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I wouldn't do something like that. As more people learned about the case from Paradise Lost and the work of people like Bakken and Sauls, the phrase Free the West Memphis Three caught on as a slogan for progressive musicians and actors in the 1990s, up there with Save the Rainforest and Free Tibet. Eddie Vedder became an early leading voice, soon followed by the likes of Peter Jackson, Johnny Depp, and Natalie Maines from the band then known as the Dixie Chicks. https://t.co/dXOtQkmjee. That there were three victims was a link to the biblical number of the beast. Terry Roland Hobbs September 11, 1959 ~ September 11, 2021 (age 62) Terry Roland Hobbs, 62, of Sweetwater, passed away on Saturday, September 11, 2021. "The reason I made the West Memphis boogeyman comment during the first film was because I was making light of the situation," Echols says in Paradise Lost 2: Revelations. A statement he made to the producers of Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills did little to help his public image. When they searched online, they found little to no information about the case. Misskelley told Hutcheson that he really didn't know much about Echols other than that he was "a weird person." West Memphis is in the heart of the Bible Belt: just a two-hour drive from where, legend has it, the devil tuned Robert Johnsons guitar, in a state thats 46 percent evangelical Protestant. That story line would make up the bulk of 2000s Paradise Lost 2: Revelations, a rare sequel for a documentary, especially before the streaming era proved that true crime series like Making a Murderer and The Staircase could maintain audience interest for years. All of them were convicted after Misskelley confessed to helping Echols and Baldwin with the murders, which he later recanted. When it didnt, the praise heaped on Paradise Lost felt hollow. Except this was 1996, and home internet was still in its infancy. In 2004, Vicki Hutcheson recanted her trial testimony, stating that she had lied on the stand. It wasnt hard for him to imagine his teenage self ending up in Echolss situation. Support came from unlikely corners: a classroom of kids who held a cookie sale that raised $30, local bands in Chicago who held a benefit show and sent $150. According to Dan Stidham, the attorney for Misskelley, that money became essential for the cash-strapped defense teams, who needed to pay for expert witnesses and other expenses. By the time she got done watching it, her life was forever changed. The causes most high-profile moment came in 2000, when Trey Parker said the slogan at the MTV Movie Awards while collecting an award for Best Musical Sequence. The footage included raw jailhouse interviews with the defendants, strategy sessions held by legal teams on both sides, and extended monologues from Mark Byers, the tall, goateed stepfather of one of the victims, who spoke as though he were reciting the Book of Revelation and who, at one point in Paradise Lost, fired a handgun at a pumpkin while reciting the names of the accused. It has happened to a lot of people that just dont have the spotlight of a documentary, he says. It ranges from Mark Byers, the crusading stepfather who became one of the West Memphis Threes biggest allies in the years before his 2020 death, to famed FBI criminal profiler (and Mindhunter inspiration) John E. Douglas. Its gone from a controversial legal theory to an accepted phenomenon. Throughout the late 1990s and early 2000s, defense attorneys working for the West Memphis Three filed multiple appeals on their behalf scrutinizing the lack of physical evidence against them. Terry Hobbs, the stepfather of eight-year-old victim Stevie Branch, has been named in documents released in Marian, Arkansas by the attorneys for Pam Hobbs, Stevie's mother. The state of Arkansas continues to attempt to prevent this testing from happening., New technology and advances in science would now allow us to test DNA in amounts so small that it would have been previously impossible. But further down, in the section for the music department, theres a curious inclusion of a consultant who never worked in film again: Alex Sinofsky, the son of Bruce who was 12 at the time of Paradise Losts release. (At one point, Sauls says, it landed on Yahoos list of the top 100 websites.) But on the subject of Paradise Lost, he speaks emphatically: He understands how important the movies were in helping him, Echols, and Misskelley walk free 10 years ago this August. When we were driving in the car a lot, wed play a lot of the Metallica album Master of Puppets, says Alex Sinofsky, who became a doctor instead of getting behind the camera himself. Leave a sympathy message to the family in the guestbook on this memorial page of Terry Hobbs to show support. Berlinger says that after months of filming, the parents of one of the victims raised the issue of payment. The Paradise Lost cameras captured not only the defenses discussions, but the full testimony, in Misskelleys trial, of an expert on coerced confessions. One of the prosecution's key pieces of evidence linking Jason Baldwin to the crime a survival knife with a serrated edge recovered from a lake behind his home has also come under scrutiny. Misskelley returned to life in West Memphis. Evidence in West Memphis Three case missing or destroyed, Judge sets bond for 76-year-old woman accused of killing terminally ill husband, Woman accused of driving into home, killing former pro basketball player Galen Young granted diversion, DA Mulroy says he doubts any drag shows will violate Tennessees new drag bill, MPD finds alleged chop shop operating in plain sight, Congressman Cohen announces $1 million grant for Memphis YMCA, Red hot Memphis womens basketball ready to make a run in AAC Tournament. (WMC) - Its a case that has captured the nation and certainly the Mid-South. He had always maintained he didnt commit the crimes, and outside the Varner Units walls, a growing chorus of activists and legal observers were arguing that same thing on his behalf. But they never had any physical evidence that connected us to this crime, Echols said in 2012. Inevitably, the West Memphis Three case always comes up. October 13, 2018 - Happy 94th Birthday Terry! Two of the West Memphis Three's most ardent supporters were director Peter Jackson, best known for The Lord of the Rings films, and his partner Fran Walsh. The second is by looking at it as an act of passion and perseverance. Although Griffis' testimony was dramatic, it showed only a tenuous grasp of occult knowledge much of it, including a reference to a cult called "Crytos," was simply made up. Almost 30 years ago, three eight-year-old West Memphis boys were found murdered and three teenagers were charged in the murders. I dont know if they were questioning it, but they werent mistreating me and telling me that what I was telling them wasnt true., While Berlinger admits that he and Sinofsky may have tilted pro-prosecution in the early days of filming, that quickly changed after witnessing how the cases came together and spending time with the three teens during pretrial jailhouse interviewsparticularly Baldwin, who Berlinger describes as sweet and studious.. On the morning of June 2, 1993, Jessie Misskelley Jr., a 17-year-old high school drop out with a reported IQ of 73, was taken into custody by Detective Mike Allen. The following day revealed the unthinkable, when the bloodied and bruised bodies of the three boys were found submerged in a muddy creek in a wooded area called Robin Hood Hills. '", In 1999, a more mature Echols explained the comment. A native of Winter Haven, born December 21, 1964, Terry has been a lifelong resident of Auburndale. There have also been several high-profile incidents of laypeople reinvestigating decades-old cold cases in more rigorous, journalistic ways and helping bring them to a resolution. On the surface, 18-year-old Damien Echols, an intelligent, but psychologically troubled teen with interests in Wicca and extreme music, fit the profile. After roughly 18 months of editing, Paradise Lost debuted at Sundance in January 1996 before heading out to other festivals. Its affected a lot of lives, but for some reason it keeps being brought up, said Hobbs. She has since expressed her belief that her ex-husband was involved in the murders, citing the discovery of her son's favorite pocket knife in Terry Hobbs' belongings. (WJHG) By Nikki Sheaks Published: Jul. Luminol tests, which reveal the hidden presence of blood, were not performed at the scene until six days later. Knowing that the police were already focusing on Damien Echols, Hutcheson asked her neighbor, Jessie Misskelley Jr., about the brooding teen and his occult connection. WEST MEMPHIS, Ark. However, under pressure, leading questions, and scare tactics, Misskelley wove a contradictory story that first placed him at the crime scene as an eyewitness to the murders and then as an active participant. weaving supposedly anti-Christian and occult messages into their songs, he discovered her while Googling cold cases, funded an extensive private investigation, a November 2010 Arkansas Supreme Court ruling, biggest allies in the years before his 2020 death, acquitted of capital murder in 2018 after a 25-year legal saga. Mojo was right. The documentarians found me in one of the worst things a person could go through, Baldwin says. Pam Hobbs divorced Terry Hobbs in 2004 and has reversed her position on the West Memphis Three's guilt. In 1996, HBO released the documentary film Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills. Terry Hobbs Net Worth. In May of that year, police discovered the bodies of Michael Moore, Stevie Branch, and Christopher Byers in the Robin Hood Hills, a small wooded area near the I-40/I-55 exchange. People have come out of the woodwork and said this and this and people have done things and a lot of them are wrong, said Hobbs. "People probably think I'm in Satanism because what they don't understand they try to destroy or ridicule. Hobbs says his book is 25 years in the making, adding it is called Boxful of Nightmares for a reason. A murderer was loose in West Memphis. Websleuths, an online forum for discussions about unsolved homicides and missing-person cases, has more than 100,000 members, and internet vigilantes have used social media and other online breadcrumbs to help track down actual criminals, such as the Canadian murderer and subject of the documentary Dont F*ck With Cats, Luka Magnotta. He was just taking in the enormity of the defining event of his life to that point, which had been committed to film and was now playing for him inside the cavernous, auditorium-style visitation room. Echols is correct. I had a friend who was working on 20/20, and they had done a film about exorcism in one of the magazine pieces, Nevins says. Covered in wounds, all three showed signs of having been beaten. Who Killed The Forgotten West Memphis Three? Rather, they were fighting for something they believed in. Please also read our Privacy Notice and Terms of Use, which became effective December 20, 2019. Robin Lynn Jones. Terry Hobbs was born in 1958 and grew up in Northern Arkansas. Terry Hobbs Memphis 32, 14-Jun, Superior Funeral Home-Hollywood. He just didnt know it would take another 14 years to happen. In June 1996, Paradise Lost debuted on HBO, bringing the story of the West Memphis Three to TV sets and showing the power of the camera in the courtroom. Everybody Id come in contact with was hostile to the truth, Baldwin says. The first being that boys were killed by someone they knew. By going into the courtroom and sticking with the case for its entire duration, Berlinger and Sinofsky were able to capture what may have otherwise been lost to time or left out of transcripts. Branded the, What has never been definitively answered, however, is who committed the 1993 murders, and , Due to marital problems stemming from Stevies death, the couple divorced in 2004, reported, The test results showed that no genetic material on the crime scene evidence was a match to Echols, Baldwin or Misskelley, reported the, The West Memphis Police Department interviewed Hobbs, who was dismissive of the findings, claiming the hair could have been picked up during a visit to his home since the victim "played with our little boy regularly," according to the, "They said close to the crime scene because at one time I did walk near where they had found the kids with Terry Hobbs But I didn't wear hats back then, my hair could have blown around anywhere, Jacoby told Memphis NBC affiliate, A year after the DNA results were released, Hobbs sued Dixie Chicks singer Natalie Maines for defamation, claiming she implied he was a murderer on the bands website and at a 2007 rally, according to, In 2009, three witnesses filed affidavits claiming they saw Hobbs with the murdered boys the night they disappeared, contradicting Hobbs previous statements to police, according to. One person who has come up in the investigation is Terry Hobbs, although police have never named him a suspect or charged him in connection with the case. The news was devastating beyond just word of his friends suffering. Much of Cecil Hotel focuses on the amateur investigators who turned coincidences into conspiracy theories, ultimately accusing an innocent person of her death. The next to be found was Stevie Branch, quickly followed by Christopher Byers. Damien Echols, Jessie Misskelly and Jason Baldwin were originally convicted of the killings and released from prison in 2011 after making a deal with prosecutors. Self. Unfortunately, for three teen outsiders, the West Memphis Police Department chose to focus on the cult angle to the detriment of their efforts to investigate the other two, more likely scenarios. Titled West of Memphis, the film, directed by Amy J. Berg, presents an overview of the West Memphis Three's 18 years in prison, the revelation of new evidence, and explores the possibility of an alternate suspect. Echols attorneys got a letter from the custodian of records for the West Memphis police department saying some of the evidence ended up lost, or misplaced, and some destroyed by fire. The idea of the average citizen becoming embroiled in a criminal investigation isnt far-fetched in 2021, decades removed from the launch of WM3.org. That type of support made observers question the verdicts perhaps more so than any rock star who shouted Echolss name into a mic because of an HBO documentary. Obituaries can vary in the amount of information they contain, but many of them are genealogical goldmines, including information such as: names, dates, place of birth and death, marriage information, and family relationships. Main Page; Over two decades after the murders, what really happened to Stevie Branch, Christopher Byers, and Michael Moore on the evening of May 5, 1993, remains a mystery. Among them was a disoriented, muddy, and bleeding African-American man who stumbled into a West Memphis Bojangles restaurant men's room less than a mile from the crime scene. At approximately 1:30 p.m., Steve Jones, a juvenile parole officer from Crittenden County, peered over the steep bank of a water-filled ditch in the woods near the Blue Beacon truck wash. Misskelley's coerced confession, as contradictory as it seemed to the evidence, was consistent in implicating Echols and Jason Baldwin. Not everyone believes that the West Memphis Three are innocent of the killings of Michael Moore, Stevie Branch, and Christopher Byers. But then the verdicts arrived: Both Baldwin and Echols were found guilty on all counts, just like Misskelley had been six weeks before them. He was an actor, known for Sleepaway Camp II: Unhappy Campers (1988), Fast Food (1989) and In the Heat of the Night (1988). 2011 Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory (Documentary) Self - Stepfather of Stevie Branch. Spotting a small, black tennis shoe in the water, Jones radioed for help. In 1994, the FBI said there was scant evidence that violent satanic crimes had ever occurred in America outside of a few isolated incidents, but that was long after TV hosts like Geraldo, Sally Jessy Raphael, and Oprah had spread moral hysteria about musicians weaving supposedly anti-Christian and occult messages into their songs, and long after wrongful convictions were handed down in the infamous McMartin Preschool sexual assault trials. One of the keys to understanding the West Memphis Three murders is the phenomenon known as the Satanic Panic. Echols said in 2012, he will never give up his mission to exonerate himself. The Messed Up Truth About The West Memphis Three Murders, citing the discovery of her son's favorite pocket knife, One of the prosecution's key pieces of evidence linking Jason Baldwin, With their 2007 request for a new trial rejected, Baldwin is the co-founder of the legal advocacy organization Proclaim Justice. He had been expecting a visitation, but was instead led to the prison chapel office, where inmates were typically brought only if someone close to them had died. Among those active in the cause were singer Eddie Vedder of the band Pearl Jam, the country music trio The Dixie Chicks, punk rock icon and poet Henry Rollins, and actor Johnny Depp. Quickly, however, he realized Berlinger and Sinofsky were taking a different approach. Defense attorneys also pointed out that Griffis' doctorate was obtained through a notorious diploma mill and had been awarded with Griffis having never attended a single class. Little kids will be looking under their bed 'Damien might be under there! I kind of enjoy it because now even after I die, people are going to remember me forever. The specter of the church looms over Paradise Lost, best represented by an early scene in which Mark Byers leads his congregation in prayer and song. So much progress had been made in the fight for new trials, most notably a November 2010 Arkansas Supreme Court ruling that ordered a hearing on new DNA analysis and other evidence not considered in 1994. She says she is too because they believe they are hearing different stories. Over the years there has been lots of speculation and finger pointing as to who was responsible. But they werent just voices in the growing choir calling for the West Memphis Threes releasethey were leading the movement. To send flowers or plant a tree in memory of Terry Hobbs, visit the Tribute Store. Even today, years after his name was cleared and authorities ruled Lams death accidental, Morbid still receives threats. As detailed by The Hollywood Reporter in 2011, Jackson and Walsh helped fund key investigations for the West Memphis Three's defense during the last seven years of their incarceration. Branded the West Memphis Three, the mens case was featured in multiple documentaries, earning them support from an array of high-profile musicians, celebrities and activists. The consequences of that online campaign were ruinous: The person they targeted, a Mexican metal musician who worked under the name Morbid, was harassed into hiding. Here were these guysat best they were neutral. People would drive by and yell at us, Theyre going to burn in hell, Sauls says. So the minute youre done, you just want to know more. Misskelley, who had entered the West Memphis police station that morning with hopes of reward money he might use to purchase a new truck for his father found himself instead charged with murder and facing life plus 40 years in prison. But they were saying that he was about to die.. And they used that visibility to help raise funds for the defense. The evolution of how the teens were perceivedon behalf of both the filmmakers and even part of the defense teamis captured on camera early as Stidham and his colleagues began to consider whether Misskelleys confession had been coerced. Quality. Berlinger also concedes Revelations had some ethical problems, chiefly because it raised the possibility that Mark Byers committed the killings. We were finally winning, he says. In an email to The Ringer, Rollins stressed that inaction was not an option., Myself and the many people I worked with did what we could to help bring attention to the case and generate much needed financial aid, he wrote. It's one. The great irony of the 18-year quest to free the West Memphis Three is that it didnt begin as a crusade. We didnt see them grow up.. He was an actor, known for Sleepaway Camp II: Unhappy Campers (1988), Fast Food (1989) and In the Heat of the Night (1988). He was handed the phone. No charges have been brought against Jacoby, and he has never been named a suspect by the West Memphis Police Department. A later confession during the trial phase would prove equally problematic. During Misskelley's trial, Hutcheson testified that she had attended an "an occult Satanic meeting" she referred to as an "esbat." Case Details. Their advocates believe the Alford pleas represent their own form of injustice, but correcting that is a less pressing issue than the early battlesthe men are free and have been able to mostly live their lives in the years since their release. That was more than the people deciding the case were able to hearthe presiding judge made the expert give most of his testimony without the jury in the courtroom because he questioned its relevance. (Its worth noting that despite the issues raised by Lindseys work, the first season of Up and Vanished renewed interest in the case, which ultimately led to arrests, albeit of people that Lindsey hadnt previously covered on the podcast.). This is a story of justice delayed and justice denied. This is the true story of the West Memphis Three murders. He said Boxful of Nightmares is his memoirs unedited. Even without a smoking gun, the circumstantial evidence was enough for a conviction in a place like Crittenden County, Arkansas. My first thought is, I hope this dude isnt trying to pull me into some type of escape, Baldwin says nearly a quarter-century later. Damion Echols, Jason Baldwin, and Jessie Misskelley were convicted of murdering the children in 1994. In November, Judge David Burnett, who had presided over the trial, was elected to the state senate. Hobbs said, I still believe in my heart that Jessie, Jason, and Damion, 'Feels Like Home:' electrical failure from a light fixture caused December fire that killed 1, Shelby County reporting an increase in drug-related overdoses, largely due to fentanyl, Severe weather threat is over | Prepare for a sunny weekend, Daylight saving time starts soon. Damien Echols (@damienechols) July 7, 2021 Terry Hobbs, the stepfather of Branch who was under suspicion but never charged, said he welcomes new DNA testing. "They said close to the crime scene because at one time I did walk near where they had found the kids with Terry Hobbs But I didn't wear hats back then, my hair could have blown around anywhere, Jacoby told Memphis NBC affiliate WMC-TV in 2013. Echols is an author and mystic living New York with his wife, architect Lorri Davis. Case Details Parties . A source said the evidence was transferred to shipping containers where there was a fire, and some of the evidence was destroyed. The judge ruled that Hobbs could not establish actual malice, and ordered Hobbs to pay Maines legal fees amounting to more than $17,000, according to the Associated Press. By staying on this subject for the next couple of decades, they gave these men a chance and really decades of freedom afterward. One of Kathy Bakkens earliest jobs in Los Angeles allowed her a certain kind of cultural currency: She designed movie posters for an entertainment-advertising company, which meant she got to see films months before they were released. What has never been definitively answered, however, is who committed the 1993 murders, and The Forgotten West Memphis Three, premiering Saturday, March 28 at 8/7c on Oxygen, reexamines the case and key theories. Despite the best efforts of the police, dozens of volunteers, a search-and-rescue team, and a helicopter dispatched from nearby Memphis, Tenn., searchers came up empty handed. . But most notably, his initial timeline of events didnt match what was known about the crimes, and every time he offered a detail that diverged from the accepted chronology, the interrogating officers seemed to steer him back in the direction of the official version. She also stated that beyond the single meeting at her trailer, she had no further contact with Echols. It was also revealed in 2012 that Hobbs nephew allegedly told his friends, My Uncle Terry murdered those three little boys," and that the killings were a Hobbs family secret, according to WMC-TV. MEMPHIS, Tenn. (localmemphis.com)More than 25 years after the murders of three 8-year-old boys in West Memphis,a new book gives a first-person account of what was happening behind the scenes. While police had focused on Echols and Baldwin in the intervening weeks because of their reputation, the arrests came largely because of a confession by Misskelley, which was leaked to the largest newspaper in the area, the Memphis Commercial Appeal, and ran under the banner headline Teen describes cult torture of boys. At a press conference shortly after the arrests, the lead investigator was asked how confident he felt about the case on a scale of 1-10. Speaking by phone last month, he comes across, in many ways, like the person Berlinger says he encountered in prison in 1994: polite, deferential, soft-spoken. Although Damein Echols had a teenager's typical disdain for authority, he nevertheless trusted that the system would work in his favor. What a story it is. Echols, who prosecutors argued was the ringleader, was sentenced to death. People in West Memphis are going to tell their kids stories. On the evening of May 5, 1993, 8-year-olds Stevie Branch, Christopher Byers and Michael Moore went missing in West Memphis, Arkansas. Eventually, they began traveling to Arkansasabout 35 trips in total, always on their own dime, Bakken and Sauls sayto collect case documents, which they scanned and uploaded to the site, also transcribing the documents so that the text could be searchable.