Wondery subscribers can listen to morbid early and ad free. Join wondery in the Wondery app or on Apple podcasts. You're listening to a Morbid network podcast.

I'm Dan Tabirsky. In 2011, something strange began to happen at a high school in upstate New York. A mystery illness, bizarre symptoms, and spreading fast. What's the answer? And what do you do if they tell you it's all in your head? Hysterical. A new podcast from Wondery and Pineapple street studios binge all episodes of hysterical earth and ad free on Wondery.

Hey, weirdos. I'm Ash.

And I'm Elena.

And this is morbid.

Who's mommy?

What's up, fuckers? What's up, fuckers? What the fuck is up, Kyle?

Oh, man. We got crumble cookie today, and it didn't slap. It, um, didn't. They couldn't do it same day.

Usually they do it same day, which.

I know sounds like an insane problem to have.

Yeah, it absolutely is.

It upset us a little bit.

What's upsetting?

What's going on?

Also, it just wasn't as good today.

It was like, a crumble is usually where. Where it's at. Yeah, like, love it. And I can't speak to that. Cause I haven't had a piece yet.

You'll probably love it.

So it didn't slap for Ash. Maybe it'll slap for me.

It just didn't.

Wow.

Sorry.

Sorry. Not sorry. You know what did slap?

I got panera today.

Oh, my God.

And the chicken and wild rice soup will just. It will just erase any problem in your life. It's so good.

All of them. It'll clear your skin, it'll pay your bills.

I don't know.

It'll fix your broken relationships.

All right. All of that, maybe.

No, Ash claimed that maybe. So mode it be.

I mean, so mode it.

So we're, you know, we're. We're doing a lot of recordings today.

Oh, my God.

I know. But you know what? The energy is here, because we're excited to talk to you guys, because we're always excited. What are you looking at?

That plane. It sounded like it was gonna fall into our house.

I. I did not feel that, but I recognize that you did.

I just felt that way. That's crazy.

You crazy. You're crazy. Yeah. So I don't think we have a lot of business.

No, we did the business in the last one.

Yeah, we don't have a lot of business today, except for the crumble cookie of it all.

And that's business.

But today I'm going to be telling you a story that is a wee bit upsetting, I bet. Which is pretty normal.

Or kids say bet. Bet.

There you go.

They should just say, I bet they.

Should just say words like full sentences.

Yeah, like, I bet that's a full sentence.

I bet you are correct.

Or just, I bet.

So we're gonna be talking about the Gaffney Strangler. Oh, Leroy Martin.

I don't know if I've heard of this.

I actually had not heard of this before. Whoa.

Two back to back cases you haven't heard about? Everybody watch out. Hell hath frozen over.

I know. Until I happened to come across it somehow and threw it over to Dave. And once I was reading it with him, he. It's insane. Like insane. It's just a very. Like I said, it's just a very upsetting case. And it's one that I'm like, why the fuck didn't I know about this? Like, it's crazy. So this takes place in the sixties. So not like super old time old timey, but not super old timey. You know? Like not me old timey.

No. You know what's crazy? That's like pretty close to 100 years ago, though.

What the fuck?

If you really think about it, like, 2060 is not that far away.

It took me a second.

I think we're closer to 2060 than we are to 1960.

Yeah, probably.

I don't know.

When you said. I thought you were saying at first that that's like a hundred years ago. And I was like, no, it's like in my head, I was that lady with all the math equations going around her.

No, but it's not that far ago.

Do the math real quick on your. Your tip, tappy.

I'm doing it, I'm doing it, I'm doing it.

There's so many people 64 years ago.

So we're closer to that being a hundred years than not.

There you go.

Like we're. When you round, when you do the rounding. Listen. Yeah, I feel you. We're closer. It's 100 years ago to 100 years.

Ago than not so 100 years ago on May 20, 1967. It's late sixties.

Oh, honey.

So we're actually less. Even more. Less.

Even closer to 100 years, I think is what I'm trying to say.

No, it's further from 100 years because it's later in the sixties.

Oh, yeah. No, exactly.

Fucked.

It's been a long day.

People listening are like, you guys got it?

That's 57 years ago. People burned in the sixties. They're like, can you just shut up and tell us a fucking case? Honestly, I'm not a hundred.

I'd like to say that I questioned.

It from the case before I turn 100.

So on May 20, 1967, Roger and Annie Dedmond, a young couple from Forest City, North Carolina, you know, they were hanging out. They spent the night out drinking in Gaffney, South Carolina.

Good for them.

But later that night, after Roger had become more than a little bit drunk, I would say Annie convinced her husband it was time to go head home. They had a newborn son, Roger Junior. Let's get home.

Take an Uber.

Yeah.

They didn't 57 years ago.

As Annie drove down the back road. So she was driving. She drove down the back roads of Gaffney. They did see a red top cab come into view behind them on the road. It's unlikely that they really even registered this cab. Who knows if they even did? But witnesses would later tell investigators that Roger and Annie had been fighting at the bar and that an argument that started at the bar extended into the car as they drove home. So the car was seen swerving from one lane to the other at times because the intensity of their argument was happening. Who knows who.

The drinking.

Yeah. So finally fed up with the argument, probably with her husband at that point, Annie pulled the car off to the side of the road and got out and was like, you know what? You go to sleep in the car. See you later.

Like, oh.

She just didn't want anything to do with it. So she started walking in the direction of home, and Roger passed out in the car.

Oh, God.

Now, Annie didn't make it very far before that red top cab pulled up beside her, and the driver asked if she needed a ride home, which she happily accepted. The following morning, the nude body of Annie Dedmond was discovered by a driver on a rural road just outside Jonesville, South Carolina.

Oh, that's so sad. You said they had a newborn baby at home.

A newborn baby. And she had been sexually assaulted. She was struck on the head with a heavy object, and her cause of death ended up being strangulation. Later that afternoon, police found her clothing scattered around the nearby wooded area. Annie's body had been discovered lying against a chain link fence that protected an electrical transformer. But other than the clothing that they found scattered all around the woods, they really didn't find any more evidence, and they didn't have any leads. Really.

Jeez.

Now, a short time later, Roger Dedmond was awoken by a knocking on the door of his home, and opened it to find police officers who came to tell him, your wife has been found dead. Now, Roger told the officers what he could remember of the night before. He said they had gone out drinking. On the way home, they got into an argument that had started at the bar. Annie pulled over, got out of the car, leaving him to pass out in the passenger seat. He said a few hours later, he woke up, and he ended up making his way home because he figured Annie was there.

Yeah.

When he got there, she wasn't there. He said he was surprised, but this wasn't the first time they'd fought like that. Or the first time that she had walked off during a fight and left him somewhere to sober up.

Oh.

Cause this was a pattern.

Uh huh.

So he expected she was just gonna show up later that morning. They'd make up, move on.

Right.

Roger was arrested and charged with the murder of his wife.

I had a feeling it might go that way.

He repeatedly insisted he had nothing to do with the murder. In fact, he actually passed a polygraph test, and they really didn't have any evidence.

Well, I was gonna say, what is he even arrested based off of?

It was entirely circumstantial. The fact that he was with her when she was last seen, that they had been in an argument, that he had left the scene and just, like, went to sleep at home. Yeah, like, none of that looked good for him, for sure. But there were some who said after his arrest that Roger had confessed to the murder.

Oh, okay.

According to Annie's father, William Hayes, Roger had at one point confessed to Annie's uncle. He said, he told my brother he did it. He said he got down on his knees in front of a window crying. He said he just blacked out. I asked him if he killed her, and he said, I don't know, but I'm afraid I did.

Well, that makes sense. I mean, he was so. It sounds like he was blackout drunk.

And that he was like, oh, my God.

Did what if I did?

Yeah, what if. I have no idea.

I mean, they're arresting him. I'm sure you know what happens when people get arrested and held in those rooms forever.

Exactly. So the deadman's had only been married for a couple of years at this point, and Annie had come into the marriage with three children from a previous marriage, which is even more sad. Like, she's a mother, she's four kids. Yeah. And I guess Roger had always been kind of, like, ambivalent to those children.

Oh.

The family suspected, at least in recent months, that the marriage hadn't been a very happy one.

Doesn't sound like it.

And according to Annie's mother, Lucille, Roger had substance abuse issues, and his drug use was starting to affect their marriage.

Okay.

According to Lucille, she told a reporter, quote, he doped. He took yellow jackets all the time. But according to the family, right before she was murdered, Annie told them as soon as the kids were done with school for the year, she was going to leave Roger and move to Georgia.

Oh, wow.

Now, between the confessions, the drug use, and Annie's plan to leave her husband, the Hayes family felt certain that Roger was the killer. And I don't blame them.

I mean, yeah, at all. It has all the makings of that.

Honestly, it kind of fits perfectly.

It's like, yeah, yeah, if I was her family member, I would probably think the same thing based on everything she'd been going through.

And it turned out that the jury shared that opinion as well. A few months later, Roger Dedman was convicted of murdering his wife and sentenced to 18 years in the Union county prison farm where he was going to spend his days working on a chain gang. And Roger's lawyer, Jonathan McKinnon, told the press, one way or another, I'll seek a new trial. I want more evidence on this thing, but I will seek a new trial for Deadmund.

I mean, it's good that he wanted more evidence, you know, one way or another. And something's telling me he didn't do this.

Something's up. So Roger Dedman's story probably would have just ended there. It just would have ended in imprisonment. But then something happened that kind of changed the tide a little bit.

Okay.

A strange phone call came into the desk of Gaffney Ledger reporter Bill Gibbons on the afternoon of February 8, 1968. So the following year, sure, but, like, obviously not that far away. So the man had asked to speak to, quote, that little fellow who drives the falcone.

Okay.

So Gibbons assumed the caller was talking about the Spartanburg Herald writer Jim Holland, because he once owned a falcon. So he was like, that's the only person I know that owns a falcon. And he told the caller Holland wasn't in, but he said, can I take a message? And the man insisted it wasn't something he could leave a message about. But then he gave Gibbons instructions. He said, take out three sheets of paper. I've got three stories for you.

What?

So he was like, okay, he's not gonna pass up a potential scoop here. So he's like, give it to me.

Sounds like a scene in the Zodiac movie.

Oh, it literally does not sound real how this happened. So Gibbons listens and he's like, okay, tell me what you gotta say. And the guy on the other line gives him three names, followed by a set of directions to locations in and around Gaffney.

Oh, no.

The first was Nancy Christine East Smith street. Then Nancy Carroll Parris Chatham Avenue. And finally Annie Deadmond. March 1967, Jerusalem Road.

Oh, no.

The names were unfamiliar to Gibbons, except he said that last name, Annie Dedmond. He was like, I recognize that one.

Because the case just happened.

It was pretty recent. So before hanging up, the caller said something very ominous. He just said, wait a second. And he said, what? And he said, you take the sheriff with you. Don't go by yourself.

Oh, I just got a chill down my whole spine.

Yep.

Oh, what the fuck?

And he's like, what the fuck? He was. Now, Gibbons was the managing editor of the Gaffney Ledger, and he got tips all the time, but he rarely went out to investigate stories himself. He was the managing editor?

Yeah.

He said, I had just returned from lunch and our reporter and photographer were out, or I probably would have sent them. In fact, Gibbons had assumed the call was probably a prank phone call, but he figured it was worth checking into. They're not gonna let it just float out there.

Yeah. You never know.

So he went himself over to the sheriff's office to let Sheriff Julian Wright know about what happened.

I'm glad he actually did go to the sheriff.

He was smart about it, not wanting to waste too much time on it. If it did turn out to be a prank. The two of them just were like, let's just head to the closest location, see if anything's there. If it's not, then we'll let it go. So they went to Chatham road because it was nearby. And according to the caller, whatever they were supposed to find there could easily be seen from the bridge on Ford Road.

Oh, no.

So they pulled up to the bridge, and both men got out of the car, and they start looking around. And Gibbons said, we thought we'd look right in the water and see a dog or a goat. We thought it might be some trick or even a liquor deal. But when they took a closer look at the brush below them, they saw the nude body of 20 year old Nancy Carol Paris laying on the sandbank below. Her head was partially submerged in the water.

Oh, man.

He said, we knew then, my God, this is real.

Uh huh.

Imagine being sent there and that's what you find and you look over, which also, I'm like, humans are wild. Because I understand what he's saying when he's like, oh, I thought we were just gonna find a dog or a goat in the water. And I'm like, the fact that your brain is like, well, humans suck so much that some guy probably pulled a prank and threw a dog in the water. I know, is wild. Our species needs to do a lot of work. But to look over that, thinking this is a prank and seeing it, actual nude dead body laying there, the amount of things that must have been going.

Through their heads, I can't imagine.

So Gibbons and the sheriff made their way down the embankment to confirm that they weren't seeing, like, a mannequin or something.

It's never a mannequin.

And the body showed almost no signs of decomposition, which led them to believe she hadn't been there more than a day.

Right.

And was most likely murdered a short time before being left there. There was a deep purple mark around her neck, and her back was covered with what appeared to be recent cigarette burns.

Oh, God.

All over her back.

Oh, that's horrible.

Yeah. Paris had been reported missing by her husband a day earlier after she had left the house to walk their dog and never came back. Oh, yeah.

20 years old.

20 years old. Left the house, said bye to her husband with her dog, and never came back.

Also, they find this Nancy, and now they have another location to go to.

They have two other locations.

Two. But at that point, they had already found Annie.

Annie Dedmond. Yeah.

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She struck him with her motor vehicle.

She had been under the influence that she left him there.

In January 2022, local woman Karen Reid was implicated in the mysterious death of her boyfriend, Boston police officer John O'Keefe. It was alleged that after an innocent night out for drinks with friends, Caryn and John got into a lovers quarrel en route to the next location. What happens next depends on who you ask. Was it a crime of passion?

If you believe the prosecution, it's because the evidence was so compelling. This was clearly an intentional act, and.

His cause of death was blunt force trauma with hypothermia or a corrupt police cover up.

If you believe the defense theory, however, this was all a cover up to.

Prevent one of their own from going down. Everyone had an opinion, and after the ten week trial, the jury could not come to a unanimous decision to end in a mistrial.

It's just a confirmation of just how.

Complicated this case is.

Law and crime presents the most in depth analysis to date of the sensational case in Karen. You can listen to Karen exclusively with wondery. Join wondery in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.

Now, no longer thinking that this was a prank, Sheriff Wright left two deputies at the scene on Ford Road to take care of that. And he, Gibbons, traveled to the first location on East Smith street that the caller had described. So what he had said was, go out to the. It's so, like, specific, which also is like, how do you know these directions so well to get there? Because he told Gibbons, go out to the junior high school, to the chain gang road, go towards the Chang gang, to the second bridge, take a dirt road to the right, go to the top of the hill, turn left, come to the edge of the woods and stop like that is so many specific. And Gibbons and Wright were now accompanied by several others who had formed a search party and followed these instructions. And after walking about three quarters of a mile into the woods, they began combing through the brush. And that's when they heard one of the deputies shout, oh, God, here she is.

Oh.

Which is so chilling.

It is.

Oh, God, here she is. They had discovered the nude body of 14 year old Nancy Christine Tina Reinhardt.

14?

Yep.

Oh, my God.

14 years old.

What the fuck, dude?

Tina had been reported missing by her parents ten days earlier when she left her grandmother's house one afternoon and just didn't come home. And no one had seen any sign of her since then. Although she had been missing for ten days. And this is even more upsetting, she appeared to have only been dead for about five or six days, which means she was held alive for a few days. And like Nancy Paris, Tina had deep purple bruising around her neck and had been burned with cigarettes as well. She also had bruises on her hands, legs, and ankles. And she had been sexually assaulted.

Oh, no.

Now. And she's 14. So strangely, she was found nude.

I.

But she was wearing a wedding ring and what appeared to be a diamond ring.

What?

But she was in 7th grade.

Yeah.

And was not engaged or married.

A wedding ring and a diamond ring? Like, two. Like a.

Like a wedding ring and a wedding ring?

What the fuck?

Yeah. The area looked pretty undisturbed, which led the sheriff to think that the body had been placed here after Tina had been murdered, which. The same was true for the Ford Bridge. The Ford road scene.

Sure.

Now, while the sheriff and the rest of the search party kept combing through the woods, they got another call into the sheriff's office, and that was answered by Deputy Vernon Wright. This caller said, did Gibbons get the sheriff to go look for the bodies? And when he. So when Deputy Wright was like, yep, he did. The caller hung up before he could ask. Anything else? Yeah.

Now, this is so crazy.

It's so spooky. It is. It is spooky and tragic and awe. So after leaving the scene in the woods behind the junior high school, the search team went to the third location on Jerusalem Road. Now, they expected to find a third body just because of what they had just come across on the first two. But when they got to the scene, there was no body, nothing to be found. There wasn't any evidence of Annie Dedmond. Like, none of it. And upon further investigation, the sheriff learned that, just as the caller had indicated, Annie Dedman had been murdered several months earlier and in March of the previous year. Like, we know, her husband, Roger Dedman, had been arrested and eventually convicted of the crime and was currently serving an 18 year prison sentence.

Right.

So they were like, what the fuck is this about?

Like, she send us here?

Yeah, like, why would you send us here?

And I'm like, is somebody else there?

And way later in 2009, Gibbons told a reporter, I don't think he would have called me, except he said that another man was serving time, this caller, and he said he was concerned about that.

What?

So the caller said to him something about, like, there's another person serving time for this crime.

And you wonder if that's, like, a compassion thing or if that's a. I don't want them getting.

I think. I don't want them getting credit. That's what I think. He tried to play it off a little bit like it was, I'm sure, like it was. I don't want someone taking. Having to serve time for my crime. It was 100% a credit thing. I bet he, as we'll see, he really wants people to ask him and know that he did it.

Oh, I hate that.

So the caller wasn't the only one who was concerned about Roger Dedman serving time for a crime he possibly didn't commit. Roger's mother, Sybil Dedmond, believe the new cases all proved that her son didn't kill his wife.

I would say so.

She said, when news of the murders and the bodies broke, she said, I know my son, and he never killed her. But whilst Dedman's family was convinced the new details were clear evidence of Roger's innocence, the sheriff's office was less convinced.

Okay.

It was the sheriff's department's refusal to accept the caller's word that prompted him to call Gibbons back a few days later.

Really?

By then, the FBI and state police had been called in to help the Gaffney police because this was a lot for them, and they'd put a trace on all incoming calls into Gibbons desk.

I was waiting to hear if they. If I didn't know if they were able to do that. At that point, I kind of thought so.

They were. But it was back when a trace would be like, hold them on the line for a long period of time so we can get the proper trace.

Like, you see the guy at the.

Phone company, kind of like, it takes forever. Now, when the man did call again, Gibbons had been instructed, like I said, to keep him on the phone as long as possible. So when he finally called, Gibbons did his best to keep him talking. And I guess he told the man, this thing has to stop. And then he suggested that they get together in person for a real conversation. What? Of course, the caller was like, fuck no.

He said, no.

And he said, they're gonna have to kill me. Like, the dog I am creepy. It's like, dogs don't do this.

So it's kind of giving, like, son of Sam vibes.

It is a little bit like it's weird. Now, he may not have wanted to meet with Gibbons in person, but this guy was nonetheless insistent that Roger Dedman had been wrongfully convicted. Made sure to say that. He said, we're going to have to do something about that man down there serving my sentence. I killed misses Deadmond. I did. I did so like, I did miss miss Paris and Reinhardt. I killed them all with them begging me not to do it.

Oh.

Now, as if to offer proof of this, the caller described the scenario under which he had picked up Annie Deadmond that included very, very specific aspects of her outfit. He said she had been wearing. She had a blue pocketbook with a snap, with a top snap, and it was lipstick. An aluminum comb, a picture of a girl sitting on the back of a white falcon. Car keys, a watch which had no band. And she said she had the band broken when she and her husband had a scuffle. So he knew all of this to a t, and he was like, well, how would I know this?

Right?

Yeah. So while Gibbons and members of the FBI tried to lure the caller out of hiding, Sheriff Wright and Dick McKinnon from the South Carolina law enforcement division sled, they launched an investigation into the murders, hoping that they might find someone who had seen something that could lead them to this guy. Yeah, I don't think they were able to get a proper trace off of that. He couldn't keep them on the line. The sheriff's department was flooded with calls from locals at this point, but they weren't getting any solid leads. Then, a few days after the bodies were discovered, a local man approached McKinnon with a tip. The man said he had been parked out by the bridge on Ford Road on the night of February 7. And he says, while he was there, he saw a tall, skinny white man dumping something large over the side of the bridge. Oh, no, he said. And then he got in his car and he sped away. And he said, when it happened, I thought. And again, I'm like, is this, like, something that happens in the Carolinas a lot? He said, when it happened, I thought he was tossing a dog over the side.

I didn't know it was a body until I heard the news.

Why does everybody think this guys are.

People just tossing dogs in the water over there? Like, what is going. I would never think that. That wouldn't be my first thought.

The only thing I can think of is farm dogs. Sometimes people, like, shoot their dogs when they're, like. Like, older or dying or something. I don't know. They're just like bridges, actually.

Don't. Don't tell me.

Yeah, don't tell us anything.

But it makes me wonder, like, what the fuck?

Yeah.

But, of course, your first question with this guy is like, that's very interesting. Thank you. Why didn't you come forward with this sooner?

Right.

You saw a guy throw something large at night into a bridge and then speed away, and you didn't think to say anything. And the man said, yeah, about that. I'm married, and I was on that bridge with another woman. Motherf.

Er.

I didn't want that fact to go back to my wife. But I eventually did decide that this was more important and that I needed to come forward.

Wow. Your moral compass.

Which is so amazing. Oh, boy. Yikes. Now, other than the witness who'd potentially seen the suspect dump this body over the side of the bridge, investigators had very little evidence and almost no leads to work with. But the killer did place one final call to Bill Gibbons. This time to his home.

Fuck.

Which I'd be freaking the fuck out.

I'd be like, no, thanks.

Gibbons tried again to convince this man to give himself up. He was like, you need help. Like, let's get you help.

Yeah.

And the man refused. He said, I'm psycho. The only reason I'm telling you this is to get the other boy out. He's serving my time.

It's like, okay, then go turn yourself in. Like, clearly that's what you're looking for.

But then, before hanging up for the last time, the caller added one thing you can tell people, I'm not gonna pick up any woman that's fat and ugly. I'll be in. But if they don't catch me, there will be more deaths. Oh, so he's a real prince.

Definitely.

You know, this is a prince of a guy. Yeah. Like, literally. That is verbatim what he said.

That's gross.

And it's like, okay.

That's a gross way to be.

Okay.

I mean, it's a gross way to be when you're, like, a murderer.

Yeah, it's pretty gross. Now, the discovery of Tina and Nancy's bodies had set the town on edge. On edge.

Oh, my God. I can't even imagine.

Yeah. And this was at a time like, this was at a scary time in the south, especially with, like, integration was already straining black and white relations across the south. So this was already, like. This was strange. Like, people were just. Tension was already at an all time high.

Yeah.

And a Gaffney pastor Clyde Thomas told a reporter in 2009, there's an indelible memory in my mind of going to the bus stop and parents being there with shotguns in their hands.

Jesus. Yeah.

He said people were afraid to go to school, afraid to go shopping. They kept their children locked in the house. And Bill Gibbons also remembered the fear that seemed to just, I mean, permeate Gaffney at the time. He recalled how law enforcement officials became concerned that terrified residents would start shooting at shadows.

Probably, yeah.

Everybody was just on edge right now. Exacerbating the tensions and all the frustrations that everyone was feeling was the absolute, complete lack of evidence and any answers into the deaths of Tina and Nancy. Both had been raped and murdered. That much Washington clear and asphyxiation looked like it was the cause of death for both. But beyond that, the coroner could offer really no insights, except they looked like they had been, like, tortured.

Yeah.

And given the marks around their neck, he speculated both might have died by hanging.

Hanging? Mm hmm.

But he couldn't say for sure.

Okay.

He said a hanging death would explain why the cord marks were around their necks.

Okay.

Now, on February 13, just one week after the other bodies had been discovered, the killer struck again.

No.

And this one's so sad. I mean, they're all sad, but this one's 15 year old. Yeah. This time he kidnapped 15 year old Opal Diane Buxon. Opal had been on her way to school with her sister Gracie, and run a short distance ahead of her when Gracie saw a white man in a sedan pull off the side of the road, jump out of the car, and grab opal and throw her in the trunk of the car in broad daylight, literally. Her sister ran up ahead of her and got plucked off the side of the road and thrown in a trunk.

What the fuck? To be that brazen.

That's the thing.

And that poor Gracie.

Poor.

It's the PTSD she must have been living with.

After that, Gracie told police she noticed the car pull out ahead of Opal and found it strange when it backed up with the trunk open. And she said, he looked at me, and I ran back towards the house. When she looked back, they were all gone, along with a woman, and they.

Weren'T even far from their house.

It sounds like she ran back to her house.

Holy shit.

Now, to law enforcement, it's basically what you were just saying. The abduction of Opal wasn't just an escalation in the killer's behavior, because it occurred in broad daylight in front of somebody else. Like, it also represented a change in victim profile.

Well, sort of.

Was black.

Oh, okay.

The other victims were all white. This is a very different kind of crime because usually we've seen this in other things. Yeah, usually killers have a very specific victim profile, or it's. A lot of times, killers won't kill outside of their own race.

Yeah, that is interesting.

That's like. Like serial killers.

Yeah.

Who I'm talking about. But. So this is interesting that we've. That he's gone from. I mean, he stays with younger women, but he's gone from, like, 20 to 14 in white and black women.

Right.

Like, that's. That makes it a lot harder to understand and a lot harder to follow who he is or what he could be doing. And Sheriff Wright told reporters at a pref briefing that same day, I'm afraid for her life. Talking about Opal. We're using every available man in this. And he was trying to assure everybody, but he said, but we have nothing definite yet. And while Gracie had gotten a look at the man who she described as a slender white man with brown hair, which, by the way, that other guy. Tall, skinny white guy. A tall, skinny white guy. But unfortunately, that description matched a lot of young men in the area, and it was really vague. Like, Gracie did the best she could under one of the worst circumstances I could possibly ever fathom in my brain.

And she's turning to run around or turning around to run.

Yeah.

Back.

She's panicking and running, and she's probably looking at her sister more than anything.

Yeah.

And she's child like. She did the best she could, and she even was able to describe the car he was driving as an old blue board, but that's also really common at the time. And it just. And to make matters worse, later that day, Gracie changed her statement and said she couldn't be certain about the make.

Of the car, because then she's sitting there like, was it a blue Ford? Like, I don't know.

If you asked me as a child, what car is that? I'd be like, a car. Like, I don't know.

You ask me now, I don't even know what some cars are. It's true.

I'd just be like, I don't know, a blue car, I guess, maybe. Could have been. Maybe black. Like, I wouldn't be good at this.

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Now, a search team started combing Gaffney immediately for Opal, but there are few clues and no signs of Opal or that blue Ford anywhere. And near the bus stop where Opal and Gracie had been waiting, Opal's father, which, like, breaks my heart, found his daughter's school books and a shoe, and her scarf was discovered along a nearby road.

Oh, that's so cool.

So they used that scarf to indicate maybe the direction the car went because it was further up, but otherwise, they really didn't have anything. And at the same time, local law enforcement's fears about widespread panic started coming to fruition. On the morning of the abduction, a local gun shop owner sold three pistols just a short time after opening for the day, two of them to young women. And when the clerk asked one of the women what kind of pistol she was looking for. She said, I don't know. I don't know anything about guns. Just give me something that will shoot.

Wow.

And when he was asked about the local rush of residents going to buy guns and take other protective measures, Sheriff Wright said, if they're good people, let them have something to protect themselves and their families with. I'm not against any man doing that. I'm afraid, though, of guns getting into the hands of the wrong people.

Yeah.

Now, the very real public fears were furthered by what appeared to have been a large number of prank phone calls received by women around the time. And these prank phone calls would warn random women, you better watch out tonight. I'm coming to get you.

Oh, God, those poor women. Can you imagine? I.

These young men are. Get it? Pigs to fucking gather. What is wrong?

Get a hobby. Get a grip.

God damn. Local women weren't the only ones getting the prank phone calls either, because following Opal, a 15 year old's kidnapping, the sheriff's department and the Gaffney ledger were plagued by a series of calls from various young men confessing to be the killer.

What the fuck is going on?

That's like, you should be able to trace every one of those and you should be able to charge them with a crime and put them in jail for.

No. Can't you get charged with, like, disrupting.

Disrupting an investigation? Like, do you something? You should get a big consequence.

Yeah, absolutely.

Like, you need to.

You need to be taught a lesson.

There needs to be a real lesson learned there because what the fuck is wrong with you? Someone's child got ripped off the side of the road on the way to school in front of her young sister.

And you're like, lol.

Thrown in a trunk. And you're like, so funny to say it's me.

Like, it's like, you might as well be a murderer. Yeah.

You're disgusting.

Yep.

Like, what the fuck is wrong with you? And in Charlotte, North Carolina, police arrested 17 year olds. You are far too fucking young. Or old. Sir Robert Wood after he placed a series of calls to Gaffney authorities claiming there's going to be another killing tonight. 17 years old.

Seriously? Come on.

Bye. Put them away. Honestly, you're a fucking menace. Like, what is wrong with that?

That's a menace.

And in response to the chaos and fear that was happening everywhere, authorities increased the number of officers working on the case to more than 100 from local agencies. And it was like, the state office of the FBI. You know, the. Was it the. It's called sled. Oh, yep, sled. But, like, all the different agencies just increased all the officers. The next day, there was still no sign of Opal. And as the search teams grew larger and larger, they came to include a significant number of residents. And this was both black and white people, which was.

They were kind of at least people.

Coming together to be like, we're all in trouble here. Like, we're all. We're all going to be prey here.

How sad that that's what it took.

It took a 15 year old black child being fucking ripped off the street. But among the searchers was professional golfer Henry Transue and his friend, forest ranger Lester Skinner. The two men had volunteered to drive around the backroads in transueus car, looking for any signs of Opal or her kidnapper, because they thought the killer had left bodies in remote areas. So maybe he'll do the same this time. So, like, it's worth a shot.

Yeah.

So they were driving around a railroad out by the cow pen's battleground memorial, and they spotted something interesting. They spotted what looked to be a man in a blue sedan parked in the field with his trunk open.

What?

So the man in the field watched Transu's car as it drove past slowly, which is something out of a horror movie. Then he got in the driver's seat and pulled out of the field. So, not wanting to lose who they believed to be the suspect, they followed the car, keeping enough of a distance to not, like, scare any further. But trans. You followed the other car for a few miles, and then the car pulled into the driveway of a local house and got out and immediately started talking to another man standing in the front yard.

Okay.

So they were like, okay. So they were like, we need to get this guy. But, like, who knows if he's armed and dangerous? We don't know.

Yeah.

So Skinner pulled out a pencil and paper and jotted down the license plate, and then they sped off in the direction of town to let the sheriff know. Okay, so Transu and Skinner, along with the sheriff and a deputy, went back to that house right away where they'd seen the car. They knocked on the door because the car wasn't there. They're thinking like, this could be the killer. This can be him. And then an elderly man opens the door, and they're like, hello, sir. Like, do, what's going on? And he was like, so they asked him about it. Like, what was that about? And he's like, yeah, a guy in a blue sedan came into my driveway a little earlier. He doesn't live here, though. He just stopped briefly and asked me if I sold beagle dogs.

I had a feeling he just pulled into the nearest driveway and was like, oh, I'm talking to this guy.

I just know this guy.

I had a feeling.

And when the homeowner said no, the guy just got back in his car and left.

That's okay. They have the license plate.

They're disappointed, but they returned to the field, too, where they first started, spotted the car, hoping there was anything that they could find a. But they didn't find anything. They didn't find Opal either. But in case, you know, just in case. FBI agents did stake out the house all night, but the car never returned. I'm not really sure why they staked out the house, to be quite honest.

I don't really know why he'd go back there.

I don't know why he would go back.

But you know what? It sounds like they were trying everything.

They were trying. They were, and they were.

It wasn't like they were, like, taking two people away from.

No.

Like, there's plenty of people in every.

Exactly. So I'm not sure what the motive was that. But again, I'm not in the FBI, so I'm sure there was a smart motive behind this, but it didn't pan out. Nobody came back.

Maybe in case he came back to threaten that guy or something, to be.

Like, did you talk to somebody? No. That's a good point, actually. So back at the sheriff's office, deputies ran that plate number on the car, followed by Transu and Skinner, and learned it belonged to 31 year old Leroy Martin. He was a millworker and father of three.

Are you fucking kidding me?

Yep. Who'd been born and raised in Gaffney.

Lived there his whole life.

Most everyone in town knew Martin.

What the fuck?

And thought he was fine, which I have questions about this, because it was like everybody thought he was fine, like, nobody had a problem with him. But then you hear about a little rap sheet that he has, and I'm like, were you okay with it?

I mean, everybody also thinks that people are just tossing dogs over the side of bridges. I don't know about Gaffney.

I don't know. But about a decade earlier, Martin was arrested and served a jail sentence for assault and battery with intent to kill after he raped a teenage girl behind his mother's house.

Oh.

Yep.

And everyone thought he was fine because.

He was released from prison and he appeared, according to everyone else, to have gotten his life together. He got married. He had three children he'd worked as sometime for, as a driver for the Red Top cab company. I don't know if that sounds.

Oh, you said red top cab?

Red cab company. And then he found work at the local milking. Mm hmm. He was literally working girl. While some members of law enforcement felt confident he was definitely the right suspect, I do. Just as many were skeptical because they said, this is someone they've known their whole lives. He can't be a psychopath.

He really.

Sorry. He's kind of already proven.

You guys okay? Again, he raped a teenager and tried to kill her. And you guys think he's. I.

Well, they're like, no, he couldn't be a psychopath. What?

I think if you're capable of that, you are a psychopath.

What was that? In fact, one sheriff's deputy said, aw, it's not him. I know Leroy Martin and his whole family. He's got a wife and three kids and works regular. Leroy Martin ain't the strangler. You're wasting your time, baby.

BTK had a whole family too, baby.

He's a John Wayne Gacy. He's a rapist, and he attempted to kill a teenage girl.

He's a rape. That's the other thing. He's a pedophile because he's a rapist of a teenager.

He's a predator. He's a rapist and an attempted murderer of a young girl. And now there's a young girls coming up raped and murdered.

Y'all don't.

Are we not seeing the connections?

Hello?

Hello?

Literally hello in the room with us.

So still believing Opal buxom could be alive, because at this point, they're hoping beyond hope. Officers didn't want to tip off Martin and risk the girl's life, which is a good move.

Smart.

So surveillance teams monitored him constantly, hoping they might lead him to them. To Opal.

Yes.

Gaffney Ledger reporter Tommy Martin was a member of one of the unofficial surveillance teams, and he remembered the first time he saw Martin, and he said he emerged from his house in the middle of the night to wash the car.

Oh, that's not good.

Which Tommy said he believed was to get rid of any evidence.

Do you ever, like, do something and you're like, wow, I probably look suspicious as fuck right now. Like, I don't know. Like, I'm trying to think of an example and I can't, but, like, you think of somebody going out to fucking wash their car in the middle of the night, you know, you don't think that's like. Like, anybody's gonna be looking at you.

Yeah.

I perfect trash out, and I'm like.

Does anybody look at me like, there's nobody in here? Well, that's when our dog, our family dog, died, like, a billion years ago.

Yeah.

And we had. It was pouring rain, and we were able to, like, you know, bury him in our woods.

Yeah.

To give him, like, a little memorial. It was pouring rain when it happened, and me and my dad had to go out in the woods and dig a hole and dig a hole with a wheelbarrow with a giant load in it covered by a blanket. And my neighbors were right there, and my dad, trying to make me laugh because it was so horrible, and we had all been sobbing. He said, do you think this is my dad's humor?

It's Gallo's humor.

That's where I later get humor. We needed it at that moment because we were so sad. But he said, do you think we should just keep your mom indoors for a few days and really make the neighbors question what we did out here?

That's hilarious.

That's hilarious. But he was literally, like, do you think they're gonna be, like, worried about what we're doing? I remember being like, yes, I think they are.

Like, but even, like, something innocuous too. Like, I can't think of an example, but I'll do something. And I'm like, oh, man. Like, did anybody see that?

Yeah.

Like, that was weird for me to do, and it's not even a weird thing. Yeah.

Like, like you said, taking your trash out, looking at you, I'm like, everybody's wondering what I'm doing. They're not.

No.

Nobody is. I don't give a shit when people take their trash out.

No.

But going out in the middle of the night and washing my car, I would be looking around, being like, my neighbors definitely think that would be.

And let me tell you something. If you're my neighbor and you're washing your car in the middle of the.

Night, I think you did too.

I'm watching.

Yeah, I'm always watching. I'm always watching.

I'm always watching. I love watching.

I do too.

Just my street.

Who doesn't love watching, you know? And I hope my neighbors love watching, so everybody just loves watching.

We're all the neighborhood watch.

Yeah.

That's the best together.

So while surveillance teams watched Leroy Martin around the clock, sheriff's deputies went to the mill to speak with the management where he worked. Although no one at the mill had anything, like, truly negative to say about Martin, they were just like, he's fine.

Other than the fact that he's raped and murdered. Oh, no. Excuse me. Raped and attempted to murder a teenage girl.

Yeah.

Just gonna keep reminding everybody about.

They were like, when we work with him, there's nothing, like, weird about him. You know? Like, we can't point to anything. That's like, oh, yeah. He gets mad angry, like, easily or anything. They're like, yeah, he's fine to work with. Like, we don't have anything bad.

It's crazy.

But when deputies looked over his time cards, they discovered that Martin had wildly been punched out during the times when the girls were believed to have been murdered.

Imagine that.

I was like, my goodness. However, while this was definitely suspicious, it was just more circumstantial evidence. We're not getting any smoking gun here.

Yep.

If they wanted to make a strong case against him and learn the location of Opal, where she was, they need something more compelling here. Uh huh. From the moment Opal was abducted on her way to the bus stop, law enforcement officials had been cautiously optimistic that they were going to find her alive. Unfortunately, those hopes were dashed on the morning of February 16 when a group searching the woods in Gaffney. So they were searchers, found Opal's nude body covered over by some brush. Like the other victims, Opal had been choked and she had been raped. But the cause of death in this case was attributed to the stab wound to her chest. She had also been stabbed once in the leg.

Oh, God.

Years later, Bill Gibbons, our guy Bill Gibbons, would speculate that the killer had stabbed Opal because she fought back.

Yeah, I was wondering that.

And otherwise, he said she would have been strangled like the others, but she was a fighter. They all were. But, like, she clearly fought so much that he had to resort to that.

Yeah.

So with Opal confirmed dead now, unfortunately, law enforcement had no reason to proceed with caution any longer. So Sheriff Wright returned to the mill, found Leroy Martin in the bathroom, where he was arrested and taken into custody because they were like, fuck that. Get in now. And while they were leading him away to the deputy's car, a young woman who worked an administrative job grabbed one of the deputies. She worked in an administrative job at the mill. So she grabbed him and said the day before he had tried to convince her to go for a ride with him. And she almost accepted, but something seemed off, and she turned him down.

What the fuck?

And she was like, fuck. Because she was like, I felt something weird. Like, I didn't go because I knew.

Something about him losing her mind as he was taken away in cuffs.

She must. I can't even.

I would never not trust my guy. I feel, like, sorry. My gut says you're. You suck.

So she has elite guts. Like, that is elite guts. And honestly trust your gut. Every time I don't trust my gut, I regret it.

Yep.

And I'm, like, an overthinker, so I constantly second guess my gut. Don't do it.

Sometimes my guts are hella elite. Do you remember that one situation? I really disliked this person that we both knew, and I could not explain why.

I had no reason, like, visible, you know, tangible reason.

And I was just like, nope, we need to stay away from this person. And, honey, was I correct?

Correct. Your guts can be very elite.

No, it was crazy.

Like, you're very. You. You have, like.

You're an intuition.

So you have this intuition that's like, yeah, like this.

And we're witchy.

I bet this gal had a good intuition.

And she's witchy.

Mm hmm. So, years later, when a reporter asked Bill Gibbons why he thought there had been a gap between Martin's first murder and the other three, Gibbons explained he attended the deadman trial, and that had a lot to do with him doing the other murders. He was upset, he said, with the miscarriage of justice, and that was the crowning blow. He turned from his good side to his bad side. I think he just. You know, I think he was mad that he didn't get credit.

I think so, too.

Well, you know, it does. It feels like he couldn't tolerate someone else in this case, Roger Dedmond, getting credit for his work. That's what it feels like to me. Definitely.

Why else would he have contacted. He wasn't contacting the local news. To be like, it wasn't like, the weepy voice killer. Like, stop. I can't be.

I can't.

I need help. He went and killed more people.

Exactly.

Like, I mean, the weepy voice killer did, too, but. You know what I mean?

But it's like. It was a different vibe. Yeah, definitely is.

I'm Dan Taberski. In 2011, something strange began to happen at the high school in Leroy, New York.

I was, like, at my locker, and.

She came up to me, and she was like, stuttering, super bad. I'm like, stop around. She's like, I can't.

A mystery illness, bizarre symptoms and spreading fast.

Like doubling and tripling.

And it's all these girls with a diagnosis. The state tried to keep on the down low.

Everybody thought I was holding something back.

Well, you were holding something back intentionally.

Yeah, yeah.

Well, yeah. No, it's hysteria. It's all in your head. It's not physical. Oh, my gosh.

You're exaggerating.

Is this the largest mass hysteria since the witches of Salem, or is it something else entirely?

Something's wrong here. Something's not right. Leroy was the new dateline, and everyone.

Was trying to solve the murder.

A new limited series from wondery and Pineapple street studios. Hysterical. Follow hysterical on the wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge all episodes of hysterical early and ad free right now by joining wondery.

So as they pulled out of the mill parking lot with their suspect in the backseat, it occurred, and this is actually really smart, it occurred to Sheriff Wright that they had a growing body of circumstantial evidence against Martin for sure, but they didn't have a shred of physical evidence connecting him to the murders. So they were like, this is fucking tenuous. And so the first thing Martin said to them as he got. As they left the parking lot was, you've got the wrong man. I didn't kill anybody. So immediately, he's like, I didn't do it.

Yeah.

So they're like, fuck, we don't have a lot to go on anyways. So, like, this is not good. So. Right. Knew if we're gonna keep him with us, we need a confession.

Yes.

So based on the phone calls the killer made to Bill Gibbons, Wright and the deputies knew this is a killer who wants attention for the murders and is mad that somebody else got the attention, and he just couldn't abide by his crimes being ignored. That was clear to them. Yup. So instead of driving back to the courthouse, Wright started driving in the opposite direction. And so Martin notices that they're heading in the wrong direction, and he's like, where the fuck are we going? And the sheriff and the deputy just didn't say a fucking word. Wouldn't look at him, wouldn't say nothing, wouldn't speak to him. So he's just like, where are we going? Like, why are we do. Where are you taking me? And they're just like. And it's just getting more and more tense, more and more awkward. And Martin couldn't bear it because they weren't asking him questions. He wanted questions.

Yeah.

He wanted to be able to say things right. He wanted them to challenge him, saying, I didn't do it. And he wasn't getting anything. Annie had no idea where they were taking him, and they wouldn't say anything. So he started babbling and just filling the space with things because he just couldn't handle that they weren't, like, putting attention on him, that they were totally ignoring him. And the further they drove, the harder it became for him to tolerate that neither of them were speaking to him and that they weren't asking him questions about the murders. So, like many people, Martin probably assumed that his arrest would immediately be followed by a barrage of interrogation questions or people challenging you, saying you didn't have anything to do. He's thinking, like, he's gonna be on having a show in here. He's gonna get to a one man show. Keep talking about it, keep playing with them. But they seemed entirely uninterested in him and entirely uninterested in whether he had killed someone or not. They didn't give a shit. They didn't even say anything to him.

They make it seem that way.

And eventually he just couldn't take it anymore. And Leroy Martin started talking about the murders he'd committed.

What?

They wore this motherfucker down by just driving around, complete silence, just all over. They gambled on this. They just gambled to see if it would work.

Wow.

And they literally gambled on his narcissism.

Yeah.

And it paid off.

If you gamble on someone's narcissism, you.

Probably went, because from the backseat of the police car, he fully confessed to killing all four women. Fully confessed strangling the first three with his belt, he said, and stabbing opal buxom.

What?

The f. Confessed to the entire thing. Damn. While they. That was, like, the wildest gamble that paid off.

Like, it's absolutely incredible.

And for them, and I imagine, just, like, it must have been so satisfying to hear this little narcissistic prick in the back seat losing his goddamn mind that they weren't paying attention to him and weren't, like, fawning over him or getting upset or anything, and that they're just like, do, do, do, do. Not even paying attention. So that afternoon, Martin was charged with the murder of opal Buxon and placed in a jail cell at the courthouse. And a couple days later, on February 18, he was charged with the murders of Nancy Parris and Tina Reinhardt. In his statement to the press, Sheriff Wright praised the large number of law enforcement officials from various agencies, and he praised all the local residents who'd worked cooperatively to quickly bring the killer to justice. He said, I'd just like to say we've had just marvelous help in this thing from all law enforcement agencies and the public has just been wonderful.

I love that you don't hear about that office.

No, you don't. You really don't. So the townspeople were able to relax a little in the wake of the arrest, but the sheriff's office had their work cut out for them now, gathering as much evidence as they could against Martin. So, going over Bill Gibbons original reports of his phone calls with the killer, now believed to be Leroy Martin, they came across several statements the caller made about where the reporter and law enforcement officials could find various objects belonging to the victims. He'd intended this as proof that he was responsible for the murders. But remember, as these calls were coming in, he was getting them, like, often. And he's, like, writing this stuff down, and then sometimes they're not chasing all these leads down. Cause they didn't even know if this was a prank. Yeah. Cause they were getting so many pranks afterwards that it was hard to tell.

And, yeah, you can't distinguish.

So, yeah. So the caller had specific. Now that they knew this was the real guy. The caller had specifically mentioned an area on Miljin Road, just off highway eleven, near where transue and Skinner had seen Martin's car.

Okay.

The collar had said they would find several items there. And when they searched the area, deputies found two Ford automobile keys, a small hairbrush, and three books of Harris teeter stamps, which all belonged to Annie Dedmond.

Whoa.

So with this new evidence, Martin was also charged with the murder of Annie Deadmund. Now, they could connect her, and her.

Husband was let out.

So we'll get to that. So, by the end of the month, investigators had also located several pieces of clothing and personal items belonging to Opalbuck, including a coat with her initials written on the label. And they found that hidden in an abandoned well about a half mile from where her body was discovered. According to press reports, quote, many items of clothing were torn or cut. Wow. Around this time, other evidence had been collected around the other crime scenes, including the body of Nancy Parris's poodle, who she had left the house to walk that night. So he killed a poodle? Yeah. He's an absolute piece of shit. He killed her dog and her.

That's so sad. So I wonder if that guy did. Wait. No, because never mind.

It ended up being. Yeah, but. So now you can see why. So, just a few days after his arrest, the evidence started piling up on Leroy Martin, and he made what a prison official described as a, quote, half hearted suicide attempt. Apparently, he pulled one of the slats out from under his prison bunk and just scratched at his wrists with it. An officer discovered it immediately, and they had a doctor look at him, and the official said, but Martin required literally no treatment. Okay, so the half hearted suicide attempt, quote unquote, and the circumstances of the crimes led to Martin being put on a 30 day hold at the state hospital in Columbia, South Carolina.

Probably what he was looking for. Sure, it's better than a holding cell.

But there he was extensively evaluated by psychiatrists. So during the evaluations, additional details of the crimes came to light. Additionally, and this is rough, everybody. In addition to sexually assaulting his victims, he had revisited the bodies of Tina Reinhardt and Nancy Parris following the murders, and he further violated their bodies. So he is a necrophiliac as well. Oh, also, he seemed to revel in the ways that his crimes affected the people of Gaffney, specifically the victims families.

Yeah, I bet.

Tommy Martin recalled, tina's sister told me Leroy Martin had come by and stayed for a lengthy period of time at her funeral. So he stayed at these funerals and watched the families grieve them.

That's a whole other level of just disturbed.

And it's like. So he is a necrophiliac. He's going back to these bodies and he's raping these dead bodies. He is raping these dead bodies. And then after he's doing this, going and showing up to funerals, knowing what he has done, your mind can't even.

Like, truly comprehend how fucked up that. Like, it's so fucked up, but it's on a level that you can't even. It's indescribable.

Comprehend. You can't even, like, label.

There's no objective.

Disgusting. That is no, like, you really can't. I can't come up with a good adjective for it.

And you're a writer, so that's it.

There you go. And thesaurus.com will not even help us with this.

No.

No. Despite the bizarre and very disturbing nature of his crimes and his complete and total lack of remorse, he had no remorse. Psychiatrists at the state hospital determined that Leroy Martin was not insane and was completely competent to stand trial.

Isn't that such a wild thought that somebody that murders people, defiles their dead bodies, and then goes, sits with their family afterwards, is legally sane?

Yeah.

Like, I believe it. It's just a fucking wild sentiment.

Yeah, because he was able to. He knew it was wrong. Now, in May 1968, a grand jury indicted Martin for the murders of Annie Dedmond, Tina Reinhardt, Nancy Parris, and Opal Buxom. Despite the indictment, the judge granted a continuance in the case until September, due in large part to the fact that the constitutionality of South Carolina's capital punishment laws had been challenged and was currently under review. So it makes sense for a continuance because they want to make sure that irons, everything goes out correctly.

Yeah.

Yeah. On September 16, 1968, Martin went to trial for the murder of opal Buxom. He waived his right to a jury trial because, as he told the judge, I don't believe I could get a fair trial anywhere in South Carolina. And when he was indicted for the murder, he pleaded not guilty. But as the trial was about to begin, Martin's lawyers, HR Swink and CD Padgetta.

HR and CD shrinking compact disk, they.

Asked the judge for a conference. And during that conference, they explained that their client wished to change his plea to guilty.

Oh.

Judge Morrison asked Martin a series of questions to determine whether he was making this change with his own free will. And once he was satisfied that it was his choice, he accepted the plea. And when asked why he had murdered Opal Buxon, Martin explained, it was like he was standing on the side of a hill and watching himself in a valley. He knew what he was doing, but he just couldn't make himself stop.

I don't think it went like that.

So even the prosecution acknowledged that although Martin knew does know right from wrong, the prosecutor's office was of the opinion that Martin acted under irresistible impulses.

Okay.

Because he's a murderer. He's a horrible, horrible, vicious murderer. Later that day, Leroy Martin was sentenced to two consecutive life terms for the murders of Opal Buxon and Annie Dedmond. Additional life sentences for the murders of Tina Reinhardt and Nancy Parris followed in the next few months. Now, Leroy Martin's explanation for his crimes has always been that he had what Bill Gibbons described as a split personality, and this thing comes over him and he can't control it. It was, he explained, his violent side who had raped and murdered the four young women in Gaffney, while his good side felt such a great deal of remorse for his crimes.

I don't buy that.

And he used to say that his good side was the one that didn't want that guy to sit in prison for him.

No, because also, if he did have a split personality, isn't that some form of insanity?

I would think so.

Right. Like when the psychologists have said something about that.

Yeah, I think it's whether you can understand right from wrong, basically. And it's.

And he clearly can yeah.

And he clearly can.

He's almost trying to make it sound like he's, like he has, like, multiple personality.

Absolutely. He is trying to say that for sure. But they have found no.

Yeah.

No evidence.

This is a cop.

When he was calling, he was saying, no, I can't meet you in person because they're gonna have to shoot me like the dog I am. So he knew what he did was wrong. He didn't want to meet anybody. He just wanted to go get the attention.

It goes beyond irresistible impulses when he's, like, he's murdering people, he's raping them, and then he's going to sit with their family. Exactly. That's not an irresistible impulse.

That's just you just doing what you do. Yeah. And again, whether this was true or not, the claim did get some sympathy, enough to place him in the mental illness wing of the central Correctional Institute following his sentence in May 1968.

I feel like that was the goal for him.

He prefer. Like, maybe he expected this to be preferable than being among the general population. But he regretted this because, among other things, security was tighter on that ward, so movement was heavily restricted, and he complained, quote, there was no sunlight in the cell.

Yeah. You know, where there's also no sunlight when you're dead. When you're dead.

Yeah.

And you did that to three different. Four different women.

Excuse me. And in December 1969, Martin was moved into general population, where he remained for three years.

I almost wish that he didn't. He should never have gotten sunlight again.

Well, he remained there for three years because a little after 05:00 p.m. on May 31, 1972, Leroy Martin got into a fight with a fellow inmate, Kenneth Rumsey. Rumsey stabbed Martin in the chest with a shiv just below his heart and killed him instantly. Damn. That earned that inmate an additional 20 years on his already lengthy sentence. But five years later, that inmate was also found dead in his prison cell after having hanged himself with his own pants. So, prison, man, quite a cycle. Now, on February 28, 1968, because you're like, what could possibly be happening here? Everybody's gone and dead. Roger Dedmon was released from the Union county prison farm after Leroy Martin confessed to the murder of Annie Dedman.

And how many years had he served?

He was convicted and served ten months in prison for a crime he didn't commit.

That's a long time.

And this crime he didn't commit was based on false testimony provided by Union County Sheriff Harold Lamb and two of his deputies, which was corroborated in court by several members of other law enforcement agencies in South Carolina.

Oh, no. I thought you guys were doing good.

Yeah. Upon his release, Dedman reclaimed custody of his son and found work as an electrician in North Carolina. When asked about the wrongful conviction, Dedman told a reporter he wasn't bitter about what had happened. He said, the justice system makes mistakes just like everybody else. Thank goodness they don't make too many.

Wow.

Which is like a very mature way of looking at that. Like, I was like, what the fuck? I wonder. I mean, ten people.

People say there's more drugs inside a prison than there are in the streets. But you wonder if he was, like, able somehow to clean up his act.

I mean, maybe it shook him up.

Yeah.

But the memory of the Gaffney Strangler and the four murdered women have absolutely haunted the small town of Gaffney since they occurred more than 50 years ago. And according to author Mark Jones, quote, the ultimate legacy are the stories that permeate through South Carolina today. The bridge is a spot that people go to. There's always these stories that there's screams of girls that can be heard. Those types of things in small towns take a long time to disappear.

Yeah, it's like the end of a horror novel.

And I did look it up in one place that is that locals and other people refer to sometimes as Leroy's bridge off Highway 329.

Call it Leroy's bridge.

It's said to be a place where people will claim to hear the screams, moans, and cries of young women.

That's really sad.

And chain gang Road is also more of the same reports.

Oh, that makes me sad because that means, like, there's.

I know. I want them to, like, I mean.

It'S like a residual haunting, hopefully.

So the animation has to be rancid there, so.

Wow. I hate that they call it Leroy's bridge. Stop doing that, guys.

I don't think, like, I don't want to, like, indict all of the people, locals there. Like, that's what I've read on certain things. So, like, whoever's doing that, you probably shouldn't, but, like.

Yeah, that's what I mean.

Yeah, I don't. I just don't want anybody to be like, you said that everybody. Yeah, I promise I didn't say that.

Don't take that away, guys.

Wow.

What a case. I can't believe we'd never heard of that one before.

Yeah, it's so sad.

It is so sad.

And it's such young women.

That is a. That's a chilling spooky.

And this. Yeah, the story of opal just like, breaks my heart. Just walking with her sister. Two school runs up ahead of her and is snatched right off the fucking road in the broad daylight in front of her sister and thrown into a trunk.

You think that, like, that had to have been like seven, eight am?

Yeah.

Like, when does school start? You know what I mean?

Yeah.

The fuck?

Yeah. It's so scary.

Chilling.

Yeah.

Having kids must be the most terrifying thing on the.

It is. It absolutely.

Responsibility. My God.

That's why we all age like a president. Like, very quickly, like I am. I'm in a constant state of anxiety.

Yeah, me too. And I don't even have children.

Yeah.

Fuck yeah. Well, keep listening.

And we hope you keep it.

We. But not so weird that I didn't even give you the choice to keep listening. I just told you, keep listening. Usually I say, we hope you keep listening, but this week you have listening. Bye.

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