This and That

Tracy Turner

Tracy Turner was a trustee prisoner in the Roanoke County Jail when Earl Bramblett was arrested and brought back from Spartansburg, SC. He overheard some conversation about Bramblett and thought he may get into a drug treatment program and some time knocked off his sentence if he could help the police. He was looking at possibly a twenty-seven year stint in the penitentiary. He called the Vinton Police Department.

A day or so later, Barry Keesee, the State Police Investigator, came to the jail to see him. Turner told Keesee he would help them if he could get his trustee status back and get into a drug treatment program. Turner had lost trustee status because of some small infraction of the rules. Keesee told Turner to let him know what he could find out and that he was a friend of the sheriff, they would work out something.

In the next eight or nine visits to Turner by Keesee, Turner gave back most of the details that Keesee had told Turner in his previous visit. Details about the crime and evidence.  Sometimes, Turner would relate the exact information minutes later. Some of this was recorder by Keesee, some not. As the Bramblett trial got closer, Turner was visited by Commonwealth Attorney Burkart and assistant Commonwealth Attorney Randy Leach along with Keesee. This visit, Leach told Turner to make notes of what Bramblett said and date them to look authentic. All knew, at that time, that Turner did not have any notes. He was told, by Leach,  to make them look like they were made at different times and use different pens and pencils, and refer to them when he gave his testimony. This is what he did in court, and it worked very well.

I wrote Turner a letter, and sent it to the prison where he had been transferred after his trial, asking to meet and talk with him. He wrote back telling me the procedure I would have to go through to do that. In the meantime, I told Lindsey's secretary about my scheduled meeting and she said she and Jennifer Givens, Bramblett's other habeas attorney, might get further talking with Turner due to their gender. I agreed and they met Turner.

Turner told them that he had contacted his attorney months before and asked her to get intouch with Bramblett's attorney because he wanted to recant his testimony.  She had forgotten. His conscience had been bothering him and he was afraid he may have helped kill an innocent man. He gave the habeas attorneys an affidavit telling of his meetings with Keesee, the conversation about the notes, and telling why he did it and why he was recanting his testimony.

He also told of the county jail letting him attend a public auction, for an entire day without a guard, as one of the perks for his help. This is unprecedented, he had a twenty-seven year sentence possible and was walking around free.

After his affidavit, Keesee wanted to meet with him but Turner refused.

Randy Leach

Randy Leach is now the Commonwealth Attorney of Roanoke County. I don't suppose the people of Roanoke County would know how to handle an honest Commonwealth Attorney. One that doesn't need lying witnesses to win a verdict.

Wayne & Judy Stinnett

Back when the Hodges murders first happened, Judy Stinnett told Bill Brown about Benjamin Carr being a good suspect in the murders. Brown replied that they already had their man. Later, the Vinton Police Chief, Rick Foutz, was told this by Wayne Stinnett and it was also brushed off.

Ben Carr was a Viet Nam veteran with a lot of problems. Anger management, or lack thereof, being the most obvious. He had been fired by the railroad, in Roanoke, the railroad is the Norfolk Southern, formerly the N&W, for using excessive force. He liked to beat up people. He was also fired by the City of Roanoke Police Department and the Vinton Police Department for the same reason. He was convicted of beating up teenagers when he was a theater security guard. He was a very dangerous person.

As we know, it's a very small world. Ben Carr and I were brotherinlaw at one time. We were married to sisters. I knew him as someone I didn't care to be around. He worked at a convenience market at the time and went to work in full combat gear, firearm and all. Later he wound up working for the post office in Roanoke and was transferred to Vinton to get away from a supervisor he was having problems with. Carr and Blaine Hodges were scuba diving rescue workers in the same volunteer outfit. The supervisor Carr was having problems with was also transferred to the Vinton Post Office. More problems, not only with the supervisor, but with Blaine Hodges. Carr was checked into the Veteran's Hospital in Salem, Virginia. Roanoke, Salem and Vinton have contiguous borders. The supervisor was concerned enough to call the V A Hospital and asked she be notified when Carr was released. He told the V A psychiatrist he had killed people for less than what the supervisor said to him.

Carr told the Stinnetts he would kill someone they had a disagreement with and added, "like the ones over on Virginia Avenue." Ben Carr died in 1996.

Keesee wanted to meet with the Stinnetts after this all came out in the appeal to the Turk Court. They also refused.

Dorothy McGee

This is the seventy-two year old lady that said she saw the truck. I talked with her on the phone several times. Once, she said she would have to check with her friend before she would talk. I called back and she said the friend told her not to talk with me. Other times she would talk awhile and then decide she wasn't going to talk more.

She did tell me she saw the truck in her headlights and it was a red truck, which she then amended to a pinkish red truck. She said the street lights made no difference because it was in her headlights.

If you remember, she said in court, it was beat up and dirty. Ben Carr drove a red Bronco and he lived on a dirt road in the county.