On the morning of June 2, 1993, Jessie Misskelley Jr., a 17-year-old high school drop out with a reported IQ of 73, was taken into custody by Detective Mike Allen. They saw this movie and they felt like, I have to do something.. She said it was one of the highest-rated pieces they had. Damien Echols (@damienechols) July 7, 2021 Terry Hobbs, the stepfather of Branch who was under suspicion but never charged, said he welcomes new DNA testing. But for every Your Own Backyard or Ill Be Gone in the Dark that has applied journalistic rigor to their research in the past two decades, theres an Up and Vanished, which has been at the center of ethical debates since the podcast debuted in 2016. Investigators never found any evidence that tied him, Jason Baldwin, or Jessie Misskelley to the murders of the boys, Stevie Branch, Michael Moore, and Christopher Byers. West Memphis is pretty much like a second Salem," Echols stated in the 1996 documentary Paradise Lost: The Murders at Robin Hood Hills. (Police questioned Byers several times during the investigation, but never considered him a suspect.) Not everyone believes that the West Memphis Three are innocent of the killings of Michael Moore, Stevie Branch, and Christopher Byers. According to Devil's Knot author Mara Leveritt, the investigation of the murders was divided along three lines. Theres no smoking gun. Inevitably, the West Memphis Three case always comes up. Quality. He was an actor, known for Sleepaway Camp II: Unhappy Campers (1988), Fast Food (1989) and In the Heat of the Night (1988). A source said the evidence was transferred to shipping containers where there was a fire, and some of the evidence was destroyed. To this day, it is still unclear who is responsible for the killings. Terry was born on September 11, 1959 in Sweetwater, to Jack Harvey and Marjorie Hobbs .Terry graduated from Sweetwater High School in 1977. In May of that year, police discovered the bodies of Michael Moore, Stevie Branch, and Christopher Byers in the Robin Hood Hills, a small wooded area near the I-40/I-55 exchange. MEMPHIS, Tenn. (localmemphis.com) - More than 25 years after the murders of three 8-year-old boys in West Memphis, a new book gives a first-person account of . Echols attorneys got a letter from the custodian of records for the West Memphis police department saying some of the evidence ended up lost, or misplaced, and some destroyed by fire. On 04/08/2021 Terry Hobbs was filed as a Bankruptcy - Chapter 13 lawsuit. By choosing I Accept, you consent to our use of cookies and other tracking technologies. Also part of the plea was the provision that the three could not sue the state. Now, evidence from the case of the West Memphis Three is either missing or destroyed. Terry Hobbs USAF Ret. February 27, 2023 (76 years old) View obituary. It was also revealed in 2012 that Hobbs nephew allegedly told his friends, My Uncle Terry murdered those three little boys," and that the killings were a Hobbs family secret, according to, I still believe in my heart that Jessie, Jason, and Damion Echols [sic] are responsible for what happened to our children, Hobbs told Memphis ABC affiliate. On August 19, 2011, all three accepted the deal and were immediately released from prison. October 14, 2017: #26 on the JazzWeek chart! Terry Wayne Hobbs was born on May 21st, 1958. Berlinger contrasts this with the approach taken by Bakken, Sauls, and Co., who considered the truth sacrosanct and avoided rumor and innuendo in part because similar speculation helped convict the West Memphis Three. Main Page; They even hired experts to examine the case, including a forensic criminal profiler who discovered what appeared to be bite marks on one of the victims that didnt match any of the convicted. Mojo, however, was considerably more fired up, believing the same thing many of Paradise Losts viewers did: that the movie showed an incredible miscarriage of justice, one that would surely be fixed. Published by The Commercial Appeal from Jun. Under order of the Arkansas Supreme Court, there were to be new evidentiary hearings in the case. We didnt see them grow up.. Spotting a small, black tennis shoe in the water, Jones radioed for help. In her recantation, Hutcheson stated that when she asked Echols directly if he had killed "those three kids," he replied, "No. I deeply admire that and I thought it was worthy of putting on film.. Bakken immediately showed her friends Burk Sauls and Grove Pashley, who were both equally gripped by what they had just watched. Terry Hobbs, the stepfather of Branch who was under suspicion but never charged, said he welcomes new DNA testing. Like everyone else who was familiar with the case, they wanted to know who committed the crimes, but their main goal was advocacy, not using the opportunity to play investigators. It's affected a lot of lives, but for some reason it keeps being brought up," said Hobbs. It's one. Berlinger says that he counts Errol Morriss The Thin Blue Line as one of his greatest influences, not just for the innovations Morris brought to the documentary genre, but also because it helped free Randall Dale Adams from a sentence for the murder of a Texas police officer that he did not commit. They asked to see a cut, and they immediately said, Not only are we going to let you use all that music, but were not going to charge you anything for it., Metallica would be the first celebrities to throw their support behind the West Memphis Three, but they were far from the last. I had a friend who was working on 20/20, and they had done a film about exorcism in one of the magazine pieces, Nevins says. Today, Berlinger calls Revelations the weakest of the three films in the trilogyadvocacy in search of a story as opposed to the in-the-moment, on-the-ground approach of the first Paradise Lost and the in-depth exploration of new evidence in 2011s Purgatory. "I knew from when I was real small that people were going to know who I was," Echols said in 1994. It is with great sadness that we announce the death of Terry Lee Hobbs of Auburndale, Florida, born in Winter Haven, Florida, who passed away on August 16, 2021, at the age of 56, leaving to mourn family and friends. Terry Castleman is a data . He retired from the US Air Force, and he was the Deputy Supervisor for Polk County Supervisor of Elections. The cult part of the Commercial Appeals headline signaled how the case would be defined by both the media and prosecutors. Leave a sympathy message to the family in the guestbook on this memorial page of Terry Hobbs to show support. Getting that kind of creative validation was exciting, but we were also extremely frustrated that it didnt move from the entertainment page of the newspaper to the editorial page, Berlinger says. Its first season ostensibly focused on the disappearance of a Georgia beauty queen, but it spent nearly as much time digging through the salacious details of the victims love life and dipping into amateur psychology as it did looking at evidence. Example video title will go here for this video. He graduated from Sweetwater High School in 1977. Self. Berlinger and Sinofsky began to take notice. Auburndale, FL - TSGT Terry Lee Hobbs, USAF, ret. Obituaries can vary in the amount of information they contain, but many of them are genealogical goldmines, including information such as: names, dates, place of birth and death, marriage information, and family relationships. Covered in wounds, all three showed signs of having been beaten. They began attending appeal hearings and visiting Baldwin, Echols, and Misskelley in prison. Now a judgewho coincidentally works part time in the courtroom where Misskelley was convictedStidham spends time speaking to law students about the judicial system. Although Damein Echols had a teenager's typical disdain for authority, he nevertheless trusted that the system would work in his favor. Its gone from a controversial legal theory to an accepted phenomenon. After 18 years in prison, the West Memphis Three were finally free, but not exonerated. Two of the West Memphis Three's most ardent supporters were director Peter Jackson, best known for The Lord of the Rings films, and his partner Fran Walsh. Terry L. Hobbs, 63, of Caldwell, HOBBS, Terry L., passed on March 7,2021 at the age of 63. He began his career in the plumbing business at a very young age, workingfor his . Initially, Misskelley repeatedly denied having knowledge of the crime, aside from rumors that Damien Echols was involved. He says his students seem to have a better grasp on the idea of coerced confessions than any of his peers in 1994. Last year, I noticed that Terry went missing. Armchair detectives of today, I think a lot of them dabble in conspiracy theory, Berlinger says. Luminol tests, which reveal the hidden presence of blood, were not performed at the scene until six days later. That story line would make up the bulk of 2000s Paradise Lost 2: Revelations, a rare sequel for a documentary, especially before the streaming era proved that true crime series like Making a Murderer and The Staircase could maintain audience interest for years. every single person in my class was either . With their 2007 request for a new trial rejected, time was running out for the West Memphis Three. But I had to. The districts current prosecuting attorney, Keith Chrestman, did not respond to requests for comment for this article, but his predecessor Scott Ellington, whose office negotiated the deals, told The New York Times in 2011 that while new trials would have likely resulted in acquittals, We dont think that there is anybody else. The Moore family has been outspoken about the end result, vehemently protesting the 2012 Oscar nomination for the third Paradise Lost installment. Branded the West Memphis Three, the mens case was featured in multiple documentaries, earning them support from an array of high-profile musicians, celebrities and activists. La Mirada, California. Baldwin and Misskelley were sentenced to life without parole while Echols received the death penalty. He knew that if he ever got out, hed want to do that in a more organized way. Create a free profile to get unlimited access to exclusive videos, breaking news, sweepstakes, and more! weaving supposedly anti-Christian and occult messages into their songs, he discovered her while Googling cold cases, funded an extensive private investigation, a November 2010 Arkansas Supreme Court ruling, biggest allies in the years before his 2020 death, acquitted of capital murder in 2018 after a 25-year legal saga. Even though they said they didnt murder the three boys, they are technically convicted killers. '", In 1999, a more mature Echols explained the comment. William Holford Griffiths. By getting to the story quickly, the directors were able to document the post-arrest period and two trials that followed in painstaking detail. Misskelley initially told police that the killings happened during the day; knowing that they actually occurred some time after dusk, the officers corrected him, helping him retrofit his story to the cases few known facts. He had always maintained he didnt commit the crimes, and outside the Varner Units walls, a growing chorus of activists and legal observers were arguing that same thing on his behalf. Terry Hobbs, one of the men named in the documents. Stating that she would ask around, Hutcheson agreed to "play detective.".
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