1
00:00:03,360 --> 00:00:06,760
Speaker 1: In the last two episodes of American Homicide, we shared

2
00:00:06,760 --> 00:00:10,520
Speaker 1: the story of Maria Marshall. In nineteen eighty four, Maria

3
00:00:10,640 --> 00:00:13,040
Speaker 1: was murdered at a rest stop off the Garden State

4
00:00:13,119 --> 00:00:17,080
Speaker 1: Parkway in New Jersey. The same night Maria was killed,

5
00:00:17,600 --> 00:00:20,960
Speaker 1: a man named Bobby Cumber was bowling with his wife

6
00:00:21,000 --> 00:00:26,680
Speaker 1: some fourteen hundred miles away. Bobby Cumber did not murder

7
00:00:26,760 --> 00:00:30,680
Speaker 1: Maria Marshall. The police knew it. Even the Marshall family

8
00:00:30,760 --> 00:00:34,519
Speaker 1: knew it. So why did Bobby spend twenty years in

9
00:00:34,560 --> 00:00:39,800
Speaker 1: prison for Maria's murder? I'm swung Glass. In this bonus

10
00:00:39,840 --> 00:00:44,640
Speaker 1: episode of American Homicide, we'll explore the unlikely and unlucky

11
00:00:44,760 --> 00:00:53,800
Speaker 1: story of Bobby Cumber. A warning that this episode contained

12
00:00:53,800 --> 00:00:59,560
Speaker 1: some graphic content. Please take care while listening. After serving

13
00:00:59,640 --> 00:01:02,520
Speaker 1: twenty five years in the Air Force, Bobby Cumber needed

14
00:01:02,560 --> 00:01:05,400
Speaker 1: something to do, so he took a job working as

15
00:01:05,440 --> 00:01:10,360
Speaker 1: a clerk and bookkeeper at a small hardware store outside Shreveport, Louisiana.

16
00:01:11,040 --> 00:01:12,880
Speaker 2: It was kind of like a mom and pop kind

17
00:01:12,880 --> 00:01:13,760
Speaker 2: of hardware store.

18
00:01:14,560 --> 00:01:17,200
Speaker 1: Journalist Judy Peep wrote about Bobby Cumber.

19
00:01:17,440 --> 00:01:20,440
Speaker 2: Bobby, at the time was living in Louisiana, even though

20
00:01:20,440 --> 00:01:22,840
Speaker 2: Bobby was originally from New Jersey.

21
00:01:22,920 --> 00:01:26,600
Speaker 1: Things in Louisiana moved a little slower than in New Jersey,

22
00:01:26,840 --> 00:01:30,000
Speaker 1: and Bobby was okay with that, But sitting still just

23
00:01:30,120 --> 00:01:31,160
Speaker 1: wasn't in his DNA.

24
00:01:31,959 --> 00:01:36,080
Speaker 2: Bobby always worked. He likes working. He likes being told

25
00:01:36,160 --> 00:01:39,760
Speaker 2: what to do. He was a little guy that did

26
00:01:39,840 --> 00:01:41,880
Speaker 2: his job and kept out of the way.

27
00:01:43,080 --> 00:01:45,959
Speaker 1: In nineteen eighty four, the soft spoken Bobby Cumber was

28
00:01:46,040 --> 00:01:49,440
Speaker 1: forty six years old. He stood five feet eight inches

29
00:01:49,520 --> 00:01:53,600
Speaker 1: tall and barely weighed one hundred and fifty pounds. Soaking wet.

30
00:01:54,120 --> 00:01:56,840
Speaker 1: He and his wife, Mara lived in a modest, one

31
00:01:56,880 --> 00:01:59,400
Speaker 1: story home with their daughter and two dogs.

32
00:02:00,160 --> 00:02:03,840
Speaker 2: They were both quiet people. They didn't drink, they bowled,

33
00:02:03,880 --> 00:02:07,320
Speaker 2: They liked going on drives in the country. They lived

34
00:02:07,360 --> 00:02:09,040
Speaker 2: a very quiet life.

35
00:02:09,600 --> 00:02:13,160
Speaker 1: That simple and modest life fit Bobby like a glove.

36
00:02:13,600 --> 00:02:20,320
Speaker 2: He was the sweetest little guy, humble, accommodating, and gullible,

37
00:02:21,280 --> 00:02:22,400
Speaker 2: with terrible luck.

38
00:02:23,000 --> 00:02:26,840
Speaker 1: So let's talk about Bobby's luck. Growing up, he dreamed

39
00:02:26,880 --> 00:02:30,320
Speaker 1: of being a sailor, so at age seventeen, he dropped

40
00:02:30,320 --> 00:02:32,959
Speaker 1: out of high school and went to enlist with the Navy.

41
00:02:33,400 --> 00:02:36,680
Speaker 2: Well, he went into the wrong door at the recruiting

42
00:02:36,720 --> 00:02:40,760
Speaker 2: station and ended up with the Air Force instead. He

43
00:02:40,919 --> 00:02:43,679
Speaker 2: ended up serving twenty years in the Air Force when

44
00:02:43,680 --> 00:02:46,000
Speaker 2: what he really wanted to do was be in the Navy.

45
00:02:46,639 --> 00:02:52,280
Speaker 2: That's Bobby. Anyone else probably would faunt that, but Bobby didn't,

46
00:02:53,200 --> 00:02:55,280
Speaker 2: because Bobby doesn't fight.

47
00:02:55,960 --> 00:02:58,800
Speaker 1: Not only did he have a twenty one year career

48
00:02:58,840 --> 00:03:02,320
Speaker 1: in the Air Force, he also fought in the Vietnam War.

49
00:03:03,280 --> 00:03:05,240
Speaker 1: Then there was his wedding to Myra.

50
00:03:06,080 --> 00:03:09,560
Speaker 2: They got married Brida in the thirteenth They went to

51
00:03:09,639 --> 00:03:12,240
Speaker 2: Dallas for their honeymoon for three days in a brain

52
00:03:12,440 --> 00:03:13,359
Speaker 2: the entire three.

53
00:03:13,280 --> 00:03:17,360
Speaker 1: Days after their wedding, Bobby adopted Myra's daughter, Becky.

54
00:03:17,880 --> 00:03:20,239
Speaker 2: She didn't know that she'd been adopted. She thought it

55
00:03:20,400 --> 00:03:24,320
Speaker 2: was her birth father, and she found out in the newspaper.

56
00:03:24,760 --> 00:03:28,800
Speaker 1: That newspaper article ran during Bobby's trial in nineteen eighty six.

57
00:03:29,680 --> 00:03:33,320
Speaker 1: We'll circle back to that trial in a bit. So

58
00:03:33,639 --> 00:03:36,160
Speaker 1: back in the spring of nineteen eighty four, you could

59
00:03:36,200 --> 00:03:39,960
Speaker 1: say Bobby's simple and quiet life in Louisiana had gotten

60
00:03:40,040 --> 00:03:41,480
Speaker 1: a little too quiet.

61
00:03:41,760 --> 00:03:44,120
Speaker 2: His wife was paying attention to their daughter because she

62
00:03:44,160 --> 00:03:47,120
Speaker 2: was having trouble in school, so he felt a little neglected,

63
00:03:47,640 --> 00:03:49,520
Speaker 2: and he came back to New Jersey.

64
00:03:49,760 --> 00:03:53,160
Speaker 1: Bobby was the oldest of seven and returned to his

65
00:03:53,240 --> 00:03:56,320
Speaker 1: hometown of perth Amboid, New Jersey to visit one of

66
00:03:56,320 --> 00:03:57,360
Speaker 1: his brothers.

67
00:03:57,320 --> 00:04:00,760
Speaker 2: And he ran into his high school girlfriend who invited

68
00:04:00,840 --> 00:04:05,200
Speaker 2: him to her daughter's graduation in Tom's River. Bobby was flattered,

69
00:04:05,240 --> 00:04:07,640
Speaker 2: so of course he went. He always did. The city

70
00:04:07,680 --> 00:04:07,920
Speaker 2: we do.

71
00:04:08,440 --> 00:04:11,240
Speaker 1: Tom's River is an upper middle class suburb along the

72
00:04:11,320 --> 00:04:14,800
Speaker 1: Jersey Shore, and that party was filled with the who's

73
00:04:14,840 --> 00:04:18,240
Speaker 1: who of Tom's River. As luck would have it, Bobby

74
00:04:18,240 --> 00:04:22,000
Speaker 1: wound up sitting next to Robert and Maria Marshall, Yes,

75
00:04:22,520 --> 00:04:25,960
Speaker 1: the same couple we talked about in the previous two episodes.

76
00:04:26,680 --> 00:04:31,560
Speaker 2: Robert Marshall sold insurance and iras and did very well.

77
00:04:32,279 --> 00:04:36,040
Speaker 2: He was an attractive man with a very attractive wife

78
00:04:36,600 --> 00:04:41,880
Speaker 2: and three teenage sons who were all championship swimmers, and

79
00:04:41,960 --> 00:04:44,120
Speaker 2: she was swim team mom of the Year.

80
00:04:44,960 --> 00:04:47,719
Speaker 1: Robert and Maria Marshall were at that party because they

81
00:04:47,760 --> 00:04:52,000
Speaker 1: lived next door to Bobby's ex girlfriend, and Robert Marshall

82
00:04:52,080 --> 00:04:54,400
Speaker 1: struck up a conversation with Bobby.

83
00:04:55,200 --> 00:04:58,360
Speaker 2: And he was very flattered that a big shot in

84
00:04:58,400 --> 00:05:01,440
Speaker 2: his mind like Robert Marsha would pay attention to him

85
00:05:01,440 --> 00:05:01,720
Speaker 2: at all.

86
00:05:02,560 --> 00:05:06,880
Speaker 1: That night, the smooth talking Robert Marshall did what he

87
00:05:06,960 --> 00:05:07,600
Speaker 1: did best.

88
00:05:08,680 --> 00:05:13,719
Speaker 2: Marshall first tried to Solomon Ira, because that was Robert Marshall,

89
00:05:14,279 --> 00:05:19,000
Speaker 2: and then Marshall asked Bobby if he could find him

90
00:05:19,000 --> 00:05:20,040
Speaker 2: a private detective.

91
00:05:20,560 --> 00:05:24,120
Speaker 1: Robert Marshall said he needed someone to investigate some of

92
00:05:24,160 --> 00:05:29,679
Speaker 1: his missing gambling winnings, and since people in Tom's River talked,

93
00:05:30,520 --> 00:05:33,000
Speaker 1: he wanted to hire an out of town PI.

94
00:05:34,240 --> 00:05:37,599
Speaker 2: It never did make any sense because if you wanted

95
00:05:37,640 --> 00:05:40,560
Speaker 2: to go out of town, there's certainly private detectives in

96
00:05:40,600 --> 00:05:43,200
Speaker 2: New York and Philadelphia. You don't have to go to

97
00:05:43,240 --> 00:05:45,160
Speaker 2: Louisiana to get a detective.

98
00:05:46,000 --> 00:05:49,240
Speaker 1: Not to mention, Bobby was a clerk and bookkeeper at

99
00:05:49,279 --> 00:05:53,760
Speaker 1: a hardware store. He didn't have those kind of connections.

100
00:05:54,440 --> 00:05:57,760
Speaker 2: But Bobby being Bobby, never questioned it. Somebody asked him

101
00:05:57,760 --> 00:06:01,440
Speaker 2: for a favor, so he said he would look around

102
00:06:01,480 --> 00:06:05,240
Speaker 2: and ask around down in Shreveport, Louisiana, where he was

103
00:06:05,320 --> 00:06:06,320
Speaker 2: working at the time.

104
00:06:06,920 --> 00:06:10,200
Speaker 1: A few days later, Bobby put Robert Marshall in touch

105
00:06:10,240 --> 00:06:13,520
Speaker 1: with a regular at the hardware store, a former cop

106
00:06:13,600 --> 00:06:18,160
Speaker 1: turned private detective named Billy Wayne McKinnon. The strange thing is,

107
00:06:18,720 --> 00:06:23,640
Speaker 1: even after Bobby connected the two, Robert Marshall kept calling.

108
00:06:25,160 --> 00:06:28,479
Speaker 1: Sometimes Robert Marshall would try to sell Bobby and Ira.

109
00:06:29,360 --> 00:06:32,880
Speaker 1: Other calls were simply messages he wanted Bobby to pass

110
00:06:32,960 --> 00:06:35,279
Speaker 1: to the private detective Billy Way McKinnon.

111
00:06:35,760 --> 00:06:40,200
Speaker 2: They used him's message shop, tell so and so to

112
00:06:40,240 --> 00:06:42,240
Speaker 2: call me. Tell McKinnon to call me.

113
00:06:45,839 --> 00:06:49,200
Speaker 1: Over the summer of nineteen eighty four, Robert Marshall made

114
00:06:49,440 --> 00:06:53,440
Speaker 1: thirty one calls to Bobby Cumber. It got to the

115
00:06:53,480 --> 00:06:56,800
Speaker 1: point where Bobby politely told Robert to call Billy Way

116
00:06:56,920 --> 00:07:00,960
Speaker 1: McKinnon directly, but the calls continued until the day before

117
00:07:01,000 --> 00:07:05,560
Speaker 1: Maria Marshall's murder. That was the last time Robert Marshall

118
00:07:05,720 --> 00:07:06,640
Speaker 1: called Bobby Cumber.

119
00:07:07,720 --> 00:07:11,480
Speaker 2: Marshall made phone calls on his office phone to Bobby Cumber,

120
00:07:12,520 --> 00:07:16,960
Speaker 2: and within two weeks of the murder, the police sound

121
00:07:17,000 --> 00:07:18,280
Speaker 2: phone calls immediately.

122
00:07:19,680 --> 00:07:23,560
Speaker 1: Maria Marshall was murdered in early September of nineteen eighty four.

123
00:07:24,200 --> 00:07:27,560
Speaker 1: When the police went through her husband's phone records, they

124
00:07:27,560 --> 00:07:29,240
Speaker 1: found his calls to Bobby Cumber.

125
00:07:29,600 --> 00:07:36,240
Speaker 2: Bobby was arrested and held for forty eight hours without charges,

126
00:07:36,400 --> 00:07:40,520
Speaker 2: without food, and without any kind of video or audio recording.

127
00:07:40,600 --> 00:07:43,400
Speaker 2: While the police hammered him, they were sure that he

128
00:07:43,640 --> 00:07:47,000
Speaker 2: had something to do with it, but Bobby didn't.

129
00:07:47,480 --> 00:07:51,680
Speaker 1: What Bobby didn't know was that Robert Marshall, the popular

130
00:07:51,760 --> 00:07:54,480
Speaker 1: guy he met at a party a couple months earlier,

131
00:07:55,240 --> 00:07:56,960
Speaker 1: had been living a double life.

132
00:07:57,400 --> 00:08:00,800
Speaker 2: Robert Marshall he had a gambling problem, He had a

133
00:08:00,840 --> 00:08:06,360
Speaker 2: girlfriend and he wanted out, and he had just in

134
00:08:06,400 --> 00:08:09,280
Speaker 2: the months before the murder up to his wife's life

135
00:08:09,280 --> 00:08:13,200
Speaker 2: insurance to a million and a half. Marshall was in

136
00:08:13,320 --> 00:08:16,200
Speaker 2: debt and he wanted his wife to pay for it

137
00:08:16,200 --> 00:08:17,800
Speaker 2: with her life.

138
00:08:18,320 --> 00:08:21,800
Speaker 1: And that's what Robert Marshall did. He may have said

139
00:08:21,840 --> 00:08:24,400
Speaker 1: he was looking for an out of state private detective,

140
00:08:25,320 --> 00:08:28,520
Speaker 1: but what he was really looking for was someone to

141
00:08:28,640 --> 00:08:32,400
Speaker 1: kill his wife, Maria. And when the police learned Bobby

142
00:08:32,440 --> 00:08:37,080
Speaker 1: Comber connected Robert Marshall to Billy Waing McKinnon, they believed Bobby,

143
00:08:37,559 --> 00:08:41,000
Speaker 1: at the very least knew something about the murder plot,

144
00:08:41,960 --> 00:08:42,760
Speaker 1: but he.

145
00:08:42,760 --> 00:08:45,319
Speaker 2: Had no idea really what was going on.

146
00:08:46,400 --> 00:08:49,080
Speaker 1: Bobby told the police all he had done was write

147
00:08:49,120 --> 00:08:52,600
Speaker 1: down simple phone messages from Robert Marshall and passed them

148
00:08:52,640 --> 00:08:56,760
Speaker 1: on to Billy Wing McKinnon. The police didn't believe him

149
00:08:56,840 --> 00:09:00,360
Speaker 1: and charged him with conspiracy to commit murder. I'm not

150
00:09:00,440 --> 00:09:03,319
Speaker 1: guilty of this crime. I just want to go back

151
00:09:03,320 --> 00:09:05,280
Speaker 1: to losing and lived out the rest of my life,

152
00:09:05,320 --> 00:09:09,080
Speaker 1: put my family. That was the voice of Bobby Cumber,

153
00:09:09,640 --> 00:09:12,600
Speaker 1: who sat in a New Jersey jail awaiting his trial.

154
00:09:13,480 --> 00:09:17,679
Speaker 1: After three hundred days, he finally caught a break when

155
00:09:17,760 --> 00:09:21,280
Speaker 1: Judge Manuel Greenberg reviewed his case and.

156
00:09:21,240 --> 00:09:24,080
Speaker 2: I conclude there's nothing in the grand jury transcript to

157
00:09:24,160 --> 00:09:26,560
Speaker 2: indicate that the Cumber knew there was going to be

158
00:09:26,559 --> 00:09:27,120
Speaker 2: a murder.

159
00:09:27,840 --> 00:09:31,920
Speaker 1: So Judge Greenberg dismissed the charges and let Bobby return

160
00:09:32,000 --> 00:09:33,400
Speaker 1: home a freeman.

161
00:09:34,280 --> 00:09:38,400
Speaker 2: On the suggestion of his attorney at the time, Bobby

162
00:09:38,840 --> 00:09:42,720
Speaker 2: filed a thirty million dollar wrongful of rest suit against

163
00:09:42,720 --> 00:09:43,840
Speaker 2: the state of New Jersey.

164
00:09:44,600 --> 00:09:48,400
Speaker 1: Along with false imprisonment. Bobby sued for mental abuse and

165
00:09:48,440 --> 00:09:50,959
Speaker 1: some physical problems he developed while in jail.

166
00:09:51,440 --> 00:09:54,600
Speaker 2: He also thought somebody should pay his wages at the

167
00:09:54,640 --> 00:09:57,960
Speaker 2: hardware store for the year he was in jail before

168
00:09:58,000 --> 00:09:58,600
Speaker 2: his trial.

169
00:09:59,160 --> 00:10:02,760
Speaker 1: And if you had us for inflation, Bobby's thirty million

170
00:10:02,840 --> 00:10:07,199
Speaker 1: dollar lawsuit from nineteen eighty five would be around eighty

171
00:10:07,640 --> 00:10:09,920
Speaker 1: seven million dollars today.

172
00:10:09,720 --> 00:10:12,400
Speaker 2: He admitted, Okay, maybe he got a little greedy, but

173
00:10:13,000 --> 00:10:15,400
Speaker 2: he didn't take the thirty million his lawyer did.

174
00:10:15,960 --> 00:10:19,520
Speaker 1: In nineteen eighty five, Bobby's lawyer told the Shreveport Journal,

175
00:10:20,120 --> 00:10:23,880
Speaker 1: the important thing here is that the justice system works,

176
00:10:24,400 --> 00:10:27,880
Speaker 1: and by the end of nineteen eighty five, Bobby's lawyer

177
00:10:28,040 --> 00:10:34,480
Speaker 1: would eat those words. After Judge Greenberg dismissed the charges

178
00:10:34,520 --> 00:10:40,679
Speaker 1: against Bobby, the Ocean County prosecutors appealed that decision, and

179
00:10:40,760 --> 00:10:44,040
Speaker 1: that's when Bobby's bad luck reared its ugly head again.

180
00:10:44,360 --> 00:10:47,760
Speaker 2: The State Supreme Court ram stated to charges.

181
00:10:47,760 --> 00:10:51,880
Speaker 1: Think about that. You're arrested for a crime you didn't commit.

182
00:10:52,880 --> 00:10:56,880
Speaker 1: A judge then throws out the charges, and then another

183
00:10:57,080 --> 00:11:02,080
Speaker 1: judge puts them back on. Even the prosecutor seemed surprised

184
00:11:02,080 --> 00:11:03,640
Speaker 1: by the court's decision.

185
00:11:03,720 --> 00:11:07,679
Speaker 2: They knew their case was very weak. So the assistant

186
00:11:07,760 --> 00:11:11,400
Speaker 2: prosecutor offered Bobby a deal. If he would plead to

187
00:11:11,760 --> 00:11:16,560
Speaker 2: conspiracy to commit insurance fraud, he could go home with

188
00:11:16,679 --> 00:11:18,920
Speaker 2: time served and he would be done with it.

189
00:11:19,440 --> 00:11:23,240
Speaker 1: On paper, it was a simple deal, but there was

190
00:11:23,360 --> 00:11:25,040
Speaker 1: one big catch.

191
00:11:25,760 --> 00:11:29,160
Speaker 2: If Bobby did that, the thirty million dollars wrongful of

192
00:11:29,240 --> 00:11:30,400
Speaker 2: rest suit goes away.

193
00:11:31,040 --> 00:11:34,439
Speaker 1: It seems like bringing back these charges was a retaliation

194
00:11:34,600 --> 00:11:37,959
Speaker 1: from the state against Bobby's lawsuit. I can't help but

195
00:11:38,080 --> 00:11:41,120
Speaker 1: to wonder what would have happened if his lawyer wasn't

196
00:11:41,160 --> 00:11:45,440
Speaker 1: so greedy and he had asked for less money. Either way,

197
00:11:45,840 --> 00:11:49,680
Speaker 1: Bobby wasn't about to admit to doing something he didn't do.

198
00:11:50,280 --> 00:11:53,200
Speaker 1: That's what I'm not guilty, and my attorney said, okay,

199
00:11:53,480 --> 00:11:54,120
Speaker 1: we'll go to trial.

200
00:11:54,920 --> 00:11:58,400
Speaker 2: Nobody can believe he did that. It was terrible advice,

201
00:11:58,760 --> 00:12:02,960
Speaker 2: and his lawyer is famous among New Jersey lawyers for

202
00:12:03,040 --> 00:12:03,680
Speaker 2: that advice.

203
00:12:04,320 --> 00:12:08,040
Speaker 1: As Judy wrote in one of her articles, Bobby was

204
00:12:08,200 --> 00:12:11,640
Speaker 1: naive to the point of lunacy, and his string of

205
00:12:11,679 --> 00:12:22,559
Speaker 1: bad luck was far from over. Bobby Cumber had a choice.

206
00:12:22,960 --> 00:12:26,640
Speaker 1: He could plead guilty to conspiracy to commit insurance fraud

207
00:12:27,040 --> 00:12:30,480
Speaker 1: and get released from jail, or he could take his

208
00:12:30,600 --> 00:12:32,079
Speaker 1: chances in the courtroom.

209
00:12:32,600 --> 00:12:35,920
Speaker 2: His lawyer told him, if you think you're innocent, I

210
00:12:35,960 --> 00:12:37,240
Speaker 2: think we should go for it.

211
00:12:37,800 --> 00:12:41,199
Speaker 1: Journalist Judy Pete wrote about Bobby Cumber, who went for

212
00:12:41,240 --> 00:12:44,960
Speaker 1: it and took his case to court. His trial featured

213
00:12:45,000 --> 00:12:48,720
Speaker 1: the same judge who initially threw out the charges against Bobby.

214
00:12:49,320 --> 00:12:51,600
Speaker 1: You can't help but to feel optimistic about that.

215
00:12:52,400 --> 00:12:56,280
Speaker 2: By the time that Bobby went to court, everybody was

216
00:12:56,760 --> 00:12:58,400
Speaker 2: sick to death as the story.

217
00:12:58,720 --> 00:13:01,679
Speaker 1: It was the summer of nineteen eighty six, and the

218
00:13:01,720 --> 00:13:05,480
Speaker 1: story of Maria Marshall had been from page news for

219
00:13:05,559 --> 00:13:10,520
Speaker 1: nearly two years. By then, Maria's husband, Robert Marshall, had

220
00:13:10,520 --> 00:13:14,720
Speaker 1: been convicted of hiring a hitman to kill her. But

221
00:13:14,840 --> 00:13:18,640
Speaker 1: here's the thing. Both Robert Marshall and one of the

222
00:13:18,679 --> 00:13:23,080
Speaker 1: guys he hired to kill Maria backed up Bobby's story.

223
00:13:23,600 --> 00:13:27,360
Speaker 2: Marshall always said that Bobby knew nothing, But Marshall did

224
00:13:27,360 --> 00:13:30,559
Speaker 2: not testify on Bobby's trial because he was a convicted

225
00:13:30,679 --> 00:13:34,800
Speaker 2: murderer on death row, not exactly a star witness.

226
00:13:35,520 --> 00:13:38,880
Speaker 1: But the jury did hear from Billy Way McKinnon. He

227
00:13:39,040 --> 00:13:42,559
Speaker 1: was the guy Robert Marshall originally hired to kill his wife.

228
00:13:42,880 --> 00:13:47,360
Speaker 2: Billy Wayne McKinnon was insisting that Bobby knew nothing about

229
00:13:47,600 --> 00:13:52,080
Speaker 2: the whole plot. He said specifically that he didn't tell

230
00:13:52,120 --> 00:13:55,280
Speaker 2: Bobby because he didn't want to share the money with him.

231
00:13:55,920 --> 00:13:59,640
Speaker 1: Robert Marshall paid Billy Wayne tens of thousands of dollars

232
00:13:59,720 --> 00:14:04,280
Speaker 1: to kill Maria Marshall, and he wanted that money for himself.

233
00:14:05,080 --> 00:14:08,280
Speaker 1: But the prosecution put a new Jersey State detective on

234
00:14:08,320 --> 00:14:11,200
Speaker 1: the stand whose testimony hurt Bobby.

235
00:14:11,640 --> 00:14:13,679
Speaker 2: They said he confessed, but he didn't know what he

236
00:14:13,720 --> 00:14:17,160
Speaker 2: was confessing to. He thought he was confessing to insurance fraud.

237
00:14:17,440 --> 00:14:19,240
Speaker 2: And they never let him have a lawyer, of course,

238
00:14:19,240 --> 00:14:21,920
Speaker 2: because when she charged somebody, they have to have a lawyer.

239
00:14:21,960 --> 00:14:24,360
Speaker 2: But you don't have to give him a lawyer until

240
00:14:24,360 --> 00:14:28,800
Speaker 2: they're charged. This was the basis primarily of why the

241
00:14:28,880 --> 00:14:32,720
Speaker 2: judge originally threw out the charges against him. They had

242
00:14:32,760 --> 00:14:36,680
Speaker 2: no motive, they had no opportunity, they had no money trail.

243
00:14:37,040 --> 00:14:41,640
Speaker 2: They really had nothing. They only had those phone calls.

244
00:14:42,600 --> 00:14:46,880
Speaker 1: Those phone calls between Robert Marshall and Bobby Cumber were important.

245
00:14:47,800 --> 00:14:52,480
Speaker 2: There were thirty one calls. They were all short phone calls.

246
00:14:53,480 --> 00:14:57,040
Speaker 1: The defense didn't dispute these calls, but they argued most

247
00:14:57,080 --> 00:14:59,600
Speaker 1: of them lasted a few seconds.

248
00:15:00,640 --> 00:15:05,400
Speaker 2: The problem with the telephone calls was that back in

249
00:15:05,720 --> 00:15:09,680
Speaker 2: that time, in nineteen eighty four, the phone company did

250
00:15:09,680 --> 00:15:13,120
Speaker 2: not keep track of the timing below a minute, So

251
00:15:13,400 --> 00:15:17,280
Speaker 2: any call that was either five seconds or ten seconds

252
00:15:17,400 --> 00:15:21,440
Speaker 2: or fifty nine seconds still registered as a minute, so

253
00:15:21,520 --> 00:15:25,280
Speaker 2: they had no way to say, well, the total conversation

254
00:15:25,560 --> 00:15:28,360
Speaker 2: was tell so and so to call me. They had

255
00:15:28,360 --> 00:15:29,120
Speaker 2: no proof of that.

256
00:15:30,120 --> 00:15:34,760
Speaker 1: During closing arguments, the prosecutor told the jury Bobby had

257
00:15:34,800 --> 00:15:38,360
Speaker 1: to have known something about the murder plot. He said,

258
00:15:39,040 --> 00:15:43,800
Speaker 1: nobody is that stupid. And listen to what Bobby's defense

259
00:15:43,880 --> 00:15:49,320
Speaker 1: layer said. In response, He stood before the jury, pointed

260
00:15:49,400 --> 00:15:56,640
Speaker 1: towards his client and said he was a simple, silly, foolish,

261
00:15:56,680 --> 00:16:00,400
Speaker 1: and limited piece of flesh who will never amount anything

262
00:16:00,480 --> 00:16:02,800
Speaker 1: more than a hardware store clerk.

263
00:16:03,880 --> 00:16:08,680
Speaker 2: Ultimately, it came down to the jury was asked to

264
00:16:08,800 --> 00:16:12,880
Speaker 2: believe that Bobby was that goable. New Jersey's a fairly

265
00:16:12,920 --> 00:16:17,240
Speaker 2: cynical state, and they just didn't believe it. They couldn't

266
00:16:17,240 --> 00:16:21,480
Speaker 2: believe he didn't know anything, so they convicted him as

267
00:16:21,520 --> 00:16:24,840
Speaker 2: an accessory to conspiracy to commit murder.

268
00:16:25,400 --> 00:16:29,120
Speaker 1: That left the wide eyed a naive hardware clerk from

269
00:16:29,160 --> 00:16:34,920
Speaker 1: Louisiana stunned, and Bobby's lawyer absolutely lost it.

270
00:16:35,200 --> 00:16:39,320
Speaker 2: His lawyer just fell apart and then burst into tears.

271
00:16:40,000 --> 00:16:44,480
Speaker 2: He couldn't believe it. It destroyed his reputation, it destroyed him practically.

272
00:16:44,840 --> 00:16:49,040
Speaker 2: He realized he had made a horrible mistake, but really

273
00:16:49,040 --> 00:16:51,560
Speaker 2: didn't have the wherewithal to fix it.

274
00:16:52,160 --> 00:16:56,240
Speaker 1: Judge Greenberg, the same judge who a year earlier had

275
00:16:56,280 --> 00:17:00,560
Speaker 1: dismissed the charges against Bobby, now had to pose a

276
00:17:00,680 --> 00:17:02,120
Speaker 1: sentence on him.

277
00:17:02,920 --> 00:17:05,320
Speaker 2: I gave mister cumber and the minimum sentence that you

278
00:17:05,359 --> 00:17:08,959
Speaker 2: could give, which was thirty years.

279
00:17:09,640 --> 00:17:15,680
Speaker 1: You can hear the heartache in Judge Greenberg's voice thirty years,

280
00:17:16,680 --> 00:17:19,280
Speaker 1: but keep in mind his hands were tied.

281
00:17:19,680 --> 00:17:23,480
Speaker 2: The thing is that the year before, New Jersey had

282
00:17:23,520 --> 00:17:27,600
Speaker 2: passed a mandatory minimum sentencing law that said an accessory

283
00:17:28,040 --> 00:17:31,679
Speaker 2: to any major crime would have to serve the same

284
00:17:32,040 --> 00:17:36,399
Speaker 2: sentence as the players, whether they had actually committed the

285
00:17:36,440 --> 00:17:41,960
Speaker 2: crime or not. So Bobby, who had never really done anything,

286
00:17:42,080 --> 00:17:47,640
Speaker 2: hadn't even jaywalked, was convicted and sentenced to the maximum,

287
00:17:47,760 --> 00:17:50,800
Speaker 2: which was thirty years in prison without the possibility of.

288
00:17:50,880 --> 00:17:54,440
Speaker 1: Prole Bobby did the math and figured out his release

289
00:17:54,480 --> 00:17:58,240
Speaker 1: state would be in twenty fifteen. He'd be released on

290
00:17:58,320 --> 00:18:00,560
Speaker 1: the same day of his wedding Innsary.

291
00:18:00,880 --> 00:18:04,040
Speaker 2: Bobby just went to prison. He ran out of appeals

292
00:18:04,119 --> 00:18:08,359
Speaker 2: after about fourteen fifteen years, and by the time I

293
00:18:08,560 --> 00:18:11,439
Speaker 2: entered the whole story, that's where Bobby was.

294
00:18:12,280 --> 00:18:15,840
Speaker 1: Judy learned of Bobby's story during a meeting with Judge Greenberg,

295
00:18:16,560 --> 00:18:18,040
Speaker 1: the man who sentenced Bobby.

296
00:18:18,600 --> 00:18:21,119
Speaker 2: He actually said, you know, there's one case that always

297
00:18:21,119 --> 00:18:26,119
Speaker 2: bothered me, Bobby Cumbers case. He absolutely believed that Bobby

298
00:18:26,119 --> 00:18:28,480
Speaker 2: shouldn't have spent a day in jail or in prison.

299
00:18:29,440 --> 00:18:32,919
Speaker 2: It sort of stunned me because sitting judges under New

300
00:18:33,000 --> 00:18:38,280
Speaker 2: Jersey law are not allowed to discuss any case they'd had. However,

301
00:18:38,400 --> 00:18:41,359
Speaker 2: he was on the border of retirement, and I think

302
00:18:41,440 --> 00:18:44,119
Speaker 2: that he had always felt bad about it. So I

303
00:18:44,200 --> 00:18:47,640
Speaker 2: went back and I looked it up, and I realized

304
00:18:48,240 --> 00:18:51,600
Speaker 2: horrible injustice had been done to Bobby and just about

305
00:18:51,800 --> 00:18:54,520
Speaker 2: everybody involved in the case. I agreed.

306
00:18:54,840 --> 00:18:58,040
Speaker 1: In nineteen ninety nine, Judy made her first visit to

307
00:18:58,119 --> 00:19:01,919
Speaker 1: New Jersey State Prison in trent where Bobby was held.

308
00:19:02,720 --> 00:19:08,800
Speaker 2: Trenton State was New Jersey's worst prison. Its most dangerous

309
00:19:08,840 --> 00:19:10,719
Speaker 2: criminals were housed in trend.

310
00:19:11,560 --> 00:19:14,320
Speaker 1: She describes her meeting like something you'd see on TV.

311
00:19:15,080 --> 00:19:18,480
Speaker 1: A small booth divided by thick glass with a phone

312
00:19:18,520 --> 00:19:22,720
Speaker 1: on each side. When Bobby shuffled in, his hair was gray.

313
00:19:23,520 --> 00:19:26,520
Speaker 1: He was blind in his right eye after a botched

314
00:19:26,560 --> 00:19:31,040
Speaker 1: eye surgery, and he had heart problems. Just walking up

315
00:19:31,080 --> 00:19:35,040
Speaker 1: a flight of stairs gave him chest pains, but none

316
00:19:35,040 --> 00:19:36,879
Speaker 1: of that seemed to bother him.

317
00:19:37,520 --> 00:19:41,400
Speaker 2: He smiled and said, it's nice to see you. I've

318
00:19:41,400 --> 00:19:42,960
Speaker 2: been waiting to tell somebody my.

319
00:19:42,960 --> 00:19:47,160
Speaker 1: Story, and that's what Bobby did. He shared everything from

320
00:19:47,160 --> 00:19:50,199
Speaker 1: the party where he met the marshals to his thirty

321
00:19:50,320 --> 00:19:54,400
Speaker 1: million dollars wrongful of rest lawsuit, to his trial and

322
00:19:54,720 --> 00:19:55,640
Speaker 1: unlikely conviction.

323
00:19:56,680 --> 00:19:59,040
Speaker 2: He told me how hard it was on his family.

324
00:19:59,520 --> 00:20:04,560
Speaker 2: A lost their house, they lost their jobs, they lost everything.

325
00:20:05,240 --> 00:20:09,480
Speaker 2: Myra his wife, she got death threats. No one would

326
00:20:09,520 --> 00:20:13,160
Speaker 2: hire her. The only reason they even survived during that

327
00:20:13,240 --> 00:20:16,000
Speaker 2: period was that Bobby had a pension from the Air Force.

328
00:20:16,560 --> 00:20:19,480
Speaker 2: The only money they had besides the pension was his

329
00:20:19,600 --> 00:20:25,399
Speaker 2: daughter Becky, clean toilets and the local library. That whole

330
00:20:25,480 --> 00:20:28,560
Speaker 2: family is the collateral damage of Bobby.

331
00:20:29,200 --> 00:20:32,600
Speaker 1: Even Bobby's siblings in New Jersey refused to.

332
00:20:32,560 --> 00:20:35,720
Speaker 2: See him ever since he was convicted. His entire family

333
00:20:35,840 --> 00:20:39,119
Speaker 2: in the New Jersey side, who were close enough to visit,

334
00:20:39,240 --> 00:20:41,920
Speaker 2: disowned him. No one would write to him or visit him.

335
00:20:42,520 --> 00:20:45,720
Speaker 1: Bobby's wife and daughter back in Louisiana, where all he

336
00:20:45,760 --> 00:20:50,639
Speaker 1: had left. If you remember, Bobby adopted Becky, and that

337
00:20:50,800 --> 00:20:54,240
Speaker 1: was something Becky had to learn from a newspaper article.

338
00:20:54,480 --> 00:20:55,880
Speaker 1: During Bobby's trial.

339
00:20:56,080 --> 00:20:59,680
Speaker 2: His daughter was bullied in school. She was thrown off

340
00:20:59,720 --> 00:21:05,000
Speaker 2: of cheerleading because she was related to a degenerate. Is

341
00:21:05,040 --> 00:21:06,280
Speaker 2: what everybody told her.

342
00:21:07,119 --> 00:21:11,199
Speaker 1: Every Sunday, Bobby talked with Myra and Becky on the phone,

343
00:21:11,440 --> 00:21:13,720
Speaker 1: but they had never been to see him.

344
00:21:14,160 --> 00:21:16,959
Speaker 2: Now, Bobby would not allow them to visit him in prison.

345
00:21:17,080 --> 00:21:19,479
Speaker 2: He didn't want them to see him locked up, so

346
00:21:19,600 --> 00:21:22,800
Speaker 2: instead they wrote letters, more than two thousand letters.

347
00:21:23,400 --> 00:21:27,080
Speaker 1: In her letters, Myra tried to stay positive, but of

348
00:21:27,119 --> 00:21:28,280
Speaker 1: course it wasn't easy.

349
00:21:28,680 --> 00:21:30,719
Speaker 2: There were daves, it was hard to breathe, it was

350
00:21:30,760 --> 00:21:36,000
Speaker 2: so awful, but she never considered divorcing him because he

351
00:21:36,080 --> 00:21:39,440
Speaker 2: was her husband and her marriage vow said for better

352
00:21:39,560 --> 00:21:41,960
Speaker 2: or worse, and she figured, hopefully this was the worst

353
00:21:42,040 --> 00:21:44,520
Speaker 2: it was going to get. One of the things that

354
00:21:44,600 --> 00:21:48,680
Speaker 2: Myra said was she wasn't hopeless, but she was helpless.

355
00:21:48,760 --> 00:21:52,000
Speaker 2: There was nothing she could do about this. Even though

356
00:21:52,040 --> 00:21:55,280
Speaker 2: she knew it was wrong, there was nothing she could do.

357
00:21:56,520 --> 00:22:00,560
Speaker 1: Bobby's new lawyers tried everything to get him released, but

358
00:22:00,640 --> 00:22:02,400
Speaker 1: they all got denied.

359
00:22:03,400 --> 00:22:08,359
Speaker 2: Here we have a pathologically nice guy with terrible luck,

360
00:22:08,640 --> 00:22:11,440
Speaker 2: which again has sort of dogged him his entire life.

361
00:22:12,880 --> 00:22:15,800
Speaker 2: And this guy ends up spending the bulk of his

362
00:22:15,880 --> 00:22:19,320
Speaker 2: adult life in the worst prison in one of the

363
00:22:19,359 --> 00:22:23,199
Speaker 2: worst states in the country. And it was so obvious

364
00:22:23,520 --> 00:22:28,760
Speaker 2: the injustice and important people like the judge, even the

365
00:22:28,800 --> 00:22:32,760
Speaker 2: prosecutors at a certain point no longer fought letting Bobby

366
00:22:32,760 --> 00:22:38,680
Speaker 2: out of jail, but nobody would go that extra distance

367
00:22:38,760 --> 00:22:41,880
Speaker 2: to fix it. That broke my heart.

368
00:22:43,080 --> 00:22:47,560
Speaker 1: Judy's first article about Bobby, titled Flawed Judgment, ran in

369
00:22:47,640 --> 00:22:48,640
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety nine.

370
00:22:49,480 --> 00:22:53,679
Speaker 2: I got into journalism to help people. I thought that

371
00:22:53,720 --> 00:22:56,600
Speaker 2: if you gave people the facts that you would actually

372
00:22:56,720 --> 00:23:00,400
Speaker 2: right wrongs that didn't happen very much my career maybe

373
00:23:00,440 --> 00:23:04,280
Speaker 2: three times that I can remember, and Bobby was the one.

374
00:23:05,000 --> 00:23:08,000
Speaker 2: I don't say we were friends, but I felt very

375
00:23:08,160 --> 00:23:09,199
Speaker 2: protective of Bobby.

376
00:23:10,040 --> 00:23:13,439
Speaker 1: Along with writing a handful of articles, Judy teamed up

377
00:23:13,480 --> 00:23:16,920
Speaker 1: with Judge Greenberg in hopes of drumming up support for

378
00:23:17,040 --> 00:23:17,920
Speaker 1: Bobby's release.

379
00:23:18,400 --> 00:23:20,760
Speaker 2: The Judge and I talked to a couple of sixth

380
00:23:20,800 --> 00:23:24,680
Speaker 2: grade classes and we told him about Bobby, and they

381
00:23:24,760 --> 00:23:28,520
Speaker 2: were outraged and started a letter writing campaign. To the governor,

382
00:23:29,320 --> 00:23:31,880
Speaker 2: and these are twelve year olds. You know, as adults,

383
00:23:31,960 --> 00:23:37,360
Speaker 2: we are just too jaded to appreciate the world's Bobby Combers. Luckily,

384
00:23:37,480 --> 00:23:40,280
Speaker 2: there's still kids out there who can appreciate.

385
00:23:39,800 --> 00:23:43,760
Speaker 1: That those letters the kids wrote to New Jersey's governor

386
00:23:44,240 --> 00:23:46,040
Speaker 1: were done for a reason.

387
00:23:46,480 --> 00:23:50,280
Speaker 2: The only chance that he had then was to have

388
00:23:50,920 --> 00:23:53,359
Speaker 2: the governor of New Jersey commune descents.

389
00:23:54,280 --> 00:23:57,200
Speaker 1: A handful of New Jersey governors came and left office,

390
00:23:58,040 --> 00:24:02,200
Speaker 1: but no one would help Bobby until two thousand and six.

391
00:24:02,440 --> 00:24:04,840
Speaker 2: At that time, the head of the Senate, the state

392
00:24:04,960 --> 00:24:08,080
Speaker 2: Senate took over as acting governor, a guy by the

393
00:24:08,160 --> 00:24:08,840
Speaker 2: name of Cody.

394
00:24:09,400 --> 00:24:14,000
Speaker 1: On his very last day as acting governor, Richard Cody

395
00:24:14,119 --> 00:24:14,800
Speaker 1: took action.

396
00:24:15,400 --> 00:24:19,760
Speaker 2: He's the one who finally signed the clembency petition and

397
00:24:19,920 --> 00:24:23,520
Speaker 2: made it very clear that justice was never served in

398
00:24:23,600 --> 00:24:28,280
Speaker 2: Bobby Cumber's case and ordered the state to get him

399
00:24:28,400 --> 00:24:29,280
Speaker 2: out of prison.

400
00:24:29,680 --> 00:24:33,199
Speaker 1: Governor Cody told reporters, it's about time we did the

401
00:24:33,280 --> 00:24:36,359
Speaker 1: right thing and let the poor guy go. So the

402
00:24:36,400 --> 00:24:40,199
Speaker 1: governor called Bobby's wife to share the good news, but

403
00:24:40,280 --> 00:24:44,000
Speaker 1: she didn't answer. She had a dentist appointment that day.

404
00:24:44,560 --> 00:24:48,600
Speaker 1: Of course, she did a few days later, Bobby was

405
00:24:48,640 --> 00:25:00,359
Speaker 1: on a plane headed home. Nearly twenty years after a

406
00:25:00,440 --> 00:25:05,399
Speaker 1: jury convicted Bobby Cumber for conspiracy to commit murder, acting

407
00:25:05,480 --> 00:25:11,040
Speaker 1: New Jersey Governor Richard Cody granted Bobby clemency in two

408
00:25:11,040 --> 00:25:16,000
Speaker 1: thousand and six. Bobby's long fight for justice was finally over.

409
00:25:16,960 --> 00:25:20,840
Speaker 1: Journalist Judy Pete was with Bobby after his release from prison.

410
00:25:21,400 --> 00:25:23,439
Speaker 2: Frankly, I don't think there are very many cases like

411
00:25:23,480 --> 00:25:27,320
Speaker 2: Bobby Kember. Bobby was the very first person under the

412
00:25:27,400 --> 00:25:29,879
Speaker 2: law to be sentenced to the Managa to amitten him

413
00:25:29,880 --> 00:25:31,280
Speaker 2: them as an accomplice.

414
00:25:31,720 --> 00:25:35,679
Speaker 1: By then, Bobby had served nearly twenty years of his

415
00:25:35,800 --> 00:25:37,720
Speaker 1: mandatory thirty year sentence.

416
00:25:38,359 --> 00:25:41,280
Speaker 2: I just wanted this poor little schmoe to go home.

417
00:25:41,840 --> 00:25:43,119
Speaker 2: That's all I ever wanted.

418
00:25:43,680 --> 00:25:46,800
Speaker 1: Well, Bobby sat in prison. A book and even a

419
00:25:46,880 --> 00:25:51,240
Speaker 1: mini series had been made about Maria Marshall's murder. Neither

420
00:25:51,320 --> 00:25:54,959
Speaker 1: of them mentioned Bobby by name. Even the prison guards

421
00:25:54,960 --> 00:25:56,880
Speaker 1: didn't know what Bobby was in for.

422
00:25:57,400 --> 00:26:00,960
Speaker 2: Nobody really paid attention to him. He was just the

423
00:26:01,040 --> 00:26:02,600
Speaker 2: other guy, a little squirt.

424
00:26:03,520 --> 00:26:06,000
Speaker 1: Judy was with Bobby on his plane ride home from

425
00:26:06,080 --> 00:26:09,960
Speaker 1: prison to Louisiana. Bobby was now sixty eight years old,

426
00:26:10,800 --> 00:26:14,040
Speaker 1: and in those twenty years the world had changed.

427
00:26:14,880 --> 00:26:20,080
Speaker 2: He couldn't believe how much coffee costs six dollars a cup.

428
00:26:20,560 --> 00:26:22,439
Speaker 2: It was thirty five cents a cup when he went

429
00:26:22,480 --> 00:26:26,160
Speaker 2: to prison. Or cell phones, the whole concept of cell phones.

430
00:26:27,080 --> 00:26:30,320
Speaker 1: Judy described Bobby like a kid on Christmas morning.

431
00:26:30,960 --> 00:26:33,920
Speaker 2: He was excited. He had a brown paper bag in

432
00:26:34,000 --> 00:26:38,399
Speaker 2: his lap. That was all his possessions. What few letters

433
00:26:38,400 --> 00:26:40,960
Speaker 2: he could have said, were in that little brown paper bag.

434
00:26:42,640 --> 00:26:46,000
Speaker 1: Those letters from his wife Mara were all Bobby had

435
00:26:46,160 --> 00:26:51,000
Speaker 1: from the last twenty years. Everything else He had lost.

436
00:26:51,960 --> 00:26:58,280
Speaker 2: His hair, color, his sight, his dog's, his house, his help.

437
00:27:00,880 --> 00:27:03,000
Speaker 2: I said, you know who do you blame? And he said,

438
00:27:03,600 --> 00:27:07,760
Speaker 2: who is there to blame? That was the one that

439
00:27:08,359 --> 00:27:13,320
Speaker 2: really struck me. Bobby just an assigned blame. We never did.

440
00:27:15,000 --> 00:27:18,080
Speaker 1: Bobby didn't even blame his lawyer, who, by the way,

441
00:27:18,440 --> 00:27:21,399
Speaker 1: stopped practicing criminal law after Bobby's trial.

442
00:27:22,720 --> 00:27:26,600
Speaker 2: That was the last criminal case that he handled. He

443
00:27:26,680 --> 00:27:29,639
Speaker 2: gave up criminal law after that and became an estate lawyer.

444
00:27:30,080 --> 00:27:34,240
Speaker 1: His lawyer told Judy he regretted not pressuring Bobby into

445
00:27:34,280 --> 00:27:38,800
Speaker 1: taking the original plea deal prosecutors offered. He also admitted

446
00:27:38,800 --> 00:27:41,440
Speaker 1: that Bobby's case seemed like a sure thing.

447
00:27:42,240 --> 00:27:44,320
Speaker 2: He thought he'd caught the case of the lifetime.

448
00:27:45,680 --> 00:27:49,480
Speaker 1: When Bobby's flight landed in Shreveport, he grabbed his paper

449
00:27:49,520 --> 00:27:52,720
Speaker 1: bag filled with Myra's letters and headed for the exit

450
00:27:52,760 --> 00:27:56,120
Speaker 1: to meet her. Remember, they had not seen each other

451
00:27:56,480 --> 00:28:00,880
Speaker 1: in twenty years. They're about to be reunited.

452
00:28:01,320 --> 00:28:08,240
Speaker 2: He was extremely happy and also sad because now was

453
00:28:08,320 --> 00:28:10,879
Speaker 2: the time as far as he was concerned, to put

454
00:28:10,880 --> 00:28:12,840
Speaker 2: his family's life back together.

455
00:28:13,600 --> 00:28:16,199
Speaker 1: Bobby held onto the railing from the jet bridge to

456
00:28:16,240 --> 00:28:19,119
Speaker 1: the gate. Well, Judy followed behind.

457
00:28:19,680 --> 00:28:21,439
Speaker 2: So he get to the end, and I thought he

458
00:28:21,520 --> 00:28:22,119
Speaker 2: was going to cry.

459
00:28:22,560 --> 00:28:25,480
Speaker 1: And at the gate, Bobby didn't see Myra or his

460
00:28:25,640 --> 00:28:27,359
Speaker 1: daughter Becky waiting.

461
00:28:27,000 --> 00:28:29,640
Speaker 2: For him, and he said, they should be here. Where

462
00:28:29,680 --> 00:28:33,560
Speaker 2: are they? And he didn't realize nine to eleven had

463
00:28:33,600 --> 00:28:36,919
Speaker 2: happened while he was in prison. They don't allow people

464
00:28:36,960 --> 00:28:40,200
Speaker 2: to come to the gates anymore. When I explained that

465
00:28:40,360 --> 00:28:42,440
Speaker 2: to him, he said, of course, there are a lot

466
00:28:42,480 --> 00:28:44,960
Speaker 2: of things I'm going to have to learn. I can

467
00:28:45,000 --> 00:28:46,480
Speaker 2: do that. I'm a patient man.

468
00:28:47,200 --> 00:28:50,520
Speaker 1: The last time Myra and Becky had seen Bobby was

469
00:28:50,560 --> 00:28:53,640
Speaker 1: in nineteen eighty six, when he was being led out

470
00:28:53,680 --> 00:28:55,600
Speaker 1: of the courtroom in handcuffs.

471
00:28:56,080 --> 00:29:00,920
Speaker 2: When he finally did meet them, they just ugged and cried.

472
00:29:01,880 --> 00:29:05,000
Speaker 2: Bobby had trouble stopping crying. He cried through most of

473
00:29:05,040 --> 00:29:05,400
Speaker 2: the day.

474
00:29:05,960 --> 00:29:09,959
Speaker 1: Judy rode with Bobby, Myra, and Becky to Bobby's new home.

475
00:29:11,080 --> 00:29:13,320
Speaker 1: Myra had to sell their old house to pay for

476
00:29:13,360 --> 00:29:14,840
Speaker 1: Bobby's legal bills.

477
00:29:15,520 --> 00:29:18,040
Speaker 2: I would go into the kitchen periodically and one of

478
00:29:18,040 --> 00:29:21,600
Speaker 2: them would follow me in, usually bursting into tears and

479
00:29:21,640 --> 00:29:25,320
Speaker 2: telling me how bad it had been and how bad

480
00:29:25,360 --> 00:29:26,320
Speaker 2: they felt for Bobby.

481
00:29:27,080 --> 00:29:29,320
Speaker 1: There were a lot of new things.

482
00:29:29,960 --> 00:29:33,120
Speaker 2: He saw his grandson for the very first time. Becky

483
00:29:33,360 --> 00:29:36,800
Speaker 2: got married and had a child that she named after Bobby.

484
00:29:37,720 --> 00:29:40,400
Speaker 2: It just rounded out everything well.

485
00:29:40,440 --> 00:29:43,760
Speaker 1: Bobby was in prison, his wife and daughter had gone

486
00:29:43,800 --> 00:29:48,240
Speaker 1: to college and become social workers. Maybe it was a coincidence,

487
00:29:48,600 --> 00:29:51,239
Speaker 1: or maybe it was their way of learning how to

488
00:29:51,280 --> 00:29:52,560
Speaker 1: process their feelings.

489
00:29:53,040 --> 00:29:55,040
Speaker 2: Bobby sat at the table and kind of gave a

490
00:29:55,080 --> 00:29:58,600
Speaker 2: speech of it's my job to draw this out of you.

491
00:30:00,080 --> 00:30:02,720
Speaker 2: I need to help make you the best I can.

492
00:30:04,560 --> 00:30:06,760
Speaker 2: You're my family, and I love you. That was it.

493
00:30:08,080 --> 00:30:10,760
Speaker 2: Then we went to dinner, and they didn't want to

494
00:30:10,800 --> 00:30:13,680
Speaker 2: talk about it at dinner because they were in a

495
00:30:13,720 --> 00:30:17,440
Speaker 2: crowded place, and they still the habit of hiding who

496
00:30:17,560 --> 00:30:20,520
Speaker 2: Bobby was from the rest of the world that Myra

497
00:30:20,680 --> 00:30:23,640
Speaker 2: and Becky lived in. It was just ingrained in them.

498
00:30:24,280 --> 00:30:26,560
Speaker 2: You know. They didn't know how people would handle it

499
00:30:26,800 --> 00:30:29,040
Speaker 2: that Bobby was an ex conduct.

500
00:30:29,800 --> 00:30:32,720
Speaker 1: And as the years passed, Judy continued to hear from

501
00:30:32,760 --> 00:30:34,000
Speaker 1: Bobby and his family.

502
00:30:34,600 --> 00:30:36,960
Speaker 2: You know, I think I got some Christmas cards from them,

503
00:30:37,040 --> 00:30:39,080
Speaker 2: but I thought it was time for me to bow

504
00:30:39,120 --> 00:30:40,240
Speaker 2: out of Bobby.

505
00:30:40,360 --> 00:30:43,000
Speaker 1: And the Combers must have felt the same way, because

506
00:30:43,040 --> 00:30:45,040
Speaker 1: those cards eventually stopped coming.

507
00:30:45,520 --> 00:30:47,600
Speaker 2: It was time for them to move on with their life,

508
00:30:47,640 --> 00:30:49,200
Speaker 2: and I was the reminder of what.

509
00:30:49,480 --> 00:30:53,600
Speaker 1: Was After being released from prison, Bobby Cumber lived another

510
00:30:53,720 --> 00:30:57,720
Speaker 1: fifteen years until he passed away in twenty twenty two.

511
00:30:59,000 --> 00:31:03,240
Speaker 1: Bobby Cumber was eighty three years old. Bobby's obituary was short,

512
00:31:03,360 --> 00:31:07,240
Speaker 1: sweet and simple. It said he enjoyed bowling and caring

513
00:31:07,280 --> 00:31:10,800
Speaker 1: for his dogs. My team did reach out to Bobby's

514
00:31:10,800 --> 00:31:14,160
Speaker 1: wife and daughter, even his attorney, but we never heard back.

515
00:31:14,920 --> 00:31:19,000
Speaker 1: In speaking with Judy, Bobby was special and loved by many.

516
00:31:19,840 --> 00:31:22,640
Speaker 1: He lived his life in service to others, and.

517
00:31:22,800 --> 00:31:26,479
Speaker 2: He did everything everybody told him to. You know, he

518
00:31:26,560 --> 00:31:30,920
Speaker 2: joined the wrong military. He served in Vietnam and Saigon

519
00:31:31,080 --> 00:31:32,360
Speaker 2: during the Fall of Saigon.

520
00:31:33,120 --> 00:31:36,920
Speaker 1: Bobby Cumber served his country and it did not serve him.

521
00:31:37,200 --> 00:31:44,560
Speaker 2: Bobby is a very important footnote in judicial history as

522
00:31:44,720 --> 00:31:50,200
Speaker 2: one of the most unlikely prosecutions that anyone had ever seen.

523
00:31:54,400 --> 00:31:58,320
Speaker 1: Next Time on American Homicide, a woman found murdered in

524
00:31:58,400 --> 00:32:03,440
Speaker 1: her home leads investigator to her alleged stalker, a married cop.

525
00:32:04,000 --> 00:32:08,000
Speaker 1: But there's so much more to this story. I'm Sloane Glass.

526
00:32:08,280 --> 00:32:11,440
Speaker 1: We'll head to Louisiana for the story of Janor Gillery.

527
00:32:11,960 --> 00:32:26,360
Speaker 1: That's next time on American Homicide. You can contact the

528
00:32:26,400 --> 00:32:30,720
Speaker 1: American Homicide team by emailing us at American Homicide Pod

529
00:32:30,800 --> 00:32:35,480
Speaker 1: at gmail dot com. That's American Homicide Pod at gmail

530
00:32:35,520 --> 00:32:39,160
Speaker 1: dot com. American Homicide is hosted and written by me

531
00:32:39,360 --> 00:32:43,680
Speaker 1: Sloane Glass and is a production of Glass Podcasts, a

532
00:32:43,760 --> 00:32:48,080
Speaker 1: division of Glass Entertainment Group, in partnership with iHeart Podcasts.

533
00:32:48,680 --> 00:32:52,440
Speaker 1: The show is executive produced by Nancy Glass and Todd Gans.

534
00:32:52,880 --> 00:32:56,000
Speaker 1: The series is also written and produced by Todd Gants,

535
00:32:56,360 --> 00:33:00,160
Speaker 1: with additional writing by Ben Fetterman and Andrea Gunning. Our

536
00:33:00,160 --> 00:33:04,200
Speaker 1: associate producer is Kristin Melcurie. Our iHeart team is Ali

537
00:33:04,320 --> 00:33:09,479
Speaker 1: Perry and Jessica Crimecheck. Audio editing, mixing, and mastering by

538
00:33:09,560 --> 00:33:14,200
Speaker 1: Nico Ruka. American Homicides theme song was composed by Oliver

539
00:33:14,360 --> 00:33:19,040
Speaker 1: Bains of Neiser Music Library provided by My Music. Follow

540
00:33:19,080 --> 00:33:23,280
Speaker 1: American Homicide on Apple Podcasts, and please rate and review

541
00:33:23,320 --> 00:33:26,840
Speaker 1: American Homicide. Your five star review goes a long way

542
00:33:26,880 --> 00:33:30,840
Speaker 1: towards helping others find this show. For more podcasts from iHeart,

543
00:33:31,080 --> 00:33:35,840
Speaker 1: visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get

544
00:33:35,880 --> 00:33:36,760
Speaker 1: your podcasts