#564 - First Family Of Murder & Pecans - San Saba, Texas

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Okay. Let's go on a trip, shall we? Where are we going? We are going to Texas this week.
Yeah. San Saba, Texas.
San Saba. S-A-N-S-A-B-A.
Two separate words. Two separate words.
Now it's actually in Harkyville, which Harkyville doesn't, it's got a population of about 12 right now. And you'll find out that's named after this family we're going to talk about, but San Saba is the main area here.
That's just kind of a little tiny speck in there. This is in central Texas.
It's about three hours and 20 minutes to Dallas, about two hours to Austin. So middle of goddamn nowhere is the best way to describe this.
About an hour and a half to Stephenville, Texas, which is our last Texas episode. Episode 515 against the wind.
If you want Bob Seger references, that is your episode. That's full of it.
Let me tell you, I don't remember what it was, why exactly, but man, this guy was, he must have reminded us of Bob Seger's population here, 3,121 in San Sabas, so not a big place at all either. Median household income here, 39,58 the rest of the country it's about 69 000 so that is nowhere near that and the median home price here kind of matches that though it's low uh median home price 156 400 is the median so that is low compared to the rest of the country uh motto here the pecan capital of the world is that right apparently so or pecan i know listen we're gonna say pecan pecan a hundred times this episode yeah i know that there it's about 50 50 about so it's pecan or pecan or pecan or i think the south uh like alabama might have something to say about they have like pecan but then some other people say pecan i don't know and i don't know i'm allergic to them and i don't care so i can't eat them so either way i don't know if i love them because they make my mouth swell up and i can't breathe so you may not have enjoyed the taste ever no i never i've i've always hated pecans and i go oh, yeah, because I'm allergic to them.
That's why I didn't like them, because they make me not be able to breathe and stuff. So, you know, a little bit of history here.
A little bit. We'll go very quickly here.
In 1931, a rancher named W.H. Uncle Billy Gibbons, which I believe is he's an original ZZ Top member very original ZZ Top member Uncle Billy Gibbons over here gave the Boy Scouts of America a 99 year lease to campgrounds along the Brady Creek on his ranch property which by the way that's coming up in about six or five years.
It's going to be up there. So then they relocated several miles upstream in 1946, but the Boy Scouts continue to use Camp Billy Gibbons to this day.
That is awesome. That is so fucking great.
1938, the San Saba River flooded, causing countywide just ruin, just screwed everything up. One third of the town was underwater.
It was a mess. Then in the 50s, they had a huge prolonged drought that fucked everything up and they couldn't grow anything.
Too much water, not enough water. That's how it goes.
Notable people that have property here, I know, and he'll come up in the story oddly enough very prominently tommy lee jones no kidding absolutely the actor it comes up prominently in the story which is strange enough as it is he plays a cowboy and a lot of shit i guess it makes sense he's got a giant pecan farm down there so really we'll talk all about it yeah uh reviews of this town we'll just do one

review because there's only two um the other one was just kind of griping so four stars here i grew up in this town and majority of the town is related to me so it made it difficult to make friends since everyone is your cousin and you almost have to already be friends with them dating was ruined wow you did that is a man whenever since everyone is your cousin that is not good um get the fuck out that's its own joke right its own cliche joke in itself the town is small but has nice scenery to it as as in the country living i guess the magazine i don't know what they're talking about i I always that was hard to read because I'm like those words even go together as in to it as in country living. What the hell I always come back to visit every chance I get you loved it so much you moved away.
That's what you just said and then came back and then you come back to visit which means you didn't love it that much if you left things to do San. San Saba Pecan Capital Trade Days.
Sure. Got that.
This is just basically sounds like a giant flea market that they have in downtown San Saba. Around pecans.
It doesn't seem to have much to do with pecans. But, you know, if you want to buy swap meat items, I feel like it's perfect.
Sure. You want pecans, you go to the Pecan bottom yeah you're a bottom a hardcore pecan bottom that's a very specific type of guy well there's there's bottoms and there's tops there's power bottoms and all that a pecan bottom is a totally different thing that is like a man you don't even know that makes power bottoms look like a pussy you you know? That's very sweet.
So at this little festival here, there's food and drinks. No coolers or outside food allowed in, though.
You're not allowed to bring your beers. Keep your coolers at home.
Let's see. We have bands.
Yeah. The coveted 10.30 a.m.
spot that all the bands want to play. The hangover slot there.
Mark Scott and Southern Comfort is their name. Then at noon, again, coveted, the Samuel Bryce Lewis will play.
Sure. 1.30, Funky Glenn Phillips and the New Chitlins.
Funky Glenn Phillips. The New Chitlins.
You know boring Glenn Phillips, but this is funky Glenn Phillips. Totally different guy.
Three o'clock, Presley Grace. Sounds like they just took Elvis Presley and Graceland and made a name out of it.
It's a gal, yeah. Also, the West Texas Exiles.
Okay. Carson Jeffrey.
Yeah. And then finally, the big closer.
here we go with your headlining act john wolf with an e okay then there you go that this sucks that is 30 to get into by the way holy shit 15 for children 4 to 11 i don't think so inflation's crazy you gotta love pecans man let's just say that shit wow i don't think so. Inflation's crazy.
You've got to love pecans, man.

Let's just say that shit.

Wow.

I don't know what they're paying those bands, but too much would be my guess.

That said.

Yeah.

Two bucks a ticket each person?

I don't know.

That's nuts.

Let's talk about some murder here.

Here we go.

This is based on, there is a very good article written here that great information came of, a real investigative piece called A Tree is Known by Its Fruit by Sonia Smith from Texas Monthly. Texas Monthly does great long-form, in-depth stuff like this.
Really do a great job. March 25th, let's go to 2012.
So not too far ago. Too long ago, I should say.
Not too far back. And, you know, everything's the same.
Your phone looks exactly the same. Same apps.
You got Instagram. You're fine.
All right. Here we go.
Late afternoon, Sheriff Alan Brown is out on patrol when a 911 call came in from a 12-year-old boy. Yeah.
Saying there's some trouble out at the ranch. Okay.
So we'll talk about that. We'll get there.
There's a trouble at the ranch. Not my ranch.
A ranch is what he said. No.
So the sheriff here, Sheriff Allen Brown, he takes off down U.S. 190.
You know, he's going and going. He pulls up here.
He

knew the house that he was going to

because apparently

Bonnie Harky,

who is the matriarch of

the Harky family,

she's lived here and she's had big

I guess

everybody goes to the same Baptist church

here too. So the sheriff

knows Bonnie from Baptist church

suppers and also

she used to host cookouts for the church

Thank you. goes to like the same Baptist church here too so the sheriff knows Bonnie from Baptist church suppers and um also she used to host cookouts for the church people at her house and stuff like that so he's been there plenty of times he knows where he's going sure yeah absolutely now the ambulance is also on route and they assumed that the ambulance was for Bonnie Harkey who is 85 years old and in terrible health.
bonnie so they're like oh shit by five it's finally time to take bonnie down here so i guess not down i guess to the hospital let's take her down put that put that old bag down bonnie's does she put we put up with enough of bonnie's shit for too long we're taking her down that's i don't think That's what's going on here. backyard and two bullets in the head and she's 85 somebody's gonna take over so she's frail she requires help from a caretaker she's got some dementia going on and some physical maladies as well but when they get to the house instead when they open the door right in the open right in the landing there when you walk in the door, is face down is Bonnie's caretaker, 50-year-old Karen Johnson, face down on the floor.
How about that? Yeah. This is fucking crazy.
Now, they look around. There's an 11-year-old boy there.
He's the one who called 911. That is Karen Johnson's son,

the caretaker.

Karen Gail Johnson is her name.

Yeah, that's her son.

But Bonnie is nowhere in sight.

Oh.

So did Bonnie have a... Did she decide,

I'm going to kill this lady

and take off?

On the land, 85.

Fuck it, I don't care.

Maybe she's Bonnie and Clyde Bonnie.

We don't know. She is old.
So the sheriff arrived at the house. He sees, you know, the ambulance that got there first.
He sees Karen Gail Johnson sprawled face down just inside the front door on top of a floral doormat. So her reading glasses are right next to her on the floor.
She was cool to the touch, and she was dead. So, yeah.
So they said, where the fuck is Bonnie here? You know what I mean? So Karen's 11-year-old son, she's the one who found his mother and called 911. He was on the front porch with the cordless phone, you know, standing there.
He had been playing video games in another room, and he said he didn't hear anything. He doesn't know.
He came out looking for his mom, and she was face down. So he called 911.
He doesn't know what the hell happened. That's the normal routine is Karen will come over with her son to take care of Bonnie.
They have a spare bedroom. The son will go in the spare bedroom and play video games as well as mom works.
Send him you know nintendo wii and that's it deal with this that's yeah 2012 from ps4 and knock yourself out so this kid is crying saying i didn't hear anything i don't know what happened and you know he doesn't have like uh you know blood on him or anything like that he's not a suspect at this point there's no sign of a struggle here either there's a broken fingernail on her right hand but they don't know if that was there before it's just one fingernail so they didn't know what the hell was going on here um so they thought maybe maybe karen had a heart attack and dropped dead yeah and bonnie didn't know what to do so she just wandered off because she's confused and old maybe she she's on the- She needs a caretaker. Yeah.
Maybe they're on the property. So they said there's plenty of space for that to happen.
So they look all over. They live on a big pecan orchard.
So the cops spread out. They get ATVs to go out into the fields to look for because it's pecan trees, so you can't just look out and see it.
Yeah. It's not if it not if it was you know some short crop you can just look out and see if she's standing there but it's not that so you have to really go explore and see um they go everywhere local firefighters deputies they get a bloodhound named jj from the state prison all hands on deck basically that they have there a helicopter was dispatched from waco to circle they had heat imaging cameras i mean they were looking for fucking bond i mean we have an 85 year old lady lost that's you know she doesn't and she's not in great health so they don't know how long she can last out there on her own in the elements who knows so they do everything they go all over the place there's high bank along the river along the river bank there's high grass they search through there they search all along tommy lee jones's fence line poor tommy lee lives next door well he doesn't live next door but his property is there he's got his horses all grazing on the other side i'll bet he does live tommy lee he doesn't live there i know for a fact he doesn't live there no it's just his property yeah okay he doesn't live there they say that he doesn't live there like in the for a fact he doesn't live there.
No, it's just his property. Really? Yeah.
Okay. He doesn't live there.
They say that he doesn't live there, like in the thing. It's just one of his properties.
I wonder how much property is there with all that shit. You got to pay for all that.
That's so expensive. Well, we'll talk all about it.
We got stats here. You got the money.
They said that maybe Bonnie had tripped in the orchard and fallen into the river, possibly. Oh, my God.
Kind of the property backs up to a river, so they're like, maybe she did that. They don't know.
But the bloodhound followed her trail down the driveway almost to the road and then stopped. So they were like, okay, that looks like getting into a vehicle in the driveway is what that looks like.
And then taken off. So what the fuck is going on? Let's talk all about it here.
All right. As of 2012, the Harky Pecan Farms we'll talk about, because that's the thing here.
It's a two-story farmhouse, and it's 3799 West US Highway 190 is the address. This family's been here a long time, and we'll talk about it.
Tommy Lee Jones has a huge cattle ranch property next door. He doesn't do pecans.
They have about a 300 acre pecan farm, though, the Harky, the Harky family. And then Tommy Lee's got an even bigger property, way bigger property next door.
Oh, it's huge. And he wants their property as well.
Oh. Yes, he's trying to buy their property.
A lot of people think he doesn't give a shit about pecans, but good water rights come with that property. Sure, sure.
And in Texas, water rights are a big fucking deal. So that's a big deal.
Apparently, Sen Saba produces up to five million pounds a year of pecans. Claims to be the pecan capital of the world, which Chandler, Oklahoma and Albany, Georgia would like to have a fucking talk with them about because they say, bullshit, we are the number one.
Now, a little bit of Harky history. They're one of the first families to settle into the area before pecans were even an industry.
They were here. Really? Absolutely.
Riley and Israel Harky, two brothers from Arkansas, drove the first wagon train into the county while serving as Indian scouts for the Republic of Texas. I can't.
Oh, boy. I can't even go through that sentence and pick out all the things that are so outdated and old timey.
It's not even funny. Wagon train, Indian scouts, Republic of Texas, it's all right there for you.
That's incredible. They liked it there and then they ended up returning in 1855 with their parents and six other siblings.
They were like, we gotta go to this place, man. They got good soil there and shit.
So the Harky Brothers founded Harkyville,

which we talked

about as a population of 12, but

in its prime, it had

a general store, a cotton mill,

a blacksmith shop, a millinery,

a racetrack, all sorts

of shit. Now there's only 12 people.

Now there's 12 people. It had a baseball

diamond. You can't even get a game going

now. No kidding.
You're six people short of a game at this can't even get a game going now you don't need no kidding

you're six people short of a game at this point so that's crazy um the great depression shuttered most of the town and um that's kind of how it went basically like a lot of these small towns the depression wiped them out sure wiped them out people went to where the work was so that was that That's what you got to do, yeah.

So Riley is described as a man with a long, bushy goatee and a square head. That's not good.
Sounds hot. Sounds hot.
Hot at all. Sounds hot, dude.
That's a very handsome man right there. That's a problem.
He bought the initial 113.9 acre tract for a farm there in 1885. And then his grandson and eventual heir, Olga Brian Harkey, they named their boy Olga, that stuff.
He was born in 1898 here as well. So there was already native pecan trees on the property.
Oh. And, yeah, apparently they were considered especially good trees in this area here.
So, Olga Brian Harkey, he planted the first orchard in 1926, installing 1,200 trees. Jesus.
Yeah. But that wasn't even for business.
That was just like a hobby. He was dicking around.
Turkeys were his business. Absolutely.
In 1932, the newspaper said they have been breeding for perfection and believe now they have a strain that gives turkeydom about everything that is to be desired in a turkey. Turkeydom.
All of turkeydom. So 1957, OB, he has one child and his name's riley um so they get together with ob riley who was 32 at that point together with riley's two sons 10 year old john five year old bruce planted another 1500 trees in the grove that came to be known as harkeyville orchard andard.
And the farms matured, and they started making a really nice living off of these pecans. Sure.
Doing really well. Now, Riley, we'll talk about.
Riley is Olga Bryan's son. Riley had a lot of, you know, very good work ethic.
Obviously, he's planting 1,500 trees. He gets his five-year-old out there to help me plant trees.
That's decent work ethic. He ends up meeting a woman named Bonnie Sawyer Compton, and that's how Bonnie comes into the equation here.
They were introduced in 1963. She was working as a telephone operator in Waco.
She was divorced and had a 14-year-old daughter of her own named Connie. So Bonnie and Connie.
Connie and Bonnie. And now Riley, as we know, has two kids of his own as well, Bruce and John.
So we're going to have some step situations here. Bonnie grew up in a farming family during the Depression.
So that tells you a lot. She had a tough life.
Her hardened gal. Yeah.
Her father was a, uh, corn, cotton, and wheat farmer. And, um, yeah, her sister, Wilma, Bonnie's sister said it bothered Bonnie that we didn't have any money growing up.
She never said anything about it, but I could tell by the way she acted, you know, grabbing her stomach and hunger and shit like that. I tell she was pissed i can tell when she was so skinny and she looked at her ragged clothes that were falling off her body from where you know jesus christ um riley's wife joan had walked out on him in the boys so that's why he ended up with bonnie joan took off she packed up the station wagon and took off for nevada fuck you people i'm out of here keep the kids keep them yeah i don't give a shit keep them so bonnie and riley get married at waco's highland baptist church a month after his divorce was finalized bonnie quit her job at the phone company and she and her 14 year old Connie moved into the Harky house on the farm.
So that's how Bonnie ended up here. And Bonnie really immersed herself in the town life.
She made friends. She joined clubs.
She one of her friends said if there was a club in town, she belonged to it all about it. She was a big Baptist, by the way.
She did all of that. She was a huge reader of Better Homes and Gardens.
That was her jam. She kept all of her back issues stacked neatly in the laundry room.
Doesn't even throw them away. No, no, no.
Those are her collector's items. Just a guy.
I saw an article in 1956 about how to do that garden better. I'm going to go get it.
Wow. Interesting.
You can use old flannel shirts to make sheets. That article told me.
Wow. I could use flower sacks to make a dress.
Yeah, not bad. So they also, she kind of helped fix up the house a little bit here.
They added an extra bedroom. They built a sun porch that seats up to 27 people, which is a giant porch.
It's a huge porch. Eventually, the home would reach 4,872 square feet.
Nice. So doing great here.
The marriage, not so great, Bonnie and Riley. Yeah, one of her friends, or this is her sister, Bonnie's sister said he often criticized her.

When she'd tell a story, he'd interrupt and say

no, that's not the way it goes.

They didn't care.

They didn't care. She's a bad

storyteller. Is he a dick

or is she a bad storyteller? Some people are bad

storytellers. Yeah, it could be both.

When you hook up with somebody,

one of the things you have to figure out is

can we tell a story? Can we tell a story together? Right. You know what I mean? Or which one of us is a family spokesperson? That's the other thing.
Can one of these people tell the story? And that's a very important deal. And I feel, I don't know if they did that here or not.
The sister said they didn't care if they were in public or not. Riley would tell her something wasn't right and she would say it is and they'd get into a big fuss over it.
So it wasn't even just like, oh, you know, she'd be like, it is too. And then they'd argue for 20 minutes in front of people.
Jesus Christ. I love it.
Also, none of the kids like each other, by the way. The stepkids hate each other.
The stepkids. Yeah.
The boys don't like Connie.nie doesn't like the boys and the boys don't like um bonnie either and yeah they and connie doesn't like riley so that's how it is apparently they were john and bruce were especially mean to bonnie is from what people said here yeah this is bonnie's sister said they would laugh at her and criticize her food they'd take a mouthful of food and spit it, or they'd talk about her and giggle all the time and act rude. They had not been trained to be nice boys.
What the fuck? Someone cooks you food, you fucking eat it. Don't spit it out, you little scumbag.
What's wrong with you? Wow. My grandmother would have beat the shit out of me if I did that.
Spit out your stepmom's food? No food she would have fucking smacked the crap out of me son of my bitch I get she'd go crazy over my hide from the Nazis to get you know you can't yeah it would have been one of those food yeah yeah no waste food uh so they they said Riley didn't discipline them at all either um that didn't help either so Bonnie's relatives stopped coming out to visit for holiday dinners because of the boys that's how bad it was yeah Bonnie's niece said I think part of their attitude goes back to being a harkey they thought the whole county should still revolve around them. Riley trained his sons.

He told them that as Harkies, they were special. We're the good people in town.
We're the special people. We were here first, and we have land and all that kind of shit.
Now, Bruce is just looking forward to the day when he can take over the orchards. He sees that as his birthright, at least a third of the orchards.
Yeah. So he expected that

at some point, when

his father was starting to get older, he

would hand over the operations to him

just like his father's father did

for him. Sure, sure, sure.
Because OB gave

him the pecan

farming deal before OB died.

So

OB could tell

that Bruce, by the way, Bruce's name is Bruce Wayne Harky. Is that right? Absolutely.
And apparently he was named after Bruce Wayne. Bruce Wayne, yeah.
Yeah, and it wasn't an accident. Yeah, his dad liked Batman.
So apparently he saw Bonnie as an obstacle of like, now I've got to deal this fucking lady too. He said that, you know, she didn't like them and she thought that.
So he was worried basically that she was going to edge him out of this farm somehow. Maybe he shouldn't have spit out the green beans, dickhead.
He liked to tell a lot of people that she made her feelings clear one afternoon when the family was in her new Thunderbird. And he said, I was in the back seat and I leaned forward and said, so do we call you mom now or what? What do we do? This was right after the wedding.
And he said, I still have the scar where my brother kicked me. but all she did was laugh.
She never responded. Like I could ever birth you losers.
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Now back to the show. His brother kicked him so hard he got a scar? Yeah, his brother was like, shut the fuck up because he was five, his brother was ten.
So five-year-old's like, do I call you mom and 10-year-old's like don't fucking ask her that we're not calling her mom she's just giggling driving the car man so bruce claims that bonnie issued an ultimatum to riley saying get rid of that kid or i'm going back to waco and leaving you so john packed up to go to college in 1965 to go to Texas Tech University. And Connie enrolled there a couple years later.
By the way, she was San Saba's homecoming queen. Oh.
Old Connie. Now Bruce ends up going back and forth to live with his mother in Nevada and all this type of shit.
This is such a small town. When he was 14 and he went to live with his mother, there was an article in the News and Star newspaper with the headline, Bruce Goes West.
He's five. Bruce is getting out of town, you guys.
A seven-year-old is going to live with his mom in Nevada for a while. Do we have a reporter that can get to the scene? Dateline, San Sabo.
Like, what the fuck are we talking about? Someone's getting getting out y'all. He's going.
He returned to San Saba for high school moved in with his grandparents in town rather than live with Bonnie and Riley. So he did a lot of extracurricular activities.
He was pretty popular. Popular with the ladies.
He met a girl named Judy Bishop and knocked her up. They got married in August 1969, her and Bruce.
And they move into an apartment, and Bruce works at a Texaco station. That's how that goes.
Doing great. She ends up giving birth to a 7-pound, 2-ounce boy named Eric Harky, Bruce's son.

He's got some health problems, though. They learn that his epiglottis was not fully formed.
Oh, no. Which meant that after feedings, he had to be held or laid on his stomach so that he wouldn't choke when he spit up.
Oh, no. It's fucking, that's hardcore.
So at one point, Bonnie invited them, the family, the three of them, Bruce's new wife and their young baby, to stay out on the farm for several days. But things went bad.
On April 15th, 1970, Bruce was in class going to college. He sat in English class.
And apparently the baby stopped breathing. Bonnie took him to the hospital but by the time

she got there the baby was dead god damn it the cause of goddess yep the cause of death was aspiration asphyxiation so they didn't have her lay down uh 14 days old by the way poor baby is that like sids you think or is it classified as that no no no because she choked on it's not just a stoppage.

That was his condition that caused that.

I guess Bonnie didn't pay close enough attention to him or something is what Bruce thinks. So it's a lot here.
He's going to already be divorced from his wife here very quickly. By January of the next year, they're divorced.
ends up uh marrying his high school sweetheart at that

point named jennifer karns but that only lasted three months and she moved back to where she was living at the time he dropped out of college drove trucks in california did some odd jobs and then ended up finding work he went to the reno police department sheriff's department in 1978 to be a police officer.

Yeah, he's junior.

He's junior he's yeah he's definitely junior this guy he got married and divorced two more times had a daughter two more times for now yeah bruce will have a total of eight wives eight wives by the time he is 58 years old he will have eight fucking wives eight oh my that is a lot eight is enough that's his show when they put that show on the air he's like i pitched this idea bullshit that's unbelievable holy shit that is fucking crazy. So yes, he ends up moving back to Texas.
And in 1987, he got a job in the Texas Attorney General's office investigating Medicaid fraud and nursing home abuse. Really? Which is pretty ironic considering what ends up happening here.
So, Bonnie and Riley end up, Connie ended up after college college got married and they adopted an eight-month-old in 1984 and that baby they called carl so his name is carl presley p-r-s-s-l-e-y um and bonnie loved this kid because it was her daughter's her daughter's kid even though it It wasn't, you know, it was an adopted kid, but whatever. So Riley here, remember Bruce's dad here, he purchased a third pecan grove in 1991, 94 acres.
Hell yeah. And he willed that to Connie.
And then the other two groves go to John and Bruce. So everybody gets a grove.
Yeah. Is the way it works here.
Giving you all some nuts. Yeah.
John went and settled outside Fort Worth and had some kids, and that's what he was doing. Okay.
Now, Riley ends up, we'll talk about dying coming up here pretty soon, and that kind of fucks everything up here. So he, by the way, Bruce, we'll go back to him.
Bruce is mad at Bonnie because of his son dying for years. He holds a grudge even in the 90s, 25 years later, he still says, Bonnie killed my son.
The man's been married eight times. It feels like he holds a grudge real strong.
Real strong, yeah. He ends up becoming a nursing home administrator in 1994 while he's on wife number seven yeah uh 1996 after his 44th birthday he married his eighth wife a 20 year old that's gonna work after after seven marriages worth of experience you didn't understand james i've whittle it down my own age that's it you didn't whittle it down to what would work and what wouldn't work you You know what I mean? You think, well, blondes.
I'm not good with blondes. Okay, none of them anymore.
All right. That's wife number two, four, and six.
Can't have them. Okay, what about you just go down the list of shit.
I need a woman that was born two years after my first marriage. What a fucking dude.
That is crazy, man. That is crazy.
Her name is Cammie Jones. Now, apparently, Riley, at this point, Bruce is saying, why don't you start stepping down, Riley, 1996, and let me run the farm? And Bruce is saying no.
He would say, so he would get mad. Cammie said Bruce would say stuff like, well, quote, well, they just need to die so I can have the farm.
So Riley does die in 1997. Really? Took his advice.
He said, thank you. That is good advice here.
So Bonnie, though, takes over everything. The three orchards bring in over $100,000 a year in pecan money.
So she's sitting pretty. She's doing fine.
She stays in in the house and that's that basically um that december she won second place for her pie and cookie entries in the san sabbock county pecan food show sure look at that um now bruce starts to really spin out apparently his marriage with cammy he grew very controlling after this oh she's 20 she's 20 she gave birth to their daughter in 1998 um and he would then after that he was awful to cammy apparently he would choke her pull her hair yeah hold a gun to her head things like that fun stuff um threatening to kill her basically one time she didn't have dinner on the table by 6 o'clock, which was his rule, and he threatened to kill her for it. So that was nice.
So when their daughter was 4, Cammy walked out on him. And so what he did is, he's a nursing home administrator, he's all pissed off.
He told a co-worker at the nursing home that he was thinking about how to kill Cammie. How do I do this? He gave the co-worker three guns, two old Chinese military rifles, and a semi-automatic 22 asking him to, can you scrape these serial numbers off? Is that possible? Do you got a Dremel at home? You got any of that? Then he talked about, this is funny, he had an idea i know how to do it one day i'll do this is how i'm gonna kill her i'm gonna put poison on her steering wheel oh and then she'll hold it and it'll seep into her body and she'll die so the co-worker and bruce's boss were so freaked out by this that they told the fucking police good yeah and a te And a Texas Ranger and an ATF agent began to record Bruce's conversations now.

They set up a sting operation where an informant provided Bruce with an illegal silencer

and federal agents arrested him, charging him with possession of firearm

in connection with a crime of violence.

Yeah.

He pleaded guilty to a lesser charge and all of that kind of of thing and his lawyer tried to say it was just all talk you bought a silencer and you gave someone guns and said can you get the serial numbers off of these that's a lot more than talk that's planning less traceable and get me a silencer god damn the judge said you sir may you, sir, mate, fuck off. Five years in federal prison for you.

He was released in 2007 and returned to San Saba.

He had to have an address at this point for parole and shit.

So he sent a letter to Bonnie saying, please let me live on the farm.

Bonnie said that after she talked it over with her pastor, she agreed. I think probably told her hey you know that's your stepson and you know this whole christian thing we're supposed to be nice to people and shit so you should probably let him stay here i would assume so um anyway uh bruce moves into an upstairs bedroom where his ex-wife one of Jennifer Carnes, remember her? Yeah.
She moves back in with him. Yeah.
They get back together. They fixed up a little apartment on the property there and did all that shit.
So now he can't find work, though, because he's a convicted felon and everyone around town knows he wanted to have his wife killed. So that doesn't work.
Tried to kill a young woman. Yeah, they said that at that point the orchards were starting to kind of fall apart a little bit.
Yeah, Jennifer said the orchards were in such horrible condition because Bonnie and Connie didn't know how to run a farm or what to do with pecan trees. So, yeah, that's that worked.
Um, I guess as a favor to their friend's son, uh, here they hired, they hired him to clean out their barn, but it was a short term deal. Uh, one afternoon, this guy showed up at the Oliver pecan company an hour before closing time to ask for a job.
This is Bruce showing up and they said, he just had a meltdown he stayed for about two hours and cried this is an hour before closing so these people had to stay past the end of their shift to listen to a stranger cry listen to a grown man cry the guy there said he told me i'm the brokest millionaire in San Saba County because he had the property he couldn't touch.

He also filed for bankruptcy in 1998 to discharge $176,256 worth of debts and owed more than $100,000 in back child support to Cammie.

$100,000.

He hasn't paid a dime.

Wow.

A former Texas Ranger who knew him said if you asked him what time it was, he'd tell you how to build a watch.

One of those guys.

Oh, boy.

He said there's no secrets around here, and if there is a secret, someone will make up a story to fill in the gaps.

The Harkies had that reputation that there was always some trouble brewing after Riley died.

I guess with any big estate worth any kind of value, you've got a bunch of people involved, there's going to be fuss. They love fuss here.
They replaced the word fighting with fuss. Everybody's fussing.
Everybody's fussing about. Now, Carl, let's talk about Carl here.
Remember Carl? Connie's a doctor's son. Yeah.
Bruce began to hang out with Carl more around this time. Why? He's, what? Carl's in his 20s.
He's, Carl developed two loves as an adult. Uh-oh.
Motorcycles and methamphetamine. The two M's.
The big M's right there. Those are his two big ones.
The M&M's that real go together. Yep.
This article describes him at 24 years old as having, the meth has worn his bottom teeth down to little yellow stubs. How old? 24.
Oh my God. Yeah.
He's got a problem. Bonnie spoiled him fucking rotten, basically.
He's been living with Bonnie for a while now Connie and he would stay here while Connie did something else she bought him a truck when he ruined it he said he wanted to raise boar goats so she bought him a flock of them and shit like that. Like just whatever he wants.

And they all died.

Yeah.

She's the apple of his eye.

I mean, she had a daughter.

She didn't have any sons.

This is a son.

He dropped out of high school after the 11th grade and went to work in the oil fields.

Then he married a local woman in 2003 when he was 19.

They had a daughter and a son.

They separated.

Carl started dating Lillian King, who he had another daughter with in 2008. yeah yeah he's gonna keep having kids he's 24 and has three kids and no teeth three kids no teeth and a pocket full of meth but a sweet motorcycle it's sweet um he's also in charge of orchards and can't even eat eat the fucking fuck no.
He's like, oh, man, they look crunchy. He also has got a pretty good criminal record, too.
He was charges include trespassing, domestic violence. In 2005, the domestic violence isn't for a woman, by the way.
In 2005, he allegedly tried to run his stepfather over with a tractor, which is a very small town murder kind of crime right there.

That's wild.

He also, you know, realized that pecans are worth a lot of money.

Yeah.

He said, you know, a truck full of nuts is worth a lot of money.

So he started stealing pecans from the barn.

One guy said Carl would show up with a pickup full of pecans and we bought them we didn't know he stole them how could you tell i mean how would you know carl's such a fuck up he's banned from the first the first baptist church you can't even come where we forgive people that's what we've heard the church is like come here to get redemption and all this type of shit except you asshole you fuck everything up when you come here we will not redeem nor forgive you ever shit no apparently he showed up at bible study on a wednesday one time to demand money from bonnie and uh the pastor said if he was coming to worship and study that was fine but we didn't want that anger right another time uh connie or bonnie refused to buy him a new set of tires, so he blocked her car with his truck and refused to let her leave the house. Essentially kidnapped his step-grandma or his grandmother here.
Until you get me some new BFGs. Oh my God, but she kept giving him money.
Her niece said, the more we tried to convince her to get away from him, the more she would say it was not the Christian thing to do. But he was bleeding her dry.
2011, Connie, Bonnie's daughter, Carl's mom, dies of pneumonia. Really? Yes, she dies.
How old is she? She was 62, I think, or something like that. 2012, the Harky Bunch.

Here they are.

Bonnie, 85 years old.

The pecan queen of the county as she's known.

The matriarch.

She's got white puffy hair.

She looks like if you said, draw me a picture of a little old Baptist lady in Texas, you would draw her.

Little old lady, white curly hair.

She looks like the old lady from uh the warner brothers

cartoons that beats up uh the cat yeah yeah away from tweeting exactly yeah she's got a pie cooling on the windowsill one of those things and a broom is her favorite weapon oh yeah she's in garden club and goes to all the sunday school and everything like that but she's also suffering from dementia and she was diagnosed with an aortic aneurysm.

So she's also suffering from dementia and she was diagnosed with an aortic aneurysm so she's on her way out she's 85 and not well and not well good health at all she's on her way out she you know declined a lot she still lived on the home though and everything uh but uh bruce said that she couldn't recognize him or or his wife when they visited about her in 2012. Bruce said, we knew that Bonnie was in horrible physical and mental condition.
But she was also lucid about some things. Her daughter, Connie, had her driver's license revoked, had Bonnie's driver's license revoked.
So Bonnie wrote a letter to the Texas Department of Public Safety to contest it. Could you maybe give her the back tour, please? She said, I don't, I really don't know

what caused someone to report that I am incapable of operating an automobile. I try to be careful

when driving. I do not take any medicine that would cause me, that would cause unsafe driving.

I do drive slowly more times than I should because I would not want to hurt anyone. I do have family who want the property I live on, and I have heard many times they want to get rid of me.
She wrote that. That's interesting.
Her friend, Betty Ann, who would stop by to fucking see her all the time, said every time I went, she said, please do not let them take my home away from me, Betty Ann. I want to stay here as long as I can.
Then you got Bruce, the son, who's got a murder for hire plot that happened already. Former police officer and Texas Attorney General's office investigator and ex-husband of eight women.
So, that's wild. Really living the opposite life of Bruce Wayne.
Totally. Absolutely annette king is bruce's common-law wife at this point a new one in here now uh we have carl wade presley he's the grandson he's about 27 at this point um and she the one that she's been giving all this fucking money to and all that kind of thing no teeth in his head yeah totally not.
A lot of jail stints, by the way, for Carl. Besides the tractor incident, he also went to jail for harassment of his uncle, driving with an invalid license and violating probation by threatening his mother.
Texas Murdaugh's. That's what they are.
Yes, that's kind of what they are, except not as rich.

Yeah.

Bruce said, Carl ran through money like water. She's the only woman who ever nurtured, ever cared for him, provided for him, gave him everything in the world that he ever wanted.
And yeah, Lillian King is his girlfriend. She's 24.
Tommy Lee Jones lives next door. That's the cast of characters at this point.
so Bruce and John the brothers

Briley's kids

Bonnie's stepkids

they saw their inheritance and they started wrangling over the property. In 2011, the brothers had persuaded Carl to sell them his future rights to the orchard that his mother had for $75,000, even though the property was valued at $500,000.
Well, those are meth prices. Fire sale.
That's what a meth person, it's a $500,000 orchard. I'll give it to you, 75 grand.
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Now back to the show. That is fucking funny.
Now, Bruce was broke, so Carl didn't see any of that money until a little bit later when another sale was approved of a field that they had and all this type of shit. But the most of all, their neighbor, Tommy Lee Jones, wants their property.
He bought his property in 1981 and had amassed a 5,050 acre ranch. Holy shit.
Tommy Lee just adds on to it. Try never to see anybody.
Every movie, He just adds on to it every try and never to see anybody every movie he just adds on to it he's like that's what you're like why is he in all these shit movies that's why he's like this is my happy face they're like why is he doing that this is why men in black eight you bet i'll do it i'll do it more property wow so yeah he's doing all this type of shit uh he's trying to buy these this these properties here um john and bruce reached out to him and after some negotiation through an intermediary tommy lee jones put down an offer of 541 822 dollars and 50 cents on the offer okay the brothers accepted contract was drawn up. But Bonnie still lives there.
Yeah, you can't get rid of her. What's the agreement? That's the problem.
So Bonnie's lawyer looked over the deal and found the terms were not beneficial to her at all and said, you can't do this. We're not doing it.
So Bonnie was pissed off at this point and Bruce is mad at her and everybody's everybody's all goddamn pissed off here. So, yeah.
So they decide, look, we got to get this money. We're going to get this money and we can't get it as long as she's alive.
We're going to sit here and wait and watch her with her away. So instead, Bruce goes to Carl and says, tell you what, Carl, I'll give you $500, 500 big ones to quote, make her gone this weekend.
Okay. Then after she's dead, I'll give you a $55,000.
So a down payment of 500 followed by 55,000, which is. You're going to get 55, five to do this.
That's it. So Bonnie woke up.
She ate breakfast. Karen, who brought along the young son.
This is March 25, 2012, the day this all happened here. Brought along her young son.
She drove Bonnie to church in Bonnie's gold Chevy Malibu. After Sunday school, they attended the 1030 service, sitting in the sixth row,

listening to the pastor.

It was deal.

Afterward,

they went home.

Bonnie changed out of her Sunday clothes and Karen's son went in to play in

the bedroom and Bonnie sat in her maroon recliner to watch television and read

magazines like she normally did.

Not bad.

So then you get the 911 call. Everybody goes.
They find Karen Johnson. Nobody.
No. Now, after reconstructing Bonnie's movements that morning, the search team had no fucking idea where she was.
They looked for her. I told you.
They didn't know if she fell in a river, if she's in the pecan fields. So one of the sheriffs said, someone's got to go back to the office to be near the phones in case someone calls.
Literally everyone was out. Everybody was.
Everybody. The phones are ringing off the fucking hook at the police station.
There's a water leak, there's shit spraying everywhere. It's fucking crazy.
It's all sorts of, there's food deliveries going, no one's getting them. So about 8.30 p.m.
that night, a call comes in and it's Lillian King's mother. That is Carl's girlfriend's mother.
OK. Yeah.
She knew that her daughter and Carl had been out at the Harky house that afternoon and had asked a friend to contact the sheriff when she learned that Karen was dead. She said, I know things are crazy right now, but I might have some information about where Bonnie Harky is.
I'm 99 percent sure that Carl Presley is involved's involved that's what she said so they spent the next few hours the cops do trying to find carl and lillian and also requesting a silver alert for bonnie and a statewide apb on carl's mustang so finally at two in the morning they call carl's cell phone all night. Finally, at 2 in the morning, he answers.
Oh? He and Lillian were in Normandy, which is four hours east of San Saba, staying at a campground. So they told him, get your ass back here immediately.
Karen's dead. Bonnie's missing.
Let's go. You got some splinter to do.
Lillian said Carl started crying at this point, but they weren't real tears. Oh.
So they get to the station. They're separated immediately.
And Carl said that, yeah, I did. I took Bonnie for a drive in her car.
He said we went to the San Saba River, and that's what happened. So we just hung out.
And then, I don't know, I brought her home, and I don't know where she wandered off to. An 85-year-old woman wanted to run down to the river.
You know, she likes the river down there. She was going swimming.
So she likes to fight the current. It's good for her.
It's good cardio. So then Lillian in the other room just breaks down and says, it was eating me alive.
I just couldn't do it anymore. What? So they separate them, obviously.
Yeah. And they sat in the Sally port of the jail, which is where the cop cars are, where they could use a patrol car's dash cam to record the interrogation because they don't have a fucking interrogation room with a camera in it.
In 2012. Dude, in 2012, they don't have a fucking interrogation room with a camera.
It does have a spotlight. I mean, you can probably put her under the hot one.
And he said, we don't have the budget of big cities, so we had to use the same thing we used to record traffic stops to record a capital homicide

confession. Unbelievable.

So they're trying

to lock Carl into a story

and he said yeah me and Lillian went out

there and he said that he's just

bullshitting basically through it. He's saying

that yeah now he says I

took because they said your girlfriend said you took

her and he said yeah

I did take my grandmother out of the house to protect her from some tough guys i know i owed money to okay so they were mad at me yeah i'm trying to protect her so i picked her up in the evening you're like look i am on drugs obviously drives her to a uh rainies crossing and drops her off uh drops her off in the bushes. I said, stay here in the bushes and hang out.
They said, no, that's probably not true. So he said, okay, yeah, that's not true.
You're right. I took Bonnie back to my trailer in Normandy.
And he said, yeah, I really miss my grandmother. And they were like, well, isn't she at your trailer in Normandy? What the fuck are you talking about and um that's weird and so that all goes on finally about two hours later he says fine and he says quote she ain't gonna forgive me no he says and the sergeant says your grandmother's forgiven you for everything else why wouldn't she forgive you for this just tell us so finally he said okay fine lillian dropped me off at the house while bonnie was at church i climbed through a window and hid downstairs and smoked meth while i waited for her to return why would you do that okay when bonnie and karen get home he texted lillian who was to come back and ring the doorbell serving as a distraction while he tiptoed into bonnie's bedroom this is a meth plan he planned to smother bonnie with a pillow at nap time he was gonna hide in the closet till she went to sleep then pop out and fucking smother with a pillow and that's gonna okay okay so that was the plan and then he was gonna sneak out but he said karen spotted him as she answered the door she answered the door for lillian and he was going to run in the bedroom but she it's a fucking I don't know if she thought that he thought Karen was blind and deaf also or also 85 but she's a 50 year old lady it was fine really focused on answering that door totally so apparently that's that was the problem Karen spotted him.
He said he panicked and tackled her in a bear hug and threw her to the floor where he suffocated her beneath his body weight he just smushed her until she couldn't breathe anymore and died this poor lady a meth addict holy shit lillian meanwhile kept kept Bonnie occupied in the living room away from all this with conversation and the TV. They're having a nice chat.
Oh, you went where? Oh, that's nice. While he's suffocating a woman.
That was the sermon. Carl then went to find Bonnie and asked if they could pray together in her bedroom.
We go in your bedroom and pray together? Can't pray out here, obviously. God's only in your bedroom.
How Baptist is she?

Very.

She agreed.

They said her Bible sits on a doily on her coffee table, like it's a special thing.

Yeah.

She agreed.

They sat together at the foot of the bed and prayed, and then Carl lunged toward her with a pillow.

He said he stopped short of smothering her when he thought he heard the doorbell ringing then bonnie called out to lillian that carl's trying to kill me yeah and then carl somehow convinced bonnie that no no no no i wasn't trying to kill you i was i was helping and convinced her of it because she's an old lady with dementia then he said we should all go for a drive come on let's go a drive. It's a nice day.
So they all got into Carl's car. He insisted that Lillian drive because his license had been revoked.
Obviously they went for the, the campground in Norman G or Normandy. I don't know which one it is where a friend from his motorcycle club had loaned him an RV.
He said, but by the time they arrived, it was evening. And Carl told Bonnie that he wanted to show her a real nice fishing hole, like all 85-year-old ladies care about.
So she said, oh, okay, sure, dear. Because she's a nice old lady, and it's her grandson.
Fuck. So they walked...
She's giving him for everything. Yep.
They walked to a nearby ravine and down the embankment to a small stream where he hit her over the head with a dead tree branch.

This is a fucking 85-year-old lady.

And pushed her face, the water's only ankle deep,

he pushed her face into it until she stopped struggling.

He fucking drowned her in ankle deep, shitty brown water.

Oh, my God.

Then he covered her up with leaves and mud by the handful and left.

Oh, my, what? left her there yeah so they said who else is involved and he said lily and they said who else and then he thought for a moment and looked down and then he said bruce wanted me to get rid of her and take care of her he put money in my bank account according to carl bruce had come to see him on Friday to propose a deal,

get rid of Bonnie this weekend. I'll pay you.
I'm going to be out of town. I don't want nothing to

do with it. Don't tell anyone I had anything to do with it.
Bruce gave him $100. $100.
That's all

I need. $100 cash with the promise of depositing 350 more in his bank account on Monday after it's

done. And then he said, of course, we'll give you all that later here.
He initially offered

Thank you. 350 more in his bank account on Monday after it's done.
And then he said, of course, we'll give you all that later here. He initially offered 500, but Carl offered to do it for $50 less, knowing that Bruce was kind of broke.
I'll do it for $450. The cop later said, Carl has not been accused of being very intelligent, which I can tell you that right now.
I don't know if it's the meth or what. It's fucking crazy.
He said that all Bruce ever talked about was Bonnie killed my son. She needs to suffer the way my son did, Bruce told me.
Wow, that is fucking wild. I don't even know what to say about that.
So according to Carl, he approached another potential man about killing Bonnie, but the guy wanted 10 grand for it so he's like never mind i'll just have carl do it yeah bruce told him you know i tried to get a guy to do it but you know hitmen are expensive you're a method you'll do it he wanted more money than i have man so yeah that when they searched for bonnie they found her he led them to body. They found her curled up in the fetal position and buried under a thick layer of leaves and mud caked into her white hair.
Autopsy reveals, we'll find out, but she'd been hit over the head and drowned in shallow water, just like he said. He was honest with that.
The preliminary autopsy said she died of a combination of homicidal violence comprising blunt force head injuries and probable asphyxia, including drowning. Water was found in her lungs, indicating she was still breathing when she was put under the water.
Wow. Yeah.
Carl's friend here said that he got a message, phone message from Carl about his grandmother's death. And he said he was this guy said, I was trying to help Carl rebuild his life and all this type of shit.
I got him into a trailer home. I got job interviews lined up for him.
I gave him gas money. He said, quote, I feel like I got stabbed in the back.
At least you didn't get drowned in a shallow creek. It's better than that.
Could have been worse. So a few hours after Carl's confession, Bruce gets news that the investigation knows about him.
Yeah. So he called the sheriff himself.
And he said, Sheriff Brown, he said, Alan, I just got a phone call from my wife saying she just got a phone call about you coming to arrest me, my brother and her. I said, for what? And they said, yeah, you're going to get arrested, stupid.
And he was arrested and he heard about you he said i didn't do it he said first of all i wouldn't hire forrest gump to commit murder okay that's what carl said okay he calls carl forrest gump you know what i'm saying he said second of all if i thought somebody needed killing that bad i'd take care of it myself oh he's a he's a he's a stone cold killer not hire fucking forrest gump to do it um but then they talked to all sorts of people basically everyone in town said oh yeah he's all i heard him say i just wish the old bitch was dead i wish that old bitch would die already another one said quote i told him that i could just get the money and go to belize go to south america now um it's wild uh here so he had an alibi because he was he you know he knows to make an alibi for himself he was outside of fort worth at a friend's house when all this was going down on purpose yeah he said i'm going out of town so anyway by the time the three within 72 hours of the murder here. Bruce is in jail.
Carl's in jail. And so is so is Carl's Lillian there.
So Lillian and she goes by Annette sometimes. I don't know why.
So they're all I don't know if it's her middle name. Who knows? They're all sent to different county jails.
I guess Jennifer, Bruce's wife, was never arrested. And John, they were looking into him, the other brother.
But he died of a heart attack three months later. So they just said, well, fuck it, I guess.
He may have been part of it. We don't know.
Maybe that killed him. Oh, my God.
So, yeah, maybe that was it. Yeah, my brother killed my mother.
That's crazy. So, I guess he's got about, the family owns about 200 acres, they said, and they didn't know who will control the property at this point.
It's one of those things. That's all up in the air.
So Bruce goes to trial. They say this was all about greed.
Go down a list. He believed that Bonnie was responsible for his son's death,

resented Bonnie, and referred to her using insults and expletives,

told people he wished she would die. A few days before the murder, King's mother overheard,

this is Annette's, Lillian's mother,

overheard Carl tell another person on the phone that Carl needed $100.

She also overheard another conversation in which Carl said he needed $250 if the other person, quote, wanted something done. Yeah, Harkey told several people he was going to be out of town that weekend, emphasizing in an unusual way that he was going to be gone all weekend.
I'm going to be gone, you guys. I won't be back until Monday.
Like, on Sunday, I'll be gone the whole day like not coming back till the next day yeah it's gonna be a while at least 24 48 cell phone records show that carl called bruce twice the day of the murders bruce told an investigator that he could have killed bonnie himself if he wanted to and specifically mentioned he could have pushed her off a riverbank or put a pillow over her face it's like i could do that he goes down a little for the investigators i could have killed her this way that way um yeah it's it's a lot here um and they said they had also evidence that harkey had previously tried to have bonnie killed as well um testimony that harkey had solicited two people to kill a justice of the peace, two lawyers, and two of his ex-wives too. These are all the different murders he's plotted.
He gets in relationships with people and then he's just like, I'll kill everybody. I'll kill all y'all.
So in exchange for a lighter sentence, Carl and Lillian testify against Bruce. Sure.
They also hear from two inmates from where Bruce is housed in jail,

including one member of the Aryan Brotherhood who claimed that Bruce tried to

hire them from jail to kill both Carl and fucking Lillian.

I heard y'all a real bad man.

Wow.

One of Bruce's attorneys in the closing said that there's no evidence that

links him to the killings at all.

Nothing. He said, so what if those two testified that they were hired? That's bullshit.
The verdict, the jury took an hour to reach the verdict of fucking guilty for Bruce. Holy shit, he couldn't be more guilty.
Couldn't be more guilty. One of the cops said, quote, he genuinely thought he was fixing to get a not guilty verdict.
Genuinely thought the jury read it out his mouth dropped open and his shoulders dropped he was floored getting fucked speaking of floored you sir may fuck off life without parole for bruce welcome to texas welcome to texas for he's lucky he didn't get the fucking death penalty for that shit. So it's a lot.
Carl and Lillian, on the other hand, they're going to get sentenced here. Carl, you, sir, may fuck off.
You might not know where you are because you're a little stonad, but that's okay. Life without parole.
Same shit. Same shit.
So no lighter sentence there.

They just said we'll take the death penalty off the table.

At her hearing, Lillian here sobbed uncontrollably.

The sheriff handed her a cup of water and said,

you're making out better than anyone else in this by far.

Don't worry about it. You, ma'am, may fuck off.

45 years in prison.

There's a silver lining. There's a silver lining.

That's a silver lining.

She's eligible for parole in 2034, I believe.

Fuck.

That's amazing.

And then outside the courtroom, a witness who watched the whole trial and knows all these people said,

they said, what do you have to say about this?

You know all the participants.

You watched the whole trial and sum it up for us.

And he said, well, we're just trying to figure out who lee jones plays in the movie if he doesn't play himself oh god so bruce is looking forward to hollywood casting this one that's amazing bruce is housed at the james. Allred unit in Wichita Falls, Texas.

Carl and Bruce in prison, by the way.

Holy shit, it's fucking funny.

Carl said, Bruce could con you into doing anything he wanted you to do.

He said, I thought Bruce was my best friend, but he don't care about anybody but himself.

He cares about Bruce.

That's right.

He said, and then the author reached out to Bruce, and Bruce said,

the real story is of greed, corruption, love, hate, lies, and violence,

and I'm the only one left alive that knows the truth.

Oh.

That's right.

He said, was I enamored or happy about Bonnie Harkey?

No.

I never did like her, never did get along with her,

but that didn't mean that I was responsible for her murder.

She's the closest thing to a mother that I've ever had. That's what she said.
You're a dick to her. Yeah, I would say so.
Carl said, quote, or no, Bruce said, how is it if I'm the mastermind that I established an alibi before I planned the crime? Exactly. That's what she did.
That's the idea. That's what masterminds do.
Totally. He then then said i didn't have anything to do with the

death of bonnie harkey or miss johnson uh nothing if i waste my time and energy hating the people i've claimed i did i'm taking away time for my loving wife and children which one which of your eight wives and i won't do that all i want to do is get cleared up and go home clear it all up it's real foggy around here. Nobody knows what happened.
Holy shit. So that's fucking amazing.
Carl's legal wife, by the way, who he wasn't living with just like three wives ago, Melissa Pafford and their two children, they move into the house. Into the pecan house? The pecan house.
Yeah, apparently. They said it appears the orchards would be divided up among them and the heirs.
At this point, if you look up the house, it is like a one-acre property. It's separated from the farms now.
All the shit is gone, and it's just the house. They had people, I guess, farming the property that had a lease.
Their lease ran out, and that was that. That's how it goes.
The author said, quote, that they drove up to the house to look at it and said, as I got out to read the inscription, the property's owner, a mustachioed 74-year-old named Larry Hibbler, wrote up to me on an ATV. He said, this was all Harky before the whole area.
He said his son had built the house where the Harky blacksmith shop once stood, and they said, you could still find racing horseshoes if you dug in the dirt. This guy said, but I'm the mayor of Harkyville now.
And he looked around and said, there aren't any Harkys left. Oh, my God.
All gone. They did a city confidential on this, by the way, called San Saba's Deadly Harvest.
So there you go, everybody. We're running late.
I'm going to run through the end real fucking quick. That's a crazy goddamn story.
That's what I was trying to say. That's a lot.
It's a cram into an express. It's a lot.
A huge piece of shit and Forrest Gump's a murderer. So there we go.
Very interesting. Check out ShutUpAndGiveMeMurder.com.
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