April 24, 2023 • 40 mins
On New Year’s Eve in 1993, Hank Skinner fell asleep early on his couch after being rendered comatose from a cocktail of vodka, xanax and codeine. His girlfriend, Twila Busby, left for a party, and when she returned, she and her two sons were brutally murdered. Pampa, TX law enforcement knew Hank from previous charges and he was the sole survivor of the attack, so he soon became the prime suspect. Despite evidence that Hank was incapable of committing these murders, Hank faced 27 years on Texas death row. Hank was scheduled for execution in September of 2023, but tragically passed away in February of 2023 due to complications following a surgery for an aggressive brain tumor. At the time of Hank’s death, he and his team were still fiercely fighting for his innocence. Maggie talks to Hank Skinner, Sandrine Ageorges-Skinner, Hank's wife, and Rob Owen, Hank's attorney.
To learn more and get involved, visit:
https://justice4hank.org/and-now/
https://justice4hank.org/in-memoriam-hank-and-his-friends/
Wrongful Conviction with Maggie Freleng is a production of Lava for Good™ Podcasts in association with Signal Co. No1.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
This is Maggie Freeling. Today we're revisiting an episode from
season one that's very close to my heart. When I
visited Hank Skinner last year at the Polunsky death Row
unit in Livingston, Texas, I was nervous. Hank and I
had been in touch for a few years, but only
through letters. He was not permitted to use phones on
(00:22):
death Row. We once had a tense exchange of letters
when Hank misinterpreted something I said, and it kind of
put me on edge talking to him. So I was
super nervous to go down there. But as soon as
Hank was brought out and sat down, he said to me,
if I knew this is what you looked like, I
would have been more open with you. And then we
(00:43):
were both just at ease. And I think what he
meant was because I look like him with tattoos and
just jeans and a T shirt, that he felt like
I was like him and not just a suit that
was coming in to tell his story and then leave.
So I left that interaction with Hank elated about meeting him,
(01:04):
the trust we had built, and really hopeful for his future. Unfortunately,
that would be the last time I spoke with Hank.
Hank died this past February at the Prison Hospital in Galveston,
with his wife, Sandrine at his side, and in the end,
it wasn't the state that killed him, but complications following
(01:25):
surgery for an aggressive brain tumor. And despite his illness,
Hank staunchly continued to maintain his innocence and to fight
for exoneration with the tireless help and support of Sandrine
and his attorneys. Hank's dedication to the truth and the
face of massive injustice has inspired us all, and so
(01:48):
to honor his memory, we'd like to share his story
with you again. On December thirty first, nineteen ninety three,
thirty one year old Hank Skinner was pregaming for a
New Year's Eve party. He was with his girlfriend of
seven months, forty one year old Twila Busby, and her
(02:10):
two adult children, Scooter and Randy. Hank passed out before
ten PM from a potent combination of vodka, codine, and xanax.
Despite his condition, Twyla left for the party without him.
When she returned, she was strangled and bludgeoned to death.
Her two sons were stabbed to death. Hank was the
(02:31):
sole survivor and was instantly the prime suspect, despite evidence
that Hank was incapable of committing these murders and that
another more probable person of interest exists. Hank has spent
nearly thirty years on Texas death row awaiting execution.
Speaker 2 (02:49):
And they've tried to kill me five times, so I
believe that they were serious about that.
Speaker 3 (02:57):
But I think with the evidence.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
We have now that there's no way they're going to
have to let me go, and they're going to have
to acknowledge that I'm innocent. I don't see any other way.
Speaker 1 (03:11):
From LoVa for good. This is rumful conviction with Maggie
Freeling today. Hank Skinner. Hank Skinner was born on April fourth,
(03:32):
nineteen sixty two. He's the oldest of four kids.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
I'm from Virginia, Okay.
Speaker 2 (03:38):
I was born in the foothills of the Blue Ridge
Mountains in Franklin County, Virginia, which is the moonshine capital
of the United States.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
His dad was part of the local industry. He was
a foreign car mechanic as well as a moonshiner.
Speaker 3 (03:52):
See.
Speaker 2 (03:52):
He had three eight hundred gallons steam steels and fired
on butane.
Speaker 3 (03:57):
He made the best sugar looker you've ever drank, and
see moonshine.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
If it's made correctly, it's a lot better than store
bought wicker And so my dad's stuff burned clear, and
I mean it was.
Speaker 3 (04:10):
About one hundred and forty proof.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
You can just get a four ounce glass to do
ice cubes and sip.
Speaker 3 (04:15):
On it off.
Speaker 4 (04:16):
So did you just grew up drinking moonshine?
Speaker 3 (04:18):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (04:18):
Sure.
Speaker 4 (04:19):
When was the first time you drank it?
Speaker 3 (04:21):
Six years old? I stole it from my dad.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
Growing up, Hank felt like he had the best parents
in the world. He takes pride that he was named
after his dad.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
I'm actually a junior, but when my dad passed, I
took his name and so now I'm just Henry Skinner
Hank Skinner.
Speaker 3 (04:42):
Hank is a nickname for Henry.
Speaker 2 (04:44):
He loved Hank Williams Senior, and I love Hank Williams
Junior and Hank the third.
Speaker 4 (04:50):
I love them all.
Speaker 3 (04:51):
Yeah, out the same way.
Speaker 1 (04:53):
Hank learned a lot from his dad.
Speaker 2 (04:55):
Like my dad, he taught me how to slaughter hogs
and slaughter cattle.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
Worked for his dad too young. Hank was a skilled
laborer and free spirit.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
We were just a bunch of wild, rambunctious kids having
a good time. We had field cake parties and cow pastors.
There was bikers up there everywhere. That's who I grew
up with.
Speaker 1 (05:17):
But Hank also had a soft spot for the female
role models in his life. Like his mom and grandma,
Hank grew up learning a lot from them, including how
to respect women.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
If you want to find out anything in life that
really means something, find out from a woman. They know
how to do everything, and so I can sew, I
can alter clothes. I used to make dresses for my
little sister on my mama's sewing machine. I made quilts.
I know how to do everything. I know how to
can vegetables, you know, out of the garden. We used
(05:50):
to do this every year. Where the women aren't the shit.
That's all there is to it, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1 (05:58):
Hank also learned a lot about women after he married
quite young.
Speaker 2 (06:03):
I was nineteen, My wife was sixteen, and we had
just gotten married because she was already pregnant. I had
a daughter, Natalie Joe. I was so in love with
her when.
Speaker 3 (06:14):
She was born.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
Natalie Joe was the light of Hank's life, but Hank's
marriage to Natalie, Joe's mother was another story. He and
his wife struggled to get along. According to Hank, she
had substance abuse issues.
Speaker 2 (06:27):
She was strung out on cocaine. Well, he had a
big argument to fight going on all the time.
Speaker 3 (06:33):
And so my daughter stayed with her mother.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
That was the only thing that was acceptable to her.
My mama wanted her, but she wouldn't let my mama
have her. And so my wife was doing crazy things
when we divorce.
Speaker 3 (06:49):
So I just said, fuck this, I'm done. I left
and I went first to Georgia.
Speaker 1 (06:55):
There in Georgia, Hank worked at a casino who's high
earning customers were key or two by women.
Speaker 2 (07:01):
And these are gamblers and they're high rollers, and so
they want woman on their arm.
Speaker 1 (07:06):
You know, Hank took it upon himself to look out
for these.
Speaker 2 (07:09):
Women if they get two hands yet, like you know,
I'm the guy who steps in and tells them now, no, no,
you know it can't.
Speaker 3 (07:16):
Be doing that.
Speaker 2 (07:18):
And so have you ever seen that movie Roadhouse with
Patrick Swayze, Because that's what I did.
Speaker 3 (07:23):
I was a cooler just like he was.
Speaker 2 (07:25):
In that movie, but not in a bar in the
gambling establishment, And so I lived in an old, old
ramshackle rooming house that had three stories and had big
stucco porch on the top.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
And so I could sit up there and drink beer
and smoke weed.
Speaker 2 (07:40):
And watch all the cars go by and holler at
the girls.
Speaker 3 (07:43):
I was the rooster of the hymn house.
Speaker 1 (07:45):
I had it off in his mind. Hank was living
the life.
Speaker 4 (07:49):
So how'd you wind up in Texas?
Speaker 2 (07:51):
So when I came out here, I came out here
because I wanted to break out in the oil field,
because I heard about the oil field.
Speaker 3 (07:58):
It was a good place to make money. I did.
I made a lot of money out here. I ended
up moving to Papa. That's an old filled town.
Speaker 1 (08:07):
And Pampa Hank found kindred spirits in the lifestyle he enjoyed,
but soon he was charged and convicted for unauthorized use
of a motor vehicle and was on parole. He started
going to AA as part of his parole, and that's
where he met Tila Busby.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
These two guys were picking on her, and so I
dried up her tears and I talked to her and
got her all right.
Speaker 3 (08:30):
She was just they were just drilling.
Speaker 4 (08:34):
I mean the way they were, mister, what were picking
on her for?
Speaker 2 (08:38):
She's a whore, She's a sorry bitch. She drank you know,
she ain't never go sober up.
Speaker 3 (08:43):
It was just horrible.
Speaker 2 (08:45):
So anyway, I ended up giving.
Speaker 3 (08:47):
Her a ride home.
Speaker 1 (08:49):
On the way, Hank asked if she wanted to stop
for a cup of coffee.
Speaker 2 (08:56):
And we sat down and started talking, and it was like,
just like instantly we'd been together for fifty years.
Speaker 3 (09:03):
I mean, she was so easy to talk to.
Speaker 2 (09:06):
And she told me, she said, I have never met
anybody like you in my life. What are you some
kind of magician? And I'm like, why do you say that?
Speaker 3 (09:16):
She said, I don't know. But since I sit.
Speaker 2 (09:18):
Down and you started talking to you, I just started
feeling some kind of way.
Speaker 1 (09:23):
Twila and Hank started spending all their time together.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
Twila and I were soulmates. We could just look at
each other and know what other was thinking and what
to say, you know, And whenever we went to another
people's house, she always said in my loud people said
we were like two high school kids.
Speaker 3 (09:40):
That we were so in love.
Speaker 4 (09:41):
Well, she was a lot older.
Speaker 3 (09:42):
Than you, right, ten years. That's not a lot.
Speaker 1 (09:52):
Twila had two sons, Elwyn, who went by Scooter, was
twenty two and Randy was twenty, and Hank took on
the young menace his own. The three of them had
even worked together in a landscaping business. Hank had a
previous hand injury that left his right dominant hand virtually useless,
so the boys were a big help.
Speaker 2 (10:12):
So I laid out the plans and showed them what
to do and how to do it, and they did
all the manual labor and we made good money.
Speaker 1 (10:21):
Everything was going great for Twila and Hank until seven
months into their relationship New Year's Eve, nineteen ninety three,
when it all came crashing down. This episode is underwritten
(10:45):
by AIG, a leading global insurance company. AIG is committed
to corporate social responsibility and to making a positive difference
in the lives of its employees and in the communities
where they work and live. In light of the compelling
need for pro bono legal assistance, and in recognition of
AIG's commitment to criminal and social justice reform, the AIG
(11:07):
pro Bono Program provides free legal services and other support
to underrepresented communities and individuals. On December thirty first, nineteen
ninety three, Hank, Twila, and Twyla's sons were all at
(11:28):
home preparing for their evening celebration. Although it could be
a dangerous combination. Hank took some xanax and drank the
better part of a fifth of vodka, and then he
accidentally started sipping Twila's drink, not realizing that she had
spiked it with codeine.
Speaker 2 (11:45):
That in class looked the same as mine, and I
grabbed it and drank from it, and I had no.
Speaker 3 (11:53):
Idea what was in.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
Hank wound up passing out that night from the combination
of substances. He also says he's allergic to codeine.
Speaker 2 (12:02):
It makes me sick. It gives me a vertigo. I
can't stand up, it makes me very lethargic. I lose
my balance, I can't talk well. It feels like my
throat is constricting, like my wounds are full of cotton.
Speaker 3 (12:18):
I can't get a deep breath.
Speaker 4 (12:20):
Do you remember feeling any of that? Were you already
really drunk?
Speaker 2 (12:22):
I remember feeling all of that before I passed out.
Speaker 1 (12:27):
Around ten fifteen PM, Hank and Twila's friend, Howard Mitchell,
came to pick them up to drive them to attend
his New Year's Eve party. When Howard arrived, he found
Hank in a practically comatose steam. He tried to rouse
his friend but got no reaction. According to Howard, Hank
was out cold, so he and Twila left for the
party without Hank.
Speaker 4 (12:50):
So but nobody called nine one one to make sure
you're okay.
Speaker 2 (12:54):
We're all a bunch of partiers. Everybody passes out. How
many times a year been no party? And that's three
or four? Motherfucker land. I learned the corners, and I've
been passed out before.
Speaker 3 (13:04):
But not like that.
Speaker 1 (13:11):
At the party, Twyla encountered her uncle, Robert Dennell. He
was incredibly drunk, following Twila around and making sexual advances.
They had previously had a sexual relationship, although Twila's consent
to the relationship was questionable. She had allegedly told people
her uncle had raped her more than once. Twila got
uncomfortable and Howard took her home. They arrived back sometime
(13:35):
between eleven and eleven fifteen. After that, what happened is
not totally clear, but here's how Hank remembers it. Sometime
that night, Hank says he was shaken awake by Scooter.
Speaker 3 (13:50):
When I first woke up, I couldn't. I couldn't. I
couldn't see where the fuck I was at. I couldn't.
I don't know it's his hort.
Speaker 2 (13:59):
I couldn't think in words, and I'm seeing blood all
over the walls, but I didn't recognize it as what.
I'm thinking, What in the fuck that people slinging all
over this living room? And so he got me up
and he gave me my pants and he told me
put them on.
Speaker 3 (14:16):
We got to get the fuck out of here.
Speaker 4 (14:18):
And he was already interested.
Speaker 3 (14:19):
Yes, And I didn't know that.
Speaker 1 (14:21):
Scooter had been stabbed in the chest and stomach area,
but he was still managing to move around and was
trying to save both of their lives.
Speaker 3 (14:30):
He said, we got to get out of your hank.
Speaker 2 (14:32):
They're coming back, and I'm thinking, who's coming back? What
the fuck are you talking about?
Speaker 4 (14:37):
You remember him saying they were coming back?
Speaker 3 (14:39):
Yes, yes, and he.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
Was saying it in a high screamed voice. That's one
of the things I remember.
Speaker 1 (14:46):
Scooter was a big guy, six foot six and about
two hundred and twenty five pounds, and despite his injuries,
he was able to lift hank up and help him out.
Speaker 4 (14:57):
Was anything registering at this point.
Speaker 2 (15:02):
Now feeling whatever has happened is bad.
Speaker 3 (15:06):
This is bad. We have got to get the fluck
out of here.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
But I wasn't thinking any words.
Speaker 3 (15:11):
I was just thinking any emotions.
Speaker 1 (15:17):
Still unsteading on his feet, Hank started looking around.
Speaker 2 (15:20):
But when I did, I lost my balance and fell
face forward on the floor. And so I remember looking
across the floor, got up on my elbows trying to
get up, and I couldn't do it. And I remember
looking across the floor and I could see my girlfriend,
and all I could see was a mass of her
hair and a blood black tinting the edges of everything,
(15:44):
and everything was looking alternately red and green, but her
face was gone.
Speaker 1 (15:52):
Twila had been strangled and bludging to death. Someone had
hit her fourteen times in the head with the handle
of a pickaxe. When she was found, her pants were
unzipped and her shirt was lifted up. As Hank was
still trying to absorb everything, Scooter was pulling him to
go check on his younger brother, Randy.
Speaker 2 (16:12):
And so we get in the bedroom and he leans
me against the dresser so we can see about his brother.
And I couldn't even stand up, even holding on with
the dresser, and I fell in the floor.
Speaker 3 (16:22):
And this is something I remember. I don't remember falling.
Speaker 2 (16:25):
I don't remember trying to get up, but I remember
looking up at him, and he's looking at his brother,
and he's got this horribly sad expression on his face,
and so I know he's dead.
Speaker 1 (16:40):
Randy had been stabbed in the heart through his back
while he was asleep. He had died on the top
level of the bunk bed he shared with Scooter.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
That's when I realized my hand was cut. And I
didn't know how it had gotten cut, but I had
a vague memory of somebody standing over top of me
with a knife and I threw my hands up and
they cut my hand.
Speaker 3 (17:03):
And it was burning. And so.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
I didn't know if that really happened to her, if
I was just dreaming it.
Speaker 1 (17:12):
Hank wasn't dreaming that his hand was cut. That was real.
He and Scooter moved through the house trying to escape,
but they were bleeding everywhere, and.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
So we got out in the backyard and we went
through the gate, and I didn't know where we were going,
but we had to get the fuck out of there.
That's all I knew, and so I fell in the
alley and he told me, Hank, I can't keep picking
you up. And I said, don't worry about me, just
go go get help, Go get help. And so I
(17:41):
remember seeing him walk off towards the street light through
the alley.
Speaker 1 (17:52):
Hank passed out again, so he didn't know that Scooter
had made it to the neighbor's porch, where he finally
succumbed to his wounds and collapsed. A neighbor found Scooter
and called nine one one, and he was immediately brought
to the hospital. There at twelve forty five am, Scooter died.
(18:12):
When the police showed up and found out where Scooter lived,
they immediately went to the house. When they arrived, they
found a massacre. There was a trail of blood from
the fence to the front porch. The front storm door
was smeared with blood. Once inside, police found multiple bloody
handprints on doors and doorknobs in the bedroom, kitchen, utility room,
(18:35):
and on the door leading out to the backyard, along
with bloody handprints and blood smeared throughout the house. Police
also found a black plastic trash bag containing a wet,
brown stained towel and a knife. They found the bloody
pickaxe handle used to bludge in Twila, as well as
a knife that was on the porch. They also found
(18:56):
a man's windbreaker, and of course, the bodies of Twila
and Randy. Almost immediately the police started looking for Hank
the living boyfriend. They found him at Andrea Joyce Reid's house,
where Hank had gone for help after he came to consciousness.
Andrea was a neighbor and she was also Hank's ex girlfriend.
(19:18):
Hank became the prime suspect.
Speaker 5 (19:21):
The reason he was accused of the crime, I think
is because in fact, he was the only survivor from
the scene, which was both very lucky because the assailant
didn't kill Hank, but it's also very unlucky because it
meant all the fingers were immediately pointed at him.
Speaker 1 (19:37):
This is Rob Owen.
Speaker 5 (19:38):
I'm a lawyer. I live in Chicago. For many years
I practiced in Texas doing mostly death penalty cases, and
during that time was when I became one of the
members of Hank Skinner's defense team. The police assumed that
this was an open and shot case. They assumed that
he had to be the killer he had some of
the blood of Twila Busby and the other victims on
(19:59):
his clothing, for example.
Speaker 1 (20:01):
And Hank says the blood very likely came from touching
Twila to see if she was okay.
Speaker 5 (20:06):
I think that was all. It was very easy for
the cops to assume that they had the right guy.
Speaker 1 (20:13):
Hank was taken to the police station and booked, but
he was still so messed up from the alcohol and
codine that he couldn't even stand on his own while
his photograph was taken. The police had to hold him up.
He was eventually taken to the hospital. Hank's cut hand
was treated and he voluntarily gave blood samples. Results of
those samples were used to calculate Hank's blood alcohol levels
(20:34):
at the approximate time of the murders. They showed that
at the time, Hank's blood alcohol content was almost three
times the drunk driving standard and his coding level was
two and a half times the recommended dose. And so
this is Hank's alibi.
Speaker 5 (20:51):
Hank couldn't have committed this murder or these murders because
he was simply physically incapable at the time of carrying
them out.
Speaker 1 (20:59):
Remember or Hank was virtually comatose when Howard came to
pick him up for the party, and Twila came home
from that party only about an hour later. Hank couldn't
have possibly sobered up by the time the murders transpired.
Speaker 5 (21:12):
Hank could only have been able to sort of at
most stand and stagger like That would have been about
the sum of his physical ability based on the volume
of alcohol and codeine in his bloodstream.
Speaker 1 (21:30):
Police searched the house for ten days without a warrant,
but they failed to collect key evidence, including non bloody
finger and handprints. Vaginal swabs were taken from Twila, and
despite one detective urging him to do so, Gary Stallings,
the criminalist who was leading the forensics team, did not
believe Twila was raped and did not have the swabs tested.
(21:52):
None of the evidence directly linked Hank to the crime. Yes,
his bloody handprints were there, but he also lived in
the house and says he was attacked. There was also
DNA and at least one handprint that was not Hank's, Twila's,
scooters or Randy's, But despite all of that, Hank was
prosecuted for the murders. His trial began a little Over
(22:13):
a year later, in March nineteen ninety five, he faced
the death penalty. District Attorney John Mann was the prosecutor
in the case. At trial, Man arrested his argument on
two key testimonies, that of state witnesses Howard Mitchell and
(22:37):
Andrea Joyce Reid. No actual forensics linking Hank to the
crime were presented at trial. In fact, Stalling's the criminalist,
conceded that just because the evidence proved Hank was there
at the house does not identify him as the murderer.
Howard Mitchell testified for the state and said that Hank
was completely comatose when he arrived to take them to
(22:57):
his party. But he also said that when Ryla's uncle,
Robert Dennell was harassing her at his house, Howard took
her home and that they shared a friendly kiss on
the porch. Man used Howard's testimony to argue that Hank
killed Twila, Scooter and Randy in a jealous rage. Andrea
Joyce Reid, Hank's sex girlfriend and neighbor, also testified, but.
Speaker 5 (23:19):
She came in and said, well, when he got to
my house on the night of the crime, he was
behaving in ways that didn't seem that messed up. He
was obviously intoxicated, but he was able to walk into
the house under his own steam. He was able to
take off his shirt. He was able to stitch up
the severe cut that he had sustained on one hand
(23:41):
using thread and needles that Andrea Reid provided him.
Speaker 1 (23:45):
Her testimony was a blow for the defense. Harold Comer,
who happened to be a former prosecutor, was Hank's court
appointed defense attorney. Comer argued that Hank survived the attacks
because the perpetrator didn't perceive him as a threat in
his condition. Also argued that Hank's pre existing injury had
left his right hand with nerve and tissue damage. He
(24:05):
did not have the strength to carry out these brutal murders.
William T. Lowry, a forensic toxicologist for the defense, also
said that it was quote highly improbable that Hank could
have committed the murders based on how intoxicated he was.
In a later afi David, he added to his argument.
He said, quote, mister Skinner at best would have been
(24:26):
in a stuporous state, barely able to stand without assistance,
and completely without the physical coordination or mental acuity required
to commit these murders by strangulation, beating, and stabbing end quote.
According to doctor Lowry, Hank was likely exerting whatever strength
and energy he had just to stand up and walk.
(24:48):
Based on Hank's bloody handprints around the walls of the
house and his inability to stand for a photo at
the police station, this was likely the case. Hank's defense
attorney also presented Twyla's called Robert Dannell as an alternate suspect,
but he failed to make a strong case of reasonable
doubt for Hank, and on March eighteenth, nineteen ninety five,
(25:09):
the jury deliberated for only two and a half hours
before finding Hank guilty. Five days later, they handed him
a death sentence.
Speaker 2 (25:18):
And I just can't believe they're done this to me
because I'm innocent, and they know they knew I was
innocent before they arrested me.
Speaker 6 (25:44):
The fact that a country in the Western world still
executed citizens is beyond shocking.
Speaker 1 (25:51):
This is sindury a George Skinner.
Speaker 6 (25:54):
I am French, spending half my time in Texas and
half most time in France.
Speaker 1 (26:00):
And Hank have been married since two thousand and eight,
and Hank is anxious to get out of prisons. They
can be together because of the pandemic. They hadn't seen
or heard each other for almost three years until recently.
So for three years, you guys have just been writing letters.
Speaker 6 (26:16):
Yeah, that's correct.
Speaker 1 (26:19):
How did you hear about Hank? And you know you're
in France? What interested you? And somebody in Houston, Texas?
Speaker 2 (26:28):
Well.
Speaker 6 (26:29):
I had a friend in France who was a young
lawyer and he wrote his thesis on the death penalty
in Texas and he sent me a copy. I read
it and I just had off my chair. I couldn't
believe that the legal system in the US was so
poor and so flawed. And he told me at the
time about an organization that was set up and run
(26:50):
by the death row prisoners in Texas and they had
a sort of a trimestral newsletter. And he said, you know,
if you want to translate it in French, could distribute
in France and get people, you know, a bit more
aware about what's going on there. And so I did
a couple of times, and he said, well, she want
to correspond with people there. I'm thinking of three guys
(27:11):
I'm sure you'll get along with and Hank was one
of those three guys. That's how we started writing in
nineteen ninety.
Speaker 1 (27:17):
Six saintdrins As. They corresponded for about four years before
she went to visit Hank on death Row, a place
where prisoners are confined in cells alone and do everything alone.
When she met Hank on death Row, that's when she
felt he was more than just a pen pal.
Speaker 6 (27:35):
And you know, he's very smart, he's very funny, he's
very strong, as you can imagine with what he's been through.
And we just clicked instantly, even at a distance and
in writing, and we clicked even more when we.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
Met in what ways? I mean you might think, you know,
you'd see our worlds apart literally, I mean you're we
are a woman in France and he's a man on
death row.
Speaker 6 (28:02):
Totally different culture, different background. Well yeah, you know, kindred spirits,
I guess, no, no borders.
Speaker 1 (28:09):
So you guys have never been able to be intimate
in any kind of way. You've never even touched his hand?
Speaker 6 (28:14):
No, never?
Speaker 1 (28:15):
What is that like?
Speaker 6 (28:16):
It's well, I'm not a masochist, but honestly, it is
a torture. It is a torture. It really is a torture.
Because you look sometimes, you know, when you even with
your friends. I mean, I don't know here in the US,
but in front, we are very felly, touchy, We need
to be close. We kiss, we hug, so you know
someone's sent their skin, you know, you know a lot
(28:40):
of things. So basically our sensorial memories of each other's
are the sound of our voices and our eyes and
the look in our eyes. And not knowing his skin,
not being able to comfort him is very, very hard.
Speaker 1 (29:02):
Through the years, Sandrine has flown back and forth between
France and Houston to visit Hank on death row. Although
she was not originally involved in Hank's innocence claim, Sandrine
eventually became convinced of his innocence.
Speaker 6 (29:14):
And I read tons and tons of paperwork, and to
me it was obvious, I mean physically, scientifically, for a
number of reasons, it was very clear that he was innocent.
Speaker 1 (29:27):
And indeed, the one key witness that Hank's fate rested on,
Andrea Jorce Reid, recanted her statement. Here's Robowen again.
Speaker 5 (29:35):
After Hank was convicted and sent to death row, Andrea
Reid contacted Hank's lawyers and said that testimony wasn't true.
I was really afraid because I thought I was likely
to be accused of being some sort of accomplice or
having assisted Hank in some way that would put me
into legal jeopardy. She was at the time trying to
gain custody of a child, and she thought that that
(29:57):
would certainly be unlikely if the authorities were angry at
her or believed she had some role in this crime.
So she essentially went to trial and exaggerated systemically and
repeatedly the things that Hank was able to do. What
she said in her recantation was in fact, Hank was
(30:17):
not able to get into the house on his own.
She had to go outside basically drag him up the
steps and into the house.
Speaker 1 (30:24):
But when she recanted, Prosecutor Man was not pleased.
Speaker 5 (30:28):
John Mann dragged Andrea Reid before a grand jury after
she gave her affidavit recanting her trial testimony, and threatened
to prosecute her for perjury if she persisted, And to
her great credit, she did not back away from the recantation,
and she said, I don't want false testimony on my conscience,
(30:49):
and so I'm going to stick now telling the truth
now about what the consequences for me personally are But
I think that says a lot about mister Mann that
he was willing to threaten to prosecute her in order
to keep her truth from coming out.
Speaker 1 (31:02):
Hank filed multiple appeals, one based on Andrew's recantation, but
clearly none were sufficient for the court to free him.
He was only met with execution dates. Sandrina and Hank
kept up their relationship for nearly fifteen years before Hank
got another execution date in March twenty ten. This time
it was serious. He was transferred to one of the
(31:24):
cells near the death chamber in Huntsville, Texas.
Speaker 2 (31:30):
They killed my first rand March the second, they killed
my second.
Speaker 3 (31:33):
Frand March the eleven.
Speaker 2 (31:34):
They were going to kill me March twenty four or
thirteen days later. Is that?
Speaker 4 (31:39):
What is that like? When you when you know you're
going to die.
Speaker 2 (31:44):
It's indescribable. The last seven days you don't sleep at all.
You're hyper vigilant. Your mind starts unrolling all of the
things you've done in your life that you wish you
hadn't done, the things you could have done better. I'm
sitting there looking at that gurney that they're fixing to
(32:06):
put me on. I could see it through the door.
They had the door open. I could see the microphone,
I could see the straps, arm boards, and I was
absolutely convinced I.
Speaker 3 (32:16):
Was fixing a die.
Speaker 2 (32:18):
I just knew that I was gonna die because the
courtsey just give me the short shrift. Every time we
had files, I was like, fuck you the fuck you died, ie,
And so.
Speaker 3 (32:30):
I felt like that was it.
Speaker 4 (32:33):
Did you get a last meal?
Speaker 3 (32:34):
Yes? I did?
Speaker 4 (32:35):
What was it?
Speaker 2 (32:36):
Popeye's fried chicken, a cheese burrow, a double cheeseburger with
onions and tomatoes, no lettuce, and uh chocolate pudding, chocolate cake,
and a chocolate milkshake.
Speaker 3 (32:53):
And I ate every bit of it.
Speaker 1 (33:01):
Fortunately, Hank's execution was stayed by the US Supreme Court
less than an hour before he was set to be killed. Today,
Hank spends his time as a jailhouse attorney, helping other
prisoners with the law and their cases. And although he's
in solitary on death row, incarcerated people do have a
right to provide legal help to one another, so that's
(33:22):
really his only social interactions. Hank has maintained his innocence
for nearly thirty years. To this day, he believes he
was framed by Twyla's uncle, Bob Donell, and at one
of Hank's later hearings, Denell's longtime neighbor, Deborah Ellis, testified
that she saw Denell in his yard a few days
(33:44):
after the murders took place. He was giving a frenzied
cleaning to his old beat up pickup truck, taking out
the seeds, throwing away the carpet, and scrubbing the floorboards
with an astringent cleaner. Ellis found his behavior strange because
Robert reportedly rarely cleaned his truck. Hank's theory is that
(34:05):
after Twyla left the party with Howard, Denell followed them home.
When Howard Mitchell testified at trial, he said that when
he returned to the party, Denell was gone. Hank thinks
he left to confront Twila at home, and when he
saw Hank passed out, he left him as the sole survivor,
knowing how that would look. And if you remember, there
was a men's windbreaker jacket that was taken as evidence,
(34:28):
however it was never tested.
Speaker 5 (34:30):
Clearly has potential evidentiary value. It's got blood spatter on
the sleeves, it's got sweatstains on the collar, it's got
hairs on the interior lining.
Speaker 1 (34:42):
Over the years, Rob and Hank's team have tried to
test all the evidence they could, but it.
Speaker 5 (34:47):
Was only once we got into court that the state
came in and said, oh, well, we don't know what
happened to the jacket. The jacket is lost. And it's
also a little weird that it's the only piece of
evidence that they say is lost. Right, they had all
the other events of the same. They've got the blood swabs,
they got the knives, they've got fingernail clippings, they've got hairs,
but somehow they managed to lose an object as large
(35:09):
as a man's windbreaker jacket. So I'm not going to
vouch for their claim to have lost this jacket. I
think they should still be looking for this jacket.
Speaker 1 (35:19):
DNA testing that was able to be done on the
items from the crime scene has been completed. None of
the results have implicated Hank as the murderer. However, the
courts ruled that even if the DNA testing and results
had been available at the time of trial, it's not
reasonably probable that the jury would have found him not guilty,
meaning the judge who decided the verdict would have reached
(35:39):
the same conclusion. Hank has appealed this to the Texas
Highest Criminal Court. When I met with Hank at the
Polanski death row unit, I asked him.
Speaker 4 (35:59):
Do you wish you were killed that night instead of
winding up here?
Speaker 2 (36:04):
There have been times when I wished that, because, especially
in the first days after this happened and I was
in jail, ce by myself, it would have been so
much better, you know what I mean? And uh, alright,
I just could not believe that they were called. I mean,
(36:24):
the three people I loved most.
Speaker 3 (36:26):
Of this world.
Speaker 2 (36:26):
Her sons were my best friends. We spent all our
time together, and so uh f t to wake up
one morning and there it is all gone, and I,
you know, survivor's guilt.
Speaker 3 (36:43):
I didn't do this.
Speaker 2 (36:44):
There's nothing in the world that could have made me
do it. But I felt so responsible because I was
the king of that castle, and instead of passed out
the drunk on the fucking couch, I should have been
awake and able to do something. H m M.
Speaker 4 (37:18):
Can you envisional life outside of here?
Speaker 3 (37:21):
Sure?
Speaker 4 (37:22):
What does that look like?
Speaker 2 (37:23):
I'm gonna be with saying dream, do.
Speaker 4 (37:25):
You think you'll go to France?
Speaker 2 (37:27):
Absolutely, you're gonna get out of here? Oh yeah, I'm
out of this country. They let me out of here.
I'm so out of here.
Speaker 3 (37:33):
It ain't fund you.
Speaker 4 (37:35):
Do you think you're gonna get out?
Speaker 2 (37:39):
Well, tax is crazy and they've tried to kill me
five times, so I believe that they're very serious about that.
Speaker 3 (37:49):
But I think with the evidence we have now that.
Speaker 2 (37:53):
There's no way they're gonna have to let me go,
and they're gonna have to acknowledge that I'm innocent.
Speaker 3 (37:59):
I don't any other way, you know.
Speaker 2 (38:02):
I think, after all I've suffered that I deserve a chance,
I deserve to be with my wife. I deserve to
have a life. I deserve to be released and get
the hell out of here.
Speaker 3 (38:14):
And I won't out. I'm telling you something, you know.
Speaker 2 (38:19):
It was just so amazing to find love a second time,
and I love her endlessly, man, And I mean, we
are really truly so amazed.
Speaker 1 (38:37):
Hank was facing another execution date in September of twenty
twenty three. At the time of his death, Hank, Sandrine
and his team were still fiercely fighting for his Innocence.
If you'd like to make a donation in Hank's memory,
Sandrine recommends the Texas After Violence Project. More information about
this and about Hank's case can be found at the
(38:59):
link in our bio. Thank you for listening to Wrongful
Conviction with Maggie Freeling. Please support your local innocence organizations
and go to the links in our bio to see
(39:20):
how you can help. I'd like to thank our executive
producers Jason Flamm and Kevin Wurtis, as well as our
senior producer Annie Chelsea, researcher Lila Robinson, story editor Sonya Paul,
with additional production by Jeff Cleiburn and Connor Hall. The
music in this production is by three time OSCAR nominated
composer Jay Ralph. Be sure to follow us on Instagram
(39:42):
at Wrongful Conviction, on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction Podcast, and
on Twitter at Wrongful Conviction, as well as at Lava
for Good. On all three platforms, you can also follow
me on both Instagram and Twitter at Maggie Freeling. Wrongful
Conviction with Maggie Freeling is a production of Lava for
Good Podcasts in association with Signal Company Number one
This is Maggie Freeling. Today we're revisiting an episode from
season one that's very close to my heart. When I
visited Hank Skinner last year at the Polunsky death Row
unit in Livingston, Texas, I was nervous. Hank and I
had been in touch for a few years, but only
through letters. He was not permitted to use phones on
(00:22):
death Row. We once had a tense exchange of letters
when Hank misinterpreted something I said, and it kind of
put me on edge talking to him. So I was
super nervous to go down there. But as soon as
Hank was brought out and sat down, he said to me,
if I knew this is what you looked like, I
would have been more open with you. And then we
(00:43):
were both just at ease. And I think what he
meant was because I look like him with tattoos and
just jeans and a T shirt, that he felt like
I was like him and not just a suit that
was coming in to tell his story and then leave.
So I left that interaction with Hank elated about meeting him,
(01:04):
the trust we had built, and really hopeful for his future. Unfortunately,
that would be the last time I spoke with Hank.
Hank died this past February at the Prison Hospital in Galveston,
with his wife, Sandrine at his side, and in the end,
it wasn't the state that killed him, but complications following
(01:25):
surgery for an aggressive brain tumor. And despite his illness,
Hank staunchly continued to maintain his innocence and to fight
for exoneration with the tireless help and support of Sandrine
and his attorneys. Hank's dedication to the truth and the
face of massive injustice has inspired us all, and so
(01:48):
to honor his memory, we'd like to share his story
with you again. On December thirty first, nineteen ninety three,
thirty one year old Hank Skinner was pregaming for a
New Year's Eve party. He was with his girlfriend of
seven months, forty one year old Twila Busby, and her
(02:10):
two adult children, Scooter and Randy. Hank passed out before
ten PM from a potent combination of vodka, codine, and xanax.
Despite his condition, Twyla left for the party without him.
When she returned, she was strangled and bludgeoned to death.
Her two sons were stabbed to death. Hank was the
(02:31):
sole survivor and was instantly the prime suspect, despite evidence
that Hank was incapable of committing these murders and that
another more probable person of interest exists. Hank has spent
nearly thirty years on Texas death row awaiting execution.
Speaker 2 (02:49):
And they've tried to kill me five times, so I
believe that they were serious about that.
Speaker 3 (02:57):
But I think with the evidence.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
We have now that there's no way they're going to
have to let me go, and they're going to have
to acknowledge that I'm innocent. I don't see any other way.
Speaker 1 (03:11):
From LoVa for good. This is rumful conviction with Maggie
Freeling today. Hank Skinner. Hank Skinner was born on April fourth,
(03:32):
nineteen sixty two. He's the oldest of four kids.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
I'm from Virginia, Okay.
Speaker 2 (03:38):
I was born in the foothills of the Blue Ridge
Mountains in Franklin County, Virginia, which is the moonshine capital
of the United States.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
His dad was part of the local industry. He was
a foreign car mechanic as well as a moonshiner.
Speaker 3 (03:52):
See.
Speaker 2 (03:52):
He had three eight hundred gallons steam steels and fired
on butane.
Speaker 3 (03:57):
He made the best sugar looker you've ever drank, and
see moonshine.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
If it's made correctly, it's a lot better than store
bought wicker And so my dad's stuff burned clear, and
I mean it was.
Speaker 3 (04:10):
About one hundred and forty proof.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
You can just get a four ounce glass to do
ice cubes and sip.
Speaker 3 (04:15):
On it off.
Speaker 4 (04:16):
So did you just grew up drinking moonshine?
Speaker 3 (04:18):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (04:18):
Sure.
Speaker 4 (04:19):
When was the first time you drank it?
Speaker 3 (04:21):
Six years old? I stole it from my dad.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
Growing up, Hank felt like he had the best parents
in the world. He takes pride that he was named
after his dad.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
I'm actually a junior, but when my dad passed, I
took his name and so now I'm just Henry Skinner
Hank Skinner.
Speaker 3 (04:42):
Hank is a nickname for Henry.
Speaker 2 (04:44):
He loved Hank Williams Senior, and I love Hank Williams
Junior and Hank the third.
Speaker 4 (04:50):
I love them all.
Speaker 3 (04:51):
Yeah, out the same way.
Speaker 1 (04:53):
Hank learned a lot from his dad.
Speaker 2 (04:55):
Like my dad, he taught me how to slaughter hogs
and slaughter cattle.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
Worked for his dad too young. Hank was a skilled
laborer and free spirit.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
We were just a bunch of wild, rambunctious kids having
a good time. We had field cake parties and cow pastors.
There was bikers up there everywhere. That's who I grew
up with.
Speaker 1 (05:17):
But Hank also had a soft spot for the female
role models in his life. Like his mom and grandma,
Hank grew up learning a lot from them, including how
to respect women.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
If you want to find out anything in life that
really means something, find out from a woman. They know
how to do everything, and so I can sew, I
can alter clothes. I used to make dresses for my
little sister on my mama's sewing machine. I made quilts.
I know how to do everything. I know how to
can vegetables, you know, out of the garden. We used
(05:50):
to do this every year. Where the women aren't the shit.
That's all there is to it, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1 (05:58):
Hank also learned a lot about women after he married
quite young.
Speaker 2 (06:03):
I was nineteen, My wife was sixteen, and we had
just gotten married because she was already pregnant. I had
a daughter, Natalie Joe. I was so in love with
her when.
Speaker 3 (06:14):
She was born.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
Natalie Joe was the light of Hank's life, but Hank's
marriage to Natalie, Joe's mother was another story. He and
his wife struggled to get along. According to Hank, she
had substance abuse issues.
Speaker 2 (06:27):
She was strung out on cocaine. Well, he had a
big argument to fight going on all the time.
Speaker 3 (06:33):
And so my daughter stayed with her mother.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
That was the only thing that was acceptable to her.
My mama wanted her, but she wouldn't let my mama
have her. And so my wife was doing crazy things
when we divorce.
Speaker 3 (06:49):
So I just said, fuck this, I'm done. I left
and I went first to Georgia.
Speaker 1 (06:55):
There in Georgia, Hank worked at a casino who's high
earning customers were key or two by women.
Speaker 2 (07:01):
And these are gamblers and they're high rollers, and so
they want woman on their arm.
Speaker 1 (07:06):
You know, Hank took it upon himself to look out
for these.
Speaker 2 (07:09):
Women if they get two hands yet, like you know,
I'm the guy who steps in and tells them now, no, no,
you know it can't.
Speaker 3 (07:16):
Be doing that.
Speaker 2 (07:18):
And so have you ever seen that movie Roadhouse with
Patrick Swayze, Because that's what I did.
Speaker 3 (07:23):
I was a cooler just like he was.
Speaker 2 (07:25):
In that movie, but not in a bar in the
gambling establishment, And so I lived in an old, old
ramshackle rooming house that had three stories and had big
stucco porch on the top.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
And so I could sit up there and drink beer
and smoke weed.
Speaker 2 (07:40):
And watch all the cars go by and holler at
the girls.
Speaker 3 (07:43):
I was the rooster of the hymn house.
Speaker 1 (07:45):
I had it off in his mind. Hank was living
the life.
Speaker 4 (07:49):
So how'd you wind up in Texas?
Speaker 2 (07:51):
So when I came out here, I came out here
because I wanted to break out in the oil field,
because I heard about the oil field.
Speaker 3 (07:58):
It was a good place to make money. I did.
I made a lot of money out here. I ended
up moving to Papa. That's an old filled town.
Speaker 1 (08:07):
And Pampa Hank found kindred spirits in the lifestyle he enjoyed,
but soon he was charged and convicted for unauthorized use
of a motor vehicle and was on parole. He started
going to AA as part of his parole, and that's
where he met Tila Busby.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
These two guys were picking on her, and so I
dried up her tears and I talked to her and
got her all right.
Speaker 3 (08:30):
She was just they were just drilling.
Speaker 4 (08:34):
I mean the way they were, mister, what were picking
on her for?
Speaker 2 (08:38):
She's a whore, She's a sorry bitch. She drank you know,
she ain't never go sober up.
Speaker 3 (08:43):
It was just horrible.
Speaker 2 (08:45):
So anyway, I ended up giving.
Speaker 3 (08:47):
Her a ride home.
Speaker 1 (08:49):
On the way, Hank asked if she wanted to stop
for a cup of coffee.
Speaker 2 (08:56):
And we sat down and started talking, and it was like,
just like instantly we'd been together for fifty years.
Speaker 3 (09:03):
I mean, she was so easy to talk to.
Speaker 2 (09:06):
And she told me, she said, I have never met
anybody like you in my life. What are you some
kind of magician? And I'm like, why do you say that?
Speaker 3 (09:16):
She said, I don't know. But since I sit.
Speaker 2 (09:18):
Down and you started talking to you, I just started
feeling some kind of way.
Speaker 1 (09:23):
Twila and Hank started spending all their time together.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
Twila and I were soulmates. We could just look at
each other and know what other was thinking and what
to say, you know, And whenever we went to another
people's house, she always said in my loud people said
we were like two high school kids.
Speaker 3 (09:40):
That we were so in love.
Speaker 4 (09:41):
Well, she was a lot older.
Speaker 3 (09:42):
Than you, right, ten years. That's not a lot.
Speaker 1 (09:52):
Twila had two sons, Elwyn, who went by Scooter, was
twenty two and Randy was twenty, and Hank took on
the young menace his own. The three of them had
even worked together in a landscaping business. Hank had a
previous hand injury that left his right dominant hand virtually useless,
so the boys were a big help.
Speaker 2 (10:12):
So I laid out the plans and showed them what
to do and how to do it, and they did
all the manual labor and we made good money.
Speaker 1 (10:21):
Everything was going great for Twila and Hank until seven
months into their relationship New Year's Eve, nineteen ninety three,
when it all came crashing down. This episode is underwritten
(10:45):
by AIG, a leading global insurance company. AIG is committed
to corporate social responsibility and to making a positive difference
in the lives of its employees and in the communities
where they work and live. In light of the compelling
need for pro bono legal assistance, and in recognition of
AIG's commitment to criminal and social justice reform, the AIG
(11:07):
pro Bono Program provides free legal services and other support
to underrepresented communities and individuals. On December thirty first, nineteen
ninety three, Hank, Twila, and Twyla's sons were all at
(11:28):
home preparing for their evening celebration. Although it could be
a dangerous combination. Hank took some xanax and drank the
better part of a fifth of vodka, and then he
accidentally started sipping Twila's drink, not realizing that she had
spiked it with codeine.
Speaker 2 (11:45):
That in class looked the same as mine, and I
grabbed it and drank from it, and I had no.
Speaker 3 (11:53):
Idea what was in.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
Hank wound up passing out that night from the combination
of substances. He also says he's allergic to codeine.
Speaker 2 (12:02):
It makes me sick. It gives me a vertigo. I
can't stand up, it makes me very lethargic. I lose
my balance, I can't talk well. It feels like my
throat is constricting, like my wounds are full of cotton.
Speaker 3 (12:18):
I can't get a deep breath.
Speaker 4 (12:20):
Do you remember feeling any of that? Were you already
really drunk?
Speaker 2 (12:22):
I remember feeling all of that before I passed out.
Speaker 1 (12:27):
Around ten fifteen PM, Hank and Twila's friend, Howard Mitchell,
came to pick them up to drive them to attend
his New Year's Eve party. When Howard arrived, he found
Hank in a practically comatose steam. He tried to rouse
his friend but got no reaction. According to Howard, Hank
was out cold, so he and Twila left for the
party without Hank.
Speaker 4 (12:50):
So but nobody called nine one one to make sure
you're okay.
Speaker 2 (12:54):
We're all a bunch of partiers. Everybody passes out. How
many times a year been no party? And that's three
or four? Motherfucker land. I learned the corners, and I've
been passed out before.
Speaker 3 (13:04):
But not like that.
Speaker 1 (13:11):
At the party, Twyla encountered her uncle, Robert Dennell. He
was incredibly drunk, following Twila around and making sexual advances.
They had previously had a sexual relationship, although Twila's consent
to the relationship was questionable. She had allegedly told people
her uncle had raped her more than once. Twila got
uncomfortable and Howard took her home. They arrived back sometime
(13:35):
between eleven and eleven fifteen. After that, what happened is
not totally clear, but here's how Hank remembers it. Sometime
that night, Hank says he was shaken awake by Scooter.
Speaker 3 (13:50):
When I first woke up, I couldn't. I couldn't. I
couldn't see where the fuck I was at. I couldn't.
I don't know it's his hort.
Speaker 2 (13:59):
I couldn't think in words, and I'm seeing blood all
over the walls, but I didn't recognize it as what.
I'm thinking, What in the fuck that people slinging all
over this living room? And so he got me up
and he gave me my pants and he told me
put them on.
Speaker 3 (14:16):
We got to get the fuck out of here.
Speaker 4 (14:18):
And he was already interested.
Speaker 3 (14:19):
Yes, And I didn't know that.
Speaker 1 (14:21):
Scooter had been stabbed in the chest and stomach area,
but he was still managing to move around and was
trying to save both of their lives.
Speaker 3 (14:30):
He said, we got to get out of your hank.
Speaker 2 (14:32):
They're coming back, and I'm thinking, who's coming back? What
the fuck are you talking about?
Speaker 4 (14:37):
You remember him saying they were coming back?
Speaker 3 (14:39):
Yes, yes, and he.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
Was saying it in a high screamed voice. That's one
of the things I remember.
Speaker 1 (14:46):
Scooter was a big guy, six foot six and about
two hundred and twenty five pounds, and despite his injuries,
he was able to lift hank up and help him out.
Speaker 4 (14:57):
Was anything registering at this point.
Speaker 2 (15:02):
Now feeling whatever has happened is bad.
Speaker 3 (15:06):
This is bad. We have got to get the fluck
out of here.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
But I wasn't thinking any words.
Speaker 3 (15:11):
I was just thinking any emotions.
Speaker 1 (15:17):
Still unsteading on his feet, Hank started looking around.
Speaker 2 (15:20):
But when I did, I lost my balance and fell
face forward on the floor. And so I remember looking
across the floor, got up on my elbows trying to
get up, and I couldn't do it. And I remember
looking across the floor and I could see my girlfriend,
and all I could see was a mass of her
hair and a blood black tinting the edges of everything,
(15:44):
and everything was looking alternately red and green, but her
face was gone.
Speaker 1 (15:52):
Twila had been strangled and bludging to death. Someone had
hit her fourteen times in the head with the handle
of a pickaxe. When she was found, her pants were
unzipped and her shirt was lifted up. As Hank was
still trying to absorb everything, Scooter was pulling him to
go check on his younger brother, Randy.
Speaker 2 (16:12):
And so we get in the bedroom and he leans
me against the dresser so we can see about his brother.
And I couldn't even stand up, even holding on with
the dresser, and I fell in the floor.
Speaker 3 (16:22):
And this is something I remember. I don't remember falling.
Speaker 2 (16:25):
I don't remember trying to get up, but I remember
looking up at him, and he's looking at his brother,
and he's got this horribly sad expression on his face,
and so I know he's dead.
Speaker 1 (16:40):
Randy had been stabbed in the heart through his back
while he was asleep. He had died on the top
level of the bunk bed he shared with Scooter.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
That's when I realized my hand was cut. And I
didn't know how it had gotten cut, but I had
a vague memory of somebody standing over top of me
with a knife and I threw my hands up and
they cut my hand.
Speaker 3 (17:03):
And it was burning. And so.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
I didn't know if that really happened to her, if
I was just dreaming it.
Speaker 1 (17:12):
Hank wasn't dreaming that his hand was cut. That was real.
He and Scooter moved through the house trying to escape,
but they were bleeding everywhere, and.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
So we got out in the backyard and we went
through the gate, and I didn't know where we were going,
but we had to get the fuck out of there.
That's all I knew, and so I fell in the
alley and he told me, Hank, I can't keep picking
you up. And I said, don't worry about me, just
go go get help, Go get help. And so I
(17:41):
remember seeing him walk off towards the street light through
the alley.
Speaker 1 (17:52):
Hank passed out again, so he didn't know that Scooter
had made it to the neighbor's porch, where he finally
succumbed to his wounds and collapsed. A neighbor found Scooter
and called nine one one, and he was immediately brought
to the hospital. There at twelve forty five am, Scooter died.
(18:12):
When the police showed up and found out where Scooter lived,
they immediately went to the house. When they arrived, they
found a massacre. There was a trail of blood from
the fence to the front porch. The front storm door
was smeared with blood. Once inside, police found multiple bloody
handprints on doors and doorknobs in the bedroom, kitchen, utility room,
(18:35):
and on the door leading out to the backyard, along
with bloody handprints and blood smeared throughout the house. Police
also found a black plastic trash bag containing a wet,
brown stained towel and a knife. They found the bloody
pickaxe handle used to bludge in Twila, as well as
a knife that was on the porch. They also found
(18:56):
a man's windbreaker, and of course, the bodies of Twila
and Randy. Almost immediately the police started looking for Hank
the living boyfriend. They found him at Andrea Joyce Reid's house,
where Hank had gone for help after he came to consciousness.
Andrea was a neighbor and she was also Hank's ex girlfriend.
(19:18):
Hank became the prime suspect.
Speaker 5 (19:21):
The reason he was accused of the crime, I think
is because in fact, he was the only survivor from
the scene, which was both very lucky because the assailant
didn't kill Hank, but it's also very unlucky because it
meant all the fingers were immediately pointed at him.
Speaker 1 (19:37):
This is Rob Owen.
Speaker 5 (19:38):
I'm a lawyer. I live in Chicago. For many years
I practiced in Texas doing mostly death penalty cases, and
during that time was when I became one of the
members of Hank Skinner's defense team. The police assumed that
this was an open and shot case. They assumed that
he had to be the killer he had some of
the blood of Twila Busby and the other victims on
(19:59):
his clothing, for example.
Speaker 1 (20:01):
And Hank says the blood very likely came from touching
Twila to see if she was okay.
Speaker 5 (20:06):
I think that was all. It was very easy for
the cops to assume that they had the right guy.
Speaker 1 (20:13):
Hank was taken to the police station and booked, but
he was still so messed up from the alcohol and
codine that he couldn't even stand on his own while
his photograph was taken. The police had to hold him up.
He was eventually taken to the hospital. Hank's cut hand
was treated and he voluntarily gave blood samples. Results of
those samples were used to calculate Hank's blood alcohol levels
(20:34):
at the approximate time of the murders. They showed that
at the time, Hank's blood alcohol content was almost three
times the drunk driving standard and his coding level was
two and a half times the recommended dose. And so
this is Hank's alibi.
Speaker 5 (20:51):
Hank couldn't have committed this murder or these murders because
he was simply physically incapable at the time of carrying
them out.
Speaker 1 (20:59):
Remember or Hank was virtually comatose when Howard came to
pick him up for the party, and Twila came home
from that party only about an hour later. Hank couldn't
have possibly sobered up by the time the murders transpired.
Speaker 5 (21:12):
Hank could only have been able to sort of at
most stand and stagger like That would have been about
the sum of his physical ability based on the volume
of alcohol and codeine in his bloodstream.
Speaker 1 (21:30):
Police searched the house for ten days without a warrant,
but they failed to collect key evidence, including non bloody
finger and handprints. Vaginal swabs were taken from Twila, and
despite one detective urging him to do so, Gary Stallings,
the criminalist who was leading the forensics team, did not
believe Twila was raped and did not have the swabs tested.
(21:52):
None of the evidence directly linked Hank to the crime. Yes,
his bloody handprints were there, but he also lived in
the house and says he was attacked. There was also
DNA and at least one handprint that was not Hank's, Twila's,
scooters or Randy's, But despite all of that, Hank was
prosecuted for the murders. His trial began a little Over
(22:13):
a year later, in March nineteen ninety five, he faced
the death penalty. District Attorney John Mann was the prosecutor
in the case. At trial, Man arrested his argument on
two key testimonies, that of state witnesses Howard Mitchell and
(22:37):
Andrea Joyce Reid. No actual forensics linking Hank to the
crime were presented at trial. In fact, Stalling's the criminalist,
conceded that just because the evidence proved Hank was there
at the house does not identify him as the murderer.
Howard Mitchell testified for the state and said that Hank
was completely comatose when he arrived to take them to
(22:57):
his party. But he also said that when Ryla's uncle,
Robert Dennell was harassing her at his house, Howard took
her home and that they shared a friendly kiss on
the porch. Man used Howard's testimony to argue that Hank
killed Twila, Scooter and Randy in a jealous rage. Andrea
Joyce Reid, Hank's sex girlfriend and neighbor, also testified, but.
Speaker 5 (23:19):
She came in and said, well, when he got to
my house on the night of the crime, he was
behaving in ways that didn't seem that messed up. He
was obviously intoxicated, but he was able to walk into
the house under his own steam. He was able to
take off his shirt. He was able to stitch up
the severe cut that he had sustained on one hand
(23:41):
using thread and needles that Andrea Reid provided him.
Speaker 1 (23:45):
Her testimony was a blow for the defense. Harold Comer,
who happened to be a former prosecutor, was Hank's court
appointed defense attorney. Comer argued that Hank survived the attacks
because the perpetrator didn't perceive him as a threat in
his condition. Also argued that Hank's pre existing injury had
left his right hand with nerve and tissue damage. He
(24:05):
did not have the strength to carry out these brutal murders.
William T. Lowry, a forensic toxicologist for the defense, also
said that it was quote highly improbable that Hank could
have committed the murders based on how intoxicated he was.
In a later afi David, he added to his argument.
He said, quote, mister Skinner at best would have been
(24:26):
in a stuporous state, barely able to stand without assistance,
and completely without the physical coordination or mental acuity required
to commit these murders by strangulation, beating, and stabbing end quote.
According to doctor Lowry, Hank was likely exerting whatever strength
and energy he had just to stand up and walk.
(24:48):
Based on Hank's bloody handprints around the walls of the
house and his inability to stand for a photo at
the police station, this was likely the case. Hank's defense
attorney also presented Twyla's called Robert Dannell as an alternate suspect,
but he failed to make a strong case of reasonable
doubt for Hank, and on March eighteenth, nineteen ninety five,
(25:09):
the jury deliberated for only two and a half hours
before finding Hank guilty. Five days later, they handed him
a death sentence.
Speaker 2 (25:18):
And I just can't believe they're done this to me
because I'm innocent, and they know they knew I was
innocent before they arrested me.
Speaker 6 (25:44):
The fact that a country in the Western world still
executed citizens is beyond shocking.
Speaker 1 (25:51):
This is sindury a George Skinner.
Speaker 6 (25:54):
I am French, spending half my time in Texas and
half most time in France.
Speaker 1 (26:00):
And Hank have been married since two thousand and eight,
and Hank is anxious to get out of prisons. They
can be together because of the pandemic. They hadn't seen
or heard each other for almost three years until recently.
So for three years, you guys have just been writing letters.
Speaker 6 (26:16):
Yeah, that's correct.
Speaker 1 (26:19):
How did you hear about Hank? And you know you're
in France? What interested you? And somebody in Houston, Texas?
Speaker 2 (26:28):
Well.
Speaker 6 (26:29):
I had a friend in France who was a young
lawyer and he wrote his thesis on the death penalty
in Texas and he sent me a copy. I read
it and I just had off my chair. I couldn't
believe that the legal system in the US was so
poor and so flawed. And he told me at the
time about an organization that was set up and run
(26:50):
by the death row prisoners in Texas and they had
a sort of a trimestral newsletter. And he said, you know,
if you want to translate it in French, could distribute
in France and get people, you know, a bit more
aware about what's going on there. And so I did
a couple of times, and he said, well, she want
to correspond with people there. I'm thinking of three guys
(27:11):
I'm sure you'll get along with and Hank was one
of those three guys. That's how we started writing in
nineteen ninety.
Speaker 1 (27:17):
Six saintdrins As. They corresponded for about four years before
she went to visit Hank on death Row, a place
where prisoners are confined in cells alone and do everything alone.
When she met Hank on death Row, that's when she
felt he was more than just a pen pal.
Speaker 6 (27:35):
And you know, he's very smart, he's very funny, he's
very strong, as you can imagine with what he's been through.
And we just clicked instantly, even at a distance and
in writing, and we clicked even more when we.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
Met in what ways? I mean you might think, you know,
you'd see our worlds apart literally, I mean you're we
are a woman in France and he's a man on
death row.
Speaker 6 (28:02):
Totally different culture, different background. Well yeah, you know, kindred spirits,
I guess, no, no borders.
Speaker 1 (28:09):
So you guys have never been able to be intimate
in any kind of way. You've never even touched his hand?
Speaker 6 (28:14):
No, never?
Speaker 1 (28:15):
What is that like?
Speaker 6 (28:16):
It's well, I'm not a masochist, but honestly, it is
a torture. It is a torture. It really is a torture.
Because you look sometimes, you know, when you even with
your friends. I mean, I don't know here in the US,
but in front, we are very felly, touchy, We need
to be close. We kiss, we hug, so you know
someone's sent their skin, you know, you know a lot
(28:40):
of things. So basically our sensorial memories of each other's
are the sound of our voices and our eyes and
the look in our eyes. And not knowing his skin,
not being able to comfort him is very, very hard.
Speaker 1 (29:02):
Through the years, Sandrine has flown back and forth between
France and Houston to visit Hank on death row. Although
she was not originally involved in Hank's innocence claim, Sandrine
eventually became convinced of his innocence.
Speaker 6 (29:14):
And I read tons and tons of paperwork, and to
me it was obvious, I mean physically, scientifically, for a
number of reasons, it was very clear that he was innocent.
Speaker 1 (29:27):
And indeed, the one key witness that Hank's fate rested on,
Andrea Jorce Reid, recanted her statement. Here's Robowen again.
Speaker 5 (29:35):
After Hank was convicted and sent to death row, Andrea
Reid contacted Hank's lawyers and said that testimony wasn't true.
I was really afraid because I thought I was likely
to be accused of being some sort of accomplice or
having assisted Hank in some way that would put me
into legal jeopardy. She was at the time trying to
gain custody of a child, and she thought that that
(29:57):
would certainly be unlikely if the authorities were angry at
her or believed she had some role in this crime.
So she essentially went to trial and exaggerated systemically and
repeatedly the things that Hank was able to do. What
she said in her recantation was in fact, Hank was
(30:17):
not able to get into the house on his own.
She had to go outside basically drag him up the
steps and into the house.
Speaker 1 (30:24):
But when she recanted, Prosecutor Man was not pleased.
Speaker 5 (30:28):
John Mann dragged Andrea Reid before a grand jury after
she gave her affidavit recanting her trial testimony, and threatened
to prosecute her for perjury if she persisted, And to
her great credit, she did not back away from the recantation,
and she said, I don't want false testimony on my conscience,
(30:49):
and so I'm going to stick now telling the truth
now about what the consequences for me personally are But
I think that says a lot about mister Mann that
he was willing to threaten to prosecute her in order
to keep her truth from coming out.
Speaker 1 (31:02):
Hank filed multiple appeals, one based on Andrew's recantation, but
clearly none were sufficient for the court to free him.
He was only met with execution dates. Sandrina and Hank
kept up their relationship for nearly fifteen years before Hank
got another execution date in March twenty ten. This time
it was serious. He was transferred to one of the
(31:24):
cells near the death chamber in Huntsville, Texas.
Speaker 2 (31:30):
They killed my first rand March the second, they killed
my second.
Speaker 3 (31:33):
Frand March the eleven.
Speaker 2 (31:34):
They were going to kill me March twenty four or
thirteen days later. Is that?
Speaker 4 (31:39):
What is that like? When you when you know you're
going to die.
Speaker 2 (31:44):
It's indescribable. The last seven days you don't sleep at all.
You're hyper vigilant. Your mind starts unrolling all of the
things you've done in your life that you wish you
hadn't done, the things you could have done better. I'm
sitting there looking at that gurney that they're fixing to
(32:06):
put me on. I could see it through the door.
They had the door open. I could see the microphone,
I could see the straps, arm boards, and I was
absolutely convinced I.
Speaker 3 (32:16):
Was fixing a die.
Speaker 2 (32:18):
I just knew that I was gonna die because the
courtsey just give me the short shrift. Every time we
had files, I was like, fuck you the fuck you died, ie,
And so.
Speaker 3 (32:30):
I felt like that was it.
Speaker 4 (32:33):
Did you get a last meal?
Speaker 3 (32:34):
Yes? I did?
Speaker 4 (32:35):
What was it?
Speaker 2 (32:36):
Popeye's fried chicken, a cheese burrow, a double cheeseburger with
onions and tomatoes, no lettuce, and uh chocolate pudding, chocolate cake,
and a chocolate milkshake.
Speaker 3 (32:53):
And I ate every bit of it.
Speaker 1 (33:01):
Fortunately, Hank's execution was stayed by the US Supreme Court
less than an hour before he was set to be killed. Today,
Hank spends his time as a jailhouse attorney, helping other
prisoners with the law and their cases. And although he's
in solitary on death row, incarcerated people do have a
right to provide legal help to one another, so that's
(33:22):
really his only social interactions. Hank has maintained his innocence
for nearly thirty years. To this day, he believes he
was framed by Twyla's uncle, Bob Donell, and at one
of Hank's later hearings, Denell's longtime neighbor, Deborah Ellis, testified
that she saw Denell in his yard a few days
(33:44):
after the murders took place. He was giving a frenzied
cleaning to his old beat up pickup truck, taking out
the seeds, throwing away the carpet, and scrubbing the floorboards
with an astringent cleaner. Ellis found his behavior strange because
Robert reportedly rarely cleaned his truck. Hank's theory is that
(34:05):
after Twyla left the party with Howard, Denell followed them home.
When Howard Mitchell testified at trial, he said that when
he returned to the party, Denell was gone. Hank thinks
he left to confront Twila at home, and when he
saw Hank passed out, he left him as the sole survivor,
knowing how that would look. And if you remember, there
was a men's windbreaker jacket that was taken as evidence,
(34:28):
however it was never tested.
Speaker 5 (34:30):
Clearly has potential evidentiary value. It's got blood spatter on
the sleeves, it's got sweatstains on the collar, it's got
hairs on the interior lining.
Speaker 1 (34:42):
Over the years, Rob and Hank's team have tried to
test all the evidence they could, but it.
Speaker 5 (34:47):
Was only once we got into court that the state
came in and said, oh, well, we don't know what
happened to the jacket. The jacket is lost. And it's
also a little weird that it's the only piece of
evidence that they say is lost. Right, they had all
the other events of the same. They've got the blood swabs,
they got the knives, they've got fingernail clippings, they've got hairs,
but somehow they managed to lose an object as large
(35:09):
as a man's windbreaker jacket. So I'm not going to
vouch for their claim to have lost this jacket. I
think they should still be looking for this jacket.
Speaker 1 (35:19):
DNA testing that was able to be done on the
items from the crime scene has been completed. None of
the results have implicated Hank as the murderer. However, the
courts ruled that even if the DNA testing and results
had been available at the time of trial, it's not
reasonably probable that the jury would have found him not guilty,
meaning the judge who decided the verdict would have reached
(35:39):
the same conclusion. Hank has appealed this to the Texas
Highest Criminal Court. When I met with Hank at the
Polanski death row unit, I asked him.
Speaker 4 (35:59):
Do you wish you were killed that night instead of
winding up here?
Speaker 2 (36:04):
There have been times when I wished that, because, especially
in the first days after this happened and I was
in jail, ce by myself, it would have been so
much better, you know what I mean? And uh, alright,
I just could not believe that they were called. I mean,
(36:24):
the three people I loved most.
Speaker 3 (36:26):
Of this world.
Speaker 2 (36:26):
Her sons were my best friends. We spent all our
time together, and so uh f t to wake up
one morning and there it is all gone, and I,
you know, survivor's guilt.
Speaker 3 (36:43):
I didn't do this.
Speaker 2 (36:44):
There's nothing in the world that could have made me
do it. But I felt so responsible because I was
the king of that castle, and instead of passed out
the drunk on the fucking couch, I should have been
awake and able to do something. H m M.
Speaker 4 (37:18):
Can you envisional life outside of here?
Speaker 3 (37:21):
Sure?
Speaker 4 (37:22):
What does that look like?
Speaker 2 (37:23):
I'm gonna be with saying dream, do.
Speaker 4 (37:25):
You think you'll go to France?
Speaker 2 (37:27):
Absolutely, you're gonna get out of here? Oh yeah, I'm
out of this country. They let me out of here.
I'm so out of here.
Speaker 3 (37:33):
It ain't fund you.
Speaker 4 (37:35):
Do you think you're gonna get out?
Speaker 2 (37:39):
Well, tax is crazy and they've tried to kill me
five times, so I believe that they're very serious about that.
Speaker 3 (37:49):
But I think with the evidence we have now that.
Speaker 2 (37:53):
There's no way they're gonna have to let me go,
and they're gonna have to acknowledge that I'm innocent.
Speaker 3 (37:59):
I don't any other way, you know.
Speaker 2 (38:02):
I think, after all I've suffered that I deserve a chance,
I deserve to be with my wife. I deserve to
have a life. I deserve to be released and get
the hell out of here.
Speaker 3 (38:14):
And I won't out. I'm telling you something, you know.
Speaker 2 (38:19):
It was just so amazing to find love a second time,
and I love her endlessly, man, And I mean, we
are really truly so amazed.
Speaker 1 (38:37):
Hank was facing another execution date in September of twenty
twenty three. At the time of his death, Hank, Sandrine
and his team were still fiercely fighting for his Innocence.
If you'd like to make a donation in Hank's memory,
Sandrine recommends the Texas After Violence Project. More information about
this and about Hank's case can be found at the
(38:59):
link in our bio. Thank you for listening to Wrongful
Conviction with Maggie Freeling. Please support your local innocence organizations
and go to the links in our bio to see
(39:20):
how you can help. I'd like to thank our executive
producers Jason Flamm and Kevin Wurtis, as well as our
senior producer Annie Chelsea, researcher Lila Robinson, story editor Sonya Paul,
with additional production by Jeff Cleiburn and Connor Hall. The
music in this production is by three time OSCAR nominated
composer Jay Ralph. Be sure to follow us on Instagram
(39:42):
at Wrongful Conviction, on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction Podcast, and
on Twitter at Wrongful Conviction, as well as at Lava
for Good. On all three platforms, you can also follow
me on both Instagram and Twitter at Maggie Freeling. Wrongful
Conviction with Maggie Freeling is a production of Lava for
Good Podcasts in association with Signal Company Number one
Hosts And Creators
Lauren Bright Pacheco
Maggie Freleng
Jason Flom
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