Speaker 1: A confrontation between two best friends turned deadly.
Speaker 2: There was a lot of alcoholic went on that night,
Speaker 2: and we believe that's what led to the rage, which
Speaker 2: led to the murder.
Speaker 1: And it all happened in front of the victim's wife.
Speaker 3: This poor woman has just watched her husband be gunned down.
Speaker 1: But even after the shooter's confession, the police believed there
Speaker 1: was more to this story.
Speaker 3: There were just a lot of pieces that did not
Speaker 3: make sense, and it.
Speaker 1: Put the spotlight on the wife of the victim.
Speaker 2: When we first came across her, she was playing the
Speaker 2: grieving widow. But the more you look at this, the
Speaker 2: more you say things aren't adding up.
Speaker 1: We are in Covington, Louisiana today for the conclusion of
Speaker 1: the Louisiana Love Triangle. I'm slung glass and this is
Speaker 1: American Homicide. Just a note that this episode contained some
Speaker 1: graphic content. Please take care while listening.
Speaker 3: There's a saying about law enforcement in general, that's very
Speaker 3: true for dispatchers, where it's a lot of periods of
Speaker 3: boredom interspersed with minutes of panic, and that's very true
Speaker 3: in Covington.
Speaker 1: Heather Jenkins spent two decades working as a dispatcher for
Speaker 1: the Covington Police Department.
Speaker 3: You may not do anything for hours, and then you
Speaker 3: may have, you know, an hour where you don't even
Speaker 3: have time to take a drink of water. There's often
Speaker 3: no rhyme or reason, you know, to how that happens.
Speaker 1: Covington is a suburban community that sits just across the
Speaker 1: Causeway from New Orleans, and based on some of the
Speaker 1: calls Heather receives, it seems even further away than that.
Speaker 3: I received a call about a cow loose in the city,
Speaker 3: and we did have to do a pursuit with that cow,
Speaker 3: and we did get it back home. And we've had
Speaker 3: peacocks loose in the city. We had a squirrel loose
Speaker 3: in a home that actually did a lot of damage.
Speaker 1: Along with loose cows and squirrel break ins. She's responded
Speaker 1: to her fair share of more serious calls, including the
Speaker 1: December two thousand and four murder of Thomas Tally.
Speaker 3: Mister Tally had been shot and was laying in the driveway.
Speaker 1: And his wife, the mother to his children, Kendra, witnessed
Speaker 1: the whole thing.
Speaker 3: Kendra Tally was outside yelling for help, yelling call no
Speaker 3: long one.
Speaker 1: Kendra watched in horror as her husband, Thomas Tally was
Speaker 1: shot and killed by his best friend, Tommy Row. Can
Speaker 1: you even imagine.
Speaker 3: Kendra Tally was just basically there kind of freaking out.
Speaker 3: She was a victim of this horrible crime. Her husband
Speaker 3: had just been shot.
Speaker 1: Kendra was able to identify the shooter as Tommy Row.
Speaker 3: At some point, he did surrender and was taken into custody.
Speaker 1: And that left the question on everyone's mind. Why on
Speaker 1: earth would Thomas's best friend turn on him like that.
Speaker 3: It did not make any sense to me whatsoever, And
Speaker 3: I don't really I don't know if anybody really understood
Speaker 3: what happened in the very beginning.
Speaker 1: Well, according to Kendra, it all had to do with
Speaker 1: a secret she told Tommy about what her husband did
Speaker 1: to her.
Speaker 3: At some point, she did say that her husband forced
Speaker 3: her into having sex.
Speaker 1: And that pushed Tommy rowl over the edge because you see,
Speaker 1: Tommy had feelings for Kendra and didn't want to see
Speaker 1: her hurt.
Speaker 3: I think she told Tommy that to try and cause
Speaker 3: him to be jealous, and that she got more jealousy
Speaker 3: than she expected and couldn't talking out of it.
Speaker 1: Tommy Row's jealousy turned into rage. As the sun was
Speaker 1: about to come up that morning, Tommy drove Kendra back
Speaker 1: to her.
Speaker 3: Home, shots were fired, and mister Talley was dead almost immediately.
Speaker 1: Detective searched Tommy Raw's house and found pictures of Kendra
Speaker 1: and her son, as well as a suicide note that
Speaker 1: read like one part confession and another part love letter.
Speaker 1: I also want my mother to know that I love
Speaker 1: her with all my heart and Kendra just as much
Speaker 1: or more. I just hope Kendra can forgive me for
Speaker 1: what I have done. I also hope Kendra will always
Speaker 1: know how much I love her and what she means
Speaker 1: to me. I just can't sit around and watch her
Speaker 1: being hurt all the time. Love always Tommy. So was
Speaker 1: Tommy upset because he shot Thomas or was he upset
Speaker 1: that he fell in love with Kendra? And if he
Speaker 1: couldn't stand to see Kendra hurt all the time, how
Speaker 1: to killing her husband saw that?
Speaker 3: I don't know. I mean, I can only surmise that
Speaker 3: he cared about her.
Speaker 1: And if we didn't already have enough questions, the results
Speaker 1: of Thomas Tally's autopsy presented a few more.
Speaker 3: Two guns were used. It didn't make sense. I just
Speaker 3: felt that that was just such a juxtaposition of all
Speaker 3: the stuff that had gone on.
Speaker 1: Tommy Row was an avid hunter, but did he really
Speaker 1: use two different guns to shoot Kendra's husband?
Speaker 3: And I just thought, this is not how I feel
Speaker 3: like this went down. The story that Kendra had told
Speaker 3: us that morning was not going to be the full story.
Speaker 1: According to Kendra, Tommy locked her in the truck while
Speaker 1: he went and got two guns out of his house.
Speaker 3: You can't really lie somebody in a truck the way
Speaker 3: that she said that he did.
Speaker 1: Kendra said when Tommy Raw fired the first shots at
Speaker 1: Thomas from inside the truck, he pushed her head down
Speaker 1: and shot through the passenger side window. Tommy then exited
Speaker 1: the truck and fired two more bullets.
Speaker 3: There were just so many little pieces that didn't make sense,
Speaker 3: that it didn't mesh, and it had already become pretty
Speaker 3: clear that this wasn't just a single man that had
Speaker 3: a grudge against somebody's husband.
Speaker 1: Four days after her husband's murder, Detective Doug Eyirwood brought
Speaker 1: Kendra back in for questioning. He wanted to know more
Speaker 1: about the strange dynamic between her husband, Thomas, and his
Speaker 1: best friend Tommy Row.
Speaker 2: She cleaned their ages on the rocks. She didn't know Thomas.
Speaker 2: He just wasn't great to be with. He was just
Speaker 2: kind of a house husband and wasn't a party type
Speaker 2: of guy. I no, she was a party girl. I
Speaker 2: think he wanted to be the dedicated, calm life at
Speaker 2: home with his wife and child and started to progress
Speaker 2: in life as a married couple.
Speaker 1: Kendra then talked herself into trouble.
Speaker 2: She was telling me about how her husband that day
Speaker 2: that had oral surgery, and in orders to help him,
Speaker 2: she thought the best thing to do was to go
Speaker 2: to the French Quarter with a boyfriend that night.
Speaker 1: Yes you heard that right. Kendra called Tommy Raw her boyfriend.
Speaker 1: So Tommy Raw wasn't just her husband's best friend who
Speaker 1: happened to be obsessed with her. The two were actually
Speaker 1: having an affair.
Speaker 2: There was this grand or they put together of that
Speaker 2: being some sort of love between them. It was just
Speaker 2: this incredible relationship.
Speaker 4: He asked me.
Speaker 2: It was a bunch of rubbish.
Speaker 1: Knowing Tommy and Kendra were having an affair certainly changed
Speaker 1: the way to detectives viewed the night of the murder.
Speaker 2: So it shows you what kind of a class person
Speaker 2: she is, and that immediately had my suspicions.
Speaker 1: The detective kept questioning Kendra, hoping to find the truth.
Speaker 2: Most of an interview with a police officer isn't like
Speaker 2: you see on TV. It's not the good cup Bank cup.
Speaker 2: That's all TV stuff. The most successful interviews you sit down,
Speaker 2: you talk with somebody and eventually you sort of getting
Speaker 2: them to open up and then you get to the truth.
Speaker 1: But he didn't feel that happening with Kendra. She kept
Speaker 1: changing her story and sometimes would answer questions with things
Speaker 1: she said she read in the newspaper or saw on
Speaker 1: the news.
Speaker 2: It was obvious that she was just not knowing what
Speaker 2: to say, and she was lost for words because it's
Speaker 2: difficult to put a lie on top of the lie,
Speaker 2: because she don't know what lie you've said. If I
Speaker 2: contradict the other lie, which was contradiction of that because
Speaker 2: I made up and I got to cover that one,
Speaker 2: it just goes on and on. It's nobles, It's a
Speaker 2: domino effect. It just gets worse and worse.
Speaker 4: I think.
Speaker 2: Even though a couple of times her attorney sort of
Speaker 2: looked at her and CURIATI WHI to ask her a
Speaker 2: question because he was dying to find out in the
Speaker 2: answer to some of these questions too, and they just
Speaker 2: weren't forthcoming, they weren't believable. At the end of the interview,
Speaker 2: they said, Okay, we'll cooperate to do you need any more,
Speaker 2: you can contact us. What we're going to leave now
Speaker 2: and I said, you, as the attorney may leade she
Speaker 2: may not.
Speaker 1: The detectives believed they had enough evidence that just hours
Speaker 1: before her husband's funeral, they arrested Kendra and charged her
Speaker 1: with second degree murder. Instead of grieving her husband's death graveside,
Speaker 1: she'd be arrested, booked, and behind bars by the afternoon.
Speaker 5: And that's what makes the whole thing even more weird.
Speaker 1: That's Thomas's brother, Mark Tally.
Speaker 6: And if she did what she did, she's a good
Speaker 6: actress because I did not see her that way.
Speaker 1: Mark was completely floored. Then not only was Kendra having
Speaker 1: an affair, but that she could be involved in his.
Speaker 6: No, they didn't have their problems, but they seem genuinely.
Speaker 5: Happy with each other.
Speaker 6: I just know she's not going to go describe a
Speaker 6: gun and shoot somebody.
Speaker 5: She has to be persuaded into doing that.
Speaker 6: That's again my opinion, I just think she got caught
Speaker 6: up in something that was way over her head.
Speaker 1: Tommy Raw didn't talk after his arrest, but his mother did.
Speaker 1: She told reporters that Kendra visited Tommy nearly every day
Speaker 1: and that the two were very much in love. She
Speaker 1: said that you acted like a family, and even when
Speaker 1: Christmas shopping together just before the murder.
Speaker 6: How they pulled this off is the one thing that
Speaker 6: amazes name. How could they do this with all the
Speaker 6: people that they know around and seeing around town?
Speaker 4: How I could?
Speaker 5: That's one thing I can't understand.
Speaker 1: Kendraw's mother also claimed that Hendra wanted out of her
Speaker 1: marriage and had planned on leaving her husband to be
Speaker 1: with Tommy.
Speaker 5: The behind the scenes stuff that I don't know.
Speaker 6: I'm sure there was a lot of arguments and disagreements
Speaker 6: like any other family.
Speaker 4: But from what I.
Speaker 5: Saw, I think Kendred truly loved Thomas.
Speaker 6: The way I look at it is and it's not
Speaker 6: knocking her in any way, more of a fourteen year
Speaker 6: old than a twenty five year old body, you know,
Speaker 6: kind of defiant.
Speaker 1: With Kendra's arrest just hours before Thomas's funeral, can you
Speaker 1: imagine how uncomfortable his memorial service had to be.
Speaker 5: It was almost like family feud.
Speaker 6: You had Kendra's family sitting on one side and the
Speaker 6: other on the other. They actually had to have a
Speaker 6: security detail.
Speaker 5: I'm like, come on, this is about Thomas.
Speaker 6: If you guys are gonna fight, I'm gonna leave because
Speaker 6: I'm not gonna.
Speaker 4: Deal with this.
Speaker 1: Thankfully, everyone behaved themselves. The real battle would take place
Speaker 1: years later in the courtroom. Nearly three years after Thomas
Speaker 1: Talley was gunned down in front of his home, his
Speaker 1: best friend Tommy Row went on trial for his murder,
Speaker 1: and from the moment he entered the courtroom, assistant Da
Speaker 1: Jack Hofstadt feared the worst.
Speaker 7: Well, how Tommy look when he got arrested with just
Speaker 7: Sember elevens was completely different. Now he looked when he
Speaker 7: got the trial. He's six foot two, two hundred pounds
Speaker 7: and he came hobbling in on the crotches. It shaved
Speaker 7: real well. He looked real pretty as he could.
Speaker 1: They always seem to do this, come into court with
Speaker 1: an ailment that seems to say feel sorry for me.
Speaker 1: I'm weak. There's no way I could have done this.
Speaker 1: Would jurors believe this? Fee who struggled to get around
Speaker 1: the court room on crutches, could be capable of killing
Speaker 1: his best friend.
Speaker 4: Those things sticking him mind.
Speaker 7: But I do know absolutely had Tommy Raoul killed a
Speaker 7: shot mister Twing, and I do.
Speaker 4: Know that it was as cold blood as you're fit
Speaker 4: in that.
Speaker 1: In Louisiana, there are three categories of murder, first degree,
Speaker 1: second degree, and manslaughter. Originally, prosecutors charged Tommy Rown with
Speaker 1: first degree murder, which carried the death penalty. The lower
Speaker 1: the charges to second degree, meaning Tommy faced life in prison,
Speaker 1: but Tommy's lawyer had aimed even lower.
Speaker 4: They were gone for manslaughter.
Speaker 1: If Tommy Rown was going to convince the jury, he'd
Speaker 1: finally have to share his version of what happened the
Speaker 1: night of the.
Speaker 7: Murder, so he pretty much had the testify.
Speaker 1: First. He testified about his relationship with Thomas Tally. He
Speaker 1: said Thomas was one of his best friends. They barbecue,
Speaker 1: played darts, lid fireworks, and drank beer together.
Speaker 7: He was crying and this crying and kids are flowing
Speaker 7: down his face.
Speaker 1: Tommy said he met Kendra when she was a teenager,
Speaker 1: although Tommy was twelve years older than her. He said
Speaker 1: he eventually developed feelings for her, but Kendra went up
Speaker 1: marrying his best friend, Thomas Tally. But about a year
Speaker 1: before Thomas's murder, Kendra and Tommy started having an affair.
Speaker 7: Tommy and her had had a long term relationship. I
Speaker 7: think he met her when she was sixteen. They had
Speaker 7: had things were going on. She's running around in the husband.
Speaker 1: But the most explosive testimony was about how his and
Speaker 1: Kendra's evening on Bourbon Street ended in murder.
Speaker 7: Kendrick went off with Tommy Rale and two other people
Speaker 7: in one New Orleans drank some beer, took some math,
Speaker 7: and some marijuana. During the night, Thomas Talley kept calling
Speaker 7: his wife on phone on fire when she was coming
Speaker 7: home and where she was.
Speaker 4: According to Kendre, he had been an asshole.
Speaker 7: Apparently three o'clock in the morning, they go to the
Speaker 7: waffle house, and at the waffle house.
Speaker 4: Kendra said that her husband had raped her.
Speaker 1: And that's when Tommy said he went into a wage
Speaker 1: and left the restaurant. His version of what happened next
Speaker 1: is very different than what Kendra told the police.
Speaker 7: At this point in time, the story is diverge. His
Speaker 7: story was that they never went back to his house,
Speaker 7: that he always carried two guns in his vehicle, one
Speaker 7: on his side and one on the other side.
Speaker 1: Tommy Rawle told the court that he drove to Thomas
Speaker 1: and Kendra's home and when they arrived, it was Kendra
Speaker 1: who made the first move. He said that Kendra honked
Speaker 1: the horn and that made Thomas Tally walk outside. He
Speaker 1: was barefoot, wearing sweatpants and a T shirt.
Speaker 7: He said they got there and that she was sitting
Speaker 7: on the console right next to her, and she start
Speaker 7: as shooting. He was shocked that Kendra had shot through
Speaker 7: the window. He had no idea shot in a shoot
Speaker 7: and when she was shooting through the window, he was
Speaker 7: immediately getting out the call with his forty five and
Speaker 7: went and shot Miss Tally twice. And who he described
Speaker 7: as a very good friend. I don't know what he
Speaker 7: did with his enemies, but he described him as a
Speaker 7: good friend. He did a lot of stuff together.
Speaker 1: So this is a completely different story than Kendra's. If
Speaker 1: you remember, Kendra told detectives it was Thomas who fired
Speaker 1: first from inside the truck.
Speaker 7: She says that Tommy pushed her head down and shot
Speaker 7: through the window glass one everywhere. Then she says that
Speaker 7: Tommy got out the car and shot he husband two
Speaker 7: more times.
Speaker 1: That was the only thing both sides agreed on.
Speaker 4: Which other story is true.
Speaker 7: We know that Tommy shot him in the head twice.
Speaker 1: Tommy Roll only admitted to firing the final two shots
Speaker 1: at Thomas, and he said it all stemmed from what
Speaker 1: Kendra told him about her husband sexually assaulting her.
Speaker 7: Yes, he is shot him, but he had shot him
Speaker 7: because he was basically out of control. But he did
Speaker 7: it because he was defending the honor of his girlfriend.
Speaker 1: And during cross examination, the prosecutor asked Tommy to show
Speaker 1: the jury how he shot Thomas.
Speaker 7: Tally, I had co console lay on the floor and
Speaker 7: Tommy got off the stand, stood over him and showed
Speaker 7: the jury exactly how he shot him in the head.
Speaker 1: So there was Tommy Rowe on his crutches, looking all frail. Well,
Speaker 1: he reenacted how he killed his best friend.
Speaker 7: On cross examination, I always ask questions that you got a.
Speaker 4: Yes or no.
Speaker 1: The prosecutor then asked Tommy if he cried while having
Speaker 1: sex with his best friend's wife. Tommy didn't answer.
Speaker 7: And I thought asking him whether he was crying while
Speaker 7: he was shooting him, and he was crying when he
Speaker 7: was getting ready to have a shootout with the police.
Speaker 4: His tears just went away and.
Speaker 7: He just had this like cold expression on his face,
Speaker 7: and he kept that throughout the cross examination.
Speaker 1: The prosecutor wanted the jury to know that Tommy Row
Speaker 1: resorted to murdering his best friend when there were a
Speaker 1: million other things he could and should have done if
Speaker 1: his ultimate goal was to be with Kendra.
Speaker 7: The last question I asked him is how much is
Speaker 7: forty five its cost? And he said between cloud and
Speaker 7: fifteen dollars. I said that's cheap and hiring a lawyer, huh?
Speaker 4: He said, yes, sir.
Speaker 1: In his closing arguments, Tommy's lawyer admitted that yes, his
Speaker 1: client did shoot Thomas Talley twice, but he said the
Speaker 1: real culprit wasn't Tommy Row. It was Tommy's love for Kendra.
Speaker 1: He claimed it was a crime of passion because Tommy
Speaker 1: was obsessed with Kendra and she manipulated Tommy. He said,
Speaker 1: when a woman knows that a man has been obsessed
Speaker 1: with her for years and years and she tells him
Speaker 1: someone violently, repeatedly assaulted her, what did she expect to happen?
Speaker 7: Mrdicase, are the things that sticking in mind because there's
Speaker 7: always a victim.
Speaker 1: Jack Hofstad prosecuted the case against Tommy Row.
Speaker 7: Mister Tally was shot and we had to speak up
Speaker 7: for him, wait to make sure he got justice. But
Speaker 7: it was an unusual case. Him shooting twice forty five
Speaker 7: is uncontested. He admitted that.
Speaker 1: But Tommy's lawyer argued it was a crime of passion
Speaker 1: and therefore it was manslaughter, not murder in the second degree,
Speaker 1: and that it was all a result of Kendra Tally
Speaker 1: telling Tommy that her husband, the father of her child,
Speaker 1: had sexually assaulted her. Neither the defense nor the prosecution
Speaker 1: called Kendra to testify.
Speaker 7: They were going for manslaughter and there was no reason
Speaker 7: I would want to put her in the stand. Why
Speaker 7: put somebody understand that you don't believe who're this's.
Speaker 1: Nd The case against Tommy Row went to the jury
Speaker 1: and forty five minutes later they returned with a verdict.
Speaker 1: They found him guilty of second degree murder. At his sentencing,
Speaker 1: the judge called it the most senseless crime he had
Speaker 1: come across during his nine years on the bench. He
Speaker 1: sentenced Tommy Row to life in prison and told him,
Speaker 1: you have made your own bed. Now you get to
Speaker 1: sleep in it, although it won't be comfortable. Three years later,
Speaker 1: and nearly six years after Thomas Talley was shot, Kendra
Speaker 1: Talley went on trial for her role in her husband's murder.
Speaker 7: She's charge of the principal of the Myrtle and a
Speaker 7: principal in Louisiana means that if you're involved in a
Speaker 7: planning and you're just as involved as a person who
Speaker 7: actually pulls the trigger, you're guilty.
Speaker 4: The best example is an on robbery.
Speaker 7: They might have one guy planning on robbery, another guy
Speaker 7: at the getaway driver, and the third guy goes into
Speaker 7: the bank.
Speaker 4: Well, they're all equally guilty.
Speaker 7: Even though one guy won in a bank, one guy
Speaker 7: sit in a car, guys sitting his house.
Speaker 1: And remember when this all began, Kendra was seen as
Speaker 1: a victim.
Speaker 7: I looked at the police board, and everything on the
Speaker 7: police boardinated no sense at all. I think everybody was
Speaker 7: suspiciously of Kendre once they started.
Speaker 4: Looking at it.
Speaker 1: But as the trial kicked off, prosecutors faced an uphill
Speaker 1: battle because Tommy Row refused to testify.
Speaker 7: Tommy Raw was not going to come down and testify
Speaker 7: to what he testified a trial, So all we had
Speaker 7: at that point in time was her story and we
Speaker 7: were going to have Tommy to come down were futed.
Speaker 1: It was a huge hurdle for prosecutors, but they plowed forward.
Speaker 1: On the first day of the trial, both sides presented
Speaker 1: their opening statements before lunch. Afterwards, the two sets of
Speaker 1: lawyers informed the judge of something no one in the
Speaker 1: courtroom had expected. They had struck a plea deal.
Speaker 7: I felt at that time still do that she was
Speaker 7: involved in the murder. But it doesn't matter what I think.
Speaker 7: It matters whether they have evidence. And let's just say
Speaker 7: that even in this conservative jurisdiction, which we get at
Speaker 7: ninety conviction, very probably on the jury trials, we could
Speaker 7: have convicted her. That's not the right thing to do.
Speaker 7: You can't prosecute somebody because you think they did it.
Speaker 7: You need evidence.
Speaker 1: Without enough compelling evidence, it seems like neither side wanted
Speaker 1: to gamble by leaving Kendra's fate up to a jury,
Speaker 1: so they struck a deal. In her plea deal, Kendra
Speaker 1: admitted to one count of possession of meth and one
Speaker 1: count of manslaughter. A manslaughter charge carried up to forty
Speaker 1: years in prison.
Speaker 7: All the time you get please reports where you say, yeah,
Speaker 7: I think they did that. Well, thing in the world
Speaker 7: is for somebody who prosecuted somebody because they think they
Speaker 7: did that, And we didn't go down that road.
Speaker 1: And when it came time for sentencing, the judge gave
Speaker 1: Kendra just ten years for a manslaughter and five years
Speaker 1: for the drug charge. Even though she faced far more
Speaker 1: time in prison. Her plea deal with prosecutors kept her
Speaker 1: sentence at ten years. Kendra was all smiles when the
Speaker 1: judge ruled that she could serve both sentences concurrently.
Speaker 2: Was the wisest thing she did was to take that
Speaker 2: plea deal.
Speaker 1: Detective Doug Arrowood worked the case, and.
Speaker 2: She knew that that was probably the best chance to
Speaker 2: get through this, the quickest way to do the least
Speaker 2: time to have to suffer the least from her actions.
Speaker 4: I wish, knowing.
Speaker 2: What I'd do, that we had not taken the plea
Speaker 2: deal and gone for it. But it's not up to me.
Speaker 2: It's up to the family. And you also go to
Speaker 2: think about the sun as well, even though he was
Speaker 2: an infintent time, they'll take the w into account and
Speaker 2: they were very satisfied with a ten year sentence, So
Speaker 2: that's what counts, and that's.
Speaker 4: What we went with.
Speaker 2: Maybe we would prefetzy Kendra get twenty years as supposed
Speaker 2: to tend. But is there that chance that she could
Speaker 2: have walked out of the courtroom that day.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and they didn't want to see the hat.
Speaker 1: When Kendra took the plea deal, she was just thirty
Speaker 1: years old. She told her family in the courtroom that
Speaker 1: she'd still have a life when she's released from prison.
Speaker 6: I think the trial was fair, although I think Kendra
Speaker 6: got off somewhat easy.
Speaker 1: The victim's brother, Mark Towley, struggled with Kendra's plea deal,
Speaker 1: and from what he learned in the courtroom, Kendra shot first.
Speaker 6: She shot first through the window of the pickup truck.
Speaker 6: To me, that's not man slaughtered, that's premeditated murder.
Speaker 5: But I wasn't there, so I don't know.
Speaker 4: I don't know all the facts.
Speaker 6: So I think she basically got away with more than
Speaker 6: she should have.
Speaker 5: I feel like.
Speaker 6: The universe has a way of handling with, you know,
Speaker 6: people like that, And to me, if there is punishment,
Speaker 6: they'll get it at some point or another. I do
Speaker 6: forgive him and Kendra, but I will never forget it.
Speaker 5: I just cope with it.
Speaker 1: Kendra became a free woman in twenty thirteen after serving
Speaker 1: most of her ten year sentence. She has since remarried
Speaker 1: and moved to Arkansas. She refused our request for comment.
Speaker 6: I still see Kendra as the bubbly, happy, you know,
Speaker 6: cheerful person.
Speaker 5: I think she's a good person, you know.
Speaker 4: I don't think she's evil.
Speaker 6: Yes, and was shocked that it happened, and especially that Kendra
Speaker 6: was a part of it. That was probably the hardest
Speaker 6: part for me, because in my mind, she had to
Speaker 6: be persuaded to do this or be incapacitated.
Speaker 5: That's just my opinion.
Speaker 1: Detective Era Wood disagrees.
Speaker 2: You got two guns, you got two people. I think
Speaker 2: they both decided to go and do this. She didn't
Speaker 2: have to talk him into anything. He didn't have to
Speaker 2: talk her into anything. They were both intent on the
Speaker 2: same thing. I think they wanted to be together and
Speaker 2: they wanted to get rid of the obstacle. It was
Speaker 2: in their way, So let's get rid of the husband.
Speaker 1: But the question is why why killed Thomas Tally? Only
Speaker 1: Kendra and Tommy Rowell have the answer to that, and
Speaker 1: they're both sticking to their respective stories.
Speaker 2: The only thing I regret and I wish I had
Speaker 2: gotten was a confession from her. If I had a
Speaker 2: confession from her, that's the slam duck was at out
Speaker 2: in court, out done. We're probably gone away for the
Speaker 2: rest of your life. I wish I'd have had.
Speaker 1: That, even without a confession from Kendra. He believes Tommy
Speaker 1: Row's version of what happened.
Speaker 2: With the evidence of the scene, My theory was that
Speaker 2: she shot through the window when he came out of
Speaker 2: the house, and rowl got out, went around and finished
Speaker 2: him off on the drive point blank. We knew we
Speaker 2: had the right theory behind it, but we couldn't make
Speaker 2: him testify the her trot. As we couldn't make him testify,
Speaker 2: we couldn't produce him as a witness, so we couldn't
Speaker 2: present what he had presented in court previously.
Speaker 1: Today, Tommy Row remains in a Baton Rouge prison serving
Speaker 1: out his life sentence. Kendra got off much easier.
Speaker 2: It's not the result I wanted, but it's next best.
Speaker 7: Though.
Speaker 2: It's a tragedy when you have these things to happen,
Speaker 2: but at the same time, some of these things that
Speaker 2: can bring close together and strange stories.
Speaker 1: Lost in all of this is the other victim in
Speaker 1: this story, Thomas and Kendra's son, who was just two
Speaker 1: years old when he lost his father.
Speaker 2: She still has a son. I don't know if she
Speaker 2: sees her son or not. If she does, I hope
Speaker 2: she can be a positive importance in his life if
Speaker 2: it's necessary for her to be a positive inquist by
Speaker 2: being away, and I think she needs to stay away.
Speaker 2: That's up to her, her family, her son, because I'm
Speaker 2: sure he's almost old enough to make that decision himself now.
Speaker 2: So you have to take everything into account. I think
Speaker 2: justice was served here in the sense of Tommy Rowl.
Speaker 2: He was sentenced to life, and I think he deserved it.
Speaker 4: I think Kendrew did too.
Speaker 1: Next time on American Homicide, after an aspiring preacher winds
Speaker 1: up dead, the community looks inward to understand who was responsible.
Speaker 1: What's discovered is a web of crimes. We're back in
Speaker 1: Louise for part one of Bodies on the Bayou. I'm
Speaker 1: Sloane Glass. That's next week on American Homicide. You can
Speaker 1: contact the American Homicide Team by emailing us at American
Speaker 1: Homicide Pod at gmail dot com. That's American Homicide pod
Speaker 1: at gmail dot com. American Homicide is hosted and written
Speaker 1: by me Sloane Glass and is a production of Glass Podcasts,
Speaker 1: a division of Glass Entertainment Group, in partnership with iHeart Podcasts.
Speaker 1: The show is executive produced by Nancy Glass and Todd Gans.
Speaker 1: The series is also written and produced by Todd Gans,
Speaker 1: with additional writing by Ben Fetterman and Andrea Gunning. Our
Speaker 1: associate producer is Kristin Melcurie. Our iHeart team is Ali
Speaker 1: Perry and Jessica Crimecheck. Audio editing, mixing and mastering by
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