September 16, 2022 • 29 mins
In 1997 Charles Thompson and Denise Hayslip fell into a whirlwind romance, but soon the relationship would turn sour after physical abuse became apart of their relationship. Denise looked to her friend Darren Cain for comfort, but through rage and jealousy Charles took Darren and Denise's life. Sources: https://caselaw.findlaw.com/tx-court-of-criminal-appeals/1483586.html https://www.ksla.com/story/4080892/escaped-death-row-inmate-arrested-in-shreveport?outputType=amp Intended Evil I Am a Killer: Season 1, Episode 8 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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(00:18):
Hello, Hello everyone, and welcomeback to Murder Squared, the true crime
podcast. I am your host,MICHAELA. Here we talk about the solved,
the unsolved, the missing, andthe murdered. And boy, oh
boy, do I have a casefor you today. This one is so
(00:39):
wild. And the way that Icame across this case was on Netflix,
the show it's called I Am aKiller. Now. Fun fact about me,
I never ever really watched stuff onNetflix. I usually go to like
Investigation i D, Discovery plug Ussometimes, you know, twenty twenty things
(01:02):
like that, but for some reason, never really Netflix. And I started
watching this show and it's where killerstalk about the crimes that they've done,
and it's pretty much them telling theirversion of what happened. Now. Of
course, the people that are doingthese interviews are not always like, yeah,
(01:22):
totally, that's definitely what happened.They go and they interview other people.
They'll interview the victims family members,they'll interview jurors that were there during
their trial. They'll talk to prettymuch, you know, anybody that knew
the victims and the defendant in everydaylife to talk to them about the version
(01:45):
of events that this person that isnow in jail is talking about and then
they come back and they do asecond interview basically calling that person out on
the things that they said versus whatpeople in their life have, the information
that they have given them that contradictstheir stories. And I'm really here for
(02:07):
it. It is so incredibly cringeyand I don't even know if that's the
word to use, and ironically funnyto watch these people hear the actual truth
of what happened and hear that storyright in front of them and then them
have to tell these producers with acamera in front of their face, hey,
(02:29):
actually I lied, or they'll justsay, well, I don't know
why they're saying that, because this, this, and this. So if
you've never watched I'm a Killer onNetflix, please please go watch it.
Okay, but that is where today'scase came from. So I'm really ready
to talk about it because I havejust finished the research going through the court
(02:51):
documents watching that. So if you'reready, get squared away and let's talk
murder. So we're gonna be rollingback the clock to nineteen ninety seven and
(03:12):
we're gonna be going to Houston,Texas. So we're gonna be talking about
Charles Thompson and Denise Hayslip. Sowhen Charles first met Denise hay Slip,
it was on his birthday in Juneof nineteen ninety seven, and the two
were immediately attracted to one another.In just a matter of two weeks,
Denise and Charles had moved in together, but also living in Denise's home was
(03:38):
her son and Denise's co worker,Lisa, and then Lisa's two daughters.
So Denise was thirty eight years oldand she had just recently been divorced,
and she was known by pretty mucheverybody as being very happy and carefree and
known as the life of the party. Now. Charles, on the other
(04:00):
hand, at this time in ninetyseven, is twenty seven years old,
and he really just thought the worldof Denise, and this relationship came together
very quickly the two. There wasprobably love or at least lust in the
beginning, but it also had itsproblems. Soon arguments would get physical between
Denise and Charles, and eventually Deniseends up moving out into her own apartment
(04:27):
and Charles follows behind, which reallyLisa was happy about Lisa Gonzalez, her
coworker that she was living with,because on more than one occasion she had
seen Charles just get very angry,and really, Lisa and Charles just didn't
get along, and Charles was oftenphysical with Denise, and he would just
(04:48):
do things that she didn't like andshe didn't want to be around her kids.
Like when he got mad, hewould start kicking the refrigerator, he
would hit the walls. He justreally didn't know how to express anger.
And on one instance in particular,when Charles was having one of these fits,
it was on Saying Patrick's day.He had been drinking. Him and
(05:09):
Denise had gotten into an argument,and his argument was over Denise wanting to
dance with other people at the clubthat they were at, so Denise hit
him, and in a fit ofrage, he hit her back. He
says that he slapped her three times, but the result of this fight was
Denise having a black eye and abusted lip, and of course, like
(05:32):
many men say, he's just sosorry afterwards, and he regretted hitting her.
But Lisa said that this was notthe first time that something physical like
this had happened between Denise and Charles. That before, when he would have
his anger problems, he remembers seeingCharles grabb Denise by her shoulders and shake
her very violently. But it's notlong after that Denise begins another relationship,
(05:59):
and this is with a bartender attheir favorite bar, and his name is
Darren Kane. Now, her relationshipwith Darren did start while she was still
entangled with Charles. Now from allaccounts, they were very on again,
off again in their relationship. ButDenise had just told many people that she
was done with their relationship. Itwas just very tumultuous after basically him blacking
(06:26):
her eye and busting her lips,she was really done. She just wasn't
there for it anymore. So Charlesdidn't really know about Denise and Darren,
but Darren did know that Denise wasin this awful relationship. And people that
knew Darren and Charles, who actuallygoes by Chuck, say that they were
(06:47):
night and day. That Darren wasthis thoughtful, nice person, He had
a lot going for him, hewas an overachiever. And people say that
Chuck, on the other hand,was a drunk and he was addicted to
drugs and he had anger problems,and just they were not even in the
same category of man. Basically iswhat people say that knew both of them.
(07:09):
So on Wednesday, April twenty ninthof nineteen ninety eight, Charles,
Denise, and their friends close downBimbos. Now, this is the bar
where Darren works, and this isa Wednesday night routine for them to close
down the bar, and that isbecause it's their favorite night of the week.
It's five dollars staking Potato night,and they stay all night. They
(07:32):
shoot darts, they drink and theyhave a good time. But on this
particular Wednesday, Darren gets a callfrom Denise around three am in the morning,
and in this call, she saysthat Charles is messing with her,
and at some point Charles actually getson the phone and begins to threaten Darren.
So Darren tells his friend, Hey, this is happening over at Denise's
(07:56):
house. I'm going to go andhelp her because it it does sound like
anything good is going to happen there. A neighbor is awokeome at three a
little after three am in the morningon the thirtieth by screaming coming from Denise's
apartment. She hears things like helpand stop, and then when she walks
out to see what's going on,she can hear that Charles is calling Denise
(08:18):
a whore, and when she looksat Charles, Charles is beat out of
hell. He is a black guy. He's got blood all over his face,
it's swollen. It's clear that therehas been a fight there, and
she's already called the police. Sothey're on their way for a domestic dispute,
which is from what I can imaginefrom all the things that I have
read, is not uncommon for somethingdomestic like this to be happening at this
(08:43):
apartment. So at this time,when Charles is cussing Denise out, Darren
tells him, hey, man,you need to chill, and Charles says,
do you want to die? Andthis is when an officer arrives on
this scene, and Denise and Charlesand Darren at this point are all calm.
Everything's kind of calmed down. They'vesaid their peace, they've fought a
(09:05):
little. Everything that needs to happen, it looks like it's happened. And
the apartment belongs to Denise. Soshe's asked by the deputy Deputy Coker if
she wants to press charges against Charles, and she says no. And it's
clear to this officer too that Charleshas been in a fight, and he
(09:26):
you know, asks how it happenedand basically finds out that Charles is the
one that has started all of this. So Deputy Coker he tells Charles,
if you return, this is criminaltrespassing. Do not come back here,
and Charles leaves, but he onlyleaves for three hours. At six am,
(09:46):
that same neighbor that had reported thedispute before heard a loud knock on
her door. She goes to thedoor and she finds Denise. Denise has
crawled over to her door. She'snow lying on the ground and there's blood
just flowing from her mouth. Andbecause of the amount of blood that is
(10:07):
in Denise's mouth, she can't speak, so she uses gestures to say what
had happened to her. And thegesture that she uses is her thumb and
her two fingers to look like agun like she has been shot. So
right away, this neighbor calls theauthorities again. This time, the same
(10:28):
deputy arrives. Deputy Coker comes in. He looks through the apartment and he
finds Darren's dead body on the livingroom floor. He had been shot twice,
and from there Denise is assessed andairlifted to the hospital. So while
she's awaiting surgery, her brother Mikecomes to talk to her and he asked
(10:52):
her, did Chuck do this toyou? And she nods her head yes.
Six hours lay, Denise's airway wasblocked and the doctors did an emergency
at Trinkia and they tried to resuscitateher, but she had been without air
for almost ten minutes. Denise spentuntil May at six on life support and
(11:15):
when her family finally decided to turnoff the machine. Here's what happened with
Charles after the attack. So themurder, Charles went to his friend Diane's
house to sleep, and his friendwoke him up because she saw all these
bruises all over his face and shemakes this comment, She's like, man,
I hope the other guy looks worsethan you, and Charles just looks
(11:39):
at her and he goes, hedoes I shot him? So Charles told
Diane about that night and how afterthe fight and after the police made him
leave, he left to go geta gun. He was mad. He
was mad because Darren had not onlybeat him up, but he had stayed
there with Denise. So that morning, around six am, Charles kicks in
(12:05):
the apartment door and he shoots DarrenCaine four times, and then he turned
to Denise. He put a gunto her cheek and he pulled the trigger.
And then after this he talks abouthow he leaves and how he threw
the gun that he used in acreek after on his way to her house.
(12:26):
So, after Charles tells his friendhis story, the news of what
happened at Denise's apartment is actually beingbroadcasted on TV, and Charles then realizes
through this footage on TV that Deniseis sitting straight up on a stretcher.
She as bandages all over her face. So through this he's like, oh,
(12:48):
Denise is not dead. So hecalls his dad and he's asking his
dad. He's like, oh,my gosh, have you seen what happened
all this stuff? And his dadsays, yeah, they've already been here,
Charles, They've already been here lookingfor you. So his dad convinces
him to surrender to the police becausehe tells him that on the TV right
now, there's a picture of himthat says he's armed and dangerous, so
(13:11):
he needs to go take care ofthis. So his dad drives him to
the police station where he surrenders,and there he's charged with one count of
manslaughter and one count of aggravated assault. But in this time of when he
surrenders, he's arrested and he ischarged, this is when Denise is put
on life support and she dies.So from there the state pulls him back
(13:35):
into court to revise the charges.Now Charles is being charged with capital murder.
The prosecution has dropped the previous manslaughterand aggravated assault charge. This capital
murder charge was because now Darren Kaneand Denise Hayslap have both died. But
Charles he's confused because Denise died atthe hospital from what he thought was hospital
(14:01):
error. His family had told himthe whole situation of what happened with Denise
before the corps ever even pulled himin, saying that she had died in
the hospital, and Denise's family actuallyat this point are starting to file a
wrongful death suit against the hospital.So he's very confused of why he's getting
charged with her murder when it lookslike it's completely the hospital's fault. And
(14:26):
this is going to take a big, big play in his murder trial.
So Charles went to trial for doublemurder almost an exact year after the attack,
and this would be on April twelfth, in nineteen ninety nine. The
defense presented their case that the hospitalkilled Denise, not Charles, and it
really was never a question. Iguess that Charles did kill Darren, but
(14:52):
it was thought that it was throughself defense. So somehow they think,
and this is through Charles tell ofevents, that darre and had grabbed a
knife out of the knife block andcame after Charles. But we know that
Charles has kicked the door into thisplace and all of this stuff has happened.
But anyways, they're trying to saythat Darren grabbed a knife out of
(15:16):
the kitchen block and it was selfdefense that Charles had killed him. But
so really I don't know that thatwas so much as a question. What
the defense really went for, though, was the fact that they believed that
the hospital killed his niece and notCharles. But the doctor that performed the
autopsy and did the report put onthe report that her cause of death was
(15:37):
a gunshot wound to the face.The report stated that a gunshot wound through
the cheek severed Denise's tongue leading toand causing her death. So at trial,
one of her doctors stated that hadan ambulance not came, had Life
Star not flown her to the hospital, that Denise surely would have died without
(16:00):
their medical care at all. Thisdoctor states that from her tongue being severed
that very easily could have blocked herairway causing her suffocation, or through her
tongue being severed, the amount ofblood that was coming out of her mouth
and feeling her lungs would have causedher to drowned. And the defense ends
up calling their own medical expert inand they eventually agreed that Denise's injuries were
(16:26):
life threatening, but she did diein the hospital, so pretty much what
they're saying here is her injuries werebad enough that she had to have the
medical care, so she wouldn't havedied in the hospital had she not been
shot with a gun. And oneof the biggest things that they tried to
(16:47):
use in this the prosecution was thatpicture and footage of Denise where she's sitting
on the gurney and she's sitting straightup, and the reason that she's setting
straight up, I mean, thisis very morbid and very gory is she's
sitting straight up so she doesn't drownon her own blood. Through this trial,
(17:07):
the medical malpractice suits filed by thehay Slips family, it's ended up
determined that it is not the hospital'sfault, that they are not at fault
for malpractice. And this obviously isnot going to help Charles case at all.
But let me tell you what elseisn't going to help Charles case is
the fact that he was trying toorder a hit on his friend Diane.
(17:32):
And this is Diane Zerna. Thisis the person's whose house he went to
after he killed Darren and attacked Denise. Remember, he confesses to her what
he did. He tells her everythingfrom the I shot him to I threw
the gun in the creek. Hetells her everything. That morning, she's
obviously going to be called to testifyat his trial against him, and he
(17:56):
just says, well, she hasto die, and is trying to arrange
this hit to be done by hiscellmate Max. He's getting out of jail,
so Charles is going to pay himand he's going to provide him with
a gun. But throughout the courseof this other people get involved. And
there's a deal that's made with theDA and an undercover cop goes under to
(18:18):
have a meeting with Charles. Andthis is supposed to be basically a friend
of a friend who's a hitman,but obviously it's not a hitman, it's
a cop. So in this meeting, they talk about the retrieval of a
gun, they talk about Denise's description, they talk about Denise's address, and
even in this little pow wow thatthey're having, keep in mind it's still
(18:41):
in jail. When this undercover copis coming to talk to him. He
tells him how his ex cellmate Max, he gave him a down payment of
one hundred and twenty five dollars,but the Max screwed him over and that
he just isn't going to do it. So he tells him, he says,
I need you to take care ofthe state's witness. He's the only
witness that they have, and theyarrange for Charles to pay him fifteen hundred
(19:06):
dollars to kill Diane. And thisis all recorded and it's all presented at
trial. So on April sixth oftwo thousand, Charles Thompson is sentenced to
death. But we're not done becausesix years later he gets a retrial,
and this is because of the recording. It's now considered illegal the way that
(19:33):
the recording was obtained, in thequestions of how it happened, and basically
through everything's just inadmissible somehow. Sothis new trial was to set a punishment
without the recording. So in thisnew trial they have new jurors and they
have to decide is life in prisonis that too much? Is the death
(19:53):
penalty too much? What would weconsider a fair sentencing for this man?
And the lead juror in it,she asked them, is there any way
he's ever going to get out?Does it even matter if we change this,
because if he's ever going to beon the streets again, this will
determine what we say here. Andthe judge tells them, no, absolutely
(20:15):
not. He's on de row.He's never ever going to see the outside
of a prison ever again. Butthen two days after his resentencing, Charles
Thompson escapes. He had been inprison for six years altogether at this point.
This is in two thousand and five, So one day after court,
after the resentencing, he's waiting ina holding cell. He has on his
(20:40):
very nice court clothes, and heprovides a bailiff with a fake ID it
since he's in these nice clothes,and I'm sure he had the confidence to
back it up. He escapes andCharles was on the run for four days
now. He was arrested outside ofa liquor store in Shreveport, Louisiana.
(21:00):
The reason he gets arrested is becausehe's drunk okay, and an officer approaches
him at a pay phone and hesays who are you? And Charles says,
you know who I am? Andwitnesses say after that, it's literally
like something you see out of amovie. It's like swat team comes in
and they astract him. So fromthere, Charles Thompson went back to jail
(21:23):
where he is now sitting in aLivingstone prison in Texas on death row.
I'll right, you, guys,thanks for coming along with me today,
another Friday, another true time case. So let's just talk a little bit
(21:47):
about it for a minute. Sowhen I said that Charles had a whole
other tale of events, he saysthat him and Denise had went home with
each other from Bimbos, the barthat they we're at on that night,
and when they get home they geta call from Darren and Darren is wanting
(22:10):
to spend time with Denise. Andit's unclear, but to me, this
is kind of where I think thatCharles finds out that Darren and Denise are
dating and that they've been together before, and this is when him and Denise
start fighting. So they start fighting. The police is called. The police
(22:33):
tell him, hey, everybody's together, separate ways, and he says that
he goes and he drives around andtries to basically sleep it off, you
know, he's smad, sleep itoff. He says he was drunk,
so he comes back, though,he says he calls Denise on a pay
phone. He comes back to theapartment and when he comes back, he
(22:53):
finds them in bed together, andhe says that he wasn't trying to wake
Denise up. He's trying to bereally quiet. He was just trying to
grab his stuff for work and thenget out. But then when he goes
to get his stuff, she wakesup. He sees Darren next to her,
and then that's when this whole thingensues of him attacking and what he
says happens is he's trying to grabhis stuff from where Darren goes into the
(23:17):
kitchen, he gets a knife fromthe knife block, and Charles actually says
that he grabs a pistol from thecloset, okay, and that he grabs
this pistol and he tells Darren,hey back up, and Darren doesn't back
up, and he keeps coming towardshim, and he has this knife,
and so he shoots him. Heshoots him once Darren keeps coming out of
(23:37):
him, shoots him again. Theyfight over the gun, and in this
process of them fighting, a bulletgoes off and hits Denise. This is
what Charles says happens, and hegoes, well, some of it is
a blur though, because I reallywas still you know, kind of buzzed.
I was still kind of drunk.He says that he tried to call
the police and that the phone wasn'tworking, he couldn't go through, and
(24:00):
that he was so panicked that hewent out and he ran and then that's
when he went to He never saysher name, but he says, that's
when I went to my friend's houseand I was in shock, and I
just passed out from being in shock, and then you know, I wake
up and I see my face onTV, and that's when I realized that
I have to go turn myself in. So I call my dad to do
that, and you know, that'shis little tale of events. So when
(24:25):
he's confronted with what actually happened andthey tell him, you know, hey,
what about you trying to order ahit on your friend on Diane's what's
up with that? And he's like, that's embarrassing, and that's all he
says. He goes, that's embarrassing. And I kind of laughed at that
part because I was like, Yeah, that is embarrassing. You just fed
(24:47):
these people this just crock of shit, pardon my language, and you just
you just think, oh, yeah, that's embarrassing. I really shouldn't really
shouldn't try to kill my friend there. Yeah, sir, that is embarrassing.
And the thing that really got meis when he's trying to order this
hit on Diane, this friend's housethat he wouldn't crashed out. He's telling
(25:07):
them how old she is and he'slike, yeah, she's like thirty eight,
forty years old. She has afourteen year old daughter. And he's
describing the house what it looks like. The neighborhood it's in. He tells
this person, the undercover cop,everything down to what the mailbox looks like,
and the undercover cop is like,well, you know, I couldn't
reappend or anything in here, soI'm trying to remember this all by memory
(25:30):
and all this. But the thingthat just got me was he just spouted
out that this woman that was hisfriend what her house looked like, and
he had probably been to her houseso many times that he knew exactly what
everything looked like, and he justsaid, without a care in the world,
that she was a mom of afourteen year old girl, and that
there wasn't anyone else living in thehouse or anything. So his plan was
(25:52):
to kill this person off and toleave this fourteen year old out in this
world without anybody, somebody who washis friend. And that's another thing that
one of the jurors said that justkind of speaks to the evil of this
guy. He killed a man,shot a woman that he apparently loved,
then goes to a friend's house,and then when he gets to jail,
tries to call the friend to takeback what he said and not to talk
(26:15):
to the cops, but of courseshe is because she's not a piece of
garbage like he is. And thenhe's like, well, if you're not
gonna do what I want you todo, then I'm just gonna have to
kill you, and I'm just gonnahave to leave your daughter without anyone in
this world. And that just spoketo me really of his character. And
the whole time he's talking, youknow, really what he's saying is smooth,
(26:37):
and it sounds like it's just gotto be the truest thing in the
world, but you know that it'snot. And it just speaks to the
power of basically narcism that he hasand his manipulation powers. I don't know.
If you haven't watched that, basically, go watch it. Watch this
one. It's called Intended Evil.I believe it's season two on there.
(26:59):
I just ran only came across it, and it was so interesting, so
interesting. Another thing I just wantto say really quickly too, is in
the course of the case and thetrial and everything, it really did seem
like Darren Caine's murder was just overlooked. And that's very sad because the people
that knew him and loved him saidthat he was a wonderful person. And
(27:21):
that you know he worked at thisbar. He was, but that wasn't
all he had gone for him,and that he was just a really a
fun guy. He was a carryingguy. And that's what brought him to
Denise's apartment that night, was thathe cared about her and he knew that
Charles had hit her before, andhe was just worried about her. And
he didn't go there to fight him. He went there to keep him from
(27:45):
fighting her. And then at theend of the night, actually Darren tells
a friend of his that him andCharles shook hands and that they walked away
and that they both he felt likethey both resolved the problem and that he
felt good about what happened there thatnight. And then three hours later he
is dead. He is killed bythis man. So anyways, if you
(28:11):
enjoyed hearing this case today and wouldlike to hear more interesting cases, please
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(28:36):
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square and I'll see you next Murder
Hello, Hello everyone, and welcomeback to Murder Squared, the true crime
podcast. I am your host,MICHAELA. Here we talk about the solved,
the unsolved, the missing, andthe murdered. And boy, oh
boy, do I have a casefor you today. This one is so
(00:39):
wild. And the way that Icame across this case was on Netflix,
the show it's called I Am aKiller. Now. Fun fact about me,
I never ever really watched stuff onNetflix. I usually go to like
Investigation i D, Discovery plug Ussometimes, you know, twenty twenty things
(01:02):
like that, but for some reason, never really Netflix. And I started
watching this show and it's where killerstalk about the crimes that they've done,
and it's pretty much them telling theirversion of what happened. Now. Of
course, the people that are doingthese interviews are not always like, yeah,
(01:22):
totally, that's definitely what happened.They go and they interview other people.
They'll interview the victims family members,they'll interview jurors that were there during
their trial. They'll talk to prettymuch, you know, anybody that knew
the victims and the defendant in everydaylife to talk to them about the version
(01:45):
of events that this person that isnow in jail is talking about and then
they come back and they do asecond interview basically calling that person out on
the things that they said versus whatpeople in their life have, the information
that they have given them that contradictstheir stories. And I'm really here for
(02:07):
it. It is so incredibly cringeyand I don't even know if that's the
word to use, and ironically funnyto watch these people hear the actual truth
of what happened and hear that storyright in front of them and then them
have to tell these producers with acamera in front of their face, hey,
(02:29):
actually I lied, or they'll justsay, well, I don't know
why they're saying that, because this, this, and this. So if
you've never watched I'm a Killer onNetflix, please please go watch it.
Okay, but that is where today'scase came from. So I'm really ready
to talk about it because I havejust finished the research going through the court
(02:51):
documents watching that. So if you'reready, get squared away and let's talk
murder. So we're gonna be rollingback the clock to nineteen ninety seven and
(03:12):
we're gonna be going to Houston,Texas. So we're gonna be talking about
Charles Thompson and Denise Hayslip. Sowhen Charles first met Denise hay Slip,
it was on his birthday in Juneof nineteen ninety seven, and the two
were immediately attracted to one another.In just a matter of two weeks,
Denise and Charles had moved in together, but also living in Denise's home was
(03:38):
her son and Denise's co worker,Lisa, and then Lisa's two daughters.
So Denise was thirty eight years oldand she had just recently been divorced,
and she was known by pretty mucheverybody as being very happy and carefree and
known as the life of the party. Now. Charles, on the other
(04:00):
hand, at this time in ninetyseven, is twenty seven years old,
and he really just thought the worldof Denise, and this relationship came together
very quickly the two. There wasprobably love or at least lust in the
beginning, but it also had itsproblems. Soon arguments would get physical between
Denise and Charles, and eventually Deniseends up moving out into her own apartment
(04:27):
and Charles follows behind, which reallyLisa was happy about Lisa Gonzalez, her
coworker that she was living with,because on more than one occasion she had
seen Charles just get very angry,and really, Lisa and Charles just didn't
get along, and Charles was oftenphysical with Denise, and he would just
(04:48):
do things that she didn't like andshe didn't want to be around her kids.
Like when he got mad, hewould start kicking the refrigerator, he
would hit the walls. He justreally didn't know how to express anger.
And on one instance in particular,when Charles was having one of these fits,
it was on Saying Patrick's day.He had been drinking. Him and
(05:09):
Denise had gotten into an argument,and his argument was over Denise wanting to
dance with other people at the clubthat they were at, so Denise hit
him, and in a fit ofrage, he hit her back. He
says that he slapped her three times, but the result of this fight was
Denise having a black eye and abusted lip, and of course, like
(05:32):
many men say, he's just sosorry afterwards, and he regretted hitting her.
But Lisa said that this was notthe first time that something physical like
this had happened between Denise and Charles. That before, when he would have
his anger problems, he remembers seeingCharles grabb Denise by her shoulders and shake
her very violently. But it's notlong after that Denise begins another relationship,
(05:59):
and this is with a bartender attheir favorite bar, and his name is
Darren Kane. Now, her relationshipwith Darren did start while she was still
entangled with Charles. Now from allaccounts, they were very on again,
off again in their relationship. ButDenise had just told many people that she
was done with their relationship. Itwas just very tumultuous after basically him blacking
(06:26):
her eye and busting her lips,she was really done. She just wasn't
there for it anymore. So Charlesdidn't really know about Denise and Darren,
but Darren did know that Denise wasin this awful relationship. And people that
knew Darren and Charles, who actuallygoes by Chuck, say that they were
(06:47):
night and day. That Darren wasthis thoughtful, nice person, He had
a lot going for him, hewas an overachiever. And people say that
Chuck, on the other hand,was a drunk and he was addicted to
drugs and he had anger problems,and just they were not even in the
same category of man. Basically iswhat people say that knew both of them.
(07:09):
So on Wednesday, April twenty ninthof nineteen ninety eight, Charles,
Denise, and their friends close downBimbos. Now, this is the bar
where Darren works, and this isa Wednesday night routine for them to close
down the bar, and that isbecause it's their favorite night of the week.
It's five dollars staking Potato night,and they stay all night. They
(07:32):
shoot darts, they drink and theyhave a good time. But on this
particular Wednesday, Darren gets a callfrom Denise around three am in the morning,
and in this call, she saysthat Charles is messing with her,
and at some point Charles actually getson the phone and begins to threaten Darren.
So Darren tells his friend, Hey, this is happening over at Denise's
(07:56):
house. I'm going to go andhelp her because it it does sound like
anything good is going to happen there. A neighbor is awokeome at three a
little after three am in the morningon the thirtieth by screaming coming from Denise's
apartment. She hears things like helpand stop, and then when she walks
out to see what's going on,she can hear that Charles is calling Denise
(08:18):
a whore, and when she looksat Charles, Charles is beat out of
hell. He is a black guy. He's got blood all over his face,
it's swollen. It's clear that therehas been a fight there, and
she's already called the police. Sothey're on their way for a domestic dispute,
which is from what I can imaginefrom all the things that I have
read, is not uncommon for somethingdomestic like this to be happening at this
(08:43):
apartment. So at this time,when Charles is cussing Denise out, Darren
tells him, hey, man,you need to chill, and Charles says,
do you want to die? Andthis is when an officer arrives on
this scene, and Denise and Charlesand Darren at this point are all calm.
Everything's kind of calmed down. They'vesaid their peace, they've fought a
(09:05):
little. Everything that needs to happen, it looks like it's happened. And
the apartment belongs to Denise. Soshe's asked by the deputy Deputy Coker if
she wants to press charges against Charles, and she says no. And it's
clear to this officer too that Charleshas been in a fight, and he
(09:26):
you know, asks how it happenedand basically finds out that Charles is the
one that has started all of this. So Deputy Coker he tells Charles,
if you return, this is criminaltrespassing. Do not come back here,
and Charles leaves, but he onlyleaves for three hours. At six am,
(09:46):
that same neighbor that had reported thedispute before heard a loud knock on
her door. She goes to thedoor and she finds Denise. Denise has
crawled over to her door. She'snow lying on the ground and there's blood
just flowing from her mouth. Andbecause of the amount of blood that is
(10:07):
in Denise's mouth, she can't speak, so she uses gestures to say what
had happened to her. And thegesture that she uses is her thumb and
her two fingers to look like agun like she has been shot. So
right away, this neighbor calls theauthorities again. This time, the same
(10:28):
deputy arrives. Deputy Coker comes in. He looks through the apartment and he
finds Darren's dead body on the livingroom floor. He had been shot twice,
and from there Denise is assessed andairlifted to the hospital. So while
she's awaiting surgery, her brother Mikecomes to talk to her and he asked
(10:52):
her, did Chuck do this toyou? And she nods her head yes.
Six hours lay, Denise's airway wasblocked and the doctors did an emergency
at Trinkia and they tried to resuscitateher, but she had been without air
for almost ten minutes. Denise spentuntil May at six on life support and
(11:15):
when her family finally decided to turnoff the machine. Here's what happened with
Charles after the attack. So themurder, Charles went to his friend Diane's
house to sleep, and his friendwoke him up because she saw all these
bruises all over his face and shemakes this comment, She's like, man,
I hope the other guy looks worsethan you, and Charles just looks
(11:39):
at her and he goes, hedoes I shot him? So Charles told
Diane about that night and how afterthe fight and after the police made him
leave, he left to go geta gun. He was mad. He
was mad because Darren had not onlybeat him up, but he had stayed
there with Denise. So that morning, around six am, Charles kicks in
(12:05):
the apartment door and he shoots DarrenCaine four times, and then he turned
to Denise. He put a gunto her cheek and he pulled the trigger.
And then after this he talks abouthow he leaves and how he threw
the gun that he used in acreek after on his way to her house.
(12:26):
So, after Charles tells his friendhis story, the news of what
happened at Denise's apartment is actually beingbroadcasted on TV, and Charles then realizes
through this footage on TV that Deniseis sitting straight up on a stretcher.
She as bandages all over her face. So through this he's like, oh,
(12:48):
Denise is not dead. So hecalls his dad and he's asking his
dad. He's like, oh,my gosh, have you seen what happened
all this stuff? And his dadsays, yeah, they've already been here,
Charles, They've already been here lookingfor you. So his dad convinces
him to surrender to the police becausehe tells him that on the TV right
now, there's a picture of himthat says he's armed and dangerous, so
(13:11):
he needs to go take care ofthis. So his dad drives him to
the police station where he surrenders,and there he's charged with one count of
manslaughter and one count of aggravated assault. But in this time of when he
surrenders, he's arrested and he ischarged, this is when Denise is put
on life support and she dies.So from there the state pulls him back
(13:35):
into court to revise the charges.Now Charles is being charged with capital murder.
The prosecution has dropped the previous manslaughterand aggravated assault charge. This capital
murder charge was because now Darren Kaneand Denise Hayslap have both died. But
Charles he's confused because Denise died atthe hospital from what he thought was hospital
(14:01):
error. His family had told himthe whole situation of what happened with Denise
before the corps ever even pulled himin, saying that she had died in
the hospital, and Denise's family actuallyat this point are starting to file a
wrongful death suit against the hospital.So he's very confused of why he's getting
charged with her murder when it lookslike it's completely the hospital's fault. And
(14:26):
this is going to take a big, big play in his murder trial.
So Charles went to trial for doublemurder almost an exact year after the attack,
and this would be on April twelfth, in nineteen ninety nine. The
defense presented their case that the hospitalkilled Denise, not Charles, and it
really was never a question. Iguess that Charles did kill Darren, but
(14:52):
it was thought that it was throughself defense. So somehow they think,
and this is through Charles tell ofevents, that darre and had grabbed a
knife out of the knife block andcame after Charles. But we know that
Charles has kicked the door into thisplace and all of this stuff has happened.
But anyways, they're trying to saythat Darren grabbed a knife out of
(15:16):
the kitchen block and it was selfdefense that Charles had killed him. But
so really I don't know that thatwas so much as a question. What
the defense really went for, though, was the fact that they believed that
the hospital killed his niece and notCharles. But the doctor that performed the
autopsy and did the report put onthe report that her cause of death was
(15:37):
a gunshot wound to the face.The report stated that a gunshot wound through
the cheek severed Denise's tongue leading toand causing her death. So at trial,
one of her doctors stated that hadan ambulance not came, had Life
Star not flown her to the hospital, that Denise surely would have died without
(16:00):
their medical care at all. Thisdoctor states that from her tongue being severed
that very easily could have blocked herairway causing her suffocation, or through her
tongue being severed, the amount ofblood that was coming out of her mouth
and feeling her lungs would have causedher to drowned. And the defense ends
up calling their own medical expert inand they eventually agreed that Denise's injuries were
(16:26):
life threatening, but she did diein the hospital, so pretty much what
they're saying here is her injuries werebad enough that she had to have the
medical care, so she wouldn't havedied in the hospital had she not been
shot with a gun. And oneof the biggest things that they tried to
(16:47):
use in this the prosecution was thatpicture and footage of Denise where she's sitting
on the gurney and she's sitting straightup, and the reason that she's setting
straight up, I mean, thisis very morbid and very gory is she's
sitting straight up so she doesn't drownon her own blood. Through this trial,
(17:07):
the medical malpractice suits filed by thehay Slips family, it's ended up
determined that it is not the hospital'sfault, that they are not at fault
for malpractice. And this obviously isnot going to help Charles case at all.
But let me tell you what elseisn't going to help Charles case is
the fact that he was trying toorder a hit on his friend Diane.
(17:32):
And this is Diane Zerna. Thisis the person's whose house he went to
after he killed Darren and attacked Denise. Remember, he confesses to her what
he did. He tells her everythingfrom the I shot him to I threw
the gun in the creek. Hetells her everything. That morning, she's
obviously going to be called to testifyat his trial against him, and he
(17:56):
just says, well, she hasto die, and is trying to arrange
this hit to be done by hiscellmate Max. He's getting out of jail,
so Charles is going to pay himand he's going to provide him with
a gun. But throughout the courseof this other people get involved. And
there's a deal that's made with theDA and an undercover cop goes under to
(18:18):
have a meeting with Charles. Andthis is supposed to be basically a friend
of a friend who's a hitman,but obviously it's not a hitman, it's
a cop. So in this meeting, they talk about the retrieval of a
gun, they talk about Denise's description, they talk about Denise's address, and
even in this little pow wow thatthey're having, keep in mind it's still
(18:41):
in jail. When this undercover copis coming to talk to him. He
tells him how his ex cellmate Max, he gave him a down payment of
one hundred and twenty five dollars,but the Max screwed him over and that
he just isn't going to do it. So he tells him, he says,
I need you to take care ofthe state's witness. He's the only
witness that they have, and theyarrange for Charles to pay him fifteen hundred
(19:06):
dollars to kill Diane. And thisis all recorded and it's all presented at
trial. So on April sixth oftwo thousand, Charles Thompson is sentenced to
death. But we're not done becausesix years later he gets a retrial,
and this is because of the recording. It's now considered illegal the way that
(19:33):
the recording was obtained, in thequestions of how it happened, and basically
through everything's just inadmissible somehow. Sothis new trial was to set a punishment
without the recording. So in thisnew trial they have new jurors and they
have to decide is life in prisonis that too much? Is the death
(19:53):
penalty too much? What would weconsider a fair sentencing for this man?
And the lead juror in it,she asked them, is there any way
he's ever going to get out?Does it even matter if we change this,
because if he's ever going to beon the streets again, this will
determine what we say here. Andthe judge tells them, no, absolutely
(20:15):
not. He's on de row.He's never ever going to see the outside
of a prison ever again. Butthen two days after his resentencing, Charles
Thompson escapes. He had been inprison for six years altogether at this point.
This is in two thousand and five, So one day after court,
after the resentencing, he's waiting ina holding cell. He has on his
(20:40):
very nice court clothes, and heprovides a bailiff with a fake ID it
since he's in these nice clothes,and I'm sure he had the confidence to
back it up. He escapes andCharles was on the run for four days
now. He was arrested outside ofa liquor store in Shreveport, Louisiana.
(21:00):
The reason he gets arrested is becausehe's drunk okay, and an officer approaches
him at a pay phone and hesays who are you? And Charles says,
you know who I am? Andwitnesses say after that, it's literally
like something you see out of amovie. It's like swat team comes in
and they astract him. So fromthere, Charles Thompson went back to jail
(21:23):
where he is now sitting in aLivingstone prison in Texas on death row.
I'll right, you, guys,thanks for coming along with me today,
another Friday, another true time case. So let's just talk a little bit
(21:47):
about it for a minute. Sowhen I said that Charles had a whole
other tale of events, he saysthat him and Denise had went home with
each other from Bimbos, the barthat they we're at on that night,
and when they get home they geta call from Darren and Darren is wanting
(22:10):
to spend time with Denise. Andit's unclear, but to me, this
is kind of where I think thatCharles finds out that Darren and Denise are
dating and that they've been together before, and this is when him and Denise
start fighting. So they start fighting. The police is called. The police
(22:33):
tell him, hey, everybody's together, separate ways, and he says that
he goes and he drives around andtries to basically sleep it off, you
know, he's smad, sleep itoff. He says he was drunk,
so he comes back, though,he says he calls Denise on a pay
phone. He comes back to theapartment and when he comes back, he
(22:53):
finds them in bed together, andhe says that he wasn't trying to wake
Denise up. He's trying to bereally quiet. He was just trying to
grab his stuff for work and thenget out. But then when he goes
to get his stuff, she wakesup. He sees Darren next to her,
and then that's when this whole thingensues of him attacking and what he
says happens is he's trying to grabhis stuff from where Darren goes into the
(23:17):
kitchen, he gets a knife fromthe knife block, and Charles actually says
that he grabs a pistol from thecloset, okay, and that he grabs
this pistol and he tells Darren,hey back up, and Darren doesn't back
up, and he keeps coming towardshim, and he has this knife,
and so he shoots him. Heshoots him once Darren keeps coming out of
(23:37):
him, shoots him again. Theyfight over the gun, and in this
process of them fighting, a bulletgoes off and hits Denise. This is
what Charles says happens, and hegoes, well, some of it is
a blur though, because I reallywas still you know, kind of buzzed.
I was still kind of drunk.He says that he tried to call
the police and that the phone wasn'tworking, he couldn't go through, and
(24:00):
that he was so panicked that hewent out and he ran and then that's
when he went to He never saysher name, but he says, that's
when I went to my friend's houseand I was in shock, and I
just passed out from being in shock, and then you know, I wake
up and I see my face onTV, and that's when I realized that
I have to go turn myself in. So I call my dad to do
that, and you know, that'shis little tale of events. So when
(24:25):
he's confronted with what actually happened andthey tell him, you know, hey,
what about you trying to order ahit on your friend on Diane's what's
up with that? And he's like, that's embarrassing, and that's all he
says. He goes, that's embarrassing. And I kind of laughed at that
part because I was like, Yeah, that is embarrassing. You just fed
(24:47):
these people this just crock of shit, pardon my language, and you just
you just think, oh, yeah, that's embarrassing. I really shouldn't really
shouldn't try to kill my friend there. Yeah, sir, that is embarrassing.
And the thing that really got meis when he's trying to order this
hit on Diane, this friend's housethat he wouldn't crashed out. He's telling
(25:07):
them how old she is and he'slike, yeah, she's like thirty eight,
forty years old. She has afourteen year old daughter. And he's
describing the house what it looks like. The neighborhood it's in. He tells
this person, the undercover cop,everything down to what the mailbox looks like,
and the undercover cop is like,well, you know, I couldn't
reappend or anything in here, soI'm trying to remember this all by memory
(25:30):
and all this. But the thingthat just got me was he just spouted
out that this woman that was hisfriend what her house looked like, and
he had probably been to her houseso many times that he knew exactly what
everything looked like, and he justsaid, without a care in the world,
that she was a mom of afourteen year old girl, and that
there wasn't anyone else living in thehouse or anything. So his plan was
(25:52):
to kill this person off and toleave this fourteen year old out in this
world without anybody, somebody who washis friend. And that's another thing that
one of the jurors said that justkind of speaks to the evil of this
guy. He killed a man,shot a woman that he apparently loved,
then goes to a friend's house,and then when he gets to jail,
tries to call the friend to takeback what he said and not to talk
(26:15):
to the cops, but of courseshe is because she's not a piece of
garbage like he is. And thenhe's like, well, if you're not
gonna do what I want you todo, then I'm just gonna have to
kill you, and I'm just gonnahave to leave your daughter without anyone in
this world. And that just spoketo me really of his character. And
the whole time he's talking, youknow, really what he's saying is smooth,
(26:37):
and it sounds like it's just gotto be the truest thing in the
world, but you know that it'snot. And it just speaks to the
power of basically narcism that he hasand his manipulation powers. I don't know.
If you haven't watched that, basically, go watch it. Watch this
one. It's called Intended Evil.I believe it's season two on there.
(26:59):
I just ran only came across it, and it was so interesting, so
interesting. Another thing I just wantto say really quickly too, is in
the course of the case and thetrial and everything, it really did seem
like Darren Caine's murder was just overlooked. And that's very sad because the people
that knew him and loved him saidthat he was a wonderful person. And
(27:21):
that you know he worked at thisbar. He was, but that wasn't
all he had gone for him,and that he was just a really a
fun guy. He was a carryingguy. And that's what brought him to
Denise's apartment that night, was thathe cared about her and he knew that
Charles had hit her before, andhe was just worried about her. And
he didn't go there to fight him. He went there to keep him from
(27:45):
fighting her. And then at theend of the night, actually Darren tells
a friend of his that him andCharles shook hands and that they walked away
and that they both he felt likethey both resolved the problem and that he
felt good about what happened there thatnight. And then three hours later he
is dead. He is killed bythis man. So anyways, if you
(28:11):
enjoyed hearing this case today and wouldlike to hear more interesting cases, please
hit that subscribe button. By rating, reviewing, and subscribing, that is
really how you help this podcast,or any other podcast the most. If
you have a minute and would liketo leave a review that would help the
podcast as well, you can followme over on the Instagram page at Murder
(28:36):
Squared. If you have a casethat you would like to recommend, Please
do that over at murder Squared atgmail. And until next time, stay
square and I'll see you next Murder
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