Pod Insights Criminology Holly Bobo About this episode On April 13th, 2011, twenty-year-old Holly Bobo, a nursing student at the University of Tennessee at Martin, was abducted from her Darden, Tennessee home. She woke up early that morning to study for an 8 AM exam. Her parents were at work, but her brother was home and saw her outside with a man he thought was her boyfriend. Join Mike and Morf as they discuss the murder of Holly Bobo. There were some neighbors who gave some possible clues to police, but the case went cold for years. Then a man came forward to say he knew what had happened to Holly and implicated others. Several men were tried and convicted but many think that the authorities convicted the wrong people. You can help support the show through Patreon. We'd love to connect with listeners on social media. We are available on the following platforms: Facebook - Facebook Discussion group - Instagram - Threads - X Formerly Twitter - Blue Sky - Twitch - Tik Tok Criminology is an Emash Digital production hosted by Mike Ferguson and Mike Morford.
Transcript 10,478 words · 4 speakers
0:00 Speaker 00 Hi, I'm Jamie, host of Murderish, the podcast. On Murderish, I give you a 3D look at gripping murder cases. Just the facts, no banter. By the end of each episode, you'll know who was involved, details of the crime, and what went down at trial. Also featured on Murderish is my own personal story about the time a man followed me home at night and I found him in my bedroom. Listening to this podcast doesn't make you a murderer, it just means you're murder-ish. Listen to Murderish on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
0:34 Speaker 01 Criminology is a true crime podcast that may contain discussion about violent or disturbing topics. Listener discretion is advised.
1:11 Speaker 02 Hello, everyone, and welcome to episode 388 of the Criminology Podcast. I'm Mike Ferguson.
1:17 Speaker 03 And this is Mike Morford.
1:19 Speaker 02 Morf, how you doing this week, buddy?
1:21 Speaker 03 I'm doing pretty good. I was doing some Christmas shopping and looking online while I was waiting for you to come on. You overslept a little bit. We won't say too much about that, but yeah, just getting ahead of my shopping.
1:33 Speaker 02 Throwing me under the bus, man. I see how you are. I did oversleep. It happens every now and then, and I always feel bad about it, but you know, not that bad, actually.
1:44 Speaker 03 Well, when you don't have kids at home and you can just sleep in, I don't blame you. I do it too, if I could.
1:49 Speaker 02 So let's do our Patreon shout outs. We had Jasmine Houck and Sandra Bozvert jumped out to our highest level. So we really appreciate that support.
2:00 Speaker 03 Yeah, that's awesome. Thank you so much. And for everyone that helps support the show, we appreciate it. And if you want to sign up, head over to patreon.com/criminology.
2:09 Speaker 02 And just a quick reminder, since we're close to the end of 2025, we'll be at CrimeCon in May 2026, so not all that far away, and we hope to see you there.
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2:33 Speaker 02 Use our promo code CRIMINOLOGY when you check out at crimecon.com and that'll save you 10% on your standard badges. So now that we have all that out of the way, let's jump into this week's case. And this one was suggested by one of our listeners, Valerie B. And this is a very interesting case. So thank you, Valerie. She suggested the case of Holly Bobo and her case made quite a bit of news. It's also a case that's been back in the news recently because one of the men convicted in this case is petitioning for a new trial since one of the main witnesses is now saying that they lied on the stand about pretty much everything that they told the jury. For the family of Holly Bobo,
3:15 Speaker 02 it's just another difficult thing in a long series they've been forced to deal with since April of 2011, when Holly disappeared. And whether you believe the prosecution got it right in this case or not, I think we can all agree that it's heartbreaking to see that Holly's family is still dealing with these legal proceedings nearly 15 years after she was killed.
3:39 Speaker 03 The Bobo family lived on Swan Johnson Road in the town of Darden in rural Decatur County, Tennessee. This is a very small town of only about 400 residents. On April 13th, 2011, 20-year-old Holly Bobo, a nursing student at the University of Tennessee at Martin, had an important exam. She actually woke up early that morning around 4:30 so that she could cram a little bit more before she had to leave for class. The exam was at 8 a.m. sharp in the nearby town of Parsons, and she was determined to pass it with flying colors. Holly was by all accounts, a very caring person and was set to touch many lives and help many people during her time as a nurse. Her father Dana was the next member
4:21 Speaker 03 of the family to wake up that morning. Holly was in her room studying. The two talked for a few minutes and he left her money for gas before he headed to work. Shortly after this, her mom Karen woke up. She made breakfast and packed a lunch for Holly. When she left for work around seven, Holly had moved to the kitchen table and she was still studying.
4:41 Speaker 02 At around 7:30, Holly got a call from her boyfriend Drew, who was having a problem. He was on Holly's grandmother's property, just over 20 miles away, turkey hunting with his father. He had the grandmother's permission to be there, but someone who spotted Drew there, gave him a hard time, not trusting that he was really allowed to be hunting. Holly told Drew to call her mom, Nancy, to get the situation straightened out, and she was able to take care of it. Drew had to work at 8:00 a.m. that morning. And after he left the property, he either called or texted Holly to tell her about the outcome of the hunting dispute on the property. Just after this, Holly headed out to her car.
5:23 Speaker 02 The last activity on her phone was an outgoing call at 7:33 a.m. Sometime around 7:40 or 7:45, a man named John Bat was fishing in a pond near the Bobo home when he heard some kind of squealing, which he thought were cats fighting.
5:43 Speaker 03 At about that same time, James Barnes, who lived next door to the Bobo home, was outside packing up his truck, getting ready to take his son to daycare and go to work when he heard something unusual. It sounded like it was coming from the Bobo property. According to WREG.com News, James Barnes heard a woman say, "Stop, I said stop." Despite what he heard, it didn't seem like anything too bad was going on at first. He thought maybe someone was playing a prank on someone or something like that. Then he heard screams and thought he'd better check it out. Once James got his son in the car, he drove to the Bobo home, stopped at the end of the driveway and turned off his engine so he could hear better.
6:24 Speaker 03 Only Holly's car was in the driveway, and he couldn't see or hear anything wrong, so he left.
6:30 Speaker 02 And it strikes me that, you know, this comes up in so many cases. You know, someone hears something, a neighbor or someone nearby, but they're not sure what it is, and they don't know for sure if it's even something serious.
6:46 Speaker 03 Yeah, and I think all too often, we are talking about somebody that hears something, hears a scream, but doesn't do anything and just moves on about their business. In this case, James took the extra step of heading over there and trying to listen and see what was going on, but he didn't see anything. So at least he, you know, made the effort to see what was happening.
7:09 Speaker 02 Although James Barnes hadn't seen or heard anything that seemed to indicate something was clearly wrong, the incident didn't sit right with him. And soon after leaving, he called his mother, who knew Karen Bobo's number at work. Karen was a teacher at an elementary school in a neighboring county. Around 7:45 or 7:50, the school secretary informed Karen that a neighbor had called her to tell her that they heard screaming coming from her home. She immediately went to the library to use the phone. It was faster than getting her cellphone out of her locked desk. She called her son, 25-year-old Clint, to check on things at home.
7:51 Speaker 02 He was at home and had woken up by this point. Clint said that everything was fine. He told Karen that Holly was out in the driveway with her boyfriend Drew. This alarmed Karen because she had just talked to Drew about the issue he had while hunting on the property about 25 miles away.
8:09 Speaker 03 It was at this point that Karen's motherly intuition kicked in. Since the neighbor had heard screams, and it clearly wasn't Holly's boyfriend in the driveway, she knew something was wrong. And she told Clint to call the neighbors, and she hung up on him. She then called 911, but because she worked the county over, there was some confusion about where to send officers and what was going on. After his mom hung up on him, Clint was very confused. He had still been sleeping that morning when Holly was leaving for school. He didn't hear any of the screams reported by the neighbor, but he was suddenly woken up by the family dog when it started barking and wouldn't stop. He got up to see what was going on, and he could hear two people talking.
8:49 Speaker 03 When he looked outside, all he saw was Holly and who he thought was her boyfriend Drew. He was wearing all camouflage, which didn't alarm Clint because he knew that Drew had been planning on turkey hunting that morning. Holly and the man he thought was Drew were both kind of crouching down. So at first, Clint thought that he was back from hunting and showing Holly something on the ground. He listened for a moment and realized that they were obviously having some kind of argument or tense discussion. According to kpho.com, all he could make out was that Holly was saying, "No, why?"
9:23 Speaker 02 Clint, still confused, called his mother back to ask if Holly had class that day, since she was still home and her car was still there. Karen told Clint to get a gun and shoot the man because it wasn't Drew. While he was still on the phone with his mom, he looked out the window again. This time, he saw Holly and the man walking towards the woods. It was at this moment, he realized that the man was too tall to be Drew. But again, he was confused and thought that it must be their cousin, who was also pretty tall. The two were headed toward a trail that leads to an old logging road. Clint figured Holly was going to see the spoils of a successful hunt, or something like that.
10:06 Speaker 02 It looked like the man was holding a deer grunt call, which is a device used by hunters that mimics the sounds made by bucks. It's important to note that many deer grunt calls look a lot like the barrel of a gun. So he may have been mistaken. Clint went back to his room to get dressed and put on shoes before following them into the woods. He grabbed a loaded gun on his way out the door, as requested by his mother. But Karen was having trouble explaining the severity of the situation. So she hung up again.
10:40 Speaker 03 As Clint moved through the carport, he noticed a few spots of fresh blood on the ground, just in front of Holly's car. It was bright red. He was still thinking that there had been a turkey hunt and that this blood was from a catch. But as he started to walk toward the woods, the neighbor's mother, the one who called Karen at work, pulled up in her car. She had come to check on things. She informed Clint of the screaming. He finally started to understand what was going on. He called 911. Meanwhile, one of Karen's coworkers was driving her to the house as fast as they could possibly go. Karen called 911 for a second time, once they crossed the county line. By 8:10 a.m., officers had arrived at the Bobo home. It's safe to say that this moment, all hell was breaking loose.
11:25 Speaker 03 It was clear that Holly had been abducted and that time was of the essence.
11:29 Speaker 02 Yeah, I think all hell breaking loose is probably a pretty good definition, right, of what was going on. But there's a couple of things that jump out at me. One is definitely the confusion that was being experienced by, you know, different individuals. Especially Clint, right? He had not been up all that long. I know what it's like when you just wake up, you're not 100%. But there's also the issue, I think, of one person trying to explain the severity of a situation to another person. And, you know, how good are
12:14 Speaker 02 they at it? And is the other person understanding? And I think we have that issue here where they just weren't exactly on the same page.
12:23 Speaker 03 Yeah, that feeling in the morning when you get up and you're groggy, maybe your eyes aren't all the way working yet, you haven't had coffee, and you've got this situation where you hear somebody outside, you know, one of the people's your sister, and you assume the other person is her boyfriend. But unfortunately, he didn't look out the window and actually see for sure that it was him. He just assumed it was. And then he gets this panic call from his mom, and he doesn't, hasn't the clarity at that point to really piece things together as to how dire the situation is.
12:56 Speaker 02 What I will say is, I don't know how many people have had their mom tell them, get a gun and shoot that man. So, you know, that's, that's a, that's a pretty severe thing to say.
13:10 Speaker 03 Yeah, that's one of those kind of moments where you probably get an adrenaline rush. And, you know, for me, and again, I wasn't in his shoes, but I would think if I heard those words from, from somebody close to me, I'd immediately, you know, be on alert and wide awake at that point.
13:27 Speaker 02 John Bab, the fisherman, would recall seeing a white pickup truck, likely a Ford extended cab, speeding down Swan Johnson Road. After what he had thought was the sounds of cats fighting. Mark Gwen, director of the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, later told ABC News that he was immediately sure that the person responsible for Holly's disappearance lives in the area. He went on to explain that because of the terrain, you have to know where you're going, entrances and exits. The big test Holly had scheduled that morning started late because of Holly's disappearance. Immediately after the exam, her classmates headed to the area of her home to help assist in the
14:11 Speaker 02 search. Classmate Emily Suzanne Pratt found Holly's cellphone on top of a drainage ditch. There was no SIM card inside of it. Word quickly spread through the small town of what had happened, sending people into a panic, but also causing them to keep their eyes and ears open.
14:30 Speaker 03 The day after Holly's disappearance, a man named John Graves was searching his property just in case Holly or her abductor had traveled through it. And that's when he found a black and white polka dotted lunchbox with a large H embroidered on it. It was just out in the open near a creek on Gooch Road. He opened it and found that there was a sandwich inside. After hearing that the lunchbox was found, farmer Gerald Stevens decided to search his property and found a pair of pink underwear on the side of Yellow Springs Road. Near this, there was a crumpled up piece of paper from a nursing school with Holly's name and information on it. John Graves told the Jackson Sun, "In my mind, if something was found on Gooch Road, somebody was heading north of the county and therefore toward the interstate."
15:16 Speaker 03 The items that were found were thought to belong to Holly. Police and searchers carefully looked through those areas for any other sign of her, but found nothing else. Her family spent the next few weeks waiting for news that Holly had been found and hoping for the best.
15:30 Speaker 02 In May, just weeks after Holly was abducted, Adnisha Brasher was on a bike ride when she saw a SIM card lying on Camden Road. She took it home and put it in her phone. When she listened to the voicemails, she realized that the SIM card belonged to Holly Bobo, and she called police. The card was found in the same general area as the last ping from Holly's phone at 9:25 a.m. on the morning she was abducted. Investigators believe that the SIM card was taken out of her phone after that ping and done so no later than 9:40 that morning. If you look on a map where all of these items of Holly's were found, it really looks like
16:12 Speaker 02 someone was just flinging Holly's belongings out of the car window as they drove away from the area where she was abducted. Despite multiple items of Holly's being found, none of it helped ID her abductor. Weeks turned into months. It was hoped that someone in the small town would hear a rumor or have some info that would help find Holly, but that never happened. There was no real movement on the case for years. No one could find Holly. No one knew what happened to her.
16:42 Speaker 03 A break in the case would eventually come from a man named John Dylan Adams, known as Dylan. He had been arrested on federal weapons charges. One of Dylan's cousins told the Jackson son that Dylan has the mental ability of a 10 year old with an IQ in the low 70s. His grandpa, Dick Adams, explained that he couldn't even read a clock. While the information Dylan was putting forward could be important, the police weren't sure how much weight they could give Dylan's story. Dylan took a plea deal on the weapons charges, pleading guilty to lesser charges in exchange for the more serious charges being dropped, and he was released into the custody of Dennis Benjamin, a retired police officer.
17:23 Speaker 03 It's not entirely clear why Dylan was released into the custody of Dennis Benjamin. He wasn't family or even a friend of Dylan's family. In fact, Dylan was kept from his actual family and basically assigned to live with this retired investigator, who it turned out was a friend of the Bobo family. After a few weeks of Dylan living with Dennis Benjamin, he suddenly wanted to confess to something terrible in relation to the Holly Bobo case.
17:49 Speaker 02 Police brought Dylan in to hear his story. At first, he claimed that he saw Holly at his brother Zachary's house, alive and wearing a pink t-shirt, which is consistent with what she was last believed to be wearing. He said that when he saw her there, a man named Jason Autry was there as well. Dylan claimed that his brother Zachary admitted that he had raped Holly and that they had filmed it. Eventually Dylan claimed that he too had also raped Holly, something he'd later backtrack on. This was the first compelling information that police had in Holly's case, and they moved quickly on it. Multiple searches of Zachary Adams' home yielded nothing.
18:32 Speaker 02 None of Holly's DNA, fingerprints, or even hair was found in the home. One month after this, brothers Jeffrey and Mark Piercy were charged with accessory after the fact and tampering with evidence. Investigators were told that the brothers had a video of a girl who looked like Holly tied up and crying, and that Zachary Adams was also in the video. This sort of backed up what Dylan had said before about a video, but no trace of this video has ever been found. And charges against the Piercy brothers were dropped. And morph to me, this is a, you know, a really strange situation.
19:14 Speaker 02 Number one, you have to believe that there's an immense amount of pressure on police to solve this case, as there often is. And you have this individual Dylan, who, you know, as we said, had the mental ability of a 10-year-old. He had a pretty low IQ. Just knowing that, and that first thought that has to jump into your mind is, okay, he would be susceptible to police pressure. I don't think it would be too hard to imagine him maybe saying something that wasn't true to get the police to leave him alone. You know, kind of Brendan Dassey comes to mind.
19:59 Speaker 02 But this whole idea of him being released to this retired investigator who has no connection with his family, but is friends with the Bobo family, seems so very odd to me.
20:13 Speaker 03 And I think the timing of this confession after he's been forced to live with him also is of interest because, you know, he doesn't know this guy, he goes to live with him and then suddenly after living with him for a while, he's confessing to this Holly Bobo case.
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21:54 Speaker 03 Despite not finding physical evidence or a video of Holly, investigators felt that they were on the right track and that they had the right guys. And sadly, they believed Holly was dead and her body had been hidden. They just needed to prove it. On March 4, 2014, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation announced that Zachary had been indicted on especially aggravated kidnapping and felony first-degree murder charges. One month later, Jason Autry was also indicted. Jason Autry's cousin Shane Austin was also charged, but he was offered immunity for any cooperation. There was just one condition. He had to lead investigators to Holly's body, but he wouldn't or couldn't, and the deal was taken from him. The crumpled up nursing paper with Holly's name on it
22:39 Speaker 03 was found close to Shane Austin's driveway on his neighbor's property. To some, this seemed like a smoking gun, but to others, it's not powerful. Multiple items had been found of Holly's and not all in the same spot. And being a piece of paper, he could have blown in the wind before coming to rest where it was found. The lack of a body in the case would make a prosecution in the case difficult, but that would soon change.
23:04 Speaker 02 On September 7th, 2014, Ernest Larry Graves was hunting for Jensen near County Corner Road in Decatur County, about 20 miles north of the Bobo home, when he came across a three gallon bucket in the middle of the woods. It was upside down and seemed out of place. As he went to investigate it, he saw what were unmistakably parts of a human skeleton. He didn't waste any time calling police who raced to the scene. Holly's wallet with her driver's license still inside was found nearby. So was Holly's purse, her car keys, a makeup bag and her pencil case with her inhaler inside. DNA testing would officially confirm
23:50 Speaker 02 that these were the remains of Holly Bobo. Analysis revealed that she had been shot one time in the back of her head, most likely by a 32 caliber weapon. The news was devastating for Holly's friends and family. The family wanted to lay Holly to rest, but sadly, since her body was considered evidence, they had to wait over three years before Holly's remains were released. She was finally laid to rest in a family plot in Parsons, Tennessee in February 2018.
24:23 Speaker 03 In late February 2015, Shane Austin was found dead in a hotel room in Bartow, Florida. He had taken his own life by hanging himself. His attorney, Luke Evans, urged the public not to see that as a sign of guilt. According to CBS News, he said, "The cloud of these baseless allegations over him would have taken a toll on anybody." Before he died, Shane had claimed that Zachary Adams said he put Holly in a river next to a rock that had an orange tea on it. That turned out not to be true. So, one of the men on the radar, a prosecutor, was dead, but they pressed on. Prosecutors announced in May 2015 that they intended to seek the death penalty in Holly's case.
25:07 Speaker 02 So, you said more, you know, prosecutors were set on pressing forward, but with what? Based on what? I mean, that's my big question. You've got a few people saying things, some of which, a lot of which, turns out not to be true. There's very little, if any, physical evidence. It seems pretty thin to me.
25:35 Speaker 03 Yeah, and I mentioned earlier how having a no-body case would be tough to prosecute. Now, they had a body, but they just don't have anything to go with it as far as that physical evidence. So, you know, it wasn't even an improvement when her remains were found. It didn't help all that much in building a strong case against them, but they were nonetheless ready to go to trial with it.
25:56 Speaker 02 Well, the one thing that, you know, finding the body does help is it proves that she's dead. I mean, a defense attorney can't make the argument that she's not dead, which they would in a no-body case. But other than that, you're right. It doesn't help as far as the prosecution goes much at all. In September of 2017, Zachary Adams went on trial. Jason Autry became the prosecution's star witness. According to JRN, Channel 5, when Jason was initially charged, he denied any knowledge of the crime, saying, "I don't want to speculate and make a rumor of what happened to the girl."
26:39 Speaker 02 But by the time of trial, he had a lot to say. In court, he claimed that Holly's brother, Clint Bobo, invited them all over to the house that morning so that they could teach him how to make meth. Jason claimed Holly knew what they were up to, and she wasn't having any of it. Jason said that when Holly saw them, she ran out of the house yelling at them, telling them to go away. She was causing such a scene that they ended up kidnapping her. Clint Bobo was actually a suspect at one point because authorities had no other real leads. It was very upsetting for the family, and this tidbit about him being involved
27:19 Speaker 02 or wanting to learn how to be involved in the drug world, making meth, may have been an attempt by Jason to cast doubt on Clint and away from himself. Perhaps he thought it would look better if he was invited there that day.
27:34 Speaker 03 It turns out that there were people who were suspicious of Zachary Adams early on. His ex-girlfriend, Rebecca Erp, told the jury that the day after Holly's disappearance, a news segment about her played on TV while Shane Austin was over. She recalled that Shane smirked and that Zachary said, "They'll never be able to find her." It struck her as odd and cold. She also claimed that months later, Zachary threatened to tie her up, like the way he had tied up Holly Bobo, and told her that nobody would ever see her again. This was one of the final straws for Rebecca, who broke up with Zachary that same day. However, Rebecca also admitted that agents from the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation
28:16 Speaker 03 had threatened to take her child into CPS custody if she didn't cooperate with their investigation into Zachary Adams. A fellow inmate at the Chester County Jail claimed that Zachary told him to pass along a message to his brother Dylan. It was clearly a threat. The inmate said the message from Zachary to Dylan was for Dylan to shut his mouth, or Zach would put him in a hole beside Holly. Zachary did not take the stand to testify in his own defense.
28:42 Speaker 02 The official theory by police and prosecutors was that Shane Austin is the one who kidnapped Holly that morning. He, Dylan Adams and Zachary Adams, all sexually assaulted her and that Zachary is the one who ultimately killed her. The prosecution through their witness Jason Autry claimed the following sequence of events happened that morning. Jason tried to get a hold of Zachary Adams to buy some morphine. Right around 8:00 a.m., Zachary told him that he was busy and he would call him back later. Jason decided to head to Shane Austin's house. And when he was on his way, Zachary called him and told him to go to Shane's house because he needed some help.
29:25 Speaker 03 When he got to Shane's house just after nine, there was a large fire in a burn barrel. Dylan Adams was standing at the front door shirtless. Shane was walking around, kind of freaking out. He had a gun holstered at his hip. Despite all that weirdness, Jason bought the morphine from Shane, not Zachary. Then he mixed it with his meth and injected it. Then Zachary asked him to help bury a body that was wrapped in a blanket. He thought for some reason it was the body of a man named JoJo, but he was told, no, that's Holly Bobo. That didn't mean anything to him because he didn't know her and he hadn't heard of her. They drove around the body in the back of the truck while they tried to figure out how to get rid of it. Jason recalled a time when
30:08 Speaker 03 he had seen a dead body in the river. It would have sunk or floated out of stream, except that the person's intestines got stuck on some debris. With this reasoning, he thought they should gut her and dump her in the Tennessee River.
30:21 Speaker 02 Next, according to Jason, they drove to a boat ramp under a highway overpass. They got there between 9:35 and 9:40. Zachary claimed they had kidnapped and sexually assaulted Holly, and then injected her with drugs, which is what killed her, or so he thought. As they moved Holly's body out of the truck, she made a noise. And they realized she was still alive. Zachary got the pistol Shane had been pacing with at his house and shot Holly. Jason described the echo to the jury and recalled how a flock of birds were startled by the noise. Then they heard a boat, so they put Holly's body back in the truck and took off. They drove back to the area of Shane's
31:06 Speaker 02 house where Jason left his car. Then they parted ways.
31:10 Speaker 03 Later that evening, Jason needed more drugs, so he was back hanging with Zachary, Dylan, and Shane. They weren't happy. Shane was upset that Zachary had killed Holly, but Zachary told him that he was just as guilty since he had taken part in sexually assaulting her. Days later, Dylan got drunk and spilled more details to Jason. He admitted that they had taken Holly to Shane's grandmother's barn and sexually assaulted her there. Dylan also told Jason that he gave Zachary and Shane oral sex to get them erect so they could sexually assault Holly. According to Jason, it was this homosexual activity that was his line in the sand that he had an issue with. But somehow, the talk of sexual assault and a murder to this point was no problem for him.
31:54 Speaker 02 It's interesting to note that the neighbor who lived next door to Shane's grandmother's barn was actually outside most of that morning. He returned from work around 6:00 a.m. and then after unwinding a bit, went out to mow his lawn. It took him about two hours. And during that time, he didn't see any people or vehicles, and he didn't hear anything suspicious, though admittedly, the mower would drown out sound for a lot of the time. Jason's testimony mentioned this neighbor. He said that he was told that the Addams Brothers told him that they saw a neighbor mowing, but managed to get in and out of the barn undetected.
32:32 Speaker 03 So Jason's story has plenty of details. For someone to believe his claims, they have to believe that he knows absolutely everything about Holly's abduction, rape, and murder, but didn't take any part in it. The other men apparently walked him through exactly who kidnapped Holly, who sexually assaulted her, where, when, and why. Then, instead of having to fill in gaps about how she was killed and by who, according to Jason, she was still alive when they went to dump her body. So Jason actually witnessed the murder. This is important, because when you directly observe something, it's not hearsay. He also had very important details that anchor his testimony to undisputed facts, like the fact that Shane stayed behind that morning instead of helping to move her body, because
33:16 Speaker 03 he had a pre-scheduled appointment with a TV satellite installer, or the fact that a neighbor in a very crucial location was outside. While many people don't believe that Jason Autry wasn't somehow involved, the jury believed him and all the other prosecution witnesses. On September 22nd, 2017, Zachary Adams was found guilty on all charges, first degree murder, aggravated kidnapping, and aggravated rape.
33:42 Speaker 02 After being found guilty, Zachary Adams and the prosecution came to an agreement about his sentencing and skipped the penalty phase. It would bring a resolution sooner for the Bobo family, and he was also able to avoid the death penalty, though he wouldn't exactly get off easy. Zachary Adams was sentenced to life in prison, without the possibility of parole, as well as an additional 50 years. Dylan Adams decided to take an offered plea, maintaining his innocence, but admitting that he had no real chance at trial. He was sentenced to serve 35 years in prison. Jason Autry was released from prison in September of 2020. His freedom was extremely short-lived.
34:27 Speaker 02 He was arrested just two months later on weapons charges. He was eventually sentenced to 224 months in prison. So the trial's over. You know, everyone involved has been sentenced. No doubt Zachary Adams got the largest sentence, life without the possibility of parole, plus an additional 50 years, which always seems redundant, but I get why they do it, you know, in case something happens to that, the, uh, the life without parole. Dylan Adams was sentenced to 35 years. Jason obviously got a much lighter sentence and was released in 2020.
35:11 Speaker 02 But I go back more to the trial and the lack of physical evidence. So what do these convictions really come down to? It seems to me, much of it is based on the testimony of Jason Autry. So if Jason is telling the truth, then everything works out the way it should work out. But what if he's not? Because it does seem like everything hinges, right? On the veracity of his testimony.
35:44 Speaker 03 Yeah, we mentioned that a lot of the stuff he had been told supposedly was all second hand hearsay, but the key thing was that he supposedly was there when Holly actually was murdered. So, you know, that was firsthand information. I think that was the strongest thing in this case that led to these convictions because he's a direct eyewitness. Besides that, as we talked about, there was really nothing in the way of physical evidence that tied any of these guys to the murder.
36:17 Speaker 02 And I do think there's a, there's a scary element to that. Now, if these people are guilty, great. The resolution worked itself out. But what if they're not? I mean, I put myself in that position. To me, it's very scary to think you could not do anything and be convicted of a heinous crime solely based on essentially the word of one person or a couple of people. That, that's a scary proposition to me.
36:49 Speaker 03 And to me, this has some, some West Memphis Three vibes. And as we're going to talk about moving forward, there's a real possibility, or heavy doubt at least, that these guys may have been involved in the murder. Now, this case has been in the headlines again because in July 2024, Zachary Adams petitioned for a new trial. He had already exhausted all of his appeals, but now Jason Autry had recanted his testimony, all of it. So Adams is using the Autry recantation to try and get a new trial. At the time of Jason Autry's testimony, he was afraid that he would get pulled into the prosecution for murder with
37:30 Speaker 03 the others and he'd be facing the death penalty or life in prison. Neither of these options were suitable for him. According to News 5 Nashville, he felt he faced a 95% chance of being convicted in Holly's murder if he didn't make up the entire story blaming the others. And if he lied to stay out of prison, it worked. He was released just three years after his conviction due to the time served, while Zach and Dylan are both still in prison.
37:57 Speaker 02 So I mentioned, you know, that it's, it's scary to think about being convicted in large part based on one person's statements. And now, you know, Jason has recanted those statements. Now, there is an issue of, okay, at what point do you believe this guy? I think you have that anytime somebody, you know, flip flops in a case. But again, I stick with the, you know, this is scary situation to think of yourself being in and how it could go very wrong very quickly for you.
38:37 Speaker 03 It's interesting to think too about the motivations of him recanting. You know, had he been involved and somehow managed to not be part of the, the sentence of life in prison or the death penalty and that stuff. And he was now out of prison. It would behoove him to just keep his mouth shut and go on about his life. And instead he does the reverse and he says, I made all this up and it was all a lie. So you wonder what would motivate him to do that? Is it a guilty conscience because these other guys are rotting away in prison? And he feels that they don't deserve to be there. You know, that's, that's an interesting part that we really don't know what prompted him to, to do this.
39:22 Speaker 02 Yeah, that, that's a good point because my thought is double jeopardy wouldn't come into play if they charged him for the murder. Right? That would be a new charge. Despite Jason Autry recanting, the judge refused to enter his new statements, recanting his testimony into evidence, calling it hearsay. This is important because it was Jason Autry's testimony that was really the main thing that sealed Zachary Austin's fate. There were no forensics, like DNA matches, fingerprints, ballistics, things like that. There was no proof that Holly had been sexually assaulted before she was killed because it appears that none of the lower half of her body was even recovered.
40:07 Speaker 02 Jason Autry also claims that he had the entire discovery file when he was making up his story and he used it to fill in details. He knew exactly what evidence needed to be pieced into the narrative. This could explain why Jason claimed that Zachary was driving his grandfather's white pickup truck, that a speeding white truck was in the files after being seen near Holly's home. However, there is a 911 call proving that Zachary was demanding the keys to the truck from his grandfather the evening that Holly disappeared, which opens the possibility that he didn't have that vehicle during the crucial timeframe.
40:48 Speaker 02 It's also interesting that the specific language or phrase "gut" was already in court records regarding Zachary Adams at the time that Jason Autry gave his story about the idea of gutting the body.
41:03 Speaker 03 Jason Autry was being held in solitary confinement when he was facing these charges in Holly's case. He started writing letters confidently stating he would be getting out, suggesting that he knew he was giving investigators exactly what they wanted and they were buying it. Holly was abducted just before 8:00 a.m. According to Jason Autry, by 9:35, she had already been taken to a barn about 20 minutes away, sexually assaulted by three men, possibly injected with drugs, killed, moved to Shane Austin's house, then moved to the boat ramp. It's an incredibly tight timeline for all of that to have happened. In fact, the original lead investigator on the case calculated that for Jason's story
41:45 Speaker 03 to be possible, they would have had to drive 106 miles an hour at points. And therefore Holly's cell phone pings to fit with this story, whoever had it would have had to drive 1,127 miles per hour.
41:59 Speaker 02 Okay, that's, that's pretty fast.
42:02 Speaker 02 I mean, that's ridiculously, impossibly fast, right?
42:08 Speaker 02 That sounds like reasonable doubt to me. If, if the calculation is correct, I mean, I think you have to put that caveat into everything. There were two different cellphone experts in this case and their opinions differed a lot. It's important to note that in such a rural area, there aren't that many cellphone towers, phone pings are not GPS data points and have a pretty large margin of error. The prosecution's expert claims that Holly's phone and Zachary's phone pinged at the same location. However, the defense's expert claimed that while Holly's phone did ping
42:48 Speaker 02 in the same spot as Zachary's phone, it wasn't at the same time. Holly's phone pinged in the area at 7:42 a.m. while Zach's phone pinged there at 8:19 a.m. The defense expert claims that the records actually show that Holly's phone was not with Zachary Adams' phone at any point that morning.
43:10 Speaker 03 From 9:42 a.m. to 10:30, Jason Autry and Zachary Adams' phones were pinging together from an area suggesting they were under the bridge. At this time, Holly's phone was not near the bridge. It was south of Gooch Road where it was later found. And crucially, Jason answered a phone call from his mother at 9:42 a.m. while he was supposedly under the bridge with a dead body. That seems like an odd time to answer a call and pretty risky too. According to investigator Terry Dykes, who we'll discuss more later, Holly's phone didn't stop moving until 9:25 a.m. This would mean that the story about taking her to the barn, or the story about her being in a truck when Jason showed up at Shane's house, were impossible. Her phone would have been stationary during both of those events.
43:56 Speaker 02 Between 8:19 a.m. and 8:55 a.m., Jason Autry and Zachary Adams were texting and calling each other. This suggests that they weren't together and that Zachary wasn't too busy to communicate. Would someone really answer a text, let alone a call, if they were in the middle of an abduction, sexual assault, and murder? At 8:28 a.m., Zachary's phone was pinging off the tower closest to his house. And by 9:12, after Holly had already been abducted and while her phone was still moving, Zachary's phone was still pinging off his home tower, according to Terry Dykes.
44:37 Speaker 02 If that all seems kind of confusing, it's because it was presented that way. The experts used different methods of geolocation and focused on different timestamps.
44:49 Speaker 03 So what's going on here? If Jason Autry was lying back then, but he's telling the truth now, it seems possible that Dylan was manipulated into a false confession because of his low IQ. And Zachary was at his house well after the abduction. If those things are accurate and they didn't kill Holly Bobo, then who did? Terry Dykes, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, original lead investigator on the case, doesn't believe that any of the men charged, arrested, or convicted are actually responsible for Holly's murder. He believes that the best suspect is a man named Terry Britt. Britt is a convicted sex offender who lived not too far from the Bobo home. He also had a thing for girls with blue eyes and blonde hair like Holly. Britt also had a criminal record that included rape and kidnapping.
45:34 Speaker 03 There were also searches on his computer for pornography that involved things like rape and kidnapping.
45:40 Speaker 02 Terry Dykes has noted that Britt's wife Janet, who was his alibi for the morning of Holly's murder, was with him on more than one occasion when he did something illegal or creepy and would likely cover for him on this. Clint Bobo, Holly's brother, said that Britt did sound like the man he heard arguing with his sister that morning when he assumed it was her boyfriend. According to Clint in a court affidavit, the man had a deep, raspy smoker's voice, which apparently matches Britt's voice. It's also been said that Britt had his phone off that entire morning and that there's no cellphone data for him.
46:21 Speaker 03 At all. Britt and his wife claimed to have been buying a bathtub and renovating their home that morning. Britt actually provided a handwritten receipt for the tub, which he had kept stored in a safe. Despite having that handwritten receipt in a safe, the store, which kept carbon copies of all receipts, didn't have a record of the purchase or of any bathtub sale that entire week. None of the employees could recall seeing Britt or his wife either.
46:49 Speaker 02 And this handwritten receipt, you know, more did jump out at me. Who keeps a handwritten receipt for a bathtub in their safe? It's like you're protecting this for what? An alibi?
47:05 Speaker 03 I have some weird stuff in my safe and my, my box that I keep. My wife says I'm a little bit of a hoarder when it comes to weird receipts. So, you know, if you went through my box, you might find some, some strange stuff. But in this case, the fact that the store doesn't have the carbon copy of it is a, is a little bit strange. The only eyewitness to Holly's abduction is her brother Clint, and none of the men who were charged or convicted in this case matched Clint's description of the man who he saw walking toward the woods with Holly that morning. The closest was Shane Austin, who matched the body type the best, but he had reddish blonde hair and Clint was very
47:46 Speaker 03 clear that the man wearing camouflage had dark hair. At the time, Terry Britt had dark hair that matched the description, but he cut it shortly after the abduction. Also, the pink underwear found by the side of the road and thought to have been Holly's turned out not to belong to her, even though they were presented at trial. It's not clear how they later determined the underwear weren't Holly's, but now a pair of underwear near Holly's belongings close to Shane Austin's trailer isn't the damning piece of information it originally seemed to be. One more thing that opens up a possibility of someone else altogether being involved.
48:21 Speaker 02 There's no real connection between Holly and any of the men who were arrested. What we do know is that Karen Bobo was Jason Autry's 7th grade teacher. Autry was also Holly's 2nd cousin, though it's unclear whether they had ever met. Karen had also once been Zachary Adams' 4th grade teacher. And we mentioned it early on, right? This is a very small town. So it seems likely that people there would cross paths in some fashion. And it doesn't prove that the connection is a solid one. But just 1 week before Holly disappeared, she and her cousin Natalie crossed paths with someone and they were not happy about it. It was Terry Britt.
49:04 Speaker 02 They were creeped out by him and rejected his advances. Could this have been when Britt decided that he would basically take what he wanted and targeted Holly? Dykes felt that it was possible, but he was removed from the investigation in the summer of 2013 because other investigators believed that he had tunnel vision that was causing him to ignore leads on the case like Austin Autry and the Adams brothers.
49:32 Speaker 03 Terry Dykes is not alone in his belief that Terry Britt could be responsible for Holly Bobo's murder. Senior United States Marshals Inspector John Walker told CBS that in March 2013, when he visited Terry Britt and told him he was a suspect, Britt said, "It sounds like you have it all figured out." And also said he would plead to it in exchange for a 20-year sentence. When asked about this at Zachary's trial, he actually laughed pretty hard, pretty gleefully, for a guy being accused of murder on the stand. Terry Britt also referred to Holly as "it" and called her a "toy."
50:07 Speaker 02 According to News Channel 5, in 2015, Decatur County District Attorney Matt Stowe apparently sent emails complaining that the investigation was progressing so slowly that the culprits were always 1 step ahead and that the TBI was leaking information and possibly covering up evidence. To many people, this shows that there were a lot of problems with the investigation and a lot of tension behind the scenes. Authorities did wiretap Terry Britt's phone, but he apparently never said anything incriminating. Officers also had him under physical surveillance, but he never did anything suspicious or went anywhere relevant to the investigation.
50:50 Speaker 02 Meanwhile, according to multiple witnesses, Zachary Adams was going around referencing Holly. He says that this is a regrettable action now, but that he was just trying to be intimidating and basically earned street cred by making it look like he was involved. And I know people do this, but it seems like such a bad idea. If you're not involved in a murder, going around and threatening people, saying that you'll end up like Holly Bobo, that obviously could be used against you at a trial. Why would someone do that if they didn't have anything to do with the murder? Or why would they do it if they did?
51:35 Speaker 03 Especially in a small town, it seems like it would be very easy to get back to somebody and you could find yourself having to answer as to why you said that. It seems just from looking at the map that Holly's abductor took her north to where her body was found and then drove east to be able to drive back south, throwing her things out of the vehicle along the way. Her phone pings indicate that she, or at least her phone, were in the same area for about 30 minutes. This is likely when any assault in her murder occurred. Then the killer headed back south. Coincidentally or not, Terry Britt, if he was the killer, would have needed to head down the route that her belongings were found on to get back to his home.
52:16 Speaker 03 As tantalizing a suspect as Terry Britt may be, he's not the only person getting attention.
52:21 Speaker 02 There's another man named John Dot who may have had some kind of score to settle. He had recently tried to break into the Bobo home. He drove a white truck, was reportedly seen in the area the morning of Holly's disappearance, and had access to a cabin close to the Bobo's house. There's a lot less information about him online, but if the white truck was really involved in Holly's case, then maybe there is some potential here with this man. If Zachary Adams truly is guilty, then the white truck was likely unrelated to Holly's abduction. It's been reported that the truck he had access to that day was a dark truck.
53:04 Speaker 02 For what it's worth, investigator Terry Dykes doesn't believe the white truck was involved. For him, the timing doesn't add up, and it was driving the opposite direction that Holly's phone moved in. At the end of the day, the white truck could be just a red herring. Just think about how many white trucks we see every day. Lots of different companies use those kinds of trucks. They're everywhere.
53:28 Speaker 03 Jason Autry's recanted testimony is not the only reason Zachary Adams believes he deserves a new trial. He says that there's proof that he has an alibi that day, and that he was in a dark truck, not a white truck, but that his lawyer never requested the alibi be brought to light. He also is arguing ineffective counsel on that and other issues like the fact that he didn't testify. He says that his lawyer told him not to, so he didn't, even though he wanted to. The alibi is that he, Shane, and Dylan were together that morning, but not with Holly. There's video of a dark truck going through a drive-up ATM at a bank. Zachary says it was him driving the truck, and he withdrew cash at the ATM.
54:09 Speaker 03 Not much may come from this because apparently, none of the bank transactions are timestamped. It seems to be shocking that even in 2011, financial transactions, which are pretty important, wouldn't have some kind of timestamp. It's also not clear if his banking transactions from all those years ago could be accessed now to verify the transaction. Additionally, the image we've seen of the truck is blurry, and you can't see any of the people who might be inside.
54:35 Speaker 02 Right now, we're still awaiting the judge's decision as to whether or not Zachary Adams will receive a new trial. He's still serving his sentence at Morgan County Correctional Complex in Wortburg, Tennessee. By most accounts, Zachary Adams is not a good guy, but is he a killer? There are multiple reports of his past behavior. In 2004, 19-year-old Zachary actually shot his mother in the knee with a 9mm pistol, though he'll say he did not shoot his mother. She just kind of got in the path of the bullet, that the gun he was holding fired. In July of 2011, his girlfriend Rebecca Earp filed for a restraining
55:17 Speaker 02 order after he physically assaulted her. In 2014, he also reportedly threatened and held a gun to the head of Amber Bray, the sister of his then-girlfriend, and once did the same with a knife and said he was going to gut her.
55:33 Speaker 03 Whether or not you think Zachary is a good person or a killer, it's very powerful that the person who provided most of what convicted him is now saying that it's all a lie. Should a jury have to consider the remaining evidence, the threats to his girlfriend, his brother, and Amber Bray, the cell phone pings, the weapons found, everything else, and come to a new verdict? Or do we accept the fact that the jury heard all the inconsistencies and all the things that didn't make sense and still found Zachary Adams guilty? His defense attorney at trial reportedly admitted she was overwhelmed and that the hostility she faced from the judge and the prosecutor actually negatively affected her mental health.
56:13 Speaker 02 You know, one thing that's very sad in this case is that Holly's family may not really know what's true and what's not, and if the men who killed Holly are really in prison paying for it. I'm sure they want to know that the right person is behind bars. For as long as this case has put the Bobo family through hell, Holly's memory has lived on. There is a Holly Bobo Memorial Scholarship, given to a University of Tennessee at Martin Parsons Center student, studying nursing each year. There's not a lot of information about it, but it looks like it was started in 2015, and it was awarded earlier this
56:54 Speaker 02 year. In addition, the Holly Bobo Act was signed by the governor in 2020, allowing the TBI to include people
57:04 Speaker 02 Ages 18 to 21 in things like critical alerts. Holly was robbed in life of her chance to help people as a nurse, perhaps in debt. She can help others with the scholarship or the Holly Bobo Act. I think more of, you know, as we wrap this case up, there are a lot of questions that still surround this case. What's not in question is that something, you know, really terrible, really heinous happened to Holly Bobo and her life was taken from her at a very young age. I think, you know, a lot of people look at this case and they kind of focus in on the convictions.
57:48 Speaker 02 And that's where a lot of the questions crop up. You know, did they get the right guys? You know, we've mentioned it, right? The, the evidence was pretty thin. I think that's safe to say, but heck, a lot of cases are tried and decided on what you would have to call fairly thin circumstantial evidence. That doesn't mean the person didn't do it. I think for me, it comes down to Jason Autry and his testimony. If it is completely false, as he is now saying, well, that could change everything.
58:28 Speaker 03 Yeah, there's just so many components to this case and to the conviction. So much to the story that you have to wonder what's true, what's accurate. You know, are the right people in jail? You know, as a family member, as you, as you mentioned, I think they want the right person to be paying for this crime. I don't think they just want somebody in prison just to say somebody's in prison. So I, you know, I feel for that family having to wonder, are the right guys in jail? And at this point, if it turns out that they're not, can a case be made against somebody else? You know, is there enough evidence? There wasn't really a lot of evidence to convict these guys.
59:13 Speaker 03 So would there be evidence to somehow convict somebody else? And if somehow these guys ever walk free and there's not enough evidence to charge somebody else?
59:25 Speaker 03 That might undo any of the justice that the Bobo family feels that they received.
59:32 Speaker 02 Yeah, I think you could make a case that, you know, this guy Terry Britt could be a very interesting viable suspect. And a lot of people in law enforcement have said they they believe he is. When you have Holly and her cousin reportedly having an encounter with this guy, rejecting his advances. Okay, you can start to think of possible motive there. It was also said that if charged, he would plead to it in exchange for a 20 year sentence. I mean, if that's true, that's pretty damning to me. Not that you could convict somebody solely on that, but it would be damning information to come out.
1:00:18 Speaker 03 Yeah, I agree. And I think that the fact he is a convicted sex offender and some of the things we talked about him doing in the past proves that he is the type of person that might be able to do something like this. And we also have him crossing paths. It was documented that Holly and her cousin were creeped out by this guy not long before she was abducted. That's pretty powerful. Where, you know, on the other hand, we don't have any evidence of her crossing paths with any of the other guys. I mean, it doesn't mean it didn't happen. But here we have a documented interaction with Terry Britt.
1:01:00 Speaker 02 Yeah, I guess for me, I just go back to this notion that it is possible that you could be arrested, tried and convicted pretty much solely based on the word of one or two people. And if you really didn't do it, have anything to do with it, man, that scares the you know what out of me. I'm not saying he didn't do it, Zachary or these other guys. I'm just saying if if it turns out to be the case, man, that is scary.
1:01:33 Speaker 03 And to me, that's where the whole West Memphis Three vibes come in, the making a murderer with Brendan Dassey, like we talked about, there's just enough stuff there that plants doubts in your mind and makes you wonder. What's going on here? Did they get it right? Or did they get it totally wrong?
1:01:54 Speaker 02 But I think what you know, what is safe to say is that because this is in the news again, things are going on, you know, at one point it was thought to have been wrapped up. And now it may not be, and we'll have to kind of follow it, wait and see, you know, if more information comes out. But that's it for our episode on Holly Bobo. As always, if you love the show, but haven't done so yet, take a minute, go out, leave us a review, a rating. Also, keep telling your friends. Word of mouth about the podcast really helps us out.
1:02:33 Speaker 03 If you want to find us on social media, we're on every major platform. Just search for Criminology Podcast on your favorite. And for news, past episodes and other information, head over to our website, criminologypodcast.com. And if you want to join the discussion about podcasts or the cases we've discussed, head over to Facebook to the Criminology Podcast Discussion and Fans Group.
1:02:54 Speaker 02 So that's it for another episode of Criminology. But Morph and I will be back with you all next Saturday night with a brand new episode. So until then, for Mike.
1:03:03 Speaker 03 And Morph.
1:03:04 Speaker 02 We'll talk to you next week.
1:03:06 Speaker 03 Take care, everyone.
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