Buried Memories (25 page)

A few hours later, Hugh DeWoody was back on the phone with O’Brien. “Fortunately, Betty is just one of those women that men remember,” DeWoody said, chuckling. “We found an Oscar Reemers who worked for the Cherokee Shore’s maintenance at the time. Said Betty needed the hole for a barbecue pit. Sound familiar?”

Friction began growing in the Branson family. As Betty sat alone in her jail cell, fingers were pointed at siblings who had testified against their mother.

They suspected Shirley of buying her way out of jail at her mother’s expense when she gave her statement to the investigators. Robby had stopped talking to his brother and sisters altogether after he had called Betty in jail. He admitted to his mother that he had told authorities the truth.

Ray Bone had heard that Shirley and Robby had committed the murders and he told them to do the right thing—“Get down to the jail and tell the truth so Betty can get out.”

Phyllis told Bone that wasn’t true, and added, “If I had known that Mama killed Wayne before Jimmy Don died, I would have warned Jimmy Don, because I damn sure didn’t want it to happen to anyone else. I just don’t understand how Mama could have done something like that to someone like him. And it’s not fair for us kids to go through the hell of this.”

But the family also suspected Ray of lacking loyalty for having turned Betty over to authorities in Mansfield.

Investigators frequently questioned Ray Bone because of his closeness to Betty, but with his past history, they didn’t place much credence in his responses.

After one long discussion where Bone continued extolling Betty’s innocence, an investigator asked, “Ray, do you happen to have a life insurance policy with Betty’s name as the beneficiary?”

Ray’s yellow eyes loomed large when he said, “Oh, God, I hope not!”

The pretrial hearing of
Texas
vs.
Betty Lou Beets,
kicked off on September 11, 1985, with E. Ray Andrews pleading for a change of venue.

Judge Holland watched E. Ray parade all of the local newspaper reporters into court, along with their headlined articles displaying pictures of digging up bodies on Betty’s property. He had reporters give their circulation numbers, and held up articles leading with such headlines as: BEETS SHOT HUSBAND IN THE BACK.

After naming all the newspapers, television channels, and radio stations, Andrews said, “Your Honor. There’s just no way we can get a fair trial here with this kind of publicity. The whole area would be prejudiced against my client.”

Then he led a procession of dozens of witnesses who lived in Henderson County. One man testified how the local bars and restaurants buzzed with stories of Betty, and most everyone had decided she was guilty. He questioned a woman who said she didn’t have time to read the newspapers, but from talking with her friends, she was sure of Betty’s guilt.

E. Ray called on a man who described reading everything he could get his hands on about Betty.

“Do you think she’s guilty?” E. Ray asked.

The witness said, “You shouldn’t have asked me that. Sure, I think she’s guilty.”

Then Andrews called a man to the stand named Frank Steinsmith. E. Ray questioned him about his access to newspapers, radio, and TV, and asked if he’d had any discussions with his friends about Mrs. Beets and the murders. The man nodded, and asserted that he had talked with his barber, the grocery store clerk, the guy down at the filling station, and many of his friends.

“Would you say this case is widely discussed?”

“Absolutely. By everyone in town.”

Before allowing Steinsmith to leave, Bandy questioned him and learned he’d been a long-time friend of E. Ray’s.

Taking another tack, E. Ray held up a copy of the
National Enquirer.
The supermarket tabloid’s front page headline, printed in inch-high letters, read:
SELF-MADE WIDOW.
Under the headline, a large photograph depicted Betty Lou Beets handcuffed to Deputy Rick Rose.

“Just look at this!” E. Ray shouted. “It accuses Mrs. Beets of murdering two husbands.”

Bandy rose to thank E. Ray for making that point. “That paper is proof that this case has received nationwide as well as statewide coverage. There’s no place in this country that hasn’t heard of her. Mrs. Beets should be tried by a jury of her peers and they would be found right here in Henderson County.”

Judge Holland announced, “The motion for change of venue is overruled,” and pounded his gavel.

“But, Your Honor,” E. Ray pleaded, “people are just waitin’ to be picked for the jury so they can find this lady guilty.”

TWENTY-THREE

Haggling over the change of venue consumed the entire morning, and now lawyers spent the afternoon questioning 150 prospective jurors. Because it was a capital murder case, they questioned each prospect individually.

E. Ray Andrews’s chatty demeanor included such questions to prospective jurors as, “I think I know you. Didn’t you pick cotton for my old daddy?” He intended to be their friend from the beginning, and he easily made friends. Many times he had counted on an amicable jury to find his client innocent because they liked him.

The entire voire dire procedure consumed five days, from September 23 through September 27.

Finally, on October 7, 1985, the long-awaited trial began.

Athens, Texas, a town of 10,000, was known as the “Black-Eyed Pea Capital of the World.” The lowly cowpea had been used for livestock feed until someone came up with the ingenious idea that it brought good luck. The town leaders began a festival in 1917 to celebrate the black-eyed pea, and forty years later Neiman Marcus began packaging the vegetable in fancy containers, calling it “Texas Caviar.”

But regardless of that notoriety, nothing compared to the trial of Betty Lou Beets. Every major newspaper across the country and all the main national television networks sent reporters to cover the case, all drawn by her “Black Widow” image and the bizarre facts surrounding her case. The streets were clogged with media vans.

Long lines stretched from the courthouse out to the street as people waited for the maintenance crew to arrive and unlock the doors. Many held sack lunches and planned to make a day of it.

In spite of handcuffs circling her wrists, Betty Beets managed a smile as Deputy Copeland escorted her to the courthouse. Copeland always found the good in people, and he tried to see some in Betty. He treated her gently and with respect, and she rewarded him with frequent smiles and thank-yous.

Betty wore a gold ring on her left hand, presumably her wedding ring from Jimmy Don. Her lacy blouse, tucked into a gored, print skirt, showed her still trim waistline, and she wore high heels. Everyone expected to see the forty-eight-year-old’s signature blond hair and carefully applied makeup, and they weren’t disappointed.

People roamed the corridors, unable to get into the packed courtroom. If anyone inside the room had to leave for the restroom, they reserved their place with a newspaper or their sack lunch. Frequently, someone in the hall would hurry to sit in their place, not respecting squatter’s rights.

Many firemen had driven the seventy miles from Dallas to Athens with their wives to show support for Jimmy Don, and some of them were stranded in the hall as well.

Before the trial began, all of the witnesses were assembled inside the courtroom, where the district clerk swore them in en masse to save time and remind them from that moment on they couldn’t discuss their testimony or the case with anyone.

Case #A-2144,
The State of Texas
vs.
Betty Lou Beets,
came to order in the 173rd District Court with Judge Jack Holland presiding.

A very capable Henderson County attorney, Allen Boswell, assisted DA Bill Bandy. Boswell himself normally handled misdemeanor cases, but in important cases like today’s, he also helped the DA.

E. Ray Andrews had pulled in an attorney “fresh out of law school,” as he told everyone—a young man by the name of Gilbert Hargrave.

Judge Holland motioned to the attorneys to approach his bench, and leaned over to tell them, “I need to warn the prosecution not to bring up the killing of Doyle Wayne Barker nor the shooting of Billy York Lane unless the defense does it first.” The judge also told Bandy to instruct witnesses not to mention Barker.

The court had finally selected a jury of eight women and four men. All jurors were white except for the one black alternate. A deputy went to a door to the left of the judge’s bench and opened it for the jurors to file into the courtroom, then directed them to their leather chairs.

The boomerang-shaped table in the center of the courtroom held E. Ray Andrews, Betty Beets, and Gil Hargrave on the right, with DA Bill Bandy and Allen Boswell on the left. The point of the “V” remained empty to give some semblance of separation.

For all of the turmoil surrounding the case, everything started smoothly, with Billy Bandy’s reiteration of the facts that the people of Henderson County knew by heart from their newspaper, the
Athens Daily Review.

Bandy, always a natty dresser and possessing a flair for the dramatic, stood before the jury summing up his presentation. “The evidence is going to
shock
you,” he said, punching his fist in the air for emphasis. “It will
appall
you, and it is a necessity that this evidence be brought before you. I make no apology for it because I didn’t create that necessity. At the conclusion of this evidence, the only reasonable verdict will be guilty of capital murder.”

E. Ray Andrews, wearing a suit, ostrich-skin boots, and a serious expression, waived his right to make an opening statement.

Bandy called his first witness. Deputy Johnny Marr entered through double doors in the middle of the long wall in the large courtroom. Witnesses were cloistered in an anteroom off the foyer to the courtroom entrance.

Marr testified about his visit with Betty Beets and taking her statement regarding her missing husband. Everything flowed uneventfully as he answered all of the questions with well-documented proof.

Then came E. Ray’s turn to cross-examine. “Just why are you so sure it was August sixth when you questioned Betty?” he asked, frowning.

“I logged it in my book,” Marr said, showing Andrews his report.

“Did you do that at Betty’s house or did you wait until you got back to the office?”

“I wrote out everything when I talked with Mrs. Beets.”

“Would it surprise you to know that on August sixth Betty Beets was in Dallas shopping?”

“It was Saturday morning.”

Marr stayed firm in his testimony and accurate with his written details. E. Ray couldn’t fight that, so he took off on another tangent.

“Are you testifying that somebody shot someone? Or buried someone? You’re not trying to tell these people over there,” Andrews said, pointing to the jury, “that you saw any of that, did you?”

“No, sir.”

Andrews’s questions flicked away Marr’s written report like yesterday’s newspaper. Instead, he questioned Marr about witnessing a murder, a murder Marr never claimed to have seen.

Next, Bandy called for Mike Warren from the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department. Lil Smith had phoned him the night they found the boat, and he had come to inspect it.

“At the time I thought the boat could have drifted away from somebody’s dock,” he said. “ ’Course, after examining it closer, I saw the possibility that someone might have been working on the motor and fell overboard.”

On cross-examination, Andrews asked, “How deep is the water over there where they found the boat?”

“I really don’t know,” Warren said.

“Think about the area from the Redwood Marina back to the shore. Could a lady put her feet on the ground in that lake and walk to the nearest highway and get out of there?”

“No, sir.”

“So if a lady couldn’t swim, she couldn’t get out of there?”

“I would think not,” said the parks’ representative. Andrews excused the witness, and Bill Bandy called Captain James L. Blackburn to the stand. Bandy led him through the three-week search that Betty allowed to continue despite knowing Jimmy Don was not in the lake.

Blackburn told of organizing the search, of the hundreds of people involved, and the hours everyone spent searching.

“How did Mrs. Beets appear?” Bandy asked.

“She was very, very calm. She didn’t appear to be grieving in any way.”

Andrews objected. “Your Honor, that calls for a conclusion by the witness.”

The judge overruled his objection and Bandy proceeded.

The DA asked, “You’ve been around a lot of grieving people and you’ve seen them act in different ways?”

“No, I just didn’t see her grieve. She appeared the same on all other visits. She never appeared distressed.”

During the cross-examination, E. Ray would have a high hurdle to jump because Blackburn came across as a hard-working, sincere witness, who had gone to a lot of trouble because of Betty’s grand scheme. E. Ray needed to pull the jury out of that sympathetic mood.

“Mr. Blackburn, where do you live at?” E. Ray asked.

Appearing surprised by the unusual question, Blackburn answered, “[ ] Wisteria in Dallas.”

“Really?” Andrews said with a neighborly smile. “I used to live on that street.

Blackburn nodded at the information, probably wondering what difference it made.

“Okay, y’all volunteered to come down here and search for your friend?”

“Yes.”

“You understand what this lady’s being charged with here today?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You didn’t suspect her of any foul play at that time, did you?”

“No, sir. Not at
that
time,” Blackburn said.

The next witness, Chaplain Denny Burris, stated that his job included general counseling, hospital visitation, crisis intervention, and death counseling.

“How did Betty appear when you first saw her that Sunday morning?” Bandy asked.