S3 Ep117: West Memphis Three: Troubled Teenager to Murder Suspect (Part 3)

Crime Weekly

Audioboom Studios

True Crime, Society & Culture, News

4.8 • 9.5K Ratings

🗓️ 24 March 2023

⏱️ 134 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

West Memphis, Arkansas is located in Crittenden County and is directly across the Mississippi River from Memphis Tennessee, but in 1993, West Memphis and Memphis were worlds apart. Memphis boasted a healthy and growing population of over 620 thousand, while West Memphis had just over 28 thousand residents. But Memphis, TN struggled with high crime rates, with 1993 setting a record for the most homicides in one year, a record that wasn’t broken until 2016. West Memphis Arkansas had a more small town, laid back feel, and as cliche as it sounds, people felt safe leaving their doors unlocked and letting their young children play outside all day with no supervision. That was until May 5th, 1993, when three eight year old boys rode away on their bikes, eager to expel the energy they had built up all day while sitting in their second grade classrooms at Weaver Elementary School, but they never came home. It wouldn’t be long before the residents of West Memphis and then the world found out what happened to Stevie Branch, Michael Moore and Christopher Byers. Their battered and mutilated bodies were found the next day in a swampy wooded area known to locals as Robin Hood Hills, and the community of West Memphis felt a shockwave hit their community that they would not recover from for some time. Within a month three teenagers were arrested and charged with capital murder, and it wasn’t long before whispers of witchcraft, devil worship and occult killings rippled throught the homes and businesses of West Memphis, and those whispers eventually turned into a loud roar, a roar that might accompany an angry mob looking for someone to blame for an unimaginable tragedy, akin to the infamous witch hunts that are dotted throughout history. This is the story of six boys from West Memphis, Arkansas; three were brutally murdered and stolen from this world far before their time, the other three were marched to the proverbial gallows, guilty in the court of public opinion, and found guilty in an actual court of law. Six lives destroyed, six lives forever changed, six lives eternally tied together.

Try our coffee!! - www.CriminalCoffeeCo.com

Become a Patreon member -- > https://www.patreon.com/CrimeWeekly

Shop for your Crime Weekly gear here --> https://crimeweeklypodcast.com/shop

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/CrimeWeeklyPodcast
Website: CrimeWeeklyPodcast.com
Instagram: @CrimeWeeklyPod
Twitter: @CrimeWeeklyPod
Facebook: @CrimeWeeklyPod

ADS:
1. HelloFresh
Go to HelloFresh.com/crimeweekly60 and use code crimeweekly60 for 60% off plus free shipping!

2. ZipRecruiter
Go to this exclusive web address to try ZipRecruiter FOR FREE: ZipRecruiter.com/CRIMEWEEKLY

3. Beis
Go to BEISTRAVEL.com/CRIMEWEEKLY for 15% off your first purchase.

4. Honey
Get PayPal Honey for FREE at JoinHoney.com/crimeweekly

5. PDS Debt
PDS DEBT is offering free debt analysis to our listeners just for completing the quick and easy debt assessment at www.PDSDebt.com/crime.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Hello everybody, welcome back to Crime Weekly. I'm Stephanie Harlow.
0:16.6	And I'm Derek Levasser.
0:18.0	So today we're moving into part three of the West Memphis 3 series and I guess we're
0:24.8	kind of keeping the theme of three because today we're focusing our episode on the three
0:30.2	suspects that would be arrested for the murders of these eight year old boys. We've got
0:37.9	Damien Eccles, Jason Baldwin, Jesse Miss Kelly, Jr. And that is who we are talking about
0:42.5	today. Basically, I think because we're going in depth on this case, it's important to know
0:46.2	and understand who these three suspects were. It's important to give all the information
0:50.0	available, not just the information that supports whatever side of the story is being told.
0:54.8	Or whatever narratives being upheld. And in order to do this, I have turned to several
1:01.2	sources to piece together what I hope to be, you know, a thorough and unbiased view of all three
1:07.2	teenage boys who were arrested and put on trial for the murder of eight year old Stevie Branch
1:11.3	Christopher Biers and Michael Moore. The sources that I used for this episode were the autobiography
1:17.3	of Damien Eccles. It's called Life After Death as well as the book that's called The Case Against
1:22.3	the West Memphis Three by Gary Mies and also the book Devils Not by Mara Levert as well as
1:28.8	obviously internet resources, Damien Eccles medical history, his interactions with law enforcement,
1:35.8	things like that. And all of the sources that I used were both in support of the three teenagers
1:41.3	and against them. So I tried to, you know, get a good sprinkling of different viewpoints in there
1:48.0	in order to put this together. And hopefully I did all right. I'm sure you did. And I'm glad we're
1:53.9	going from both sides of it. There have been some comments. When I say that I always say it as if
1:58.9	like it's not the majority, but you have, we have new subscribers every single week and people
2:04.2	who tune into specific series that we do because they have a personal interest in that particular case
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Audioboom Studios, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Audioboom Studios and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.