Speaker 1: Before this episode published, I called Tiffany Horn. I wanted
Speaker 1: to make sure she knew what was coming. I wanted
Speaker 1: to let her know that we begin with her brother, Trevor.
Speaker 1: She said to me, I put my love for him
Speaker 1: in this box in my heart and I don't open
Speaker 1: it often because it's too painful. But she insisted he
Speaker 1: should be seen. He deserves it. And just so you
Speaker 1: know this episode of Hitman might be hard to hear listener,
Speaker 1: discretion is advised. A blade of grass. There was this
Speaker 1: single blade of grass on Trevor's cheek when the police
Speaker 1: found him on the morning of March third, nineteen ninety three.
Speaker 1: He was lying in his crib wearing his white and
Speaker 1: blue Peachays. One of the nurses would later testify that
Speaker 1: he was given a bath every evening before bed. They
Speaker 1: were very thorough, and the nurse she knew that grass
Speaker 1: couldn't have been thereby accident. He stayed in his wheelchair
Speaker 1: any time he went outside. If he played, she said,
Speaker 1: it was on the rug or on the quilt in
Speaker 1: his room. The prosecutors argued that the grass had to
Speaker 1: have come from the killer's hands, that he wrapped one
Speaker 1: hand around the boy's nose and mouth and the other
Speaker 1: around his track opening and left behind that blade of grass.
Speaker 1: I came across the crime scene photos of Trevor last
Speaker 1: year and I tried not to look. It almost felt disrespectful.
Speaker 1: But this is the reality of what happened to him,
Speaker 1: As Tiffany said, I owed him a moment of acknowledgement
Speaker 1: of seeing him. I understand if you've been trying to
Speaker 1: put Trevor out of your mind, if you'd rather I
Speaker 1: tell you more about Motown or this crazy book hit man,
Speaker 1: or the French publisher behind the murder manual, or maybe
Speaker 1: you just want me to hurry up and get to
Speaker 1: the part where they catch the killers. But anytime someone
Speaker 1: tells me, oh, it's just to book, it's just a book,
Speaker 1: it's just a book. I remember that a hitman entered
Speaker 1: a quiet home in the middle of the night and
Speaker 1: smothered an eight year old child. I remember that blade
Speaker 1: of grass. It wasn't an accident. Trevor wasn't collateral. His
Speaker 1: death was all part of the plan. It was the plan.
Speaker 1: Trevor had to die in order for Lawrence to inherit
Speaker 1: Trevor's money, but Millie had to die so that Lawrence
Speaker 1: could inherit all of it. I'm Jasmine Morris from My
Speaker 1: Heart Radio and Hit Home Media. This is Hitman. It
Speaker 1: took eighteen months for detectives to complete their investigation into
Speaker 1: the triple murder of Trevor and Millie Horn and Janice Saunders,
Speaker 1: but it only took one day for police to establish
Speaker 1: a prime suspect in a motive. Millie had seen this coming.
Speaker 1: She knew. She was very fearful for Trevor's life. Millie's
Speaker 1: sister Maryland, and she was also fearful for herself because
Speaker 1: she always said, I will not die in an aeroplane crash.
Speaker 1: If something ever happens to me, it's Lawrence Horn. And
Speaker 1: all the sisters were there and we laughed about it.
Speaker 1: We're like Millie, he's crazy, but he's not that crazy.
Speaker 1: She actually said that to you. She said that, she said,
Speaker 1: if anything ever happens to me, you all make sure
Speaker 1: that Lawrence Horn is never alone with Trevor. Lawrence never
Speaker 1: took responsibility for Trevor, even on the day he was born.
Speaker 1: I mean, he didn't even show up for the birth,
Speaker 1: so he had no connect into this child at all.
Speaker 1: He showed no interest. My brother being sick was such
Speaker 1: a turn off. He totally rejected him. And that was
Speaker 1: when my mom was finally really done with my dad,
Speaker 1: which is looking back, really sad for her, but I
Speaker 1: think she knew it just was never going to go
Speaker 1: the way she wanted it to go with him. And
Speaker 1: so here's where I need to tell you about how
Speaker 1: and when Trevor's life suddenly became valuable to Lawrence Horn.
Speaker 1: Remember when Trevor and his twin sister, Tammiel were born
Speaker 1: three months premature. Trevor was really sick. He had been
Speaker 1: born with underdeveloped lungs, but by the time he was one,
Speaker 1: he was exceeding doctor's expectations. He was doing really well.
Speaker 1: And then one day he went in for something routine
Speaker 1: at Children's Hospital in d C and there was some
Speaker 1: kind of accident. He was without oxygen for seven or
Speaker 1: eight minutes, leaving him with significant brain damage. They put
Speaker 1: him in the COLMA. Yeah, you didn't give us very
Speaker 1: much hope, and they talked to Milly about removing him
Speaker 1: from life support. So she talked to us about it
Speaker 1: and we said, Milly, you know, what's your decision, because
Speaker 1: I said he would you know, more than a vegetable.
Speaker 1: She still wasn't sure what she was going to do,
Speaker 1: and so Milly went to his room and Trevor opened
Speaker 1: his eyes, looked urd smile, and that was the answer.
Speaker 1: Doctors told Milly to put Trevor in a care facility.
Speaker 1: They said that caring for him would be too much
Speaker 1: of a burden on her and her family. Milly refused,
Speaker 1: here's Tiffany. I mean she learned how to be a nurse,
Speaker 1: Like who does that? She definitely did. She knew his
Speaker 1: care better than the nurses that she fired, and she
Speaker 1: would fire them if they didn't do what she wanted
Speaker 1: them to do. Milly made sure that Trevor had a
Speaker 1: life the same as any other child. At a pool party,
Speaker 1: he's in the pool. The nurse and Trevor and Millie,
Speaker 1: they're in the pool. Halloween, he had his costume. He
Speaker 1: got dressed up. Actually I remember too. One was a clown,
Speaker 1: another one was Peter Pain. They said he would never talk.
Speaker 1: Trevor learned to talk. He used to say I love you.
Speaker 1: His favorite story was Three Little Pigs. He was so smart.
Speaker 1: I would say the wolf would huff and he would puff.
Speaker 1: He would be laughing so much. Here's John Marshall, a
Speaker 1: lawyer and close family friend. He was doing better and
Speaker 1: better and better and defining the odds, you know, Salts Corner,
Speaker 1: but by dint of determination of his mother and sure love.
Speaker 1: That's who Milly was. She was determined and willful. It's
Speaker 1: like she never questioned what insurmountable things she had to
Speaker 1: do to protect the ones she loved. It reminds me
Speaker 1: of this story Maryland told me about their childhood growing
Speaker 1: up in South Carolina. During Jim Crow, our family decided
Speaker 1: that we would get a better education at an integrated school.
Speaker 1: It was horrible. I just couldn't believe that people could
Speaker 1: be so mean to me because of the color of
Speaker 1: my skin. And there was this guy on the bus.
Speaker 1: It was a white guy, and he was bigger than
Speaker 1: me and older than me, and every day he would
Speaker 1: push me, and one day I decided I am not
Speaker 1: going to take that anymore. So when he pushed me,
Speaker 1: I pushed him back, and of course he pushed me
Speaker 1: down on a seat and he's beating me up. I mean,
Speaker 1: he's really beating me up. And Millie Millie came to
Speaker 1: my desfense. Millie stepped in and the boys stopped beating
Speaker 1: Maryland and started in on Millie. She was badly hurt.
Speaker 1: She had to be taken to the hospital. Her shoulder
Speaker 1: was dislocated. She was not going to stand by it
Speaker 1: and the herd or simply so That's the way she was.
Speaker 1: She was our big sister. It wasn't until about three
Speaker 1: years after the accident when it became clear just how
Speaker 1: challenging and expensive it was going to be to care
Speaker 1: for Trevor. That's when Milly decided to pursue a lawsuit
Speaker 1: against Children's Hospital. John Marshall and Howard Siegel representator. Here's John.
Speaker 1: This was not a case where this family was going
Speaker 1: to make millions of dollars. This was a case where
Speaker 1: whatever money that was going to be received out of
Speaker 1: the matter was going for Trevor's use. And that was
Speaker 1: Millie's goal from day one was just how do I
Speaker 1: take care of him? So John helped the family bring
Speaker 1: a lawsuit against Children's Hospital. I had been in touch
Speaker 1: with Lawrence. He called and we talked about it, and
Speaker 1: I explained to him the cases we saw. It was
Speaker 1: at its core Millie and Trevor. They had the bond.
Speaker 1: That was the emotional heart of the case. As we've
Speaker 1: heard from Tiffany, Lawrence was barely a father to Trevor.
Speaker 1: Even still, the lawyers felt Lawrence should be listed in
Speaker 1: the suit. They thought it played better to a jury,
Speaker 1: the idea that this estranged couple came together to fight
Speaker 1: for their son. Here's Howard Siegel, John's co council. The
Speaker 1: first time I ever met him was at the trial.
Speaker 1: He made a good impression. He was a big, nice
Speaker 1: looking guy, and Lawrence played his part. John and Howard
Speaker 1: went back and forth with the hospitals insurance company for months.
Speaker 1: Finally they got a settlement offer they thought was fair.
Speaker 1: This is a really important moment, and so for the
Speaker 1: next couple of minutes, I'm just gonna let John and
Speaker 1: Howard tell you what happened next. They offered a significant
Speaker 1: amount of money, and Millie was clear this was going
Speaker 1: to Trevor. Every lawyer is different, but our philosophy was,
Speaker 1: if you get to a point where you can look
Speaker 1: at the client in the eye and say, you know,
Speaker 1: we can't guarantee you're gonna do better, and this number
Speaker 1: in this kind of a case, will if we invest
Speaker 1: it wisely, that he will be able to be taken
Speaker 1: care of so Milly was fine. Lawrence Horn was sitting
Speaker 1: at council table with us, and Lawrence turned to us
Speaker 1: and he said, that's not enough. And I turned to
Speaker 1: him and I said, what do you mean that's not enough.
Speaker 1: It turned out that Lawrence Horn through a major bomb
Speaker 1: into the settlement. He wrote down on a yellow pad
Speaker 1: with a red pen a million dollars times which was
Speaker 1: the interest rate back then is a hundred thousand a year,
Speaker 1: and he said, I came here expecting this for me.
Speaker 1: I turned to him and I said, what makes you
Speaker 1: think you're entitled to one nickel of this child's money?
Speaker 1: And he looked at me and he said, Trevor lives
Speaker 1: through me. I assumed he meant that because Trevor was
Speaker 1: profoundly disabled and could not enjoy life, that when Lawrence
Speaker 1: took his money and wrote down Hollywood Boulevard in a BMW,
Speaker 1: that Trevor would be enjoying it. I was stunned. I've
Speaker 1: just never been so shocked by anything anybody said to
Speaker 1: me in my life. It was the first time he
Speaker 1: had revealed himself, and we were floored. It had just
Speaker 1: never been discussed that the parents were going to get
Speaker 1: any money at all. I just never came up from
Speaker 1: that point on. He just dug his heels in. We
Speaker 1: took a recess. I went out in the hall with
Speaker 1: John Marshall and I said, I have just looked into
Speaker 1: the eyes of pure evil. This man scares me. It
Speaker 1: was the way that he said it. It was chilling,
Speaker 1: It was detached, It was matter of fact. Lawrence Horn's
Speaker 1: only concern was what he was going to get out
Speaker 1: of it. The Children's Hospital settlement came through and the
Speaker 1: family was awarded two million dollars, with roughly half of
Speaker 1: that going into a trust for Trevor and three dollars
Speaker 1: going to Millie, which she used to buy that big
Speaker 1: house in Silver Spring, with the whole wing devoted to
Speaker 1: Trevor's care. Lawrence walked away with Millie's sister Maryland. He
Speaker 1: felt that he got cheated, that he should have gotten
Speaker 1: more money, and it was all her fault. As long
Speaker 1: as Lawrence was working at Motown, the majority of Trevor's
Speaker 1: medical bills were covered and the settlement money would go
Speaker 1: into that trust. But then Lawrence lost his job. In
Speaker 1: Trevor had exhausted the lifetime maximum benefits on Milly's insurance
Speaker 1: and we had to go to court for the first
Speaker 1: time to ask for some money to be used for
Speaker 1: Trevor's care, which meant that every month, now six thousand
Speaker 1: dollars the cost of Trevor's care was going to come
Speaker 1: out of Trevor's one point seven million dollar trust fund.
Speaker 1: All of this timing was because these policies had run
Speaker 1: out and now we were cutting into Trevor's money. There
Speaker 1: there's no accident about this timing. This was all done
Speaker 1: to maximize the return to Lawrence. I remember Millie being
Speaker 1: very wary, very agitated that something was amiss, and of
Speaker 1: course she was right. A month later she was killed,
Speaker 1: and as we're about to learn, Lawrence Horn had been
Speaker 1: planning this for a very long time. We'll be right back.
Speaker 1: When you think about Hitman, you probably imagine the ones
Speaker 1: you've seen in movies, like John Wick, Jason Bourne, James
Speaker 1: Bond with his double ow license to kill. They only
Speaker 1: killed bad men, men who deserved it. The Hitman book
Speaker 1: plays on these same tropes. The writer Rex Ferrell insists
Speaker 1: that he's quote the last recourse in these times when
Speaker 1: laws are so twisted that justice goes unserved. But in
Speaker 1: this story, the mark was a defenseless child and two mothers.
Speaker 1: So I know we've been jumping around a lot in
Speaker 1: the story telling you different bits of pertinent information. But
Speaker 1: for the rest of this episode, I'm going to walk
Speaker 1: you through Lawrence's plan. This wasn't just something that was
Speaker 1: done in a vacuum where my dad, in a crime
Speaker 1: of passion, just murdered them, which is not okay either way.
Speaker 1: But there was a lot of planning. There was a
Speaker 1: lot of time that passed by within the planning. There
Speaker 1: was money exchange. About a year before the murders, in
Speaker 1: the spring of Lawrence took a trip back home to
Speaker 1: Detroit and reconnected with family. Here he is talking about
Speaker 1: that in a deposition. You drove to Detroit? Did you
Speaker 1: do it one day? Yes? You know how far it
Speaker 1: is the Detroit seven hours, five hundred miles? And where
Speaker 1: did you stay in Detroit? Had a relatives? Relatives? Did
Speaker 1: you when you were in Detroit? Tommy Turner? What else
Speaker 1: he related to, Oh, he's my mother's sisters son. Lawrence
Speaker 1: hadn't seen his cousin, Thomas Turner in twenty years. Turner
Speaker 1: would later take immunity, but according to his testimony, Lawrence
Speaker 1: talked about his divorce and said quote that he was
Speaker 1: having a problem seeing his children. Turner didn't even know
Speaker 1: that Lawrence was married or had it's until this visit,
Speaker 1: but that's when he told Lawrence about his close friend,
Speaker 1: a straight preacher and spiritual advisor. Turner drove a truck
Speaker 1: in the occasional taxicab and he'd helped this guy drom
Speaker 1: up business by passing out as cards and flyers that
Speaker 1: said things like that love problem must go, get your
Speaker 1: luck straightened out, feel good again. Don't worry. I got it.
Speaker 1: I see where you just feel like giving up. Listen
Speaker 1: at the darkest moment, there is a light. All you
Speaker 1: need is faith in God, and get this He has
Speaker 1: given me to give unto you. I know just what
Speaker 1: to do for all your problems. That friend, James Edward Perry,
Speaker 1: turns out they met in prison thirteen years prior before
Speaker 1: becoming a spiritual advisor. Perry once shot at a Michigan
Speaker 1: State trooper in an attempted bank robbery in the seventies.
Speaker 1: Lawrence would visit his cousin more than once in the
Speaker 1: spring of NTO, and this is around the same time
Speaker 1: he started showing up in Maryland to see his kids.
Speaker 1: Remember those recordings we'd played last episode, the ones he'd
Speaker 1: make while driving around with his daughters. Where am I here?
Speaker 1: Oh I got business? Well, investigators found something else on
Speaker 1: those tapes. At one point, he recorded himself driving the
Speaker 1: route from a daizen in Rockville, Maryland, the same one
Speaker 1: Perry would later stay at, to Milly's house. He was
Speaker 1: not only pretending to be personable or caring for his
Speaker 1: family and spending time with his two daughters. That's Lawrence
Speaker 1: Horns defense attorney Jeff O'Toole. It became clear that when
Speaker 1: he was doing his videotaping he was he was planning
Speaker 1: the escape route for James Perry. These trips out to
Speaker 1: Maryland were like reconnaissance missions. And remember that moment in
Speaker 1: our last episode when he asked his two young daughters
Speaker 1: where Trevor's room was. Which one? Well, that's not all.
Speaker 1: There was another tape where he asked Tiffany two videotape
Speaker 1: Trevor and where his room was in the house. He
Speaker 1: was like, well, I have a video camera. Do you
Speaker 1: think if I show you how to use it that
Speaker 1: you can? You know, tape Trevor and like show me
Speaker 1: your new house. That you keep talking about and I mean,
Speaker 1: obviously I'm going to do it. He's my dad. I
Speaker 1: went right in and came right out and gave it
Speaker 1: to him. He made it seem like this was his
Speaker 1: way to try to learn more about his son. I
Speaker 1: wanted him to be that dad. I wanted him to
Speaker 1: like dig deep down and find in the love for
Speaker 1: his child. I felt like he was so disappointed that
Speaker 1: he wasn't like a normal son that it almost broke him.
Speaker 1: So I was trying to feel sympathetic towards my dad.
Speaker 1: I'm trying to tell him, no, it's okay, Like you know,
Speaker 1: we've created this life and he's he's perfect. You know,
Speaker 1: we love him. Tiffany and her dad were close at
Speaker 1: one point, and he used that he definitely manipulated me.
Speaker 1: He was just a liar, like he was just a
Speaker 1: sick person that I felt, just this obsessive need to
Speaker 1: like prove something or win, and he was willing to
Speaker 1: throw everything away, even his relationship with me. And it
Speaker 1: wasn't the last time Lawrence would use Tiffany like this.
Speaker 1: A day before the murders, late at night on March one,
Speaker 1: Tiffany got a phone call to a dorm room at
Speaker 1: Howard University. He never called me, but he asked me
Speaker 1: whether my mom was going to be flying out the
Speaker 1: next morning because he wanted to talk to my sister.
Speaker 1: And so I told him that my sister, if she
Speaker 1: wasn't home, would probably be at my aunt's house. I
Speaker 1: called my mom right after I got off the phone
Speaker 1: with him. He was like searching for information, which I
Speaker 1: found odd. Tiffany said, over the course of their ten
Speaker 1: minute call, he asked her about Millie and Tammielle four
Speaker 1: or five times. The following evening on March two, Millie
Speaker 1: also received a call. I talked to Millie at night
Speaker 1: about ten o'clock. She called to tell me guess who
Speaker 1: called me. Lawrence called me, and she said, do you
Speaker 1: know I was actually nice to him. I talked nice
Speaker 1: to him for a change. So that's the last time
Speaker 1: I talked to her. Lawrence was also asking Milly about
Speaker 1: Tammielle's whereabouts. Here's Prosecutor Bob Dean. Lawrence made sure that Tammielle,
Speaker 1: twin sister of Trevor, would not be home the night
Speaker 1: of the killing. And you know, we had an information
Speaker 1: that that. You know, he was careful about that, and
Speaker 1: I don't know what that means or shows other than
Speaker 1: the fact that you know, she didn't fit into the
Speaker 1: plans for the inheritance. They ordered a copy of the
Speaker 1: book from Palinin Press. They did it was like, oh
Speaker 1: my god, here it all is. It was written out,
Speaker 1: So there were many similarities that say about what was
Speaker 1: said in this book and what was done, and some
Speaker 1: of the evidence that they hadn't covered also matched specifics.
Speaker 1: Just so you know, there's no evidence that Lawrence ever
Speaker 1: read Hitman. In fact, there's no evidence James Perry read
Speaker 1: it either. Investigators never found an actual copy, but they
Speaker 1: found the Paladin Press catalog in his apartment with the
Speaker 1: book's title circled, and they got a copy of the
Speaker 1: check he made out to Paladin for two books, including Hitman,
Speaker 1: though that checked it bounce. Paladin even shared the order
Speaker 1: form with investigators, so they believed he ordered it. And
Speaker 1: the similarities between rex Ferrell's manual and the murders of
Speaker 1: Millie Horn, her son, Trevor, and Janice Saunders are difficult
Speaker 1: to ignore. I'm going to walk you through some of those.
Speaker 1: Now we've already told you about a few Hitman instructs,
Speaker 1: An explicit detail with photographs how to build a homemade
Speaker 1: silencer from material available in any hardware store. The silencer
Speaker 1: is one of the most important tools a professional will
Speaker 1: ever have. Again, we got that same actor to read
Speaker 1: these lines. The silenced weapon, when fired will not draw attention.
Speaker 1: Lack of adenda means more time. More time means getting
Speaker 1: a job done right. According to the Deputy Chief Medical
Speaker 1: Examiner for Maryland, Donald writes testimony, one of Janis Saunder's
Speaker 1: gunshot wounds indicated Perry likely used a silencer. A hitman
Speaker 1: without a gun is like a carpenter without a Hammer's
Speaker 1: not very effective. The first weapon listed in the basic
Speaker 1: Equipment Checklist for Beginners on page twenty one of Hitman
Speaker 1: is an a R seven rifle, exactly what was used.
Speaker 1: Hitman goes on to instruct its readers on where to
Speaker 1: find the rifles serial number here's Bob Dean. It suggested
Speaker 1: that you drill out the serial numbers to the weapon,
Speaker 1: which James Perry did. But beyond obscuring the serial number,
Speaker 1: Hitman also explains that the gun barrel needs to be
Speaker 1: altered with a rattail file as well. Each one of
Speaker 1: these items leaves its own definite mark and impression on
Speaker 1: the shell casing, which if any shell has happened to
Speaker 1: be left behind, can be matched to the gun under
Speaker 1: a microscope. In the police laboratory, we found the file
Speaker 1: in the BA back yard, the file that was used
Speaker 1: to go into the barrel of the gun. We had
Speaker 1: that file tested. That file had elements of ammunition on
Speaker 1: the file. It's clearly consistent with rubbing through and defacing
Speaker 1: the interior of a rifle. Hitman suggests shooting at close
Speaker 1: range to ensure quote the desired result has been achieved.
Speaker 1: It's best to shoot from a distance of three to
Speaker 1: six ft. You'll not want to be at point blank
Speaker 1: range to avoid having the victim's blood splatter you or
Speaker 1: your clothing. Ballistics showed Millie and Jennie were shot from
Speaker 1: about a foot and a half to three ft away,
Speaker 1: aimed for the head, preferably the eye sockets. If you
Speaker 1: are a sharp shooter. Lawrence Horns defense attorney again Jeff O'Toole,
Speaker 1: the book suggested shooting the victims in the eye because
Speaker 1: that was going to be the most assured way to
Speaker 1: to make sure they're dead. That's an image from the
Speaker 1: book that you just can't. You just can't let go.
Speaker 1: And the reason Rex Ferrell recommends the a R seven
Speaker 1: in his book, it's a gun that's easily disassembled. The
Speaker 1: book suggested that you dismantle the gun in the silence
Speaker 1: room and throw it along the way as you're escaping.
Speaker 1: So they did a drag net search of these woods
Speaker 1: and they found a small piece of a gun, but
Speaker 1: it was the trigger mechanism only, which is an odd thing.
Speaker 1: They were instructed to break the gun into many pieces
Speaker 1: and distribute them wherever, you know, felt like it. We
Speaker 1: had an analysis done on the pieces of the gun
Speaker 1: and according to the FBI expert did he did a
Speaker 1: rust development analysis. He felt that based upon the weather
Speaker 1: conditions of March of that year that they had been
Speaker 1: outside for you know, the side of the road for
Speaker 1: for several weeks, a matter of weeks, it was clear
Speaker 1: that this was the weapon, the weapon that was used.
Speaker 1: If the hit was supposed to look like a burglary.
Speaker 1: Messed the place up a bit, take anything of value
Speaker 1: that you can carry concealed. There was some disheveling and
Speaker 1: disturbance of pieces of furniture. There's a bookshelf that was overturned,
Speaker 1: but it didn't appear that much was stolen. There were
Speaker 1: some items that were taken from um, the purse of Mildred.
Speaker 1: Of course, you can't keep anything. These items have to
Speaker 1: be ditched, along with your work clothes and the weapon. Actually,
Speaker 1: the day of the murder, there was a jogger who
Speaker 1: found Mildred Horns credit cards and identification cards that had
Speaker 1: been taken from her purse hours before. He had done
Speaker 1: exactly what the book said to do. I've been thinking
Speaker 1: a lot about accountability as I report this story. Was
Speaker 1: the book an accomplice of sorts? The courts would later
Speaker 1: say just that the story is a whole tangled knot
Speaker 1: of accountability. It's like that saying it's turtles all the
Speaker 1: way down. Lawrence was clearly the mastermind. And sometimes I'm
Speaker 1: tempted to just look through Perry to see Lawrence the
Speaker 1: hitman becomes a tool or a pawn or an instrument
Speaker 1: to just get the job done. But it was James
Speaker 1: Perry's hands that killed Trevor. It was his hands that
Speaker 1: left that blade of grass. Lawrence recorded so many things
Speaker 1: as part of his plan. The surveillance tapes, the LBI tape,
Speaker 1: the one where he's standing in front of his TV,
Speaker 1: clearly displaying the time and date, which was pretty much
Speaker 1: the exact time of the murders. But there was one
Speaker 1: other recording the investigators found in the search of Lawrence's apartment,
Speaker 1: and it took everyone by surprise. You heard an excerpt
Speaker 1: from this in our first episode. Remember this call was
Speaker 1: made from a payphone not far from Millie's house, and
Speaker 1: investigators believed it was made just hours after the murders.
Speaker 1: It's a little hard to understand, but basically you hear
Speaker 1: Lawrence answer the phone, and then another man we now
Speaker 1: know to be James Perry, presumably calling to say the
Speaker 1: job was done, all right? Then you him right right.
Speaker 1: It was cryptic, but investigators believed this meant he was
Speaker 1: going to take a photograph of Trevor to prove he'd
Speaker 1: done his job, but the noise of Trevor's alarm was distracting.
Speaker 1: I didn't want to go. Was this on an answering
Speaker 1: machine machine? Remember those answering machines, And sometimes if you
Speaker 1: picked up too late, it would record exactly So is
Speaker 1: that what happened? Horn didn't mean to record it. I
Speaker 1: don't think he did. It cuts off because actually it
Speaker 1: comes at the very end of this answering machine tape.
Speaker 1: It literally ran out of tape. The fact that this
Speaker 1: tape even exists is kind of hard to believe. Lawrence's
Speaker 1: own defense attorney Jeff O'Toole. So Lawrence was this person
Speaker 1: who taped everything. He made a career of taping Stevie
Speaker 1: Wonder and all the different people and the songs that
Speaker 1: the Holland Brothers wrote. He knew how to tape things well. Unfortunately,
Speaker 1: he was taping his telephone conversation when Perry called him.
Speaker 1: That was a tape recording that was accidentally either taped
Speaker 1: or certainly accidentally kept by Lawrence Horn. What did he
Speaker 1: have to say about that tape? You know, I think
Speaker 1: he shook his head Jasmine and said sort of. I'm
Speaker 1: not sure we had the expression back then, but I
Speaker 1: think he said it is what it is. I think
Speaker 1: he he wasn't able to say that wasn't his tape.
Speaker 1: He wasn't able to say that was not James Perry.
Speaker 1: The tape was was really something to hold up and
Speaker 1: go here it is, ladies and gentlemen. Was there a
Speaker 1: smoking gun? Probably The second phone call that Perry made
Speaker 1: to Horn was was a crucial one, of course, that
Speaker 1: was made you know, an hour or so after the murders.
Speaker 1: The plan almost worked, They almost got away with it.
Speaker 1: Perry left no identifying evidence behind. Lawrence had his alibi,
Speaker 1: and if Perry hadn't checked into the hotel under his
Speaker 1: own name, who knows what would have happened. Here's what
Speaker 1: we're going to talk about next week. Even as investigators
Speaker 1: telled the Hitman and the mastermind, why are tapping their phones?
Speaker 1: Building their case, Lawrence was trying to pull off the
Speaker 1: last piece of his plan, getting the one point seven
Speaker 1: million dollars and his son's trust fund. Just one thing
Speaker 1: stood in his way, well, a couple of things. Millie's sisters,
Speaker 1: my aunts were really strategic, especially my aunty Lane. She
Speaker 1: made sure to file a civil suit like immediately to
Speaker 1: block my dad from receiving my brother's estate, which is
Speaker 1: essentially the reason why he had them murdered in the
Speaker 1: first place. And that became like a primary goal, even
Speaker 1: without him being arrested, because we knew that was always
Speaker 1: about power and control, of course, but the money he
Speaker 1: wanted that money. Hitman is a production of I Heart
Speaker 1: Radio and hit Home Media. It's produced and reported by
Speaker 1: me Jasmine Morris. Our supervising producer is Michelle Lance. Mark
Speaker 1: Latto is our story consultant. Executive producers are Main gesh Ha,
Speaker 1: Tiktor and Me. Mixing by Josh Rogison, Michelle Lance and
Speaker 1: Jacopo Penzo. Our fact checkers are Austin Thompson and Natsumi Ajisaka.
Speaker 1: Special thanks to Andrew Goldberg, the Montgomery County States Attorney's
Speaker 1: Office and the Criminal Department in Central Files at the
Speaker 1: Montgomery County Courthouse. Our theme song by Alice McCoy in.
Speaker 1: Additional music written and produced by the students at DIME,
Speaker 1: powered by the Detroit Institute of Music Education,