September 27, 2023 • 45 mins
This week we talk about the Dallas Carter High School football robbery ring. Join us as we talk about the unexpected criminal activies of a high school football team, how their actions both on and off the field, led to a scandal that rocked the community. From winning the state championship to heists, we will reveal the hidden side of these young men and the consequences they faced.
Sources for this episode:
Wikipedia - Oak Cliff
Wikipedia - David W. Carter High School
Stateline Sports Network - Carter High...'it simply doesn't matter that you can run the football'
Dallas News - Former players on 1988 Dallas Carter football team tried to move on, but shaking past wasn't easy
Dallas News - From the Archives: arter High stripped of 1988 State Title After Win
WFAA - 'Best team ever assembled': As Dallas ISD prepares for its first championship since 1958, memories of Dallas Carter's 1988 season remain
Carter Boyz by Gary Edwards
Dallas News - Bad habit: Robbery spree involving 6 1988 Dallas Carter football players was 'just for kicks'
New York Times - 10 Texas Athletes Are Sentenced to Jail Terms for RobberiesSupport the show
Sources for this episode:
Wikipedia - Oak Cliff
Wikipedia - David W. Carter High School
Stateline Sports Network - Carter High...'it simply doesn't matter that you can run the football'
Dallas News - Former players on 1988 Dallas Carter football team tried to move on, but shaking past wasn't easy
Dallas News - From the Archives: arter High stripped of 1988 State Title After Win
WFAA - 'Best team ever assembled': As Dallas ISD prepares for its first championship since 1958, memories of Dallas Carter's 1988 season remain
Carter Boyz by Gary Edwards
Dallas News - Bad habit: Robbery spree involving 6 1988 Dallas Carter football players was 'just for kicks'
New York Times - 10 Texas Athletes Are Sentenced to Jail Terms for RobberiesSupport the show
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to Crime on My Coffee.This podcast contains graphic descriptions and adult content
mature audiences only. Please, Hi, y'all, and welcome to Crime with
(00:30):
My Coffee. I'm your fabulous hostesswith the Mostess, June, and I'm
Suzanne. We're gonna tell you somestories you've heard, some of you haven't,
and some you'll wish you hadn't,all with a Texas twang. All
right, Well, welcome back,you guys, welcome back. So glad
to have you. Absolutely, we'reglad you're here. We got plenty for
(00:54):
you to listen to. If youhaven't heard many or any before, m
give us a try. Yeah,yeah, sounds good, it could be
fine. What's in your mug thisweek? Well, in my mug,
you know, I just got theregular breakfast blend Donut Shop coffee that I
(01:19):
normally always have in French vanilla creamerbecause that's what I like, and it's
it's about it, just your basic. I didn't go to the cut the
boxopods. Maybe next time. I'mjust I'm getting down to like every time
I pick one out, I sayssomething about pumpkin spice or something like that,
(01:42):
and I'm not sure. I'm quiteready for that because we were in
probably false start and fall, youknow, because we're here in Texas,
and so I just now, buteventually I'll I will drink them all.
My just haven't done it yet.So, and what's in your mug?
(02:05):
I went adventurous this week. FaceBones Coffee Company partnered with Indiana Jones,
or maybe they didn't partner with them, and they just did some Indiana Jones
inspired coffee. I'm not real sure, but they had some Indiana Jones inspired
coffee. The one that I amdrinking today is Toffee Treasure. Oh yeah,
that sounds delicious. It's not thatbad. I'm I'm about it.
(02:30):
Then that's awesome. So I'm drinkingthat with some dunkin Donuts creamer in it
or extra extra creamer in it.It's pretty good, pretty good. It's
not my normal. It's got justalmost a hint of chocolate maybe, and
I want to say caramel maybe,which is really weird because I'm not usually
a big caramel person. Right,But this coffee is not bad. It's
(02:53):
not bad. It's it's the wholetoffee thing. You know. I like
a good coffee. What is ita little candy. That's that's like a
toffee candy. It's almost it's acrunchy candy. I can't think of what
it's called, but I like itwhatever it's called. Okay, well,
good for you. Yeah, wellI have a case for us this week.
(03:15):
Okay. We are going to notvery far at all, by the
way, all right, we aregoing to go to Oak Cliff in Texas.
Okay. Now, oak Cliff tous is more of a city within
(03:36):
Dallas, Texas. Yes, butit actually was annexed in two Dallas in
nineteen oh three, and so itis considered a neighborhood in Dallas. Gotcha,
gotcha. So the whole town areathat we consider oak Cliff, Dallas
(03:57):
considers an established neighbor hood. Okay, all right, okay, yeah,
so I want to name off afew people from oak Cliff. M Clifton
Abraham he graduated high school in nineteenninety. He was a defensive back for
the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in nineteen ninetyfive, the Chicago Bears in nineteen ninety
(04:21):
six, and the Carolina Panthers innineteen ninety seven. Yay football. Jesse
Armstead. He graduated in nineteen eightynine. He was a linebacker for eleven
seasons with the New York Giants andthe Washington Redskins. Yay football. Another
(04:43):
person I want to mention Joe Birch. He graduated in nineteen eighty nine.
He was an offensive and defensive lineman. He played for the New England Patriots
and the Denver Broncos. Yay football. Okay, wait a minute, you're
gonna be awful happy with all thesefootball stuff. I've not done naming people
(05:04):
something in store, and I'm notsure I'm gonna love it. Let me
finish naming these people. I havetwo more. Okay, yeah, okay,
let's go. Greg Hill he graduatedin nineteen ninety. He was a
running back for the Kansas City Chiefs, the Saint Louis Rams, and the
Detroit Lions. Gay football. Andthe last one I want to mention is
(05:29):
Lashai Maston. He graduated in nineteeneighty nine. He was a running back
for the Houston Oilers. Yes,there did used to be a Houston Oilers
team, and then they became theTennessee Oilers, and then they were the
Tennessee Titans, and then they werethe Houston Titans, and now they're the
Houston Texans. I don't know it'scrazy anyway, but Lashai Maston was a
(05:49):
running back for the Houston Oilers,the Jacksonville Jaguars, and the Washington Redskins.
Nice, very nice. They lovefoot ball. As you point it
out, all of these people wereNFL players. Yes, they had that
in common. Something else they alsohad in common is they all played for
(06:11):
the nineteen eighty eight nineteen eighty nineDallas David W. Carter High School Cowboys
football team from the Oak Cliff neighborhood. Sweet It was a football team that
made headlines that season for multiple reasons, which we'll get into mm. It
has been touted as a one ofthe best high school football teams ever put
(06:38):
together by some people. It wasloaded with talent anyway you look at it.
Oh yeah, absolutely. Did youhear all the names I just named
off exactly? You ever heard?Have you ever seen the movie Friday Night
Lights? I don't think I everhave. I know that is an amazing
(07:00):
movie. It's got tim and growin it. Mother, I know,
I just I don't. It's gotBilly Bob Thornton in it. I just
don't think I've ever seen it.For whatever reason, I am so disappointed
in you. I know, maybeI'll watch it tonight or something. It's
streaming on Peacock. Okay, well, there you go. Now we know,
(07:23):
just so you know, as oftoday, as of us recording it,
it is streaming on Peacock. Okay, okay. Anyway, the Carter
Cowboys were featured in that movie.In that movie, they were portrayed as
the cheap shot takers and they werejust these huge giants compared to the players
on the Odessa Permian team for thenineteen eighty eight state championship title. However,
(07:49):
they weren't these cheap shot takers.They weren't these huge giants. I
mean, you know, they dideventually a lot of them went on to
play NFL and they were pretty big. But they were good football players,
you know exactly. They were footballplayers. They love the game, they
loved what they were doing. Sothey were just good. Yeah. And
(08:13):
they didn't beat Odessa Hermian for thestate title. They actually faced them in
the state semifinals. I mean theydid beat them, just not for the
title. Right. But let's rewindand let's start back at the beginning of
the nineteen eighty nine or nineteen eightyeight nineteen eighty nine high school football season
(08:37):
for Carter High. Okay, Iread that college scouts were filling the bleachers
before the season ever even got started. They were there. It makes sense
that they would. Did you hearall these names of all these football players
who love the game, who absolutelyat that point in high school and stuff,
(09:03):
when you're playing, you love thegame so much. It's not a
job, it's your life. Soyeah, I get it. I get
it. But before the season evenstop, they even started, scouts were
already watching this team, watching thesekids, trying to think, Okay,
we want to offer him a scholarship. We want to offer him a scholarship.
(09:24):
We want to offer him a scholarship, right, and the people of
Oak Cliff, we're also filling thebleachers just to watch the practices. The
I want to say, these werepractices before school even started. You know,
it's still summertime and they're doing footballpractice. Gotcha. Now, remember
(09:45):
people, the eighties and the ninetieswere a different time than they are now.
Just so you know. Yes,Well, as the season got started,
the Carter Cowboys would put quite ashow on the field. They dominated,
They were fast, they were fit, they were a well oiled machine.
(10:11):
The only game that they didn't winthat regular season, they didn't technically
lose it either. They ended uptying with another high school. From what
I understand, they went to theyplayed this high school and it was a
tie game at the end of thefourth quarter, so they go into overtime,
(10:31):
and at the end of the overtimequarter it was still tied, so
they just agreed to call it atie for both teams. Okay, so
their record going into the playoffs forthe state championship was eight and zero.
Sweet plus that little hidden one atthe end for the tie, but we
don't really have to count that one. Right just before their first playoff game,
(10:56):
though, the UIL got in touchwith Dallas Carter because they had received
an anonymous tip that one of theplayers on their team had been ineligible ineligible
to play at one point during theseason and they were going to have to
do this investigation into it. Now. Back in nineteen eighty five is when
(11:18):
Texas enacted a no pass, noplay policy that requires all students who are
doing extracurricular activities sports, choir,band, you know whatever, they have
to be passing all of their classesor they can't participate. Yes, so
if that's not something you had todeal with while you went to school,
(11:41):
but I did, so you know, the no pass, no play to
me was just always there. Well, now they wanted all and as far
as I know, everybody that didextracurricular stuff like that, football and everything
they passed. They were decent studstudents anyway, you know, I think
(12:01):
it was just ingrained in them.If you want to do this, you
have to do good in school becausethis is not going to be something that
you can just cushion your life withor whatever. Right. So yeah,
So but in nineteen eighty five,Texas did actually pass this and make it
(12:22):
a thing. You know, nopass, no play, that's what we
call it here. Right, Well, it turns out that their star corner
corner back, not quarterback like Istarted to say, their star cornerback,
Gary Edwards was the student in question. M It was said that he had
(12:46):
actually failed in the first six weeksin his algebra class. And he's like,
no, I didn't, And theysaid, you know, no,
he changed his grade. He wasfailing. And he's like, no,
no, I didn't. He pullsout his report card, he pulls out
all this stuff, you know,to show the school officials and the UIL
investigators and his parents and his lawyer, because they got a lawyer because they
(13:09):
said, you know, okay,no, he was passing, barely passing.
It was a seventy two, butit was passing. That's passing exactly.
And so they said, you know, we're going to fight this,
and so they got a lawyer,and they hired this guy, and he
started going to court, you know, to get injunctions because they were saying,
you know, he was ineligible forthe first six weeks. He shouldn't
(13:31):
have been playing, and so thereforey'all technically didn't make it to the playoffs.
You'll have to forfeit these first gamesof the season, so that means
you're not eligible for the playoffs.So they're fighting and they finally get this
injunction the day they're supposed to havetheir first playoff game, and so they're
told, okay, you can play. They actually moved the game to the
(13:54):
next day because it came so latein the day on playoff day that it
said, you know, they couldplay. So they go the next day
and they play against this team andthey win nice. So they're getting ready
to move on to the next round. The next week, they had to
end up going through the same RGAMOrole again, having to go to court
get an injunction to say, youknow, they can play blah blah blah.
(14:18):
They eventually do get this injunction andthey go to the playoff game and
they win that game. Nice.That's pretty much the way things went for
most of the playoff games. Now, the UIL would eventually, I want
to say, one or two gamesbefore the title game, the UIL came
(14:39):
in and said, okay, no, yeah, we're clearing him. He
was passing. Dallas Carter went onto play Odessa Prmian in the semifinals.
They won. They moved on tothe state championship game against Converse Judson and
they won that game too. Nineteeneighty eight, they are the state champs
for high school football in the stateof Texas. It was the first time
(15:03):
that a Dallas I s D Schoolhad won a state championship since nineteen fifty.
Wow. Now, the UIL,I think though, kept digging and
looking into the background of all this, you know, Gary Edwards's grades and
all of that, and basically whatit all ended up boiling down to was
(15:26):
the way that this one particular teacherthat he had for algebra for the first
six weeks because he did transfer outof his class. Okay, But the
way this particular teacher was inputting gradesinto his grade book versus how the principle
said, you need to input yourgrades and count your grades in your grade
books. So there was supposed tobe like a bell ringer warm up class
(15:50):
work grade that counted for twenty percentof your grade. There was supposed to
be a weekly test that counted fortwenty percent of your grade. There was
supposed to be weekly homework that outfor twenty percent of your grade, and
then the final test that would countas twenty five percent of your grade.
I said twenty percent on all theothers, but I meant twenty five percent.
Okay. Well, the way theteacher was putting the grades in his
(16:12):
grade book was if you did thework, if he turned in the work
after he graded the work, hewould put a check mark in his grade
book. If you didn't do thework, if you turned in part of
the work, he would just putan n C for not complete. Okay.
When this teacher averaged his grades withhis way of grading nobody really knew
(16:36):
what these grades were, what thecheck mark grade was. So you know,
when this teacher averaged these grades,I don't know what he what number
grade he gave for the check marks, but I know he gave a zero
for all of the ncs that hehad in his book. His When Gary
Edwards's grade was averaged that way,he was failing with the sixty eight point
(17:00):
something percent for the class right,and seventy or below is spelling, so
technically sixty nine or below is right. But the principle came in and said,
no, you know, if you'regoing to count these check marks as
let's say on one hundred or ninetyeight or ninety or whatever, you got
to count these in c's. Thesenot completes. You can't count them all
(17:25):
as zeros because what if they didhave the work, you know, we
can't tell that from your grading.So we're going to put a fifty as
his grade for every incomplete that hehas, and they averaged that all out,
and his grade was a seventy two, and so that's what they had
put on his report card. Andso that's what basically this whole controversy was.
(17:47):
Anyway, so they win the statechampionship, the school, the community,
they're all excited that Dallas Carter won, making it like I said,
Okay, No, I didn't saythis part, making it the third time
a Dallas I. S D.School had won the one and the like
I said, the first time sincenineteen fifty. Wow. And after this
(18:08):
championship game, a lot of thekids were whisked away on school scholarship recruiting
trips and such to all these variouscolleges all over the country. M If
everything that I read, if Iread it all correctly, eighteen kids that
were on the team for nineteen eightyeight to nineteen eighty nine, they were
(18:32):
not all seniors that year, butany but out of all the kids that
played on the team that year,sophomores, junior, seniors, eighteen of
them would eventually get scholarships, fullscholarships to college to play football. Nice,
very very nice. It made anational record high for the number of
(18:52):
scholarships awarded to one team, oneschool. That's awesome, Yeah, it's
awesome. Exactly. Well, afew weeks before graduation in nineteen eighty nine,
Gary was heading to class and hewas talking with two of his friends,
Vincent and Derek Evans. Derek wasalso on the football team. I
(19:14):
don't think Vincent was though, buthe might have been, but I don't
think so. Well, they cameup with a plan to rob the Taco
Bueno that Vincent was working at.No no, no, no, no.
Yeah. The whole plan was itwas going to be a fake robbery.
They were just going to make offwith the money. They Eric and
(19:36):
er sorry Evans and Edwards would comein one night while Vince was working while
he was working there at the cashregister. They'd come up. They'd tell
Vince, hey, give us allyour money, and Vince would hand over
all the money and then they wouldsplit the money three ways, easy peasy,
nobody gets caught. It's fine,right, Yeah, we're high school
ors. That's exactly had the waythe world works. And yes, that
makes sense to us because we're inhigh school. While they're in high school,
(20:00):
their local celebrities, they feel likenothing can touch them, They can
do no wrong, they can dowhatever they want and it's fine. Hm.
Well, the big night came up, they went in and they left
with about fifteen hundred dollars that night. Wow, that's a lot of money
(20:22):
even now, that's all. Yeah. Even now, that's a lot of
money. But in today's dollars,I did convert this one. This one
I did convert into today's dollars,almost four thousand dollars. Wow. And
they split it three ways. Evansand Edwards drove off, they split,
you know, took their shares andwent about their separate ways. The next
(20:44):
day at school, they gave Vincehis cut. It was all gravy.
Mmm. Edwards get caught. Well, Edwards and Evans were thinking, you
know, hey, that was supersuper easy. Let's do it again.
Well, for first of all,it was an inside job, and so
if you do it again, youmight not know these people. It might
(21:07):
not be so easy. Well,they set their sights on a local church's
chicken. They go, they goin, Evans walks up to the cashier,
order some food and then says,screw it, give me your money.
At this time, Edwards is usingthe old finger in the jacket or
shirt trick to make it look likehe's got a gun, even though he
(21:27):
really didn't have a gun. Hejust has his finger guns. Right.
But you know, so technically it'snot an armed robbery. It's just a
robbery because there is no gun robbery. Yeah, I don't know's you gotta
use his arm, so it's arm. No, I'm just kidding. Well,
you know, like I said,using the old finger in the shirt,
(21:49):
you know I have a gun trick, right. Well, then they
figured they should probably change that justin case anybody decided to give them trouble
the next time. No, soEdwards went and he took a gun that
his parents had without his parents knowing, and he started taking nat on their
little surprise robberies. The next jobthey pulled was that the astro drive in
(22:15):
with a friend from Edwards's neighborhood.Edwards and the friend both had a gun
this time. Then they hit alocal dry cleaners. They had successfully pulled
off four robberies in the span oftwo weeks. Do they wear ski mask
(22:37):
or anything? Okay? So Iwho they are now? I did read
a book that was written by GaryEdwards, the Gary Edwards that we were
talking about in this case, theone that was of you know, in
the middle of the whole grade controversy, the one that's robbing these places with
Derek Evans, his teammate, right, And he wrote this book about this
(23:00):
whole thing from his experience, hispoint of view, the way he sees
things. And I know that hesaid the first time they didn't wear any
masks or anything. He didn't sayanything specifically about any of the others that
followed after that, but he didsay in this book that you know,
(23:21):
they weren't worried about getting caught becauseyou know, everybody knew who they were,
but nobody was going to tattle onthem because they just won the freaking
state championship for football and they werefreaking celebrities and they were all going to
college, and they were all goingto go to the NFL and they were
going to be super famous. Yeah, but you're stealing from me, and
I'm gonna tell on you. I'mjust saying, Yeah. Well, like
(23:45):
I said, I read this bookby Edwards. I will make sure I
link it in the show notes.But right around this time, Edwards said
that he started to notice a fewother guys around the school dressing a little
flashier, with new shoes or anew jacket, or maybe new jewelry.
(24:07):
These particular ones that I'm going tomention are Keith Campbell, Carlos Allen.
Oh, I think I need tochange that name we'll say John Smith,
okay, because if I didn't,I don't think I changed it in this
pot in my notes, but Ithink I changed it later on. So
(24:29):
John Smith and Patrick P. K. Williams, they were the ones that
he specifically mentioned in the book.They were also all on the football team
that year. M Edwards figured theywere doing something illegal. You don't just
start showing up with all this flashyor new stuff without doing something illegal,
(24:51):
he thought. But he definitely wasn'tgoing to ask them about it, and
they weren't going to volunteer it becausethe first rule of illegal club is don't
talk about illegal club bro exactly,And you're doing the same thing. So
really you want to judge somebody else, siout, okay, sure? Yeah.
(25:14):
Well, sometime in June, aftergraduation, Evans and Edwards were on
their way to the gym together.They were doing summer workouts before they shipped
off to their respective colleges, youknow, to start working out with their
respective new college teams and teammates.But they didn't want to get soft in
the you know, little time theyhad between graduation and shipping out for that.
So they're still working out together,gotcha. Well, they're heading to
(25:36):
the gym, and they just theyEdwards said that they shared this look between
them, and he described it asa look of they both knew that they
were going to rob the video storeafter their workout. I don't know if
they knew that it was going tobe the video store. I don't know
if they were passing by the videostore and that's when they looked at each
other, or if it was justa you know, hey, we're going
to hit another another place after weget done working out. It wasn't real
(26:00):
specific on that end, but eitherway, it goes. After their workout,
they go into the local video rentalstore, which I am picturing as
a blockbuster because I don't think Hollywoodwas around yet. This was the late
eighties, right, And Evan goesup and he tells the worker, hey,
I want all your money. AndEdward is this standing over here by
the door, you know, makingsure nobody's running in or out or whatever.
(26:23):
And he said that the cashier personstarted yelling and screaming and freaking out.
I can't blame them. I wouldbe doing the same thing. You're
pointing a gun at me, oreven if you're not pointing a gun at
me, you know, whether it'sfinger guns or if you just walk in
and you're this big, buff guyand you're saying to me, give me
all your money. I'm gonna belike, here you go, and I'm
gonna throw it at you in I'ma dug and run for cover, like
(26:45):
I'm definitely gonna freak out. Absolutely, I got no beef with you,
bro. This is not my money. You can have it, exactly.
I just work here. Here yougo, this is above my pay grade.
Take all you want. There yougo. But while Evans, you
know, so Evans stayed there toget the money, Edwards decided to start
(27:07):
heading out to the car, maybeto get it ready to go so that
it's running when they leave or whatever. But he said, as he was
walking out, he passed this guy. We're going to call him Jimmy.
That is not his real name.But he passed Jimmy, this guy that
he knew. They weren't friends,but they knew each other. And he
said, Jimmy, man, something'sgoing on in there. I don't know,
(27:29):
it's kind of crazy. You mightwant to come back later, or
you know, come back tomorrow,or wait a few minutes. Whatever.
I don't know, it's crazy inthere. I'm out of here. And
he gets in his car and Evanscomes out and joins him in the car,
but he said Jimmy went in tothe video store anyway, because Jimmy
was like, whatever, I justgotta drop this movie off, you know,
or I know exactly what I'm getting, you know, everybound. It's
(27:52):
fine, exactly exactly. But Jimmygoes ahead and goes in. Edwards and
Evans get in the car. Theytake off. They're leaving and they got
about a thousand dollars or so fromthis video store and they're splitting it between
the two of them, and Evanswas like, man, this isn't enough.
I need more, and they decided. But he wouldn't elaborate on what
he meant by that, right,But they get to the mall and they're
(28:15):
sitting in the car and they seethis cop car kind of kind of driving
around the area a little bit,but they're not really nervous. They're thinking,
you know, hey, we're awesome, super cool football players, and
there's no way this cop is lookingfor us because we can do anything.
We're invincible. We are basically heman yo. And so they get out
(28:37):
of the car to head into thestore to get whatever it was they need,
and after they got out of thecar, boom, they're surrounded by
cops. There's like lots of copcars here, lots of cops here.
They're placed under arrest and on theirway to the station. The cops are
like, oh yeah, we're totallygetting you for all these robberies. Jimmy
told us who you were, whatyou drove, where we could find you.
(28:57):
He gave us. We were justwaiting on him to are spitting out
your social Security number and your birthday. You know, he gave us everything
we needed. He gave it upand he wouldn't even party your clan exactly.
So they get down there and theythe cops hold them, Okay,
we're going to charge you with,you know, all all these robberies.
(29:18):
And they're thinking, okay, youknow it's like five six whatever, and
they're like, no, no,no, it's more than twenty, you
guys, more than twenty. AndEdwards said he was going to excuse me,
excuse me. I didn't fell math. I know math, So I'm
thinking no, yeah, Well,Edwards attorney, the one that he had
(29:45):
used for the UIL stuff just afew months before ended up bailing them out
of jail the next morning. LikeI said, the two of them were
facing more than twenty counts of armedrobbery. Wow. Edwards in his book
he said that he knew he andEvans hadn't pulled that many jobs, not
even close to that many jobs,so he didn't know for sure who else
(30:08):
was pulling these jobs. But inhis book he said, even if he
did know, he wasn't no snitchlike Jimmy over here. There you go,
so you know, he wouldn't havetold he had just taken the heat.
Art is what he says in hisbook. Well, Evans, however,
he didn't have the same sense ofloyalty that Edwards did. He said,
(30:29):
screw this. If I'm going down, everyone I know about is going
down with me, And he juststarted talking up up turns out. Now,
I read two different numbers. Iread five and I read six,
and I read them both about thesame amount of times. But five or
six members of this football team wereinvolved in this robbery ring that was made
(30:53):
up of about eleven or twelve people. Wow. Now, not all of
them went to Dallas Carter. Threeof them went to a different high school
in the same area, but theywere all sixteen, seventeen, eighteen year
old kids. Yep. P Kwas working at a Jack in the Box.
(31:15):
He I think he might have setup a fake robbery there. I
could be wrong, but you know, there's probably probably heard through the grape
bun that it worked for these guysonce, and you know they just kind
of backpacked off of that. Yeah, there's, like I said, there's
a fifty fifty chance on the factthat he set up a robbery there at
the Jack in the Box that heworked at. I can't remember for sure,
(31:38):
so you know, he might nothave, but I do know that
he did end up losing his jobthere, and he went to work at
the Ponchos where Keith Campbell worked.And so now they got two guys on
the inside at Ponchos and they endedup robbing Ponchos twice, and they robbed
a Grandi's. Well, you knowwhat, back in the day, both
(32:01):
of those places were a hoppen happenin place. There is still a Poncho's
open last I saw, you knowwhat, As far as I know,
there is one not far from whereI live. That's the one now I
can tell you. Last time Iwent there, I was not impressed at
(32:22):
all. But it's still open,and I just don't see how because I
don't think that many people go thereanymore. I don't know. But raise
the flag, baby, raise theflag all the time. It was you
know what, you know what whenyou come next time you come over to
(32:42):
my house, we might have togo there for dinner one night the next
time I come over to your house. And no, we have other plans.
Oh, I know, but you'recoming the day before. Yeah,
but I don't know that I wantthat for dinner the day before we get
on an airplane. I know wemight be okay, yeah wa waita wait,
(33:05):
okay. Anyway back to the case. Here turned out that there were
actually three different sets of guys workingindependently of each other to pull off these
jobs, but they would sometimes bringin an outside guy or two for help
as needed if the occasion called forit. There was Edwards and Evans,
(33:28):
The kids from the other school madeup a second group, James Lusk,
Keith Bryant, and Keeland McClanahan,and the last group was a mix of
Eric Andrews, Carlos Allen, KeithCampbell, Jimmy Edwards, Yeah, John
Smith here. I changed his nameto Pete later on in the end of
the story or in the end ofthe case. My note Pete. He
(33:52):
was a minor at the time,so he actually ended up not being charged
formally for with anything, so Ididn't want to mention his name. Okay.
Norbert Roberts and P. K.Williams, and they were occasionally joined
by Darren Jones and Ronald Edwards,who happened to be Gary's brother. Oh
(34:14):
wow. All in all they werecharged with a total of twenty one acts
of aggravated robbery. Pretty sure theyall pled guilty. I don't think any
of them went to trial. Ithink they all pled guilty. Now,
so all of these groups, allof these guys get charged with the same
(34:35):
amount. This is not sure.I couldn't. I couldn't find out all
the specifics on that because it didhappen back in the late eighties. Yeah.
Yeah, I was limited on whatI could find. Okay, Okay.
So Edwards said that he didn't evenknow that his brother was involved in
this at all until all of theirarrests were made. Wow. Well,
(35:02):
I mean you don't talk about itthat's yeah, and his brother and his
brother had had been arrested for beinga driver for a single robbery by the
way. Wow anyway, So allin all, total twenty one counts of
aggravated robbery that everyone was charged with. Pretty sure they all pled guilty.
I don't think anybody went to trial. September twenty second, nineteen eighty nine.
(35:27):
They were all doing court for theirsentences to be handed down to them.
Most of them were expecting probation becausethey had never really been in trouble
with the law before the judge handeddown the sentences, which I'll read off
in just a minute. Vincent wasn'tpunished by the courts at all at all
(35:50):
because at this point he had alreadyenlisted into the Marines and the Marines were
going to handle it. Oh.I think he got off worse than anybody.
He probably would have been better offgoing to civilian court. I'm just
saying that's how it goes in myhead anyway. Yes, So now for
(36:13):
the sentences. Carlos Allen was sentencedto thirteen years and he served three years
and three months. Eric Andrews wasgiven a ten year deferred sentence. Keith
Bryant was sentenced to two years andten years deferred probation. Keith Campbell was
handed down a twenty five years sentence. The judge called him the ringleader and
(36:37):
he ended up serving seven years andsix months. Gary Edwards, the author
of the book I Read, wasgiven a sixteen year sentence, of which
he served four years. Jimmy EdwardsJunior, no relation to Gary Edwards,
was given a sixteen year sentence andserved four years. Ronald Edwards, Gary's
brother, was given five years Sirtwo of them. Derek Evans was sentenced
(37:02):
to twenty years and he served seven. Pete or Jimmy whichever name you want
to call him at this point,was a minor and wasn't charged. Darren
Jones was given a ten year sentence. James Lusk was sentenced to twelve years.
He spent three years incarcerated. KeelandMcClanahan was sent to a ninety day
(37:25):
prison boot camp and given ten yearsdeferred adjudication. Norbert Robert Norbert Rogers was
sentenced to ten years and served twoyears and six months. P. K.
Williams was sentenced to fourteen years,and he served three years and nine
months. Part Way through their sentences. I've read both nineteen ninety and nineteen
(37:45):
ninety one. I'm not sure whichone it could really be, but one
of the two. But at thatpoint, Dallas Carter was officially stripped of
their state championship title win in nineteeneighty eight due to the fact that they
did eventually find that Edwards was failinghis class the first six weeks of school
(38:07):
and he was ineligible to play inthose games, and therefore they shouldn't have
ever been allowed to participate in theplayoffs in the first place, much less
make it all the way to thefinals and when that and so they gave
it to Converse Judson, And that'smy case. That's what I got for
you this week. Oh don DonDunn. But you know what I sella
(38:36):
football that was very exciting. Soyeah, well you think about them apples.
Yeah, I mean, not everybody'sa good person. Not everybody thinks
clearly, and especially when you're inhigh school and you, you know,
(38:59):
think you're in Vince and you thinkyou're granted every everything that you can do
is okay. And now I wantto say that I read in either the
book or a couple of articles thatI read or something that eight students from
(39:20):
that team, not necessarily that we'reseniors that year, but eight students that
played on the team that year wenton to play in the NFL. That's
freaking insane. Do you know howgood that football team had to have been
in high school? Exactly? Imean they were that, Like I said,
football was their life, this wasthis you know. Yeah, yeah,
(39:45):
I know somebody in that mental statehimself right now. He's it's football,
Everything is about football, and heis a football player in his little
football table, I know, Iknow. Oh my god. So we
(40:08):
went after the football game that wewatched, and uh we went out for
ice cream. We were having icecream, and he had wanted to take
his uh pads and his jersey off, you know because they were kind of
you know, tight on him andkind of cutting into him and everything,
(40:28):
and we were eating ice cream.So he pulled pulled him off, and
then he's this tiny little boy andYou're like, where what But you look
so buffing your uniform, you know. So so I get it. You
know, when you're all about football, that's that's all that matters. And
yeah, you think you're invincible,and wow, that's crazy. So now
(40:52):
I did also read in in thebook that I read a lot of these
guys that did serve time, theywent on after they serve their time,
they got out, they are now, most of them are productive members of
society. A couple of them wenton to play college ball for a little
bit afterwards. Anyway, after theirsentences, so, you know, but
(41:15):
and a lot of people felt thattheir sentences that they were given were super
harsh, a lot harsher than theyshould have been. I mean, they
could have been worse than what theygot. They could have been worse.
But a lot of people thought that, you know, because they were first
time offenders, you know, maybethey should have been given probation or lighter,
(41:36):
shorter sentences. You know, ifthey were first time offenders and they
had only done it once, it'spossible. But they were they just continued
to do it well. And somepeople think that they were given such harsh
sentences because it was an election yearand the judge was up for reelection that
(41:58):
or you know, shouldn't have doneit. There's there's really no telling.
But I did read that one ofthem went on he is he has his
regular full time job or whatever,but he's also a youth minister at his
church. A couple of them workfor a different couple of cities. They're
they're employed by the city. Nice. So, I mean, you know,
(42:22):
a lot of them went on tolead generally productive lives as productive citizens.
They didn't really reoffend. I wantto say there was only one,
maybe two out of the eleven ortwelve that that did reoffend and got back
into trouble. But only one ortwo out of all of them. I
mean I would call that a win. Oh yeah, yeah, you know,
(42:46):
because I mean it could have happenedlike that, whether they were playing
football and robin or not. Yeah. So, And in fact, one
of them, I don't I don'tremember which one it was, but one
of them said, you know,hey, you going to jail saved my
life. Like I was headed downthe wrong path with the wrong people.
(43:07):
It put me back on the straightand narrow. So you know, some
are thankful for it, some arenot. Some don't talk about it,
some do. But yeah, that'sthat's my case. That's what I got
for you this week. Well,you wanted football, so I gave you
football. You know what, estill, I still love the game, don't
(43:30):
think I know, I still lovethe game, so that's crazy. Thank
you for sharing that. That's probablya story A lot of people, unless
you're from this area, don't know. Probably they probably know about Dallas Carter
(43:50):
just because, like I said,they were in the movie Friday Night Lights.
They were mentioned even more extensively inthe book Friday Night Lights that the
movie was based on. Okay,but yeah, like you said, unless
you're from the general area or eventhe state, because I'm sure back then
it was making statewide news because theywere stripped of the title. Oh I'm
(44:15):
sure. I'm sure, yes,so, and so many of them had
their scholarships revoked after they were arrestedand charged and everything, So I'm sure
it made pretty good news coverage.But yeah, I think you're right.
I think a lot of locals mayknow this, maybe not so unlocals.
(44:36):
Yes, yes, but thank youfor Sharon. Anyway, I appreciate it.
And it is football season now,so you know, it just makes
it all that much better. Yeah. I missed our local town rivalry football
game last week, but we hadstorms rolling in and I was like,
I don't want to go sit outthere for delay of game in the storm.
(44:59):
I'll just stay home. It's fine. Yeah, there you go,
but I will probably go to acouple of other games later this season.
So very nice, very nice.Well, thank you for Sharon, and
we're glad y'all could join us forthis. And I guess until next time,
I lie.
Welcome to Crime on My Coffee.This podcast contains graphic descriptions and adult content
mature audiences only. Please, Hi, y'all, and welcome to Crime with
(00:30):
My Coffee. I'm your fabulous hostesswith the Mostess, June, and I'm
Suzanne. We're gonna tell you somestories you've heard, some of you haven't,
and some you'll wish you hadn't,all with a Texas twang. All
right, Well, welcome back,you guys, welcome back. So glad
to have you. Absolutely, we'reglad you're here. We got plenty for
(00:54):
you to listen to. If youhaven't heard many or any before, m
give us a try. Yeah,yeah, sounds good, it could be
fine. What's in your mug thisweek? Well, in my mug,
you know, I just got theregular breakfast blend Donut Shop coffee that I
(01:19):
normally always have in French vanilla creamerbecause that's what I like, and it's
it's about it, just your basic. I didn't go to the cut the
boxopods. Maybe next time. I'mjust I'm getting down to like every time
I pick one out, I sayssomething about pumpkin spice or something like that,
(01:42):
and I'm not sure. I'm quiteready for that because we were in
probably false start and fall, youknow, because we're here in Texas,
and so I just now, buteventually I'll I will drink them all.
My just haven't done it yet.So, and what's in your mug?
(02:05):
I went adventurous this week. FaceBones Coffee Company partnered with Indiana Jones,
or maybe they didn't partner with them, and they just did some Indiana Jones
inspired coffee. I'm not real sure, but they had some Indiana Jones inspired
coffee. The one that I amdrinking today is Toffee Treasure. Oh yeah,
that sounds delicious. It's not thatbad. I'm I'm about it.
(02:30):
Then that's awesome. So I'm drinkingthat with some dunkin Donuts creamer in it
or extra extra creamer in it.It's pretty good, pretty good. It's
not my normal. It's got justalmost a hint of chocolate maybe, and
I want to say caramel maybe,which is really weird because I'm not usually
a big caramel person. Right,But this coffee is not bad. It's
(02:53):
not bad. It's it's the wholetoffee thing. You know. I like
a good coffee. What is ita little candy. That's that's like a
toffee candy. It's almost it's acrunchy candy. I can't think of what
it's called, but I like itwhatever it's called. Okay, well,
good for you. Yeah, wellI have a case for us this week.
(03:15):
Okay. We are going to notvery far at all, by the
way, all right, we aregoing to go to Oak Cliff in Texas.
Okay. Now, oak Cliff tous is more of a city within
(03:36):
Dallas, Texas. Yes, butit actually was annexed in two Dallas in
nineteen oh three, and so itis considered a neighborhood in Dallas. Gotcha,
gotcha. So the whole town areathat we consider oak Cliff, Dallas
(03:57):
considers an established neighbor hood. Okay, all right, okay, yeah,
so I want to name off afew people from oak Cliff. M Clifton
Abraham he graduated high school in nineteenninety. He was a defensive back for
the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in nineteen ninetyfive, the Chicago Bears in nineteen ninety
(04:21):
six, and the Carolina Panthers innineteen ninety seven. Yay football. Jesse
Armstead. He graduated in nineteen eightynine. He was a linebacker for eleven
seasons with the New York Giants andthe Washington Redskins. Yay football. Another
(04:43):
person I want to mention Joe Birch. He graduated in nineteen eighty nine.
He was an offensive and defensive lineman. He played for the New England Patriots
and the Denver Broncos. Yay football. Okay, wait a minute, you're
gonna be awful happy with all thesefootball stuff. I've not done naming people
(05:04):
something in store, and I'm notsure I'm gonna love it. Let me
finish naming these people. I havetwo more. Okay, yeah, okay,
let's go. Greg Hill he graduatedin nineteen ninety. He was a
running back for the Kansas City Chiefs, the Saint Louis Rams, and the
Detroit Lions. Gay football. Andthe last one I want to mention is
(05:29):
Lashai Maston. He graduated in nineteeneighty nine. He was a running back
for the Houston Oilers. Yes,there did used to be a Houston Oilers
team, and then they became theTennessee Oilers, and then they were the
Tennessee Titans, and then they werethe Houston Titans, and now they're the
Houston Texans. I don't know it'scrazy anyway, but Lashai Maston was a
(05:49):
running back for the Houston Oilers,the Jacksonville Jaguars, and the Washington Redskins.
Nice, very nice. They lovefoot ball. As you point it
out, all of these people wereNFL players. Yes, they had that
in common. Something else they alsohad in common is they all played for
(06:11):
the nineteen eighty eight nineteen eighty nineDallas David W. Carter High School Cowboys
football team from the Oak Cliff neighborhood. Sweet It was a football team that
made headlines that season for multiple reasons, which we'll get into mm. It
has been touted as a one ofthe best high school football teams ever put
(06:38):
together by some people. It wasloaded with talent anyway you look at it.
Oh yeah, absolutely. Did youhear all the names I just named
off exactly? You ever heard?Have you ever seen the movie Friday Night
Lights? I don't think I everhave. I know that is an amazing
(07:00):
movie. It's got tim and growin it. Mother, I know,
I just I don't. It's gotBilly Bob Thornton in it. I just
don't think I've ever seen it.For whatever reason, I am so disappointed
in you. I know, maybeI'll watch it tonight or something. It's
streaming on Peacock. Okay, well, there you go. Now we know,
(07:23):
just so you know, as oftoday, as of us recording it,
it is streaming on Peacock. Okay, okay. Anyway, the Carter
Cowboys were featured in that movie.In that movie, they were portrayed as
the cheap shot takers and they werejust these huge giants compared to the players
on the Odessa Permian team for thenineteen eighty eight state championship title. However,
(07:49):
they weren't these cheap shot takers.They weren't these huge giants. I
mean, you know, they dideventually a lot of them went on to
play NFL and they were pretty big. But they were good football players,
you know exactly. They were footballplayers. They love the game, they
loved what they were doing. Sothey were just good. Yeah. And
(08:13):
they didn't beat Odessa Hermian for thestate title. They actually faced them in
the state semifinals. I mean theydid beat them, just not for the
title. Right. But let's rewindand let's start back at the beginning of
the nineteen eighty nine or nineteen eightyeight nineteen eighty nine high school football season
(08:37):
for Carter High. Okay, Iread that college scouts were filling the bleachers
before the season ever even got started. They were there. It makes sense
that they would. Did you hearall these names of all these football players
who love the game, who absolutelyat that point in high school and stuff,
(09:03):
when you're playing, you love thegame so much. It's not a
job, it's your life. Soyeah, I get it. I get
it. But before the season evenstop, they even started, scouts were
already watching this team, watching thesekids, trying to think, Okay,
we want to offer him a scholarship. We want to offer him a scholarship.
(09:24):
We want to offer him a scholarship, right, and the people of
Oak Cliff, we're also filling thebleachers just to watch the practices. The
I want to say, these werepractices before school even started. You know,
it's still summertime and they're doing footballpractice. Gotcha. Now, remember
(09:45):
people, the eighties and the ninetieswere a different time than they are now.
Just so you know. Yes,Well, as the season got started,
the Carter Cowboys would put quite ashow on the field. They dominated,
They were fast, they were fit, they were a well oiled machine.
(10:11):
The only game that they didn't winthat regular season, they didn't technically
lose it either. They ended uptying with another high school. From what
I understand, they went to theyplayed this high school and it was a
tie game at the end of thefourth quarter, so they go into overtime,
(10:31):
and at the end of the overtimequarter it was still tied, so
they just agreed to call it atie for both teams. Okay, so
their record going into the playoffs forthe state championship was eight and zero.
Sweet plus that little hidden one atthe end for the tie, but we
don't really have to count that one. Right just before their first playoff game,
(10:56):
though, the UIL got in touchwith Dallas Carter because they had received
an anonymous tip that one of theplayers on their team had been ineligible ineligible
to play at one point during theseason and they were going to have to
do this investigation into it. Now. Back in nineteen eighty five is when
(11:18):
Texas enacted a no pass, noplay policy that requires all students who are
doing extracurricular activities sports, choir,band, you know whatever, they have
to be passing all of their classesor they can't participate. Yes, so
if that's not something you had todeal with while you went to school,
(11:41):
but I did, so you know, the no pass, no play to
me was just always there. Well, now they wanted all and as far
as I know, everybody that didextracurricular stuff like that, football and everything
they passed. They were decent studstudents anyway, you know, I think
(12:01):
it was just ingrained in them.If you want to do this, you
have to do good in school becausethis is not going to be something that
you can just cushion your life withor whatever. Right. So yeah,
So but in nineteen eighty five,Texas did actually pass this and make it
(12:22):
a thing. You know, nopass, no play, that's what we
call it here. Right, Well, it turns out that their star corner
corner back, not quarterback like Istarted to say, their star cornerback,
Gary Edwards was the student in question. M It was said that he had
(12:46):
actually failed in the first six weeksin his algebra class. And he's like,
no, I didn't, And theysaid, you know, no,
he changed his grade. He wasfailing. And he's like, no,
no, I didn't. He pullsout his report card, he pulls out
all this stuff, you know,to show the school officials and the UIL
investigators and his parents and his lawyer, because they got a lawyer because they
(13:09):
said, you know, okay,no, he was passing, barely passing.
It was a seventy two, butit was passing. That's passing exactly.
And so they said, you know, we're going to fight this,
and so they got a lawyer,and they hired this guy, and he
started going to court, you know, to get injunctions because they were saying,
you know, he was ineligible forthe first six weeks. He shouldn't
(13:31):
have been playing, and so thereforey'all technically didn't make it to the playoffs.
You'll have to forfeit these first gamesof the season, so that means
you're not eligible for the playoffs.So they're fighting and they finally get this
injunction the day they're supposed to havetheir first playoff game, and so they're
told, okay, you can play. They actually moved the game to the
(13:54):
next day because it came so latein the day on playoff day that it
said, you know, they couldplay. So they go the next day
and they play against this team andthey win nice. So they're getting ready
to move on to the next round. The next week, they had to
end up going through the same RGAMOrole again, having to go to court
get an injunction to say, youknow, they can play blah blah blah.
(14:18):
They eventually do get this injunction andthey go to the playoff game and
they win that game. Nice.That's pretty much the way things went for
most of the playoff games. Now, the UIL would eventually, I want
to say, one or two gamesbefore the title game, the UIL came
(14:39):
in and said, okay, no, yeah, we're clearing him. He
was passing. Dallas Carter went onto play Odessa Prmian in the semifinals.
They won. They moved on tothe state championship game against Converse Judson and
they won that game too. Nineteeneighty eight, they are the state champs
for high school football in the stateof Texas. It was the first time
(15:03):
that a Dallas I s D Schoolhad won a state championship since nineteen fifty.
Wow. Now, the UIL,I think though, kept digging and
looking into the background of all this, you know, Gary Edwards's grades and
all of that, and basically whatit all ended up boiling down to was
(15:26):
the way that this one particular teacherthat he had for algebra for the first
six weeks because he did transfer outof his class. Okay, But the
way this particular teacher was inputting gradesinto his grade book versus how the principle
said, you need to input yourgrades and count your grades in your grade
books. So there was supposed tobe like a bell ringer warm up class
(15:50):
work grade that counted for twenty percentof your grade. There was supposed to
be a weekly test that counted fortwenty percent of your grade. There was
supposed to be weekly homework that outfor twenty percent of your grade, and
then the final test that would countas twenty five percent of your grade.
I said twenty percent on all theothers, but I meant twenty five percent.
Okay. Well, the way theteacher was putting the grades in his
(16:12):
grade book was if you did thework, if he turned in the work
after he graded the work, hewould put a check mark in his grade
book. If you didn't do thework, if you turned in part of
the work, he would just putan n C for not complete. Okay.
When this teacher averaged his grades withhis way of grading nobody really knew
(16:36):
what these grades were, what thecheck mark grade was. So you know,
when this teacher averaged these grades,I don't know what he what number
grade he gave for the check marks, but I know he gave a zero
for all of the ncs that hehad in his book. His When Gary
Edwards's grade was averaged that way,he was failing with the sixty eight point
(17:00):
something percent for the class right,and seventy or below is spelling, so
technically sixty nine or below is right. But the principle came in and said,
no, you know, if you'regoing to count these check marks as
let's say on one hundred or ninetyeight or ninety or whatever, you got
to count these in c's. Thesenot completes. You can't count them all
(17:25):
as zeros because what if they didhave the work, you know, we
can't tell that from your grading.So we're going to put a fifty as
his grade for every incomplete that hehas, and they averaged that all out,
and his grade was a seventy two, and so that's what they had
put on his report card. Andso that's what basically this whole controversy was.
(17:47):
Anyway, so they win the statechampionship, the school, the community,
they're all excited that Dallas Carter won, making it like I said,
Okay, No, I didn't saythis part, making it the third time
a Dallas I. S D.School had won the one and the like
I said, the first time sincenineteen fifty. Wow. And after this
(18:08):
championship game, a lot of thekids were whisked away on school scholarship recruiting
trips and such to all these variouscolleges all over the country. M If
everything that I read, if Iread it all correctly, eighteen kids that
were on the team for nineteen eightyeight to nineteen eighty nine, they were
(18:32):
not all seniors that year, butany but out of all the kids that
played on the team that year,sophomores, junior, seniors, eighteen of
them would eventually get scholarships, fullscholarships to college to play football. Nice,
very very nice. It made anational record high for the number of
(18:52):
scholarships awarded to one team, oneschool. That's awesome, Yeah, it's
awesome. Exactly. Well, afew weeks before graduation in nineteen eighty nine,
Gary was heading to class and hewas talking with two of his friends,
Vincent and Derek Evans. Derek wasalso on the football team. I
(19:14):
don't think Vincent was though, buthe might have been, but I don't
think so. Well, they cameup with a plan to rob the Taco
Bueno that Vincent was working at.No no, no, no, no.
Yeah. The whole plan was itwas going to be a fake robbery.
They were just going to make offwith the money. They Eric and
(19:36):
er sorry Evans and Edwards would comein one night while Vince was working while
he was working there at the cashregister. They'd come up. They'd tell
Vince, hey, give us allyour money, and Vince would hand over
all the money and then they wouldsplit the money three ways, easy peasy,
nobody gets caught. It's fine,right, Yeah, we're high school
ors. That's exactly had the waythe world works. And yes, that
makes sense to us because we're inhigh school. While they're in high school,
(20:00):
their local celebrities, they feel likenothing can touch them, They can
do no wrong, they can dowhatever they want and it's fine. Hm.
Well, the big night came up, they went in and they left
with about fifteen hundred dollars that night. Wow, that's a lot of money
(20:22):
even now, that's all. Yeah. Even now, that's a lot of
money. But in today's dollars,I did convert this one. This one
I did convert into today's dollars,almost four thousand dollars. Wow. And
they split it three ways. Evansand Edwards drove off, they split,
you know, took their shares andwent about their separate ways. The next
(20:44):
day at school, they gave Vincehis cut. It was all gravy.
Mmm. Edwards get caught. Well, Edwards and Evans were thinking, you
know, hey, that was supersuper easy. Let's do it again.
Well, for first of all,it was an inside job, and so
if you do it again, youmight not know these people. It might
(21:07):
not be so easy. Well,they set their sights on a local church's
chicken. They go, they goin, Evans walks up to the cashier,
order some food and then says,screw it, give me your money.
At this time, Edwards is usingthe old finger in the jacket or
shirt trick to make it look likehe's got a gun, even though he
(21:27):
really didn't have a gun. Hejust has his finger guns. Right.
But you know, so technically it'snot an armed robbery. It's just a
robbery because there is no gun robbery. Yeah, I don't know's you gotta
use his arm, so it's arm. No, I'm just kidding. Well,
you know, like I said,using the old finger in the shirt,
(21:49):
you know I have a gun trick, right. Well, then they
figured they should probably change that justin case anybody decided to give them trouble
the next time. No, soEdwards went and he took a gun that
his parents had without his parents knowing, and he started taking nat on their
little surprise robberies. The next jobthey pulled was that the astro drive in
(22:15):
with a friend from Edwards's neighborhood.Edwards and the friend both had a gun
this time. Then they hit alocal dry cleaners. They had successfully pulled
off four robberies in the span oftwo weeks. Do they wear ski mask
(22:37):
or anything? Okay? So Iwho they are now? I did read
a book that was written by GaryEdwards, the Gary Edwards that we were
talking about in this case, theone that was of you know, in
the middle of the whole grade controversy, the one that's robbing these places with
Derek Evans, his teammate, right, And he wrote this book about this
(23:00):
whole thing from his experience, hispoint of view, the way he sees
things. And I know that hesaid the first time they didn't wear any
masks or anything. He didn't sayanything specifically about any of the others that
followed after that, but he didsay in this book that you know,
(23:21):
they weren't worried about getting caught becauseyou know, everybody knew who they were,
but nobody was going to tattle onthem because they just won the freaking
state championship for football and they werefreaking celebrities and they were all going to
college, and they were all goingto go to the NFL and they were
going to be super famous. Yeah, but you're stealing from me, and
I'm gonna tell on you. I'mjust saying, Yeah. Well, like
(23:45):
I said, I read this bookby Edwards. I will make sure I
link it in the show notes.But right around this time, Edwards said
that he started to notice a fewother guys around the school dressing a little
flashier, with new shoes or anew jacket, or maybe new jewelry.
(24:07):
These particular ones that I'm going tomention are Keith Campbell, Carlos Allen.
Oh, I think I need tochange that name we'll say John Smith,
okay, because if I didn't,I don't think I changed it in this
pot in my notes, but Ithink I changed it later on. So
(24:29):
John Smith and Patrick P. K. Williams, they were the ones that
he specifically mentioned in the book.They were also all on the football team
that year. M Edwards figured theywere doing something illegal. You don't just
start showing up with all this flashyor new stuff without doing something illegal,
(24:51):
he thought. But he definitely wasn'tgoing to ask them about it, and
they weren't going to volunteer it becausethe first rule of illegal club is don't
talk about illegal club bro exactly,And you're doing the same thing. So
really you want to judge somebody else, siout, okay, sure? Yeah.
(25:14):
Well, sometime in June, aftergraduation, Evans and Edwards were on
their way to the gym together.They were doing summer workouts before they shipped
off to their respective colleges, youknow, to start working out with their
respective new college teams and teammates.But they didn't want to get soft in
the you know, little time theyhad between graduation and shipping out for that.
So they're still working out together,gotcha. Well, they're heading to
(25:36):
the gym, and they just theyEdwards said that they shared this look between
them, and he described it asa look of they both knew that they
were going to rob the video storeafter their workout. I don't know if
they knew that it was going tobe the video store. I don't know
if they were passing by the videostore and that's when they looked at each
other, or if it was justa you know, hey, we're going
to hit another another place after weget done working out. It wasn't real
(26:00):
specific on that end, but eitherway, it goes. After their workout,
they go into the local video rentalstore, which I am picturing as
a blockbuster because I don't think Hollywoodwas around yet. This was the late
eighties, right, And Evan goesup and he tells the worker, hey,
I want all your money. AndEdward is this standing over here by
the door, you know, makingsure nobody's running in or out or whatever.
(26:23):
And he said that the cashier personstarted yelling and screaming and freaking out.
I can't blame them. I wouldbe doing the same thing. You're
pointing a gun at me, oreven if you're not pointing a gun at
me, you know, whether it'sfinger guns or if you just walk in
and you're this big, buff guyand you're saying to me, give me
all your money. I'm gonna belike, here you go, and I'm
gonna throw it at you in I'ma dug and run for cover, like
(26:45):
I'm definitely gonna freak out. Absolutely, I got no beef with you,
bro. This is not my money. You can have it, exactly.
I just work here. Here yougo, this is above my pay grade.
Take all you want. There yougo. But while Evans, you
know, so Evans stayed there toget the money, Edwards decided to start
(27:07):
heading out to the car, maybeto get it ready to go so that
it's running when they leave or whatever. But he said, as he was
walking out, he passed this guy. We're going to call him Jimmy.
That is not his real name.But he passed Jimmy, this guy that
he knew. They weren't friends,but they knew each other. And he
said, Jimmy, man, something'sgoing on in there. I don't know,
(27:29):
it's kind of crazy. You mightwant to come back later, or
you know, come back tomorrow,or wait a few minutes. Whatever.
I don't know, it's crazy inthere. I'm out of here. And
he gets in his car and Evanscomes out and joins him in the car,
but he said Jimmy went in tothe video store anyway, because Jimmy
was like, whatever, I justgotta drop this movie off, you know,
or I know exactly what I'm getting, you know, everybound. It's
(27:52):
fine, exactly exactly. But Jimmygoes ahead and goes in. Edwards and
Evans get in the car. Theytake off. They're leaving and they got
about a thousand dollars or so fromthis video store and they're splitting it between
the two of them, and Evanswas like, man, this isn't enough.
I need more, and they decided. But he wouldn't elaborate on what
he meant by that, right,But they get to the mall and they're
(28:15):
sitting in the car and they seethis cop car kind of kind of driving
around the area a little bit,but they're not really nervous. They're thinking,
you know, hey, we're awesome, super cool football players, and
there's no way this cop is lookingfor us because we can do anything.
We're invincible. We are basically heman yo. And so they get out
(28:37):
of the car to head into thestore to get whatever it was they need,
and after they got out of thecar, boom, they're surrounded by
cops. There's like lots of copcars here, lots of cops here.
They're placed under arrest and on theirway to the station. The cops are
like, oh yeah, we're totallygetting you for all these robberies. Jimmy
told us who you were, whatyou drove, where we could find you.
(28:57):
He gave us. We were justwaiting on him to are spitting out
your social Security number and your birthday. You know, he gave us everything
we needed. He gave it upand he wouldn't even party your clan exactly.
So they get down there and theythe cops hold them, Okay,
we're going to charge you with,you know, all all these robberies.
(29:18):
And they're thinking, okay, youknow it's like five six whatever, and
they're like, no, no,no, it's more than twenty, you
guys, more than twenty. AndEdwards said he was going to excuse me,
excuse me. I didn't fell math. I know math, So I'm
thinking no, yeah, Well,Edwards attorney, the one that he had
(29:45):
used for the UIL stuff just afew months before ended up bailing them out
of jail the next morning. LikeI said, the two of them were
facing more than twenty counts of armedrobbery. Wow. Edwards in his book
he said that he knew he andEvans hadn't pulled that many jobs, not
even close to that many jobs,so he didn't know for sure who else
(30:08):
was pulling these jobs. But inhis book he said, even if he
did know, he wasn't no snitchlike Jimmy over here. There you go,
so you know, he wouldn't havetold he had just taken the heat.
Art is what he says in hisbook. Well, Evans, however,
he didn't have the same sense ofloyalty that Edwards did. He said,
(30:29):
screw this. If I'm going down, everyone I know about is going
down with me, And he juststarted talking up up turns out. Now,
I read two different numbers. Iread five and I read six,
and I read them both about thesame amount of times. But five or
six members of this football team wereinvolved in this robbery ring that was made
(30:53):
up of about eleven or twelve people. Wow. Now, not all of
them went to Dallas Carter. Threeof them went to a different high school
in the same area, but theywere all sixteen, seventeen, eighteen year
old kids. Yep. P Kwas working at a Jack in the Box.
(31:15):
He I think he might have setup a fake robbery there. I
could be wrong, but you know, there's probably probably heard through the grape
bun that it worked for these guysonce, and you know they just kind
of backpacked off of that. Yeah, there's, like I said, there's
a fifty fifty chance on the factthat he set up a robbery there at
the Jack in the Box that heworked at. I can't remember for sure,
(31:38):
so you know, he might nothave, but I do know that
he did end up losing his jobthere, and he went to work at
the Ponchos where Keith Campbell worked.And so now they got two guys on
the inside at Ponchos and they endedup robbing Ponchos twice, and they robbed
a Grandi's. Well, you knowwhat, back in the day, both
(32:01):
of those places were a hoppen happenin place. There is still a Poncho's
open last I saw, you knowwhat, As far as I know,
there is one not far from whereI live. That's the one now I
can tell you. Last time Iwent there, I was not impressed at
(32:22):
all. But it's still open,and I just don't see how because I
don't think that many people go thereanymore. I don't know. But raise
the flag, baby, raise theflag all the time. It was you
know what, you know what whenyou come next time you come over to
(32:42):
my house, we might have togo there for dinner one night the next
time I come over to your house. And no, we have other plans.
Oh, I know, but you'recoming the day before. Yeah,
but I don't know that I wantthat for dinner the day before we get
on an airplane. I know wemight be okay, yeah wa waita wait,
(33:05):
okay. Anyway back to the case. Here turned out that there were
actually three different sets of guys workingindependently of each other to pull off these
jobs, but they would sometimes bringin an outside guy or two for help
as needed if the occasion called forit. There was Edwards and Evans,
(33:28):
The kids from the other school madeup a second group, James Lusk,
Keith Bryant, and Keeland McClanahan,and the last group was a mix of
Eric Andrews, Carlos Allen, KeithCampbell, Jimmy Edwards, Yeah, John
Smith here. I changed his nameto Pete later on in the end of
the story or in the end ofthe case. My note Pete. He
(33:52):
was a minor at the time,so he actually ended up not being charged
formally for with anything, so Ididn't want to mention his name. Okay.
Norbert Roberts and P. K.Williams, and they were occasionally joined
by Darren Jones and Ronald Edwards,who happened to be Gary's brother. Oh
(34:14):
wow. All in all they werecharged with a total of twenty one acts
of aggravated robbery. Pretty sure theyall pled guilty. I don't think any
of them went to trial. Ithink they all pled guilty. Now,
so all of these groups, allof these guys get charged with the same
(34:35):
amount. This is not sure.I couldn't. I couldn't find out all
the specifics on that because it didhappen back in the late eighties. Yeah.
Yeah, I was limited on whatI could find. Okay, Okay.
So Edwards said that he didn't evenknow that his brother was involved in
this at all until all of theirarrests were made. Wow. Well,
(35:02):
I mean you don't talk about itthat's yeah, and his brother and his
brother had had been arrested for beinga driver for a single robbery by the
way. Wow anyway, So allin all, total twenty one counts of
aggravated robbery that everyone was charged with. Pretty sure they all pled guilty.
I don't think anybody went to trial. September twenty second, nineteen eighty nine.
(35:27):
They were all doing court for theirsentences to be handed down to them.
Most of them were expecting probation becausethey had never really been in trouble
with the law before the judge handeddown the sentences, which I'll read off
in just a minute. Vincent wasn'tpunished by the courts at all at all
(35:50):
because at this point he had alreadyenlisted into the Marines and the Marines were
going to handle it. Oh.I think he got off worse than anybody.
He probably would have been better offgoing to civilian court. I'm just
saying that's how it goes in myhead anyway. Yes, So now for
(36:13):
the sentences. Carlos Allen was sentencedto thirteen years and he served three years
and three months. Eric Andrews wasgiven a ten year deferred sentence. Keith
Bryant was sentenced to two years andten years deferred probation. Keith Campbell was
handed down a twenty five years sentence. The judge called him the ringleader and
(36:37):
he ended up serving seven years andsix months. Gary Edwards, the author
of the book I Read, wasgiven a sixteen year sentence, of which
he served four years. Jimmy EdwardsJunior, no relation to Gary Edwards,
was given a sixteen year sentence andserved four years. Ronald Edwards, Gary's
brother, was given five years Sirtwo of them. Derek Evans was sentenced
(37:02):
to twenty years and he served seven. Pete or Jimmy whichever name you want
to call him at this point,was a minor and wasn't charged. Darren
Jones was given a ten year sentence. James Lusk was sentenced to twelve years.
He spent three years incarcerated. KeelandMcClanahan was sent to a ninety day
(37:25):
prison boot camp and given ten yearsdeferred adjudication. Norbert Robert Norbert Rogers was
sentenced to ten years and served twoyears and six months. P. K.
Williams was sentenced to fourteen years,and he served three years and nine
months. Part Way through their sentences. I've read both nineteen ninety and nineteen
(37:45):
ninety one. I'm not sure whichone it could really be, but one
of the two. But at thatpoint, Dallas Carter was officially stripped of
their state championship title win in nineteeneighty eight due to the fact that they
did eventually find that Edwards was failinghis class the first six weeks of school
(38:07):
and he was ineligible to play inthose games, and therefore they shouldn't have
ever been allowed to participate in theplayoffs in the first place, much less
make it all the way to thefinals and when that and so they gave
it to Converse Judson, And that'smy case. That's what I got for
you this week. Oh don DonDunn. But you know what I sella
(38:36):
football that was very exciting. Soyeah, well you think about them apples.
Yeah, I mean, not everybody'sa good person. Not everybody thinks
clearly, and especially when you're inhigh school and you, you know,
(38:59):
think you're in Vince and you thinkyou're granted every everything that you can do
is okay. And now I wantto say that I read in either the
book or a couple of articles thatI read or something that eight students from
(39:20):
that team, not necessarily that we'reseniors that year, but eight students that
played on the team that year wenton to play in the NFL. That's
freaking insane. Do you know howgood that football team had to have been
in high school? Exactly? Imean they were that, Like I said,
football was their life, this wasthis you know. Yeah, yeah,
(39:45):
I know somebody in that mental statehimself right now. He's it's football,
Everything is about football, and heis a football player in his little
football table, I know, Iknow. Oh my god. So we
(40:08):
went after the football game that wewatched, and uh we went out for
ice cream. We were having icecream, and he had wanted to take
his uh pads and his jersey off, you know because they were kind of
you know, tight on him andkind of cutting into him and everything,
(40:28):
and we were eating ice cream.So he pulled pulled him off, and
then he's this tiny little boy andYou're like, where what But you look
so buffing your uniform, you know. So so I get it. You
know, when you're all about football, that's that's all that matters. And
yeah, you think you're invincible,and wow, that's crazy. So now
(40:52):
I did also read in in thebook that I read a lot of these
guys that did serve time, theywent on after they serve their time,
they got out, they are now, most of them are productive members of
society. A couple of them wenton to play college ball for a little
bit afterwards. Anyway, after theirsentences, so, you know, but
(41:15):
and a lot of people felt thattheir sentences that they were given were super
harsh, a lot harsher than theyshould have been. I mean, they
could have been worse than what theygot. They could have been worse.
But a lot of people thought that, you know, because they were first
time offenders, you know, maybethey should have been given probation or lighter,
(41:36):
shorter sentences. You know, ifthey were first time offenders and they
had only done it once, it'spossible. But they were they just continued
to do it well. And somepeople think that they were given such harsh
sentences because it was an election yearand the judge was up for reelection that
(41:58):
or you know, shouldn't have doneit. There's there's really no telling.
But I did read that one ofthem went on he is he has his
regular full time job or whatever,but he's also a youth minister at his
church. A couple of them workfor a different couple of cities. They're
they're employed by the city. Nice. So, I mean, you know,
(42:22):
a lot of them went on tolead generally productive lives as productive citizens.
They didn't really reoffend. I wantto say there was only one,
maybe two out of the eleven ortwelve that that did reoffend and got back
into trouble. But only one ortwo out of all of them. I
mean I would call that a win. Oh yeah, yeah, you know,
(42:46):
because I mean it could have happenedlike that, whether they were playing
football and robin or not. Yeah. So, And in fact, one
of them, I don't I don'tremember which one it was, but one
of them said, you know,hey, you going to jail saved my
life. Like I was headed downthe wrong path with the wrong people.
(43:07):
It put me back on the straightand narrow. So you know, some
are thankful for it, some arenot. Some don't talk about it,
some do. But yeah, that'sthat's my case. That's what I got
for you this week. Well,you wanted football, so I gave you
football. You know what, estill, I still love the game, don't
(43:30):
think I know, I still lovethe game, so that's crazy. Thank
you for sharing that. That's probablya story A lot of people, unless
you're from this area, don't know. Probably they probably know about Dallas Carter
(43:50):
just because, like I said,they were in the movie Friday Night Lights.
They were mentioned even more extensively inthe book Friday Night Lights that the
movie was based on. Okay,but yeah, like you said, unless
you're from the general area or eventhe state, because I'm sure back then
it was making statewide news because theywere stripped of the title. Oh I'm
(44:15):
sure. I'm sure, yes,so, and so many of them had
their scholarships revoked after they were arrestedand charged and everything, So I'm sure
it made pretty good news coverage.But yeah, I think you're right.
I think a lot of locals mayknow this, maybe not so unlocals.
(44:36):
Yes, yes, but thank youfor Sharon. Anyway, I appreciate it.
And it is football season now,so you know, it just makes
it all that much better. Yeah. I missed our local town rivalry football
game last week, but we hadstorms rolling in and I was like,
I don't want to go sit outthere for delay of game in the storm.
(44:59):
I'll just stay home. It's fine. Yeah, there you go,
but I will probably go to acouple of other games later this season.
So very nice, very nice.Well, thank you for Sharon, and
we're glad y'all could join us forthis. And I guess until next time,
I lie.
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