Speaker 1: Murder on Songbird Road is a production of iHeart Podcasts.
Speaker 1: What follows is a nine one one call place buy
Speaker 1: a woman named Julia Beverly in December of twenty twenty.
Speaker 1: Its content may be disturbing to some listeners.
Speaker 2: Hey, Julie, Okay, okay, okay listen content?
Speaker 3: What is listen to me?
Speaker 4: Condent?
Speaker 5: What's your address?
Speaker 6: Four?
Speaker 1: One three zero four is un murder Aia, Illinois?
Speaker 4: Okay?
Speaker 1: Okay, okay listen?
Speaker 5: He said one three zero four songbird.
Speaker 7: And one there is zero four okay.
Speaker 1: Sometimes you find a story, sometimes the story finds you.
Speaker 1: The message request started coming in through Facebook February sixteenth,
Speaker 1: of twenty twenty three. The first one was a link
Speaker 1: to an article with the headline jury finds Julia Beverly
Speaker 1: guilty in the stabbing death of Jade Beasley. It was
Speaker 1: immediately followed up with a message notification, which was immediately unsent,
Speaker 1: and then this text please prayer hand emoji if you
Speaker 1: can help considering. The prosecution's ending argument was even though
Speaker 1: we have no physical evidence, dot dot dot yet guilty.
Speaker 1: And so began a steady stream of missed video calls
Speaker 1: and links pertaining to this case.
Speaker 8: A jury trial for a Williamson County woman accused of
Speaker 8: murdering a young girl starts tomorrow. Julia Beverley is set
Speaker 8: to be in county court tomorrow morning at nine. She's
Speaker 8: accused of murdering eleven year old Jade Beasley in December
Speaker 8: of twenty twenty. Beasley died from multiple stab wounds. According
Speaker 8: to investigators. Beverly pleaded not guilty. In the wake of
Speaker 8: Beasley's death.
Speaker 1: In Marion, Illinois, an eleven year old girl brutally stabbed
Speaker 1: to death her father's longtime living girlfriend, maintaining innocence but
Speaker 1: charged with her murder.
Speaker 9: I ain't gonna life, you know, by the news articles,
Speaker 9: I thought she was guilty at hers, aspiring what the
Speaker 9: news said.
Speaker 1: That's Whitney Nicole, the woman behind my myriad of Facebook messages.
Speaker 3: I'm just a resident of this town and I can't
Speaker 3: be quiet, and this eleven't innocent woman, but I believe
Speaker 3: truly is innocent to.
Speaker 9: Just sit in wat'e more of her time behind ours.
Speaker 1: Whitney speaks the way she communicated on Facebook a bit
Speaker 1: in bursts.
Speaker 9: Marrying has always been a sweet stuff under the red
Speaker 9: type of deal around here.
Speaker 7: They don't saw murders they cover, and these journalists around
Speaker 7: here or news reporters are ridiculous.
Speaker 3: They were lives.
Speaker 9: And it's not innocent a proven guilty around here, it's
Speaker 9: you're guilty.
Speaker 1: Her outreach seems sincerely motivated by her concern for Julia Beverly,
Speaker 1: a woman she says she barely knows.
Speaker 9: I haven't only met her, probably a couple of times.
Speaker 9: But I'm just seeing all the Ronalds. I just this girl,
Speaker 9: it just needs help. That's a sorry for her, like
Speaker 9: she does not deserve this.
Speaker 1: I'm Lauren brad Pacheco, and this is murder on some
Speaker 1: Bird Road. The nine one one call came in Saturday,
Speaker 1: December five, twenty twenty, at twelve twenty four pm. It
Speaker 1: was an unseasonably warm winter day in Illinois, sunny, with
Speaker 1: a high of fifty four degrees.
Speaker 4: He said, someone had broken into your house.
Speaker 1: Yeah, when it broke in, they were running out as
Speaker 1: I was coming home.
Speaker 9: From Okay, listen, listen to me.
Speaker 2: You're gonna take a bit.
Speaker 4: I can't understand what you're saying.
Speaker 5: Okay.
Speaker 1: It originated from a somewhat rural section of Marion, Illinois,
Speaker 1: a flat area of former farmland peppered with modest, mostly
Speaker 1: ranch style homes.
Speaker 4: He said, someone came running out of your house.
Speaker 10: Daly got running out wherever home?
Speaker 2: I know?
Speaker 9: My norm was over?
Speaker 1: Okay. The stretch of Songbird Road where the murder occurred
Speaker 1: is dotted with Little League baseball fields, some still playable,
Speaker 1: most overgrown by weeds and sectioned off, resting chain link fences,
Speaker 1: exuding an eerie air of time suspended and innocence lost.
Speaker 8: Which way did they go?
Speaker 10: That is right out where all one? And I came
Speaker 10: in the check on Jane.
Speaker 1: The call lasts for nearly twelve minutes. As a sobbing
Speaker 1: Julia Beverley struggles to speak.
Speaker 11: Who are else than the residence?
Speaker 10: This is me right now?
Speaker 9: But darn't?
Speaker 10: Dead?
Speaker 3: Is in the bottom?
Speaker 9: We've got multiple one all over?
Speaker 8: Okay?
Speaker 1: Who is it in the bathtomb?
Speaker 7: Is much time?
Speaker 1: Hatter?
Speaker 9: Okay?
Speaker 2: How old is she.
Speaker 6: One?
Speaker 11: Okay?
Speaker 1: Is she awakes?
Speaker 12: No?
Speaker 6: I think that's not moving.
Speaker 9: Okay.
Speaker 12: Hold on.
Speaker 4: When that person left?
Speaker 11: Did they leave in a vehicle or on foot?
Speaker 4: They were on pos They just took over rudden.
Speaker 8: Okay?
Speaker 5: Could you tell if there was a male or a female?
Speaker 2: It was a male?
Speaker 4: Could you tell that colored shirt he was wearing.
Speaker 9: He wasn't all black.
Speaker 4: Okay.
Speaker 1: Police arrived on the scene at twelve thirty five.
Speaker 2: Thought, okay, there's.
Speaker 11: An author's tree pulling end.
Speaker 5: Okay, Joe, I wanna let you talk to them.
Speaker 9: Okay, thank you.
Speaker 1: They would find a still hysterical Julia Elaine Beverly, aged
Speaker 1: twenty nine, inside the house in a bathtub with cold
Speaker 1: running water. They would discover eleven year old Jade Marie Beasley.
Speaker 1: Jade would be pronounced dead at the scene. The cause
Speaker 1: of death was loss of blood from multiple stab wounds.
Speaker 1: Through existing media coverage, I could quickly piece together that
Speaker 1: Julia Beverly and Jade's father, Mike Beasley, had been a
Speaker 1: couple for nearly eight years. They both had a child
Speaker 1: from previous relationships who were about the same age. Jade
Speaker 1: was eleven and Julia's son, Jaden, was ten years old
Speaker 1: at the time of the murder. In addition, the couple
Speaker 1: shared two young daughters together. One was three at the time,
Speaker 1: the other was just one and a half years old.
Speaker 1: That Saturday morning, Julia Beverly and Jade Beasley were the
Speaker 1: only people in their one floor modular home. Mike was
Speaker 1: at work as a cook at the local cracker barrel.
Speaker 1: Julia's son, Jaden, was visiting his birth father, and the
Speaker 1: couple's two young girls were spending the weekend with their grandmother, Sheila.
Speaker 1: Mike's mom, Julia Beverly, was working the morning shift from
Speaker 1: home as a remote customer service representative for Hyatt. Beverly
Speaker 1: initially told police she had left Jade alone to do
Speaker 1: holiday shopping at the local Walmart, but upon getting there,
Speaker 1: realized she'd left her wallet at home when she switched
Speaker 1: from her diaper bag to a smaller purse, so she
Speaker 1: returned back home to the house. That's when, according to Beverly,
Speaker 1: she encountered a knife wielding, masked man dressed in black
Speaker 1: who tussled with her at the front door before fleeing
Speaker 1: on foot. She then discovered blood throughout the house and
Speaker 1: Jade in the bathtub before calling nine one one. Just
Speaker 1: five days later, the now former Williamson County State's Attorney,
Speaker 1: Brandon Soonati, held a press conference.
Speaker 2: A few hours ago, I charged Julia Beverley, aged twenty nine,
Speaker 2: of eleven three oh four Songbird Road, Marion with three
Speaker 2: counts a first degree murder. The murder of Jade Murray Beasley,
Speaker 2: an eleven year old girl, and arrest warrant was issued
Speaker 2: and Julia Bevley was arrested within the past hour and
Speaker 2: is being processed and held with the Williamson County Jail.
Speaker 2: She's being held on a two million dollar bond.
Speaker 1: Zanati would then hold up a photo of the victim,
Speaker 1: Jade Beasley. It shows an adorable young girl with bob
Speaker 1: strawberry blonde hair accented with pink streaks and a pink bow.
Speaker 1: She's smiling broadly from behind pink rimmed glasses, dressed in
Speaker 1: even more bright pink. The cropped photo and the larger
Speaker 1: full body original of the small, pink clad girl would
Speaker 1: be utilized by the media throughout the duration of the
Speaker 1: investigation and trial.
Speaker 2: I recently was given a copy of the booking photo,
Speaker 2: and I have those here for anyone that may want.
Speaker 6: Then.
Speaker 1: In stark contrast, Julia Beverly appears haggard and drained in
Speaker 1: her booking photo, her dark clothing and dark hair disheveled.
Speaker 1: The grainy shot drab enough to almost appear black and white.
Speaker 2: These first degree murder charges carry with impossible penalties of
Speaker 2: twenty to sixty years in the Department of Corrections and
Speaker 2: if determined, extended term eligible up to one hundred and
Speaker 2: twenty years.
Speaker 1: Jade Beasley's murder and Julia Beverly's arrest were both announced
Speaker 1: during that same press conference, but while no motive was given,
Speaker 1: Zanati added this.
Speaker 2: When the incident occurred, the suspect gave law enforcement an
Speaker 2: initial report that the unidentified mail ran from the residence
Speaker 2: upon her arriving home. She said that she left the
Speaker 2: residence with Jade alone in the home for a short
Speaker 2: time and return home to find an unidentified male fleeing.
Speaker 2: The investigation has proven this story to be false.
Speaker 1: Murder on Songbird Road will continue after the break. Now
Speaker 1: back to Murder on Songbird Road.
Speaker 8: What they had told us at the press conference was
Speaker 8: that they had arrested Julie Beverly. They charged her with
Speaker 8: murder and had said that she had told them a
Speaker 8: story about a suspect that left the home and that
Speaker 8: that was later proven to be false. That was the
Speaker 8: first official word of that case. But they never explained
Speaker 8: how that happened. I should have asked, you know, looking
Speaker 8: back at it now in hindsight.
Speaker 1: That's Danny Vaie, who was a reporter and anchor at
Speaker 1: local news station WSIL News three when the Beverly story broke.
Speaker 8: Every town has its crime. Marian's no different than any
Speaker 8: other towns. Marion gets a lot of theft, calls, burglaries.
Speaker 8: Very few times that we've covered shootings in Marion, but
Speaker 8: there have been. Not to say that there haven't been,
Speaker 8: but to have a murderer screwsom is. Jade Beasley's doesn't
Speaker 8: happen very often down here, not at all. It's very rare.
Speaker 1: And by down here, Vaya means south.
Speaker 8: Marion is So if you know Southern Illinois University, Carbondale,
Speaker 8: it's about thirty minutes east of Carbondale on Route thirteen.
Speaker 8: If you're more familiar with highways, it cuts right by
Speaker 8: in their stay fifty seven, it cuts through Marion.
Speaker 1: And if you don't know any of the above, know
Speaker 1: that Marion, Illinois is in extremely southern Illinois, closer to
Speaker 1: Missouri than Chicago. Vye's recollection of Jade Beasley's murder remains
Speaker 1: extremely clear. Three years later, on.
Speaker 8: December fifth, twenty twenty, it was a Saturday. I was
Speaker 8: still the morning anchor. My shift was over by around
Speaker 8: ten eleven o'clock am, so I went home, and I'm
Speaker 8: pure in rumblings that there's something happening in Marion. Joe
Speaker 8: Rohanne was actually the first one to go over there.
Speaker 8: He's our protog reporter. He actually shot the initial footage
Speaker 8: of the police response there and he was just telling us,
Speaker 8: you know, that there was a big presence. He went
Speaker 8: to go eventually here back on the scanner that they
Speaker 8: were calling a METAVAC helicopter to the home. But then
Speaker 8: later on we find out that the call was rescinded,
Speaker 8: that the aravact was canceled. Immediately, we were thinking someone died,
Speaker 8: but we just don't know who. We just know that
Speaker 8: there's a lot of police. There's so much activity going on,
Speaker 8: like this is a huge response. I mean, it was insane.
Speaker 8: The number of cars were there. I think there were five,
Speaker 8: but it seemed like there were more. Even in the
Speaker 8: days after when we followed up, they were still there.
Speaker 8: But yeah, we first heard about it on Saturday. We
Speaker 8: didn't get much information officially, and we were slowly hearing
Speaker 8: little details on what may have happened. We were hearing
Speaker 8: that it may have been a little girl. We were
Speaker 8: hearing that it was the girl's mother. Then we're hearing
Speaker 8: it wasn't the mother, it was a stepmother.
Speaker 1: The lack of information, especially during the isolation of the pandemic,
Speaker 1: led to immediate spec and concern.
Speaker 8: People were calling us for five days asking what was
Speaker 8: going on. People were wondering if the person was still
Speaker 8: out there. There were so many questions. People were wondering
Speaker 8: if there was a serial killer out there because there
Speaker 8: was no hint of we need to find a suspect.
Speaker 8: All we heard was that they were looking for surveillance
Speaker 8: video of the area and that was it. They never
Speaker 8: gave out a suspect description. They never said whether the
Speaker 8: suspect was in custody or not. They never said if
Speaker 8: there was a person of interest until the days leading
Speaker 8: up to the press conference. We didn't hear official word
Speaker 8: until Wednesday, So literally five days later after the fact,
Speaker 8: when something's happening the press conference, that was the first
Speaker 8: official word of that case. And I was actually the
Speaker 8: one filming that.
Speaker 1: Vye would go on to cover the case and the
Speaker 1: trial reporting that would put him and the media in
Speaker 1: general at odds with Renee high Tower. Beverly's mother, since
Speaker 1: the day of the murder, her belief in her daughter's
Speaker 1: innocence has not wavered. The daughter, who close friends and family,
Speaker 1: called Julie.
Speaker 6: That morning, I was at work.
Speaker 1: Renee was working at one of the gas stations she manages.
Speaker 6: I remember the ambulances going by my work because I
Speaker 6: was in my Marion store.
Speaker 1: Nothing clicked.
Speaker 6: Nothing was like, Oh my god, something's happened to one
Speaker 6: of my children, you know, or one of my grandchildren.
Speaker 6: Nothing clicked. I was just watching because they were going
Speaker 6: like an extra speed. To my coworker, I was like,
Speaker 6: oh my god, something really bad must to happen. Probably
Speaker 6: about four thirty PM, my niece called me, who lives
Speaker 6: in Salem, Massachusetts, and said she's seen something on social media.
Speaker 1: Nikki is the daughter of Renee's sister and lived in
Speaker 1: Marion with her family before they moved to Massachusetts after
Speaker 1: she graduated high school.
Speaker 10: I was just kind of doing my normal thing, chasing
Speaker 10: the kids around, and I had a few moments to
Speaker 10: pop on Facebook. And I still follow the local news
Speaker 10: station Eaton, though are not there for a while. I
Speaker 10: so to like to see what goes on in the community.
Speaker 10: And I thought a new story about murdered in a
Speaker 10: rutle area in Marion, and I was like, oh my god,
Speaker 10: that's so crazy, because nothing will like that happens, at
Speaker 10: least whenever I was growing up there. I clicked on
Speaker 10: the article and the picture just it looked so familiar,
Speaker 10: and I didn't want it to look familiar that it did.
Speaker 10: And when I clicked on the article it said Songbird Road.
Speaker 10: My heart sank because I knew it that's the road
Speaker 10: that Julie lived on. It was the tree in the
Speaker 10: front yard that did it, because it's a very odd
Speaker 10: looking tree. I called my aunt, Julie's mom, and I said, hey,
Speaker 10: if we call to Julie and she was like, no, no.
Speaker 10: I was like, there's there's been a murder on her road,
Speaker 10: and I think it here's her house.
Speaker 6: She sent me a picture and sure enough I recognized
Speaker 6: it to be Julie's house.
Speaker 1: You found out through a niece who lives halfway across
Speaker 1: the country who saw it on social media. Yes, four
Speaker 1: hours later, so I raced out there.
Speaker 6: I was about twelve to fifteen miles away, and I
Speaker 6: think I got there in three minutes until I and
Speaker 6: sure enough there's police vehicles everywhere and it's taped off,
Speaker 6: and I'm in a panic, and there's an officer at
Speaker 6: Kirk and I get out of my car and I'm asking,
Speaker 6: are the kids okay? Ma'am you'll have to go to
Speaker 6: the police station. I said, this is my daughter's house.
Speaker 6: Is she okay? He would not answer, you have to
Speaker 6: go a police sestion. In the meantime, I'm calling Julie,
Speaker 6: no answer. I'm calling Mike, no answer. I'm calling Sheila Jade,
Speaker 6: and nobody's answering the phone. So my panic level is
Speaker 6: rising with every time I try to call somebody.
Speaker 1: Because at that point, anybody could have been dead.
Speaker 6: Yes, yes, And I finally get through to Sheila, Mike's mother,
Speaker 6: and I asked, what's going on?
Speaker 1: And is everybody okay?
Speaker 10: You know?
Speaker 6: And I had a many questions and her response to me,
Speaker 6: if you hold on, I'll tell you so breath and
Speaker 6: she said to me, well, Jade's with our heavenly father now,
Speaker 6: and I just lost it, lost it. I was screaming no,
Speaker 6: and I quickly have to gather myself together again and
Speaker 6: ask what happened? And she said, do you want to
Speaker 6: talk to Mike? I said yes, So Mike tells me
Speaker 6: that she committed suicide, and I'm like, what makes an
Speaker 6: eleven year old girl. What was going on? Was she depressed? No,
Speaker 6: not that I know of, but Mom and Kim said
Speaker 6: she might have been feeling a little bit depressed.
Speaker 1: That initial confusion about the cause of death within the
Speaker 1: immediate family and the fact that police only informed one
Speaker 1: side of the family were just two of the issues
Speaker 1: that would define the investigation of Jade's murder and the
Speaker 1: case against Julia Beverly, as would what Renee recalls as
Speaker 1: a notable disconnect between Mike and his fiance. I'm like,
Speaker 1: where's Julie?
Speaker 6: I don't know.
Speaker 1: Have you talked to her? No, he hasn't talked to her.
Speaker 1: He hasn't spoken to the woman he lives with, who
Speaker 1: is the mother of two of his children. Yes, yeah,
Speaker 1: Why how did he explain that.
Speaker 6: He didn't He just said he hadn't talked to her. Now,
Speaker 6: I'm sure by this time they had taken Julie's phone,
Speaker 6: so she couldn't call or talk to anyone. But if
Speaker 6: you were down in the police station like her, I mean,
Speaker 6: did you ask about her?
Speaker 9: No?
Speaker 1: I think I don't know.
Speaker 6: But he didn't even know where she was, didn't know
Speaker 6: where she was, so I figured, well, this officer was
Speaker 6: telling me to go down to the police station. So
Speaker 6: I go down to the Sheriff's.
Speaker 1: Office, which is indeed where Julia was having agreed to
Speaker 1: be questioned, initially waiving her right to an attorney.
Speaker 6: I was asking if my daughter was there, and he
Speaker 6: asked who I was, and he said, we'll be down
Speaker 6: in a minute, and police officer Carl Gustantine came down
Speaker 6: and talked to me.
Speaker 1: Remember that name, Carl Gustantine will play a pivotal role
Speaker 1: in Renee's issues with the investigation and Julia's arrest. At
Speaker 1: this point, what time is it?
Speaker 6: Probably around five thirty pm going on six. He come
Speaker 6: down and he said, we've got a lot of questions
Speaker 6: that we're talking to her. It's going to be a while.
Speaker 6: And I said, well, I'm not going anywhere. As he's
Speaker 6: going back upstairs. I said, what would make an eleven
Speaker 6: year old commit suicide? And he looked at me strange
Speaker 6: and he said, who told you that? And I said
Speaker 6: her boyfriend, Mike, and he just said oh, and he
Speaker 6: went on and finished questioning my daughter. It was crazy.
Speaker 1: It was crazy. So I'm talking to.
Speaker 6: My oldest son, Michael, and he said, why do they
Speaker 6: still have her in there. It's been hours, and I
Speaker 6: was like, I don't know. I guess they got a
Speaker 6: lot of things to talk, you know, trying to figure
Speaker 6: this out. He's like, where's Mike. I said, I think
Speaker 6: he's at home. He's like, Mom, they're looking at her,
Speaker 6: at a suspect.
Speaker 1: Julie Willingly submitted for questioning yes, without representation, because it
Speaker 1: didn't occur to her that she was a suspect.
Speaker 6: Correct now. Julia had told me later on that she
Speaker 6: could feel a change in the wind within ten to
Speaker 6: fifteen minutes of being there. But then she's trying to
Speaker 6: brush it off. They're doing their job. They have to
Speaker 6: exclude family members before they fine, you know. So this
Speaker 6: is how she's playing it in her mind. This is
Speaker 6: their job, they have to do this. I'm reading too
Speaker 6: much into it, But she did say she could feel
Speaker 6: a change within ten minutes of them being there.
Speaker 1: Of the police being at her home, at the crime scene.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes.
Speaker 1: Much of this case seems to hinge on the fact.
Speaker 1: Beverly initially told police she had made it to Walmart
Speaker 1: before realizing she'd left her wallet at home, but surveillancege
Speaker 1: established she had not completed that journey here again is
Speaker 1: Whitney Nicole.
Speaker 9: They arrested her so fast, you know, and so I'm like,
Speaker 9: she must have been drenched in blood and had all
Speaker 9: this evidence, but come to find out, there was no
Speaker 9: bloody clothing of hers found. There was no blood found
Speaker 9: in her bedroom, or in her bathroom or even in
Speaker 9: their drain. So if she even took a shower, where
Speaker 9: did that blullod go? Where did her bloody clothes go?
Speaker 9: Where did weapon go?
Speaker 6: No?
Speaker 9: Like witnesses, no, nothing, And it's supposed to be beyond
Speaker 9: a reasonable doubt, you know, And there is nothing to
Speaker 9: even prove she should have even been arrested.
Speaker 1: Whitney Nicole also brings up something that makes those photos
Speaker 1: from the press conference with the Williamson County States Attorney
Speaker 1: more interesting.
Speaker 13: Oh, Julie's side, Juliet was shorter than Jade, and she
Speaker 13: waited like.
Speaker 9: Jade was one hundred and thirty pounds in five foot three.
Speaker 9: Julia was four to eight in one hundred and fifteen pounds.
Speaker 1: A quick clarification, Beverly is actually four foot eleven.
Speaker 9: Julia never even been in a fight before, and Anna
Speaker 9: was actually said by the bio mother of Jade that.
Speaker 1: She had taught Jade, so with the fence.
Speaker 9: So in that case, like you know, Julia never being
Speaker 9: in a fight, why it wasn't there more like the
Speaker 9: fence of wounds on her?
Speaker 1: You know when I mean? The photo than Williamson County
Speaker 1: State's Attorney Brandon Sonati released to the public of eleven
Speaker 1: year old Jade Beasley was actually over a year old,
Speaker 1: depicting Jade before a very substantial growth spurt, giving the
Speaker 1: false impression that Jade was smaller than Julia Beverly at
Speaker 1: the time of her death.
Speaker 4: We begin tonight with breaking news.
Speaker 5: A Williamson County jury has reached a verdict in the
Speaker 5: Julia Beverly trial.
Speaker 1: Two years later. It would take a jury just a
Speaker 1: little over one and a half hours of deliberation to
Speaker 1: deliver a verdict.
Speaker 10: She was found guilty of murdering eleven year old Jade Beasley.
Speaker 1: But many, including the prosecution and the victim's family, believe
Speaker 1: justice was served. After the verdict, the special prosecutor, Jennifer
Speaker 1: Mudge spoke to local news.
Speaker 11: Any child murder case means a lot, and there's a
Speaker 11: lot of stake and a lot of emotions involved, So
Speaker 11: you have to in a sense taken a little bit personally,
Speaker 11: but we did our.
Speaker 1: Jobs, as did Jade Beasley's mother, Jessica Bradley.
Speaker 4: Being able to be here for justice to be served
Speaker 4: to her was.
Speaker 1: A good ending. The concepts of justice and injustice are
Speaker 1: intertwined with crime and punishment, but in the case of
Speaker 1: this murder, they played heavily into the divisive aftermath that
Speaker 1: quickly seemed to split the city of Marion, and as
Speaker 1: social media activity. According to Beverly's cousin Nikki, so did
Speaker 1: race absolutely.
Speaker 10: I remember within hours of her being arrested, there were
Speaker 10: just people that had taken pictures from her Facebook profile
Speaker 10: because she had attended a Black Lives Matter rally with
Speaker 10: Mike a few weeks earlier, and it was in the
Speaker 10: Marian town square, and they had a picture of her
Speaker 10: holding up a sign that said no Jessice, no keys,
Speaker 10: and they were using that picture to like walk her
Speaker 10: and then everybody was dashing the whole Black Lives Matters movement.
Speaker 10: But they did proceed to cut Mike out of the
Speaker 10: picture because Houston and directly behind her year's two pictures
Speaker 10: and her race and her social stances against her. I
Speaker 10: do feel that maybe that could have also impacted the
Speaker 10: police from the get go because that stuff was in
Speaker 10: our house as well.
Speaker 1: I think she still had her sign from that so
Speaker 1: when responding officers came to that house, they would have
Speaker 1: seen black Lives Matter signage, right.
Speaker 10: Yes, I think the poster board that she had at
Speaker 10: the rally, I'm pretty sure.
Speaker 1: It was in her living room. No Justice, No Peace.
Speaker 1: Her booking photo wasn't the only thing that appeared black
Speaker 1: and white. Julia Beverly is mixed race. For context, according
Speaker 1: to the most recent census, Marion, Illinois is eighty six
Speaker 1: percent white, while Renee high Tower, Julia's mother, is white.
Speaker 1: Julia and her three brothers are all mixed race. Julia's cousin, Nikki,
Speaker 1: is the daughter of Renee's sister, and when she lived
Speaker 1: in Marion, part of that white eighty six percent.
Speaker 10: That's one of the reasons why we relocated. I don't
Speaker 10: want to bad mouth where I'm from and where we
Speaker 10: grew up, but it is very much a predominantly white community,
Speaker 10: very heavily religious. Some of the things that I have
Speaker 10: growing up are a bit ridiculous. I remember an incident
Speaker 10: in our high school. There was very hard game Patrina
Speaker 10: Bill as a family that had been relocated, and they
Speaker 10: look a black boy who had been relocated to our school,
Speaker 10: and within a day somebody had picked a fight with him.
Speaker 10: They got into a physical altercation in his family. It
Speaker 10: is not a very inclusive community. I would say.
Speaker 1: Whitney Nicole is also part of that white eighty six percent,
Speaker 1: but her children are not. Do you think race played
Speaker 1: a role in the O Yes? And sex why?
Speaker 9: Because I witnessed it firsthand. I the racism. I witnessed
Speaker 9: the sexism. Say, okay, me being a white female and
Speaker 9: it was a spear against a black individual, they probably
Speaker 9: take it my aside. But say if it was between
Speaker 9: me I am another white male individual, take his side
Speaker 9: which I witness and I have experienced.
Speaker 1: Whitney attended every day of Julia Beverley's trial which unfolded
Speaker 1: in Marion. Do you think that Julie was judged by
Speaker 1: a jury of her peers?
Speaker 5: No?
Speaker 13: Oh, now, I think it was set up just the
Speaker 13: way they wanted it to be set up, like it
Speaker 13: was all.
Speaker 9: White, all white individuals, there was nobody of color.
Speaker 1: Renee high Tower is extremely aware of racial issues in Marion,
Speaker 1: having raised four mixed children into adulthood. There It's also
Speaker 1: interesting to note that two of Renee's three sons are
Speaker 1: active military. In addition, the man Julia considered her stepfather,
Speaker 1: Renee high Tower's ex husband, Angelo high Tower, was a
Speaker 1: sergeant and longtime officer of the Marian Police Department when
Speaker 1: he alleged discrimination due to his race when passed over
Speaker 1: for promotion in twenty fourteen. That's the same police department
Speaker 1: that assisted the Williamson County Sheriff's Office in the investigation
Speaker 1: of Jade.
Speaker 12: Another thing that I thought of before I forget is
Speaker 12: when you're talking about the shitty investigation here, when I
Speaker 12: was trying to get Julie's things out of the house
Speaker 12: that were left after the investigation was over, I called
Speaker 12: Carl Gusantine and I was talking to him. They did
Speaker 12: not even know that Julie owned that house.
Speaker 4: That's how deep that investigation went.
Speaker 12: Because he told me, you're going to have to talk
Speaker 12: to the owner, and I said, I did.
Speaker 6: She's sitting in jail right now.
Speaker 12: And I've got the longest pause from him, and then
Speaker 12: he said, well, they both own it, and I was like, no,
Speaker 12: Julie owns it and he's just sitting there. I'm not
Speaker 12: going to help you.
Speaker 6: Then I'm not going to help you. That's still matter.
Speaker 6: You're gonna have to talk to him.
Speaker 8: And he hung up on me.
Speaker 1: Murder on Songbird Road will return after the break. Now
Speaker 1: back to Murder on Songbird Road. Could Julia Beverly have
Speaker 1: been wrongfully convicted? Well, there does appear to be issues
Speaker 1: of possible injustice worthy of revisiting. There are also facts
Speaker 1: that remain problematic. Why did Beverly initially say she went
Speaker 1: to Walmart when her phone location and surveillance camera footage
Speaker 1: apparently show she turned around well before completing that trip.
Speaker 1: Why was there a significant delay according to the prosecution,
Speaker 1: thirty one minutes between the time Beverly returned home and
Speaker 1: found Jade before she called nine to one one. It
Speaker 1: turns out I wasn't the only person with questions or
Speaker 1: getting DMS about Julia Beverly. I just want to ask
Speaker 1: you how this case came on your radar.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it's a funny story really because it was Renee
Speaker 5: and Renee I think had run into I don't necessarily
Speaker 5: know if she listened to My Gaycy season or she
Speaker 5: was listening to My Garcia season.
Speaker 1: That's Bob Mada, former criminal defense attorney turned prolific podcaster,
Speaker 1: best known for his work as the host of the
Speaker 1: podcast Defense Diaries, where, along with his wife Alison, also
Speaker 1: a defense attorney, he discussed his high profile criminal cases
Speaker 1: and the legal system from the perspective of his two
Speaker 1: decades practicing law.
Speaker 5: I wouldn't be doing this if I hadn't done that
Speaker 5: as miserable as I was at the end of my
Speaker 5: legal career, because defense loitering is a gut wrenching profession.
Speaker 5: You're fighting the power of the government like non stop,
Speaker 5: never ending, and you're constantly losing. It's disheartening in a
Speaker 5: really fundamental way because you go into that profession wanting
Speaker 5: to really protect the rights of all of us, which
Speaker 5: is really what defense attorneys do.
Speaker 1: Turns out, Mata and I were drawn into the Beverly
Speaker 1: case in a fairly similar fashion.
Speaker 5: Renee reached out to me via email. Simultaneous to that,
Speaker 5: Whitney Nichole was hitting me up in my DMS.
Speaker 4: They were both sending me the same things.
Speaker 1: Mara and I had initially connected in February of twenty three.
Speaker 5: Because you would and I were talking about Christopher Vaughan.
Speaker 5: So you and I had this thing going on completely
Speaker 5: sevened and apart.
Speaker 1: His active community of defense diary listeners wanted his take
Speaker 1: on my take of Christopher Vaughn, who was sentenced in
Speaker 1: twenty twelve to four consecutive life sentences for the two
Speaker 1: thousand and seven shooting deaths of his wife and three children.
Speaker 1: The case was the focus of the Murder in Illinois podcast,
Speaker 1: which was released in twenty twenty one. You hit me
Speaker 1: up on Twitter, and I thought, oh, good God, here
Speaker 1: comes somebody wanting to attack me again for my support
Speaker 1: of Vaughn. And then it very quickly became obvious that
Speaker 1: you were intrigued. And that's when I just sent you everything,
Speaker 1: the trial transcripts and just said, come on, you know,
Speaker 1: let me know what you think.
Speaker 5: That gave me the answer in like the parallels between
Speaker 5: Julie's case and Christopher's case.
Speaker 4: In terms of like most people that kill.
Speaker 1: Have a reason, a motive, something.
Speaker 4: There's always a moment, and it doesn't exist here.
Speaker 1: You know, the outreach from Witne Nicole when she started
Speaker 1: blowing up my DMS started over a year ago. I
Speaker 1: didn't know what to think, but there was a very
Speaker 1: real thread of wrongful conviction red flags right the tunnel vision,
Speaker 1: the trial by media, the confirmation bias, and in this
Speaker 1: case racism. Racism for sure, but while race didn't play
Speaker 1: a role in the bond case. In addition to the
Speaker 1: tragic loss of young life, there are some other striking
Speaker 1: similarities with the case against Julia Beverly.
Speaker 5: Julie's case, in Christopher's case. The things that they said
Speaker 5: initially that were not truthful are always the hardest things
Speaker 5: to overcome in your own mind, because then when you
Speaker 5: start looking at the facts, especially with Julie's case in particular,
Speaker 5: they just don't add up.
Speaker 1: Murder in Illinois remains the most polarizing case I've personally covered.
Speaker 1: Questioning the integrity of the investigation and conviction that landed
Speaker 1: Vaughn in prison prompted some people to wish death on
Speaker 1: my children. That wasn't lost on me. When I waged
Speaker 1: looking into Julia Beverly's conviction, I was really wary of
Speaker 1: it because of my experience with taking on a family
Speaker 1: annihilator case in Illinois. So when I realized, oh no,
Speaker 1: it's Illinois again, and that this is a stepmother who
Speaker 1: has been arrested and ultimately convicted of the murder of
Speaker 1: a step daughter. I said, you know who you should call, Bob.
Speaker 1: I didn't know that you were already on Renee's radar.
Speaker 4: Renee hit me up and she's like, oh, I'm talking
Speaker 4: to Lauren. I'm like, what her and I have.
Speaker 5: Been working on Christopher Vaughan and me doing something on
Speaker 5: Vaughn for months, and I can't believe that the this
Speaker 5: never came up, and I just thought things are meant
Speaker 5: to be a little bit.
Speaker 1: Bob and I share a sense of pragmatic skepticism, but
Speaker 1: also recognize the timeliness and responsibility of discovering issues with
Speaker 1: this conviction before Beverly was even sentenced.
Speaker 5: You and I both know the stuff that we typically cover,
Speaker 5: especially you with your wrongful conviction work. I mean defendants
Speaker 5: that are in fifteen twenty years trying to get somebody
Speaker 5: to take a look at their case, knowing just how
Speaker 5: clogged the system is.
Speaker 4: You know, with this case, the.
Speaker 5: More I learned about it, the more I'm scratching my
Speaker 5: head and I'm like, man, something stinks about it.
Speaker 4: Something's not right, you know.
Speaker 1: Then you add the extra layer of the fact that yes,
Speaker 1: she's a stepmother, but she's also a mother. Yes, two
Speaker 1: at the time. Three other children, yes, two of them
Speaker 1: toddler age. Yes, she's been taken away from all of
Speaker 1: her children. And if she's innocent, I can't think of
Speaker 1: a more horrifying thing to experience me either.
Speaker 4: As a father of four.
Speaker 1: Julia Beverly has not seen the two daughters she shares
Speaker 1: with Mike Beasley since Jade Beasley's murder nearly four years ago,
Speaker 1: and there's an additional layer. Within weeks of her arrest,
Speaker 1: Julia Beverly discovered she was pregnant with her third child
Speaker 1: by Beasley, a pregnancy that ended in unfathomable cruelty, especially
Speaker 1: if the conviction of Julia Beverly proves to be a
Speaker 1: wrongful one. But there's another reason driving Beverly's supporters. If
Speaker 1: Julia Beverly is not the person who took Jade Beasley's life,
Speaker 1: there has been no justice for Jade. Here's Beverly's cousin, Nikki.
Speaker 10: It's scary because the person hinted it is still out
Speaker 10: there and nobody seems to care.
Speaker 4: Well, that's not.
Speaker 1: True, we seem to care. What happened to Jade Beasley
Speaker 1: is unfathomable and indefensible, and it is not our intention
Speaker 1: to disparage anyone living or dead, but rather to re
Speaker 1: examine this case with integrity and sensitivity while exploring whether
Speaker 1: Julia Beverley was justly charged, tried, and convicted, or whether
Speaker 1: pertinent facts and later developments that could have been utilized
Speaker 1: in her defense were intentionally overlooked or ignored. On the
Speaker 1: next Murder on Songbird Road, the ripple effect of Jade's
Speaker 1: murder rips apart relationships.
Speaker 12: I said that Jade is no longer with us, and
Speaker 12: you can see him kind of trying to swallow those
Speaker 12: tears and.
Speaker 1: Siblings do you want?
Speaker 8: I'm living with his mom and his two younger sisters
Speaker 8: to you know, get to see his siblings.
Speaker 1: But did the investigation end before it even began?
Speaker 6: Within an hour and a half, they were knock at
Speaker 6: our back door. They said they were there for Julie
Speaker 6: and they had a warrant for her arrests.
Speaker 1: Murder on Songbird Road is a production of iHeart Podcasts.
Speaker 1: Our Executive producers are Taylor Chackoine and Lauren Bright Pacheco.
Speaker 1: Research writing and hosting by Lauren Bright Pacheco. Investigative reporting
Speaker 1: by Bob Matta and Lauren Bright Pacheco. Editing, sound design
Speaker 1: and original music by Evan Tyer and Taylor Chaqoine. Additional
Speaker 1: music by Asher Kurtz. Archival elements courtesy of WSIL News three.
Speaker 1: Please like, subscribe, and leave us a review. Wherever you're listening,
Speaker 1: you can follow me on all platforms at Lauren Bright
Speaker 1: Pacheco and email the show with thought, suggestions or tips
Speaker 1: at Investigating Murder at iHeartMedia dot com. For more iHeart podcasts,
Speaker 1: visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get
Speaker 1: your favorite shows. Thanks for listening.