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Du You are now listening to True Murder, The most Shocking Killers in True crime History and the authors that have written about them Gaesy Bundy Dahmer, The Nightstalker VTK. Every week another fascinating author talking about the most shocking and infamous killers in true crime history. True Murder with your host, journalist and author Dan Zupansky.
Good evening, This is your host Dan Zupansi for the program True Murder, The most shocking Killers in true crime History and the authors that have written about them. From the time he's a teenager, Jeremy Bryan Jones had led let his violent passions run wild, attacking, raping, and mutilating. Then in Mobile County, Alabama, Jones's rampage was stopped, but no one knew how many bodies were in his past.
Convicted and sentenced to die for the brutal murder of Lisa Nichols, an Alabama mother of two children, Jones shocked authorities with the story of his life and his claims of snuffing out over a dozen victims in thirteen years. But was he telling the truth or was he simply taunting his captors. Detectives from across the South scramble to prove Jones's claims. At every turn. The man dubbed the Redneck Ted Bundy, made a mockery of investigators, the courts,
and the media. In the end, he would be convicted of three murders, but investigators investigations into the horrifying crimes attributed to him still continue. Now, for the first time, the definitive story is told about a psychopath who enjoyed confessing almost as much as he enjoyed killing. Bloodlust killing was his pleasure. By journalist and author Sheila Johnson, my special guests this evening, Thank you very much for joining us on the program, Hilia Johnson.
Thank you glad to be here.
Oh, thank you very much. It's our pleasure now. First of all, of all the cases you could have chosen, and I know you've got some work in your past, what made you to decide to both to write about this case in particular.
Well, I didn't really know about this case initially. My publisher at Pinnacle True Crime called and asked me to look into it and see if I'd be interested in doing a book. Since I was the closest writer geographically to the place where the murder took place and where Jonas had been jailed, And once I looked into it, I was totally hooked. I was on the opposite end
of the state from Mobile, where he was arrested. I was up in the north end of Alabama instead of down on the coast, and since the distance there, I hadn't heard anything about the case. But I was just immediately started getting information as soon as I saw what was involved with it. And I didn't have any idea at the time just how much information there was going to be. And it was scattered all across the southeast and Midwest, and as time passed it just kept on growing.
Now, this is a bloodlust is set in Alabama, But like you had mentioned that sort of bordering states that this whole story takes place. Now, what is the city of Mobile and an area like and how big is Mobile? For those people that aren't really don't really know what we're talking about, describe the communities where this story is set.
Okay, it's Mobile, and it's one of the five largest cities in the States. It's down it's a port city down on the Gulf. But the murder took place in a rural area north of the city, and Johns seem to prefer to we work in the more rural areas. He was just not a city boy. He was seized from Oklahoma, and he liked to be in places where he could sort of ingratiate himself to his employers and co workers and and track and press everybody and be
the good guy. And also where he could get out at night and trove for hookups at the smaller local bars and restaurants, and city women, you know, didn't really go for his line as much as the the more country girl types did. So his only adventure into the big cities was when he made a trip to New Orleans, which resulted in the murder of a prostitute there, and when he would occasionally go into Atlanta to pick up prostitutes whenever he lived in Georgia.
Okay, now you've uh got right into Jeremy Bryan Jones here, but we have a different name for him, So explain that whole. That's a very fascinating story because it's so important. Uh, just tell us who Jeremy Brian Jones is first, and then we can get into the rest go back into the background as much as you have found out in your book and tell us who Jeremy Brian Jones was. What was his character like.
Well, there's not much information available about his early childhood and background at that time, but he came from a very lower class family that there was a lot of turbulence, drinking and drugs and things of that nature involved, and his mother had some pretty serious drinking and drug issues too, for which he was arrested on one occasion. And he
was not none of his family was very educated. But he always had the ability to sort of talk his way out of trouble and charm himself into anything that he wanted to get an entry to. And he had a pretty bad temper to go along with his his charm and his conceit. Also, he thought very highly of himself even from a young age, but uh when his
temper got the best of him. Well, the first incident on his his record of any kind of trouble was a schoolyard fight when he was just a little boy, and when the mother of the boy that he was fighting with showed up to pick her son up from school and saw him and Jones tied up out in the dirt in the school yard. She rushed out to try to break things up, and he turned on her
and knocked her down to the ground. In him just a small boy, so that that was the first thing on his record, and it was sort of an indication of things to come. And he was a big favorite with the muckers of the girls that he dated in high school or was friends with, because he'd always he was like the Eddie Haskell of of criminals, I guess you could say, and they all liked him. He was the boy I'll hope that their daughters would end up marrying,
which looking back now, I'm sure they feel differently. And he started experimenting with drugs in high school and started to show a pretty dark side there and eventually worked his way around to some sexual assaults and attempted rapes and things of that nature that sent him to court.
What type of drugs was he doing? And maybe tell us the nature of the extent basically of those sexual assaults was what was involved early on. And you say these are some of his first criminal charges, and you say, you know, you're talking about the the school yard fight being an indication. Tell us about the extent of those sexual assaults and tell us what happened as a result of those.
Well, the sexual assaults I think were primarily brought about by Matthews. He was very much into crystal math from a pretty early time there. That was his drug of choice right from the beginning.
Okay.
And there's not too many details on record about those assaults because both he and the girls involved were still
juveniles at that time. Okay, so we can't learn very much about that except that, uh one of the girls said that he threatened her with a pistol and and the other girl, you know, made a few other similar claims, right, And because of those two incidents, he went into a a program that they had in effect at the time, sort of a rehabilitation program, and he was required to go to therapy and and it was a residence type situation, and he on very many occasions would get mad and
disrupt the proceedings and and storm out of his his group sessions and things of that nature. So he was working his way up to a lot of problems. And then when he got out of that situation, he tried a couple of other incidents and got arrested for those and then failed to show up, so he was wanted on failure to appear, So you.
Say the book, he becomes in essence a fugitive at that point, mm hmm.
Right, that's when he after he completed this treatment program that obviously did no good, then he went back out reoffended and then failed to appear. And that's when he started looking for a way out of trouble so that he wouldn't get arrested on those charges.
And what was his solution for not being captured again and returned to the prison to face some time for these charges.
Well, his mother really helped him out of that situation. She ran into a fellow one night in a bar, obviously pretty drunk drunker than she was because she could still out talk him at that stage, and she convinced him that her poor boy was about to get railroaded by the law and stepped to prison for something he didn't do. And she claimed that this man volunteered his social security and driver's license information, everything of that nature. I think more likely she stole it from him while
he was drunk. Right, Well, Jones took all that uh information that mama had secured for him and hopped a bus to Alabama, and once he got down here, he had a very easy time getting news allegedly replacement ID with the Social Security number and and n name and driver's license number and birthdate that he now had, and he just very easily slipped into that identity and remained
John Paul Chapman for quite some time. He was no longer Jemmy Brian Jones then, and in his mind and everybody else that knew him that he met, all the people he worked with, women he dated, everybody that knew him from that day forward knew him as John Paul Chapman.
He essentially reinvented himself. The other part of his personality was that he was a drifter. And you talk about him securing work in different areas or having the premise for being in the area working, and you include the story of Hurricane Ivan in with the story because it just happens to be that was a threat in that
area at that time. Tell us a little bit about what type of work that John Paul Chapman chose and seemed to be a convenient reason for him being traveling around and not staying put in one area.
Well, he was the construction worker and had evidently had enough experience in enough different construction feels that he could get work very easily. And when he first came to Alabama, he got to work with a man named Mark Bentley and worked with him awhile. Then he went over into Georgia. He liked to do hurricane and and tornado clean up. He he was He was real fond of doing that type work because it kept him moving around and and
it paid very well. So he went over to Georgia and worked a while over there, pretty good while, because he he committed several murders over that way, or claimed to have committed several murders, know for sure that he did a couple, but uh, that was why he liked to move around so he could he could kind of
follow storms. And when he saw Hurricane Ivan was about to come in and hit the mobile area where Bentley lived, he immediately decided that he would go down there and see if he could secure a job with him once again. And he had been living with a woman for eighteen months over in Georgia named Vicky Freeman, and he told Vicky that he would go down there and get work and then find him a place and she could come
and join him. So she thought she was due to be joining him, and then all of a sudden she learned when somebody knocked on her door in Georgia that he was in jail for murder in Alabama and he was not even who he had claimed to be for the past eighteen months. So that was a rude awakening for her.
Okay, now let's go back to just a little bit here, so our audience was to get confused at all. Now you talk about him being in two areas and with a gentleman in Georgia, if I'm not correct, just correct me, and a gentleman he had met through sort of casual circumstances and the person that said, if you're ever in Georgia, come stay with me, and certainly he took them up
on that offer, a person named McIntosh in Georgia. And the other person that he befriended was this person as you had mentioned, named Mark Bentley, very important character as well. Now tell us about Lisa Nichols. Who Lisa Nichols is in this story and how the two met. Jeremy Jones and Lisa Nichols.
Well, Lisa was a very well liked, wonderful person, from all I've been able to gather who has Like you mentioned the two daughters, their two grown daughters, and they had children of their own, and Lisa was a grandmother and you would never have known it by looking at her, because Lisa looked every bit, you know, the piggure of her own daughters. She was just very useful and attractive person, well loved in the neighborhood and the community. She worked in a grocery store.
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And she was divorced and had a very cordial relationship with her former husband. I think she must have had cordial relationships with everybody she'd ever met, because she was so so well loved, and she kept in touch with her her daughters and all of her other family members. And Lisa lived next to Mark Bentley in a trailer
park there north of Mobile. She was his next door neighbor, and she had left her home the night before the storm was to hit to go and ride the storm out with one of her daughter's family and a motel farther up to the north where they'd be more out of the way of the projected path of the storm Kay And then when she returned home to check for damage, Jones had had shown up next door looking for work again with Mark Bentley, and he noticed her and a sort of homed in own her and had uh commented
to his friend Bentley's cousin that uh he would be quite interested in making time with her if the opportunity arose, and uh because said, well, you better leave her alone. You know, she's way out of your league. And by that time Jones was so high on math and several other drugs that he and the cousin had been indulging in while Bentley and his wife were a way that just sort of made him that much more determined to go next door and see about her.
Now you say that he that the cousin, and we're talking probably about Scooter Coleman said, yg Listen, listen, you're this woman is out of your league. And what you mean by this leap is that Scooter Coleman and definitely Mark Bentley and Steve and mister McIntosh and Georgia all of these people recognized very quickly that they had a person that was unreliable and definitely had a major, major crystal meth or a major drug problem living in their
midst which created all kinds of problems. So he wasn't the most trusted person. So when you say that, I just wanted to make sure people under when you say out of his league, he really meant that they were friends with this this lady as everyone was Lisa Nichols, and they definitely didn't think this person was that they should introduce or encourage any kind of relationship.
Oh absolutely, that's that's the case. And Lisa did not date people. You know, she concentrated on work and her family and she was not out looking for a good time in that sense at all, and would never have had anything to do with somebody like Jones.
Now, what was the circumstances with Lisa Nichols being found? What what happened next? Why was why were they in the company of each other? Does anyone know? Tell us a little bit about what the circumstances of the next few hours? What happened?
Well, apparently, while Lisa was staying at the motel with her daughter's family, Jones broke in next door and stole a pistol. And then that uh night, after Lisa had
had returned home. Then uh, as soon as things kind of quieting down in the neighborhood, John's left the trailer and went next door and uh pretty much forced his way into the trailer and started making advances, and Lisa naturally ordered him out, and he got t re angry, and he was He said that at the time that he was higher than he'd ever been in his life. So raped her. Then he shot her. He put her in her body in the bathtub and attempted to set
it on fire, trying to burn the trailer down. And before all the evidence and the trailer was shut up so tight that none of the smoke escaped, and nobody in the neighborhood could tell that there had been a fire inside. And when she didn't answer, her phoned it all the following day. The two daughters came that night to check up on her and walked in with flashlights and and found the trailer full of smoke and their mother's body in the bathtub. And that was that was
an absolutely horrifying experience for them. They were very traumatized by it, and I I I can't even imagine what it would have been like for them to walk in and find something like that. And of course there was a a big cry was set up and all the neighbors from all around came running to try to help and see what was the matter, except for Jones. And he sat right there next door watching TV while everybody else was outside seeing what happened, because he knew what had happened.
Did the police also find evidence that she was sexually violated as well?
Oh yes, m first and then shot and and put in the bathtub. And he just he evidently just went into a frenzy.
Now you say that, uh, clearly that there's a an investigation looking for a killer. Tell us what happens next. How long does it take for them to identify the killer Jeremy Brian Jones.
Well, they didn't arrest him as Jeremy Brian Jones because his luck would have it, his false id held for
for quite some time after he was arrested. But Uh, when the murderer just was discovered, several of the other neighbors reported that there was a new person in the area, and Uh described the vehicle that he was in, and Mark Bentley, his former employer, was able to give him his name and social Security number and both dates of the man that he knew as John Paul Chapman, right, and Uh he had disappeared from Bentley's home to da after the murder, and so they immediately had their prime
suspect in Four days after the murder, one of the lead investigators got a phone call from Chapman and managed to keep him on the phone on enough for the call to be traced, and another one of the investigators went to the location and found him and arrested him right there, still on the phone with the other officer. So he was he was immediately arrested and charged in the.
Murder now let's just go back just just a wee bit before we get to this next and you know, very exciting part of the story. He was arrested. You telling your book that he was arrested a couple other times in between a long period of over a period of three years, and his fingerprints obviously would be taken at that time. And despite those fingerprints being entered into the FBI's database that would do comparative studies between fingerprints,
he was never the names were never associated. Just tell us a little bit about that and then go on to the next What happened.
Next, Well, nobody has ever been able to pin down exactly how that happened. But uh, when he was arrested over in Georgia, he would be run with his fingerprints and the John Poulish happened identity, and it would come up that way. There was some kind of a glitch in the system. And if nobody ever figured out exactly how it happened, but they have certainly been trying to
guard against that since that time. Because during the time he was being arrested and then released or arrested and you know, kept for a fairly short time, there were three other murders that probably would not have happened if they had caught that fingerprint mistake initially, right, but it was a FBI situation and they were they went jumping through hoops trying to cover all their bases, explaining how it might have happened, and you know, garden safeguarden that it wouldn't happen again.
Right now, Chapman, you say, is he is located after they traced the where he's making a phone call from, and now he's in police custody. How long does it take the police to find out that he is not a Chapman? And then what happens?
Well, as soon as they had him in custody, they suspected from the look of the murder scene and how things were done, that he had killed before. And they immediately sent all sorts of information out all over the country to departments, just literally from coast to coast, with all his information on there, John Paul Chapman and his name and numbers and picture in the whole nine yards. And they got a message back from a prison up in Oklahoma that said, you know, you don't have John
Paul Chapman. We don't know who you do have. But we've got John Paul Chapman up and he had been in prison since very shortly after he gave up his identity to Jones's mother in the bar. Incredible, and one of the clerks that the prison happened to see the information that came through on the murder and Jeremy Brian Jones and recognized that who they had and mobile was not John Paul Chapman. And that was the first anybody
knew of it. They were just flabbergasted. And it was some time after that that they found out his real identity because they noticed he was calling the number in Miami, Oklahoma very often to a woman named Jeane Beard, and they called the Miami Police Department and asked them what collection there could be and they said, well, we don't know that she's got a son that disappeared from up here a few years back, that we had warrant zone named Jeremy Brian Jones. And that's when they determined who
it was that they actually had in jail. He had made his false identity hold for that long.
That's incredible.
Yeah, tell you.
Think it's incredible. When they had two apparent John Shopman's in jail at the same time and no one noticed.
Yeah that I guess they weren't. The Georgia authorities were not checking like the Oklahoma prison system and not running enough information through on a federal level for anything to turn up.
So oh, sure it was.
Everybody sort of dropped the ball all the way around on those.
Yes, Now, who are the central characters in enacting a confession from Jeremy Brian Jones? And what does he say? And when does he finally get around to saying some of this stuff? Tell us about that thought about that fascinating story.
Well, at first he denied everything, and then he would tell just a little bit of detail here and there, but still deny everything. And he wasn't long before he learned that every time they brought him out for a long interview session that he might get to order some special food or or get to make an extra phone call, or get some kind of privilege that he enjoyed. So he tried to drag things out as long as he could.
But one of the most telling things that he did was to place a call to Mark Bentley from the jail and literally confessed to him about the whole murder, admit that he had done it, and how and why and how terribly sorry he was, and how he regretted it, and that, of course was recorded. So he admitted himself at that point that he had done it. And then later on, when the detectives started confronting him with more and more evidence, he started crying, big crocodile theres and oh,
he didn't want to die. He's he was afraid of dying, and and he just loved life too much, and and he didn't want to get executed with one of the detectives reminded him that his victim had loved life too, just as much as he did, so, right, so he just kind of gradually started leaking out information because he saw that the the more he dropped to the the
more he would get out of it. And all of his claims were just thoroughly investigated, and some of the time there was no indication at all that he had been involved in any way, and he just told such a good, plausible, believable story. But people would travel from all over the country to come and interview him from the various departments where he was claiming, you know, that he had killed somebody in their jurisdiction. It it just in the circus, and he loved giving phone interviews to
the media. He loved for people to come there and and talk in various TV stations and newspapers. He just he literally ate it up and always had a story to tell and claim to make, and and it was the attention. He he just got addicted to the attention and could not stop talking, even though it's everybody who was advising.
Him not too sure certainly. Uh. Now you talk about this, the conf some of the confessions he makes, and obviously you have alluded to that the some of these things or exaggerations or oh well lies, nothing can be uh confirmed what you do have in your book. You mentioned
some names, Justin Hutchings, Kathy Freeman, Danny Freeman. Uh. You you mentioned some people in your book, and there obviously is a good reason why you're mentioning there are some likely victims of this man, and explain that whole story and why you're so certain or why other people are so certain that he'd likely He is charged for more than one murder, more than Lisa Nichols. So tell us a little bit about that. Who are these people that they they think he killed?
H Okay, Well, the two. The two people that that they know he killed the little girl over in Georgia, Amanda Greenwell and uh tam Tina Mayberry is a very likely person that he killed, but there's been no proof on that now. He was indicted for Amanda's murder and Catherine Collins and New Orleans prostitute. He's been officially charged
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Georgia where he lived and she was murdered during the Halloween costume party. And just left literally lying on the front step of the bar whenever she went outside your car, and somebody stabbed her to death. And he's always been the prime suspect in that murder. But it's just that last little piece of evidence lacking in that one and another case that I still sort of believe he may
have been guilty of. Patrese Andris was a Georgia head dresser that was kidnapped from herstalon and her body was found months later behind a church, and Jones had claimed that he had done that and gave all sorts of information about where the body could be found, and nothing ever quite panned out. But I still think it's possible he could have been given false information along with his
confession that might possibly have been true. So all of those were really checked out thoroughly, and in the three cases that he was charged with, they had plenty of positive proof and evidence. But in so many others that he confessed to, he might have learned enough from newspaper and TV accounts or overheard things in jail and gotten enough to confess and then earn himself a pizza or
stake or lobster or some free phone halls. So it's there's so many things that he may have done in so many that he might have not done that it's just nearly impossible to sort him out. But there's a huge list of people that he confessed to while he was in jail in order to get favors.
Right now, y you mentioned that Amanda greenwell after she disappeared that Chapman was actually or Jeremy Jones was questioned about her death. How did that come about that he was close enough to that investigation that he was also questioned.
Well, he lived there in the same trailer park with Amanda and her family, and as he had in several other instances, he showed just a little too much interest and acted a little bit suspicious enough to get people's attention, and that's how the authorities would end up coming to question him on these You know, he just he just tipped his hands sometimes by showing too much attention to
young girls. I know when he was living there, I believe it was in the Macintosh household, he he showed a little too much attention to the the teenage daughter and literally started stalking her and tried to break in the householders several times. So, you know, he he was known for that sort of behavior.
Now, hold the murders that he confessed to. How many did the police hone in and say these could be good possibilities based on the information that he gave us. The police, Well, they did that on almost all of them.
But then when they would check 'em out in detail, they'd never be able to find enough proof for or never be able to locate bodies where he said they'd been left. And you know, they always tried. Everything he said seemed plausible at first, and then when they dig into it they might find it was coming up a little short, or or the timeline might not work out just right. But uh, for instance, the the girl that he claimed was his first victim, it was an Oklahoma
neely wed. Her name was Jennifer Judd, and she was just a gorgeous girl and I think had only been married a week and he murdered her in her apartment and he confessed to that. But he's never been charged because there was no any evidence of any kind other than what he had had claimed. There was no physical evidence ever found that could link him in any way
to that one. But he he claimed that she was his first victim, and when he claimed that he had killed a great number of prostitutes, and in Mobile and in Metro Atlanta, they could never find any corroboration there. And nobodies were found in the swamps where he said that he had dumped them, and no body in particular came up missing in the kind of numbers that he was claiming.
Now in his confession, you know, it's various various responses from various types of killers. I guess at different levels or or different levels of honesty. How did he describe his victims? How callous was he in the description of the victim? Did he do the typical trying to rationalize why some of these people were killed? I'm saying in the confession.
Itself, sometimes he would sometimes he'd be all remorseful and shed a tear or two, and sometimes he was just very matter of fact about it. And in the case of the New Orleans prostitute, they were questioning about him about her murder, and one of the officers from New Orleans that had come over said that it just gave him cold heels when they asked him why he had killed this woman, and said, a change just came over down his face and he sort of growled out because
the bitch deserved it. And you know, sometimes he would be that way, and sometimes he'd be very matter of fact, and other times he'd say, oh, it was just business. He was sent to murder somebody because they had cheated somebody else on the drug deal. You know, he always had some reason, but it changed from one case to the next.
Now you spoke of the confession that police got that was I guess damaging at court trial. Potentially this is talking about Lisa Nichols and his involvement with the death. Tell us about that confession. I'm very interested to see what he actually said. Obviously, he looked up to Mark Bentley. Mark Bentley took him under his wing. Tell us about that confession and how damaging specifically it was in some of the details he gave to Mark Bentley in that confession over the telephone.
Well, Mark Bentley was the one that he told that at the time he did that, he was hired than he had ever been in his life, right, and he said he just he didn't know why he did it. It just happened, and he regretted it so much and he was so sorry for the family and sorry if because it was a friend of Marx, and Marcus was
having none of that. He he didn't believe that for a minute, and Jones, you know, kept admitting a little more and more to him, and it boiled down to the fact that he was so high on crystal meth at the time that he was just totally out of control, and and said he'd n what he was doing. I think he was pretty well aware of what he was doing, but he didn't have any any conscience or any hesitation to to do any of it. But he'd be pretty
much outlined. Well. One thing that he did, though, he tried to turn it around on on Scooter Coleman and say that Scooter was involved. And oh really tried to convince Mark that, you know, Scooter was in on the plan. And then later on, after Scooter was killed in a freak electrical accident, then he went just full bore at the time of his trial trying to turn it around on the Scooter. But uh that that blame the dead guy tactic didn't work in that particular case.
Did he talk about any sort of rationalization or justification for having having shot her, and and then did he mention anything about the sexual aspect of it at all ever, too, Mark Bentley.
I don't believe he rationalized it in any way. I think he may have told Mark that she turned him down and he got mad when he tried to but then he he told other people later on that that it had been consensual and she had asked him to come over and bring her some drugs, and his story
changed constantly. But as far as rationalizing that, I don't think he was ever able to come up with any kind of an explanation that he thought Mark Bentley would even come near to buy because, I mean, what he did was so just beyond the pale that he tried to get Mark not to hold him as responsible as he thought he was going to hold him, and that you know, like I said, it just didn't work. Mark didn't want any part of it.
Now. Tell us about the ensuing trial. Is there many motions put forward? Is there a huge delay between the time of the arrest and the trial? And tell us about whether Mark Bentley and then McIntosh, of mister McIntosh from Georgia, his other landlord, if they participated in the trial at all. Tell us about the trial please.
Well, the trial took on some some really political aspects before it ever even got started, the Mobile County District Attorney had stalled around trying to get more confessions out of Jones, when it was obvious that he was making quite a bit of 'em up, and he kept wanting to put the the trial off and postpone any action
being taken. And Lisa Nichols family appealed to Alabama's Attorney General and he personally took over the prosecution of the case, took the case away from the Mobile County District Attorney and and tried the case himself with his own staff, which doesn't happen very often, you know. And right, that's set up a a feud that's running hot and heavy to this day between those two men because of that, And the DA ran against the Attorney General in the
last election and got soundly defeated. So, like I say, you know, the the feud is still ongoing, which started because of that. Now, when they got to the trial, Mark Bluntley did testify. They played his entire taped conversation for the jury, and I believe quite a few of the people from Georgia had come over to testify also that had worked with him over there, had offered him a place to stay until they were forced to put him out because of his drug use and things of
that nature. But uh, the trial just turned into an absolute circus. There were so much media. Aaron Jones would turn around in his seat and smile for the cameras out in the hallway and and just paid more attention to what was going on in that respect than he did what was happening in the courtroom.
But so he was really enjoy He was really enjoying himself, was he He loved it.
He loved the attention. He never acted like he was on trial for his life the whole time. He was susan enjoying the attention so much. And he was constantly talking to the press and making statements and giving interviews and talking to these investigators without his attorney being present. And the attorney was just horrified. The man was completely out of control and there was nothing his a attorney
could do about it. And he would He was constantly making his own statements, refuting whatever Jones had said that day to whoever he had said it to. And you could tell that he wished he had certainly never gotten involved in that. One on one instance, he was trying to get the judge to arrange for a psychiatric evaluation.
And this was, you know, allegedly to help Jones. Well, Jones rears up in his seat and balls out I ain't crazy to the cook room m and his lawyer trying to prove that he is so he might use it insane defense. Well, the attorney of mister Hybibiosdy jumped up out of his seat and shock Jones back down into his chair and put his hand over his mouth to shut him up. So that's that's how out of control he was.
Right, now, what was the you you mentioned now that this the state and he's tried in Alabama, obviously, right, and they have the death penalty. There is, uh the death penalty also available in Georgia as well.
I'm not sure if it is at this time or not. It has been in the past. I'm I'm not sure if it is now or not. But he's highly unlikely to ever be tried for the murder in Georgia or the murder in Louisiana either one. Even though he's been charged. I don't think he'll ever come to trial because it's such an expensive proposition to try somebody, and he's already been.
You know, he's on death row in Alabama, So as long as that's the case, I don't think they would ever attempt to try him in those states unless for some reason he got his sentence overthrown here, which is highly unlikely to ever happened.
I was just wondering, you know, just something to think about. It's not much of a question, but just often some of these guys that are facing a death only one state will often confess to crimes where there is no death penalty and realizing that there's not much that anyone can do even if they were convicted of it. Anyway, getting back to the trial, what did they use as a defense, Well, we're attempt to.
Use the Yeah, tempt is the word. It was so
far fetched. It just just went beyond the pale. Here a lot of the time that he claimed that Jones was confessed into so many murders because he had been given medication in the jail that caused him to talk uncontrollably, and that most of the details of those the vasions was coming from stories that was told by drug dealers in the jail with him, and he also it was claiming his defense was that Lisa had had consensual sex with him and things got too rough, and during the
preliminary hearing, Lsdy made the absolutely incredible statement that he didn't think it was that much of a crime to shoot a dead person, saying that Lisa had already died of a drug overdose before Jones shot her, which was not true. He Lassdy said, well, it's not that much of a crime to shoot a dead person. It's it's now a thing instead of a person, and that sent Lisa's whole family just running from the courtroom in in horror. That was to to hurt a statement like that made
under those circumstances. It that was just Yosdy was pretty good at statements of that sort anyway, And when he first took over the defense, he told the media that Jones was just a highly intelligent person, and then a few days later he'd be claiming that he was in no way mentally competent to talk to the authorities without an attorney present, And pretty soon he was saying that he didn't need talking to the media or anybody else
because he was just totally mentally unfit. And this was a man that he had initially claimed to such a stand up guide that was so intelligent that he just
couldn't possibly have murdered anybody. And uh, when when Jones finally made it under the Woodness stand, which he was just dying to do, that he couldn't hardly wait to get up there, and he had the audience literally laughing out loud because he announced what a good looking man that he thought he was, and how he had away with Lemons and he could talk the pants off of a nun and bragged about how whatever he wanted special food or privileges, all he had to do was make
what he called the magic phone call to the investigators and they immediately had him escorted into the interview room and given him whatever he wanted, and and he just generally did everything that his lawyer had told him not to do and got up there and performed like a circus monkey on the stand. And it it was a total laughing stock.
What was his explanation for why he you you've told this part of it? Why what was his explanation for having to shoot Lisa Nichols? Well, what was the purpose of it?
I think he just had the stolen gun and and shot her to keep her from telling anybody that he had broken in and raped her. See, he had committed that, and then he killed her to keep from talking. He he shot her to keep from talking, and then he tried to burn the body to cover up evidence of her having been shot and raped.
No, what I meant was what was his explanation on the stand for she s He already said, Well, she died from a drug overdose, so it wasn't a big deal. I didn't think it was a big deal to shoot her. But w what what?
Yeah? Why he said that he had shot her after she had died of a drug overdose? Right, Well, he said at one point I don't recall if he said this on the standard not, but at one point he made the statement that he he shot her to keep it from looking like he had brought drugs to her. He wanted to make it look like somebody had broken in and shot her, not that he had given her drugs and she'd died of an overdose. So that was supposedly to cover up the overdose, which didn't happen.
I see. Oh so so okay, So his claim that there was a drug overdose was totally disputed by the UH corner or the medical examiner.
Oh, absolutely, there was not a trace of any kind of drug or anything else in in Lisa's system, so that that was a total fabrication.
Yeah, and then obviously we won't go into too much. It doesn't d you know, this guy doesn't dignify too much to go through whether uh, there was any mitigating circumstances to prevent him from getting the death penalty. He certainly got the death penalty. The jury decided pretty quickly. What was the situation.
Well, it took him two hours to find him guilty and it only took him forty five minutes to decide on the death penalty. So it was pretty much a cut and dried thing. It it was. It was very fast and there were no mitigating circumstances of any kind that were ever mentioned.
Was uh Lisa Nichols family surviving members of the victim's family in the de attend court?
Oh? Yes, yes, they attended every day. Her her daughters and quite a few of her other relatives were always there.
And the father of Amanda Greenwell came from Georgia to attend the trial, and the husband of Patersea Drey came over and he attended the trial so you know, other victims' families there in addition to Lisa's family, but they were there, and after the trial, Lisa's daughters told the press that they just could not be more grateful to the mobile investigators and to the Attorney General's office for the work that they had done, because it was the
case was handled very well by everybody involved in that respect. Where they all fumbled was allowing him to play him like fiddles on all these confessions to get his extra treats and privileges.
Now, if you've answered this, I apologize. I just want to make sure that I understand this. I'm just curious. Now, officially or unofficially, Tina Mayberry, Amanda Greenwell, and Patricia Andres are the people that he is suspected of killing, likely the people women to disappeared.
Yes, but there's another huge list besides those. There's there's so many other people that he was suspected of besides them, I mean, the list of would own and own and own in several states.
How many would you say, not to pin you down or anything, but I mean, no one's going to sue you, But how many do you think he likely more than likely killed? With you know, with fairly solid evidence that of comparative type of crimes and victims and geography, how many do you really think likely that he killed.
Well. I think that it's likely that he killed Jennifer Judd, who he said was his first victim. I think it's also likely that he killed a couple in Oklahoma, Danny and Cathy Freeman, and kidnapped their daughter, their teenage daughter Ashley, and her friend Laura Bible, and then murdered them somewhere. Their bodies had never been and there was no proof of any other kind to ever substantiate that, but I have a gut feeling that he was responsible for them.
And it's also possible that another couple involved in the the drug underworld there in in Oklahoma, Danny Oakley and Doris Harris, were murdered and their trailer was burned, just like the Freemen murdered when and when their trailer was set on, and another couple out in Oklahoma was murdered under similar circumstances. There was a girl in at Moore, Alabama, close to Mobile that uh disappeared from her home under
circumstances similar to Lucy's. She's never been found now it's very possible that he could have done some or all of those murders. It's possible that he might have done none of 'em. I think he's responsible for some of those. And also justin Hutchings, the young man you referred by a drug overdose, I think that was responsible for that because he was well acquainted with him and claimed responsibility right.
Right, Yeah, with a combination of similar characteristics and mo and maybe even signature to a certain degree, or at least victim of victim characteristics. It's very likely because especially when you said earlier on that when people first look authorities first looked at this, given the particulars of Lisa Nichols murdered. Am I not correct in saying that they felt that this they immediately sent out the particulars to
other bordering states. But they really did feel that this was not from a perpetrator that was on his first offense.
That's right. The detectives said at the time that as soon as they looked at the scene, they immediately had a feeling that this was not his first crime of the sword, and that's why they sent all the details and descriptions out to so many different places and that's why they started having hits from all around over the
country from some of these similar crimes. They thought for a time that he might be responsible for some of the crimes that were attributed to the fellows that they called the truck stop killer, and uh, he kills quite a few, and Jones confessed some of those, and then you know, gave some details about some others. There were several unidentified bodies that they thought, you know, with the location and evidence of how they were killed, that might
have been Jones's responsibility. Now, the lady in New Orleans, the prostitute that was murdered there, it took a while to identify her, and they had to send her her skull to have her her face reconstructed, and then sent photographs of that around and had him on the knees. And one of her friends happened to see the picture of the reconstruction and recognized it as being her, and
she had been at that time for several months. And then they started investigating that and and discovered that Jones was responsible for that murder.
Wow, So where is uh? Just quickly, where is uh Jeremy Bryan Jones right now? Where's he being held? Uh? In death row.
Uh, he put home in prison here in Alabama, and he's having himself a fine old time. He's he's working all of the internet death row pen pal websites, and and just on one of 'em, he made the statement that all the different wonderful things that he enjoyed doing, he liked long walks, and he liked the hunt and fish,
and he liked Nascar. And then he made a statements that he liked Marti Gras, which I found pretty m I don't know, it's that's where Katheryn Collins was murdered, was during Marti grass And for him to make a statement like that on his website, I thought was pretty strange. Yeah, he's up at the throw and working it for all.
The worth and enjoying his infamy.
That's it. He enjoys that. He would do anything any way, anyhow to get attention. And he's thanks to a lot of people that I tend to personally think of as bleeding hearts. He's getting a lot of attention from those death row websites. Yeah, they all want to they all want to save the poor misunderstood boy.
Yeah, yeah, I know. We got a lot of that in Canada, a hell of a lot more than you've got. It's incredible here, you wouldn't believe. Well, we don't have too much type of that. We have a few minutes, though, I'd like to talk a little bit about some of the other books that you have and some of the other projects that you have coming up, and how people can contact you if you have a website or a
blog or just what. Uh, just give us a little bit of information about new projects and some of the other books that you have already ought in print.
Okay, My first book was about uh, one of the cases that I worked when I was a reporter. Fella was about a four hundred pound cannibal that carded his dead girlfriend's body all over the southeast, strapped into the passenger seat of his car, and he's I only had a wreck up here in the county where I was working. And that's that's how they discovered that that was a hard book to write though, because there was no trial,
there was no search for the killer. I mean, the killer was right there and they had him, you know, right from the get go. But it was it was a very interesting story and I I did manage to get a book out of It, which was my first one, and my second book was also from Concerned a man that murdered his wife and mother in law for insurance money and then stabbed him with Native American spears and knives and things to make it look like a cult
killing of some kind. And he would have gotten away with that except he just couldn't keep his mouth shutting. He had to brag to somebody about what he had done, which happens pretty often, I think. And my third book was The Jones Book. My fourth book, which will be out in August, is I'm I'm really conflicted about this book.
I have never written about somebody that received a big sentence for anything that I believed was truly innocent of what they were convicted of, right, But the woman that has been sent to spend her life in prison for murdering her ex husband's current wife, I think she's innocent. I think someone else committed the murder. There was another person with her at the time, and I think that person is the real murderer. And I'm really conflicted about it.
Everybody that has read that manuscript says that they immediately come to the same conclusion when they're just presented with the straight facts. So I would sincerely like to see this woman to get another trial. I hope that that can happen because I think she should have gotten the short sentence and the person that's walking free now should be the one in prison for life.
Well, good for you. I'm glad you're taking sort of an activist role. I think there are obvious there are people fighting for people to get retrialed, but I think the fastest, most and one of the most effective ways is to get the media involved write a book about it. It's surprising what kind of attention then comes to that same story. So I just get to you and good luck with that.
Well, I certainly hope it works in this case. I would like to sit out on my back porch and drink coffee with this lady instead of having her sitting down there in prison for the rest of her life. I feel a lot of empathy for her.
Well, that's great. I want to thank you very much, Sheila for a very informative interview about your great book, Bloodlusts. I want to thank you like I say, I want to thank you very much and have yourself a good evening and best of luck with the new project. What is the name of the new project, the projected name of the latest project. Do you have a name for it yet? Title for it?
The new book is blood Ambush.
Blood a Bush. Okay, we'll be looking for that and other titles with Sheila Johnson. Thank you very much.
Have a good Thank you so much, thank you, thank you.
Bye bye bye. You've been listening to the program A True Murder with your host Dan Zapansky, the most shocking killers in true crime history. Have a good evening, Good night,