Morbid - Episode 559: The Murder of Timothy Coggins

Episode Date: April 29, 2024

On the evening of October 9, 1983, twenty-three-year-old Timothy Coggins met up with some friends for a night out at the People’s Choice club, a popular night club in Griffin, Georgia, a rural area about forty-five minutes outside of Atlanta. When Tim didn’t return home the next day, his family assumed he’d stayed at a friend’s house, as he often did on nights he stayed out late. Those assumptions were shattered one day later, when investigators showed up at the Coggins’ front door carrying a photograph of what would be identified as Tim’s dead, mutilated body.At first, local investigators assured the Coggins family they would find whoever was responsible for Tim’s brutal murder; however, within just a couple weeks, it was clear they didn’t have any leads or evidence, nor did they seem all that interested in investigating Tim’s death. Eventually, the months passed into years and the case went completely cold and Tim’s family lost any hope of his killers being brought to justice. Then, more than three decades after his death, investigators contacted the Coggins family and told them they’d found the men responsible for Tim’s death.Timothy Coggins’ story is yet another reminder of how in many parts of the United States, the hideous beliefs of a bygone era are still alive and well, devastating families and perverting the justice system. Thank you to the incredible Dave White of Bring Me the Axe and 99 Cent Rental Podcasts for Research!ReferencesBoone, Christian. 2018. "Well proves crucial in cold murder case." Atlanta Journal Constitution, July 1.—. 2017. "2 boasted of dragging black man behind pickup truck." Atlanta Journal-Constitution, December 1.—. 2018. "Race center stage at trial's opening." Atlanta Journal-Constitution, June 21.Franklin Gebhard v. The State of Georgia. 2019. S19A1582 (Supreme Court of Georgia, December 23).Gomez, Melissa, and Matt Stevens. 2018. "Conviction after 34 years in murder of Black man." New York Times, June 27.Helm, Nelson. 2017. "5 arrested in connection with '83 murder in Spaulding County." Atlanta Constitution, October 14: B1.—. 2017. "Dragging death case was racial." Atlanta Journal-Constitution, November 2.2022. Cold Case Files. Directed by Ricky Lewis. Performed by Ricky Lewis.Lowery, Wesley. 2020. "A Brutal Lynching. An Indifferent Police Force. A 34-Year Wait for Justice." GQ Magazine, July 17.McLaughlin, Eliott C. 2017. "Killers meant to 'send a message,' sheriff says of 1983." CNN Wire, October 20.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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voices and celebrity talent like Brendan Fraser and Luke Kirby's latest sci-fi adventure The Downloaded. A first listen is waiting for you when you start your free trial at audible.ca. A bloodbath tonight in the rural town of Chinook. Everyone here is hiding a secret. Four more victims found scattered. Some worse than others. I came as fast as I could. I'm deputy Ruth Vogel. And soon my quiet life will never be the same. You can listen to Chinook exclusively on Wondery Plus. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple podcasts, or Spotify podcasts. Hey weirdos, I'm Ash.

And I'm Elena. And this is Morbid in the Morning. Haven't done one of those in a while. I know. I woke up this morning and I said, oh, that just made me think of the Sopranos. I woke up this morning. It took everything in me not to go, oh, myself and go. I feel like I did it. No, I sure didn't.

It's not what I did. I got myself a coffee and a bagel. So, little different. Little different. I picked up my packed lunch. See, it's morning in the morning. It is. It's going to be silly.

Yeah. It's going to be silly. It can be silly for the intro. It's true. And then it's not. And then it's not going to then it's not gonna be. And it's simply not silly goose behavior. Well, actually, there is some fucking silly goose behavior in this case.

Really? But before we get to it. Interesting. Well, before we get to it, you like books, guys? I like books. You like words? I like words. Do you like stories?

I'll eat a story up. Well, guess what? Tell me. There's a sequel to The Butcher and the Wren called The Butcher Game. Holy shit. I don't even know my own author. Holy shit. It's coming out September 17th, but you can preorder it now anywhere.

Preorder it. And if you preorder it on Barnes and Noble and you use the code butcher25, you can get 25% off. Ooh, I love 25% off. Which is great. It's like a coupon without a coupon. It's a coupon. Yeah.

It's a coupon code. Exactly. So do it. It's longer. It's gnarlier. It's good. Shit goes down in this book. So I think if you liked The Butcher and the Wren, I think you're going to dig it.

And if you haven't read The Butcher and the Wren yet, you should do that too. Yeah, buy them both. Let's do this. Let's go on this journey together, everybody. It's exciting. Come with me. Books.

Books. I'm actually very excited for the advanced reader copies because I happen to be an advanced reader. So, and I want to smell it. I can't wait to smell the book. I love smelling the book. They always smell like a book every time. It's true. You guys get it. You to smell it. I can't wait to smell the book. I love smelling the book. They always smell like a book every time. It's true.

You guys get it. You guys get it. Because you guys have been amazing and you've been fucking killing it and super supportive and super kind about it. And I love you guys. And you rule. Yay. Thank you so much.

Thank you for supporting me. And keep pre-ordering. I was being you in that moment. Thanks for supporting me. Love you guys. Love you. Any other biz nasty? That's my plug plug.

I like your plug plug. I don't really know. No, my only other biz nasty is the total solar eclipse was fucking mind changing. I know you got to see it like in the path of totality. Yeah, it was in that path of totality and it was fucking gnarly. The videos people took are like, I didn't go outside and see it because I am lazy.

I'm just kidding, I had other things going on. I had other things going on during the solar eclipse. Besides the solar eclipse, okay? This celestial event, not interested. Watched it on TikTok. Very zillennial of me. That was very zillennial. But yeah, the fucking videos are insane.

And they don't even capture in reality when you're looking at it. Oh yeah, I can't imagine. It's the first one that we've ever seen and we were, because John's like a huge space nerd. He loves space. All the things space, this man is all about. He's a space cadet. He is a space cadet. I love him.

So he was so excited. And he was hyping this up. And I was like, he had never seen one either, but he was hyping it up just like, because he was like, I know it's going to be amazing. He was so excited. And I was like, I hope this lives up to your hype, dude. Because like, this is the whole universe that you're hyping up.

They like surpassed his hype. We were both just like in awe. It's cool that you got to experience that too. Like as it like with your little fam, like the kids and everything. Cause they were amazed like, and that like grandma. Yeah, not like nanny. I have a grandma nanny. But yeah, it was amazing.

And then I saw all these people got engaged during it. And I saw one last night that the photographer took the photo as the diamond ring phase happened. That is the one that I was telling you about yesterday. Because the diamond ring phase in the solar eclipse is like when it's opening again, and you get this burst of light out of one side, and it literally looks like a diamond ring. That was the most beautiful thing I've ever seen, and we were talking- I could not believe that.

We were talking about it yesterday, like I can't imagine how much stress was on that poor photographer. And you could tell when she was setting up, she was like, ah! She was like, I'm so nervous. I have to get this. But it, imagine having that be your fucking proposal. And having it be the fucking diamond ring phase.

You get one on your finger. Of the solar eclipse. And there's one on, in the, in the galaxy. In the galaxy. In the galaxy. Like the moon was like, let me help you out. And just like, damn. You're starting that shit off right. Yeah.

I love it. You're starting it off on a real high bar. High bar. So it's like, you got a lot. You got to keep it. It's only up from there. Keep it at that level. Crazy.

No, it was really cool. If you ever get a chance to see a total solar eclipse in the path of totality, which like, I know it's hard to do because it happens, like, every fucking who knows when. Yeah, I think the next one I'll be like 50 something. There's like one in 2026, but you'd have to go to Iceland. I'll go. Which I was like... Time me up.

I was like, all right, threaten me with a good time. How far is Iceland? It's not a bad plane ride from where we are. The fact that I genuinely was just about to say, you could fly there. You could fly there. You could fly I genuinely was just about to say, you could fly there. You could fly there. You could fly there. In fact, it's recommended that you fly there.

You can fly anywhere. It's recommended you fly to this island. What a wild question. What a dumbass thing to say. Instead of trying to traverse the sea. I'm like, there are English Channel there? Going to cross the river with your oxen. I think that instead you can fly to the island.

I'm like, there are English Channel there? I'm like, there are English Channel there? I'm like, there are English Channel there? I'm like, there are English Channel there? I'm like, there are English Channel there? I'm like, there are English Channel there? I'm like, there are English Channel there? I'm like, there are English channel there? Going across the river with your oxen. I think that instead you should fly.

I don't even have any oxen. So it sounds like a good idea. But also like flying is a real gamble at this point. Don't you say that to me. I'm literally getting on a flight on Saturday. But you're on an Airbus. Am I? I need to look into that. I Saturday. No, it's on a, but you're on an Airbus. Am I? I need to look into that.

I hope. You didn't check? Uh, I told Drew to. Bitch! I know. I know. Check that shit. It's very complicated to check.

Boeing had another fuck up. Like, no, they're like legitimate, like, like, sums, sums up. Oh yeah, there's a whole investigation. They're taking off and the wings started shredding. I don't even think we should talk about it. You gotta, make sure you're on an Airbus. I'm going to, but I don't. I'll fight you guys. Be on an Airbus. whole investigation. I don't even think we should talk about it. I don't even think we should talk about it.

You gotta be, make sure you're on an airbus. I'm going to, but I don't. I'll fight you guys. You think I would actually sit my ass on a Boeing? I would look before I got on the plane. I was gonna say. I just might do it like five minutes before and be like, well, we gotta get a different flight at this very moment. On an Airbus. Hello, husband.

We on an Airbus on Saturday, right? Guys, I'm going to Disney. I'm so excited for her. You couldn't even say that with your whole chest. I'm excited for you. Oh, I can't wait. I love Disney. Like, Holly Madison loves Disney at this point.

Like, I understand the love. And I love it for Like, Holly Madison loves Disney at this point. Like, I understand the love. And I love it for both of you. I planned the sickest outfits. I'm gonna be hella... I got a tennis skirt. See, you and Holly. Yeah, oh, I love her style, like, especially her Disney style. And I love Marie from the Aristocats, so I have one outfit that's all Marie-themed.

I'm obsessed with this. Down to the socks. Wow. Fuck me up. Wow. Fuck me up. I love that for you. I even ordered like pink shoes to go with my pink shirt.

You know what? I'm for that. Yeah, I'm out here living. I love hyper fixate, man. Yeah, I can't wait to have kids. Get fucking excited. And bring them to Disney and make them match me. Hell yeah.

Like for the short amount of time that I'll be able to do that. I can't wait. Yeah. You know what? Just because I don't love the experience of Disney doesn't mean that I can't be like, fuck yeah, for other people. You love Disney. Glove Disney.

Thank you. That was kind. And someday I hope I can tolerate Disney. You need to go to Disney on the thing that I saw on TikTok. It was like World Golf Day at Disney. And I think they need some more villainous rides for you. Yeah. You know?

I think it's also just... Well, you also don't like rides. You don't. It's just not... I think the whole... It's tough for me to... It's going to be tough for me to enjoy it. It's not your vibe. Again, the only reason tough for me to, it's going to be tough for me to enjoy it.

It's not your vibe. Again, the only reason I enjoy it is because the kids do. As long as they enjoy it. I can take them anytime. I'm just, I'll suffer through anything for them. That's true. You will. You know, like literally anything.

So I'm like, all right, let's go. That's really sweet. Yeah. I can't wait. So that's fun. Let's fucking go. I'm also going to Mario world let's go. That's really sweet. Yeah, I can't wait. So. Well, that's fun. Let's fucking go. I'm also going to Mario World, so. John was very jealous about that. You guys were going somewhere else.

And I was like, oh man, like I want to go there. And he goes, you're going to Super Mario World. He was like, fuck off, you're going to Super Mario World. It was like such a like, it felt like a stepbrothers moment. It was such a little kid. He was like, go to Mario World. I'll get him a souvenir. Yeah, there you go. I'll get him like a Mariobrothers moment. It was such a little kid. He was like, go to Mario World. I'll get him a souvenir. Yeah, there you go.

I'll get him like a Mario shirt. Mario. Mario. All right, I think we've bantered enough. Yeah, I think we're just like, I know this is gonna be a tough one. I don't know the details of this, but I know it's gonna be a tough one.

Yeah, this is definitely a tough one. Like, let me get my more serious hat on. At the top of it, I will give you like a trigger warning. It has heavy, heavy themes of racism. This entire case is rooted in racism. And this is the case of the murder of Timothy Coggins. So, we'll get into it. Let's go.

And I just want to say at the start, I would have been Timothy's friend. Like, and you're going to feel that way too. He just seemed like, I feel like he would have been all of our friend. And he just seemed like a friendly, like just someone you would want in your friend group. And the fact that what happened to him did,

just because people are disgusting, like really pisses me off. Yeah, absolutely. And it's just gross. So Timothy Wayne Coggins was born in Georgia on August 29th, 1960. He was the fourth of eight children born to Viola Coggins Dorsey, which Viola love. Oh yeah.

Love. It immediately makes me think of Viola Davis. Yes. Which is like a very good association. 100%. The family didn't have a lot when it came to income or resources, but they were really a tight-knit family, and they were all completely supportive of one another. So where they weren't rich in money and assets,

they were rich in love for each other, which I love. Honestly, where it counts. Exactly. And despite an already full house, Viola and Tim's stepfather, Robert, constantly regularly entertained nieces, nephews, friends. They were that house you could always go to if you didn't have a place to go.

I love that. Or just if you needed some support in a place that felt like home. Yeah. Tim's niece Heather said, they didn't come from much, but they came from love, and that taught them to love each other. Aw. Now despite their limited means,

Biola and Robert worked really hard to instill strong values and a good work ethic in all of their kids. But most of all, they stressed, and I'm sure you can already tell, the importance of family connection. Tim and his younger sister, Talissa, were only two years apart, so they grew up with a really, really close bond. Talissa described Tim saying he was funny and outgoing. Tim was a man with an irresistible smile who never met a stranger. Like, I love the way she put that. Like, he never met a stranger.

Like, they were friends immediately. I love that. And he was also really, really protective of his friends and family. Especially very protective over his four sisters and his mother. Like, you were not gonna do anything to hurt them if Tim was around. And whenever one of his sisters was going to a friend's house, he would insist on walking them there and back

just to make sure they got there and home with no trouble. Oh. Likewise, he was always affectionate with his mother, and he went out of his way to help her. Heather Coggins, his niece, said, there was nothing my grandmother could ask him to do that he wouldn't do. If she asked him to walk to Atlanta and pick up a croissant, he'd do it. See, he's just a good man. He's asked him to walk to Atlanta and pick up a croissant, he'd do it.

See, he's just a good man. He's a good man. What friends and family remember most though was Tim's passion for music. In the early 1980s, the remnants of the disco and the funk era were still really popular on the radio. And Tim loved going out to the club on the weekend just to spend the weekend dancing.

Hell yeah. Loved, loved dancing, loved music. One of his aunts remembered he'd just dance anywhere. He'd dance in the street. Oh, I love that. He has dance and shoes on all the time. Dancing in the street. It's Tim.

I love that. No. In 1983, Spalding County was one of the more rural parts of the Atlanta metro area. Although it was actually the largest city in the county, Griffin was equally rural because the town was so small, the People's Choice Club, a small dance club, and the almost exclusively black part of Griffin

was the hottest place to be on a Friday night, especially if you wanted to dance, especially if you wanted to hear some music. This was the place to go. I love people who love to dance. Hell yeah. I feel like it's just like, that's a very specific kind of person

and they're always awesome. Yeah, they always rock. Shake your booty. Now on the night of October 7th, Tim caught a ride with a friend to the People's Choice Club where he was going to meet up with Ruth Mickey Guy. She was a local white woman who he had started dating a few weeks earlier.

According to a journalist, Wesley Lowry, even in the 1980s interracial dating was frowned upon in Spalding. Which is so wild. It's insane. And it's about to get even more wild. This is still his quote. Where a local clan chapter still held of regular rallies and parades. That feels like it should be a different planet.

It does. It just doesn't feel... Honestly, at this point, I'm like, yeah, that's Earth. No, absolutely. You know what I mean? Now, unfortunately, it's like everything's... I feel like everything is flipped on its head way too much. Very much so.

I feel like the wheels turn backwards way too quickly. But it should be somewhere else. But it just feels like it... You look around and you're like, it doesn't belong on this planet. No. You know, like this belongs on a less advanced planet. A less advanced society should be doing this kind of shit. It's so true.

And thinking this kind of way. It's just sad to think that like black people living in this area were just subject to seeing parades go by full of white people that wanted to do the most disgusting, horrific things to them and like literally don't see them as human. And they had to just go about their lives. And just live and share the same spaces. And it's probably one of the very big reasons

why Timothy was so adamant about walking his sister's places and you know, walking his mother places. 100%. Like making sure, like putting himself in harm's way to make sure they're safe because they're not safe. Exactly. Because I think that's exactly what it was.

It's right out loud. That's the other thing. It's like they're saying the quiet parts out loud. They're just not even hiding it. Exactly. No, it's so true. And this was very much an area, like this county, was very much an area where it was pretty segregated.

Like there were black parts of town, and there were white parts of town, and I'm sure they intersected at certain points, and that must have been just so fear-inducing for a black person to have to go in like a, in a quote-unquote white area. Yeah. And to think that this, like like this was the 1980s.

This was not like 19... No. Like 1919 or something like that. Like you know the 1930s or something where you're like still you know where you're like damn even then you're like damn we should have advanced further than that. But this is the 1980s. Like I know people that were alive during this time. You were almost alive.

I was born during this time, yeah. And it's like, when I hear these kind of stories and things like this, it's like, you—and I say this a lot, but I can't imagine looking at a kid and filling them with that kind of hatred for another person for no fucking reason. Except for what they look like. And it's so scary. I couldn't imagine looking at the girls and being like, let me teach you to hate somebody based solely on appearances.

Or at all. That's the scariest thing is you hit the nail on the head there because you think about it. And these people in this area had been taught from probably the time before they could even speak to hate. Just to hate. Just to hate because of literally the color of someone's skin. Yeah.

And it's just, and again, kids are so open. They're so impressionable. And they're so like, they come out just ready to accept whatever, ready to just make friends and be kind and be, they do. They just come out that way. We teach them things. Nine, they do. They just come out that way. Nine times out of 10, they come out that way. We teach them this shit.

And you teach them that shit real early. And it's like, I just can't fathom looking at it in like a very open-minded, just untainted child and just tainting them with adult hate. Like, I just can't. It's good that we can't fathom it, because I can't either, obviously. It's just so sad. I don't know what headspace that you have to be in.

And honestly, I think you have to have been raised with hate. Yeah, like, oh, if you're teaching that, yeah, it's a cycle, for sure. It is. I mean, but it's like, where does it start? It's got to start somewhere. And it's like, what the fuck? Well, the bigger question is, for sure. It is. But it's like, where does it start? It's got to start somewhere. And it's like, what the fuck?

The bigger question is where the fuck does it end? Yeah, absolutely. Are we done yet? Yeah, how do you break that? It's bad. It's still bad. But you do see these people who are, they come from a long line of this shit and they're taught that from a young age.

And luckily they were able to, which must be difficult if you're like, you know, so indoctrinated to think that way. Yeah, to break that cycle. Some people are able to break free of just like the indoctrination of thinking that way and be like, wait a second, and start thinking critically about it and be like, what the fuck am I doing? Like, you know, like what are these thoughts

that have been put in my head? Yeah. And they end up like going the totally different way, but it's so rare. It is. And it's so sad. Overall, it's just really sad and really scary. It's just dumb. It sucks.

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rate up month after month with this pulse pounding collection you can't hear anywhere else. You guys, I am making my way downtown walking fast through the housewife secret. It's narrated by James Laley and he has such a calming voice. It is absolutely salacious and just like scrumdiddly umptious. I totally recommend. As an Audible member, you can choose one title a month to keep from the entire catalog, including the latest bestsellers and new releases. New members can try Audible free for 30 days. Visit audible.com slash morbid or text morbid to 500 500. That's audible.com slash morbid or text morbid to 500 500 to try Audible free for 30 days. Audible.com You guys, I am so freaking stoked for summer.

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it's gluten free, vegan, dairy free, soy free, and they also have sugar free flavors which are absolutely delicious. My personal favorite is white peach but I recently tried the raspberry melon and it is so delicious and so refreshing. Turn your ordinary water into extraordinary hydration with Liquid IV. Get 20% off your first order of Liquid IV when you go to liquidiv.com and use code morbid at checkout. That's 20% off your first order when you shop better hydration today using promo code morbid at liquid IV.com. So back to the people's choice club that night.

And a lot of friends had pointed out that Tim's relationship with Mickey might not be the best idea in rural Spalding County, but their warnings did little to sway Tim. He wasn't gonna be pushed around by a bunch of racist people telling him who he could and couldn't date. And they like each other. They should be able to like each other. They should absolutely be able to like each other.

It doesn't fucking affect anybody else. No, who gives a shit? That's the thing. You don't like it, look the other way. Everybody mind your fucking business. Exactly, and that's what it really comes down to. Even in 2024, that is still true. Everybody mind your fucking business. Exactly. And that's what it really comes down to. Even in 2024, that is still true. Everyone mind your fucking business.

God damn. It's just like, if it's not affecting you, who gives a shit? And I think, honestly, I remember my mom telling me when I was little, like, I've said so many things about my mom, but this is actually a good thing that she taught me. I'm like, don't worry, it's positive. I remember, I would come home and be like, this person is driving me fucking crazy. I wouldn't say fucking, but this is actually a good thing that she taught me. I'm like, don't worry, it's positive. I remember I would come home and be like, this person is driving me fucking crazy.

I wouldn't say fucking, but I'd be like, this person is driving me nuts. And she'd be like, you need to ask yourself in the moment, is that really affecting you? Yeah. Like, does that behavior genuinely affect you? And if it doesn't, let it go. Yeah, then shut up and move on.

I apply that to so much of my life. Like if I'm like getting annoyed by something, I'm like, but is that really affecting me like outside of it just like annoying me? Or am I just choosing to let it? Or am I choosing to be annoyed? Exactly. To like draw myself into it. Right. And I think more and more people need to look at situations and behaviors like that.

Yeah. Like is it really affecting my life in any fucking way other than I'm annoyed by it? Unfortunately, social media has kind of gotten out of control at this point. Because people can say whatever the fuck they wanna say. And I feel like it's just like, it's ramped up too much now. And it's like, and it's not just racism,

it's all many other things.'s all bullying, it's harassment. But everybody's just allowed to have their fucking two cents on everybody's business. And you can say something that you would never in a million years look at someone and say. And that's another thing, when you're sitting there typing out a fucking comment, ask yours like a crazy ass comment. Ask yourself, would I say this to somebody's face? Who was, who did I see say this? I think, uh, I'm going to have to figure out who the, who the comedian was. It was, it's a girl on Tik Tok, but she was saying that like when

somebody says a mean thing online to her, she was like, I picture them like having to stand in front of everyone they've ever respected or loved, like their mother, their sister, their best friends, their dad, their grandfather, their grandmother, all the people that they respect. And then saying that same comment to me while I stand there. In front of all those people. And then having to just look at all those people and be like, yep. I said that.

I know exactly who you're talking about. I can't think of her name. Erin. Erin. Erin, you're right. Erin, hold on. Yeah, because I want to give her credit because it was such a good, I think it begins with an H, hat. I know exactly. I can literally see her face. She's a wonderful baller. She's very, very, very funny. And she has very, very good like insights onto these little things.

Erin, I'm sorry if I say your last name wrong, Hattimer. Yes, Hattimer. I almost said Hattimer, but I didn't want to botch it. But yeah, and I think that's such a great way to think about it. So if, I mean, that goes the other way too, if somebody's being mean to you, because I think a lot of people have dealt with like, you know, assholes, strangers on the internet. Just think about it that way. If it's bothering you, just picture them having to say it in front of everyone they've ever loved or respected. And it'll make you be

like, that was a dumb thing for that person to say. Yeah, it's so true. But I think back then, it's like, at this point in this story, it's like, these people need to mind their business. They do. You know? They do. Let two people care. They're two consenting adults. Let them care about each other.

And obviously, like this story, it's like, it's so much bigger than people just being assholes. Absolutely. There's not even words for what these people are. This gets taken into the stratosphere of awful. Like nightmare. Nightmare territory. But anyway, most weekend nights at the People's Club, Tim could be found, I'm sure you can

guess, at the center of that dance floor. Where his energy and charm just shone. But that night, Tim seemed very distracted almost from the moment he arrived there. And later his sister Talissa would remember making her way to the bathroom and hearing somebody else at the club say, and this is a quote, there were white men outside asking for Tim. Now in and of itself in this county that was a terrifying thing to hear that there were white men looking for your black brother. Like, I can't imagine how she felt hearing that.

And then she caught a glimpse of Tim headed for the front door of the club. So that not only did she hear that most terrifying thing that you could possibly hear in that moment, but then she's like, oh, this is true. Like, I think he's headed out there. So she followed after him to make sure that he was okay. But by the time she reached the parking lot, he was gone.

And she had no way of knowing that was the last time she was ever going to see her brother alive. Oh. The next day, no one in the Coggins house actually really thought much of the fact that Tim hadn't come home the night before. Lowry wrote, it was typical for him to disappear for a few days at a time.

He knew everyone around town, so the safe assumption was that he was crashing on someone's couch, which, you're in your early 20s, of course, like you have a night out, you spend the night at your friend's house, you come home sometime later. And if you know everybody around town,

it's like, yeah, you got a ton of places to stay. Right, but Tim was not crashing on anybody's couch. The next day, two days after Tim had gone out to meet Mickey at the club, sheriff's deputies were trying to identify a man in his early 20s whose badly beaten body had been found in a field not very far away from the People's Choice Club. Operating apparently without any sensitivity for the potential friends and family of this victim, the photo that deputies were circulating was of a brutalized black man in his early 20s. His face was beaten so badly

that he was essentially unrecognizable, but they were going around saying, do you know who this is? Showing people that photo. What the fuck? Like, what the fuck? I don't understand. I don't understand.

It was a patron though at the People's Choice who thought they recognized the man as Tim Coggins and suggested the officer, Oscar Jordan, check with the Coggins family. So when Jordan showed the photo to Viola, she broke down crying, but Talissa insisted she didn't recognize the man in that photo. She had no idea who it was. I think it was very much a trauma response. I was just going to say, there's... Why would you ever...

No part of you is going to click as like, this could be someone I love. No. Your brain is going to try to protect you from that. Absolutely. It was only later that she told a reporter, which she didn't want to admit what she knew immediately. It was Tim.

But her immediate trauma response is, no, that's not my brother. No way. No. Yeah, I don't blame her. Because that's absolutely your brain trying to protect yourself. And that family never should have seen that photo. No. Like, never, ever should have...

That never should have been their last vision of their loved one. No, of course not. It's awful. But on the morning of October 8th, Tim's body was discovered by a father and son who were out squirrel hunting on the outer edge of an airfield in Griffin. The autopsy had yet to be performed, but from what the sheriff's department could tell, and I just want to let you know this is a lot. This is very graphic.

Tim had dozens of knife wounds in the back, torso, wrist, and neck. When he was discovered, his shirt, socks, and shoes were missing. His jeans were pulled down below his knees, and the police found his bloodstained sweater a few yards away. Based on the abrasions on his body and the drag marks and patterns in the dirt, they believed that he had been dragged behind a vehicle. Like this is… That's animal behavior. It's animal behavior. That's worse than animal behavior.

I don't know how. Animals don't do this. I don't know how you can do anything like to hurt another person physically. I don't understand that headspace, thankfully. I don't know how you do this. This is not just hurting a person. This is... I don't know how you would do this to an animal.

Doing this. That's the thing. Doing this to another person or another animal. Like you should lock away and throw away the key. Like you're, you're beyond any kind of fixing rehabilitation or anything. If you're capable of this, I don't know. That's the depths. It's heinous. The true depths. Georgia Bureau of Investigation, GBI agent Jared Coleman said, it appeared he had been chained to the back of a truck. That truck then drug him feet first, around in a square pattern, and there were sites of blood at each corner.

So this, they dragged him like around and around. Like, no, I... And this all comes down to him dating a white woman. And we've heard stories like this before. We absolutely have. Which is like, this isn't a one-off by any stretch of the imagination. No. And that's something everybody should...

That's just like... It's unfathomable. It comes down to who he decided to date, who he liked and who liked him. I was gonna say, and who liked him best. It wasn't like he was harassing this girl. She met up with him at the club. She was having a good time with him.

They liked each other. That's not your fucking business and it doesn't concern you in any way. To take it upon yourself to do anything to hurt someone, but then to do this because of their choice of who they want to be romantically involved in, what the fuck is wrong with you? Look inward.

Yeah, I mean, yeah. Look inward. Look inward and then go away. Forever. Forever, and don't join society ever again. The sad part is, and I'll tell you right from the top, these people got to stay in society for a really long time before any justice was served in this story. Before any justice whatsoever.

But a few days later, and I told you from the top, like this is a heavy name. A few days later, the autopsy confirmed what the sheriff's officers already assumed and unfortunately unveiled several other horrible details. It was very difficult to tell the order in which Tim's wounds had been inflicted, but the medical examiner believed that he had been knocked to the ground and stabbed seven times in the chest in what appeared to be a kind of star pattern. And there were two intersecting slashes on his chest and back about 11 inches, like it went 11 inches in what formed a large X, which I'm sure you know why.

Yeah. In addition to the chest wounds, the tendon behind one of his knees was severed. And that was with an additional stab. Oh. And then he was dragged behind a vehicle for they don't know how long, an indeterminable amount of time. But evidence at the scene suggested there was a square pattern around the lot,

so it was over and over. Like, it wasn't just for a short period of time, it was prolonged. Holy shit. Finally, his attackers dragged him further into the field, and he was hit over the head with a large, heavy object that they believed could have been a wooden chair or a table leg. And then his body was dragged even further. And this is gross to the base of a tree that locals referred to as the hanging tree. And he was left there to die. What the fuck? The medical

examiner determined that the cause of death had been from the stab wounds, but... They don't know what order that all happened in. They don't know what order, and this was not... He was tortured. Absolutely. Like, this was not a quick death at all. Like, these people could have stopped their actions at any point in time and only continued

and progressed to do worse and worse things to this human being. The fact that you're telling me that these people, and obviously it's several people, that these people were walking around in society after this for a long time. Years, years and years. And interacting with other people and probably being around children and being around humans and being alone with people. Not only that, let me even up that,

telling people what they did. Telling people about this. Are you boasting about it? For years. Sometimes it's like really base level to be a human being. Like sometimes when you hear shit like this, you're like, can I, can I, this sucks. Like it sucks to be in the same kind of species

as these people. Like it's like, damn. Because we're the only species that will do this to each other. Like sometimes it's real gross to be the same species. It's beyond words. Like this entire, this, I've had this one done for a little bit and just like have been getting into the, you know, like...

The headspace to be able to... The headspace to actually, like, do this case justice and, like, present it well. Yeah. This is gnarly. Like, there are... I keep saying there's just not words for what this is. And the fact that this is true, this happened. And, like you said earlier, this is not the first time it's happened. No.

Not the last time it happened. No, absolutely not. This shit, similar shit like this happens right now. Like right now in the times that we live in. And that... it's beyond. Yeah. It's... this is just... this is tough. It is. It's tough. But I think's... Ugh. This is just... This is tough. It is. It's tough. But I think it's an important story to tell.

Tim's story, people should know who he was. Absolutely. I mean, there's people that still... that walk around and are like, racism is fake. Like, this is... Like, there's... I've heard people act that way. It's like, of course, it needs to be like, no, no. Like, sit down, let me be like, no, no. Sit down, let me tell you a story.

Exactly. Now, like I said, at the time of the murder, Griffin was a still somewhat, and I don't even know what, like it's segregated, it's barely somewhat. There were black residents living on one side and white residents living on the other. Heather Coggins, and again, that's Tim's niece, recalled,

you would see homes with the Confederate flag, but we live on our side of the tracks, they live on their side of the tracks and you don't intermingle if you don't have to. So that being the case, Sheriff Butch Freeman knew the black community most likely wasn't going to cooperate with a mostly white sheriff's department, especially with a clearly racially motivated crime. So he assigned one of the department's few black officers, Oscar Jordan, to lead the investigation. And Oscar Jordan tries so hard in this case and in this investigation. And when you hear what happens, when he starts actually gaining traction, you're going to

want to toss your microphone across the room. I just want to warn you. Now, from the moment Tim's body was discovered, Jordan knew this was going to be a tough case to crack because aside from the tire tracks and the drag marks found at the scene, the only other evidence investigators found was an empty bottle of Jack Daniels and a large broken table leg with black electrical tape wrapped around one end. Jordan assumed that the table leg obviously was the blunt object used to crush Tim's skull. Yeah, it's almost like they formed it into a bat. Exactly, actually, exactly.

With the electrical tape. Yep. But with no other evidence, they believed that the killer must have taken the knife that they used to do everything they did to Tim with them when they left the scene. And in the absence of the additional physical evidence, Jordan went back to the Coggins family, where he learned where Tim had last been seen, dancing at the People's Choice with a white woman on the night he was murdered. And he found out that Talissa had seen Tim leave the club and meet two white men outside. But unfortunately, while several people knew that Tim had recently started dating a white girl and actually had even seen her at the club with him, no one knew her name. Like nobody that he was talking to on the Coggins side of things even knew who she was. Others had definitely seen him leaving the club to meet two white men who were waiting across the street from the club, but nobody got a good enough look at

the men to identify them. So the Coggins family just didn't have the information to help guide Jordan's investigation, but they did have one piece of information that proved useful. According to Tim's aunt, there was a story going around that two local white guys had given Tim and his friend Danny $600 to buy marijuana, but Tim and Danny had taken the money and never returned with the drugs. And it was a story. This is alleged. A few weeks

before Tim was murdered, Danny was killed, his friend, and what everybody assumed was an accident. But in light of Tim's death, Jordan started to suspect that maybe both had been murdered in this kind of drug deal gone bad scenario. Which I guess to a degree you can understand like how this was a drug deal gone wrong, but the way in which he was killed goes so far beyond that. Yeah. Like, it's clear that this is not simply a bad drug deal. Like, I understand like following that.

Definitely. Because obviously you're not, you can't just like... And you don't have anything else. That's the thing. So I understand that, but it's like... There's hate here. There's the thing. So I understand that, but it's like, there's hate here. There's hate and rage and animalistic behavior. I just want to make sure that it doesn't get lost in like a drug deal gone bad kind of thing because, spoiler alert, that's not what it is.

That's not what it is. Now, in pursuit of more information or any kind of evidence, Officer Jordan checked with some of the known drug dealers and users who lived in Carries Park, which was a white occupied trailer park in Griffin. He didn't really get more information on the supposed $600 weed deal, but he did hear another rumor that piqued his interest. Someone told Jordan that Sandra Bunn, a local white woman living in Carries Park, had been bragging to her neighbors about Tim's murder. What the fuck?

And she's not the only person that was around town bragging about this murder, bragging about having information, about knowing who did it. The people who did it were bragging about having done it. Imagine bragging about being like a fucking lizard person who just like imagined that disgusting. No, I actually won't. Ugh. No. In this case. Return to the ooze where you belong. Who just like imagine being that disgusting... Ugh.

No. Return to the ooze where you belong. That's exactly where these people belong. This case like elicits... So much anger. So much anger and just like some of them, I can't. But she's bragging about Tim's murder. So in question she told Jordan that on the night of the murder,

she'd seen Tim in the trailer park with her brother, Frank Gebhart, and his girlfriend, Mickey Guy. Okay. I don't know if you remember Mickey Guy, that's who Tim was dating. Yeah. She had a boyfriend. Okay. A white boyfriend, Frank Gerhart. Okay. And another friend named Bill Moore. The group had been having an argument outside of Frank's house before Tim, Frank, and Bill Moore got into Frank's car and drove out of the park in the direction of the quote unquote hanging tree. So she saw all of this and then heard about what happened later and was spreading that rumor, or not even a rumor, she was spreading that story. Yeah. That true story. So finally he found like he found a viable lead in the case and he was like, okay, we got we yeah, I think we're right here. So Jordan Oscar Jordan goes to his boss, Sheriff Butch Freeman, and tells him that Tim was

last seen with this guy, Frank and Bill just hours before his death going in the direction of where his brutalized body is found. Jordan went to the sheriff in order to get an approval to interview both of these men, and was absolutely stunned when rather than approve his strategy, Sheriff Freeman inexplicably pulled him off of the case and reassigned him to traffic duty. What the fuck?

He gets a viable lead. Like, what would have closed the case then and there? That's the most transparent thing gets a viable lead. What would have closed the case then and there? That's the most transparent thing I've ever seen. What would have closed the case then and there? And he said, sorry, you need to go back to traffic. Traffic duty. Can you imagine?

And again, Officer Jordan is a black man. Gets to finally possibly chase down justice. Is cracking a case. And then they're like, hey, possibly chase down justice, is cracking a case, and then they're like, hey, go stand in direct traffic again. While you know that these two men are most likely the men that did this to a black man, and you, another black man, just go direct traffic. We're good.

We gonna just say this is coincidence, or what? Can you imagine? I can't even begin to imagine how he would have felt in that moment. Yeah, because you're helpless. Exactly. Like he must have felt so helpless. Helpless and fucking angry. And angry.

Angry. Yeah. He later remembered I was told thank you, but we're not going to need your assistance anymore. Oh, fuck. And you honestly, you must feel fucking flabbergasted, flummoxed in that moment. Just like, what? Like you're really going to do this?

Like come again? You're going to do this with your whole chest? Like you're just going to throw me on traffic duty with your whole fucking chest? And this is my livelihood. I can't just like quit and get another job somewhere else. Well, that's the problem here. I have to stay here. They know they have the power here because they know that this is somebody's livelihood.

They're not just going to throw it away. And it's like, but he's sitting here struggling with probably so many emotions and so many different feelings. Yeah. Yeah. Unbelievable. The fact that this is a true story and is so similar to other stories is just fucked. But in his place, Freeman assigned a white officer who went out to Carey's Park and interviewed Frank Gebhart. According to Frank, he was at his girlfriend's house all evening on the night of the murder,

and she corroborated that at the time of the interview. And as far as anybody knew, there was actually no attempt to even interview Bill Moore. Interesting choice. Yeah, that's very interesting. So not long after Oscar Jordan was taken off of the case, the Coggins family started getting anonymous threats at home and at work. Tim's stepfather, Robert, got to his job as a bus driver one morning and found that somebody had left a bloody t-shirt on the bus that he drove every single morning.

A few days later, somebody threw a brick through one of their windows, and it had a note tied to it that read, you're next. What the fuck? Like this family was terrorized. First they lost one of their children, brothers, one of their most loved ones. Loved people.

And then they had to see a picture of what happened to him. They got a knock on their door after he was missing, and that's what they saw. And now this is what they're going through. Wow. And it doesn't end there. And I just wanna give a quick trigger warning for animal abuse and violence,

because they arrived home one afternoon and found a decapitated dog in the hallway of their home. What the fuck? Somebody broke into their home, first of all, did that to an animal, broke into their home and left that in their home. There's no... It makes you genuinely sick. Like, it makes you nauseated.

I don't even know what to say. Like, this is just like... And why? This kind of behavior is just so fucking subterranean to me. It's just like, what the fuck? And these people are just walking around, living there, bragging about it. And there's no reason to do something like this to anyone. No.

No. For people to be able to sit there and like, to justify this in their own mind somehow. Somehow and like lay their head on a pillow. The mental gymnastics you have to be doing to justify this kind of like oozy behavior is really unbelievable. It's beyond. Yeah. Springtime is all about fresh air, fresh starts, and freshly cleaned homes. And it's the perfect time to give a fresh look at SimpliSafe Home Security, the only home security system that I use and recommend because as we know, fresh air is for dead people. But SimpliSafe makes it so that you can enjoy fresh air without becoming dead people. I love it because it's trusted by experts.

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Not everybody's gonna jive with you right away. And that is okay. Get it off your chest with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash morbid today to get 10% off your first month. That's betterhelp.help.com slash morbid. Tulissa later said, we knew from the beginning that he had been killed because he was black. But the harassment was so bad that after Tim's funeral, his family actually chose to bury him without a headstone

for fear of further victimization. They knew where he was and like they could go visit him, but they couldn't commemorate his memory in any kind of way, because they were worried that his grave would also be desecrated. And you can't blame them one fucking bit. No. But holy shit. No. They can't even properly bury their loved one. Bury and memorialize their loved one because people won't even let that lie. No, and they wouldn't have. No. I mean, look what they were doing

to this family after what they did to. They can't even think, like he's not even safe in death. No, no. His niece... That's... You... That's... It's disgusting. That's a different level. It's disgusting that these poor people had to go through what they went through continuously for so many years.

That's awful. His niece Heather said, we never put a headstone on his grave. We didn't know if they were going to desecrate the grave. We didn't know what they were capable of. And then they're probably living in fear, wondering, is that going to happen to me next? Are they just terrorizing me up to the point where then they're going to grab me and do that to me? Absolutely. That's a real fear.

The fear that these people had to have been living in, like terrifying. But with Oscar Jordan no longer leading the investigation, the case quickly went cold, almost as though no one at the Sheriff's Office had any interest in solving the murder. It's almost like that. Crazy. By December, just two months after Tim's murder, the department shelved the case and cited a lack of leads and a need to allocate resources elsewhere, leaving the Coggins family without answers and completely hopeless. Heather commented, who do you turn to for help

when the number one people who are supposed to help you don't? Like, who do you go to? Again, the helpless feeling there and the absolute desperation that goes unanswered must be... And you can't leave. I can't even conceive of it. Again, your whole life is here. That's the thing.

Your job, your house, your family, every... You can't just get up and leave because it's like awful. It's not that easy just to get the hell away from here and get to somewhere. And who... At this point, I'm like... And you don't even know where you can go. Where do you go? Where do you go that it's going to be better?

And you can't... Tim's here. Yeah. Tim's grave is there. You can't leave him. And again, it's not that easy just to pick up and run to another state or run somewhere else. It's like that's that and they know that. And unfortunately, by design, it wasn't, it was specifically not easy for the black community to have the resources to do that.

The power dynamic knows that. And eventually the months turned into years, years turned into decades, leaving the family to face the likelihood that Tim's killer would absolutely never be brought to justice. So due to limited resources, major crimes in rural parts of Georgia, especially murder, are actually typically handled by the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, who are much better equipped to investigate the cases. Since the early 2000s, the GBI actually had a practice of cycling its cold cases for review

in the hope that new officers, fresh eyes, might pick something up that other previous investigators had missed. So in 2016, the Timothy Coggins murder case, then 33 years cold, 33 years. 33 years with nothing. But it made its way to the desk of Jared Coleman, a young agent who had started with the GBI just two years earlier. After looking over the case file, what struck Coleman the most was not what the file actually contained, but what was noticeably

absent from the file. Oscar Jordan's notes heavily indicated that he believed Frank Gebhardt and Bill Moore to be the two white men seen with Tim outside of the club, and he strongly suspected that they were the two who were responsible for Tim's murder. But as far as Coleman could tell, aside from the one brief interview with Frank Gebhardt, there was very little attempt to question either man or even verify their alibis on the night of the murder. That's wild. Like his girlfriend was like, yeah, he was here with me.

And they were like, cool, cool. And then nobody even as far as anybody knows, there was never an interview with Bill Moore back in back when this actually happened. Well, the good thing is, like, as we know, like, girlfriends and boyfriends never lie know when it comes to alibis for their partners. So it's really good that they just let that go. Checked anywhere else. Yeah.

Exactly. She would never lie about that. I'm sure all these people seem like they're really like tip top people. So I definitely don't double check those statements. Totally. I bet she's telling the truth. I bet it's fine. 100%.

Now, while there was very little evidence collected during the initial investigation, it appeared several key pieces of evidence collected in 1983 had just gone missing. Oh, you know, that happens. It happens all the time. It always happens in very specific cases, but it happens. Yeah, totally. Yeah. Among the evidence that had gone missing, Tim's pants and sweater, which actually had

contained hair samples when they found them. Oh, I bet that wasn't, that was just coincidence. Yeah, just crazy. Yeah. The wooden table leg. Oh. The Jack Daniels bottle and the tire impressions that were taken at the scene. So the evidence, that's wild.

So literally almost every piece of evidence that they had because remember, they barely had any evidence at the scene other than most of those things. When this shit happens in cases where they're just like, we lost mountains of evidence for this massive murder case, you're just like, who fucking believes that? Like, who's the person that's like, yeah, that happens? Like, this was... I also want to know who destroyed that.

Yeah. Who are that? Yeah. Who are you? Who went out and did whatever the fuck they did with that to make it get lost and then went home and ate dinner with their family? Yeah. Show me them. Who laid their head on a fluffy little pillow that night after getting rid of that evidence? And just went on to live their fucking privileged ass life.

Well, probably living in the area and seeing this family, seeing them going through 30 plus years of torment and not knowing what happened to their loved one. But every night just fluffy pillow. Nighty night. Lay your head on it. I'm angry right now. Like I just, I, so many people had to be so fucking gross in this case. And that's what is really, this isn't just like, not that it's like ever just, you know, like the one murderer, you know what I mean? That like, like in a murder

case you'll have like the bad person who did it. You know? And usually you can count on the investigators to be the good guys and to be like, you get the good guys and you get the good people that come out and fix this for the family or like, at least try to come and put something together for the family. But in this one, there's just layers of nasty, nasty people that are just making this exponentially worse. In 1983, there was one good guy, Oscar Jordan, who got reassigned to traffic. As far as we know, like as far as key players in this story, I'm sure there were other good people on the police force.

I'm not saying, I mean, I know for a fact that there was a lot of absolutely deplorable, disgusting humans that weren't even just investigators, like secretaries that worked at the police station were in on this, on this cover up. And this is what I'm talking about. It's like... It goes so far, it's so far reaching. That's why this kind of thing is so... It's like so beyond the scope of comprehension, because it's like... So many people have to be so shitty...

At one place and all together. Yep. Like they all have to join hands and be the shittiest kind of like subterranean filth, fucking filth, scum together. Yeah. It's not, again, not just, it's not that you can't just look at these bad guys and be like, wow, bad guys, subterranean shitty, ooze, bi, put them away. And we all did that. It's like, there's too many. And to think too many here. To think of, there's a lot of victims in this case.

Timothy Coggins, obviously. Timothy Coggins' family, obviously. Then I couldn't stop thinking about Oscar Jordan while I was writing this, having to go into this police station where he works every single day, knowing one, that he was taken off the case. But you know there was whispering going on about what they were doing with this evidence to get it lost, what they were doing to actively ignore this case. You know he was probably feeling all of that.

He was there the day it got shelved. And it's like, he's a black man. And he was so close to solving this, or at least, like... trying. Breaking it open. Breaking it open, like doing anything. And he just had to walk into a police station where everyone was against him. Yeah. Every single person was against him

and against his community of people. But just the fact that he had to go through that is horrific. But the obviously limited effort invested in finding Tim's killer was surprising to Coleman, but things only got... Remember, it's surprising because it's 2016, and obviously, still racism is very much alive during 2016 times and now, like I said. But you can imagine that he would be fucking shocked to be like,

this was 1983 and like nothing was done and everything was lost. Yeah. But things only got more disturbing as he combed through the surviving evidence. As he dug deeper into the evidence, he started finding correspondence from an inmate named Christopher Vaughan, who actually reached out to investigators many times regarding the Coggins murder. He's disgusting too, but for some reason he wanted to help in this. It's very conflicting. People are weird.

Uh, yeah. In 2016, he was serving a sentence for, uh, trigger warning, this is gross, child molestation. Wow. Yeah. But in October of 1983, when he was a 10-year-old boy, he had gone out squirrel hunting with his father in Griffin. He and his father were the ones that discovered Tim Coggan's dead body. Wow. Which is just really nuts to imagine that, like, a 10-year-old with his dad

saw this and then still became a monster afterwards. I was just going to say, saw the depths of depravity and then decided to reach there. Yeah. Interesting. Your brain can't really compute this because he wants to help and he does help in this investigation, but he's fucking disgusting. That's, ugh, that's, ugh. It's heinous.

But according, like there's no true good people in this. Not in this at all, except... Except for the people we mentioned. Except for Oscar Jordan and Coleman here. But according to Vonn's letter, since the murder in 1983, Frank Gebhardt had admitted to him several times that he and Bill Moore had killed Tim Coggins after Frank learned that his girlfriend, Mickey Guy,

had been cheating on him with Tim. A decision that she made... I was, had been cheating on him with Tim. A decision that she made. I was just gonna say she made that decision. As far as, like, I don't know if Tim knew even that Mickey had a boyfriend. Exactly. He just liked Mickey. That's the thing, and if they're together. And he lives on the difference that he doesn't know.

He doesn't know. And you can't prove that he did. Like, that's the thing. It's like, she's the one who cheated. And even if he did, that's not an acceptable way to handle that. Exactly. That's the other thing. That doesn't even touch the fact that there's literally no justification for what you did. None. But he confessed. Frank confessed first to Vaughn at a house party when Vaughn was

just a teenager. But Vaughn claimed he confessed several times after that, always in a proud and boastful manner. According to Vaughn, Gebhardt told him they killed Tim and taken all the evidence back to his house and dumped it in an old well on the property. The fuck, where's that old well? I'll let you know. Coleman said the case really hadn't been fully dived into since 1983. But based on his cursory review, he could tell that the sheriff's office in 1983 had made essentially zero effort to follow up on any leads after Oscar Jordan was taken off the

case. So now completely determined to fill in these gaps, Coleman paid a visit to Bill Moore, who was immediately uncooperative and wildly evasive. I'm shocked. Despite having lived in the small town for his entire fucking life, this is a small rural community where like everyone knows everyone. Moore claimed to know nothing about this case. Shut the fuck up.

Nothing about this case. Told Coleman that he had actually never even heard of Tim Coggins. Wow, what a choice to go that route. You live in the trailer park where multiple people are walking around talking about this. You live in the trailer park where he was last seen. Yeah, no one believes you. Even if you do have nothing to do with this,

you fucking heard of it. You've definitely heard of it. You've heard of this wild, wild, insane, disgusting story. At least they're idiots. So there's that. They sure are. At least they're idiots.

They sure are. Yeah, he said, I've never heard of Tim Coggins. Yeah, no. Coleman immediately knew that Bill was lying. Of course. But the problem was that more than three decades had passed since the murder and several of the original witnesses had died,

including Mickey Guy. She was dead. Oh, shit. So like Oscar Jordan before him, Agent Coleman now strongly suspected Frank and Bill of involvement in Tim's murder. He was like, I think you had the right guys from the start. But given the limited investigation done in 1983 and the disappearance, quote-unquote,

of key evidence over the years, he was going to need a lot of help to prove that either of these two men were involved. So as such, he approached the newly elected sheriff of Spalding County, Daryl Dix, to ask for the sheriff's cooperation in his investigation. It's weird how, luckily, it doesn't repeat itself to the full extent, but how somebody did this in 1983,

however many years ago, like had to go to the sheriff and say like, I want to, I want to do this. I want to look into this more. And the sheriff then said, no. Luckily, the sheriff, sheriff Dix was a man of integrity and recognized that local law enforcement had a lot of work to do in order to repair the rift intentions caused by a very, very long history of racist policing in this area. So he saw- Thank goodness someone is aware of this.

Yeah. And he actually saw Coleman's request as an opportunity to make progress in rebuilding trust with the black community. So while his deputies began digging through the old case file looking for anything that could point them in the right direction, Coleman moved on to the other suspect. He already interviewed Bill. Now he goes to Frank Gebhart, who at this time, I'm sure will shock you, was serving a prison sentence. Oh, shocking. This time for sexual assault, because he's a monster in every sense of the word.

Honestly, that checks. Yeah, of course it does. Not shocking. But like Bill Moore, Frank claimed he knew nothing about Tim Coggins' murder. Yeah. I don't even think I heard of that. So Coleman, he needed to change his strategy if he hoped to get anything out of him. So based on Christopher Vaughn's letters to the GBI, Coleman heavily suspected that

Frank Gebhart's then-girlfriend, Mickey Guy, had been having an affair with Tim Coggins, which he was like, obviously this is the motive for the murder. So he tested the theory, and sure enough, when he confronted Frank with the affair, Frank's entire tone and demeanor changed dramatically. He still maintained that he had nothing to do with the murder, but this time he added, and this is disgusting, quote, he didn't care if Timothy was killed, should have been minding his own business. Wow. Why the fuck don't you mind yours? That's, I'm like, deal with your own fucking family shit in your own home.

Break up with your girlfriend. Tell it like work things out with her if you want to. Mind your own fucking business as far as Timothy Coggins is concerned. Yeah. Honestly, okay, glass house. Exactly. Mind your own business, is concerned. Yeah. Honestly, okay, glass house. Exactly. Okay, glass house. Mind your own business, he says. Yeah.

But according to Frank, he had no recollection of confessing anything to Christopher Vaughn or anyone else, though he admitted he had been a heavy drinker for more than 30 years because, uh, sure, you have to drink those fucking demons down. When I love that he's like, you know what, I have been a heavy drinker. So like it is possible that I did admit wrongfully to a horrific racially motivated and highly publicized murder that I had nothing to do with. It's possible. Yeah, I'm like, wow. Like I've gotten hella drunk at multiple different times. I've never ever confessed to a murder. I didn't commit. That you did not commit. Nope. Nope. But when Coleman asked about Vaughn's claims

that they dumped all the evidence in a well behind his house, Frank denied that too. Ooh, get that well. And when pressed further, he said, well, y'all come out there and dig my damn well up. Which whether Frank truly expected it or not was exactly what Agent Coleman intended to do. Okay. Okay. Sounds good. Threaten me with a good time. Thanks for the permission. intended to do. Okay. Of course. Okay. Sounds good.

Threaten me with a good time. Thanks for the permission. Thanks. Yeah, literally, thank you for the permission. I'm going to do that. Also, I don't even really know how it works if you're in prison, if technically that's your property anymore. I don't think so.

Honestly, I have no idea how that works. Yeah, I'm not positive, but I can, I mean, I don't think you're like paying taxes on your property from prison. Yeah, that makes sense. So maybe it just gets transferred to like Next of Kin. Yeah, it probably does. It gets sold off. I don't know. Yeah.

Yeah, actually it must get sold off. Because I'm thinking of a case that we covered where like something gross happened on a farm and they ended up having to sell it to the town. Yeah. Like the town takes ownership sometimes. Yeah. So technically it's not his property. Like the Ed Gein case. They took ownership of the property. Exactly. And then it was like an auction. Right. Because like nobody wants to buy that. But yeah, so the more Jared

Coleman learned about Frank Gebhardt and Bill Moore, the more he came to believe that they were absolutely capable of committing a racially motivated hate crime. Frank and Bill had grown up together in Griffin and had a long history of substance abuse and violent disruptive behavior. Just being dicks. Very much so. According to Wesley Lowry, and I'm sorry because these individuals are fucked, there is another trigger warning for animal abuse here. On the weekends, Gebhart would host wild debaucherous parties featuring beer and pills and shrooms,

at least one time the drunken butchering of a cow on the kitchen floor of one of the trailers, and both men were known as frequent flyers at the local courthouse. So they're just like, like there's no, like they hit all the boxes. When I said monsters in every sense of the word. Yes.

In every sense of the word. And beyond that, they were also known to be like the most racist of racists. You have to be. And they both had ties to that local chapter of the KKK and had more than a few friends each in local law enforcement agencies. Wow. So they were, it was clear as day that they had done this. Like it was clear as day that the, they at least were two men who were very capable of

doing this and had, had the means and the motive. Yeah. So the more he dug into Frank and Bill's past though, the more Coleman began to realize that his two suspects actually weren't the only people around with very racist views. And reflecting on his experience with the Sheriff's Office in the early 1980s, Oscar commented that many on the police force used pointed racial slurs and that it wasn't all that uncommon to hear those kinds of slurs amongst people in the police force that he worked on. There had always also been rumors that the Griffin Police Department and the Spalding County Sheriff's Office counted more than a few KKK members in their ranks,

many of whom marched in local parades and appeared at events as late as the early 80s when Tim was killed. How the fuck is that allowed? Like, how do you hold a position like that and be so outwardly... I think it's so hard for us to even grasp because we've lived in Massachusetts our whole lives.

I was going to say we're very lucky that we have grown up in Massachusetts because it's just a... I have never felt luckier to live in Massachusetts for my entire life because... We just don't... It's just not the same. Well, it's just... You don't see things like this here, like, fortunately. No, it's like this is... My brain is having trouble wrapping around a lot of this. In certain parts of the South, this was just what happened. And especially in this time period.

In this time period especially. And it's like, it should have been very uncommon. Absolutely. Horrific to see, but it was part of life. Yeah. But while the rumors of Klansmen working in law enforcement were troubling for Coleman and for Sheriff Dix, rumors alone weren't going to prove that local law enforcement

had attempted to protect Franker Bill or otherwise interfere in the investigation of Tim's murder. So they were going to have to keep digging for something else. But fortunately, buried deep within the cold case evidence, one of Dix's deputies found exactly what investigators had been looking for. He was combing through that old evidence for anything that could help in the hunt for Tim's killer.

And he came across, you would, I feel like you would never expect this, he came across a diary from the early 1980s that actually belonged to a former sheriff's deputy named, uh, it's Norman Fusky, I believe, or Fusky. He worked at the department during the Tim Coggins quote unquote investigation. Coleman said, in reading through the diary, we found out that the Ku Klux Klan's infiltration into the Spalding County sheriffs and the Griffin Police Department may have played some role in the lack of closure in this case. Among other things, the diary detailed the Klan's active and ongoing attempts to recruit law enforcement officers at the time, and actually named several KKK members who most

definitely worked at the Sheriff's Department during the 1980s, What the fuck? Many of whom were actually assigned to the Coggins case after Oscar Jordan was reassigned. Man. Literal KKK members were assigned to this case of... We just can't help writing stuff down that will later incriminate. Also, just like... Which like, I'm glad.

I'm glad that they kept a diary. What the fuck did that diary entry... Did it Which like, I'm glad. I'm glad that they kept a diary. What the fuck did that diary entry- Did it say like, dear diary? Today the KKK recruited this guy. Like, what did that, what did it say? Like, which again, I'm happy. Yeah. I'm happy that this guy kept a diary of all the nefariousness that was occurring around

him. But I'm always just like, how did you start that entry off? We're all just out here like, even without. Dear diary. Dear fucking diary. Like damn. Thanks for keeping the record. That really was something that helps because up to this point,

we just have a bunch of evidence gone. Yeah. The word of a child molester. A well that's sitting over. An alleged well. Waiting to be. Yeah. I'm waiting for that well. Keep waiting. I'm hanging on to that well. In the meantime, writing your diary, I guess. And then we've got a diary about all the nefarious activities.

And right now, the diary is our best piece of evidence. This is a tough case. Who'd have thought that would be it? And the problem is it's not a tough case. It's not a tough case at all, but it's a tough case to prove however many years later, 33 years later. They had it all there. If any police work had been done and they had allowed Detective Oscar to do his actual job that he was doing correctly, then they wouldn't just like let it lie at the girlfriend being like, oh yeah, he was with me all night. That never would have just, they would have looked into that

to make sure that that was the correct alibi. They didn't want to because they were literal KKK members. Wow. And that's not hyperbolic, that's fact. No, it's in the diary. Multiple people were KKK members. Damn. But at best, the diary implied that the racist view of some members of law enforcement had led to Tim's case being prematurely shelved. And at worst, it suggested an act of conspiracy to undermine the investigation by covering for or just blatantly ignoring suspects and quite literally disposing of critical evidence that would have led to a conviction. quite literally disposing of critical evidence that would have led to a conviction. It really seemed that everyone in Griffin, including the Coggins family, had suspected or just full out believed that Frank Gampart and Bill Moore were responsible for Tim's murder.

And now Coleman and Sheriff Dix also shared that belief. But the problem was going to be proving their guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. Because it was true that the diary implied indirect interference at best. And Frank had confessed his guilt on a lot of occasions, even after he knew that Coleman and Dix were zeroing in on him. He was still going around telling people that he had done this.

But it's all rumors and hearsay. You need, like, legit, concrete, compelling evidence. Yeah. So based on everything that he learned up to that point, Agent Coleman put together a new theory about the murder. He believed that in the week or so before Tim's death, Frank had heard the rumors that his girlfriend, Mickey, was cheating on him, and he was already pissed

that she was cheating on him. But because his mind and lack of a soul were so beyond racist, it sent him beyond when he found out that she was cheating on him with a black man. And he became determined to do something about it. So on the night of October 7th, 1983, Mickey arranged to meet Tim at the People's Choice while Frank and Bill waited outside. This was a setup.

Wow. Yeah. So Mickey knew about this? At least knew that they wanted him to be there? Presumably she's dead, so we can't say. So she can't speak for her own. It was the belief that she arranged to meet Tim. At the very least.

And Bill and Frank were waiting outside. And I don't know for fact if Mickey knew that they were waiting outside, but based on everything going around town and the fact that this is a small town. That's what's being thought to be the situation. Not long after Tim arrived at the club, he ended up getting lured outside and got into that car with Frank, Bill and Mickey, and then traveled to Carrie's Trailer Park where they argued outside of Frank's house. A after midnight for reasons that are still unclear. Tim ended up getting

into a truck. I'm sure he was most likely forced into that truck. I'm sure. And Frank and Bill and the three men traveled to an airfield about a mile away where they attacked him and did everything we know they did. Once they returned to Frank's house, they threw Tim's clothes, the knife, and the chain into the well behind Frank's house, the chain that they used to drag him. And in the following days, the murder investigation was open, proceeded normally while Oscar Jordan was on the case,

but then when Sheriff Butch Freeman learned of the details of the case and the suspects, he interfered to protect Frank and Bill. And to avoid exposing his department's connections to the local chapter of the KKK, piece of shit covered everything up. Wow. Wow. So Coleman took his theory to the Spalding County prosecutor Marie Broder, I believe it is. She fully trusted in him, but she was very skeptical that such a case could successfully be argued in court.

Because what they did have working in their favor were seven witnesses though, who were willing to swear in court that Frank had confessed to the murder to them, at least on one occasion. But the problem was six of those witnesses were incarcerated. And one of them was serving a sentence for child molestation, which would almost certainly harm all their credibility. Of course. If they wanted to get a conviction, what Marie really needed was a taped confession from Frank Gephart and some kind of physical evidence that could tie him and Bill Moore to the murder beyond that reasonable doubt. So in April of 2017, Christopher Vaughn agreed to help the investigators by eliciting yet another confession from Frank.

Because, remember, Frank is incarcerated at this point with Vaughn. So one day while he was out of his cell, investigators set up a hidden recording device in that cell. And then later that afternoon, after he returned, Vaughn entered the cell and they started talking to each other. At first, Frank denied knowing anything about the murder. But eventually, without any prompting, he admitted to confessing to the murder at a party more than 30 years ago. He said he did not know what he might have said while he was drunk at a party though. Hostess Again, I'm sorry. I don't know a lot of people

that confessed to brutal racially motivated murders under the influence of alcohol. No, I don't know a single one, actually. I have not yet come across that. Thankfully. But the recording wasn't really a clear, explicit admission of guilt. So that was like kind of shitty. But it did imply that Frank knew more than he was saying. Absolutely.

So several months later, investigators executed a search warrant at his house where they confiscated more than 50 knives, among other things. And a few days later, another inmate, Patrick Douglas, came forward to report that during a conversation with Frank, Frank had confessed to the murder and boasted that law enforcement would never find any evidence on the knives that they confiscated from his home because he'd actually thrown the real murder weapon in the well down the well and built a large shed over the opening so nobody could get at it. Douglas also quoted Frank as having complained quote that it

was unfair that Sheriff Freeman could get away with killing a racial slur but he could not and also stated quote he was the one who slammed him down and stabbed him in the back. Wow. Yeah. So he's also implying that the sheriff has killed a black person. And he said it's unfair that the sheriff can get away with it, but I can't. So it's like, what the fuck happened in that county? Yeah, truly. So the alleged confessions were compelling, but again, Marie Broder still needed physical evidence to present this case to a jury. But the problem was, in order to access that old well that you need the answers from. I need that well to be opened.

Investigators would have to dig up a lot of the property, destroying the sheds and parts of the house in the process, which was unreasonable and wouldn't get a judge's approval. Unreasonable in the eyes of some. Legally. Legally, exactly. Welcome to the small town of Chinook, where faith runs deep and secrets run dark. In this new crime thriller, religion and crime collide when this small Montana community is rocked by a gruesome murder. As the town is whipped into a frenzy, everyone is quick to point their fingers at a drug-addicted teenager.

But local deputy Ruth Vogel isn't convinced. She suspects connections to a powerful religious group. Enter federal agent VB Laro, who has been investigating a local church for possible criminal activity. She and Ruth form an unlikely partnership to catch the killer, unearthing secrets that leave Ruth torn between her duty to the law,

her religious convictions, and her very own family. But something more sinister than murder is afoot, and someone's watching Ruth. With an all-star cast led by Emmy Award nominee Santa Layton and Star Wars Kelly Marie Tran, Chinook plunges listeners into the dark underbelly of a small town where the lines between truth and deception are blurred and even the most devout are not who they seem. Chinook is available to listen to now exclusively with your Wondery Plus subscription. You can subscribe to Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. But fortunately, Coleman located a new company in Atlanta that actually used a machine called

a Hydrovac to clean out old wells. So using a high pressure hose, the Hydrovac company forced water into the ground, which forced all the debris out of the earth, and then all of that gets sucked up by a large vacuum. Oh, shit. All of which was done without causing any damage to the trailer. Wow. So, Coleman, Broder, and Dix spent nearly eight hours at the site watching as the vacuum

sucked up and spit out decades worth of trash, until finally they started seeing things that they recognized. Among the items pulled from the well were a pair of Adidas sneakers that matched the pair Tim was wearing the night he was killed, a white bloodstained t-shirt that appeared to be torn by multiple stab marks, a piece of old logging chain, and most importantly, a broken kitchen knife that matched the stab wounds on Tim's chest and neck. Holy shit. Decades.

It's been sitting under the earth. 30, I believe it's 33 years. 33 years and they were, imagine the satisfaction of being on like the right side of this and seeing those things come out. Like, we can finally be happy so we can get him. We can get this family justice. And that that guy has been, that all those people saying, this is what he said to me, are telling the truth.

Because he said, I threw it down the well. And now it's being confirmed. They might be fucked up people, but for some reason they were telling the truth. This idiot was telling people this stuff, so he's admitted it several times. Yeah. Marie Broder recalled, it was exciting. This was huge for us. So she took the shoe to Tim's family and his sister, Talissa, instantly recognized it as

the one her brother was wearing the night that they went out to the People's Choice the last time she ever saw him. The evidence was circumstantial, but now there was a lot of it. And it all seemed to point to Frank Gebhardt and Bill Morris, Tim's killers. Marie Broder said that that was the turning point. There had been so many obstacles along the way, but after the well, we knew we got him. Yeah. How do you can't argue that away? No way. So based on the evidence they gathered, Broder and Griffin Judicial Circuit District Attorney

Benjamin Coker, I believe, were able to get a rest warrant. And it seemed that after more than three decades, somebody was finally going to stand trial for the murder of Timothy Coggins. It's about time, man. By the time Oscar Jordan was taken off the Coggins case in 1983, he had a pretty good idea of who killed Tim Coggins and why.

And knowing that much of his removal from the case had affected Jordan, Coleman called the former sheriff's deputy. I was so hoping that this, I've been thinking this whole time, like, please tell me that this guy got to be part of this whole thing in some way. Actually, you're going to shit yourself. Coleman called him in mid-October and asked him if he would like to be among the officers to make arrests. Oh, shut the fuck up.

I am so happy right now. I was thinking this whole time. I'm like, if anybody deserves this. Coleman is such a real one. Jordan happily accepted Coleman's offer. And on October 13th, 2017, after being deputized by Sheriff Dix, Oscar Jordan led a team of officers

that arrested Frank Gebhart and Bill Moore for the murder of Timothy Coggins. Also arrested that day were Milner Police Department employee, Lamar Bunn and his mother, Sandra, and Spalding County Sheriff's Officer, Gregory Huffman, for the role that those three played in obstructing the original investigation.

Amazing. In his statement to the press, Sheriff Darrell Dix emphasized to the reporters, there's no doubt in the minds of the investigators that the crime was racially motivated. And if it occurred today, it would be presented as a hate crime. When asked why the case had been reopened by the GBI

in the Sheriff's Department, Dix explained, many of the witnesses interviewed said they'd been living with the information since Coggins' death, but had been quote unquote, afraid to come forward or had not spoken of it until now. Wow. So some people hadn't even talked about this because they were so scared of these two men and the people they were associated with. So they were harboring these secrets for 33 years. Just for fear of their own safety. Exactly.

But with Frank Gebhardt and Bill Moore in their older years, now those witnesses weren't intimidated by them any longer and wanted to do the right thing. So for Darrell Dix, the arrests felt like a major step in the right direction toward rebuilding the trust with Spalding County's black community. When asked whether reports from 1983 accurately described the murder, he replied, yes and no. It was more than a simple murder. It was done to send a message. It was overkill. And

Coleman echoed the sheriff's opinion, telling a reporter the death of Mr. Coggins was very clearly a lynching. Wow. Which it was. Yeah, absolutely. They left him underneath a hanging tree after torturing him for who knows how long. At Frank and Bill's arraignment a few days later, District Attorney Ben Coker argued both men should be denied bond, citing their long history of witness intimidation and the

frequency and pride with which they boasted about the murder, both of them. Superior Court Judge Fletcher Sams agreed with the District Attorney and denied bond, noting that to decide any other way would be quote unquote inappropriate, which like hell yeah. In early December 2017, a probable cause hearing was held to determine how the case would proceed. An interstatement to the judge judge, Marie Broder explained the theory that Tim had been murdered because of his relationship with a local white woman and the crime had 100% been racially motivated. Frank Gebhardt and Bill Moore, quote, wore the crime as a badge of honor, she said. Nicole Soule- which can you... Nicole Soule- They just went around town.

Nicole Soule- They wore this with like a badge of honor. Nicole Soule- And they were treated like it was. I was going to say. By other people in the community. And no one made them feel any different. Like other people in the community had them on the back. Yeah. No one contradicted that way of thinking.

No. So they just thought, yeah, what we did was good. Yeah, we're hometown heroes. They were treated like hometown heroes. That's almost too much to really comprehend. That truly is. It's hard to comprehend that even a couple or a few people are this gross.

Depraved. And depraved, but it's like when you really think of the far reach of this, you're like, like it's almost too much for your mind to even go to. To be like, I can't deal with the fact that there's that many people in like, like, it's almost too much for your mind to even go to, to be like, I can't deal with the fact that there's that many people in like, that are so for this and justify this and would do this or support this or just turn a blind eye to this. Like, that's a lot to think about. It's scary. And to think that like, we're're all human. Like, we're all the fucking same.

We all a sister species on the inside. Yeah, we all got the same stuff. Like, people will do this to one another. Like, a human will do this to another human. And other people will pat them on the back instead of condemning them. Instead of going to the police and exactly condemning them. It's heinous.

It is. In his testimony, Jared, Jared Coleman elaborated on their theory telling the judge they were proud of what they had done. They felt like they were protecting the white race from black people. Wow. Which is like, what? The delulu. The deranged.

The cognitive dissonance, the detachment from reality. It's monsters, absolute monsters. To support the case though, Broder cited the numerous accounts from witnesses detailing the men's proud confessions and the recordings in which Frank can be heard saying, "'If you give me a name of a witness, they won't testify.'" So he was gonna continue to fuck with witnesses

and to scare people and intimidate them. Damn. For the Coggins family, many of whom were hearing the details of the murder for the very first time, the grand jury was obviously a very difficult experience, to say the least. Sitting directly behind Frank Gebhardt during the hearing, Heather Coggins said,

it's always difficult when someone isn't sorry for what they've done. When you understand they're not sorry for what they've done, it makes it easier for you to not be sorry for what's gonna happen to them. Yeah. Because it's like, he sat in court unapologetic, completely without any remorse whatsoever, sitting in front of this man's family.

Yeah, and knowing that, like, oh, I... And for Tim Coggan's family to have to sit behind this man... And see this man. ...whose hands were capable of doing what they did to their loved one, to be in the same room with somebody that hateful toward your race must be one of the scariest, like, most intimidating experiences. Like, the fact that they had to sit there for this and were willing to is

remarkable. It's, yeah, it's just, it's, and for this guy to be completely unapologetic and zero remorse and to fathom, and only worried about his own ass. It's like, that must be a whole new level of just... To sit in the same room with him, to fathom that that guy is breathing the same errors here. But luckily the judge ruled in favor of the prosecution and on December 5th a grand jury was convened who also sided with the district attorney agreeing that the case against both men should go to trial. So Frank Gebhart's trial began in late June of 2018 and in her opening

statement Marie Broderer played the theory that Tim was murdered because of his relationship with Mickey Guy, but also noted that the murder likely would have been solved decades ago had it not been for the racist ideologies that permeated local law enforcement agencies. She told the jury the sad and incredibly bleak truth. She said they didn't care about Timothy Coggins. And then she asked them to atone for the sins of the past. Frank's defense attorney, Scott Johnston, seized on Broder's remarks about the shoddy initial investigation, emphasizing that the state's case was built on nothing more than circumstantial evidence and hearsay testimony from several known criminals.

Oh, please. He noted the missing pieces of critical evidence, including the makeshift club, extra clothing, and the Jack Daniels bottle, asking rhetorically, where did it go? According to Johnston, it was incumbent upon the state to prove his client's guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, and the prosecution, quote, shouldn't get a pass just because the case is old. The fact that this is even being like brought into the conversation is wild.

Is insane to me. And also like, what about the evidence that is there? I'm sorry, is all that shit in your wall? We're ignoring that? In your backyard? What's in your backyard? Well, that's it. I'm like, I'm sorry.

You got bloody shirts in your backyard and murder victim shoes? You got to explain to me logically and realistically how these inmates, regardless of how shitty they are, knew that these things were in that well. If that man didn't put them in that well and tell them that he put them in that well. People didn't even know that well existed. He said he hit it. Mm-hmm. He literally built a shed over it.

And he did. But then you found all this stuff that people said was going to be there, there. This guy even said, of all the knives that they confiscated, they're not going to find the one that I did it with because I threw that down the well. And then they found it in the well. I'm sorry, how do you explain that? Exactly. Like legal bullshit doesn't do shit for me with that.

It's like, no, explain it. Explain it in reality. Exactly. Every step. Exactly. How that makes any fucking sense any other way, but he put that shit down there after he committed the crime. His argument essentially was like, they didn't have some of the clothing in the Jack Daniels

bottle or the makeshift club. It's like, okay, but they found the murder weapon, one of the murder weapons, because again, there were various. And the' clothing and shoes. Like, I'm sorry, no, like a tattered shirt. There comes a time when you have to, you have to hang it up. Exactly. Hang it up. But it wasn't just the missing evidence and questionable character of informants that was working against Broder in the district attorney's office, much of the newly collected evidence, like the recordings of Frank and the evidence discovered in the well, did present challenges. The defense pointed to the discrepancies in the various confessions, noting specifically that the motives seemed to differ between racism and drugs, depending on who was asked. And after more than 30 years, it was reasonable,

quote unquote, to question whether the rumors and boasting from Frank were exactly that, exaggerations and lies. Finally, when it came to the evidence in the well, the defense noted that it had been so degraded by the elements that it was impossible to conclusively connect it to Tim Coggins. Maybe, forensically, what come the fuck on? Like I get that, I get if you're coming down to like brass tacks and like forensically we cannot conclusively link this, okay, that's reality. Like that is reality. Totally, I get that. But for me...

That's science, that's it. But if I was sitting on that jury and I heard six people said this specific shit was going to be found in this well and then it was found in this well and this man confessed to murder and his girlfriend was cheating on him with this man that was murdered and he had known ties to the KKK and KKK infiltrated law enforcement. There's a lot. Reasonable doubt gone. There's a lot here., reasonable doubt gone. There's a lot here. There's a lot here.

That's the thing. It's like, call it all circumstantial, but that's a lot. That's a lot. That's the thing. And there are cases that there's way, even way less circumstantial evidence. Absolutely. That have been convicted.

And it still gets a conviction, exactly. Yeah. But despite the, I don't know, despite the quote unquote lack of evidence, it's hard to even call it that. I know, despite the quote-unquote lack of evidence, it's hard to even call it that. I know, it literally is quote-unquote. But, you know, Broder remained laser focused on the brutality of the killing and the racist motive for the crime.

She said, it deserved fire and passion. I wanted those jurors mad about what happened to Tim Coughlin's. I wanted them rocking back on their heels. So the prosecution called more than a dozen witnesses and used every piece of evidence to demonstrate how Frank Gebhardt's racist views and connections to the KKK had not only led to Tim's murder, but also contributed to a casual conspiracy to cover up his involvement in the crime. In his closing arguments, the defense made one last attempt to undermine the case against

his client. He insisted, it's a made up story. It's a reasonable doubt because it's a made up story. But are all the things they found in the well made up? Is that made up? Or is that physically something that you can look at? No, the well, I'm sorry, I can't get past the well. If they didn't have the well, I could see there being a reasonable doubt. Yeah, because I could see just, just there's just no evidence have the well, I could see there being a reasonable doubt. Yeah, because I could see just, just, there's just no evidence. Legally,

I could see there being reasonable doubt. Legally, exactly. And it's like, but I can't get past the well. I can't get past the well. But reminding the jury where the witnesses had come from, he said, it's just trash. That's what those witnesses amount to. That's what all your jailhouse witnesses amount to,

is just trash. The same thing that was found in the well. To say that that evidence that was found in the well is just trash. If they're all singing the same tune and the tune happens to be correct, yeah, they're garbage, but they were right. I don't know what to tell you. Call that evidence that they found in that well trash. I take my trash out once a week. Never have I ever found a murder victim shoe. Never have I ever had a bloody t-shirt covered, like tattered because somebody was stabbed wearing it.

Never have I ever found a murder weapon that matched the exact murder weapon of a victim that I had ever been tied to. No, that's not just trash. That's what doesn't, it just doesn't vibe with me at all. Like that's not a riveting argument. No. But despite the degraded evidence and the questionable

and criminal character of the witnesses, the jury did not take long in their deliberation before returning to the courtroom to announce that after 33 years, Frank Gebhardt was guilty on five counts, including first degree murder, battery, and assault. After sentencing him to life in prison plus an additional 30 years, Judge Fletcher Sam's addressed Frank Gebhardt saying, hopefully sir, you have stabbed your last victim.

Wow. Later, when asked what it was that swayed the jury the most, the foreman said, we counted 17 times that Mr. Gebhardt admitted to the murder in some kind of way over the years. And that's just the way, the ones that have come out. 17 times. 17 times he has admitted to that. 17 times that they have been able to find or hear about. You don't accidentally high on drugs admit to a murder 17 times.

17 times that you didn't commit. No. Exactly. That you didn't commit. It doesn't fly. Now, remember, there's another person here. For Bill Moore, who was scheduled to go on trial in a few months, the conviction was an ominous sign of things to come. So a few days later, he agreed to a plea deal in which he pleaded guilty to manslaughter.

I'm sorry, what? Manslaughter. I don't know why this deal was presented. I think they could have convicted him. Wow. I don't know all the logistics, but wow. He got a 20 year sentence. A 20 year sentence.

I think a lot of it had to do with the fact that the murder weapon was found in Frank's on his property. And the fact that he had in many of those confessions said he was the one who stabbed Timothy Coggins, but manslaughter 20 years for this crime, that's outrageous. Well, they at least, they must have been older at this point, at least like middle-aged. Yeah. You know, like... Absolutely.

It was 33, I think they're around their early 20s when this happened. So like in their 50s or something like that. Yeah. And Frank was already in jail. Yeah. And, but on October 19th, 2021, Moore died at the Augusta State Medical Prison after serving just two years of his sentence. Whoops.

Rest in distress, asshole. Yeah. Whoops. For Coleman and Broder, the investigation and trial were just the first important step to righting the countless wrongs that had been committed against Spalding County's black community by local law enforcement for decades. Broder told a reporter, this case changed me forever. I had never experienced evil purely based on someone's skin.

You really know nothing and you have to recognize that and say, this happened, it happens. And in order to confront this evil, you cannot shy away from it. You have to confront it head on. Wow. It gives me chills. Yeah. For the Coggins family, the convictions were a remarkable turning point. They never expected to see. No, they probably thought they would go to their graves never having anything happen

in this case. For more than three decades, they had been denied justice and just left to wonder, not wonder what happened to Tim, because they saw that he was brutalized, but they didn't know the specifics, and they didn't know who had done this to their loved one. And some of them were unable to ever get those horrific images of his brutalized body out of their minds,

because remember, law enforcement was circulating a photo trying to get an ID on Tim. But thanks to the hard work of Jared Coleman, Oscar Jordan, Daryl Dix, and Marie Broder, among others, they could put those thoughts to rest somewhat and move forward remembering and celebrating Tim for the person they remembered him to be. Unfortunately, Tim Coggins' mom, Viola,

didn't technically live to see justice carried out, and this will make you possibly cry or have chills. In some otherworldly way, she did see justice. In Wesley Lowry's article about Tim's case for GQ, which I definitely recommend it's going to be linked in the show notes, definitely read it, He opens up by recounting the night that Viola had somewhat of a vision into the future. She was pretty much on her deathbed and her daughter Talissa was there making her comfortable. And Viola declared, just seemingly out of nowhere, they found out who killed Tim. And this was before anything had happened. I literally just, it went vwoop, like chills. And she continued, they found out who killed Tim. I ain't gonna be here for it,

but they're gonna get who killed Tim. Oh my God. I feel, do you ever feel chills in your head? Yes. It's like a weird like- It went all the way up to my skull. It's like a whoosh. Holy shit.

I don't know what she saw. And for her to say, I'm not going to be here for it, but... But they're going to get it. Fuck yeah, they are. A mama always knows. And I'm happy that while she didn't get like physical peace... That she knew. She knew.

It's going to happen. She got some kind of peace. Like she saw something wherever she was. Damn. Whoo. Like I guess she hadn't wherever she was. Damn. Whoo. Like, I guess she hadn't, like, eaten really in days. I want to say it was either kidney failure or liver failure. I think it was kidney failure.

But she was, like, in the throes of that. And then all of a sudden came to and said that to her daughter, Talissa. And it was like she hadn't said much in days. And imagine being Talissa on the day that they were sentenced. Oh my God. Sitting there being like, she was right. Like she knew. Oh, I can't, like I just keep getting chills

on top of my chills. I'm so happy that you got that moment though. Me too. In 2020, Talyssa Coggins told Wesley Lowry, black people have a way because of all that we've been through, the way we was raised. Forgiveness is the first thing that black people learn. After all the stuff that black people have endured from slavery up till now, we are still a forgiving people."

Wow. It's like, that makes you want to cry that like forgiveness is the first thing you have to learn as a black person. Because your whole life we're going to have to, that like you, you have, people are going to wrong you. Like, people are going to wrong you, and you learn this whole history of how everyone before you, like, in your community, was wronged.

And how to move on from that. And just to end that with, we're still a forgiving people. Damn. Like, that's a big person. Yeah. That family is a... A very impressive family. I found this case, case actually through Wesley Lowry's GQ article, and he opens it up with that story of Viola. And I read that first couple paragraphs and I was like, we have to cover this. Like, we have to cover this. It's such a gut-wrenching story.

Oh, it's a horrific story. But the fact that after 33 years, that family got justice, Talissa got to see it, Viola knew it was coming. She knew it was coming. And Oscar Jordan, a black man who was taken off the case, got to arrest those racist motherfuckers. The fact that they called him back to do, I'm like, that, you can't, you can't write that. Like that is, and I was And the whole time you were talking, after he was taken off the case, I was like, he's got to come back. If this man doesn't get some part of this justice here, I'm going to be so angry just because he was so close

and they just yanked him away right when he had it. And like sheriff, Darryl Dix, deputizing him in that county or however it had to work. And the fact that he was like, fuck that. The fact that Dix was like, I'm not continuing this same way that we've been going down here forever. We owe this to the black community in our area. We owe this and then some. It's about time people, you know, like that kind of stuff, like people step up. It's that. Wow. I'm very happy that that story has at least an ending that is satisfying, you know, like in a, in a justice. So, okay. Like something, something right came out of that. And I just wanted like, I'm, I'm so

happy that Viola, Viola, excuse me, somehow knew that's like otherworldly. And you just have to wonder where she was and what she saw. I just go into this different part of my mind trying to picture that. Yeah, just trying to figure out. It's crazy. It's a crazy story. That's wild. Wow. It's really sad, but I'm happy that it ends the way that it does.

Yeah. It's one that needs to be told. Yes. So with all of that being said, we hope you keep listening. And we hope you keep it weird. You know not to keep it as weird as anything I just told you. You know that. XOXO. I'm sorry. If you like Morbid, you can listen early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus

in the Wondery app or on Apple podcasts. Prime members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music. Before you go, tell us about yourself by filling out a short survey at wondery.com slash survey. In May of 1980, near Anaheim, California, Dorothy Jane Scott noticed her friend had an inflamed red wound on his arm and seemed unwell. She insisted on driving him to the local hospital to get treatment. While he waited for his prescription, Dorothy went to grab her car to pick him up at the exit, but would never be seen alive again. Leaving us to wonder, decades later, what really happened to Dorothy Jane Scott? From Wander8, Generation Y is a podcast that covers notable true crime cases like this one and many more. Every week, hosts Erin and Justin sit down to discuss a new case,

covering every angle in theory, walking through the forensic evidence and interviewing those close to the case to try to discover what happened. With over 450 episodes, there's a case for every true crime listener. Follow the Generation Y podcast on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to Generation Y ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus.