I watched Death Row Stories Sunday March 30th at 9 PM on CNN featuring James Duckett. Although the researchers for the show interviewed Jeanne Bragg - champion defender of James Duckett and author of the book about his mis-trial "The Truth Shall Set Him Free" , they decided to eliminate her entire 2 hour interview and did not even mention her on the show. Instead they decided to feature Marshall Frank and his illogical conclusion that James was guilty and maybe even a serial killer of another young girl. If you want actual transcripts from the trial you can order her book.
It's interesting to note that Jimmy's ex-wife Carla Duckett Boggs Massero (she had a much younger boyfriend - Brian Lee Boggs - waiting in the wings when Jimmy was on his way to prison).
An aside:
Just a note about the Bragg book: James and Carla dated since
she was 13. They married 7/11/77
at Ft Meade just before Carla's 18th birthday (8/3/59) Josh was born May 15, 1985 and his brother
Justin was born November 13, 1982. That's 5 years with no kids. I wonder
if Carla worked during that time, also it was mentioned that she cleaned
offices in the book. It also mentions that James worked as a computer room
operator at W.R. Grace, a phosphate company. He was laid off in 1986. That's
when he went to police academy in Eustis. It was May 11, 1987 that the child was raped and
killed. That was just 4 days before Josh's 2nd birthday and 1 day after Mother's day.
My thoughts...Maybe Carla was suffering from post partum depression at that
time. Supposedly before all this, they were a happy loving couple and went
everywhere together. James' childhood was a really good one. He was loved by
his brothers and sisters, his mother and he loved his step dad and vice versa.
He was mild mannered and very likeable. He may have had a dark side, but
somehow, maybe I'm prejudiced, Carla developed a very dark side. James worked
the night shift, so he was gone from 7
pm until 7 am.
Maybe Carla wanted affection and was seeking it elsewhere. She had the two
babies all day and no husband at night, and he probably slept a lot during the
day so he was only available to Carla about 4 hours per day. And like he said
there was nothing to do in Mascotte. They had 2 bars, a laundry and a
convenience store. Also, as I understand it, James' mother was very independent
and controlling. I wonder how she felt about Carla..or how Carla felt about
her.
According to Jeanne Bragg, Carla came to see James and the kids
said "Look at Mommy’s new ring (from Boggs)"
Boggs was 17 when Carla started seeing him. I think that means she was
seeing Boggs on the side before James went to prison. Carla went to Brian Bogg's high school prom when she was 27!
It was Carla who called Prosecutor Hurm to inform him that she found a toy in a bag (with bloody underwear) that Jimmy brought home one night. This was to implicate Jimmy in the murder of Jennifer Weldon a 14 year old girl. Of course she no longer had it because she told police that her sister Susan Harrell (now Peterson) conveniently threw it out.
"
Killer seen as suspect in Polk girl's '87 death
By Sherri M. Owens | Sentinel Staff Writer
Posted June 26, 2003
TAVARES -- Polk
County authorities have
revived an unsolved 16-year-old murder case, saying a new witness emerged
recently against James Duckett, a former police officer already on death row
for raping and murdering a Lake
County girl around the
same time.
A Polk Sheriff's Office investigator said Wednesday that the department intends
to present the new information to the State Attorney's Office within two weeks.
Duckett always was a suspect in the 1987 Polk case, but officials said the new
witness only came forward after reading recent news reports about Duckett's
appeal -- and claims of his innocence -- in the Lake County
case.
"We're rather confident we have a pretty good case," said Maj. W.J. Martin,
chief of the Polk County Sheriff's Office criminal-investigation division.
He would not elaborate on the new information. Duckett never was charged in the
death of Jennifer Weldon, a 14-year-old Lakeland
girl who disappeared on Sept.
19, 1987. That slaying came about a month before Duckett was
indicted on charges of killing an 11-year-old girl in Mascotte, where he had
worked as a police officer.
Duckett's lawyer, Beth Wells of Atlanta,
doubts the case is as strong as Polk officials say.
"They have nothing more now than they had years ago and they didn't indict
him then," she said, conceding she had heard little about the new witness.
"We think we'll be able to prove he didn't do it."
According to law-enforcement reports, Jennifer Weldon was last seen walking
home alone on Highway 98 just north of Lakeland.
The date and time printed on a gas receipt puts Duckett in the area the same
time the teen was said to have been there.
At the time, Duckett already was considered a suspect in the rape and murder of
Teresa McAbee, a Mascotte schoolgirl. He was seen talking to her in his squad
car on May 11, 1987,
and said he was warning her to get home before the city's curfew. The next
morning she was found floating in a nearby lake.
Duckett was fired from the Mascotte Police Department that June and was
indicted that October. In the meantime, he worked for a Polk phosphate mining
company.
"He was supposed to have been at work at 11 the night [Jennifer Weldon]
went missing, but we found out he was late that night and didn't arrive until
1," Martin said.
Other witnesses said that they saw Jennifer carrying a lime green bag and a
stuffed cat the last night she was seen alive. Duckett's wife at the time said
he brought home a lime green bag and a stuffed animal the next day.
"Not only do we have Duckett's ex-wife saying she saw the bag, but [the
ex-wife's] sister cleaned out the home and found the bag and a stuffed animal
and bloody underwear," Martin said, referring to events shortly after the
girl's death."
She also wrote a letter to then Governor Jeb Bush to ask him to execute Jimmy. She hated Jimmy (She hates me too). She once told Melinda's grandparents Nancy and Billy Eubank that "she got even with Jimmy". (Just like she got even with Melinda Duckett and Stephani and Debi).
It's also interesting that the then Sheriff - Noel Griffin - had a stepson named Joey Rothel Bowden who was jailed around that time and was a sexual offender of a child under age 12..
One of Noel's sons Monte Griffin - a policeman for Wildwood, Florida was running drugs using their private air strip and later was involved in "cracking" a case with none other than lead investigator in the Melinda Duckett case... Rich Giles.
Sheriff Noel also has another son who is with FDLE also mentioned in the article about Monte and Rich Giles:
Rocky Harris the Lake County detective on the Death Row Stories who believes James to be guilty has a checkered past of his own:
Booze-sting Team Quits Underage Secretary, Officer
Reported Drinking In Bar
April 05, 1985|By Jim Runnels of The Sentinel Staff
"TAVARES — An 18-year-old secretary who worked in a sheriff's sting
operation to stop the sale of alcohol to teen-agers and the sergeant who
supervised her work resigned Thursday when confronted with allegations that
they had been seen drinking together in a Leesburg bar.
The underage secretary was used in the sting operation so officers could
prove the law was broken by virtue of her age.
Rocky Harris, the supervising sergeant of the Lake County Sheriff's
Department Criminal Investigation Division, and secretary Becky Robbins
resigned Thursday when confronted with the allegations.
Sheriff Noel Griffin said that the 11 criminal cases that Robbins helped
officers create will not be affected by the resignations or the accusations.
''What happened with our employees doesn't technically affect the criminal
cases at all,'' Griffin said.
Defense attorneys, however, said they think the cases will be jeopardized
because juries probably will refuse to impose criminal sanctions on clerks on
Robbins' word.
''How can they expect a jury to find somebody guilty when the informant and
a supervisor in the unit are accused of violating the same law?'' one attorney
asked. He said he did not want to be identified.
Deputies began the sting operation in the wake of criticism of a similar
operation in which the department used an employee of WCPX-Channel 6 to make
cases; three clerks who were arrested March 13. The television station provided
the undercover agent -- a young female intern -- and deputies made arrests
after store clerks sold the underage girl alcoholic beverages.
Shortly after the arrests were made, sheriff's spokesman Chris Giachetti
said the department would begin doing its own sting operations, using a
department employee. He said the change was because the stings were so
successful, not because the department and the television station were being
criticized.
The employee chosen to work undercover in the sting was Robbins, whose
full-time department job was to act as Giachetti's secretary.
Giachetti said Thursday that most of the 11 cases in which Robbins assisted
were filed in the past week.
In those cases, Robbins was sent into various stores to purchase alcohol
while other officers videotaped the transactions.
While the criminal cases proceeded through the preliminary stages of the
court system this week, rumors began to circulate that defense attorneys were
planning to attack the sheriff's department because Harris and Robbins had been
seen drinking together at a Leesburg restaurant lounge.
When inquiries by The Orlando Sentinel were made to the sheriff's
department Thursday, Griffin said he ordered an internal affairs investigation.
Independent investigations of Harris and Robbins ended almost as soon as
they began, Giachetti said, with both Robbins and Harris resigning as soon as
they were confronted with the allegations.
Giachetti said the investigations went no further.
Harris was reached by telephone but refused to comment. Robbins could not
be reached."
And one of the many letters I received from James this one dated 4 years ago:
I am disappointed that this episode presented by CNN Death Row Stories did NOT give the full story nor present the information researched by Jeanne Bragg nor myself and the many others who carry the torch for this injustice.
