When two men were killed in their home, there was no forensic evidence, just a lot of suspicion.

But after a key witness made a deal with the state, the case went to trial to see if the jury would believe a somewhat incentivized witness.

I'm Charlie and welcome to crime lines.

Hello and welcome to crime lines in this week's episode. I found this case while I was researching

my latest Beyond the Files episode, which you can listen to on Patreon Supercast or Apple's

subscriptions. It's just $5 a month for two Beyond the Files episodes per month plus all

crime lines episodes ad free. I'm just doing a little plug there because I don't advertise

it nearly as much as I should, and I really do appreciate everyone who supports both

crime lines and Beyond the Files. The case we're talking about today took place in the same area

and at the same time as my most recent Beyond the Files episode, and I read everything I could find on my favorite

resource, newspapers.com, about it. Then I turned to Google, and this case really does not have

much of a digital footprint. People are just not talking about this case. It is not getting coverage,

but fortunately, there were appeals here that cover a very interesting

legal topic about accomplice testimony, and whoever wrote the 2011 decision in this case

is my hero. It's frankly cause prohibitive for me to request entire trial transcripts on every

case I cover, so getting a very detailed play-by-play

of the case in a free-to-access appellate court decision is really amazing. So thank you to the judge

and or clerk who wrote it. Let's go ahead and get started today with Charles Thomas Smith,

who was born and raised in Grimes County, Texas,

about an hour and a half north of Houston. Aside from his service in the Navy, Charles and his

wife Aline lived there for their entire lives. Charles was primarily a dairy farmer, though after

he retired, he ran a hay operation on his

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