June 4, 2024 • 31 mins
Georgia authorities find three victims tortured and murdered in Clayton County and taken to Fulton County. They were found in an abandoned car along I-85 at an exit ramp in Union City, Georgia on January 13, 2013. On this episode of Body Bags, Joseph Scott Morgan will take you into the investigation that determined the victims were tortured and murdered and Dave Mack will go into the back story on how the case remained cold for 11-years until forensics led investigators to a Middle School Assistant Principal in Alabama and 3 other suspects.
Transcript Highlights
00:00:08 Introduction – Position of authority
00:02:36 Talk about Assistant Principal arrested in cold-case triple murder
00:08:06 Discussion -11 years after 3 dead bodies found in a car, a break in the case
00:11:54 Discussion - victims found in Atlanta from Montgomery, Alabama
00:17:02 Talk about suspect was assistant principal at a middle school
00:20:51Discussion of multiple jurisdictions working on a case
00:24:23 Talk about medical examiners
00:27:40 Discussion of multiple suspects
00:30:03 Discussion of asphyxiation
00:31:14 Conclusion, what did the bodies say?
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
Body Bags with Joseph Scott Morgan. There's something about having
an assigned parking space. You know, I personally, I've never
had one. I've always thought that it would be kind
of cool to have one that, no matter what happened,
(00:32):
you know, you'd have a space to park your car
when you shut up for work. I guess that, you know,
there's always problems at arise. You'll have someone that takes
your parking spot, but it might have your title on it.
You know, it sounds kind of pretentious to a certain degree.
But today I'm going to talk about somebody that had
an assigned parking spot, but the conversation is also going
(00:55):
to deal with another vehicle that was found parked in abandoned.
Today we're going to explore, certainly a rather bizarre case
that has come to us out of Georgia, but it
has an Alabama connection. Today we're going to talk about
the bodies of three people that were found abandoned along
(01:19):
the roadway in an isolated location of South Fulton County,
just south of Atlanta. I'm Joseph Scott Morgan, and this
is body Bags. Dave. I was thinking about the idea
of if you're somebody in authority in a place. Maybe
(01:40):
you're a manager or something like that, you work at
the bank, or I don't know. In this case, you're
an assistant principle. You know how they always have like
the curve protector or whatever. That thing is there and
it'll either be written in yellow or black or white
and it says assistant principle. And you got a spot
(02:01):
to park, and it you It gives you the idea
that this person is in charge, they have authority. And
a boy, we've got an assistant principal who has finally
recently resigned from his job. And wow, the reason for
his resignation is he's got to set up a defense.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
Here's here is the statement. Now, okay, he's arrested on
a cold case murder that goes back eleven years. Here
was the announcement the school made when Conta Harris was arrested.
The guy was an assistant principal at the time at
mcadori Middle School in Jefferson County, Alabama, which is the
(02:43):
Birmingham metro area. This is the assistant principal. They have
two assistant principles. This was their statement when Contae Harris
is arrested We have been made aware that mister Kante
Harris was arrested Wednesday afternoon. At this time, we still
are gathering facts about the specifics of this situation. This
(03:04):
is from the superintendent. However, early indications are that the
charges are not related to the end to this individual's
employment with Jefferson County Schools. First standard procedure, mister Harris
have been placed unpaid administrative leave. As more facts become available,
we will act accordingly according to our district's policies. So
(03:27):
he's unpaid administrative leave when he's arrested on a multiple
homicide case dating back eleven years.
Speaker 1 (03:35):
Yeah. Well, let me tell you somebody, he's going to
need every nickel that he can get because this is
as complex as it gets from a defense perspective. He's
going to need, first off, a really good attorney, and
he's going to need experts.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
I can tell you that dating back on this Joe.
Speaker 1 (03:51):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (03:52):
January thirteenth, twenty thirteen, the bodies of Sheryl Collquit Thompson,
ken Yonez King, and Rodney Cottrel discovered inside a car
along I eighty five ramp in Union City. An officer
on regular patrol stumbled upon the vehicle sitting idly on
(04:13):
the northbound exit ramp, shot and case.
Speaker 1 (04:16):
And who, you know, who would think that it would
take this long to solve a triple homicide. And it's
not like these bodies have been found thrown into a
big hole out in the woods. It's not like you
see remnants of bone that or something's been rendered down
by fire. You're talking about arguably one of the busiest corridors,
(04:43):
certainly in the South, as far as an interstate highway goes.
And this car is literally found on the shoulder of
the road, I think, on the up exit ramp, just
sitting there. It was a Union City police officer. It's
just on standard control. And I have this vision that
he probably you know, Hung Hung a yui, in the
(05:05):
middle of the of the of the median out there
and swung back around, saw this car sitting up there
and thinking, Okay, why is this car here? What's going on?
And this is this is the kind of thing that's
always fascinated me. What is it like to be a
police officer and you're a finder of a body I found?
(05:25):
In my career, I found one body, really, yeah, I've
only found one body. It was a homicide. He got
beaten to death with a hammer and wrapped in a carpet,
and there were other people killed. We didn't know about
that body. And I happened to find its old a
minute back. How did you find Were you looking for him?
Were you just going to room to room? And I
caught a whiff of something of a foul odor. And
(05:47):
this guy was stuffed back in a closet, and I
happened to find him in there, and they just stuffed
him in there. And that's the only time, out of
all the thousands of deaths I've ever worked ave that
that was the first time I ever actually found a body.
You know. I found things like bits of skull or
bits of skeleton, that sort of thing, you know when
(06:11):
we're doing excavations, but never like an intact body. So
this I'm calling him a kid. He's you know, he
wheels off the road, comes up the ramp, and you know,
if it's late at night or whatever, and there's nothing
else going on in your police officer, you're looking for
things to do, and can you imagine he walks up
(06:34):
to this vehicle, he's probably got his lights on, he's
pulled up behind it and he's got his flashlight out. Well, Dave,
when he comes walking up to the back of his vehicle,
it's a twenty ten Dodge Charger on side of the road.
He's got his flashlight out. He starts peering in the windows,
(06:54):
and the first thing he sees are two dead bodies
in the.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
In a battle.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
See, No, they're not, they're not. It's not sleepy Tom.
And then as it turns out, there was one more
in the trunk. I can't even imagine the thought that
ran through this kid's mind, you know, when he looked
inside of the vehicle and he and he discovers this,
you know, your first your first reaction would have to
(07:23):
be one shock, even as seasoned as you might be.
But uh, you know, he's dealing with a car. And
here's the thing that we don't know a lot about
right now, Dave. How long had that car actually been there?
And I think that that's something that that they're probably
going to try to explore in this day.
Speaker 2 (07:39):
Now. You spent a lot of time in the Atlanta
metro area. Yeah, And when I was looking at this,
I wondered, did they have cameras along like eighty five
seventy five to eighty five around Atlanta, those major thoroughfares.
Do they have cameras at the on ramps off ramps were.
Speaker 1 (08:01):
At that particular time, I think that it would have been,
because we're talking how many years now, are we talking.
Speaker 2 (08:06):
Twenty thirteen, so you know eleven?
Speaker 1 (08:08):
Yeah, yeah, and so I I can't say specifically, I
know that over the years there have been problems with
cameras actually working. If they have them nowadays, I think
that they probably would. So you're really rolling the dice today.
If this happened today, I think that there would be
a higher probability that you would be probably discovered and
(08:31):
found out.
Speaker 2 (08:33):
So they would actually start looking at records for Union
City police officers that were in that area to determine
when the car was actually parked, because they usually put
a tag on them at a certain point after the
vehicle is seen abandoned on the side of the road.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
Yeah, they do. It's that orange sticker, you know, and
it's impossible to get off of a car. They make
it that way. And so wouldn't that be something if
somebody just if you had had a police officer that
pulled up saw that it was abandoned, didn't pay any
attention to what was in there, stuck a sticker on there,
and just drove off. And I don't think that's what happened.
(09:10):
I think that this this guy's first his first eyes
on on this thing. But I think that what's really
interesting about this car and I can't wait to get
into this with you, Dave, what's really interesting about this
car is the fact that this car may very well
(09:31):
be the key to everything that's going to unfold as
his case continues to develop. As with all things, you
(09:58):
have to consider the nature of a the components, the
elements that are there before you as an investigator. What's
what's fascinating about crime scenes involving motor vehicles is this
the mobility? Because you know, just to back up a
(10:18):
little bit with with crime scenes, we have primary, secondary
and we have tertiary, and those come to mean different
things with different people. But Dave, right now, we're thinking
about a car, a sedan. It's a Ford or Sedan
abandoned on a ramp in broad daylight, mind you, even
(10:42):
though it may have been dark when the car was found,
but in broad daylight where everybody can see it, that's
kind of bold. I don't know what you think about
it's kind of bold to me.
Speaker 2 (10:52):
Well, that's what I was asking, you know, when trying
to determine when was when was the vehicle parked in
this spot, and why did they choose this spot? We
know oftentimes that perpetrators will bury a body near something
they are familiar with, and I'm wondering if that was
(11:14):
the case here. This charger is abandoned on a ramp
on eighty five in Union City, Atlanta metro area. But
they find out that the victims, because you've got to
identify the victims first, who are they and why are
they here? And in identifying they find out that all
three of these victims they're from Montgomery, Alabama, And something
(11:37):
else immediately gets thrown into the fray. Montgomery is a
military town, so now you've got potentially people that are
from living Montgomery, but they could be from anywhere. You
have to track it back and then we know. So
we're actually starting at the end. We have the bodies
in the car, they're dead, How did they end up here?
(11:59):
Just because they're from Montgomery doesn't mean necessarily that they
were killed in Montgomery and brought to this area of
the world without forethought. You know, did you kill them?
And just say, you know what, I think, I feel
like going for a ride with two dead bodies in
the back. And I'm just wondering, do we know where
(12:20):
John Travolta and Samuel L. Jackson were in this time
period in twenty thirteen, because last time I heard of anybody,
you know, driving a car with a dead body in
the back was in pulp fiction.
Speaker 1 (12:31):
Yeah, he shot Marvin in the face. Well, you know
the interesting thing about it is it turns out these
these home sides actually originated out of Jonesboro.
Speaker 2 (12:40):
Georgia, Jonesbrough, Georgia.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
Now, yeah, and so we've got we've got individuals.
Speaker 2 (12:46):
You get to Jonesboro, and where is Jonesboro in relation
to Union City?
Speaker 1 (12:49):
It's immediately okay, So geographically, you know, Jonesborough is in
Clayton County, and Clayton County has a dividing line obviously
between Fulton and it's on the south side of Fulton County,
where you know Union City is.
Speaker 2 (13:06):
It's just again, all this in the Atlanta metro area.
Speaker 1 (13:09):
It's all in the Atlanta metro area. So Clayton County
and the town of Jonesboro, which I think is the
county seat. I'm not sure I think that's accurate. It
is to the east. Okay, So this case is actually
being worked being worked out of Clayton County, Georgia, because
(13:32):
they have apparently enough evidence to conclude that these three
individuals had been taken hostage and at a they were
essentially lured into a residence in Jonesboro, Georgia and Dave.
(13:53):
The authorities are saying that not only were these three killed,
but they were tortured. They were tortured at this location.
And there's a lot going on here because you know,
if you're if you're a perpetrator, and you're staring at
this idea of of well, okay, we've tortured them. First off,
(14:16):
what's your goal with the torture? And secondly, we've killed them?
Why did you kill them? Now? What are we going
to do with them? And you're it's quite the conundrum
to be in.
Speaker 2 (14:25):
Backing up, I'm made a note, how do you know
that they were lured? How just starting with something as
simple as that, we're starting with three dead bodies, two
in the backseat, one in the trunk on an off
ramp on I eighty five in the Atlanta metro area.
How in the world can you know they were lured anywhere?
Speaker 1 (14:52):
I think that what happened in this particular case because
it is as you had stated from the top, and
rightly so, David, that this is a cold case, and
somebody along the way has we'll see, how is it framed,
most of the time, has rolled over on somebody else
at this point in time, and in order to have
because this is not when you start talking about luring,
(15:16):
and you start talking about torture, which you could see
evidence of that at autopsy, and then obviously you had
the murders. That's very specific as a matter of fact.
Not only is it specific in that sense that they
were lured, we know the address to which they were
lured to, and so you've got a point of origin.
So how would police be able to mine that information
(15:38):
out of there unless there was another person that had
rolled over, had provided information that is very very specific.
And to follow this thread, as more information comes out
about this case, it's going to be fascinating to see
who this person was that's going to tell the tale,
(15:59):
because this is isn't this isn't just a random Dave.
This is not just a random homicide. It's not like
some kind of dry by things. It's not. There was
planning that went into this. When whenever this thing finally
makes it to court, this is going to be an
explosive case because you're going to learn how, You're going
(16:20):
to learn a lot of dirty details. And of course,
the reason it got on our radar, other than it's
this guy worked, the principle that's been charged works in
Alabama is the fact that you know, it's it's so
(16:40):
so bold. When you begin to think about a car
abandoned with three bodies in it, it's going to catch
our attention when we're doing research.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
Caught everyone because this story broke locally, obviously because of Alabama,
Georgia and Atlanta, but we're talking within twenty four hours.
It's in People magazine, on their online service, Daily Mail,
the New York Posts. It got national coverage mainly because
you've got a currently working assistant principal arresting. This is
(17:11):
a guy who yesterday was, you know, in charge of
your thirteen year old at school.
Speaker 1 (17:15):
Stop running, Stop running in the hallway.
Speaker 2 (17:17):
Yeah, no running at all?
Speaker 1 (17:18):
Oh yeah exactly, yeah too.
Speaker 2 (17:21):
All right, herman, you stole Dave's lunch money. Again give
it back. Now he's actually charged with a triple homicide.
And you've got all of the people who worked with him.
He's such a nice guy. You know, he did the
school play, he helped Johnny with his homework. This was
a good man. He did what There's no way you
got the wrong guy. So I'm wondering, though, how do
(17:42):
they put these things together when it's a a cold case.
They end up with four people arrested in three different states.
And they did it. They coordinated all of this at
the same time so that no words spread amongst them. Yeah,
so that I mean, boom, boom boom. This was a
highly coordinated effort to get all these people in custody.
(18:03):
But again I go back to how do you know
they were lured at gunpoint? And how do you know
they were how do you know any of this? Again,
you've got somebody has cracked, but the police had to
be working it really hard, silently to get that person
to crack.
Speaker 1 (18:21):
Yeah, you would have. And this is a multi agency event.
You're going to have the authorities in Clayton County and
I would imagine probably the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. It
would not surprise me if the FITS got involved in this.
This is something that's found out on an interstate highway.
You don't know if someone, you know, when you initially
(18:42):
roll up on this thing. You don't know if if
this was a kidnapping gone bad, maybe somebody went across
state lines. So and wow, that doesn't necessarily mean that
that happened. But I can tell you this, the police
that have been working in this case low these many
years have got all of these resources at their at
(19:06):
their back and call and at their fingertips. Uh. And
as this moves forward, it's going to be one of
these things where they're going to bring all of this
force to bear against these four people that are now
in custody. In my world, the medical legal world, we
(19:37):
have a front row seat to observe how different jurisdictions
of police officers work with one another. This is this
case that that you know is coming out of Union City,
(19:57):
Georgia in Fulton County, Georgia, is a fascinating study in
that in that you have at minimum three maybe four
agencies that are going to be involved in this case.
And it's it's something to see how how you kind
(20:18):
of do the dance, because as as an me person,
you'll get multiple requests and it might be for the
same things, kind of like duplication of request from different
jurisdictions that many times won't know what the left hand
in the right hand are doing. Most of the time,
(20:38):
it's kind of smooth because you're going to have a
lead agency and in this particular case, little old Union
City Police Department, Dave is you know, pick picks this
case up right.
Speaker 2 (20:49):
Not a The Union City is not a department. The
police department is not one of these departments has a
lot of money. Okay, matter of fact, the reason you
don't get stopped in Union City, Georgia for having a
headlight out is because the cop car probably has one
out too. That's how that is. But it's part of
the Atlanta metro area and because of that, I was wondering, Joe.
(21:14):
The overlapping jurisdicson for police is one thing, but you've
also got the medical people involved, because you've got county
areas that change. But also you've got multiple states. You've
got the victims here, all three victims are from Montgomery, Alabama,
and we have their bodies found in the Atlanta metro area.
(21:36):
But I'm curious because we have, by the way, haven't
even mentioned the other suspects here, Kenneth Thompson, Kevin Harris,
and Daryl Harris. We do not know if Keante Harris,
Kevin Harris, and Daryl Harris are related. We don't know that.
Haven't said that yet.
Speaker 1 (21:53):
But if I were a betting man, yeah there might
be connectivity.
Speaker 2 (21:57):
Yeah you might see that. But that actually would play
into it as well, because who's to say. I mean again,
they have pointed out that they know, and goes back
to what you were pointing out, Joe. Of course somebody
has somebody told the police what happened. They already know.
Now they're filling in the blanks. How do you go
from Montgomery, Alabama to knowing that they were in a
they were lured at gunpoint into a house on Magnolia Drive,
(22:22):
that they were tortured before they were their dead bodies
were put into the vehicle. By the way, were their
bodies dead when they got in the car or were
they loaded into the car and shot, stabbed or what
have you. I don't even know how they died yet,
but were they killed inside the car or were they
killed like for instance, Joe, were they driving on their thinking,
(22:43):
hey man, we got a whatever's happened is cooled off.
We're all good. We're just going on a road trip now.
And the guys pull over off the side of the
road on eighty five and pop, pop pop, they're dead.
I mean, I'm just asking because I don't know. I
know that they said they were tortured in the house
on Magnet, but that doesn't mean they were killed there.
They could have been tortured and then put in the
(23:05):
car and killed.
Speaker 1 (23:06):
Yeah, that could be could have been killed in any
number of places. They could have been placed in the car,
driven out somewhere else, killed, placed back into the car.
And there's all these permutations when you begin to think
about it, and I go back to what I had
said about primary, secondary and tertiary, and that's why all
this plays in to these scenes.
Speaker 2 (23:25):
What about medical examiners, corners, the people involved in the
dead body phase of this, Yeah, because I'm wondering who
actually not just takes the lead, because again, there are
three bodies that have to be examined and one person
has to be in charge of this, right.
Speaker 1 (23:41):
Yeah, it would be It would be my old office,
the Fulton County Medical Examiner's office.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
They the bodies were found in Fulton County.
Speaker 1 (23:47):
Yeah, and it stops there. And so that most well,
all medical legal agencies like this cover multiple jurisdictions. So
Fulton County alone has got, you know, I can't tell
you how many individual municipalities where each one of those
(24:09):
little cities towns has their own police department that work
they'll work major crimes. And then you have a county
police department, which doesn't quite exist in the same forms
it used to. Then you've got City of Atlanta, so
you've got all of these different jurisdictions, and you've got
Union Union City, but there's only one medical examiner. It's
(24:35):
not like there's multiple forensic pathologists. You can just you know,
it's one medical examiner. So all three of these bodies
would have gone down. And look, I've been I've been
present at a scene where I've got multiple law enforcement
agencies that are there looking over my shoulder while I'm
doing what i have to do at a scene. And
(24:55):
then what's really fascinating is you get a triple homicide
like this. You've got you might have four or five
people show up in suits to the autopsy and they're
all from different jurisdictions. They want to know what's going
on with this thing, and they'll all be there at
this central location to observe the autopsy or to speak
with a pathologist or the EMMY investigator. So from it,
(25:19):
it's beneficial in the sense that you have kind of
central control and that and you know, not control, that's
overstating the authority, but you have a pivot point that
everybody can kind of go from there. Now you'll have
the lead in a case like this. Here's the thing.
If if the homicides actually took place jurisdictionally in Clayton County, Georgia,
(25:45):
they would probably pick up the case because the murders
and these individuals have been charged, and Georgia's got a
real interesting murder statute. They call it malice murder. And
you don't have like degrees, you know, like first degree
secondary all that stuff, you have malice murder. I wish
we had Nancy here right now there I actually explain
(26:06):
the finer points. But because she prosecuted in Fulton County,
so that yeah, so it would be it would actually
be probably prosecuted by the Clayton County DA. But here's
the thing. We know that there's a specific address, we
know that we've got this conveyance, this twenty ten Dodge charger.
(26:31):
I think what I would be very curious about, because
you're talking about a very bloody affair, Dave. You're talking
about a house on Magnolia Drive in Jonesboro, and there
ain't too many mansions in Jonesboro. All right, it's not
going to be a gigantic house. I wouldn't think. I
would think you would have a central location where maybe
(26:54):
these people have been corralled and tortured and maybe murdered
right there after all these years. I wonder if there's
going to be something that can as far as physical
evidence that could connect that could connect these individuals to
that specific location as a murder site. Or is this
going to be an eyewitness account of somebody that says, yeah,
(27:17):
we saw them all be placed on you know, that
they've been beaten up with a baseball bat or they've
been cut or something like that, and they're screaming for
their lives and then you've got them on the ground,
you know, before you right, and you know, I come
back to this, this kind of specter that's involved in
all of this an assistant middle school principal. And when
(27:39):
you frame it in there and you think that he's
lording over this perhaps I don't know, maybe he was
just peripheral to it. Maybe he wasn't in charge of
what was going on. But how does an assistant principle
get themselves into this kind of position a guy that
is in, you know, a respected position of authority, who's
in charge of children. And to ascend to that kind
(28:01):
of level you have to have certain academic credentials as well. Well. Ay,
so that's kind of fascinating.
Speaker 2 (28:07):
You got to figure out that the guy, first of all,
the forty five year old assistant principal, was not a
forty five year old assistant principal at the time this
took place. He was in his early thirties. We don't
even know what his background was at that time. Was
he working as a teacher, We don't know yet. But
let me ask you a couple of quick ones here, Joe,
because this is what the actual statement from the Clayton
(28:29):
County Sheriff's Office set. It was determined through the investigation
that all three victims were tortured and murdered in Clayton
County and dumped in Fulton County, but said Colquitt Thompson's
body had been stuffed in the trunk. That was the
term they used, stuffed in the trunk. King and Katrel
(28:50):
were both located inside the vehicle, presumably in the backseat
because somebody would have had to have driven. And I
can't imagine writing down the road with a dead body
next to you. But what do we know about the
dead bodies? Fulton County Medical Examiner's Office is saying that
King and Control were found dead from asphyxiation in the
back seat, and Culquit Thompson, of course, you said, was
(29:11):
in the trunk from strangulation. Now is there a difference
when they say Culquit Thompson was found dead in the
trunk from strangulation and that King and Control were dead
from asphyxiation.
Speaker 1 (29:25):
That's a fascinating point because you're changing your verbiage. You know,
why not say why not say strangulation on all three
as opposed to two where you're saying asphyxiation and one
is a strangulation. Strangulation is very specific when you think
(29:47):
about the action of strangulating someone. Are you wrapping your
hands around their throat? Are you using a ligature, Have
you hung them? Which does happen, And again it goes
to torture. Asphyxiation can mean any number of things where
you might perhaps smother them in some way, or something
(30:13):
that's quite heinous. You have them in a chair and
you place a plastic bag over their head, that's an
asphixial death. And again we're talking about an element of
torture here, Dave, because with torture, I would think that
you would kind of tie that back with physical evidence
that might be found on the body, evidence that they
(30:34):
had been tortured in life. And then this currently brought
about their death. But that scene itself will reveal information
about what they found in that car. And here's another
interesting issue here. Let's just say that none of these
individuals had ever been in that car before, none of
(30:57):
the three victims. All of a sudden, if we go
back to my buddyle Card's supposition about every contact leaves
a trace, if you're in that residence at Magnolia, depend
upon the surface you're on in there, maybe carpet, whatever
the case might be, What do they find on those
bodies and within that car that could potentially tie that
(31:20):
car in that house together. This remains to be seen.
I'm Joseph Scott Morgan and this is body Backs.
Body Bags with Joseph Scott Morgan. There's something about having
an assigned parking space. You know, I personally, I've never
had one. I've always thought that it would be kind
of cool to have one that, no matter what happened,
(00:32):
you know, you'd have a space to park your car
when you shut up for work. I guess that, you know,
there's always problems at arise. You'll have someone that takes
your parking spot, but it might have your title on it.
You know, it sounds kind of pretentious to a certain degree.
But today I'm going to talk about somebody that had
an assigned parking spot, but the conversation is also going
(00:55):
to deal with another vehicle that was found parked in abandoned.
Today we're going to explore, certainly a rather bizarre case
that has come to us out of Georgia, but it
has an Alabama connection. Today we're going to talk about
the bodies of three people that were found abandoned along
(01:19):
the roadway in an isolated location of South Fulton County,
just south of Atlanta. I'm Joseph Scott Morgan, and this
is body Bags. Dave. I was thinking about the idea
of if you're somebody in authority in a place. Maybe
(01:40):
you're a manager or something like that, you work at
the bank, or I don't know. In this case, you're
an assistant principle. You know how they always have like
the curve protector or whatever. That thing is there and
it'll either be written in yellow or black or white
and it says assistant principle. And you got a spot
(02:01):
to park, and it you It gives you the idea
that this person is in charge, they have authority. And
a boy, we've got an assistant principal who has finally
recently resigned from his job. And wow, the reason for
his resignation is he's got to set up a defense.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
Here's here is the statement. Now, okay, he's arrested on
a cold case murder that goes back eleven years. Here
was the announcement the school made when Conta Harris was arrested.
The guy was an assistant principal at the time at
mcadori Middle School in Jefferson County, Alabama, which is the
(02:43):
Birmingham metro area. This is the assistant principal. They have
two assistant principles. This was their statement when Contae Harris
is arrested We have been made aware that mister Kante
Harris was arrested Wednesday afternoon. At this time, we still
are gathering facts about the specifics of this situation. This
(03:04):
is from the superintendent. However, early indications are that the
charges are not related to the end to this individual's
employment with Jefferson County Schools. First standard procedure, mister Harris
have been placed unpaid administrative leave. As more facts become available,
we will act accordingly according to our district's policies. So
(03:27):
he's unpaid administrative leave when he's arrested on a multiple
homicide case dating back eleven years.
Speaker 1 (03:35):
Yeah. Well, let me tell you somebody, he's going to
need every nickel that he can get because this is
as complex as it gets from a defense perspective. He's
going to need, first off, a really good attorney, and
he's going to need experts.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
I can tell you that dating back on this Joe.
Speaker 1 (03:51):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (03:52):
January thirteenth, twenty thirteen, the bodies of Sheryl Collquit Thompson,
ken Yonez King, and Rodney Cottrel discovered inside a car
along I eighty five ramp in Union City. An officer
on regular patrol stumbled upon the vehicle sitting idly on
(04:13):
the northbound exit ramp, shot and case.
Speaker 1 (04:16):
And who, you know, who would think that it would
take this long to solve a triple homicide. And it's
not like these bodies have been found thrown into a
big hole out in the woods. It's not like you
see remnants of bone that or something's been rendered down
by fire. You're talking about arguably one of the busiest corridors,
(04:43):
certainly in the South, as far as an interstate highway goes.
And this car is literally found on the shoulder of
the road, I think, on the up exit ramp, just
sitting there. It was a Union City police officer. It's
just on standard control. And I have this vision that
he probably you know, Hung Hung a yui, in the
(05:05):
middle of the of the of the median out there
and swung back around, saw this car sitting up there
and thinking, Okay, why is this car here? What's going on?
And this is this is the kind of thing that's
always fascinated me. What is it like to be a
police officer and you're a finder of a body I found?
(05:25):
In my career, I found one body, really, yeah, I've
only found one body. It was a homicide. He got
beaten to death with a hammer and wrapped in a carpet,
and there were other people killed. We didn't know about
that body. And I happened to find its old a
minute back. How did you find Were you looking for him?
Were you just going to room to room? And I
caught a whiff of something of a foul odor. And
(05:47):
this guy was stuffed back in a closet, and I
happened to find him in there, and they just stuffed
him in there. And that's the only time, out of
all the thousands of deaths I've ever worked ave that
that was the first time I ever actually found a body.
You know. I found things like bits of skull or
bits of skeleton, that sort of thing, you know when
(06:11):
we're doing excavations, but never like an intact body. So
this I'm calling him a kid. He's you know, he
wheels off the road, comes up the ramp, and you know,
if it's late at night or whatever, and there's nothing
else going on in your police officer, you're looking for
things to do, and can you imagine he walks up
(06:34):
to this vehicle, he's probably got his lights on, he's
pulled up behind it and he's got his flashlight out. Well, Dave,
when he comes walking up to the back of his vehicle,
it's a twenty ten Dodge Charger on side of the road.
He's got his flashlight out. He starts peering in the windows,
(06:54):
and the first thing he sees are two dead bodies
in the.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
In a battle.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
See, No, they're not, they're not. It's not sleepy Tom.
And then as it turns out, there was one more
in the trunk. I can't even imagine the thought that
ran through this kid's mind, you know, when he looked
inside of the vehicle and he and he discovers this,
you know, your first your first reaction would have to
(07:23):
be one shock, even as seasoned as you might be.
But uh, you know, he's dealing with a car. And
here's the thing that we don't know a lot about
right now, Dave. How long had that car actually been there?
And I think that that's something that that they're probably
going to try to explore in this day.
Speaker 2 (07:39):
Now. You spent a lot of time in the Atlanta
metro area. Yeah, And when I was looking at this,
I wondered, did they have cameras along like eighty five
seventy five to eighty five around Atlanta, those major thoroughfares.
Do they have cameras at the on ramps off ramps were.
Speaker 1 (08:01):
At that particular time, I think that it would have been,
because we're talking how many years now, are we talking.
Speaker 2 (08:06):
Twenty thirteen, so you know eleven?
Speaker 1 (08:08):
Yeah, yeah, and so I I can't say specifically, I
know that over the years there have been problems with
cameras actually working. If they have them nowadays, I think
that they probably would. So you're really rolling the dice today.
If this happened today, I think that there would be
a higher probability that you would be probably discovered and
(08:31):
found out.
Speaker 2 (08:33):
So they would actually start looking at records for Union
City police officers that were in that area to determine
when the car was actually parked, because they usually put
a tag on them at a certain point after the
vehicle is seen abandoned on the side of the road.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
Yeah, they do. It's that orange sticker, you know, and
it's impossible to get off of a car. They make
it that way. And so wouldn't that be something if
somebody just if you had had a police officer that
pulled up saw that it was abandoned, didn't pay any
attention to what was in there, stuck a sticker on there,
and just drove off. And I don't think that's what happened.
(09:10):
I think that this this guy's first his first eyes
on on this thing. But I think that what's really
interesting about this car and I can't wait to get
into this with you, Dave, what's really interesting about this
car is the fact that this car may very well
(09:31):
be the key to everything that's going to unfold as
his case continues to develop. As with all things, you
(09:58):
have to consider the nature of a the components, the
elements that are there before you as an investigator. What's
what's fascinating about crime scenes involving motor vehicles is this
the mobility? Because you know, just to back up a
(10:18):
little bit with with crime scenes, we have primary, secondary
and we have tertiary, and those come to mean different
things with different people. But Dave, right now, we're thinking
about a car, a sedan. It's a Ford or Sedan
abandoned on a ramp in broad daylight, mind you, even
(10:42):
though it may have been dark when the car was found,
but in broad daylight where everybody can see it, that's
kind of bold. I don't know what you think about
it's kind of bold to me.
Speaker 2 (10:52):
Well, that's what I was asking, you know, when trying
to determine when was when was the vehicle parked in
this spot, and why did they choose this spot? We
know oftentimes that perpetrators will bury a body near something
they are familiar with, and I'm wondering if that was
(11:14):
the case here. This charger is abandoned on a ramp
on eighty five in Union City, Atlanta metro area. But
they find out that the victims, because you've got to
identify the victims first, who are they and why are
they here? And in identifying they find out that all
three of these victims they're from Montgomery, Alabama, And something
(11:37):
else immediately gets thrown into the fray. Montgomery is a
military town, so now you've got potentially people that are
from living Montgomery, but they could be from anywhere. You
have to track it back and then we know. So
we're actually starting at the end. We have the bodies
in the car, they're dead, How did they end up here?
(11:59):
Just because they're from Montgomery doesn't mean necessarily that they
were killed in Montgomery and brought to this area of
the world without forethought. You know, did you kill them?
And just say, you know what, I think, I feel
like going for a ride with two dead bodies in
the back. And I'm just wondering, do we know where
(12:20):
John Travolta and Samuel L. Jackson were in this time
period in twenty thirteen, because last time I heard of anybody,
you know, driving a car with a dead body in
the back was in pulp fiction.
Speaker 1 (12:31):
Yeah, he shot Marvin in the face. Well, you know
the interesting thing about it is it turns out these
these home sides actually originated out of Jonesboro.
Speaker 2 (12:40):
Georgia, Jonesbrough, Georgia.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
Now, yeah, and so we've got we've got individuals.
Speaker 2 (12:46):
You get to Jonesboro, and where is Jonesboro in relation
to Union City?
Speaker 1 (12:49):
It's immediately okay, So geographically, you know, Jonesborough is in
Clayton County, and Clayton County has a dividing line obviously
between Fulton and it's on the south side of Fulton County,
where you know Union City is.
Speaker 2 (13:06):
It's just again, all this in the Atlanta metro area.
Speaker 1 (13:09):
It's all in the Atlanta metro area. So Clayton County
and the town of Jonesboro, which I think is the
county seat. I'm not sure I think that's accurate. It
is to the east. Okay, So this case is actually
being worked being worked out of Clayton County, Georgia, because
(13:32):
they have apparently enough evidence to conclude that these three
individuals had been taken hostage and at a they were
essentially lured into a residence in Jonesboro, Georgia and Dave.
(13:53):
The authorities are saying that not only were these three killed,
but they were tortured. They were tortured at this location.
And there's a lot going on here because you know,
if you're if you're a perpetrator, and you're staring at
this idea of of well, okay, we've tortured them. First off,
(14:16):
what's your goal with the torture? And secondly, we've killed them?
Why did you kill them? Now? What are we going
to do with them? And you're it's quite the conundrum
to be in.
Speaker 2 (14:25):
Backing up, I'm made a note, how do you know
that they were lured? How just starting with something as
simple as that, we're starting with three dead bodies, two
in the backseat, one in the trunk on an off
ramp on I eighty five in the Atlanta metro area.
How in the world can you know they were lured anywhere?
Speaker 1 (14:52):
I think that what happened in this particular case because
it is as you had stated from the top, and
rightly so, David, that this is a cold case, and
somebody along the way has we'll see, how is it framed,
most of the time, has rolled over on somebody else
at this point in time, and in order to have
because this is not when you start talking about luring,
(15:16):
and you start talking about torture, which you could see
evidence of that at autopsy, and then obviously you had
the murders. That's very specific as a matter of fact.
Not only is it specific in that sense that they
were lured, we know the address to which they were
lured to, and so you've got a point of origin.
So how would police be able to mine that information
(15:38):
out of there unless there was another person that had
rolled over, had provided information that is very very specific.
And to follow this thread, as more information comes out
about this case, it's going to be fascinating to see
who this person was that's going to tell the tale,
(15:59):
because this is isn't this isn't just a random Dave.
This is not just a random homicide. It's not like
some kind of dry by things. It's not. There was
planning that went into this. When whenever this thing finally
makes it to court, this is going to be an
explosive case because you're going to learn how, You're going
(16:20):
to learn a lot of dirty details. And of course,
the reason it got on our radar, other than it's
this guy worked, the principle that's been charged works in
Alabama is the fact that you know, it's it's so
(16:40):
so bold. When you begin to think about a car
abandoned with three bodies in it, it's going to catch
our attention when we're doing research.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
Caught everyone because this story broke locally, obviously because of Alabama,
Georgia and Atlanta, but we're talking within twenty four hours.
It's in People magazine, on their online service, Daily Mail,
the New York Posts. It got national coverage mainly because
you've got a currently working assistant principal arresting. This is
(17:11):
a guy who yesterday was, you know, in charge of
your thirteen year old at school.
Speaker 1 (17:15):
Stop running, Stop running in the hallway.
Speaker 2 (17:17):
Yeah, no running at all?
Speaker 1 (17:18):
Oh yeah exactly, yeah too.
Speaker 2 (17:21):
All right, herman, you stole Dave's lunch money. Again give
it back. Now he's actually charged with a triple homicide.
And you've got all of the people who worked with him.
He's such a nice guy. You know, he did the
school play, he helped Johnny with his homework. This was
a good man. He did what There's no way you
got the wrong guy. So I'm wondering, though, how do
(17:42):
they put these things together when it's a a cold case.
They end up with four people arrested in three different states.
And they did it. They coordinated all of this at
the same time so that no words spread amongst them. Yeah,
so that I mean, boom, boom boom. This was a
highly coordinated effort to get all these people in custody.
(18:03):
But again I go back to how do you know
they were lured at gunpoint? And how do you know
they were how do you know any of this? Again,
you've got somebody has cracked, but the police had to
be working it really hard, silently to get that person
to crack.
Speaker 1 (18:21):
Yeah, you would have. And this is a multi agency event.
You're going to have the authorities in Clayton County and
I would imagine probably the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. It
would not surprise me if the FITS got involved in this.
This is something that's found out on an interstate highway.
You don't know if someone, you know, when you initially
(18:42):
roll up on this thing. You don't know if if
this was a kidnapping gone bad, maybe somebody went across
state lines. So and wow, that doesn't necessarily mean that
that happened. But I can tell you this, the police
that have been working in this case low these many
years have got all of these resources at their at
(19:06):
their back and call and at their fingertips. Uh. And
as this moves forward, it's going to be one of
these things where they're going to bring all of this
force to bear against these four people that are now
in custody. In my world, the medical legal world, we
(19:37):
have a front row seat to observe how different jurisdictions
of police officers work with one another. This is this
case that that you know is coming out of Union City,
(19:57):
Georgia in Fulton County, Georgia, is a fascinating study in
that in that you have at minimum three maybe four
agencies that are going to be involved in this case.
And it's it's something to see how how you kind
(20:18):
of do the dance, because as as an me person,
you'll get multiple requests and it might be for the
same things, kind of like duplication of request from different
jurisdictions that many times won't know what the left hand
in the right hand are doing. Most of the time,
(20:38):
it's kind of smooth because you're going to have a
lead agency and in this particular case, little old Union
City Police Department, Dave is you know, pick picks this
case up right.
Speaker 2 (20:49):
Not a The Union City is not a department. The
police department is not one of these departments has a
lot of money. Okay, matter of fact, the reason you
don't get stopped in Union City, Georgia for having a
headlight out is because the cop car probably has one
out too. That's how that is. But it's part of
the Atlanta metro area and because of that, I was wondering, Joe.
(21:14):
The overlapping jurisdicson for police is one thing, but you've
also got the medical people involved, because you've got county
areas that change. But also you've got multiple states. You've
got the victims here, all three victims are from Montgomery, Alabama,
and we have their bodies found in the Atlanta metro area.
(21:36):
But I'm curious because we have, by the way, haven't
even mentioned the other suspects here, Kenneth Thompson, Kevin Harris,
and Daryl Harris. We do not know if Keante Harris,
Kevin Harris, and Daryl Harris are related. We don't know that.
Haven't said that yet.
Speaker 1 (21:53):
But if I were a betting man, yeah there might
be connectivity.
Speaker 2 (21:57):
Yeah you might see that. But that actually would play
into it as well, because who's to say. I mean again,
they have pointed out that they know, and goes back
to what you were pointing out, Joe. Of course somebody
has somebody told the police what happened. They already know.
Now they're filling in the blanks. How do you go
from Montgomery, Alabama to knowing that they were in a
they were lured at gunpoint into a house on Magnolia Drive,
(22:22):
that they were tortured before they were their dead bodies
were put into the vehicle. By the way, were their
bodies dead when they got in the car or were
they loaded into the car and shot, stabbed or what
have you. I don't even know how they died yet,
but were they killed inside the car or were they
killed like for instance, Joe, were they driving on their thinking,
(22:43):
hey man, we got a whatever's happened is cooled off.
We're all good. We're just going on a road trip now.
And the guys pull over off the side of the
road on eighty five and pop, pop pop, they're dead.
I mean, I'm just asking because I don't know. I
know that they said they were tortured in the house
on Magnet, but that doesn't mean they were killed there.
They could have been tortured and then put in the
(23:05):
car and killed.
Speaker 1 (23:06):
Yeah, that could be could have been killed in any
number of places. They could have been placed in the car,
driven out somewhere else, killed, placed back into the car.
And there's all these permutations when you begin to think
about it, and I go back to what I had
said about primary, secondary and tertiary, and that's why all
this plays in to these scenes.
Speaker 2 (23:25):
What about medical examiners, corners, the people involved in the
dead body phase of this, Yeah, because I'm wondering who
actually not just takes the lead, because again, there are
three bodies that have to be examined and one person
has to be in charge of this, right.
Speaker 1 (23:41):
Yeah, it would be It would be my old office,
the Fulton County Medical Examiner's office.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
They the bodies were found in Fulton County.
Speaker 1 (23:47):
Yeah, and it stops there. And so that most well,
all medical legal agencies like this cover multiple jurisdictions. So
Fulton County alone has got, you know, I can't tell
you how many individual municipalities where each one of those
(24:09):
little cities towns has their own police department that work
they'll work major crimes. And then you have a county
police department, which doesn't quite exist in the same forms
it used to. Then you've got City of Atlanta, so
you've got all of these different jurisdictions, and you've got
Union Union City, but there's only one medical examiner. It's
(24:35):
not like there's multiple forensic pathologists. You can just you know,
it's one medical examiner. So all three of these bodies
would have gone down. And look, I've been I've been
present at a scene where I've got multiple law enforcement
agencies that are there looking over my shoulder while I'm
doing what i have to do at a scene. And
(24:55):
then what's really fascinating is you get a triple homicide
like this. You've got you might have four or five
people show up in suits to the autopsy and they're
all from different jurisdictions. They want to know what's going
on with this thing, and they'll all be there at
this central location to observe the autopsy or to speak
with a pathologist or the EMMY investigator. So from it,
(25:19):
it's beneficial in the sense that you have kind of
central control and that and you know, not control, that's
overstating the authority, but you have a pivot point that
everybody can kind of go from there. Now you'll have
the lead in a case like this. Here's the thing.
If if the homicides actually took place jurisdictionally in Clayton County, Georgia,
(25:45):
they would probably pick up the case because the murders
and these individuals have been charged, and Georgia's got a
real interesting murder statute. They call it malice murder. And
you don't have like degrees, you know, like first degree
secondary all that stuff, you have malice murder. I wish
we had Nancy here right now there I actually explain
(26:06):
the finer points. But because she prosecuted in Fulton County,
so that yeah, so it would be it would actually
be probably prosecuted by the Clayton County DA. But here's
the thing. We know that there's a specific address, we
know that we've got this conveyance, this twenty ten Dodge charger.
(26:31):
I think what I would be very curious about, because
you're talking about a very bloody affair, Dave. You're talking
about a house on Magnolia Drive in Jonesboro, and there
ain't too many mansions in Jonesboro. All right, it's not
going to be a gigantic house. I wouldn't think. I
would think you would have a central location where maybe
(26:54):
these people have been corralled and tortured and maybe murdered
right there after all these years. I wonder if there's
going to be something that can as far as physical
evidence that could connect that could connect these individuals to
that specific location as a murder site. Or is this
going to be an eyewitness account of somebody that says, yeah,
(27:17):
we saw them all be placed on you know, that
they've been beaten up with a baseball bat or they've
been cut or something like that, and they're screaming for
their lives and then you've got them on the ground,
you know, before you right, and you know, I come
back to this, this kind of specter that's involved in
all of this an assistant middle school principal. And when
(27:39):
you frame it in there and you think that he's
lording over this perhaps I don't know, maybe he was
just peripheral to it. Maybe he wasn't in charge of
what was going on. But how does an assistant principle
get themselves into this kind of position a guy that
is in, you know, a respected position of authority, who's
in charge of children. And to ascend to that kind
(28:01):
of level you have to have certain academic credentials as well. Well. Ay,
so that's kind of fascinating.
Speaker 2 (28:07):
You got to figure out that the guy, first of all,
the forty five year old assistant principal, was not a
forty five year old assistant principal at the time this
took place. He was in his early thirties. We don't
even know what his background was at that time. Was
he working as a teacher, We don't know yet. But
let me ask you a couple of quick ones here, Joe,
because this is what the actual statement from the Clayton
(28:29):
County Sheriff's Office set. It was determined through the investigation
that all three victims were tortured and murdered in Clayton
County and dumped in Fulton County, but said Colquitt Thompson's
body had been stuffed in the trunk. That was the
term they used, stuffed in the trunk. King and Katrel
(28:50):
were both located inside the vehicle, presumably in the backseat
because somebody would have had to have driven. And I
can't imagine writing down the road with a dead body
next to you. But what do we know about the
dead bodies? Fulton County Medical Examiner's Office is saying that
King and Control were found dead from asphyxiation in the
back seat, and Culquit Thompson, of course, you said, was
(29:11):
in the trunk from strangulation. Now is there a difference
when they say Culquit Thompson was found dead in the
trunk from strangulation and that King and Control were dead
from asphyxiation.
Speaker 1 (29:25):
That's a fascinating point because you're changing your verbiage. You know,
why not say why not say strangulation on all three
as opposed to two where you're saying asphyxiation and one
is a strangulation. Strangulation is very specific when you think
(29:47):
about the action of strangulating someone. Are you wrapping your
hands around their throat? Are you using a ligature, Have
you hung them? Which does happen, And again it goes
to torture. Asphyxiation can mean any number of things where
you might perhaps smother them in some way, or something
(30:13):
that's quite heinous. You have them in a chair and
you place a plastic bag over their head, that's an
asphixial death. And again we're talking about an element of
torture here, Dave, because with torture, I would think that
you would kind of tie that back with physical evidence
that might be found on the body, evidence that they
(30:34):
had been tortured in life. And then this currently brought
about their death. But that scene itself will reveal information
about what they found in that car. And here's another
interesting issue here. Let's just say that none of these
individuals had ever been in that car before, none of
(30:57):
the three victims. All of a sudden, if we go
back to my buddyle Card's supposition about every contact leaves
a trace, if you're in that residence at Magnolia, depend
upon the surface you're on in there, maybe carpet, whatever
the case might be, What do they find on those
bodies and within that car that could potentially tie that
(31:20):
car in that house together. This remains to be seen.
I'm Joseph Scott Morgan and this is body Backs.
Host
Joseph Scott Morgan
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