SIDETRACKED-Richard T. Cahill Jr.

killer is responsible. As investigators struggle to find evidence, Sharpton and his supporters denounced the entire area as a clan den and make public pronouncements that a racist cult is operating throughout the area. Then, as if things can't get any worse, the transient who found the body, confesses to an unspeakable sexual act against the corpse. Almost immediately after the media reports his alleged depravity, he changes his story and accuses the police of making him a patsy and

a scapegoat. To add to the expanding circus, he tells the world he is really an undercover agent for the CIA, FBI, and Inner Pool. Only solving the crime can quell the chaos that threatens to ignite a powder keg of racial tension and get past the rumors to catch the real killer. But ken investigators overcome the outside forces that repeatedly sidetrack

their efforts. Find out in this new great true crime book from Richard T. Khill, the author of Hopton's Ladder, the book they're featuring the seating is sidetracked the betrayal and murder of Anna Kithcart with my special guest, journalist and author and attorney Richard T. Cahill. Welcome to the program, and thank you very much for a green in this interview. Richard T. K. Hill Junior, Hi, it's a pleasure to be here. Thank you very much. Very very involved case,

very unusual. The incredible detail that you bring at the trial, and we'll talk about that very very soon. First off, what is your give our audience your personal background and your personal connection to this case. And finally, how did you come to be in a position to write Sidetracked?

why not? It might be fun, and I started looking around and then I suddenly realized there was a case right here at home where I live that had a lot of things that would really be interesting. It was kind of personal to me because Victor Manny Kithgart was a year ahead of me in high school. I knew her, and, like many people in Kingston, was stunned when she was found dead that July morning. I didn't know her that well. She was very popular, big surprise. I was a geek, so,

you know. And I don't know if it's still this way in school, but in those days, popular kids didn't usually want to be seen with not so popular kids unless they were, you know, making fun of them or whatever. But Annie wasn't like that. She didn't care about that. She was friendly to everybody, and little things like that get remembered, especially when, like me, you're a not so cool kid, And you know, there were a lot of questions that I had that I wanted answered, and it had.

The case had so many interesting twists and turns, and as I started researching it and realized that I could not only write an interesting book about it, but I could present Annie in the positive light that I always felt she should have been presented yet wasn't. That's when I made the decision that this would be my second book.

Some of her hair had been cut, she had racial slurs of a type that I won't go into detail about on the program written on her in what appeared to be charcoal, and she had dog feces smeared on him. She was taken into the hospital. There were some officers and one of the emergency room doctors who immediately suspected that something was wrong because they did a test where she was unsupposedly unconscious, So they picked up her hand

and held it over her face. Now, when they let go o her hand, being unconscious, her hand should fall down and smack herself right in the face, But it didn't move to the side of her head, which was some indication that she was conscious. After a day or two, through a member of her family, she made public her

allegations as to what had happened. She alleged that I believe it was five men in total, all of whom were white, had basically kidnapped her, raped her, sodomrster her, and treated her in despicable way solely because she existed as an African American female. So this of course raised tremendous media coverage. Very prominent members of the national African American community came out and got involved. Bill Cosby as

an example. Know, he's had some problems in recent years, but back then, you know, he was the you know, he was the King of the Mountain. I mean, he was, you know, a major Hollywood star. Everybody loved him. He came out in support Mike Tyson, who at that time was the heavyweight champion of the world. He came out and support a then young reverend named Al Sharpton, who had come to some prominence over a matter, a couple of matters down in the city, the Crown Heights matter

and a few others. He came into Poughkeepsie and they began making all kinds of accusations. Eventually accusations were made accusing one of the assistant district attorneys, a man named Pagonus. He was accused of being one of the perpetrators, as was an officer who had unfortunately become depressed and committed suicide named christ They accused him as well. Pagonus would later sue them for libel and slander. The difference, of course, libral was written, slander was verbal, and there was a

significant judgment entered against them. But in any instance, so this is going on, and there's tremendous media coverage, and shortly before the whole thing happened with any Kikart, one of Sharpton's inner circle members came out publicly and made a statement that Tawana Brawley wasn't telling the truth.

So you've got a situation now where you've got tremendous racial strife that's going on in Poughkeepsie, which is about twenty one to twenty two miles south of Kingston. But the public is just starting to turn. It's starting to turn, and people are starting to think, you know, maybe this is not what it appears to be. And now the morning of July twelfth, Anny kit Carter has found and the body is found with the letters KKK carved into her legs and a K into her stomach. And when

that came out, now suddenly sharpened. His supporters pivoted to Kingston and began making accusations that the crimes were related, that the area was their words a quote planned in close quote, and they said that a racist cult was operating in the area and likely had committed both crimes. And so the media circus came to Kingston.

the nearby as you describe the very nearby hospital. So maybe you can also tell us the proximity of what we're talking about here and what he finds and his interaction with the two nurses from the hospital that night or the next day, I should se all right.

tracks that ran through there. In fact, those tracks were used up until nineteen seventy five. At that time, they were owned by a company called Conrail, and they made the decision no longer to use it and became abandoned. I can still remember from the house I grew up in the first seven years of my life. I can remember early on looking down and seeing those that train going by. But then when I was four, it went away.

But I still remember that train because I remember it was to go out in front of my house and look, and there it was. But when the train was abanned, those train tracks were abandoned. Nobody was maintained that railway bed. So although the actual path itself where the tracks were was clear, the area around it was overgrown and so forth. And so this became a place. It ran right behind the hospital, and this became a place during the day where you'd see a lot of kids playing hooky from

school and things like that. Some people use it as a shortcut to go places, but after dark it was something different. You would see bums or homeless people going back there. People would go back there to drink, do drugs, engage in other activities, so it was not a place you really wanted to be after dark. It was also there was a very little light back there. What a little light you'd get would be if you brought a

flashlight or if there was some moonlight. So this was a pretty when it got dark, it was a pretty spooky thing. In any instance. On the morning of July twelfth, two nurses are walking up the road that ran along

the side of Kingston Hospital was called Foxhall Avenue. Kingston Hospital is on the corner of Foxhall on Broadway, and you would go down Foxhall Avenue and then on the as you went down and on your left hand side you could see the entrance into the rail tracks, and even in daylight, it was very dark and gloomy on There's a picture that I put in the book just to try to get people some idea that even in the daylight this was a pretty gloomy, spooky looking place

because of all the overgrown brush overhead. So these two women are walking to work nurses as you mentioned that he worked at the hospital, and they're on their way in and out comes Kiernanan Now Kiernan had the appearance of a homeless man or a bump. He wasn't homeless, but he had significant mental issues. As you mentioned, he had run into the police, never anything serious minor stuff that you might expect from someone who has significant mental issues,

like trespassing and things like that. Nothing ever major. He wasn't a violent man by any stretch. He comes out of the wooded area, he's clearly upset, about six thirty in the morning, and he tells the woman that he's found what he described. One moment said he used the term love doll, another one said mannequin. He said, it's either that or a body. So they told him to go to a payphone, which of course was broken, as

they all were back in those days. But they eventually called the police and when they all go back there, they find nineteen year old any Kid Card back there. She had been strangled, which they would find out later. It was obvious she'd been bludgeon because part of her

face around the orbital socket was basically crushed in. Her body had been stripped except for one monthesin and her brazier which had been pushed over her breast but was still on her and as we mentioned, she had the letters KKK carved into her legs and large letter K carved into her stomach. It was a gruesome crime scene. I can tell you the hardest part about doing this book was the day that I had a chance to look at the actual crime scene photographs site. I wasn't

looking forward to it. I didn't enjoy it because I knew her, I liked her, but she was a really sweet person. And I've worked very hard in many ways to push those out of my mind. But I had to see them in order to get a fair understanding of what the crime scene was. I really didn't think I could write a book and give any type of analysis if I didn't see them. I didn't want to, but I did. They were very disturbing, and I made it and I promised to myself I would not use them,

and I didn't. There are some pictures in my book that show the crime scene, but they don't show her at the crime scene. I just couldn't do that to her family or to her memory. It was just they were just horrible.

They took the moccasin that was there. They obviously they eventually collected the brassi that they left it on their body, and they left the glass in her neck until the coroner and the pathologists could do their job. They took dirt samples, they took samples of the blood, they took they took in leaves that had blood on them. Of course, they photographed everything. There's tons and tons of photographs that they took, as they're supposed to. No video that wasn't done.

That's not all that uncommon at that time. Now it's standard protocol. Then it was mostly photographs and they took a whole variety of different things. I mean they took in the neighborhood of like thirty to forty specific items. Not all of them really had anything to do with the crime, but you know, and that's the case. You got to be thorough.

later be suggested was the murder weapon. It was never definitively proven, but I think it's more likely than not it was, and it was broken in half, likely from the impact, and they were suspicious of that, so they took that into evidence. You know, they the police in their notes, don't really go in a much speculation. They kept it pretty much to the facts. I mean, I know from interviewing different people that there were some concerns right away that this was a racial crime. Annie was

of mixed parentage. Her father was African American, her mother was Caucasian. Interestingly enough, and I mentioned this in the book, Annie never considered herself black or white. She considered herself both and never in her life that she did anybody know of her ever have any trouble with that. But there were some thoughts that could be racial. There were some that thought, well, maybe this was a cover up.

You know, for the most part, the police didn't really seem to let their reports reflect any type of speculation. They kept the reports very professional and very to the point, which turned out to be a good thing in light of all of the media circus and the wild accusations that would eventually be made by Sharpen and his supporters.

But you know they, you know they at that point, they believed at that point, and it would later be proven to be so that the killer had taken they remainder that close with him, otherwise they would obviously be there. They had to have been, although the reports don't discuss it in detail, there was some initial thought that maybe it had been sexual in nature. They couldn't tell just by looking at the body if there had been sexual aduced There wasn't they would later determine, but that was

something that was also on their minds as well. And it's important in any type of investigation like that that you keep an open mind and allow the evidence in the facts to lead you and not try to twist the evidence and the facts into what needed to be to fit your theory.

and he had slept behind that the night before. And then he said that he had walked. When he got up at the crack of dawn, he broke camp, which for him was basically picking up his bedroll, and he walked down the other railroad tracks that go through the city. And then once he got into midtown, he turned and he was supposedly heading to his mother's house, and the direction he was going was system with that, and he told him and he found the body and he immediately

reported it. Well, they were suspicious he knew more than he was letting on. They didn't know whether he had done it or he knew more, but they were questioning him a great deal, and you know, he was he was not exactly the overly forthcoming, and they felt he was not he was hiding something or that he just

wasn't willing to talk. Eventually, they brought him to another city not too far away, about an hour away called Middletown, where the state police had a barracks that had a polygraph machine commonly known as a lie detective, which he

agreed to take. And the person who did the test was convinced that he wasn't the killer, that he was telling the truth when he said he didn't kill her, but they felt that he was hiding something, and they pressured him and pressured him, and eventually he made a statement contending that he had sexually abused the body after he had found it in a most disturbing manner. Although it was not released to the public in detail, at least not until my book, because it was always just

reported generically. But he was accused of briefly performing oral sex on the body, which is quite repulsive. As to whether he really did that or not, that I'm not going to reveal that you have to read the book to find out. You know the answer to it because you've read it, but the listeners are going to have to read the book to get the answer to that, because I can definitively answer that whether he did or didn't.

But so now it comes out first you have you know, we get news that Annie's been killed, then the news comes out a few days afterwards that she had been found with the KKK letters on her, and then news comes out that this person who founder has been arrested in charge with sexual abuse against the corpse. It was a strange few days, let me tell you.

And you know, I don't know what his actual diagnosis was, you know, I don't I can't get access to those types of records. Deprive it. I would suspect he was probably a paranoid schizophrenic, but I don't know for sure. But he had significant mental issues and he could had they pressed him hard enough, he might have admitted to the Kennedy assassination. I mean, you know, he he just was not He was just somebody that would say things

that were outrageous. From times while he was in the jail, the local radio station was able to interview him, and that was an interesting experience. And of course by then he had recanted his statement and he was saying that he was a patsy and they were trying to frame him and so forth, and it was, you know, and he was claiming that it had something to do with to Wanta Brawley, and you know, the police initially were suspicious of him, thinking that maybe he had put the

the KKK letters on it on the body. And that was highlighted later because I mentioned the Brawley case earlier. There was an ongoing investigation. The governor had appointed Robert Abrams, the New York Attorney General at that time, to put together a special grand jury to investigate, and he had put together a hotline that people could send in information. Well, according to the reports from the Attorney General, he let them know that Kiernan had actually called that one claiming

he had some information. It was never disclosed what that information was, but whatever it was, they investigated it and it came up negative. So here he had somebody who had apparently tried to get involved in the Brawley case, and then he's involved here for the body that's found with those types of marks, and so there was a lot of suspicion that he might have been the one that put the letters on it. So you know, this was a not a well man to say the least.

I burst out laughing. After it was announced he had taken the case, there was an appearance in court and the media didn't know he was going to take the case, and all of a sudden, there he was and he was representing him. And after Kiernan had left him gone back to the jail, they were yelling out questions and asked, well, how did how did you come to represent mister Kiernan. He said, Wow, I don't know. He must have looked me up in the Yellow pages. So he was a man.

You can say what you want about him, but he did have a very sharp wit. He wasn't stupid by no mean or any means I should say. But you know, he made a lot of statements. He made statements. He actually had one statement where he said that only the police could have put the body where it was found, which is a you know, though he didn't say directly, that suggests that he was insinuating that the police had something to do with it. He cited a false report

from a Fox News station. I don't mean, I don't mean the modern Fox News, but the Fox network back then it was just getting started and it was different than Fox News, the modern Fox News. And there was a news reporter who said that and he had been chased by the police that night, which was incorrect, and

he harped on that as part of the allegation as well. Uh, and he reached an outrageous conclusion and it was reported by the local papers and it didn't make the police particularly happy, that's for sure.

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tip line set up as well. So while police are canvassing and they're doing their due diligence in terms of finding out about Annie, what do they find out about her and what do they start getting a picture of of maybe how she came to meet her fate that evening.

had gone out. Annie was looking for a job that day, like a lot of I shouldn't say, kid, because nineteen is legally adult, but knowing how I and a lot of my friends were at nineteen, I still used the word kid, because quite frankly, a lot of us were. But she was in a position, like a lot of kids at that age who had been parting it up and enjoying herself. Ports accuser of being an addict of some kind, and that's simply not true. She did drink,

She liked to party. She was known to smoke a joint now and again, and as was very prominent in the nineteen eighties, powder cocaine was very much almost like marijuana then it was very prominent, and she did recreationally use that, not a lot, but occasionally. And in the last six months of her life, she had been parting enough that her friends had noticed and had said something to her. And like a lot of kids who do that,

they have to make the choice. Are they going to continue to do that or are they going to straighten things up, finish growing up and maturing and get on with their lives. By all accounts, that's what Annie had decided to do. She was out looking for a job that day. She had told people she was going to go back and finish high school and get her ged and you know, get things in her life moving. They found out that she had met up with some friends.

They were going to go to a carnival uptown on the other side of the city that was there every July and is still there in fact every July. And on the way there, they stopped at a store called Convenient Mark, a little you know, the small was that what it sounds like, a small convenience store and they went in and it appears that they were looking to

get some beer. They weren't going to be able to buy because they were underage, and Annie ended up taking a forty ounce bottle of beer, and the clerk caught them, and the one friend that was with her kind of betrayed her and turned on her and said, I don't know who this person is. She's not with me. And Annie panicked and she ran with the bottle across the street and hit it, and her friends were stuck around.

The police came took a statement, and then they left, but they went up to the carnival and Annie was left on her own for the rest of the evening, and she spent the rest of the evening bumping into different people she saw, and every person she saw, she basically say you want to hang out? Do you want to get a drink? You know, she was just looking for companionship mostly the whole night, just you know, to do something and to have someone to hang out with.

And she was last seen at approximately two thirty in the morning near a bar that she had been in and out of all night called the Royal Girl. And based on where she was heading, the only place really she could have gone was this alley between a store called Cheap Charlie's, which was a little place where you could buy cigarettes and things like that, and the Royal Grill.

And that alley led to a street called Jansen Avenue, and that Jensen Avenue went right to Foxhall Avenue and was directly across the street it actually ended, and you'd be facing looking at the entrance to the old railway

bed where she was eventually found. Ironically, at one point she went down the railway bed earlier that evening with the man she had knew from school, and they drank some of the beer that she had found or that she had taken, i should say, and then they went back and she went back to the bar and the guy went home. So they had a pretty good knowledge of where she was. There was one witness that said she saw her with a man that was later identified

as the defendant, Jeff Dawson. She actually, at a different point saw another man with the same name. Jeff Dawson was actually their cousins, and ironically she had asked him do you want to the younger Jeff Dawson, she just do you want to hang out? And he said I can't, I have to get up. Turns out he was going up to the carnival as well. Any his friends were planning to meet him. She just didn't know it. Had she known, that she might have gotten in the car

and this might not have happened. But so they knew. Basically, Annie was well liked, that she had been partying recently, and they knew most of her movements up until shortly before she was killed.

and she huh. So they had no idea who it was. They heard the name, they didn't know if it meant anything, but it became They went back to it and lit not long air after because when they were doing the canvassing, they started hearing from people rumors that there was somebody out there who was bragging that he had done it, and so they asked around and they eventually traced it to a woman who lived right on Jansen Avenue and

she told them to it. She had to make some calls to see if it was okay for her to tell the police, and she eventually did. She told them that she had heard about it from Penny to Grote and her boyfriend Todd Sleet. So the police went out to where they lived, which was about ten or fifteen mins outside of Kingston, had them come into the station and they began to question them, and the story they

told was quite interesting. They said that they the I don't want to say the day after the murder, It was the day of but she died early in the morning, somewhere bet two thirty am and four o'clock in the morning,

probably around three. But later that day, in the afternoon of that day, Todd Sleeve and his girlfriend were driving down Broadway and a few maybe two blocks before they got to the Kingston Hospital, they saw Jeff Dawson, and so they because they were friends, they asked him to get in the car, and he got in the back and they started driving. So they're talking about this or that,

and then Sleeve makes the left turn onto Foxhall Avenue. Now, as I mentioned before, Foxhall Avenue was the road that goes right by the entrance one of the entrances, at least to the old railway bed. And as they go by the police or the there's cars there. They've got the area taped off and the police officers on guard,

guarding the scene as they should. And as they go by, shlid and told the police that Dawson immediately slid sideways in the seat and laid down so he couldn't be seen in the car, and he said something along the lines of I think they're looking for me. So they continue driving and eventually they get to Jeff Dawson's home and Jeff gets out of the car and so does Todd, and Todd says he's talking to him, and he asks him, well,

why are they looking for you? And he said, well, you know that I won't use the word, but you know that blank any Kithgart, Well, yeah, I do. I murdered her last night. So Todd slid himself. Like Dawson, had a significant criminal history. It was all burglaries in his case, Unlike Jef Dawson also involved drugs. Dawson's crimes really were burglaries of businesses and so forth, which shot Shlee did too. But he also had some drug offenses.

But now, and that was something that was of a level of crime above what he was used to in company and obviously bothered him, and he immediately told Penny about it, and after discussing it, they decided they would The way they would sue their conscience was for Penny to make the anonymous call, and they figured, you know that the police will investigate him now and they'll catch him.

So what the police decided to do having heard all of this, They asked Todd to wear a wire and he agreed, and a bunch of police officers and unmarked cars went into the neighborhood all around Jeff Dawson's home and Shlead and his girlfriend drove their own car over and he ended up engaging in a conversation that was recorded not the greatest quality, and there was a lot of how to be enhanced, at least as best they could in those days, but he basically was pushing him

to make a statement, and he did, although what he said was not consistent with the physical evidence. But he eventually sit on the tape he said, yeah, I pushed her and she hit her head and I made it look like a crazy person did And so then of course they immediately arrested him and brought him down and started and started the interrogation and that's how Jeff Dawson became more than a person of interest. He became a

suspect and I've actually was arrested and charged. And that's how it progressed from that simple anonymous phone call.

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some inconsistencies and what he says. So let's talk about what the police do, how they interview him, investigate his background. Tell us how that proceeds.

you were a little boy, I know your family. I mean, you have to understand Kingston's a small city and in those days in particular, just about everybody either knew everybody

or knew of everybody. And you know, you might not know let's say John Smith, but you say, oh yeah, that's Maggie Smith's boy, and you know, he kind of knew somebody, and Junius Harris was one of those guys who knew everybody, and so he kind of played that angle and did it very well actually, And they began questioning and he made a statement right away and he said, and I've actually heard the audio, that the audio still exist.

It's a very interesting listen. He said that he ran into Annie he saw the Royal Grill, and he said that he left the Royal Grill and then he saw her again near the entrance to the rail bed, and she was saying, come on, you want to do something. Now they knew each other. In fact, Annie's sister was in a relationship with somebody who was related to Jeff Dawson,

so they knew who each other were. They didn't really hang in the same circles because Jeff was in his upper twenties and end he was nineteen, but they knew who each other were. So she was saying, come on,

let's do something, and he didn't want to. He was going somewhere, and eventually he said she was starting to annoying, and he eventually said, pushed her away, get away from me, and he said, she got angry and came at him again, come on, come on, let's do something, And he said he pushed her again, and he claimed she fell hit the back of her head and she didn't move. Now, he said, she thought His exact words were, I thought she was playing, meaning I thought she wasn't she was pretending.

He said. He reached down and when his hand came you know, lifted the back of her head. He said. When his hand came back, he claimed he panicked. At that point that he tried to check her for a pulse, but he couldn't tell if she had one because his own pulse was racing. And he then took off and he went out the other side, which went to a street called East O'Reilly, and he circled around up to a building that was called Old City Hall. That was

the original city Hall. It was abandoned in the early nineteen seventies, and it had been allowed to sit there and decay all those years. It was completely abandoned. The year two thousand it was refurbished and became City Hall again, which was nice because it's beautiful building, but at that time it was abandoned. And he said he just sat there on the steps for about two hours, which would have made it to about five o'clock in the morning.

He said he went back to check on her, and when he got back, he said, somebody else must have come along, because she had been stripped and cut, and her clothes were sitting there in a pile. He said, so he still had the blood on his own hand and he had wiped it on his shirt. So he took his own shirt off and said, he took the clothes and he went off, and he left the clothes in an alley where they were later found, and which was the second crime scene that I was talking about.

And he said that, you know, he kept saying, you know, when I left her, she was alive, and the police, you know, jumped on that and said, you know, that can't be true, but he stuck to it. You know, they didn't accept it, and I don't either. It just is so far fetched to believe that he left her there. And then, you know, it was so dark in there that if somebody's laying on the ground, you might not

even see them. If you didn't know she was there, you might not have seen her because it was pitch black. And to believe that somebody came along saw her and just said, hey, I know I'll kill her and strip her. It just doesn't make any sense, but that was the story he told, and he stuck to it throughout, and he told anybody who would listen that she was alive

when I left. But his admissions were still significant in that he put himself in the alley with any in the railway I should say, the early bed with any kit guard around the time of her death, and he admitted he pushed her and caused injury to her, although there were no significant cuts in the back of her head, so it was inconsistent. There was a cut on her ear, and I suppose the blood could have run from her

ear down to the back of her head. So he married very well, I've seen blood and just had been wrong about where it came from. But he put himself in that place. So it was very strong evidence against him because now they had him not only people saying that he had bragged about it, but now they had him admitting he was in the area with her at the time, you know, around the time died. So it was pretty significant evidence.

Kiernan at least for a while. And although up until the time he was disbarred, he may have tactically still represented him. I don't know, but you know, but so they weren't, you know, they were quick to get it out there that this was not a racial crime, but they were by no means sure that Dawson was the one of the kk K marks. They thought it might have been Kiernan. At that point.

in the Royal Girl. He had stopped in earlier in the evening, played a game at Pacun, but he had left gone home and he had stayed at home the rest of the night. And his wife said, yeah, that was true. So at that point they said okay, and they let him go. Then when they got the extra piece of information you had the sleeve where the wire,

and they arrested him. They also brought in his wife, and his wife eventually bendia she had not been truthful and that she was providing an alibi, but in fact, he had gone out himself after he wasn't the Royal Girl. They did go home, but he wasn't home all night. He had gone back out, and they actually eventually at the trial, forced her to testify to that, to not only to prove that he had the opportunity, but also to get it out there indirectly that Dawson had lied

to the police and given a fake aliba. Why would you give a fake alibi unless you needed to cover up something you had done untoured?

crucial in this. So let's fast forward to this prosecution and what do each one of these crucial expert witnesses have to say, which well is in contrast to what okay, go ahead. Sorry.

the murder weapon. They weren't able to say it was, but they could say it was consistent. They both agreed that the KKK marks were made at least at the beginning while she was alive, but the last one on one leg was after she had died, so her heart they could tell because there was no blood flow, the heart had stopped beating. So but where they disagreed was whether she was choked first or whether she was bludgeoned first.

And this becomes important. If she was choked first, then you can theorize the scenario where they got into an argument. He grabbed her in a chokelock, and many people think that a choke that a chokelock will take a long time before you go out, and that's not necessarily true. I know from personal experiences. I regularly take judo that if a choke is hit just right, you can go out within a second. If even that and he was a strong man, and she wasn't frail by any stretch.

But she was not a big woman. She was thin, and if he caught it just right, that choke was right, she would go right out. So you could argue a scenario that he choked her, she went unconscious, he panicked, and then, according to his words, made it look like a crazy person did it. And the real tragedy there would be him thinking she was dead and she's not.

And this occurred within a couple hundred yards of the emergency room, so he could have picked her up and carried her over there and maybe she survives, which is even more said the other scenario. However, if the bludgeoning occurred first, there really isn't any way to argue manslaughter. You can't exactly argue that it was an unintentional debt. If it started with you beating somebody over the head

with a brick, it just doesn't follow. And then the incredible savagery that you're you're thinking of, if after the beating with the brick, he then picks her up and then chokes her whilst, you know, while the whole head is caped in. I mean, it's a it creates a very different impression of who this person is. I believe that the former is what happened that I think the choking occurred first based on you know, Jeff Dawson's background,

who he was, and a few other things. But if it was the reverse, if that other expert was right, you're looking at a cold, vicious killer at that point. It presents a very different scenario. And yet that the experts disagreed about it.

for him. I've known him for a long time. He went on to become a New York State Supreme Court judge, and it's now retired. The only logical reason to not use that tape in your case in chief was that he believed strongly enough that the defendant was going to testify that the theory would be to try to argue manslaughter and get less of a sentence than murdered, because that is going to be the biggest weakness of their case.

Is if he said, no, I choked her first, it was an accident, and he admitted that he did it, and the argument was about whether or not he intended it, and so forth, there would have been a legitimate chance to get a manslaughter conviction as opposed to murder. However, what Kavanough didn't know, and he couldn't know because he's not privy to it, was Dawson had no intention of pleading to anything, and their strategy from the beginning was to go for an acquittal. So once he finished his case,

Dawson didn't testify. In fact, he only called one defense witness, and it was a police officer, and it was just designed to get some information to try to preclude some things, and it was to try to shore up something on an appeal because the judge had denied certain things and that was it. He didn't really present a defense. He was just going to argue that the evidence was insufficient

and they didn't have a lot of evidence. Now, if this case occurred today, a very different scenario, because the forensics are so much better today than they were in nineteen eighty eight. And during the trial in nineteen eighty nine, there was a lot of blood and yet more often than not, they couldn't even type it. The only blood they were able to actually get a typing for was the blood that was found in the orange basin I

mentioned before, and it was covered in blood. Nowadays you can not only get typing, but you can get DNA from a drop. DNA was in its absolute infancy. It was rarely used at that point, and they didn't even try it, and they probably wouldn't except for the one basin.

They may not even had enough base in the way it was done back then to do DNA, So without that, the only blood that they typed was consistent with Annie's blood and not consistent with the defendant, so they really didn't have a lot of blood evidence to go with. There was a bite mark that they bruise that was believed to be be a bite, and they brought in a dentist, doctor Mobson, who testified that he felt that

the defendant caused the bite. Although I thought Littman probably his best cross examination was the cross examination of the defendant. The dentist, I should say, in that he really assailed the bite, and he got the witness to say, well, if he only bit a bitter once, it's not consistent.

And he tried to come up with this theory that he had bitten her, that she had moved during the bite, and that doesn't really make any sense because if he beat her over the head first, she's unconscious, but both doctors admit that. And if he choked her first, it's unlo You know, that might come for the bite, but why are you going to bite while you're choking. That doesn't make any sense. So I didn't wasn't overly impressed with it, but that was the only physical scientific evidence

that they tried to connect Dawson to it. Was that bite mark. And considering the time period, there was another prompt serial killer that had been convicted largely on white mark evidence down in Florida, and so that was in the news a lot, and it was difficult to really

convince the jury that this wasn't great evidence. As I've mentioned in the book, as the years worth gone on, there have been a number of cases where white mark evidence was the basis of a conviction and once they could do DNA, they found out the person didn't do it. So and in Texas there's been a call for a moratorium on it. And Texas is not exactly known as a criminal defendant's paradise. It's concerned to be a prosecutor's paradise. And yet even there they're talking about a moratorium on

that type of evidence. So so it would have been a different case today. But both sides had some interesting arguments to make, and you know, it ended up going to the juror with both sides thinking they had a shot.

and over again. There were no bruises, significant bruises in the back of the head that showed a lot of blood because in the statement that he likely intended to use to impeach Dawson if he testified, Dawston said he put his hand under the back of under the back of her head, and when he came back to this blood. What Lippmann tried to point out was she had a significant cut on the side of her ear, and there was an argument about whether or not that it could

have been caused by her falling on a stick. The witness kept saying, no, she had to be struck with a stick. I didn't find that particularly credible because if you're hit by the stick, either by being swung or you fall with enough force, there's not a lot of difference there. And if you know she was found on her back so the blood you know, from the ear would easily have rolled rolled back down her neck and as he reached under that could have been the blood

he got on his hand in theory. But there was a lot of argument back and forth on that. It never really became significant for the jury because, as I said, Dawson didn't testify and they never heard the tape.

doubt in that jury. That's really all he's trying to do, isn't it.

It is a completely different thing. And I've been there as an attorney when you were actually in the heat of battle and you're going back and forth, much more difficult to make those decisions and those calaus and so forth, and even some of the best attorneys out there are going to do things that people are going to look at say geez, why did you do that? You know, the idea of Dawson testifying was a very reasonable conclusion.

I would have put the you know, I would have put the tape in just because I prefer to keep the defendant off the standard generally, because you know, the jury is always told not to take it into consideration that the defendant didn't testify, but they they always do even though they're not supposed to. So my preferce would have been to put it in. But I understand what my Kavanaugh was doing. He was setting a trap for the defendant, and uh defendant just decided not to testify.

The other reason he didn't want to testify is because the jury would have found out in some detail about his prior record. There was a mistake made by mister Lippman that allowed some of that information to get to the jury, which by that may have made it easier for me to testify. But well, there was there were mistakes on both sides. But when you're in the heat of battle like that, that can happen. And I don't want people to think that I thought. I don't think

highly of either man. I didn't know mister Lippman. He was pretty much retired by the time I started practicing. But Mike Cavanugh I've known for a long time and I had a great deal of respect for him. So I can understand how these things happen in the heat of battle because the pressure is on. I mean, here you are as a prosecutor's trying to get justice for any and her family's there and very much wants to see justice done. And on the other hand's defense attorney.

You've got this guy's life in your hands. He's going to spend the rest of his life like lean jail if you lose. It's a lot of pressure and it's not an easy thing to be in that situation. I've been there on both sides. It's difficult.

for the time prior. He says he was sleeping in the woods, which there was some support of that, but who, even with the support they had, who knew what time he actually got up. He had made statements to the police at one point where he was he admitted doing a perverted thing with the body. There was an article in the paper where the police chief had stated that Kiernan had actually admitted at one point to cutting the body. He then recanted it, So he got a crazy person.

Who's in this? Who's there? And the only thing that was done when Kavanaugh gave his clothing, he said, well, you know we have his clothes. There wasn't blood found on his clothes. Well, on the pair of jeans that they found in mister Dawson's home with the service of the warrant, they found basically like a dot of blood and that was it. And they tried to say, well it was washed away because that night he was he

swam in a pool and washed it off. Well, even then they used luminol, and luminol would have lit it up like a tree even if he had swam in a pool. So, you know, been screaming from the top of my lungs that Kiernan was the suspect, and I don't understand why he didn't. There must have been a reason. I would have loved to have spoken with him and find out. But that's something that should have been argued in my opinion. But then again, like I said, it's easy to be a Monday morning quarterback.

what he was wearing. Tell us about her testimony and how important it was to this case.

And she mentioned that he had been wearing blue pants. They had recovered a period of blue jeans and they were trying to get her to say a trial that he was wearing blue jeans, and she said, no, it wasn't blue jeans. It was a different type of blue pants. And they argued about that quite a bit. But basically, her major part of her testimony was that he lied to the police and he was out and about and

had the opportunity to commit the crime. And you know when that's coming from your wife, that doesn't look good to the George.

that was consistent with Jeff Dawson on that shirt. And you know, it was pretty it was good evidence in that protestifying that he came home without a shirt was such that that obviously he had lost his shirt somewhere he had taken it off, so it supported the idea that this was his shirt with the clothes. And you know, once the jury hears this and breaches a conclusion that his clothes were with the clothes of the person was murdered, what other reason would there be for him to get

rid of his shirt? Then you know, he got blood all over it, and the idea that he wiped his hands on his shirt really didn't didn't follow the you know, the idea was that he had blood on his shirt that splashed on him on he was coller, you know, beating him with the brick.

were there and some that were not. You know, over the years, I've seen different trials where you would think certain family members are there and they're not, either because they can't handle the idea of hearing about a loved one that was killed, or they just can't keep their emotions and check while a loved one is on trial. So not necessarily shocking that you'll see family members from both sides not there from time to time, because the emotions on both sides can often be overwhelming.

But in order to use that information to try to impeach on Sleid, he would have had to give up his client. So after that there was another attorney and he didn't last very long. He was out relatively quickly, and then finally County Court Judge Judge Vote told him, this is your last attorney, so if you fire this guy, you're on your own. He didn't really get along very well. The media was constantly questioning Dawson as he would go

back to jail. He'd be brought out of the courthouse to the waiting policeman, and he'd make comments about how bad his attorney was and so forth. They'd ask Lipman about it. Until Lipman's credit, he would say things like, I'm not going to discuss the case. I'm not going to discuss that. He would ignore it, which couldn't have been easy. I mean, here you got somebody that's questioning your ability, questioning your ethics, which is no fun when

somebody does that. But you have to be able to not respond to that, because if you do that, you're attacking your own client, and that's contrary to what you're supposed to do. It sounds easy, but let me assure you it's not.

So you know, when that came out and they heard it was playing for them, there was you know, there's always speculation about what the jurors are thinking and whether you know, people always say, oh, that's good for the prosecution, that's good for the No one really knows for sure, but obviously they were focusing on that, so some people thought, well, that's good for the defense, because if they're focusing on that, maybe they're looking as they're not considering the other evidence

that's out there. So in any instance, so they go back in. They also requested a chalkboard and chalk that was given to them, and they go back, they deliberate, then they come out and they're asking for a clarification about the law. Now, in this case, the judge charged

intentional murder being killed with intent. You also charged manslaughter, you know, the idea of an accidental death and so forth, and they were asking for They also charged what they call depraved indifference murder, which is kind of between the two. It's the equivalent of intentional murder, but it's a different theory. It means you may not have acted with intent to kill, but your conduct was so outrageous and so reckless and so depraved to human life that it was obvious that

death could occur and you just didn't care. So that they had to go through all of that, so that now there's some thought about, well, maybe they're not going to go with the intentional murder, maybe they're going to come back with man story. And you know, they had some more. They came back another time for some testimony again about that conversation. They eventually were ordered dinner, and then after that they finally came back and they had

a verdict. But it took quite a while. A lot of people were expecting would be over quick, but it wasn't.

talk about was intentional murder. They wouldn't get to the other charges unless they found him not guilty, and the foreman announced they had found him guilty of murder in the second degree the first count, and so there was nothing else to ask them other than the traditional polling of the jury, which for non attorneys who were listening, what that means is in order to confirm that it's unan, the defense will ask the judge to question each juror individually,

what is your verdict, and you'll have each one of them say guilty, guilty, guilty, and nine and ninety nine hundred thousand times out of a million pep, you're going to have all twelve saying guilty. But once in a while you get somebody that hedges or says I can't do this, So the defense always asks for it, but it's very very rare to see it and not happen.

I've never seen it happen. But I saw one more guy hedged a little bit, but he eventually said no, and that was it, and there actually was an appeal on that, but ampletely different case. So if they asked them for the polling, they all confirmed it, and then the case was adjourned for sentencing and that was the end of the trial, except per sentence in some time.

So they were going to have this hearing and they kept the Dawson and a Tiernon at this point was out unbailed, and he kept showing up every time, but Maddox didn't, and each time there was an excuse given he was in court on another matter, and they confronted it. In fact, one time he was actually representing al Sharpton on that and he didn't show. He didn't show. Finally he shows up, but Dawson's not keep saying Dawston's he's getting tired. T isn't there and he said where is he?

And Maddix as well, he went to California. Now this is in front of Judge Brun in city court, because in New York misdemeanors are tried in local court except under very rare circumstances. So Judge Brune and city court, and now he's kind of annoyed and he says, well, why did he go to California? He said, well, he says he went on vacation. There was no restrictions on his ability to travel, so he went out there and he ran out of money. Last I knowed he was

in Arizona somewhere. But he caused me periodically, and George Brune really flushed his fine, he went on vacation, but you're not explaining to me during the midst of all this, why did he start to suddenly decide to travel? And Maddox made one of the best lines of the entire case. He looked at Judge Brune without missing and beat me. He said, well, he's a man of the world, judge, And by all accounts, Brune himself kind of smiled when

he said that, and the case was adjourned. Eventually there was a warrant put out for him, but he never returned to Kingston, and so the case never never was, never went on trial. And you know whether or not he did it, and whether or not they could have convicted him, all that is disclosed in the book. But that's one thing I'm holding back for the readers. You want to learn that when you got to buy the book. But absolutely, because that's one of the few things that

no one ever knew the answer to. And I found it so absolutely, but it was Yeah, so when I read that when he said he's a man of the world, Judge, I said, that's going in the book. It's knowing. That's a great line.

so to speak. But you know, sure, but it was just quite than one month before the book there it is.

It could have been about doing something. I know some people, some of the officers thought maybe that it that he there was a sexual overture by Dawson, she rejected him. Whatever it was, whatever the argument was, I think part of what daw since it was true. I think he said eventually said get away from me. He pushed her and so forth, and I think she got mad when

he pushed her and probably started yelling at him. Todd Sley they said he noted a slight bruise on Duston's eye, so it's if that's credible, then perhaps maybe she smacked him. I think was and grabbed her in her choke hold, not trying to kill her, but the controller and calm

her down. I think he hit the choke hold just correct on the corota artery, and I think with the edited adrenaline, the fact that he had done cocaine earlier in the day and was drinking vodka earlier in the day, that and all the adrenaline and his strength, I think he hit it just right. He fractured the horn of the larynx and she went unconscious immediately, and I think he panicked. I thought she was dead, and I think he decided to make it look like a psychopath did it.

I think he is the one that cut the kk cain and her legs. I mean, you know, no one would ever suspect man of putting the KKK on somebody. You know, they just it's not something they would do. So he made it look like a crazy man did it to try to cover his tracks. And again, the sad thing really is that if he had not panicked and he just picked her up after she went unconscious and brought her to the hospital, he deserved some time in prison because he was on parole at the time

for a burglary. He had gone back, but he wouldn't have spent twenty nine years in prison, and then he would still be alive. But that's what I think happened.

which I don't think is likely, but it's possible. Second, it was put there post more than or Third it's a lab error. I don't know which it is. That's never that's something it's never been resolved. But you know, it is certainly a mystery of why there was cocaine resident on her nose but nothing in her system. Because snorting the reason you see people snort cocaine. It gets in your system right away.

I mentioned that you you've been parting in a few months before she died, so she had sidetracked herself although she was getting herself back on track and this end. Then of course you've got Kiernan who comes in with all of his shenanigans. That sidetracks a great deal. The investigation, you got sharp and coming in and all of these things.

And then the family, of course they were trying. They had to actually hold the funeral hours earlier than it was announced to keep the media from showing up and shoving microphones in their face and saying how do you feel about this? Well, how do you think they feel?

So all these different things were happening that sidetracked the investigation, sidetracked the family, and then I think the last part of the sidetrack is that as the years have gone on, prior to me writing this book, you never ever ever heard anything about her in the media after he was convicted. In fact, after he was convicted, they had one article where the police said, up, We're glad this matter is done.

The next time the case or she appears in the paper is when he got per rolled twenty nine years later, and even her memory got sidetracked. And that was one of the reasons I wanted to write the book because I felt her story deserved to be told. She was a real nice, nice lady and a nice person, and she deserved better than what happened to her, and she deserved have her story told. And I just hope, as I say in the introduction, I hope I did justice to her memory.

least you'll see two different videos. One that I and a friend of mine created with my voice, and there's another one that my publisher created with another person's voice that's well better than the one I created. But I think they're both good. But the one the published that the publisher did was better because well that's what they do.