The Cadaver King and the Country Dentist

by Radley Balko

  But there was a big problem with Eichelberger’s story. If the only witness to the kidnapping told him the name of the perpetrator just hours after the crime, even before the body had been recovered, it’s baffling why Eichelberger would then arrest every man who had been anywhere near the house that night—but would not arrest Brooks.

  In any event, in his second interview with Ashley, “Uncle Bunky” Williams presented the girl with a second photo lineup he had prepared himself. He used the same photo of Brooks that had been used in the first lineup, but picked five different men for the other photos. Once again, all the others were men Ashley had never met, and all had closely cropped hair. She again picked Brooks. Williams then asked if she knew the name of the man she had just picked. According to Williams, Ashley replied, “Tie Tee. I don’t know his nickname. I just know his first name. He used to come over to my mama’s house and talk to her.” According to Williams, Ashley then confirmed that her sister’s abductor was wearing an earring, and that he had pulled a stocking over Courtney’s head—two details that, again, were first introduced by Williams, not by Ashley.

  Ashley also provided a wealth of new information in the second interview. Nearly all of it was wrong. This time around, for example, she said the attackers left after abducting Courtney, but came back later with potato chips and drinks. They then got out of their car and taunted her with, “Na, na, na, I got your sister!” She also told Williams that Tie Tee “had a bag of money in his hand.”

  At this point, there was little reason to put much stock in anything she had to say about the night her sister was taken. Instead, police and prosecutors again took what they needed and ignored the rest. In its profile of Uncle Bunky that ran the previous June, the Tupelo Daily Journal began: “For generations, Robert Williams has been able to get children to say anything.” That lede would turn out to be far more accurate than the author could have imagined.

  At about the same time Williams interviewed Ashley Smith for the second time, Eichelberger interviewed the man who actually murdered Courtney Smith. Justin Johnson, then thirty-five years old, had dropped out of high school in the ninth grade. He worked at the Bryan Foods meat processing plant in the town of West Point, about thirty miles from Brooksville. When Eichelberger questioned him, Johnson already had a few arrests on his record, at least one for a sex offense. He had been brought in as a suspect in this case because at around the time Courtney Smith was killed, several witnesses had seen his blue and white 1979 Buick Electra parked near the pond where her body was found.

  Johnson really didn’t have an alibi. He said that after work on Saturday, he had gone to a club in Crawford. He left at around twelve thirty a.m., went home, and went to sleep. Though he said witnesses could verify he was at the club, he had left the club alone, had gone home alone, and was alone during the window of time when Courtney Smith would have been abducted and murdered. Eichelberger read Johnson his rights and placed him under arrest. Next came what should have been a significant clue. Eichelberger asked Johnson if he’d ever been arrested. Johnson replied, “Yes, for a similar deal. Attempt rape.” He added that the arrest was “not long ago.”

  Between the sightings of his car, his weak alibi, and his criminal record, there was every reason for Eichelberger to immediately make Justin Johnson the focus of his investigation. But despite the arrest, no one ever showed Ashley Smith a photo lineup that included Justin Johnson. His brief conversation with Eichelberger would be the last he’d have with law enforcement about the murder for nearly twenty years. That’s because by all indications, by the time local law enforcement interviewed Johnson, they were already pretty sure that Levon Brooks was the killer. They just needed Michael West to tell them they were right.

  At around five that evening, West drove to the Noxubee County Jail and took dental molds from twelve people. This is the procedure in which a dentist fills a mouth-shaped tray with plaster, then sinks a patient’s upper or lower teeth into it. The dentist creates a model of the patient’s dentition from the molds. The procedure is commonly used by orthodontists and cosmetic dentists, but it’s also used by forensic odontologists—or forensic dentists.

  The suspects from whom West took molds that night included all the men Eichelberger had arrested to date, plus Sonya Smith and a few others who lived or had been seen near the crime scene and consented to the procedure. That night, West examined the dozen dental molds and compared them to the tissue sample he had cut from Courtney Smith’s arm. It didn’t take him long. The next day, West told county officials that he had “excluded” all twelve people as the source of the bite.

  Among those West excluded was Justin Johnson. West was probably right this time, at least about Johnson’s teeth not matching the marks on Courtney Smith’s wrist. Johnson killed the girl, but his teeth couldn’t have matched the bite marks Hayne noted and West confirmed because contrary to Hayne’s suspicions and West’s assertions, they weren’t human bite marks at all. When Johnson finally confessed to killing Courtney Smith nearly two decades later, he made no mention of biting the girl.

  Michael West has often claimed over the years that for every suspect he implicates with his bite mark testimony, he “exonerates” many more. In the Brooks case, he claimed to have exonerated a dozen people. But by the time West took those dental molds—between about five p.m. and seven p.m. on September 23—Eichelberger no longer suspected any of the people from whom West was taking impressions. By then, by his own testimony, his chief suspect was Levon Brooks. There’s no record of Eichelberger telling West as much, but West frequently consulted with police and prosecutors before performing an analysis.

  If West and his groundbreaking forensics had indeed been valid, if his method was really the scientific marvel that he claimed it was, he should have never concluded that the marks on Smith’s body were human marks. Assuming West was right about that and subsequent forensic analysts were wrong—assuming they were human bites—then West should have implicated Justin Johnson and exonerated Levon Brooks, the man the police would bring to him two days later. Instead, West did just the opposite.

  MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 24

  On Monday night at around nine thirty p.m., Ernest Eichelberger officially placed Levon Brooks under arrest for the murder of Courtney Smith. Investigator Harry Alderson then interrogated Brooks. Alderson asked Brooks when he was last in the town of Brooksville. Brooks responded that he had been there a couple weeks earlier, when he took his sister to the doctor. Alderson next asked Brooks if he was willing to take a lie detector test. Brooks replied, “Sure will. I will be willing to take the test tomorrow.” He then agreed to answer more questions without first talking to a lawyer. Brooks also gave Eichelberger permission to search his home, and his car (a nonoperational Camaro), and have his body examined for any scratches and bruises. He voluntarily provided a hair and blood sample. Crime lab testing would later find several hairs from a black male in Courtney Smith’s bed and on her blanket that didn’t match anyone in her family. They also weren’t a match for Brooks.

  Eichelberger then asked Brooks if he had ever been arrested in another state. Brooks replied that he had—in Alabama for “grand larceny.” Brooks not only volunteered that information, he overstated his crime. In April 1981 Brooks was convicted of second-degree theft in Pickens County, Alabama. He pleaded guilty and was sentenced to three years, two of which were suspended. In September of the same year he was convicted in Noxubee County of “burglary, accessory after the fact,” for helping a friend hide some cash and merchandise that the friend had stolen from a gas station. For that, Brooks was sentenced to two years behind bars. Those were mistakes of youth, committed in his early twenties. He had been clean ever since. Now thirty-one, Brooks had a steady job. He had no ensuing arrests at all, much less for violent crimes, sex crimes, or crimes against children. But Eichelberger and Alderson had pegged him for this murder. They processed the arrest, then drove Brooks two hours to Michael West’s office in Hattiesburg to make dental molds
of his teeth.

  TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 25

  Sometime early to mid-morning on Tuesday, Michael West called law enforcement officials in Noxubee County with the results of his analysis: in his opinion, Levon Brooks was the only person on earth who could have made the (alleged) bite marks on Courtney Smith’s wrist. A few weeks later, in a three-paragraph letter to Alderson dated October 18, West made it official. In the second paragraph under the heading “Opinion,” West wrote, “The dental structures of one Levon Brooks did indeed and without a doubt inflict the bite mark found on the body of Courtney Smith.”

  That was probably more than enough for an indictment. But there was still the matter of the lie detector. The Noxubee County Sheriff’s Office had neither a polygraph machine nor anyone trained to operate one. So at around ten forty-five a.m., the head detective from the police department in Starkville came to Macon to administer the test to Brooks.

  Polygraph machines aren’t really “lie detectors,” of course, which is why the test results aren’t admissible in court. At best they can detect when someone is nervous or uncomfortable. But there could be any number of reasons for nervousness or discomfort, not least of which would include being a suspect in the rape and murder of a three-year-old girl. According to the analyst, Brooks failed the polygraph test. That result was later confirmed by the FBI.

  FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 28

  Eight days after arresting him, Eichelberger released William “Slick” Mickens on his own recognizance. On the release form, Eichelberger wrote that Mickens had been “cleared through investigation, of not being number #1 [sic] suspect.”

  It wasn’t exactly vindication, but it did allow Mickens to go home. Mickens never really recovered. His wife, Betty, later said that for the rest of his life, her husband felt as if he lived under a cloud of suspicion. It wore him down. After his arrest, he was told he could no longer help coach the local school’s football and baseball teams. He was barred from coaching Little League. In fact, no one in the area would let him work with children at all. Little of that changed even after Brooks was formally charged. It just wasn’t worth the risk. Mickens’s drinking problem got worse. He ultimately died a broken man.

  William Smith also struggled with his arrest. He’d barely had time to mourn his niece before he was arrested for her murder. Many in the family and community never fully bought into Levon Brooks as Courtney’s killer. Smith had come home that night right around the time she was killed. He felt their suspicions, even if unstated. He grew despondent. Prior to that night in 1990, Smith had never been in trouble with the law. Afterward, he moved to Columbus and was arrested several times for various low-level offenses. He wound up homeless and eventually lost contact with his family.

  But of course Levon Brooks would suffer most of all. A failed polygraph, a stacked photo lineup, a botched interview with a five-year-old, and Michael West’s identification of Brooks’s teeth were more than enough to seal his fate. Brooks was formally indicted for the sexual assault and murder of Courtney Smith. District Attorney Forrest Allgood announced that he’d be seeking the death penalty.

  Shortly after the murder of Courtney Smith, some in the community raised concerns about her surviving siblings, Ashley and Patria. After some complaints to the local social services organization, the two girls relocated to the home of their paternal grandmother, Marion Smith.

  Smith also lived in Brooksville. She had a large, clean home and plenty of food. All were enough to convince the social workers that she could provide a better home for the girls. But the transition was hard on the girls, particularly on Ashley, who was old enough to feel the loss of her sister. Whatever she may or may not have seen that night, in the days since then she’d certainly heard enough to know to be scared. In order to help the girls cope for the first few nights, Marion Smith gave up her bedroom and moved to the couch in the living room. The children would then beg their grandmother to get in bed with them until they fell asleep. Even then, she remembers, the slightest shift or noise would startle the girls awake, after which they’d cry out for help.

  One night about a week after Courtney’s murder and just two days after Levon Brooks had been arrested and charged, Smith had finally gotten the girls settled when all three of them heard a terrifying noise. Someone was trying to break into the house. Whoever it was first tried the window. When that didn’t open, the prowler moved around to the side door. The girls woke with a start and then froze with fear. Marion Smith grabbed a butcher knife and ran outside. The prowler scurried away. She hurried back inside and called the police. Chief Russell showed up a few minutes later at her door. After reprimanding her for taking matters into her own hands, he circled the house but found nothing.

  It was an awful ordeal for the children, but it also made Marion wonder. By then, Levon Brooks was behind bars. What if whoever had murdered Courtney was still out there? Did the prowler target her home by sheer chance that night, or did he know that two young girls were asleep inside?

  About a year after Courtney Smith was murdered, Verlinda Monroe fell asleep with her clothes on in the bedroom of her trailer in Crawford, Mississippi. At around two a.m., Monroe woke to the terrifying sensation of someone—or something—touching her stomach. The room was dark, but she sensed a figure hovering over her. She let out a scream and heard the figure bolt toward the door. Monroe’s brother woke in the next room and flipped on the lights, just in time to catch a glimpse of a man fleeing the trailer. He gave chase but couldn’t catch up to the prowler. When Monroe looked down at her stomach, she saw that her pants had been unbuttoned and unzipped.

  Fortunately, Monroe’s brother had seen enough of the fleeing man to recognize him. He worked with him at the Bryan Foods chicken plant. It was Justin Albert Johnson.

  Johnson was arrested and charged with burglary of an occupied dwelling. He bonded out a few days later.

  2

  THE MURDER OF CHRISTINE JACKSON

  Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep’s clothing.

  —Matthew 7:15 (King James Version)

  SATURDAY, MAY 2, 1992

  Gloria Jackson had gone out to a club—the Santa Barbara of course, the only game in town. This time, there was no Levon Brooks to take the cover charge, or to cook at the end of the night. He was three months into his life sentence for the murder of Courtney Smith. Gloria had left three of her children in the care of her boyfriend, Kennedy Brewer, including three-year-old Christine. For several months, Brewer and Jackson had been living together in a ramshackle house on Pilgrim’s Rest Road, which wasn’t so much a “road” as a graveled country lane in the further reaches of Noxubee County.

  Gloria Jackson wasn’t a particularly attentive mother. She was young, and she’d had some mental health problems. Social services had been called to the house on a number of occasions to check on the children’s welfare. The kids were often dirty and hungry, and she sometimes left them unattended. The house wasn’t much to look at, or really to live in. Most of the time, the five residents spent their time in two rooms, having relinquished the others as too dirty to use. The front door had no lock. They kept it shut from the inside with a bent nail. Brewer was the more responsible and capable of the two, but not by much. He was only nineteen and underemployed. For the most part, his efforts consisted of bringing the children to his mother’s and sisters’ houses from time to time to get them fed and bathed.

  Shortly after Gloria Jackson left for the evening, Dewayne Graham and Leshone Williams dropped by the house. The two young men lived just down the road and were close in age to Brewer. Graham’s grandmother was Jackson’s landlord, and from her house next door, she kept an eye on comings and goings. That night, she noticed Gloria Jackson leaving and was concerned that the children may have been left by themselves. So she asked her grandson and Williams to check on them. At around nine p.m. Graham and Williams went down the road and around to the side of the house—to the bedroom window—in order to get Brewer’s attention. The three y
oung men talked for twenty-five minutes or so, until Graham’s grandmother yelled at him to come home and wash the dishes. Before they left, they made plans with Brewer to get together later that evening to watch television.

  After Graham finished his chores, he left his house and went back to see Brewer. He met up with Williams along the way. The three sat out on the front porch for a few minutes, then went inside to watch American Gladiators. Both Graham and Williams remembered seeing all three children asleep on the bed. The three young men hung out until shortly before midnight.

  Gloria Jackson came home from the club at around twelve thirty a.m. Brewer had “locked” the door with the nail, and Jackson didn’t want to knock and wake the kids. So, just as Graham and Williams had done, she walked around to the side of the house to the same bedroom window where Brewer was sleeping. She called out to wake him. He let her in the front door. Brewer and Jackson had sex and then chatted for a few minutes in the other room before returning to bed and going to sleep. Christine slept on a pallet at the foot of the bed.

  When asked to look back on his crimes twenty years later, Justin Johnson said his actions that night felt spontaneous—out of his control. He was out late, walking by himself down Pilgrim’s Rest Road with nothing to do and nowhere to go. He’d been staying with his parents since he moved back home from Crawford. They lived about half a mile as the crow flies from Kennedy Brewer, Gloria Jackson, and the kids.