Verdict and Ongoing Questions

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We've got all the links in our episode notes The opinions expressed in the following episode do not necessarily reflect those of the Minds of Madness podcast Listener disiscretion is advised It was Saturday may eleventh of twenty nineteen at the Muhammad Ali International Airport in Louisville, Kentucky passengers shuffled through TSA security checkpoints in the usual fog of mundane travel Shoes off, laptops out, notothing in your pockets Among them was a man in a crisp PSA airlines uniform, heading for the gate. He was the co pilot of Flight five thousand five hundred twenty three to Charlotte, North Carolina Then, with that warning, a team of eight law enforcement officers materialized from the crowd heads turn as the officers converged on the pilot arresting him in front of the stunned passengers That night, the news broke The pilot's name was Kit Martin, a former US Army major been charged with a brutal triple homicide in rural Kentucky case that had gun unselfol for nearly four years Join me now As we examine the mysterious murders of Calvin and Pam Phillips and the neighbor at Donerow Casted up again in a quiet rural home and ended with three people dead andnd the suspect who guilt? Divide those closest to the investigation Kentucky sits in the rural western corner of the state town of roughly seven hundred people, where neighbors still keep tabs on one another On november eighteenth, twenty fifteen A local resident named Marlene Laque decided to check in on one of her former neighbors, fifty nine year old Calvin Phillips two it bonded over their shared love for German shepherds earlier that day Marlene had learned from a local veterinarian that one of Calvin's German shepherds was sick So she tried calling Calvin in the early afternoon. Got no answer. About thirty minutes later, she decided to swing by in person I said, let's go by his house. Maybe he's outside So we went my daughter, I say, we My daughter is with me we over the house and the house was wide open. When I say wide open, the front door was open and the screen doors shut, but she could see straight through the house And they never left that door open it was just unusual to see And I yelled for Cal and he didn't come to The door so we just left I figured he was in the back in the field or something A few hours later, Things to return Around five thirty that evening, Calvin's wife twentyty seven year old Phillips Marlene after finding her message, Pam had just gotten home from work in nearby Hopkinsville, where she worked as a bank's vice president Pam called my house. about five thirty that evening And she told me she said I picked up your message off the answer machine. and then she told me a little about Jerry Lee And then she asked me if I had seen cow that day and I said I had gone up to see cal, but I never saw him I said, your house was open And she says, open I said, yeah, your front door was open, but he never came to the door She said, Okaykay. She said she had asked the next door neighbor to go look for Cal in the back because she thought maybe he had fallen or something because his keys and his wallet, she said, were still laying on the table. And so she thought maybe something had happened to him in the b The neighbor Pamet asked for help was sixty three year old that Donero a jazz musician and piano teacher who lived right next door And while Marlene was still on the phone with Pam She heard something strange And then all of a sudden she says, hold on, don't hang up. I think I see something. and so I hell on, I hell on. then All of a sudden I heard this scream. It was like a scream of somebody got startled You know, like you run over a mouse or something. It wasn't a blood curtling screen And that it was pure silence, nothing. So I think I stayed on the phone Posed to ten minutes And then I hung up around around six PM. Marlene decided to return to the Phillips house Well, I Michelle and I were sit on cous talking and then I just got an uneasy feeling and I said, Michelle, let's go down and check, you know, You get a gut feeling about something. So we went down there and the house was still wide open Both of us went to the front door. I yell for her. She didn't come to the door And I even opened the door up a little bit, stuck my foot in, and I said, No, I'm not gonna to do that. And I yelled again and she didn't come So we turned aroundound left beforefore leaving. Marle noticed Pam's car parked in the driveway Exactly where it should have been that was parked right where she usually parks it pulled up to the house and the front end, it was facing the house like this back at home The uneasiness only grew B by seven thirty Marlene couldn't ignore it anymore But she went back one final time Well, we went home and we were talking watching little TV and I looked at Michelle and I said, Michelle, I know you don't want to hear this, but I said, I think I need to go back up there So we went back up there When we got there this time, the house was completely closed up. Door was shut just like it would normally have been. And she knocked and called out I should didn't get any answ On this trip, Marley noticed Pam's car had been moved I made the mention to Michelle. I said, Michelle, that's funny. That car's been turned around. I said the truck is facing the porch. Whereas before, the engine was next to the porch. Without any answer at the door, Marlene and her daughter left once again still unsure of what had happened She would never hear from Pam or Calvin again Around two fifteen AM the next morning, november nineteenth. A local farmer, John Hummock, was jolted awake His farm stoped three miles from the Phillips house The night before is when I heard two explosions. Now I'll be honestly You know in Kentucky, you're allowed to hunt certain animals with a shotgun at night Okay At the time John didn't think much of it. Well, I heard two shots. And then I went back to sleep. Well, I remember looking at the time It was about two fifteen or two thirteen What do I do nothing? I go back to sleep after I hear those noisise that I wasn't going out. My whole area got high intensity lights. and if there's somebody out there shooting You know, I'm ready to go but not right now Around that same time, another nearby resident Earl Jed was also awake His dogs started barking outside And so I got up and I went to the bathroom and I saw flickering through the windows the bathroom window because it faces outside her after told where that incident happened. And I saw a flickering sub little little shake back and I said w I's out there burning trashes this hourred morning between two and two, fifteen the time everything was done. P said it was okay for us burn trash at night when the wind's down and stuff like that So I just passed it off as that And I heard I heard a noise like, you know, a crack like a gunshot or something. I don't know exactly what it was. thought maybe was something exploding in the fire And then I went back and be it. John, Pearl convinced himself it was nothing unusual, and went back to bed But a few hours later, everything changed Llaura went off at five o'clock. I get up get things set and ready for breakfast and stuff like that. and then About eight o'clock. It's time for me to make my runs to grocery runs and stuff like that. So I look down a driveway there into Mr. Hmocks field and I see Smoldery. I look now. man, what the he I pulled down in there et about seventy five feet from the area where it was at, I recognized that it was an automobile. I automatically throw it reverse, backed up, got away from it, went over to mister Oy's house there, and I knocked on his door and told him, I said, John, we got a problem or you got a problem? He said, I ain't got no problem. I said, ye, there's a car burning on your property And I remember my neighbor coming the next morning and get me up. and then I remember then looking across the street and seeing a car burning. It wasn't burning, it was smoking, okay. My neighbor knocked on the door, woke me up, and said, John, come on outside. He said you burning tr I said, No. I said, borrow trash cor and we look we' looking across and j going if it onen't looked like a car off fire. smmke coming out of it' off fire Okay. And so I said, Oh, you better call nine hundred and eleven. And so herl call nine hundred eleven. And they came out there. Within minutes, police were on their way Starting something new isn't just hard, it's terrifying. So much work goes into this thing you're not entirely sure what will work out. And it can be hard to make a leap of faith. Trust me, I know. When I started this podcast, I wasn't sure what I was doing. What if no one listens? What if I make a fool of myself? Now, I know that I was right and believing in myself and launching my podcast, despite all the fears and hesitations, it also helps when you have a partner like Shopify on your side to help Shopify is the commerce platform behind millions of businesses around the world, and ten percent of all e commerce in the US. fromom household names, like Heinz and Alberirds, to brands just getting started, accelerate your efficiency, whether you're uploading new products or trying to improve existing ones, Shopify is packed with helpful AI tools that write product descriptions page headlines and even enhance your product photos. What if people haven't heard of my brand? Shopify helps you find customers with easy to run email and social media campaigns. And what if I get stuck? Shopify is always around to share advice with their award winning twenty for seven customer support. It's time to turn those what ifs In two With Shopify today, sign up for your one dollar per month trial today at shhopify dot com slash madness. Go to shopify dot com slash madness. That's shopify dot com slash madness First responders arrived at the scene to find a vehicle completely destroyed by fire Lieutenant Leonard Smith of the Christian County Sheriff's Office C help process the scene. I was contacted by the Christian County Sheriff's Office on the morning of november nineteenth at approximately ten thirty AM Requesting assistance with the processing of a burnt vehicle I responded to the scene, which was located in the three thousand eight hundred block of Roseown Road in Christian County This is a gravel road here. This is all farm property It stays flooded the majority of the time it holds water. Whenever I approach the vehicle especially on the rear passengers area I detected an odor of kerosene The firehe Destroyed in eight. The interior, the vehicle, the roof had been Pulled in from the heat As investigators worked through the wreckage, they made a horrifying discovery Inside the vehicle were two sets of human remains burned so badly that investigators couldn't determine if they were male or female Let alone identify them On the ground nearby, they found the car's license plate It was registered to Pam Phillips When it was determined that the vehicle belonged to Pamela Phillips, deeputies went to that address to attempt to locate any owners or people at the residence to try to figure out what was going on. Whenever deputies responded to four forty three South Maine They learned of another body. been located in the cellar of the residence. s home sat on a ru property Kelvin had been restoring for years when deputies moveved to the back of the home They notice something unusual family's German shhepherd, laying on top of a wooden cellar door And when they went to lift it Calvin Phillips He been shot multiple times and his body was at the bottom of the stairs pile of dry wood along with bloody t shirts and paper towels Beneath them was Chred, suggesting someone had tried to set the house on fire The fire hadn't spread Investigators believed that once the cellar door was closed The lack of oxygen caused it to burn out Deputies also noticed that the back door headad Donero's house was standing wide open next door Inide, the television was on A meal sat half prepared, and a beer had been freshly opened. On a nearby chair was an empty gun holster out in the Phips backyard Deputies found a pool of blood and laning beside it thirty two caliber pistol from the World War II era A g that belonged to E's father But Ed himself was nowhere to be found. find his car, which was located about a mile away Pembroke Elementary School while investigators processed the scene begin to spread through the small community Marlene La Rocke learned what was happening down the street I was cooking supper with my daughter and my neighbor two doors down calls me And he says, Rocky, what's going on down at Cow's house? And I said, Well, how would I know? I'm in the kitchen? He said, Well, you know everything's going on at Benbro He said, well, they've got police taappe and everything around that place And I said, Oh, no. So I told Michelle, I said, T off all the burners. We need to go down there So we got down there and I saw the policeman asset Michelle Do we need to find out what's going on? because I was You know, I talked to him yesterday crime lab worked to confirm identities, detectives began piecing together a timeline basased on what they knew so far They suspected the remains in the burnt vehicle belonged to Pam Phillips and their neighborad Donzero Tenant Smith focused on reconstructing the Phillips family's last known movements Early in the investigation, we learned that miss. Phillips was supposed to receive a wash machine delivered to her residence The washing machine was supposed to be delivered on november eighteenth of twenty fifteen, but the delivery company whenever they were contacted advised that their delivery driver actually tried to make contact with the residents at an estimated time of ten fifty four AM was unable to make contact with anybody And they then attempted to contact Miss. Phillips or called Miss. Phillips numerous times at her place of employment and advised her that they were trying to make contact with somebody at the residence to deliver the washing machine It was learned through interviews that Ms. Phillips was highly upset about this because her husband, Calvin knew that she was supposed to be getting that washing machine delivered that day And the fact that he wasn't there wasn't answering the phone And she couldn't get the washing machine delivered highly agitated her For investigators, the miss delivery stood out As a retired Army officer himself, It wasn't like Calvin to miss a scheduled appointment And yet He hadn't answered the door or his phone suggesting something had already gone wrong earlier that morning Th then there was a second point in time Marlene Le Rox called the pam. ending with that sudden scream around five thirty PM. Two separate moments, hours apart which raised a troubling possibility This wasn't a single attack One happened in the morning the other in the early evening att least six and a half hours apart DNA testing would eventually confirm it. Two victims found in the burnt vehicle were Pam Phillips and Ed Donzero It wasn't the fire that killed them a forensic pathologist determined Both had died from multiple gunshot wounds from a twenty two caliber firearm Calvin had been shot with something different forty five caliber to the neck and torso Kelvin and Pam Phillips had been murdered just two days before sharing their thirty fourth wedding anniversary together. Their son Matt remembers, his parents as opposites perfectly matched. Kalvin was loud goinging and full of energy Pam was quieter reserved and deeply kind So my entire young life, my dad served in the First Gulf War. He ended up being in the spepecial Forces. He had an interesting military career. He loved it It was part of his thirst for life, if you will. My dad was a funny man and a guy who really enjoyed all that life had to offer and the military for him was a great outlet. So he enjoyed his service and loved leading men. He loved leading his soldiers. It was a big part of who he was, especially in my early life My mom worked at a bank. She was a vice president at a bank there. She worked in compliance, so she made sure that the bank stayed within regulations and made sure that the bank could grow safely. Well, whenever I was middle school and prior she was a stay home mom. so she had the task of trying to wrrangle me and tehing her didn't sit still long enough to do that. But whenever I got to middle school, she went back into the workforce and she always worked in banking my entire life, she worked in banking when she wasn't a stay at home mom Right next door to the Phillips home lived at Donzero Matt had known him simply as the neighbor. Someone his parents trusted We shared a driveway with Ed Donzero, so You know you come up the driveway at Don's Ro is on the left and we were on the right. Ed was there maybe the last year or two of my high school experience, and then I moved away. So the majority of the time, I knew Ed is just our neighbor that mom and dad had a great relationship with. He loved to play music. My dad loved to play music. They both loved to tell jokes. They were friends. They had a great relationship where if dad was traveling for whatever reason and mom needed something, she'd call Ed, Hey Ed, can you come over and you whatever was needed? sameame way both way. It's the definition of small town great neighbor Ed spent much of his time in Bowling Green, about an hour away music, top piano time with his longtime girlfriend, Sally Jackson Sally remembers him this way He was a wonderful jazz piano player He was also not formally trained, but he was a gourmet cook which I enjoyed a great deal He taught students at a music shop in Bowingering taught them how to play jazz piano, and he did that for years on Tuesdays Over the years, Sally had also come to know Calvin and Pam cow was very vivacious. alwaysways had a joke. Pam was just probably the kindandest person you ever met. She was very soft spoken but would do anything for you. They were both really good people and they were friends On november eighteenth, Sally spoke to Dad around four fifteen PM He was at home preparing dinner A little while later, she called him again This time There was no answer called his cell phone, left a message. All I got was his voicemail. I called the home phone, left a message, never heard back from him. And then I really I just honestly got busy with the kids. you know there were three of them and they were very small then I was busy with them until the evening and I thought, that's really strange that it hasn't called me So I called the cell phone again Same thing message and the home phone That was it I never got, you know, I never got to talk to him. By every account, all three were well liked partart of the community So who could possibly want to harm them? Everybody's talking about weight loss injections because the results are so dramatic. They work by lowering blood sugar and reducing appetite. So what if you're looking to lose weight, but not interested in painful weekly injections? Eespecially when you hear about some of those intense side effects. 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That's promo code than you twenty five at takelean dot comot We've also provided a link in our show notes take long for investigators to identify someone who stood out On november nineteenth Mid afternoon, we learned that Calvin Phillips was a critical witness in a federal court martial against mister Martin and that put mister Martin at the top of our list for possible suspects and persons of interest in this investigation That name was Major Christian Martin Known to most people as kid Calvin Phillips wasn't just a neighbor He was also set to testify against him Federal courourt martial scheduled for december first, twenty fifteen twowo weeks after the murders. mister Phillips was a critical witness in the court marsial due to some items of evidence that he had found and had turned over to the FBI These items of evidence consisted of a US government laptop And also some compact disk that contained Classified sensitive information. For investigators, it raised an obvious question Whether that testimony gave Kid a reason to want Calvin silenced But there was something else His address was four hundred fifty eight South Main Street which is directly across the street from mister Donserow's address and Katy Corner to the Phillips' address forty eight year old Kit Martin had lived across the street from Pam and Calvin Phillips for several years Calvin, Kid's military record was also impressive He was an officer an army ranger and an Apache helicopter pilot who served multiple tours in Iraq byy any measure, Kid had built a long and decorated career In his personal life, he had three children with his first wife, Stacey. But that marriage ended in two thousand four That same year, Kitt began dating Joan Hermman. who also had three children of her own When I got orders to go back on active duty I came to the point where I was either going have to leave her and the kids and go on active duty by myself or We get married and she could go and the kids could come with me. And it was a little earlier in the relationship than I really wanted to make that decision, but it's kind of forced on us and So we asked him what to just go get a marriage certificate one day explained the situation to the lady. He was like,, I got two weeks to get everything sorted out. getet out act to do. She's like, Well, I do ceremony right here And then you can do church wedding later. And I was like, oK, let's do that So we did had we had a ceremony. It was Pearl Harbvor's Day two thousand four. For the next eight years, Kid and Joan were happily married and moved to Pembrok, Kentucky, after a number of years stationed overseas. But according to Kit's daughter Mackenzie began to change around twenty twelve I moved in, it would have been the summer of I think twenty twelve It was my dad, Joan Harman, and her three kids. After moving in MKenzie says, she began noticing tension in the home. I noticed that after I moved in, it had become a lot more problematic. There was a lot of arguing A that time Essentially there was an argument and at the conclusion of the argument, I overheard my dad say, you know to her He stated that he wanted a divorce from her at that time during that argument Kenzie heard Jones say something chilling. She said, If you reave me, I will ruin your life. I will ruin your military career. I know how to do it. I'll tell them that you abuse me Not long after that Kid and Mcenzie left the house Joan packed up and moved out Un as it turned out Jonan asked her neighbor, Calvin Phillips to help box everything up and take it to a rental unit that he owned timee Kitten Mackenzie came back home Everything was gone When we got back It appeared that just about everything had been taken out of the house. Pictures, family heirlooms, furniture that wasn't too heavy, everything was gone, animals were gone. pets and the livestock. We had two German shhepherds at the time. And I believe there were some sheep and some pigs, chickens that kind of thing and they were all gone Things were never, I guess what you would call normal after that. Our tires were getting slashed. There was even an instance where there was a dead animal left in the mailbox For me to find, yeah, it was pretty crazy I felt unsafe living there Then, another complication emerged Kid's divorce attorney discovered his entire marriage to Joan was never legally valid because she never finalized a divorce from her previous husband. Joan later pleaded guilty to felony bigamy and received five years of pretrial diversion. But while Joan was finding herself in Lgo hot water, So was Kid in that is where Calvin Phillips enters the picture. while helping Joan move out after the separation Celvin Phillips came across something unexpected A laptop and several CD's believed to contain classified military information Calvin turned it all over to the FBI He also provided military authorities with photographs Images Joan claimed showed injuries to her son She alleged had come from Kid Together, it was enough to trigger a military court martial against Kit Martin And he was charged with mishhandling classified information along with serious allegations of child abuse. If convicted His military career would be over, and he would face serious prison time. case didn't move quickly. Over the next two years court martial date was repeatedly delayed During that time, Calvin and Kit lived across the street from each other in a simmering feud. Although rumors of an affair between Calvin and Joan began circulating through town, they denied it By november twenty fifteen Celvin's friend said Calvin was increasingly concerned One of those friends was Steve Durham. I've known Kale and Pam for probably close to twenty years. In general, I'd see him, you know every few days, probably Approximately two weeks, somewhere like that beforehand, he said pointain blank that Kip Martin was going to kill him He said, lookook, he says he says this guy's going to kill him And Cal was a very sharp individual. neverever thought that could really happen to be honest with you You know, I knew he was extremely concerned, but I thought maybe he was overreactive until I got a phone call Another friend, Stephvenen Bollinger, described a similar conversation Cversation, Mr. Phils called me over late one afternoon and He wanted to speak to me and He basically told me if he ever come up missing or dead that look acrossroad that all famous to be poent to Mis. Mark after the discovery of the triple homicide Investigators focused on the history between Kit Martin, Joan and Calvin Phillips On its face, it appeared to be Motf There was a problem. Kid had an alibi twenty fifteen Kit was living with his new fiance, Laura Spencer Teenage children A acccording to Kit He went to work that morning at Fort Campbell home at four fifteen PM From that point on, he said he spent the rest of the day with Laura. And Laura backed it up We had a nice dinner Just a nice quiet evening in. just a regular evening, dinner. Hanging out We ate dinner together and watch TV and hunang out like we normally did Laura told investigators they spent the rest of the day together, into the evening and night. Even so Police searched kids home on noveber twentieth and seased several firearms, including a Gock forty five But when the forensic results came back They didn't point to him His DNA didn't match anything recovered from the scene A least for the moment It looked like Kit was in the clear Nine days after the murders Calvin's sister Diana was at the house cleaning Going through his belongings, she noticed something sitting on a shelf A military dog tag Line next to Calvin's wallet The name on it was Christian Martin after turning it over to police Investigators reviewed the original crime scene photos and confirmed it had been there from the beginning About a month later There was another discovery in late December, Joan Herman walked into an AT andT store with a cell phone She said she'd found it in the yard of her rental home in Okton, Kentucky ten miles east of Panbrock. When employees examined the phone, they found it was registered to Pam Phillips They informed Joe they were contacting police Before officers arrived, she left the store. Joan later claimed she had no idea how the phone ended up in her yard Then, months later, in april twenty sixteen Another piece of evidence surfaced. backack at the Phillips home. Diana was cleaning again when she found a single forty five caliber shell casing It was under a pile of debris near the cellar door, where Kelvin's body had been discovered If you've ever felt stuck trying to lose weight, you're not alone. Between diets, workouts, and endless advice, it can be hard to know what actually works and what's just another thing competing for your time. That's why weight loss by Hers now offers access to an affordable range of FDA approved GLP one medications, including the WekoV Pill And the Wigovi pen. 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To get started and learn more, including important safety information, Weovi clinical study information and restrictions, visit forHers. com these discoveries, no charges were filed and the case stalled In the meantime, Kit Martin's court martial moved forward. and he was convicted Dismissed from the army and ordered to serve ninety days confinement After that, He and Laura relocated to North Carolina We're in twenty eighteen began working as a commercial pilot for PSA airlines Time, it appeared the case had faded But in may twenty nineteen, that changed when Kit was arrested in a Louisville airport charged with three counts of murder More than three and a half years after the killings According to the grand jury testimony, investigators had developed new evidence Ballistics testing indicated that a forty five caliber shell casing found at the Phillips back porch had been fired from Kit's Glock forty five cell phone analysis also placed his phone in the same area as both crime scenes, with Data suggesting his and Pam Phillips' phone were moving together the following day. O on the surface These claims looked extremely damning A showcasing from his gun cell data placing him at both scenes, a victim's phone, seemingly in his hands those findings would not go unchallenged trial fence would push back on each of them Before trial began, Kit was offered a plea deal One that would have resulted in a sentence of five to thirteen years He refused choosing instead to fight the charges in court Saring opening arguments. Assistant atttorney General, Barbara Whaley, laid out the state's case against Kid Three homicides, three murders Calvin Phillips, Pamela Phillips. Edward Denzro first to murder Calvin Phillips in the morning. And then again Sometime in the immediate vicinity of five thirty PM to murder Panela Phillips and Ed Danzero, Ed Danzero. was simply a good person in the wrong place at the wrong time for the right reason, coming to help. But Christian Martin had motive and the means and the opportunity, most important, the motive. for Calvin Phillips was scheduled to be a key critical witness for Army prosecutors in the court martial trial of the defendant, Christian Martin State's theory was straightforward Celvin Phillips was killed first Th then hours later Pam Phillips in it Dserow They argued that Kit Martin had the motive and the opportunity. So Calvin was home alone that morning Keep in mind, this is two weeks before the court martial trial. pressure is getting more and more each day on the defendant facing this trial He didn't log into his computer at Fort Campbell until nine fifty AM. So everyone has left the Martin home, but he's not left. pllenty of time for him to go across the street Of course, the most convenient way to do that is out the front door, which we don't unfortunately have a surveillance camera for. Prosecution suggested Kid had the time that morning to go across the street before logging into work that day And later that day, to return. And into the home of Calvin Phillips and commit the shooting, murder of Calvin Phillips dump his body into the cellar and use the t shirts and other items to clean up the blood. throw it down into the cellar and try to burn it. At three thirty two PM, the defendant logged off of his computer at Fort Campbell and at four fourteen on the surveillance video, he arrived home Tamela Phillips leaves the bank at five hundred two PM at five thirty. She is at home on the phone with her friend who hears the scream Under that theory, the timeline hinged down one key point Kid been able to leave his home unnoticed. pointed to one detail they believed supported that at eleven twenty seven PM The defendant set the alarm on his phone for one ten AM T ring the top gun, ring top They argued, the alarm was set so we could wake up in the early hours of the morning. Move the bodies and burn the vehicle then return home without anyone knowing Kid offered a different explanation The alarm was set to check on a kerosene heater Something he often did when the weather turned cold The state then presented their two primary physical pieces of evidence Dog tag and the shell casing There was one other piece of evidence. that also was left behind. And that piece of evidence has the defendant's name on it Dog take. and had the tag on it with his name on it. The family also found it had not been picked up by the police In April of twenty sixteen, Calvin Phillips's sister located on the back porch where the cellar doorm that lifts up where Calvin's body was thrown. There was a forty five caliber shell case. Now she didn't know what it was. That casing then was sent to the Kentucky State Police Cime Lab in Louisville along with theock forty five that had been found in the safe. There is no doubt that that casing was fired. in the defendant's clock The defense took a very different position Arguing. phhysical evidence didn't support the state's case Usually the sort of evidence you'd hear and see in a case this serious You'd hear about things like DNA Right? Well, the officers has looked for DNA in this case. He sent it to the lab and you know what it comes back? Negative, negative, negative, negative, negative Excluded Not him They're just charging the wrong guy So let's talk about the showcase Five months goes by where that house is unoccupied, or anyone can go into that backbard someone placed that shell casing on that back porch. It is found in a place that has been searched by the police. and they didn't just search it all on littleid. They searched it and they searched it and they searched it. I'm quoting the prosecution. They searched and searched and searched. They searched that porch so closely, they cut pieces of the floor up carried them away. Fence focused in particular on the shell casing Aguing it had been discovered months later in an area that had already been searched I do want to be clear We're not disputing that that shell casing appears to match our client's gun. What matters are the actual bullets, the projectiles that struck these poor people. and those Don't match the gun. That shell casing did not and is not associated with any of the bullets that hit those people The ballistics expert added another layer describing the results as inconclusive and leaning away from a definitive match In this particular case Yes, the class characteristics are the same. They have the eight right polygonal rifling, but there are differences between my test fires and the three bases. Those differences, though, are not sufficient to conclusively go that extra step and say they were not fired by that gun So it's basically an inconclusive But it's leaning. there's basically more support for the fact that they would be from a different gun as opposed to that gun. It's unlikely that they were fired in the Gock forty five that I was submitted fence then pointed to someone else Joan Harermman So let's talk a little bit about Joan Harma The last night they were together Jones said I will ruin your life And I know how to do it They went to court try and get a divorce, but they couldn't because it turned out that Joan was still married to someone else. Joan is the one who got Calvin involved in all of this. And there was another issue One that had played a role in securing the indictment Cell phone data By the time of trial That analysis had changed On the nineteenth of November, while he's sting the word? Pam's phone. Pam Phillips is in motion. The phone that belongs to Pam Phillips who had died on the eighteenth was in motion on the nineteenth and it is not with Kit. Instead it's headed E Now you may not know the geography of that area, so I'll tell you East of Christian County is Todd County. J know who lives in Todd County? Joan Harmon lives in Todd County. And interestingly enough, John Harmon strolls into the AT and T store in late December and says, hey, I found this Pone Can we unlock it defefense argued that data no longer placed Kit where investigators initially believed. and instead pointed in a different direction Kid Martin chose to testify in his own defense Well, the prosecutor says you walked across the street in broad daylight He committed a murder Yeah, stupid I didn't do it. And the evidence shows I haven't done it. All this technology that I even know existed proves where I was at and what I was doing. No, I did not murder these people. Did you have someone else murder these people? No. No, I did not. Cal was my key witness. Ed was my friend. I mean, it's crazy. Are you behind these charges? No, I'm not. contontrary to the prosecution's claim of motive Kick claimed Calvin's testimony would have been essential to proving his innocence And in that testimony, Captain Garreredt said that Calvin was the reason that the Ct marshal had come about. He had talked to Calvin and Calvin had said this and told him about that and all that. Well, my private investigators had interviewed Calvin and we have his audio that was actually played on channel four in Nashville. and he denied all that. So he was key for me too disprove Joe and also disprove Garret at that point. That's why he was to me my most important witness defense hadn intended to question Joan Harman at trial but she invoked her right not to testify. So the jury never got to hear Kitt's attorneys question her. during closing arguments Date repeatedly described the murders as being carried out with military precision. But if this Amy Ranger and Apache helicopter pilot was so precise calculating and deadly Did it really make sense that he'd be so clumsy to leave his dog tag on the shelf at the crime scene Or was this one simple mistake you'd made during an otherwise deadly military operation After eight days of trial testimony, the jury reached a decision Is it your verdict We as the jury find the defendant Christian Martin guilty of murder under instruction number four. It is Upon the jury's recommendation, Kit Martin was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. which he's since appealed and been denied When you're a maintenance engineer in a beverage manufacturing plant You keep production lines moving and quality on track because there is no room for slowdowns With Ganger's vast selection of high quality motors, sensors, belts, and hard to find parts, you can get what you need fast and all in one place, so nothing gets in the way of getting the job done Call one eight hundred Ganger, click ranger. com or just stop by Ranger For the ones who get it done. Granger knows, when you're a procurement manager for an office park You're not managing one building, you're managing all of them And to stay ahead, you need to see through walls and around corners. Light's about to fail, filters ready to clog, Hack on its last leg. If you wait until something breaks, you're already behind Count on Granger for quality products, easy reordering, and twenty four seven support Call one eight hundred Granger, click Granger. com or just stop by Granger. For the ones who get it done For some K Kid's conviction marked the end of a years long fight for truth and justice. But for others, serious questions remain Qions about whether the jury got it right or whether anyone else may have been involved According to WZTV Nashville, the town of Pembroke itself was already split before the trial. And after the evidence was presented at trial those divisions didn't disappear continues to maintain his innocence from behind bars. A new discovery was made in twenty twenty three Recorded phone calls from jail led investigators to a hidden box inside Kitt's home in Raleigh, North Carolina. But when Lieutenant Smith traveled there to locate it The space was empty After tracing a series of calls, investigators eventually recovered what had been inside A silencer compatible with Kit's Glock forty five and a twenty two caliber rifle Ohon's missing Investigators believe the rifle may be connected to the killing of Pam Phillips and it Dserow The silencer could help explain why no one reported hearing gunshots when Calvin Phillips was killed But as of now, no new evidence has been released, linking either item directly to the murders less of where anyone stands on the verdict one thing that's not up for debate. Is the loss Celvin Phillips was a retired spepecial Forces officer seen enough of the world and just wanted to be home Fixing up his house, mowing his alwn spepending time with this German shepherds. Tam Phillips was the quiet center of her family The woman who gave everything she had to the people she loved thoseose closest to her described her as One of the kindest people they've ever known Dwnserow was a jazz pianist Gourmet cut Above all else Good neighbor. kind of man who showed up the moment someone needed help. free lives. who deserve to grow up old in the town they called home.