taken in a Criswell hearse to the state medical examiner’s office in Oklahoma City, where it arrived at 6:25 p.m. and was placed in a refrigerated unit.
Detective Smith and Agent Rogers returned to the Ada Police Department and spent time with the family of Debbie Carter. As they tried to console them, they also gathered names. Friends, boyfriends, co-workers, enemies, ex-bosses, anybody who knew Debbie and might know something about her death. As the list grew, Smith and Rogers began calling her male acquaintances. Their request was simple: Please come down to thepolice department and provide us with fingerprints and samples of saliva and head and pubic hair.
No one refused. Mike Carpenter, the bouncer at the Coachlight who’d seen Debbie in the parking lot with Glen Gore around 12:30 that morning, was one of the first to volunteer evidence. Tommy Glover, another witness to Debbie’s encounter with Gore, was quick to provide samples.
Around 7:30 p.m., December 8, Glen Gore showed up at Harold’s Club, where he was scheduled to spin records and tend bar. The place was practically empty, and when he asked why the crowd was so thin, someone told him about the murder. Many of the customers, and even some of Harold’s employees, were down at the police station answering questions and getting fingerprinted.
Gore hustled over to the station, where he was interviewed by Gary Rogers and D. W. Barrett, an Ada policeman. He told them that he had known Debbie Carter since high school and had seen her at the Coachlight the night before.
The entire police report of Gore’s interview reads as follows:
Glen Gore works at Harold’s Club as a disc jockey. Susie Johnson told Glen about Debbie at Harold’s Club about 7:30 PM, 12-8-82. Glen went to school with Debbie. Glen saw her Monday Dec 6th at Harold’s Club. Glen saw her 12-7-82 at the Coachlight. They talked about painting Debbie’s car. Never said anything to Glen about having problems with anyone. Glen went to the Coachlight about10:30 PM with Ron West. Left with Ron about 1:15 AM. Glen has never been to Debbie’s apt.
The report was prepared by D. W. Barrett, witnessed by Gary Rogers, and filed away with dozens of others.
Gore would later change this story and claim that he’d seen a man named Ron Williamson pestering Debbie at the club on the night of December 7. This revised version would be verified by no one. Many of those present actually knew Ron Williamson, a somewhat notorious carouser with a loud mouth. None remembered seeing him at the Coachlight; in fact, most of those interviewed stated emphatically that he was not there.
When Ron Williamson was in a bar, everyone knew it.
Oddly enough, in the midst of all the fingerprinting and hair clipping on December 8, Gore fell through the cracks. He either slipped away, or was conveniently ignored, or was simply neglected. Whatever the reason, he was not fingerprinted, nor did he give saliva and hair samples.
Over three and a half years would pass before the Ada police finally took samples from Gore, the last person seen with Debbie Carter before her murder.
At 3:00 the following afternoon, December 9, Dr. Fred Jordan, a state medical examiner and forensic pathologist, performed an autopsy. Present were Agent Gary Rogers and Jerry Peters, also with the OSBI.
Dr. Jordan, a veteran of thousands of autopsies, first observed that it was the body of a young whitefemale, nude except for a pair of white socks. Rigor mortis was complete, meaning she had been dead for at least twenty-four hours. Across her chest, written in what appeared to be red fingernail polish, was the word “die.” Another red substance, probably catsup, was smeared over her body, and on her back, also in catsup, were the words “Duke Gram.”
There were several small bruises on her arms, chest, and face. He noticed small cuts inside her lips, and shoved deep into the back of her throat and extruding out through her mouth was a blood-soaked
Detective Smith and Agent Rogers returned to the Ada Police Department and spent time with the family of Debbie Carter. As they tried to console them, they also gathered names. Friends, boyfriends, co-workers, enemies, ex-bosses, anybody who knew Debbie and might know something about her death. As the list grew, Smith and Rogers began calling her male acquaintances. Their request was simple: Please come down to thepolice department and provide us with fingerprints and samples of saliva and head and pubic hair.
No one refused. Mike Carpenter, the bouncer at the Coachlight who’d seen Debbie in the parking lot with Glen Gore around 12:30 that morning, was one of the first to volunteer evidence. Tommy Glover, another witness to Debbie’s encounter with Gore, was quick to provide samples.
Around 7:30 p.m., December 8, Glen Gore showed up at Harold’s Club, where he was scheduled to spin records and tend bar. The place was practically empty, and when he asked why the crowd was so thin, someone told him about the murder. Many of the customers, and even some of Harold’s employees, were down at the police station answering questions and getting fingerprinted.
Gore hustled over to the station, where he was interviewed by Gary Rogers and D. W. Barrett, an Ada policeman. He told them that he had known Debbie Carter since high school and had seen her at the Coachlight the night before.
The entire police report of Gore’s interview reads as follows:
Glen Gore works at Harold’s Club as a disc jockey. Susie Johnson told Glen about Debbie at Harold’s Club about 7:30 PM, 12-8-82. Glen went to school with Debbie. Glen saw her Monday Dec 6th at Harold’s Club. Glen saw her 12-7-82 at the Coachlight. They talked about painting Debbie’s car. Never said anything to Glen about having problems with anyone. Glen went to the Coachlight about10:30 PM with Ron West. Left with Ron about 1:15 AM. Glen has never been to Debbie’s apt.
The report was prepared by D. W. Barrett, witnessed by Gary Rogers, and filed away with dozens of others.
Gore would later change this story and claim that he’d seen a man named Ron Williamson pestering Debbie at the club on the night of December 7. This revised version would be verified by no one. Many of those present actually knew Ron Williamson, a somewhat notorious carouser with a loud mouth. None remembered seeing him at the Coachlight; in fact, most of those interviewed stated emphatically that he was not there.
When Ron Williamson was in a bar, everyone knew it.
Oddly enough, in the midst of all the fingerprinting and hair clipping on December 8, Gore fell through the cracks. He either slipped away, or was conveniently ignored, or was simply neglected. Whatever the reason, he was not fingerprinted, nor did he give saliva and hair samples.
Over three and a half years would pass before the Ada police finally took samples from Gore, the last person seen with Debbie Carter before her murder.
At 3:00 the following afternoon, December 9, Dr. Fred Jordan, a state medical examiner and forensic pathologist, performed an autopsy. Present were Agent Gary Rogers and Jerry Peters, also with the OSBI.
Dr. Jordan, a veteran of thousands of autopsies, first observed that it was the body of a young whitefemale, nude except for a pair of white socks. Rigor mortis was complete, meaning she had been dead for at least twenty-four hours. Across her chest, written in what appeared to be red fingernail polish, was the word “die.” Another red substance, probably catsup, was smeared over her body, and on her back, also in catsup, were the words “Duke Gram.”
There were several small bruises on her arms, chest, and face. He noticed small cuts inside her lips, and shoved deep into the back of her throat and extruding out through her mouth was a blood-soaked
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