August 4, 2025 • 40 mins
Police in Rogers, Arkansas, were responding to a report of somebody not breathing one early morning in September 1999. As they pulled up outside the unassuming apartment, a nude man flung open the front door and screamed: “He’s not breathing!”
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:48):
Rogers is a small city in Arkansas that was founded
in eighteen eighty one as a railway town along the
Saint Louis and San Francisco Railroad. It was developed as
an agricultural shipping center, especially for poultry and forms. Then,
in nineteen sixty two, a man named Sam Walton opened
a small five and dime store right in the heart
of Rogers. It was humble and unassuming, but it was
(01:10):
the beginning of something massive. That little store eventually grew
into Walmart, the largest retail corporation in the world, and
even as the company exploded in size and scope, Rogers
clung to its roots. Today, the historic downtown is preserved
with brick paved streets in turn of the century storefronts, cafes,
and boutique shops. Away from the queen downtown along South
(01:31):
Dixieland Road lies the Rogers Police Department. This is where
the nine one one Dispatch Center is housed. Here, the
center dispatches police, far and EMS units not only across Rogers,
but also neighboring Benton County agencies. It homes with routine
calls from vander Bender's domestic disputes and everything in between.
(01:53):
That's how the morning of September twenty sixth, nineteen ninety
nine began. But at around five am that morning, a
phone call came in that would change everything. There was
a man on the other end of the line. He
sounded panicked as he said, I have a guy. He's dead.
We're trying to resuscitate him. Hell he ain't, but fourteen,
I don't know what the fuck went wrong. The operator
(02:16):
tried to get more details, but the caller was frantic.
He continued, we was playing some kind of goddamn game
and tying each other up and all that shit. Officers
were immediately dispatched. Officers Aan Smith and Jason Curry were
the first to respond. Their cruiser pulled in to asleep.
He called the sack lined with duplexes one two oh
(02:38):
seven West Sunset Drive with the RAM style unit that
didn't stand thout, low brick and wood paneling typical of
the area. It was the kind of place you would
drive past without a second thought. Just across the street,
the baseball field at Northwest Park sat under the soft
morning hayz, empty and still. Before the officers could even
(02:59):
reach the front stone Epps, the door burst open a
naked man rushed towards them. He's not breathing, he shouted.
(03:22):
Greasy Valley Road winds its way through the hills outside
Prairie Grove and Arkansas, just past the small town of Clyde.
It's a quiet, rural stretch of road, framed by open
fields and sprawling farmland. It was along this unassuming stretch
of countryside the thirteen year old Jesse durk Heising lived
with its family in a modest trailer, tuck between tall
(03:44):
grass and farmland. Their home wasn't grand, but it was theirs.
Jesse was the eldest of three children born to Tina
and Timothy Durkaisin, but his parents' marriage didn't last just
two years, and after the divorced, Timothy drifted out of
his son's life, leaving a quiet vacancy where our father
figures should have been. That space was eventually filled by
(04:07):
Miles Yeats, Tina's new partner. Jesse called him Dad, and
to his younger siblings Chatham Renee, Jesse was more than
just a brother. He was a protector, a playmate, and
somebody that they could look up to. Jesse was said
to have an easy going charm that made him well liked,
not just at home, but at school as well. He
was in the seventh grade at Lincoln Middle School. While
(04:30):
he was popular, school didn't come easy to Jesse. According
to the principal, Beverly Davenport, he lacked something to be desired.
He had to repeat the seventh grade. But Jesse made
up what he lacked in academics with heart. Before the
morning bell rang, he'd be out on the grass with
a pack of fifteen other boys playing touch football. They
(04:51):
did the same thing at lunch. He was a kid
who loved the outdoors, from hiking, fishing, and hunting. He
especially loved camping trips with the family. There was nothing
extraordinary about Jesse Durkaising, nothing that would have caught the
eye of the world. He was just a regular boy
living a regular life in a quiet patch of America.
(05:12):
But sometimes the most horrifying stories don't come from the
place as we expect. When Officers Ain Smith and Jason
Curry pulled up outside the low rise duplex on West
Sunset Drive, they were met at the door by a
(05:33):
naked man. He was visibly shaken, his eyes wide with panic.
His name was Davis Stawn Carbenter, he was thirty eight
years old, and he was frantic. He's not breathing, he
kept repeating, over and over, like he was trying to
convince himself more than anybody else. Carpenter quickly led the
(05:53):
officers inside through a narrow hallway with Warren carpets and
low ceilings. The apartment was small and save for the
distant hum of a television left on in another room,
the smell of faces hit the officers almost immediately. Standing
in the hallway was another man, twenty two year old
Joshua Brown. He was completely naked, clutching a flashlight in
(06:16):
one hand and a telephone in the other. Braun didn't speak.
Carpenter continued to lead the officers towards the back of
the apartment and into a small bedroom. The door creaked open.
There on the floor was a mattress, no frame, no sheathes,
no blankets, just a bare, stained mattress in the middle
(06:36):
of an otherwise empty room, and beside it with a
teenage boy lying motionless. It was Jesse dark Eysing. He
was naked, His small frame lay awkwardly beside the mattress,
and his genitals and abdomen were smeared with feces. The
smell that had clung to the hallway now swallowed the
(06:57):
room hole. It was, as officers Curry later said, overwhelming.
The officers rushed to Jesse's side. His lips were tinged
blue and his skin was cool to the touch, but
there was still a pulse that was faint and barely there,
although he wasn't breathing. The officer scanned him quickly, instinctively,
(07:18):
noting every detail. There was doc tape rapped tightly around
his right hand. They turned to Braun and asked what
it was doing there. Braun looked up and softly responded,
we were playing a game. As they waited for paramedics
to arrive, the officers swept their flashlights around the room.
That's when they started to see more. On the mattress
(07:39):
was an empty prescription pill bottle. On a nearby mirror
was loose pills scattered around a razor blade. There was
also drug paraphernalia. The quid of the neighborhood was shattered
by the sudden arrival of paramedics. Red and blue lights
flashed across the street. It was just past five am,
and most of Rogers was still asleep, unaware of the
(08:00):
horror unfolding inside this unremarkable apartment, The medics moved quickly.
They lifted Jesse carefully on to a stretcher, shielding his
body with a blanket. As the ambulance roared away from
West Sunset Drive with their sirens wailing, The team worked
furiously to keep Jesse alive. They were headed to Saint
(08:21):
Mary's Hospital as Jesse Jurchising's life hung in the balance.
Back at the apartment, the officers believed they were standing
in the middle of a crime scene. Nothing about what
they had just encountered appeared to be normal. A naked
(08:42):
teenage boy, naked men, and a collection of disturbing items.
While normally a search warrant would be executed, detectives didn't
need one. They had asked if they could search the apartment,
and Davis Carpenter had responded, well, you're going to look anyway.
You're going to get a search warrant and look. He
then signed a consent to search form as a warning.
(09:05):
The next section of this episode deals with the abuse
of children. Please listen with caution. In the living room
and bedroom, detectives recovered numerous small green pills, various wattles
of prescription medication, which included amatriptolene, which is a heavy
sedative commonly used to treat depression. There was also a
small quantity of meth amphetamine. But it wasn't just drugs
(09:28):
that detectives found. There were countless tubs of petroleum jelly.
In the bedroom. Two cucumbers were recovered. One was covered
in petroleum jelly while the other was covered in faces.
Nearby was a tube shaped sausage and crushed banana. In
another corner of the bedroom, they came across bondige items
(09:49):
including bells, stock tape, strapping tape, nylon rope, rubber jump rope,
and electric cord. Discarded on the floor lay a plastic
disposable douche bottle with the applicator secured in place with
jock tape. The search then continued in the living room.
The computer was still running and up on the screen
was a program that was titled Medical Drug Reference four
(10:11):
point zero. On a computer table lay a piece of
paper with a handwritten note addressed to baby in the
right corner of the note with the names of three
types of prescription pills. The note referred to making somebody
take those pills. It then referenced positioning pillows beneath this
person in a certain way. A different section of the
(10:34):
same note said to tell him not to fight. Over
the next fourteen hours he would be sexually assaulted. Nearby,
detectives found the second note the reference to piece of
meat being inserted into somebody's anus. The note also referred
to Davis engaging an intercourse with Yu blindfolded on pills.
(10:54):
Another note was discovered, once more addressed to baby. This
note referred to docor tape and included a hand drawn
diagram of somebody bond to a bed. There were notations
that referred to pillows, tape all the way around faced on,
and the barocks of a person being raised approximately two feet.
There were other letters discovered in various parts of the apartment.
(11:18):
One addressed a baby, was signed by Davy. In this letter,
Davy describes saying baby's little ten year old blonde hour
at her bus stop in the morning. He went on
to graphically describe how he would envision baby engaging in
sexual acts with this child. The search of the apartment
continued and detectives found another pad of handwritten notes. In
(11:40):
these notes, the writer described a man making a fine
crushed white powder from the small, oddly purple colored pill.
He described cutting the pill into four sections so there
would be enough to do this again in four rs.
The note continued, describing the man giving a nine year
old girl a glass of milk with the powdered mixture it.
(12:01):
The writer then wrote of the man laughing out loud,
knowing that in twenty minutes the drink would make her
helpless and drunk. He then described in detail the man
having the girl masturbate and then perform oral sex on him.
It was clear that what had happened inside that apartment
was anything other than an accident. The two men standing
(12:22):
before detectives were clearly child predators, and Jesse jurk Heising
was their victim. By now, more officers had arrived at
(12:47):
the apartment. One of them was Corporal Rick Simmons. He
separated Carpenter and Brown and began questioning Joshua Brown. Without warning,
Brown lunged at him. He swung a fist towards Simmons.
He was restrained before he could make contact. Officers quickly
placed him under arrest. Detective Martha Armstrong stepped in and
(13:07):
read him as Miranda rights. That's when Braun began to talk.
He told him that he and day of His Carpenter,
were in a relationship. He said Carpenter called him Baby,
a detailed that immediately called the detective's attention. It was
the same name used in the disturbing letters found throughout
the apartment. Braun said that he and Jesse frequently tied
(13:30):
one another up, but he insisted it wasn't sexual. He
described what happened that night. He said he snuck up
on Jesse, tied his hands behind his back, and stuffed
a pair of underwear into his mouth. He secured it
with a bandana and DUC tape, and then blindfolded him
again using DUC tape. Told everything in place. A T
(13:52):
shirt was pulled over Jesse's head, but Braun claimed he
made sure that Jesse's nostrils were left uncovered. He said
he then by Jesse's legs with belts tight around the
knees and ankles. Once immobilized, Broun said he untied Jesse's hands,
only to secure them again, this time to opposite corners
of the mattress. Jesse was then placed on his stomach.
(14:16):
Braun told investigators that he penetrated Jesse with different objects,
including a cucumber, a sausage, a banana, and a douche bottle,
but he wasn't finished there. Broun said he then prepared
an enema using his own urine mixed with the sedative
ame triptolene, and administered it. Then he took the cucumber again,
(14:36):
this time taping it in place. After that, Braun said
he went into the kitchen and made himself a sandwich.
When he left Jesse in the bedroom, he said that
the boy was kicking around and acting goofy. He said,
we was mess and irond and stuff. I left him
for five minutes. I didn't think I tied his hands
that tight. I left his nose uncovered so he could breathe.
(15:00):
When Braun returned, he said that Jesse wasn't breathing. He
claimed he removed the bindings, including the t shirt, the bandana,
the tape, the underwear from his mouth, and then ran
to wake up Carpenter. Carpenter, however, told a different story.
He said that he had been asleep when Braun woke him,
saying that Jesse wasn't breathing, but when Carpenter walked into
(15:22):
the bedroom, he said that Jesse was still bound. He
claimed he attempted tapor and then called nine one one,
But nothing about this version matched the scene or the evidence.
It was clear that Jesse had been the victim of calculated,
sadistic abuse, and it was just as clear that both
men had played a role. The handwritten notes tied Carpenter
(15:43):
directly to the abuse. Many of them had been written
by him addressed to Baby, his pet name for Braun.
The two men were then taken into Costudy and transported
to the Rogers Police Department for formal interrogation. Joshua Braun
sat down in front of detech of Sergeant Hayes Minor.
His story had since changed. He now claimed that he
(16:06):
and Jesse had been sexually involved for approximately two months,
since Jesse was just a child. However, Brin had actually
been grooming and molesting him. They weren't sexually involved, as
he had put it. He described the sexual assaults he
had inflicted his games in playing. According to Braun, he
and Jesse had spent the entire weekend sneaking up on
(16:27):
one another and tying each other up. He described cutting
Jesse's clothing off, telling the detectives I told him a
how do you like that? Brum was then questioned about
Carpenter's involvement in the rape of Jesse. He now admitted
that Carpenter wasn't asleep. He said Carpenter had stood in
the doorway of the bedroom he was naked and masturbated.
(16:51):
Braun then admitted that the notes in the home were
indeed from Carpenter. Various ones were telling him what to
do to Jesse. Car had even purchased the items used
in the sexual assault. While Braun had initially characterized the
assault on Jesse's horseplay gone wrong, he later changed his tune.
He blamed Jesse for initiating sexual compact. He claimed that
(17:15):
nights earlier, Jesse, who was a thirteen year old boy,
had come on to him and performed a sex act.
Over at the hospital, doctors fought desperately to save Jesse's life,
but it was tragically too late. He died shortly after
he arrived. His body was transported to the medical Examiner's office,
where the autopsy revealed the cause of death, positional asphyxia.
(17:39):
Jesse couldn't breathe the way he had been restrained and
positioned cut off his air. Toxic levels of a powerful
sedative found in his system had also contributed to his death.
Joshua Braun and Davis Carpenter were subsequently charged with first
degree murder. At the court hearing, Judge David Klinger refused
(17:59):
to set bail for EA. Their man prosecutor, Brad Butler,
stood before the court and announced his intent to seek
the death penalty. He spoke with Deake conviction as he said,
what I saw inside that apartment was the most horrific
thing I've witnessed in my eleven years as a prosecutor.
It was a horrible, brutal crime. No one deserves to
lose a child this way. Bron and Carpenter were then
(18:22):
sent back to jail and each were placed into isolation
for their own safety. But before they were separated, Carpenter
had already spoken to some inmates at the jail. He
admitted to them that he had taken part in Jesse's assault.
He said he had forced pills do on his throat.
He claimed he didn't know whether it was the drugs
or the tape binding and gagging him that caused his death.
(18:46):
But for detectives, questions still remained. How exactly had Carboner
and Braun come to know Jesse, who had a child,
ended up in their grasp. Davis Carpenter wasn't a stranger.
(19:10):
He had been a friend of Tina and Miles Yets.
He had first met Miles through methamphetamine. Miles had sold it,
and Carpenter had been a client. But more recently, Carpenter
was managing a local beauty salon. In the months before
Jesse was killed, Carpenter had offered him a job sweeping
hair on the weekends. He knew that Jesse was saving
(19:31):
up money to fix an old pickup truck. Tina and
Miles agreed they trusted Carpenter. They also trusted Braun. Jesse
was over the moon. Fifty dollars a weekend was a
lot of money to him, so each Saturday and Sunday,
Tina or Miles would drive him to the salon from
their home in Prairie Grove and pick him up again
that evening. But Carpenter soon offered to make things easier.
(19:55):
Jesse could stay over on Saturday nights and come home Sunday.
Saved to petrol. It saved time, but in the end,
it cost everything. The Monday after Jesse was murdered, his
space on the school bus sat empty. The ride was
unusually quiet. Bus driver Gary Trambley noticed the silence. Then
(20:19):
he noticed something else. Somebody had left floorers on Jesse's safe.
One of the children sat there. They had silently decided
it would remain Jesse's. At school, councilors were brought in.
Jesse's classmates were barely teenagers themselves, but they came together
in grief and love. They wanted to do something anything.
(20:41):
They started collecting money for Jesse's funeral flowers and for
his family. Gary allowed them to keep a collection box
on the school bus. By Tuesday morning, they had raised
thirty dollars. Gary said one of Chad's little bodies must
have cleaned out his piggy bank, and he was right.
A nine year old friend of Jesse's little brother handed
(21:03):
over everything he had. His mother, who asked not to
be named, said that her son often worried that Jesse's
family didn't have enough to eat. Back in Rogers, where
Braun and Carpenter lived, the community was just as horrified.
Their apartment sat in a six unit complex, close quarters
where neighbors knew one another. Most of them thought that
(21:23):
the two men were brothers. Carpenter was known as a
nat freak brawn came off as friendly and approachable. Connie
nw Coome, who lived next door, commented, you never heard
any noise, no wild parties, no craziness going on just today.
Before Jesse was killed, Carpenter had invited Diane Watkins to
bring her ten year old daughter's soccer team to his
(21:45):
heirslon Her husband, Tom commented, it scared my wife and
daughter a hole lot. It just scared them to death.
My daughter was scared to sleep in her bedroom for
a few days. Even Connie's ten year old son had
been inside the men's apartment. He'd gone in to play
with their cats. The horror of what had happened shook
the entire neighborhood. Half of the tenants moved out. They
(22:09):
couldn't leave that close to the place where something so
monstrous had happened. On the thirteenth of October, Joshua bron
and Davis Carpenter appeared in court, where they pleaded not
(22:32):
guilty to all of the charges. Their defense teams filed
the motion for gag orders, hoping to keep the disturbing
details of Jesse's murder sailed from the public, but the
judge denied the request. Still, despite the brutality of the case,
media coverage remained strangely sparse. A few local papers had
(22:52):
covered Jesse's murder, but there was no national outcry, not
until a week later, when The Washington Times ran aheadline
the demanded attention media tune out torture death of Arkansas boy.
The piece criticized the near silence surrounding the crime. Sim Graham,
director of Media Analysis that the Media Research Center, commented,
(23:14):
nobody wants to say anything negative against homosexuals. Nobody wants
to be seen on the wrong side of that issue.
David Smith, a spokesman for the Human Rights Campaign, quickly
responded and said this has nothing to do with gay people.
The article drew a sharp comparison between the lack of
attention to Jesse dark Heising's murder and the intense media
(23:35):
response to the murder of Matthew Shepard, a gay man
who was beaten to death in Wyoming the previous year.
Both were he and his crimes both involved vulnerable victims,
but only one had made headlines across the nation. Even
Prosecutor Christopher Plumley admitted he was surprised by the quiet reaction.
He didn't want to speculate why, but noted that Jesse's
(23:58):
rape and murder had occurred in a small town with
a low violent crime rate. He saw outrage and rogers
on Prairie Grove, but not the kind of national response
that Matthew Shepherd's murder had sparked. After the Washington Times article,
other outlets finally began covering the case. The New York
Post published a column by Brett Bosel, editor of Media
(24:21):
Reality Czech, who wrote, why would this story go on?
Told had Jesse Durchising been shot inside his Arkansas school,
he would have been an immediate national news story, but
his national interest grew so the political agendas and de
gay hate group seized on the case. They accused the
media of downplaying the story out of political correctness. Conservative
(24:47):
activist Peter le Barbera called on others to use Jesse's
death as a rallying cry, just as Matthew Shepherd's death
had become a symbol for LGBTQ plus rights. Back in
the courtroom, the growing publicity prompted Carpenter's attorney Tim Buckley
to file a motion for a change of venue. He argued,
(25:07):
it's been on everyone's lips down here for a month
and a half. Benton County is a very conservative county.
It's the corporal headquarters of Walmart. It's always been a
bassi of Republican conservatives. He believed that his client could
get a fair trial. Braun's attorney, Charles Duel, filed his
own motion requesting a separate trial. In February. Judge David
(25:30):
Klinger granted the request and said that the men would
be tried separately. He also ordered Braun to undergo a
psychological examination at the State Hospital in Little Rock. Its attorney,
Lewis Limb, made it clear they were exploring an insanity defense.
They were trying to determine whether Braun had been seen
at the time of the murder and whether he could
(25:51):
assist in his own defense. The results came back in September.
Joshua Brown was found to be competent, so was David's
con There would be no mental health defense, no diminished capacity.
Both men would stand trial. It was decided that Joshua
(26:17):
Broun would be standing trial first, but first. The judge
said he wanted to hear from potential jurors before deciding
whether the trial needed to be moved. The jury selection
began in March and in preparation security was tightened. Members
of the westbor Baptist Church had announced they were going
to be outside the courtroom to protest. They referred to
(26:39):
the case as a conspiracy from hell and accused the
National press of covering up Jesse's murder because the suspects
were gay. By the fourteenth, the jury was selected and seated,
meaning that the trial was indeed going ahead in Benthamville.
The jury was warned that details of the case were
going to be extremely horrific, and after that opening statements
(27:01):
got underway. Prosecutor Bob Balf told the jury, this case
is not about homosexuality. The charge in this case concerns
the rape and murder of a child. This case is
about child's sexual abuse. He said it didn't appear as
though Braun intended on killing Jesse, before adding if you
commit a violent act and it ends in death, it's
(27:23):
still capital murder. Prosecutor Balf led out the facts of
the case, describing how Jesse was propped up with pillows
and sodomized by Braun during the prolonged or Dale Carpenter
had left the apartment and gone to a nearby grocery
store to purchase items that would later be used in
the assault. He stated, this wasn't some spontaneous act that
(27:46):
got out of hand. This wasn't a consensual act, he continued, stating,
while Jesse was bound and helpless and naked in this position,
he was repeatedly raped over a period of ours by
that man Joshua Braun. Jesse slowly suffocated and died. Braun's
defense attorney Lewis Limb described Braun during his opening statements
(28:09):
as a lost young man who was under the corrupt
influence of Carpenter. He drew parallels between the childlike Braun
and Jesse, who he described as mature for his age.
He mentioned how both had been abandoned by their fathers
at a young age, and both were susceptible the Carpenter's
parent like attention. Lim also set the stage for the
(28:30):
defense to shift blame from Braun to Jesse's parents. He
revealed to the jury for the first time that Myles
had known Carpenter through their dealings with Metham Fermine. The
night that Jesse died. He said that he had taken
the drug with Carpenter and Braun it had been found
in his system. The defense attorney then spoke on Braun's upbringing.
(28:51):
He said he was placed into state custody at nine
years old after his mother struggled with mental illness and
couldn't care for him. He bonced from fall Mister Home
to Foster Home until he was seventeen, when he moved
to Mississippi, where his mother had moved to. He described
Braun as a troubled, insecure teenager with drug addictions when
Carpenter walked into his life in nineteen ninety seven. Garbinder
(29:14):
was a successful hairdresser at the time. He befriended Braun
and offered him a job. Lim said to the jury,
Carpenter realized, this is a young man who I can
bring into my fold. By the time they moved to
Rogers in nineteen ninety nine, Braun depended on Carpenter financially.
He said that Carpenter had done to Jessee what he
had done to Braun, isolated him from his family before
(29:37):
stepping down. The defense attorney conceded statutory rape, but said
that Braun never intended for Jesse to die. Testimony got
underway with the officers who responded to the crime scene
that morning. Officers Jason Curry and Ian Smith both said
that they didn't attempt to revive Jesse at the scene.
They explained they weren't carrying masks necessary to protect the
(30:00):
from disease, Department policy mandates their use during resuscitation efforts.
They explained, Officer Curry had left to go and get
the masks, but paramedics arrived and begun resuscitation efforts before
he got back. The defense team suggested that Jesse might
have survived if resuscitation efforts were performed immediately. Lim asked
(30:22):
paramedic Jackie Weissman. Could one breath have made a difference.
She responded, yes, Sir. That same day, Jesse's mother, Tina
Yates testified. She told the jury that she had known
that Braun and Carpenter were lovers, but it didn't matter
to her. They were like family. She said she trusted them.
(30:43):
She had even been inside their apartment. Nothing raised red flags.
Through sobs, she stated, Jesse was my best friend. Jesse
and I did a lot of growing up together. Jesse
and I had no secrets from each other. Tina told
the jury that Jess as he hadn't wanted to work
the weekend that he was killed. He wanted to stay
(31:04):
home and ride his motorcycle, but he went anyway, and
the plan was for Carpenter to bring him home on Sunday.
She recalled their final goodbye steering Jesse gave me a
hug and a kiss, and I gave him one. She
admitted to using drugs when she was younger, but said
it was never in front of her children. She also
(31:24):
claimed she had no idea that Miles had sold methamphetamine.
Tina explained that she and Miles had told Jesse if
he ever wanted to experiment with alcohol or drugs to
come to them first. We wanted to know what he
was taking, she said. The jury then got to hear
bronze taped confession. In it, he claimed that he and
(31:45):
Jesse had agreed to tie each other up, and that
Jesse had agreed to at least one act of sodomy.
He stated the night before he had hogtied me, so
I thought I'd get him back. I left him for
five minutes. I kept checking him and stuff, but I
killed them anyway. During the trial, the grim notes found
inside the apartment were presented. It was suggested that the
(32:08):
blonde girl that Carpenter referenced was Diane Watkins's young daughter.
Diane testified that five days before the murder, ron had
handed her a note inviting her daughter and her friends
for hair cuts. By Carpenter, she said he knew Healy
played soccer, he knew how to spell her name. I
was concerned how he knew her her daughter. Haley's skillbuss
(32:32):
stopped in front of the apartment, and she often visited
an elderly woman who lived next door. The judge had
allowed the notes to be entered into evidence, although the
defense had tried to have them blocked. The judge referred
to them as blue prints for child rape. Thankfully, Diane's
daughter was never harmed by the men, but the descriptions
(32:52):
of acts they wanted to perform on her were very
similar to how Jesse was drugged, bond and sodomized. When
Braun was first interviewed, he downplayed Carpenter's involvement. He first
of all said that he was asleep throughout the entire deal. However,
he finally admitted that all of the notes were written
by him. They were instructions on how they abuse children.
(33:14):
He further admitted that he had gone to the store
midway through the assault to purchase the cucumber and sausage.
When Jeffers and Inmated also testified about Carpenter's involvement, he
had been in a cell above braun cell and they
had communicated through the events. Braun had told him he
didn't really know Jesse, that Carpenter was the one who
really knew him. He said that Carpenter had lured Jessee
(33:37):
into the situation by offering him money. He then drugged Jesse.
Jeffers told the jury he was reluctant at first, and
Carpenter made it sound like a game. Braun told him
that Jesse had wanted to go home, but that Carpenter
started to hit him and then sexually assaulted him. He
stated he was crying. He was really crying. He wanted
(33:59):
to go home. Brown also told him that he had
sexually assaulted Jesse too, and he had wanted to release him,
but Carpenter told him now that he wanted to keep
him bond as his sex thing. Braun told Jeffers that
he and Carpenter had checked on Jesse twice. The first
time he was struggling and the next time he wasn't breathing.
(34:21):
The defense then began their case. They tried to portray Jesse,
a thirteen year old boy, as a drug user. They
called on fourteen year old Carissa Melbourne, who claimed she
saw Jesse in the apartment of a forty three year
old woman near the apartment of Carpenter. According to her,
the woman was injecting Jesse with metham pheramine. The defense
(34:43):
were clearly trying to claim that the metham pheramine and
Jesse's system and the overdose of antidepressant hadn't come from Braun.
The defense also called on Braun's mother, Judith Wesson, who
spoke about his time in foster care. When he was
a teenager, he had been physically abused by an uncle.
Judith told the jury, I didn't know Joshua had homosexual
(35:04):
tendencies until after he was arrested. While Braun had admitted
to saying Jesse take two am a triptolene pills on
the day of his death and giving him an enema
of the drug that same day, the defense called on
doctor Jimmy Valentine. He suggested that Jesse had taken the
drug up to two weeks before his death. The defense
then called on Marianna Arragon. Carpenter had been her family's hairdresser.
(35:30):
She portrayed him as controlling, telling the jury mister Brown
was totally dominated by mister Carbenter. He was a very
mixed up kid who got lost in the shuffle. And
after that, the trial came to a close. During the
closing arguments, prosecutor balf said that logic showed a thirteen
year old boy was not a willing participant in a
sexual bondage game that led to his death. He spoke
(35:53):
about Carpenter going to the store midway through the assault,
asking the jury why did they need more duct tape?
Was it because he was struggling. Carpenter had purchased the
duct tape, sausage and cucumber at the store, but he
also picked up two sandwiches. The prosecutor touched on this
and said Jesse wasn't going to get anything to eat.
(36:13):
It wasn't stopping any time soon. Defense attorney Limb said
during his closing arguments that his client was guilty of
nothing more than statutory rape and manslaughter. He stated, I
think we can all agree that Josh didn't knowingly cause
his death. This is pointing to negligence. On rebuttal, the
prosecutor declared, this isn't a car accident, folks, this is
(36:37):
the binding, gagging, and raping of a thirteen year old boy.
The jury were then sent off to deliberate. Ultimately, they
found Joshua Brown guilty of first degree murder and rape.
They rejected the more serious kind of capital murder, which
would have come with the death sentence. Brown was then
(36:57):
sentenced to twenty five years in prison for the rape,
in life without parole for the murder. In handing down
the sentence, Judge David Klinger told him, usually a murder
is over in a minute. In this case, this victim
was left helpless and bond Trying to imagine his thought
process has sent shivers down my spine. The judge said
(37:18):
that Braun and Carpenter had also devised a plan to
rape Jesse. He rejected the defense's claims that Braun had
been manipulated by Carpenter, stating, I don't find that Jesse
ever agreed to that that he agreed to become a
sex toy of two grown men. Brawn was given the
opportunity to speak during the court hearing, he began to
(37:41):
cry before he wakely said I say I'm sorry. The
(38:02):
guilty verdict was in good news for Davis Carpenter. He
and his defense attorneys knew that if he went to trial,
the outcome would almost certainly mirror Bronze or even be worse.
Almost immediately they began working on a Playdale to spare
him the death penalty. On the eighteenth of April, Carpenter
stood before the court and pleaded guilty to the rape
(38:23):
and murder of Jesse Dark heisinc He was sentenced to
life in prison without the possibility of parole. Then, in
a voice void of the cruelty he'd once inflicted, Carpenter
turned to Jesse's parents and said, I'd like to say
to Milesintena that I'm sorry Jesse's gone. I tried to
save him but couldn't. Every day I pray for them,
(38:46):
and I will continue to pray for the rest of
my life that the Lord will heal the hole in
their heart. Well, best Sie's That is it for this
(39:25):
episode of Morbidology. As always, thank you so much for listening,
and I'd like to say a massive thank you to
my newest supporter up on Patreon Amy. The link to
patron is in the show notes if you'd like to join,
and there are absolutely no obligations. You can cancel your
subscription at any time. As an independent podcast, the support
upon Patreon seriously goes such a long way, and I
genuinely am eternally grateful. As I've mentioned in a few
(39:47):
episodes more Bidology, it's now up on YouTube, where the
episodes are presented in a documentary style, along with videos
and photos from each case. So if you'd like to
head on over to YouTube and hit that subscribe button,
I really would appreciate it. Remember the check is id
at morbidology dot com for more information about this episode
and to read some true crime articles. Until next time,
(40:08):
take care of yourselves, stay safe, and have an amazing week.
Rogers is a small city in Arkansas that was founded
in eighteen eighty one as a railway town along the
Saint Louis and San Francisco Railroad. It was developed as
an agricultural shipping center, especially for poultry and forms. Then,
in nineteen sixty two, a man named Sam Walton opened
a small five and dime store right in the heart
of Rogers. It was humble and unassuming, but it was
(01:10):
the beginning of something massive. That little store eventually grew
into Walmart, the largest retail corporation in the world, and
even as the company exploded in size and scope, Rogers
clung to its roots. Today, the historic downtown is preserved
with brick paved streets in turn of the century storefronts, cafes,
and boutique shops. Away from the queen downtown along South
(01:31):
Dixieland Road lies the Rogers Police Department. This is where
the nine one one Dispatch Center is housed. Here, the
center dispatches police, far and EMS units not only across Rogers,
but also neighboring Benton County agencies. It homes with routine
calls from vander Bender's domestic disputes and everything in between.
(01:53):
That's how the morning of September twenty sixth, nineteen ninety
nine began. But at around five am that morning, a
phone call came in that would change everything. There was
a man on the other end of the line. He
sounded panicked as he said, I have a guy. He's dead.
We're trying to resuscitate him. Hell he ain't, but fourteen,
I don't know what the fuck went wrong. The operator
(02:16):
tried to get more details, but the caller was frantic.
He continued, we was playing some kind of goddamn game
and tying each other up and all that shit. Officers
were immediately dispatched. Officers Aan Smith and Jason Curry were
the first to respond. Their cruiser pulled in to asleep.
He called the sack lined with duplexes one two oh
(02:38):
seven West Sunset Drive with the RAM style unit that
didn't stand thout, low brick and wood paneling typical of
the area. It was the kind of place you would
drive past without a second thought. Just across the street,
the baseball field at Northwest Park sat under the soft
morning hayz, empty and still. Before the officers could even
(02:59):
reach the front stone Epps, the door burst open a
naked man rushed towards them. He's not breathing, he shouted.
(03:22):
Greasy Valley Road winds its way through the hills outside
Prairie Grove and Arkansas, just past the small town of Clyde.
It's a quiet, rural stretch of road, framed by open
fields and sprawling farmland. It was along this unassuming stretch
of countryside the thirteen year old Jesse durk Heising lived
with its family in a modest trailer, tuck between tall
(03:44):
grass and farmland. Their home wasn't grand, but it was theirs.
Jesse was the eldest of three children born to Tina
and Timothy Durkaisin, but his parents' marriage didn't last just
two years, and after the divorced, Timothy drifted out of
his son's life, leaving a quiet vacancy where our father
figures should have been. That space was eventually filled by
(04:07):
Miles Yeats, Tina's new partner. Jesse called him Dad, and
to his younger siblings Chatham Renee, Jesse was more than
just a brother. He was a protector, a playmate, and
somebody that they could look up to. Jesse was said
to have an easy going charm that made him well liked,
not just at home, but at school as well. He
was in the seventh grade at Lincoln Middle School. While
(04:30):
he was popular, school didn't come easy to Jesse. According
to the principal, Beverly Davenport, he lacked something to be desired.
He had to repeat the seventh grade. But Jesse made
up what he lacked in academics with heart. Before the
morning bell rang, he'd be out on the grass with
a pack of fifteen other boys playing touch football. They
(04:51):
did the same thing at lunch. He was a kid
who loved the outdoors, from hiking, fishing, and hunting. He
especially loved camping trips with the family. There was nothing
extraordinary about Jesse Durkaising, nothing that would have caught the
eye of the world. He was just a regular boy
living a regular life in a quiet patch of America.
(05:12):
But sometimes the most horrifying stories don't come from the
place as we expect. When Officers Ain Smith and Jason
Curry pulled up outside the low rise duplex on West
Sunset Drive, they were met at the door by a
(05:33):
naked man. He was visibly shaken, his eyes wide with panic.
His name was Davis Stawn Carbenter, he was thirty eight
years old, and he was frantic. He's not breathing, he
kept repeating, over and over, like he was trying to
convince himself more than anybody else. Carpenter quickly led the
(05:53):
officers inside through a narrow hallway with Warren carpets and
low ceilings. The apartment was small and save for the
distant hum of a television left on in another room,
the smell of faces hit the officers almost immediately. Standing
in the hallway was another man, twenty two year old
Joshua Brown. He was completely naked, clutching a flashlight in
(06:16):
one hand and a telephone in the other. Braun didn't speak.
Carpenter continued to lead the officers towards the back of
the apartment and into a small bedroom. The door creaked open.
There on the floor was a mattress, no frame, no sheathes,
no blankets, just a bare, stained mattress in the middle
(06:36):
of an otherwise empty room, and beside it with a
teenage boy lying motionless. It was Jesse dark Eysing. He
was naked, His small frame lay awkwardly beside the mattress,
and his genitals and abdomen were smeared with feces. The
smell that had clung to the hallway now swallowed the
(06:57):
room hole. It was, as officers Curry later said, overwhelming.
The officers rushed to Jesse's side. His lips were tinged
blue and his skin was cool to the touch, but
there was still a pulse that was faint and barely there,
although he wasn't breathing. The officer scanned him quickly, instinctively,
(07:18):
noting every detail. There was doc tape rapped tightly around
his right hand. They turned to Braun and asked what
it was doing there. Braun looked up and softly responded,
we were playing a game. As they waited for paramedics
to arrive, the officers swept their flashlights around the room.
That's when they started to see more. On the mattress
(07:39):
was an empty prescription pill bottle. On a nearby mirror
was loose pills scattered around a razor blade. There was
also drug paraphernalia. The quid of the neighborhood was shattered
by the sudden arrival of paramedics. Red and blue lights
flashed across the street. It was just past five am,
and most of Rogers was still asleep, unaware of the
(08:00):
horror unfolding inside this unremarkable apartment, The medics moved quickly.
They lifted Jesse carefully on to a stretcher, shielding his
body with a blanket. As the ambulance roared away from
West Sunset Drive with their sirens wailing, The team worked
furiously to keep Jesse alive. They were headed to Saint
(08:21):
Mary's Hospital as Jesse Jurchising's life hung in the balance.
Back at the apartment, the officers believed they were standing
in the middle of a crime scene. Nothing about what
they had just encountered appeared to be normal. A naked
(08:42):
teenage boy, naked men, and a collection of disturbing items.
While normally a search warrant would be executed, detectives didn't
need one. They had asked if they could search the apartment,
and Davis Carpenter had responded, well, you're going to look anyway.
You're going to get a search warrant and look. He
then signed a consent to search form as a warning.
(09:05):
The next section of this episode deals with the abuse
of children. Please listen with caution. In the living room
and bedroom, detectives recovered numerous small green pills, various wattles
of prescription medication, which included amatriptolene, which is a heavy
sedative commonly used to treat depression. There was also a
small quantity of meth amphetamine. But it wasn't just drugs
(09:28):
that detectives found. There were countless tubs of petroleum jelly.
In the bedroom. Two cucumbers were recovered. One was covered
in petroleum jelly while the other was covered in faces.
Nearby was a tube shaped sausage and crushed banana. In
another corner of the bedroom, they came across bondige items
(09:49):
including bells, stock tape, strapping tape, nylon rope, rubber jump rope,
and electric cord. Discarded on the floor lay a plastic
disposable douche bottle with the applicator secured in place with
jock tape. The search then continued in the living room.
The computer was still running and up on the screen
was a program that was titled Medical Drug Reference four
(10:11):
point zero. On a computer table lay a piece of
paper with a handwritten note addressed to baby in the
right corner of the note with the names of three
types of prescription pills. The note referred to making somebody
take those pills. It then referenced positioning pillows beneath this
person in a certain way. A different section of the
(10:34):
same note said to tell him not to fight. Over
the next fourteen hours he would be sexually assaulted. Nearby,
detectives found the second note the reference to piece of
meat being inserted into somebody's anus. The note also referred
to Davis engaging an intercourse with Yu blindfolded on pills.
(10:54):
Another note was discovered, once more addressed to baby. This
note referred to docor tape and included a hand drawn
diagram of somebody bond to a bed. There were notations
that referred to pillows, tape all the way around faced on,
and the barocks of a person being raised approximately two feet.
There were other letters discovered in various parts of the apartment.
(11:18):
One addressed a baby, was signed by Davy. In this letter,
Davy describes saying baby's little ten year old blonde hour
at her bus stop in the morning. He went on
to graphically describe how he would envision baby engaging in
sexual acts with this child. The search of the apartment
continued and detectives found another pad of handwritten notes. In
(11:40):
these notes, the writer described a man making a fine
crushed white powder from the small, oddly purple colored pill.
He described cutting the pill into four sections so there
would be enough to do this again in four rs.
The note continued, describing the man giving a nine year
old girl a glass of milk with the powdered mixture it.
(12:01):
The writer then wrote of the man laughing out loud,
knowing that in twenty minutes the drink would make her
helpless and drunk. He then described in detail the man
having the girl masturbate and then perform oral sex on him.
It was clear that what had happened inside that apartment
was anything other than an accident. The two men standing
(12:22):
before detectives were clearly child predators, and Jesse jurk Heising
was their victim. By now, more officers had arrived at
(12:47):
the apartment. One of them was Corporal Rick Simmons. He
separated Carpenter and Brown and began questioning Joshua Brown. Without warning,
Brown lunged at him. He swung a fist towards Simmons.
He was restrained before he could make contact. Officers quickly
placed him under arrest. Detective Martha Armstrong stepped in and
(13:07):
read him as Miranda rights. That's when Braun began to talk.
He told him that he and day of His Carpenter,
were in a relationship. He said Carpenter called him Baby,
a detailed that immediately called the detective's attention. It was
the same name used in the disturbing letters found throughout
the apartment. Braun said that he and Jesse frequently tied
(13:30):
one another up, but he insisted it wasn't sexual. He
described what happened that night. He said he snuck up
on Jesse, tied his hands behind his back, and stuffed
a pair of underwear into his mouth. He secured it
with a bandana and DUC tape, and then blindfolded him
again using DUC tape. Told everything in place. A T
(13:52):
shirt was pulled over Jesse's head, but Braun claimed he
made sure that Jesse's nostrils were left uncovered. He said
he then by Jesse's legs with belts tight around the
knees and ankles. Once immobilized, Broun said he untied Jesse's hands,
only to secure them again, this time to opposite corners
of the mattress. Jesse was then placed on his stomach.
(14:16):
Braun told investigators that he penetrated Jesse with different objects,
including a cucumber, a sausage, a banana, and a douche bottle,
but he wasn't finished there. Broun said he then prepared
an enema using his own urine mixed with the sedative
ame triptolene, and administered it. Then he took the cucumber again,
(14:36):
this time taping it in place. After that, Braun said
he went into the kitchen and made himself a sandwich.
When he left Jesse in the bedroom, he said that
the boy was kicking around and acting goofy. He said,
we was mess and irond and stuff. I left him
for five minutes. I didn't think I tied his hands
that tight. I left his nose uncovered so he could breathe.
(15:00):
When Braun returned, he said that Jesse wasn't breathing. He
claimed he removed the bindings, including the t shirt, the bandana,
the tape, the underwear from his mouth, and then ran
to wake up Carpenter. Carpenter, however, told a different story.
He said that he had been asleep when Braun woke him,
saying that Jesse wasn't breathing, but when Carpenter walked into
(15:22):
the bedroom, he said that Jesse was still bound. He
claimed he attempted tapor and then called nine one one,
But nothing about this version matched the scene or the evidence.
It was clear that Jesse had been the victim of calculated,
sadistic abuse, and it was just as clear that both
men had played a role. The handwritten notes tied Carpenter
(15:43):
directly to the abuse. Many of them had been written
by him addressed to Baby, his pet name for Braun.
The two men were then taken into Costudy and transported
to the Rogers Police Department for formal interrogation. Joshua Braun
sat down in front of detech of Sergeant Hayes Minor.
His story had since changed. He now claimed that he
(16:06):
and Jesse had been sexually involved for approximately two months,
since Jesse was just a child. However, Brin had actually
been grooming and molesting him. They weren't sexually involved, as
he had put it. He described the sexual assaults he
had inflicted his games in playing. According to Braun, he
and Jesse had spent the entire weekend sneaking up on
(16:27):
one another and tying each other up. He described cutting
Jesse's clothing off, telling the detectives I told him a
how do you like that? Brum was then questioned about
Carpenter's involvement in the rape of Jesse. He now admitted
that Carpenter wasn't asleep. He said Carpenter had stood in
the doorway of the bedroom he was naked and masturbated.
(16:51):
Braun then admitted that the notes in the home were
indeed from Carpenter. Various ones were telling him what to
do to Jesse. Car had even purchased the items used
in the sexual assault. While Braun had initially characterized the
assault on Jesse's horseplay gone wrong, he later changed his tune.
He blamed Jesse for initiating sexual compact. He claimed that
(17:15):
nights earlier, Jesse, who was a thirteen year old boy,
had come on to him and performed a sex act.
Over at the hospital, doctors fought desperately to save Jesse's life,
but it was tragically too late. He died shortly after
he arrived. His body was transported to the medical Examiner's office,
where the autopsy revealed the cause of death, positional asphyxia.
(17:39):
Jesse couldn't breathe the way he had been restrained and
positioned cut off his air. Toxic levels of a powerful
sedative found in his system had also contributed to his death.
Joshua Braun and Davis Carpenter were subsequently charged with first
degree murder. At the court hearing, Judge David Klinger refused
(17:59):
to set bail for EA. Their man prosecutor, Brad Butler,
stood before the court and announced his intent to seek
the death penalty. He spoke with Deake conviction as he said,
what I saw inside that apartment was the most horrific
thing I've witnessed in my eleven years as a prosecutor.
It was a horrible, brutal crime. No one deserves to
lose a child this way. Bron and Carpenter were then
(18:22):
sent back to jail and each were placed into isolation
for their own safety. But before they were separated, Carpenter
had already spoken to some inmates at the jail. He
admitted to them that he had taken part in Jesse's assault.
He said he had forced pills do on his throat.
He claimed he didn't know whether it was the drugs
or the tape binding and gagging him that caused his death.
(18:46):
But for detectives, questions still remained. How exactly had Carboner
and Braun come to know Jesse, who had a child,
ended up in their grasp. Davis Carpenter wasn't a stranger.
(19:10):
He had been a friend of Tina and Miles Yets.
He had first met Miles through methamphetamine. Miles had sold it,
and Carpenter had been a client. But more recently, Carpenter
was managing a local beauty salon. In the months before
Jesse was killed, Carpenter had offered him a job sweeping
hair on the weekends. He knew that Jesse was saving
(19:31):
up money to fix an old pickup truck. Tina and
Miles agreed they trusted Carpenter. They also trusted Braun. Jesse
was over the moon. Fifty dollars a weekend was a
lot of money to him, so each Saturday and Sunday,
Tina or Miles would drive him to the salon from
their home in Prairie Grove and pick him up again
that evening. But Carpenter soon offered to make things easier.
(19:55):
Jesse could stay over on Saturday nights and come home Sunday.
Saved to petrol. It saved time, but in the end,
it cost everything. The Monday after Jesse was murdered, his
space on the school bus sat empty. The ride was
unusually quiet. Bus driver Gary Trambley noticed the silence. Then
(20:19):
he noticed something else. Somebody had left floorers on Jesse's safe.
One of the children sat there. They had silently decided
it would remain Jesse's. At school, councilors were brought in.
Jesse's classmates were barely teenagers themselves, but they came together
in grief and love. They wanted to do something anything.
(20:41):
They started collecting money for Jesse's funeral flowers and for
his family. Gary allowed them to keep a collection box
on the school bus. By Tuesday morning, they had raised
thirty dollars. Gary said one of Chad's little bodies must
have cleaned out his piggy bank, and he was right.
A nine year old friend of Jesse's little brother handed
(21:03):
over everything he had. His mother, who asked not to
be named, said that her son often worried that Jesse's
family didn't have enough to eat. Back in Rogers, where
Braun and Carpenter lived, the community was just as horrified.
Their apartment sat in a six unit complex, close quarters
where neighbors knew one another. Most of them thought that
(21:23):
the two men were brothers. Carpenter was known as a
nat freak brawn came off as friendly and approachable. Connie
nw Coome, who lived next door, commented, you never heard
any noise, no wild parties, no craziness going on just today.
Before Jesse was killed, Carpenter had invited Diane Watkins to
bring her ten year old daughter's soccer team to his
(21:45):
heirslon Her husband, Tom commented, it scared my wife and
daughter a hole lot. It just scared them to death.
My daughter was scared to sleep in her bedroom for
a few days. Even Connie's ten year old son had
been inside the men's apartment. He'd gone in to play
with their cats. The horror of what had happened shook
the entire neighborhood. Half of the tenants moved out. They
(22:09):
couldn't leave that close to the place where something so
monstrous had happened. On the thirteenth of October, Joshua bron
and Davis Carpenter appeared in court, where they pleaded not
(22:32):
guilty to all of the charges. Their defense teams filed
the motion for gag orders, hoping to keep the disturbing
details of Jesse's murder sailed from the public, but the
judge denied the request. Still, despite the brutality of the case,
media coverage remained strangely sparse. A few local papers had
(22:52):
covered Jesse's murder, but there was no national outcry, not
until a week later, when The Washington Times ran aheadline
the demanded attention media tune out torture death of Arkansas boy.
The piece criticized the near silence surrounding the crime. Sim Graham,
director of Media Analysis that the Media Research Center, commented,
(23:14):
nobody wants to say anything negative against homosexuals. Nobody wants
to be seen on the wrong side of that issue.
David Smith, a spokesman for the Human Rights Campaign, quickly
responded and said this has nothing to do with gay people.
The article drew a sharp comparison between the lack of
attention to Jesse dark Heising's murder and the intense media
(23:35):
response to the murder of Matthew Shepard, a gay man
who was beaten to death in Wyoming the previous year.
Both were he and his crimes both involved vulnerable victims,
but only one had made headlines across the nation. Even
Prosecutor Christopher Plumley admitted he was surprised by the quiet reaction.
He didn't want to speculate why, but noted that Jesse's
(23:58):
rape and murder had occurred in a small town with
a low violent crime rate. He saw outrage and rogers
on Prairie Grove, but not the kind of national response
that Matthew Shepherd's murder had sparked. After the Washington Times article,
other outlets finally began covering the case. The New York
Post published a column by Brett Bosel, editor of Media
(24:21):
Reality Czech, who wrote, why would this story go on?
Told had Jesse Durchising been shot inside his Arkansas school,
he would have been an immediate national news story, but
his national interest grew so the political agendas and de
gay hate group seized on the case. They accused the
media of downplaying the story out of political correctness. Conservative
(24:47):
activist Peter le Barbera called on others to use Jesse's
death as a rallying cry, just as Matthew Shepherd's death
had become a symbol for LGBTQ plus rights. Back in
the courtroom, the growing publicity prompted Carpenter's attorney Tim Buckley
to file a motion for a change of venue. He argued,
(25:07):
it's been on everyone's lips down here for a month
and a half. Benton County is a very conservative county.
It's the corporal headquarters of Walmart. It's always been a
bassi of Republican conservatives. He believed that his client could
get a fair trial. Braun's attorney, Charles Duel, filed his
own motion requesting a separate trial. In February. Judge David
(25:30):
Klinger granted the request and said that the men would
be tried separately. He also ordered Braun to undergo a
psychological examination at the State Hospital in Little Rock. Its attorney,
Lewis Limb, made it clear they were exploring an insanity defense.
They were trying to determine whether Braun had been seen
at the time of the murder and whether he could
(25:51):
assist in his own defense. The results came back in September.
Joshua Brown was found to be competent, so was David's
con There would be no mental health defense, no diminished capacity.
Both men would stand trial. It was decided that Joshua
(26:17):
Broun would be standing trial first, but first. The judge
said he wanted to hear from potential jurors before deciding
whether the trial needed to be moved. The jury selection
began in March and in preparation security was tightened. Members
of the westbor Baptist Church had announced they were going
to be outside the courtroom to protest. They referred to
(26:39):
the case as a conspiracy from hell and accused the
National press of covering up Jesse's murder because the suspects
were gay. By the fourteenth, the jury was selected and seated,
meaning that the trial was indeed going ahead in Benthamville.
The jury was warned that details of the case were
going to be extremely horrific, and after that opening statements
(27:01):
got underway. Prosecutor Bob Balf told the jury, this case
is not about homosexuality. The charge in this case concerns
the rape and murder of a child. This case is
about child's sexual abuse. He said it didn't appear as
though Braun intended on killing Jesse, before adding if you
commit a violent act and it ends in death, it's
(27:23):
still capital murder. Prosecutor Balf led out the facts of
the case, describing how Jesse was propped up with pillows
and sodomized by Braun during the prolonged or Dale Carpenter
had left the apartment and gone to a nearby grocery
store to purchase items that would later be used in
the assault. He stated, this wasn't some spontaneous act that
(27:46):
got out of hand. This wasn't a consensual act, he continued, stating,
while Jesse was bound and helpless and naked in this position,
he was repeatedly raped over a period of ours by
that man Joshua Braun. Jesse slowly suffocated and died. Braun's
defense attorney Lewis Limb described Braun during his opening statements
(28:09):
as a lost young man who was under the corrupt
influence of Carpenter. He drew parallels between the childlike Braun
and Jesse, who he described as mature for his age.
He mentioned how both had been abandoned by their fathers
at a young age, and both were susceptible the Carpenter's
parent like attention. Lim also set the stage for the
(28:30):
defense to shift blame from Braun to Jesse's parents. He
revealed to the jury for the first time that Myles
had known Carpenter through their dealings with Metham Fermine. The
night that Jesse died. He said that he had taken
the drug with Carpenter and Braun it had been found
in his system. The defense attorney then spoke on Braun's upbringing.
(28:51):
He said he was placed into state custody at nine
years old after his mother struggled with mental illness and
couldn't care for him. He bonced from fall Mister Home
to Foster Home until he was seventeen, when he moved
to Mississippi, where his mother had moved to. He described
Braun as a troubled, insecure teenager with drug addictions when
Carpenter walked into his life in nineteen ninety seven. Garbinder
(29:14):
was a successful hairdresser at the time. He befriended Braun
and offered him a job. Lim said to the jury,
Carpenter realized, this is a young man who I can
bring into my fold. By the time they moved to
Rogers in nineteen ninety nine, Braun depended on Carpenter financially.
He said that Carpenter had done to Jessee what he
had done to Braun, isolated him from his family before
(29:37):
stepping down. The defense attorney conceded statutory rape, but said
that Braun never intended for Jesse to die. Testimony got
underway with the officers who responded to the crime scene
that morning. Officers Jason Curry and Ian Smith both said
that they didn't attempt to revive Jesse at the scene.
They explained they weren't carrying masks necessary to protect the
(30:00):
from disease, Department policy mandates their use during resuscitation efforts.
They explained, Officer Curry had left to go and get
the masks, but paramedics arrived and begun resuscitation efforts before
he got back. The defense team suggested that Jesse might
have survived if resuscitation efforts were performed immediately. Lim asked
(30:22):
paramedic Jackie Weissman. Could one breath have made a difference.
She responded, yes, Sir. That same day, Jesse's mother, Tina
Yates testified. She told the jury that she had known
that Braun and Carpenter were lovers, but it didn't matter
to her. They were like family. She said she trusted them.
(30:43):
She had even been inside their apartment. Nothing raised red flags.
Through sobs, she stated, Jesse was my best friend. Jesse
and I did a lot of growing up together. Jesse
and I had no secrets from each other. Tina told
the jury that Jess as he hadn't wanted to work
the weekend that he was killed. He wanted to stay
(31:04):
home and ride his motorcycle, but he went anyway, and
the plan was for Carpenter to bring him home on Sunday.
She recalled their final goodbye steering Jesse gave me a
hug and a kiss, and I gave him one. She
admitted to using drugs when she was younger, but said
it was never in front of her children. She also
(31:24):
claimed she had no idea that Miles had sold methamphetamine.
Tina explained that she and Miles had told Jesse if
he ever wanted to experiment with alcohol or drugs to
come to them first. We wanted to know what he
was taking, she said. The jury then got to hear
bronze taped confession. In it, he claimed that he and
(31:45):
Jesse had agreed to tie each other up, and that
Jesse had agreed to at least one act of sodomy.
He stated the night before he had hogtied me, so
I thought I'd get him back. I left him for
five minutes. I kept checking him and stuff, but I
killed them anyway. During the trial, the grim notes found
inside the apartment were presented. It was suggested that the
(32:08):
blonde girl that Carpenter referenced was Diane Watkins's young daughter.
Diane testified that five days before the murder, ron had
handed her a note inviting her daughter and her friends
for hair cuts. By Carpenter, she said he knew Healy
played soccer, he knew how to spell her name. I
was concerned how he knew her her daughter. Haley's skillbuss
(32:32):
stopped in front of the apartment, and she often visited
an elderly woman who lived next door. The judge had
allowed the notes to be entered into evidence, although the
defense had tried to have them blocked. The judge referred
to them as blue prints for child rape. Thankfully, Diane's
daughter was never harmed by the men, but the descriptions
(32:52):
of acts they wanted to perform on her were very
similar to how Jesse was drugged, bond and sodomized. When
Braun was first interviewed, he downplayed Carpenter's involvement. He first
of all said that he was asleep throughout the entire deal. However,
he finally admitted that all of the notes were written
by him. They were instructions on how they abuse children.
(33:14):
He further admitted that he had gone to the store
midway through the assault to purchase the cucumber and sausage.
When Jeffers and Inmated also testified about Carpenter's involvement, he
had been in a cell above braun cell and they
had communicated through the events. Braun had told him he
didn't really know Jesse, that Carpenter was the one who
really knew him. He said that Carpenter had lured Jessee
(33:37):
into the situation by offering him money. He then drugged Jesse.
Jeffers told the jury he was reluctant at first, and
Carpenter made it sound like a game. Braun told him
that Jesse had wanted to go home, but that Carpenter
started to hit him and then sexually assaulted him. He
stated he was crying. He was really crying. He wanted
(33:59):
to go home. Brown also told him that he had
sexually assaulted Jesse too, and he had wanted to release him,
but Carpenter told him now that he wanted to keep
him bond as his sex thing. Braun told Jeffers that
he and Carpenter had checked on Jesse twice. The first
time he was struggling and the next time he wasn't breathing.
(34:21):
The defense then began their case. They tried to portray Jesse,
a thirteen year old boy, as a drug user. They
called on fourteen year old Carissa Melbourne, who claimed she
saw Jesse in the apartment of a forty three year
old woman near the apartment of Carpenter. According to her,
the woman was injecting Jesse with metham pheramine. The defense
(34:43):
were clearly trying to claim that the metham pheramine and
Jesse's system and the overdose of antidepressant hadn't come from Braun.
The defense also called on Braun's mother, Judith Wesson, who
spoke about his time in foster care. When he was
a teenager, he had been physically abused by an uncle.
Judith told the jury, I didn't know Joshua had homosexual
(35:04):
tendencies until after he was arrested. While Braun had admitted
to saying Jesse take two am a triptolene pills on
the day of his death and giving him an enema
of the drug that same day, the defense called on
doctor Jimmy Valentine. He suggested that Jesse had taken the
drug up to two weeks before his death. The defense
then called on Marianna Arragon. Carpenter had been her family's hairdresser.
(35:30):
She portrayed him as controlling, telling the jury mister Brown
was totally dominated by mister Carbenter. He was a very
mixed up kid who got lost in the shuffle. And
after that, the trial came to a close. During the
closing arguments, prosecutor balf said that logic showed a thirteen
year old boy was not a willing participant in a
sexual bondage game that led to his death. He spoke
(35:53):
about Carpenter going to the store midway through the assault,
asking the jury why did they need more duct tape?
Was it because he was struggling. Carpenter had purchased the
duct tape, sausage and cucumber at the store, but he
also picked up two sandwiches. The prosecutor touched on this
and said Jesse wasn't going to get anything to eat.
(36:13):
It wasn't stopping any time soon. Defense attorney Limb said
during his closing arguments that his client was guilty of
nothing more than statutory rape and manslaughter. He stated, I
think we can all agree that Josh didn't knowingly cause
his death. This is pointing to negligence. On rebuttal, the
prosecutor declared, this isn't a car accident, folks, this is
(36:37):
the binding, gagging, and raping of a thirteen year old boy.
The jury were then sent off to deliberate. Ultimately, they
found Joshua Brown guilty of first degree murder and rape.
They rejected the more serious kind of capital murder, which
would have come with the death sentence. Brown was then
(36:57):
sentenced to twenty five years in prison for the rape,
in life without parole for the murder. In handing down
the sentence, Judge David Klinger told him, usually a murder
is over in a minute. In this case, this victim
was left helpless and bond Trying to imagine his thought
process has sent shivers down my spine. The judge said
(37:18):
that Braun and Carpenter had also devised a plan to
rape Jesse. He rejected the defense's claims that Braun had
been manipulated by Carpenter, stating, I don't find that Jesse
ever agreed to that that he agreed to become a
sex toy of two grown men. Brawn was given the
opportunity to speak during the court hearing, he began to
(37:41):
cry before he wakely said I say I'm sorry. The
(38:02):
guilty verdict was in good news for Davis Carpenter. He
and his defense attorneys knew that if he went to trial,
the outcome would almost certainly mirror Bronze or even be worse.
Almost immediately they began working on a Playdale to spare
him the death penalty. On the eighteenth of April, Carpenter
stood before the court and pleaded guilty to the rape
(38:23):
and murder of Jesse Dark heisinc He was sentenced to
life in prison without the possibility of parole. Then, in
a voice void of the cruelty he'd once inflicted, Carpenter
turned to Jesse's parents and said, I'd like to say
to Milesintena that I'm sorry Jesse's gone. I tried to
save him but couldn't. Every day I pray for them,
(38:46):
and I will continue to pray for the rest of
my life that the Lord will heal the hole in
their heart. Well, best Sie's That is it for this
(39:25):
episode of Morbidology. As always, thank you so much for listening,
and I'd like to say a massive thank you to
my newest supporter up on Patreon Amy. The link to
patron is in the show notes if you'd like to join,
and there are absolutely no obligations. You can cancel your
subscription at any time. As an independent podcast, the support
upon Patreon seriously goes such a long way, and I
genuinely am eternally grateful. As I've mentioned in a few
(39:47):
episodes more Bidology, it's now up on YouTube, where the
episodes are presented in a documentary style, along with videos
and photos from each case. So if you'd like to
head on over to YouTube and hit that subscribe button,
I really would appreciate it. Remember the check is id
at morbidology dot com for more information about this episode
and to read some true crime articles. Until next time,
(40:08):
take care of yourselves, stay safe, and have an amazing week.
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