Loading summary
Transcript130 lines
- [00:00]
Alice
For weeks now, New Jersey residents have been plagued by unexplained drones flying overhead.
- [00:05]
Brett
Is there intelligent alien life? And if so, has the government been covering it up?
- [00:10]
Alice
All right, UFO sightings the military can't explain, Congressional hearings, Pentagon whistleblower. What does it all mean?
- [00:18]
Brett
What does it all mean? We are here to try and figure it all out with our new Ancient Aliens podcast. There is a doorway in the universe. Beyond it is the promise of truth. It demands we question everything we have ever been taught. The evidence is all around us. The future is right before our eyes. We are not alone. We have never been alone. Listen to the Ancient Aliens podcast, available wherever you get your podcasts. Foreign I'm Brett.
- [01:01]
Alice
And I'm Alice.
- [01:02]
Brett
And we are the Prosecutors. Today on the Prosecutors, we discuss the Satanic panic. Hello, everybody, and welcome to this episode of the Prosecutors. I'm Brett and I'm joined as always, by my devilish co host, Alice.
- [02:02]
Alice
Hi, Brett. Way to go. Way to go. As a precursor for talking a lot about Satanism today.
- [02:10]
Brett
Satan.
- [02:11]
Alice
Satan. You know, it's really funny, I just noticed you say Satanism gets kind of a soft. I say Satan. Satanism. I don't know what I'm saying anymore. I don't know. It's lost all meaning. It's lost all meaning because I've read it so many times now. Satan, be gone. Satan. Satan.
- [02:28]
Brett
I'm gonna talk a lot about Satan. We may talk about Satan for two episodes. If we do that, we'll release the second episode on Wednesday, though. We'll. Yeah, we'll just do one week on Satan. Too much Satan in your life, you know, who wants too much?
- [02:40]
Alice
This is an exorcism case, so.
- [02:43]
Brett
No, it's not. It's not. This is the most I'll probably ever talk about Satan, though. You know, this would have been perfect for October. We couldn't fit the whole series in one month.
- [02:51]
Alice
I think this is going to be really truly. I think this is going to be very interesting because obviously we know that the Satanic panic was kind of swirling around. At least it's been cast that way when we look back on this case. But to understand kind of where this case sat in history, if it was a Satanic panic or if it was just an interest in certain things. I think it's very informative when we're looking back on this case decades later. And I learned a lot about Satanism. I'm not gonna lie. When we research this.
- [03:19]
Brett
No, I think that's absolutely true. You know, this case sits sort of at the tail end of the Satanic Panic, what is often called the Satanic Panic, which is a really interesting period in American history. If you're interested in this, there's a great podcast called Devil and the Deep Blue Sea. It's actually in the middle of releasing it. So they've got like five episodes out now. The first episode is actually about the West Memphis three. Now, they totally just go with the standard, the three are innocent. It was Satanic Panic. The show is really about the Satanic Panic and how it came to be. So it's worth listening to if you're interested in that. Probably won't learn much about West Memphis 3, but it's a really interesting podcast. You can check that out. And this is one of those things that if you're learning about this case now, it is difficult to sort of wrap your head around what was going on in the country at this time. And I think it's worth looking at because it puts everything into context. Why the police were doing the things they were doing, why certain things that Damien said were taken seriously, even if they shouldn't have been, and sort of what informed the process that happened in the investigation. I think it's worth looking into whether or not you think Satanism actually played any role in this case or not. This case is often described as part of the Satanic Panic. And either very much was, or there was some weird stuff going on in West Memphis, or maybe both. Probably going to land a little bit on the maybe both thing. But. Okay, so what do we mean by the Satanic panic? Let's start with the history of the Satanic Panic in America and in short, the blame. Canada probably didn't expect that. But the Satanic Panic is often said to have begun with the publication of Michelle Remembers, which is a book chronicling the recovered memories of Michelle Smith, a Canadian woman from Victoria, British Columbia. And this is one of the first instances where recovered memory therapy is used. And sort of using hypnosis, Smith was able to recall that in 1955 she had been subjected to sexual abuse during a ritual that had summoned Satan himself. We talked about this when we did the exorcism of Anneliese Michel case, where if you're into demonology or even just familiar with religion in any way, you know, there's all these sort of lesser angels and lesser demons, but in these cases, it's always go for the jugular.
- [05:51]
Alice
Right. So important you go straight to the top.
- [05:54]
Brett
Yeah.
- [05:55]
Alice
Not the other, you know, less are.
- [05:57]
Brett
Demons, as I mentioned, couldn't Just have been like, you know, Mephistopheles or something.
- [06:01]
Alice
Satan, I mean, even God sends, like, his, you know, angels ahead to, like, the angel Gabriel to, like. Yeah, it's usually not God coming down to say things, but Satan, apparently, they.
- [06:12]
Brett
Go straight there, straight to Satan. And this began. This was the first instance of something that came to be known as satanic ritual abuse, which was this idea that there were these satanic rituals going on and people were being abused sexually, physically, as part of them, up to and including human sacrifices, including sacrifices of children. And at times, there would be statistics that tens of thousands of children had disappeared across the United States and Canada. They were part of what was going on with this whole thing. And so during this ritual, multiple children and adults had been sacrificed. So she was sexually abused, Satan appeared, and there was human sacrifice on a grand scale. The ritual lasted 81 days, which is wild. So this book is released. Michelle remembers, and it was an absolute sensation. She toured the world. She visited the Vatican. She appears on the Oprah winfrey show. Everything right, Just all over the place. And the psychiatrist who conducted the hypnosis was a man named Lawrence Pazder. And he actually would end up marrying Michelle. It was not known when this started that they were in a sexual relationship, and in fact, he had left his wife for her. But, you know, background information like that matters. So he became an international expert on satanic ritual abuse. And he was someone who would be hired as a consultant around the country when these cases arose. And as her story got out, and various other stories are starting to be spread across the country, you start seeing these accusations that various people are involved in some sort of satanic cult activity. So Pazder was hired as a consultant on the McMartin Preschool investigation, which culminated in accusations that 360 children had been abused sexually and physically as well as mentally for years as part of a number of satanic rituals. It turned out, you probably won't be surprised to know this, that many of the stories the children told, which were very lurid, just awful, horrific stuff. If you've ever heard tapes of the interviews, I mean, hearing these little small voices talking about what happened to them is just devastating. But it turned out that a lot of this was the result of suggestive interviews by psychologists at the time. Psychologists thought when you're interviewing children, you know, you need to kind of prod them along so that they'll tell you the story, so that they won't just close up. And in the years since, it's become very evident that children like to Please. And that if you prod them along, they will go as far as you want to push them. The kids even claimed there were underground tunnels that led to secret rooms where they were sexually abused by various adults, including Chuck Norris. And that should have been the first sign that this was not true. Chuck Norris, you know, American hero, he would not be involved in something like this. But this turned out to be the longest and most expensive criminal case in history. At the time, California spent more than $15 million in a case that ultimately resulted in zero convictions. And by 1990, the cases were over. Many of the children eventually recanted. The preschool was torn down and excavated, and there were no tunnels. Shocker of shocker. But this is the sort of zeitgeist of the time where people, they hear these stories and they not only think they're possible, they believe them fully. And everyone in the country was under the impression that something like this was happening.
- [09:55]
Alice
And I mean, this isn't just sensationalism in the book. This is now in real people's lives. I mean, 360 interviews, these horrible allegations, you can't even write fiction like this. Nor do the kids realize that they're part of the ultimately, I think, what was shown to be fiction. But you can see how this catches fire because as many people were saying at the time, okay, maybe one child can fib or say something that isn't real, but could 360 possibly do that? And so this is very, very attractive in the sense of, we have to stop this. This can't possibly be 300 plus people making up lies. We are under spiritual warfare here, one of the darkest of evils coming after us. And in addition to these types of cases, which ultimately didn't go anywhere, how do we learn about things today? Well, we have lots of streaming services and lots of shows, and you betcha, especially this case, we saw it with HBO's paradise loss. When you can catch fire with your media, you're able to all of a sudden capture eyes around the nation, around the world. And that's what happened. In 1985. ABC's 2020 aired a report called the Devil Worshippers. And in this 2020 episode, it reported that 15,000 animal mutilations, satanic rituals across the country were happening. And this was the spread of Satanism. It wasn't just your weird kid in the backyard. This was something that was an undercurrent of our entire society. And it was taking over in waves by the thousands. I mean, can you imagine the horror that you don't even know what's happening in your own community. So Dale Griffiths, who would later testify in the West Memphis Three case, makes an appearance on this 2020 episode.
- [11:46]
Brett
Well, I just want to say that if you haven't seen this, you can watch it on YouTube. This, this episode is available on YouTube. Just look up 2020, you know, Satanic panic. And you can watch the whole thing. And, you know, you watch it and at the end, Barbara Walters is like, I can't believe this is going on in our country. And I just think it is impossible to really put yourself in this mindset unless you live through it. But you got 2020, you got Barbara Walters, you got this report. They're going across the country talking to people from San Francisco to New York about this. And you know, they have children in this, reenacting the things that happened and the rituals that they saw. And it feels so real. Dale Griffiths, he is going to testify in this case. He has become rather famous. If you saw Paradise Lost, you've seen his testim. You know, he had a, you know, mail in order degree, right? And that was sort of a big knock on him in the trial. But it's hard to say that he wasn't an expert on this to the extent you could be an expert on it. He is talking on national television about it. He is being called in by police departments around the country to talk about it. There's one guy in this, and this should sort of give you an idea that not everyone who's involved in this is being honest. There's one guy they talked to who was like a Christian comedian who used to be a Satanist, a high ranking Satanist. And he would, he'd tell these stories about how the rituals went down and the sacrifice and everything else. And it turned out an investigation later on. He was just a complete fraudster. He made everything up, all of it up. It was never involved in anything like that. But he's going on 2020 telling everybody, this is what's happening. You know, this is what your kids are getting into. And I can tell you from growing up in the south and during this time, this was a very real thing. Like I can remember, I couldn't do anything that involved dragons. Like dragons were satanic. So if there was a dragon in a movie or a dragon in a video game, couldn't touch it. That was the pathway to evil, to hell.
- [13:46]
Alice
Right? I mean, literally, my. So I did not grow up in Alabama as a child, but my husband did. And he like recounted stories of he'd be driving home with like, you know, other youth group members. And this was on, like, many years later. So this is past the satanic panic. Harry Potter was coming out, and their youth pastor, like, threw the copies of Harry Potter out the window because he was like, you're opening up the doors to hell because this is magic. I mean, this had lasting impressions, even outside of kind of the core time period that we're talking about here.
- [14:18]
Brett
I remember I talked to Jason and Blair. I can't remember what we're talking about. They were talking about, like, mysteries and why mysteries are Important. Silver Linings Handbook. And I was telling him there were two things we were afraid of growing up in Alabama, the Ku Klux Klan and Satanist. And they were kind of interchangeable. Like, there were all these stories about these roads that would lead off into the forest, and they were either clan roads or Satanist roads. But either way, if you, like, ended up on that road in the middle of the night, you were totally getting murdered. You were either getting sacrificed or just murdered straight up. I mean, this was real in all of our minds through high school. I can remember in high school, which was in the mid-90s, people still talking like this. And it wasn't until. I don't know exactly when it was like, wait, none of that was real. Like, there weren't Satanists running around the forest of North Alabama. I don't know. I can say the same thing about the Klan, but there certainly weren't any Satanists doing that. Right. But we believed it wholeheartedly, and our parents certainly believed it. And I guarantee you my parents talked about this case. I don't know, they never discussed it with them, but I bet they did. I mean, this was the kind of nightmare that every parent was primed to believe back in the early 90s.
- [15:33]
Alice
Yes, especially. And this is so, so important that you're saying this, because I think when we look back on this case, West Memphis three, as we are decades removed, it's easy to just say, well, this little small town, West Memphis, was just captured by something that was clearly false or it didn't touch anyone else except for West Memphis, because they were, I don't know, rural, not a big town, not sophisticated, whatever you want to say. But Here we have 2020 report. Barbara Walters basically warning the nation, the world of this Satanism that was sweeping every corner of our society, reaching our most vulnerable, our children, our preschoolers, our small children, our animals. Really, no one was safe from this. And so it was no surprise that the police in West Memphis were conditioned to believe that there was at least a possibility that Satanism was rife in their community. Not just because this was something that was being reported on national media, but as we saw from the timeline in their communications and interviews with people in West Memphis. Damien Echols wasn't the only person to bring up Satanism. He was one of many to bring up Satanism. And people who had nothing to do with it talked of these meetings and rituals in the forest in Robin Hood Hills. And so this wasn't something dreamed up at the police department in West Memphis because they didn't have any more leads to go down. Rather, this was fertile ground for essentially this theory to take root and have legs to run. So Jerry driver in 1992 called in Steve Nowizek. He was the little Rock corner and self proclaimed satanic cult expert. Note self proclaimed because I'm not exactly sure how you would get a degree in this other than as we saw with the psychiatrist who helped Michelle. Remember, he became the expert. But you know, how do these people become experts? Essentially you have to become self proclaimed. So he was called in to essentially investigate the satanic scene in West Memphis. And based on the bonfires, the graffiti and the animal carcasses found around town, just by the way, in Texas we call those roadkill. But he was looking at all of these things. And in total, Steve determined that a group of self styled Satanists were running around West Memphis. So this is his expert opinion to Jerry Driver, who was already going around looking for these satanic cult killers. Now, Steve said that this group of satanists in West Memphis would be made up of a certain profile. And the profile he developed for the Satanists were troubled youths who used Satanism as an excuse to do drugs, have sex and generally like a middle finger to society. And he said that there would generally be a charismatic leader which Driver believed to be Damien Echols. Now, Driver was suspicious of Damien because of Damien's statements to him after his arrest with Deanne Hul. And here's how Driver described it. We read this to you before, but we think it's worth listening to.
- [18:45]
Brett
And I'll just say this before I read what he says. If you watch this ABC thing and you watch various other things, Geraldo had a special on Satanism because of course he did. There essentially were three different levels of this that police were concerned about. One was what you might consider sort of a worldwide underground satanic cult. So think like Adrenochrome. Now think like the Illuminati, you know, like every time Beyonce, you know, puts her hands up, she's signaling some satanic thing. Like everybody in government's a Satanist. Like this was sort of the top level of this and that was something people believed in. And there was an interconnected group. Right. So big conspiracy. Then though, there were these sort of self styled Satanists, these local groups, which is kind of what we're talking about here, where you would have unconnected groups of people who were dabbling in this stuff really as an excuse to do other things. And then you would have basically just one off people who believe they were Satanist and did bad things. Right. I think it's pretty clear we're going to talk about this a little bit, that the bottom exists. Like there are people who consider themselves to be like the Son of Sam or whatever and who are involved in criminality because they want to be evil. Right. The other two is where you really get into a lot of questions. So it's worth noting in West Memphis, they're not saying this is part of the global elite satanic cult. They're saying self styled group, small group, people who are doing this. So why does Jerry Driver believe that Damian's involved in this? Well, this goes back to that arrest and we talked about this before, but I want to read this to you just, just to remind you of what all was said. So. Yes, and so he's being interviewed in relation to this case and he's talking about how he came to believe that Damien was involved in this kind of stuff. Yes, that is correct. About 29 May 1992, I received a call from the Crittenden County Sheriff's office that Mr. Echols had been arrested along with Deanna Holcomb at a trailer down in Lakeshore Trailer Park. He was charged with burglary and, let's see, sexual misconduct. I went to the sheriff's office and along with Detective John Murray, questioned Mr. Echols at the time. Mr. Echols said to both of us that he was involved in the occult, but not as a devil worshipper as such. He said he was a gray witch and that he had a group of people that participated in this with him and that his main participant was a boy named Jason Baldwin who also lived at Lakeshore. Just real quick, the gray witch. I don't know how much of this is true. How much of this Damian actually said. The gray witch thing is something that Damian has said before and has written down before Indiana Holcomb talked about. So I could see him saying something like that Damon would talk about. He doesn't want to be in the light or the dark. He wants to be somewhere in the middle. So this sort of fits with that. And mentioning Jason Baldwin. He also informed me at the time that Jason would never, ever give him up and that he loved him. During the same interview with Mr. Echols, he was asked what was the extent of the cult activities in Crittenden county in the West Memphis area. And he told us that it was fairly extensive, that there were three or four groups in West Memphis itself. They were further along in their activities than he may or may not have been. And by that, he said he meant that they had reached the end of their animal sacrifice portion to receive power, and the next logical step would be to sacrifice a human. So giving you the background of where we are with the satanic panic, what police officers are thinking, what West Memphis has already been primed to believe, you can imagine they hear something like that now. They're like, oh, my goodness, like, what in the world is going on? Like, we clearly have this massive issue. And we said before, you know, is Damien just pulling his chain or is this real or whatever? We kind of left it there. Well, now I'm going to tell you that he is almost certainly, certainly pulling his chain. He goes on to tell him that this book has come to West Memphis, a grim war of great power. The Necronomicon. Now, the Necronomicon, for those of you who don't know, is a book created by HP Lovecraft that is supposedly the Book of the Dead. The Book of Dead names the book for naming the dead, depending on how you interpret it. And it's not real. Now, there have been people who have written books called the Necronomicon, but the Necronomicon itself is not real. Now, Jerry Driver wouldn't have known anything about the Necronomicon, but Damien Echols almost certainly would. And he's very clearly just being a punk kid with this gullible officer and selling him this line about the Necronomicon. One thing I also appreciate, this is the only cool thing about Yale. I don't know if they still do this or not, but it used to be. So the Necronomicon is the Latin translation, the Al Azif by Abdul Alhazred. And the original was written in. Oh, God, why am I losing my mind? Arabic it was. The original was in Arabic. It was translated into Latin. The Latin translations were in a few different places. So there was one at Cambridge, there was one at Harvard, there was one at Yale, but they've all been lost, of course. Yale, for the longest time had an entry for the original Latin Necronomicon and had it as checked out. So it was always checked out. So you can never get it. It's just a, just a fun little thing.
- [24:01]
Alice
When was it checked out?
- [24:02]
Brett
Like in like 1910 or something? It was like forever.
- [24:05]
Alice
I wonder who has it.
- [24:06]
Brett
Yeah, exactly. So, yeah. Al Azif, by the way, is the sound that insects make in the night in the desert, which I think is great, supposedly drives you insane. This is a long aside to say that there was no Necronomicon. If it wasn't at Yale, it probably wasn't in West Memphis. And this just goes to show you what Damien was doing. Now the fact that Damien is putting on the police, that is relevant for the case, but it also just the fact that he did that pushed these guys so far down this path in May of 1992 that a year later, when these murders happen, they're ready to believe it is some sort of satanic ritual. And at this point, Dale Griffiths, who will eventually testify, he actually gets brought in, he becomes like a consultant for the West Memphis police as they are trying to sort of nail down this satanic cult that they believe is operating in their area and that is going to commit a human sacrifice sometime in the near future.
- [25:07]
Alice
That's a lot, right? This, this is a lot in the sense that it is. You're beginning to see, see where it's coming from. Because I do think there has been a light cast on this that it was dreamed up of out of nowhere. And whether Damien was pulling their legs, it certainly sounds like that he was. Whether they're watching these national reports, this national frenzy about it, it certainly was not something that was made up whole cloth in the middle of West Memphis. Now, whether there was any teeth to actual Satanism in West Memphis, a whole nother story. But this was prime. By the way, whenever you find anyone during any sort of a craze who claims to be an expert on something that you, hmm, how can you possibly be an expert on that? Follow your gut feeling, right? The fact that all these people can claim to be self proclaimed experts says something. People were looking for answers because they truly believed, or at least were too scared not to believe the possibility. Because what if just a 0.1% this was true? That's terrifying. We should probably take it seriously, right? These are some very serious allegations. So, of course, although the idea of satanic cults around the country sacrificing thousands of people a year has now been debunked but of course it's been replaced by a different kind of cult, some maybe say the Odinists, it seems, which is very true and will not be debunked. And there are very many experts on it. Now, that was in jest. For those of you who follow the Delphi case, Odinism is not the cult to replace it by. But by the way, going back to this, we are always drawn to kind of the unknown cultish behaviors that probably have some sort of underlining truth to them that don't quite rise to the level of what ultimately became the Satanic panic, what became the Odinism cult travesty that was the Delphi case. We want to believe these things because we know that these terrible things, when humans follow their worst tendencies, have existed in history. But that doesn't mean they exist at every turn. So let's say that even though we now know the satanic, you know, panic has been debunked, that doesn't mean that there aren't people. And this is probably what fueled the original panic or the original stories of why these cults may have existed. Doesn't mean that there aren't people who have murdered others and describe themselves as Satanists to fuel it, to make it something bigger, cooler than what they are. Because if you're just a murderer, you're just a murderer. But if you're a satanic murderer, maybe something bigger than yourself. Now we covered Rod Farrell and his Kentucky vampire cult, and we've also covered the Palo Mayombe practice of drug trafficker Adolfo Constanzo. And there are others that we haven't covered, such as the murder of Giselle Cote by Scott Waterhouse, a self professed Satanist. And the murders by the night stalker, Richard Ramirez. There are many more. So you can see how whether it was a flashpoint in time or not, it certainly was fed by these real murders done by people who claim to have been part of the Satanic cults. Now, given this history, perhaps it's not surprising that the police thought of Satanism when they found three young boys brutally murdered in West Memphis. And although the grip of the Satanic panic was breaking by 1993, it really didn't end until a few years later. And you know, we've talked about our experience in Alabama or the south, but it, it wasn't limited to the South. Some of the most prominent cult cops were actually in the big cities on the coast, San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York. And with that background, the things going on in West Memphis primed the police to believe that Satanism was involved.
- [28:52]
Brett
Today's episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. You chose to hit play on this podcast today. Smart Choice. Progressive loves to help people make smart choices. That's why they offer a tool called Auto Quote Explorer that allows you to compare your Progressive car insurance quote with rates from other companies so you save time on the research and can enjoy savings when you choose the best rate for you.
- [29:17]
Alice
Give it a try after this episode@progressive.com Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates not available in all states or situations. Prices vary based on how you buy. So guys, if you've been listening to us for some time, you know that despite doing true crime podcasts, I actually am kind of a scaredy cat and get scared very easily. And I spend so much time researching these cases and getting into all of the bloody details that I end up scaring myself to death and spending even more time trying to get myself to sleep. Enter Beam's Dream Powder because when it comes to solving the case of your sleepless nights, dream is a lifesaver. When I found dream, everything changed. I was able to relax after we recorded and sleep through the night without tossing and turning. And even better, I woke up energized, not groggy. It's been a game changer for me. Dream is made with a powerful blend of all natural ingredients, Reishi, magnesium, L theanine, epigenin, and melatonin. It's designed to help you fall asleep, stay asleep and wake up feeling amazing. And unlike other sleep aids, there's no next day grogginess, just great restful sleep.
- [30:27]
Brett
And Alice, I am the same way. I don't get scared when we do these episodes, but I get really excited and so I have all this adrenaline pumping and we finish it's time for bed and guess what? I can't go to sleep. But that's why Beam is so great. It has helped me fall asleep faster. And I'm not the only one. Beam has already improved over 17 and a half million nights of sleep, helping people across the country wake up and feel their best. And here's the twist. Beam's giving our listeners an exclusive offer of up to 40% off their best selling dream powder. That's right, up to 40% off. To finally crack the case of your bad sleep, go to shopbeam.com prosecutors and use code prosecutors at checkout that shop b e a m.com prosecutors and use code prosecutors for up to 40% off because better sleep. That's the kind of mystery you can solve. Yeah. And as their investigation continues I mean, initially you sort of have. You have Jerry Driver, you have these guys who are the juvenile officers, right? I mean, they're the ones who dealt with Damien. I think Jerry Driver had spoken to Damien like 20 times in the last year, and he would ask him about all this cult stuff and how the cult stuff is going, because he was really interested in that. And you can imagine Damien would egg him on. Now, look, Damien was clearly. He was interested in alternative religions. He was interested in Wicca. You know, he might have been interested in Satanism, in sort of the actual religion of Satanism, which started, I think, in the 60s and is more like this sort of hippie, do whatever you want thing than it is worshiping the devil. It's an atheist religion. They don't believe in the devil. Right. He probably did look into that and all that sort of other stuff, but frankly, what he was doing wasn't all that unusual. I certainly knew people who did that in high school who were into that whole thing. I knew somebody who had the Satanic Bible and carried around. It was written by Anton lavey, who was the founder of modern Satanism. You know, I hung out with everybody in high school. Like, I remember when Columbine happened, I had to go to the office because I was friends with all the people who wore trench coats, because there were people who wore trench coats. I guess it was just true of every high school. There was just a group of people who wore trench coats. So, of course, Columbine happens. If you wore a trench coat, you were getting, like, looked into. So I was friends, everybody. I was friends with a Satanist. I was in the Christian club. So I knew all these people right, in my area. And there certainly were people who probably weren't that different from Damien. And if we'd had some really weird murder, maybe they would have ended up being investigated. But you have the police, you have these juvenile officers who are interested in this and they're sort of pushing it. It's never clear to me, frankly, that, like, Gary Gitchell ever believed in this whole Satanism thing. And in fact, he has made statements and made statements at the time that he didn't think this was a cult killing. But as the police are investigating, they continue to hear things that are going to lead to the prosecution's use of this sort of occult activity as a possible motive, particularly in Damien and Jason's trial. And you got to remember, this is a bifurcated trial. So you've got Damien and Jason are tried, and then you've got Jesse Misskeli who's going to be tried by himself. The reason for that is because Jesse Misskelley confessed, he made statements which implicated his co defendants, he cannot be forced to testify. That's his right. So the Supreme Court has said in a case called Bruton that when you have that, you got to figure something out. One way to do it, we've talked about this before, is you can actually have two juries. You can try everybody together, but you have two juries and you bring the juries in and out. And if you know when Jesse's confession was discussed, there would be. Jesse's jury would be the only one in the room, for instance. They didn't do that. They bifurcated the trial. So in Jesse's trial, you've got his own words, you've got his own statements, you've got his confession. Pretty standard sort of murder trial. But then once you get to Jason and Damian's, unless Jesse's willing to testify, you can't bring that statement in because they need to be able to confront their accuser in this case, Jesse Miskelly. So Jesse can testify and he can say everything he said in his confession. But unless he does that, it doesn't come in. So the police and the prosecutors have to get a little bit more creative in that second trial. And one thing they focus on a lot more is the motivation why this happened. And that's when they start talking about Satanism. That's when Dale Griffiths testifies, as in Damien and Jason's trial. And so the stuff we're going to talk about now is sort of the things that happened during the investigation that I think would have justified that in the mind of the police. We'll start off with where the bodies were found. And we talked about this a little bit. In the beginning, the area where the bodies were discovered was whispered to be one of these places where cults would gather. Kathy Myrick reported that a resident of Mayfair, member of the Mayfair Apartments are right next to this area, told her that Robin Hood was a place of devil worshiping. And this was supported by other residents who spoke to the police, though they never offered specifics because that's the way this always goes. This is rumor, it's the things that are heard, it's things that are spreading. And now all of a sudden everybody has a story about all the dark things that happened in the place where three young boys have just been found murdered. And you can appreciate how that happens and why it happens. Multiple Mayfair Complex residents, including Laurie Sparles, And Lynette Thomas said there were devil worshippers in the woods, and they had seen one with black hair and one with red hair. Now, why is this interesting? Because Domini, who is Damien's girlfriend, had red hair. It was like her most defining trait. And then Damien, of course, had black hair. Now, not exactly the most solid identification, but you can imagine how in the mind of the police, this would have been significant. The police also spoke to a woman named Sheila Stewart, whose husband found sacrificed animals in Robin Hood. Now, what does it mean, sacrificed animals? I don't know. That's how she describes it. As Alice said, animals die. And sometimes animals die in violent ways. And maybe if you came upon them, you would say, oh, the animals been sacrificed. Especially if you're already primed to believe the area where you find the animal is an area with devil worshippers.
- [37:08]
Alice
I mean, not the same thing at all because it wasn't a forest. But I remember last year I walked out to take the garbage out, and it was dark out, and I live by some, like, lakes, and I felt something squish beneath my foot as I rolled the garbage can out. And I was like, oh, my. That felt like it once used to be alive. And so I quickly ran back, was too scared to look because I didn't want to know what I had stepped in and turned on the lights and looked out. And very strangely, I live on land. You know, my house is on land. And there was this massive, massive. I don't know what kind, because I want to get close enough fish, like larger than half my wingspan, right? So what about 3 foot long fish in the middle of my driveway? And it had its head cut off and it had the little spine poking out of it and it looked like terrified. It smelled terrible because fish doesn't smell great when it's not in the water anymore. And my very first thought was, who put it there to intimidate me?
- [38:10]
Brett
It's a Sicilian Message, Alice.
- [38:13]
Alice
Exactly. I was like, someone put it there. Someone put it there with its decapitated head. The head is nowhere to be found in the middle of my driveway to scare me. That was my very first thought. I mean, this is also at a time when we're prosecuting some kind of scary people who moved a lot of drugs. So my first thought was, this is intimidation factor. And then I like, came down off my fear factor horse. And I was like, okay, realistically, I live a little bit far from this lake, but it's walking distance. And really likely what happened is one of the blue heron who live in my neighborhood, probably was trying to wrestle this massive three foot long fish, which was about as large as the heron, and probably was able to, like capture its, you know, head alone. And the fish was probably swaying back and forth, decapitated itself and fell on my driving. That's most likely what happened. But if you had talked to me within the first five minutes of me finding it, I was like, someone is here to intimidate me. And there's no way this naturally could have appeared here. That's just one small way of showing. And I was primed at the time to think someone wanted to intimidate me as well, because we had gotten threatening messages and people were supposedly stalking and watching, you know, our office as we were prosecuting this case. So all to say is the mind is going to filter whatever it sees. And you can easily see how something that could just be roadkill, dead animals, can suddenly look like animal sacrifice or it could really be animal sacrifice. But keep that in mind. It's all being filtered through this lens that we've just talked about. 2020 reports, national reporting of these under, you know, pinnings of our society that are threatening the very core of what is good and evil.
- [39:56]
Brett
Yeah, and that's where everybody was. And Sheila, she didn't stop with that animal. She also said that she, at night she could smell smoke and hear chanting, strange music at night. Now probably there were like kids listening to rock music and smoking pot down in the woods. And that's what she was hearing is chanting. But nevertheless, you know, in her mind, you know, there is a satanic ritual going on down there in Robin Hood, and she's going to report it to the police. And as I said, there were just a lot of people. Deborah O. Tinger, who was another person who was interviewed, she would testify that there had always been talk of satanic activities in the woods in Robin Hood where these boys were found. Now, these people, obviously these are some interesting stories. They got nothing though, on Alvis Clem Bly.
- [40:49]
Alice
Nothing. Nothing at all. Buckle up, y' all, because on June 29, 1993, the police talked to Alvis Clem Bly. He's a 36 year old man who at the time had been in the county jail for four months for one of the most horrendous crimes, and that's of raping his stepdaughter. So Bly claimed that he had lived in Lakeshore, and during that time he became a part of a local culture. He reported that the cult would kill dogs and chickens. They would Drain their blood, burn their hearts. In the center of a pentagram that was drawn with white and blue carpenter's chalk. He said that both Jason Baldwin and Jesse Misskelley were part of this cult. Can you imagine the police hearing this as they are deep in their investigation? And here comes Bly telling them everything of their very worst fears. That seems to coincide with what they've already been hearing as rumor and innuendo from others. But no one's been able to point specifically at what it is until Bly comes along. And even better, he points fingers at Jason and Jesse. So he's shown a picture of Jason Baldwin, and he says, that's not who I'm thinking about. Instead, even though he says the name Jason Baldwin, when shown a picture of Jason Damien, he says, that's who I'm talking about. That's Jason. So in other words, the people he's thinking about are actually Damien and Jesse, though he calls them Jesse and Jason. And by the way, he gets that wrong a little bit, too. Instead of Damien, he calls him Davion. Now, Bly also claimed that Jesse Misskelley was the head of this cult, which seems unlikely. I was going to say we've. We've heard from Jesse Misskelley, and he very well may be a follower, but I don't know that he's the head of a cult. And so Bly claimed that he knew Jesse very well and that he'd gone water skiing with Jesse. He said that Ms. Kelly told him that the devil would give him more than God ever would. In addition to killing the dogs, Bly claimed that the cult had raped a girl at a place the locals called Stonehenge. Bly doesn't stop there. He said that Ms. Kelly came up with the idea of murdering the three boys, but Baldwin. And again, he says Jason Baldwin. But after looking at the pictures, we think he actually means Damien or Davien went along with it. So all up until now, we've heard that it's Damien who's kind of the brains, and if anyone was following it was Jesse Misskelley. But here we have, of course, the flip of the story, and it may just be he heard something and flipped it around, because it doesn't actually seem like he knows Jesse Ms. Kelly Kelly that well. I don't know that Jesse Misskelley has water skied. Maybe they do all the time. Maybe it would have been better had he said I wrestled with him if he did his research on who Jesse Ms. Kelly was. And by the way, this is how we Assess jailhouse informants, things like this. Because people are talking all the time. But the fact that, for example, he calls Jason Damien Jason, and then he even says Damien is Damian. All these things are kind of triggers to think, okay, do you really know what you're talking about?
- [44:06]
Brett
And I'll say this about Bly. He either had seen something or he had quite the imagination. You've already seen some of the stuff he said, but he keeps going. I mean, this is. This is available in Callahan. This is a wild read. And I'll just say, you know, when we started this, I just assumed that the whole satanic panic thing, it was just satanic panic's going on. Damian's weird. There was probably some devil worshippers, and that's how they came up with it. And then you start reading this stuff and you find stuff like this, and it's just like, wow, what are they.
- [44:38]
Alice
Supposed to do with this? My goodness.
- [44:39]
Brett
Exactly. What do you do with this if you're the police?
- [44:41]
Alice
I can't imagine if they just shut the book. And they were like, well, that was an interesting conversation, and moved along their way. What? This is intense, right?
- [44:52]
Brett
You mentioned Odinism, and that was the criticism, right. In the Richard Allen cases, the police didn't look hard enough into Odin. Like, why didn't they look harder at this? Right? Even though they did, and there are a couple of cops who did look into that. But the main bulk of the police looking into those murders were not actually thinking this is odinous. They thought that was absurd. But the defense is like, well, I need to look into this more. And so here you have this guy coming in and telling them this stuff. And I'll just continue. This is how he describes the ritual that he witnessed as a part of this cult meeting. We would hang the dog up above that, and then we would cut his throat, the first thing. And we would catch the blood in a pail. And then we drink a cup full, a piece, each of us, of the blood. And then we would cut his head off. Then we would cut him open and cut his heart out. We would put the heart in the middle of this and pour alcohol on it mixed with baby oil. I mean, like, these details are just so weird, right? Anyways. And they would put his heart. We had a pie pan that we would set in the center of this, which he's talking about the pentagram in the center of this, which is the same thing I'm talking. You know, we got the blood in, and then we would put the baby oil on the heart and, you know, burn it. It would burn up, but it would burn it and we would praise to the devil and stuff. I mean. Yeah, I mean, I'm just trying to imagine if you're the police and you're sitting there listening to this guy describe this and he keeps going, do we.
- [46:14]
Alice
Look for receipts for baby oil? You know, yeah.
- [46:16]
Brett
Where's the baby oil come in? It's baby oil.
- [46:19]
Alice
Flat. I guess that's how you make candles, apparently.
- [46:22]
Brett
Baby oil. I mean, yeah, that's. I guess it's oil.
- [46:25]
Alice
I guess that's what he's thinking, right?
- [46:27]
Brett
Alcohol would seem to be.
- [46:28]
Alice
Because it coats it. Because it coats it so that you burn that up. But alcohol doesn't burn very long. So, I mean, this is a high level of detail. This is not like the other witnesses who say, oh, everyone knows that Robin Hood Hills is the place of animal sacrifices. He's actually talking about very gruesome details. Whether he's completely making them up or not. They are details. And like, you can't. You can't write a movie, you know, more salacious than what he's telling them. And he goes on. Bly claimed that there were at least 20 people in the cult, but very specific, never fewer than eight. So the meetings were always on Sunday at 6pm and they used a black book with a dragon with a goat's body on the COVID By the way, maybe your mom was right about dragons. You know, There you go. What's happening over here? Dragons got their bad rap. I mean, talk about details here, right? So on this black book, and there was this, you know, dragon with a goat's body, who he referred to as St. Lucifer's second son. Not first son, second son. Bly said that if the cult killed the boys, they would have beaten them to death. Now, Bly was surprised that they hadn't had their heads cut off, because that's what you're supposed to do, he said, and in fact, what they've done to the dogs. So he noted that the book told them to bite the penis off of the dogs, what he called the devil's circumcision.
- [47:54]
Brett
I mean, just. But he said, no, this is so detailed. This is like wild.
- [47:59]
Alice
I know this.
- [48:00]
Brett
Wild.
- [48:00]
Alice
Anyways, so it's not just. It's not just like describing horrific things, even if it's just his imagination, he's naming them as well. Right? It's not just, oh, we do this horrific thing where we bite off, you know, the sex organs. He's. He says, oh, of course, that's Called the Devil's circumcision. You haven't heard of it? I mean, he, he absolutely is pulling in all the elements to. If I am the interviewer, my head's exploding at this point because I, I don't believe him. But also, I can't not follow up. And then also I have to believe him in some senses because he is being so detailed and so specific about the things that are happening. So back to him talking about the devil's circumcision. He claims that no one was brave enough to do that, which is to bite off the sex organ. And so what they did was they cut the penis off instead. Now, Bly said that Jesse Misskelley carried a knife with him at all times and that he called it a gut knife. The cult wanted to sacrifice a child, and Bly said that the book told them it had to be a child who was eight years old or younger. Now, very interesting because we've been hearing about all these things that the book tells them they have to do. Bly doesn't even own this book. Bly says that he got this book from the library. He checked it out, it's due in two weeks. Or he gets charged a fine and the west makes. I mean, can you imagine if this is the book? Yeah, if, if this is like the book of life, death, whatever you want to call it. The book that tells you basically how to live your life as a cult leader. You don't even own it. You know, like I just check out my Bible and read it in two week spurts.
- [49:34]
Brett
Hey, maybe the West Memphis library did have the Necronomicon. I mean, they, they, this library, maybe.
- [49:39]
Alice
They, maybe they checked it out from Yale.
- [49:42]
Brett
Remember, this is the same library that Hutchinson went to to get her book.
- [49:45]
Alice
That's right.
- [49:46]
Brett
To put on the coffee table. So Damien would think she was also into Satanism. I mean, this is the most well read library in the south at this time. I'm gonna say this like Vanderbilt. Their library had nothing on West Memphis Public Library.
- [50:00]
Alice
So Bly said that he left the cult about a month before the murders. Of course, he had nothing to do with the murders. He just knows everything about it and that he was in jail at the time of the crimes. Now, he said that they had to sacrifice every full moon. For what it's worth, the moon waxed full the night of May 5th and into the morning of May 6th, 1993. So you can, you know, a broken clock is still right twice a day. But he does mention the full moon and specifically That a full moon is the night of sacrifices, which, remember, Driver was driving around on full moon nights looking for just this sort of thing. Again, Driver wasn't making this up in his mind. You have someone like Bly telling you specifically how they hang up a dog, slit its throat, drink its blood, pour baby oil on it, light it up like a candle, and doing sacrifices on full moon nights. This is absolutely being fed by multiple witnesses and not in small part by Bly as well. Now, like all the other witnesses, police wanted to polygraph Blythe, but it appears that he never was. I mean, I don't really trust and really depend on polygraphs, but it would have been fun to see it light up like a Christmas tree.
- [51:13]
Brett
Yeah, I think I would have trusted this one when it said he was lying. I think I would have bought that. I mean, look, this is fascinating and really interesting. I think all of us sitting here listening to this, we not being in the midst of the satanic panic. The guy is clearly trying to get off from the rape charge. Right. When he's raped his stepdaughter, he's looking a lot of time if he can help.
- [51:35]
Alice
By the way, when I said it was one of the worst crimes, I didn't mean like worst in terms of. I mean, obviously we were talking about a triple horrific homicide. Worse to be in jail for. You know, who does not get it? Well, by other criminals in jail, someone who has violated their own. You know, a child within their care is one of kind of the lowest crimes in terms of the totem pole of security, shall we call it in prison. So that's what I meant by one of the worst. He has a lot to lose if he stays in prison. He may not make it out alive. He has every interest to try and get out because it's facing a very long sentence among other inmates who hate his guts.
- [52:14]
Brett
And I think he would have known. He knows his way around the system. He would have known if he just goes in and says, oh, yeah, Damien's in a cult and so is Jesse Miskelly. You notice this is right after the confession. Right. What does everybody know? Everybody knows that Jesse Misskelley confessed. Who's the head of the cult in his telling? Jesse Misskelley. Right. Not surprising. And he also throws in Damien's name, he throws in Jason's name. It's going around the jail cells just like everywhere else. Now, he is a storyteller. The stuff he talks about is wild. And you wonder also how much of the facts of the crime have also Gotten around the jail because several of the things he says are consistent, like that the boys were beaten to death. They were beaten to death. One of the boys has very serious injuries to his genitalia. That's consistent with what he's saying. So he clearly he has some information, but I don't think it's because he was in a cult. I think it's because he's heard things going around. But once again, you can imagine what the police heard when they heard the story. Though it seems like even the police, he went too far because they never did polygraph him, and this sort of just dies away. But he is not the only one who talks about occult rituals at Stonehenge, which is always two words. When they wrap this up, it's always two words.
- [53:38]
Alice
They don't write it as Stonehenge.
- [53:39]
Brett
Hinge, H I N G E. So.
- [53:41]
Alice
You know, it's like the app, and it was fine.
- [53:44]
Brett
Stones. Exactly. Exactly. There you go. If you're looking for a cultist in your area, you can go to Stonehenge. This is like an old swipe, right? It's like an abandoned cotton gin. It reminds me. So it's super creepy. You know, there's all these, like, pentagrams and everything else. It reminds me in Tuscaloosa. I've told this story before. Tuscaloosa is famous for its insane asylums, and one of them is called Old Bryce. And Old Bryce was the place that you went to in the middle of the night to scare yourself. It was completely abandoned. It had caught on fire. It was gutted, it was overgrown, everything. But what was funny about it, there is a Bryce hospital that is very old. This was actually the newest of the buildings, but it was just one that had closed and had kind of fallen into disrepair. So it was the one that got the reputation as being this sort of really creepy place. Right. And I feel like Stonehenge is the same way. It looks creepy, but it's just because it's this, like, abandoned building. So it has this sort of creepiness about it. And so everybody was talking about how this was a place where rituals happened, and some of them were a little bit closer to the trio than this Bly fellow. So Dennis Carter, who described himself as a good friend of Jesse's and said he had known him all his life, said that he had heard of rituals happening at Stonehenge that involved sacrificing dogs by decapitating them, which is exactly what Bly said. Gotta just wonder how far this story is sort of circulating. Six Months before the murder, Jesse had told Dennis that Damian was a devil worshiper that killed dogs as part of his rituals, which confirmed for Dennis what he had already heard. And Dennis had heard that cult members would also eat part of the dogs after decapitating them, specifically the meat off the legs. This is something that Jesse had also said in his various confessions about eating the meat off the legs. And just to confirm what I was saying earlier, Dennis stated that in the woods around West Memphis that he had often seen satanic or KKK symbols carved in the trees. I'm telling you, I don't know why, but in the south at this time, there was this linkage between the Ku Klux Klan, which for those of you in the other country, as this white supremacist, like domestic terrorist group in the United States, and satanic cults. For some reason, I'm not sure why, but you see Dennis Carter saying the same thing in describing what he had heard from Jesse. And this is a story the police probably took a little bit more seriously than Bly's. He is not the last person they interview. They also interview a 16 year old named Ricky Clymer. Now Ricky said that he had joined the cult at around 10 because he just wanted something to belong to. Interestingly, Ricky referred to Damien as Michael, which was his given name. So sort of makes you think maybe this, there's something to this. Ricky said that Damien, Jason and Jesse were members of the same cult as him. And he said that they would perform rituals in the woods that included animal sacrifices, including cats and dogs. He said they would cook these animals after they sacrificed them and they would eat the meat of the animals and it made them feel powerful, by the way.
- [56:58]
Alice
Just really quick, I'm not a expert in animal sacrifices at all, but isn't like, at least historically, the purpose of a sacrifice is that you give it up and so like you do not take it back for meat. I mean, like in the biblical times, in like civilizations that are now gone, when you do sacrifice, the whole point is you sacrifice and you give in place of something else, like a child and you leave it at the altar for the gods or the Satans that you are worshiping and you don't then get to like barbecue with it. So I'm just having a little issue with their, with their animal sacrifice because that just sounds like a barbecue. It doesn't sound like animal sacrifice.
- [57:36]
Brett
I'm going to live and say torture at that. If this cult existed, they weren't the most sophisticated cultists, so. But you're Right. And as a criticism, shouldn't be eating the meat.
- [57:46]
Alice
One of many.
- [57:47]
Brett
Yeah, exactly, exactly. Otherwise it is just a. We're just cooking out. That's all we're doing. We're choosing to eat dogs. But they would do that. They would eat the dogs. It made them feel powerful. He also said that they would rape people and that they even jumped a cop once.
- [58:02]
Alice
They as a 10 year old.
- [58:03]
Brett
I mean, I just.
- [58:05]
Alice
Again, horrific. We should look into this because this is horrific.
- [58:09]
Brett
And you see how this reminds me of the McMartin cult thing, right? Like it starts off sort of simple but terrible. And it gets more and more complex and all of a sudden you have tunnels underneath the school and you have Walker, Texas Ranger is like part of it. I mean, you know, just in the same thing here, you know, he just get. He escalates. Oh, we'd sacrifice animals, eat them. Oh, we would rape people. We even attacked a cop once, obviously, if they had attacked.
- [58:34]
Alice
All the worst things you can possibly do on a list, you know.
- [58:36]
Brett
Yeah, exactly. He said they would paint pentagrams and carve them into trees. He said drugs were often consumed at these events. Everything from huffing gasoline and paint to smoking marijuana, doing cocaine and lsd. Now, as Alice pointed out, Ricky was pretty young when he was doing all this. He said he left the group when he was 14 and that at that time it was getting more and more violent.
- [59:04]
Alice
Homes.com knows when it comes to home shopping, it's never just about the house or condo. It's about the home. And what makes a home is more than just the house or property. It's the location and neighborhood. If you have kids. It's also schools, nearby, parks, and transportation options. That's why homes.com goes above and beyond to bring home shoppers the in depth information they need to find the right home.
- [59:29]
Brett
And when I say in depth, I'm talking deep. Each listing features comprehensive information about the neighborhood, complete with a video guide. They also have details about local schools with test scores, state rankings, and student to teacher ratio. They even have an agent directory with the sales history of each agent. So when it comes to finding a home, not just a house, this is everything you need to know, all in1place.homes.com We've done your homework, guys. I want to talk about one of our favorite sponsors and one of my favorite subscription services, First Leaf. It's springtime. That means refreshing everything, including my wine fridge. And that's one reason I love my First Leaf membership. They always keep my selection fresh by sending me the perfect case of personalized wines right to my door. Whether I'm craving a light red, a crisp white, or a refreshing, I'm always stocked and ready to enjoy a glass on a sunny day or at any spring gathering. I've been a First Leaf member for a while now, and I can confidently say that they truly get my taste. Whether you're someone who likes red or white, sweet or dry, every shipment is filled with wines they know you'll love. You get a great glass of wine without the guesswork and getting started is easy. You answer a few quick questions and First Leaf takes care of the rest. They actually listen to my feedback too, so every shipment gets better and better, perfectly matching my taste. And one of the best perks of my First Leaf membership is the flexibility. I control when the wine ships, so I'm always stocked for hosting. Plus, as a member, I get free access to their awesome wine concierge team whenever I want to talk to an expert. And I've said this before, I love wine, but I know nothing about it. And it was so easy to use First Leaf to really hone in on the wines I wanted. I was, you know, I wanted to be more adventurous. It was a question they ask you. And so I'm getting wines from all over the world, different varieties, things that I've never tried before. It is awesome. If you're having spring events or any kind of gatherings, it's great to be able to pull out a bottle of wine that your guests have probably never heard of or seen, but will love. And if you don't absolutely love it, that's not a problem because First Leaf has a 100% satisfaction guarantee. Enjoy the fresh vibes of spring with wines you'll love from First Leaf. Go to tryfirstleaf.com prosecute to sign up and you'll get your first six hand picked bottles for just $44.95. That's T R Y F I R S T l e a f.com prosecute try firstleaf.com prosecute.
- [62:13]
Alice
So as you can probably tell, Clymer had some problems. He's been in and out of mental hospitals for years. And the story that you just heard he told, it smacks a fantasy. It doesn't really seem rooted in reality. Well, at one point he tells police that Damien and the group attacked and killed a Blood of gang fang because they were affiliated with the Crips who are apparently in climbers telling a satanic group. So all of a sudden the Bloods and the Crips are Part of this as well. I mean, this kid watches TV is all I know. I don't know that he's reading books, but if he does, it's definitely at the West Memphis Public Library. And not to make fun of him because it's. It smells like. And we know of his mental history that it is fantasy. Except this probably a lot of underlying mental illness that's causing him to say a lot of these things as well. But he's not the only one. It would be one thing if we just had a couple people who were in and out of mental institutions saying these sorts of crazy things and just a couple inmates who were trying to get off of their sentences saying these things. We are just rife with people who are feeding into this theory here. So then there's Jason Crosby. Crosby also called Damian Michael his given name, and he had known him for over a year. Now, Jason Crosby also said he knew Jesse Misskelley and Jason Baldwin. John Heath, who was the principal at Marion Junior High, took a statement from Jason in which Jason told him that he knew Damien was in a satanic cult and he would kill animals and eat the meat. Again, this is coming back with the. Eating the meat. He claimed that he'd overheard Jesse and Damien in the weeks before the murders talking about catching a bum and setting him on fire. He claimed that he was afraid to tell anyone because Jesse would kill him. And Jason would later deny all of this when questioned by the police. He said that Damien had told him about Wicca, but never about black magic or satanic groups. And Jason would later disclaim these statements as well. Again, when you hear about all these things that he's saying, very well. They may have talked about finding a bum and burning him. Was it. That's a little bit different than ultimately, of course, what happened. That's horrible to say. They may have said it because, as we know, Damien really likes to say things that gets rises out of people. But hearing him say something, that wasn't ultimately what happened. Right. Is it a weird thing to say? Should you not say those things? Yes, that's all true. But did we find anything of real value in his testimony? I don't think so. Not really.
- [64:49]
Brett
Yeah. And he did not testify, so we'll make that clear. And a lot of these people didn't testify. This file is deep and it contains a lot of crazy stories, and this is one of them in the place. But they're talking to all these people and they're getting all this information. Much of much of it. I mean, Some of it, this whole, it makes you wonder, you know, Damien is accused at one point of beating a Great Dane to death and basically scalding, you know, the fur and everything off for the skull. And that story seems like it may be true. And it makes you wonder if like that somehow got transposed into Damien sacrificing a dog and eating the meat or something. Because so many people say that clearly that's a story that's out there, right? That this had happened at some point, whether, you know, it had or not. So. Police also interviewed 18 year old Shane Divelbiss. You'll remember him from before. While Damien and Deanna Holcomb were dating, Shane and Deanne had begun to talk. And when Damien and Deanne broke up, Shane and Deanne started dating. Deanne told Shane that Damian had forced her to have sex in a circle of candles surrounded by other people. She also told him that Damian had proclaimed himself to be the son of Satan. Deanne, you know, she testifies in the trial, doesn't testify to any of this. You know, none of this comes up. It's all about some of the other stuff. And Dan would be someone who'd be interesting to talk to. I would like to talk to her just because so much of what we know about Damien comes from Deanne. Deanne says so many things about Damien and his involvement in various cults and everything else, and it's just interesting. So she tells him this story. Now, Divelopus will say that Damian had threatened to kill him. And one day at school, and we've heard about this, threw him to the ground and clawed at his eyes until someone pulled him off. It was so bad that when Shane went missing for a day on February 3, 1993, police were immediately suspicious that Damien had murdered him. He had not. And Shane showed up. But it hadn't always been that way. At first, Damien and Shane were actually close friends. He described Damien as an imposing figure with his friends, one who could silence them with a glance. He said Damian was manipulative and he could convince people to do anything.
- [67:04]
Alice
Which is again why when Bly said that it was Damien who went along with Jesse Misskelli as leader seemed unlikely in terms of what we know about Damien now. Shane said that when Damien and Deanne broke up, he gave her two things, a crow's foot and a gold coin. Shane said that the crow's foot was used in black magic to represent pain, while the gold coin represented pleasure. Remember, this is coming from the new boyfriend about an ex boyfriend. Take it through that lens as well. Now, Shane explained that he'd studied white and black magic and that a downward pointing pentagram is used to ward off spirits while an invoking pentagram is right side up. But based on Shane's study, he's now the self proclaimed expert. He did not believe the murders were satanic as they didn't match any kind of ritual that he knew of personally.
- [67:56]
Brett
There you go.
- [67:57]
Alice
Take. There you go. So he is the. It didn't fit in one of the books that he checked out from the library, so he doesn't think it was satanic. Now they also spoke to Garrett Schwarting. Garrett, you may recall, gave an alibi for Jason, only to recant it later. So Garrett described himself as a white witch practitioner. He told police that he was sure Jason Baldwin was not involved in the murders, but that Jesse and Damian had committed the crime. Garrett said that Damien was possessed by a demon put there by a man named, you guessed it, Lucifer. And Damian was supposed to kill nine people before he could become a God. And the first person he was supposed to kill was actually his best friend, Jason Baldwin. But Garrett said that Damien couldn't kill Jason. And why not? Because he said that Damian was bisexual. And, and he implies that essentially Damian maybe had a love interest for Jason and that's why he couldn't kill the first of the nine people he needed to kill to become a God. And Lucifer could be identified by a purple streak in his blonde hair. Garrus said that another person, Jerry Nearns, was part of the cult with Jesse, Jason and Damian, and that they would nail cats to trees in sacrifice. Is these poor cats, man, really going after the cats? They eat the dogs, but they nail the cats.
- [69:21]
Brett
Yeah, and this Lucifer guy comes up all the time, they call it, called him Lucy for short. Bunch of people mention Lucifer and they all describe him as this sort of tall, blonde headed older guy who was sort of the head of this cult. But nobody ever knows who this guy is or identifies him or what. So whether he existed or not, probably didn't, but who knows? So that's Lucy. So we talked about Nairns. He was 18 and he was on the police radar after a teacher at the local high school wrote Gary Gitchell that Nairns fit the profile to a T of the person who would commit these murders. He was familiar with the area and he had been known to go to the Robin Hoods woods. Police took Nairn's hair prints and pubic hair as part of their investigation. They also polygraphed him, but he Passed. And as we know, when you passed a polygraph in the West Memphis three case, that pretty much meant good to go, you were good to go. Then, of course, there's Damien's prior girlfriend and possibly the person who introduced him to Satanism. As we've talked about. Deanne Holcomb. Now, she was the girlfriend of Damien's in 1992. In May of 1992, they ran away together after Deanne's parents forbade her from seeing Damien. They're arrested in a vacant mobile home in Lakeshore. And Echols was charged with burglary, breaking and entering, disorderly conduct, sexual misconduct, and terroristic threatening. I think the terroristic threatening was when he threatened to burn down Deanne's house. But whatever. So at that point, Damien was institutionalized. As we talked about, he was in and out of mental institutions really throughout the year of 1992 and into 1993. I think he was in three separate times. And at this point, Deanne and he broke up.
- [71:06]
Alice
So we said that Diane had a lot to say about Damien. And so she goes on, because she says that Damian was going to sacrifice their first daughter were they to have one. Remember, this comes back later when we hear about Dominique, and they do, in fact, have a child together. But deann also said that he would get people involved in magic and tell them what he was doing was white magic, while in fact, it was actually black magic. So tricking them. And Damien had told her that he'd never killed anyone, but he really wanted to because he wanted to know what it felt like. Now, she said that new members of Damien's cult would have been made to strip naked and possibly drink blood. It's like they all watch the same movie about what a satanic cult should be. Like nail cats to trees, drink blood.
- [71:51]
Brett
You know, I would be interested to know what b movies were floating around in the early 90s that kind of influenced this.
- [71:57]
Alice
Absolutely, because they all have similar strains. But it doesn't sound like from personal experiences. It sounds like they all read the same comic book book or something to that effect. Now, she said Damien would often go into the woods to do drugs with others. I honestly can believe that. Deanne said May was a big month for cults. Mark your calendars, not just for Cinco de Mayo, particularly around the full moon. And Deanne said that Damien would hide in the sewer manholes. And he had suggested that they go to the sewer when they ran away. You know what was popular around this time? Teenage Mutant Ninja turtles.
- [72:31]
Brett
There you go.
- [72:32]
Alice
I don't Say that in jest. Right. Like thinking of places, this goes along with the preschool, the tunnels under the ground, things that are kind of unseen but right at the surface of the rest of life. This really strikes a chord of fear within anyone listening.
- [72:45]
Brett
What's interesting is there is a alternative theory in this case that the boys were killed in the sewers and hidden beneath the manholes and that's why the bodies weren't found and they were moved later on. It's a stupid theory, and I'm not saying it's a good theory, but it's sort of of goes with this whole idea about Damien and his manhole covers.
- [73:04]
Alice
Right. So after this interview, Deanne, like so many of the other witnesses in this case, was polygraphed. Now, she indicated deception on only one question, whether she knew for sure who killed the boys. So in the post polygraph interview, she said she was sure it was Damien, though she also said she didn't think he would have done the killing. He would have had someone else do it. And Deanne said that if Damien ordered Jason to kill the boys, that Jason would have done it. So for what it's worth, I mean, she on the polygraph seemed to be telling the truth.
- [73:40]
Brett
Like I said, I'll. Let's talk to the end. Maybe we'll get to talk to the end.
- [73:42]
Alice
That'll be cool.
- [73:43]
Brett
So Deanne said she was a black witch. She went on to say that Damon would lie and say he was into white magic, but he was actually into black magic. And she noted that Damien would never hurt himself because he loved himself too much. Now, as we've, we've noted, police certainly investigated this satanic angle, and what they heard was seeming to confirm it for them. They were told that creek banks, where land and water meet is a sacred space for the occult. They were told that sacrifices would be bound and that body parts would be missing, with those parts often being genitalia, and the sacrifice would be nude because cults prefer to perform their rituals sky clad. Police were also told that the age of the victims was significant as eight is the witch's number. So, you know, once again, six. You know, that's what I thought too, but apparently you're stereotyping witches as satanic eight.
- [74:40]
Alice
I perhaps am.
- [74:41]
Brett
Maybe it is six. I don't know. But they were told it was eight. And that's the thing, like whether it was.
- [74:45]
Alice
Maybe it was like you. They couldn't see it because they had to carve it in. They're not really good at carving. So the six Looks like an eight.
- [74:50]
Brett
Yeah. If the boys had been six, the number would have been.
- [74:53]
Alice
It would have been six. That's right. So Dennis Engel was a preacher at the Lakeshore Baptist Church. Remember we've heard of him before. Now he said that Damien Echols was known to be involved in cults and wore boots with not 8, 8, 8 but 6, 6, 6 on the side of them. Now the First Baptist Church also had a connection to this case because Murray Ferris and his buddy Chris Luttrell attended a revival at the church the night of the murders. And remember, that was their alibi that cleared people of interest at first. Now this was a little unusual as both Ferris and Luttrell were self described white witches, though they assured police they believed in harming no one. Littrell would tell police that Damien had attended a few of their Covid meetings. But the white witch deal wasn't for him. Ferris would tell police that he suspected a leader of an evil cult was involved. A 37 year old man who drove an off white or cream van.
- [75:52]
Brett
That's Lucy again.
- [75:53]
Alice
That's Lucy, right. Of course he draws and also like the stuff of all kidnapping slash horror movies. Right. They're never driving like a hot pink.
- [76:03]
Brett
Free candy.
- [76:06]
Alice
Ice cream in here.
- [76:08]
Brett
So you know, it's interesting because the whole 666 on the side of Damien Echols shoes, in fact it was LG Hollingsworth was the one who had shoes with 666 on the side of them. And you may recall LG Hollingsworth is a popular alternative suspect. So little crossing of Damien and LG Hollingsworth there. So one of the experts and the final expert we're going to talk about today that the police talked to was Damien himself. As I said, Damien spoke to the police a lot about what was going on in West Memphis and sort of fed them this story about satanic rituals. He explained, as everyone said he would, that he was a white witch and that he did not participate in black magic. The police went to Damien's home all the way back in May of 1992, because remember that's when he first had those interactions with the police. And this was related to breaking into that trailer. And when they searched his home, they found a dog skull. And this is the one everyone talks about, the Great Dane dog skull. As well as a book from a funeral home with spells written on it. They also found a picture of a man with a goat's head standing on an elevated platform with people bowing before him. Damien told police that the penis was the symbol of power and that water is a symbol of dark power, which I never heard. No. You know, I don't claim to be some expert on the occult, but water typically is like a boundary for. So, like, witches can't cross running water, for instance. So, like, if you've seen the Headless Horseman, the Ichabod Crane, the cartoon, Disney cartoon From, like, the 40s or whatever, you know, once Ibod crosses the bridge, my friend, the ghost is through. His power ends because he can't cross the running water. The water is a boundary farm. So I don't know where Damien got this, but I think he's probably wrong about it. But nevertheless, that's what he said, since he's saying to the police, like, oh, water, you know, and of course, the crimes are committed on a creek bank. Damien also told police that it was significant that there were three victims, as three was a number of power, like the Trinity, I guess. He also told police he was a member of Murray Ferris and Chris Luttrell's coven, which is consistent with Chris Luttrell and Murray Ferris saying that Damien had been to a couple of the meetings that they had, but it didn't really work out. So for what it's worth, the Wednesday was a full moon, as we said before, and it was the first full moon after May 1st. This goes back to what Deanna said about May being an important month. It's actually the most important month in Wicca or Satanism or whatever you want to say, whatever you want to call it, because April 31st to May 1st is Walpurgis Night and the Beltane, and this is the most sacred day of the Wiccan calendar. Just going back to Disney. If you've seen Fantasia, the night on Bald Mountain is Walpurgisnacht. So that's like, what's happening there is, you know, all the great evils are rising on that night, and then when the sun comes out, they all have to go back. But that night is like the witch's Sabbath. If you've read Faust, Faust has a whole thing about Walpurgisnacht and very important, April 31st to May 1st. Now, you might be saying to yourself, the murders happen on May 5, so what does it have to do with anything? Even though, for convenience sake, Valpurgusnacht, Beltane is celebrated on April 31 and May 1. For purists, the holiday doesn't fall on a date from the solar calendar. Instead, it falls on the Beltane full moon, which is the fifth full moon after the Yuletide and that would have been Wednesday the 5th. And in fact, the moon would have been full at 10:34pm so there you.
- [80:02]
Alice
Go, there you have it. That was a roller coaster of emotions.
- [80:06]
Brett
And I'll just say now that we finished talking about that, I don't anticipate we're going to talk about this much more as we continue through this. Personally, I have always believed, and I continue to believe, even after reading all this, seeing all this, that whatever happened in those woods had nothing to do with Satanism. It was not an occult sacrifice.
- [80:24]
Alice
But at the same time, kind of like what we're talking about here, it doesn't mean that the police shouldn't have looked into it. I think they. They had to look into it to some degree. I think it is a smoke that doesn't actually get us to the truth of what happened here. Right. Like, it is. It can even be a part of this case and not have been wrongful convictions or a wrongful arrest, if that makes sense.
- [80:46]
Brett
Yeah. And look, I mean, Damien was definitely dabbling in all this stuff, you know, he absolutely was. And we're going to talk later on about his testimony. He's going to lie about some of it, too. I mean, he was deeper involved in some of this than he admits, but he has a reason to lie about it because he knows how bad this looks in 1993, in Arkansas, really anywhere. And we talk about Arkansas like it was unique anywhere. These would have been bad facts for Damien, that he was involved in all this to whatever extent he was, even if it was just, you know, he liked to read Alistair Crowley or whatever would have been bad for him. You know, if Damien Echols is guilty, if the three are guilty, could some of this have been rolling around in his head when it was happening? Maybe. I'm not going to say it wasn't. It's just like we said before, there are people who have murdered people who had sort of like these ideas in their mind when they were doing it. But I don't think this was some sort of sacrifice. I don't think there was any sort of sacrificing going on. I think this was the zeitgeist at the time. This was the milieu that everyone was living in in West Memphis, that this was what was going on. And it did affect the investigation and it did affect the way the police looked at Damien and prosecuted this case eventually. But is this a satanic crime? No. Does that really have anything to do with whether or not these three are involved in the murder? I Don't think so. And like Alice said, I feel like this is kind of a smokescreen. And it's been a smokescreen that's been over this case for a long time. If you've watched Paradise Lost, you see it. There's so much focus on this. There's a reason we felt it was necessary to do an entire episode on it, to talk about it, because it is such a part of this case. But that doesn't mean it's a part of the crime. And I don't think it's part of the crime. And, you know, I'm curious what other people think now that they have heard how this investigation went.
- [82:38]
Alice
Yeah, I know. I think that's absolutely right. I think it helps explain why certain measures were taken, why certain interviews were requested, why they took certain people's polygraphs. But at the end of the day, I don't think that this is a satanic killing. I think this is a horrific killing. And very possibly the people who did it, it may have even pointed it to saying it was a satanic cling to make it something bigger than it was, which was just a horrific crime against innocent children. And to weave this into some movie as opposed to what it is, which is just devastation and tragedy. And seeing all this, it's helpful to know where it sits in time. But I think focusing on the satanic panic and ties of the convicted to the Satanist culture, maybe not white witch, black witch, whatever, is missing the real thrust of the evidence in the case. And I don't think we need to spend more time focusing on it, because if we wanted to write a movie, if we wanted to make something that was very, you know, exciting, of course you would focus on the satanic aspect of the case, but for evidentiary purposes, other than to understand why they interviewed certain people, what people were saying, and kind of what was everyone's filter in which they were seeing many things, is helpful to know. But I don't think this is going to be the key for understanding what happened that night to the boys, like I said.
- [83:58]
Brett
Well, I'm sure we'll mention some of this again because it comes up a lot. But I think we're not gonna spend a lot of time on Satanism going forward. Next week, we're going to sort of return back to our general outline and start talking about various things about the case in more depth, including some tough stuff like the autopsies of the boys, how these boys were bound, the kind of injuries they suffered, what kind of weapons might have been used the area they were found, that sort of thing. Now that we've talked about this subject, which, you know, there's not a lot that's fun about this case, but you can kind of have fun with this just because it's so out there. Next week's gonna be a little bit tougher, but we're gonna get back into that and work through some of that. I'm interested to know what you guys think, though. If we've been too dismissive of the satanic angle, there are people who believe. No, I talked about that book Abomination, and that guy thinks this is part of some greater satanic thing going on in the world. That's his position. So maybe we've been too dismissive of it. It is something that's. That's important. It played a role in the trials, or at least one of them. So, you know, let us know what you think. Shoot us an email. Prosecutors Pod at Prosecutors Pod for all your social media. Join us on the gallery, on Facebook. There's been a lot of discussion of this case, and frankly, it's been pretty good. This is our eighth episode we've recorded. We've released two. Hadn't gotten crazy yet. I don't know if everybody's focused on Karen Reed or not. There's a few people who are, whatever. But that's fine. That's part of the game. So join the gallery and let us know what you think on there. If you want to hear these episodes recorded live, join Patreon. For as little $3 a month, you can watch us record these episodes. And then you can also get those episodes once they're edited early and ad free before everyone else. Alice, is there anything else you want to mention before we move on?
- [85:51]
Alice
No. I mean, I think it was important to really talk about the satanic panic, both in terms of what was happening in the background as well as specifically with respect to the testimonies in the interviews with witnesses. I wouldn't even call many of them witnesses, people who they talk to. But I do think that there's been too much focus on Satanism and it doesn't help us understand this case for purposes of then drilling down for the truth. But I understand the appeal. I absolutely understand the appeal. You heard the stories that were told.
- [86:23]
Brett
They.
- [86:23]
Alice
They are quite. They are as salacious as they get. So I. I know that there will be people who want to push back and say no, it is because of the salaciousness that the wrong people were focused upon. But I think going back to our outline and digging deeper into the case, we can hopefully leave this part behind. Because you can see this on every documentary, every TV show ever done about this case. But now that we've dealt with this, I hope we can move forward and look at the case as if we were investigating it, which is going to be very interesting, because still, a lot of question marks. A lot of question marks that I think will be continued to be unsolved.
- [87:02]
Brett
And I'll just say this. Even if it's true, they focused on Damien because they thought he was a Satanist, that doesn't mean he's innocent. Maybe they stumbled on the right guy for the wrong reason, and the evidence shows that. I don't know. We're going to go through the evidence and see where we lie, where we end up. But I feel like sometimes people, they start with the proposition of, well, this is part of the satanic panic, therefore, Damien Echols is innocent. Possible, or it could be, this is part of the satanic panic, and wouldn't you know it, they stumbled on the right guy. We're gonna see what happens. But just because there was some weirdness going on here, and frankly, I wish the police had spent some of the time they spent talking to these people, doing things like canvassing the neighborhood and figuring out exactly where the boys were at every moment or exactly when the last time they were witnessed or, I don't know, interviewing Terry Hobbs. Yes, I wish they had done that instead of talking to Bly, but I don't think that necessarily means that the entire case is undermined. Okay, well, we've been going long tonight, Alice, so we'll skip the question. So I know you're. You're a busy person, but we'll keep it shorter next week. We'll do questions for you guys. I know you like questions. All right, Anything else you want to say before we sign off, Alice?
- [88:13]
Alice
That's it, Brett. That's it. Except that we have many more things to say because this is episode eight.
- [88:17]
Brett
Episode eight? Yeah. Can't wait. Episode eight of 80. All right, we'll be back next week with more on the facts of this case. But until then, I'm Brett.
- [88:29]
Alice
And I'm Alice.
- [88:30]
Brett
And we are the prosecutors.
- [88:52]
Alice
You want to know something funny?
- [88:53]
Brett
Sure.
- [88:54]
Alice
Oh, wait, hold on. Last time, I hope my audio wasn't weird, because my. It switched. Like, when I opened it up again. I hope it wasn't originally switched.
- [89:03]
Brett
I'm sure it's fine.
- [89:04]
Alice
We'll find out. We'll find out. Okay, before we get started, so can you hear me?
- [89:10]
Brett
Yeah, I was just doing my.
- [89:12]
Alice
Okay, I know. I'm testing my sound, too. So I was like, man, I have this, like, massive bruise on my arm. Like, how did I. Like, did I hit it when I was asleep? Or like, what is this? And I could not figure it out. Sorry. Still, I was like, man, what is this? Like, did I run into the wall? I could not, like, figure it out. And then tonight, while I was holding Alice's son, I always hold him on my left arm because I'm doing things with my right arm. And he was, like, pounding it like this with his hand. It was like, right in the spot. And I was like, you gave me a bruise.
- [90:46]
Brett
There you.
- [90:52]
Alice
Sam.
- [91:28]
Brett
Are you looking for your next case? Pluto TV has all your favorite crime dramas streaming for free. You're gonna need some backup. Which means suspense is free. Very cool. Watch CSI New York. Criminal Minds, Blue Bloods Tracker, FBI and swat. All for free. You can't outrun them. Someone is going to pay for all this crime. But it's not going to be you. Take care of business, fellas. Watch all the cases. All for free from all your favorite devices. We got you. Feel the free Pluto TV stream now, Payload.