Jake Felt (28:54)
You know, one of the things that I've continually heard is, you know, the only reason that I. I stick around and I continue to be involved is for the girls. And I can tell you for a fact that that's the reality is, is you're doing it for your own self interests, whether it be because of how you would be viewed in the community or because it would affect your business. You are making a conscious choice to turn your back on what you know is the right thing, and you're doing it to fulfill your own self interest and telling yourself otherwise. As I've become aware of the. The. The evidence, I just apply the common sense reality. If my wife, who I love, the mother of my children, goes missing, your initial thought is, I need to go get the tires changed. And These tires are 10 months old, and I need to travel on the opposite side of town two hours to the south to replace the trunk. And I guess originally I just thought that the trunk got cleaned, like you would have a carpet cleaned or something. Now I become aware that, no, it wasn't cleaned. Essentially, the trunk was replaced. And while your wife is missing, you are actually going around and telling people, don't worry. Don't go look for her. You don't need to. She'll be back. And while you are telling people this, you are using your own resources to take her car all over the eastern part of Texas to cover your tracks. You don't report her missing. You report her missing to your best friend. If I. My best friend was in law enforcement, a police officer, I'm very confident that he would not only file a missing persons report, but he would make sure that every single person in law enforcement in that part of the. In that county knew that my wife is missing. All hands on deck. Let's go. Yes. Nothing. Nothing. And then you go through life and you have these precious little girls, and you make a conscious choice not to make sure they're okay, not to provide them with the help and everything else. They need. Nothing. And the only thing that you ever tell them is that, yeah, essentially your mother, you know, she had too much drink, she made bad choices, she walked off, and she never came back. I think any of us, as a man going through a divorce and has, you know, been dealing with a very difficult time and hardships in connection with his wife. I know that if something, God forbid, happened, Ashley, tomorrow, that the only thing I would ever tell them, which would be true, was your mother was amazing. She was beautiful, and she loved y' all more than anything in the world. And that's what I would tell them. That's the only thing they would ever hear from me. That's the only thing they should ever hear from me. Ashley never heard that, not once. To me, that says it all. One of the things they, they, my youngest one asked me recently was, daddy, why do you have a problem with Diddy? That's what they call Jerry. And I was like, oh man, here we go. I said, you know, buddy, I just have a problem with some choices that he has, he has made. And if it's something you want to talk about when you get older, we can talk about it, but not right now. And I think that's, that's, that's the best I can do right now. Because someday if they want to talk about it, we can talk about it. I want to make sure to provide them with the tools to become healthy, educated, thoughtful, loving, and, you know, morally sound men. That they'll be able to think through some of these things, these facts and these details and that they will be able to come to their own opinions. And they know that if they want to talk to their dad about something, that I'm here, I'll talk to them. And they know I'm going to shoot them straight. I've even told this to Ashley, is that if your father has the ability to influence my children whatsoever, I will feel that I have failed. My just kind of willingness to fight. It's coming from a dad of two little boys that I feel that I need to protect. And I think the greatest threat to their well being at this point in their lives is Jerry. Because I think he will do everything he can to mold and manipulate, to implement his control over them just like he did his two little girls. What for me was the most damning evidence against Jerry had nothing to do with the actual evidence. What was damning to me about Jerry was that I knew who he was and I knew that that man was capable of anything. That is what made me start questioning Jerry. It had nothing to do with the evidence. It had to do with me getting to know the man. We can't be certain about anything, but I have absolutely no question that he killed Shelly Watkins.
