Case 277: Linda Slaten

Transcript

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Speaker 1 The three-member Slayton family lived in a one-story, two-bedroom duplex off Brunel Parkway in the Florida city of Lakeland.

Speaker 1 Single mum Linda slept in one bedroom with her youngest son Tim in the other. Linda's oldest boy, 15-year-old Jeff, slept on a cod in the living room.

Speaker 1 It was early on Friday, September 4, 1981, when Jeff Slayton woke to a strange sound.

Speaker 1 It was the crackle of a police radio.

Speaker 1 Jeff quickly realized that several officers had gained access to his home and were quietly moving about.

Speaker 1 What's going on? he asked.

Speaker 1 Jeff was told to get dressed and go outside.

Speaker 1 He did so, completely perplexed as to why the police were even there.

Speaker 1 The officers made sure he exited out the front door away from his mother's bedroom.

Speaker 1 Jeff wandered out into the morning light and was immediately taken aback.

Speaker 1 It seemed like every cop in Florida was standing outside his home, along with the news crews and reporters.

Speaker 1 Jeff spotted his auntie Judy among the crowd. She was crying.

Speaker 1 Judy told Jeff that his mother had been murdered.

Speaker 1 Shortly before Jeff woke up that day, Judy Butler arrived at the Slayton's apartment to have her regular Friday morning coffee with her older sister, Linda.

Speaker 1 The sisters lived in the same government-owned complex just three doors away from each other.

Speaker 1 Judy knocked on Linda's front door several times and waited. When no one answered, she headed back home.

Speaker 1 Along the way, she glanced over at Linda's bedroom window. It was wide open and its screen had been removed.

Speaker 1 Judy went to examine it.

Speaker 1 Inside, Judy could see her sister's still figure sprawled across the bed, seemingly fast asleep.

Speaker 1 But Judy thought it was strange that Linda was lying horizontally instead of vertically with her head on the pillow.

Speaker 1 As Judy processed the scene, She was suddenly hit with the realization of what she was seeing and let out a blood-curdling scream.

Speaker 1 A maintenance worker for the Housing Authority heard the scream and contacted police, who arrived soon after 8.35am.

Speaker 1 They observed 31-year-old Linda Slayton's body through her bedroom window.

Speaker 1 It was clear she was deceased.

Speaker 1 The officers wandered around the property looking for a way in. but all of the doors and every other window was locked.

Speaker 1 They didn't want to disturb the scene by entering through Linda's bedroom window.

Speaker 1 But Judy Butler was distraught. Her nephews, Jeff and Tim, would be inside the apartment and she was scared they might have been hurt too.

Speaker 1 Left with no other option and facing an urgent situation, officers climbed through the open window into Linda's bedroom.

Speaker 1 The noise of their arrival woke Jeff Slayton in the living room. His younger brother, 12-year-old Tim, was asleep in the second bedroom.

Speaker 1 You need to wake up, a policeman told a confused Tim. Go outside with your brother.

Speaker 1 Tim wondered why the officer didn't mention his mother.

Speaker 1 Still wearing his pajamas, Tim headed towards the front door.

Speaker 1 The door to his mother's room was closed, but when Tim walked by, it swung open as a police officer emerged. Tim caught a glimpse inside.

Speaker 1 His mother's body lay awkwardly on the bed.

Speaker 1 Her dress was bunched around her abdomen, exposing both her upper and lower naked body. Her underwear was on the floor, and a wire was twisted around her bloodied neck.

Speaker 1 It was a sight that Tim would never be able to erase from his mind.

Speaker 1 53-year-old Sergeant Edgar Pickett led the Lakeland Police Department's crime scene unit.

Speaker 1 He was a legendary fingerprint expert and only one year away from retirement when he was summoned to the Slayton's apartment.

Speaker 1 Upon arriving, a detective remarked to Sergeant Pickett, who was African-American,

Speaker 1 A black man don't have any business looking at a naked white woman.

Speaker 1 Despite his successful career and upstanding reputation, Pickett still faced prejudice on a daily basis.

Speaker 1 Of the many deaths he'd attended, Pickett had never seen anyone treated as brutally as Linda Slayton.

Speaker 1 She had been sexually assaulted, then strangled to death with a wire coat hanger from her own closet, or while her two young sons slept close by.

Speaker 1 Aside from the displaced window screen, everything else appeared to be in place.

Speaker 1 Linda's purse was still in her room and her jewelry lay undisturbed in a box on her dresser.

Speaker 1 There were no overt signs of a struggle, indicating the altercation had taken place entirely on the bed.

Speaker 1 Sergeant Pickett examined the entire room for evidence. Shoe prints were found on the carpet leading from the window to the closet.
Pickett also discovered a partial palm print on the windowsill.

Speaker 1 It cemented the police's theory that Linda's killer had broken into her room as opposed to being invited in.

Speaker 1 Linda's final movements were pieced together. She and her sons had only been living in the apartment for about two weeks.

Speaker 1 The previous afternoon of Thursday, September 3, 15-year-old Jeff Slayton had arrived home to find there was nothing to eat.

Speaker 1 The Slaytons lived in government housing and relied on welfare. They didn't have much, but Jeff knew his mother loved her family and did the best she could.

Speaker 1 There could be two cans and a bag of flour in the cupboard, and Linda would still manage to make a feast.

Speaker 1 Her single priority was caring for her boys.

Speaker 1 Linda took Jeff and Tim out to the beach, parks and to concerts, with her goal always being to have fun.

Speaker 1 Although she struggled to make ends meet and keep her sons in line, Linda maintained a positive and happy outlook on life.

Speaker 1 When speaking with police, Jeff Slayton admitted to being somewhat rebellious and clashing with his mother. He maintained it was only ever typical teenage blow-ups and nothing serious.

Speaker 1 They'd had one such conflict on September 3 when Jeff became angry over the lack of food at home. He left the apartment and rode his bike to his maternal grandparents' house.

Speaker 1 They fed him and dropped him back home at around 9.30 that night.

Speaker 1 12-year-old Tim Slayton had spent the latter part of the day at football practice and was given a ride home afterwards.

Speaker 1 He arrived at around 8.30 p.m., shortly before his older brother returned. Tim then attended a get-together at an apartment next door with his mother.

Speaker 1 A small group inside were playing cards and Linda and Tim joined in.

Speaker 1 At about 10 o'clock, Linda went back to her apartment to let Jeff know where she was, then returned to the card game.

Speaker 1 She and Tim headed home at about 11.30 p.m.

Speaker 1 Jeff was still up in the living room watching television. Tim went to bed as Linda washed the dishes in the kitchen.

Speaker 1 Jeff said that by now the tension between them had eased.

Speaker 1 As Linda passed him on the way to her room, he said,

Speaker 1 I love you, mum. I'll see you tomorrow.

Speaker 1 Linda replied, I love you, Jeff. Good night.

Speaker 1 Jeff said he turned the TV off at around midnight, then fell asleep.

Speaker 1 Though he described his 4 foot 10 inch mother as weighing just 100 pounds soaking wet, Jeff maintained she was tough and capable of fighting back against an attacker.

Speaker 1 Yet, neither he nor Tim reported hearing anything amiss during the night.

Speaker 1 Jeff insisted that if he knew his mother was in danger, he would have rushed to help.

Speaker 1 Traces of semen found inside Linda formed the basis of a rape kit.

Speaker 1 As forensic DNA analysis was still a few years away, investigators had to narrow down potential suspects using more traditional means.

Speaker 1 Many people were questioned, including those at the card game Linda attended hours before she was killed and other neighbours.

Speaker 1 Police also spoke with a local construction worker named Bobby Dean, who Linda had been dating.

Speaker 1 They discovered the couple had reportedly broken up two days before Linda was killed and that Linda had told others that Bobby was possessive of her.

Speaker 1 Bobby said he was at home with his sister and mother on the night of the murder. They confirmed this but couldn't be certain if he stayed home after they went to bed.

Speaker 1 Bobby agreed to take a polygraph test. The results were inconclusive.

Speaker 1 After that, he refused to cooperate with police.

Speaker 1 Police also looked into Jeff and Tim's father, Frank Slayton.

Speaker 1 He was described by Linda's sister, Judy, as a mean, no-count scoundrel.

Speaker 1 Linda and Frank met as teenagers and had their two children young. They'd married, wanting to provide their sons with a proper family experience.

Speaker 1 For years, the four of them had lived together in the neighboring state of Alabama. But it hadn't been the happy family unit the young parents had hoped for.

Speaker 1 Jeff and Tim both recalled times when their father had beaten their mother. Frank's violence escalated when he was drunk, which was often.

Speaker 1 When Jeff was seven years old, he saw his father grab his mother by the throat, then press a gun to her head.

Speaker 1 Jeff intervened by pulling Frank away. He believed that if he hadn't done this, Frank could have pulled the trigger.

Speaker 1 In mid-1981, after nine years of marriage, Linda had filed for divorce. That was when she relocated to Lakeland with her sons for a fresh start.

Speaker 1 Given Frank Slayton's history of domestic violence and the sexual tone to Linda's murder, he became a strong suspect.

Speaker 1 Frank, who still lived in Alabama, insisted that he was at home when his ex-wife was killed.

Speaker 1 After their mother's murder, Jeff and Tim Slayton went to live with their maternal grandparents and never set foot in their apartment again.

Speaker 1 The boys referred to the unknown killer as the monster and lived in constant fear of him.

Speaker 1 It took time before they felt comfortable leaving their grandparents' house.

Speaker 1 The local community shared the same anxieties, believing the person responsible was among them and would strike again.

Speaker 1 The Slayton boys spent many many nights sleeping in their grandparents' bed while their grandfather stayed up guarding them with a shotgun in hand.

Speaker 1 The brothers eventually returned to school, driven by advice their mum had once given them. Keep moving forward and never give up.

Speaker 1 Tim went back to playing football, finding support among his teammates and coach.

Speaker 1 Meanwhile, Jeff Slayton faced an entirely new battle.

Speaker 1 You got big arms on you, a detective once told him, before adding,

Speaker 1 and you're strong enough to put your hands around your mum's neck and kill her.

Speaker 1 Like his father, Jeff was considered a suspect.

Speaker 1 He was the last known person to have seen his mother alive and admitted to having a heated argument with her that evening.

Speaker 1 Jeff cooperated with authorities, but felt like he was being interrogated all the time.

Speaker 1 Members of the Lakeland Police Department frequently took him out of school just to question him.

Speaker 1 Jeff voluntarily took a polygraph test which he passed.

Speaker 1 When the police wanted to perform the test again and floated the idea of putting Jeff under hypnosis, his grandparents stepped in and said, enough.

Speaker 1 They told investigators to leave Jeff and their family alone and find their daughter's real killer.

Speaker 1 Being treated as a suspect caused the grief-stricken Jeff even more agony. Still, he ultimately agreed to sit the second polygraph test.
Once again, he passed.

Speaker 1 While police accepted there was nothing further implicating him, he remained under a cloud of suspicion.

Speaker 1 The pressure took its toll. Both Jeff and Tim dropped out of school, feeling aimless and indifferent.

Speaker 1 Jeff fell into a deep depression during which he contemplated suicide.

Speaker 1 The pair obsessively checked the news, hoping to hear of a breakthrough in their mother's case. Yet, there was none.

Speaker 1 Every person the police interviewed had their hand and footprints compared to those from the crime scene.

Speaker 1 None were a match, and the Slayton case inevitably went cold.

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Speaker 1 Almost 20 years later in 1998, a Lakeland detective named Brad Grice was tasked with taking a fresh look at the case.

Speaker 1 He told The Ledger newspaper,

Speaker 1 They say a lot of times in a case like this, it's someone close to you who did it.

Speaker 1 He had the killer's semen sample examined by a crime lab with updated technology, permitting the extraction of a full DNA profile.

Speaker 1 Detective Grice met with the Jeff and Tim Slayton, who were now in their 30s. Both voluntarily provided DNA samples.
Neither matched the killer.

Speaker 1 Jeff Slayton was finally vindicated and officially dismissed as a suspect.

Speaker 1 Linda's ex-husband, Frank Slayton, had cleaned up his life and was no longer drinking, instead committing to repairing his relationship with his sons.

Speaker 1 He too gave a DNA sample, which ruled him out of the investigation.

Speaker 1 Other persons of interest, including Linda's ex-boyfriend, Bobby Dean, were also cleared.

Speaker 1 Detective Grice had reached a dead end.

Speaker 1 Then in September, he received a compelling tip.

Speaker 1 The year after Linda Slayton was murdered, a 10-year-old Lakeland girl was abducted from her home. The assailant had carried the girl out of her bedroom window as she slept.

Speaker 1 He then drove her around for hours, during which she was raped and strangled.

Speaker 1 Her ordeal ended at an interstate overpass.

Speaker 1 Her attacker forced her to climb over the side of the railing. As she clung desperately onto it, he pried her fingers loose, causing her to fall 24 feet to the ground.

Speaker 1 She survived and the man responsible was identified as 24-year-old Lakeland local named James Ulmer.

Speaker 1 He was charged with burglary, kidnapping and attempted murder.

Speaker 1 Ulmer was found to have a history of breaking into people's homes. On one occasion, he was caught standing over a sleeping teenage girl before fleeing.

Speaker 1 It was also believed he was responsible for the death of another girl found dead at the base of an overpass.

Speaker 1 Yet, Ulmer wouldn't cooperate with investigators.

Speaker 1 It was discovered that in September 1981, James Ulmer had been staying with a friend who lived in the same apartment complex as Linda Slayton.

Speaker 1 In fact, the apartment was directly across from hers and he was there on the night she was killed.

Speaker 1 Given Linda's murder shared striking similarities to Ulmer's known offending, Detective Grice was certain he'd found Linda's killer.

Speaker 1 By the time James Ulmer was on Grice's radar, he had been dead for five years.

Speaker 1 He passed away in prison, reportedly from respiratory failure, and had been cremated.

Speaker 1 Further complicating matters was the fact that Ulmer's DNA was never collected and stored when he entered the prison system.

Speaker 1 Detective Grice spoke with the authorities who'd investigated Ulmer's previous offending.

Speaker 1 Because that case was closed, everything to do with it, including DNA samples, had been disposed of.

Speaker 1 Yet, an opportunity arose when Detective Grice convinced Ulmer's mother to provide him with a DNA sample.

Speaker 1 It could be used to determine if someone genetically linked to her had raped Linda Slayton.

Speaker 1 The results concluded that James Ulmer was not Linda's killer.

Speaker 1 This was yet another major blow for Detective Grice, who was now back where he started.

Speaker 1 He remained in contact with the Jeff and Tim Slayton, promising them that he wouldn't retire until their mother's killer was caught.

Speaker 1 He sent the killer's profile to the FBI's National DNA database where it was continually compared against the new submissions.

Speaker 1 But they failed to generate a hit and a reward for information went unclaimed.

Speaker 1 Detective Grice told The Ledger,

Speaker 1 There's still hope, but man it's tough. It's frustrating when you know if you could just identify that DNA.
It's like having the suspect. You just don't have the name.

Speaker 1 As years continued to pass, Detective Grice came to suspect that Linda's killer was likely deceased.

Speaker 1 After working on the case for 17 years, Brad Grice retired in 2015 for medical reasons.

Speaker 1 He'd been unable to keep his promise to the Slaton brothers and felt he'd let them down.

Speaker 1 Although Jeff and Tim were disappointed, they had no hard feelings.

Speaker 1 They just resigned themselves to the fact that they'd likely take their last breaths without ever knowing who killed their mum.

Speaker 1 Jeff Slayton, quote,

Speaker 1 It's been rough my whole life not knowing who it is.

Speaker 1 Always being scared to death I was friends with him, always looking over my shoulder, sleeping with a switchblade knife under my pillow.

Speaker 1 Tim Slayton told the ledger,

Speaker 1 It could be that guy over there.

Speaker 1 You just don't know.

Speaker 1 By now, more than two dozen detectives had actively worked on the Slayton case. Leeds were pursued into state in Louisiana and North Carolina.

Speaker 1 Jeff and Tim Slayton continued to visit and call the Lakeland Police Department so the detectives wouldn't forget them.

Speaker 1 They wound up befriending these officers, who reassured the brothers that they were still very passionate about solving the crime.

Speaker 1 But years continued to slip by with no arrests. Hope was fading.

Speaker 1 In 2018, Parabon Nanolabs, a company that specializes in using genetic genealogy to investigate cold cases, reached out to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.

Speaker 1 They asked if they wanted to send the DNA from the Slayton case for further testing due to the growing success of this new form of investigation.

Speaker 1 38 years had passed since Linda's murder, but the rape kit had been kept in pristine condition in anticipation for a moment like this.

Speaker 1 Cece Moore was the head of Parabon Nanolab's Genetic Genealogy Unit.

Speaker 1 She was an expert in the field and her team was given the Slayton case file.

Speaker 1 They began by uploading the killer's DNA into a public genealogy website called JEDMatch.

Speaker 1 Customers voluntarily submitted saliva swabs to genealogical testing companies like JEDMatch in exchange for an ancestry report.

Speaker 1 They could then connect with family members and distant relatives via online databases.

Speaker 1 Similarly, cold case investigators uploaded anonymous DNA from crime scenes to the same databases, but with the intention of identifying suspects through their familial lineage.

Speaker 1 This method was used to help capture the Golden State killer a year prior, as covered in episode 53 of Case File.

Speaker 1 Unsurprisingly, Linda Slayton's killer hadn't uploaded his DNA to Jedmatch.

Speaker 1 But genealogist Cece Moore and her team constructed a family tree based on his distant relatives who had.

Speaker 1 They filled in the gaps using birth certificates, marriage licenses, obituaries, and social media.

Speaker 1 It only took Moore's team a weekend to uncover three genetic networks, individual branches that converged into one single family.

Speaker 1 The family only had one son, and he had roots in Lakeland in 1981.

Speaker 1 C.C. Moore was highly confident he was the DNA contributor.

Speaker 1 Tim Slayton's favorite sport was American football. Weeks after his mother was killed, 14-year-old Tim returned to the game, finding comfort among his teammates.

Speaker 1 One of his biggest supporters was his team's assistant coach, a 20-year-old man affectionately called Coach Joe.

Speaker 1 Coach Joe's full name was Joseph Mills. When he wasn't volunteering with Lakeland's youth football program, Mills worked at a dairy warehouse.

Speaker 1 He knew Linda Slatum was a single mum who couldn't afford a car and helped her out by giving Tim rides to and from practice.

Speaker 1 In fact, he had picked up Tim and driven him home on the very day Linda Slatum was later killed.

Speaker 1 The next day, police interviewed Mills briefly over the phone. He wasn't questioned any any further, meaning he'd failed to register on their radar.

Speaker 1 It wouldn't have helped that those who knew him would have provided glowing character references.

Speaker 1 When genealogist C.C. Moore was tracing Linda Slayton's killer in 2019, all branches led to Joseph Mills.

Speaker 1 Better yet, he was still alive.

Speaker 1 The now 58-year-old lived on Bailey Road, 30 minutes from the crime scene. It was the same place he'd lived in 1981.

Speaker 1 Mills had changed a lot since then. He'd gone bald and his facial hair had greyed.
He was still married to the same woman and not only did he have children of his own, but grandchildren as well.

Speaker 1 Over the past three decades, Mills had taken on a variety of jobs. Now he was running his own cleaning business.

Speaker 1 Mills was also known to police.

Speaker 1 In 1984, he had been convicted of grand theft after forging a will. He didn't go to prison, but his handprints were taken and kept on file.

Speaker 1 These were compared to the partial palm print lifted from Linda Slayton's windowsill.

Speaker 1 It was a match.

Speaker 1 The final piece of the puzzle was comparing Joseph Mills' DNA to that of Linda's killer.

Speaker 1 Investigators covertly surveilled Mills for several weekends, waiting for an opportunity to discreetly obtain a sample of his DNA.

Speaker 1 This would be done by picking up something he discarded, like a tissue or coffee cup.

Speaker 1 When this approach failed, investigators secretly seized Mills' trash from the curb outside his home.

Speaker 1 After digging through the garbage bags, they uncovered a piece of used medical adhesive tape for a colostomy bag.

Speaker 1 A 2013 photograph on Mills' Facebook page showed he had a colostomy bag.

Speaker 1 The tape was most certainly his, but to be sure, officers also collected two cotton swabs and a plastic spoon from the trash.

Speaker 1 All the items were sent off for testing.

Speaker 1 Eleven days later, the results were in.

Speaker 1 Joseph Mills' DNA matched the DNA of Linda Slayton's killer.

Speaker 1 Following this, police spoke with the Joseph Mills at his home. He said he didn't remember Linda Slayton or her murder.
He was then shown photographs of Linda and her two sons.

Speaker 1 This prompted Mills to claim he did remember them but hadn't known Linda personally.

Speaker 1 He also said that he didn't recall coaching Tim Slayton or that he'd dropped him off at the Slaytons' home the night Linda was killed.

Speaker 1 Eight days later, on Thursday, December 12, 2019, police met with Mills again and placed him under arrest. He didn't seem surprised and never asked why.

Speaker 1 Instead, he was unusually calm and showed no emotion.

Speaker 1 During a subsequent police interview, Mills was now willing to open up about his history with Tim Slayton.

Speaker 1 He asserted that whenever he dropped Tim off at home after practice, he stayed in his car.

Speaker 1 Mills maintained that he had never been inside the Slayton home at any time for any reason.

Speaker 1 What we have tells us a different story, a detective responded, before adding,

Speaker 1 you were in that apartment.

Speaker 1 Mills was informed that evidence placed him in Linda Slayton's bedroom, with one detective remarking,

Speaker 1 It's been 38 years and I'm sure you go to bed every night thinking about this.

Speaker 1 Mills remained indignant, reiterating that he had never been inside the apartment.

Speaker 1 Upon learning that his handprints and DNA were found at the crime scene, Mills changed his story again.

Speaker 1 He said that he had met Linda for the first time on Thursday, September 3, 1981, when he dropped Tim home.

Speaker 1 Linda approached Mills' car to thank him. According to Mills, Linda gave him an open invitation to stop by for, quote, a good time.

Speaker 1 Mills took her up on her offer that night. He entered her bedroom through her unlocked window.
Linda was lying on her bed waiting for him.

Speaker 1 Mills claimed that the wire coat hanger was already around her neck and she asked him to tighten it for her pleasure.

Speaker 1 They had consensual sex that Mills described as wild, during which he twisted the wire tighter and tighter as per Linda's wishes. Linda then lost consciousness.

Speaker 1 After finishing, Mills left back out the window without checking to see if Linda had woken up.

Speaker 1 He claimed that he'd only learnt that she'd died when detectives questioned him about it later.

Speaker 1 Linda's autopsy results determined her injuries were inconsistent with consensual sex.

Speaker 1 There were even self-sustained claw marks to her neck consistent with her struggling to remove the wire.

Speaker 1 When detectives pointed out how deep the hangar was embedded in Linda's skin, Mills maintained, quote,

Speaker 1 It was a game.

Speaker 1 Detectives were unconvinced. They were certain that after dropping Tim Slayton home, Joseph Mills returned to the apartment later, having made the decision to rape Linda.

Speaker 1 He broke in through her bedroom window at around 9pm during a brief period of time when no one was home.

Speaker 1 Mills then lay in wait in Linda's bedroom, likely hiding in the closet, where he collected the wire hanger.

Speaker 1 When Linda retired for bed that night, she walked into her room and and closed the door, oblivious that Mills was already in there waiting for her.

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Speaker 1 It's that time of year again. The holidays are coming fast, and if your kids are anything like mine, that list is already getting pretty long.

Speaker 1 And let's be honest, some of the things on that list make us stop and think, like a smartphone.

Speaker 1 What makes me nervous about kids having phones isn't the screen time, it's everything they can stumble across online.

Speaker 1 There's so much out there they're not ready for, and once they see it, you can't take it back. It's scary how easily they can end up in those corners of the internet without even meaning to.

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Speaker 1 Joseph Mills was charged with burglary, sexual battery and first-degree murder.

Speaker 1 Jeff and Tim Slayton were stunned to learn a trusted family friend had killed their mother.

Speaker 1 The thought that Coach Joe could be responsible had never even crossed their minds.

Speaker 1 They hoped to see Mills face trial, explain himself on the stand, and face the death penalty.

Speaker 1 After being advised by his attorney that it was in his best interest to plead guilty to all charges, Mills did so.

Speaker 1 Yet, he still refused to admit to killing Linda Slayton.

Speaker 1 Jeff and Tim Slayton were in court during sentencing in February 2022, surrounded by supportive friends and family. They were both given the opportunity to speak.

Speaker 1 Jeff turned to Mills and tearfully asked over and over, sometimes yelling, Why?

Speaker 1 I just want to know why, Joe. Why'd you take my mama from me? I loved my mama.
We were happy.

Speaker 1 I hate you. You can't die and burn in hell fast enough for me.

Speaker 1 Mills remained silent and stone-faced in response. Linda's sister, Judy Butler, was met with the same reaction when she asked Mills, Do you have any soul? Do you have any remorse?

Speaker 1 The court also heard from Linda's grandchildren who never got to meet her.

Speaker 1 When the defendant was given the chance to speak, he told the court,

Speaker 1 I am a good person. I'm not that person that they're painting me out to be.

Speaker 1 He explained that he owned a successful business in which he gave people chances.

Speaker 1 The judge was unmoved by these claims. He sentenced Joseph Mills to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Speaker 1 A tearful Jeff Slayton told the media outside court,

Speaker 1 I don't know if there's anything such as closure, but it has been easier knowing he's locked up.

Speaker 1 Tim Slayton added,

Speaker 1 It's not over in the sense because he's still walking and my mum's not.

Speaker 1 Detective Brad Grice was one of the dozens of detectives who investigated the Slayton case over the near 40 years it went unsolved.

Speaker 1 He had worked on it for 17 of those years but had to retire before it was solved. When Joseph Mills was identified as the killer, Detective Grice blamed himself for not having identified him sooner.

Speaker 1 The Slaton brothers felt differently. They expressed gratitude to all those who worked to find their mother's killer, including Detective Grice, whom they considered a friend.

Speaker 1 In fact, Jeff was so appreciative of the detective's effort, he named one of his sons after him.

Speaker 1 The Slayton brothers held the same regard for Sergeant Edgar Pickett, who uncovered the killer's palm print on Linda's bedroom windowsill.

Speaker 1 This evidence helped solidify Joseph Mills' guilt.

Speaker 1 By the time Jeff and Tim were able to meet Pickett and thank him, he was 94 years old.

Speaker 1 It was a case Pickett had never forgotten. Once his job at the crime scene was over, his mind kept returning to the two Slayton boys.

Speaker 1 Pickett himself had children and was driven to solve Linda's murder to give her son's closure.

Speaker 1 Despite his involvement in the investigation, Pickett had never heard the name Joseph Mills and was unaware that the young man had been questioned early on in the investigation.

Speaker 1 In fact, Pickett revealed that he had been told to compare the palm print to a number of black men following reports of suspicious activity by black individuals at the time.

Speaker 1 Pickett, who was African-American himself, had admitted that the prejudice of his white colleagues influenced his own mindset.

Speaker 1 Random black men were questioned and fingerprinted en masse. Meanwhile, the white football coach who'd been at the Slayton home the night Linda was murdered was completely overlooked.

Speaker 1 Pickett admitted that he didn't handle the case like he should have and it had been on his conscience ever since.

Speaker 1 Despite this, case detectives maintained that Joseph Mills didn't slip through the cracks.

Speaker 1 Genealogist CeCe Moore, who had worked on hundreds of cases and solved more than 50 using genetic genealogy, said that Linda Slayton's made her the angriest because the killer targeted Linda while her children slept nearby.

Speaker 1 When Joseph Mills blamed Linda, denigrating her and making her look bad in front of her own children, Moore's disgust grew further.

Speaker 1 C.C. Moore expressed gratitude to the original crime scene investigators, saying,

Speaker 1 At the time this crime was committed, they didn't even know DNA was going to be used in criminal investigations.

Speaker 1 And so the fact that they collected that and then it was stored responsibly and carefully all these years by that department is so important.

Speaker 1 If that hadn't happened, we couldn't have done our work.

Speaker 1 In May 2019, JEDMatch, the DNA database used to help solve the Slayton case, changed its privacy rules. It is now much more difficult to solve cold cases using this method.

Speaker 1 C.C. Moore said,

Speaker 1 Whatever one thinks about this decision, it is inarguably a setback for justice, victims, and their families.

Speaker 1 Jeff and Tim Slayton have come to terms with the Joseph Mills's outcome, but still lack closure.

Speaker 1 It stung them that he was able to live a full life and raise a family for four decades.

Speaker 1 The brothers felt they were handed a far harsher sentence than he was, as they had to grow up and live without their mother.

Speaker 1 Still, they harbored no no resentment towards law enforcement for taking so long to apprehend Mills, with Tim Slayton explaining,

Speaker 1 I know it's a lot of hard work behind the scenes that people don't see that goes on.

Speaker 1 You know, what they do, the hours upon hours they put in.

Speaker 1 I mean, you could get mad, but only so much could be done in a day.

Speaker 1 The brothers have said that they couldn't have survived their ordeal without without each other.

Speaker 1 Over the years, they stayed close, living just a few miles apart and sharing the same hobbies so they could constantly be in each other's lives.

Speaker 1 They visited their mother's gravesite often and lit a candle every year on the anniversary of her murder.

Speaker 1 My mum, she's looking down on us and would want us to live our lives and do good.

Speaker 1 I want to make her proud.

Speaker 1 After his mother's murder, Tim Slayton cried for two weeks straight. Then he stopped and has been unable to cry since.

Speaker 1 Some have seen his inability to cry as cold, but it's as though Tim ran out of tears.

Speaker 1 Following Linda's death, Joseph Mills continued to act as a friend to Tim.

Speaker 1 He continued picking him up and dropping him off at football practice.

Speaker 1 During these trips, Mills asked about Linda's case and what leads police were looking into.

Speaker 1 Tim didn't know it at the time, but his mum's killer was using him to scope out the ongoing investigation.

Speaker 1 Then, a month after Linda's murder, Mills had a team photo taken.

Speaker 1 In it, Tim and his teammates stand side by side in their white jerseys.

Speaker 1 Directly behind Tim was Coach Joe.

Speaker 1 Tim saw his coach organizing this as a show of solidarity and support.

Speaker 1 He appreciated the photo so much that he hung it up in his bedroom at his grandparents' home.

Speaker 1 He had no clue that he was looking at the face of his mother's killer daily.

Speaker 1 The photo was once a source of pride for Tim, but now it disgusts him.

Speaker 1 He sees it as proof of how cold-hearted Joseph Mills was.

Speaker 1 Worse still were the haunting memories of seeing his mother's brutalized and naked body in situ.

Speaker 1 Tim Slayton, quote,

Speaker 1 I've seen the crime scene. It's in my head every day.

Speaker 1 I've got to live with that.

Speaker 1 Unlike his younger brother, Jeff Slayton cries all the time. He tells himself he won't, but tears fall whenever he starts thinking about his mother.

Speaker 1 Speaking with the journalist Paula Zahn about Joseph Mills, Jeff said tearfully,

Speaker 1 The day he murdered my mum, he murdered my childhood.

Speaker 1 It was the last day me and my brother were kids.

Speaker 1 Jeff harbors immense guilt, telling filmmakers of the CBS series The Betrayal of Linda Slayton.

Speaker 1 I would have died that night trying to save my mum. I mean, we're right there in the house, but I didn't hear nothing.

Speaker 1 How could you not hear something like that?

Speaker 1 It's so hard to live with that.

Speaker 1 In order to explain why he and Tim didn't hear the attack, Jeff believes that Joseph Mills threatened their mother to keep quiet or else he'd hurt her children.

Speaker 1 So, she saved us is the way we look at it. She could have screamed and yelled, like a lot of people would have done if you're in that position, but again, she was looking out for us.

Speaker 1 That was probably the last thing on her mind.

Speaker 1 Was us.

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Speaker 1 This episode is brought to you by Gab.

Speaker 1 It's that time of year again, the holidays are coming fast, and if your kids are anything like mine, that list is already getting pretty long.

Speaker 1 And let's be honest, some of the things on that list make us stop and think, like a smartphone.

Speaker 1 What makes me nervous about kids having phones isn't the screen time, it's everything they can stumble across online.

Speaker 1 There's so much out there they're not ready for and once they see it, you can't take it back. It's scary how easily they can end up in those corners of the internet without even meaning to.