September 15, 2025 • 58 mins
JOIN US today as we discuss a man that was able to not only get away with killing not one, not two, but SIX people in his family.. BUT he also financially benefited from almost every single one. JOIN US as we discuss Reverend Willie Junior Maxwell.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Black Chee Crime is a podcast that researches and discusses
murders committed by black offenders. It is a podcast that
anyone and everyone is welcome to enjoy, but it may
not be enjoyed by anyone and everyone, so listener discretion
is advised. Now, without further ado, this is Black Chee Crime.
(00:38):
Hello everyone, I'm Kayla and I'm Nikki, and this is
Black True Crime. Well long, and if this is your
first time here at the show, friend, welcome and hello,
Hi friends, welcome, welcome, missed you. You may be thinking like,
who's this amazing woman? If you're if this is your
(00:59):
first time, she's my mother, the Mama. She's incredible and
she hasn't been on the show in a couple of weeks,
but we're really happy to have her back. Yeah. I've
been life, been life, and but I've been living. Girl,
I'm here. She's been living, y'all, and we ain't been
comb but it's okay. We're not looking at our best,
but whatever, we're here. We're on video and you guys
(01:21):
love the video, so yeah, we were gonna do what
we could to give it to you. In our new
home in New Mexico, Yeah, we am new Mexic girls.
It's very nice. The mountains are, oh my god, majestic
and just loving it here so far. Yes, I may
even include some pictures of our view from our house
(01:42):
because Mom is staying here a bit with us to
get us situated and comfortable. And thank god, yeah, I
had to make shoot my grandbaby. My grammy boy was okay. Period.
He's doing great, y'all. He's so sweet, naughty. He's amazing,
sweet and naughty. So today is episode one hundred and
(02:03):
ninety nine. Letters Letters one hundred and ninety nine. Imagine
how far we would be if we weren't skipping those
weeks that we missed. Ok, let's not think about that.
We'll be on three hundred. I haven't missed that many weeks,
but so exciting.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
UH.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
This week, upcoming week is gonna be episode two hundred.
We're gonna have christ in here with us, and I'm
gonna try to make it super special. So we're gonna
have It's gonna be the congrats, Kale, congrats, You've done
the thanks, thank you. And then feespot dot com actually
emailed us and told us that we were number one
for UH in the top ten of black core podcasts
(02:43):
listen to in twenty twenty five.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
Who I Know?
Speaker 1 (02:50):
Y awesome and thank you guys. What yeah, friends, we
did that, all of us, Yes, all of us. No
one would know who we were if it weren't for
you guys. So incredible. Thank you so much much, Thank
you so much, too much before we get into the episode.
But we're happy, so let us be happy. We need it, amen. Okay,
(03:12):
one more thing though, We are going to be in
Vegas on Halloween, so you guys have to come see us.
Get your tickets online right now now. We're gonna stop
signing the tickets October first, Like, if you don't have
your ticket by then, you screwed. The pooch And Cayla
is definitely overpriced and she she price just no profit made.
We even come out of our pocket. Okay, we do,
(03:34):
we do sometimes, yes, but it's because we want to
be in front of the people. I know. We love
the people. I'm just saying that to let them know that,
you know, their sacrifices are made so for sure, I
love you guys. Yeah, it's so much fun. It is
so don't miss out. Never been in Vegas, so come
on Vegas. Okay, guys for endless time. Are you ready?
(03:58):
We're ready, Kayla, Let's get started. Okay, join us today
as we discuss a man that was able to not
only get away with killing not one, not two, but
six of his own family members. So not only did
he get away with that, but he also financially benefited
from almost every single one. So join us as we
(04:20):
discussed Reverend Willie Junior Maxwell what not? The reverend? These
reverends are something. They passes and bishops and and apostles,
not apostle apostles. They're not apostles there apostles, apostle possums
(04:41):
and apostles, as you guys know by now. That So
when we previously talked about on the show, has been
finally arrested for his crimes. We personally knew this person
and we're going to talk about it one day and
the you know, the future wants everything goes off. Mom
might not be here because it's too close to home,
(05:03):
you know, like sometimes you don't want to relive certain things,
and we respect it. Well, it's my past and it's
under the bloods. Okay, nobody judge me, no no judgment here,
but we don't want to rein, you know, reopen some
wounds whatever. But me and Kristen are gonna go down
that rabbit hole. So be here for that episode, all right.
But today we're talking about Reverend Willie Willie Willie Maxwell
(05:26):
was born in Cusack County, Alabama, Alabama, in nineteen twenty five.
I know he grew up with at least one older brother,
and he had one sister as well, And when he
was just twenty years old, he served in the army
and fought during World War Two. Will okay, Willette, well
a not bad looking. He's I'm not mad at it
(05:49):
at all.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
Right.
Speaker 1 (05:50):
After his service in the war, he went back to
Cusack County in nineteen forty seven and got a job
doing manual labor in the lumber industry. So I feel like,
you know, veterans shouldn't have to go and work harder
when they come home. But at least he had something,
because a lot of veterans we're too scarred to even
be able to work. That's true. My mom was born
(06:10):
in the nineties, I mean forty seven. Oh, okay, doo,
I think he's supposed to say twenty five. I thought
who was born to. My grandmother was born in nineteen
thirty Okay, so she's still younger than this cat. Two
years after his return, Willie got married to a woman
named Mary lou Edwards. She was local to his town,
and the couple lived a pretty normal life together for
over ten years before Willie started preaching and became an
(06:34):
ordained minister in nineteen sixty two. Okay, so pretty cool. Yeah,
it's tracking, Yeah, we're not mass live.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (06:42):
And then in nineteen seventy he received a Certificate of
theology from Selma University. All right, so he's taking the
time to educate himself about his new vocation. You should
you should know the word study to show yourself approved
little word and be mad at that. I'm honestly surprised
that at this point the episode we're in, like what
literally four minutes the episode, Willie is thirty seven years old, Okay,
(07:07):
and I haven't seen any red flags from him yet.
He's doing the thing usually we see some you know,
we'rerisome stuff. Well, I see one. Oh what is it?
Then mustache is really crooked? Mom, Well that says a lot.
What does it say? He's a killer? His mustache crooked?
(07:28):
Then he got crooked tendency, that maybe his face is
crooked because that's what it's given. One side, Yeah, mine
that my mind, dude. One, No, she's lower one smile
one side of my mouth. But it's because I chew
on one side of my mouth, which is very problematic.
(07:49):
I need to fix that. But that one side is
just a little slanted in it a little longer than
the other. Maybe trauma. I think he's halfway smiling. Honestly,
I'm not gonna lie. I think that's his attempt at
a greet. Yes, I ain't managing Willy. Come on, we're not.
We're not Willy. Reverend. Yeah, you look put together. So
let's see how fast the rest of this case spirals downhill. Okay,
(08:13):
on Monday, August third, nineteen seventy. So remember in nineteen seventy,
this is the same year he got his certificate theology
from Selma. Okay, August third. My sister were born two
days later August fifth, nineteen seventy. Oh really, boom okay it.
On Monday, August third, nineteen seventy, Willy's wife, Mary Lou
(08:36):
was found twelve feet off the road on Highway twenty two.
She was in her car. The engine was still running
and her lights were on. Mary Lou was unfortunately dead
in the car, Mary Lou, But she didn't die from
a car accident like you may be thinking. I was
thinking car accident. She was found actually severely beaten and
(09:00):
strangled to death. Jesus, Yeah, she was murdered. Sorry, Mary
Lou pressed in peace to marry Lou. Yeah, but who
would want to kill Mary Lou? And in such a
violently passionate way? Yeah, disgusting strangling then beaten? Nobody like
you hated her? Look at his eyes? Sound like you
(09:21):
will it now that I'm looking at him, I looking
him in a different way, I know, turn green and crooked. Yep, yep, yep. Well.
Investigators started their investigation as close to home as they
could get, and obviously that's her husband, Willie always thoughts always.
Mary Lou and her car were found not too far
from their home, and when they started looking closer into
(09:43):
the couple's relationship, investigators quickly learned it wasn't as perfect
as it seemed. Never is it never is. Apparently, Willy
was in a lot of debt, He owed a lot
of people money, and he was allegedly a bit little
cheater that tracks freaking shock. But this doesn't necessarily mean
(10:05):
that he killed his wife, right, No, no, no, it's possible.
Was somebody else? Yeah, well, according to a neighbor named
Dorcas Anderson, it wasn't. It wasn't somebody else, Okay, because
she says she saw something suspicious enough that night that
made investigators feel confident with charging Willy with Mary murder.
(10:26):
What did you say, Dorcas? What did you say? I'm
not entirely sure. I didn't find exactly what she said
in those court documents, but we're gonna come back to Dorcas. Okay,
Oh yeah, Dorcas. Willie ended up pleading not guilty to
the charges, and his trial started in August of nineteen
seventy one. Okay, I remember Dorcas we just talked about
(10:50):
seven seconds ago. Yeah. Well, she was supposed to be
testifying that Reverend Willie was responsible for Mary Lou's death.
But instead, what did she do? He provided an I'll
buy for him for that night darkest, single handedly destroying
the state's case. What I know, because they didn't have
much physical evidence to start with anyway. So but did
(11:15):
he record her line? Tail and Beginners I mean they did.
But when you say one thing in an interview and
then you say another thing on the stand under oath,
your credibility is gone. Blitzed. My goodness, Why did he
threaten her life? Did he give her some what was
giving herself? Oh? Darkest, Yeah, we're into it. So Willie
(11:40):
is able to walk free from Mary Lou's death. He
was completely acquitted. And it gets worse. Less than four
months after his trial, he ended up marrying Dorcas Get
out of town mom. He married Dorcasky's So, Dorcas was
(12:07):
twenty seven, by the way, yeah, twenty years. It was like,
what forty six? I don't know how old he is.
I'm not good with math. Y'all know how old he is.
Forties he was twenty years older. Too old? Nasty Willy
reven And then Dorcas herself was married to a man
at the time. His name was Abram. Yeah, but he
(12:31):
died in April of nineteen seventy one. So four months
before Willie went to trial and eight months after Mary
loose murder. So they just killing spouses. M So she's
now free to marry Willy. You know, if you marry somebody,
you can't testify against them now. According to what I saw,
they got married in November, which was after his trial.
(12:54):
But they should have put her in jail for perjury
because you get on the stand and say something completely different,
you should go to jail for that. Well, they should
put in jail of a murdering her husband, because I'm
sure that's what happened. Well, a lot of people think
that Willy murdered her husband. Yes, yeah, Now, Abram was
suffering from als at the time of his that he died,
(13:17):
but he wasn't suffering to the point that he was
expected to die. So when he died, it was everyone
was surprised by it. Well, I did say alsne just
it's not no, it's like a it's a Is it
a joint? Is it a muscle bone? Something like that?
Speaker 2 (13:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (13:33):
So he wasn't in a great way, but he wasn't
about to die.
Speaker 2 (13:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (13:36):
Yeah, So everyone was surprised, and his death was eventually
listed as being caused by pneumonia. Get out of town
as you do, they always say nomonia. Who was just
going around having pneumonia? Like her pneumonia is a long
(13:58):
yet I had it as a out pneumonia. Yeah, and
they told my mom and she didn't stop smoking, that
she would kill me. And she stopped smoking. My your
mother used to smoke, Oh like a chimney. What did
she smoke, Virginia slam like, yeah, oh, like a chimney smoke.
Because hung out with them. That they of your grandmother,
(14:20):
I said, my mother, I mean your mother, my grandmother,
my grandmother. Yeah. Yeah, never goes so close to her.
Lord Jesus, I'm just saying she's been called my MoMA
Gloria all this time, and now she's your grandmother because
she smoked cigarette. No, that's not why she Oh you
GLORI said. She was checking people the door, like I
(14:40):
love you got a lot of gloria in you. Why
wouldn't you say that when dad will always say I
have Nita, No, I would prefer to have glorious. Well,
the fighting point come from. But my mom would fight,
but she didn't start them, and I didn't start it.
Drama part, that's neither Okay. My mom wasn't drumma, but
she didn't play. But yeah, the smoking and cussing like
(15:01):
a sailor. And sometimes you remember that you really didn't
get to know her, you know, And she had a
whole life. She was a life. Yeah, okay, love her okay,
So pneumonia boo. And even if you don't think Willy
was responsible for Mary Lou's murder, I do, you might
at least be disgusted by the fact that Willy had
(15:23):
multiple life insurance policies I'm Mary Lou, ranging from hundreds
of dollars to thousands of dollars. So yeah, And then
he had to fight most of the companies because they
were not trying to pay it out. They're like, she
was murdered, it's clear that she was murdered. We need
to find out who did it. We don't want to
pay out her husband, but he was technically acquitted for it,
(15:46):
so the companies were eventually forced by the court to
pay him out. This man's swimming in money, right, no
more debt, probably actually knowing him. He probably didn't even
pay off his debt because he's discussed it. Crooked crooked
Willie yep. So rest in peace. Marry Lou. Yeah, gosh
sucks you marry people. That's him that's paying bad picture
(16:11):
right there, that's exactly who we picture. Look at his
hair sticking up in the front. That crooked minds, Dad,
that crooked dash is just crooked malid or not. Well,
his lip is raised there too, My Jesus. Shoot, you
don't have many pictures of him, but he looks ridiculous
cock eye and the very least in this one, the
(16:33):
whole one side is just wrong. Wrong, wrong left side really,
the rong left side, wily? Oh my god. Okay, well,
recipe to Mary Lou Marden. She was a cancer just
like me.
Speaker 3 (16:49):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (16:50):
She died August fourth, August fourth, super sad. Yeah, it
says August fourth there, so maybe she was kind of
like in the wee hours of the morning because on
August third her car was found technically, but I don't know.
When it comes to older cases, the details are all
over the place.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:08):
The what's that called the undertaker wasn't paying attention, right, undertaker? Yeah,
the people that bury him. Underwriter, undertaker, that's what her call.
So the Undertaker wrestler is named after undertaker of the
job at the cemetery. Pretty cool. I'll kill you and
take you on the you can't lie. Pretty cool. So
(17:29):
in November of nineteen seventy one, Dorcas and Willie get married.
They're still moviewts during life when three months later, oh
oh dark as dead. On Sunday, February sixth, nineteen seventy two,
Willy's older brother, John Columbus Maxwell, was found dead at
the intersection of Highway twenty two in Highway nine, at
(17:52):
that same place where Mary lob was very close and
he's just in the street. Ma laid out and naturally
I assume, okay, this man was hit by a car.
My god, it is the seventies, right, the cars aren't
as safe as they are now. But there was no
signs of any of that, No blood, no, no trauma
to his body. Nothing. So when his blood alcohol levels
(18:15):
were tested, it showed that it was high enough for
it to have killed him, but too high for him
to have been voluntarily consuming that much on his own,
so someone was pumping it in correct. However, his official
death certificate listed the cause of death as a heart
attack caused by excessive alcohol, so it wasn't labeled as
(18:37):
a homicide even though it was. Everybody would have brain
involved said hey, there's no way he could have even
being conscious enough to drink this much. Really yep, wow,
and it still wasn't labeled a homicide unbelievable, and Reverend
Willie the devastated little Brother had in his policy cast
(19:00):
on another few life insurance policies shortly after.
Speaker 4 (19:03):
Dang, we're not laughing at what he did. But what
are you thinking telling you, I'm give all these shoes policy?
Speaker 2 (19:15):
What?
Speaker 5 (19:16):
Well?
Speaker 1 (19:16):
How did he get their socials? Girls? And he paid
premium left and pay he has, you have to pay
every month on this own stuff. So when did he mom,
it's up. The amount of insurance policy that he took
out on everybody that he knew is absolutely he was.
He was killing people using the money he made to
take out more insurance policies. That way he could make
(19:39):
actually make money and use the money on the other
deaths that would happen. This is Roberta, Elder to the Tea.
We did an episode about our African woman. She's something else. Court,
no mom, no decorum. No, she didn't give a gone.
(20:00):
She actually felt inconvenience and didn't blame the mama. She
was and they was taking my mom. She was saying,
mama show but crazy as roles. If you haven't listened
to the Roberta episode, go listen to week Girl. She
was grat she was diabolical, horrible. So rest in peace
(20:25):
to John. Yes good. I'm not sure like exactly how
much he got from these policies, not no nor but
she got for Mary lose. But in such a short
amount of time, I mean, two loved ones have passed.
I hope he's at least pretending to be distraught about
the deaths of his family. If you're benefiting financially, my god,
(20:48):
and then to marry your neighbor a year after your
wife was murdered. It was a little it was a
little over year. Okay, it's it's sick.
Speaker 5 (20:57):
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(21:20):
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Speaker 1 (21:52):
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And speaking of the neighbor, uh huh, seven year old
Dorcas Anderson was found dead in the front seat of
her car. Did loy it in a way that didn't
seem natural? Like she wasn't put in that position on
her own? What is wrong with him? And what is
(22:14):
that with him? With these cars? You didn't even know
the prop dude, because this road side of the road,
in the road thing, it's working well for him. Mom,
And I guess because who the ding down dingalings? Then
ain't putting two to two and two together? You ain't
eve gotta put two and two, You gotta put one
and one together. You'd be like, hmmm, both his wives
(22:34):
die in the car unnatural waves on the side of
the same road, and the brother and the brother and
he got all these insuance policies like come on. So
this was on Wednesday, September twentieth, nineteen seventy two, So
seven months after his brother died. Her car was found
on Highway nine. The engine was running and the lights
(22:57):
were on, just like Mary. Hmm. And still investigators detected
no foul play, and her cause of death was listed
as a cute asthmatic bronchitis pneumonia. Actually it's an indirect
way of saying she was suffocated, which you could also
(23:21):
say the woman was strangled. My God, So rest in peace, Darkest,
little girl. I'm not saying nothing other than you're not
here no more, and that sucks, and you married the
wrong man. Darkest, I'm gonna say this. I pray you
rest in peace. But dark As you saw the red flag,
you stood for this dude. You knew he took out
(23:44):
on the line his first wife. Now, why didn't you
think he were gonna do you? Darkest? You know, I
know you're twenty seven, young and dumb, but I no
offense to y'all twenty sevencause some of them mature, but
some of them are not. Uh, you thought that you
would be a better wife. But Darkest, and part of
me feels like the way that these things are happening,
(24:08):
it doesn't seem like a lot of people are They're
either Mom dumbest door nails, respectfully, because y'all get mad
when we call women dumb when they be doing dumb stuff,
either their dumbest door nails or they're not in control
of their actions right now or what they're doing. Well,
let me say this, and I'm gonna probably get some
shade for it, but I'm gonna say it. Anyhow, they
(24:33):
were back in Alabama. I don't know exactly where that
city located, but they probably was in the back of woods.
Then people wasn't doing too much of the investigation and
putting things together and all that kind of stuff. But
they weren't that dumb because Willie went to school for theology.
He went to the military, so he wasn't too stuck
(24:53):
on you know. But anyhow, something right. You know how
the police can be right. This is the early seventies.
So the fact that their care exactly they were black, true,
being honest Alabama. And if you think the cops were
all black, you shoe you haven't been paying attention. Right,
(25:15):
So the ops are investigating these deaths. Let's just say
that it's not going well. And I have no nothing
against Dorcas. I don't like what she did. I think
her changing her story at the trial is completely ridiculous.
I don't think she should have died, No, but she
didn't deserve that, correct. But I think it's okay to
(25:38):
say that she was not innocent even though she lost
her life. Because one, I think Willie killed Mary Lou
and she helped him cover it up.
Speaker 3 (25:46):
She did.
Speaker 1 (25:48):
But two, Dorcas had Willy's baby six months after they
got married, which means between the times she pointed the
finger at him as Mary Lose killer in August nineteen
seventy and the time he went to trial in August
nineteen seventy one, she got pregnant with him. They were
(26:08):
doing the do they were hooking up after she had
already told him that she you know what I'm saying, yep,
and to be twenty eight and forty six like in
this situation. Some situations it's not as gross as it seems,
but this one it just seems incredibly gross. Yeah, he
did it, didn't He didn't even want dark cause he
did it to close her mouth, correct, So she opened
(26:30):
her legs and closed her mouth. Poor thing, poor thing,
And he promised her something. He let her live for
a year. Where's the baby? It's crazy, that's horrible. You
married somebody with the full intent of knowing that you're
going to kill them later. Is it's hard to swallow? Yeah,
(26:51):
because he's all right, all right, I got her. Let
me put the policy on her because she's gonna pay
for this one way or the other. Don't get my
money back because you made me go to Jay. Oh,
you made to kept your big mouth shut in the
first place, right right right, You're gonna pay for this.
This is horrible, Oh, reverend, reverend, reverend, I don't like you.
(27:11):
So Dorcas is not with us anymore. She was born
in July as well, but she's a leo. Yeah to her.
But Dorcas already had two life insurance policies in place
before she met Willie. Okay, Dorcas, But in the ten
months the couple was married, Willie took out fifteen more
life insurance policies on her. What the hell left side role, Willie?
Speaker 5 (27:37):
What?
Speaker 1 (27:39):
What the heck? I know, who was that salesman? Fifty more?
And you know all this stuff there's not online. So
these life insurance policy companies probably aren't talking to each other.
They're not communicating, they don't have a system, so he
can call as many different companies as he wants and
take out policies and they won't know how many policies
she has already with solely him being the beneficiary. Good God, almighty.
Speaker 2 (28:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (28:07):
So I honestly blamed some of the life insurance policies
these older cases because they were just so lazy. You're
just giving people money because someone died. This is lazy
to melies, Oh learning into it?
Speaker 5 (28:21):
What?
Speaker 1 (28:22):
All together they totaled one hundred and thirty one thousand
dollars dang, and Willy ended up getting eighty thousand of that. Well,
the rest went So the rest went to court fees
because he had to spend a lot of time in
Core to even get these insurance policies, get the money
(28:43):
companies to payoff policies. Yes, good, good. His lawyer said
it was so bad that they literally thought they would
run out of available people in the county to be
unbiased on the jury. MM, because let's be clear, like
the entire area is talking about Willy Bags. I mean,
(29:11):
if if he was preaching out a church and had
people following him, he was about to get these socials
and started taking out policies on them day. That's how
it is a social well. I don't know what it
was back then, but it seems like I could have
called Tom, Dick and Harry and told them all I
want a different policy and they were like, okay, cool,
that's it. Unbelievable. God, yeah, So Willie has a reputation.
(29:38):
He has a reputation now with all these family debts
and these insurance policies, he's being a hotboy. How many
issues company was in Alabama, I don't know, ma, too many,
maybe just national.
Speaker 5 (29:53):
You know.
Speaker 1 (29:53):
He probably was reaching out to everybody, anybody that would
take his call and approve it. He was flipping all
of the previous insurance money to pay the premiums on
more because each time the count went up, had to hair.
He wasn't working, He wasn't making no real money to
be paying for all these fifteen policies on one one person.
(30:13):
You gotta pay the premium on all this every month.
I tell you one thing. He was organized because he
showed n't have direct deposits. He made sure ye crazy crazy.
So he's doing all this, everybody's watching him, all eyes
on him, and he doesn't seem to care. Oh, because
this number three. This is number three Jesus that we
(30:34):
know of, right, and not counting Dorcas's husband, possibly right.
Then he didn't have that insurance policy, but Darkas did.
Dorcas had to, so he used that exactly. Jeez, Louise.
But at least he waited two years this time before
I'm marrying his third wife, a woman named Ophelia Burns
in November of nineteen seventy four. Now Ophelia isn't a
(30:58):
new woman in his life. He didn't just like meet
her after he because he was the Syria was with
a cheater. Correct. In fact, she was charged with being
involved in Mary Lou's murder. What I feel like somebody
made this up in their living room, wrote a book
and I'm talking about it. What's happening in Bama? This
(31:20):
has to be fixed, But it's not. It really happened.
She was charged with being involved in Mary Lose murder,
but because he wasn't convicted or anything like that, her
charges ended up being dropped. M So the couple is
now living together, along with the son he had with Dorcas.
No yept the baby and then a young girl named
(31:40):
Shirley and Ellington. Oh, Shirley watch out. I read that
she was Ophelia's adopted daughter, and she was referred to
as Willie's stepdaughter several times, and for a while no
one died. Things were going well until Valentine's Day nineteen
seventy six, oh, which one when another car was found
(32:02):
on Highway nine, not too far from the reverends home,
and this time it was his nephew, James Hicks. Yeah,
he was killing everybind you thought, you thought, you think,
you thought, and then it's somebody else, the nephew, God,
the stray, what the nephew. I think it was his
sister's son. Okay, not not the brother, the brother correct.
(32:26):
And he was found dead in his car with no
signs of injury, and the medical examiner concluded that there
was nothing to quote which would adequately account for the
death of this subject. Let me tell you one thing,
Willie man not had no is showing the policy on
the nephew too. How the heck one?
Speaker 2 (32:46):
Now?
Speaker 1 (32:46):
Why would you happen to showing policy on your nephew, Willie?
Willie why? I don't even into the why. We know
the why. I know, well, we know why, But how
I definitely had one and with no evidence to suggest
foul play. Willie was able to cash in on the
four life insurance policies he had put out on his nephew.
(33:06):
Dear Jesus, what, mom, he's just picking them out. And
then imagine there's still family members around him right now.
They have to watch all these people that they love
die and they're just looking at are they are they looking?
Are they are their heads in the clouds? I want
to know if somebody's smelling the sewage right next to
them or are they heads in the clouds? But come on, y'all,
(33:29):
I don't care if they were uneducated back in the woods,
no electricity, water swamp, whatever, a nobody put together these
three cars three not three cars, that same role. They're
in the car. And wait, people aren't just and these
(33:52):
are young people, they're not just dying. No mom, the pardon?
No what God? Boys and like nothing like that. Please.
You were born in the seventies, I know. And what's
even more sick is he tried to convince his sister
James's mom to sign over power of attorney to the
(34:15):
Hicks estate to him so he could control it, which
just tells me that he was planning on targeting his
sister and the rest of her kids to make it
easier if he had control over the estate. It doesn't
matter who necessarily these policies were toward or said that
he has control over the state. Why why why do
you think she was signed that over to you, Willie?
(34:36):
Why are you mom? Let's look at him again, like,
let's all be serious. He had that been hiding behind
the word like he had that been hiding by the
word black hitler. Yeah, he does. But the arm up
and everything. Oh my god, sorry if you guys here
squeaking to my baby is here? So sorry? Not sorry?
Speaker 3 (34:58):
What?
Speaker 1 (34:59):
Yeah? Crooked nose willly don't like the love side, Wally melted,
pot faced. I just hate him, oh wily, so rest
in peace to James, my God, Jesus and our heart
squall to his mother and his family like they so
(35:19):
we have to how many now? I think we're up
to four? Four four for sure for the possible one
and him and him so far? Yeah, yet one more
and next. Willie had his sights set on sixteen year
old Shirley Anne, not the baby girl, bastard, and he
couldn't wait for the opportunity. In June nineteen seventy seven,
(35:43):
Sureley Anne was found crushed underneath the Reverend's car. Another
damn car. Sorry, y'all, I'm just in rare formula. Another car. Wait,
it's William guy, say my caic. No, that's the thing.
And is he retrieving all these cars after he emptied
the bottom Now, because the other cars were those other
people's cars, this is the first time his actual car
(36:05):
is involved, so we know that this is the Reverence car.
It was found on the side of Highway nine, and
from the way the scene looked, investigators felt that she
must have been trying to change the tire the baby
correct when something went wrong and it crushed her head.
Like her head was crushed by the car. The baby, yes,
was changing the tire. Sixteen. I'm fifty and I don't
(36:25):
know how fifty one. Oh, I'm fifty one. I recently
learned how to change a tire, but eat on the
side of the highway. I'm not changing no tire. I
can't have the damn thank you. She's sixteen years old.
Crush that baby head yep. And even back then, everyone
was skeptical because a sixteen year old girl with no
experience on how to change a tire is getting out
(36:48):
on the highway to change a tire. They lying they
ain't have the dust and fingerprint stuff back then. Evidently,
I mean they regardless that they did. They were so lazy.
Their mom. The laziness that was a it has to
be something supernatural. We're gonna get to that. So she
sat on the highway, they think, oh, it's an accident.
(37:08):
But when the autopsy revealed that she was dead before
she was put under the car, they finally had the
evidence of a murder that they needed to go properly
investigate Willie. Thank god, because everything else was circumstantial. You know,
now they got it. And at this point he can
be responsible for the death of six people. Good, he
(37:28):
needs to be responsible for seven and eight, well, get
punished for him, at least. I agree, what Lilly, what
is what happened to him? I don't know. We don't
how to do it. It all comes down the money.
In this case, it's all coming down the money. But
he is a ship to pay them bills all by this.
If he was loan shark, if he was involved with
a loan shark and somebody was starting to cut his
(37:50):
toes off or break his kneecaps, and he killed his
first wife to get the money on it, because, let's
be honest, he was plotting on her. We know he
took those policies out. They were married what less than
a year? Ten months?
Speaker 2 (38:01):
Right?
Speaker 1 (38:01):
No, that was the second wife, Dorcas. No, him and
Mary were married for over fifteen years. Yes. Wow, So
to kill someone that you've known that long because you're
in debt like you, His humanity was turned off a
long time ago. I just don't know what caused it.
And if Willy had plans of continuing to get away
(38:22):
with his six scheme, he should have never killed Shirleyanne
because she had her own family. Mind you, this Shirleianne
was not his family. No, Chrilianne came with his wife, Ophelia,
so she had a family that loved her. Hundreds of
people were in attendance at her funeral. I read from
three hundred to six hundred people were there. Wow, including
(38:43):
Willie Maxwell. Let me ask you some did that Negro
have a policy baby too? We don't even get that far. Good,
so good watch what happens? Okay.
Speaker 3 (38:56):
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Speaker 1 (39:51):
So, like I said, funeral, everybody was suspicious of him
and rightfully so seemingly accept his duve wife. God O
feel you you were dumb Filia, So whatever. Shout out
to Shirley Anne. Shout out to her family that showed
up and was mad and vocal about her death. Because
(40:16):
she was so cute. I found a picture of her. Because,
as you guys can see, a lot of the other
victims we didn't have no pictures are but I was
so glad I could humanize what she went through. She
was freaking adorable. Yeah. So not only did we he
have the audiocity to show up to the funeral funeral,
but he got up there, what half ball and performed
(40:38):
her eulogy. Don't let him do that. Let the devil
in eulogi is precious baby. When he cracked her skulls,
smashed her car on her head, how evil is that?
But o'pheeli and needs rocks rocked, Like, why would you
(41:01):
even put let that nigga come up in there? Anyway?
He doesn't right, People are furious, furious mom, including one
of shirley AND's sisters, who yelled at Willie after the
eulogy in front of everyone and said, quote, you killed
my sister and now you're gonna pay for it good.
And when she said now, male, she meant, right right now,
(41:25):
did the cavali come in and take his black a
out of there? Something even better, somebody kill And immediately
after she said that, a man in a green suit
stood up from the pews in front of Willie, turned
around and shot him in the head three times. Whoa wow, wow,
(41:47):
you won't collect on this one, like God just got adrenaline.
Rush oh am g who every times in the head
he met what he met? You mean what he met?
He mean when he did? He stood on it three
times a day. They said, if he was any close home,
this is exciting. I'm not. I'm not excited, am I?
(42:10):
I don't know he killed all these people, He killed
this poor girl. He had the audacity to get up,
to get up on that funeral and say how amazing
she was and how sweet she was, and everybody knows
you killed her. It takes another level of self control
to not do what this man ended up doing. So
(42:31):
Who The fifty two year old died instantly, well technically
not instantly, because, according to the Guardian, listened to this
one mom quote. Maxwell tried raising his handkerchief to wipe
away the blood, but he died before the white cotton
touched his face. I want to die with dignity, worried
(42:53):
about how you're looking, and wipe and you got three
billo holes of your Hey geez. The man that shot
him was a relative as Shirlians. Thank you. Thirty six
year old truck driver Robert Lewis burns Wow and Robert
had a wife and daughter of his own. That's her.
That's her funeral. They were taking her casket out and stuff.
(43:13):
But that's Burns's been playing. Nope. And although everyone ran
out of the funerals screaming obviously and ducking for cover,
no one wondered why Willie was the target. When I
say this man had a reputation on people were so
afraid of him. They didn't know who his next target
would be. They knew he was doing this, and according
(43:35):
to many people in that area, they believe that Willie
was practicing voodoo, and not only his victims, but also
the law enforcement officers that were responsible for catching him.
So that's why they were determining that no foul play.
This person wasn't murdered, because the medical examiner has to
determine that someone was murdered or they died via homicide.
(43:57):
For him to even remotely because considered responsible for their death,
especially back then, Wow Chow. So everywhere I looked for
research on him, it was like the voodoo preacher. They
kept calling him the voodoo preacher, but there wasn't a
lot of information about Well, I'll say, is proof right
(44:17):
that he was doing the voodoo. I'm not sure, but
there are a lot of people close to him that
would even come out later and say, yo, he was.
He had voodoo stuff always around him like he was
on that. So I don't know who's wherever he was,
but he was in touch with some with some evil
things in the sense of, oh, you can practice voodoo
(44:39):
and have something evil and bad or death happened to someone.
I'm sorry. I know you guys get offended, but that's bad. Yeah,
and it shouldn't be offend. People say, you know, you
guys are so misinformed about voodoo. It's a religion. So
sud if I can, if I can do something to
cut chickens neck and have somebody die from that or
(45:00):
put a hex on somebody from that's wrong. That's dead wrong.
I don't care what they did to me. I can't
open that type of karma up to myself. That's why
I plead the blood. Yeah, I'll say what you wanta say.
The blood works, press blood versus chicken blood. How how different.
We're not gonna play with you about don't don't do that,
(45:21):
don't do that. But anyway, Uncle Burns looked like he
part of the temptations or fine heartbeats or something, but
he wasn't playing Yes, definitely get thank you, and he
had to go to jail. Didn't did they put him
in jail ridic his trial because of course Robert had
to go to trial. He murdered someone in front of
hundreds of people. I ain't see it, I all right.
(45:42):
And he was actually represented in court by Willie's old
insurance claims attorney Tom Radley. So this is the guy
that was going through all of Willie's like court stuff, exhausted,
like dang, you know, knowing he killed these people. Let's
be real, but in my mom like day, this town
is really small.
Speaker 5 (46:00):
It is.
Speaker 2 (46:01):
It is.
Speaker 1 (46:01):
So the trial started in September of nineteen seventy seven,
so three months after Shirley Ann's murder, and lasted two days.
The case should have been a slam dunk. Like I said,
he not only he killed him in front of a
bunch of people, but he also confessed to the cops
when they pulled up. So everybody runs out of the church, right,
he stays inside. When the cops get in there to
(46:24):
arrest him, he says, quote, I had to do it,
and if I had to do it, over I do
it again. Only God can judge me. He killed my family.
But that's not where robert attorneys wanted to focus on. See,
he wanted the conversation to be about if Robert was
justified in the killing, not if he did it or not.
(46:45):
We all know he did it, and for that reason,
he had Robert enter a plea of not guilty by
reason of insanity. You ain't crazy, but okay, come on listen,
I'm listening. The defense attorney brought up how many people
had died close to Willie. He brought in a witness
named Alfonso Murphy that testified that Willy had tried to
(47:07):
hire him to kill Shirley Anne, but he refused. There
was also evidence presented that suggested Willie was this voodoo
practitioner and kept a lot of voodoo related materials around
him and where he lived. It's pretty specific, right. They
also argued that after seeing all of the loss of
(47:27):
life and chaos and Vietnam when he was stationed there
ten years ago, Robert, that's the guy's name, right, You
gonna forget to name in a second. Yes, Robert's PTSD
had deeply affected him. Oh so all that coupled with
the loss of his you know. Yeah, and we have
to remember the jury lives in the area. The jury
(47:47):
most likely have heard something did a get off. As
a shock to many, the jury found that Robert was
in fact insane at the time of the murder, and
the judge ordered Robert to be committed to a state
mental institution for as little as thirty days or as
many as needed. He could be released in the first
(48:09):
thirty days only if it was determined that he is
not mentally disturbed or dangerous and like his presence state.
They gave him slap on the wrist. As a black man,
they gave a slap on the wrist. Good holy conn
and he just he shot somebody three times in the
head in front of hundreds of people. They could have
easily just been like, give him the chair, let's kill him.
(48:31):
Why fun right now? You know, legally kill a black man.
Why not? He took a murderer. He took a serial
murderer the streets. It's true and the worst of the
worst of the serial killers are people that target what
children and their own family members. So I think the
jury really related to that and was like, give them,
(48:53):
you know, the minimum, not the maximum. The minimum, and
he was literally released a few weeks later.
Speaker 7 (48:59):
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and let go of whatever you're carrying today. Well, I'm
letting go of the worry that I wouldn't get my
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they're so fast and breathe. Oh sorry, I almost couldn't
(49:19):
breathe when I saw the discount they gave me on
my first order. Oh sorry, no mistay.
Speaker 6 (49:25):
Visit one eight hundred contacts dot com today to save
on your first order one eight hundred contacts.
Speaker 1 (49:30):
So that's him Burned and his wife and his daughter
before he goes to court. Good, good, look at fam.
She looks cute. I can really see it, but she's yeah,
here is on point. And then that's the journeyed Tome.
That's Tom and then this is our guy, Robert Burns
as old man go Robert being interviewed in twenty twenty.
(49:54):
I think it was twenty twenty. Yeah really, Oh, he
got out and lived a full life, had a wife
saying yeah, still down this way where I'm gonna say,
somewhere in his ring saying it's saying the same saying
saying it's same sign. He wasn't crazy when he went in,
He ain't crazy when he got out. He met when
he meant, he did what he did, and and he
should not have lived his life in prison. I don't
(50:17):
think so, absolutely not. I think that was a street justice.
I said that that was justified. You know, I ain't
the one to take a person life, but still that
was justified because he would have kept going. Yes, mom,
he wouldn't have stopped. Nobody was up. And Tom Hadley
shout out to that dog one man because he could
have easily given in to it, or or if he
(50:39):
wasn't as creative as he was with the defense, Robert
could have been sitting on death row right now. Yeah,
wow wow, So yeah, that's our case. Basically, we have
a little bit of a little fun fact. I don't
know if you've heard of it, mom, but the author
of the of the book To Kill a mocking Bird
(51:00):
heard of that. Her name's Harper Lee. She is from
this part of Alabama, and she was writing a book
based on this case. Oh, like did all the research.
He interviewed Robert himself and everything. She was going to
call it The Reverend. I think she put hours mom
and hours into it. She talked to family members and said,
(51:20):
you have no idea how many people he had insurance
policies on, Like, you guys will never understand how many
people were at risk if he wasn't stopped. So did
she write the book? It never was published. Unfortunately, it
never got out and she died. So I would love
to read it. I know she had so much information too,
Like she really was boots to the ground in the
(51:40):
thick of it, and she has a little caucus woman
or a little cigarette. Look good. It looked like all Virginia.
Oh wow, yeah, so really cool. She didn't she wasn't
writing it in the way of you know, the mouse
saying stupid. So it's the best story, yeah, I mean
it was. It was enticing. And when she returned to
her hometown was when what's his name they were people
(52:04):
were trying to get Robert put to death or something
like that. I know, it was a whole thing. She
she came back right when he was going on trial
for everything, and you know that's what she learned about
Willie and all that. So pretty cool to kill a
Mockingbird is pretty famous famous. Shout out to you, Harper
for being interested in this story, you know, sharing it.
(52:26):
I hope someone dig up the archives and go ahead
and put it out there. So the first couple of
chapters I think were happened upon by Shirley Ann's family,
but I haven't seen them. I didn't see them released
or anything like that, so maybe they're just keeping it,
you know, under wraps or whatever. But I mean, yeah,
(52:46):
Shirley should have not died. Ophelia, my god, Ophelia, you
were you were messing with this man when you knew
he was not only cheating on his wife, but two
of his wives had already been killed, and then you
still married him. That's what I'm saying. She was part
of the I know, but I'm tired of women just
thinking I'm different or I'm the exception who she didn't
think back because he skipped over to get to the
(53:08):
next door neighbor, right, and then when she died she
was okay. Yeah, but I'm just saying, like the stupidity
of all the brainwashing. But was it brainwashing? Were these
women under some type of voodoo spell?
Speaker 2 (53:20):
You know?
Speaker 1 (53:21):
Did did Dorcas succumb to something that he put on her,
and that's why she married this man and didn't testify
against him. All of that. I don't know much about
those types of things. I don't know much about changing
someone's behavior with spells and stuff like that, but I
know it's possible. So who knows what he was really
doing to these people? Oh girl, that's why we gotta
(53:41):
stay prayed up and ever people and protect your piece
of space. Yes, yes, yes, yes, you don't know what
people got going on? So yeah, that's our case, y'all.
What a dousing. I don't like too many people. Guy
that should not die. He should have been in jail
(54:03):
thanks to Dorcas. He would have been in jail after
he killed Mary Lou. You know, so dog on a Dorcas.
Damn it Dorcas. Let me say that. That's my one
cuss word of the episode. Mom has had three I did,
so I canto I forget them.
Speaker 5 (54:21):
He did.
Speaker 1 (54:21):
Yeah, but let us know what you guys thought about
this episode? Oh my work. Yeah that's a doozy. Friends,
what there's two hundred're gonna be like? I know, I
really wanted to be something that like grips you all
by those short and curlies, so short curls. So send
(54:45):
me your request for what you want episode two hundred
to be. If I don't get something that I feel
like it is really really juicy, I'm just gonna pick one.
And you know we're just gonna have fun anyway. Yes, mom,
oh lot, I'm gonna shave y'all go wax tram. We
(55:06):
do want you to grab I want this episode, this
next episode to grab you. Okay, love you guys so much,
so much. Please come see us in Vegas in October. Yes,
the trip, and I'm not gonna lie even if you
guys don't come, we may have to go out there
and I want to gamble. We might go out there
(55:28):
have a gamble.
Speaker 2 (55:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (55:29):
Oh we have a year so we can put your
feet in it. But you gotta go to Vegas. So
come see us, y'all. We might even you know, hit
a hit a blackjack table two together. We'll see. Because
our friends been hanging out, they like to hang. You
wanna hang too, So hopefully we see you guys in
October thirty. First get your tickets at blackchucrime dot com.
(55:51):
And yeah, we love you so much. If you enjoy
the show at all. Wait a minute, if they come
on Halloween, can they dress up like a different characters?
You have to dress up? Matter of fact, it's not
I have to, but absolutely, please please please dress up.
I'm gonna be dressed up looking fine. Oh girl, Oh
I already got my No, I'm serious. I plan on
dressing up. I know, but I mean we're doing characters
(56:15):
or well, you can dress up as whoever you want
to look howeveryone. I'm not dressing up as a murder killer. No, no, no,
I'm dressing up as who I want to dress up as.
It's gonna be a sexy surprise and come show up
and it's gonna be a vibe. Oh and we'll have
a we'll have a contest, yes, of the most creative costume.
Mom's gonna dress up. It's gonna be a vibe. I'm
(56:37):
gonna be an angel. I'm gonna let y'all know right now, Akay,
she's dressing up as something she's not. So yes, like
we all are all those things that be not read
that clock your te ball, all right, y'all, all right,
look all right, y'all. Love you guys so much, Thank
(56:58):
you so much, and Yeah, if you enjoy the show
at all, please give us a five star rating act Spotify,
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safe you say, protect your piece huh and protect your space. Yeah,
so we don't have to cover your caves. Ye, PRIs
(57:23):
in Vegas. Thanks so much for listening to the show.
You can stream all of our episodes on Amazon Music, Spotify,
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(57:46):
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Black Chee Crime is a podcast that researches and discusses
murders committed by black offenders. It is a podcast that
anyone and everyone is welcome to enjoy, but it may
not be enjoyed by anyone and everyone, so listener discretion
is advised. Now, without further ado, this is Black Chee Crime.
(00:38):
Hello everyone, I'm Kayla and I'm Nikki, and this is
Black True Crime. Well long, and if this is your
first time here at the show, friend, welcome and hello,
Hi friends, welcome, welcome, missed you. You may be thinking like,
who's this amazing woman? If you're if this is your
(00:59):
first time, she's my mother, the Mama. She's incredible and
she hasn't been on the show in a couple of weeks,
but we're really happy to have her back. Yeah. I've
been life, been life, and but I've been living. Girl,
I'm here. She's been living, y'all, and we ain't been
comb but it's okay. We're not looking at our best,
but whatever, we're here. We're on video and you guys
(01:21):
love the video, so yeah, we were gonna do what
we could to give it to you. In our new
home in New Mexico, Yeah, we am new Mexic girls.
It's very nice. The mountains are, oh my god, majestic
and just loving it here so far. Yes, I may
even include some pictures of our view from our house
(01:42):
because Mom is staying here a bit with us to
get us situated and comfortable. And thank god, yeah, I
had to make shoot my grandbaby. My grammy boy was okay. Period.
He's doing great, y'all. He's so sweet, naughty. He's amazing,
sweet and naughty. So today is episode one hundred and
(02:03):
ninety nine. Letters Letters one hundred and ninety nine. Imagine
how far we would be if we weren't skipping those
weeks that we missed. Ok, let's not think about that.
We'll be on three hundred. I haven't missed that many weeks,
but so exciting.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
UH.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
This week, upcoming week is gonna be episode two hundred.
We're gonna have christ in here with us, and I'm
gonna try to make it super special. So we're gonna
have It's gonna be the congrats, Kale, congrats, You've done
the thanks, thank you. And then feespot dot com actually
emailed us and told us that we were number one
for UH in the top ten of black core podcasts
(02:43):
listen to in twenty twenty five.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
Who I Know?
Speaker 1 (02:50):
Y awesome and thank you guys. What yeah, friends, we
did that, all of us, Yes, all of us. No
one would know who we were if it weren't for
you guys. So incredible. Thank you so much much, Thank
you so much, too much before we get into the episode.
But we're happy, so let us be happy. We need it, amen. Okay,
(03:12):
one more thing though, We are going to be in
Vegas on Halloween, so you guys have to come see us.
Get your tickets online right now now. We're gonna stop
signing the tickets October first, Like, if you don't have
your ticket by then, you screwed. The pooch And Cayla
is definitely overpriced and she she price just no profit made.
We even come out of our pocket. Okay, we do,
(03:34):
we do sometimes, yes, but it's because we want to
be in front of the people. I know. We love
the people. I'm just saying that to let them know that,
you know, their sacrifices are made so for sure, I
love you guys. Yeah, it's so much fun. It is
so don't miss out. Never been in Vegas, so come
on Vegas. Okay, guys for endless time. Are you ready?
(03:58):
We're ready, Kayla, Let's get started. Okay, join us today
as we discuss a man that was able to not
only get away with killing not one, not two, but
six of his own family members. So not only did
he get away with that, but he also financially benefited
from almost every single one. So join us as we
(04:20):
discussed Reverend Willie Junior Maxwell what not? The reverend? These
reverends are something. They passes and bishops and and apostles,
not apostle apostles. They're not apostles there apostles, apostle possums
(04:41):
and apostles, as you guys know by now. That So
when we previously talked about on the show, has been
finally arrested for his crimes. We personally knew this person
and we're going to talk about it one day and
the you know, the future wants everything goes off. Mom
might not be here because it's too close to home,
(05:03):
you know, like sometimes you don't want to relive certain things,
and we respect it. Well, it's my past and it's
under the bloods. Okay, nobody judge me, no no judgment here,
but we don't want to rein, you know, reopen some
wounds whatever. But me and Kristen are gonna go down
that rabbit hole. So be here for that episode, all right.
But today we're talking about Reverend Willie Willie Willie Maxwell
(05:26):
was born in Cusack County, Alabama, Alabama, in nineteen twenty five.
I know he grew up with at least one older brother,
and he had one sister as well, And when he
was just twenty years old, he served in the army
and fought during World War Two. Will okay, Willette, well
a not bad looking. He's I'm not mad at it
(05:49):
at all.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
Right.
Speaker 1 (05:50):
After his service in the war, he went back to
Cusack County in nineteen forty seven and got a job
doing manual labor in the lumber industry. So I feel like,
you know, veterans shouldn't have to go and work harder
when they come home. But at least he had something,
because a lot of veterans we're too scarred to even
be able to work. That's true. My mom was born
(06:10):
in the nineties, I mean forty seven. Oh, okay, doo,
I think he's supposed to say twenty five. I thought
who was born to. My grandmother was born in nineteen
thirty Okay, so she's still younger than this cat. Two
years after his return, Willie got married to a woman
named Mary lou Edwards. She was local to his town,
and the couple lived a pretty normal life together for
over ten years before Willie started preaching and became an
(06:34):
ordained minister in nineteen sixty two. Okay, so pretty cool. Yeah,
it's tracking, Yeah, we're not mass live.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (06:42):
And then in nineteen seventy he received a Certificate of
theology from Selma University. All right, so he's taking the
time to educate himself about his new vocation. You should
you should know the word study to show yourself approved
little word and be mad at that. I'm honestly surprised
that at this point the episode we're in, like what
literally four minutes the episode, Willie is thirty seven years old, Okay,
(07:07):
and I haven't seen any red flags from him yet.
He's doing the thing usually we see some you know,
we'rerisome stuff. Well, I see one. Oh what is it?
Then mustache is really crooked? Mom, Well that says a lot.
What does it say? He's a killer? His mustache crooked?
(07:28):
Then he got crooked tendency, that maybe his face is
crooked because that's what it's given. One side, Yeah, mine
that my mind, dude. One, No, she's lower one smile
one side of my mouth. But it's because I chew
on one side of my mouth, which is very problematic.
(07:49):
I need to fix that. But that one side is
just a little slanted in it a little longer than
the other. Maybe trauma. I think he's halfway smiling. Honestly,
I'm not gonna lie. I think that's his attempt at
a greet. Yes, I ain't managing Willy. Come on, we're not.
We're not Willy. Reverend. Yeah, you look put together. So
let's see how fast the rest of this case spirals downhill. Okay,
(08:13):
on Monday, August third, nineteen seventy. So remember in nineteen seventy,
this is the same year he got his certificate theology
from Selma. Okay, August third. My sister were born two
days later August fifth, nineteen seventy. Oh really, boom okay it.
On Monday, August third, nineteen seventy, Willy's wife, Mary Lou
(08:36):
was found twelve feet off the road on Highway twenty two.
She was in her car. The engine was still running
and her lights were on. Mary Lou was unfortunately dead
in the car, Mary Lou, But she didn't die from
a car accident like you may be thinking. I was
thinking car accident. She was found actually severely beaten and
(09:00):
strangled to death. Jesus, Yeah, she was murdered. Sorry, Mary
Lou pressed in peace to marry Lou. Yeah, but who
would want to kill Mary Lou? And in such a
violently passionate way? Yeah, disgusting strangling then beaten? Nobody like
you hated her? Look at his eyes? Sound like you
(09:21):
will it now that I'm looking at him, I looking
him in a different way, I know, turn green and crooked. Yep, yep, yep. Well.
Investigators started their investigation as close to home as they
could get, and obviously that's her husband, Willie always thoughts always.
Mary Lou and her car were found not too far
from their home, and when they started looking closer into
(09:43):
the couple's relationship, investigators quickly learned it wasn't as perfect
as it seemed. Never is it never is. Apparently, Willy
was in a lot of debt, He owed a lot
of people money, and he was allegedly a bit little
cheater that tracks freaking shock. But this doesn't necessarily mean
(10:05):
that he killed his wife, right, No, no, no, it's possible.
Was somebody else? Yeah, well, according to a neighbor named
Dorcas Anderson, it wasn't. It wasn't somebody else, Okay, because
she says she saw something suspicious enough that night that
made investigators feel confident with charging Willy with Mary murder.
(10:26):
What did you say, Dorcas? What did you say? I'm
not entirely sure. I didn't find exactly what she said
in those court documents, but we're gonna come back to Dorcas. Okay,
Oh yeah, Dorcas. Willie ended up pleading not guilty to
the charges, and his trial started in August of nineteen
seventy one. Okay, I remember Dorcas we just talked about
(10:50):
seven seconds ago. Yeah. Well, she was supposed to be
testifying that Reverend Willie was responsible for Mary Lou's death.
But instead, what did she do? He provided an I'll
buy for him for that night darkest, single handedly destroying
the state's case. What I know, because they didn't have
much physical evidence to start with anyway. So but did
(11:15):
he record her line? Tail and Beginners I mean they did.
But when you say one thing in an interview and
then you say another thing on the stand under oath,
your credibility is gone. Blitzed. My goodness, Why did he
threaten her life? Did he give her some what was
giving herself? Oh? Darkest, Yeah, we're into it. So Willie
(11:40):
is able to walk free from Mary Lou's death. He
was completely acquitted. And it gets worse. Less than four
months after his trial, he ended up marrying Dorcas Get
out of town mom. He married Dorcasky's So, Dorcas was
(12:07):
twenty seven, by the way, yeah, twenty years. It was like,
what forty six? I don't know how old he is.
I'm not good with math. Y'all know how old he is.
Forties he was twenty years older. Too old? Nasty Willy
reven And then Dorcas herself was married to a man
at the time. His name was Abram. Yeah, but he
(12:31):
died in April of nineteen seventy one. So four months
before Willie went to trial and eight months after Mary
loose murder. So they just killing spouses. M So she's
now free to marry Willy. You know, if you marry somebody,
you can't testify against them now. According to what I saw,
they got married in November, which was after his trial.
(12:54):
But they should have put her in jail for perjury
because you get on the stand and say something completely different,
you should go to jail for that. Well, they should
put in jail of a murdering her husband, because I'm
sure that's what happened. Well, a lot of people think
that Willy murdered her husband. Yes, yeah, Now, Abram was
suffering from als at the time of his that he died,
(13:17):
but he wasn't suffering to the point that he was
expected to die. So when he died, it was everyone
was surprised by it. Well, I did say alsne just
it's not no, it's like a it's a Is it
a joint? Is it a muscle bone? Something like that?
Speaker 2 (13:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (13:33):
So he wasn't in a great way, but he wasn't
about to die.
Speaker 2 (13:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (13:36):
Yeah, So everyone was surprised, and his death was eventually
listed as being caused by pneumonia. Get out of town
as you do, they always say nomonia. Who was just
going around having pneumonia? Like her pneumonia is a long
(13:58):
yet I had it as a out pneumonia. Yeah, and
they told my mom and she didn't stop smoking, that
she would kill me. And she stopped smoking. My your
mother used to smoke, Oh like a chimney. What did
she smoke, Virginia slam like, yeah, oh, like a chimney smoke.
Because hung out with them. That they of your grandmother,
(14:20):
I said, my mother, I mean your mother, my grandmother,
my grandmother. Yeah. Yeah, never goes so close to her.
Lord Jesus, I'm just saying she's been called my MoMA
Gloria all this time, and now she's your grandmother because
she smoked cigarette. No, that's not why she Oh you
GLORI said. She was checking people the door, like I
(14:40):
love you got a lot of gloria in you. Why
wouldn't you say that when dad will always say I
have Nita, No, I would prefer to have glorious. Well,
the fighting point come from. But my mom would fight,
but she didn't start them, and I didn't start it.
Drama part, that's neither Okay. My mom wasn't drumma, but
she didn't play. But yeah, the smoking and cussing like
(15:01):
a sailor. And sometimes you remember that you really didn't
get to know her, you know, And she had a
whole life. She was a life. Yeah, okay, love her okay,
So pneumonia boo. And even if you don't think Willy
was responsible for Mary Lou's murder, I do, you might
at least be disgusted by the fact that Willy had
(15:23):
multiple life insurance policies I'm Mary Lou, ranging from hundreds
of dollars to thousands of dollars. So yeah, And then
he had to fight most of the companies because they
were not trying to pay it out. They're like, she
was murdered, it's clear that she was murdered. We need
to find out who did it. We don't want to
pay out her husband, but he was technically acquitted for it,
(15:46):
so the companies were eventually forced by the court to
pay him out. This man's swimming in money, right, no
more debt, probably actually knowing him. He probably didn't even
pay off his debt because he's discussed it. Crooked crooked
Willie yep. So rest in peace. Marry Lou. Yeah, gosh
sucks you marry people. That's him that's paying bad picture
(16:11):
right there, that's exactly who we picture. Look at his
hair sticking up in the front. That crooked minds, Dad,
that crooked dash is just crooked malid or not. Well,
his lip is raised there too, My Jesus. Shoot, you
don't have many pictures of him, but he looks ridiculous
cock eye and the very least in this one, the
(16:33):
whole one side is just wrong. Wrong, wrong left side really,
the rong left side, wily? Oh my god. Okay, well,
recipe to Mary Lou Marden. She was a cancer just
like me.
Speaker 3 (16:49):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (16:50):
She died August fourth, August fourth, super sad. Yeah, it
says August fourth there, so maybe she was kind of
like in the wee hours of the morning because on
August third her car was found technically, but I don't know.
When it comes to older cases, the details are all
over the place.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:08):
The what's that called the undertaker wasn't paying attention, right, undertaker? Yeah,
the people that bury him. Underwriter, undertaker, that's what her call.
So the Undertaker wrestler is named after undertaker of the
job at the cemetery. Pretty cool. I'll kill you and
take you on the you can't lie. Pretty cool. So
(17:29):
in November of nineteen seventy one, Dorcas and Willie get married.
They're still moviewts during life when three months later, oh
oh dark as dead. On Sunday, February sixth, nineteen seventy two,
Willy's older brother, John Columbus Maxwell, was found dead at
the intersection of Highway twenty two in Highway nine, at
(17:52):
that same place where Mary lob was very close and
he's just in the street. Ma laid out and naturally
I assume, okay, this man was hit by a car.
My god, it is the seventies, right, the cars aren't
as safe as they are now. But there was no
signs of any of that, No blood, no, no trauma
to his body. Nothing. So when his blood alcohol levels
(18:15):
were tested, it showed that it was high enough for
it to have killed him, but too high for him
to have been voluntarily consuming that much on his own,
so someone was pumping it in correct. However, his official
death certificate listed the cause of death as a heart
attack caused by excessive alcohol, so it wasn't labeled as
(18:37):
a homicide even though it was. Everybody would have brain
involved said hey, there's no way he could have even
being conscious enough to drink this much. Really yep, wow,
and it still wasn't labeled a homicide unbelievable, and Reverend
Willie the devastated little Brother had in his policy cast
(19:00):
on another few life insurance policies shortly after.
Speaker 4 (19:03):
Dang, we're not laughing at what he did. But what
are you thinking telling you, I'm give all these shoes policy?
Speaker 2 (19:15):
What?
Speaker 5 (19:16):
Well?
Speaker 1 (19:16):
How did he get their socials? Girls? And he paid
premium left and pay he has, you have to pay
every month on this own stuff. So when did he mom,
it's up. The amount of insurance policy that he took
out on everybody that he knew is absolutely he was.
He was killing people using the money he made to
take out more insurance policies. That way he could make
(19:39):
actually make money and use the money on the other
deaths that would happen. This is Roberta, Elder to the Tea.
We did an episode about our African woman. She's something else. Court,
no mom, no decorum. No, she didn't give a gone.
(20:00):
She actually felt inconvenience and didn't blame the mama. She
was and they was taking my mom. She was saying,
mama show but crazy as roles. If you haven't listened
to the Roberta episode, go listen to week Girl. She
was grat she was diabolical, horrible. So rest in peace
(20:25):
to John. Yes good. I'm not sure like exactly how
much he got from these policies, not no nor but
she got for Mary lose. But in such a short
amount of time, I mean, two loved ones have passed.
I hope he's at least pretending to be distraught about
the deaths of his family. If you're benefiting financially, my god,
(20:48):
and then to marry your neighbor a year after your
wife was murdered. It was a little it was a
little over year. Okay, it's it's sick.
Speaker 5 (20:57):
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the California can see se pre Coupan, Lilo contin Ownnos
moss pecaniosas as Tierra Quid and the tea poventrasin the
(21:20):
Familia receive tradition and Pierre Real California milk. Who's gonna
say you so good, so.
Speaker 1 (21:29):
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Speaker 2 (21:31):
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Speaker 1 (21:52):
It's easy, big gifts, big perks. That's why you rack.
And speaking of the neighbor, uh huh, seven year old
Dorcas Anderson was found dead in the front seat of
her car. Did loy it in a way that didn't
seem natural? Like she wasn't put in that position on
her own? What is wrong with him? And what is
(22:14):
that with him? With these cars? You didn't even know
the prop dude, because this road side of the road,
in the road thing, it's working well for him. Mom,
And I guess because who the ding down dingalings? Then
ain't putting two to two and two together? You ain't
eve gotta put two and two, You gotta put one
and one together. You'd be like, hmmm, both his wives
(22:34):
die in the car unnatural waves on the side of
the same road, and the brother and the brother and
he got all these insuance policies like come on. So
this was on Wednesday, September twentieth, nineteen seventy two, So
seven months after his brother died. Her car was found
on Highway nine. The engine was running and the lights
(22:57):
were on, just like Mary. Hmm. And still investigators detected
no foul play, and her cause of death was listed
as a cute asthmatic bronchitis pneumonia. Actually it's an indirect
way of saying she was suffocated, which you could also
(23:21):
say the woman was strangled. My God, So rest in peace, Darkest,
little girl. I'm not saying nothing other than you're not
here no more, and that sucks, and you married the
wrong man. Darkest, I'm gonna say this. I pray you
rest in peace. But dark As you saw the red flag,
you stood for this dude. You knew he took out
(23:44):
on the line his first wife. Now, why didn't you
think he were gonna do you? Darkest? You know, I
know you're twenty seven, young and dumb, but I no
offense to y'all twenty sevencause some of them mature, but
some of them are not. Uh, you thought that you
would be a better wife. But Darkest, and part of
me feels like the way that these things are happening,
(24:08):
it doesn't seem like a lot of people are They're
either Mom dumbest door nails, respectfully, because y'all get mad
when we call women dumb when they be doing dumb stuff,
either their dumbest door nails or they're not in control
of their actions right now or what they're doing. Well,
let me say this, and I'm gonna probably get some
shade for it, but I'm gonna say it. Anyhow, they
(24:33):
were back in Alabama. I don't know exactly where that
city located, but they probably was in the back of woods.
Then people wasn't doing too much of the investigation and
putting things together and all that kind of stuff. But
they weren't that dumb because Willie went to school for theology.
He went to the military, so he wasn't too stuck
(24:53):
on you know. But anyhow, something right. You know how
the police can be right. This is the early seventies.
So the fact that their care exactly they were black, true,
being honest Alabama. And if you think the cops were
all black, you shoe you haven't been paying attention. Right,
(25:15):
So the ops are investigating these deaths. Let's just say
that it's not going well. And I have no nothing
against Dorcas. I don't like what she did. I think
her changing her story at the trial is completely ridiculous.
I don't think she should have died, No, but she
didn't deserve that, correct. But I think it's okay to
(25:38):
say that she was not innocent even though she lost
her life. Because one, I think Willie killed Mary Lou
and she helped him cover it up.
Speaker 3 (25:46):
She did.
Speaker 1 (25:48):
But two, Dorcas had Willy's baby six months after they
got married, which means between the times she pointed the
finger at him as Mary Lose killer in August nineteen
seventy and the time he went to trial in August
nineteen seventy one, she got pregnant with him. They were
(26:08):
doing the do they were hooking up after she had
already told him that she you know what I'm saying, yep,
and to be twenty eight and forty six like in
this situation. Some situations it's not as gross as it seems,
but this one it just seems incredibly gross. Yeah, he
did it, didn't He didn't even want dark cause he
did it to close her mouth, correct, So she opened
(26:30):
her legs and closed her mouth. Poor thing, poor thing,
And he promised her something. He let her live for
a year. Where's the baby? It's crazy, that's horrible. You
married somebody with the full intent of knowing that you're
going to kill them later. Is it's hard to swallow? Yeah,
(26:51):
because he's all right, all right, I got her. Let
me put the policy on her because she's gonna pay
for this one way or the other. Don't get my
money back because you made me go to Jay. Oh,
you made to kept your big mouth shut in the
first place, right right right, You're gonna pay for this.
This is horrible, Oh, reverend, reverend, reverend, I don't like you.
(27:11):
So Dorcas is not with us anymore. She was born
in July as well, but she's a leo. Yeah to her.
But Dorcas already had two life insurance policies in place
before she met Willie. Okay, Dorcas, But in the ten
months the couple was married, Willie took out fifteen more
life insurance policies on her. What the hell left side role, Willie?
Speaker 5 (27:37):
What?
Speaker 1 (27:39):
What the heck? I know, who was that salesman? Fifty more?
And you know all this stuff there's not online. So
these life insurance policy companies probably aren't talking to each other.
They're not communicating, they don't have a system, so he
can call as many different companies as he wants and
take out policies and they won't know how many policies
she has already with solely him being the beneficiary. Good God, almighty.
Speaker 2 (28:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (28:07):
So I honestly blamed some of the life insurance policies
these older cases because they were just so lazy. You're
just giving people money because someone died. This is lazy
to melies, Oh learning into it?
Speaker 5 (28:21):
What?
Speaker 1 (28:22):
All together they totaled one hundred and thirty one thousand
dollars dang, and Willy ended up getting eighty thousand of that. Well,
the rest went So the rest went to court fees
because he had to spend a lot of time in
Core to even get these insurance policies, get the money
(28:43):
companies to payoff policies. Yes, good, good. His lawyer said
it was so bad that they literally thought they would
run out of available people in the county to be
unbiased on the jury. MM, because let's be clear, like
the entire area is talking about Willy Bags. I mean,
(29:11):
if if he was preaching out a church and had
people following him, he was about to get these socials
and started taking out policies on them day. That's how
it is a social well. I don't know what it
was back then, but it seems like I could have
called Tom, Dick and Harry and told them all I
want a different policy and they were like, okay, cool,
that's it. Unbelievable. God, yeah, So Willie has a reputation.
(29:38):
He has a reputation now with all these family debts
and these insurance policies, he's being a hotboy. How many
issues company was in Alabama, I don't know, ma, too many,
maybe just national.
Speaker 5 (29:53):
You know.
Speaker 1 (29:53):
He probably was reaching out to everybody, anybody that would
take his call and approve it. He was flipping all
of the previous insurance money to pay the premiums on
more because each time the count went up, had to hair.
He wasn't working, He wasn't making no real money to
be paying for all these fifteen policies on one one person.
(30:13):
You gotta pay the premium on all this every month.
I tell you one thing. He was organized because he
showed n't have direct deposits. He made sure ye crazy crazy.
So he's doing all this, everybody's watching him, all eyes
on him, and he doesn't seem to care. Oh, because
this number three. This is number three Jesus that we
(30:34):
know of, right, and not counting Dorcas's husband, possibly right.
Then he didn't have that insurance policy, but Darkas did.
Dorcas had to, so he used that exactly. Jeez, Louise.
But at least he waited two years this time before
I'm marrying his third wife, a woman named Ophelia Burns
in November of nineteen seventy four. Now Ophelia isn't a
(30:58):
new woman in his life. He didn't just like meet
her after he because he was the Syria was with
a cheater. Correct. In fact, she was charged with being
involved in Mary Lou's murder. What I feel like somebody
made this up in their living room, wrote a book
and I'm talking about it. What's happening in Bama? This
(31:20):
has to be fixed, But it's not. It really happened.
She was charged with being involved in Mary Lose murder,
but because he wasn't convicted or anything like that, her
charges ended up being dropped. M So the couple is
now living together, along with the son he had with Dorcas.
No yept the baby and then a young girl named
(31:40):
Shirley and Ellington. Oh, Shirley watch out. I read that
she was Ophelia's adopted daughter, and she was referred to
as Willie's stepdaughter several times, and for a while no
one died. Things were going well until Valentine's Day nineteen
seventy six, oh, which one when another car was found
(32:02):
on Highway nine, not too far from the reverends home,
and this time it was his nephew, James Hicks. Yeah,
he was killing everybind you thought, you thought, you think,
you thought, and then it's somebody else, the nephew, God,
the stray, what the nephew. I think it was his
sister's son. Okay, not not the brother, the brother correct.
(32:26):
And he was found dead in his car with no
signs of injury, and the medical examiner concluded that there
was nothing to quote which would adequately account for the
death of this subject. Let me tell you one thing,
Willie man not had no is showing the policy on
the nephew too. How the heck one?
Speaker 2 (32:46):
Now?
Speaker 1 (32:46):
Why would you happen to showing policy on your nephew, Willie?
Willie why? I don't even into the why. We know
the why. I know, well, we know why, But how
I definitely had one and with no evidence to suggest
foul play. Willie was able to cash in on the
four life insurance policies he had put out on his nephew.
(33:06):
Dear Jesus, what, mom, he's just picking them out. And
then imagine there's still family members around him right now.
They have to watch all these people that they love
die and they're just looking at are they are they looking?
Are they are their heads in the clouds? I want
to know if somebody's smelling the sewage right next to
them or are they heads in the clouds? But come on, y'all,
(33:29):
I don't care if they were uneducated back in the woods,
no electricity, water swamp, whatever, a nobody put together these
three cars three not three cars, that same role. They're
in the car. And wait, people aren't just and these
(33:52):
are young people, they're not just dying. No mom, the pardon?
No what God? Boys and like nothing like that. Please.
You were born in the seventies, I know. And what's
even more sick is he tried to convince his sister
James's mom to sign over power of attorney to the
(34:15):
Hicks estate to him so he could control it, which
just tells me that he was planning on targeting his
sister and the rest of her kids to make it
easier if he had control over the estate. It doesn't
matter who necessarily these policies were toward or said that
he has control over the state. Why why why do
you think she was signed that over to you, Willie?
(34:36):
Why are you mom? Let's look at him again, like,
let's all be serious. He had that been hiding behind
the word like he had that been hiding by the
word black hitler. Yeah, he does. But the arm up
and everything. Oh my god, sorry if you guys here
squeaking to my baby is here? So sorry? Not sorry?
Speaker 3 (34:58):
What?
Speaker 1 (34:59):
Yeah? Crooked nose willly don't like the love side, Wally melted,
pot faced. I just hate him, oh wily, so rest
in peace to James, my God, Jesus and our heart
squall to his mother and his family like they so
(35:19):
we have to how many now? I think we're up
to four? Four four for sure for the possible one
and him and him so far? Yeah, yet one more
and next. Willie had his sights set on sixteen year
old Shirley Anne, not the baby girl, bastard, and he
couldn't wait for the opportunity. In June nineteen seventy seven,
(35:43):
Sureley Anne was found crushed underneath the Reverend's car. Another
damn car. Sorry, y'all, I'm just in rare formula. Another car. Wait,
it's William guy, say my caic. No, that's the thing.
And is he retrieving all these cars after he emptied
the bottom Now, because the other cars were those other
people's cars, this is the first time his actual car
(36:05):
is involved, so we know that this is the Reverence car.
It was found on the side of Highway nine, and
from the way the scene looked, investigators felt that she
must have been trying to change the tire the baby
correct when something went wrong and it crushed her head.
Like her head was crushed by the car. The baby, yes,
was changing the tire. Sixteen. I'm fifty and I don't
(36:25):
know how fifty one. Oh, I'm fifty one. I recently
learned how to change a tire, but eat on the
side of the highway. I'm not changing no tire. I
can't have the damn thank you. She's sixteen years old.
Crush that baby head yep. And even back then, everyone
was skeptical because a sixteen year old girl with no
experience on how to change a tire is getting out
(36:48):
on the highway to change a tire. They lying they
ain't have the dust and fingerprint stuff back then. Evidently,
I mean they regardless that they did. They were so lazy.
Their mom. The laziness that was a it has to
be something supernatural. We're gonna get to that. So she
sat on the highway, they think, oh, it's an accident.
(37:08):
But when the autopsy revealed that she was dead before
she was put under the car, they finally had the
evidence of a murder that they needed to go properly
investigate Willie. Thank god, because everything else was circumstantial. You know,
now they got it. And at this point he can
be responsible for the death of six people. Good, he
(37:28):
needs to be responsible for seven and eight, well, get
punished for him, at least. I agree, what Lilly, what
is what happened to him? I don't know. We don't
how to do it. It all comes down the money.
In this case, it's all coming down the money. But
he is a ship to pay them bills all by this.
If he was loan shark, if he was involved with
a loan shark and somebody was starting to cut his
(37:50):
toes off or break his kneecaps, and he killed his
first wife to get the money on it, because, let's
be honest, he was plotting on her. We know he
took those policies out. They were married what less than
a year? Ten months?
Speaker 2 (38:01):
Right?
Speaker 1 (38:01):
No, that was the second wife, Dorcas. No, him and
Mary were married for over fifteen years. Yes. Wow, So
to kill someone that you've known that long because you're
in debt like you, His humanity was turned off a
long time ago. I just don't know what caused it.
And if Willy had plans of continuing to get away
(38:22):
with his six scheme, he should have never killed Shirleyanne
because she had her own family. Mind you, this Shirleianne
was not his family. No, Chrilianne came with his wife, Ophelia,
so she had a family that loved her. Hundreds of
people were in attendance at her funeral. I read from
three hundred to six hundred people were there. Wow, including
(38:43):
Willie Maxwell. Let me ask you some did that Negro
have a policy baby too? We don't even get that far. Good,
so good watch what happens? Okay.
Speaker 3 (38:56):
This episode is brought to you by Jack Daniels. Jack
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Speaker 1 (39:51):
So, like I said, funeral, everybody was suspicious of him
and rightfully so seemingly accept his duve wife. God O
feel you you were dumb Filia, So whatever. Shout out
to Shirley Anne. Shout out to her family that showed
up and was mad and vocal about her death. Because
(40:16):
she was so cute. I found a picture of her. Because,
as you guys can see, a lot of the other
victims we didn't have no pictures are but I was
so glad I could humanize what she went through. She
was freaking adorable. Yeah. So not only did we he
have the audiocity to show up to the funeral funeral,
but he got up there, what half ball and performed
(40:38):
her eulogy. Don't let him do that. Let the devil
in eulogi is precious baby. When he cracked her skulls,
smashed her car on her head, how evil is that?
But o'pheeli and needs rocks rocked, Like, why would you
(41:01):
even put let that nigga come up in there? Anyway?
He doesn't right, People are furious, furious mom, including one
of shirley AND's sisters, who yelled at Willie after the
eulogy in front of everyone and said, quote, you killed
my sister and now you're gonna pay for it good.
And when she said now, male, she meant, right right now,
(41:25):
did the cavali come in and take his black a
out of there? Something even better, somebody kill And immediately
after she said that, a man in a green suit
stood up from the pews in front of Willie, turned
around and shot him in the head three times. Whoa wow, wow,
(41:47):
you won't collect on this one, like God just got adrenaline.
Rush oh am g who every times in the head
he met what he met? You mean what he met?
He mean when he did? He stood on it three
times a day. They said, if he was any close home,
this is exciting. I'm not. I'm not excited, am I?
(42:10):
I don't know he killed all these people, He killed
this poor girl. He had the audacity to get up,
to get up on that funeral and say how amazing
she was and how sweet she was, and everybody knows
you killed her. It takes another level of self control
to not do what this man ended up doing. So
(42:31):
Who The fifty two year old died instantly, well technically
not instantly, because, according to the Guardian, listened to this
one mom quote. Maxwell tried raising his handkerchief to wipe
away the blood, but he died before the white cotton
touched his face. I want to die with dignity, worried
(42:53):
about how you're looking, and wipe and you got three
billo holes of your Hey geez. The man that shot
him was a relative as Shirlians. Thank you. Thirty six
year old truck driver Robert Lewis burns Wow and Robert
had a wife and daughter of his own. That's her.
That's her funeral. They were taking her casket out and stuff.
(43:13):
But that's Burns's been playing. Nope. And although everyone ran
out of the funerals screaming obviously and ducking for cover,
no one wondered why Willie was the target. When I
say this man had a reputation on people were so
afraid of him. They didn't know who his next target
would be. They knew he was doing this, and according
(43:35):
to many people in that area, they believe that Willie
was practicing voodoo, and not only his victims, but also
the law enforcement officers that were responsible for catching him.
So that's why they were determining that no foul play.
This person wasn't murdered, because the medical examiner has to
determine that someone was murdered or they died via homicide.
(43:57):
For him to even remotely because considered responsible for their death,
especially back then, Wow Chow. So everywhere I looked for
research on him, it was like the voodoo preacher. They
kept calling him the voodoo preacher, but there wasn't a
lot of information about Well, I'll say, is proof right
(44:17):
that he was doing the voodoo. I'm not sure, but
there are a lot of people close to him that
would even come out later and say, yo, he was.
He had voodoo stuff always around him like he was
on that. So I don't know who's wherever he was,
but he was in touch with some with some evil
things in the sense of, oh, you can practice voodoo
(44:39):
and have something evil and bad or death happened to someone.
I'm sorry. I know you guys get offended, but that's bad. Yeah,
and it shouldn't be offend. People say, you know, you
guys are so misinformed about voodoo. It's a religion. So
sud if I can, if I can do something to
cut chickens neck and have somebody die from that or
(45:00):
put a hex on somebody from that's wrong. That's dead wrong.
I don't care what they did to me. I can't
open that type of karma up to myself. That's why
I plead the blood. Yeah, I'll say what you wanta say.
The blood works, press blood versus chicken blood. How how different.
We're not gonna play with you about don't don't do that,
(45:21):
don't do that. But anyway, Uncle Burns looked like he
part of the temptations or fine heartbeats or something, but
he wasn't playing Yes, definitely get thank you, and he
had to go to jail. Didn't did they put him
in jail ridic his trial because of course Robert had
to go to trial. He murdered someone in front of
hundreds of people. I ain't see it, I all right.
(45:42):
And he was actually represented in court by Willie's old
insurance claims attorney Tom Radley. So this is the guy
that was going through all of Willie's like court stuff, exhausted,
like dang, you know, knowing he killed these people. Let's
be real, but in my mom like day, this town
is really small.
Speaker 5 (46:00):
It is.
Speaker 2 (46:01):
It is.
Speaker 1 (46:01):
So the trial started in September of nineteen seventy seven,
so three months after Shirley Ann's murder, and lasted two days.
The case should have been a slam dunk. Like I said,
he not only he killed him in front of a
bunch of people, but he also confessed to the cops
when they pulled up. So everybody runs out of the church, right,
he stays inside. When the cops get in there to
(46:24):
arrest him, he says, quote, I had to do it,
and if I had to do it, over I do
it again. Only God can judge me. He killed my family.
But that's not where robert attorneys wanted to focus on. See,
he wanted the conversation to be about if Robert was
justified in the killing, not if he did it or not.
(46:45):
We all know he did it, and for that reason,
he had Robert enter a plea of not guilty by
reason of insanity. You ain't crazy, but okay, come on listen,
I'm listening. The defense attorney brought up how many people
had died close to Willie. He brought in a witness
named Alfonso Murphy that testified that Willy had tried to
(47:07):
hire him to kill Shirley Anne, but he refused. There
was also evidence presented that suggested Willie was this voodoo
practitioner and kept a lot of voodoo related materials around
him and where he lived. It's pretty specific, right. They
also argued that after seeing all of the loss of
(47:27):
life and chaos and Vietnam when he was stationed there
ten years ago, Robert, that's the guy's name, right, You
gonna forget to name in a second. Yes, Robert's PTSD
had deeply affected him. Oh so all that coupled with
the loss of his you know. Yeah, and we have
to remember the jury lives in the area. The jury
(47:47):
most likely have heard something did a get off. As
a shock to many, the jury found that Robert was
in fact insane at the time of the murder, and
the judge ordered Robert to be committed to a state
mental institution for as little as thirty days or as
many as needed. He could be released in the first
(48:09):
thirty days only if it was determined that he is
not mentally disturbed or dangerous and like his presence state.
They gave him slap on the wrist. As a black man,
they gave a slap on the wrist. Good holy conn
and he just he shot somebody three times in the
head in front of hundreds of people. They could have
easily just been like, give him the chair, let's kill him.
(48:31):
Why fun right now? You know, legally kill a black man.
Why not? He took a murderer. He took a serial
murderer the streets. It's true and the worst of the
worst of the serial killers are people that target what
children and their own family members. So I think the
jury really related to that and was like, give them,
(48:53):
you know, the minimum, not the maximum. The minimum, and
he was literally released a few weeks later.
Speaker 7 (48:59):
Good, yeah, close your eyes, exhale, fill your body, relax,
and let go of whatever you're carrying today. Well, I'm
letting go of the worry that I wouldn't get my
new contacts in time for this class. I got them
delivered free from one eight hundred Contacts. Oh my gosh,
they're so fast and breathe. Oh sorry, I almost couldn't
(49:19):
breathe when I saw the discount they gave me on
my first order. Oh sorry, no mistay.
Speaker 6 (49:25):
Visit one eight hundred contacts dot com today to save
on your first order one eight hundred contacts.
Speaker 1 (49:30):
So that's him Burned and his wife and his daughter
before he goes to court. Good, good, look at fam.
She looks cute. I can really see it, but she's yeah,
here is on point. And then that's the journeyed Tome.
That's Tom and then this is our guy, Robert Burns
as old man go Robert being interviewed in twenty twenty.
(49:54):
I think it was twenty twenty. Yeah really, Oh, he
got out and lived a full life, had a wife
saying yeah, still down this way where I'm gonna say,
somewhere in his ring saying it's saying the same saying
saying it's same sign. He wasn't crazy when he went in,
He ain't crazy when he got out. He met when
he meant, he did what he did, and and he
should not have lived his life in prison. I don't
(50:17):
think so, absolutely not. I think that was a street justice.
I said that that was justified. You know, I ain't
the one to take a person life, but still that
was justified because he would have kept going. Yes, mom,
he wouldn't have stopped. Nobody was up. And Tom Hadley
shout out to that dog one man because he could
have easily given in to it, or or if he
(50:39):
wasn't as creative as he was with the defense, Robert
could have been sitting on death row right now. Yeah,
wow wow, So yeah, that's our case. Basically, we have
a little bit of a little fun fact. I don't
know if you've heard of it, mom, but the author
of the of the book To Kill a mocking Bird
(51:00):
heard of that. Her name's Harper Lee. She is from
this part of Alabama, and she was writing a book
based on this case. Oh, like did all the research.
He interviewed Robert himself and everything. She was going to
call it The Reverend. I think she put hours mom
and hours into it. She talked to family members and said,
(51:20):
you have no idea how many people he had insurance
policies on, Like, you guys will never understand how many
people were at risk if he wasn't stopped. So did
she write the book? It never was published. Unfortunately, it
never got out and she died. So I would love
to read it. I know she had so much information too,
Like she really was boots to the ground in the
(51:40):
thick of it, and she has a little caucus woman
or a little cigarette. Look good. It looked like all Virginia.
Oh wow, yeah, so really cool. She didn't she wasn't
writing it in the way of you know, the mouse
saying stupid. So it's the best story, yeah, I mean
it was. It was enticing. And when she returned to
her hometown was when what's his name they were people
(52:04):
were trying to get Robert put to death or something
like that. I know, it was a whole thing. She
she came back right when he was going on trial
for everything, and you know that's what she learned about
Willie and all that. So pretty cool to kill a
Mockingbird is pretty famous famous. Shout out to you, Harper
for being interested in this story, you know, sharing it.
(52:26):
I hope someone dig up the archives and go ahead
and put it out there. So the first couple of
chapters I think were happened upon by Shirley Ann's family,
but I haven't seen them. I didn't see them released
or anything like that, so maybe they're just keeping it,
you know, under wraps or whatever. But I mean, yeah,
(52:46):
Shirley should have not died. Ophelia, my god, Ophelia, you
were you were messing with this man when you knew
he was not only cheating on his wife, but two
of his wives had already been killed, and then you
still married him. That's what I'm saying. She was part
of the I know, but I'm tired of women just
thinking I'm different or I'm the exception who she didn't
think back because he skipped over to get to the
(53:08):
next door neighbor, right, and then when she died she
was okay. Yeah, but I'm just saying, like the stupidity
of all the brainwashing. But was it brainwashing? Were these
women under some type of voodoo spell?
Speaker 2 (53:20):
You know?
Speaker 1 (53:21):
Did did Dorcas succumb to something that he put on her,
and that's why she married this man and didn't testify
against him. All of that. I don't know much about
those types of things. I don't know much about changing
someone's behavior with spells and stuff like that, but I
know it's possible. So who knows what he was really
doing to these people? Oh girl, that's why we gotta
(53:41):
stay prayed up and ever people and protect your piece
of space. Yes, yes, yes, yes, you don't know what
people got going on? So yeah, that's our case, y'all.
What a dousing. I don't like too many people. Guy
that should not die. He should have been in jail
(54:03):
thanks to Dorcas. He would have been in jail after
he killed Mary Lou. You know, so dog on a Dorcas.
Damn it Dorcas. Let me say that. That's my one
cuss word of the episode. Mom has had three I did,
so I canto I forget them.
Speaker 5 (54:21):
He did.
Speaker 1 (54:21):
Yeah, but let us know what you guys thought about
this episode? Oh my work. Yeah that's a doozy. Friends,
what there's two hundred're gonna be like? I know, I
really wanted to be something that like grips you all
by those short and curlies, so short curls. So send
(54:45):
me your request for what you want episode two hundred
to be. If I don't get something that I feel
like it is really really juicy, I'm just gonna pick one.
And you know we're just gonna have fun anyway. Yes, mom,
oh lot, I'm gonna shave y'all go wax tram. We
(55:06):
do want you to grab I want this episode, this
next episode to grab you. Okay, love you guys so much,
so much. Please come see us in Vegas in October. Yes,
the trip, and I'm not gonna lie even if you
guys don't come, we may have to go out there
and I want to gamble. We might go out there
(55:28):
have a gamble.
Speaker 2 (55:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (55:29):
Oh we have a year so we can put your
feet in it. But you gotta go to Vegas. So
come see us, y'all. We might even you know, hit
a hit a blackjack table two together. We'll see. Because
our friends been hanging out, they like to hang. You
wanna hang too, So hopefully we see you guys in
October thirty. First get your tickets at blackchucrime dot com.
(55:51):
And yeah, we love you so much. If you enjoy
the show at all. Wait a minute, if they come
on Halloween, can they dress up like a different characters?
You have to dress up? Matter of fact, it's not
I have to, but absolutely, please please please dress up.
I'm gonna be dressed up looking fine. Oh girl, Oh
I already got my No, I'm serious. I plan on
dressing up. I know, but I mean we're doing characters
(56:15):
or well, you can dress up as whoever you want
to look howeveryone. I'm not dressing up as a murder killer. No, no, no,
I'm dressing up as who I want to dress up as.
It's gonna be a sexy surprise and come show up
and it's gonna be a vibe. Oh and we'll have
a we'll have a contest, yes, of the most creative costume.
Mom's gonna dress up. It's gonna be a vibe. I'm
(56:37):
gonna be an angel. I'm gonna let y'all know right now, Akay,
she's dressing up as something she's not. So yes, like
we all are all those things that be not read
that clock your te ball, all right, y'all, all right,
look all right, y'all. Love you guys so much, Thank
(56:58):
you so much, and Yeah, if you enjoy the show
at all, please give us a five star rating act Spotify,
Apple Podcasts, and even Facebook. It really really helps the
show grow. And yeah, as always, before we go, b
safe you say, protect your piece huh and protect your space. Yeah,
so we don't have to cover your caves. Ye, PRIs
(57:23):
in Vegas. Thanks so much for listening to the show.
You can stream all of our episodes on Amazon Music, Spotify,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your favorite podcasts. And
if you enjoy the show, please leave us a five
star rating on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and even Facebook. It's
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(57:46):
and for more information about the show, you can visit
blatchuchime dot com. See you next time.
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