Taking In The Strays

Benton is a small town in Marshall County in western Kentucky, just outside Paducah. It was founded in 1842 and named after Thomas Hart Benton, a senator from Missouri, and incorporated in 1845. In 1908 Benton and the whole of Marshall County became sundown towns. On 23 January 2018 a mass shooting at Marshall County High School injured 19 people and killed two, and in 2021 an F4 tornado struck the town. At the time of the episode Benton had a population of 4,734, while Marshall County had about 31,000 residents. The median household income was about $55,000 and the median home cost $137,100.

the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it He was a small man, five foot four and 130 pounds, and a journeyman bricklayer by trade, but he was also a heavy drinker with a long record of driving offences, criminal trespass, criminal damage and bad cheques. He had never held a driver's licence, and in 2007 he was still on felony probation in Illinois, which forbade him from leaving the state except for work.

Deborah Hendrixon was 46 and lived in a mobile home at Scale Road in Benton. She had worked at the Benton Walmart for seven years and managed its infants and girls departments. She was a widow, her husband Jerry having died, and had survived cancer and been in remission for about five years. Friends said she liked to take in strays. this part of the story is covered for now He came and went for bricklaying jobs and spent weekends there. In June 2007 an Illinois court gave him an exemption to leave the state for work and ordered him to pay $19 a week in child support.

details of the account remain covered until revealed A house he owned in Illinois burned in December 2004, and Progressive Insurance later obtained a civil judgment of $11,527.72 against him over the claim. On 14 July 2007, the day after that judgment, Hendrixon's Pontiac Firebird burned. 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

On 8 September 2007 the two drove to Paducah, visited bars, ate and drank, and stopped at a liquor store before returning to the trailer. this part of the story is covered for now At about 6.25 p.m. he began calling 911 from her phone to report a fire, but he could not give the address or her surname. At 7.34 p.m. an Illinois state trooper stopped him on Interstate 57 at the 46-mile marker near Marion, driving more than 100 mph. details of the account remain covered until revealed At about 8 p.m. a neighbour came home to find the trailer engulfed in flames. Firefighters could not enter until the fire was knocked down, and about three hours after it began they found Hendrixon dead in the living room, her body burned and her skull crushed.

The autopsy found that blunt force trauma to the head killed her. There were skull fractures, subdural haemorrhage and bruises to the brain, and no soot in her airways, which showed she had not been breathing during the fire. the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it this part of the story is covered for now

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details of the account remain covered until revealed In 2018 he wrote an account for prisonwitness.org describing his chronic pain and his efforts to get medication. the rest of this account is covered until you choose to reveal it Deborah Hendrixon was remembered by friends for her big heart and her love of children.