stole $1.50 from Bertha, the mother's purse, which is like 20 bucks. Today, on his way out of the house, he was confronted by Bertha and Beverly in the kitchen. He told them that he would leave quietly, but they attacked him. So he said in self defense, he knocked them down and kept on swinging the axe. And he, you know, agrees to this confession and he signs it from the police, so that, that is what leads to charges. Now what do you think about that? It doesn't sound like the evidence lines up with what he's saying happened.
- [27:28]
C
No, no, he is completely. I've used this term, you know, in the past. He is, he is purposely Minimizing. This is a term that we use in law enforcement. He is trying to make it look, you know, less than what it actually was. So this idea that he got the ax as just a bluff, right? And he talks about how he's attacked by Beverly and Bertha. So now he's using this ax in self defense, yet, you know, oh, Bertha's skirt has been pushed up, you know, her head is almost hacked off. It's so obvious what's going on here that, you know, he's basically telling a lie and he's putting some truth into the lie to make it seem like that's would be palatable for the investigators to accept.
- [28:30]
B
Well, the next day he is charged, but only with Bertha's murder, not Beverly June's. And despite this confession, he pleads not guilty. He says that he signed it under duress, which I'm assuming would be the third degree from these Tacoma cops. But the trial starts November 23, 1947. So Byrd wanted to represent himself, but he is forced to have, I guess, a defense attorney. He has to have a defense attorney in, and it's a guy named James W. Selden. And he argues this case and he moves to have the confession declared inadmissible because of what I told you. He says it was under duress. So the defense attorney calls a officer to the stand who had transported Jake Byrd to the hospital. So not one of the two responding officers who he stabbed. This is somebody different. And this officer, Officer Hickey, said that Byrd had maintained his innocence the night of the murder, which I don't think you would find surprising. He said that there was another black man in Tacoma named Leroy who was the killer. And Hickey said that Byrd only confessed after another officer beat him up in jail. So this is, I think, the only witness that the defense attorney puts on the standard. So you do have an officer saying that he has been handled inappropriately by the police and he had been maintaining his innocence. So what do you think about that development, the confession?
- [30:06]
C
You know, I finished my career at the DA's office and I remember having great conversations with some very, very high level DAs, and many of them would rather not have a confession. And even if, even if the defendant did confess, you know, they wouldn't move to put that into trial, especially if the case is strong on other fronts, you know, so, you know, a strategy as you present the case. The case is so strong against Bird, they easily can get a conviction and then get Bird on the stand and, you know, basically in front of a jury, you Know, start making these ridiculous statements and looking like an idiot. So, you know, I don't know how, how the prosecution handled this, this case, but the idea of just trying to get the confession, you know, thrown out is really trivial as far as the overwhelming evidence against Byrd in, in this particular case.
- [31:09]
B
Yep. So this is a three day trial, which is pretty fast. You know, 1947, they were getting a little bit longer. You know, I mean, we were. We're used to like two day trials, one day trial. In the 1800s, this was three days. But Seldon doesn't really put on any kind of a defense because, as you had said, with the overwhelming evidence, he was not able to get the confession tossed. They read the confession aloud and the prosecutor is arguing for the death sentence. And the jury deliberated for 35 minutes, and they come back with a guilty verdict. So he is sentenced to death by hanging. And this is set in January 16th of 1948. And, and, and this is not. This is sort of. We're now halfway through this story because you would think that would be the end of it. But, but we're not, you know, even close because this was an open and shut case as far as the DA was concerned. Right.
- [32:05]
C
It's as easy as it gets.
- [32:07]
B
Yeah. So what? One of the things that makes this story, I would say, well known for true crime history buffs, is something that happens at trial. Okay. Actually, it's not at trial, it's at sentencing. So the sentencing hearing is on December 6, and his defense attorney makes it very clear that he really did not like Jake Byrd. And of course, remember, Jake Byrd wanted to represent himself. He says, I feel whenever any man, 45 years old, gets an idea that no lives are still safe to anyone except his own, that man is a detriment to society and should be obliterated. So he's happy about the death penalty. I mean, that doesn't sound very ethical to me. I, I don't know. I've never heard a defense attorney do that, certainly at sentencing.
- [32:58]
C
Well, and Al also want to. I wonder if there's a way that he is trying to set a. Set the stage for an argument for inadequate or incompetent counsel, you know, and so he's now going, yeah, I mean, the guy I represent should get the death penalty, you know, and now it's like, okay, you're not doing your job as a defense attorney.
- [33:26]
B
Well, wouldn't that be bad for business? I mean, this is not his last client. Right.
- [33:33]
C
Well, but if he prevents Bird from getting the death Penalty as a result of incompetent counsel. You know, he basically proves that I'm willing to go all out for, for my defendant.
- [33:44]
B
Yeah, well, I don't think Bird buys into that theory because he says this. He has given time to talk and he says, all you guys who had anything to do with this case are going to die before I do. Wait and see. You policemen and judges will be sitting and waiting at the pearly gates a long time before I roll up. That's like an epic statement there. And this was called Jake Byrd's Hex. And I heard of it because it came true, because a lot of people dropped dead before he did in this case. And I just thought, I've never heard of somebody hexing someone else before. I mean, that's not the only interesting part of this, but that's part of, he was, you know, expressing some anger there at the end.
- [34:33]
C
Sure. You know, I've never heard of Jake Bird's hex, you know, but, you know, it happens to all of us. At some point, you know, you're going to pass away. So it could just be coincidence that many of the people involved in this case passed away before he did.
- [34:46]
B
It could be, it could be. Let's, let's see how it goes though. So he's on death row, and here's sort of the beginning of the list. And this is all within an 18 month period. So sentencing is December 6th. Less than a month later, the judge dies from a heart attack. Then a couple months after that, the undersheriff who had gotten confessions from Byrd, apparently under duress, he says, dies from a heart attack. A couple of months after that, a court reporter dies from the heart attack. And then the main detective on this dies that same year. And on November 26, which is basically a year from when this happened, the attorney dies that he hated so much. Heart attack. This might be a little bit more of a comment on what people ate in 1947, 1948, I don't know, but, but that's a lot. I mean, the majority of these people who he really, really he hated ended up dying in less than a year.
- [35:47]
C
So what comes to my mind, 1947, think about Dwight D. Eisenhower. You know, one of the things, you know, he ended up having a major heart attack when he was president, I believe. And this is where people started to recognize the, you know, the five packs of cigarettes a day that they were smoking was a major contributing factor. That's what I think is probably going on. It's not so much the diet it was the fact that all of these people are smoking.
- [36:17]
B
Yeah. And in stressful jobs, of course.
- [36:19]
C
Yeah, sure.
- [36:21]
B
But this, this does help, you know, push along the legend of Jake Byrd Hex.
- [36:28]
C
Well, I, I, you know, I am kind of somewhat surprised that the, the number of people that died within a year, I was thinking. Yeah, over the course of 20 years, of course. But within a year, maybe, maybe there's something to this hex.
- [36:43]
B
Now you're talking about five, five or six people. And he was right. They died. They died before he did.
- [36:51]
C
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A
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- [39:12]
B
So now we get to whether or not we believe Jake Byrd. So he is delaying his execution. He's on death row at the Washington State Penitentiary in Walla Walla. And he, during his, you know, this time that he's on death row, fairly quickly confesses to having murdered 44 other people over the past 20 years, which would make him the most prolific serial killer of all time up, you know, to that point. So then I will unravel what he's talking about. We know he has killed at least one other person than, you know, the Kloots in Tacoma. And he has done some pretty bad things around the country. So he's capable of it. It's a matter of is he doing it and why confess to it?
- [40:01]
C
Yeah, yeah. Well, I think a little bit of insight is he wanted to represent himself at trial. That's showing a level of narcissism, you know, and so this is where now evaluating his, you know, acknowledgment of being involved in 44 other cases. Is he somebody like, like a Henry Lee Lucas or another guy? I'm very familiar with a Curtis Dean Anderson who are willing to say, I, I did this and I did that because they want the notoriety, you know, that they are seeking that out and they are willing to confess to something they didn't do just to have another, you know, notch in the belt. So that's where it's going to be. Okay, so what kind of details did. Did Bird provide on these other cases, you know, and can law enforcement. Can the investigators say, yeah, you know, with what he's providing, we believe only the killer would be able to know those details. Or, you know, what? We actually do have fingerprints from this case. Let's do a direct comparison to Jake Bird. Yes, his fingerprints are at the scene, just like in Berth and Bever Beverly's crime scene.
- [41:13]
B
Well, they are able to tie some of these things to him, but then they're picking apart different motives for, you know, some of the cases that he brings up. So let me tell you, we'll get into some of this. Most of the victims that he's talking about were white women whom he stalked and bludgeoned with a hatchet or an ax. He had only escaped justice because he thinks his crimes had occurred across the U.S. you know, with the train job so Illinois, Kentucky, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Kansas, South Dakota, Ohio, Florida, Wisconsin, Michigan, Iowa and Washington state where we are. At first he says he just wants to clear up his conscience. And then he says, well, I can clear up some details of the murders, including providing names of accomplices for a life sentence.
- [42:05]
C
Okay, yeah, so he's now gunning for a deal, get rid of the death penalty. I'll give you names of individuals that helped me know, commit these crimes. You know, you think about the number of states that you, you mentioned, you know, this, this transient nature, you know, this is always a concern in an, in an investigation is, okay, we have residents within a certain town. We, you know, we can put people in this town based on they live here and that's the easy suspect pool to go after. But in any town, there is this transient suspect pool that may be there one day and they're flowing through. And unless they were contacted or somebody tips law enforcement off, how do we know that there's somebody we need to look at? That's always that sort of that big unknown. And these, who done it homicides. When you are dealing with these railroad workers, it's just like long haul truckers. And how many serial killers are long haul truckers? Because they have this freedom, you know, so that's, that's. When, when you mentioned that he was railroad, I was like, okay. You know, I've talked to guys from Matt. It's far back in 1940s, but in the 1970s. And you know, they, the train would stop and, you know, they would flow into neighborhoods and their buddies would cover for them, you know, and they're committing burglaries or they're committing sexual assaults, you know, so Jake Bird probably had a similar type of freedom and took advantage of that to attack all across the United States. Now, is he being truthful about everything he did? You know, that's going to be the
- [43:52]
B
million dollar question, you know, and the, I'm writing an audiobook right now that's set in the early 1800s in London where there were sailors pouring in and out of port constantly and, you know, specific areas of London like Wapping that were basically built to cater for, you know, all of these guys coming in and out and perfectly capable of committing crimes and then taking off. And so there is always that boogeyman that a defense attorney can bring up and say, how do we not know it's some stranger, you know, and so, so this is the situation we're in a little bit. He is traveling a lot. So he says the first time he murdered somebody was on July 1, 1928. So remember, we're in 48 when he's on death row. So this is 20 years earlier. He says it was in East Omaha, Nebraska, and he says it was an eight year old named Harvey Boyd. Harvey had disappeared on his way to buy a scooter at a shop two blocks from his house. And he was missing for several weeks. Then his body was discovered in a sunflower patch about a half a mile from his home. His skull was caved in behind his left ear and they believe that he was bludgeoned with a hammer. Now there's a guy who confessed. His name was Clarence Luke Hart. He's 21 and he was in prison on a separate charge. And two days after Harvey went missing, Lukart had sexually assaulted an, a different eight year old boy. And in his confession he describes hitting this boy who survived with a hammer on his head. So he is convicted of this and I don't know what other evidence there was, but he was sentenced to life in prison for the criminally insane. That's the ward he was in over the next 20 years. His parents said he didn't do it, he didn't do it. And now Byrd is saying, well, I'm the one who did that. So now they don't know what to make of this. But he has been given a two month reprieve. Two days before he was supposed to be executed. He's now been given two months to spill his guts.
- [46:04]
C
You know, on one hand, the fact that he is bringing up a crime that somebody else was, was convicted of, that might increase the veracity of the truthfulness and what he's saying. But also is he generally aware of this crime because he's seen it in the newspapers. Was he in Omaha at the time and reads the headlines and then goes, oh, you know, for me to, you know, not be hung in the next two days, I might as well throw a nugget out there of a case I'm aware of. You know, this is where you have to get into the weeds a little bit with him and say, okay, well you're going to have to give us a hell of a lot of detail because we've got a guy that's been sitting in prison for 20 years. Now the fact that he's saying that the first case is this case, this eight year old boy, Harvey out of Omaha going back to 1928, you know, bird is 45 and we often see these serial predators, you know, they start escalating to homicide in Their, you know, their 20s. And so this is making sense to me that the timeline is tracking appropriately in terms of what he is saying his first case is.
- [47:14]
B
Okay, well, what they find out later is that Lukart and Byrd had known each other at a state penitentiary.
- [47:25]
C
Oh, there you go.
- [47:26]
B
Animosa State Penitentiary. They think later on that Byrd is confessing to this to help Lucard out. I don't think that's what it is. I think he's trying for some other stuff, but he is. He will implicate people in crimes, and then he will say, you're wrong about the person you convicted for this crime. And so it's interesting to try to piece together what are these grievances and friends and, you know, what is he doing? Exactly. But, you know, they do end up tying some to him.
- [47:54]
C
Yeah, well, and this. This very much complicates the. The interview with Byrd, because a lot of the details of Lockhart is a true killer. You know, in those, you know, discussions in prison, you know, Lockhart is giving Bird a lot of details that only the killer would know. So now it makes it much tougher. This is probably in this day and age, it's probably you're gonna have to resort to some DNA testing or something to prove that it was Bird versus Lock.
- [48:24]
B
Yep. And, you know, the hard part about this is I'm not sure how vigilant the railways are, keeping records of who is working when. So because he's often on trains, I don't think there's like a. There might not be a log that says, for instance, in the case we have coming up, he says, you know, the next thing happens in Nebraska. So before, we had said was in east Omaha. Now we're talking about south Omaha. He says that the next day, after killing this boy, he murders two sisters who were 18 and 21 in South Omaha. And then he says four days after that, he tried to murder a couple in their mid-20s in their home in Carter Lake, Iowa. Now, both of these people survived, the husband and the wife. And there was a man who had just escaped from a mental institution who confessed to those murders. And it sounds like maybe attacking this family in Iowa, which is very close to where the other murders were. But he didn't look anything like the offender, and people knew that, but Bird looked very much like the offender. So in the case of the couple who survived and were able to ID him, he was arrested in Des Moines in 1928, charged with assault with intent to kill. So they didn't pursue what happened In Nebraska, they pursued Iowa. Okay? So they had enough evidence to convict him of trying to kill this couple in Iowa, and he was found guilty. The reason that makes a big difference is that they had pursued murder charges against him in Nebraska, he would have potentially been executed or spent at least 30 years in prison. And in Iowa, because the laws were different, he only served 12 years. And then he got out for good behavior. He got out in, yeah, less than 12 years. So he was convicted of almost killing somebody, you know, a couple.
- [50:37]
C
The amount of time he served is not surprising at all. You know, we saw this rampant in California in the 1970s where people were convicted of rape murders. And I've got one guy that, that served five years and was released on parole, and he. What does he do? He starts sexually assaulting and killing again, you know, so, you know, I'm surprised that he served 12 years in Iowa, you know, so obviously, if Bird is in custody now, we don't have anything during those 12 years. He gets released. He must say, okay, now I'm now killing out in some other state. Right?
- [51:16]
B
Yes. So he is released December 24, 1941. Ten months after he gets out, he is in Chicago. So this is October 21, 1942. He hooked up with this gang of men. I don't. I. You know, criminals, petty criminals, burglars, that sort of thing. They were gambling at someone's apartment. They lost a lot of money, and so they started prowling the area for a house to burglarize. So they broke into a home and held these women at gunpoint. They stole three furs and some jewelry, and all of this amounted to about $600,000 today. Then they clubbed the women to death using a sawed off baseball bat loaded with lead. He had named a couple of accomplices. One of this was a guy named Boykins. And details of Byrd's account actually match the evidence in that case, the clubbing of these two women. He said that Boykins had used his handkerchief, Bird's handkerchief, to wipe blood off of his shoes. And sure enough, near the crime scene, they find a bloody handkerchief made of expensive linen, embroidered with the initial B on it. It. And Byrd says that Boykins had a stutter, which he did, but Bird wasn't arrested at the time. So, you know, I don't know if that's enough evidence to say that he was responsible, but that's what he's confessing to. And he's naming this guy Boykins, who had not been arrested. I don't think anybody had been arrested in this.
- [52:52]
C
Yeah. And we don't know if they ever identified the actual Boykins.
- [52:58]
B
I don't believe. So they found that. I think this was an unsolved case.
- [53:03]
C
Yeah. At least, you know, I mean, there's some good admissions and details within those admissions, probably not sufficient to close the case. You know, this is where the limitations of 1947 kind of come into play. Because now, even though those are some good details to try to make it into a chargeable offense, that handkerchief, you know, just because it has a bee on it, that's not. That's not very strong. This is where you go after DNA is birds. DNA on that handkerchief, in addition to the victim's, you know, blood fingerprints at the. At the crime scene. You know, being able to identify who Boykins is. You know, today we have a lot more tools in the digital age to try to track down who this Boykins actually is and then go interview him. So I would say, yeah, there's a chance that Byrd is there, and this is a kind of a cooperative double homicide. But they definitely didn't have enough, I think, in order to be able to push it over the finish line and convince a jury of 12.
- [54:17]
B
So he says that he was a watchman during that, the bludgeoning of these two women. But on October 23rd, so that was two days later, he's arrested for a spat of burglaries in Michigan. St. Joseph, Michigan. And when he was arrested, he's holding a hatchet. He pleads guilty. He's sentenced to six months to five years in prison, and he's released August 27, 1942. So then he goes to Tacoma, and this is where the Klute women were his final victims. So then, as we get closer to his execution date, because now he's used up his two months of, you know, rattling on about all this. He revises his timeline. He said he actually killed also people in Jersey. He robbed and murdered a grocer in LA in 1923. So he's going back even further. There are two men and a women in Cleveland, Ohio. He dumped their bodies. I mean, just sort of like on and on. And they ultimately, out of these, 44, felt pretty sure about 11 of the murders, and they were substantiated and confirmed by investigators, but certainly not all of them. But again, you know, we also. We kind of went and looked at Luke Hart and, you know, figured out that they were in the penitentiary together. And so, you know, was he trying to help his friend or did he have, like, I Think you and I have talked about too many. He had so many facts from being with this guy that he was able to provide things to the police based
- [55:54]
C
on just the details of the Bertha and Beverly double homicide. You know, I truly feel that this Jake Byrd is. I mean, he most certainly could be responsible for as many as he's claimed, but we just have seen that some of these offenders will confess the things that they didn't do for, you know, a variety of reasons. The fact that law enforcement was able to basically corroborate 11, you know, and of course, I'm like, well, did they truly corroborate them? Right. You know, it's sort of like with Lucas and the Texas Rangers back in the day.
- [56:33]
B
Yep.
- [56:34]
C
Nope. They just wanted to go, yep, case closed. And I don't have to do any more work on it.
- [56:39]
B
So.
- [56:40]
C
But, yeah, that. I'm sure some of those cases probably truly were closed and. And could be chargeable. But now he's saying, oh, and I was also out in New Jersey and I got more cases out there. He's just trying to delay, delay, delay, because he doesn't want to be hung in the next two days.
- [56:56]
B
Yep, absolutely. And I think a lot of investigators say these are stalling tactics. I don't know if we should believe any of these confessions. And he successfully stoles for months and months and months, and he ends up filing appeals and everything is denied for a retrial. And so after he ends up delaying a total of about 18 months. So he was supposed to be executed in January of 48, and he is finally hanged on July 15th of 1949. And so it is at that point, over. But I will. I'm going to circle back to the hex. There was a prison guard who he did not like, Washington State penitentiary guard who died of pneumonia two months before Byrd was executed. I hate to laugh at that, but this hex thing keeps coming back. So now we're at six or seven people who, you know, I mean, this. This guy, I don't know if he killed 11 people or if he killed 44 people, but he was. Was clearly a terrible person. And the stalling tactics that he used, I. We've seen being used. And so that's. It's interesting to. You look back in the 1940s and see it happening just like it might today.
- [58:14]
C
He, you know, Bird obviously is a. He's a. He's a serial predator. If he truly did these 44 other cases, you know, a very prolific serial predator. The case against him with Bertha And Beverly was so strong. This isn't where I'm like aghast at how fast the death sentence was carried out. It's like it was him. This is a no brainer. They are fortunate. Byrd being at 45, he could have continued a killing series for the next, the next decade, two decades possibly. And so the fact that this witness saw him, called police and police responded and arrested him did save lives. There's no question in my mind about that.
- [59:07]
B
You know, I have a question that you probably don't have the answer to. When I was reading through all of this and I read about the initial time, you know, with the Cloots, and I just thought, this guy does not seem like a smart killer. As in, can't he really get away with even 11 out of 44 of these cases? He just doesn't seem like this mastermind slipping in and out. And I know we talk about criminal masterminds don't really exist, but still, I mean, he got caught so quickly and so easily. Could he really have gotten away with 11 or more of those?
- [59:40]
C
I think in Beverly and Bertha's case, the luck is that witness these other cases, if you don't have that witness across, across the street or the neighbor. Absolutely. Because I mean, law enforcement is so handicapped in what they could do investigating these cases, let alone the transient nature of Bird, you know, so he could have left all sorts of evidence at the crime scene or with the victim's bodies and he would never be identified.
- [60:12]
B
Yep. Well, there you go. I mean, next week, hopefully no confession Killer, as they called Henry Lee Lucas, which was so nauseating if you've ever read anything about, you know, him and, and sort of like the relationship that he had created with these investigators, you know, that's what this reminded me of. So anyway, no Henry Lee Lucas or Jake Bird next week and. But maybe a hex. I don't know. I was interested in the hex. I thought that was good. That's how I had heard of it.
- [60:44]
C
Something out of. Out of Salem. Huh.
- [60:46]
B
But I. But I've never been hex. And I know you probably have had some version of a hex thrown on you.
- [60:51]
C
By guarantee there's a lot of people out there that don't like me.
- [60:57]
B
Oh, no, we can't end like that, Paul. Okay, next week, some other interesting and strange and twisty case without hexes, hopefully. All right, I'll see you.
- [61:11]
C
Bye.
- [61:16]
B
This has been an exactly right production
- [61:18]
C
for our sources and show notes. Go to exactlyrightmedia.com buriedbones Sources Our senior
- [61:25]
B
producer is Alexis Amorosi, research by Allison
- [61:28]
C
Trouble and Kate Winkler Dawson.
- [61:30]
B
Our mixing engineer is Ben Tolliday.
- [61:32]
C
Our theme song is by Tom Breyfogel.
- [61:35]
B
Our artwork is by Vanessa Lilac, executive
- [61:38]
C
produced by Karen Kilgari, Sheriff Georgia Hardstark and Danielle Kramer.
- [61:42]
B
You can follow Buried Bones on Instagram and Facebook @But buriedbones pod.
- [61:47]
C
Kate's most recent book, all that Is Wicked A Gilded Age Story of Murder and the Race to Decode the Criminal Mind is available now and Paul's best
- [61:54]
B
selling memoir, Unmasked My Life Solving America's Cold Cases is also available now.
- [62:00]
C
Listen to Barry bones on the iHeartRadio app. Apple Podcasts or wherever wherever you get your podcasts. From Sauce to Dust to Nuggets Diablo Dusted Crispy Chicken Nuggets no, they don't come in mild. That would make like zero sense with the name new Diablo Dusted Crispy Chicken Nuggets Only at Taco bell at participating
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