WEBVTT - Behind the Crown 0:00:04.519 --> 0:00:06.120 This is quite a wall here. 0:00:07.400 --> 0:00:10.080 Oh, these are some great photos. 0:00:10.600 --> 0:00:12.959 That's Jimmy Carter enough me. 0:00:14.280 --> 0:00:18.800 Uh huh, yes, me and Lorena Lynn. How did this 0:00:18.920 --> 0:00:19.480 come about? 0:00:20.200 --> 0:00:23.200 She was given a concert in Burninghalla. Uh huh, carry 0:00:23.280 --> 0:00:24.640 me backstage, leader. 0:00:25.000 --> 0:00:26.640 Look at this suit that you have on. 0:00:27.200 --> 0:00:30.400 Maybe you've never heard of Bill Baxley, but here in 0:00:30.440 --> 0:00:32.160 Alabama he's a big deal. 0:00:32.440 --> 0:00:34.760 That Johnny Cash. Oh wow. 0:00:34.920 --> 0:00:39.880 Baxley is eighty two, slightly balding, with silver hair and eyebrows. 0:00:40.840 --> 0:00:42.960 In the pictures he's showing me on the wall of 0:00:43.000 --> 0:00:47.280 his office, I see him looking younger, his hair is dark, 0:00:47.479 --> 0:00:51.199 and he's standing with famous musicians and politicians. 0:00:51.960 --> 0:00:54.800 That's my daddy swearing me in for my first term. 0:00:55.160 --> 0:00:55.600 Wow. 0:00:56.040 --> 0:00:59.560 Baxley was elected as Alabama's attorney General when he was 0:00:59.640 --> 0:01:03.560 just twenty eight years old. He later served as lieutenant governor, 0:01:03.680 --> 0:01:08.680 and he's still practicing law today. During his career, Baxley 0:01:08.760 --> 0:01:13.400 prosecuted hundreds of cases and sent three people to Alabama's 0:01:13.440 --> 0:01:13.920 death row. 0:01:15.000 --> 0:01:19.200 There are some crimes that are so wrong and so 0:01:19.440 --> 0:01:23.440 horrible that they only deserve one punishment. 0:01:24.280 --> 0:01:28.759 He's a lifelong defender of the death penalty, a true believer, 0:01:29.840 --> 0:01:32.800 Like when the US Supreme Court outlawed the death penalty 0:01:32.840 --> 0:01:37.039 in the nineteen seventies, Baxley worked hard to bring executions 0:01:37.200 --> 0:01:42.480 back to Alabama. He's that kind of true believer, so 0:01:42.560 --> 0:01:46.039 it's not surprising that Baxley was skeptical when his son, 0:01:46.240 --> 0:01:49.480 who's also an attorney, asked his dad to look over 0:01:49.520 --> 0:01:53.080 a case because he believed an innocent man was on 0:01:53.200 --> 0:01:53.760 death row. 0:01:54.800 --> 0:01:59.080 Over the course of my long career, I've had dozens 0:01:59.120 --> 0:02:04.160 and dozens of instances where these I'll call them do gooders, 0:02:04.160 --> 0:02:08.840 but they're good people. They take up there's causes of 0:02:08.880 --> 0:02:12.800 people that have been sentenced to death, and they get 0:02:12.919 --> 0:02:15.079 interested in trying to help them, and they all think 0:02:15.120 --> 0:02:16.240 they're always innocent. 0:02:17.200 --> 0:02:20.720 Baxley didn't even glance at the case file until weeks later. 0:02:21.120 --> 0:02:24.840 On an icy winter morning, it was too slippery to 0:02:24.919 --> 0:02:27.960 walk down the driveway and grab the newspaper, so he 0:02:28.040 --> 0:02:30.840 picked up the file that his son sent him and 0:02:30.960 --> 0:02:35.200 began reading about a black man named to Forrest Johnson, 0:02:35.560 --> 0:02:38.400 who was sentenced to death for killing a Shaff's deputy. 0:02:39.320 --> 0:02:42.680 I mean, mid morning, I couldn't believe what I was reading. 0:02:43.040 --> 0:02:45.440 I wouldn't have believed that something like this could have happened. 0:02:45.480 --> 0:02:47.359 What was so unbelievable about it? 0:02:47.520 --> 0:02:51.440 Everything? Everything. I don't know how the guy got indicted, 0:02:51.760 --> 0:02:55.280 how they got I didn't see how the jury convicted him. 0:02:55.639 --> 0:02:57.919 I would have never believed that that could have happened 0:02:57.919 --> 0:03:03.320 in Alabama. Quest question in my mind. This guy was 0:03:03.360 --> 0:03:08.880 not guilty of this crime, and I couldn't comprehend how 0:03:08.919 --> 0:03:09.560 this could happen. 0:03:10.600 --> 0:03:14.480 There's only one other case where Basley thought the defendants 0:03:14.520 --> 0:03:18.000 were innocent, and that case is almost one hundred years old. 0:03:19.000 --> 0:03:23.560 So what is it about this case to Forrest's case 0:03:24.000 --> 0:03:28.040 that convinced Backsley that Alabama is trying to execute an 0:03:28.040 --> 0:03:28.880 innocent man. 0:03:30.360 --> 0:03:37.520 It's a unique absurdity that I've never seen before. It's 0:03:38.480 --> 0:03:40.640 too late to give him back all those years he's 0:03:40.680 --> 0:03:43.960 been on death road, but it's not too late to 0:03:44.080 --> 0:03:48.120 correct it today and get him out for the future. 0:03:49.240 --> 0:03:52.720 It's wrong, it's gone this long, but it's still not 0:03:52.840 --> 0:03:53.800 too late to correct. 0:03:55.880 --> 0:03:59.520 My name is Beth Shelburne. Like Bill Baxley, I was 0:03:59.560 --> 0:04:02.560 born in raised in Alabama. I grew up about a 0:04:02.600 --> 0:04:05.280 mile away from where the crime at the center of 0:04:05.320 --> 0:04:09.080 this story took place. I'm a journalist and writer and 0:04:09.120 --> 0:04:12.440 for the last three years, I've been investigating the case 0:04:12.520 --> 0:04:17.200 that rocked Bill Baxley's world. The story begins on a 0:04:17.240 --> 0:04:21.359 hot July night in nineteen ninety five. It unfolds in 0:04:21.440 --> 0:04:26.000 two places at once, the Crown Sterling Sweet's Hotel and 0:04:26.080 --> 0:04:30.400 a nightclub that's almost four miles away called Tea's Place. 0:04:31.560 --> 0:04:34.159 By the end of the night, one man will be 0:04:34.279 --> 0:04:38.479 shot dead and two others will encounter someone who will 0:04:38.520 --> 0:04:43.520 put them at the center of the murder investigation to 0:04:43.640 --> 0:04:47.800 Forrest Johnson is still on death row and he's running 0:04:47.839 --> 0:04:48.640 out of time. 0:05:04.200 --> 0:05:17.240 M hm, do you hear my maness? 0:05:19.880 --> 0:05:20.240 Laughter? 0:05:21.400 --> 0:05:41.479 Had my feet? Sorrows dep re list in this bad tears. 0:05:42.880 --> 0:05:53.760 I want to see revelation. I want to know you. 0:05:57.800 --> 0:06:05.400 I'm reason Oh, it's precious. 0:06:05.520 --> 0:06:24.160 To I'm Beth Shelburne. 0:06:24.680 --> 0:06:38.799 This is ear witness, Chapter one Behind the Crown. 0:06:39.960 --> 0:06:42.919 Yes, ma'am, this is very calling from Crowns Drilling Sweet 0:06:43.000 --> 0:06:46.800 Hotel in Birmingham, Alabama. I'm calling because I've had several 0:06:46.839 --> 0:06:49.360 guests report what appears on the windows. There have been 0:06:49.440 --> 0:06:52.920 two gunshots and people running in the parking lot. 0:06:53.040 --> 0:06:57.560 It's twelve fifty five am on July nineteenth, nineteen ninety five. 0:06:59.080 --> 0:07:02.839 It's twenty three plain, that is correct. I have security 0:07:02.880 --> 0:07:05.120 on the premisist, which is typically County Police, but I'm 0:07:05.160 --> 0:07:08.080 calling you because I want to make sure that the 0:07:08.120 --> 0:07:11.120 Birmingham Police arrive. Please, all right, look at the one out. 0:07:11.320 --> 0:07:12.440 Thank you very much, all right. 0:07:18.240 --> 0:07:21.560 The Crown Sterling Suites Hotel was a nine story building 0:07:21.600 --> 0:07:27.040 in Birmingham. Today the hotel is an embassy suites. Inside 0:07:27.080 --> 0:07:30.600 the main entrance of the hotel, there's a pale tiled 0:07:30.800 --> 0:07:33.360 walkway that leads through the lobby. 0:07:33.560 --> 0:07:34.800 The front desk. 0:07:34.720 --> 0:07:37.760 Is to the left, but keep walking past it and 0:07:37.800 --> 0:07:42.320 you enter a huge atrium, an open space surrounded by 0:07:42.360 --> 0:07:47.040 windows with an indoor garden of leafy green plants and trees. 0:07:48.400 --> 0:07:51.360 The tiled walkway leads to a coy pond with a 0:07:51.400 --> 0:07:56.560 fountain at the center. It's lush and humid inside, but 0:07:56.680 --> 0:08:01.160 despite all the windows, the field is dim and moody. 0:08:02.840 --> 0:08:06.120 Keep walking past the cooy pond and there's a short 0:08:06.240 --> 0:08:11.040 hallway that leads to the hotel's back parking lot. It 0:08:11.200 --> 0:08:14.640 was here outside the double doors of the Crown Sterling 0:08:14.680 --> 0:08:20.320 Suite's Hotel where a deputy sheriff was killed. No one 0:08:20.360 --> 0:08:23.680 saw the murder, but a few people heard gunshots. 0:08:25.080 --> 0:08:28.360 I remember hearing popping noises from the distance. 0:08:29.720 --> 0:08:32.680 Barry Rushikov was working at the front desk when he 0:08:32.760 --> 0:08:34.360 made that nine to one to one call. 0:08:35.320 --> 0:08:37.360 When I heard it, I believe that's when I tried 0:08:37.360 --> 0:08:41.360 to call Officer Hardy on the radio with no response. 0:08:42.559 --> 0:08:45.880 Officer William Hardy, who went by Bill, had been a 0:08:45.920 --> 0:08:49.640 deputy with the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office for twenty three years. 0:08:50.240 --> 0:08:53.080 He was also a security guard at the hotel, where 0:08:53.080 --> 0:08:57.200 he worked the night shift to make extra money. Hardy 0:08:57.280 --> 0:09:00.520 was five foot ten, had a thin mustache, and wore 0:09:00.559 --> 0:09:03.360 his hair in a Jerry curl. He was known to 0:09:03.440 --> 0:09:08.280 be easy going and friendly. When Deputy Hardy wasn't making 0:09:08.320 --> 0:09:13.000 hotel security rounds, Barry usually saw him wearing his brown 0:09:13.040 --> 0:09:16.400 and tan deputy uniform, sitting at one of the tables 0:09:16.400 --> 0:09:21.400 in the hotel's atrium, smoking more brand menthol cigarettes and 0:09:21.520 --> 0:09:22.559 drinking coffee. 0:09:23.320 --> 0:09:23.839 You know, when I. 0:09:23.800 --> 0:09:25.680 Worked there, and when I was working nights, it was me, 0:09:26.880 --> 0:09:30.679 you know, Officer Hardy or whatever officer on duty, and 0:09:31.000 --> 0:09:34.320 or we would sometime have a houseman who is cleaning 0:09:34.320 --> 0:09:35.120 floors or something. 0:09:35.120 --> 0:09:38.960 But very minimal group, and I never felt unsafe. 0:09:39.280 --> 0:09:42.880 Barry wasn't the only person to hear the popping noises. 0:09:43.360 --> 0:09:47.679 A few guests at the hotel also heard gunshots, including 0:09:47.920 --> 0:09:51.559 Marshal Kelly Cummings, a guest in a fourth floor room 0:09:51.800 --> 0:09:54.200 directly above the hotel's back exit. 0:09:55.080 --> 0:09:57.120 I can remember like it was yesterday, ma as far 0:09:57.200 --> 0:09:58.280 as the details. 0:09:58.440 --> 0:10:01.560 As I worked on this project, I started referring to 0:10:01.640 --> 0:10:05.520 Cummings as the Keebler cookie guy, because in nineteen ninety 0:10:05.520 --> 0:10:09.640 five he worked for Keebler as a truck driver. 0:10:09.320 --> 0:10:12.199 When I was with Keebler driving one of the step 0:10:12.320 --> 0:10:15.679 vans delivering cookies and crackers and stuff, and. 0:10:15.080 --> 0:10:18.120 We had a Cummings was staying at the Crown Sterling 0:10:18.280 --> 0:10:22.120 for a company training. After the workday was over, he 0:10:22.200 --> 0:10:25.439 drank a few beers at the hotel bar with some coworkers, 0:10:25.960 --> 0:10:28.719 and then he and the other Keepler employee he was 0:10:28.800 --> 0:10:33.400 rooming with turned in between ten and eleven PM. But 0:10:33.520 --> 0:10:35.640 Cummings was not asleep for long. 0:10:35.679 --> 0:10:38.079 But he just I woke up and it was I 0:10:38.160 --> 0:10:40.920 kept hearing somebody talk kind of talk. 0:10:41.640 --> 0:10:44.080 So you heard some voices and it sounded like they 0:10:44.120 --> 0:10:45.280 were arguing or. 0:10:45.400 --> 0:10:47.520 Not really bad. But they were. 0:10:47.480 --> 0:10:48.440 Having a conversation. 0:10:49.120 --> 0:10:51.280 Yeah it was male voices. 0:10:51.320 --> 0:10:55.520 Yeah, well they quit arguing and then I didn't hear anything. 0:10:55.520 --> 0:11:00.359 So I laid back down and it probably wasn't seconds, 0:11:00.400 --> 0:11:01.679 thirty seconds, forty five. 0:11:01.720 --> 0:11:02.079 I'm out. 0:11:02.120 --> 0:11:06.079 I didn't count boom, small caliber gun. He won a 0:11:06.120 --> 0:11:08.520 big caliber and all of a sudden, the few sects 0:11:08.559 --> 0:11:11.600 are a boom. About the second time I say it, Ben, 0:11:12.840 --> 0:11:13.160 that was. 0:11:13.160 --> 0:11:22.000 A gun, he remembers, turning to the coworker he was 0:11:22.040 --> 0:11:22.920 sharing a room with. 0:11:24.120 --> 0:11:27.280 I said, you hear that? He says, yeah. So I 0:11:27.280 --> 0:11:30.040 stood up and opened the blind to get my eyes 0:11:30.080 --> 0:11:32.480 fixed because it was dark. Then it had the lights 0:11:32.480 --> 0:11:32.640 in the. 0:11:32.679 --> 0:11:36.720 Last one directly beneath his window, Cummings sees a four 0:11:36.760 --> 0:11:40.880 door car. It's dark copper or light brown with the 0:11:41.000 --> 0:11:45.680 vinyl top, parked facing the hotel's back double doors. He 0:11:45.760 --> 0:11:48.600 sees a tall person get into the driver's side of 0:11:48.640 --> 0:11:52.960 the car, close the door, and slowly pull away with 0:11:53.040 --> 0:11:53.960 the headlights off. 0:11:54.920 --> 0:11:57.040 And so I called down to the front desk. I said, hey, 0:11:57.040 --> 0:11:58.000 there's been shots fired. 0:11:58.000 --> 0:11:58.200 I heard. 0:11:58.280 --> 0:11:58.920 Did you hear that? 0:12:00.000 --> 0:12:01.800 I believe I got a phone call from someone in 0:12:01.840 --> 0:12:03.079 the room saying they heard. 0:12:03.000 --> 0:12:07.640 Gunshots, So Barry makes that initial nine to one one call, 0:12:08.000 --> 0:12:11.120 hangs up and decides to investigate it. 0:12:11.280 --> 0:12:14.000 Jumped over the counter to walk back, and I was 0:12:14.080 --> 0:12:14.600 walked back. 0:12:14.679 --> 0:12:16.400 I saw Offsta Hardy's radio. 0:12:17.679 --> 0:12:20.960 Barry sees Deputy Hardy's radio on a table in the 0:12:21.000 --> 0:12:25.320 hotel's atrium, and right next to it his cigarette still 0:12:25.360 --> 0:12:34.880 burning in an ash tray. Meanwhile, back on the fourth floor, 0:12:35.080 --> 0:12:38.160 Marshall Kelly Cummings hangs up the phone with Barry and 0:12:38.240 --> 0:12:39.439 goes back to the window. 0:12:40.400 --> 0:12:42.440 And I kept looking, and I kept looking. Finally my 0:12:42.480 --> 0:12:45.800 eyes got where I could see, and I looked down. 0:12:45.880 --> 0:12:49.120 I could see him laying on the ground. I went, oh, no, 0:12:49.120 --> 0:12:49.800 this ain't good. 0:12:50.720 --> 0:12:54.600 Cummings spots a body on the ground and realizes someone 0:12:54.679 --> 0:12:58.439 has been badly hurt. It's right around this time Barry 0:12:58.600 --> 0:13:01.040 makes the same tearable discovery. 0:13:01.920 --> 0:13:03.840 There's a hallway that went to the door that went 0:13:03.880 --> 0:13:06.800 back out to the back parking lot. As I turned 0:13:06.800 --> 0:13:09.439 the corner to go down that hallway and I looked 0:13:09.440 --> 0:13:12.600 out the door in the distance, I saw Offsta Hardy. 0:13:12.480 --> 0:13:15.760 On the ground. That's when I ran back to the front. 0:13:15.520 --> 0:13:25.720 Desk made an emergency phone call to the police. 0:13:25.640 --> 0:13:27.800 Just man the Supirital crowds to phys. 0:13:27.840 --> 0:13:32.880 Colia and I have a pit. What appears to be a. 0:13:31.840 --> 0:13:33.840 Jumped the county police officer shot. 0:13:33.640 --> 0:13:34.559 In the back of our building. 0:13:35.480 --> 0:13:39.640 She ends not moving. People in a car drove away 0:13:40.480 --> 0:13:44.160 and he's lying on the on the pavement. I'm a 0:13:44.160 --> 0:13:47.520 little fraid to go up. Yes, he is a Birmingham 0:13:47.520 --> 0:13:49.000 Police out Jefferson County. 0:13:49.240 --> 0:13:52.400 He is a hired night time security for us. 0:13:53.000 --> 0:13:55.400 Hi, do you know if you can sign anything? 0:13:55.520 --> 0:13:59.000 Like if it's breeze? I K and how much blood? 0:13:59.120 --> 0:14:00.760 I'm trying, man, my, my, my promise. 0:14:00.800 --> 0:14:02.320 I don't know if the people are still out there. 0:14:02.800 --> 0:14:05.760 Okay, we we should be that Charlotte you I'm gonna 0:14:05.760 --> 0:14:06.719 go back. 0:14:06.760 --> 0:14:07.520 Okay, thank you. 0:14:11.600 --> 0:14:15.240 Got Jess Ketty deputy has been shot on the back 0:14:15.400 --> 0:14:19.040 entrance of the hotel Crown Show the suite and is. 0:14:19.040 --> 0:14:20.920 One of us and we are they have got one 0:14:21.000 --> 0:14:22.640 down who has been shot. 0:14:23.480 --> 0:14:27.400 And they said it looks gad, it looks too bad. 0:14:27.440 --> 0:14:32.200 Three three two Do we have any information? Do we 0:14:32.280 --> 0:14:38.440 have anything on a suspect to know anything? 0:14:50.320 --> 0:14:52.680 After he makes the second nine to one one call, 0:14:53.240 --> 0:14:56.520 Barry walks down the hallway to the back parking lot. 0:14:57.320 --> 0:15:00.240 And then I went back out the office. Already he 0:15:00.400 --> 0:15:03.080 was not a good condition. He did have a wound 0:15:03.120 --> 0:15:08.000 to his face. He was making a gurgling, gasping noise. 0:15:08.040 --> 0:15:12.680 You know, he was not conscious. I believe I took 0:15:12.720 --> 0:15:16.080 my jacket off, my uniform jacket off, to try to 0:15:16.200 --> 0:15:18.080 cover him, or put under his head, or try to 0:15:18.080 --> 0:15:24.680 comfort him. But fortunately officers arrived so quickly, and I 0:15:24.840 --> 0:15:27.440 was removed from that area immediately. 0:15:29.000 --> 0:15:32.760 More than a dozen officers from four different agencies arrive 0:15:32.800 --> 0:15:37.000 at the hotel. One of them is Detective Tony Richardson, 0:15:37.560 --> 0:15:40.920 who says he'd known Deputy Hardy since he first started 0:15:40.960 --> 0:15:44.640 working for the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office in nineteen seventy eight. 0:15:45.800 --> 0:15:51.720 Being black and bo being black, naturally I noticed him. 0:15:52.480 --> 0:15:54.920 I was told more than once to get a haircut. 0:15:55.720 --> 0:15:57.880 That you know, to be a deputy shaff you got 0:15:57.920 --> 0:16:01.360 to have your haircut. So the reason I mentioned that 0:16:01.560 --> 0:16:05.400 is because from the first day that I ever saw him, 0:16:05.600 --> 0:16:06.760 his hair was out. 0:16:06.600 --> 0:16:09.840 To hear big afro, big afro. 0:16:10.840 --> 0:16:13.320 And he would put on his hat. 0:16:14.200 --> 0:16:17.520 He wore that hat religiously. Everybody else as the Sheriff's 0:16:17.520 --> 0:16:19.960 office hated those hats. They didn't want to wear him, 0:16:20.000 --> 0:16:21.760 you know, But he always wore his hat. 0:16:22.800 --> 0:16:28.040 Deputy Hardy often wore his traditional broad brimmed tan smoky 0:16:28.080 --> 0:16:32.000 the bear style sheriff's hat. It was later entered as 0:16:32.080 --> 0:16:35.120 evidence from the crime scene with a bullet hole through 0:16:35.120 --> 0:16:38.040 the brim. 0:16:36.840 --> 0:16:38.960 And he would have it on his head and all 0:16:39.000 --> 0:16:41.280 that hair would be on the side would be out here, 0:16:41.800 --> 0:16:44.320 and I'm like, who is this guy? How can he 0:16:44.400 --> 0:16:47.480 get away with that? And not only that, he is 0:16:47.640 --> 0:16:51.160 in the sheriff's office. How can he get away with that? 0:16:52.960 --> 0:16:56.080 So I was in treat by him, fascinated by him, 0:16:56.320 --> 0:16:58.760 but I was scared of him. I was scared to 0:16:59.240 --> 0:17:02.080 meet him because I thought, of my mind, this guy's 0:17:02.080 --> 0:17:04.879 got to be crazy, you know who to do that 0:17:05.000 --> 0:17:05.800 and get away with it. 0:17:05.800 --> 0:17:06.600 He's got to be greaty. 0:17:06.640 --> 0:17:07.680 I would scatter of him. 0:17:08.280 --> 0:17:12.320 But anyway, when I first met him, I met him 0:17:12.560 --> 0:17:15.560 and talked to him. He started to feel better about well. 0:17:15.640 --> 0:17:17.240 I started to feel better about him. 0:17:18.000 --> 0:17:19.040 We were never. 0:17:19.000 --> 0:17:21.840 Just busom buddies real close, but we were close and 0:17:22.200 --> 0:17:23.040 we knew each other. 0:17:24.400 --> 0:17:27.680 Tony Richardson and Bill Hardy had been colleagues at the 0:17:27.760 --> 0:17:33.720 Jefferson County Sheriff's office for seventeen years. Richardson remembers the 0:17:33.840 --> 0:17:36.160 last time he saw Hardy alive. 0:17:37.480 --> 0:17:41.680 The last day I saw Bill, my brother and I. 0:17:41.800 --> 0:17:44.960 My brother would put a sheriff's office offso and we 0:17:44.960 --> 0:17:48.320 were standing there smoking and Bill drove out the alley 0:17:49.480 --> 0:17:52.600 and he was pulling up twenty second and he stopped 0:17:52.600 --> 0:17:55.640 in the road and he started to talk to us, 0:17:55.680 --> 0:17:57.760 and he said, hey, guys, hang out doing loan with 0:17:57.880 --> 0:18:00.840 some money. It's just you know, stuff like that. And 0:18:00.920 --> 0:18:02.639 we laughed and talked for a minute. And that was 0:18:02.640 --> 0:18:04.280 the last time I saw him. And the next time 0:18:04.320 --> 0:18:06.439 I heard Bill's name was about two o'clock in the 0:18:06.440 --> 0:18:09.520 morning when I got the call saying that he had 0:18:09.520 --> 0:18:15.159 been shot. At that time, I was what was considered 0:18:15.200 --> 0:18:21.880 a Crimes against Persons detective, which meant that I worked homicides. 0:18:23.800 --> 0:18:27.480 The lieutenant felt like because it involved a deputy sheriff, 0:18:27.640 --> 0:18:30.639 and you know that we needed all the help that 0:18:30.720 --> 0:18:32.440 we could get. So I got called out. 0:18:33.080 --> 0:18:35.240 Did you go to the actual scene? 0:18:35.760 --> 0:18:36.080 Yeah? 0:18:37.000 --> 0:18:38.800 What did you encounter when you got there? 0:18:39.400 --> 0:18:46.120 Well, by the time I got there, Bill's body was gone. 0:18:47.040 --> 0:18:50.879 Paramedics had already lifted Bill Hardy into an ambulance and 0:18:51.000 --> 0:18:54.800 rushed him to the emergency room of Birmingham's largest hospital. 0:18:55.680 --> 0:18:59.360 He is gravely injured with two gunshot wounds to. 0:18:59.359 --> 0:19:01.080 His head and jaw. 0:19:01.640 --> 0:19:05.240 A medical examiner notes a bullet wound to Hardy's finger 0:19:05.800 --> 0:19:09.520 likely means he raised his hand in a defensive posture 0:19:09.640 --> 0:19:13.800 when he was shot. Police go to his house to 0:19:13.880 --> 0:19:17.359 tell his wife, Patricia Diane Hardy, and bring her to 0:19:17.400 --> 0:19:21.640 the hospital. Jim Woodward, the chief deputy in Jefferson County, 0:19:22.040 --> 0:19:24.960 also rushes over when he hears that Hardy was shot. 0:19:26.000 --> 0:19:28.120 What do you remember about the incident? 0:19:28.400 --> 0:19:32.119 I got the call that Hardy had been shot, and 0:19:32.160 --> 0:19:36.480 they told me said looked very serious. So I got 0:19:36.520 --> 0:19:40.639 in my car and went down to the hospital. I 0:19:40.680 --> 0:19:43.120 stood there while they were operating on him, and then 0:19:44.040 --> 0:19:47.199 I just heard one say that's it. It's over. We 0:19:47.240 --> 0:19:48.040 can't do anymore. 0:19:48.400 --> 0:19:48.919 It's over. 0:19:49.320 --> 0:19:51.600 We can't save him. He's gone. 0:19:52.200 --> 0:19:55.159 What does that feel like when you are a career 0:19:55.240 --> 0:19:56.640 law enforcement officer in. 0:19:56.840 --> 0:20:00.720 Well, it's kind of devastating to you. You know, you 0:20:00.840 --> 0:20:04.320 get to know these guys and I knew Hardy. Well, 0:20:05.080 --> 0:20:07.320 that's a very devastating thing that happen to you. 0:20:09.440 --> 0:20:13.679 Deputy Bill Hardy is pronounced dead seven hours after he 0:20:13.800 --> 0:20:18.000 was shot. The cause of death is two gunshot wounds 0:20:18.119 --> 0:20:24.640 fired at close range. I wanted to know more about 0:20:24.680 --> 0:20:28.840 Deputy Hardy, so I wrote to several family members inviting 0:20:28.880 --> 0:20:33.240 them to talk. They never responded, and I can only 0:20:33.280 --> 0:20:36.760 imagine his murder must be one of the hardest things 0:20:36.880 --> 0:20:40.919 they've ever experienced. But I have learned a few things 0:20:40.960 --> 0:20:45.199 about Deputy Hardy. He was married to Patricia Diane Hardy. 0:20:46.000 --> 0:20:50.280 He had two children and four adult step children. Hardy 0:20:50.320 --> 0:20:54.439 started working as a deputy in nineteen seventy two. His 0:20:54.600 --> 0:20:59.800 duties included delivering subpoenas and directing traffic outside the courthouse. 0:21:02.840 --> 0:21:03.160 You know. 0:21:08.760 --> 0:21:12.160 It was rough. It was rough. It's rough right now. 0:21:13.280 --> 0:21:19.320 It's a rough right This many well working homicide I 0:21:19.400 --> 0:21:25.359 worked at bunch, but none of them affected me like 0:21:25.600 --> 0:21:28.800 the killing of a deputy Shaff. You know, you have 0:21:28.840 --> 0:21:33.640 a bond with the guys you work with in the uniform. 0:21:33.640 --> 0:21:39.000 Whether you know 'em or not, you have a bond. 0:21:39.400 --> 0:21:44.320 So when I was a deputy Share working another deputy 0:21:44.359 --> 0:21:46.600 Share it's murdered, do you think that was emotional? Yes? 0:21:46.680 --> 0:21:52.680 It was mm very and had it been my decision 0:21:53.560 --> 0:21:56.760 the day we caught the people that did it. Let's 0:21:56.840 --> 0:21:58.160 let's put 'em on death throat. 0:22:04.320 --> 0:22:08.239 Lead Detective Tony Richardson and his team of investigators have 0:22:08.440 --> 0:22:12.160 no eyewitnesses to the shooting, and there's no known motive. 0:22:13.080 --> 0:22:16.320 A fellow officer has just been shot, and they have 0:22:16.560 --> 0:22:30.399 almost no evidence to go on. At the exact time 0:22:30.480 --> 0:22:34.199 that Deputy Bill Hardy was shot to Forrest Johnson and 0:22:34.240 --> 0:22:37.639 his friend Ardregis Ford were four miles away from the 0:22:37.680 --> 0:22:41.639 crime scene at a downtown Birmingham nightclub called Tea's Place, 0:22:42.240 --> 0:22:46.520 but they would soon become the focus of Tony Richardson's investigation. 0:23:04.480 --> 0:23:07.879 Just a few hours before Deputy Hardy is shot ar 0:23:07.960 --> 0:23:11.680 dragas Ford gets into the passenger side of his nineteen 0:23:11.840 --> 0:23:16.280 seventy one black Monte Carlo. It's an old car and 0:23:16.320 --> 0:23:19.960 the driver's side door doesn't open, so he slides over 0:23:20.080 --> 0:23:23.560 into the driver's seat, starts the ignition, and heads out 0:23:23.600 --> 0:23:26.520 to pick up his friend to Forrest Johnson to go 0:23:26.560 --> 0:23:31.560 to a club called Teas Place. I wasn't able to 0:23:31.600 --> 0:23:36.200 interview to Forest or Ardregas for this podcast. The Alabama 0:23:36.240 --> 0:23:39.520 Department of Corrections doesn't allow people on death road to 0:23:39.560 --> 0:23:43.320 do interviews with reporters like me. So I was unable 0:23:43.359 --> 0:23:47.639 to talk to Forrest directly. And ar Dragas died in 0:23:47.680 --> 0:23:50.840 twenty twenty one, I didn't get a chance to interview 0:23:50.920 --> 0:23:55.639 him before then. I was able to speak to Ardregas's mother, 0:23:55.960 --> 0:23:57.000 Joyce Ford. 0:23:58.760 --> 0:24:02.199 That particular night said they was going to teas and 0:24:02.240 --> 0:24:05.440 see he would go to Tease every Tuesday and he 0:24:05.600 --> 0:24:09.480 have his particular same parking space and everything because he 0:24:09.520 --> 0:24:11.280 would give them good tips. 0:24:12.080 --> 0:24:14.920 Ardregas was willing to pay for a good parking space 0:24:15.400 --> 0:24:19.679 because he was in a wheelchair. When Ardregas was a teenager, 0:24:20.080 --> 0:24:23.520 a group of men began shooting outside an apartment building 0:24:23.560 --> 0:24:27.399 he was visiting. He was shot trying to shield his 0:24:27.560 --> 0:24:29.800 cousin and her baby from gunfire. 0:24:30.920 --> 0:24:33.840 My son when he got shot when he was fifteen, 0:24:34.840 --> 0:24:36.840 I had just gotten off from work. I was tied 0:24:36.840 --> 0:24:39.560 in the phone, rang Rang Rang. I didn't answer the phone, 0:24:39.680 --> 0:24:44.320 you know, and I finally answered it and they stated 0:24:44.359 --> 0:24:48.679 that he had gotten shot. I need to rush to 0:24:48.760 --> 0:24:53.280 the murgency room. That was like a dream, you know. 0:24:53.359 --> 0:24:56.960 You hear about things happening to other people, but when 0:24:57.040 --> 0:25:01.320 it hit home, you know, and then he got spinal 0:25:01.400 --> 0:25:05.800 cord injury. He got shot in the back. Yeah, and 0:25:05.840 --> 0:25:10.800 he was paralyzed realize from chest down T four they 0:25:10.880 --> 0:25:14.400 called it. So that was like a nightmare. 0:25:16.600 --> 0:25:20.400 In his early twenties, ar Dragus outfitted his Monte Carlo 0:25:20.640 --> 0:25:23.800 with the makeshift system so he could throw his wheelchair 0:25:23.840 --> 0:25:26.639 in the back and drive the car using just his 0:25:26.720 --> 0:25:27.920 upper body. 0:25:28.480 --> 0:25:34.000 He would cut a broom you know, the broomsticks. He 0:25:34.000 --> 0:25:36.919 would put have one to the brakes, one to the salator, 0:25:37.280 --> 0:25:40.240 and he would tape it to the car. He would 0:25:40.280 --> 0:25:40.879 tape it to it. 0:25:41.119 --> 0:25:43.680 So he like retro fitted his Yeah. 0:25:43.400 --> 0:25:44.640 He did. Did. 0:25:45.960 --> 0:25:49.480 He didn't buy the regular equipment that he should have used. 0:25:50.520 --> 0:25:53.399 Ar Dragas and to Forest actually came up with this 0:25:53.520 --> 0:25:57.560