For the next two hours and 29 minutes, the two inmates sat in near silence watching Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills, the landmark documentary released on HBO 25 years ago this week that captured the trials of Baldwin, Jessie Misskelley Jr., and Damien Echols, the three teenagers convicted in 1994 of the crimes that ripped through the small, working-class community of West Memphis, Arkansas. I wouldn't do something like that. A theory held is that Terry Hobbs was the one who actually killed the three boys and had pinned it on the Memphis 3 boys. On Aug. 11, 2011, the West Memphis Three entered the courtroom for the final time. Although Damein Echols had a teenager's typical disdain for authority, he nevertheless trusted that the system would work in his favor. Now a judgewho coincidentally works part time in the courtroom where Misskelley was convictedStidham spends time speaking to law students about the judicial system. The idea of killer teens in the Christian South, not any greater sense of purpose, was mainly what intrigued Sheila Nevins, then the head of HBOs documentary division, when she spotted a story about the case on the inside pages of The New York Times. the only grade you receive is from quizzes, exams, and the final. Sauls says that the former Black Flag frontman was one of the few big names who dug deep into the evidence, wanting to learn as many details as he could about the case. Terry Hobbs's income source is mostly from being a successful Actor. 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. It has happened to a lot of people that just dont have the spotlight of a documentary, he says. They began attending appeal hearings and visiting Baldwin, Echols, and Misskelley in prison. Damion Echols, Jason Baldwin, and Jessie Misskelley were convicted of murdering the children in 1994. This article was updated after publication to add more context about the honorariums paid to the families of the victims and the West Memphis Three and also to correct the time frame in which Berlinger and Sinofsky informed HBO about the changing scope of the documentary. I didn't even comprehend that the situation could get this serious that it can go this far. Hobbs says his book is 25 years in the making, adding it is called Boxful of Nightmares for a reason. Few celebrities at the time did as much as Henry Rollins, however. During the final year of the two-year span, from July 2021 to July 2022, California lost about 211,000 people, according to data from the state Department of Finance. He says that while he was in the supermax prison in Varner, he would write letters trying to drum up support for not just himself, but also for other inmates he believed were wrongfully convicted. (Echolswho is in better health today, though his eyesight has degenerated and he has premature arthritis from his time in solitary confinementin particular has maintained a relatively public life, through the five books hes published, performing magic for Patreon subscribers, and making TV appearances to discuss other cases he sees as similar to his.) I think we were the first internet sleuths, but we were not internet sleuths.. He says his dad and Berlinger werent seeking notorietydocumentaries certainly werent a means to get rich or famous in those days. . TSGT Terry Lee Hobbs, USAF, ret. Michelle McNamara helped crack the Golden State Killer case by poring over thousands of pages of case files while working on her book Ill Be Gone in the Dark, which was published two years after her 2016 death, while Chris Lambert and his podcast Your Own Backyard were highlighted by authorities after two arrests in April in connection with the 1996 disappearance of Cal Poly student Kristin Smart. Sheriff's deputies in Calhoun County say Terry Hobbs was reported missing on Saturday, April 20, 2019. Main Page; At the suggestion of the police, Hutcheson hid microphones in her home and borrowed occult books from the library to inspire Echols' interest. He knew that if he ever got out, hed want to do that in a more organized way. But its closing moments point to how the filmmakers felt: that a horrific tragedy had just been compounded by a monumental miscarriage of justice. 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. We didnt see them grow up.. Stidham, who was just 30 years old and not long out of law school when the court appointed him to be Misskelleys attorney, went in thinking he would negotiate a deal for his client, who had told police that his acquaintances Baldwin and Echols committed the crimes and that he was present and played a role as an accessory. What a story it is. The nonprofits work hasnt always been easyfundraising is hard, and because hes a convicted felon, hes unable to visit clients in prison or discuss pleasbut its been essential for him as he strives to live the words by 14th-century Persian poet Hafez that he keeps as an email signature: The small man builds cages for everyone he knows / While the sage, who has to duck his head when the moon is low / Keeps dropping keys all night long for the beautiful rowdy prisoners. Baldwin says hes learned that justice isnt a computer programthat you can input all the evidence and testimony and still get the wrong results. (Maines briefly became a part of the story when Terry Hobbs, stepfather of another . TERRY HOBBS OBITUARY Terry Roland Hobbs, 62, of Sweetwater, passed away on Saturday, September 11, 2021. It just needed a catalyst. Please also read our Privacy Notice and Terms of Use, which became effective December 20, 2019. doesn't know how to teach the material and you will end up teaching yourself everything. A native of Winter Haven, born December 21, 1964, Terry has been a lifelong resident of Auburndale. Who Killed The Forgotten West Memphis Three? It was almost like an out-of-body experience., When the credits rolled shortly after the unforgettable final scene, which shows a now-convicted Baldwin and Echols leaving the courtroom in handcuffs and entering a police cruiser as Metallica plays, Baldwin sat stunned. Also part of the plea was the provision that the three could not sue the state. 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. To authorities working in West Memphisa largely Southern Baptist communitysatanic activity seemed to be the most likely cause for the killings, in part because the boys bodies were bound and appeared to have been mutilated. 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. October 13, 2018 - Happy 94th Birthday Terry! Jason Baldwin had no idea what was happening when a fellow inmate at the supermax prison in Varner, Arkansas, woke him up early one morning in 1997. Share Memories & Support the Family. . To learn more or opt-out, read our Cookie Policy. They were naked and hog-tied with their own shoelaces, and showed signs of blunt force trauma and mutilation, the latter of which may have been the work of wild animals, reported the, Three teenage boys were arrested for the crimes , Baldwin and Misskelley were sentenced to life without parole while Echols received the death penalty. Now, evidence from the case of the West Memphis Three is either missing or destroyed. Baldwin remembers the dire circumstances laid out during the call. By choosing I Accept, you consent to our use of cookies and other tracking technologies. In 1994, Dr. Dale W. Griffis was a retired police officer who had embarked on a second career as a self-styled consultant on occult and cult-related crime. 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. (At one point, Sauls says, it landed on Yahoos list of the top 100 websites.) 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 third put forth the unusual theory that the killings were committed as a cult ritual. The bodies of Branch, Byers, and Moore were found in a drainage ditch in West Memphis May 6 . (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.). More than 2,500 people attended and the story dominated the local press for days. But then the verdicts arrived: Both Baldwin and Echols were found guilty on all counts, just like Misskelley had been six weeks before them. 34465541-95D0-45B0-BEEB-B9E0361A315A He could have been me, he told Rolling Stone in 2011. Hobbs denied the accusation, saying that his family does have secrets, but none of them have to do with murder. 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. 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, I still believe in my heart that Jessie, Jason, and Damion Echols [sic] are responsible for what happened to our children, Hobbs told Memphis ABC affiliate. 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. Cinemorgue Wiki. 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. He died on April 4, 2019 in Panama City Beach, Florida, USA. The reason for the credit gets less curious when hes asked about it: He was a huge Metallica fan. By the end of Paradise Lost, you cant believe they were found guilty, Bakken says. Local 24 News EXCLUSIVE: Terry Hobbs on his new memoir on the West Memphis 3. Baldwin and Misskelley were sentenced to life without parole while Echols received the death penalty. According to Devil's Knot author Mara Leveritt, the investigation of the murders was divided along three lines. 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. Over the course of the initial investigation, a number of alternate suspects and scenarios came to light that were largely ignored or otherwise dismissed by authorities. According to Griffis, black hair, black T-shirts, and black jeans were signs that a kid was in league with the devil. 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. It'll be sort of like I'm the West Memphis boogeyman. Robin Lynn Jones. This is not a smoking-gun-type case.. They had a daughter together, Amanda Hobbs, who was 4 years old at the time of her brothers death. Now, I see they can. The attorneys representing Echols and Baldwin believed that the juries wouldnt accept the prosecutions versions of eventsthat they were too fantastical and tied to second-hand informationand that without conclusive proof, their clients would walk. " (Detective Allen) told me if I knew anything, that there was a $35,000 reward, and if I could help them out, we'd get the money," said Misskelley, as quoted by Mara Leveritt in Devil's Knot. Reaching its apex in the late 1980s and early 1990s, the Satanic Panic was a wave of paranoia rooted in the belief that Satanic cults intent on corrupting the souls of the young had infiltrated American society. Mara Leveritt, a journalist who followed the case throughout the 1990s and wrote the 2002 book Devils Knot: The True Story of the West Memphis Three, calls the strain of Christianity that runs through the region very literal and says that even her children faced harassment as teenagers for playing Dungeons & Dragons and listening to Ozzy Osbourne. Quickly, however, he realized Berlinger and Sinofsky were taking a different approach. So advocacy and diligence become tantamount, because most people in a similar situation to the one he was in dont have the benefit of filmmakers and musicians fighting on their behalf. The final scene Berlinger and Sinofsky filmed may have been the piece that stuck with viewers the most: the image of Baldwin and Echols being led out of the courthouse in handcuffs and bulletproof vests, now property of the state. The first being that boys were killed by someone they knew. It was a call about Damien Echolshe wasnt dead, but his wife, Lorri Davis, feared he might be soon. Sign up forOxygen Insiderfor all the best true crime content. We use cookies and other tracking technologies to improve your browsing experience on our site, show personalized content and targeted ads, analyze site traffic, and understand where our audiences come from. They saw the same thing you did. Essentially, it allows the accused to assert their innocence while pleading guilty, conceding that the prosecution has an overwhelming amount of evidence to procure a conviction. When they searched online, they found little to no information about the case. Coverage of the latest true crime stories and famous cases explained, as well as the best TV shows, movies and podcasts in the genre. Baldwin is the co-founder of the legal advocacy organization Proclaim Justice. After 18 years in prison, the West Memphis Three were finally free, but not exonerated. Paradise Lost is a narration-free documentary filmed with a journalistic remove. Boxful of Nightmares is the personal memoirs of Terry Hobbs, the stepfather of one of the children murdered. No charges have been brought against Jacoby, and he has never been named a suspect by the West Memphis Police Department. 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. The state of Arkansas continues to attempt to prevent this testing from happening. Echols is an author and mystic living New York with his wife, architect Lorri Davis. Wherever it was screened, Berlinger says, it was followed by intense Q&As from audience members who couldnt believe what theyd just watched. 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 sce 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. 25, 2021. 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. In West Memphis, Hobbs worked as an ice cream delivery man and Hicks worked at a restaurant. And that makes him hopeful that exoneration is on the horizon. 2011 Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory (Documentary) Self - Stepfather of Stevie Branch. Case Number : 2:21-BK-21177. As the movement to free the West Memphis Three gained traction, a number of celebrities joined the cause, bringing the case under more scrutiny. Its gone from a controversial legal theory to an accepted phenomenon. Share Memories & Support the Family. They werent telling me I was lying, even if they may have been saying that in their minds. 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. Hobbs said he wrote the book so people, especially other victims of crime, could understand the tragedy he has gone through and how it impacted his life. February 27, 2023 (82 years old) View obituary. Bakken immediately showed her friends Burk Sauls and Grove Pashley, who were both equally gripped by what they had just watched. As for Paradise Lost, it was the inciting incident in the two-decade chain of events that led to the release of the West Memphis Three. 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. It allowed them to get out of prison after almost 20 years. He said Boxful of Nightmares is his memoirs unedited. Echols' disdain for authority, penchant for black clothes, and propensity to make shocking statements didn't help his plight. Terry L. Hobbs, 63, of Caldwell, HOBBS, Terry L., passed on March 7,2021 at the age of 63. The idea of the average citizen becoming embroiled in a criminal investigation isn't far-fetched in 2021, . Minutes later, Sgt. Its evidence that Damien Echols attorneys wanted to do new DNA testing on. Terry Hobbs was born in 1958 and grew up in Northern Arkansas. But for every Your Own Backyard or Ill Be Gone in the Dark that has applied journalistic rigor to their research in the past two decades, theres an Up and Vanished, which has been at the center of ethical debates since the podcast debuted in 2016. So the minute youre done, you just want to know more. 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. Pam Hobbs divorced Terry Hobbs in 2004 and has reversed her position on the West Memphis Three's guilt. there are no assignments to cushion your grade, so either pass or fail. Terry Hobbs, one of the men named in the documents. Dec 13th, 2021. I went to a Baptist school and I got accused of being a devil worshiper because I was trying to learn how to write hieroglyphics, says Sauls, today a screenwriter and VFX designer. Despite an offer of a reduced sentence, Misskelley ultimately recanted his statements and refused to testify against Echols and Baldwin. Two questions plagued the conservative, middle-class community: Why would anyone commit such a heinous act, and, more importantly, who? He is from USA. Dan Stidham, the original attorney for Misskelley, who would also work on Baldwins and Echols appeals, says he has the answer. But the lawyer quickly noticed inconsistencies in Misskelleys purported confession. (Despite Misskelleys statement, the coroners examination found no injuries on the victims consistent with sexual assault.) Baldwin, the youngest member of the trio that had come to be known as the West Memphis Three, was serving a life sentence after being convicted on charges connected to the 1993 killings of three 8-year-old boys. 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. After new DNA evidence was discovered, the West Memphis Three were released from prison in August 2011 by agreeing to an Alford plea, which allowed him to proclaim their innocence while admitting the prosecution had enough evidence to convict him. Berlinger contrasts this with the approach taken by Bakken, Sauls, and Co., who considered the truth sacrosanct and avoided rumor and innuendo in part because similar speculation helped convict the West Memphis Three. I just checked again and HE IS STILL MISSING. eyewitness evidence surfaced 16 years later. Further down, it includes names such as Rick Dior, a sound mixer who worked on Apollo 13 and Dirty Dancing, and Bob Richman, a three-time Emmy-nominated cinematographer whose rsum also includes renowned docs like An Inconvenient Truth and Waiting for Superman. Over the years there has been lots of speculation and finger pointing as to who was responsible. 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. This is before considering the 2013 dramatized movie based on the events (and Leveritts book), Stidhams plans to release the book Harvest of Innocence, and how elements of the case made their way into True Detectives third season. With the area secured, Detective Bryn Ridge volunteered to search the ditch. 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. Not everyone believes that the West Memphis Three are innocent of the killings of Michael Moore, Stevie Branch, and Christopher Byers. (Shortly after Villegass acquittal, Baldwin had something of a full-circle moment with his client: He took him to a Metallica show in El Paso, Texas, where they hung out backstage on the invitation of Lars Ulrich.). 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. 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. Hobbs has never wavered in his conviction that justice was served the first time around. After ending his first marriage, he wed Pamela Hicks Branch in 1986, when her son Stevie was almost 2 years old. Although blood scrapings were taken, the West Memphis police lost the evidence. Paradise Lost also led to a famous citizen-activist campaign championing the release of the three teens that caught on at the dawn of the Internet Age and would eventually pull in Eddie Vedder, Henry Rollins, and a whos who of the rich and famous. WEST MEMPHIS, Ark. Replacing Burnett was Circuit Court Judge David Laser. On the evening of May 5, 1993, three 8-year-old boys disappeared from the streets of West Memphis, Ark. A benefit album was released in 2000, and the phrase made it into a Dawsons Creek episode when Pacey shouted Free the West Memphis Three over an airport intercom. It wasnt hard for him to imagine his teenage self ending up in Echolss situation. The test results showed that no genetic material on the crime scene evidence was a match to Echols, Baldwin or Misskelley, reported the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Terry was born on September 11, 1959 in Sweetwater, to Jack Harvey and Marjorie Hobbs .Terry graduated from Sweetwater High School in 1977. I don't entirely think Hobbs did it, but I . So, how much is Terry Hobbs worth at the age of 50 years old? Spotting a small, black tennis shoe in the water, Jones radioed for help. We were mainly in it for the aesthetics of filmmaking, but the last scene of Paradise Lost, when Damien is chained up and sent away to death row, that was just heartbreaking and devastating for us, Berlinger says. March 8, 2021, Terry Hobbs passed away on March 8, 2021 in Boise, Idaho. Hobbs, with the help of an author, put all that journaling intoa book about the 1993 murders of his stepson Stevie Branch, and Branchs friends Michael Moore and Chris Byers. Quality. Published: Dec. 21, 2021 at 9:56 PM CST WEST MEMPHIS, Ark. A spiritual successor to Errol Morriss The Thin Blue Line, and a forerunner of more recent documentaries like Making a Murderer, the film stands today as the most affecting examination of one of the most studied legal cases in U.S. historyone that put heavy metal lyrics and black T-shirts on trial and helped lay the groundwork for the current thinking around false confessions. Terry Hobbs stated both family and co-workers believed he was guilty from day one and continued to believe him guilty after the trial and convictions of the West Memphis Three. Explore. Armchair detectives of today, I think a lot of them dabble in conspiracy theory, Berlinger says. The next day, their bodies were found in a nearby canal. As part of the deal, they cannot file wrongful-conviction lawsuits, which both Berlinger and Baldwin say couldve cost the state tens of millions of dollars. And without substantial physical evidence, police zeroed in on a pair of teens they knew well: Echols, a self-professed Wiccan who wore all black and read Stephen King, and his best friend Baldwin, who was considered an outsider because of his love of drawing and bands like Metallica. 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. He responded proudly, 11.. (WMC) - Its a case that has captured the nation and certainly the Mid-South. Then youd try to find it, and it didnt exist, because when we went out to discussion groups, no one knew about the case yet., After learning that the teens were still in prison, Bakken, Sauls, and Pashley decided to make full use of the budding technological revolution. During the trials of Jason Baldwin and Damien Echols, Griffis drew tenuous links between circumstantial evidence, such as the killings taking place near the date of the pagan festival of Beltane. Another hair found near the crime scene on a tree stump was found to be consistent with the DNA of Hobbs friend, David Jacoby, according to court documents obtained by Oxygen.com. Pam Hobbs divorced Terry Hobbs in 2004 and has reversed her position on the West Memphis Three's guilt. Hobbs was Branch's stepfather. As rumors of a Satanic sacrifice swept the community, the minds of many in West Memphis were already made up. In 1996, HBO released the documentary film Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills. All three had been submerged face down in the mud, stripped naked, and bound with their shoelaces. I had a big box. 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. In November, Judge David Burnett, who had presided over the trial, was elected to the state senate. When it didnt, the praise heaped on Paradise Lost felt hollow. Family and friends can send flowers and/or light a candle as a loving gesture for their loved one. That the slain boys were each 8 years-old was important because eight was a "witch's number." Almost 30 years ago, three eight-year-old West Memphis boys were found murdered and three teenagers were charged in the murders. Its no surprise the juries found the prosecutions narrative compelling, Leveritt says: For them, the image of killer satanists headbanging to Metallica was more than plausible. With a large population of fundamentalist Christians, the American South was particularly subject to occult paranoia. The sneaker ligatures in which Terry Hobbs' DNA was found in," Soury said . Its like ripping a Band-Aid off a wound. Critics were effusive in their praise and stunned by the footageparticularly Roger Ebert, who wrote in a four-star review that at the end of the film I was unconvinced of their guilt. The film won Emmy and Peabody awards to go with more than a dozen other nominations. Due to marital problems stemming from Stevies death, the couple divorced in 2004, reported CNN. 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. Their bikes were found by a pipe nearby. And they used that visibility to help raise funds for the defense. Link your TV provider to stream full episodes and live TV. He graduated from Sweetwater High School in 1977. 2012 West of Memphis (Documentary) Self - Steven Branch's Stepfather. A native of Winter Haven, born December 21, 1964, Terry . None of the initial trio behind WM3.orgnor their friend Lisa Fancher, who later became a key part of the efforthad ever considered themselves an activist to that point. La Verne, California. 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.
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