Witnessed: Devil in the Ditch - Friendly Fire | 8. The Verdict

Episode Date: July 25, 2022

The civil trial that will determine whether Marty is liable for killing John John officially begins. We are left with the biggest question of all: Did Lori do the right thing? A Campside Media & Sony Music Entertainment production. Find more great podcasts from Sony Music Entertainment at sonymusic.com/podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I want to introduce you to a man named Patrick Weber. Let me turn this volume down just a little bit. Go ahead, I'm sorry, good morning. He's retired now, but he used to work in the office of a company that makes doors and windows. He lives in a small community called Powell, Tennessee, just north of Knoxville and east of Oak Ridge. And he's been there for a long time. That's where he raised his family

and that's where he lived in 2007. Well, I had, of course, my wife and my son was just started going to UT and my daughter was in middle school, at that time. Patrick's a native of East Tennessee, law abiding, upstanding, the kind of guy who wouldn't try to duck out a jury duty. So when he got a summons in the mail,

he went where he was told to go, the federal courthouse in Knoxville. I was chosen, I guess, to be on a jury for a federal trial, which set place back in November 2007. That was Lori's case. Patrick lived about an hour south of Scott County. And he was familiar with it. He had passed through a few times for work. Did you ever have any interactions with the Scott County Sheriff's Department? No, no. That's one thing that they'd ask us about was if we knew the defendant or the plaintiff,

and of course I did not. He says he might have heard something about the lawsuit or about a deputy getting shot. Nothing specific he could remember. It was just part of another news broadcast and I didn't even know the names of the people that were involved or anything but seemed like I'd heard something about it. Now of course he knows almost everything about the case. Of course, he knows almost everything about the case. On November 5th, 2007, he drove to the federal courthouse for the first day of testimony in Yancey versus Carson. Same like we had to be there at nine o'clock.

Patrick gathered with the seven other jurors and waited in a side room until the judge, Thomas Barlin, called them into the courtroom. George Barlin made arrangements for us, the jury, to leave by back doors. They were concerned that there were some people who may want to influence us. So he had us weave our way through the federal building there

back to where we were parked. Was that every day? Every day. Were you concerned about your safety at all? Well, at first, yes. At Judge Varlan, he wouldn't have gone to the trouble to lead us out this circuit as way if he hadn't had some concerns about it.

They introduced the lawyers for the plaintiff and the defendant and that's kind of a way it started. From Campside Media and Sony Music Entertainment, season two of Witnesses, this is Friendly Fire, the final episode. I'm Sean Flynn. Opening arguments in L'Oreal Yancey's civil suit against Marty Carson began on Monday, November 5, 2007. Three years, 11 months, and eight days after Marty shot John-John. And they happened in Knoxville, in a courtroom in our south of Scott County where the Carson name didn't have the same authority. Neutral ground more or less.

Lori met with her lawyers at first morning at her Montseers office in Knoxville. Sunny day, a little bit cool. The federal core house wasn't too far, maybe just a couple blocks. So we all walked over there. You know, I haven't seen Lori. I haven't seen that family. So I'm really nervous. Just about meeting all them in court, you know, just being face to face with all of them. It's a lot weighing on me. But, you know, I'm glad to be there. I feel like finally, you know, someone's gonna hear John Charles out of the story and what's happened.

So, we're leaves that were finally there. Lori was called to the stand stand late on that first day. She was the fourth witness after a lead TBI agent and two state troopers. She spoke very softly, so softly that one of her lawyers reminded her to pull the microphone closer. He asked her about her life with John John and he showed some pictures to the jury. John John and Laurie on their wedding date, John John at the police academy, a vacation in Myrtle Beach. That lasted four minutes, and then that lawyer let her into the night her

husband died. From Thanksgiving, the day before the shooting, through those hours in the emergency room with John John, all the way to the viewing and the funeral home where people had lined up for blocks to pay their respects. A very emotional day. The whole thing is overwhelming all the way around. We can put on the stand and go through my own Mount John Jones live together, the night of the event. It's just, it's really just, it's just hard to talk about all that, especially the night that that

happened. Lori and her testimony had just gotten to the part where Marty approached John John's casket. She said Marty's wife was on one side of Marty and Donnie Phillips was on the other side. She said that it was, quote, as if they were carrying him up there. And she thought it was very odd. Then Marty's lawyer objected, because he knew what she was going to say, that Marty wreaked of alcohol.

Judge Varron sustained the objection, As Marty's lawyer put it, he could have been drunk if he was drunk, at his partner's funeral visitation for any number of reasons. The next day, the second day of testimony, Marty's lawyer cross-examiner. He asked some pointed questions about the alleged motive, how to switch so quickly from politics to drugs, as if she were scrambling, trying to find any reason to make an accident look evil. I think he just tried to paint me as a greedy widow looking for money. I feel like that's the way he saw me or thought it was. I think he was just really kind of a s'more illick with me, I guess that's my opinion.

I think he really believed Mordy Carson. From the jury box, Patrick Weber and the other seven jurors were taking all of this in. Trials don't typically open with bombass and drama. You have a plaintiff methodically building a case and a defendant just as methodically trying to undercut that case. The jurors are just supposed to listen. And you don't want to try to form any opinions one way or the other. There seemed to be ordinary folks who just had an unfortunate encounter that they were trying to resolve. There's no audio or video recordings of the trial, but we do have almost a thousand pages

of transcripts. There were no real surprises, nothing you haven't heard already. Except for this one thing. Early in the trial, the very first day, third witness, his name was Mark Chitwood, and he was, still is, a trooper with the Tennessee Highway Patrol. Before that, he was a part-time deputy with the Scott County Sheriff's Department. He was also John John's friend. Mark Chitwood testified that John John had been investigating

Marty Carson for, quote, being involved with the drug trade and accepting payoffs. He also said that John John had been doing that, investigating his own partner, since 2001, two years before he was shot to death. That's apparently the first and only time Mark Chitt would have ever said that. I wanted to talk to him to confirm his testimony and to learn more about John John. He said he wanted to talk to me,

but that I'd have to clear it with his boss at the highway patrol, which I tried to do. My request was denied, and I was not given a reason why. Rick Babbs swept into the courtroom on the second day. He introduced himself as an outlaw and said he bought drugs from Arty and he told a story about the cemetery and he also conceded that he had a terrible memory. A man named Nick Letner followed Rick. He also used math and got arrested a lot. He said that starting around the year 2000

he was cooking math with Lonnie Gunter and that Rick Babb picked up that math from Arty. Nick Letner in fact said that he escaped from jail was allowed to escape with Lonnie, just so they could make more meth for Marty. Nick also said that shortly before John John was killed, he was locked up in the Scott County jail. He was what's called a trustee, which means he had some extra privileges,

a little more freedom could work around the jail. He said he was hanging sheetrock outside of Marty Carson's office when he heard Marty say, the problem with Mr. Yancey is going to be taken care of. The defense pointed out that Nick didn't actually see Marty when he supposedly heard this, so how could he be sure who is talking? Marty Carson testified on the fourth day, but not in his own defense. He was called by Laurie's side so that her bon seer, her lawyer, could point out the contradictions and inconsistencies in his evolving story,

like about the lighting. How could it be pitch black in the bathroom, but well lit in the hallway? Marty couldn't really explain any of it. That's just the way he remembered it. He also said he never used Rick Bab as an informant because his information was never any good. And he most definitely did not ask him to kill anybody.

After five days of testimony and then closing arguments, the case went to the jury on November 13, 2007. How are you feeling when the jury disappears to go deliberate this? Are you hopeful? Are you worried? Are you worried? Are you? Both. I mean, because you can't read a jury or I could not I could tell anything. But I thought that Herb and David both in a great job in the trial, you know, delivering all the facts. And I think it definitely pointed to more these inconsistent statements,

but not knowing what a jury's going to decide if that was enough or not. And then whenever they went out to deliberate, my family, John Jones family, we're all there. We just went to a place close by just to get some food while we wait. And I remember I couldn't eat anything. I said, and I think I'll cry at the whole time. It's just because I thought, you know, all this is just in their hands.

But yeah, as I've said, worried, because just don't know any, you know, how they're going to say this. Meanwhile, Patrick Weber was elected Foreman of the jury. Basically, it's spokesperson. Any questions the jury has or anything the judge wants to know usually is directed to the foreman and then the foreman presents it to the court or presents it to the jury depending on who's asking.

The question we had to answer to us was whether Deputy Carson meant to shoot John or not on purpose. You go back into that jury room. And when you get back there, then what? Is there a plan? Is there, are there objections? Is there arguing? We got back into the jury room and I said, okay, we've heard all the evidence.

Now let's start talking about what we've heard. It was, it was pretty thoughtful. There was, there was not a whole lot of evidence, it's mostly just testimony. There wasn't a very little physical evidence. Some people had more questions in others. At least one or two of the jurors were questioning some of the testimony that we heard. It means testimony from people like Rick Bab and Nick Letner. Did you find them credible? Rick Bob and Nick Letner. Did you find them credible? Uh, at the time we did, as they seemed to lose it at the time, but you have to take, you

have to consider that, especially, you know, there were some witnesses, people that were in the jail that said they overheard Marty, uh, saying that he was going to take care of John. How long were your deliberations? I'd say probably four or five hours maybe. It seems like there was one juror maybe two that were undecided, even almost until the end. Like Patrick Weber said, there wasn't really any physical evidence to decipher.

What the jury had heard over the five days of testimony were stories, different versions of the same event. Carson said that John was not behind him. When they went down, he went down the hall, there was nobody in the hallway, apparently, but him. But the young lady, that would be Nicole Porter, Nikki, who opened the door from Arty and held John John's hand as he died, said that, no, that John was right behind him. So that's one of the reasons we finally got

to the point where we almost had to reenact the shooting itself. There was another little room off to the side. So we had had some person act as the Mr. Carson, some person act as Mr. Yancey, and then we turned the lights off and on to see what the vision was like. Because that was a big part of it. Once you did reenactment that everyone sort of fallen in line with this, that, yeah, this is, this is what it looks like. Mm-hmm. Yes.

Yes, everyone, everyone of Fime and Greed says, yeah, that's, I believe that's, it looks to best. That's what took place. But at the end, it was unanimous, correct? Oh, yes. Mm-hmm. We've decided that the deputy Carson should have known John was behind him, because there was enough life that he could have told. The fact that John followed Carson down that little hallway,

that seemed to be the more credible story to us. Another thing was, no evidence was ever found of a shotgun being there. We don't know what Carson saw. Interesting. So you thought Nicole's story was more credible than Marty's? Yes. Okay. Right. Uncover from CBC podcasts brings you award-winning investigations year-round. Infiltrate an international network of neo-Nazi extremists.

Braton with racist language. Discover the true story of the CIA's attempts at mind control. Their objective was to wipe my memory. Or dig into a crypto-king's mysterious death and a quarter billion dollars missing. There are deep oddities in this case. mysterious death, y a un $4 billon de dólares, missing. ¡Dos hay más de dos autores en este caso! Con episodios de hoy, un cover es tu casa para la deputación de la reporte y la excepcionalidad de la historia. ¡Vamos a ver con el cover, donde tienes las podcastes! son contagiosos, pero MailChimp no. MailChimp analiza los datos de millones de correos electrónicos para ofrecer recomendaciones personalizadas para mejorar el

contenido de tus correos electrónicos, segmentar tu público, entre muchas cosas más, adivina menos y vende más con IntuitimailChimp. La marca número 1 en Emilio el Marketing y Automatización. Empieza hoy mismo en MailChimp.com. Vas a vender a tus públicos de marcas competidoras en número de globales de clientes en 2020 o 2022. if they don't find Morty guilty, it's just devastating if they don't. Devastating. You know, we go back in, and all the jurors come back in, and it seems like it doesn't take long, you know, that they, you know, give their verdict that they all find guilty. That's just, I just can't even explain the relief that just, you know, came over me. It's just, you know, you just feel like, you know, I'm not crazy.

Other people say this the same way that I did. What was Marty's reaction? You know, I didn't say Marty. I didn't even look at him. Yeah, I don't even know. Did you ever hear from him after this? Never, never. Never.

Knoxville is not a big media market, but every TV station had a camera and a reporter waiting outside the courthouse. Marty, wearing a dark suit and tie and holding his wife's hand, looks very much like a man who wants to run away without looking like he's running, trying to slip by them, but they all follow him down the sidewalk. Sir, may I come from the underworld? I'm not going to call him anything. We make the monitoring. Marty hurried away, but his lawyer, John Duffy,

stuck around to talk to reporters. Marty Carson, his family, and are deeply saddened by the jury's verdict today. We respect their judgment and consideration of the case, although vehemently disagree with it. Lori's lead attorney, Herb Moncier, was restrained, as the circumstances would suggest he'd be. He is both satisfying to them to have accomplished this

and to have brought the case to this point, but on the other hand, they are filled with memories of John John Yannick. Her ball said he hoped the investigation wasn't over yet, and that he hoped the verdict would quote, make other people feel comfortable enough to come forward with more information as to what was going on in Scott County, Tennessee. Lori stood behind her with John John's mother holding her hand. She wore a white jacket and black slacks, and every now and again the flicker of a tight sad smile.

It was a remarkable moment. It would have been easier for a lot of people to just accept what the prosecutor and the TBI had decided, an accident, not a crime to be prosecuted. Instead, Laurie found a lawyer. Then she found another lawyer who wasn't afraid. She found a different arena with different rules. She found witnesses. Then she convinced a jury, strangers, of what she believed in her bones for almost four years. Laurie won. Marty lost.

But if you turn the sound off, put her on mute, just watch Laurie. You'd never know what the verdict was. She doesn't look triumphant. And are those even the right terms won and lost? Because after the verdict, everyone, Laurie, Marty, their families just went home back to their lives in Scott County. Because the jurors found Marty liable, that's the term liable as opposed to guilty, they had the option to award damages, money.

There are some ways to calculate that. For instance, there's loss of income. John-John made about $23,000 a year, and he was 35 years old. So if he worked for another 30 years, counting raises, that's a little under $700,000. Jerry's can also award punitive damages, a fine basically. They can consider pain and suffering. They'll take all of that into consideration, do some rough math, and come up with a number.

Those are very human decisions. Here's Ben Barton, University of Tennessee Law Professor. The jury is not a machine where you type in 51%, or with beyond a reasonable doubt, 92%. The jury's 12 random people who've been hauled off the street and are put in a jury box and then the judge actually instructs them. And it's like, you shall find this by the reponderance of the evidence, proponderance of them, it just means more likely than not.

And just reads it to them. And if you've ever been to a trial like this, the instructions can go on for 15, 20 minutes. I mean, they're not listening at all. Like, they're just completely glazed over while the judge is reading. And then they get in the back and the question is not preponderance

of the evidence what do they have. They're like, did he do it or not? What do you think? That's the actual where the rubber hits the road. Like, they're just like, they're gonna make that call, whether they think plaintive did enough. Here's a small window into how the jury was thinking.

They sent one question to the judge. The question was, is the malicious and sadistic behavior only referring to the shooting or can it refer to the lack of care afterwards? The jury ordered Marty to pay Laurie $5 million. Afterwards, the jury ordered Marty to pay Laurie $5 million. There's a $5 million jury verdict, so plenty of not only did it enough, plenty of wowed them in this case for sure. William Paul Phillips, the prosecutor who declined to bring criminal charges against Marty,

didn't quite see it that way when I asked him about this. In East Tennessee, Federal jury basically came to the conclusion that Marty killed his partner on purpose. By the preponderance of the evidence. In East Tennessee, Federal Jury is not going to weigh, it's 51 percent. Yeah, I mean, we have to be reasonable about that. That was, they weren't going with the preponderance of the evidence. Well, you can't speculate on that.

You're saying that it wasn't a preponderance. It would be just as easy for me to say, she had small children. And the jury did not know that she had received a compensation from this death. The jury didn't know that. She had received, there's a national fund for officers who are killed in the line of duty, and she had received that. She was married, which was a happy event, but the jury didn't know that.

I mean, I could argue just as much that this jury was swayed by sympathy for this widow and her children. She had been compensated, but they didn't know that. That was not admissible. The fact that she had married, that wasn't admissible. And I'm not saying that the jury should have known that. I'm just pointing out to you. They did not know that. And she absolutely is a fine person and is worthy of sympathy.

Phillips in that last bit about Laurie remarrying is, of course, talking about Howard Ellis. Remember him? Laurie's new husband, the former prosecutor. Marty's lawyer really wanted the jury to know that Laurie had remarried and that Howard was helping her. After all, as her husband, he would likely benefit from any judgment Laurie might win. It's a very thin argument. Howard was no longer a prosecutor. He couldn't offer anyone a deal.

He couldn't cut time off anyone's sentence. Couldn't toss anyone's charges, and Judge Viral and agreed, and ruled that Laurie's marriage to Howard had no bearing on what happened in that trailer, and was not actually relevant to whether Marty shot John John on purpose. But what Philip seems to be suggesting is that if the jury had known Laurie had a husband, maybe their verdict would have been different. Luckily, we have a juror we can ask. We've had people tell us with great conviction what the jury was thinking,

and I want to run this both by you real quick. What it has made a difference to you or the jury, to know that Lori had been remarried and that money from a national fund for officers who are killed in the line of duty had been paid to her No, no, I wouldn't have made any difference Did you just feel bad for Laurie? Well, sure, I mean you feel bad for any young lady who's lost her husband like that. I mean, that's yeah, that's tough

But did that affect your verdict? That's really a question. I don't think it did. Well, at least it did. I did it to me. And what about the standard of proof? Are you reaching a verdict based on 51-49? Or are you feeling a little more certain about this? Well, we wanted to feel as certain as possible because there was so much money involved.

Ben Barton thinks the key to herb monseer strategy was so much money involved. Ben Barton thinks the key to herb monseer strategy was discrediting Marty. I would bet. I'm just gonna bet dollars to donuts. He won this case by persuading the jury, the Carson was a liar. I don't think that he won this case because he proved that Carson wanted to get rid

of somebody for office that he ran a meth lab. I bet he won this case because he was like, do this guy's story doesn't hold water at all. Which is enough in a civil case, but that's a lot harder in a criminal case. You know, beyond a reasonable doubt, the prosecutor doesn't have the option to come in and be like, I've got eight theories about why this happened.

The prosecutor typically comes in and has to prove to say straight story, this is what happened and why. And it really would be hard to put that together on these facts. We can't speak for the whole jury, but Patrick Weber says that's basically right. That the jurors just didn't believe Marty's story. The Patrick didn't completely rule out Lori's theory either. The motive they were alleging that Marty murdered John John because John John found out Marty was in the meth business. It sounds like you at least did not discount that motive. We did not discount that. We didn't know any proof.

But it seemed to me like that Marty, they were taking payoffs. I don't see how they could carry on like that without the police knowing about it. I still feel like that Carson knew what he was doing in that trailer that night. En el Centro Universitario Sanisidoro, ascrito a la Universidad Pablo de la Vida de Sevilla, formamos a los profesionales del mañana. Derecho, ade, comunicación digital, periodismo, publicidad, audiovisual, fisioterapia, cafit, convíercete con nosotros en un profesional 360.

Y prepárate para el futuro. Hoy, centrosanisidoro.es The carcines were already out of power, and Laurie was still a nurse in the ER. She never got a dime of that $5 million. She never expected to. Marty was responsible for paying, not the county or its insurance company, and Marty was never going to have $5 million. But she says money was never the point. Laurie wanted the verdict.

She wanted a jury of repairs of Marty's peers to say, yep, he shot John John on purpose, he meant to kill him. But the verdict like that, prosecutors would have to take a second look. And they did, says Paul Phillips. But there were new allegations that came out in the federal trial and that we were, and that we and the TBI were going to investigate this new information and that if we developed proof beyond a reasonable doubt, we would prosecute. The FBI agreed to take a look too. After the federal trial, they called me and said they would review it.

And I said, great, you have our cooperation, anything we have, you're welcome to, and I'm glad you're going to do that. I assume they concluded there's not proof beyond a reasonable doubt. Phillips concluded that because Lori never got the criminal charges from the feds that she wanted. After their investigation, they said they didn't have enough to take this to criminal court. That some of the witnesses tell about the people in the trailer that over the years some of the stories were inconsistent for what they initially testified to because time has passed,

so many years has passed, and that they would not take it too criminally important unless they were certain they would get a guilty verdict that they had to have proof beyond the show of it out that he did it intentionally. So they left the case open in case any new developments ever came up. So that was how it was left. The case just left open, but nothing was ever done. Some of the evidence that we investigated that came out in the federal trial, we found

to be not credible. For example, there was a Richard Bab who testified at the federal trial. And after that trial and as a part of our continuing investigation, the FBI gave him a polygraph test about his allegation that Marty Carson tried to hire him to kill officer Nancy. And he failed the polygraph test. Polygraphs are almost never admissible in court. They're too imprecise and who's administering the test, asking the questions that are interpreting the results, matters a lot.

But the FBI did polygraph Rick Bab, and according to the FBI examiner, his answers were indicative of deception. He failed. His explanation was, while I was using meth at the time, and when you use meth, you imagine things that don't really happen.

Rick said there'd been times in the past when he heard things and saw things that weren't there and that now, well, he wasn't sure of anything. He said, as a matter of fact, there were other things that my family have told me, did I imagine that work true didn't really happen. And so that was his explanation. His nephew Joseph said Rick was high on math when he took the polygraph. That said, Rick told me that he was stone sober and he just didn't like the examiner, and that threw his answers off. Either way, how does the prosecutor go to criminal court with a witness like that? That doesn't make him a very credible witness. And anyway, there were

other things that were investigated after the federal trial. But the bottom line was, federal trial. But the bottom line was we never thought, nor did it, TBI think, that we had proof beyond the reasonable doubt of crime. I noticed sitting there with Phillips that the phrase, beyond a reasonable doubt, is stuck in that sentence like a big, gaudy ornament. That's some very precise parsing for the killing of a sheriff's deputy. He's not saying there was no crime, or even more neutrally, that there was no evidence of a crime, just that they couldn't prove it beyond a reasonable doubt. It's not that I doubt him. It's just curious, Ben Barton also has some thoughts on this matter. Why is it Marty ever criminally charged?

Yeah. Several different reasons. The most clear reason is prosecutorial discretion. On the state level, the prosecutors in Scott County work every day with these officers and under no circumstances. And I mean that in Scott County, it's actually literally true. Under no circumstances with a big and murder charge against an officer, period. Like, this is never gonna happen. Now, there are some places in America

where they're like trying to roll that out, especially post-George Floyd, but Scott County is gonna be the last place where that happens. Theoretically, you could bring a federal charge here, but then you do the US Attorney's Office, and again, they're not in the business of bringing murder charges against police officers.

So part of it's that, just prosecutor, don't wanna do this. If you wanted to be more generous to them and say, no, it's not that they have this bias so that they would never take one of these cases, because this case is too messy. This case may have been too messy. I mean, it's a really, really, really tough case to make. That's where John John lived most of his life. That's where he grew up.

He has periods on the home, close to the highway. We'll pass that here just a little bit. The house we bought was actually just around around the worth of grade for more people to grow up. I went to Scott County in the fall of 2021. My first time back since I reported the story shortly after the trial. Not much had changed. We went to lunch with Lauren and her son Chase at Ray's Act's Grill. She'd get the corn nuggets because they're awesome. And Lauren took us on a tour of Scott County and of her life with John John.

So this is the high school that's, of course, all my boys attended at me and John John went to the high school and here this is where we met. This all happened so long ago. It's been almost 19 years since John John was shot. 15 since a jury said Marty did it on purpose. It should be history, not for Lori or her sons, but for everyone else, just something that happened in the past.

Except in a way, it's still happening, lingering like the fog tangled around the mountains on this rainy afternoon. It lingers because it was never really solved, not definitively. A jury said Marty meant to kill John-John, but the jury couldn't say that beyond a reasonable doubt. That wasn't the standard they were asked to apply. So for a lot of people, there's still a question, not legally, but in their minds.

Was it murder? Looks like they may have the gate closed where we can't travel. Lori directs us to a park that's special to her. So yeah, there's the sound of this name on it. They just name this park in honor of John-John. The park's on. Welcome to the John-John Yancey Memorial Park.

There's a big picture of John-John on the sign. He's wearing a ball cap, smiling. Big dimplin' his chin. So this is mostly for the high school, the soccer team plays here, the baseball team, and the softball team, and it's owned by the county. And then this is the Justice Center. She's pointing behind us to the building across the street, the Scott County Justice Center. The sheriff's office is in there, and the jail, and the courts. The sheriff's again named Ronnie Phillips, and his identical twin brother, Donnie, works right next door.

He's the clerk of courts. Donnie was one of the officers in the yard the night of the shooting. The one who ended up confirming Marty's version of events after he prayed on it. He must have to look at that sign at least twice a day. You look so young. Yeah. Robbie Carson, who was the chief detective at the time, he wrote his own book, arguing that the shooting was an accident. It's called, This is Justice, with a question mark, The tragic death of a canine officer

and other interesting stories. It's out of print. We couldn't find a copy and Robbie never responded to us. But in excerpts we found online, he argues that there was never a conspiracy to cover up anything. Because if there had been, he would have been a part of it, and he wasn't. So there you go. Chase.

So as he's got older, he's been more curious in a lot of questions. He was just so young when it happened. He was three. And you know, as he's got older, I mean, he's still too young to even remember things from the trial and stuff. Chase is Laurie's youngest. He's in college now and he's riding with us. We're on William's Creek Road, where his dad died. I would say like, start his dad died. the court transcripts, the depositions, anything that she had. The mobile home isn't there anymore. Chase had wanted to see it, but by the time he got curious, he was already gone.

I sat with Laurie for close to eight hours over two days in the house where she raised Chase and his brothers. The house were the man who shot her husband to death helped build the deck on the back. And I kept returning to this one thought, why stay? Why not get out of here, out of this county? Because it's the place where she raised her family, the place where she was raised and her friends and their kids. Because despite it all, it's home.

So now in all those years since, have you ever heard from any of the people involved that night? No, no. Still never. Anything from Marty Carson, any of his family members. This always struck me as the strangest part. Everyone still lives here, crossing each other's paths, seeing each other at the grocery store, at the gas pump. Lori's husband just casually mentioned to me one day

that he saw Jim Carson at the gas station. He waived to him, said hi Sheriff. Marty sort of slipped out of you once his father was no longer Sheriff, but when he cut off three fingers with a saw, everyone knew. And when he got picked up for drunk driving in 2011, the paper printed his mug shot, eyes closed, mustache drooping with the corners of his mouth.

And the story identified him in the very first sentence that as a former Scott County Lawman responsible for the shooting death of his partner. Over the years, you know, you don't notice many people talk about it like I did when that first happened. So I don't know if that's how people in the community look at it now that all this should just be swept away and forgotten. It's in the past. That's impossible because what happened in that mobile home was one of those moments that maybe doesn't define a community, but colors it.

Scott Coney will forever be a place where some people will wonder if a sheriff's deputy got away with murder. That's something that can't be swept away. Can't be forgotten. But what if Laurie's wrong? We had to ask. What if she accused a man, built a case against a man who just made a terrible mistake? No, no. You know, right at the beginning, I didn't think that Marty had did this intentionally.

You know, I really, I feel like I gave him the benefit of the doubt because I just didn't immediately think you've murdered my husband. You know, letting me apart of that funeral and, you know, I can understand an accident. I know those things can happen. And had it been a true accident? You know, I wouldn't have held that against him. You know, I know these unfortunate things happen. And it would just been a tragedy.

But, no, I've never felt like no I'm wrong no the more information I found just proved more that this was intentional ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ʻ‿ʻ ʻ‿ The Witness is a production of Campside Media and Sony Music Entertainment. Friendly Fire was reported and hosted by me, Sean Flynn. Lindsey Kilbride is the senior producer and Callie Hitchcock is the associate producer. The story editor is Daniel Riley. The series was sound designed by Shawnee Aviram with mixing by E.W. and Light from Ewan. This episode was fact-checked by Alex Yablon.

The theme song is Booey by Shook Twins. Archival news clips you heard are from Next Star Media Group. A special thanks to our operations team, Amanda Brown, Doug Slaywin, Alia Papers, and Allison Haney. Campside Media's executive producers are Josh Dean, Vanessa Gregoriotis, Adam Hoff, and Matt Cher. If you enjoyed witnessed friendly fire, please rate and review the show wherever you get your podcasts.

Soy Paco y voy a ser periodista. El futuro es exigente pero me siento preparado. También doblegrado en comunicación, con comunicación digital, doblegrado en derecho y ade, fisioterapia, deporte, más de 30 años formando profesionales de éxito. Centro universitarios Anisidoro, alitor la Universidad Pablo dio la vida de Sevilla En tranceentreosanisidoro.es y prepárate para el futuro hoy