Navigated to Questions: Part 1 [bonus] - Transcript

Questions: Part 1 [bonus]

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1

In Atlanta.

Another body was coming today at police Task Dors headquarters.

There are twenty seven faces on the wall, murdered, one missing.

We do not know the person or persons that are responsible.

Therefore, we do not have the mode from Tenderfoot TV and How Stuff Works in Atlanta.

Like eleven other recent victims in Atlanta, Rogers apparently was as fixy victor Atlanta.

It was unlikely to catch the killer unless he keeps on killing.

This is Atlanta Monster.

Hey, guys, thanks for tuning into our first Q and A episode.

I'm Payne Lindsay.

I'm here with the Tenderfoot team and the House Stuff Works team.

Hey, it's Jason here with How Stuff Works Merit from Tenderfoot, and this is Donald from Tenderfoot.

And today we're gonna be going through some of the voicemail questions.

To start this off, we received an overwhelming amount of listener voicemails ranging from all types of questions, and today we've picked some of the best ones and we'll be going through them individually and giving the best answers we can.

Hi, my name is Jimal Anthony.

Why this story?

What made you guys?

Decided this was the story to tell it's a very unique story, but it's very um complex and it seems to be ever changing, you know, so many moving parts to it.

So what made you guys decide to pick the Atlanta child murders.

That's a good question.

Um really, Donald all right, my business partner here at tender Foot TV, he brought this story to me.

At first, I'd never heard of the Atlantia Old murders.

Donald, what inspired you to bring this up in the first place?

Initially, I know we wanted to do something different, Um first podcast up and vantashed.

You know, we're planning on doing a season two of it, but I know we wanted to do something other than a missing person's case.

And um, just thinking back on my childhood, the Atlanta childmars was something I remember growing up.

Um, it affected me, and I think some of our other listeners that are either forty and up and from the black community especially remember hearing about this.

And I was away in California, UM, but it still affected me.

You know, I heard about it from my parents, from my uncle's and it was something that just I felt like I needed to ask you if if you had ever heard of it before?

And when I did, and you hadn't you hadn't heard of it.

I was like, how many other people out there, you know, just don't know about this tragic story.

So I figured, look, if we can bring this story, uh some more attention, maybe some justice or some at least at the very least some awareness and the closure for those families, then I think I'd be worth this.

You and shot yeah.

And I did some initial research after you told me about it to see if this would be a good podcast, and I realized very quickly how important this story was um to the nation, especially just the city of Atlanta.

Um all the racial bifurcations in the story, the way it's sort of shaped this city, and kind of it's had this sort of dark cloud over Atlanta for a long time, and it's something that was sort of swept under the rug.

And the more you dig into it, the more you learn that just isn't readily available out there, right, And I think also, I mean I learned a lot, you know, I thought I knew about this case, and I think a lot of people think that they know about this case until you actually do the research listen to the podcast, so you know the things that I thought, you know, some of those, um were rumors, and and you know those were dispelled by doing the research.

So I got a lot from it.

But I think the interesting thing also is that, you know, we sat down with Jason from How Stuff Works, Uh, and you also, Jason had had this idea to do this podcast, so it kind of seemed like a perfect match and that's why we ended up doing it together.

So yeah, But when I met you, Jason, I had just talked to Donald about the Atlanta child murders case, and we met for the first time in your office, and you brought up the Atlanta child murders and I said, I'm not kidding my business partner, Donald just mentioned this to me, and I was gonna write there in between you guys, what was your take on doing this as a podcast?

You know, for me, I was what nine or ten years old at the time, and that image of the case, even living far away in Wisconsin, was burned in my brain.

And I think what Donald said is right where, um, something's actually surprised us here.

So um the reactions from folks who lived during that time and remembered it but actually didn't quite remember everything.

These things tend to be urban legends the longer they get drawn out, and the stories tend to change over time, and um, you know, even if you listen to the podcast, you'll be like, it sounds like even folks at the FBI don't quite remember everything thirty or forty years later, and so there's a certain mythology that that builds over time.

Uh.

The second thing that, um, I think most shocked me, and I think pain you probably feel this way too, is how many people had no idea that this was actually a story that happened, that this many African American children were missing in murdered, and that this happened in a major metropolitan city like Atlanta.

The other why is that it's been forty years, and part of this is what's the same and what's different about this country in this city actually, And we're talking about race, we're talking about economics, we're talking about politics, we're talking about police and justice, and it's pretty stunning to see certainly some things have changed, but a lot fuels the same after forty years.

Yeah.

I think I've said this before, UM, speaking about the podcast, is that you know, there's a difference between progress and change, and a lot has changed, but we haven't progressed as much as a nation as we'd like to think.

And I think that's one lesson I want to take away you can have from listening to this podcast.

To add to that the why now it's been forty years, Like you're saying, a lot of these players in this case are getting really old now, whether some of them are not even around.

So I mean, in ten years, I don't think you could do this podcast, if you know.

And just kind of brings up another side note, which is what was our goal on the podcast.

So it was an investigation and we wanted to get to the root of the stories.

But at think we discussed early on, um, we wanted people to make up their own minds and and here everything, even the wild crazy stuff, and make up their own minds and then looking themselves and be like, why did I think that way?

What's causing me to think that way?

Is it based on things I've held onto for years?

Or is it because I really feel compelled one way or another that the evidence is swaying me.

Yeah, I promise as a listener, whatever you were feeling, I was feeling the exact same thing at some point.

This is so confusing, This is puzzling, Why why is this like this?

Do I believe this?

Do I not believe this?

Those are things that people have thought for almost forty years now.

It's nothing new in this case.

Everyone associated with this has kind of a different perspective um based on age, based on race, and like Pain being thirty, you know, you weren't even born when this happened.

You know, Meredith's on our team even younger.

Jason and I were young and you heard about this growing up.

But just you too, you know, Meredith and Pain, you guys are the generation of pot cast listeners that you know, really don't know about the story.

So just hearing about it and learning about it in the way that you did, you can probably relate a little bit more to the listener um that's hearing about it firsthand from the podcast.

Right.

So I didn't grow up with the story obviously like either of you did.

But I think it's interesting in my perspective to still see um parallels between this story now and what's happening today in and social issues we're facing now, and how like you're suggesting, Donald, there might not have been as much progress as we like to think that we have, and these issues that are there, some of them are still here in two thousand eighteen, and I think that it's interesting to see that from my perspective and coming across the story brand new right now.

Hey, paying, this is Wendy from North Atlanta.

So my question is, so the bridge that supposedly Wayne Williams through the body off of I was wondering why it took so long for them to recover that body.

Don't bodies float when they're first thrown in the water and then they sink later.

Therefore, they would be able to recover that body that night, as opposed to waiting three days and then not being able to connect it to Wayne Williams throwing the body in.

That's a good question.

I am, by no means an expert on uh the human body in that sense, but from what I know, a dead body does not flow up until the gases inside from the decomposition make it rise to the surface.

So let's assume that it was Nathan Okator's body that was tossed off the bridge, and he had died just a few hours earlier.

Within that timeframe, he likely would sink and then rise to the top later, the FBI told us and Also, it's in the FBI reports all the documents that they did go search for a body that night with boats and with helicopters and all kind of stuff, but they found nothing.

So Yeah, and that's not I've been fishing on the Chattahoochee many times and it's it's very cold, very cold water, and it's a little bit tricky to navigate.

It's not the widest river in the world.

There's lots of overhanging trees, and if you were to do that at night, it's not the easiest thing to kind of find a clear pathway and just a body be there.

Um.

And so I just knowing that environment, I know it is a little bit tricky, and I'm sort of not surprised it took him maybe an extra day or two to to find the body.

Yeah.

I think another thing is the current.

It's been suggested to us that the current was really strong.

It's also been suggested to us that the current was relatively calm.

So depending on who we talked to, we get mixed information.

We got mixed information about that, and I think, um, regardless, there was a lot of time between when they heard a splash Wayne was pulled over.

They talked to Wayne the assembled people to go out and start investigating the splash.

That was in the early early morning hours of that night and or of that day.

And I think it probably took a long time before anything was set in motion, so that could account for some you know, missing time, or where Nathaniel Kator's body, if it was indeed dumped that night, where it would have been in relation to actually first hearing the splash.

But the focus was on Wayne almost immediately you have this the splash, this uh suspicious character on the bridge.

It's late at night, so all the police officers the FBI are there focused on Way Williams.

They're also trying to look for a body that one recruit claimed he heard hit the water.

So it's late, it's dark, and I think that um even Macomis made a comment to us offhand, the FBI agent that they didn't even launch a full investigation that night in the water because the current was strong and it was not safe to do.

Yeah, and if you think about it, they didn't even really know for sure what they're looking for.

They didn't know Nathaniel Kator was missing at this point.

It wasn't that they were looking for someone in particular, They just here's a kind of fishy situation, let's look into it.

So I think that definitely is a good point to bring up.

That mcomis they didn't know what they're looking for.

They didn't even launch an official investigation yet.

I think FBI also mentioned that the recruit under the bridge could have been as much as fifty yards away from uh where, directly where the body may have hit the water.

So if he's you know, under the bridge, fifty yards away and that he hears a splash, he still used to you know, walk over there and then shine his light on the water.

And by that time, I mean, even the body has hit the water and initially come up before it sinks again and the current takes it away.

I mean you're looking at at least a couple of minutes of someone walking and then looking around.

The body can definitely have disappeared by that time.

So you know, there's a lot of variables.

I think, um, there's no definitive answer to really, they should have found it as soon as it hit the water or three days later.

Hi, my name is Julian.

I just finished listening to your podcast.

So if Wayne used to drive around the blue car with like the police scanner, pretend to be a police officer or be the reporter and get all the information on the cops.

How did he not know that the cops were at the stakeout and then like, you know, not and then the boy being caught regardless, It just there's just seems to be I'm just kind of confused about that.

Well, according to Wayne Williams himself, he did know about this.

He told me it was an episode ten in one of my last phone calls with him, that he knew about the bridge steakouts.

Was he telling the truth?

I don't know, But according to Wayne in two thousand eighteen, he did know about the bridge steakouts, and he did have a car that was like a police car with a police scanner, so he had the know how and the ability to hear a police scanner and possibly find out about bridge steakouts.

I don't know if that helps or hurts his story, but that's what he told me.

That's the only time I've ever heard him say of that.

Do you think he was like that that was just another turn in the story at the end, because I don't think he even had the police scanner in the white station wagon.

I think it was in some of the other vehicles.

I just I have a tough time believing that he knew, and if he knew, why would he do it?

Anyway?

I think Wayne tends to say things and shape things as he's talking to people, UM, and he shapes the stories in a way that fits whoever he's talking to and whatever he's trying to get across.

UM.

I think in that moment, he felt compelled to tell me that, you know, all this is ridiculous because he knew about these steakouts when you know.

I don't know why he didn't say that in his trial.

I think it's a good point that he didn't necessarily have the police scanner with him in that car.

I'm not sure if that was something.

He moved around to different cars, and he moved drowned plenty of cars, as we know, But he did know enough about what was going on.

This is me talking assuming that Wayne did this, But he did know enough about what was going on to change the place of dumping to the rivers.

So I don't think it was out of the question to think that he knew they would be looking at rivers by this point.

It wasn't like this was the first body that was that had shown up in a river.

Yeah.

Bottom line is kids were turning up dead in the Chattahoochee River.

That was in the Atlanternal Constitution, that was in articles, it was in the news.

That was a known fact in Atlanta at that time.

And then mainly adults at the end showing up further and further outside the Atlanta city boundaries in rivers.

Again, as Um Popcorn says, because he heard the fibers were important, so he was stripping the clothes off of them.

Um, I'm actually really surprised that the law enforcement was able to keep their steak outs a secret from the media.

I don't know if there was an agreement with the media to keep it quiet, but for all the stuff that happened to be able to essentially cover every one of these bridges out in the country for thirty days and no one knows about it, I'm still surprised that that didn't get out.

I thought it was suggested to us once that maybe people didn't know exactly what was going on and where, but that they knew that police were steaking out new locations.

Even Captain Dave Captain Dave said off hand in our interview that he recalls on the police skinner they were using code words.

I don't remember what the word was, but it was something.

It was some street name that he had never heard of in Atlanta.

He said, where is this street?

Where is this turns out it was a code word for the bridge steak out and he found this out during that time period.

So way Williams having the same access that this guy has, And you know, it's plausible that Wayne would know about the bridge steak out.

The question is then if he did, like Wayne saying, if he did know about the bridge steake out, then why does he go into the bridge at three in the morning.

Yeah, it's it's surprising, but it is conceivable.

And I think it's important that to remember that when he was pulled over, at least to us, he suggested that when um, he was questioned, he said, is this about the kids?

Even if he's claiming his innocence, he knew that he was being pulled over in association with you know, the kids being missing and turned up murdered.

So also, I think he could have known about the bridge steakouts, and um, that's not going to deter if it, you know, if he's the one who is guilty of it's not going to deter that person from dumping them in the water.

That was he believed at the time that it was, you know, getting rid of evidence.

So you know, the killer has to know.

It's just common sense if I'm dumping bodies and rivers, there's if there is a steak out there probably looking at rivers and you know where these bodies are being found.

Um.

And also they say he was aware of the steakouts, doesn't mean he knew exactly which bridges, exactly which times when the bridge steakhouts were ending, and that that was the actual last night.

So also a lot a lot of variables when it comes to that take out.

Yeah, I was gonna say, just while we're on the topic of the bridge again over over and over again, we were out at the bridge and they have a kind of an extra fence on top, now one of those kind of curved rails that prevent people from jumping off into the into the river.

And so we had to use a lift in order to get Randy over the top and drop him.

But this kind of question of how could how could anyone Wayne's size pick up a body and throw them in the river.

Well, if you look at the original um bridge structure and some of the photographs, that structure is actually not that tall.

It's less tall than um than a height of a normal car, and it is solid concrete.

So the ability again I'm getting a little bit graphic here, but to pick up a body, even force it against that concrete structure and push it over.

To me, that doesn't seem very difficult, even if um those bodies were a lot heavier than the victims who bodies were pushed over.

Yeah, I mean it's absolutely doable.

I mean if if you you try to live Randy.

Yeah, if you take the Randy, it his height and weight compared to Nathaniel Katy, which is you know, it's been some back and forth about exact height and weight, but it's it's all very similar to what we were dealing with.

And um, you know, my height and weight and not much different than way Williams at that time.

And I was able to take the dummy um from about the middle of the bridge, drag you know, put my arms underneath the dummies arms and drag it up the curb over to the bridge and lifted at least to my chest height and to be able to put it over what would have been the barrier At that time.

It wasn't a scientific test being done by us.

It was you know, what do we believe?

Like?

What did I just hear?

Like?

The best way to test this is to do it yourself and see if there's anything there.

We put ears where the recruit heard this splash, so you, as a listener, got to hear what it could sound like.

It wasn't altered it.

We literally bought these uh microphone ears to emulate, uh, the way people hear things.

And so that's the closest we could possibly get.

Scenario again.

Why did they rent so many cars during that period?

I mean the mom shicked the father.

I didn't know you know what I'm talking about.

I wonder why they rented so many stations wide into whatever?

Why by they did rent a lot of cars, And we asked me about that.

According to Wayne and to Larry Peterson too, who's the fiber analyst um, the Williams family was having trouble with a newly purchased LTG during this time period and it was in and out of the shop.

So all of the rental cars they got were associated with that.

I don't I don't know if it was directly suggested that it was from the car shop that they were going to that was giving them these rentals, but it was because they had a new car that was having trouble.

Um, it sounds convenient that they had all these rental cars, not planned necessarily, you know, looking at the list by check Donlinger, there was even he talks about the confusion around the cars and and what goes where and when, and I had trouble following it.

Frankly, this is something I found that was interesting to me.

Um, not just because of the cars, but they had pulled over another individual and their car.

It was actually a tag associated with Wayne Williams Um associated to Metro News Productions on eighteen seventeen Penelope Road, which is Wayne and his family's address.

So they actually went to visit Wayne in January.

It's the first time he was talked to as part of the investigation, and well in advance of him being questioned and arrested later that summer.

So whether they knew it or not, they had are actually already talked to Wayne because of an association with one of his cars.

Well, we talked to Corn, the FBI agent.

He told Meredith and Knight that there was this list of about three thousand people that the FBI had created and Wayne Williams was on that list.

So he said that no matter what, eventually they were going to find Wayne because there was this list of individuals that fit a profile that they had built in.

Wayne's name was Lomahold on that list.

Hi, Payne, my name is Deel London.

I'm calling from Campton, Georgia.

Is it possible that Cheryl Johnson was like a frame by the g d I or the FBI, Like could they have called and left the incorrect name and number in hopes that he would go out and end up on that bridge so that they could arrest him or Am I really far fetched in that?

I think that's a little far fetched.

I don't believe in these huge elaborate conspiracies to pin all this on Wayne Williams.

What's the point If it was thought out that much, then they would have more evidence on Wayne Williams.

First of all.

And if that's also the case, why is it Wayne saying that the FBI with plants and stuff like that.

It just doesn't make any sense.

I mean it's they didn't say, did Sheryl Johnson come to my house right now?

He decided when he wanted to go to her house.

You know, he could have went after the first call, after the second call, before he went to the club, or after the club, so he could have win a completely different direction.

Could have been coming from North Atlanta or from East Atlanta.

You never know where he's coming from when he decides to go to Sheryl Johnson's house.

So yeah, I think it's kind of far fetched.

And I also don't believe in like the larger conspiracy theories that involve you know, a ton of players that are out to get Wayne Williams.

There's just not enough.

There's not an evidence to support that.

And like you said, paying if they were framing him there will be would be a much better frame job than this.

I think it's important that Wayne doesn't suggest it was ever that um, regardless of Sheryl Johnson is real or not, he like always stays true to that it was a print call about someone who knew using the music business, and he always says true to the conspiracy only started after I was stopped on the bridge, So it doesn't even you know, matter if CHERRYL.

Johnson is real or not.

I think Wayne Williams knows no matter what, that it's a bad alibi.

Yeah, there's there's just no way that it's a setup.

If it was, then they messed up and a body was tossed over the bridge as a result.

Like if if they were really trying to set him up, they would have been waiting at the top of the bridge.

And it just seems very far fetched.

The two in the morning thing.

If he's a suspect, you knock on history and take him downtown and you questioned him with all the stuff you've got on him, you do not do an elaborate you know, bridge stake out to trap the killer if you will, and to not see someone dropped the body off the bridge.

If my point was to catch the killer, then they would have caught the killer right then and there.

But they didn't.

And if it's all made up, I'm gonna makeup a better story.

The guy unto the bridge, You say, oh, I saw Wayne Williams throw that body over, Like why so you know, why did it such a shaky story If it's a set up, If you're luring a killer and You're expecting them to drop a body off a bridge and and no one sees it.

That just doesn't make any sense.

I mean, how many different versions of that story do we here?

Hi, my name is Meg, and I thought that I heard earlier in the podcast that some of the victims had been sodomized, and so I was just curious there was ever d N a collection that would have correlated with Wayne Williams, or if there was even the ability to gather DNA compare it, since that's not necessarily was on trial for So it's just one piece that was curious about.

I think it's firstly important to talk about the suggested sexual abuse.

Apparently from everyone we talked to during our own investigation of this, there was no evidence of sexual abuse.

It was serialized that sex was a motive and it's possible, but we couldn't find any records of rape kits.

No one from the FBI or the a p D ever suggested that there's any sexual abuse.

So I think firstly that's an important distinction.

We've thought a lot about the DNA connection because that you know, DNA testing wasn't even a thing.

It really came to late around UM and the suggestion to be able to kind of go back and see what happens.

I've asked that question.

We'll probably play a clip from Maurice Godwin who came on the show and talked a little bit about this.

Carpet fibers is not direct evidends.

Carpet fibers, you've got to have something else to support it to make it stronger.

DNA is direct evidence.

You don't need anything else to support DNA and fingerprints.

Carpet fibers that was in the vehicle for forty years could still hold DNA that could produce a profile.

The problem is what type of environment the car had been in.

Heat destroys the DNA.

Time destroys the DNA.

Now, a case that I worked in O eight to oh ten happened in five.

It was a woman and her two children brutally murdered in their house, and I worked for the defense from O eight oh ten and they used a vaginal squaff from her from not teen eighty five that was just kept in an old cardboard box and they matched it to him in oh six.

From back then you only could use blood.

The original blood analysis they cut and say was he as or not?

But they said the DNA was and so they they recharged him in No.

Six and and court martialed him in O ten and found him guilty.

He's on death row.

Now.

Everything that was collected by the FBI and the g PI and law enforcement for the Willy Williams casse, where is it.

Well, they have the right to destroy the evidence after the trial.

Do you think that they did in this case.

I don't think so.

I think it's in probably aces, is probably into sureff an X, is probably some boxes down and who knows where in the police department.

It's probably in all kinds of locations.

And I very seriously doubt that they transferred the information and the evidence and everything when computer technology came along, very seriously doubt they transferred that to a spreadsheet.

So the problem is you would have to put somebody down there to physically crawl on the floor and look and everything to find two things.

You might find some things, but I would not be surprised at all if it's not into the trash dumb victims clothing with blood.

Do you think they held under that?

Well, Um, you've got two convictions and the rest of them have been um exceptionally cleared, it's what it's called.

Uh, they probably don't.

And and then frankly, you could go deeper and say, um, you know, DNA evidence matching is not what it used to be.

It was originally you know, positioned as how do we take the wrongly accused and find something that exonerates them, and it's turned into how do we get a guilty play out of someone based on this DNA to also going even further in saying, um, it's actually swaying some of the jurors, they've said, because if I see DNA testing put in front of me, I tend to believe that that is the truth.

And so even d N a kind of being considered, this, this bullet proof evidence actually has a lot of biases in here and is problematic in these days.

Um So even if we opened it up, even if the samples were clean, there's some problems there.

Hi, my name is Kim, and my question after listening to the POECAST is about the evidence collected.

I'm assuming it's just sitting in an evidence flucker or in storage or something, and I'm just wondering why they can't now use modern DNA testing to either clear or condemn Wayne if there's so many questions about his innocence or his guilt.

A couple of points here.

In two thousand and ten, there was a case update that actually said in looking at DNA findings between Way Williams and Patrick Baltazar, it would have actually strengthened the case against Wayne Williams, not for him.

The other thing to consider in looking at again we talked about these flawed techniques.

Think about it this way.

Even if you were to match some of the DNA from the hairs that was that was a part of the case, But the fiber matching was such a stronger case for the state against Wayne, and he has less of a defense against that.

So I think you answer one question, you end up opening up a bunch of others.

I just I still think it's problematic.

I think the lack of DNA evidence in this case is what's allowed it to be so confusing over the years.

Usually it's in a murder case in two thousand eighteen, when there's DNA you can usually rule someone in or out as to be at the crime scene or anything like that.

That wasn't really done here.

The closest thing we had to it was these blood samples in the back of one of way William's cars.

And what's interesting is I actually asked way Williams about those blood samples.

It didn't make it into the final episode, but I want to play that clip for you guys here.

This is his answer.

My understanding is what they claimed to have found in the car were two dry scrapings of blood that were determined to be human blood.

And these scrapers were supposed to come from the Barrick case and the John Porter case, and they presented evidence and trial about supposing enzyme tiste and matching their blood type or something like that book book.

An issue is according to the Decab County medicalistam and the report in the case of William Bart he was apparently staffed post mortem or near at the time of depth or whatever.

But in any case, the medical examiner was embedic and that there was no external bleeding on him.

How can you have a case where somebody did not bleed externally, but Jet you said you found a blood scraper from that person that done that?

I remember the thing or John Porter.

He was originally not even included on the task for Smiths.

He was hold on to give the notes here okay, he was found in the open and a makeup lot and for multiple staff wounds, and this probably was a street crime, so it was it was just an attempt to link two cases in a pattern that basically never existed.

When we were partitioning the court for DNA testing back into two thousand and nine, one of the issues we raised was to have those blood sapples tested at the State Crime Lab.

And my attorney's team go to the State Crime Lab to to get the two slides samples of the scrapements to send off to the lab.

They have a tested, but when they went back the next day to oversee the package that the packing of the blood slides sapples, the samples were lost.

Not only were they lost, but they also lost the caust seat that they claimed that these samples came from.

My point is this, You've got the samples the day before, but yet all of a sudden overnight you lose them.

When you find out, you know, in the process of doing DNA tested, you know that raises a real flag with anybody.

I have a somewhat related question that I've never been able to get my um head around, and that's the lack of fingerprint evidence that came up a couple of times, especially with Wayne.

I don't know the answer to that either.

Do you guys have any thoughts there.

It's certainly odd that there's no fingerprints of any of the victims inside way William's home, if that's where they're theorizing that he killed some of these kids.

Um, I don't know if that's because they didn't dust the entire place.

I do know that when Larry Peterson told us about the night that he went to the house to get the carpet samples, he told us exactly what he was looking for.

He was not looking for fingerprints.

He was looking for a match on the carpet it.

So he saw the green carpet, took the sample, he saw the purple material, took that sample.

He knew what he was looking for.

He came back that night and it was a match.

So I don't know if the focus was just not on fingerprints or what it was, but there weren't any.

So I think one thing to consider is Wayne Williams had a leg up on anyone coming to search his atmosphere.

In fact, like people have said, there's that one strange story of like Homer in the backyard, burning things, bringing boxes out to the trash.

I don't know how good fingerprint evidence is or was then, but it sounds like there was some time to cover some tracks, if there were tracks to be covered.

Yeah, even if you weren't covering your tracks as you were, you know, committing these murders, you had time when once you left that bridge, you knew that you were a suspect, and you had time to then cover your tracks.

And also, you know, we don't know where else to look for fingerprints because there is no like where to seem the crime.

You don't know where these kids exactly where only disappeared.

All we know is that you know, they have evidence from the house, evidence from the cars, and those are two places that he was able to clean up after himself.

They I didn't come into way William's house and view a crime scene.

They just viewed a normal looking house.

There was no body on the ground, there was nothing to there was nothing to definitively test for fingerprints.

Sure, in theory you could fingerprint the whole house, but I'd assume that they just did not do that.

Remember, half the media was in his house the that when it got back from being downtown.

Yeah, it's pretty loosey goosey.

There was people in and out.

It was all over the place at that time.

Thanks for listening to part one of our Q and A session.

Um.

If you have any questions of your own, please call us at one eight three three eight five six six six seven again that's one, three, three five six six six seven and tune in next week for port two.

The blow below lay below b

Never lose your place, on any device

Create a free account to sync, back up, and get personal recommendations.