My Daddybrother Did It

Clayton is a small town in Rabun County in the north-east corner of Georgia, about an hour and forty-five minutes from Atlanta and five hours and fifteen minutes from Savannah. At the time of the episode its population was 2,157. The story James tells begins not in Clayton itself but with a family whose violence ran across generations. details of the account remain covered until revealed He was a truck driver and a Baptist, and he had children by several women. the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it Dale did not remember the family home fondly. In May 1976 Roger came into the family trailer in Toccoa, about fifteen miles south of Clayton, and found Fay in bed with a man named George Hunt. Roger took a .22 revolver and shot Hunt in the head, killing him. Fay ran, and Roger shot at her and hit her, though she survived. this part of the story is covered for now details of the account remain covered until revealed the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it He spent a year in Florida, then returned and Fay took him back. What followed, according to Dale, was sustained abuse. Roger threw hot coffee in Fay's face more than once, choked her, gave her black eyes and beat her with a 64-ounce Hunt's ketchup bottle, glass Coca-Cola bottles and frying pans. At one point he stamped on her until one of her lungs collapsed. Dale also said that in the early 1980s his father sexually abused him, and that he was too frightened to tell his mother because he expected her to be beaten in return. Roger made the boy drive him from bar to bar before Dale had a licence. He chased Dale with shotguns, pulled handguns on him and once dragged him behind a car. this part of the story is covered for now Dale jumped between them and she shot the back of Roger's 1971 Ford LTD as he drove away. Fay and Roger eventually separated during the 1980s. details of the account remain covered until revealed Dale's own record began early. the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it this part of the story is covered for now details of the account remain covered until revealed the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it Roger had meanwhile met Kathy Van Hook, sixteen years his junior, and married her within a year. They were raising Erica Marie Hayes, Roger's daughter by his former wife Desiree, known as Deszy, who was born about 1990. Roger's lawyer, Richard 'Dick' Tunkle, described him as a changed man who had found God, read Erica bedtime stories and kept a clean home. this part of the story is covered for now details of the account remain covered until revealed In about 1995 or 1996 Deszy and Dale left, taking Erica with them. Deszy and Dale married in October 1997. A judge granted Roger and Kathy full custody of Erica, allowed Deszy only supervised visits and barred Dale from being near the child. The judge heard that Dale and Deszy had been caught driving 100 miles an hour the wrong way along a highway with Erica in the back seat. On 9 December 1997 Dale spent the day drinking: five fifths, four beers, a bottle of wine and then three fifths of vodka. His sixteen-year-old nephew, David Andrew 'Drew' Parson, was living with him and Deszy in a dilapidated trailer on U.S. Highway 76 and drank with him. The two played a knife-throwing game. Dale went out on the porch to be sick, came back wiping his mouth and said, 'I gotta go hurt somebody and hurt them bad.' He and Drew drove in Dale's blue Ford Probe to Roger's mobile home on Leatherwood Lane, a few miles outside Clayton. Dale cut the telephone line before going in. He carried two knives. Erica, who was seven, woke when the trailer door was pulled open. Drew said he grabbed her and told her to go back to her room. From the next bedroom Roger said, 'Son, I forgive you for what you're doing.' Kathy was heard calling out, 'Dear Lord Jesus, help us.' Dale told his father he was going to die and asked whether he wanted to be cut or shot; he asked Kathy whether she wanted to live or die. Kathy said she wanted to live to raise Erica, and Dale replied that she had said the wrong thing. He stabbed Roger twenty-three times, including wounds to the scalp and ear, and cut his throat. He stabbed Kathy eighteen times and cut her throat. The bedroom was covered in blood. A clock radio went off at 5.50 a.m. Dale gave Drew the keys and told him to take Erica to her mother. He drove to Fay's house a few miles away, covered in blood and drunk, and told her he thought he had killed Roger and Kathy. Fay telephoned Dale's trailer, where Drew answered, and warned him to get out. Dale stopped at the trailer, then he and Drew drove towards South Carolina and back into Georgia. Near the bridge over the Chattooga River Dale threw a bloody knife into the woods. He took Roger's Monte Carlo down a muddy road, doused it with petrol and burned it. the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it Police found blood by the front door, the cut phone lines and both bodies in the bedroom. A pocket knife and a silver cross had been placed on Roger's chest. The burned Monte Carlo was found near Toccoa. The next day the sheriff and a GBI agent found Dale hiding between a bed and the wall in his mother's guest room. He said he had been drunk and did not remember, but was not sad that Roger was dead. this part of the story is covered for now details of the account remain covered until revealed the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it this part of the story is covered for now The truck was found abandoned in a restaurant car park in Batavia, Illinois, on 20 February. details of the account remain covered until revealed He was flown back to Georgia. the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it this part of the story is covered for now details of the account remain covered until revealed Erica was placed in the custody of the county Department of Family and Children Services, and Deszy filed for divorce. the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it