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You are now listening to True Murder, the most shocking killers in true crime history and the authors that have written about them Gasey, Bundy, Dahmer, The Nightstalker BTK. 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 Zupanski.
Good Evening.
Two families mysteriously murdered under similar circumstances just a month apart. One was memorialized in Truman Capoti's classic novel In Cold Blood, the other was all but forgotten. Dick Hickcock and Perry Smith confessed to the first, the November fifteenth, nineteen fifty nine, murder of a family of four in Holcombe, Kansas. Despite remarkable coincidences between the two crimes, they denied committing the second, the December nineteenth murder of a family of four in Osprey, Florida.
Over half a century later, a determined Florida detective undertakes exceptional efforts to try to bring closure to the long cold case. The book that were featuring this evening is in Colder Blood, The True Story of the Walker Family Murder, with my special guest, journalist and author J. T.
Hunter.
Welcome back to the program and thank you for agreeing to this interview.
J T.
Hunter, Thanks for having back on Dan.
Thank you very much. It's always a pleasure. Now, how did you come to write this book?
Well, I don't honestly remember when I first heard about this case, but at some point in a couple of years back, I came across a story about the murder of the family in Ausbury, Florida, and I just started doing some basic research into the case, tracking down different newspaper accounts of the killings, and went over to Sarasota, did some research there in the library and got, you know, some older newspaper articles about it, and then ended up
going over to the Sarasota County Sheriff's office and getting access to their files on the case. And you know, the more I read about it, the more interested I got in it, and you know, I planned on writing about it. Eventually I assembled a lot of materials about it, and it was something that I really thought was it was an interesting case and of itself, and so I
planned on writing about it at some point. And then, you know, several several years after that, I heard I came across a recent story about a detective who I had actually met when I was doing my initial research on the case. She had come up with a theory in the case, which ended up being the theory. That's that's, you know, the the focal point of the book in Colder Blood, right, right.
Well, let's get to that.
We won't completely go obviously through in Cold Blood. The obviously the classic book that people are pretty familiarized with a couple of movies in the book. But let's talk about a completely different family. It just happens to be a family of four. But this is the former Christine Myers and Cliff Walker. He's a ranch hand at this Palmer ranch and they live free, so he makes just a.
Few hundred dollars.
But in that time, in at nineteen fifty nine, and they've got a couple kids, a three year old boy named Jimmy and a little girl named Debbie.
Two.
And this is an osprey, you say, Southwest Florida, Sarasota County. So now you open the book with their out looking at new cars. So tell us a little bit about the beautiful Christine Myers and the rugged Cliff Walker and their little family, and a little bit about Osprey, South Florida to introduce this story. And then just before Christmas, they're out looking for a brand new car or a new car anyway.
Yeah, as you mentioned, you know, the family lived in and lived in Osprey, Florida, and that's that's not far from Sarasota. They're in the Southwest Florida area. And you know, back at the time, this is back in nineteen fifty nine, that area was was you know, extremely rural, you know, even more so than today obviously. And as you mentioned, they lived in a house there on the on the ranch.
He Cliff the husband, he was a ranch hand there on the Pumber ranch and he was able to live in this house, you know, rent free as part of his work there. And you know, they didn't have a ton of money. They weren't weren't a wealthy family by any stretch of the imagination. They were pretty pretty simple kind of country family, you know that you might picture. Cliff was kind of the consummate cowboy working the ranch there,
and you know, Christine. He had met her during high school and they had you know, they got married shortly after that and ended up having the two kids, Jimmy who was who was three years old, and Debbie, who was almost two at the time. And you know, Christine was you know, she was an attractive woman and she was, you know, people likened her figure to being, you know, similar to that of Marilyn Monroe, that sort of figure. And you know, she was a friendly, friendly person, outgoing
and you know, well liked by everybody. And Cliff was, you know, kind of a little more reserved character, but also someone who generally gone along well with everybody else. And you know, was very much, very much a family man, you know, interested in spending time with his kids and enjoyed them. And they lived out there in that house in the ranch for a couple of years prior to the you know, the incident that's detailed in the book.
Now you talk about this day and on the nineteenth of December nineteen fifty nine, and they're looking to trade or looking at used cars or looking at cars. Take us into that scene where they are looking for cars and what do they do before we introduce the intersection a very faithful intersection with mister Hickcock and mister Smith.
Okay, so on December nineteenth, they had a lot of errands. You know, it was holiday season, Christmas was not too far off, and so you know, there was a lot going on, as you can imagine, just like there is for most people on the holiday. And sure in that particular day, they had a lot of errands that they planned on doing, and in one of which was looking
at looking at new cars. They were interested in trading for a car that would be more functional for them, be better for them, you know, with a with a growing family, the kids and whatnot. So they planned on going into into Sarasota to look at cars, and you know,
they ended up doing that. They ended up going at different used car lots in dealerships in Sarasota looking at various cars, and you know, they ended up being a particular particular type of car that sort of caught cliss I was a nineteen fifty six Chevy was what he was interested in in getting, apparently, and they they went several places looking for him.
Now you introduce Hitcock and Smith and they're driving a vehicle, and you also introduced the backgrounds of Smith and Hitcock again to explain how this might have happened. This again, this intersect between these two parties. So tell us a little bit about Smith and Hitcock, their backgrounds, and what they were driving reportedly around that time.
Okay, so a few days before the nineteenth of December, which was the day the Walkers were out looking at cars, it was a Saturday, So a few days before that, Hickcock and Smith were making their way south. You know, it was about a month earlier that they had killed the Clutter family up there in Hokam, Kansas, and they
had been traveling around quite a bit since then. And a few days before the nineteenth of December, they were hiding down into Florida, and they were they had along the way, they had apparently they had stolen a a car, and you know, as it turned out, it was a nineteen fifty six Chevy bel Air, which was the type of car that Cliff was purportedly interested in had been been eyeing while while the Walker family was out looking
around in car shopping. So Hickock and Smith had that same type of car, that same make and model car, and they were driving it down into Florida a few days prior, and you know, they made their way down through UH, through the Panhandle and UH in Tallahassee, and they were they stopped at various various places along the way, and witnesses, you know, described them, and the descriptions met that of Hickock and Smith, and you know, eventually they
made their way down into South Florida, and you know, and it's partly detailed and in Truman Capode's in Cold Blood, they ended up in Miami right around the time of the Walker family was murdered. They ended up in Miami during that during that time period and stayed at a hotel there. And then that's where things get a little more blurred a little bit.
Uh.
You know, the account in Capode's novel as to how long they stayed in the hotel versus what the evidence that investigators ended up finding out about how long they stayed there and where they're you know, about where their whereabouts were during the pertinent time period.
Yeah, And before we open up this, I guess you've you've started to do this with Copodi and I won't we won't go into any kind of critique of Copoti and in Cold Blood, but you do say in this that there may have been some motivation to downplay either Smith and Hitcock's participation in this murder for publishing purposes, for practical publishing purposes, because Copoti wanted a really suitable
ending for In cold Blood. Hence the executions to wrap up the entire story that would have delayed the publishing would have delayed the story. So anyway, it seems that what this detective has put together and your book really talks about is the again, a very detailed, point by point reasonable analysis of the connection between these people that killed, these two people that killed the Clutter family and the people that of the Walker family.
And why. So let's get back to.
Smith and Hitcock. These guys met in prison, they got out three days later, they went and killed the Clutter family. Now you take us that they are a thousand miles away in Florida, and then the Walker family. Again, what is the how would it come and again you provide
this in the book. How would it come to be that what was the background of Hitcock and what was the background of Smith that would likely that would have them come in contact with the Walker family that day while they're out searching for a vehicle.
Well, Hickock and Smith.
They were known to have background working as a car painters, car repair and you know, doing bodywork on cars and that sort of thing. So they were known to stop at dealership and car lots looking for work when they were, you know, when they were on the run basically after the killing the Clutter family. So they they had they both had backgrounds and in automobile work, and you know, that's what they ended up doing when they were down
there in Florida. They they stopped at a number of dealerships and used car lots and various other places, you know, inquiring about whether there you know, be work for repairing cars or painting cars and that sort of thing. So they were spotted, ya you know, a lot of people that they came across. And the interesting thing as I was researching the case was that the witnesses they came into contact with, you know, at the time, they didn't know obviously that it was hicc Hock and Smith that
they were encountering. But nonetheless, the descriptions they provided were really, i mean, really remarkably.
Similar.
You know, they basically almost spot on to descriptions of Smith and Hiccock, And especially when you take into account what may have occurred at the at the walker House, you know, when the when the family was murdered, and the descriptions of the two men who, as I said, you know, fit fit the descriptions of Hitcock and Smith quite quite closely, would would seem to definitely support that they were there at the walker house.
You provide that Hitcock was a mechanic also a used card salesman for a certain time, which is a you know, amazing connection to somebody that's going to trade a car to to a family perspectively while they're looking at actual car lots. And you also said that you also had the other track record of all the witnesses saying that they exchanged tires, they cashed in various car parts for
money when needed. So they were familiar with that kind of salesmanship or the entrepreneurship or whatever you want to call it. And they also knew obviously prices of things involved with vehicles, so they were familiar with that. It's likely that that's reasonable thing that they would be around those types of places that this family could have bumped into.
These people. Now let's get to and also what we missed here is that I guess what you're we don't want to give away is the description of Hitcock, which was repeated by a bunch of witnesses. So let's not give that away. What that description very very specific detail of Hitcock in these this is reports. Let's get back to what happens with the Walker family in their pursuit of this vehicle, at least in the reconstruction that you put together, the likely reconstruction.
Okay, well, yeah, The theory was that during the course of car shopping that day that they either directly encountered Hickock and Smith and you know there and thereby Hickock and Smith learned of Cliff Walker's interest in the very same type of car that they were driving, and uh, you know, in which which case needing money, it was quite likely that they engaged him in discussions about either selling the car to him or trading it in some capacity.
But in either event they could have directly encountered them or uh, you know, in visiting the various dealerships. Having the the backgrounds they did, Hickock and Smith, you know, probably knew how to talk to the people that worked there and probably heard from one of the car salesmen or someone else there at the at the dealership, or a car a lot that at the Walker family had been around looking for the same type of car that
they were driving. You know, it could have been as simple as, oh, you know, there was a family in here just a little while ago looking for the same type of car, or they were interested in getting, you know, that sort of thing. So so one of those two ways, either one of them would have been would have been quite possible for Hickock and Smith to learn of the Walker's interest in that type of car.
You have an interesting again eyewitness report from that time is that there's a service station that they both use, and he had called Cliff had used the phone at someone's home and called at three point fifty no answer three point fifty five. You say that Christine and the kids were going to a service station, filled up, went home, and then fifteen or twenty minutes later, Cliff arrived at
that same service station and then proceeded home. So take us from again what the reconstruction seems to point to in terms of positioning of the car before we talk about the actual what must have happened that day to this family.
Okay, well, yeah, I mean leading up to that day. You know, obviously Higreck and Smith would have been traveling down from up north down through Florida. And you know, on their way down through Florida, they were spot at different spots. You know, on the seventeenth, a couple of days before the murder, they were spotted in Tallahassee. I think you may have mentioned the you know, they ended up selling the new tires they had in their car in exchange for some money and a set of older tires.
And then you know, they were spotted further down in the Sarasota area at a station asking about anybody needing auto painting and that sort of thing. And the same day they were spotted asking a resident down there in the Sarasota area if he wanted them to repair a
dent that they noticed on his car. And then they checked into the Miami Hotel on December eighteenth, the evening December eighteenth, and according to the hotel records, they ended up checking out of that hotel the very next morning, even though they had paid for h think about a week's worth of you know, rent, basically ahead of time.
For some reason, they decided they wanted to leave, so they left the next morning, they asked for refund and weren't given one, but but left anyway, and a couple of men matching their description were spotted in a department
store in Sarasota later that day on the nineteenth. And you know, while that was going on, the Walker family had done their car shopping on the nineteenth and that's, you know, obviously the day that these two parties could have intersected there in Sarasota, the Hickock and Smith coming up from Miami and the Walker family coming down from Ostbury, and they definitely could have intersected there in Sarasota. And then, as you mentioned, let's see the Walker family returning from Sarasota.
What happened is they had stopped by a friend's house and spent some time there, and eventually Cliff was was staying there to get some some hay or some feed for the cattle that they they maintained over there at their house, and Christine left early to go home and ahead of them, so she left, as you said, she stopped at this gas station not far from where they lived, and Cliff followed a little bit after about you know, I think it was about fifteen twenty minutes approximately after her,
and he had the two kids. He had Jimmy and Debbie with him. He stopped by that same gas station on the way home, so witnesses, you know, spotted them. And then so the the kind of the reconstructed events, you know, placed Cliff getting home with the kids somewhere around a quarter to five, around four forty five in the evening on the nineteenth of December, with Christine having arrived home a little bit before that, you know, about fifteen twenty minutes or so.
It's interesting you made that correction that I made a mistake where the kids were with her, they were rather with him, which is just a little less horrifying. When we talk about this one question in the Clutter family, we will get to all the comparisons, but I want to get to this one now because I think it will be important.
Is that.
When Hitcock and Smith killed the Clutter family, you talk about and in cold blood talks about Smith fighting or trying to stop Hitcock from raping Missus Clutter. Now missus Walker gets home first, and we talk about the encounter likely with these guys. And I asked you about the positioning of the car. It looked like what had happened in terms of the parking of the vehicles and what that was an indication of. And then I alluded to what happens with missus Walker, So can you tell us?
Yeah, so you know, according to the reconstruction again of what happened, Christine, according to friends and family that knew her well, normally parked her car a certain spot near the near the gate, near near the fence at the house there, and you know, to make it easy to get in get in the house, walk in through the
through the gate there and get into the house. And on this particular day of the nineteenth they when when you know, long ended up getting to the house, they found her car at a strange spot and not parked where it normally was, which indicated that some other vehicle must have been parked in her usual spot so that she couldn't parked there and had to park somewhere else.
So so that's the placement of the vehicles that I think you're referring to, is that Christine parked at an unusual spot for her, not where she normally would have been. So it's seemed quite likely that there was a car there at the house already when she got home on
that day. And you know, the the continuing the reconstruction and the theory of what happened is that it was Hitcock and Smith were there at the house already waiting for her when she got home, and you know, by herself she was she had gone ahead of again of Cliff and the kids, and so it's, uh, it's it's theeriyes that that they were there when she got there,
and then at some point there was a confrontation. And you know, Hickock was known to be sexually aggressive with with women, and it's their eyes that you know, he he took a liking to Christine and ended up sexually
assaulting her. And there's evidence in the house that supports that that that story as well, you know, including where where her shoes were found, you know, her high heeled shoes that she apparently uses a weapon to try to fend off the person who attacked her, you know, when shoe was found in the patio or porch area to the house, bloody shoe, and another one was found inside inside the house in one of the bedrooms there where
she was apparently actually raped in. And so it seems like the that Hiccock may have raped her, and in this particular case, you know, Smith either didn't try to or was unsuccessful and stopping Hitcock from acting on his sexual inclination there. And so Christine was actually sexually assaulted there in the house. And while that was going on, or right after it happened, is when Cliff showed up at the house with the kids and you know, obviously not knowing what was going on inside there.
And what does the evidence show how these killers approached because she it may have warned him or they may have known, but regardless, in the reconstruction, it looked like what was their approach to having to deal with Cliff? What did they do in anticipation of Cliff coming home?
Well, they were probably she may have said something to them to indicate that he was coming back, you know, along the lines of my husband will be here pretty soon or something along those lines, and you know, obviously alerted to that they would be looking for him. But you know, he ended up trying to go in, trying to enter the house the way he normally did, and the door that way was locked, so he had to walk around and go in through the patio area. Basically
the porch and entered the house through that door. So they had plenty of time to position themselves for that, and so they basically waited an ambush for him when he walked in the house.
Incredible you show.
You include part of the is the warning about the graphic photos, but this this is not so graphic, but just an incredible photo of person. Look like he's just laying on his back with his cowboy hat on. After that, so there's a friend named Don McLeod becomes a person of interest in his story throughout this story for many years. Don McLeod, he's friends with Cliff.
MM.
They're supposed to go hog hunting the next day or something. So you take us to the early morning and Don McLeod coming to get his friend Cliff and his discovery tell us about this.
This is a amazing scene.
Yeah, so in the the you know, the the next morning, so that you know the murders would have occurred the evening of December nineteenth. Yeah, Cliff had had come home with the kids and was ambushed as as we mentioned, and you know, basically they shot him as he entered
the house. So he you know, he didn't he didn't see it coming as soon as he walked in the door, he was he was shot dead, you know, in cold blood, and as you said, you know, referencing the photograph, he fell straight back on his back with the cowboy hat still on his head. And then you know, the rest of the family was killed right after that. So the next morning, the friend Don mc clouds, as you mentioned, he had made plans with Cliff to go hunting that morning.
And you know, this is this is the sort of thing that they did, you know, from time to time, fairly fairly often. And so he made his way over to the house early in the morning like he like he usually did, and typically when he got there, Cliff would be up and ready ready to go, you know, because they like to get an early start. But on this particular morning on December twentieth, when he got there, the house was dark, it was quiet, and uh you know this this is he found it pretty strange. This
is very unusual. He went up to the house and walked around to the back door there and knocked, and there wasn't there wasn't any response from the house, and uh so he started going around to other parts of
the house trying to get somebody to respond. And trying to see what was going on, went to the front of the house, and you know, the door was the door was secured, but the screen door was was unlocked to the porch, so he's able to get in there in the porch, but the doors into the house were locked. So he looked in the windows and saw saw some kind of like flickering light or something. So he got a little worried and thought, well, maybe the maybe the heater,
the gas he or maybe maybe malfunctioned or something. And you know, the family was breathing gas all night or something. So he got a little alarmed about that and decided he needed to get in the house. So he ended up cutting the screen door to the house and unhooking the doorlouch and opening up the back door to get into the house. And as he walked into the the kitchen there and turned on the light, you know, that's when he spotted some legs, Christine Walker's legs on the
on the floor. And you know, as he walked in a little bit more into the kitchen there, looking towards into the living room, he saw Christine's body there, and then he saw the the bodies of of Cliff and and Jimmy there in the living room as well, and obviously seeing that he got uh the adrenaline started pumping and he raced out of there and had to There's no phone there to you so he had to drive back into town to call the police to get somebody
out there. So you know, he did that as quick as he could.
Now, how did police assess this, uh crime scene? Other than they see that this is a slaughter of a family and obviously an isolated location and especially for the time, this is an incredible, horrific murder, slaughter of a whole family. What can they deduce by the forensic evidence left at the murder scene? What do they have there? And at immediately what do they who do they think? What kind of force? So they think they're reckoning with here with this murder?
Well they you know, there was bloodstains in different parts of the house that enabled them to reconstruct what had happened to some extent, you know, And I talked about a little bit about this already, about you know, what likely Christine had done and trying to defend herself and where she had been in the house, and you know, with the bloody shoes and all that and where the assault sexual assault had taken place, and so they were they were able to reconstruct those those events with where
her where her attacker would have first assaulted her, and then where where she had been shot. You know, as
it turned out, she was actually shot twice. The first time, the bullet just kind of grazed down the top of her head there, and it wasn't a fatal shot, just really as I said, just kind of kind of grazed her there, and her she was dragged to a different part of the house where she was actually the killing shot was actually administered a close range kind of like almost like an execution style shot, which is where the rest of the family was killed as well, based on
the the bullets and the bloodstains and whatnot, except for Debbie, the little girl who's not quite two years old, she had been shot, but the evidence seemed to indicate that the the killer or killers had run out of AMMO, ran out of bullets, and so you know, to finish her off, they picked her up and took her, carried her into the bathroom and plugged up the bathtub and filled it with water and put her in the bathtub
and held her under the water. Soil she till she drowned, and that's where they found her body in the bathtub. So there was you know, there was quite a bit of evidence in that respect, and they also found a bloody bootprint or a couple of different bloody bootprints different parts of the house that they attributed to being having been left by the killers as well.
Now right away, again police don't have a real good grasp of what's going on, but they proceed with likely suspects and hearing things as reports of the murder have come out. So they do have a few suspects, as you mentioned, with no real definite leads as of a few days later, as of December twenty fourth, even the state attorney says there's no definite leads, but suspects have been developed. So can you tell who those five basic suspects were?
Yeah, the you know, the primary suspects that that came up, I mean there were there. This case was was investigated for for decades and there were hundreds of people at suspects at various times, but as you mentioned, there were some certain people that rose to the top of the list, so to speak, and you know, one of them was Chliss's cousin Albert Walker. One of them was a former boyfriend of Christine Walker named Curtis McCall. One of them was one of the closest neighbors to the Walker family.
There a guy named Wilbert took her who was an older guy, and uh. One of them was actually a a serial killer who who was actually confessed to killing them, although it was later determined that he was making it up, he didn't really do it. But this guy named Emmett Spencer and uh, and then one of the other primary suspects was the was a close friend. They're the guy that and uh that Cliff had planned on going hunting with that morning, and you know, the same guy who
discovered their bodies don the cloud. So those were the kind of the prime suspects there for a while. And you know, Hickcock and Smith's names actually came up too, and they were investigated a little bit, but ultimately it was decided that probably wasn't them. Uh, And they didn't stay very high on the suspect list there for long. I mean, it was very early on in the investigation when they were considered and kind of cast aside as
probably not having done it. So they weren't. They weren't really seriously considered again for a long time after that, you know, decades and decades later before they were really closely investigated.
Again, tell us the circumstances that they did come under scrutiny at first, where police had an opportunity and missed it. Obviously, tell us what those circumstances were, so we can see how much they did miss What were those circumstances.
Well, for Hickock and Smith, I mean they you know, they obviously after they were arrested for the order of the Clutter family and there were reports of individuals matching their description having been been seen in different areas in the in the vicinity and the same general time frame is what first drew the sheriff's investigators attention to them. And you know, so they were they were looked into
a little bit. But their their fingerprints did not match the prints that were or the partial prints I should say really that were left at the in the Walker house, so that obviously tended to you know, minimize their the likelihood of their involvement in the murder. And uh, and then you know, they at some point after that they took light detector tests and denied having any sort of
involvement in the Walker murder as well. So you know, a combination of those things led the investigators that were involved early on in the case to rule them out as likely having committed the crime. But you know, down the down the road, it was determined that you know, the first of all, the partial prints were really what they thought they were, and so there was there was really no way that it would have matched the princes they were looking at from Hickock and Smith. And then
also the light detector test. The polygraph tests administered back at the time were notoriously inaccurate, so you know, a suspect being able to pass the test back then really cut in ort to be accepted as strong evidence of their not being involved. So the primary reasons that the early investigators ruled hickockram Smith out were later shown not to be accurate.
They did have a pretty good suspect for a while, at least in terms of behavior with Cliff's cousins, Albert, when a witness had said that he had always or long been enamored by Christine and he had acted strangely after the murders, almost hysterical outside the Walker home sobbing uncontrollably at the funeral or inconsolably at the funeral, and he fainted twice and had to be carried out of the funeral. So how serious did they look at him?
And I know we've already alluded it that obviously he ends up being cleared, But how long did they look at any of these suspects?
Were especially Albert? Did they look at him very seriously? And for how long?
Yeah, I mean they looked at Albert seriously. They looked at Don McLeod seriously. They looked at quite a few of these guys for a long time. I mean it was they were suspected for years and years, you know, you know, decades they were suspected of this. They could never really be completely ruled out. You know, they had again, they had taken light attector tests and things like that, but there was no way to rule them out definitively.
So they remained suspects throughout the investigation. You know, as new sheriffs came and went during the years there at the Sheriff's office, these people still remained suspects, and they were still whispered about in the community, and you know, even only members suspected elder could have done any sort of things, so they were suspects for a long time.
You also include, obviously paralleli the careers of the people involved on the police side and also potentially prosecution side with the authorities anyway, and you say that the sheriff Boyer dies in nineteen seventy three, and then in nineteen eighty one a distant cousin of Cliff worked his way up through the police ranks up to detective and takes this upon himself or gets the opportunity anyway to work
on this case. So tell us a little bit about how things have changed by nineteen ninety four he or pardon me, in nineteen eighty one is rom ron Albritton gets involved. And you fast forward to August fifth, nineteen ninety four, in an anonymous call, tell us about what happens. What changes obviously changes in DNA technology, but tell us what happens in this story.
Okay, well, well yeah, well, first you mentioned this anonymous call in ninety four, and so what happened there is someone had called into the saraceitas Eriff's office and left a message on the machine there, and this person said that they were a bartender in Pennsylvania Town in Pennsylvania, and that while she was working her shift one night recently at an old, older man she said in his sixties, who was a pretty regular customer hers had started talking
to her and actually started crying while he was there at the bar, without any real reason that she could
figure out. And so she asked him why he was crying, and he made up telling her that when he was a lot younger, he had killed some people and he specifically mentioned Osprey, Florida, and said, you know, said it was near Tampa, and purportedly had mentioned the name Walker also, And so she she called in to relay that information to the Sarasota Sheriff's folks there and had left the message, and in her message she said she would try to
get some more identifying information about the customer and would call back on a different day there. But she never ended up calling back. But what was really note worthy about that call was that Curtis McCall, who was one of the prime suspects that I mentioned that's talked about in the book, he would have been around that same
age in nineteen ninety four. He would have been close to sixty at the time at that call, so it seemed to indicate that, you know, he could have potentially been involved with it, but there was there was no further information on that. They detectives were never able to track down that caller, that bartender, despite you know, even zeroing in on the specific talent that she was supposedly from. No one matching that was ever was ever found or
any more leads generated from that. So, you know, that was one of the leads through the years in the case that kind of came and went, and as you said, they had different people work in the case and all written took over the case for quite a while, years and years and leading us up into more recently in two thousand and seven when Kim mcgath, the detective there in the Sheriff's office, took over the case and de dictive.
Mcgathe was the one who really started looking hard at Hickock and Smith as being very viable suspects and having committed the murder. And you know, she she's the one that really came up with the theory of the the car. She really focused on the car. That's really what got her attention was the fact that the walkers were looking for this certain type of car, the fifty six Chevy bel Air, and that you know, just happened to be the exact same make and model car that Hickock and
Smith were driving when they were in the area. And the fact that Hickock and Smith were spotted around that area known to be in the area at the same time the walkers were looking for the car, so that really really got her attention and she really started investigating
that and came up with this theory. And you know that the interesting thing too is that you know, not just the days leading up to the murder, but the days right after the murder, Hickock and Smith or individuals closely matching their descriptions were seen in the area as well. And you know, the the interesting thing with with the
the witness reports right after the killing. You know, the day after the killing, there were descriptions of someone that would match Hickock, the Kickock's description, and there were things physical attributes, I guess you would say that would be very consistent with someone who had been in a fight or someone who had been assaulting, someone who had been bearing the brunt of of a fierce resistance, and you know, in the form of you know, Christine fighting back against
her attacker, so it really seemed to fit quite well.
So uh so, uh so Kim mcgath, Detective mcgath, came up with the theory, and you know, she decided, well, DNA evidence would be the.
Real key there to be able to say definitively yes, hick Hock and Smith were there in the Walker residence and that they did can describ. So she, uh she decided that she needed to get that DNA DNA evidence however they could do it.
Let's go back just a little bit too. I think something that's really important and very very very uh again, very vivid scene in this book is that a few of the eyewitnesses talk about again an app app description of Smith and Hitcock, because there's a stark difference between the two characters. He has been disfigured, as you write in the book, with his face somewhat, and Smith has
been disfigured in his legs somewhat. But the eyewitness reports are that they see this guy that looks like fits the description of Hiccock, but with scratches on his face, but even more importantly, something else on his face about the size of a dime.
Which is very very important.
Yeah, so you know this, this individual matching Hiccock's description has spotted the day after the murder. You know, murder was in the nineteenth so on the twentieth he spotted several times in the area again at serviceations, car lots, these sort of places. But he spotted, uh with with
these scratches on a seace, as you said. And then also he has injuries to his face that are about dime size roundish, very very similar to the size of a woman's high heel shoe, so very consistent with having been inflicted by you know, Christine Walker using her high heeled shoes to defend herself. And you know, sure enough the high heel shoes were found at the crime scene with you know, blood on them. So so see even even more of this this evidence that seeming to tie
tie them to what happened. And you know, really it in the book, it's it's really laid out in detail all the similarities and all the evidence pointing to Hickock and Smith having committed the Walker murder as well as the Clutter murder. And there's there's a lot of similarities between the two murderers, just as far as you know, how they occurred, and who the victims were and how the victims were killed and all these sorts of things, and it's it's really, I mean, it's it really seems
to add up. There's a lot of it, and a lot of it just doesn't seem to be able to be explained by just this kind of happenstance or you know, crazy coincidence.
Now you have a you're right, you have a quadrupal murder father, mother, son, and daughter and the same order of murder son and son and daughter father. Uh so, same same order, father's son, daughter, mother, no witnesses, isolated crime scene victims shot in the head, male members shot in the face, adult women raped, blonde type A semen found on both mothers. Heron had tissue on the wall, just as they had reported that. Smith had said he
wanted to see some hair on the walls. Bootprints at both scenes, petty theft in both instances, lights turned off, no jewelry, stolen cigarette butts or rapper at both scenes. Buried evidence. Smith had followed both cases on radio and then lied about where he had read and found out of both stories. I found that was quite profound. Tell us a little bit about that.
Well.
Yeah, so, as as Capote had included in Cold Blood, Smith had propooredly read about the Clutter family murder and the Miami Herald newspaper when he and Hiccock were at the hotel in Miami, So he apparently had come across the story about it and had basically said something like, Wow, this is really bizarre coincidence that this family of four was murdered, you know, similarly to how we murdered the
Clutter family. And he made a comment to the effect that, you know, probably some crazy copycat killer read about the Clutter family killing that we did and then decided they wanted to go do it themselves, and so they're the ones that committed the Walker family murder. But you know, subsequent investigation revealed that there was there wasn't a story like that in the Miami Herald on that particular day that he supposedly read about it, and any of the
of the paper. So I mean that narrative, that story about how he had first heard about the Walker crime just simply wasn't accurate.
Now you outline that there'd been other people that were on this case, that it stayed with them and they went to. In one case, the guy went right to his grave regretting not having solved this case. But this mcgath is quite persistent. I don't want to give everything away, and I know you've got to go right on in a short period of time. But tell us a little bit about some of the efforts that mcgath did to try to get this This was not an easy tax to try to get evidence to prove you alluded to
talking about DNA and that pursuit. So tell us a little bit about how far she does go in trying to find a resolution to this.
Well, she initially tried to get some sort of DNA evidence from relatives of Hickock and Smith, and she pursued that for a while, and there was, you know, there was a viable candidate for that, but he didn't want to cooperate ultimately and didn't want to give the give the sample. So what she eventually ended up having to do is she decided that, well, it's going to be necessary to actually exhume the bodies of Hickock and Smith.
So she worked on that in conjunction with one of the individuals with the Kansas Bureau of Investigation and put together a proposed order to exhume the bodies, and they ended up filing that with the cord up there in Kansas, and she flew up there, and the judge there in Kansas, you know, read over the information and decided that, you know, there's probable cause to believe that Haycock and Smith were the ones that committed the Walker family murder, you know,
sufficient to support granting the request and allowing the exhamation of the bodies to move forward. So that's what they did, and they ended up digging up Hickock and Smith's bodies to get DNA samples from.
Them, and there was no guarantee that there would be any usable DNA despite the new advances in technology, but there was some hope just based on the sort of a geograph geography of the graves itself, so at least there was that opportunity. So without giving everything away, was there usable DNA to make tests?
Yeah?
So, I mean this was I mean, you got to keep in mind the time that has passed. I mean, it's it's over half a century since they were buried, so you know, it was it was over fifty years that they've been laying in their graves there, so it was really not clear whether or not they'd be able to get usable DNA extracted from the from the remains whatever remains were left there. Uh So, you know, they were able to get ultimately a DNA profile from Smith from his remains, but they were not able to get
one from Hickcock's profile, you know. And and you know, and according to the theory and knowing what they knew about Hiccock's background and his propensities and whatnot, you know, he's the one that was of the two, was much more likely to have committed the sexual assault on Christine, but his his profile wasn't able to be uh be obtained as a result of the exhumation of his body.
Now, you had this human touch in this book as well. Well human touch, so more human touch in terms of just an emotional character named Wendy Cassirella and she's a correctional officer in Christine's niece. Just tell us what bit of story you included in your book about her.
Well, Yeah, as you mentioned, she was Christine Walker's niece and so obviously you know, she's very emotionally and invested in the case and had you know, grown up at all heard about Christine from other family members and how how you know kind hearted Christine was, and so she always really kind of you know, looked up to Christine and you know, had had had deep feelings for and as you mentioned she, you know, she worked as a corrections officer for a time and uh, she she followed
the investigation over the years, and you know, including the theory that mcgaff came up about Hickock and Smith, and you know, the more she looked at that into it and heard and read about and whatnot, the more she became convinced that hick Hock and Smith did in fact do it. So she she she became convinced that that they were the ones that that had killed killed the family.
Now, this case has been deactivated until Bill that time remains where there is new developments in DNA technology or I guess some new compelling information. And again we just
left it open on this DNA. The very amazing part of the book too as well is that this decision on this examination to see if they can get this usable DNA we talked about that there was usable DNA to do testing, and it will just leave it at that in terms of a little bit of a mystery in terms of what happens with that testing Now with this book in Colder Blood, what has been sort of the reaction in making this connection after all this time actually when there is again not a huge criticism, but
there is some criticism on the official story laid out in Cold Blood.
Well when mcgaffe, when detective mcgaffe went to exhumee the bodies. I mean, there was a lot of media coverage of that event, you know, because of the connection too in Cold Blood tu many clothis in Cold Blood, which you know, obviously is I mean, that's a seminal true crime work.
You know, that's extremely well known and extremely popular. So the connection there and the possibility that the the two the two guys in that kind of this, you know, really the subjects of that book, that they had actually committed another very similar quadruple murder. You know that that
caught a lot of people's attention. So there was extensive media coverage of the UH exhamation of the bodies and the efforts to get the DNA UH and you know, as a as a side, as an offshoot of that, there was a lot of interest from a literary perspective, too, about well, if this is true, what does this mean about the veracity of Truman Capote's account in the in the book in Cold Blood, you know, which was supposedly
a completely true account of the crimes. And you know, and and in conjunction with that, you know, there's been there's been investigation and reports about other issues with with the Capote's account, you know, things that he included in the book that weren't really true or that didn't actually didn't happen at all. You know, he made up some
things that were there that never actually happened. And there were connections between him and Dewey, the you know, the kind of the main investigator there on the case, from the from KBI, the CANDABS Bureau of Investigation, made a very close relationship there, and there was some you know, kind of some extra considerations given to get cooperation and
things like that. So there was there there was a lot of a lot of interest generated as a result of that about the the truthfulness of Capote's account, and so you know that that of course really lends itself to this this possibility which you know, I really I would go so far to say this probability that Hickock and Smith actually did commit this other murder.
What's fascinating, too, is that the machinations that were in place, with Capoti being a best selling fictional author with a powerhouse publishing company able to finance the legal rep representation of the two men, you imagine to cost that in
today's dollars. But this incredibly stark difference because of that in the national, even to a certain extent, I guess, even regional, but especially national reaction to almost identical crimes with almost identical, innocent, young and horrific murders at the center. But completely, I mean, incredibly stark difference in the reactions to these two murders that both happened in nineteen fifty nine.
Yeah, it really is. Uh, it really is a an attention drawer now, you know, looking looking back at it, it's uh, it's definitely something that merits a new look and a deeper consideration. And it's certainly a shame that, as you said, that there wasn't similar attention or investigation or care given to the the nearly uh nearly identical crime.
Yes, absolutely, well, I want to thank you very much J. T. Hunter again for another remarkable tale in Colder Blood, the true story of the Walker Family murder. I guess in you've done a service in terms of bringing this story to light, and hopefully this investigation will not end and maybe, just maybe, hopefully there'll be some definitive conclusion out of this. Still something to come, but still a very good service to come and be able to tell the story of the Walker Family murder.
So thank you very much j T. Hunter for coming on this evening.
Thanks for having me on again, Dan, I appreciate it's always it's always a pleasure to come on your show and talk to you well.
Thank you very much, JAT you have a great night and hope to talk to you again soon. Thank you, good night, Good night,