Matthews never responded. Resides in Greenwood, MS. It was a .380-caliber automatic handgun, coated in dirt and rust. Search by Name. Because Mr. Evans didnt tell them about the Alabama connection. Asked if she remembered where she was when the murders happened, she recalled the morning clearly. Evans didnt want jurors comparing his tortured theory with a simple and sensible alternative. Willie Hemphill's passing at the age of 97 has been publicly announced by Arnold Family Funeral Services Inc. - Hillside Chapel in Altadena, CA.Legacy invites you to offer condolences and share memori Baran found Hemphills booking card showing he had been arrested and jailed a few days after the killing. At first, Willie James Hemphill was calm. At first he was reluctant to divulge who he was with that morning, but later said it was a woman named Twanda Woods. Simpson's brother Emmett was an early suspect, too a fact Matthews had himself testified to in the second Flowers trial. It takes no imagination at all to imagine Marcus Presley committing a crime like thatwe have the video from the pawn shop. If Woods had been at the mall with Hemphill at the time of the murders roughly 10 a.m. she couldn't have been back in Winona any earlier than noon. They fell out and broke. The district's Republicans should nominate James Hemphill as their candidate for Congress in the May 3 primary. Willie James Hemphill in Georgia Fulton County arrested for U/S VGCSA POSS* BLOG; CATEGORIES. Search by Name. Gamble told me that they saw a few licks while they were in Mississippi. This score is (-15%) Above the National Average View Actual Score View Reputation Details . No one was going to all that trouble over the approximately $400 investigators say was in the till that morning. Evidence of false testimony by prosecution witnesses could potentially get Flowers' conviction overturned, Bennett Gershman, a former prosecutor who now teaches law at Pace University, told the APM reporting team. Goldberg doesn't remember the alibis Presley or Gamble gave, but he said following up on those wouldn't have been his job. In The Dark proved that Curtis Flowers was railroaded by an unjust system. Find out more about our policy and your choices, including how to opt-out. We encourage you to research and . The suspects include the gunman in an Alabama crime spree that summer that bore several similarities to the Winona killings and a violent career criminal who at the time of the murders was living with a girlfriend across from the furniture store. Hours after the killings, authorities interviewed Flowers, who said he had been babysitting the children of his girlfriend, Connie Moore, and also gone to his sister's home and a nearby store. Actually,In the Dark hasnt weighed in on the guilt-innocence issue (thats not what they do), but their careful dissection of DA Doug Evans case against Flowers has left the case in a shambles. There are 60+ professionals named "Willie Hemphill", who use LinkedIn to exchange information, ideas, and opportunities. 1.58 3.33 /5. Goldberg couldn't tell whether he was telling the truth. One, Rigby,was killed with two shots to the head. Flowers parents have long believed in his innocence, visiting him in prison. . Nine days later, on July 25, 1996, the bodies of two innocent people were discovered in a pawn shop in Birmingham, Alabama. Willie married Janeen Winegar on August 10, 2003 in Las Vegas, Nevada. Editor's note: This endorsement editorial was updated on . He told the podcast he had an airtight alibi. Maybe. He freely admitted that he had been a suspect and even says that, although innocent, he would have made a more convincing suspect than Curtis. Hemphills name came up briefly in Flowers 2010 trial. 2. Share to Pinterest. Finding the truly guilty person (or people) strengthens the case that Flowers is innocent. Fleming had said six times since 1996 she saw Flowers running from the store on the morning of the murders. Willie James Hemphill, 38. View Willie Hemphill results including current phone number, address, relatives, background check report, and property record with Whitepages. Store employees were threatened with death and forced to lie on the floor. But we found a document showing that another man, Willie James Hemphill, had also been questioned just days after the murders. That might not be so if the whole world wasnt watching, but it is. The FBI checked it out. 5 Visits. Curtis Flowers, as any prison guard who has ever worked with him can tell you, has no demons. Hemphill had previously told police and the podcast that he was not in Winona on the morning of the murders. INDIANAPOLIS At first, Willie James Hemphill was calm. In a remarkable turn of events almost 23 years after four people, including a 16-year-old boy, were gunned down and left inside the Tardy Furniture store in Winona, Mississippi, three things have happened. His mothers mutt, Patches, was barking in the crawl space, causing him to find a gunbeneath the house she was renting. By his own account, someone told investigators that they'd seen him on Front Street that morning, though Hemphill has said repeatedly that he wasn't there. In the months before the Tardy Furniture murders, Presley hit a grocery store, a fireworks retailer, three gas stations and three liquor stores. You said that was an airtight alibi we talked to Twanda and she said she wasnt with you that day., Hemphill: They released me based on that. Me and Twanda was out of town," he said. Hemphill's ex-girlfriend Monkra Moore told In the Dark that she and Hemphill lived together on the east side of Winona in 1996 and that he was at home around 7 a.m. on the morning of the murders when she was leaving for work. Hemphill says he was in Memphis on the day of the murder and his alibi might check out. But there was a three-week gap in the Alabama crime spree right at the time of the Tardy murders. In 1996, central Alabama saw a string of armed robberies, where the criminals told store clerks to lie down and held them at gunpoint, sometimes killing them. Usually if somebody starts shooting, he said, others will run.. He was nominated for an Academy Award in the category Best Sound for the film Belfast. He thought back to when Small took the gun. Eight persons linked to this address. A .380-caliber is hard to control. They wanted to ask him about his alibi for the day of the Tardy Furniture murders, an alibi that hadn't checked out. The whole time Ive been telling them, I dont remember the day, Fleming said. Who was he? Willie James Hemphill an early suspect in the Tardy Furniture murders was charged with disorderly conduct last week. The U.S. Supreme Court decided 7-to-1 that prosecutors unconstitutionally eliminated black jurors during the trial proceedings for Timothy Tyrone Foster in 1987. analysis of his record of striking potential black jurors, Curtis Flowers' prosecution witness says testimony was all 'make believe', Recanted testimony, subjective science helps put Curtis Flowers on death row, Your California Privacy Rights/Privacy Policy. Surveillance video from John's 280 Pawn Shop broadcast by ABC News. Illuminating Journalism from American Public Media. After finding the weapon, Armstrong wondered how the gun had wound up under the house his mother was renting on Knox Street, only 700 feet or so from the furniture store. The podcasts decision to try to figure out who may have actually committed the murders at the Tardy Furniture store in Winona, Mississippi isnt surprising. I aint saying nothing bad. Authorities put together alineup later that day of black-and-white photos, and she identified Flowers from the lineup as the man she briefly saw that morning when she came outside to move her car. Case Details. And the investigative file not shared with the defense showed investigators had considered Marcus Presley, the gunman in the murders and a string of similar crimes that same summer in neighboring Alabama. Presley and Gamble did four of the June heists together and one crime was perpetrated by Presley alone. Historical Person Search Search Search Results Results willie james hemphill (1955 - 2006) Try FREE for 14 days Try FREE for 14 days. Episode 10 of the In the DarkPodcast was largely dedicated to the strange case ofWillie James Hemphill, a local bad boy with a violent streak who was continually getting cross-ways with the law. I know he didnt do it, Archie Flowers said. Hemphill was held in jail for 11 days, according to county records, though it's not clear why he was held. Willie Hemphill Found 194 people in Mississippi, Illinois and 31 other states. Even before finding the gun, Armstrong had doubts about whether Flowers played a role in the quadruple murder. Investigators said the Simpson brothers were eliminated quickly because they were both at work at the time of the murders. "I don't know nothing about it.". View Actual Score Check Background . EPISODE 16. In fact, it appears Miller had specifically asked for the photo of Presley from an investigator in Virginia, where Presley and his accomplice, LaSamuel Gamble, were apprehended. Last month, the Supreme Court overturned Flowers latest conviction, citing In The Darks reporting. The answer was yes many, many times. Obituaries Section. Hemphill supposedly had an alibi for the time of the murders, but when In The Dark dug into it, they were able to determine his alibi was barely credible if at all. He said he would have sent a written report back to Mississippi, so authorities there could check out the stories. His father had, for just a few months, been the first sheriff in the county, but returned to farming his land. Before he left on July 3, he said she gave him $30. Three of the four were each killed with a single head shot. And that omission, a law professor and former prosecutor told the team, could mean a seventh new trial for Flowers, condemined to death for the murders of four people at Tardy Furniture Store. Why was he questioned? I knew his sisters, I knew his brother, he said. Why was he questioned? Me and her was leaving," he said, forfeiting his Memphis alibi altogether and placing himself a short walk from Tardy Furniture. He lived near Tardy Furniture at the time of the murders, and near where a gun that might have been the murder weapon was found. We went to boot camp together., The officers denial dont make me mad, he said. The judge denied Flowers' request to attend his mother funeral here on July 21. The funeral service will be 1pm Sunday at China Grove A.M.E. Zion Church. APM Reports recently interviewed a man named Willie James Hemphill, who said he was a suspect early in the investigation. If the state Supreme Court were to order a seventh trial for Flowers, the district attorney would face a difficult task, Saums said. Can Marcus Presleys affidavit be trusted? After a multistate manhunt, Presley and Gamble were arrested in Norfolk, Virginia. "Because once you get people on a roll to admitting to crimes, they just don't stop. James Graham, was a blues pianist and her mother, Virgie Lee Graham, was skilled in many instruments, though she did not . It remains unclear why Mississippi investigators ruled them out as suspects. The murders rocked the small town. LAYTON - Willie Morris Hemphill, 69, passed away August 11, 2018 at St. Mark's Hospital in Salt Lake City, Utah. Share to Tumblr. Early voting has begun. The crime had a random and senseless quality to it. Willie James Hemphill Obituary. With the discrediting of Hallmon and other witnesses, Saums said, I think the district attorney would find it hard to prosecute Curtis Flowers again, much less convict him.. Visitation: 6-8 pm Friday, March 2, 2012 at Laurel Land Funeral Home. That day in October 2015, Ali was looking at a photo lineup that law enforcement had used to implicate Flowers in the Tardy case. He didnt bother anybody.. Right now, Willie Hemphill lives in Rock Hill, SC. Just after the murders, police arrested and jailed him as a suspect, but then let him go. Share to Twitter. However, In the Dark's reporting has uncovered no clear evidence linking him to the Tardy murders. But there was no mention of the Alabama crimes and suspects in the investigative files the prosecution had turned over to Flowers' defense attorneys. He's also targeted women in general and often women carrying purses. They also discovered an unfired .380 bullet, which might suggest the gun jammed. "After a short time, we realized that he didn't know anything about the case.". It was still in the morning time.". Initially, Hemphill refused to provide further details of his whereabouts on July 16, 1996. He said: "If it wasn't for the fact that I had an airtight alibi, I could be the one on death row right now. Not long after Armstrong found the gun in October 2001, two police officers happened to pull him over for speeding. And Hemphill had actually lived for a time in Winona. Following his release from prison in 2013,Hallmon tried to run over a Carroll County sheriff's deputy while escaping a drug bust. Case Details Parties Documents Dockets . When we finally found Hemphill, living in Indianapolis, he had some very surprising things to say about the case . They did, however, find bullets, bullet fragments and shell casings at the crime scene. He quoted Bertha Tardy as saying he would have to be responsible for paying for the batteries. She lived in Winston, Mississippi, United States in 1930 and Beat 2, Winston, Mississippi, United States in 1940. Asked to clarify what he'd just said, Hemphill became agitated. "They were investigating that intently back then. In loving memory of Willie Mae Hemphill who passed away February 25, 2012. Select this result to view William Thomas Hemphill's phone number, address, and more. Presley and Gamble were extradited to Alabama, and again Gamble was questioned, almost in passing, about Mississippi. "I was out of the whole jurisdiction in another state.". The second season of the In the Dark podcast is about the case of Curtis Flowers, who was tried six times for the same crime. We know that Willie James Hemphill had been residing in Gaffney, Cherokee County, South Carolina 29341. You can send your sympathy in the guestbook provided and share it with the family. Find Willie Hemphill's phone number, address, and email on Spokeo, the leading online directory for contact information. 0 Add Rating Anonymously. ", "I was nowhere near the scene," he said. He didnt mark it or put it in an evidence bag, he told the Clarion Ledger. Reporter: Mr Hemphill. Contacts (5) Locations (10) Family (3) Social (2) Phone Number: (704) 751-NZMM +2 phones. In The Darks reporting on the case documented the inequities and outright barbarism of Mississippis criminal justice system. Law enforcement clearly saw Hemphill as a prime suspect. He said he knew nothing about the burglary. He allegedly committed robberies to fund a drug habit. Flowers gave authorities conflicting statements about the times he went to these places. But instead of stopping there, its reporters started snitching to the same system whose injustice they had just unmasked. "If he's guilty, he's guilty.". Reporters from In the Dark tried to contact Hemphill online to present him with these findings. The July 16, 1996, killings of Tardy Furniture owner Bertha Tardy, 59, and three employees, Carmen Rigby, 45, Robert Golden, 42, and Derrick Stewart, 16, have haunted this town ever since. Case Number : 20-11001. A surveillance camera revealed that the killer was wielding a 380 pistol that jammed repeatedly. When Jeffrey Armstrong heard his dog barking, he went outside tosee the reason for the commotion. In October 2015, some 20 years after the murders, Katie Ali, one of Flowers attorneys in his appeal, recognized him in the photo lineup law enforcement used to implicate Flowers: In those Alabama crimes, store employees were shot execution-style with a .380 handgun the same type weapon used in the Tardy Furniture Store killings that might have jammed, and a suspect was wearing Fila shoes the same type shoe found from a bloody shoe print at the scene. At a hearing, the attorney generals office told the judge that prosecutors knew of no such gun. He testified in multiple trials that the other images in the photo lineup were just "filler pictures," chosen "at random" based on some resemblance to Flowers. He told APM Reports that he was arrested and questioned in the . Records show he was questioned Hemphill said he was interrogated for hours and held for 11 days before being released. More: Curtis Flowers' prosecution witness says testimony was all 'make believe', More: Recanted testimony, subjective science helps put Curtis Flowers on death row, Supreme Court rules jury selection in Ga. trial unconstitutional. So, if Curtis Flowers isnt guilty, who is? The first of these events took place last month when the US Supreme Court tossed out Flowers conviction. Historical Person Search Search Search Results Results Willie James Hemphill (1952 - 2006) Try FREE for 14 days Try FREE for 14 days. Miller would not comment. "We did go to the mall, but it wasn't the day of the killing. The Dallas Morning News. Baran noted that Hemphill was known to love the song Nasty Bitch by Bust Down it was not for kids, Baran said which he would sing and dance to on Winonas streets in those days. It was all make believe. "[I]t's almost like a hair trigger that would cause a reversal if you've got false testimony that is significant.". Marcus Presley and Lasamuel Gamble werent raised at all. According to testimony in Flowers' first trial, authorities found $255 hidden in the headboard of Flowers' girlfriend. Hemphill certainly sounds like a career criminal who is fully capable of committing violence; but he doesnt come off as a psychopathic killerand whoever did the deed at the Tardy furniture store was either a hired killer (or killers) or enjoyed killing people for kicks. Miller, the Mississippi investigator who made the lineup and asked for the two to be interrogated, declined to answer questions from APM Reports. Other facts may help explain why Hemphill initially was a suspect: The shoes he told In the Dark that he was wearing when he was questioned by investigators on July 21, 1996 Fila Grant Hill high-tops are the same type of sneaker that had left bloody footprints at the scene of the murders five days earlier. What an Alabama crime spree might reveal about the Curtis Flowers investigation. Her new position on exactly what happened that morning is likely to be heard by a jury if Fleming faces one for a seventh time. Menu. In Flowers' third trial, Snow testified that the height of the man she saw was between 5-foot-3 and 5-foot-5. Flowers, who had been fired from the store 13 days before the murders, reportedly owed a small amount of money to one of the owners. Current Address: EHZR Hannah Dr, Rock Hill, SC. Now the spotlight is on three other deaths that are linked to the case. On April 30, 2018, American Public Medias true crime podcast In The Dark began airing its second season, an investigation of the case of Curtis Flowers, a black man in Mississippi accused of a quadruple homicide at a furniture store in 1996. When Willie Hemphill was born on 14 August 1891, in Mississippi, United States, her father, Thomas Wiley Hemphill, was 23 and her mother, Izora Sullivan, was 21. Willie James Hemphill was confronted in an Indianapolis courthouse last week, 23 years after police deemed him an initial suspect but later pursued leads against Flowers. Search by Name Search . Convicted murderer Alex Murdaugh has been sentenced to life in prison for killing his wife and son. But at Curtis Flowers' trials, the prosecution downplayed any investigation of other suspects. It took the In the Dark team a full year to track Hemphill down in an Indianapolis courtroom (he's still getting into trouble). <a . Saums pointed out that Simpson who has since died lied to police about how he had gotten the gun. And in the first Flowers trial, in 1997, he testified that "there were numerous suspects" in the early days of the investigation. Yet theyre willing to hand him over to the prosecution, to possibly watch him die. Willie Dixon - The Big Three Trio 1947-1952 (Roots N' Blues C 46216) FLAC . On November 16, 2015, Marcus Presley signed an affidavit claiming that Lasamuel Gamble and Steven McKenzie (the driver of the getaway car) had been in Mississippi the day of the Winona murders and had returned with several hundred dollars in their pockets after claiming to have hit a lick (committed a crime). Hemphill, now almost 50, hasnt been arrested for violence in more than a decade, according to the rap sheet assembled on In The Darks website. LOW HIGH. He allegedly committed robberies to fund a drug habit. Officers gave him a gunshot residue test, finding oneparticle of residue. An APM Reports investigation of Hallmon's criminal history shows that at least seven felony charges against him fell away between 2001 and 2016. At the time, investigators in Mississippi told the media they were looking into whether the crimes could be connected to the murders at Tardy Furniture. And the gun that Armstrong says he discovered is additionally important . He didn't work on July 4, a holiday, and didn't show up for work on July 5, 6 or 8. Willie James Hemphill has done many terrible things. Name. The murder weapon in the Tardy Furniture case was a .380, and an unfired round was found at the scene; investigators believe that might indicate that the gun had jammed. Prosecutors have always said that Curtis Flowers was the only serious suspect in the Tardy Furniture investigation. It was his legal obligation, but its easy to see why he didnt. AVERAGE AGE. As far as him telling me he killed some people, hell, naw, he aint ever told me that. But Flowers deserves to have a fair trial and prosecution, he said. "I was here in Winona," Woods said. When Flowers went back on trial, Armstrong heard no mention of the gun by either prosecutors or defense attorneys. The officer who was with Small when they pulled over Armstrong for speeding told APM Reports that Armstrong had indeed given them a handgun, which was turned over to the district attorneys office. Flowers was convicted and sentenced to death in the first three trials, but each time, the verdict was overturned on appeal for prosecutorial misconduct in the first and second trials, and for racially discriminatory jury selection in the third. "I haven't heard anything about them," John Johnson, the investigator for the District Attorney's office, had said when questioned about the Alabama suspects at the sixth Flowers trial.