Butchering Family - Harrington, Delaware

Summary

Small Town Murder – "Butchering Family – Harrington, Delaware"

Podcast: Small Town Murder
Hosts: James Pietragallo & Jimmie Whisman
Episode Air Date: June 19, 2026
Theme: A deep dive into the devastating double murder of Bayard and Alberta Smith in tiny Harrington, Delaware, the backgrounds (and failures) leading to the crime, and the over-the-top evidence that sealed the fate of two hapless—and horrifying—killers.

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Episode Overview

In this episode, James and Jimmie turn their comedic investigative lens on the tragic slaying of an elderly couple in rural Delaware in 1979. With trademark banter and dark humor, the hosts unpack the lives of the victims and their murderers, exploring how generational trauma, addiction, and sheer stupidity culminated in a gruesome crime spree—against the relative’s own flesh and blood. Interspersed with small-town trivia and law enforcement missteps, the episode is an engaging, tragic, and sometimes absurd true crime tale.

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Setting the Scene: Harrington, Delaware

[04:45] – [12:05]

• A Town Few Can Place, Even Fewer Visit:
  The hosts riff on Delaware’s forgettable reputation and Harrington’s sleepy central location ("There's no real reaction to Delaware." – James, [04:49]).
• Demographics & Vibe:
  Population: ~3,730. Median income lower than national average, cheap homes, very rural, everyone seems to know each other or is related.
  • "There's a lot of rural areas around here, too. There's some farmland, and it's very rural." – James, [05:46]
• History, Fun Facts, and the Delaware State Fair:
  • Town named after Samuel Maxwell Harrington, developed as a railroad hub.
  • Big on harness racing, has a bustling casino ("a $6 million slots palace").
  • State fair’s major draw includes pig races with punny names (Kevin Bacon, Snoop Hoggy Hog, Ari Hamma Grande), racing corgis, and small-town entertainers.
    • "I knew there was going to be a ham reference." – Jimmie, [11:24]

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The Victims: Bayard & Alberta Smith

[12:11] – [13:47]

• Bayard (68) and Alberta (69), a retired couple living modestly, "doing all right for themselves." Raised kids during the Depression, obsessed with stocking up frozen food, living on tight finances and surrounded by family.
  • "They keep shitloads of frozen food. They're like paranoid or running out of food." – James, [12:54]

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The Murderers: William Flamer & Andre Deputy

[14:07] – [19:51]

• William Henry Flamer:
  • Alberta’s nephew, raised in hardship by his grandmother, alcoholic since elementary school, criminal record for forgery, couldn’t hold down a job.
  • "He started drinking pretty much around then, like elementary school. He's an elementary school drinker." – James, [16:09]
  • Notoriously unlucky name ("He had a tough time in junior high, this kid." – James, [14:42])
  • Known for "partying and jiving," a 1970s phrase they mercilessly lampoon.
• Andre Deputy:
  • Friend of Flamer, fundamentally dangerous—convictions for manslaughter, sexual assault, Molotov cocktails. Product of intense trauma (witnessed mom’s shotgun murder at age 12).
  • "He's not doing a little forgery. He's raping and killing and blowing shit up." – James, [18:18]
  • Son of a preacher; childhood trauma, mental health issues; multiple siblings became alcoholics.

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The Crime Unfolds

Build-Up & Motive

[23:07] – [25:14]

• The Neighborhood:
  • Both offenders and victims lived within a few hundred yards in the rural community.
  • Deputy and Flamer spent days drinking, day-drinking at the Blue Moon bar.
    • "If you do it once a year. It's like, man, what a great day. I'm taking a nap by 4 o'clock." – James, [22:46]
• Morning of the Murder:
  • Feb 7, 1979: Arthur Smith, son, sees dad’s car missing post-snowstorm.
  • He finds both elderly parents butchered on the living room floor, house ransacked, evidence everywhere.
    • "If you made a horror movie and you said, I mean, cover it in blood, you could not do this. It's that much blood." – James, [24:05]
    • "A sofa cushion had cut marks, his dad's trouser pants are turned inside out, and the television's gone. Frozen food is all over the place." – James, [24:20]
    • "Somebody thought they kept the money in the freezer or something." – Jimmie, [25:15]

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Investigation: The Clues and Stupidity

[31:29] – [37:36]

• Police quickly ID the Smith’s missing car, witnesses saw a suitcase-carrying man (Flamer) abandon it.
• Their own family fingers William Flamer immediately from the composite: "That's William Flamer, who was her cousin." – James, [33:10]
• They find:
  • At Flamer’s home: Stolen TV with cut antenna cable, frozen food wrapped just like the Smiths’, and the murder bayonet, "covered in dried blood, sitting right in the middle of the goddamn kitchen." – James, [35:14]
  • Jimmie: "Something's wrong with him." [35:25]

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Arrests & Interrogations

[36:43] – [46:29]

• Both men are easily located—at the Blue Moon, drinking, Flamer literally covered in blood.
  • "He went to a bar, covered in blood. Still." – James, [37:38]
• Deputy caught with the stolen wallet and ID in his pocket; tries to pass himself off as ‘Ray Anderson’.
• Multiple, shifting stories: versions involve denial, rando scapegoat ("Johnny Christopher"), and then vague blame-shifting.
  • "If you're going to make up a name, don't start it with Johnny, which sounds immediately like you made it up." – James, [44:46]
• Police employ psychological tactics ("Do you believe in God? You're going to burn in hell unless you get straight with me." – James, [46:17])

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Crime Recap & Evidence

[49:49] – [53:27]

• Confessions (in pieces):
  • Both eventually admit to entering the Smith’s house under a ruse (a relative had a stroke), carrying a bayonet and kitchen knife.
  • Both stabbed the couple: Flamer "started stabbing his uncle" and Deputy "began stabbing Alberta" (with each then joining in against both victims).
  • Motive: Pathetically small loot—$25, a TV, a fan, frozen food—all left in plain sight at home or with the suspects.
• Overwhelming evidence:
  • Multiple witness IDs.
  • Blood everywhere, on skin, clothes, under nails.
  • Stolen items, food, and weapons traced directly.
  • Eyewitnesses saw them abandon the car and walk away in broad daylight.

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The Crime’s Brutality

[51:11] – [53:27]

• Autopsy:
  • Bayard Smith: 79 stab wounds (19 with bayonet, 8 with paring knife, 52 undetermined).
  • Alberta Smith: 66 stab wounds (25 with bayonet, 2 paring knife, 39 undetermined).
  • Both had countless defensive wounds.
    • "150 stab wounds on elderly people. James, this is so fucked up." – Jimmie, [53:27]

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Trials, Appeals, and Sentencing

[64:00] – [73:03]

• Separate Trials: Both charged with four counts of 1st-degree murder (intentional and felony), robbery, and more.
• Defense Strategies:
  • Flamer’s: He was scared of Deputy and went along out of fear. (Not convincing.)
    • James: "Not a good defense ... This is your idea." [64:37, 64:41]
  • On the stand, Flamer spun a new story, flatly contradicted by his own confession.
  • Defense attorney waives closing argument to avoid prosecutor “sandbagging” during rebuttal.
• Guilty Verdicts: Both men sentenced to death (by hanging, later switched to lethal injection).
  • "The prosecution said, yeah, thou shalt not kill. Pertain to William too. He had free choice ... You, sir, may fuck off. Death by hanging." – James, [68:44]
• On Death Row:
  • Both get "jailhouse religion", sing in choirs, claim they've changed, plead for mercy.
    • Deputy: "I'm trusting my Lord and Savior to save me so I can serve him in the prison and lead others to him." – Deputy (letter), [78:49]
• Executions:
  • Andre Deputy executed June 23, 1994 (chose lethal injection).
  • William Flamer executed January 30, 1996 (chose lethal injection; barely covered in the press as attention had faded after the previous hanging).
• Aftermath: Delaware eventually dismantled the gallows in 2003 when no eligible prisoners remained.

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Notable Quotes & Banter

• "There's only about a 10 year period of time in the world where you could have been jiving. And that's from about '71 to '81. Other side of that, there's no jiving going on." – James, [15:51]
• "He learned alcohol from him. I've never. It's what? ... We've never heard that phrase ever." – James, [15:21]
• "If you come in covered in blood or holding the dead person's wallet with their ID in it, either way, you're kind of fucked at that point." – James, [48:51]
• "I hope every one of [his last meal] was a Frozen one." – Jimmie, on the irony of Deputy’s execution menu, [79:13]
• "That should be Tiger Rose. They should have did that first. It would have been good for him. You take a sip and then you turn into a tiger." – James, on the killer’s drink of choice, [81:32]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Town Profile & Banter: [04:45] – [12:08]
• Victims' Background: [12:11] – [14:07]
• Suspect Backgrounds & Childhood Trauma: [14:07] – [19:51]
• Day Drinking & Small-Town Bar Life: [22:27] – [23:45]
• Discovery of Bodies/Crime Scene: [23:45] – [25:39]
• Police Investigation: [31:29] – [37:36]
• Arrest & Interrogation Comedy: [36:43] – [46:29]
• Confessions/Recap: [49:49] – [53:27]
• Trial & Sentencing: [64:00] – [73:03]
• Final Executions/Life in Prison: [73:03] – [80:45]

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Memorable/Absurd Moments

• The hosts’ riffing on the absurdity of the frozen food obsession.
• Repeated incredulity at the criminals' stupidity—e.g., leaving murder weapons and loot in plain view, walking around town covered in blood.
  • "He hasn't even washed his hands. His hands and face are covered with blood." – James, [37:38]
• The offhand review of the local pig race at the state fair—"Arie Hamma Grande is good." – James, [11:25]
• Jimmie’s mockery of complaints about "not having cigarettes and liquor in jail"—"This is the least jiving prison I've ever been in, man. This sucks." – James & Jimmie, [43:36–43:49]
• Unintentional irony in the killer’s final meal: fried, frozen-style shrimp and flounder.

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Tone and Language

Consistently irreverent, occasionally profane, mixing gallows humor with empathy for the victims and frustration at the idiocy, violence, and tragedy of the crime. The hosts punctuate brutal details with punchlines, yet avoid making light of the senseless loss at the story’s core.

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Summary

This episode details the senseless 1979 slaying of a harmless, elderly couple in Harrington, DE, at the hands of their own family and a hardened criminal friend. Traversing the idiocy, trauma, and drunkenness that led to a crime solved almost immediately, James and Jimmie highlight just how dumb—and dark—real-life murder can be, all while slinging punchlines and keeping the outrage real. From the town’s state fair pig races to the execution chamber, "Butchering Family" is a true crime tale both horrifying and bizarrely, bleakly funny.

Transcript

[James Pietragallo]

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[James Pietragallo]

Hello, everybody, and welcome back to small town Murder Express.

[Podcast Advertiser]

Yay.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Choo choo.

[James Pietragallo]

Yay indeed, Jimmy. Yay indeed. My name is James Petregallo. I'm here with my co host, Jimmy.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I'm Jimmy Whisman.

[James Pietragallo]

Thank you folks so much for joining us today. All aboard the Murder train pulling away from the station. We have a wild story, as we always do every episode, whether it's an express or a regular, it's always crazy. And this is no different than any of them. And we're going back to a different place we haven't been in a while. It's going to be a lot of fun. Before we get to all that, definitely head over to shut upandgivememurder.com all the merchandise you could possibly want there. In addition to that, tickets to live shows. You want those? Our live shows are so fun. They are big, big comedy show and there's also a murder. And it's a lot of fun. And there's so many.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Have you seen anything like this?

[James Pietragallo]

No, you haven't. Honestly, people that see our show, like people in the comics and stuff are like, that's a crazy show you guys put on. That's wild.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Pretty fucking legit.

[James Pietragallo]

It's pretty legit. There's a lot of pictures with jokes and pictures of stuff and we're always riffing. It's a good time. So get your tickets right now for September 18th at the Pabst in Milwaukee. Can't wait for that. Those are almost gone, so get those now and then also the next night, State Theater in Minneapolis on September 19th. Can't wait. We've been there once and it was a great show. Can't wait to go back there again. Get your tickets for that right now. Then in October, Dallas, San Jose, Sacramento and November, Terrytown in Boston. So great. Get them now while they're hot, that is. Shut up and give me murder dot com. Can't wait to see everybody out there. Listen to our other two shows. Yeah, Crime in Sports, which we're doing a big series on the Yahweh Benyawe cult that murdered a whole bunch of people. So you don't have to like sports to like that. Your stupid opinions is as hilarious as ever. Actually more. It's getting better and better and it's so much fun. So do that and listen to those shows. Get yourself patreon. Very important. Patreon.com crimeinsports Just like the name of that show that we do there. What you get there? Anybody? $5 a month or above. Never going to grow up. That's what it is. $5 a month. You get everything we put out. As soon as you subscribe. You get hundreds of back bonus episodes you've never heard before. Almost 400 of them. Like a whole other feed. Then you get new ones every other week. One crime and sports, one small town murder. And you get them. That's right, Every damn drop of them. So get in there this week, which you're gonna get for Crime and Sports. We're gonna talk about different hostage situations over the years.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Fantastic.

[James Pietragallo]

It's so much fun after that. Stockholm1. I'm fascinated by these things. And then Small town murder it is. Cory Richens part three. And believe me, there's reason for it because it's all new information. Now we have what her kids said happened that night, which is bonkers and the complete opposite of what she said and makes her 10 times worse of a murderer. She's awful. And how bad. They talk about how bad of a mother she is. Her kids rip her a new asshole. It's crazy stuff. And then her allocution's crazy too. We'll talk about all that and more. Patreon.com crimeinsports and you get all the shows we put out everything. All ad free as well. Ad free. And then on top of that, you get a shout out at the end of the regular show. Oh yeah, you're getting it all, everybody. So you get in there right now. Patreon.com crimeinsports that said, I think it's time everybody to sit back. What do you say? Clear the lungs here. Get ready for Everything. Arms to the sky. Let's all shout Shut up and give me murder. Let's do this, everybody.

[Jimmy Whisman]

All right.

[James Pietragallo]

Let's go on a trip, shall we?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Let's do it.

[James Pietragallo]

We're going to Delaware.

[Jimmy Whisman]

It's lovely

[James Pietragallo]

every time. There's no real reaction to Delaware. Delaware. Oh, that's by Maryland, isn't it? That's all you say.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I just consider it. It's probably just a lot of houses with blue and gold all over.

[James Pietragallo]

A lot of blue, yeah. Maybe some nautical themes. Blue and white, possibly.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah. A lot of boat wheels in these homes.

[James Pietragallo]

Oh, tons of them. This is in central Delaware. The whole thing's kind of one big panhandle. It's just like a strip that they

[Jimmy Whisman]

cut out of another strip of land.

[James Pietragallo]

That's it. It's 30 minutes to Dover, Delaware. About an hour and 40 minutes to Baltimore. Want to go that way? And about an hour and 10 minutes to Newcastle, Delaware, which was our last Delaware episode. This is episode 710. That was episode 528.

[Jimmy Whisman]

God damn.

[James Pietragallo]

Been a minute since we've done some Delaware. So definitely that's been a while. This is in Kent County. That episode was called Murder Math, by the way. That was a fun one. Area code here, 302. Population 3,730. So pretty small place.

[Jimmy Whisman]

And it's.

[James Pietragallo]

There's a lot of rural areas around here, too. There's some farmland, and it's very rural. Median household income here is just below the national average about $62,639. But the median home cost is well under the national average as well. That is $221,900, which is pretty inexpensive compared to everywhere else. And it has two mottos here. Two. One is the hub of Delaware.

[Jimmy Whisman]

It's not.

[James Pietragallo]

But okay, it's in the middle. I mean, that's. You know. And then because these are all like geography based, it feels like just where they're located. The next one is where Delaware comes together.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Does it?

[James Pietragallo]

Cause it's the middle of it, I guess. That's all I can think now. Little bit of history. Harrington was named for the Honorable Samuel Maxwell Harrington, who's a former chancellor of the state. Yeah, I don't know what's going on there. The town developed at a railroad junction along the Delaware Railroad and served as a trading center. Before it was Harrington, it was known as Clark's Corner. Clark's Corner. Clark's Corner. It was fashioned out of 6,000 acres of forest is basically it. Clark was Benjamin Clark. And in 1780, he built a home and a tavern here and kind of started the place on the corner of two roads.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Benjamin Clark was a pretty big deal, wasn't he?

[James Pietragallo]

I'd never heard of him.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Thirteen original colonies.

[James Pietragallo]

Benjamin Clark.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I feel like he was one of the authors of. No. Did he not sign that?

[James Pietragallo]

I don't think so. Because in 1780, he was running a tavern in the middle of here. So 1770.

[Podcast Advertiser]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

Maybe he retired early. Yeah. Can't imagine he fell that far in four years from. Hey, Ben, will you sign this? We need your signature on this day. Fuck off and go tell drunks to get out of your fucking place. It's a little different. I hope that didn't happen.

[Jimmy Whisman]

It feels like an important name, though. Unless he really just gave up on everything. Was like, fuck it, I'm selling boots.

[James Pietragallo]

Might have had a big scandal, Just had to open a bar. It's a huge scandal. Who knows?

[Jimmy Whisman]

A scandal back then would have to be crazy because everybody was fucking everybody.

[James Pietragallo]

The scandal would be, you didn't go to church on Sunday or something.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Scandal would be, he didn't fuck those people.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, but he could have had, like, 45 illegitimate children, half of them with fucking slaves. It wouldn't have mattered. Like, they would have been, well, I mean, that's fine, but he should have went to church Sunday. We're gonna hold him responsible for that. So 1862 is when they named it Harrington. Who was the chancellor of the Delaware Railroad.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah, I don't think. I don't think.

[James Pietragallo]

Wow. No reviews of this town here. Five stars. Harrington is a nice small city in Delaware, and it is somewhere nice to move, if you prefer small towns and not big cities. We have a couple of places that are walking distance. And overall is a nice town to live in.

[Jimmy Whisman]

A couple of places that are walking distance.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. Sounds like that person just had a stroke. By the way they're writing. It's just like very.

[Jimmy Whisman]

There's only 4,000 people, and you got nothing walkable.

[James Pietragallo]

Not even 4,000. There's a lot of rural areas around here, too. That's the thing. So long distances. One star. I will never spend a cent in this corrupt town.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Okay.

[James Pietragallo]

I hope their little speed trap racket is worth it to their revenue. One of those towns, that's how they make.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That's a traveler right there. That's not somebody that spent any time here. They spent whatever it took to be stopped by the police here.

[James Pietragallo]

The same review we leave of that town in Texas, we got pulled over, going through same thing. Let's hope it's worth it because we're never going to.

[Jimmy Whisman]

A couple in New Mexico, a couple in Utah. They're all over the southwest. Those little towns fucking. That's all they make money. That's the only way they make money.

[James Pietragallo]

And finally, one star. A terrible place to live.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah. Wow.

[James Pietragallo]

Very corrupt. And many clicks. Just waiting until I can get out of here.

[Jimmy Whisman]

How'd they spell clicks?

[James Pietragallo]

They spelled it correctly.

[Jimmy Whisman]

How about it?

[James Pietragallo]

I'm surprised, honestly. The last person didn't spell cities correctly. But they spelled clicks correctly. So that's good things to do. Harrington has been big. A big harness racing town.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Is that right?

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Like chariots?

[James Pietragallo]

Apparently. Yeah. It started in the 1946 and the next year they swarmed an association called the Harrington Raceway and built the track that is still there. Still a major attraction.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Wow.

[James Pietragallo]

Then there's also the Harrington Raceway and casino. A quote $6 million slots palace with 1327 machines to play.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Doesn't seem like a lot.

[James Pietragallo]

No. It attracts 1.5 million people every 10 months which is a very odd measurement. How about we just do it every 10 months now? Fuck years.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Is 10 months a fiscal year? Is that. What are they doing?

[James Pietragallo]

You got me. I don't know what's going on, but that really shocked me.

[Jimmy Whisman]

They must close down for a couple of months.

[James Pietragallo]

They have to. And then there's also the Delaware State Fair is in Harrington. Oh, and at the Delaware State Fair they have the Hollywood racing pigs. What are those pig races? Well, the highly energetic show features adorable mini pigs and pot bellied pigs racing around a custom built obstacle strewn track to win their favorite prize. An Oreo cookie. That's their reward at the end.

[Jimmy Whisman]

So we all watch pigs Run for a cookie.

[James Pietragallo]

Run for a cookie pig races. And you bet on them here because it's at the casino, I'm sure. And they have celebrity pig puns. That's what the draw is as they name the pigs. There is Kevin Bacon. Obviously that's a given. Snoop Hoggy Hog Britney Spareribs.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I like that.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, that's funny. Ari Hamma Grande. That's my favorite.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I knew there was going to be a ham reference.

[James Pietragallo]

That's a good one there. So yeah. There's also racing corgis. So tiny dogs racing. Which is kind of hilarious.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I mean the dog that looks most like a pig.

[James Pietragallo]

That's right. Yeah.

[Jimmy Whisman]

With their faces on very small and long and fat.

[James Pietragallo]

And also performing there will be Jess Kelly Adams following the Hollywood pig races. That's how you want to follow. And also Adam Calvert. Beats me. No idea.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Those are country acts.

[James Pietragallo]

And there's also Dan. Dan the farmer man. That's hilarious. Okay, that said, let's talk about some murder, shall we? All right, let's do this. All right. That fair sounds great though. That sounds like fun.

[Jimmy Whisman]

At least they've got senses of humor about it. They know it's stupid, right?

[James Pietragallo]

Arie Grande is good. So this murder. Let's talk about Bayard and Alberta Smith. First off, they're 68. Bayard's 68 and his wife Alberta is 69.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Bayard with a D. Bayard.

[James Pietragallo]

Bayard. B Y, A R D. Never seen that name before in my life. That's ever. Yeah, So I was like, okay, Bayard. Now, as of 1979, that's where we're gonna catch up with them. They're living in a nice little two story house. Modest but nice. They've done all right for themselves. They're retired now. Money's tight. They live on Social Security. They're not wealthy people or anything like that. They keep shitloads of frozen food. Oh, shitloads. They're like paranoid or running out of food. And then think about when they came up. This is 1979. They came up during the Depression.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

They keep. They can get food now. They stockpile it for later. That's how it is.

[Jimmy Whisman]

What kind of frozen food? Do they freeze everything or do they frozen shit?

[James Pietragallo]

Boxes of it, bags of it, frozen dinners, frozen things. Frozen. They're in the frozen. And that must be a thing. Cause one of my grandmothers, racist nan, was very much like that. She had a freezer in the basement that was just packed with shit. And I'm talking shit that. When she. Like when my grandfather died, I remember my father went down and he cleaned out the freezer and there was stakes in there that were twisted and white. And the sell by date was like 14 years ago. That's how much things store. Shit. She'd have ate it too. That's the sad part. She'd have tried to serve it to somebody.

[Jimmy Whisman]

You can freeze things for a bit. It doesn't stop the breakdown, but it slows it tremendously.

[James Pietragallo]

And it starts a different kind.

[Jimmy Whisman]

A lot of the frozen foods are in. Your frozen food section is full of fucking preservatives also. It's a frozen preservative.

[James Pietragallo]

It's meant to be frozen and stay frozen for a while. So they would keep that. They have adult children who. Including a son named Arthur who's about 35 years old and lives right across the street. They have a Daughter who lives in the area. They have a lot of family right around them on the streets. One of these rural areas where one family kind of dominates a whole area here, other family in the area, they have Alberta, the wife has a half sister named Mildred who lives on the street as well. Her son also lives there. And that is William Henry Flamer. Yeah, he had a tough time in junior high, this kid.

[Jimmy Whisman]

The worst.

[James Pietragallo]

The worst time in junior high. The worst. Hey, Billy Flamer. Look at you now. William had been raised mostly by his grandmother Florence Benson, in a house about 150 yards from Bayard in Alberta. That's because he had a terrible life, essentially. Born in 1954, raised by his grandmother Florence Benson, with his father also in the home. But not great. He recalls, basically his father was always drunk and he said that his dad would jump on mom and take her money. I learned alcohol from him. I learned alcohol from him. I've never. It's what? I've never. We've never heard that phrase ever.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I don't think that's ever been said before.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, even I've never heard anybody say I've learned drugs from him.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

It just doesn't make sense.

[Jimmy Whisman]

No.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, he worked at the racetracks. Different. The Harrington one and a different one. This is. William did, he said, but he spent most of his time, quote, this is a great 1979 quote quote, partying and jiving. Jiving, just jiving. Real 70s style.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Not the hand variety.

[James Pietragallo]

No. There's only about a 10 year period of time in the world where you could have been jiving. And that's from about 71 to 81. Other side of that. There's no jiving going on.

[Jimmy Whisman]

You could hand jive in the 50s.

[James Pietragallo]

You could do that. But you can't be just partying and jiving.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Just generally jiving. No, you got to get a job.

[James Pietragallo]

A general jive was a very small window to have a general drive here. And he said I could drink a fifth at a time as well. Partying and driving, drinking a fifth, jiving. His mother lived elsewhere, but basically he said he saw his mom every day after she'd get off work when he was young. But he lived with his grandmother since the age of five. He started drinking pretty much around then, like elementary school. He's an elementary school drinker. He started at that age. His mother said he was a good student until the 11th grade when he quit school and just started drinking full time.

[Jimmy Whisman]

He was a good student and then was like, nah, I'm done.

[James Pietragallo]

He just Wanted to drink all the time. Wow. And everybody says his personality would change, switch on a dime when he was drunk, which some people, that's what they do. He got married briefly. That didn't work out, mainly because he was drunk. 1976, he has a daughter as well.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That's in the middle of jiving.

[James Pietragallo]

I mean, partying. That's what happens when you're partying and jiving. You knock somebody up. That's part of the jiving.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

I jived during this. I'm unprotected and this is what happened. So 1975, he's got some problems. He couldn't hold steady work. A lot of it was his drinking. And in 1975 he picks up two felony convictions for forgery.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Shit.

[James Pietragallo]

Because he's just trying to like some check thing or something, trying to get a few bucks. And he's doing odds.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Cause he's got a baby.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, he's doing odd jobs and part time work now. He's got a friend of his who he hangs out with here named Andre Stanley. Deputy, like a deputy officer.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Wow.

[James Pietragallo]

Now deputy was not from this town. No, deputy's from Wilmington. He's about six years older than William and also pretty big too. And he's got a fucking hell of a story here. Wow. He's got by 79, he's already had a bunch of convictions. One for manslaughter, what? One for sexual assault and one for the manufacturing of Molotov cocktails.

[Jimmy Whisman]

He's a bad man.

[James Pietragallo]

He's serious. He's not doing a little forgery. He's raping and killing and blowing shit up.

[Jimmy Whisman]

There's bodies in his wake and things are getting set on fire.

[James Pietragallo]

It's fucking crazy. Now, he was born in Wilmington. He's the son of a preacher and one of 11 children.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah, I don't think this is who she was singing about though.

[James Pietragallo]

No, this is not. Well, maybe. Unless she likes to be raped and set aflame by a Molotov cocktail.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Maybe he was handsy.

[James Pietragallo]

He was a little handsy. He dropped out of school in the ninth grade and worked odd jobs at racetracks just like the other guy. Long history of shit with the law. And he is a story. His origin story is like a comic book or something. It's crazy. When he was 12 years old, he saw his mother killed by a shotgun blast in front of him.

[Jimmy Whisman]

God damn.

[James Pietragallo]

That's gotta be a little dramatic, I would say, right?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Your mom. Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

That'll set you drinking. I think he explained it as, my sister had this Boyfriend. And he told her if she leaves him, she would never go with anyone else again. And they broke up. One night, he sneaked into our house, came through the third floor window, and sneaked down the stairs. Deputy said he was sitting in the living room with his mother, two of his brothers and his baby sister. And he said the boyfriend had a shotgun. My mother told him to put the gun down. She got up and he shot her. Oh, my God. In front of all the kids.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That's a terrible story.

[James Pietragallo]

That's a horrible story. That's some shit you'd see of how a comic book villain is formed or a hero, one of the two. That's crazy.

[Jimmy Whisman]

A guy broke up with his girlfriend and went and broke into the house

[James Pietragallo]

and murdered her mother in the living room. But this makes Fat Man's origin story look like bullshit. Like he's a pussy who should have just went to therapy twice and he would have been fine. This is way worse. This is terrible.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I mean, everybody goes to therapy for a long time.

[James Pietragallo]

He saw Batman and was like, bullshit, pussy. That's you off. So it's bad. So with the death of the mother, him and his brothers basically started jiving, I assume, just really out there jiving it up.

[Jimmy Whisman]

What happened to the sister?

[James Pietragallo]

She's alive.

[Jimmy Whisman]

She's off jiving somewhere too.

[James Pietragallo]

Partying and jiving. He said that basically the dad. His dad, quote, showed Andre and his siblings no little to no affection, spending all of his time, except when he was at work, in church because his dad is a preacher. He said I wasn't allowed to have friends. My father was strict. He thought that if I fooled around with other kids, I'd get into trouble. I got into trouble anyway. And he was. At age 9, he was still soiling himself in bed and basically living in a dream world, not living in reality. So he was sent off to the Governor Bacon Health center near Delaware City. He's sent off to a mental hospital for children when he's nine. When he's nine, before he even saw his mom.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Murked.

[James Pietragallo]

That's before he saw his mom. So he had problems to begin with. And then his mom got murdered and it all went crazy. So all of his siblings became horrible alcoholics, by the way, which seems about right.

[Jimmy Whisman]

And this guy's a rapist, slash manslaughter

[James Pietragallo]

and bomber as well.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

And in 1979, in February, when he's hanging out with William Flamer, there's one more thing. He also has a warrant out for his arrest at this point. A what? Warrant for Murder. A fucking murder warrant here. James W. Jackson was killed on July 15, 1977 after an argument over. I'll let you fill in the mad argument over. You'll never get it in a million years.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Well, you're 79.

[James Pietragallo]

77. 77.

[Jimmy Whisman]

77. Pinball game.

[James Pietragallo]

A game of horseshoes.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Horseshoes, of course, of course. It's a close counts, man. Horseshoes, the only game that close actually points.

[James Pietragallo]

This counts it. Yeah. That's crazy. So there's that. Now what they do, William and Andre, is hang out at the Blue Moon, which is a bar.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Is that bar.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. Just hanging out here and day drinking. Just bad times.

[Jimmy Whisman]

It's a good time. It's funny you said that time. I'm like, that sounds great.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, it's good times.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Nothing good comes from that though. If you do it consistently, if you

[James Pietragallo]

do it one day, it's an amazing vacation. If you do it every day, your life is a fucking disaster. You do it once a year. It's like, man, what a great day. I'm taking a nap by 4 o'.

[Podcast Advertiser]

Clock.

[James Pietragallo]

This is fantastic.

[Jimmy Whisman]

When you day drink and you don't do it, you go, we should do this more often. And then 6pm you go, I don't ever want to do that again.

[James Pietragallo]

That was terrible. My whole night's ruined now. Whole night's fucked. So they're shooting pool, hanging out. Nobody knows that this guy's wanted for murder or anything. So that's what's going on. That's the crew in the neighborhood and everything now. February 7, 1979, at 8:00am, Arthur Smith, who is Bayard and Alberta's son, who lives across the street, 35 years old. This morning he glances over, it's a heavy snowstorm this morning, snowing like crazy. So he looks over to his parents house and notices his father's car is missing from the driveway. He's like, that's weird. That doesn't go out in the snow in the morning.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah, who the fuck is at all?

[James Pietragallo]

Where's he going? So, yeah, he looks over, sees that, sees the weather and he's like, this isn't right at all. So he goes over to the house to see what's going on and goes inside. And what he finds is both of his parents, that's good. Problem is they're both dead on the living room floor.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh no.

[James Pietragallo]

Surrounded by shitloads of. I mean, blood is fucking everywhere. If you made a horror movie and you said, I mean, cover it in blood, you could not do this. It's that Much blood.

[Jimmy Whisman]

You'd be like, oh, you guys, this is too much. Nobody's gonna believe this.

[James Pietragallo]

It's on the ceiling, on the wall. I mean, it's fucking everywhere. And when you hear what the attack was, you'll understand why. Overturned chairs are everywhere. It just looks like it's horrifying. It looks like two lions came in and mauled them to death in here and knocked shit over while they were doing it. Like two giant animals. A sofa cushion had cut marks where a knife had gone through it. His dad's trouser pants are turned inside out. So someone's looking for something. And the television's gone. The antenna cable is cut. Because back then they had a cable from the antenna that's cut and left dangling there. So they know the TV is gone. And the other thing is in the kitchen. Frozen food is all over the place and all over the house. There's frozen food packages on the ground, things that came out of the freezer

[Podcast Advertiser]

all over the place.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Somebody thought they kept the money in the freezer or something.

[James Pietragallo]

But not all the frozen foods on the floor, just some of it packed shit strewn about. So Arthur Smith calls the police, as one does in that situation. They arrive the Delaware State Police, homicide here. They come in and they said that it was the worst thing they'd seen in years at best. You know what I mean?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Sandy champs everywhere.

[James Pietragallo]

All sorts of fish sticks as far as the eye can see. Gorton's fisherman is working overtime here. So the bodies, they find crazy amounts of injuries to the bodies. They've been stabbed a lot. I mean, a lot. And there's patterns and they're old. They're not bothering anybody. The wound patterns tell of two distinct weapons, too. These are not the same knife. There's one knife and one big knife and one small knife that you can tell they've been stabbed with. Hey, everybody. Jess gonna take a quick break from the show. To tell you a better way to get your wine with the First Leaf, try firstleaf.com Absolutely. I love a glass of wine at the end of the day after work with dinner or something like that. But the problem most people have is they don't know what to buy. Yeah, you just grab something and you hope that it's good. You don't know what's in that. You don't know if it's good.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Wines take on the flavor of the barrel they're in. So it's tough to know, tough to try something new.

[James Pietragallo]

Absolutely. So you end up just buying by price. Like, well, if it's that much. I guess it's good, but you don't know. That's the problem. And then you'll end up wasting your money. And you know, then we found First Leaf and it just makes the whole thing so much easier. They match wines to your taste and send them right to your door. First Leaf, they deliver premium wine straight to our doors. Every month you do just a quick quiz like we did about the preferences that you have for wine. And now they're sending us personalized selections that we're guaranteed to love. No more guesswork, no more settling on some random bottle you picked up right to your palate. That's it. Here's what makes it really easy. Every box comes with easy to follow tasting notes and pairing suggestions right in the box too, which helps. So whether you know we're making like a pasta or putting together a cheese board, if you got people over on a Friday night, you always know exactly what to pour. It's like a little cheat sheet that makes you look like you know what you're doing. So you look pretty cool. It's neat. First Leaf works directly with wineries, which means that we and you get access to award winning bottles, including wines you can't find at your local store at prices well below retail. And it really is. The prices are great. Better wine for less money, kind of a no brainer. If you want to have some wine here, you can control your delivery schedule completely. If you need wine by Friday, I can adjust the timing. If I'm going on vacation, I can hit skip a shipment. It fits your life perfectly. And if a bottle doesn't hit the mark, First Leaf has a 100% satisfaction guarantee. They will make it right. You definitely don't get that buying wine at the store. You can't bring a half a bottle back and go, I didn't really like this. They'll go, I'm tough. I don't know what to tell you. So we love First Leaf. I love it. We get Pinot Noirs and cabs in there. And depending on if we're having some steak or just having a glass of wine on a nice night, depends. And I love it. They have great brands, fantastic prices. This is the way to buy wine. This really is take the guesswork out of it. It's ridiculous. Stop settling for wines that don't quite hit the mark. Head to try firstleaf.com smalltownmurder to sign up and you'll get 50% off your first box plus free shipping for an entire year. That's T R Y F I R S T l e a f.com SmallTownMurder Try FirstLeaf.com SmallTownMurder now back to the show. Hey, everybody. Just gonna take a quick break from the show to tell you how to get a much better night's sleep with

[Jimmy Whisman]

Bolen, Branch, bolenbranch.com B O L L

[James Pietragallo]

and branch.com this is the best stuff you're gonna look at your bed. Your sheets are slipping off a little bit. They've been washed a few too many times.

[Jimmy Whisman]

How annoying is that?

[James Pietragallo]

It's the. Your pillows don't feel. You gotta, like, fold them over, put your arm under them. They're not quite what they were. You know what I mean? But people keep their bedding way longer than they should have. It's like a family heirloom to some people. They're gonna keep it forever, but it's not. It doesn't go up in value. It just actually brings your sleep down in value. That's the problem here. That's why. And people think it's a new mattress that they need. Bedding is what you're looking for. You need the new bedding, and that's why we upgraded myself and Jimmy with Boll and Branch. They make everything your bed needs. Their signature organic cotton sheets, pillows, and blankets, and comforters are all designed to be breathable, incredibly soft, and get better over time. They do, too. They're so good. I don't know how they do this. I don't know how bowl and Branch does this, but it's incredible.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Their sheets are so nice. You take a shower and climb in them. Fresh, clean sheets and fresh, clean body. They're shams.

[James Pietragallo]

They're the comforter.

[Jimmy Whisman]

The throw. The throw's amazing. You can take it out on the couch with you. It's incredible.

[James Pietragallo]

And their pillows. Their pillows are awesome. Their pillows are awesome. And that's. Most people start with the signature sheets, and a lot of customers buy two sets so they can rotate them. And we also added the waffle blanket they have now. And the whole bed is awesome. It's just so good with all that stuff. The moment you get into bed, you notice the difference. You want to be in there to see sleep. It's so good. And I know we've been. We talk about this off the air, how good these sheets are. And Jimmy's like, I sleep so much better now. We love the bowl and branch. It's just great. And it's like, what was it the first day you got it?

[Jimmy Whisman]

It's like immediate that waffle blanket is amazing.

[James Pietragallo]

It's so good. It's so good. So I'm telling you from us, you want to get a better night's sleep, you really need to do this. Really get it. Get the pillows, get the waffle blanket. Hook it up. Sleep cooler this summer with Bole and branch during their annual summer event. For a limited time, get 20% off site [e-mail] Smalltown Murder with the code smalltown murder. That's Boland Branch B O l l a n-dash.com Smalltown murder code Small town murder to take 20% off bolandbranch.com Smalltown murder code Small town murder exclusions apply.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Now back to the show.

[James Pietragallo]

They look around. The scattered frozen food, the antennae, all of that. It's wild. Then they find a watch band pin. So a little pin thing. Oh, yeah, the watch banner up here. Yeah. They find that little tiny thing lying loose, which near Bayard's body. So probably came off of his watch ripped. Yeah. Overturned furniture, emptied pockets, purses, purse upside down and contents strewn about. Then while they're still at the scene working this, they get a call saying they found the Smith's car. Bayard and Alberta Smith, they found their car because that was missing. It was abandoned north of Felton. So they have to go find the car. The residents in Felton described they have witnesses that saw a man leaving the car, which is good. They see a man leaving the abandoned car that morning. So a hardware store employee named William Wooters described a man coming into his store using the phone. A witness named Clara Green saw a man leaving the area with a suitcase and other items. And everybody got a good look at this guy. I mean, he wasn't hiding himself. He came in, went into the store, used the phone, everything. So the detectives, they have a description. Several witnesses describe the exact same person.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

So they go, that's gotta be the guy. And they all given. If you have five different people and they all give the same description, that's probably who it is. And they haven't talked to each other. So they take that description to the Smith family.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh.

[James Pietragallo]

Which is an odd.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Does this sound familiar? Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

Do you know this person? So they take. Because there's no forced entry, so they let somebody in the house or they had the door unlocked, whatever. But they're saying that this is not like no one kicked in the door or anything. So do you know this person? And they give the description. Their daughter heard it and said, that's William Flamer. That sounds exactly Like William Flamer, who was her cousin.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That's William. Brace yourself for his last name.

[James Pietragallo]

You guys are going to want to make fun of him when you put the cuffs on. Don't worry. They said, well, do you know where he lives? And they go, 150 fucking that way. Right there. That's their house, that one. See the green one? That's the house, yeah. So the detectives go up the street to 147 Ms. Pilon, Ms. Pillion street, where Florence Benson, the grandma, answers the door and says he's not home and I don't know where he is. So they say, do you mind if we come in and look around a bit? And she said, come on in and invited him in to search the house. Okay. They go, well, where's William's room? And she says, up there. So they go there first and they find brown paper bags of frozen food.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Why did he do that?

[James Pietragallo]

Not even in the freezer. They're in his room, so it's just gonna rot. And they're wrapped in brown paper bags the same way as the food sitting on the floor in the house. In the first floor closet, they find a TV set with an antenna cable cut, cut free, which matches up to the other end over there. Also a fan that they stole. They stole a fan, Jimmy.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Like a standing fan?

[James Pietragallo]

Like a fucking fan? Like just a fan.

[Jimmy Whisman]

A box fan. Either way.

[James Pietragallo]

Either way. A portable thing back then, $8 a fan, the fan was there. Then the coup de grace, here. They go into the kitchen and they're talking to Florence. And they look over. Out in the open, sitting on a stand, is a bayonet just covered in dried blood.

[Jimmy Whisman]

What the fuck?

[James Pietragallo]

A fucking giant bayonet covered in dried blood. And the sheath is covered in blood. It's just covered in blood sitting right in the middle of the goddamn kitchen. So it's human blood?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah. Something's wrong with him.

[James Pietragallo]

Stupid. Is that it? Drunk?

[Jimmy Whisman]

I mean, yes, something's wrong. You didn't even consider that? This is weird.

[James Pietragallo]

Drunk is the problem, as we'll talk about. So the detectives went before justice of the peace. They got a first degree murder warrant. And there's gotta be some stupid too, because that's crazy. I feel like if you're really smart, you don't get like half as smart if you're drunk, you know what I mean? I feel like it takes a lot of your intelligence away. And if you're not that smart, it could really make you super stupid. But you'd have to be a little stupid to begin with to end up there. I feel like baffling. It's weird.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I mean, you'd have to be just ossified drunk to be able to fucking wreck to get to this level of stupid. And is this arrogance?

[James Pietragallo]

What is it? I'm take frozen food. Just get all of it. I'll make it all tonight. It's okay.

[Jimmy Whisman]

And what is the. Is this like filet Sweet. What's in there? That's wrapped up? That's. Is that salmon chunks? What is that?

[James Pietragallo]

I have no idea. So they get the warrant, and while they're still at the courthouse, they get a report that William Flamer has been seen at the Blue Moon tavern on Route 13 south of Woodside.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Right now?

[James Pietragallo]

Right now. So by 3:15, they are converging on the Blue Moon Tavern. So they found the scene at 8, and by 3:15, case is solved and we're going to get the guy, which is impressive, I gotta say. So three state police detectives and two Harrington officers converge on three men walking down the shoulder of Route 13. Always a sign of success when grown men are walking down the shoulder of a major road. That's how you know three wild, three wide. Three wide. And yeah, it's Flamer, Andre, deputy, and a guy named Ellsworth Coleman. Okay, now, one of the detectives recognizes Flamer because it's a small town and he's dealt with him before. So he knows. He goes, that's the guy we're looking for. They confront them. Hey, guys, how you doing? Flamer is covered in blood. He's covered in blood.

[Jimmy Whisman]

He has not changed yet.

[James Pietragallo]

He hasn't even washed his hands. His hands and face are covered with blood. Yeah, blood on his clothing covering it. And he has fresh scratches all over his neck and chest. And, I mean, it looks like, hey, I'm a guy who murdered someone a little while ago. Like I said, if you were in a movie, the makeup would be, he just slaughtered two people. This is exactly how you'd put him, dress him.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oblivious is the word.

[James Pietragallo]

Oblivious. Walking down the street like he went to a bar, covered in blood. Still, he's arrested. On the warrant, all three men are frisked. Okay, officers feel a wallet in Andre Deputy's back pocket. They don't take it out right now because they don't have a warrant for him. But they ask him for identification. He says he doesn't have any. They ask Andre deputy, what's your name? Now he's got a murder warrant, so he's not gonna tell them. And he says, ray Anderson.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Good guess.

[James Pietragallo]

Good shot. So all three of them are taken to the police station about 4pm Now Coleman, the third man, is questioned and released. He just met up with them like an hour ago. So he's like, I don't know what the fuck they did earlier. I just met them. I just met up with him. And he had an idea.

[Jimmy Whisman]

But I'm crazy, too, because I walk down the street with men covered in

[James Pietragallo]

blood, covered in blood. And I'm like, you want to walk down the road? And I go, yeah, man. Covered in blood. I'd like to walk down a highway with you. Sure.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Let's go for a walk, the two of yous.

[James Pietragallo]

So February 7th, 1979, 4:00pm to 7:00pm here's what goes on. Here is Flamer's story, version one. Okay. Okay. He's Miranda's and everything like that. He says, well, I was home asleep. That's it. And he said, andre, Deputy woke me up that morning and asked me to come along to my aunt and uncle's house to get some food. We're gonna steal some food from them. Okay?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Okay. So they did that.

[James Pietragallo]

He said when he got there, he found the Smiths were already dead. He said, we walked in. That's how we found it.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That's terrible.

[James Pietragallo]

It's awful. And he said they were already dead. He said, I just helped carry out the food. That's why I got blood on me. Because there was blood on the. So I just took it. Being in the house, you saw it. He said, I'm not a killer. I just wanted to get some fucking Swansons. Just going for a banquet. What are we doing here?

[Jimmy Whisman]

You seen the market price for salmon?

[James Pietragallo]

Shit, these Salisbury steaks are expensive. So, yeah, he said just that. They said, the blood. And he goes, yeah, the food run. And they go, well, why didn't you call the cops and say they were dead? And he's like, oh, well, I didn't know what happened. I didn't want to really be involved.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I don't want to shake things up.

[James Pietragallo]

I don't want to be involved. Now, down the hall, they have Andre Deputy. Now they pat him down because he's in an interrogation room. They have to pat him down and make sure he has no weapons. So they pat him down. They pull his wallet out. It's Bayard Smith's wallet.

[Jimmy Whisman]

It's not his.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, in the wallet is Bayard Smith's driver's license, Social Security card, and two watches. One of them is missing a watch band pin that matches the pin they found on the floor. He couldn't have a better puzzle piece of evidence to give them.

[Jimmy Whisman]

What did they think was gonna happen?

[James Pietragallo]

That's what I mean, this is the least thought through fucking murder of all time. $25 in cash he had also. That's what he got out of them.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Some frozen food, watches, probably $15, $20 they just spent at Blue Moon.

[James Pietragallo]

Then that. Yeah, who knows? So they said, well, why do you have this shit if you weren't there? And he said, well, William Flamer gave me the wallet. He just said, here's a wallet. You'd carry that for me? And I said, sure, and put it in my pocket. Okay. So they go, okay, you're under arrest for murder too, by the way. Not murder too. Murder also.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Also, yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

In addition to him, you got this dude's wallet. You're under arrest. So about 6pm William Flamer and tells the deputies that, listen, guys, I'll be honest with you. I'm gonna be straight up with you.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Now.

[James Pietragallo]

He's gonna be honest. I'm not a killer. Obviously. Look at my record. I'm a forger or whatever. I'm a nice guy. But let me tell you, my friend in there, his name ain't Ray Anderson. His name is Andre Deputy and he's wanted for murder.

[Jimmy Whisman]

It's a bad man over there.

[James Pietragallo]

He's a bad man and I'm a little scared of him at this point.

[Jimmy Whisman]

You guys are being real casual with the murderer.

[James Pietragallo]

Yep. So then they go in and they go, hi, Andre Deputy. And he goes, fuck. Shit. Now I'm extra screwed.

[Jimmy Whisman]

No, I just said, ray.

[James Pietragallo]

Ah, shit.

[Jimmy Whisman]

The ray of entree.

[James Pietragallo]

Damn it. Yeah, I got that part right. So then the cops give them dinner because they're gonna have a long night. They stay the night. Now the reason they stay the night, they're supposed to drive them to Dover. But it is a huge snowstorm and they're not gonna drive to Dover. An hour and a half as we said in the snow. So they just give the opportunity for

[Jimmy Whisman]

this car to crash. And now I'm in the woods with a fucking murderer.

[James Pietragallo]

Now we got a 48 hour situation where Eddie was Murphy's scampering off from a bus accident. So they hold the men overnight there and they're gonna take them in the morning, which is a very important thing. Normally they would have been sent to jail. That's it. End of story. They'll go to court. But Flamer is in a cell here and Deputy is in a different place. Flamer is in a cell at Troop 5 and Deputy is at the Bridgeville Police Department, by the way. Deputy will claim later that while he was at the police department he slept in a cold cell, was threatened by police with a hollow point to his head. He said that's what they told him. And this is the greatest complaint of jail I've ever heard in my life. He was deprived of cigarettes and liquor. They didn't even bring women in here for me to fuck. It was ridiculous. It was crazy. No cocaine. I couldn't jive at all in here. This is crazy.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Where's the weed for Christ's sake?

[James Pietragallo]

Come on, a little something. I'm in jail, where am I going?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Whiskey, cigarettes or pussy? This place sucks.

[James Pietragallo]

This is terrible. Fucking place is lame, man. You guys are boring.

[Jimmy Whisman]

He really.

[James Pietragallo]

This is the least jiving prison I've ever been in, man. This sucks.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I can't even jive in here.

[James Pietragallo]

I have very little jiving room on top of everything. How am I supposed to jive in here? Guys? I'm looking around, it's unjivable. I can't do it.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Deprived me of booze and cigarettes.

[James Pietragallo]

Isn't that amazing? Deprived. He actually is. Yeah, that's jail. Now Late Evening Flamer has version two of his story.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh.

[James Pietragallo]

They confront him with the physical evidence. They say, we pulled a blood covered bayonet from your own grandmother's kitchen. There's blood all over you, there's blood under your fingernails, on your hands, there's. Come on, what are we talking about?

[Jimmy Whisman]

I got news for you. My grandma's a psychotic bitch.

[James Pietragallo]

She's crazy. They said you were there. And he says, okay, fine, I was there. But, but, and the but's the very important part. There's actually a third guy there and he did all the stabbing. Oh, he was a psycho. We could not control him. What's his name? Johnny Christopher. Now if you're going to make up by the they. Look, there's no such person as Johnny Christopher. If you're going to make up a name, don't start it with Johnny, which sounds immediately like you made it up.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Well, he was gonna say Christmas, but he caught it in the app.

[James Pietragallo]

Johnny is a bad fucking name.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Johnny

[James Pietragallo]

shit. Something like that. So now he's either asleep at home and he came over and they're all dead, or he invented a person now. So now there's two stories. So the next morning, the 8th of February, the snow lets up. Flamer is taken to the justice of the Peace Court 6 in Harrington for his appearance. Okay, he's informed of the charges Four counts of first degree murder, two, intentional two felony, and he's advised of his rights. Again, he asked the magistrate if he can call his mother to ask about bail and about possibly being represented by Herman Brown Sr. The family's lawyer. They say, yes, you can make the call. And they appoint a public defender for him in the interim. Both men sign the form Flamer requesting appointment of counsel and the magistrate appointing it. So now he calls his mother, Mildred Smith, who's the sister of the woman he's charged with murdering, obviously, and tells her that the mom, tells her Herman Brown Sr. Retired, so he can't be your lawyer. So she meets him, comes down and meets him, and then she leaves. And then Corporal Porter steps in. Okay, He's a local cop and he knows William Flamer. And Porter. This is how he describes it. Later on, he said, quote, I asked him, I said, do you believe in God?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, boy.

[James Pietragallo]

And he said, yeah. And I said, then you gotta believe in heaven and hell, right? And he said, yeah. I said, by the way, if they ever ask you, detectives down the just disagree with everything they say. Sky's blue, right?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Go.

[James Pietragallo]

I don't think so. Just do not ever say yes to them. It's a thing that they're doing. He said, well, then you're going to burn in hell unless you get straight with me about what happened today or what happened yesterday. I want you to tell me. He said. I said, you have to clear your conscience of what's going on. And this is when he started weakening up a little bit. He had some tears in his eyes, and he said, okay, I'll talk to you. And that's when I took him out of the cell. Oh, this is a very common strategy by cops. They start with God. Then they go to, you know, you said you were raised by your grandmother. What would your grandmother think about this? You're going to disgrace your grandmother. You should tell the truth. You know, that's what your grandmother would want you to do. They start that, threats, guilt, there's all they can, psychologically, they're trying to tell. So they said, you used your little knife to stab Bayard, who had the big knife, because he know there's a big knife and a little knife. And he said, Andre, he said, and he used it to stab who? And he said, he killed my Aunt Alberta. And then he was killing Bayard. That's what he said. Okay? Now, February 8th, on the other place, Andre, Deputy is there, and he agrees to a polygraph. He takes the test. They say, you failed Miserably probably not good. So then he says, okay, I'll talk. He said, I went with William to the Smith's house to get money and an argument broke out. So he said that William started stabbing Bayard Smith out of nowhere. Just started hacking at him. And Alberta Smith begged deputy to stop the attack. Begged him. And he said, I just left. I don't know what happened after I left. He goes, there was a stabbing going on. This lady saying, stop him. And I was like, it was too much for me. I got to go. I got to get driving. I got to go now.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Why do both of these guys not want to just tell it?

[James Pietragallo]

I mean, you're so deny it or either deny it or tell it. That's the thing. But you're so fucked.

[Jimmy Whisman]

The truth sometimes sets you free, but lies always put you in prison.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, well, or they can just. You can't do both. That's the thing, right? Either pick one. Either tell the truth or lie. Pick one or say nothing.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Just tell them. If you keep lying, it looks like you did the murdering. If you tell what you did. Well, if they tell what they did, they did the murdering too.

[James Pietragallo]

I think they're fucked here. I think you're kind of. Especially with all this evidence, if you come in covered in blood or holding the dead person's wallet with their ID in it, either way, you're kind of fucked at that point. So Andre Deputy goes before the justice of the Peace. He's committed to the Sussex Correctional Institution in default of bailiff. So he's supposed to be driven to a jail. Instead, Detective Chaffinch has him brought back to Troop 5. Instead, uniformed officers depart with Deputy headed for the prison. And this guy directs them to turn around and bring him back. So officers are following a judge's order and taking them. And this detective says, no, no, no, no, no. Bring him back to me. Why now? Because Flamer, during his own confession, just told police that both men stabbed with two different knives. Now they've recovered the second knife, a paring knife that Flamer threw off to the side of Route 13 where he was arrested when he saw the cop come and he tossed the knife.

[Jimmy Whisman]

A paring knife. They're such bad knives for murder.

[James Pietragallo]

Awful. Awful. And because Deputy claimed he went to the Smith's house for money and was arrested carrying $25, this guy wanted to question him. So he told Deputy, he says that he said, when I come back, we will sit down and get the whole truth and put it on a tape statement and you'll be taken to sci fi. So that's what he says. By 9:50, he returns and talks to Deputy about getting the truth, is what he says. At 9:50, Deputy gives the second tape statement. This time he and William went there for money. The Smiths refused. William started stabbing Bayard. Alberta begged deputy to stop. And he says at that point, he took the knife from Flamer and stabbed Alberta while she begged them to stop.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, boy.

[James Pietragallo]

So an old sweet lady is begging you not to stab her husband and you go, I gotta shut her up and start stabbing her. Okay. He said he kept. Flamer kept stabbing Bayard with another knife. And he said. Deputy said he killed Alberta out of fear she would report them to the police. There you go.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Probably would.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, I would think so. So it ends with, you killed Alberta Smith? And he said, I guess so. I don't know. And they said, what do you mean you guessed so? And he said, I don't know whether she was dead or not. She wasn't moving. Wait till you hear how many stab wounds.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, Jesus.

[James Pietragallo]

They said, you're reasonably sure she was dead? And he said, probably she was dead. And he said, yeah. And they said, and there's no question about the truth. Everything you've told us is the truth. And he said, everything's the truth. Now, the autopsy wounds from two different blades. Bayard Smith has 79 stab wounds.

[Jimmy Whisman]

God damn it.

[James Pietragallo]

10 more than his age. You don't need to stab him 79 times. 19 are positively attributable to the bayonet, 8 are attributable to the paring knife, and 52 could have come from either. There's so many stab wounds, it's hard to tell where one starts and one ends.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Okay.

[James Pietragallo]

Alberta Smith had 66 stab wounds.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That's so cool.

[James Pietragallo]

25 from the bayonet, two from the paring knife, and 39 indeterminate all over the place. All over. The wounds are concentrated on the head, neck, throat and chest. You know, all the important stuff. Horrifying. They had defensive wounds on their hands. I mean, these fucking poor people tried to fight back and tried to defend themselves. Just poor people. They did nothing. So here we go. What they have is a bayonet with human blood and fibers microscopically similar to Alberta Smith's. Clothing. Television with a cut antenna matching the severed cable at the scene. Frozen food wrapped identically to the Smiths with Bayard Smith's own fingerprints on one of the bags, by the way, that they had then what they had on them. Blood on his hands, coat, shoes and face. Blood he himself admitted came from the scene. Blood under his fingernails, scratches on his neck and chest consistent with people fighting on. Deputy, you got the wallet, the Social Security card and the watch with the missing pin. Oh, by the way, you also have witnesses who saw the man at the abandoned car, who was William Flamer. So it's ridiculous. The amount of it's an embarrassment of riches here. Then they have two tape confessions from Deputy, one full tape confession from Flamer, plus a preliminary. All of his lies that he sold at first too, which is just crazy. So putting both of their stories together, here is what happened that day. Okay, I don't wanna hear it. Tuesday, February 6th. Yeah, unfortunately, you have to. Tuesday, February 6th, 1975.

[Jimmy Whisman]

150 stab wounds on elderly people. James, this is so fucked up.

[James Pietragallo]

Just kindly senior citizens.

[Jimmy Whisman]

So fucked up.

[James Pietragallo]

Just eating frozen fucking Starbucks.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Worked the balls off to retire to eat.

[James Pietragallo]

Fucking to eat that little tiny peach cobbler. It's two bites.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Frozen meatballs. Fuck.

[James Pietragallo]

So this was in the middle of one of the nastiest winters. There's snow everywhere. This is Tuesday, February 6th. Flamer said the 6th was a day of drinking. Deputy said he Woke up at 9, headed down to town in search of liquor. By noon he had consumed 3/5. 3/5 of tiger Rose. What the fuck is that? Cheap whiskey, I guarantee cheap that makes Thunderbird look good. Like that is Tiger Rose.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Tiger Rose?

[James Pietragallo]

I've never heard of that.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That feels like it's the name of a liver disease.

[James Pietragallo]

It really. You got Tiger Rose? What do you mean? It's a euphemism for cirrhosis. We call it Tiger Rose.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Tiger Rose.

[James Pietragallo]

So Deputy said he drank for a while with Flamer's father, then passed out about 7pm When Flamer came home, about 11:30pm Then Deputy woke up and started drinking again with him. He and Deputy drank throughout the whole next day there and by the late evening or they drank that whole night and by late. By the end of the night, they need money and food. Yeah. So they armed themselves before walking to the Smith's house. Because they figured that'll be a place that they have money in there.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That's literally what they went for. Was Tiger Rose money.

[James Pietragallo]

Tiger Rose, Yeah. They took a bayonet, a smaller knife, and the medical examiner called it a kitchen paring knife. And they took a shotgun as well. They went outside, decided the shotgun would be too loud. So they buried it in the snow outside the door before they went in so no one would see it. Flamer had the paring knife Deputy had the bayonet concealed under his coat. Now, what they did to get in the house, they knock on the door, it's about midnight, and they say, grandma just had a stroke and we can't find her.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That's how they got in.

[James Pietragallo]

She had a stroke and wandered off into the neighborhood. We need help finding her.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, my God, she's out there slurring

[James Pietragallo]

somewhere and it's snowing. So they're like, oh, my God, it's her nephew. He lives up the street. So they're like, yeah, yeah, come in, come in. And that's the problem. They stood inside the house talking for 10 or 15 minutes. Then flamer said, Deputy gave a signal. And then Flamer started stabbing his uncle on the signal. He said after he started stabbing Bayard, Andre, Deputy began stabbing Alberta with the bayonet. And at some point, Deputy turned the bayonet on Bayard as well. By Deputy's confession, basically that's exactly what he said too. He said he started stabbing Flamer, Flamer started stabbing his uncle. Alberta said, make this stop. And then he started stabbing Alberta. So they both said that. That seems to be what happened. They turned out Bayard's pockets. They opened the purse, they found four wallets. They got the tv, they got a fan, frozen food, and that's why it's dropped and scattered as they left, because they were just holding frozen food. It was falling out of their arms and shit. They loaded it into the Smith's car and drove to Flamer's house, where they stashed the tv, the fan, the food, and burned three of the four wallets. Deputy kept the fourth in his pocket with the driver's license and all that. The real incriminating one. Then he got back in his uncle's car, drove off in the snow, went to the outskirts of Felton, and then got so drunk. He was so drunk, he fell asleep in the car. At that point, fell asleep in the car after all this drove that he woke up and the battery was dead. So he abandoned the car and just walked off carrying a suitcase. He went to the Blue Moon Tavern, met back up with Deputy, and spent the late morning and afternoon shooting pool and drinking. And then he was run into on the street, and that's what happened.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Whatever is in Tiger Rose should be illegal.

[James Pietragallo]

That's probably why I've never heard of Tiger Rose. And they probably pulled it off the market at this point. They were like, we can't have that out there. At least change the name. This is terrible publicity.

[Jimmy Whisman]

This makes you crazy.

[James Pietragallo]

Wow.

[Jimmy Whisman]

You've never heard of somebody smoking weed and doing this to people?

[James Pietragallo]

No, never. No, no, no.

[Jimmy Whisman]

This story doesn't exist.

[James Pietragallo]

It might, but it's not for weed money. I don't think it might just be high. And also a murderer. Like, they might be a. You could get Ted Bundy stoned and he'd still probably kill somebody. Actually, he wouldn't that night. Probably. He'd be like, I don't feel like it. I'm all right. This is good.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I wouldn't.

[James Pietragallo]

Let's see what's on the.

[Jimmy Whisman]

You're gonna get hungry. You're going to your uncle's house for all that frozen food. But the opportunity to stab somebody, you're not doing it?

[James Pietragallo]

No. You're like, oh, then I gotta run away. I gotta hide. I gotta. Fuck that. So much work. It's just too much work.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I'll just make you nachos too. I'll make a second plate. How about that?

[James Pietragallo]

Is that better? Is that easier? Can you jive with that? Is that fine?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Jive with.

[James Pietragallo]

Can you drive with these nachos?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Tiger Road should be illegal for sure.

[James Pietragallo]

For sure. 1980 is the flamer trial. They separate trials. He goes on four counts of first degree murder, like we said to intentional to felony. Plus possession of a deadly weapon during a felony and first degree robbery and also misdemeanor theft as well. Hey everybody, just gonna take a quick break from the show to tell you about the best way to do your banking. Banking made for you with chime chime.com. absolutely. Chime changes the way people bank. They're doing it right now. They offer the most rewarding fee. Free banking fee, free banking built for you, everybody. That's what they have. This is not like your traditional old bank that charges you overdraft and monthly fees. And that's a dead model. You don't need to do that anymore, people. There's plenty of places. Well, there's. Chime is where you need to go. Really. They have thousands of fee free ATMs. Why pay to get your own money? It's your money and they're using it. So why are you paying to get it out? That's crazy. It's built for you. Not the 1%. That's the thing. This is a bank that cares about you. The regular person. Chime members can benefit from up to 1100 $50 in annual rewards fee. Free direct deposit unlocks the most rewarding way to bank at Chime. Chime is rated five stars by USA Today for customer service. That's because they have real humans. 24. 7. None of this AI garbage that you're going to have to deal with because you don't want to deal with that. When you're dealing with money. You want someone who knows what they're talking about. You're not just switching banks. You're upgrading to America's number one choice for banking with a Chime checking account. Get 5% cash back on Chime card in a category of your choice like gas or groceries. You can get your savings that grows faster with 3.75 APY. That's nine times higher than the national average. Plus you get premium travel perks like airport lounge access and 24.7Travel Concierge included in your Chime card. You can even get $500 of your pay when you do it with my pay. It's great. They also have Spot Me which lets you overdraft up to $200 again, fee free. And that's the important thing to keep keep talking about fee free. This is a better way to do it. We're not letting people charge us to go to ATMs anymore. You gotta get Chime like we did. Don't be silly. Don't waste money. Chime is not just smarter banking. It's the most rewarding way to bank. Join the millions who are already banking fee free today. Head to chime.comsmalltown murder that's chime.com smalltown murder. It only takes a few minutes to sign up.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Now back to the show.

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[James Pietragallo]

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[Jimmy Whisman]

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[James Pietragallo]

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[Jimmy Whisman]

Wait, too late?

[James Pietragallo]

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[Jimmy Whisman]

Now back to the show.

[James Pietragallo]

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[Jimmy Whisman]

That's a bad defense. I don't give a fuck.

[James Pietragallo]

Not a good defense.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Without him, this doesn't happen.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, it's not his aunt and uncle.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Right?

[James Pietragallo]

This is your idea. So the prosecution said, look at all this evidence we have. We found him covered in blood and all of the shit was in his house. What are we talking about? He's got. And also we have a confession tape as well. Hey, let's walk through. Here's maps to visuals of the bodies in an autopsy way. Let's walk through 145 stab wounds right now. How's that? No one's gonna care if this guy forced you or not.

[Jimmy Whisman]

You did that. Cause you're scared. Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

So in the defense, Flamer takes the stand and he comes up with a different version of what happened on the stand.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

He said Deputy woke him up on the night of the murder and brought him to the Smith house to help steal frozen food. He asked Deputy where the Smiths were, and Deputy's answer was, never mind about that. Then he saw the bodies. This is after they've heard his taped confession.

[Jimmy Whisman]

His story has already happened.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. So during closings, this is the craziest shit ever. The defense attorney waives closing argument. I'm good.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Really?

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Now, what's that strategy about?

[James Pietragallo]

It is a strategy, and later on in an appeal, it's gonna come up, and it's a legitimate strategy because he said the Kent county prosecutors in that era were known to basically do a short, soft opening summation, then let the defense in to try to do their big thing, beat the woman shit out of you. Then they come in with their massive rebuttal, which is the thing they were gonna say to begin with. So they reopened. Yep, they're gonna go up there for three hours of some crazy thing, and that's what they would do. Courts called the practice sandbagging, and it's actually documented in the case of Billy Bailey, who we talked about, the last man hanged in the United States there. So one of Flamer's own prosecutors said that he'd been prepared for two to three hours of rebuttal.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Okay.

[James Pietragallo]

So they said, no, no, no closing. So the verdict comes in. Obviously guilty.

[Podcast Advertiser]

Very.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, very guilty. Sentencing comes in. Okay. Mitigating hearing. They call three witnesses. Flamer himself, who narrated his life through. I'm a drunk and I'm a daughter. I have a three year old daughter and odd jobs. And I've always been a mess and just my life has always been shit. His mother Mildred, who described him as a good story student who quit in the 11th grade and changed when he drank. And his grandmother Florence, who said that he was a good boy. To me. He was a good boy. The prosecution calls. Nobody really. They just bring in Flamer's two forgery convictions which weren't allowed in during the trial, but now in sentencing they're allowed. And also called both of them real scumbums. We've heard that before. Scumbumps. Yeah, we have. Real scumbags.

[Jimmy Whisman]

It's a shit ass, isn't it?

[James Pietragallo]

I think it is.

[Jimmy Whisman]

What's a scumb?

[James Pietragallo]

You're not properly driving is what that means. So the defense closing said, ladies and gentlemen, although we're here today talking about murder, I'm simply going to ask you to show mercy. Do not kill William Henry Flamer simply because the law in the state of Delaware says you can't. There is a far, far greater law than anything conceived by this state and punished by this state which tells you thou shall not kill. Thank you. Because death penalty is on the table here.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah. So he's saying if you give him life without, that's a win for me.

[James Pietragallo]

That's great. That's all he's asking for. It's already convicted. So now the prosecution says the robbery. There's a robbery commission. That's one of the, you know, they took a fan. And the outrageously or wantonly vile, horrible or inhumane act, which it absolutely is. The prosecution said, yeah, thou shalt not kill. Pertain to William too. He had free choice. And then they said, quote, please be fair. Kay comes back, you, sir, may fuck off. Death by hanging. That's not good.

[Jimmy Whisman]

We're gonna do this specifically. Help him with this fucking fall.

[James Pietragallo]

Help me with my fucking fall. Deadwood reference for everyone out there now. Andre, Deputy during his trial. Pretty much. They have the same evidence. Everything comes out the same. They said they'd get the deputy in there and they try to get him about the. Do you believe in God and all that kind of shit. The deputy is the one. They said you brought him back from the jail. Basically. Which you weren't supposed to and all that, but comes in guilty anyway.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

Now in sentencing, during mitigating, three ministers and a Bible study instructor testify to his conduct in jail. And deputy took the stand himself, expressing reverence and describing the changes in his lifestyle. Also, the ministers played a tape for the jury of deputies singing in the prison chapel, saying, you can't kill him. He sings like an angel. Literally. He is raped before he sings like an angel. Jimmy, you haven't heard him jive. That's the problem.

[Jimmy Whisman]

He's wanted for murder outside of this.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, that's the thing. And that's the other thing they bring up in the aggravators. They say, not only was it all horrible, he's got priors for sexual assault. Fuck, he killed a guy. Molotov. He's a bad guy.

[Jimmy Whisman]

He's getting worse.

[James Pietragallo]

So the jury returns you, sir. They fuck off. Four times death penalty. Oh, times four.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Okay.

[James Pietragallo]

Now that's actually good, though, because later on, as we'll see here, two of those will get struck down, but then there'll be two left. So you collect as many as you can.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Throw them away.

[James Pietragallo]

He's going to throw them away like it's go fish or something. I'm going to keep those threes. You never know. So Flamer's direct appeal, very quickly here, they affirm his convictions. Among the issues, Delaware's statutory aggravator. That a murder be outrageously or wantonly vile, horrible or inhumane. They say the language is so vague that you can't really pin that on anything. And they went, we get what it is, and it's what he did. Bye. Fuck off, Deputy appeals. And that's the. They appeal. The Delaware Supreme Court throws out the second tape confession, the one with the I guess so in it.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Okay?

[James Pietragallo]

And they said, holding that the magistrate committed him and his Sixth Amendment right to counsel had attached nine hours in a holding cell in defiance of a court order engineered by a detective. Is not okay.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Okay.

[James Pietragallo]

A judge said, take him here, and you disobeyed him and took him somewhere else. Right there, that's thrown out. But the first one's there. Both intentional murder convictions are reversed, but the felony ones stick with two death penalties attached to them. That's why you give four. They ruled an error harmless to the felony murder. Now Flamer tries to get more. They say his confession should have been suppressed, saying that he was. They said, no, he was Mirandized. And he kept talking. And requested to inquire about possible representation with his mother. But that's not an unambiguous demand for counsel, and we've gone over this. Unless you say lawyer right now. Stop talking to me. It's not a request for a lawyer. So how will they die if they're killed? Well, they have the gallows for hanging. They were built in 1986 by the Delaware Department of Corrections on the prison grounds.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, yeah, okay. Yeah, like prison guards.

[James Pietragallo]

And not the prison the Department of Corrections paid for. It is what that means. Not, they put a bunch of prison guards out there with hammers and nails. Build us a gallows, boys. All right.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Or the prisoners building.

[James Pietragallo]

That would be even worse. It's a two story wooden structure with a 15 foot platform, trapdoor roof and stairs. They built this for Billy Bailey, essentially. Yeah, there's some weird shit about that, too. The Gallows required renovation and strengthening before the 1996 execution date of Billy Bailey because the last previous hanging was in 1946.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, boy. Yeah, that's some rotten wood.

[James Pietragallo]

That's not gonna work. Yeah, put a deck on your house and leave it there for 50 years and see how it looks after a while.

[Jimmy Whisman]

See if he'll even walk out on it.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, see if it doesn't collapse under you. So Flamer, while he's in prison, he's on death row but has a job, which is weird. They said that there's only three death row inmates allowed to work in the whole state. Billy Bailey, Reginald Sanders, and William Henry Flamer. Bailey's a barber and Flamer works in the laundry room there. And yeah, they said it's one step below maximum security, but not as much freedom as the general population in medium or minimum security. So they're the trustees of death row, essentially. Now, Flamer said when he went to prison and death row, at first I felt hate. A man can't die but once, but a man without funds doesn't stand a chance. So that's what he's saying about going to prison. To begin with, he didn't have money for a real lawyer. So if you don't have money, you're fucked. He said if you've never been faced with death, you cannot understand the fears and anxieties that come down on a person. But to meet your maker can bring on suicide, hatred, violence or rage. Or a man could reach inside himself for some hidden talent or reach for God. For the first year and a half, I worried. He said his weight dropped from 181 to 129lbs and he developed an ulcer. And so he said that wasn't great as well. He didn't like that. But he's been, you know, it's been difficult times, obviously, in prison, which is real. Flamer said that baseball's been his main diversion. He said, quote, I hit 179 home runs over the fence in one season. I don't know what the dimensions of this field are, he said. But In March of 1980, he said he found God. And he said since then, he's declared his, quote, Moorish American nationality that has let him achieve a higher plane, mentally and physically, and is dedicated to uplifting fallen humanity.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Great.

[James Pietragallo]

Terrific. That's great. Yeah. He says, I have love in my heart, I am at peace. I tell the truth, I shall be free, and justice will take its own course.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Terrific.

[James Pietragallo]

Great. Deputy is never seen without his Bible. He carries one in black leather with his name engraved in gold letters, a present from a minister. He says, this is the first time in my life nothing else matters, he said. And one of the guards said, andre is one of the happiest guys in here. He always has a smile on his face. Okay, yeah. He said that he feels like he's going to be executed. Prison guards say they're usually skeptical when it comes to jailhouse religion, but they say they believe Flamer and Deputy. Actually, they seem to be genuine. Deputy dreamed of being a professional singer when he was younger, but now he sings in the gospel choir. In jail, he's composed a couple of gospel songs, including, quote, jesus is the Best Thing that Ever Happened to Me, which is a bit wordy for a title. Yeah, can't fit that in the old jukebox slot there back in the day. So, yeah, he does all of this. He said that all of his family are still alcoholics. His brother John is still a drunk in Wilmington, but his brother Ronald is living in New York and joined Alcoholics Anonymous.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Great.

[James Pietragallo]

Terrific. So he said, I used to get in trouble about five times a month, cursing the guards. Just nonsense. I got tired of it. So I had this 12 hour lockdown and I was smoking two packs a day. I said, God, if you're real, come into my life and make me quit smoking. You're asking a lot. Some things you have to do on your own. Make me.

[Jimmy Whisman]

The thing about that is that that's chemical, babe.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, well, he said, you see, I had to test this a little. And he said when he came out of lockup, he had no desire for cigarettes or booze and hasn't wanted them ever since. That's what he said. He said, God Replaced alcohol. He said alcohol was something to fill the void of my mother's loss. Now I know that void was a lack of God. He's also got his GED and participated in Scared Straight programs. So he's telling kids, I want your shoes, motherfucker. That's him. He's doing that.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, my God. I mean, that's. That's the bad guy that you want yelling at kids, I'm a fuck your face.

[James Pietragallo]

That's the guy. Yeah.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Give me a toothpaste. You can have whatever you want.

[James Pietragallo]

He cooks too. In the prison. He said, I like my own cooking. He said, if I had things to do over, I'd be a rebel or I'd be a minister. He said, I was pushed too hard and that's why I rebelled. My father was too religious. If he was somewhere in the middle, then everything would have been fine, I guess. Now 93, Andre's nearing execution. He's a born again Christian, a prison chaplain, and stands to the Board of pardons. And yeah, a prison chaplain called him a role model. No, he's not a prison chaplain. A prison chaplain called him a role model who put his faith in God. And the board said, no, I don't care. Don't think so.

[Jimmy Whisman]

You put your knife in two old people.

[James Pietragallo]

Fuck off. So he sent a letter to the editor of a newspaper. My name is Andre Deputy, and unless God intervenes, I'm scheduled to be executed on June 23rd at midnight. No matter what has been said, I did not commit the murders of the Smiths. Okay? I'm very, very sorry for their family. And I wish I had tried to stop it instead of running out of fear. There was no blood found on me or fingerprints on their stolen property. I'm trusting my Lord and Savior to save me so I can serve him in the prison and lead others to him. The scripture I'm believing in is some horseshit. I will not die, but I will live and declare the works of the Lord. Please pray for me. I am believing in God, but at times it gets rough. Thank you to all the people who have supported and written to me.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Now he's denying it. He's an innocent man.

[James Pietragallo]

Now he's an innocent man. He didn't do it at all. So June 23, 1994, is execution day for Andrew. Relatives and clergy and his attorneys visit him. Last meal, everybody.

[Jimmy Whisman]

They're gonna do it. What do you.

[James Pietragallo]

Fried shrimp and flounder with French fries, rolls and a coconut custard pie.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I hope every one of them was a Frozen one.

[James Pietragallo]

Oh yeah, all Vandy camps. That sounds great. Except for the custard pie. Cause I'm allergic to coconuts. That wouldn't.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Everything from the frozen aisle at Costco.

[James Pietragallo]

That's it. No last words. By the way. He's done.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Did they hang him or did they lethal injection after.

[James Pietragallo]

I guess they had a. You could do a choice by 86. Delaware switched its execution method to lethal injection in 86. But if you were sentenced before 86, you can have a choice of lethal injection or hanging. All right, Absolutely. William chose lethal injection.

[Jimmy Whisman]

He did.

[James Pietragallo]

William Flamer chose lethal injection too. Now they're trying to get him out. William Flamer, get the death penalty taken away. And instead it's not quite working. He goes to the pardon board here and says, I'm an alcoholic 11th grade dropout. I'm a loser. He said, I found God and now I've changed my life and I've gotten a GED and I can completed college and I'm a certified dietitian. I've worked in the prison kitchen. And they go, well, that's good. Anyway, denied and shoot him off of there now. January 30, 1996 is his execution day. I don't know his last meal. I can't find it anywhere. Horrible. It's four days after Billy Bailey. Billy Bailey with the hanging got all the attention and then everybody just kind of left. And then four days later they just kind of.

[Jimmy Whisman]

They were in a daze without paying attention.

[James Pietragallo]

They had to go back to wherever they were from. So he is 41, strapped down and lethally injected. And that's that. By the way. 2003, they dismantled the gallows.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, they took them apart, huh?

[James Pietragallo]

There's nobody that was eligible for them. There was nobody else eligible to choose it anymore. So it was just a thing. So there you go. That is Harrington, Delaware. And quite the fucking case of not jiving very well.

[Jimmy Whisman]

No, this is what happens when you drink Tiger Rose. It'll make you roar, babe.

[James Pietragallo]

It'll make you fucking. We don't know what the other guy was drinking, but I'll bet that's why

[Jimmy Whisman]

it looked like the same thing.

[James Pietragallo]

Remember I said look like a lion attacked him. More like a tiger came in and attacked them. A tiger rose couple of times. That should be the commercial. You take a sip and then you turn into a tiger.

[Jimmy Whisman]

It'll make you roar.

[James Pietragallo]

St I commercials where you turned into something. Didn't snoop turn into some shit. In a ST I commercial in the 90s.

[Jimmy Whisman]

What was he? Was it kind of similar to that thing that he turned into in murder

[James Pietragallo]

was the case in the video. Yeah, I think something like that. So that should be Tiger Rose. They should have did that first. It would have been good for him. So anyway, there you go. There is Harrington, Delaware. If you like that show, get on whatever app you're on. Give us five stars. It helps so much. It helps drive the show up the charts. If you're watching on Netflix, thumbs up please. It helps a ton. So thank you for everyone for doing that. ShutUpAndGiveMerder.com is where you get the tickets and everything else for live shows. Come and see us September 18th at the Pabst in Milwaukee, September 19th at the State Theater in Minneapolis. Get those tickets right now. Also in October, Dallas, San Jose, Sacramento and in November, Tarrytown, Boston. Get those right now. Follow on social medialtownmurder on Instagram, smalltownpod on Facebook. Facebook, do that. Get yourself Patreon. My God, get Patreon. Patreon.com crimeinsports all you have to be is $5 a month or above and you get everything we put out. As soon as you subscribe you get almost 400 back bonus episodes to binge on. New ones every other week. This week for crime and sports. Nothing to do with sports. Hostage situations. They're interesting and we're going to talk about them for specific ones for small town Murder, Corey Richards Part 3 Her kids statements came out and showed everything she said is a lie and she is a way more cold blooded asshole than even we thought she was. And there's frozen lasagna and everything else to talk about. So we'll get into that. Patreon.com CrimeInSports in addition to all that you get all the shows we put out ad free and all ad free and you get a shout out at the end of the regular show where Jimmy will fuck your name all up for you. So there you go. If you want to find us on social media, shut up and give me murder.com. there's menus. It'll take you everywhere you want to go. That said, thank you so much for joining us and until next week everybody, it's been our pleasure.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Bye.

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[James Pietragallo]

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