Speaker 1: Hi there, I'm Steve Fishman from Orbit Media and I've
Speaker 1: got a goodie for you. Today we're dropping the first
Speaker 1: episode of ear Witness, which is a favorite podcast of
Speaker 1: mine from our friends at Lava for Good. They released
Speaker 1: it in twenty twenty three and it didn't get enough attention,
Speaker 1: so luckily they're re releasing it in their Bone Valley feed. Personally,
Speaker 1: I think this podcast will rile you. It riled me.
Speaker 1: It's the story of Tafarest Johnson, a man who was
Speaker 1: wrongfully convicted for murder in Alabama and is still on
Speaker 1: death row. There weren't any eyewitnesses, no physical evidence to
Speaker 1: forrest had ten witnesses who put him at some place
Speaker 1: other than the scene of the crime. The state tried
Speaker 1: to convict a different man for the same crime. Maybe
Speaker 1: most disturbing of all is that his conviction relied on
Speaker 1: an ear witness that's the name. This was a woman
Speaker 1: who claimed to have evesdropped on an incriminating phone call,
Speaker 1: a woman whom prosecutors paid for her testimony in secret,
Speaker 1: a secret they never revealed. Fans of the Burden and
Speaker 1: Empire and Blood will love this story. All eight episodes
Speaker 1: of ear Witness are available now wherever you get your podcasts. Enjoy.
Speaker 2: This is quite a wall here. Oh, these are some
Speaker 2: great photos.
Speaker 3: That's Jimmy Carter enough me, uh huh, yes, me and
Speaker 3: Lorena Lynn.
Speaker 4: How did this come about? She was given a.
Speaker 3: Concert in burmah Allen carrying me backstage to leader.
Speaker 5: Look at this suit that you have on. Maybe you've
Speaker 5: never heard of Bill Baxley, but here in Alabama he's
Speaker 5: a big deal.
Speaker 6: Oh.
Speaker 7: Wow.
Speaker 5: Baxley is eighty two, slightly balding, with silver hair and eyebrows.
Speaker 5: In the pictures he's showing me on the wall of
Speaker 5: his office. I see him looking younger. His hair is dark,
Speaker 5: and he's standing with famous musicians and politicians.
Speaker 3: As my dad, I sweared me in for my first term.
Speaker 8: Wow.
Speaker 5: Baxley was elected as Alabama's Attorney general when he was
Speaker 5: just twenty eight years old. He later served as lieutenant governor,
Speaker 5: and he's still practicing law today. During his career, Baxley
Speaker 5: prosecuted hundreds of cases and sent three people to Alabama's
Speaker 5: death row.
Speaker 3: There are some crimes that are so wrong and so
Speaker 3: horrible that they only deserve one punishment.
Speaker 5: He's a lifelong defender of the death penalty. A true believer,
Speaker 5: like when the US Supreme Court outlawed the death penalty
Speaker 5: in the nineteen seventies, Baxley worked hard to bring executions
Speaker 5: back to Alabama. He's that kind of true believer. So
Speaker 5: it's not surprising that Baxley was skeptical when his son,
Speaker 5: who's also an attorney, asked his dad to look over
Speaker 5: a case because he believed an innocent man was on
Speaker 5: death row.
Speaker 3: Over the course of my long career, I've had dozens
Speaker 3: and dozens of answerces were these I'll call them do gooders,
Speaker 3: but they are. They're good people. They take up there's
Speaker 3: causes of people that have been sentenced to death, and
Speaker 3: they get interested in trying to help them, and they
Speaker 3: all think they're always innocent.
Speaker 5: Baxley didn't even glance at the case file until weeks later.
Speaker 5: On an icy winter morning, it was too slippery to
Speaker 5: walk down the driveway and grab the newspaper, so he
Speaker 5: picked up the file that his son sent him and
Speaker 5: began reading about a black man named to Forrest Johnson,
Speaker 5: who was sentenced to death for killing a shareff's deputy.
Speaker 3: I mean mid morning, I couldn't believe what I was reading.
Speaker 3: I wouldn't have believed that something like this could have happened.
Speaker 5: What was so unbelievable about it?
Speaker 3: Everything? Everything. I don't know how the guy got indicted,
Speaker 3: how they got I didn't see how the jury convicted him.
Speaker 3: I would have never believed that that could have happened
Speaker 3: in Alabama, no question in my mind. This guy was
Speaker 3: not guilty of this crime, and I couldn't comprehend how
Speaker 3: this could happen.
Speaker 5: There's only one other case where Basley thought the defendants
Speaker 5: were innocent, and that case is almost one hundred years old.
Speaker 5: So what is it about this case to Forrest's case
Speaker 5: that convinced Basley that Alabama is trying to execute an
Speaker 5: innocent man?
Speaker 3: If it's a unique absurdity that I've never sleen before,
Speaker 3: it's too late to give him back all those years
Speaker 3: he's been on death road, but it's not too late
Speaker 3: to correct it today and get him out for the future.
Speaker 3: It's wrong that it's gone this long. It is still
Speaker 3: not too late to correct.
Speaker 5: My name is Beth Shelburne. Like Bill Baxley, I was
Speaker 5: born and raised in Alabama. I grew up about a
Speaker 5: mile away from where the crime at the center of
Speaker 5: this story took place. I'm a journalist and writer, and
Speaker 5: for the last three years, I've been investigating the case
Speaker 5: that rocked Bill Baxley's world. The story begins on a
Speaker 5: hot July night in nineteen ninety five. It unfolds in
Speaker 5: two places at once, the Crown Sterling Sweet's Hotel and
Speaker 5: a nightclub that's almost four miles away called Tea's Place.
Speaker 5: By the end of the night, one man will be
Speaker 5: shot dead and two others will encounter someone who will
Speaker 5: put them at the center of the murder investigation to
Speaker 5: Forrest Johnson is still on death row and he's running
Speaker 5: out of time.
Speaker 9: M do you heed my man?
Speaker 10: Laughter?
Speaker 11: Haads?
Speaker 4: My fe.
Speaker 10: Souls save bly is in this bad of tears? I
Speaker 10: want to see revelation. I want to know who you are,
Speaker 10: am reation in this inspiration to the Who's holding stand,
Speaker 10: to the Who's holding Stand.
Speaker 5: I'm Beth Shelburne. This is ear Witness, Chapter one, behind
Speaker 5: the Crown a Lot.
Speaker 8: Yes, ma'am, this is very calling from Crown Sterling Sweet
Speaker 8: Hotel in Birmingham, Alabama. I'm calling because I've had several
Speaker 8: guests report what appears on the windows who have been
Speaker 8: two gunshots and people running in the parking lot.
Speaker 5: It's twelve fifty five am on July nineteenth, nineteen ninety five.
Speaker 4: It's twenty three critch flight.
Speaker 8: That is correct. I have security on the premises, which
Speaker 8: is ship of the County Police. But I'm calling you
Speaker 8: because I want to make sure that the Birmingham Police arrive.
Speaker 8: Please all right, we'll get the one out, thank you
Speaker 8: very much.
Speaker 4: All right.
Speaker 5: The Crown Sterling Suites Hotel was a nine story building
Speaker 5: in Birmingham. Today, the hotel is an embassy suites. Inside
Speaker 5: the main entrance of the hotel, there's a pale tiled
Speaker 5: walkway that leads through the lobby. The front desk is
Speaker 5: to the left, but keep walking past it and you
Speaker 5: enter a huge atrium, an open space surrounded by windows
Speaker 5: with an indoor garden of leafy green plants and trees.
Speaker 5: The tiled walkway leads to a koi pond with a
Speaker 5: fountain at the center. It's lush and humid inside, but
Speaker 5: despite all the windows, the field is dim and moody.
Speaker 5: Keep walking past the koi pond and there's a short
Speaker 5: hallway that leads to the hotel's back parking lot. It
Speaker 5: was here outside the double doors of the Crown Sterling
Speaker 5: Suite's hotel, where a deputy sheriff was killed. No one
Speaker 5: saw the murder, but a few people heard gunshots.
Speaker 12: I remember hearing popping noises from the distance.
Speaker 5: Barry Rushikov was working at the front desk when he
Speaker 5: made made that nine to one one call.
Speaker 12: When I heard it, I believe that's when I tried
Speaker 12: to call Officer Hardy on the radio with no response.
Speaker 5: Officer William Hardy, who went by Bill, had been a
Speaker 5: deputy with the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office for twenty three years.
Speaker 5: He was also a security guard at the hotel, where
Speaker 5: he worked the night shift to make extra money. Hardy
Speaker 5: was five foot ten, had a thin mustache, and wore
Speaker 5: his hair in a Jerry curl. He was known to
Speaker 5: be easy going and friendly. When Deputy Hardy wasn't making
Speaker 5: hotel security rounds, Barry usually saw him wearing his brown
Speaker 5: and tan deputy uniform, sitting at one of the tables
Speaker 5: in the hotel's atrium, smoking more brand menthol cigarettes and
Speaker 5: drinking coffee.
Speaker 12: You know, when I worked there, and when I was
Speaker 12: working nights, it was me, you know, Officer Hardy or
Speaker 12: whatever officer on duty, and or we would sometime have
Speaker 12: a house who is cleaning floors or something, but very
Speaker 12: minimal group, and I never felt unsafe.
Speaker 5: Barry wasn't the only person to hear the popping noises.
Speaker 5: A few guests at the hotel also heard gunshots, including
Speaker 5: Marshall Kelly Cummings, a guest in a fourth floor room
Speaker 5: directly above the hotel's back exit.
Speaker 13: David, I can remember like it was yesterday now as
Speaker 13: far as the details.
Speaker 5: As I worked on this project, I started referring to
Speaker 5: Cummings as the Keebler cookie guy, because in nineteen ninety
Speaker 5: five he worked for Keebler as a truck driver.
Speaker 13: When I was with Keebler driving Wonder step Lands and
Speaker 13: delivering cookies and crackers and stuff.
Speaker 5: And Cummings was staying at the Crown Sterling for a
Speaker 5: company training. After the workday was over, he drank a
Speaker 5: few beers at the hotel bar with some coworkers, and
Speaker 5: then he and the other Keepler employee he was rooming
Speaker 5: with turned in between ten and eleven PM. But Cummings
Speaker 5: was not asleep for long.
Speaker 13: But it just I woke up and it was I
Speaker 13: kept hearing somebody talk kind of talk.
Speaker 5: So you heard some voices and it sounded like they
Speaker 5: were arguing or not.
Speaker 13: Really bad, but they.
Speaker 2: Were having a conversation.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it was male voices.
Speaker 13: Yeah. Well they quit arguing and then I didn't hear anything.
Speaker 13: So I laid back down. And it probably wasn't twenty seconds,
Speaker 13: thirty seconds, forty five.
Speaker 14: I'm out.
Speaker 13: I didn't count boom, small caliber gun. They won a
Speaker 13: big caliber and all of a sudden, a few secons
Speaker 13: of a boom about the second time I saw it, Ben,
Speaker 13: that was a.
Speaker 5: Gun, he remembers, turning to the coworker he was sharing
Speaker 5: a room with and.
Speaker 13: I said, you hear that? He says, yeah. So I
Speaker 13: stood up and opened the blind to get my eyes
Speaker 13: fixed because it was dark. Then they had the lights, and.
Speaker 5: The lights directly beneath his window. Cummings sees a four
Speaker 5: door car it's dark copper or light brown with a
Speaker 5: vinyl top, parked facing the hotel's back double doors. He
Speaker 5: sees a tall person get into the driver's side of
Speaker 5: the car, close the door, and slowly pull away with
Speaker 5: the headlights off.
Speaker 13: And so I called down to the front desk. I said, hey,
Speaker 13: there's men shots fired. I heard I did you hear that?
Speaker 12: I believe I got a phone call from someone in
Speaker 12: the room saying they heard gunshots.
Speaker 5: So Barry makes that initial nine to one one call,
Speaker 5: hangs up, and decides to investigate it.
Speaker 12: Jumped over the counter to walk back, and I was
Speaker 12: walked back. I saw Offsta Hardy's radio.
Speaker 5: Barry sees Deputy Hardy's radio on a table in the
Speaker 5: hotel's atrium, and right next to it his cigarette still
Speaker 5: burning in an ash tray. Meanwhile, back on the fourth floor,
Speaker 5: Marshall Kelly Cummings hangs up the phone with Barry and
Speaker 5: goes back to the window.
Speaker 13: And I kept looking, and I kept looking. Finally my
Speaker 13: eyes got where I could see, and I looked down.
Speaker 13: I could see him laying on the ground.
Speaker 3: I went, oh, no, this ain't good.
Speaker 5: Cummings spots a body on the ground and realizes someone
Speaker 5: has been badly hurt. It's right around this time Barry
Speaker 5: makes the same terrible discovery.
Speaker 12: There's a hallway that went to the door that went
Speaker 12: back out to the back parking lot. As I turned
Speaker 12: the corner to go down that hallway and I looked
Speaker 12: out the door in the distance, I saw Offsta Hardy
Speaker 12: on the ground. That's when I ran back to the
Speaker 12: front desk, made an emergency phone call to the police.
Speaker 8: Yes, man, it's a very cross again and I have
Speaker 8: a pit what appears to be a.
Speaker 4: Go to the county police officer shot.
Speaker 8: In the back of our ability. He ends that moving
Speaker 8: people in.
Speaker 4: The car drove away and he's lying on the on
Speaker 4: the pavement. I'm a little afraid to go. Yes, he
Speaker 4: is a Birmingham police out Jefferson County. He is a
Speaker 4: hired night time security for us. Right, do you know
Speaker 4: if you can.
Speaker 15: Sign out anything like if you breathe?
Speaker 8: I protesting how much flood I'm trying, man, my my promise.
Speaker 8: I don't know if the people are still out there.
Speaker 4: Okay, we we should be that Charlotte, you say much.
Speaker 8: I'm gonna go back. Okay, thank you.
Speaker 4: Jess County Debut has been shot on the back entrance
Speaker 4: of the hotel clown show Sweet. It is one of
Speaker 4: us and we are they have got one down who
Speaker 4: has been shot and it looks too bad. Three three two?
Speaker 4: Do we have any information? Do we have anything?
Speaker 10: No?
Speaker 4: Nice afect anything.
Speaker 5: After he makes the second nine to one one call,
Speaker 5: Barry walks down the hallway to the back parking lot,
Speaker 5: and then I went back out the office.
Speaker 12: Already he was not a good condition. He did have
Speaker 12: a wound to his face. He was making a gurgling,
Speaker 12: gasping noise.
Speaker 3: You know, he was not conscious.
Speaker 12: I believe I took my jacket off, my uniform jacket off,
Speaker 12: to try to cover him, or put under his head,
Speaker 12: or try to comfort him. But fortunately officers arrived so
Speaker 12: quickly and I was removed from that area immediately.
Speaker 5: More than a dozen officers from four different agencies arrive
Speaker 5: at the hotel. One of them is Detective Tony Richardson,
Speaker 5: who says he'd known Deputy Hardy since he first started
Speaker 5: working for the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office in nineteen seventy eight.
Speaker 16: Being black and Bill being black, naturally I noticed him.
Speaker 16: I was told more than once to get a haircut.
Speaker 16: That you know, to be a deputy sheriff, you gotta
Speaker 16: have your haircut. So the reason I mentioned that is
Speaker 16: because from the first day that I ever saw him,
Speaker 16: his hair was out.
Speaker 17: To hear big afro, big afro, and he would put
Speaker 17: on his hat. He wore that hat religiously everybody else's.
Speaker 17: The shaff's office hated those hats. They didn't want to wear,
Speaker 17: you know, but he always wore his hat.
Speaker 5: Deputy Hardy often wore his traditional broad brimmed tan smoky
Speaker 5: the bear style sheriff's hat. It was later entered as
Speaker 5: evidence from the rhyme see with a bullet hole through
Speaker 5: the brim, and he.
Speaker 14: Would have it on his head and all that hair
Speaker 14: would be on the side would be out here, And
Speaker 14: I'm like, who is this guy? How can he get
Speaker 14: away with that? And not only that, he is in
Speaker 14: the Sheriff's office. How can he get away with that?
Speaker 14: So I was in treat by him, fascinated by him,
Speaker 14: but I was scared of him.
Speaker 16: I was scared to meet him because I thought, of
Speaker 16: my mind, this guy's got to be crazy, you know
Speaker 16: who to do that and get away with it. He's
Speaker 16: got to be crazy. I was scared of him.
Speaker 9: But anyway, when I first met him, I met him
Speaker 9: and talked to him.
Speaker 16: He started to.
Speaker 9: Feel better about well. I started to feel better about him.
Speaker 16: We were never just bullsom buddies real close, but we
Speaker 16: were close and we knew each other.
Speaker 5: Tony Richardson and Bill Hardy had been colleagues at the
Speaker 5: Jefferson County Sheriff's Office for seventeen years. He remembers the
Speaker 5: last time he saw Hardy alive.
Speaker 16: The last day I saw Bill, my brother and I
Speaker 16: My brother would put a sheriff's office also, and we
Speaker 16: were standing there smoking and Bill drove out the alley
Speaker 16: and he was pulling up twenty second and he stopped
Speaker 16: in the road and he started to talk to us,
Speaker 16: and he said, Hey, guys, how y'all doing loan me
Speaker 16: some money. It's just you know, stuff like that. And
Speaker 16: we laughed and talked for a minute. And that was
Speaker 16: the last time I saw him. And the next time
Speaker 16: I heard Bill's name was about two o'clock in the
Speaker 16: morning when I got the call saying that he had
Speaker 16: been shot. At that time, I was what was considered
Speaker 16: a Crimes against Persons detective, which meant that I worked homicides.
Speaker 16: The lieutenant felt like because it involved a deputy sheriff,
Speaker 16: and you know that we needed all the help that
Speaker 16: we could get, So I got called up.
Speaker 2: Did you go to the actual scene?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: What did you encounter when you got there?
Speaker 16: Well, by the time I got there, Beale's body was gone.
Speaker 5: Paramedics had already lifted Bill Hardy into an ambulance and
Speaker 5: rushed him to the emergency room of Birmingham's largest hospital.
Speaker 5: He is gravely injured, with two gunshot wounds to his
Speaker 5: head and jaw. A medical examiner notes a bullet wound
Speaker 5: to Hardy's finger likely means he raised his hand in
Speaker 5: a defensive posture when he was shot. Police go to
Speaker 5: his house to tell his wife, Patricia Diane Hardy, and
Speaker 5: bring her to the hospital. Jim Woodward, the chief deputy
Speaker 5: in Jefferson County, also rushes over when he hears that
Speaker 5: Hardy was shot. What do you remember about the incident?
Speaker 15: I got to call that Hardy had been shot, and
Speaker 15: they told me some looked very serious. So I got
Speaker 15: in my car and went down to the hospital. I
Speaker 15: stood there while they were operating on me, and then
Speaker 15: I just heard one say that's it.
Speaker 17: It's over.
Speaker 3: We can't do it anymore.
Speaker 15: It's over. We can't save him. He's gone.
Speaker 5: What does that feel like when you are a career
Speaker 5: law enforcement officer and one well.
Speaker 15: It's kind of devastating to you. You know, you get
Speaker 15: to know these guys, and I knew Hardy that's a
Speaker 15: very devastating thing that happened to you.
Speaker 5: Deputy Bill Hardy is pronounced dead seven hours after he
Speaker 5: was shot. The cause of death is two gunshot wounds
Speaker 5: fired at close range. I wanted to know more about
Speaker 5: Deputy Hardy, so I wrote to several family members inviting
Speaker 5: them to talk. They never responded, and I can only
Speaker 5: imagine his murder must be one of the hardest things
Speaker 5: they've ever experienced. But I have learned a few things
Speaker 5: about Deputy Hardy. He was married to Patricia Diane Hardy.
Speaker 5: He had two children and four adult step children. Hardy
Speaker 5: started working as a deputy in nineteen seventy two. His
Speaker 5: duties included delivering subpoenas and directing traffic outside the courthouse.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 16: It was rough.
Speaker 6: It was rough.
Speaker 3: It's rough right now.
Speaker 16: There's a rough right as many working homicide. I've worked
Speaker 16: at bunch, but none of them affected me like the
Speaker 16: killing of a deputy ship. You know, you have a
Speaker 16: bond with the guys you work with in the uniform.
Speaker 16: Whether you know him or not, you have a bond.
Speaker 16: So when I was a deputy shareer working another deputy
Speaker 16: SHA's murder, do you think that was emotional. Yes, it
Speaker 16: was very and had it been my decision the day
Speaker 16: we caught the people that did it, let's put them
Speaker 16: on death throat.
Speaker 5: Lead Detective Tony Richardson and his team of investigators have
Speaker 5: no eyewitnesses to the shooting, and there's no known motive.
Speaker 5: A fellow officer has just been shot, and they have
Speaker 5: almost no evidence to go on. At the exact time
Speaker 5: that Deputy Bill Hardy was shot to Forest Johnson and
Speaker 5: his friend ar dragas Ford were four miles away from
Speaker 5: the crime scene at a downtown Birmingham nightclub called Te's Place,
Speaker 5: but they would soon become the focus of Tony Richardson's investigation.
Speaker 5: Just a few hours before Deputy Hardy is shot, our
Speaker 5: dragas Ford gets into the passenger side of his nineteen
Speaker 5: seventy one black Monte Carlo. It's an old car and
Speaker 5: the driver's side door doesn't open, so he slides over
Speaker 5: into the driver's seat, starts the ignition, and heads out
Speaker 5: to pick up his friend to Forrest Johnson to go
Speaker 5: to a club called Te's Place. I wasn't able to
Speaker 5: interview to Forest Ardregas for this podcast. The Alabama Department
Speaker 5: of Corrections doesn't allow people on death road to do
Speaker 5: interviews with reporters like me. So I was unable to
Speaker 5: talk to Forrest directly. And Ardregas died in twenty twenty one.
Speaker 5: I didn't get a chance to interview him before then.
Speaker 5: I was able to speak to Ardregas's mother, Joyce Ford.
Speaker 7: That particular night, they said they was going to teas
Speaker 7: and see he would go to tease every Tuesday and
Speaker 7: he have his particular same parking space and everything because
Speaker 7: he will give them good tips.
Speaker 5: Ardregas was willing to pay for a good parking space
Speaker 5: because he was in a wheelchair. When Ardregas was a teenager,
Speaker 5: a group of men began shooting outside an apartment building
Speaker 5: he was visiting. He was shot trying to shield his
Speaker 5: cousin and her baby from gunfire.
Speaker 7: My son when he got shot when he was fifteen,
Speaker 7: I had just gotten off from work. I was tied
Speaker 7: in the phone, Rang Rang Rang. I didn't answer the phone,
Speaker 7: you know, and I finally answered it and they stated
Speaker 7: that he had gotten shot. I need to rush to
Speaker 7: the murdency room. Who That was like a dream, you know.
Speaker 7: You hear about things happening to other people, but when
Speaker 7: it hit home, you know, and then he got spinal
Speaker 7: cord injury, got shot in the back. Yeah, and he
Speaker 7: was paralyzed to realize from chests down T four they
Speaker 7: called it. So that was like a nightmare.
Speaker 5: In his early twenties, ar Dregis outfitted his Monte Carlo
Speaker 5: with a makeshift system so he could throw his wheelchair
Speaker 5: in the back and drive the car using just his
Speaker 5: upper body.
Speaker 7: He would cut a broom you know, the broomstick. He
Speaker 7: would put one to the brakes, one to the clerator,
Speaker 7: and he would tape it to the car.
Speaker 9: He would tape it to it.
Speaker 11: So he like retro fitted his Yeah, he did.
Speaker 4: Did.
Speaker 7: He didn't buy the regular equipment that he should have used.
Speaker 5: Are dragas and to Forrest actually came up with this
Speaker 5: idea together. Here's to Forrest's cousin, Antonio.
Speaker 6: Green Drake's was. I guess that was a pride thing.
Speaker 6: He didn't want the handicap accessible pedals and stuff in
Speaker 6: his car. But as far as come up with this great,
Speaker 6: this genius idea where they're gonna well some metal rods
Speaker 6: to the break and accelerator pedal so he could use
Speaker 6: his hands and dry, well, he get to thinking about
Speaker 6: this thing and metal rods, Well did from the brake
Speaker 6: pedal or the accelerator. That's not too good of an
Speaker 6: idea in case you get in the accident. He hate
Speaker 6: to see Draga's impaled through the seat right here. So
Speaker 6: he goes and buys two brooms out of the little
Speaker 6: dollar store or wherever. And no measurements, no, just nothing
Speaker 6: precise about it. He just gets the broom and breaks
Speaker 6: them and Duc tape the sticks one to the accelerated
Speaker 6: pedal and one to the brake pedal, so Dragas could
Speaker 6: drive his car.
Speaker 2: Could he get around?
Speaker 7: Well?
Speaker 11: I mean did he grow real?
Speaker 5: Well, it's been a while since to Forest and our
Speaker 5: dregas have hung out because to Forest had recently gotten
Speaker 5: out of prison. He was arrested for driving with a
Speaker 5: suspended license, and as officers padded him down at the
Speaker 5: city jail, he tossed something into a nearby trash can.
Speaker 5: Officers reached into the can and found a plastic bag
Speaker 5: of cocaine. To Forest ended up pleading guilty to drug possession.
Speaker 5: To Forest served about a year in prison, and by
Speaker 5: the night of Hardy's murder, he'd been out about three months.
Speaker 5: To Forrest puts on jean shorts and a Tommy Hill
Speaker 5: figure blue and white shirt, then gets into the passenger
Speaker 5: side of Ardregis's car and they head downtown. They pull
Speaker 5: up and park outside Tea's Place, but it's too early
Speaker 5: to go inside, so they hang out in the parking
Speaker 5: lot flirting with some girls who work at the car
Speaker 5: dealership across the street. To Forrest buys a hot dog
Speaker 5: from a cart on the sidewalk. Regulars start trickling into
Speaker 5: the club, drinking, dancing, and catching up. Inside. There's thumping music,
Speaker 5: low lighting. It's Tasty Tuesday at Teas Place, which means
Speaker 5: women get in free.
Speaker 2: I used to go to Teas Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday.
Speaker 5: Barbetta Hunt was one of the regulars who was there
Speaker 5: that night. What's your nickname back then?
Speaker 2: Mama Cat.
Speaker 5: That's like in the world of nicknames, that's in them.
Speaker 2: Mother, it's the purpose and my father, Fred Perkins, they
Speaker 2: gave me that name when I was born. But that's
Speaker 2: my name. My name is Mama Cat.
Speaker 5: When she was in her early twenties, Mama Cat spent
Speaker 5: a lot of nights hanging out at Tea's Place.
Speaker 2: When you walk into the door, that's my spot right there.
Speaker 2: It's on the right hand side. Every time I got
Speaker 2: that was my spot. I see, I don't move from
Speaker 2: this spot.
Speaker 9: I don't walk to the bag.
Speaker 2: I don't walk there. I say, right there. Me and
Speaker 2: my friend Velinicia Aqui Sanders, we were together.
Speaker 11: We got there before eleven because the club was always
Speaker 11: free on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday before eleven for women.
Speaker 5: This is Belanique Sanders nicknamed Queisi.
Speaker 11: Anything after eleven it was five dollars and me and
Speaker 11: Barbetta was very cheap, so we tried to make sure
Speaker 11: we got there in free because the little money we had. Say,
Speaker 11: we wanted to something to eat, and I love to
Speaker 11: get a chicken plate from there, a chicken breast with
Speaker 11: some French fries.
Speaker 5: Oh my god, did you know to Forest Johnson?
Speaker 16: Yes, I did.
Speaker 11: I knew him from hanging out in the neighborhood in
Speaker 11: Ansley and I, oh my god, I had a crush
Speaker 11: on him. He was the finest.
Speaker 5: Yeah, what do you remember about what he looked like?
Speaker 11: He was short, a nice body, Oh my god. Anyway,
Speaker 11: he was a ladies man. I will say that, sweet,
Speaker 11: always kind. He was just a nice gentleman. Like his
Speaker 11: mama had raised him really well.
Speaker 5: Did you guys ever go out or did he know
Speaker 5: that you had a crush on him?
Speaker 11: He knew I had a crush on him, but we
Speaker 11: never went out. No, we would just see each other.
Speaker 11: I smiled, be like, Oh that he is, I'm gonna
Speaker 11: get him.
Speaker 9: Yeah, that's it.
Speaker 5: To Forest mostly grew up in Birmingham's Pratt City neighborhood,
Speaker 5: or Pratt for short.
Speaker 6: We grew up together, I mean closer than just cousins.
Speaker 6: We were like brothers because we were all pretty much
Speaker 6: raised right in the same little local community.
Speaker 5: While to Forest was growing up, most of his extended
Speaker 5: family also lived in or near Pratt, including his cousin
Speaker 5: Antonio Green.
Speaker 6: And since we were toddlers, i mean babies, we were
Speaker 6: kind of together, took out in this thing, and he
Speaker 6: was a couple of years younger than I am, so
Speaker 6: he always kind of held on to my shirt tail
Speaker 6: and you know, so I've been closely connected with him
Speaker 6: for our entire life.
Speaker 3: Pretty much.
Speaker 5: To Forest's mom, Donna was seventeen when she had him,
Speaker 5: and when to Forest was young, she was more like
Speaker 5: a sister to him than a mother. Donna leaned on
Speaker 5: her parents and siblings to help take care of to Forest,
Speaker 5: and as to Forest got older, on him to help
Speaker 5: take care of his little brother.
Speaker 6: He started at a very young age, much too young
Speaker 6: to really be faced with the type of responsibility that
Speaker 6: he took on. He was at an age where he
Speaker 6: was still a kid. I'm talking about eleven twelve, you know,
Speaker 6: just in nineteen years and had to take on the
Speaker 6: responsibility of taking care of his little brother. You know,
Speaker 6: he had a little brother that he got ready for school,
Speaker 6: he earned his clothes, he did. You know, He's always
Speaker 6: been that caring little dude, you know, and he did that.
Speaker 6: So he had to take on some things during that time.
Speaker 3: You know, his mom and.
Speaker 6: Dad was there, but his dad was a very very
Speaker 6: heavy drinker.
Speaker 5: To Forest's father, Ronald, was an alcoholic and would get
Speaker 5: violent when he drank, which was every day. This made
Speaker 5: home life extremely volatile for to Forrest, his younger brother,
Speaker 5: little ron and especially his mother, Donna. She eventually left
Speaker 5: Ronald when to Forest was a teenager and moved in
Speaker 5: with another man who had an apartment and the Tuxedo
Speaker 5: Projects in Birmingham's Insley community, also known as the Brickyard.
Speaker 2: Oh it was called the Brickyard.
Speaker 5: Velainique aka Queisi, the one who had a crush on
Speaker 5: to Forest, also grew up there.
Speaker 9: It was rough, idre.
Speaker 11: You know, my mom had three girls, had three and
Speaker 11: we lived in a five bedroom project with our grandparents.
Speaker 11: So it was just a bunch of girls in the house.
Speaker 11: But I mean, you know, I had just seen people
Speaker 11: get killed right in front of me. My cousin got
Speaker 11: shot in the stummy.
Speaker 18: You know, a lot of.
Speaker 6: It was rough.
Speaker 11: You had family's daddy couldn't afford to eat, you know,
Speaker 11: kids come to school, you know, wearing the same clothes
Speaker 11: over and over.
Speaker 6: It was rough.
Speaker 9: It was rough growing up in the projects.
Speaker 5: To four and his little brother moved there when to
Speaker 5: Forest was sixteen. When he was seventeen, to Forrest was
Speaker 5: shot and a drive by shooting and spent three months
Speaker 5: in the hospital. To Forest's mom told me the bullet
Speaker 5: is still lodged in his chest. During this period, seven
Speaker 5: of to Forest's friends would be shot and killed. No
Speaker 5: one was ever prosecuted for any of these crimes, and
Speaker 5: it was around this time that to Forest dropped out
Speaker 5: of school. Several family members tell me that at twenty two,
Speaker 5: to Forest was somewhat adrift. He spent his time working
Speaker 5: on old cars and playing video games. He was having
Speaker 5: a good time dating different women. He had five children
Speaker 5: who he loved, but he was also unsettled. He hadn't
Speaker 5: yet figured out his purpose, and he didn't know he
Speaker 5: was running out of time. As to Forrest and Ardregas
Speaker 5: wait outside of Teas, Ardregas's beeper goes off a few times.
Speaker 5: The beeps are from a girl he met a few
Speaker 5: nights before, but he ignores her, hoping to meet someone
Speaker 5: else inside. Tees to Forrest walks toward the club's entrance
Speaker 5: behind Ardregas and his wheelchair. They're focused on meeting girls
Speaker 5: and having a good time. They don't know that this
Speaker 5: night will change their lives and the peace they run into.
Speaker 5: Don't know they're about to become alibi witnesses.
Speaker 9: There was a love before eleven, and we were standing
Speaker 9: outside and they came up as far as it was
Speaker 9: pushing the Draca's.
Speaker 5: One of the first people they run into is Kenyara Pickett,
Speaker 5: who was standing near the entrance.
Speaker 9: I remember exactly where I was standing, right in front
Speaker 9: of the club when he walked up, because I thought
Speaker 9: I was shocked that night out. You know, back in
Speaker 9: the days. It was TFC wearing big clothes back then.
Speaker 9: And I had on some black, some black big jeans
Speaker 9: but shorts, and I had on some black and white
Speaker 9: rebox and then I think I had on the button
Speaker 9: down shirt. My sister she had just got out of
Speaker 9: the hospital. She had a blood clot and I when
Speaker 9: she got out to the hospital, we just went down there,
Speaker 9: you know, to celebrate that.
Speaker 5: She came home to Forrest and Ardregas make their way
Speaker 5: past Kenara and go into Tea's. Mama Cat and Velanik
Speaker 5: are already inside, perched at their table right by the
Speaker 5: front door.
Speaker 2: Or Tavarras Johnson. I remember he was pushing Adreka's flour
Speaker 2: in the wheelchair they came together.
Speaker 11: I saw so far was pushing a Draca's in the club,
Speaker 11: because we always stand at the front by the door
Speaker 11: so we can be nosy and see everything.
Speaker 5: You wanted to see who was coming in and who
Speaker 5: was leaving with who?
Speaker 9: Yes, yes, ma'am.
Speaker 19: About eleven o'clock, I saw Tafarest come in pushing Anddrega's
Speaker 19: in and I was excited to sing him because I
Speaker 19: hadn't seen him in a year because I had just
Speaker 19: got out the military.
Speaker 5: Stanley Chandler is also at Tease that night to catch
Speaker 5: up with friends. He and to Forrest knew each other
Speaker 5: as kids and Pratt.
Speaker 19: So we stood there and we start we talked, you
Speaker 19: know about old times, you know, and I mean we.
Speaker 5: Joked, laying and laugh to Forrest and Ardregas settle in
Speaker 5: at a table chatting with people who stopped by watching
Speaker 5: the dance floor.
Speaker 18: I was sitting on the bathroom because when you go around,
Speaker 18: it's like a little balcony part that you could sit at,
Speaker 18: And so I seen Draca's and to Forest when they
Speaker 18: came in the door because he was pushing them in
Speaker 18: a wheelchair.
Speaker 5: This is Dedra Carter, who was celebrating getting released from
Speaker 5: the hospital with her sister Kenyara. Dedra was also at
Speaker 5: Tease that night.
Speaker 18: And him and my cousin Mona and my sister all
Speaker 18: us was just there talking and you know, I think
Speaker 18: Toft liked it Mona, so you know, he was trying
Speaker 18: to hook up with him, but she wouldn't.
Speaker 2: No, she wouldn't never hook up with him.
Speaker 18: We used to laugh, talk, joking like even we at
Speaker 18: the club, music playing we're still cracking up, you know,
Speaker 18: you know, just talking and stuff.
Speaker 5: To Forrest SIPs a Long Island iced tea and orders
Speaker 5: our Draga's a brandy and coke. At one point, to
Speaker 5: Forrest goes back to the bar because Dragas says his
Speaker 5: drink is too weak, and the bartender makes him a
Speaker 5: new one. They linger at the club into the early
Speaker 5: hours of Wednesday morning.
Speaker 18: When I say, we would probably ship the club now
Speaker 18: we was there, I know it's probably like they used
Speaker 18: to close about maybe one two o'clock, so we would
Speaker 18: leave right right before that.
Speaker 9: So I know it was like maybe one.
Speaker 19: I ain't leaving a club roughly about I'm gonna say
Speaker 19: around about right at one. And like I said, he
Speaker 19: was staying across the club. You know, you could see
Speaker 19: him because I mean, it wasn't a big, big club,
Speaker 19: you know. And I just started to do signs.
Speaker 2: Up and I left and I was still there.
Speaker 19: Yeah, he was stay there.
Speaker 3: When I left.
Speaker 5: There are at least ten people who say they saw
Speaker 5: to Forrest and Rodregis at Tea's place between eleven pm
Speaker 5: and one thirty am. Deputy Bill Hardy was shot right
Speaker 5: in the middle of that time frame, around twelve fifty am,
Speaker 5: four miles away at the Crowns Darling Sweet's Hotel. People
Speaker 5: like Kenyara, Dedra Stanley, Queisi, Mama Cat all remember that night.
Speaker 5: Their corroborated statements weave together a shield. That shield should
Speaker 5: protect to Forest and Ardregis from the accusations about to
Speaker 5: head their way.
Speaker 2: But it doesn't.
Speaker 5: The state would arrest to Forrest and Ardregis, try them
Speaker 5: and seek the death penalty against both of them for
Speaker 5: Deputy Hardy's murder. For the last three years, I've been
Speaker 5: trying to figure out how this happened. I've read through
Speaker 5: thousands of pages of court transcripts and investigative documents. I've
Speaker 5: done a full audit of all the media coverage and
Speaker 5: interviewed more than eighty people, including several who were direct
Speaker 5: involved in this investigation and prosecution, and many who have
Speaker 5: never spoken publicly about the case. I'm not trying to
Speaker 5: find the real killer of Deputy Hardy. I'm investigating why
Speaker 5: that person was never found. One of the first things
Speaker 5: I tried to unwind, how did to Forrest Johnson and
Speaker 5: ardregas Ford end up at the center of the investigation
Speaker 5: when they were somewhere else at the time Deputy Hardy
Speaker 5: was killed. Here's one thing everyone agrees on. After they
Speaker 5: leave Tea's place to Forrest and Ardregas pick up two
Speaker 5: girls and the Monte Carlo. One sits in the back
Speaker 5: by Ardregas's wheelchair, the other one sits between Ardregas and
Speaker 5: to Forest in the front. And that girl the one
Speaker 5: in the front seat. What she tells police will land
Speaker 5: to Forest and dregis right at the center of the investigation.
Speaker 16: I'm at to share his office headquarters along with Yolanda
Speaker 16: Michelle Chambers. Yolanda is a black female. She's fifteen years
Speaker 16: of age.
Speaker 5: That's next time. Ear Witness is a production of Lava
Speaker 5: for Good Podcasts in association with Signal Company Number One.
Speaker 5: Executive producers are Jason Flam, Jeff Kempler, Kevin Wardis, and
Speaker 5: me Beth Shelburn. The investigative reporting for this series was
Speaker 5: done by Me and MARAA McNamara. Producers are MARAA McNamara,
Speaker 5: Hannah Bial and Jackie Pauley. Kara Kornhaber is our senior producer.
Speaker 5: Britt Spangler is our sound designer. Additional story at a
Speaker 5: time from Marie Sutton, fact Check help from Catherine Newhan
Speaker 5: and special thanks to to Forrest Johnson's legal defense team.
Speaker 5: You can follow the show on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and
Speaker 5: Twitter at Lava for Good. To see behind the scenes
Speaker 5: content from our investigation, visit Lava for Good dot com.
Speaker 5: Slash earwitness