and it was haunting the hell out of him. Williamson also screamed for his mother to forgive him.
I N D ECEMBER , one year after the murder, Glen Gore was asked to stop by the police station and give a statement. He denied any involvement in the death of Debbie Carter. He said he’d seen her at the Coachlight a few hours before she was killed, and added the new wrinkle that she had asked him to dance with her because Ron Williamson was making her uncomfortable. The fact that no one else at the Coachlight reported seeing Ron there was apparently insignificant.
But as anxious as the cops were to paste togethera case against him, the evidence was simply too scant. There was not a single fingerprint lifted from the Carter apartment that matched either Ron or Dennis Fritz, a gaping hole in the theory that the two were there during the prolonged and violent attack. There were no eyewitnesses; no one heard a sound that night. The hair analysis, always shaky at best, was still bottlenecked in Melvin Hett’s office at the OSBI.
The case against Ron consisted of two “inconclusive” polygraph exams, a bad reputation, a residence not far from that of the victim’s, and the delayed, half-baked eyewitness identification of Glen Gore.
The case against Dennis Fritz was even weaker. One year after the murder, the only tangible result of the investigation had been the firing of a ninth-grade science teacher.
I N J ANUARY 1984, Ron pleaded guilty to the forgery charge and was sentenced to three years in prison. He was transported to a correctional center near Tulsa, and it wasn’t long before his odd behavior attracted the attention of the staff. He was transferred to an intermediate mental health unit for observation. Dr. Robert Briody interviewed him on the morning of February 13 and noted: “He is usually subdued and appears in control of his actions.” But during an interview that afternoon, Dr. Briody saw a different person. Ron was “hypomanic, loud, irritable, easily excited, has loose associations, flight of ideas, irrational thoughts, and some paranoid ideation.” Further evaluation was suggested.
Security was not tight at the intermediate unit. Ron found a baseball field nearby and enjoyed sneaking overat night for the solitude. A policeman found him once, napping on the field, and escorted him back to the unit. The staff slapped his wrist and made him write a report. It reads:
I was feeling down the other nite and needed some time to think things out. I’ve always felt peaceful on a ballfield. I strolled out to the ballfield’s southeast corner and kind of like an old blue-tick hound I curled up under the shade tree. A few minutes later a police officer asked me to go back to the CTC Building. I met Brents halfway up the field and we walked in the front door together. He said that, after seeing I wasn’t up to no good, that he’d forget it. However, as this letter attests, I’ve been given a write-up.
W ITH THE prime suspect behind bars, the investigation into the murder of Debbie Carter came to a virtual halt. Weeks passed with little activity. Dennis Fritz worked for a short time in a nursing home, then a factory. The Ada police harassed him occasionally but eventually lost interest. Glen Gore was still in town but of little interest to the cops.
The police were frustrated, tensions were high, and the pressure was about to increase dramatically.
In April 1984, another young woman was murdered in Ada, and though her death was unrelated to Debbie Carter’s, it would eventually have a profound impact on the lives of Ron Williamson and Dennis Fritz.
D ENICE H ARAWAY was a twenty-four-year-old student at East Central who worked part-time at McAnally’s convenience store on the eastern edge of Ada. She had been married for eight months to Steve Haraway, also a student at East Central and the son of a prominent dentist in town. The newlyweds lived in a small apartment owned by Dr. Haraway and were working their
I N D ECEMBER , one year after the murder, Glen Gore was asked to stop by the police station and give a statement. He denied any involvement in the death of Debbie Carter. He said he’d seen her at the Coachlight a few hours before she was killed, and added the new wrinkle that she had asked him to dance with her because Ron Williamson was making her uncomfortable. The fact that no one else at the Coachlight reported seeing Ron there was apparently insignificant.
But as anxious as the cops were to paste togethera case against him, the evidence was simply too scant. There was not a single fingerprint lifted from the Carter apartment that matched either Ron or Dennis Fritz, a gaping hole in the theory that the two were there during the prolonged and violent attack. There were no eyewitnesses; no one heard a sound that night. The hair analysis, always shaky at best, was still bottlenecked in Melvin Hett’s office at the OSBI.
The case against Ron consisted of two “inconclusive” polygraph exams, a bad reputation, a residence not far from that of the victim’s, and the delayed, half-baked eyewitness identification of Glen Gore.
The case against Dennis Fritz was even weaker. One year after the murder, the only tangible result of the investigation had been the firing of a ninth-grade science teacher.
I N J ANUARY 1984, Ron pleaded guilty to the forgery charge and was sentenced to three years in prison. He was transported to a correctional center near Tulsa, and it wasn’t long before his odd behavior attracted the attention of the staff. He was transferred to an intermediate mental health unit for observation. Dr. Robert Briody interviewed him on the morning of February 13 and noted: “He is usually subdued and appears in control of his actions.” But during an interview that afternoon, Dr. Briody saw a different person. Ron was “hypomanic, loud, irritable, easily excited, has loose associations, flight of ideas, irrational thoughts, and some paranoid ideation.” Further evaluation was suggested.
Security was not tight at the intermediate unit. Ron found a baseball field nearby and enjoyed sneaking overat night for the solitude. A policeman found him once, napping on the field, and escorted him back to the unit. The staff slapped his wrist and made him write a report. It reads:
I was feeling down the other nite and needed some time to think things out. I’ve always felt peaceful on a ballfield. I strolled out to the ballfield’s southeast corner and kind of like an old blue-tick hound I curled up under the shade tree. A few minutes later a police officer asked me to go back to the CTC Building. I met Brents halfway up the field and we walked in the front door together. He said that, after seeing I wasn’t up to no good, that he’d forget it. However, as this letter attests, I’ve been given a write-up.
W ITH THE prime suspect behind bars, the investigation into the murder of Debbie Carter came to a virtual halt. Weeks passed with little activity. Dennis Fritz worked for a short time in a nursing home, then a factory. The Ada police harassed him occasionally but eventually lost interest. Glen Gore was still in town but of little interest to the cops.
The police were frustrated, tensions were high, and the pressure was about to increase dramatically.
In April 1984, another young woman was murdered in Ada, and though her death was unrelated to Debbie Carter’s, it would eventually have a profound impact on the lives of Ron Williamson and Dennis Fritz.
D ENICE H ARAWAY was a twenty-four-year-old student at East Central who worked part-time at McAnally’s convenience store on the eastern edge of Ada. She had been married for eight months to Steve Haraway, also a student at East Central and the son of a prominent dentist in town. The newlyweds lived in a small apartment owned by Dr. Haraway and were working their
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