Behind the Yellow Tape: On the Road With Some of America's Hardest Working Crime Scene Investigators by Jarrett Hallcox, Amy Welch Read Free Book Online Page B

I’m not going to hell for killing anybody; I didn’t.” On March 17, 2007, Blair was moved from the Sevier County Jail to the Brushy Mountain Correctional Complex—the same facility where the infamous James Earl Ray, assassin of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., remained until his death. Within four days of being admitted to his new residence, he was assaulted, supposedly for a comment he made about another inmate’s girlfriend—proof yet again that there is at least some honor among thieves.
     
    Today, a small wooden cross marks the place where Kelly Sellers’s body was found. It’s a simple monument, two sticks tied together with a small piece of brown twine, in remembrance of where Kelly was removed from her earthen tomb. A sun-faded soft drink can marks the top of the trailhead leading down to the rudimentary memorial. When we visited the site, with the sun permeating magnificently through the trees, it marked the one-year anniversary of Kelly Sellers’s murder. The experience was sobering, to say the least.
    Seeing that setting on English Mountain up close was a truly remarkable experience. And even though it had been a year since they had dug up Kelly Sellers, you could still smell a hint of death in the air. That smell never, ever completely dissipates. A distinctly somber mood hung over us as we walked down to the roots of that overturned tree. There was an unplanned and unrehearsed moment when no one spoke and no one moved. Eventually we began speaking again, and we talked at length about the case, all of us wondering aloud how Blair must have felt as he drove his truck over the ragged terrain exactly 2.1 miles from his house, nostrils still filled with the stench of bleach and—given his story—at one point probably seeing Kelly sit up in the back of his truck bed in his rear-view mirror. How she must have felt as he dragged her probably live and very battered body over that uprooted tree as she bled out into the tarp, spending her last few minutes on earth buried alive. And how did he do it? There were no drag marks to be found. Did he throw Kelly over his shoulder and carry her down there by himself? John Wayne Blair is not a big man. Did he have help burying her? We may never fully know. Ninety-nine times out of a hundred, a killer will confess to everything but the “how.” So far, Blair has admitted to nothing. Nevertheless, the conversation gave us all a chill as we considered just how cruel people can really be.
    When we started back up the hill to leave, the CSIs began reminiscing about their time at the academy and telling tall tales exaggerated by time. They told us they wouldn’t trade their experiences for anything. These people truly epitomize what it means to be a “good ol’ boy”—a gender-neutral term, of course. It means that you work hard, you play hard, and you help others when you can. Yes, these guys can be rambunctious, but they are some of our closest friends and greatest allies. It doesn’t matter what we ask for; anything we ask, they will do it for us. And even though it’s been a few years since Sevier County had a CSI come through the program, a mysterious mason jar filled to the brim with a clear liquid always seems to make it to an academy class—even if for medicinal purposes only.

2
The Crying Game
    BOONE COUNTY SHERIFF’S OFFICE, KENTUCKY

    Boone County is the northernmost county in the state of Kentucky, and it sits right on the bank of the Ohio River. Founded in 1798, it is currently one of the fastest growing counties in the country. Boone County was named after Daniel Boone, a frontiersman from Tennessee. The county seat is Burlington. Though Boone County has the feel of a small town, it can have the crime of a large metropolitan area because Cincinnati is directly across the river. In fact, the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport sits right in the heart of Boone. The Boone County Sheriff’s Office is the second-largest agency in the state and