BONUS! The Real Story Behind "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil"

Dep Kirkland: 00:00:00

Well, you know, I get called in the middle of the night, four o'clock

Dep Kirkland: 00:00:03

in the morning to go to, uh, come down here for a minute who knew it was going to

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turn into this and who knew it was going to turn into this tourist tsunami and it's

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in the Gulf, Savannah still to this day.

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People still go to that house.

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That's the money continued today in the most notorious criminal trial

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in Richland county history, Dr.

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John Boyle is accused of killing his wife, Maureen and burying

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her body in the basement of his new home in Erie, Pennsylvania.

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The 12 year old son lively took the stand and I heard a scream.

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I heard this loud where the jury find the

Collier Landry: 00:00:35

defendant and guilty.

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When I was 12 years old, my testimony sent my father to

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prison for murdering my mother.

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This podcast serves as a type of therapy and reconciliation for

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myself, and it is my hope that it helps anyone who has experienced

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deception, betrayal, and dark trial.

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I'm calling your Landry and this is moving past.

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Hey movers, what's going on?

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I'm calling your Landry and this is moving password.

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I just want to say, it's been really cool getting to know a lot of you during my

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IgE lives, which I have every Tuesday at 11:00 AM Pacific 2:00 PM Eastern time on

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my Instagram channel, which is at Collier Landry, which should be like right there.

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And I love just getting to know you guys and getting you guys ask me questions.

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You asked me questions about my story, about my life.

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I can ask you questions.

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And so I want to thank you guys for tuning in, and if you watching this on

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YouTube, please like, and subscribe.

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I really appreciate it.

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It helps with the algorithm.

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You guys know the drill.

Collier Landry: 00:01:34

Thank you very much.

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My guest today is a gentleman named Deb Kirkland.

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DEP was the assistant D one of the assistant DA's in a case, this

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case came to national prominence through a film that was directed

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by the amazing Clint Eastwood.

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It was called midnight in the garden of good and evil.

Collier Landry: 00:01:51

There were three mistrials, I believe.

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Case.

Collier Landry: 00:01:55

Um, and then I think the fourth ended in a conviction.

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You will get to hear a depth, explain the case and his role in it more.

Collier Landry: 00:02:01

It'll be very raw and unedited here to discuss all the wonderful games that

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lawyers play is my guest, Deb Kirkland.

Collier Landry: 00:02:09

So Deb, thank you so much for being with us today.

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Now you cross our paths because you are getting out of the lawyer games

Collier Landry: 00:02:18

and jumping into the Hollywood games.

Dep Kirkland: 00:02:21

That's right.

Dep Kirkland: 00:02:22

I don't know which is worse.

Dep Kirkland: 00:02:23

Oh, I mean better.

Dep Kirkland: 00:02:24

Excuse me.

Dep Kirkland: 00:02:25

Yeah,

Collier Landry: 00:02:26

I would, I would concur with that statement.

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I think they both have sharks and cesspools.

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Just take your pick, take your pick, which a group of bottom feeders

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you might want to be a part of.

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Now you wrote this book, a lawyer games after midnight in the garden of

Collier Landry: 00:02:43

good and evil, which we've all seen.

Collier Landry: 00:02:45

I believe the movie came out in late, late 1990s, early two thousands.

Collier Landry: 00:02:49

Kevin Spacey, who is now a Hollywood pariah and Jude law, I believe

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was directed by Clint Eastwood.

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I think Alison Eastwood is in it.

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Ladies Chablis makes it up, makes an appearance.

Collier Landry: 00:03:00

Uh, but why don't you tell us a little bit about the book and

Collier Landry: 00:03:03

sort of your, your background?

Dep Kirkland: 00:03:06

Well, I actually started out, uh, I'm originally from Savannah

Dep Kirkland: 00:03:09

the, by Pamela there now in years, but I was originally from there.

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I started out as a young whippersnapper lawyer and went to the DA's office.

Dep Kirkland: 00:03:18

I did misdemeanor cases like everybody else.

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And then I left and went out into private practice.

Dep Kirkland: 00:03:23

And then I went back to the DA's office sometime later as the chief, deputy chief,

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uh, chief assistant district judge da.

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And I basically ran the trial teams and this and that and tried capital

Dep Kirkland: 00:03:34

cases and all of that sort of thing.

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During the course of that phase, my career, this case occurred.

Dep Kirkland: 00:03:42

So, um, interestingly enough, I lived in, uh, in historic Savannah

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downtown in a place called trustees gardens, very nice little townhouse.

Dep Kirkland: 00:03:52

And about three in the morning, one morning, I get a call from a detective

Dep Kirkland: 00:03:57

with the Savannah police department who told me that they were at a murder

Dep Kirkland: 00:04:01

scene or they were at the scene of a killing let's put it that way.

Dep Kirkland: 00:04:05

And they wanted me to come over, which is a little unusual today, I think, in

Dep Kirkland: 00:04:10

a larger, for a larger municipalities LA, for example, where you guys are,

Dep Kirkland: 00:04:15

they do have teams that go out to scenes from the DA's office, because they want

Dep Kirkland: 00:04:20

them there in case they have search issues or questions or that sort of

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thing that was not done much back then.

Dep Kirkland: 00:04:26

Uh, and the fact was they couldn't find the da, not, I shouldn't, I have not

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slandering his name and he, I guess he didn't answer the phone and I did.

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So I was, I was.

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Um, and this was a homicide detective.

Dep Kirkland: 00:04:39

So I went to this house.

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The house is a well-known in Savannah now because of this midnight phenomenon

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that has swept through Savannah people, tourism, there is insane.

Dep Kirkland: 00:04:52

I don't know how many millions of people go to Savannah every year.

Dep Kirkland: 00:04:55

It started actually with the book and the movie about midnight,

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this murder, because it involved a very wealthy, uh, antique dealer.

Dep Kirkland: 00:05:06

One of the most prominent people in the city who lived in a mansion

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on a, on a square in Savannah.

Dep Kirkland: 00:05:12

Uh, so of course, when I was told where I'm going, like, oh yeah, it's the,

Dep Kirkland: 00:05:17

it's the old Mercer house on the square and Savannah and I lived downtown.

Dep Kirkland: 00:05:21

So it took me two minutes to get there.

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So I went to the scene.

Dep Kirkland: 00:05:26

Um, I go, I went in the house and interestingly enough, There were, uh,

Dep Kirkland: 00:05:33

there was a, uh, fellow in, uh, in his, I guess I know in that, you know,

Dep Kirkland: 00:05:38

those houses, uh, the parlor of the mansion sitting with his two lawyers

Dep Kirkland: 00:05:46

who were already on the scene, which is interesting, which I'll get to and in

Dep Kirkland: 00:05:51

a room on a study to the one side they lead me in, I met the D uh, I met the,

Dep Kirkland: 00:05:57

uh, two homicide detectives there and we go in the room and the body is still

Dep Kirkland: 00:06:00

on the floor fellow named Danny hands for a young man, 19 years of age, face

Dep Kirkland: 00:06:05

down on the floor, three bullet holes.

Dep Kirkland: 00:06:08

And they tell me that the gentleman, James Williams, who own

Dep Kirkland: 00:06:13

the house and was sitting in the borrower, had shot the young man.

Dep Kirkland: 00:06:18

And he claimed that it was self-defense because he said that he had been

Dep Kirkland: 00:06:21

attacked with another pistol.

Dep Kirkland: 00:06:23

Now, the interesting thing is right off is the two pistols involved in this case.

Dep Kirkland: 00:06:30

We're two world war II, vintage German, Lugers, not a lot of people that have

Dep Kirkland: 00:06:36

those hanging around their house.

Dep Kirkland: 00:06:37

He didn't know too.

Dep Kirkland: 00:06:39

He had more than two.

Dep Kirkland: 00:06:42

So I was told, I said, well, why don't you, why do you need me?

Dep Kirkland: 00:06:44

They said, because this something doesn't look right.

Dep Kirkland: 00:06:48

Something smells.

Dep Kirkland: 00:06:49

And we thought because of who he is, and I knew it, wasn't lawyers.

Dep Kirkland: 00:06:53

I said, tell him, hi, Bob, how you doing?

Dep Kirkland: 00:06:55

I see these guys in there.

Dep Kirkland: 00:06:56

So we decided to call you just to get a second opinion, because this could be big.

Dep Kirkland: 00:07:03

So I go in, I look, I look around and I said, you're right.

Dep Kirkland: 00:07:11

This doesn't make sense.

Dep Kirkland: 00:07:12

And I could explain some of it, I guess I don't want to get too much

Dep Kirkland: 00:07:14

into the details, but there were facets of that scene aspects of

Dep Kirkland: 00:07:19

that scene that no, no, no, no, no.

Dep Kirkland: 00:07:23

The most, the most telling part.

Dep Kirkland: 00:07:27

Was that there was a chair, an antique heavy wooden chair, curved back.

Dep Kirkland: 00:07:35

And that chair was about halfway up the backside of this, of this young

Dep Kirkland: 00:07:42

man, the back leg of the chair had his pants leg pinned underneath it,

Dep Kirkland: 00:07:51

against the floor against the carpet.

Dep Kirkland: 00:07:53

Like that doesn't make any sense.

Dep Kirkland: 00:07:55

How did it get, how did him, how did he get a backup under that chair so far?

Dep Kirkland: 00:07:59

And how did that pan, how did that chair leg get on top of his pants

Dep Kirkland: 00:08:02

leg if he was supposedly standing up attacking the guy with the gun?

Dep Kirkland: 00:08:05

So, no, it didn't make sense.

Dep Kirkland: 00:08:07

And I actually went through the scene with them.

Dep Kirkland: 00:08:09

They showed me what they found.

Dep Kirkland: 00:08:11

Uh, and I actually discovered a, another piece of evidence that

Dep Kirkland: 00:08:16

they hadn't, I guess, noticed away.

Dep Kirkland: 00:08:19

Which was that supposedly the, the fellow who stole alive, Jim Williams

Dep Kirkland: 00:08:25

had been sitting at his desk.

Dep Kirkland: 00:08:27

This was his story.

Dep Kirkland: 00:08:28

He's sitting at his desk when this crazy kid answered, who lived in his house.

Dep Kirkland: 00:08:32

And he took care of him to his room, with a Luger and shot at him missed.

Dep Kirkland: 00:08:38

And he got his own Luger out of a drawer next to his desk and

Dep Kirkland: 00:08:41

returned fire shot him three times, defending himself into the story.

Dep Kirkland: 00:08:45

What had happened was that the bullet from the original Luger, the one that

Dep Kirkland: 00:08:50

Hansford had supposedly fired and, uh, had pierced a stack of papers on the desk.

Dep Kirkland: 00:08:58

It had hit a brass belt buckle and had ricocheted and then go

Dep Kirkland: 00:09:03

on and then hit a wall behind where Williams had been sitting.

Dep Kirkland: 00:09:06

The interesting thing about that was that when he went through the stack of papers,

Dep Kirkland: 00:09:10

the bullet created a shower of paper for.

Dep Kirkland: 00:09:15

The Luger that Williams had used to quote unquote, defend himself.

Dep Kirkland: 00:09:20

He had placed on the desk after he had shot and for follow this, the paper

Dep Kirkland: 00:09:27

fragments created by the supposedly Hanford shop were on top of the Luger that

Dep Kirkland: 00:09:33

Williams had supposedly used afterwards.

Dep Kirkland: 00:09:39

That was impossible because the paper fragment cloud was created

Dep Kirkland: 00:09:47

after Williams had already placed his defensive weapon on his desk.

Dep Kirkland: 00:09:52

So I said, so I showed it to them and they're like, oh my God.

Dep Kirkland: 00:09:55

You're right.

Dep Kirkland: 00:09:55

So we put a photograph, they were already photographing signs.

Dep Kirkland: 00:09:58

They photograph thanks.

Dep Kirkland: 00:09:58

I said, all right.

Dep Kirkland: 00:09:59

So here's what has to happen?

Dep Kirkland: 00:10:01

You have to arrest him.

Dep Kirkland: 00:10:03

Okay.

Dep Kirkland: 00:10:03

That's what we thought.

Dep Kirkland: 00:10:04

We just wanted to check with you.

Dep Kirkland: 00:10:06

So I go into the other room and then I'll do.

Dep Kirkland: 00:10:09

To the details of what you weren't talking about.

Dep Kirkland: 00:10:10

The case itself, the trial, I go into the other room to the borrower to inform

Dep Kirkland: 00:10:15

Bob Duffy, the original lawyer who was there on the scene with, with Williams,

Dep Kirkland: 00:10:20

that he was about to be arrested so that he could call and make arrangements for

Dep Kirkland: 00:10:22

a bail, whatever it is he wanted to do.

Dep Kirkland: 00:10:25

Because at this point he says, it's self-defense, he thinks

Dep Kirkland: 00:10:27

that they're going to leave.

Dep Kirkland: 00:10:29

So I go into the other room.

Dep Kirkland: 00:10:30

Williams is sitting there on the sofa next to Duffy, and I said, you just want to let

Dep Kirkland: 00:10:35

you know that your client is going to be arrested for what charge is it for murder?

Dep Kirkland: 00:10:44

And instead of, uh, instead of the lawyer answering Williams himself

Dep Kirkland: 00:10:49

looked up at me, he was incredulous.

Dep Kirkland: 00:10:53

He couldn't not believe that that was going to happen.

Dep Kirkland: 00:10:55

And he says to me, he said, you know, if I wanted to shoot you, I could have

Dep Kirkland: 00:11:00

done it because there's another pistol in this desk drawer, a drawer I draw to the

Dep Kirkland: 00:11:05

table, a side table next to the, uh, sofa.

Dep Kirkland: 00:11:07

He was sitting.

Dep Kirkland: 00:11:09

Well, because he wasn't your normal defendant.

Dep Kirkland: 00:11:12

The police had not secured the area within the control of the

Dep Kirkland: 00:11:17

accused to check for weapons.

Dep Kirkland: 00:11:20

So he's sitting next to a side table looking at the drawer.

Dep Kirkland: 00:11:24

There's another Lugar.

Collier Landry: 00:11:25

Wow.

Collier Landry: 00:11:26

So obviously you show up, police are on the scene, you show

Collier Landry: 00:11:32

up, you are automatically know something's rotten in Denmark.

Collier Landry: 00:11:36

Right.

Collier Landry: 00:11:37

And this gentleman, so he's a very wealthy antiques dealer and correct.

Collier Landry: 00:11:43

Correct.

Collier Landry: 00:11:44

Absolutely.

Collier Landry: 00:11:45

And the two

Dep Kirkland: 00:11:48

he's on the board of the T of the museum he's

Dep Kirkland: 00:11:50

on, I mean, he's very started.

Dep Kirkland: 00:11:52

He was one of the people who began the historic restoration

Dep Kirkland: 00:11:54

movement and the city of Savannah.

Collier Landry: 00:11:56

Okay.

Collier Landry: 00:11:57

So he's, so he's probably fairly well connected.

Collier Landry: 00:11:59

It's safe to say.

Collier Landry: 00:12:03

Again, a junior German Luger, uh, is not a common firearm that

Collier Landry: 00:12:08

most people possession, loaded,

Dep Kirkland: 00:12:10

loaded, and loaded, ready to fire and write

Collier Landry: 00:12:14

a fire.

Collier Landry: 00:12:15

So it sounds to me right then and there that this is a cut and dry case.

Collier Landry: 00:12:21

You have all the evidence laid out before you, uh, you're talking to his defense

Collier Landry: 00:12:26

lawyer who you happen to know, right.

Collier Landry: 00:12:28

Or his personal lawyer, and, you know, Hey, we're going to book your, your

Collier Landry: 00:12:32

client and start making some preparations to get them bailed out, yada yada.

Collier Landry: 00:12:36

And I would presume that a, the swift hand of justice did not play

Collier Landry: 00:12:45

out the way that you potentially thought it would, or maybe you did.

Collier Landry: 00:12:49

And it turned into a circus and a fiasco, which is why they made a movie out of it.

Collier Landry: 00:12:52

Right.

Dep Kirkland: 00:12:54

So why don't you?

Dep Kirkland: 00:12:56

Oh, I'm sure.

Collier Landry: 00:12:58

Sure.

Collier Landry: 00:12:58

So why don't you give us a little bit of background here on earth

Collier Landry: 00:13:01

that a little bit of background, but what, what happened next?

Dep Kirkland: 00:13:06

No, he makes bail.

Dep Kirkland: 00:13:07

Uh, I actually, I, I was so, uh, accommodating with these

Dep Kirkland: 00:13:12

folks, but I knew those.

Dep Kirkland: 00:13:13

I knew his lawyer.

Dep Kirkland: 00:13:14

He's a nice fellow.

Dep Kirkland: 00:13:14

I nothing to, he says, well, we need to have a bail hearing.

Dep Kirkland: 00:13:17

Well, by now it's like four in the morning.

Dep Kirkland: 00:13:19

Sure.

Dep Kirkland: 00:13:20

And so I go with them, they find a judge, they wake up a judge.

Dep Kirkland: 00:13:25

I went with them, we wake the judge up and he comes out in a bathrobe and we

Dep Kirkland: 00:13:29

have a bail hearing in his living room.

Dep Kirkland: 00:13:31

He sets bail, you know, myself, the detectives sets a bail off.

Dep Kirkland: 00:13:37

He goes, he posts bail.

Dep Kirkland: 00:13:38

He calls his friend who is at the house and has him bring the

Dep Kirkland: 00:13:43

bail money down in a sack in a.

Dep Kirkland: 00:13:48

Actual cash says, you know, where money is.

Dep Kirkland: 00:13:50

He brings a paper bag to the jail with whatever it was 10,000 an hour

Dep Kirkland: 00:13:55

made thousands of dollars on it.

Dep Kirkland: 00:13:56

And off he goes back home.

Dep Kirkland: 00:13:58

Yes.

Dep Kirkland: 00:13:58

I thought, well, here we go to me.

Dep Kirkland: 00:14:02

And to your point, I have said, I said this before, because this thing,

Dep Kirkland: 00:14:07

this case was tried four times, four times, four times over a space of over

Dep Kirkland: 00:14:13

a period of nine and a half years.

Dep Kirkland: 00:14:16

Right?

Dep Kirkland: 00:14:16

So I always thought, because I left the DA's office after the

Dep Kirkland: 00:14:20

first trial, which I tried with the da and I, I set the case up.

Dep Kirkland: 00:14:25

I handle all the expert witnesses.

Dep Kirkland: 00:14:27

I handle the construction of it.

Dep Kirkland: 00:14:28

And then I left and I went to Atlanta to work for the gutter.

Dep Kirkland: 00:14:31

So the last three trials, I was not there.

Dep Kirkland: 00:14:34

And I was asked about it because a very famous case.

Dep Kirkland: 00:14:37

What do you think the first case was reversed?

Dep Kirkland: 00:14:39

The second, the first trial ended in conviction.

Dep Kirkland: 00:14:42

Second one ended in can be.

Dep Kirkland: 00:14:44

They were both overturned.

Dep Kirkland: 00:14:45

The third one ended in a hung jury, 11 to one for guilty because of something

Dep Kirkland: 00:14:50

I'll tell you about this person ended up on the jury that shouldn't have been.

Dep Kirkland: 00:14:53

And nine and a half years later, the case was finally moved to Augusta,

Dep Kirkland: 00:14:57

Georgia because of publicity supposedly.

Dep Kirkland: 00:15:01

And he was actually acquitted nine and a half years later.

Dep Kirkland: 00:15:05

Now I as asked, I was asked about this all the time.

Dep Kirkland: 00:15:08

Well, what do you think about the Williams case?

Dep Kirkland: 00:15:10

What do you is going on down there?

Dep Kirkland: 00:15:11

And I said, look, I don't know why they keep reversing.

Dep Kirkland: 00:15:14

Here's some shenanigans at the Supreme court.

Dep Kirkland: 00:15:16

There's a lot going on with this guy.

Dep Kirkland: 00:15:18

He has very prominent people behind him, but I will tell you this.

Dep Kirkland: 00:15:23

There's a, uh, uh, there is a judge that was a friend of mine.

Dep Kirkland: 00:15:29

And I had mentioned something about this to him and his dad had been a judge

Dep Kirkland: 00:15:33

and he said, my dad told me something.

Dep Kirkland: 00:15:34

Once you have this thing about these lawyers or lawyers or

Dep Kirkland: 00:15:37

magician, oh, I'm going to hire so-and-so and I'm going to get.

Dep Kirkland: 00:15:41

I'd have to tell you that the, the, the defense lawyer in the first trial

Dep Kirkland: 00:15:44

of Williams was a fellow named Bobby Lee cook, who is world renowned.

Dep Kirkland: 00:15:49

He may not, we blew this.

Dep Kirkland: 00:15:50

I don't know if he's still around.

Dep Kirkland: 00:15:52

He'd be 90.

Dep Kirkland: 00:15:52

You have to be close to a hundred today, but he had tried 500 murder trials.

Dep Kirkland: 00:15:57

He'd represented the Carnegie's.

Dep Kirkland: 00:15:58

I mean, this guy was the, the sartorial, uh, goateed quoter of Shakespeare, that

Dep Kirkland: 00:16:04

guy that's, who showed up to defend him.

Dep Kirkland: 00:16:07

One of the biggest, most famous trial lawyers.

Dep Kirkland: 00:16:10

And particularly in murder cases in the United States is kind

Dep Kirkland: 00:16:14

of like an athlete Bailey type.

Dep Kirkland: 00:16:16

But, but, but with a better record, wow, sorry, better record than definitely yet.

Dep Kirkland: 00:16:23

But yes, that guy's one is the one that, uh, I was talking to Brenda earlier,

Dep Kirkland: 00:16:29

is it, you know, there are things that happen in a criminal case when you

Dep Kirkland: 00:16:32

have a very prominent, uh, uh, accused.

Dep Kirkland: 00:16:37

Person, the first thing you see is the perp walk.

Dep Kirkland: 00:16:41

You see the police with this famous person handcuffed, and they're being

Dep Kirkland: 00:16:45

ushered in to the jail with the media and all the Bella flashbulbs

Dep Kirkland: 00:16:50

and the cameras are all going on.

Dep Kirkland: 00:16:52

The next thing you see is that person walking out of the jail with attorney X,

Dep Kirkland: 00:17:02

right into the face of the microphones, where they have their press conference.

Dep Kirkland: 00:17:06

Is it, you tell, you know, when you see who the lawyer is like, you know

Dep Kirkland: 00:17:12

that we've all done this because I have done it myself and I see who it is.

Dep Kirkland: 00:17:16

I like, oh yeah, he did it.

Dep Kirkland: 00:17:18

It's like are a bit, there are lawyers at that level that when you see them show

Dep Kirkland: 00:17:23

up in a case, you know, the defendant is in trouble because you're very expensive.

Dep Kirkland: 00:17:28

Well, that's

Collier Landry: 00:17:29

the mark Geragos comes to mind spiral over Shapiro.

Collier Landry: 00:17:34

You know, Johnny Cochran, God rest his soul.

Collier Landry: 00:17:38

You know, I think those are the big, those are the heavy hitters, Alan Dershowitz,

Collier Landry: 00:17:42

all of whom I believe representatives.

Collier Landry: 00:17:45

Yes, they did.

Dep Kirkland: 00:17:47

Including F Lee Bailey, who, uh, had in fact, the last,

Dep Kirkland: 00:17:51

before the OJ case, the last case that Bailey had tried was actually

Dep Kirkland: 00:17:56

Patty Hearst and he had lost it.

Dep Kirkland: 00:17:57

So this dream team, I know that's a whole different subject, but the

Dep Kirkland: 00:18:01

dream team was not such a dream team.

Dep Kirkland: 00:18:03

Johnnie Cochran.

Dep Kirkland: 00:18:03

He made his, made his bones suing the police department for police

Dep Kirkland: 00:18:06

harassment, which was fine.

Dep Kirkland: 00:18:08

He made a good living doing that.

Dep Kirkland: 00:18:10

They didn't actually, it wasn't even, it was not a murder.

Dep Kirkland: 00:18:13

He was not a, uh, a trial over the table, the whole lot of murder cases.

Dep Kirkland: 00:18:17

But Hey, that's uh, the OJ case is a whole different thing.

Dep Kirkland: 00:18:20

So that's what you thought would happen?

Dep Kirkland: 00:18:21

I thought, well, I said to people who asked me about

Dep Kirkland: 00:18:24

the Williams case chaperone.

Dep Kirkland: 00:18:26

And I said, I have to tell you this.

Dep Kirkland: 00:18:28

And this is to share with you what the, my friends, judge, father had

Dep Kirkland: 00:18:31

told him about that sort of thing.

Dep Kirkland: 00:18:33

These high powered, famous magicians, as lawyers, his dad had said, I'll tell

Dep Kirkland: 00:18:39

you what, you let me pick my evidence and I'll let you pick your lawyer.

Dep Kirkland: 00:18:45

And that's what I told people.

Dep Kirkland: 00:18:46

I said, if Jim Williams is tried a hundred times for this murder, he

Dep Kirkland: 00:18:51

will be convicted a hundred times.

Dep Kirkland: 00:18:54

Why?

Dep Kirkland: 00:18:54

Because gravity doesn't change and there's nothing he can do about it.

Dep Kirkland: 00:19:01

There's the chair leg.

Dep Kirkland: 00:19:02

There's blood that is in, uh, all over the, the hand of this kid

Dep Kirkland: 00:19:07

who supposedly had shot at him.

Dep Kirkland: 00:19:10

There is, uh, put a Luger underneath the kid's hand.

Dep Kirkland: 00:19:13

His fingers are completely chosed close in what was called.

Dep Kirkland: 00:19:17

When people are shot, occasionally they will clench their fist and

Dep Kirkland: 00:19:20

they'll take them to the chest.

Dep Kirkland: 00:19:21

This kid is on the floor.

Dep Kirkland: 00:19:22

He's got his one hand under his chest.

Dep Kirkland: 00:19:24

The others had been pulled out his fingers slightly uncurled and

Dep Kirkland: 00:19:28

laid on the handle of a Luger.

Dep Kirkland: 00:19:31

Right?

Dep Kirkland: 00:19:32

There's no blood anywhere on that.

Dep Kirkland: 00:19:33

Lugar is filled with blood because he had bled into, onto it underneath

Dep Kirkland: 00:19:38

his chest because that's how he died.

Dep Kirkland: 00:19:41

So it, and then you've got the paper fragments you've uh, the

Dep Kirkland: 00:19:44

defendant in his story had him on the wrong end of the desk.

Dep Kirkland: 00:19:47

He said he came in from there, but his feeder at the other end, I could go on.

Dep Kirkland: 00:19:53

There's so much physical evidence in this case.

Dep Kirkland: 00:19:55

And he thought he was very clever.

Dep Kirkland: 00:19:57

He thought that he could get on the stand and say what he

Dep Kirkland: 00:19:59

wanted and they would believe.

Dep Kirkland: 00:20:02

And he also put on the performances.

Dep Kirkland: 00:20:03

He was quite, quite a, quite a character.

Dep Kirkland: 00:20:05

I lost my son.

Dep Kirkland: 00:20:06

He made a movie out of it.

Collier Landry: 00:20:07

Well, I mean, you got Kevin Spacey played

Collier Landry: 00:20:08

him, so I'm sure he was.

Collier Landry: 00:20:10

So let me, let me, let me ask you.

Collier Landry: 00:20:13

So was it true that this, um, this perp, uh, that came in,

Collier Landry: 00:20:19

was that his really his lover?

Collier Landry: 00:20:21

Yes.

Collier Landry: 00:20:22

Okay.

Collier Landry: 00:20:23

And what did, so was this, you know, this young lover was, did he have family

Collier Landry: 00:20:30

in the area or was he just sorta like a transient, like a grifter in the area?

Collier Landry: 00:20:35

So he did.

Collier Landry: 00:20:36

So they never in essence got justice for

Dep Kirkland: 00:20:39

their son?

Dep Kirkland: 00:20:40

No, they did not.

Dep Kirkland: 00:20:41

And I was contacted by his sister because the thing that part of the

Dep Kirkland: 00:20:47

defense tactic was to portray him.

Dep Kirkland: 00:20:51

And if you see the movie, you'll see that you would want to play this.

Dep Kirkland: 00:20:54

Now, one thing I will say, Kevin Spacey, pariah that you mentioned.

Dep Kirkland: 00:21:00

Yeah.

Dep Kirkland: 00:21:00

If anybody nailed it nailed apart and nail Jim Williams.

Dep Kirkland: 00:21:03

It was Spacey in that movie that was Julie Williams, as far as, as, as if

Dep Kirkland: 00:21:08

he had been pulled up and from the grave and put on the screen, junior

Dep Kirkland: 00:21:12

law portrayed the kid, Danny Hansford.

Dep Kirkland: 00:21:16

It was a, like, he was some sort of creature from the deep.

Dep Kirkland: 00:21:21

He was like, he was this evil, this embodiment of evil that was not Danny.

Dep Kirkland: 00:21:26

And Danny Hanford was a kid.

Dep Kirkland: 00:21:28

He was a street punk.

Dep Kirkland: 00:21:30

Jim Williams used to this was according to the testimony, not me.

Dep Kirkland: 00:21:34

He would cruise the parks.

Dep Kirkland: 00:21:37

And that's what they did.

Dep Kirkland: 00:21:38

Some of these kids in the parks of Savannah late at night, it

Dep Kirkland: 00:21:42

was a big of underground culture.

Dep Kirkland: 00:21:45

Jim Williams used to have a, and this was in the film.

Dep Kirkland: 00:21:49

He had a Christmas party, everybody who was, anybody came to his Christmas.

Dep Kirkland: 00:21:55

He within open up the doors on the second floor of the mansion

Dep Kirkland: 00:21:59

and he would play the pipe organ.

Dep Kirkland: 00:22:00

I mean, it was an amazing event.

Dep Kirkland: 00:22:03

If you were the mayor, if you were anybody in Savannah, you went

Dep Kirkland: 00:22:06

to Jim Williams Christmas party.

Dep Kirkland: 00:22:09

And I know that actually, uh, the ID officer in this case who handled some

Dep Kirkland: 00:22:14

things that helped us with evidence later, when working on the book,

Dep Kirkland: 00:22:17

she worked security for him at those parties as an off duty police officer.

Dep Kirkland: 00:22:21

So she knew all about it.

Dep Kirkland: 00:22:22

She said, oh yeah, we did know.

Dep Kirkland: 00:22:23

Yeah, that was on say Saturday night or Friday night, the next night he

Dep Kirkland: 00:22:31

had another party, but it wasn't advertised, but it was also at the mansion

Dep Kirkland: 00:22:36

because he still had the lights up.

Dep Kirkland: 00:22:37

He still had all of the food.

Dep Kirkland: 00:22:38

He still had over the booze and it was for men only.

Dep Kirkland: 00:22:42

And it was all guys, all in tuxedos.

Dep Kirkland: 00:22:45

So that was, it was a Williams led.

Dep Kirkland: 00:22:48

And I, you know, at that happens in some cities where people have double lives.

Dep Kirkland: 00:22:54

He had his public life where he would have a woman go with him.

Dep Kirkland: 00:22:57

So it was like his date.

Dep Kirkland: 00:22:58

And then he would, you know, the next night it was different.

Dep Kirkland: 00:23:01

Danny Hanford was a street urchin who was very cute and hung out in the parks

Dep Kirkland: 00:23:08

and he would do what he did for money.

Dep Kirkland: 00:23:10

And all the kids do.

Dep Kirkland: 00:23:12

Jim Williams picked him up and took him home.

Dep Kirkland: 00:23:16

And that's something that I talk about in the book.

Dep Kirkland: 00:23:18

Are they, I believe it was this obsessive relationship.

Dep Kirkland: 00:23:22

He bought him a car.

Dep Kirkland: 00:23:23

He bought him jewelry.

Dep Kirkland: 00:23:25

He buys Welty.

Dep Kirkland: 00:23:25

Danny Hansford was not gay, could have been and find him, but he wasn't.

Dep Kirkland: 00:23:32

He did what he did for money.

Dep Kirkland: 00:23:34

So for example, there was a period of time, right before I think it was

Dep Kirkland: 00:23:37

the day before he was killed or the day, day or two, before he was killed.

Dep Kirkland: 00:23:42

Jim Williams gave him.

Dep Kirkland: 00:23:45

A, uh, right.

Dep Kirkland: 00:23:47

Expensive gold necklace.

Dep Kirkland: 00:23:48

We knew what it cost.

Dep Kirkland: 00:23:49

I don't want to remember now, but it's in the book about what today's

Dep Kirkland: 00:23:51

value of that thing would have been.

Dep Kirkland: 00:23:53

It was a lot, it gives Danny this gold necklace chain, necklace, and he takes the

Dep Kirkland: 00:23:59

necklace and gives it to his girlfriend.

Dep Kirkland: 00:24:03

Williams notices that he doesn't have the necklace.

Dep Kirkland: 00:24:06

So

Collier Landry: 00:24:07

now that's me just, you know, I'm not a prosecutor or

Collier Landry: 00:24:10

a, a lawyer, but that to me, sounds like that could be something we call

Dep Kirkland: 00:24:15

motive.

Dep Kirkland: 00:24:16

There's no doubt that maybe

Collier Landry: 00:24:19

Mr.

Collier Landry: 00:24:19

Williams, wouldn't be very excited about that notion.

Collier Landry: 00:24:23

No.

Collier Landry: 00:24:23

And it'd be an escape fantasy, or you have this fantasy about this

Collier Landry: 00:24:26

guy, you know, that was straight, that was playing gay, gay for pay.

Dep Kirkland: 00:24:32

Um, I just, with him, he was, he was his

Dep Kirkland: 00:24:36

plate that he was his boy toy.

Dep Kirkland: 00:24:37

He did not like he didn't like him having a girlfriend.

Dep Kirkland: 00:24:40

I mean, he didn't say this at trial until later the first trial.

Dep Kirkland: 00:24:44

There was nothing to that.

Dep Kirkland: 00:24:45

He was just a kid that he had taken off the street because he felt sorry for him.

Dep Kirkland: 00:24:49

She was trying to get him, get him, help him, get his life back together.

Dep Kirkland: 00:24:52

And here's the thing about mark, about murder cases.

Dep Kirkland: 00:24:55

And you know, this, uh, it, Brenda knows this there's no

Dep Kirkland: 00:24:59

necessarily there's no requirement.

Dep Kirkland: 00:25:01

There's no requirement that you prove motive and a murder case.

Dep Kirkland: 00:25:05

W why don't you say that again?

Dep Kirkland: 00:25:06

One more time.

Dep Kirkland: 00:25:07

There is no requirement that you prove motive in America.

Dep Kirkland: 00:25:11

It's not an element of the offense.

Dep Kirkland: 00:25:14

However, if you don't juries, don't like it.

Dep Kirkland: 00:25:19

They want to know why this happened.

Dep Kirkland: 00:25:22

Motive is important.

Dep Kirkland: 00:25:24

You need to prove, I know they say motive.

Dep Kirkland: 00:25:26

It means an opportunity.

Dep Kirkland: 00:25:27

What you really need that's for investigators.

Dep Kirkland: 00:25:29

What you really need for a conviction is opportunity

Dep Kirkland: 00:25:34

means, and you need to prove it.

Dep Kirkland: 00:25:37

And I don't care why it happened.

Dep Kirkland: 00:25:39

If you've got a video of the killing, you don't need it doesn't matter why

Dep Kirkland: 00:25:44

somebody got mad or why they flew off the handle or why they pulled the trigger.

Dep Kirkland: 00:25:48

They pulled the trigger.

Dep Kirkland: 00:25:49

If you can prove that you don't need to prove motive, but you,

Dep Kirkland: 00:25:51

but it's important to, because juries want to know what that was.

Dep Kirkland: 00:25:55

Why would somebody do this?

Dep Kirkland: 00:25:57

Why did this?

Dep Kirkland: 00:25:58

That's

Collier Landry: 00:25:58

interesting.

Collier Landry: 00:25:59

So, so I did a Ted talk, um, about my pursuit of making my film, which

Collier Landry: 00:26:08

was a murder of Mansfield about the murder of my mother by my father.

Collier Landry: 00:26:11

And I witnessed the murder happened and I testified at

Collier Landry: 00:26:14

trial for two and a half days.

Collier Landry: 00:26:16

Um, Against, uh, my father and put, essentially put my father in prison.

Collier Landry: 00:26:21

Right.

Collier Landry: 00:26:21

I wouldn't let him get away with it.

Collier Landry: 00:26:22

Nobody believed me except for one detective.

Collier Landry: 00:26:25

And over the course of like 25 days, he and I put together everything.

Collier Landry: 00:26:28

And I found this picture, this house that my father had had in his truck.

Collier Landry: 00:26:31

And that's where they turned up.

Collier Landry: 00:26:32

It ended up finding my mother's body was in another state.

Collier Landry: 00:26:35

So, uh, but I, it was in this Ted talk.

Collier Landry: 00:26:38

I'm talking about, you know, that we, as humans are natural paths.

Collier Landry: 00:26:43

So it's interesting to hear you say this because, you know, I talk

Collier Landry: 00:26:47

about, you know, we always want to know why things happen so we can

Collier Landry: 00:26:49

come to some sort of understanding or rationale of why these crimes.

Collier Landry: 00:26:54

Or are perpetrated.

Collier Landry: 00:26:55

Right.

Collier Landry: 00:26:55

Right.

Collier Landry: 00:26:56

And that's interesting that this even translates over into, uh, you're

Collier Landry: 00:27:02

prosecuting or prosecutors taking into account this sort of psychology when

Collier Landry: 00:27:07

they're trying to present a murder case to a jury, is there has to be

Collier Landry: 00:27:11

that, that bit of empathy, whether it's a sympathetic form of empathy,

Collier Landry: 00:27:16

or just a general understanding or comprehension of why would they do this?

Collier Landry: 00:27:20

Because without that, that humanistic link, you know, in our brains is

Collier Landry: 00:27:24

called the mirror neuron system.

Collier Landry: 00:27:26

Without that link, that sort of bonds us, they can't come to any sort of

Collier Landry: 00:27:29

rational decision one way or another.

Collier Landry: 00:27:31

You're

Dep Kirkland: 00:27:31

absolutely right about that.

Dep Kirkland: 00:27:32

And in this case, I actually had someone say to me at one point about a, uh, it

Dep Kirkland: 00:27:38

was about an insanity defense or murder case, and they were not involved in

Dep Kirkland: 00:27:42

the case, but we were talking about it.

Dep Kirkland: 00:27:44

And he said, you know, I don't understand, does it.

Dep Kirkland: 00:27:49

Why would someone for no reason to kill somebody else who doesn't that

Dep Kirkland: 00:27:52

just per se tell you that they're insane because that's insane as they,

Dep Kirkland: 00:27:57

well, that's not the legal definition, but I get what you're going for.

Dep Kirkland: 00:28:00

And it's what you're talking about.

Dep Kirkland: 00:28:01

We want to be, we want to juries want to feel comfortable with their decision.

Dep Kirkland: 00:28:06

So a lot of what you do as a prosecutor, and I think you do it as a defense lawyer,

Dep Kirkland: 00:28:10

you're trying to get them to understand and be confident that if they're going

Dep Kirkland: 00:28:14

to cut somebody loose, who is in a courtroom was accused of killing somebody.

Dep Kirkland: 00:28:17

That's a bad thing.

Dep Kirkland: 00:28:18

I don't want to let somebody go that maybe did it as a defense lawyer.

Dep Kirkland: 00:28:22

You have to get them to the point that they feel okay about their decision.

Dep Kirkland: 00:28:26

It ha it comes up in, uh, in capital cases.

Dep Kirkland: 00:28:28

It comes up in death cases.

Dep Kirkland: 00:28:31

Oh, you're going to put this person to death.

Dep Kirkland: 00:28:33

It's important.

Dep Kirkland: 00:28:34

But in this case, it, it, it, uh, the motive question was a double edge.

Dep Kirkland: 00:28:41

Because William's position was he didn't stand up and say this, but

Dep Kirkland: 00:28:45

this was his, this was his counsel's position in the first trial was

Dep Kirkland: 00:28:49

that this was a normal relationship.

Dep Kirkland: 00:28:51

Maybe it was a little lie, but there was nothing else to it.

Dep Kirkland: 00:28:54

It was all fine.

Dep Kirkland: 00:28:55

He was trying to help you.

Dep Kirkland: 00:28:56

Why in the world would someone like James Williams and his position in

Dep Kirkland: 00:29:02

life decide to take the life of this?

Dep Kirkland: 00:29:06

Nobody street arching.

Dep Kirkland: 00:29:09

Okay.

Dep Kirkland: 00:29:10

But the better question is why would a young man who has been taken off

Dep Kirkland: 00:29:17

the street and is being taken care of by, I call him the golden goose

Dep Kirkland: 00:29:22

by James Williams, living in one of the finest mansions in Savannah

Collier Landry: 00:29:27

by why would he bite the hand that feeds him.

Dep Kirkland: 00:29:30

That's exactly.

Dep Kirkland: 00:29:31

What is his, what in God's name does he get for by killing James?

Dep Kirkland: 00:29:37

Uh, James Williams.

Dep Kirkland: 00:29:38

Now, is it, what was there,

Collier Landry: 00:29:40

what was their defense?

Collier Landry: 00:29:41

He came up during

Dep Kirkland: 00:29:42

the trial, uh, as it came up during the trial and later

Dep Kirkland: 00:29:46

in the appellate part process, their claim was that Hansford had a plot.

Dep Kirkland: 00:29:53

It was ridiculous, but he had a plot to kill Williams and take his money.

Dep Kirkland: 00:29:59

Well, you might ask yourself, how exactly was he going to get Jim

Dep Kirkland: 00:30:04

Williams money if your children?

Dep Kirkland: 00:30:07

And the other thing that I point out in the book is, and where's he going?

Dep Kirkland: 00:30:11

If he kills Jim Williams on Friday night, where is he sleeping?

Dep Kirkland: 00:30:14

Saturday night.

Dep Kirkland: 00:30:15

Exactly.

Dep Kirkland: 00:30:17

Yeah, but that's what, that's what, that's one of the things that the defense, uh,

Dep Kirkland: 00:30:22

when, after it was this made note since Danny Hansford and that's why I think

Dep Kirkland: 00:30:27

he was played the way he was by Judy.

Dep Kirkland: 00:30:30

Danny Handford was mentally unbalanced.

Dep Kirkland: 00:30:34

That was their thing.

Dep Kirkland: 00:30:36

He had been put in a regional hospital at Muslim time when he was 17 or wherever

Dep Kirkland: 00:30:40

twice, he had been to Georgia regional.

Dep Kirkland: 00:30:42

Now why?

Dep Kirkland: 00:30:44

Because he had, he drank a lot.

Dep Kirkland: 00:30:46

He was drugged up and he broke a door.

Dep Kirkland: 00:30:49

His, uh, his, uh, apartment that he lived in, he attack some guy that he claimed

Dep Kirkland: 00:30:54

had sprayed his cat with us with, uh, uh, with a, uh, paint with a bug killer.

Dep Kirkland: 00:30:59

And he was a raucous wild, young man who lived in the streets.

Dep Kirkland: 00:31:06

Okay.

Dep Kirkland: 00:31:06

So that's what he was like.

Dep Kirkland: 00:31:08

And he would get into trouble.

Dep Kirkland: 00:31:09

He'd get drunk, he'd smashed something up.

Dep Kirkland: 00:31:11

And his mother would put him in Georgia regional, and then a day later they

Dep Kirkland: 00:31:15

let him out, but they brought him in, they put it psychiatrist on the stand.

Dep Kirkland: 00:31:19

They brought out his medical records.

Dep Kirkland: 00:31:21

They tried to paint this picture that he was basically.

Dep Kirkland: 00:31:25

Um, out of control, raging every, uh, it's kinda funny actually, because during

Dep Kirkland: 00:31:31

the trial, when James Williams would tell this story and he had to tell it four

Dep Kirkland: 00:31:36

times, because he was tried four times, his story kept changing, but he loved me.

Dep Kirkland: 00:31:40

He took the stand.

Dep Kirkland: 00:31:42

Oh, he took the stand.

Dep Kirkland: 00:31:44

Oh yes.

Dep Kirkland: 00:31:44

He was never not taking the stand.

Dep Kirkland: 00:31:46

It was,

Collier Landry: 00:31:47

would you say this guy Williams was a narcissist and associates

Dep Kirkland: 00:31:51

question?

Dep Kirkland: 00:31:52

No question about it.

Collier Landry: 00:31:54

Cause I feel that it only narcissists and sociopaths

Collier Landry: 00:31:58

really feel the need to take the witness stand in a murderer.

Collier Landry: 00:32:03

I mean, my father did, you know, and it's just, it's just, they do.

Collier Landry: 00:32:07

They just think that they're so much smarter than everyone else and they

Collier Landry: 00:32:11

can fool everyone and then it just backfires, but they're not even,

Collier Landry: 00:32:15

they're not even cognizant of their sociopathy or their narcissism to

Collier Landry: 00:32:20

realize that they're, they look.

Collier Landry: 00:32:24

No ad what I'm saying is everyone can read through them.

Collier Landry: 00:32:28

You know,

Dep Kirkland: 00:32:29

between the second trial, I said four trials between

Dep Kirkland: 00:32:32

the second and the third trial when Williams was out, he and his lawyer

Dep Kirkland: 00:32:38

did an interview with us magazine.

Dep Kirkland: 00:32:41

Who does that?

Dep Kirkland: 00:32:42

What criminal defendant accused of murder sits down with a lawyer and

Dep Kirkland: 00:32:45

starts talking about their defense.

Dep Kirkland: 00:32:47

And he says, during the interview, yes, we've been talking, we're

Dep Kirkland: 00:32:50

hoping to do a plea, maybe to voluntary manslaughter, blah, blah.

Dep Kirkland: 00:32:53

What are you doing?

Dep Kirkland: 00:32:54

He thought exactly what you're talking about.

Dep Kirkland: 00:32:57

It's such an ego that he believed he could not stand the district attorney.

Dep Kirkland: 00:33:01

He could not stand being even questioned by this man, which I

Dep Kirkland: 00:33:06

love because he used that to get to him and he lost it on the stand.

Dep Kirkland: 00:33:10

He did not the fourth time, but he, you could see through it.

Dep Kirkland: 00:33:14

He looked like I said, he looked like he actually seemed like.

Dep Kirkland: 00:33:18

Uh, a tank commander about what to rise, you know, around his

Dep Kirkland: 00:33:21

tanks and attack the enemy.

Dep Kirkland: 00:33:23

And everyone is going to he's the commandant that he's

Dep Kirkland: 00:33:25

going to March into battle.

Dep Kirkland: 00:33:26

Now here's the thing about this case because of the physical evidence, there

Dep Kirkland: 00:33:32

was also some, some things going on at the other end of the desk, down there with,

Dep Kirkland: 00:33:35

uh, with, uh, uh, marijuana cigarette.

Dep Kirkland: 00:33:38

It was ground into the top of his antique leather.

Dep Kirkland: 00:33:41

That's what happened?

Dep Kirkland: 00:33:41

I think they were having a conversation.

Dep Kirkland: 00:33:43

This was the middle of the night.

Dep Kirkland: 00:33:44

We were supposed to go to Europe the next day with Danny going

Dep Kirkland: 00:33:47

along as his, uh, as his helper to keep him, you know, whatever.

Dep Kirkland: 00:33:51

So we know what happened.

Dep Kirkland: 00:33:53

So you've got that down there.

Dep Kirkland: 00:33:54

You've got the chair leg on the pants.

Dep Kirkland: 00:33:57

You've got him at the wrong end of the desk.

Dep Kirkland: 00:33:58

You've got all of this that you had the blood, you've got all this stuff going on.

Dep Kirkland: 00:34:01

Now, if I'm a defense lawyer, I'm going to say, you know what, if you

Dep Kirkland: 00:34:06

don't explain this because I don't have an explanation and you were in the.

Dep Kirkland: 00:34:11

Unlike in your case, there are only two people in this case and the dead guy.

Dep Kirkland: 00:34:17

Can't tell you what happened though.

Dep Kirkland: 00:34:18

I think he can tell you what happened from the evidence, but he can't speak.

Dep Kirkland: 00:34:23

So what happened was

Collier Landry: 00:34:24

that a heater and some smelling salts?

Collier Landry: 00:34:25

That's for sure.

Dep Kirkland: 00:34:26

Right?

Dep Kirkland: 00:34:27

You're not going to get him up.

Dep Kirkland: 00:34:28

It is coming back.

Dep Kirkland: 00:34:29

So what you tell them is, look, I can't eat.

Dep Kirkland: 00:34:32

You're going down.

Dep Kirkland: 00:34:34

If you can't explain this evidence, why is that chair on his pants?

Dep Kirkland: 00:34:40

Slate?

Dep Kirkland: 00:34:40

How did it get on his pants leg?

Dep Kirkland: 00:34:42

I could come up with an a, you could, too, if you had enough time,

Dep Kirkland: 00:34:45

you'd come up with an explanation.

Dep Kirkland: 00:34:47

It was October, for some reason it had to have been knocked over because it was

Dep Kirkland: 00:34:50

obviously had been put back upright and put back up right in the wrong position.

Dep Kirkland: 00:34:55

So you've got to have any excuse for having been toppled in the first place.

Dep Kirkland: 00:34:58

Well, I feel

Collier Landry: 00:34:59

like it's like these guys always have, you know,

Collier Landry: 00:35:03

The answers to every question, they have the answer for everything.

Collier Landry: 00:35:07

And I, I feel like that's a pretty typical thing.

Collier Landry: 00:35:10

Now, my question to you is did William's story evolve from the

Collier Landry: 00:35:16

first trial to the fourth trial?

Collier Landry: 00:35:17

Did it get more intense?

Collier Landry: 00:35:19

Was there more creative liberties that happened or did he pretty much stick to a

Dep Kirkland: 00:35:22

script?

Dep Kirkland: 00:35:24

He, then there was a point I was about to make without that, when you bring

Dep Kirkland: 00:35:27

that up as you're very true, you might put somebody on the stand because you

Dep Kirkland: 00:35:31

have to, because there are things about it that somebody, you better explain it.

Dep Kirkland: 00:35:35

And so you think, okay, I'll put him on the stand to explain the chair,

Dep Kirkland: 00:35:40

but you don't put him on the stand and then have them tell you that they don't

Dep Kirkland: 00:35:43

have any idea how the chair got there.

Dep Kirkland: 00:35:45

Oh.

Dep Kirkland: 00:35:45

And paying attention to that chair.

Dep Kirkland: 00:35:47

He didn't address the physical evidence.

Dep Kirkland: 00:35:49

So why is he testifying?

Dep Kirkland: 00:35:51

All he's doing is pontificating and is helping us because he

Dep Kirkland: 00:35:53

looked like this megalomaniac.

Dep Kirkland: 00:35:55

It doesn't make any sense.

Dep Kirkland: 00:35:57

He doesn't explain any of this stuff.

Dep Kirkland: 00:35:58

So to your point, That doesn't make sense because he's on

Collier Landry: 00:36:03

stage, he's on stage, he's on stage.

Collier Landry: 00:36:06

You know, my father did similar things, you know, my father had read it a Jack

Collier Landry: 00:36:09

hammer that he used because my father was convicted of premeditated murder.

Collier Landry: 00:36:14

Cause it was premeditated.

Collier Landry: 00:36:15

And a lot of people they've seen the documentary.

Collier Landry: 00:36:18

They were like, well, I wasn't clear.

Collier Landry: 00:36:19

Did he kill her?

Collier Landry: 00:36:20

Like, no, it was premeditated.

Collier Landry: 00:36:21

He, you know, he read it, the Jack hammer prior to her murder.

Collier Landry: 00:36:24

He, he asked about lowering the basement floor in the home, uh, where she was

Collier Landry: 00:36:30

eventually found in the buried underneath the concrete floor in the basement.

Collier Landry: 00:36:34

Um, and all these things were set up.

Collier Landry: 00:36:36

And I think that, uh, you know, when he was being, you know, cross-examined, uh,

Collier Landry: 00:36:43

he couldn't explain the way these things, but was feeling like he was, uh, because,

Collier Landry: 00:36:47

well, you just take my word for it.

Collier Landry: 00:36:49

It's kind of their thing.

Collier Landry: 00:36:50

Well, cause I'm, you know, Yeah, I'm the narcissist, I'm the sociopath.

Collier Landry: 00:36:55

And you should just believe me and trust me.

Dep Kirkland: 00:36:57

Absolutely.

Dep Kirkland: 00:36:58

Absolutely.

Dep Kirkland: 00:36:59

I don't understand why they, but you know what?

Dep Kirkland: 00:37:02

I also had a judge.

Dep Kirkland: 00:37:03

I also had a judge make a comment once because as you know, in a murder

Dep Kirkland: 00:37:06

trial, well then any trial there's, it comes a point about, it comes a

Dep Kirkland: 00:37:10

point when you ask, is the defendant going to take the stand or not?

Dep Kirkland: 00:37:14

And if they decide not to, there's a whole process that the court has

Dep Kirkland: 00:37:18

to go through, questioned them, to make sure they understand that

Dep Kirkland: 00:37:21

they have the right to testify.

Dep Kirkland: 00:37:23

They have the right to cross examine.

Dep Kirkland: 00:37:25

They have a right to confront their witnesses.

Dep Kirkland: 00:37:27

And if the decision is made not to get on the stand Zandy, it

Dep Kirkland: 00:37:31

has to be a part of the record.

Dep Kirkland: 00:37:33

And then they can, you know, that's fine.

Dep Kirkland: 00:37:34

They can make that decision and they have to talk about what their attorneys

Dep Kirkland: 00:37:37

told them, where they will advise fine.

Dep Kirkland: 00:37:39

I had that in a case happen when a fellow is not going to take the stand afterward,

Dep Kirkland: 00:37:45

I'm talking to the judge in the case.

Dep Kirkland: 00:37:47

And he says, you know, I've never understood that.

Dep Kirkland: 00:37:50

Like, what do you mean?

Dep Kirkland: 00:37:50

You mean not testify?

Dep Kirkland: 00:37:52

He said, look, if I'm on trial for my life, if I don't get on the

Dep Kirkland: 00:37:58

stand, what am I telling people?

Dep Kirkland: 00:38:01

He said, I just don't have a lot of respect for somebody.

Dep Kirkland: 00:38:03

They won't try to save their own life.

Dep Kirkland: 00:38:08

He says, I get the strategic decision, but I can tell you, I don't think is like it.

Dep Kirkland: 00:38:13

Um, now what happens is with people like your dad and like Jim Williams,

Dep Kirkland: 00:38:18

they're sociopath, they think sure that they will be believed.

Dep Kirkland: 00:38:23

For example, I'll give you an example.

Dep Kirkland: 00:38:24

The night that this thing happened, where had they been?

Dep Kirkland: 00:38:28

Well, they had been to the drive in that Quinn with others.

Dep Kirkland: 00:38:32

I think that driving might still be there.

Dep Kirkland: 00:38:33

It's kind of a goofy thing to go.

Dep Kirkland: 00:38:34

Do they go?

Dep Kirkland: 00:38:36

They want, they had gone to the drive in Williams.

Dep Kirkland: 00:38:39

Testified.

Dep Kirkland: 00:38:40

That Danny Hansford on the way to the drive in did they had stopped

Dep Kirkland: 00:38:45

at the package store and they had gotten two half pints of wild

Dep Kirkland: 00:38:48

Turkey or some kind of liquor.

Dep Kirkland: 00:38:51

And during the movie Hansard had smoked, oh, I don't know, six or seven

Dep Kirkland: 00:38:57

or eight joints, like, wait a minute.

Dep Kirkland: 00:39:00

And he drinks the liquor and he's like, I heard this driving.

Dep Kirkland: 00:39:03

I'm thinking, I'm thinking, so maybe he was smoking or maybe he

Dep Kirkland: 00:39:08

was smoking a joint at the driving.

Dep Kirkland: 00:39:09

Fine.

Dep Kirkland: 00:39:10

But he couldn't, he couldn't let it go at a gym.

Dep Kirkland: 00:39:13

It had to be six or seven or eight.

Dep Kirkland: 00:39:15

And I'm thinking, okay, I don't know about this jury, but I know what I know.

Dep Kirkland: 00:39:19

Like if I joined, I smoked at each point and I drank two half

Dep Kirkland: 00:39:23

by, so I would be outside the car on the ground at the drugs.

Dep Kirkland: 00:39:27

Yeah, exactly.

Dep Kirkland: 00:39:28

And then the other thing is of course, how about the drugs?

Dep Kirkland: 00:39:31

Oh, no drugs are allowed in mind.

Dep Kirkland: 00:39:34

Sure, but not at the drive-in.

Dep Kirkland: 00:39:36

And my other question to Williams is I didn't, I didn't cross examine

Dep Kirkland: 00:39:39

Williams, but my question in the book that I would have asked Williams is,

Dep Kirkland: 00:39:43

so were you in the car at the drive?

Dep Kirkland: 00:39:46

It, did you not inhale the air in the car?

Dep Kirkland: 00:39:50

Because he doesn't touch drugs?

Dep Kirkland: 00:39:51

You know, we have don't know, no drugs are not for me.

Dep Kirkland: 00:39:53

Like you're a car where somebody supposedly smoked a half a dozen

Dep Kirkland: 00:39:57

joints and you somehow didn't you remained in a bubble, the stuff they

Dep Kirkland: 00:40:03

say sometimes doesn't make sense.

Dep Kirkland: 00:40:06

Well,

Collier Landry: 00:40:07

I believe when I was in college, we called that hotboxing.

Collier Landry: 00:40:10

So he would've been hopping.

Dep Kirkland: 00:40:13

Yes.

Dep Kirkland: 00:40:13

He would have like it or not, you could have been a priest and

Dep Kirkland: 00:40:17

he still would've been in there and you still have to breathe.

Dep Kirkland: 00:40:19

Right.

Dep Kirkland: 00:40:19

But it's like, it's like, your dad is like, they can't, first of all, they

Dep Kirkland: 00:40:23

believe that people will believe them and they tend to exaggerate things

Dep Kirkland: 00:40:30

just to make their case a little bit.

Collier Landry: 00:40:33

Yeah, hyperbole becomes their, uh, their only ally.

Dep Kirkland: 00:40:37

Um, and Hansford, here's where, the thing, you mentioned his story,

Dep Kirkland: 00:40:41

as he told the story over and over and over, it did try to adjust for where he's

Dep Kirkland: 00:40:46

standing because he needed to move him.

Dep Kirkland: 00:40:49

His feet were at the wrong end of the tape of the desk, his

Dep Kirkland: 00:40:52

feet, because he had been shot.

Dep Kirkland: 00:40:54

The first shot entered his chest and severed his aorta.

Dep Kirkland: 00:40:58

He was dead in the space of a half, four seconds.

Dep Kirkland: 00:41:01

He felt a complete straight down didn't move.

Dep Kirkland: 00:41:03

And that was from their own testimony.

Dep Kirkland: 00:41:05

Their own experts testified to that.

Dep Kirkland: 00:41:06

He fell down, he never moved.

Dep Kirkland: 00:41:07

He was dead and no 10 seconds.

Dep Kirkland: 00:41:10

Well, his feet were at the end of the desk where the chair had been and

Dep Kirkland: 00:41:17

where the cigarette was ground out into the top of the leather table.

Dep Kirkland: 00:41:22

My feeling is that was the trigger because this was his

Dep Kirkland: 00:41:26

antiques and his possessions were.

Dep Kirkland: 00:41:31

Yeah, it used to do this.

Dep Kirkland: 00:41:33

His friend said this, he said, you know, Danny would piss Williams off.

Dep Kirkland: 00:41:38

He'd do it intentionally.

Dep Kirkland: 00:41:39

He did it all the time because then Williams would blow up at

Dep Kirkland: 00:41:42

him and then later he'd feel bad.

Dep Kirkland: 00:41:45

And he by himself.

Dep Kirkland: 00:41:46

Exactly.

Dep Kirkland: 00:41:47

Yeah.

Dep Kirkland: 00:41:47

What he did, that was their pattern.

Dep Kirkland: 00:41:51

Well, um, that, that's what happened.

Dep Kirkland: 00:41:53

I think that's what happened in this case.

Dep Kirkland: 00:41:55

We never had to prove, we didn't have to prove that Williams

Dep Kirkland: 00:42:00

planned it didn't plan it.

Dep Kirkland: 00:42:02

How all we had to prove was that it wasn't self-defense

Dep Kirkland: 00:42:06

because he had admitted shooting.

Dep Kirkland: 00:42:09

So we could prove that that self-defense theory fell apart.

Dep Kirkland: 00:42:12

He's standing there having confessed to having shot the kid.

Dep Kirkland: 00:42:15

So we didn't have to go into what was the cigarette doing down here?

Dep Kirkland: 00:42:18

What was the chair doing?

Dep Kirkland: 00:42:19

What probably happened that led up to this, but we did, you know, he, so he

Dep Kirkland: 00:42:23

did try to con he tried to change that.

Dep Kirkland: 00:42:25

He said, oh, he, we came in and every time he said he came into the.

Dep Kirkland: 00:42:29

He would say, well, he came in and he was raging.

Dep Kirkland: 00:42:31

He was raging, raging became the word of the day.

Dep Kirkland: 00:42:35

He must have said it 50 times you, he was raising, he came in and he was raging.

Dep Kirkland: 00:42:40

I like this.

Dep Kirkland: 00:42:40

He also spoke in a way that most people don't, it's this

Dep Kirkland: 00:42:44

heightened type of language.

Dep Kirkland: 00:42:46

It's almost like he was an aristocrat from somebody.

Dep Kirkland: 00:42:49

He was high flow,

Collier Landry: 00:42:50

very highfalutin.

Collier Landry: 00:42:51

Well that, you know, obviously a high level of intelligence goes hand in hand

Collier Landry: 00:42:54

with sociopathy and narcissism, for sure.

Collier Landry: 00:42:58

And, uh, yeah, like you, uh, you use the, you know, you said earlier,

Collier Landry: 00:43:02

it's like he was pontificating to everyone from the witness box.

Dep Kirkland: 00:43:06

Well, they convicted him, uh, the first time and I wasn't

Dep Kirkland: 00:43:12

surprised I did a actually, no, I did the final closing in the case.

Dep Kirkland: 00:43:20

And, um, I, I think I said to the jury, I forget what I said exactly,

Dep Kirkland: 00:43:24

but I said to them basically, Uh, you've, you've had a view into a side

Dep Kirkland: 00:43:28

of life in Savannah that most people never see it's in a different world,

Dep Kirkland: 00:43:33

and this is the world they lived in.

Dep Kirkland: 00:43:36

They, this was normal for them.

Dep Kirkland: 00:43:39

This was normal behavior for Williams.

Dep Kirkland: 00:43:42

I was told later by someone who knew him quite well.

Dep Kirkland: 00:43:47

And I don't know if this is true.

Dep Kirkland: 00:43:48

I don't think I put it in the book because I, I assume it's true because

Dep Kirkland: 00:43:51

I've known this person all my life.

Dep Kirkland: 00:43:53

Um, and he knew Williams quite well downtown in that neighborhood.

Dep Kirkland: 00:43:58

And he said, Jim Williams used to pay people to go over into the

Dep Kirkland: 00:44:02

projects with money and pay a kid and bring him back to the house.

Dep Kirkland: 00:44:07

That's the guy he was.

Dep Kirkland: 00:44:09

And then he got latched on to Danny Handford and he was, I don't know what

Dep Kirkland: 00:44:15

you'd call it to his psychosis, but it was one thing he could not control.

Dep Kirkland: 00:44:23

He could not control.

Dep Kirkland: 00:44:26

And in the end, I think that's what happened.

Dep Kirkland: 00:44:30

I think the Hansford pushed him one too many times.

Dep Kirkland: 00:44:32

He had apparently a temper and it came out occasionally on the stand because

Dep Kirkland: 00:44:37

whenever Spencer Walton was the da, uh, who went on to serve for 35 years in that

Dep Kirkland: 00:44:42

position, Spencer would cross examine him.

Dep Kirkland: 00:44:44

And you could just see where it's getting so irritated and agitated,

Dep Kirkland: 00:44:51

and that doesn't help either.

Dep Kirkland: 00:44:52

Like you said, about a motive, a jury watches people, they watch

Dep Kirkland: 00:44:56

the lawyers, they can decide.

Dep Kirkland: 00:44:58

I have had juries come up with decisions.

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:00

That's another thing about trying cases.

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:02

You think, you know, you think you made this brilliant point and you think if you

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:07

win a case that you want it because of this, because of your argument, because,

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:11

oh, it was about this and it was, here's why, you know, we really nailed them

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:14

on the blood, but if you're a defense lawyer, you're like, yeah, I got them.

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:17

You know, I got them.

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:17

I think they really went for this.

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:19

There you talk to jurors after.

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:22

And it is incredible.

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:23

The things they come up with for doing reasons.

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:27

They come up with for doing what they do.

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:29

Sometimes it's not your brilliance whatsoever.

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:31

It could be.

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:32

I don't like the lawyers tie that guy.

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:34

I just didn't believe him anything.

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:35

He said, what you're talking about?

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:37

The defendant, no, I'm talking about his lawyer.

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:39

He was like, what?

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:41

Where did you come up with this stuff?

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:42

So they are very observant and they really watch the defendant.

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:47

They don't just watch them when they're testifying, they watch them.

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:50

When they're in the courtroom, they watch them at the table.

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:53

They watch their reaction to evidence.

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:55

They walk into that and he did not do that.

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:57

Well, what happened?

Dep Kirkland: 00:45:59

And I'll tell you that for trials, I get it.

Dep Kirkland: 00:46:01

First one was reversed.

Dep Kirkland: 00:46:02

Second one was reversed.

Dep Kirkland: 00:46:03

Again.

Dep Kirkland: 00:46:04

He was convicted.

Dep Kirkland: 00:46:05

The third one, he was, I say, I was, ended up 11 to one for guilty and

Dep Kirkland: 00:46:09

that's a completely different story.

Dep Kirkland: 00:46:10

There was a person on the jury years later when I was working on the book, I

Dep Kirkland: 00:46:15

came back and I talked to a detective.

Dep Kirkland: 00:46:19

Who it was the homicide detective lead detective.

Dep Kirkland: 00:46:21

In that case, he was running a task force at the time I went to see him, I said,

Dep Kirkland: 00:46:24

so what do you think about all this?

Dep Kirkland: 00:46:26

I know we're talking about the third trial, which ended 11 to one.

Dep Kirkland: 00:46:29

There was a person on there that hung that jury.

Dep Kirkland: 00:46:32

And he said, well, you know what happened in that case?

Dep Kirkland: 00:46:34

I said, no, I didn't.

Dep Kirkland: 00:46:35

And in fact, the da didn't know it.

Dep Kirkland: 00:46:36

My friend, he didn't know that this is what I'm working on the

Dep Kirkland: 00:46:39

book years later, he says, the fact was, we already tried this twice.

Dep Kirkland: 00:46:43

Here's a third trial.

Dep Kirkland: 00:46:45

And my Lieutenant would not allow me to go to the jury selection portion

Dep Kirkland: 00:46:50

of the trial, because I'd already spent so much time on this thing.

Dep Kirkland: 00:46:53

And he's like, look, you can go to the trial because as you know, uh,

Dep Kirkland: 00:46:56

the, the, the detectives will, will sit with the prosecution during trial.

Dep Kirkland: 00:47:00

So he was going to do that, but he didn't go to the jury selection

Dep Kirkland: 00:47:03

portion, which they normally would.

Dep Kirkland: 00:47:04

They be there from day one.

Dep Kirkland: 00:47:05

He said he wouldn't let me go.

Dep Kirkland: 00:47:07

And I got all the things to do.

Dep Kirkland: 00:47:08

You've got cases.

Dep Kirkland: 00:47:09

You don't need to go down there and watch him pick a jury.

Dep Kirkland: 00:47:11

So he didn't go.

Dep Kirkland: 00:47:12

And he said, if I had been there, that woman would never have been on the.

Dep Kirkland: 00:47:18

Really does.

Dep Kirkland: 00:47:19

I know her, I had served warrants at her house.

Dep Kirkland: 00:47:24

Her husband, her boyfriend slash husband is what we call a safe burglar.

Dep Kirkland: 00:47:30

These are the guys that would break into a, into a store, take the safe

Dep Kirkland: 00:47:34

out, burn the store and take this.

Dep Kirkland: 00:47:36

I mean, this guy is a professional criminal.

Dep Kirkland: 00:47:38

We have been after him and she is his girl and we've been to her house.

Dep Kirkland: 00:47:42

I know her, like, I know what was she doing on the jury?

Dep Kirkland: 00:47:45

She's on the jury.

Dep Kirkland: 00:47:46

That's incredible.

Dep Kirkland: 00:47:47

How did that happen?

Dep Kirkland: 00:47:49

I don't think Spencer knew any of that.

Dep Kirkland: 00:47:51

He's been there out of toll.

Dep Kirkland: 00:47:52

Well, she hung the jury and there was no way she was going to convict.

Dep Kirkland: 00:47:57

Then they go to trial number four, which was now over nine

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:01

years later and it's in Augusta.

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:05

So he moved the trial and I deal with this in the book, as

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:08

it goes, they acquitted him.

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:10

They acquitted him.

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:12

Like, how is this possible?

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:13

Back to my earlier comment.

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:15

We'll wait, wait, wait.

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:16

The chairs.

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:18

The residue still there.

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:21

The blitz still there.

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:21

Aye.

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:22

How in the world did they cut him loose?

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:25

So I had to go through and come up with an analysis of why I think

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:29

maybe he was acquitted finally.

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:32

Yeah.

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:32

One of those pieces was that in the early, this is about your

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:36

dad and it's about Jim Lee.

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:38

Sure.

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:39

In the earlier part of this, when he was pontificating and he was

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:44

showing off, he was irritating.

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:46

He looked like somebody who thought that this, this kid was a piece of trash

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:51

and was a nap that he gets swamped.

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:52

Sure.

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:53

By time of the last trial, now it's nine and a half years later.

Dep Kirkland: 00:48:57

And I talked to the court reporter who sat through that trial.

Dep Kirkland: 00:49:00

And I said, was there anything different?

Dep Kirkland: 00:49:03

She is the only thing I can tell you that was different.

Dep Kirkland: 00:49:05

Was his demeanor.

Dep Kirkland: 00:49:07

It was like, he'd been beaten down plus he's nine and a half years old.

Dep Kirkland: 00:49:12

So he's he looked like this loop, this old man who probably, I don't know,

Dep Kirkland: 00:49:18

he just didn't, he was not the same arrogant Jurich that he was in the

Dep Kirkland: 00:49:23

first trials and it just was like, he responded with a different person.

Dep Kirkland: 00:49:27

Now, my analysis was that the people in this other city who

Dep Kirkland: 00:49:31

didn't know him, this is something else that happens with juries.

Dep Kirkland: 00:49:35

This case had been tried three times.

Dep Kirkland: 00:49:38

Now you're in a different city and all of a sudden here comes this trial

Dep Kirkland: 00:49:41

into your town and you're on a, stay on a jury and say, well, isn't this.

Dep Kirkland: 00:49:45

And it was well known throughout the state of Georgia.

Dep Kirkland: 00:49:47

It was a big deal.

Dep Kirkland: 00:49:48

Your allegations are connected to the former governor.

Dep Kirkland: 00:49:51

I mean the Supreme court, some shenanigans here, it was all over the paint.

Dep Kirkland: 00:49:55

Everybody knew about this case.

Dep Kirkland: 00:49:57

So you see, that has been brought here.

Dep Kirkland: 00:49:59

You see that he's been tried three times.

Dep Kirkland: 00:50:01

You see that he's still here.

Dep Kirkland: 00:50:03

So those, those trials, those convictions were reversed.

Dep Kirkland: 00:50:07

Then there was a hung jury.

Dep Kirkland: 00:50:08

So what are you thinking.

Dep Kirkland: 00:50:11

Something's wrong with this case, there must be a reason

Dep Kirkland: 00:50:15

that they keep throwing it out.

Dep Kirkland: 00:50:17

This is subconscious.

Dep Kirkland: 00:50:18

There must be a reason they had to come to Augusta to get justice for this man.

Dep Kirkland: 00:50:23

Gotta be something to this.

Dep Kirkland: 00:50:24

And my final comment about it was, and you look at this God, and he doesn't look like

Dep Kirkland: 00:50:29

the commandant of the tank court anymore.

Dep Kirkland: 00:50:32

He looks like this harmless old man.

Dep Kirkland: 00:50:34

And you know what?

Dep Kirkland: 00:50:35

It's been nine and a half years.

Dep Kirkland: 00:50:37

He's probably not going to kill anybody else.

Dep Kirkland: 00:50:40

And if he does, it's not going to be in my town.

Dep Kirkland: 00:50:44

Right.

Dep Kirkland: 00:50:45

And so they let him go.

Dep Kirkland: 00:50:49

What's that sounds like when you refer to the fact that they went to the

Dep Kirkland: 00:50:55

projects and brought back kids, you're talking about kids under the age of 18.

Dep Kirkland: 00:50:59

So this guy a pedophile.

Dep Kirkland: 00:51:02

Oh yeah.

Dep Kirkland: 00:51:03

Well, people in the town, I'm assuming.

Dep Kirkland: 00:51:07

You know, for the most part, what, now nobody knew this.

Collier Landry: 00:51:12

They weren't aware of his

Dep Kirkland: 00:51:13

behavior.

Dep Kirkland: 00:51:13

Oh gosh, no, gosh, no.

Dep Kirkland: 00:51:15

Nobody knew this except people who really knew him.

Dep Kirkland: 00:51:17

That's what I'm saying.

Dep Kirkland: 00:51:18

It's the it's and this is, I don't think it's, uh, you might say it's

Dep Kirkland: 00:51:23

something about out of Tennessee Williams, you know, that it's one

Dep Kirkland: 00:51:26

of those Southern Gothic stories.

Dep Kirkland: 00:51:29

And I think that's one reason if you want to know why I think the

Dep Kirkland: 00:51:32

midnight book did so well, John Barron's book, it's not accurate.

Dep Kirkland: 00:51:37

It's not it's it's fiction.

Dep Kirkland: 00:51:39

Um, and it, it doesn't even tell you about the four trial.

Dep Kirkland: 00:51:42

The, one of the reasons I think that it became so popular was not because

Dep Kirkland: 00:51:46

it was about this murder case, because it was barely about this murder case.

Dep Kirkland: 00:51:50

I think the murder case was his way in.

Dep Kirkland: 00:51:53

He didn't even show up until after the second trial.

Dep Kirkland: 00:51:55

He wasn't there in the beginning, even though in the movie, he is.

Dep Kirkland: 00:51:58

Okay, because it was about Savannah and it was about the quarter is about the

Dep Kirkland: 00:52:04

guy owns a dog and invisible dog and the people and the guy has flies on a string

Dep Kirkland: 00:52:09

and the, the, the, uh, the cotillion and, uh, the people who talk like that,

Dep Kirkland: 00:52:13

and they all got guns hit in some way.

Dep Kirkland: 00:52:15

I know all of this stuff, I think it was such so delicious.

Dep Kirkland: 00:52:19

It was a summary.

Dep Kirkland: 00:52:20

And you sit on a beach, you can read it quickly.

Dep Kirkland: 00:52:22

Yeah.

Dep Kirkland: 00:52:22

That was pretty good.

Dep Kirkland: 00:52:23

But it wasn't this case.

Dep Kirkland: 00:52:24

So I think like it's, that, that environment is not only unique to the

Dep Kirkland: 00:52:28

south, but it is this environment where you have people who have two lives.

Dep Kirkland: 00:52:35

Maybe you go to Italy where I don't know if this is true anymore.

Dep Kirkland: 00:52:39

But then at one time we had have cow men.

Dep Kirkland: 00:52:42

They have, there was a place in New Jersey that I knew somebody who worked.

Dep Kirkland: 00:52:45

It was a Roadhouse and she was the chief bartender.

Dep Kirkland: 00:52:49

And she said we had two nights, Friday night was girlfriend night.

Dep Kirkland: 00:52:54

Ours are the other way around.

Dep Kirkland: 00:52:55

I'm not sure.

Dep Kirkland: 00:52:56

Saturday night was,

Collier Landry: 00:53:00

says, he says that in a, you know, they said

Dep Kirkland: 00:53:02

the same guy would come in one night with a girlfriend one

Dep Kirkland: 00:53:06

night with a family, nobody said a word, and I'm sure the wife knew that

Dep Kirkland: 00:53:10

he was used to didn't talk about it.

Dep Kirkland: 00:53:12

He didn't talk about

Collier Landry: 00:53:13

it.

Collier Landry: 00:53:13

Yeah.

Collier Landry: 00:53:14

And that is the taboo of the old way of doing things Southern.

Collier Landry: 00:53:18

Yeah.

Collier Landry: 00:53:19

It's a, it's interesting.

Collier Landry: 00:53:21

It's sort of a swap culture if you will.

Dep Kirkland: 00:53:24

Yeah.

Dep Kirkland: 00:53:24

It's a fascinating thing, but I still, I still struggle with, and

Dep Kirkland: 00:53:29

there was some things that happened.

Dep Kirkland: 00:53:31

Uh, legally there was some things that happened with some decisions

Dep Kirkland: 00:53:33

that the courts that started to restrict the ability of, uh, experts

Dep Kirkland: 00:53:36

to testify about certain things.

Dep Kirkland: 00:53:38

And, and they went into that fourth trial, uh, with a, a brand new case that the

Dep Kirkland: 00:53:42

judge had to interpret from the Georgia Supreme court and interpreted it in a way

Dep Kirkland: 00:53:47

that I thought was even more restrictive than the court asked him to do.

Dep Kirkland: 00:53:50

Which meant that the, uh, expert testimony from the people in the crime

Dep Kirkland: 00:53:54

lab and the firearms experts and the head forensic guy from there, they, they

Dep Kirkland: 00:53:58

were, they couldn't draw a conclusion.

Dep Kirkland: 00:54:00

So he basically couldn't walk the jury through the, through this

Dep Kirkland: 00:54:04

evidence that we've talked about.

Dep Kirkland: 00:54:06

They couldn't talk about why the hand being here with the blood

Dep Kirkland: 00:54:09

being here and not there matters why the time who matters, why the

Dep Kirkland: 00:54:14

sequence of the shots are different.

Dep Kirkland: 00:54:16

There was the last, the last shot was, was fired through Hanford's back after he was

Dep Kirkland: 00:54:24

face down on the floor, he's already dead.

Dep Kirkland: 00:54:26

The third shot went straight through his, back into the floor.

Dep Kirkland: 00:54:30

And I was there when they dug the bullet out of the floor.

Dep Kirkland: 00:54:33

Yeah.

Dep Kirkland: 00:54:33

All right.

Dep Kirkland: 00:54:34

He claimed that he was behind his desk the entire time.

Dep Kirkland: 00:54:37

That is not possible.

Dep Kirkland: 00:54:39

You would have to bend a bullet in flight for that to happen.

Dep Kirkland: 00:54:42

For sure.

Dep Kirkland: 00:54:42

You have to have somebody explain that to him.

Dep Kirkland: 00:54:46

Now I think you do, or I, or I think if you're relying on the experts to do it,

Dep Kirkland: 00:54:51

if you're relying on your expert to draw all those diagrams and you end up at the

Dep Kirkland: 00:54:56

last second, not having them be to do that and you aren't prepared to do it, then I

Dep Kirkland: 00:55:03

think that's what happened in that case.

Dep Kirkland: 00:55:04

I think he, he seemed a little more, you know, less threatening and they didn't

Dep Kirkland: 00:55:09

have the expert testimony they needed.

Dep Kirkland: 00:55:11

The detective was not allowed to walk the jury through the case and

Dep Kirkland: 00:55:15

to see the evidence as it appeared and to say, what here's this.

Dep Kirkland: 00:55:18

Now I did talk to the court reporter, as I told you.

Dep Kirkland: 00:55:21

And I said, what do you think Barb?

Dep Kirkland: 00:55:23

She said, I'll tell you what I've always thought about that case.

Dep Kirkland: 00:55:26

And if I had it, I wish I had it.

Dep Kirkland: 00:55:28

I would put it up on the screen.

Dep Kirkland: 00:55:29

I show it to you.

Dep Kirkland: 00:55:29

The, the, the, the image of that chair planted on his pants

Dep Kirkland: 00:55:34

leg and halfway up his body.

Dep Kirkland: 00:55:37

She said, my opinion has always been that you could have

Dep Kirkland: 00:55:40

taken that photo and blown it.

Dep Kirkland: 00:55:44

And hung it in the courtroom and rested your case.

Dep Kirkland: 00:55:48

Now you didn't.

Dep Kirkland: 00:55:50

And what happens is if you don't, you try to explain things, it becomes complicated.

Dep Kirkland: 00:55:54

Complication is the friend of the defense.

Dep Kirkland: 00:55:58

The more complicated it is, the more places they can find reasonable doubt.

Dep Kirkland: 00:56:03

But she said, look, there's no way to explain that chair.

Dep Kirkland: 00:56:06

She sat through four trials.

Dep Kirkland: 00:56:07

She said he can't be explained and they still let him go.

Dep Kirkland: 00:56:10

I said, do you know why she said, I think it's because he just had been later,

Dep Kirkland: 00:56:13

it was in Augusta and he just didn't look like he was all that threatening

Dep Kirkland: 00:56:17

and they just decided to cut him loose.

Collier Landry: 00:56:21

Um, that's fascinating.

Collier Landry: 00:56:23

I

Dep Kirkland: 00:56:23

want to tell you this just one, one tidbit.

Dep Kirkland: 00:56:26

Sure.

Dep Kirkland: 00:56:28

Uh, I don't know if it's 30 days later or 60 days later.

Dep Kirkland: 00:56:31

Um, it was founded in his, in his, in the same study where he was shot hands fruit.

Dep Kirkland: 00:56:38

He had a heart attack.

Dep Kirkland: 00:56:39

He fell dead across the threshold of that.

Dep Kirkland: 00:56:43

Wearing nothing but a t-shirt and apparently had been entertaining

Dep Kirkland: 00:56:47

some guests of his that evening before, because they were cocktail

Dep Kirkland: 00:56:51

glasses around here and there.

Dep Kirkland: 00:56:53

And apparently after he dropped dead, they didn't stick around.

Dep Kirkland: 00:56:58

That was the life he led eventually.

Dep Kirkland: 00:57:01

Eventually, I guess he, uh, yeah.

Collier Landry: 00:57:07

Uh, that's fascinating.

Collier Landry: 00:57:10

We have been speaking with Deb Kirkland.

Collier Landry: 00:57:13

He is the author of lawyer games after midnight in the

Collier Landry: 00:57:16

garden of good and evil depth.

Collier Landry: 00:57:20

Uh, thank you so much for joining us.

Collier Landry: 00:57:21

Uh, fascinating, fascinating story.

Collier Landry: 00:57:25

I'm

Dep Kirkland: 00:57:26

glad to be with you.

Dep Kirkland: 00:57:27

Thanks.

Dep Kirkland: 00:57:27

So there's a lot to it.

Dep Kirkland: 00:57:28

I'm sorry.

Dep Kirkland: 00:57:29

It can go on as bar in Brisbane and we'll tell you, there is that's the

Dep Kirkland: 00:57:34

tip of the iceberg about this case and everything could happen, but absurd.

Dep Kirkland: 00:57:41

Oh, no.

Dep Kirkland: 00:57:43

When I get called in the middle of the night, four o'clock in the morning to

Dep Kirkland: 00:57:45

go to, uh, she come down here for a minute who knew it was going to turn

Dep Kirkland: 00:57:49

into this and who knew who was going to turn into this tourist tsunami.

Dep Kirkland: 00:57:52

And it's in the Gulf, Savannah still to this day.

Dep Kirkland: 00:57:55

People still go to that house.

Dep Kirkland: 00:57:57

And then, uh, and then they'll go to the bookstore nearby and they get my

Dep Kirkland: 00:58:00

book and they get, uh, Barron's book.

Dep Kirkland: 00:58:04

And, uh, they are told, they said, look, if you go to the house and you

Dep Kirkland: 00:58:08

care about the Williams case, you need to read the original midnight.

Dep Kirkland: 00:58:11

And you've got to read this book besides it's got the companion.

Dep Kirkland: 00:58:15

It's got the photos.

Dep Kirkland: 00:58:17

Um,

Collier Landry: 00:58:19

well, uh, again, thank you so much.

Collier Landry: 00:58:21

Step Kirkland.

Collier Landry: 00:58:22

Uh, it's been an honor to talk to you.

Collier Landry: 00:58:26

That was a really interesting conversation with Deb.

Collier Landry: 00:58:28

One of the reasons why I wanted to have him on the program is not only

Collier Landry: 00:58:31

because I really enjoy that movie midnight in the garden of good Knievel.

Collier Landry: 00:58:33

I remember seeing it in theaters long time ago, but also, uh,

Collier Landry: 00:58:38

you know, he seen a side of the law that not many of us get to.

Collier Landry: 00:58:41

I mean, we see these sort of dramas play out on television,

Collier Landry: 00:58:45

I suppose, or in our own fantasy worlds on a true crime podcast.

Collier Landry: 00:58:49

Maybe I don't know.

Collier Landry: 00:58:50

But for the most part, you know, he has an insider's look and it's tough

Collier Landry: 00:58:56

because it has me again, questioning our justice system in a way that I really

Collier Landry: 00:58:59

hadn't done before, because ultimately, if you look at it, my father was

Collier Landry: 00:59:05

convicted of the murder of my mother.

Collier Landry: 00:59:06

He did have a high power team of lawyers and he ultimately lost mostly because

Collier Landry: 00:59:11

of the impact of his 12 year old son.

Collier Landry: 00:59:14

But nonetheless.

Collier Landry: 00:59:17

However it does make me feel and think about the people who I've

Collier Landry: 00:59:21

interviewed on this program.

Collier Landry: 00:59:22

Like Melissa McKinnis, for example, who was in a couple episodes ago,

Collier Landry: 00:59:25

who still looking for justice for her son Danye Deon Jones, right.

Collier Landry: 00:59:29

And evidence being destroyed and things of that nature.

Collier Landry: 00:59:33

It's, it's heartbreaking.

Collier Landry: 00:59:35

So as much as I have, as much as I have respect for the justice system

Collier Landry: 00:59:42

and that I feel it serve me, it doesn't serve everyone in the same way.

Collier Landry: 00:59:47

And that's unfortunate.

Collier Landry: 00:59:50

And hopefully with conversations like these, we can begin to

Collier Landry: 00:59:54

change that narrative in this country and around the world.

Collier Landry: 00:59:57

Um, I mean, look, life is not fair.

Collier Landry: 01:00:03

It, sometimes it really sucks if life were fair.

Collier Landry: 01:00:06

Ultimately my mother would still be here.

Collier Landry: 01:00:08

She wouldn't have been murdered, but that's what it is.

Collier Landry: 01:00:12

I mean, it's.

Collier Landry: 01:00:16

It's tough, but, um, again, I want to hear from you guys, my listeners,

Collier Landry: 01:00:20

uh, thank you so much for tuning in.

Collier Landry: 01:00:22

I'm calling your Landry and this is moving past murder.

Collier Landry: 01:00:26

Thanks.

Collier Landry: 01:00:26

Y'all

Collier Landry: 01:00:31

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Collier Landry: 01:00:36

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Collier Landry: 01:00:41

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Collier Landry: 01:00:50

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Collier Landry: 01:00:55

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Collier Landry: 01:01:02

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Collier Landry: 01:01:06

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