In The Dark proved that Curtis Flowers was railroaded by an unjust system. The news was quickly followed by a shocking revelation in American Public Media podcast In The Dark. They fell out and broke. Willie James Hemphill was born on June 2, 1941. (1870), A.M. (1872), and LL.D. Presley was the tougher of the two, and he didn't say much. If the state Supreme Court were to order a seventh trial for Flowers, the district attorney would face a difficult task, Saums said. Their reporters know better than anyone that Hemphill wouldnt get a fair trial. The whole time Ive been telling them, I dont remember the day, Fleming said. He told the podcast he had an airtight alibi. Illuminating Journalism from American Public Media. Who was he? Username. But perhaps the most intriguing new development is the emergence of a man who verbally attacked journalists on the podcast while denying he was in town on the day of the murders. Visitation will be 10 a.m. to 7 p.m . In the midst of the probe, the Mississippi Crime Lab sent a copy of the bloody shoeprint found at Tardy to the lead Boston investigator. Fourteen lawyers. On April 30, 2018, American Public Medias true crime podcast In The Dark began airing its second season, an investigation of the case of Curtis Flowers, a black man in Mississippi accused of a quadruple homicide at a furniture store in 1996. UNLOCK PROFILE. A woman who admitted having sex with a 13-year-old boy and becoming pregnant with his baby has avoided jail time. Willie James Hemphill Phone Numbers (662) ***-4391 It was all make believe. Burial will be at Barber Memorial Cemetery The police there picked up the investigation and also apparently probed the Tardy Furniture connection. Jessie Mae Hemphill; Jimmie Gordon; Jimmy "Duck" Holmes; Jimmy Burns; Jimmy Dawkins; Jimmy Holmes; Jimmy Johnson; . In the past, Willie has also been known as Willie James Hemphill, Willie A Hemphill, Willie James Hemphill, Willie J Hemphill and Willi Hemphill. An investigative team from American Public Media has uncovered evidence that law enforcement had at least two other suspects in the 1996 quadruple homicide in Winona that put Curtis Flowers on death row information that was not shared with his defense attorneys. Nine days later, on July 25, 1996, the bodies of two innocent people were discovered in a pawn shop in Birmingham, Alabama. Fleming had said six times since 1996 she saw Flowers running from the store on the morning of the murders. "They wanted to put all these robberies onto Marcus and LaSamuel.". Mississippi Highway Patrol Lt. Wayne Miller, the investigator who created the lineup, testified that the only suspect pictured in the lineup was Flowers. Later, he said, one of the officers, Vince Small, came by, and he handed the officer the gun. Like LaSamuel Gamble, Hemphill wore Fila shoes and had a criminal record. When Flowers went back on trial, Armstrong heard no mention of the gun by either prosecutors or defense attorneys. Its almost impossible to not hate him and to believe he is guilty. He is aiming to get bail, which is rare in capital murder cases. Service: 11 am Saturday, March 3, 201. Ive been confused of the day from the beginning. Contacts (5) Locations (10) Family (3) Social (2) It happens. Willie Hemphill's passing at the age of 97 has been publicly announced by Arnold Family Funeral Services Inc. - Hillside Chapel in Altadena, CA.Legacy invites you to offer condolences and share memori Before he disappeared into a men's bathroom, he once again dodged the question of where he was on the day of the murders and insulted two female reporters with vulgarities. ", "I was nowhere near the scene," he said. And there he was. His mothers mutt, Patches, was barking in the crawl space, causing him to find a gunbeneath the house she was renting. Why was he questioned? John Johnson, the DAs investigator, told the jury, I think they talked to him for five minutes. After learning that Willie James Hemphill was an initial suspect in the murders at Tardy Furniture, reporters for In the Dark wanted to find out if he'd ever broken the law before. 0 Rate Willie. A shoeprint in a pool of blood found in the Winona furniture store was found to be from a Grant Hill Fila shoethe footwear Gamble, McKenzie (and just about every other young man in America) was wearing while in Mississippi. . But attempting to deliver another black man into that same system goes against its good work. Menu. His mother lived there, and he had gone to school there on and off. Hemphill said investigators told him he was a suspect because witnesses had placed him on Front Street near Tardy Furniture Store on the morning of the murders and because of the kind of shoe he wore: Fila Grant Hills, the shoe investigators determined had made the bloody shoe prints inside the store. While that case was delayed for more than two years, Hallmon murdered three people, including his ex-girlfriend, Marquita Hill, and her mother. He spent 11 days in jail before authorities released him. Current Address: EHZR Hannah Dr, Rock Hill, SC. Hemphills name came up briefly in Flowers 2010 trial. Hemphill said investigator took his shoes for a few minutes as well as his fingerprints. Willie James Hemphill didn't come up until the sixth Flowers trial, and law enforcement officers said he was eliminated as a suspect in about five minutes. He's also targeted women in general and often women carrying purses. Updated: June 22, 2016 . Initially, Hemphill refused to provide further details of his whereabouts on July 16, 1996. A witness whose statement put a man on death row for 22 years has performed a remarkable backflip, turning a case on its head. The presence of live ammunition on the floor suggested that one of the killers was using a 380 pistol that jammed repeatedly. Appendix III: List of Soldiers by Name Updated February 22, 2005 War of 1812 Discharge Certificates Appendix I: List of Units and Subunits Appendix II: List of Company/Detachment Commanders Appendix III: List of Soldiers by Name Appendix IV: List of Soldiers by Unit Appendix III: List of Soldiers by Name [table striped="true" responsive="true"]NameYearRegimentCompanyAbbey, Edward17951st . Willie Headen; Willie James Lyons; Willie Love; Willie Mabon; Willie Smith; Willie Trice; Willie Williams; Lab officials, however, say the gun never arrived and was never tested. An early suspect in the murders, Willie James Hemphill, who has a long criminal history, lived less than a mile from where Armstrong found this gun in 2011. The FBI checked it out. As I argue in the course of the program, Simpson seemed to be bending over backwards to let the world know that a gun had been stolen from his car in the parking lot of the garment factory where he worked. Injustice flourishes in the darkness, and the sun is now blazing in the heavens (at least for Curtis Flowers). Born in 2 Jun 1941 and died in 27 May 2008 Gaffney, South Carolina Willie James Hemphill In the 1980s and '90s, Hemphill spent time in Memphis. Sarah Warnock and Jerry Mitchell/Clarion Ledger, Your California Privacy Rights/Privacy Policy. APM lead investigative reporter Madeleine Baran found one page among the documents Evans did give the defense attorneys, a form someone named Willie James Hemphill, then 24, of Memphis had signed . He told APM Reports that he was arrested and questioned in the early days of the investigation. That brings us to a theory that has been explored extensively by some of the folks currently representing Mr. After finding the weapon, Armstrong wondered how the gun had wound up under the house his mother was renting on Knox Street, only 700 feet or so from the furniture store. He was born on December 6, 1948 in Weir, Mississippi the son of Eddie Allen and Garner Lee Edwards Hemphill. But that doesnt mean that he killed those four people at Tardy Furniture. Why offer up another suspect? Willie James Hemphill, Willie J Hemphill, Williae Hemphill. The two men had family in both Boston and Norfolk. A photo array that contains Marcus Presley (No. The Tardy Furniture murders were committed at a store on Front Street in Winona, Mississippi, at about 10 a.m., and around the time that one of the store's employees, Carmen Rigby, was returning with a bank bag. His alibi is weak, according to In The Dark. So, maybe Curtis didnt steal the gun after all. . By the end of the two episodes devoted to the Flowers case, they had all abandoned Curtis as a suspect. The officer who was with Small when they pulled over Armstrong for speeding told APM Reports that Armstrong had indeed given them a handgun, which was turned over to the district attorneys office. Where were you?, Hemphill: I was in your p***y. It was Geraldine. He's shown a fearlessness about committing brazen attacks and thefts in daylight with high risks and low payoff, in places close to where he's lived and where people are more likely to recognize him. … A bunch of lies., Asked about Hallmons recantation, District Attorney Doug Evans, who has prosecuted Flowers in all six trials, said, Thats why the judge instructs the jury that a jailhouse informant is not very reliable, because they can change their statements very easily, for any reason. According to testimony in Flowers' first trial, authorities found $255 hidden in the headboard of Flowers' girlfriend. View More. We developed information that Doyle was missing from work that morning for about 30 or 40 minutes, which was about the time of the murders, he said. Presley and Gamble had developed a simplemodus operandi. Search by Name Search . That might not be so if the whole world wasnt watching, but it is. Not the right Willie? They wanted to ask him about his alibi for the day of the Tardy Furniture murders, an alibi that hadn't checked out. Evidence suggests that Marcus Presley was a psychopath who enjoyed random violence for its own sake. Selected filmography. And in searching for Hemphill, she came upon a cousin with the same name who recalled three carloads of deputies showing up at his mobile home in 1996 looking for the other Hemphill. Records show he was questioned Hemphill said he was interrogated for hours and held for 11 days before being released. In fact, it appears Miller had specifically asked for the photo of Presley from an investigator in Virginia, where Presley and his accomplice, LaSamuel Gamble, were apprehended. Even so, they had to wade through a stack of rat-eaten files stored in an abandoned factory to realize he had been booked into jail. Illuminating Journalism from American Public Media. It's not like you're going to say, 'Yeah I robbed this 7-11, but I didn't rob that 7-11.'". The truths going to come out.. The day in photos. Not the right Willie? I know he didnt do it, Archie Flowers said. Willie Ray Hemphill, Jr., 49, of Bryan, passed away Thursday, August 13, 2009 at his residence. The bodies of Derrick Stewart, 16, Robert Golden, 42, Carmen Rigby, 45, and Bertha Tardy, 59, were found spread throughout the store and in the back office. Check resumes and CV, arrest records, places of employment, social media profiles, photos and videos, public records, skilled experts, publications and memorials . During the sixth Flowers trial, Matthews, who worked with Miller at the Mississippi Highway Patrol, said the only suspect in the case aside from Flowers was Doyle Simpson, whose gun the prosecution argued Flowers stole and used as the murder weapon. Photos. 0 Reputation Score Range. The podcast, which uncovered evidence used by Flowers to get his conviction overturned, spoke with witness Clemmie Fleming. And why didnt DA Doug Evans even consider the Presley-Gamble connection? James Graham, was a blues pianist and her mother, Virgie Lee Graham, was skilled in many instruments, though she did not . Also known as Willie L Hemphill, Hemphill Wilie. "He would have just told me everything and anything at that point," Goldberg said. Visitation: 6-8 pm Friday, March 2, 2012 at Laurel Land Funeral Home. Willie James Hemphill; Willie James Hemphill, Age 44. aka Willie Jr Hemphill. It might mean letting someone get away with an abominable crime. They contained no mention of the Alabama suspects. He lived near Tardy Furniture at the time of the murders, and near where a gun that might have been the murder weapon was found. In other words, Evans committed two egregiousBrady violations that will, in the days that lie ahead, force the courts to grant a new trial and, just as likely, insist that Doug Evans recuse himself from this case. Reporters also poked holes in Hemphill . If youve listened toIn the Darkor watchedWrong Manon the Starz channel, you either came away convinced that Curtis Flowers didnt kill four people in cold blood back in 1996 or you werent paying attention. He died on July 14, 2000 at age 81. But Flowers deserves to have a fair trial and prosecution, he said. The answer was yes many, many times. Email Address: w XMLS @yahoo.com +1 email. Hemphill, Willie Mae Willie Mae Hemphill, Born March 8, 1926. In the Dark,episode 10, makes it clear that the prosecution committed what is called a Brady violation by failing to inform defense counsel that Hemphill had been a suspect early in the investigation. Flowers, the individuals I reference as the Birmingham boys. Search by Name. And the investigative file not shared with the defense showed investigators had considered Marcus Presley, the gunman in the murders and a string of similar crimes that same summer in neighboring Alabama. In that 1963 ruling, the court said: "The suppression by the prosecution of evidence favorable to an accused violates due process where the evidence is material either to guilt or to punishment.". Podcasts should stick to exonerating the innocent. Simplistic journalism ethics call for reporters to follow the facts wherever they might lead. Obituaries Section. The obituary was featured in The Bryan-College Station Eagle on August 16, 2009. "If he's guilty, he's guilty.". Maybe. I aint saying nothing bad. James appears the first time in the 1870 Federal Census as a six year-old, living with two brothers and a sister on his parents farm in Lampasas County, Texas. The suspects include the gunman in an Alabama crime spree that summer that bore several similarities to the Winona killings and a violent career criminal who at the time of the murders was living with a girlfriend across from the furniture store. Their names are Michael Lee Boies , Crystal Davis , and six others. Reporters also poked holes in Hemphill . Record for Willie James Hemphill 27 May 1919 - 14 July 2000 in Quantico National Cemetery, Triangle, Prince William, Virginia, United States from BillionGraves GPS Headstones. When reporters talked to Hemphill last year, he said investigators cleared him because he had an alibi he called it "airtight." Willie married Janeen Winegar on August 10, 2003 in Las Vegas, Nevada. Gamble never discharged his weapon. The fourth and fifth trials ended with hung juries. Resides in Greenwood, MS. It was June 21 just an hour before the U.S. Supreme Court would overturn Curtis Flowers' conviction and reporters for In the Dark had intercepted Hemphill at a courthouse in Indianapolis. Told that Woods had a clear memory of being in Winona on the morning of July 16 and learning, outside the Piggly Wiggly, that the murders had just happened, Hemphill interrupted and altered his story. Authorities put together alineup later that day of black-and-white photos, and she identified Flowers from the lineup as the man she briefly saw that morning when she came outside to move her car. <a . Whoever killed four innocent people in the Tardy Furniture store on that fateful day in 1996 was familiar with armed violence and kind of liked it. Both involved store employees who were shot execution-style, a .380 handgun that might have jammed, and a suspect wearing Fila shoes. A series of Willie James Hemphill mugshots ranging from 2000 through 2016. Hemphill: A lot of people dont like to talk to the press and the police., Reporter: She was actually pretty talkative., Hemphill: Maybe she dont recall the day in question., Reporter: She actually has a really clear memory of that day., Hemphill: I dont know what she told you. Historical Person Search Search Search Results Results willie james hemphill (1955 - 2006) Try FREE for 14 days Try FREE for 14 days. Information APM Reports obtained from the Montgomery County Sheriffs Department through a public records request shows Hemphill was held for 11 days in jail. Although authorities quicklysettled on Flowers as their main suspect, he wasnt arrested until seven months later. Detective Goldberg got Presley and Gamble to confess their roles in a pair of murders at a Birmingham pawn shop less than two weeks after the Tardy Furniture murders. Doug Evans, the district attorney who prosecuted Flowers in all six trials, has declined to be interviewedby APM Reports and has not returned calls from the Clarion Ledger. You may also light a candle in honor of Willie James . NEWS & ADVICE. After nearly 23 years locked up, Curtis Flowers has a chance to get out on bail if his lawyers can convince the judge to rule in his favor. "You're confusing me. Willie Hemphill in Virginia. Police arrived at the factory and interviewed employee Katherine Snow. When we finally found Hemphill, living in Indianapolis, he had some very surprising things to say about the case. Share Obituary. Willie James Hemphill was confronted in an Indianapolis courthouse last week, 23 years after police deemed him an initial suspect but later pursued leads against Flowers. Hired by Starz to examine the case, Saums said the crime"suggests somebody who has done it before. No one was going to all that trouble over the approximately $400 investigators say was in the till that morning. According to the July 8, 1996, police report, store owner Bertha Tardy reported to police that a burglar or burglars smashed through a skylight, tried to break into the safe and stole the side door key. His age is 79. Nationwide News Pty Ltd 2023. Before he left on July 3, he said she gave him $30. The district's Republicans should nominate James Hemphill as their candidate for Congress in the May 3 primary. There is little doubt that Hemphill has done terrible things. An early suspect in the murders, Willie James Hemphill, who has a long criminal history, lived less than a mile from where Armstrong found this gun in 2011. It was still in the morning time.". He died on May 27, 2008 at age 66. View contact information: phones, addresses, emails and networks. He never responded. The answer was yes many, many times. The show revealed that the district attorneys office bullied and threatened people into lying on the witness stand. Although Presley was only sixteen, he seems to have been the driving force behind these crimes. "We did go to the mall, but it wasn't the day of the killing. Evans has spoken to the Greenwood Commonwealth, most recently about APM Reports analysis of his record of striking potential black jurors vs. white juries 4 1/2 times more often. In 1996, Mississippi investigators told the local paper they were looking into a possible connection. Marcus Presley sometimes accompanied by LaSamuel Gamble had committed a string of robberies in 1996 in and around Birmingham, with the same modus operandi. The crime itself was extraordinary, but the case drew In The Darks attention because a local prosecutor had tried Flowers six times for the murders. She said the shoes had belonged to her son, who no longer lived there. Marcus Presley, then 16, points a gun at pawn shop owner John Burleson shortly before killing him on July 25, 1996, in a suburb of Birmingham, Alabama. In The Darks reporting on the case documented the inequities and outright barbarism of Mississippis criminal justice system. Maybe he and Doyle were co-perpetrators. Each victim of the July 16, 1996 murders was murdered execution styleone or two bullets to the back of the head. View Willie Smith results in Kingwood, TX including current phone number, address, relatives, background check report, and property record with Whitepages. The similarities between the crimes were striking. In fact, he said, police never searched the crawl space beneath the house. The podcast has never cared about the fundamental horrors of the justice system; it just wants to ensure that those horrors only happen to the correct people. Editor's note: This endorsement editorial was updated on . They wanted to ask him about his alibi for the day of the Tardy Furniture murders, an alibi that hadn't checked out. WINONA Renowned pathologist Dr. Michael Baden said evidence he reviewed of the 1996 Tardy Furniture slayings suggests more than one personcarried out the quadruple murder. Evans didnt want jurors comparing his tortured theory with a simple and sensible alternative. Usually if somebody starts shooting, he said, others will run.. 2) and Curtis Flowers (No. If Woods had been at the mall with Hemphill at the time of the murders roughly 10 a.m. she couldn't have been back in Winona any earlier than noon. "We have never had any evidence that showed anything other than this defendant's guilt," Evans said. APM lead investigative reporter Madeleine Baran found one page among the documents Evans did give the defense attorneys, a form someone named Willie James Hemphill, then 24, of Memphis had signed at the Winona Police Department five days after the murders waiving his rights to an attorney. Eight persons linked to this address. It wasn't until Flowers' sixth trial that jurors heard anything about the Alabama suspects. Law enforcement had interviewed a different suspect with a violent criminal history, Willie James Hemphill a fact which was not disclosed to the defense. This case was filed in U.S. Courts Of Appeals, U.S. Court Of Appeals, Eleventh Circuit. But we found a document showing that another man, Willie James Hemphill, had also been questioned just days after the murders. Willie Hemphill Found 194 people in Mississippi, Illinois and 31 other states. It was his legal obligation, but its easy to see why he didnt. Her new position on exactly what happened that morning is likely to be heard by a jury if Fleming faces one for a seventh time. Jurors at Flowers trials had only heard of one suspect who could have worn Fila Grant Hills Flowers although investigators never found the shoes they said he wore. And in the first Flowers trial, in 1997, he testified that "there were numerous suspects" in the early days of the investigation. Name. Reporter: Were trying to puzzle through this. There are 60+ professionals named "Willie Hemphill", who use LinkedIn to exchange information, ideas, and opportunities. They found out later that Flowers uncle, Doyle Simpson, said his .380 automatic had been stolen from the glove box of his car parked at the Angelica Garment Factory where he worked. A wealthy lawyer who killed his wife and son at close range has been sentenced in one of the most troubling cases the judge said he had seen. He thought back to when Small took the gun. Submit an Obituary. Following that arrest, Hemphill committed crimes nearly continuously for the next three decades. On July 19, the Clarion Ledger did just that, finding wires, broken concrete blocks, parts of childrens toys and a plastic dog bone. Evidence of false testimony by prosecution witnesses could potentially get Flowers' conviction overturned, Bennett Gershman, a former prosecutor who now teaches law at Pace University, told the APM reporting team. 1. He didnt mark it or put it in an evidence bag, he told the Clarion Ledger. When Baran and her producer eventually tracked down the right Hemphill, he told them, Yeah, they actually had me as a suspect in that.. What an Alabama crime spree might reveal about the Curtis Flowers investigation. He freely admitted that he had been a suspect and even says that, although innocent, he would have made a more convincing suspect than Curtis. The funeral service will be 1pm Sunday at China Grove A.M.E. Zion Church. It hurts my feelings.. How do we create a person's profile? In a remarkable turn of events almost 23 years after four people, including a 16-year-old boy, were gunned down and left inside the Tardy Furniture store in Winona, Mississippi, three things have happened. Presley murdered four people and wounded three others in a spree of robberies and murders that year. Includes Address(1) Phone(2) Email(1) See Results. Willie James Hemphill has done many terrible things. EPISODE 16. Miller, the Mississippi investigator who made the lineup and asked for the two to be interrogated, declined to answer questions from APM Reports. She had at least 2 sons and 1 daughter with James Tobias Whitehead. By licks he meant places to rob.. Steven McKenzie, the driver of the getaway car in the pawn shop murders, was arrested on August 1 in his hometown of Boston, Massachusetts. Select this result to view William Thomas Hemphill's phone number, address, and more. Me and Twanda was out of town," he said. You said that was an airtight alibi we talked to Twanda and she said she wasnt with you that day., Hemphill: They released me based on that. The investigative file contained no indication of what Hemphill said or why he was eliminated as a suspect. Maybe Doyle did the deed and reported his gun stolen to throw everyone off the scent. One of them wore Grant Hill Fila sneakers. Hemphill also wasnt held briefly. How did your name get involved in this?, Hemphill: I wasnt in the city. Photos. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008); The Social Network (2010) The killer or killers could have used the key to enter the side door, perhaps hiding before the store opened. In the Dark has previously reported that Hemphill was an initial suspect in the days after the July 1996 murders in Winona, Mississippi. Just after the murders, police arrested and jailed him as a suspect, but then let him go. Eight days before these murders, a side door key was stolen. Explosive end to case thats rocked America. The accused has had his conviction overturned for the sixth time, the woman who put him at the scene of the murders has backflipped on her story and another man has been forced to deny it was him all along. Grief Support. Wiilie Hemphill passed away in Bryan, Texas. In addition, one jailhouse snitch has recanted, he said. "I think we pretty much ruled him out from the get-go," Matthews testified. But he believed Gamble's denial. Username. Find records of Willie Hemphill . While Presley drove the action, Gamble kept his gun trained on the scene in case anyone tried to flee. Wrong Manpresented us with a small group of criminal justice professionals who started out believing that Curtis was probably the killer. My mom, my stepdad were afraid that, hey, if they're manhunting me like that, they may shoot me down in the street, Hemphill told them. Shooting a handgun with accuracy is more difficult than people think, said private investigator Charlie Saums of Ridgeland. It was June 21 just an hour before the U.S. Supreme Court would overturn Curtis Flowers' conviction and reporters for In the Dark had intercepted Hemphill at a courthouse in Indianapolis. Winona, Mississippi lies three hours west of Birmingham on Highway 82. 0.68 2.43 /5. Willie Dixon - The Big Three Trio 1947-1952 (Roots N' Blues C 46216) FLAC .