The Debrief With MyronGainesX - Murder For Hire & Political Corruption In Mississipi! Fed Explains The Dixie Mafia!

00:00:00.880 All right, and we are live. What's up, guys? Welcome to FedIt. Today, we're going to be covering the Dixie Mafia. 0.98

00:00:05.300 You guys requested this one, man. We're going to take a break from serial killers. We're going to go back to organized crime and public corruption.

00:00:10.280 Let's get into it. This is going to be a good one.

00:00:14.440 I was a special agent with Homeland Security Investigations, okay, guys? HSI.

00:00:17.660 The cases that I did mostly were human smuggling and drug trafficking.

00:00:22.760 No one else has these documents, by the way.

00:00:25.060 Here's what FedIt covers.

00:00:26.200 Dr. Lafredo confirmed lacerations due to stepping on glass.

00:00:33.000 Murder investigations.

00:00:34.020 You see him reaching in his jacket. You don't know.

00:00:36.300 And he's positioning.

00:00:36.920 Been on February 13, 2019.

00:00:38.640 You're facing two pounds of two-legitated murder.

00:00:41.780 Bracketeering and Rico conspiracy.

00:00:43.560 Young Slime Life here and after referred to as YSL.

00:00:46.180 This is 6ix9ine, and then this is Billy Seiko right here. 0.82

00:00:49.640 Now, when they first started, guys, 6ix9ine ran with me. 0.98

00:00:52.260 I'm a Fed. I'm watching this music video.

00:00:53.740 Well, you know, I'm bobbing my head like, hey, this shit lit. 0.98

00:00:56.600 But at the same time, I'm pausing. 0.99

00:00:58.080 Oh, wait, who this? Right?

00:00:59.880 Who's that in the back? 0.73

00:01:01.940 Firearms and violent plans.

00:01:03.360 A.K.A. Bush IC violated.

00:01:05.140 In order to stay away from the victim. 0.97

00:01:06.820 Sex trapping and sex crimes.

00:01:19.520 They can effectively link him to paying an underage girl.

00:01:22.820 I'm going to love my sister.

00:01:23.860 And the first bomb went off right here.

00:01:27.340 Suspect 2 set down a back half.

00:01:29.680 The site is the second explosion.

00:01:30.960 Inspired by Al-Qaeda. 0.93

00:01:32.400 Two terrorists, brothers, the Zokar Sarnab and Tamerlan Sarnab.

00:01:36.940 When the cartels shipped drugs into the country.

00:01:39.000 As this guy got arrested for espionage, okay?

00:01:41.680 Trading secrets with the Russians for monetary compensation. 0.57

00:01:45.380 The largest corrupt police bust in New Orleans history.

00:01:49.980 The days of the police are gone.

00:01:51.760 So he was in this bad boy.

00:01:53.140 We're going to go over his past.

00:01:54.900 The gang guy.

00:01:55.740 So that this all makes sense.

00:02:03.020 All right.

00:02:03.660 We're back.

00:02:04.120 What's up, guys?

00:02:04.600 Welcome to Fed It, man.

00:02:06.000 Guys, don't forget to like this video.

00:02:07.820 Okay.

00:02:08.260 Subscribe on your way in.

00:02:09.720 Okay.

00:02:10.000 Quick notes before we get into the show.

00:02:11.000 Number one.

00:02:11.360 Rumble.com slash Fresh Fit.

00:02:12.480 Help us hit 100,000 on there.

00:02:14.720 Second announcement.

00:02:15.700 Guys, I want to show y'all the channel real quick.

00:02:19.040 As you guys can see, right?

00:02:20.300 We got the Fed Explains, the merchant of death.

00:02:22.660 This is doing really well, man.

00:02:23.660 So go ahead and watch this video, guys.

00:02:25.200 If you guys want to know the real backstory on Victor Bout and why he was really a bad dude.

00:02:31.060 I break this down.

00:02:31.800 I go over the entire investigation that ended up putting him in jail.

00:02:34.720 But, yes, this guy was trying to sell weapons to undercover DEA operatives that were trying to kill American soldiers that were combating the Colombians and the Americans going against the FARC.

00:02:46.040 Okay.

00:02:46.320 So, yeah.

00:02:47.520 Really wild stuff.

00:02:48.800 The L United States on this part because that was a bad trade.

00:02:53.360 Also, guys, check out my whole serial killer playlist, man.

00:02:57.320 I got a whole playlist on infamous serial killers for you guys.

00:02:59.780 We got the Zodiac Killer.

00:03:00.740 This is a four-hour-plus breakdown on the most notorious serial killer of all time.

00:03:05.100 We got the railroad killer. 0.65

00:03:06.020 I did this one a couple weeks ago, almost two weeks ago now at this point.

00:03:09.160 Obviously, we got the Night Stalker, Jeffrey Dahmer, John Wayne Gacy, Ted Bundy, the Unabomber, right?

00:03:15.200 Real famous one.

00:03:16.520 Also, I got a complete breakdown on 9-11, guys.

00:03:18.680 We go into the World Trade Center bombing, 9-11, an FBI investigation, Osama bin Laden.

00:03:24.080 His backstory, you know, a lot of people didn't know that he was a multi, multi, multi-millionaire.

00:03:28.140 His family was worth billions of dollars.

00:03:30.740 Because the bin Laden family was responsible for a lot of the construction in Saudi Arabia. 0.97

00:03:36.260 And then we go into the conspiracy theories of 9-11 as well, where we went ahead and broke down the documentary, The New Pearl Harbor.

00:03:41.760 And I gave my take on it as well.

00:03:43.980 And, you know, we covered, you know, a bunch of different things with, you know, Shancrela Robinson's murder down there in Mexico.

00:03:51.020 We also go ahead and cover – we got the clips, right?

00:03:54.440 And, obviously, you got all the videos you guys have come to learn and love, such as, you know, YNW Melly, YSL, the O'Block Rico, the takeoff shooting, Casanova, 6ix9ine, Tory Lanez.

00:04:06.580 We'll also be covering, you know, KFLOC, all the stuff.

00:04:09.660 R. Kelly, all that stuff is there, guys.

00:04:11.280 So be sure to subscribe to the channel.

00:04:13.600 Definitely one of the best true crime channels on YouTube by far because there's no one else that has my experience giving you all this kind of sauce on the internet, man.

00:04:22.440 Anyway, with that said, I got a special guest in the house.

00:04:24.700 Christina, why don't you give yourself to the people? 0.96

00:04:27.260 Hi, I'm Christina.

00:04:28.700 If you guys have any cases or tell me, like, whatever state you guys are in, contact Betit1811 on IG.

00:04:34.880 Bam.

00:04:35.520 She manages that.

00:04:36.260 Instagram, guys, she helps me out behind the scenes.

00:04:39.020 She went ahead.

00:04:39.900 I've got to mark her for you on this one.

00:04:40.940 She went ahead and got me the Young Dolph documents, guys, and we got some more documents coming in.

00:04:46.580 We made some connections, and the Young Dolph case is definitely going to be done very soon.

00:04:51.060 We got exclusive documents that other people don't have.

00:04:53.460 Christina's in the process of gathering all the documents.

00:04:55.380 I think they got a court date in January, right?

00:04:57.620 That's what we're waiting?

00:04:58.380 They have a court date this week, and then they have two more in January, but what I can't – I don't want to say.

00:05:06.700 Okay, that's fine.

00:05:07.820 Some stuff that we can't disclose yet we will on the episode, but yeah, Christina and Xena went up to Memphis and went and got the documents themselves, so shout out to both of them for helping me out.

00:05:18.080 Also, quick announcements.

00:05:19.720 I'm going to go ahead and do – the next serial killer I'm going to cover, guys, is BTK, a.k.a. Dennis Rader.

00:05:24.300 Gotcha.

00:05:24.700 You guys have been asking for that one.

00:05:26.100 That one's coming very soon. 1.00

00:05:27.480 That dude is fucking crazy. 1.00

00:05:28.600 Definitely had Kansas, the worst serial killer, definitely in Wichita slash Kansas slash – well, Kansas is history, okay, let alone one of the most notorious serial killers in U.S. history. 1.00

00:05:40.660 And then I'm also going to go ahead and cover the guy that got arrested, FTX, Samuel Friedman.

00:05:48.620 I got his indictment.

00:05:50.500 I got his documents.

00:05:51.440 I'm also going to be covering that one very soon as well.

00:05:54.500 And I know you guys have been asking about those college shootings.

00:05:57.220 I'm going to be covering that as well.

00:05:59.900 Samuel – let's see.

00:06:01.300 What was his name again?

00:06:02.140 I'm going to check the email.

00:06:03.100 What was that?

00:06:03.660 I'm going to check the Instagram.

00:06:04.920 Instagram?

00:06:05.680 Okay.

00:06:07.100 It's – yeah, Samuel Bankman-Fried.

00:06:09.320 Sorry, guys.

00:06:10.100 Yeah, Samuel Bankman-Fried.

00:06:11.380 SBF.

00:06:13.000 I'm going to be covering his case as well coming up.

00:06:16.680 And as you guys know, Tory Lane right now is in the middle of trial.

00:06:20.620 Meg the Stein took the stand yesterday.

00:06:22.940 I'm going to go ahead and look at, you know, the court transcripts and go ahead and go through some of the videos of how her testimony went.

00:06:28.800 But I'll probably do a reaction to the trial as well for you guys.

00:06:33.180 So we got some big things coming on for –

00:06:35.260 All right, guys.

00:06:37.480 So with that said, guys, today we're going to be covering the Dixie Mafia, man.

00:06:40.320 This is organized crime and public corruption at its finest.

00:06:42.080 A lot of you guys may be familiar with Biloxi, very famous gambling slash tourist town.

00:06:51.060 But it wasn't always like that.

00:06:52.420 And we're going to go ahead into the dark backstory of Biloxi.

00:06:57.640 And, yeah, we're going to cover the Dixie Mafia. 0.95

00:06:59.780 This has been a request.

00:07:01.140 This is a really good organized crime case when it comes to public corruption.

00:07:04.880 We've covered a couple of public corruption cases on this channel.

00:07:07.880 But I'm excited to get back into it.

00:07:09.280 So as usual, we're going to break down a documentary from the FBI Files, man.

00:07:12.940 One of my favorite documentaries, as you guys know.

00:07:15.340 And, yeah, without further ado, let's get right into it, ladies and gentlemen.

00:07:19.380 The Dixie, Mississippi.

00:07:26.200 Quiet southern town.

00:07:29.040 With a burning core of corruption.

00:07:33.140 In 1987, its secret burst violently to the surface.

00:07:40.200 Leaving two prominent citizens dead.

00:07:45.400 And ripping the top off a grand conspiracy.

00:07:49.620 And, yeah.

00:07:51.060 I mean, I mean, I mentioned a lot.

00:07:52.880 And there's two waiting on the j

00:08:10.260 One, yeah.

00:08:11.080 I mean, right?

00:08:12.660 You guys think of these two people?

00:08:17.960 And there's two people.

00:08:18.700 on mississippi's gulf coast a judge and his politician wife are murdered in their home

00:08:26.880 the killer left few clues so this is our guys off rep you got a judge

00:08:32.980 and a political figure being murdered in their own homes you already know this reeks of some

00:08:38.080 craziness but once you guys see the reason why and who was behind it is about to be wild

00:08:42.700 it looked like a professional hit and the investigation led nowhere but the fbi refused

00:08:50.120 to give up i'm jim kalstrom former head of the fbi's new york office until we could prove that

00:08:56.220 federal laws have been broken our hands were tied it would take years to break the conspiracy of

00:09:01.840 silence and reveal the tangled tale of corruption biloxi mississippi monday september 14th 1987

00:09:17.400 it was a typically warm summer night in this quiet gulf coast town the workday was over

00:09:25.820 and most residents had retreated to the tranquility of their homes

00:09:29.820 like most of their neighbors state circuit court judge vincent sherry and his wife margaret

00:09:37.280 were unwinding after a long day

00:09:39.420 vincent sherry was a prominent judge in biloxi

00:09:44.200 margaret was making plans to run for mayor 1.00

00:09:48.720 just so you guys know where biloxi is right because it's it's important to kind of know

00:09:55.480 where the area is so here is mississippi right here um

00:10:01.240 okay so boom so here we go here's mississippi

00:10:08.920 right you come all the way down here you can see biloxi

00:10:14.200 is right here right on the coast okay as you can see hard rock a hotel and casino

00:10:20.520 um it's it's a vacation destination now but it wasn't always like that you guys are going to see

00:10:25.400 what ended up um leading to this very soon okay

00:10:29.400 both were fixtures at biloxi's social and community functions

00:10:37.720 they were a happy couple who had raised three grown children

00:10:47.320 tomorrow they planned to visit their daughter out of state

00:10:53.080 be ready until tomorrow

00:10:54.520 their life together seemed ideal

00:10:57.780 they were just settling in for the night when an unexpected visitor came to the door

00:11:06.360 and brought their perfect world to an end

00:11:21.320 the sherrys were supposed to be with her daughter so no one realized anything was wrong until two days later when the judge failed to show up in court

00:11:48.860 later when the judge failed to show up in court on wednesday september 16th

00:11:58.940 oh yeah mississippi is hot guys and this is the 80s this is before

00:12:02.380 you know central ac was a huge thing so this is late 80s

00:12:10.380 calls to the sherry's home went unanswered

00:12:14.300 i'm sorry we can't take your call but leave your message after the beep

00:12:19.180 his colleagues at the court phoned pete hallette

00:12:29.020 vincent sherry's friend and former law partner

00:12:33.900 morning peter but he hadn't seen or heard from the judge either well he's supposed to be in court

00:12:40.540 i don't know no wait you let me call him at home and i'll figure out where he is all right

00:12:48.860 after he left a concerned message on the sherry's answering machine hallette felt he'd better

00:12:55.980 check on his friend personally i got the machine judge judge it's pete they're looking for you in

00:13:01.100 court is everything okay on his way out he asked his junior partner charles legere to ride with

00:13:08.780 i need some help so let's go let's go let's go let's go let's go give me a call back okay yeah

00:13:13.820 i think if we go together the two of us hmm smart bringing a witness

00:13:19.660 as they drove legere tried to make conversation

00:13:28.220 uh that seemed distant perhaps concerned about the judge

00:13:31.980 both of the sherry's cars stood in the driveway

00:13:48.060 well the car's here

00:13:57.260 i don't like

00:14:00.220 cars here supposed to be important

00:14:01.500 so let's go ahead

00:14:18.460 as you rang the doorbell but no one answered

00:14:23.740 he saw that the last two morning newspapers hadn't been picked up

00:14:26.940 up

00:14:30.220 just to let y'all know um you know obviously as a judge

00:14:34.060 wife is a politician you're not missing a newspaper guys remember in 1987 there was no

00:14:39.980 other way really to get the news besides conventional television a lot of times it

00:14:44.860 would have to be cable tv unless unless i don't even think cnn was like a thing really at this point

00:14:48.540 where they had 24 7 news okay um or you're watching the broadcast through you know you're watching

00:14:54.860 like the news broadcasts that came in throughout the day you know maybe 8 a.m news and the 5 p.m

00:14:59.180 news and maybe some late later evening news around 7 or 9 p.m but in general newspapers were a way 0.91

00:15:05.020 of life back then guys i know nowadays it's like what the fuck newspaper magazines books ha no one 0.99

00:15:10.460 needs that stupid but back in the 80s that was a big deal so for him to see two days of newspapers 0.98

00:15:16.060 not being picked up that's that's yeah what the hell's going on here all right and i know a lot 0.99

00:15:20.540 of you young bucks are like what the hell are you talking about myron but yes guys

00:15:23.740 newspapers were a big deal back then i remember myself my dad

00:15:30.540 he would he couldn't get through the day unless he had the morning paper just a thing

00:15:37.020 the neighbor told her that she hadn't seen the sherry's for a couple of days

00:15:40.620 which she thought was odd since both of their cars were in the driveway

00:15:43.900 when legere tried the sherry's door he found it unlocked something wasn't right pete pete

00:15:56.620 i think that's unusual

00:16:03.260 yeah i was uh just knocking on him the door opened up a lot concerned by the open door cautiously stepped

00:16:09.340 inside

00:16:18.300 a few steps in he made the gruesome discovery judge sherry had been gunned down in his own home

00:16:24.620 he was wrong they called the police

00:16:36.540 authorities arrived to find the body of vincent sherry at the front of the house

00:16:40.380 in the back bedroom they discovered marked

00:16:45.340 because the couple was so popular the murder investigation became top priority

00:16:52.460 detectives contacted the fbi's biloxi field office

00:16:57.820 though the fbi would not yet be officially involved they offered the use of their agents and forensic

00:17:03.180 laboratory all right so let me break this down for y'all real quick when you're in a small town right

00:17:09.100 remember this is before biloxi blew up and became the city that is it is now being a vacation

00:17:13.100 destination um it was still in its infant stages when when you're a federal agent right and you're

00:17:18.780 assigned to a small city like this all the law enforcement know each other so if something crazy

00:17:25.100 happens something big happens to town everybody is going to come in and work together all right the

00:17:29.820 feds are going to come in and help out the state now remember guys it's a murder case right and i've

00:17:34.460 explained to you guys before murder cases nine out of ten times unless there's some other type of

00:17:39.820 federal crime being involved right let's say a bank robbery for example typically are state-led

00:17:44.700 investigations all right premeditated murder you know murder in a second degree where it might not

00:17:49.740 necessarily been premeditated almost always falls to the state the feds don't come in unless the

00:17:55.580 state asks for the help or the state needs the help whether it might be like they said in the

00:18:00.060 documentary um you know a forensic lab they need manpower uh you know they have a working

00:18:05.740 relationship where hey listen i got a buddy who's an fbi agent and you got a homicide detective and

00:18:10.220 they just want their help you know he'll request uh hey can i get some assistance or whatever maybe

00:18:14.460 they want a profile on the killer right if it's a serial killer someone crazy and there's a pattern

00:18:18.220 of the killing and they want to figure out what type of individual he may be right so all of these

00:18:23.580 things come into play but typically when there's a fbi office a homeland office an atf office dea

00:18:30.140 office etc in a smaller area they work together a lot of the time so it wouldn't be uncommon right

00:18:37.260 even though this is going to be a state-led investigation off rip for the fbi to come in

00:18:41.020 and assist especially with something like this that has a lot of uh media coverage right you got a judge

00:18:46.700 and you got a political figure being murdered in their home well yeah quite clearly there's

00:18:52.700 some nefarious activity behind that so um you know at the onset of the investigation fbi is probably

00:18:58.460 going to come in um because it's a smaller town everyone knows each other so this isn't uncommon

00:19:02.620 but in a major city yeah it's a little bit different you know unless there's good relationships

00:19:07.180 between agencies you're not going to see camaraderie like this level

00:19:19.420 inside the police began scouring the crime scene for clues

00:19:25.420 they conducted blood spatter analysis to determine projectile angles

00:19:31.340 if they could figure out where the murderer had stood when he fired the shots

00:19:35.420 they might be able to reconstruct the crime

00:19:40.220 okay

00:19:44.780 inspector robert burris a crime technician with the biloxi police department helped process the scene

00:19:53.020 he discovered a possible clue in the den

00:19:58.780 there was blood trailing from his feet actually going down between his legs a little ways

00:20:05.820 back to where he was laying there was blood spatter on a double sliding glass door

00:20:13.340 that was right beyond his head and for other examination in this room i found some

00:20:20.220 small pieces of foam rubber

00:20:24.220 burris didn't see where the foam rubber could have come from

00:20:29.020 a search of the house led him to one conclusion

00:20:31.420 now this foam rubber had to have been brought into the house we examined

00:20:38.220 every piece of material in this house in every room of the house all pillows mattresses everything

00:20:43.500 else there's no foam rubber tore up in this house it was brought into the house it does have gunshot residue on it

00:20:50.380 and basically about the only way it can get there is for a bullet to be fired through it

00:20:57.740 for burris the significance of the foam rubber was obvious the killer had used a homemade silencer

00:21:03.340 all right so guys that's a huge red flag the fact that they use the silencer tells you okay

00:21:13.660 we're not dealing with some amateurs here right number one silencers aren't necessarily easy to

00:21:17.260 get and then the fact that there was rubber foam means it was a homemade one which means that this

00:21:20.780 guy had a serious um you know if that doesn't show premeditation i don't know what does right

00:21:26.460 clearly they had to get in they knew the statute the the status of the individuals that they were

00:21:30.940 targeting they had to get it done in a way where it wouldn't be loud it's a quiet neighborhood so all

00:21:35.820 these you know different uh steps that the killer took right show what premeditation right the type

00:21:43.900 of figures that they were going after the want to keep it uh nice and quiet because it's a residential

00:21:48.860 neighborhood all this stuff factors into it so the police at this point know that they're not dealing 0.99

00:21:53.260 with some amateur idiot whoever they're dealing with is a planned and seasoned professional 0.99

00:22:02.620 investigators dusted for fingerprints but found none of any value 1.00

00:22:09.980 they found nine spent 22 caliber shell casings from a semi-automatic pistol

00:22:16.380 as well as the bullets used to murder the sherris

00:22:18.700 the position of the shells indicated that the shots had been fired in rapid succession

00:22:27.820 but most striking was how well the killer had covered his tracks

00:22:33.820 nothing at the scene pointed to the killer's identity

00:22:39.260 so what do you think he did his job well and his mission was clear

00:22:43.180 the lack of evidence in this house such as uh items stolen uh a struggle occurring the absence of

00:22:53.420 forced entry uh no ransacking going on in the house whatsoever a person came there for one thing

00:23:00.380 that was to kill the two sherris special agent keith bell from the biloxi fbi field office agreed that

00:23:07.980 this was a professional job the sherris had been assassinated the crime scene appeared to be very

00:23:17.100 limited as far as evidence remaining which meant it was well planned well executed and professionally done

00:23:24.780 a small caliber weapon had been used the uh foam rubber indicated that perhaps a silencer had

00:23:33.340 also been used and the sherris had been shot in the head so uh it seemed to be a very professional job

00:23:43.900 now also this might seem familiar for you guys you guys know i went ahead and covered another podcast

00:23:49.020 right um a guy that actually committed a hit and he used a book called hitman right to commit the murders

00:23:57.580 and i actually had a got a copy of the book here let me say christina can you try to dig it up it's

00:24:02.220 somewhere um and he filed the instructions in that book and he ended up almost getting away with the

00:24:08.140 murder yet the police when they searched his house found that book and he and obviously a lot of the

00:24:13.820 things that they found at the crime scene matched the book so that was a big uh how do i say this that

00:24:19.580 that was a l for him for sure because the next thing you know fbi open up so and he ended up going to

00:24:27.820 jail but um this is also very interesting to see that we got another professionally done hit in this

00:24:33.340 one but go check out that episode guys it was probably one of the worst murder for hire cases uh 0.98

00:24:38.300 i've covered you know ended up where a wife and a child were killed by a crazy ass husband uh go check 0.75

00:24:44.620 it out it's on fed it on the documentary breakdown channel playlist a multi-agency task force was 0.71

00:24:51.580 assembled with special agent keith bell among its members investigators and this is an uncommon guys

00:24:59.260 like i said before in small towns the feds in the state typically work fairly closely together and

00:25:03.660 task force is a common thing and if you got a big case like this where you got prominent figures of

00:25:09.340 public officials etc getting killed and the way that they got killed with a professional hit aka a hitman

00:25:14.300 with almost no evidence yeah everyone's going to be all over it spend days processing the crime scene

00:25:25.500 they grappled with a single question why had the cherries been murdered

00:25:34.860 that was one of the main questions uh that being why were both judge sherry and margaret

00:25:40.780 shout out to christina she found the book there's a book right here guys uh hitman okay a technical

00:25:47.420 manual for independent contractors crazy stuff and real quick i'll show y'all the episode that i'm

00:25:54.140 talking about in general here um so if you go to fed 1811 it's right here um you go over to crime

00:26:00.380 documentary breakdowns and it is right here this band uh this band book led to the murder for hire and um

00:26:07.340 oh hold on my bed it's not even on the screen let me share screen with y'all this is it right here

00:26:11.580 okay uh and this this was crazy records and we broke it down really good episode um and the book ended

00:26:19.420 up getting banned after from a lawsuit so yeah anyway timestamp surrender you know definitely go check

00:26:26.380 it out go enjoy we got more breakdowns like that on uh fed it but anyway let's get back to the episode here

00:26:31.020 we'll hold on hold on we murdered because it was fairly obvious that judge sherry could have been

00:26:40.860 killed during his morning or afternoon jogs around the neighborhood so it was a real mystery why margaret

00:26:49.340 had been killed investigators believe the answer might lie in the controversy over biloxi's future

00:26:56.300 some civic leaders hoped to transform the sleepy southern town on mississippi's gulf coast

00:27:04.620 into a flashy resort where casinos would attract tourist dollars

00:27:11.580 but with strip clubs already established in town

00:27:14.700 margaret sherry felt biloxi's small town charms were threatened

00:27:17.980 and the casinos would attract a criminal element

00:27:26.220 as a candidate for mayor she had made powerful political enemies by trying to keep gambling out 1.00

00:27:32.940 hmm so there you go that's a clue right there guys

00:27:37.180 she didn't want biloxi to become what it is now okay a gambling hub because obviously

00:27:42.300 i mean let's be honest here anytime you introduce gambling what do you introduce you introduce

00:27:45.980 a lot of degeneracy with gambling comes strip clubs bars um prostitution uh drug trafficking

00:27:54.620 uh criminal activity in general just comes alongside gambling it is what it is guys you look at places

00:27:59.020 like las vegas you look at any type of place that's huge with gambling some type of criminal activity

00:28:04.220 isn't far behind okay so um she didn't want that so obviously there's a lot of money to be made in

00:28:10.220 gambling in these types of uh vices so i'm not surprised that she would be a target 0.60

00:28:15.980 uh agent bell wondered if margaret was killed to silence her protests

00:28:23.900 margaret had been so outspoken politically in the community

00:28:27.740 she was known to be anti-gambling and uh if elected mayor in 1989 she had planned to close down

00:28:34.780 the remaining strip clubs in biloxi so there was always a possibility that she might have been the 1.00

00:28:40.060 target rather than judge sherry the task force would investigate margaret's political enemies 0.99

00:28:48.940 but first they'd question the sherry's friends and neighbors

00:28:54.060 someone in the neighborhood must have seen something

00:28:56.220 in biloxi but even people who'd known the sherries for years were reluctant to talk

00:29:05.340 fearing the specter of biloxi's emerging criminal underworld

00:29:08.620 the sherry murders brought a dark cloud over the city of biloxi many of the citizens in biloxi were

00:29:21.180 afraid to openly express their opinions they saw that margaret sherry who had been quite vocal and quite

00:29:28.060 outspoken in political circles had ended up dead as had her prominent husband judge sherry so many

00:29:35.420 citizens after these murders were hesitant even to be interviewed by fbi agents or by local police

00:29:43.500 officers because they basically did not want their names tied into anything to do with this case

00:29:51.420 if people wouldn't talk to the authorities perhaps they would talk to lynn spazito the sherry's daughter

00:29:57.580 after being notified of her parents murders lynn rushed to biloxi from her home in north carolina

00:30:03.740 determined to find justice she questioned everyone in the neighborhood

00:30:09.100 one family friend that makes me wonder if the police asked her hey can you you know

00:30:12.940 do some do a little bit of snooping for us or whatever this is the 80s man times were different back then

00:30:17.660 uh but yeah you ain't gonna be able to turn away uh a very sad daughter about her parents death

00:30:25.020 gave her a crucial piece of information

00:30:26.940 he described a suspicious car and driver in the neighborhood on the night of the murders oh here we go

00:30:42.300 she took the lead to the police they identified a man who had seen a suspicious

00:30:49.900 ford fairmont driving in front of the sherry home on monday night september 14th 1987.

00:31:00.220 investigators tried to determine the identity of the driver based on the witness's description

00:31:06.780 their search came up empty

00:31:08.220 but a few days later not far from the sherry's home investigators found an abandoned car

00:31:18.620 a ford fairmont

00:31:19.820 uh okay

00:31:23.500 a check on the vehicle's identification number showed it had been reported stolen the day before the

00:31:28.700 murders

00:31:31.180 police also learned that the tags on the car were not registered to the car

00:31:34.940 realized more clues realizing that this vehicle was probably the killer's getaway car investigators

00:31:43.500 towed it to a police garage to examine it further

00:31:48.460 somewhere in the car they hoped to find a key to the killer's identity

00:31:58.460 less than a week after the brutal murders of deluxe couple vince and margaret sherry

00:32:03.260 investigators received their first promising lead

00:32:07.500 they recovered an abandoned car matching the one witnesses described seeing the night of the murders

00:32:16.700 after contacting agent keith bell about the discovery investigators processed the car for clues

00:32:26.220 inspector robert burris found something peculiar

00:32:28.780 i was processing this vehicle and one of the things i noted

00:32:34.620 the dome light had been dismantled and the bulb taken out of it in other words if you open the door

00:32:39.900 you ain't got no light both of the sun visors were in the down position whether you're riding

00:32:44.860 around daytime or nighttime you ain't gonna be able to see the people's face in it very well

00:32:50.380 investigators believed more than ever that this was the car used by the sherry's killer

00:32:55.500 anything found inside it was labeled packaged and shipped to the fbi labs in washington dc

00:33:08.380 but fbi lab examiners would find nothing of evidentiary value

00:33:12.220 after agent bill arrived he examined the license tag more closely

00:33:21.580 he discovered it had its own story to tell

00:33:24.300 here and it was determined that the tag on the ford fairmont had been stolen from an abandoned vehicle

00:33:33.100 in 1984 actually three years before these murders occurred so what it meant was someone had removed

00:33:40.540 the license plate likely in 1984 had kept the license plate and then when this major crime in

00:33:46.700 the city of biloxi was uh to occur they pulled it off the shelf so to speak

00:33:54.460 so that's weird so you're telling me that they could potentially plan this thing a year prior

00:34:03.100 with no other solid evidence investigators hope that following the trail of the stolen tag

00:34:08.140 might lead to the killer it was traced to an apartment complex where the original car

00:34:13.660 had been abandoned three years earlier investigators contacted the apartment manager who told them

00:34:22.940 that prior to having the vehicle towed he called a friend to come and strip it for parts

00:34:29.660 the manager's friend was a man that agents knew by name and reputation

00:34:34.780 biloxi locksmith lenny swetman he was the last person to be seen near the car

00:34:44.220 swetman belonged to a loosely organized group of criminals the fbi was investigating in connection

00:34:49.500 with another case the group here we go it was known as the dixie mafia bam now we've been able to

00:34:58.300 effectively link a vehicle that was more than likely used in a murder of a public official no well actually

00:35:04.060 two public officials and um and link it back to an organized criminal group now the bureau can kind of

00:35:12.780 come in and get involved because they were already investigating them for organized criminal activity

00:35:17.820 now they're able to go ahead and add murder to the criminal activity guys as a as a part of the uh

00:35:24.700 you know typically when you're doing organized crime they typically look at it from a racketeering

00:35:28.380 standpoint murder is considered a crime that can fall under racketeering okay aka rico

00:35:34.220 fbi agent keith bell had connected the car used in the sherry killings to lenny swetman now bell

00:35:42.780 wondered if the dixie mafia was linked to the sherry murders

00:35:50.860 if swetman had a part in it bell believed that other dixie mafia members couldn't be far behind 0.98

00:35:56.300 he began looking into swetman's associates what that meant to us immediately those of us familiar

00:36:05.420 with the criminal associations on the coast was that if lenny swetman was involved in getting the tag for

00:36:12.780 the hit car then quite likely his close personal friend and longtime associate mike gillich the strip

00:36:20.620 club owner in biloxi might also be involved in these murders i'm sorry sometimes you know this

00:36:27.020 oh thanks all right gillich who owns a strip club owner also being linked to the person who is involved

00:36:35.580 with the vehicle guys more clues and would a strip club owner want a casino to be opened up in his town

00:36:45.660 more than likely yes three strip clubs in biloxi was well known to local law enforcement

00:36:55.340 he was currently under investigation by the fbi in connection with a dixie mafia operation

00:37:00.700 known as the lonely heart scan

00:37:07.660 but special agent bell needed a thread that connected the two investigations together

00:37:11.980 he started by familiarizing himself with the lonely heart scan

00:37:20.220 it was run out of angola prison in louisiana

00:37:25.660 by a man named kirksey nix the incarcerated kingpin of the dixie mafia no the first model nicks would run

00:37:34.380 ads in gay magazines asking for money to help fictional gay men get out of trouble with the law

00:37:41.980 through the skin nicks was hoping to generate enough money to solve his own legal problems

00:37:49.020 yo the finesse yo so he was out here right once again man the male 0.98

00:37:55.740 thirst for sex is so powerful that a dude in prison can go ahead and scam and say yo guys i'm gay i need 0.96

00:38:04.460 help i'll i'll write you letters blah blah blah give me some attention just pay me some money this is only

00:38:09.820 fans before only fans even existed it's coming from a dude out in jail making a bunch of money for his

00:38:16.460 own legal fees wild what a finesse

00:38:21.500 he was serving a life sentence for murder from his jail cell at angola he coordinated what we've been

00:38:30.060 referring to as the homosexual scam which generated hundreds and remember also guys homosexuality back 0.91

00:38:38.140 in the late 80s was not accepted okay there was no gay marriage and none of that other stuff this is

00:38:43.100 all newer stuff in the past five to ten years i mean gay marriage was only approved i think what what in

00:38:48.860 the last decade or so so guys um for him this was kind of like a way to make money under the table

00:38:55.820 because there was still you know the lgbt committee wasn't as out there and pronounced as they are now

00:39:00.860 okay and here is your boy right here kirksey nix okay here he is uh he's still alive is the is the

00:39:08.380 former leader of the dixie mafia he's uh suspected oh my bad uh he was a suspect in assassination

00:39:15.580 attempt on sheriff buford uh buford pusser and in the death of buford's wife on august 12 1967 nix has

00:39:21.420 repeatedly refused to comment about pusser's claims that he was one of his wife's killers that's probably

00:39:26.140 what put him in jail in the 80s in the 1972 nix was convicted of murdering frank corso a new orleans

00:39:30.780 grocery executive in a break-in at corso's home and began serving a life sentence without parole

00:39:35.260 nix was later involved in 1987 murder for hire killing of judge vincent sherry and his wife

00:39:39.900 margaret in biloxi mississippi and we'll talk about that a little bit more but here he is here's

00:39:44.540 his uh here's his wikipedia page let me see if we can get uh here he is right here this is him guys

00:39:51.100 kirksey nix okay former leader of dixie mafia

00:39:59.020 what's so funny christina oh his hair oh yeah it's like the impact of thousands of dollars

00:40:06.220 from individuals around the country and as well as some people in canada

00:40:12.220 uh with this money what did he call did he call it the homo scam 0.94

00:40:15.500 homosexual scam oh yeah which is amazing to me that's just like 1.00

00:40:21.820 well this documentary is from the early 2000s so they ain't gonna 0.99

00:40:24.060 fuck back that either late late 90s early 2000s so 0.88

00:40:28.380 hundreds of thousands of dollars we've been referring to as the homosexual scam 0.99

00:40:36.940 they would never be able to talk about the imagine the fbi today called the homosexual scam

00:40:41.420 they would never be able to call that now man times have changed which generated hundreds of

00:40:49.020 thousands of dollars from individuals around the country and as well as some people in canada

00:40:56.620 with this money he intended to buy his way out or attempt to buy his way out of his louisiana prison

00:41:04.780 sentence believing that they were helping gay men out of trouble people who read the magazine ads

00:41:10.540 would wire or mail money to a nearby western union

00:41:15.580 nix would then call his contact on the outside mike gillich

00:41:21.420 gillich would then dispatch his bag man to retrieve the money

00:41:28.460 gillich made sure that the scam money was distributed to dixie mafia members

00:41:32.780 and safely stashed away for curtsy nix take care all right so this is very interesting so here's

00:41:38.300 this so the scheme is you got curtsy nix who's in prison right for murder he's going ahead and

00:41:43.820 doing some scam with uh you know and targeting the the gay community right from a victim mindset like 0.98

00:41:50.300 hey i i need help blah blah blah help us out blah blah blah gets a bunch of money wired to him then

00:41:56.140 he tells gillich who's on the outside owns the strip clubs right he's getting a bunch of wires hey

00:42:01.340 well he runs a strip club it's a cash business who cares right then he says bag man goes get some

00:42:05.660 money and then he probably gets a cut of it and then he stores it for nix for his legal defense

00:42:10.460 smart scheme right here my friends that's a bunch of scamming right there i'm trying to say like what

00:42:14.780 else he did with it in the coming months investigators developed more evidence in the lonely heart scan

00:42:23.820 but still had no direct link between these conspirators and the sherry's killers

00:42:32.380 a year into the investigation the murder case threatened to stop

00:42:41.500 hi as the year stretched to 16 months the sherry's daughter lynn sposito grew increasingly frustrated

00:42:48.860 you said on the phone in january 1989 she hired a private investigator to rev up the inquest into

00:42:56.140 her parents murder i'll give him a call and i'll be on this case this afternoon shout out to her

00:43:03.340 daughter for not giving up the family had wanted very much to have a quick resolution to the case

00:43:09.660 but by early 1989 there'd still been no arrest of course at this point the fbi had not formally entered

00:43:17.900 the case

00:43:24.780 the lack of official fbi involvement hampered bell's investigation

00:43:30.940 so when the private investigator paid him a visit bell welcomed his assistants hoping they could okay

00:43:36.380 let me break this down for you out real quick about how the fbi works guys the fbi is a very bureaucratic

00:43:42.700 and it's kind of funny because it's called the federal bureau of investigation but the bureaucracy

00:43:47.180 helps them from going ahead and getting their fucking work done okay they have a lot of red tape 0.91

00:43:52.140 it's very dope for them to do their job a lot of the times and what i mean by this is the fbi can't 0.97

00:43:57.260 actually commit serious resources to an investigation unless they have a case opened however it's a pain 0.50

00:44:04.220 in the ass for them to get an investigation open they need a supervisor they need a bunch of approvals 0.99

00:44:10.060 they need to have some kind of serious nexus blah blah it's bullshit so for them right for him to 1.00

00:44:16.060 actually commit the time he wants to and commit the resource he wants to in the effort that he wants to 0.75

00:44:20.060 he needs to actually formally open up an fbi investigation okay and as you guys can see it's a murder case

00:44:27.180 it's not the fbi's main thing now he's been able to make some links here and there with yo it might may or may

00:44:32.540 not be related to the dixie mafia because a stolen car was tied back to a guy that's associated to

00:44:38.700 another guy that's not strong enough to open up a case so for him his hands were kind of tied in this

00:44:45.660 case all right and that's kind of one of the things that sucks about the fbi a lot of people don't know

00:44:49.660 and i know because i work with them very closely many times is that they can't actually do anything

00:44:56.060 unless they open a full-fledged criminal investigation for them to open up a full-fledged 0.95

00:45:00.620 criminal investigation it's a lot of red tape man it's a pain in the ass versus when i was working 0.95

00:45:06.220 as an agent for hsi it's fairly easy to open up a case hey boss i got this going on blah blah you

00:45:11.660 tell your gs14 your supervisor i want to open up this case right even if it's to mirror right a state

00:45:18.300 and local case maybe you're assisting there you open up a case so that you can attribute your hours

00:45:22.380 and your efforts or something like that you know you could you you roll with it you know they're not

00:45:26.140 going to sit there and be like oh well you can't open a case because xyz and all this other bs

00:45:30.300 no not nearly as much red tape as the fbi when it comes to opening up cases and committing resources

00:45:36.780 so um this is something that that kind of sucks with the bureau and it's wild because this is the

00:45:42.540 80s they have even more uh their hands are even more tied nowadays guys than back then share information

00:45:50.540 so the c the the the private investigator aka the pi comes in with some of the information that he's

00:45:55.340 gotten right during the course of his private investigation on behalf of the daughter

00:46:00.300 rolled acquaintances from the private investigators days in law enforcement

00:46:05.980 since agent bell was unable to act officially the private investigator would pursue a lead that looked

00:46:11.260 promising he would interview another angola inmate the private investigator and bell hope the inmate at

00:46:18.380 angola could finally link the lonely heart scam and the sherry murders 0.58

00:46:27.020 he met with all the right people and because of his knowledge of the dixie mafia

00:46:33.420 and from what he had learned from law enforcement authorities on the coast

00:46:36.940 he did go over to angola and did talk to the right person over there

00:46:40.780 the inmate's name was bobby joe fabian he was another known member of the dixie mafia

00:46:50.460 doing time for kidnapping and shooting a state trooper

00:46:57.740 fabian claimed he had not been involved in the sherry murders

00:47:02.060 but he had learned that fellow inmate kirksey nix had been fabian told the private investigator that

00:47:08.700 nix had had judge sherry killed because sherry had allegedly stolen money from nix's lonely heart scan

00:47:16.540 that wasn't all he said nix had been told of the theft by none other

00:47:20.940 than pete halat sherry's former law partner 0.99

00:47:25.740 halat the man who oh shit guys 0.94

00:47:30.220 that uh may have forgotten halat is the guy that went with you know his clerk or whoever his employee 0.98

00:47:36.060 to go look at the house a couple days after the murders who delivered the eulogy at the sherry's

00:47:42.300 funeral was now implicated in their murders wow it'd be the ones closest to you they end up getting you

00:47:50.140 a lot officially represented nix on legal matters but fabian said halat's role in the lonely heart

00:48:04.460 scam was criminal not legal

00:48:09.260 halat was one of the people receiving money from nix for safekeeping through mike gillich's bag man

00:48:14.460 oh man so they're right that right there guys looks to be the link between the murders because

00:48:24.220 you got the bag man bringing the money to the lawyer for safekeeping for kirksey nix

00:48:31.420 don't forget

00:48:34.780 and the ties between the outlaw and the lawyer went deep

00:48:37.500 kirksey nix's girlfriend and accomplice laray sharp worked in halat's office

00:48:47.100 more negative links coming in

00:48:52.540 see i could see the conspiracy coming in here the inner web of of 0.96

00:48:56.220 fuckery right 1.00

00:49:00.780 fabian said both laray sharp and pete halat

00:49:03.500 were stashing money from the scam in a safe deposit box for kirksey nix

00:49:10.780 and he said the amount had reached six figures

00:49:17.420 thanks to fabian the link between the murders and the lonely heart scam had been made 0.64

00:49:24.860 and uh one hundred thousand dollars guys in 1987 i'm looking at it here

00:49:29.500 right they said six figures let's so we'll just go with one hundred thousand it's worth one hundred

00:49:33.820 sixty two thousand sorry it's worth one hundred sixty two thousand dollars today okay or no excuse

00:49:41.020 me one hundred thousand dollars in 1987 is equivalent in purchasing power to about two hundred sixty two

00:49:45.820 thousand uh dollars today and here it is right here so yeah that's wild uh damn over doubled

00:49:59.500 and not only had fabian given investigators a possible motive for the killings he was also

00:50:06.300 able to supply the name of the alleged hitman oh an ex-con named john ransom

00:50:14.220 who was believed to be living in john ransom that sounds like a like a criminal's name georgia

00:50:20.460 but tracking down ransom would take time

00:50:29.420 anytime law enforcement uh people get together and start talking about notorious

00:50:33.900 dixie mafia members john ransom comes up quite early in the conversation

00:50:39.420 he's a long-time alleged hitman for the dixie mafia

00:50:42.940 in august of 1989 two years after the sherry murders agent bell now had enough evidence to

00:50:51.100 warrant a full fbi investigation into the killings so it took him two years to be able to get the

00:50:56.540 information just to open up a case and he probably went to the u.s attorney's office to go ahead

00:51:00.860 and um get someone to secure prosecution hey i'll work the case and i'll prosecute on my head once

00:51:06.620 you develop all the information accompanied by the sherry's daughter lynn sposito he approached

00:51:14.140 the united states attorney and the fbi with a demand to officially open the case

00:51:21.660 so with the tying in of the scam to the murders we knew we had some federal violations involved we

00:51:29.340 have wire fraud we had mail fraud and we perhaps had a hit wire fraud and mail fraud

00:51:36.380 and mail fraud guys are some of the easiest charges to prove federally um all you gotta

00:51:40.620 prove is that hey you got money and or receive some type of wire through mail or through wire

00:51:46.940 through the seat or fraud done they got you next thing you know it's a federal charge

00:51:52.860 fairly easy to prove and traveling from georgia to mississippi to kill the sherry's

00:51:57.900 it was decided to open an official fbi investigation and join with local authorities in the investigation

00:52:06.380 that changes things significantly because now not only are you going after a lawyer

00:52:27.820 right you're going after the mayor potentially which is a big deal guys you need to get a lot of

00:52:34.620 approvals to go after public officials in high authority positions investigators encountered new roadblocks

00:52:44.700 it became very difficult for the fbi to share all of its information with the local authorities

00:52:52.540 yeah because technically they work for him

00:52:56.940 we are not uh saying that the local police were corrupt what we are saying is

00:53:02.460 that mayor halat put his own people in as director of public safety and as police chief so we were

00:53:10.300 somewhat circumspect on what we we shared uh with local authorities during that time period

00:53:19.740 in august of 1989 as investigators attempted to unravel the truth about the sherry's murders

00:53:25.260 informant bobby joe fabian made a surprise move he told his story about the sherry murders 0.51

00:53:31.900 to the tv news fabian oh my god when cloud chasing goes fucking wrong 0.96

00:53:41.420 so obviously you can assume whatever the hell he tells the news now the public's gonna know they're 0.89

00:53:46.380 gonna be like oh the police are probably gonna be on us now holy by bringing attention to himself

00:53:54.940 kirksey nix would be less likely to have him killed for cooperating with authorities

00:54:03.500 along with the report the station broadcast a mugshot of john ransom

00:54:07.820 the alleged hitman in the sherry case oh my god

00:54:16.700 when charles legere pete halat's junior partner saw the photo it surprised him he recalled seeing

00:54:23.500 ransom outside the sherry halat law offices a few weeks before the murder oh 0.99

00:54:28.460 holy shit 0.95

00:54:34.460 legere shared his information with the task force 0.99

00:54:43.180 major randy cook of the harrison county sheriff's department took legere's statement

00:54:49.020 legere said the reason he remembered ransom was ransom stepped off of a curve

00:54:54.460 and came up to him and asked him where it's been sherry's office at when legere was interviewed

00:55:02.540 gimme he recalled there was something unusual about the way ransom stepped off of the curve 0.98

00:55:09.900 well could you imagine this fucking guy comes up to you hey uh well i meet with uh your boss uh you 0.98

00:55:15.420 know i look a little kind of i know i'm messed up looking and i'm limping and stuff and i may or may 1.00

00:55:19.260 not have killed people in the past but yeah show me where he's at like bro what the hell you're 0.70

00:55:23.260 gonna definitely remember that oh man ransom had a prosthesis on one leg

00:55:36.300 investigators learned that ransom was now in a georgia prison serving time for another murder

00:55:42.460 when questioned about the sherry murders he refused to cooperate

00:55:45.980 oh

00:55:49.180 as cook further questioned legere about the day he and halat had found the bodies an important detail emerged

00:55:55.420 legere remembered that halat had walked into the sherry's living room 0.97

00:56:04.620 seen judge sherry's body and said vince and margaret are dead

00:56:08.380 cook relayed this to agent bell what the hell oh so he only saw one of the dead bodies but knew that both were done

00:56:25.260 my friends that is what you would call a clue

00:56:29.340 what was interesting was that margaret's body was in the far back bedroom of the residence

00:56:39.740 and according to chuck legere pete hallat did not have time

00:56:44.620 other than to briefly enter the front of the house and would have no way of knowing

00:56:48.700 that margaret's body was also in the very back bedroom

00:56:55.420 in october of 1989 two years after the murders agent bell knew halat was involved but he still

00:57:02.780 lacked enough evidence for an arrest even so so now you're investigating the the mayor of the city

00:57:08.700 oh lord oh he felt it was time to confront mayor halat

00:57:17.740 it would be a quiet warning man to man and i let mayor halat know that i thought his knowledge

00:57:25.740 of the sherry murders was much greater than what he had shared with law enforcement authorities up to

00:57:31.580 that point and i recall also telling him that the fbi would continue working on this case

00:57:38.380 until it was totally solved my recollection is he smiled and did not have much else to say

00:57:47.820 yeah he's a lawyer bro he ain't gonna say nothing he's like the police

00:57:53.660 as a lawyer halat knew bell would need more concrete evidence in order to secure a conviction

00:57:59.420 what he likely didn't realize was the depth of bell's commitment to bring him to justice

00:58:08.460 yeah shout out to this agent man he was very persistent and did a fantastic job we're gonna

00:58:13.740 uh we're gonna see some more of that here in a second

00:58:18.780 three years have passed since judge vincent sherry and his wife margaret were murdered in their

00:58:23.260 three years luxe mississippi hall fbi special agent keith bell had connected the killings to

00:58:29.900 members of the dixie mafia and to judge sherry's friend and one-time law partner pete halat

00:58:35.180 the alleged trigger man john ransom was refusing to talk

00:58:40.860 in january of 1990 agent bell and major randy cook the harrison county sheriff's department

00:58:51.500 drove to the atlanta federal penitentiary to question another possible accomplice

00:58:55.500 possible accomplice this is special a man named bill rhodes rhodes a known associate of john ransom

00:59:04.540 was willing to cooperate well informers is how you build cases my friends

00:59:09.580 he told them that in early 1987 ransom had contacted him about driving the getaway car in a crime to

00:59:17.740 take place in southern mississippi

00:59:22.620 ransom had said a judge would be murdered and that the pay was ten thousand dollars

00:59:26.780 there were certain promises made to roads that by ransom that i know certain people in biloxi that

00:59:37.260 if you'll help me on ten thousand dollars in 1987 guys was the equivalent of purchasing power of about

00:59:41.740 twenty six thousand two hundred six dollars and ninety five cents today on this and you'll have

00:59:46.540 the run of biloxi anytime you want it so in march of 1987 rhodes went to biloxi and met with ransom

00:59:54.620 and a man named pete it was pete who specifically asked roads and ransom to do the hit

01:00:05.980 road said he also met with mike gillips the biloxi strip club owner who would supply us you

01:00:10.780 guys are seeing a spiderweb here of a bunch of different uh conspirators you got mike gillips

01:00:16.220 the strip club owner you got the mayor right you got freaking kirksey nixon jail you got

01:00:23.900 these hit men that are negotiating price uh you got the girlfriend of kirksey nixon that's helping

01:00:30.620 with storing the money from the lonely heart scheme so as y'all can see this is a very complex

01:00:37.420 um investigation in using different components different crimes different individuals different

01:00:43.340 roles etc and my friends this is organized crime at its finest the money once the hit is done

01:00:50.380 but five months later before they could do the job rhodes was arrested on an unrelated bank

01:00:58.620 robbery charge and ransom got cold feet afraid rhodes would turn on him

01:01:04.780 ah he knew too much so he didn't want to commit the murder

01:01:09.260 the information helped the case inch forward but agent bell and officer cook still felt

01:01:14.220 that ransom held the missing pieces another year would pass without much progress

01:01:25.740 in late 1990 the investigators went to the bostick correctional institute in georgia

01:01:30.940 where ransom was serving time

01:01:35.180 finally ransom agreed to talk

01:01:37.260 hey here we go he admitted that he delivered a 22 caliber pistol to laray sharp

01:01:44.940 kirksey nix's girlfriend 22 caliber is very uh popular with hitmen guys because it's not as loud 0.87

01:01:50.220 it's easy to procure and uh weapons that you use right especially if you're going to do a headshot

01:01:55.500 it works perfectly it's easier to silence as well this is all in that hitman book

01:01:58.940 but ransom insisted that he did not do the job

01:02:07.900 based on what ransom said laray's involvement was starting to look bigger than simply stashing

01:02:13.180 scam money in a safe deposit box

01:02:15.180 through his contact with sharp nix learned that the investigation was heating up

01:02:29.340 he worried that his girlfriend might talk so he tried to head off the problem by putting out a contract

01:02:35.900 on her life

01:02:39.980 oh my man cold-blooded yeah you want her to get that yeet 1.00

01:02:57.020 but in late 1990 agent bell arrested her for her participation in the murders

01:03:01.820 in the murders inadvertently saving her from nix's gunman

01:03:12.540 during a polygraph test sharp denied her involvement in the lonely heart scam and the sherry murders

01:03:19.900 the machine called her bluff

01:03:24.540 when bell and his team added her statements to their existing stacks of evidence

01:03:28.860 they were ready to bring indictments against several key players

01:03:32.940 women always fold man i'll tell y'all this man when i

01:03:36.700 now do my arrest you always go after the girlfriends man they will snitch and then the 1.00

01:03:40.300 fact that he wanted her killed bro definitely something to add to your repertoire when you interview

01:03:46.140 her hey this dude didn't care about you you're storing his money and he wanted you dead 1.00

01:03:50.140 what do you got to say to that okay i'll tell y'all everything

01:03:53.020 mike gillich because remember she's right in the middle guys she's dealing with the with the corrupt 0.79

01:04:02.700 mayor the boss boyfriend in prison for murder she's storing the cash she's seeing the bag man

01:04:10.620 she knows gillich the strip club owner is the one sending the money so she's right in the middle of it

01:04:15.660 man john ransom the race sharp and kirksey nicks were charged as conspirators in the sherry murders

01:04:23.660 notably missing from the list was pete hallat

01:04:29.260 pete hallat is the mayor guys the case against hallat would have to wait until they had enough

01:04:34.700 evidence for a murder conviction and not only that you're going after the mayor you don't want

01:04:39.660 to mess that one up you know like i tell y'all before federal prosecutors the feds in general

01:04:45.420 rarely lose if ever so if you get indicted you're more than likely gonna have to plead guilty to one

01:04:50.780 of those charges on that indictment so um they want to make sure that they got their t's crossed

01:04:55.980 eyes dotted when you go after a public official especially a lawyer a lawyer that is a mayor now

01:05:02.540 for now the fbi would look to convict the others on conspiracy to commit murder

01:05:09.660 so many of the questions came up why didn't y'all indict pete hallat early on when you indicted

01:05:17.580 everybody else well at the time we didn't have the hard evidence that you would have to have

01:05:25.660 to arrest a mayor and prosecuting

01:05:31.820 the conspiracy trial produced several key witnesses that would help investigators piece together the

01:05:37.020 complex scheme robbie gantt gillich's bag man for the lonely heart scan testified for the prosecution

01:05:51.260 his testimony helped prosecutors link the sherry murders to the scan

01:05:54.860 all four defendants were found guilty that's a l for all of them

01:06:09.980 back man came forward in years in addition to the life sentence he was already serving for murder

01:06:15.740 gillich also received a 15-year prison term ransom got 10 years and the ray sharp one

01:06:25.820 check out one year but that's how y'all know that she gave a lot of information

01:06:29.340 she was probably the linchpin that got them all indicted and secured the convictions that's why she 0.69

01:06:33.820 only got one year with these conspirators behind bars and the lonely heart scam no longer operational

01:06:48.300 bell moved on to his next objective we decided not to end the sherry investigation after the 1991 initial

01:06:57.420 convictions because at that time we had not proven who had actually uh shot the sherrys and also pete

01:07:06.220 halette had not been indicted or convicted at that point and we all felt strongly that pete halette had

01:07:12.700 played a major role in the scam and in the murder plot so we were determined to continue the investigation

01:07:21.340 to see if we could get enough evidence to indict and convict mr halette and the actual shooter

01:07:31.340 in late july of 1992 agent bell got the break he was looking for

01:07:37.980 following the conspiracy trial mike gillich was desperate to find a way out of prison

01:07:44.540 he contacted one of his associates in biluxo and asked him to approach robbie gant with an offer

01:07:51.340 okay gant told agent bell about it and the associate had offered robbie gant 20 000

01:08:04.940 if gant would recant his testimony against gillich and sign a false affidavit stating that he had been

01:08:12.300 threatened by me to testify against gillich oh oh oh these guys are don't know when to quit uh to testify

01:08:24.300 falsely against gillich

01:08:28.460 gant agreed to wear a wire and get the offer from gillich's accomplice on tape oh

01:08:33.660 gant met with him in mississippi this time gant's tape was rolling when gillich's associate reiterated

01:08:54.620 the bribe gant accepted as bell had instructed

01:09:08.860 now bell had the evidence he needed to turn up the heat on gillich

01:09:12.540 gillich just the man who could tell the story from the inside

01:09:24.700 by 1993 six years after the double murder of vince and margaret sherry

01:09:29.740 fbi agent keith bell had put four members of the dixie mafia behind bars

01:09:34.380 but he still had no formal murder convictions against those involved

01:09:42.940 and mayor pete halat the suspected mastermind of the case was still free

01:09:49.900 and running the city of biloxi

01:09:54.780 in fact the year before mayor halat had broken ground in the city's first big casino

01:09:59.740 the victory for our town and our people the press still hounded halat about his involvement in

01:10:07.980 the sherry murders but he remained adamant as you guys know right miss sherry did not want 1.00

01:10:15.020 casinos all over biloxi and about his innocence

01:10:22.540 and she wanted to be mayor

01:10:23.740 bell continued to work his plan he used the bribe robert gant had recorded on tape

01:10:32.380 to level another charge against mike gillich already in jail

01:10:40.300 now bell indicted gillich for witness bribery and witness tampering for trying to buy off gant oh man

01:10:49.100 i ain't looking at even more time bro

01:10:50.940 and that did the trick no doubt the most important uh turning point was in october of 1993 when mike gillich

01:11:03.740 finally decided to cooperate and tell the story of this whole case from an insider's point of view

01:11:12.620 and that's what really uh allowed us to bring final resolution to this investigation

01:11:18.300 after the years of painstaking work bell had spent on the case it was a satisfying moment

01:11:26.300 finally it seemed his patience and ingenuity were paying off

01:11:33.740 gillich was in no hurry to accrue more jail time

01:11:37.420 bell's relentless pressure had persuaded him to cut a deal before the bribery trial even began

01:11:42.300 hey there we go baby the dixie mafia member would tell what he knew about the murders

01:11:51.180 maybe now bill could get the convictions he knew were long overdue

01:11:55.260 oh i had 18 usc 201 man i i was i had it right um this is guys the charge that they probably hit him

01:12:06.300 with bribery of public officials okay this is more than likely that what they hit him on okay oh man

01:12:14.380 big l i remember when i was an agent myself uh anytime someone would try to bribe you

01:12:23.740 you know you had to go ahead and call that to you know off office of professional responsibility aka 0.98

01:12:28.060 internal affairs immediately and you know you you basically would bust the fucking guy for doing 0.99

01:12:34.300 it so they take bribery pretty pretty seriously guys when it comes to the u.s government and federal 0.97

01:12:39.260 agencies right because you're held to a higher standard you know which is why a lot of the

01:12:43.980 times the feds typically investigate public corruption because it is so much harder to

01:12:48.060 penetrate the feds than you know other levels of government now am i saying that it doesn't occur

01:12:52.860 of course you know i did i covered a whole thing on robert hanson right the fbi agent that

01:12:57.660 you know was basically paid by the russians to spy and provide a bunch of information probably the biggest

01:13:02.220 uh security leak in u.s history but um but you guys got to remember that that's rare and

01:13:10.380 extremely infrequent for uh federal agents to be uh you know susceptible to public corruption or to be 0.85

01:13:19.260 paid off and bribed for shit now that is not to say that there aren't lazy agents there's a bunch of 0.99

01:13:24.620 agents that don't do their job that are lazy as fuck this is true they don't fucking investigate as 1.00

01:13:28.780 hard as they should or follow up while on leads whatever but you guys gotta remember that laziness 0.99

01:13:33.820 isn't necessarily corruption there's a very fine line between the two so yeah that was the l for

01:13:40.700 this guy with the bribery not saying that corruption doesn't exist in the federal government definitely

01:13:46.460 does but it's not as prevalent as other levels of government or in other countries for that matter

01:13:56.460 as much as people talk about the united states we definitely do have rule of law to some degree

01:14:01.340 versus other countries which is why the u.s dollar is um obviously the reserve currency that's a big part

01:14:07.020 of being a reserve currency is having rule of law in your country which is why russia and china will

01:14:11.500 never get it you know unfortunately but for a career criminal for them of course like mike gillich

01:14:18.060 adjusting to life on the right side of the law wasn't easy

01:14:21.100 at first he tried to bluff his way out

01:14:31.820 of course it always takes some time a period of weeks to develop some degree of trust and to be able

01:14:40.620 to communicate with someone like this who for the first time has decided to leave his lifelong role as a

01:14:50.060 uh a criminal and start cooperating with the fbi

01:14:57.260 when deception didn't work gillich had no alternative he had to tell the truth

01:15:02.540 now for the first time bell heard the story from an inside source

01:15:08.860 gillich knew all the details

01:15:10.620 mike was the center point mike knew kirksey nix mike knew pete hallett for years and in fact when

01:15:20.860 kirksey nix was looking for an attorney over on the coast area to represent him on various matters

01:15:27.820 mike gillich introduced nix into pete hallett he confirmed that pete hallett was indeed behind the plan to

01:15:36.060 murder the sherries and that the plot grew directly out of the lonely heart scam of angola prison inmate

01:15:42.300 kirksey nix

01:15:45.660 some months before the sherry's deaths

01:15:47.980 hallett had closed the safe deposit box he and nix's girlfriend larae sharp had access to

01:15:53.820 effectively cutting off her access to the money

01:15:57.020 he then transferred the money into a box only he and judge sherry could use

01:16:03.180 motivated by greed he stole one hundred thousand dollars cash from there

01:16:08.380 holy we went over how much that actually is guys it's uh over a quarter million well over double 262

01:16:15.500 000 uh was a hundred thousand dollars back in 1987.

01:16:19.100 as nix's trusted accomplice hallett could blame the theft on judge sherry bam next he went to mike

01:16:29.020 gillich with news of the theft

01:16:34.700 mr gillich stated that pete hallett approached mr gillich himself in late 1986 and told mr gillich

01:16:43.420 that much of the money was missing supposedly around a 100 000 and mr allatt blamed judge sherry for

01:16:52.780 taking the money bam uh mr allatt knew that kirksey nix would be very furious about this

01:17:10.860 it is not known who ordered margaret's death but as a fierce opponent of corruption

01:17:27.580 she posed a threat to the underworld forces hoping to control biloxi with margaret dead 1.00

01:17:33.900 palat could be free to run the town

01:17:35.900 and do what make a bunch of money guys okay clearly y'all know that she didn't want 0.99

01:17:45.820 the strip clubs the casinos and all these other types of businesses in biloxi

01:17:51.980 so that was a direct threat on gillich the strip club owner because that affects his business that's

01:17:57.180 a direct threat to um the guy who wanted to run for mayor so he wants to make this money he wants

01:18:03.980 these businesses to come in because it creates more uh revenue for the city in general but she didn't

01:18:08.620 want that gillich said that he and halat planned the murders halat my bad ransom and rhodes provided

01:18:19.740 the murder weapon but when they passed on doing the hit gillich found a replacement

01:18:26.380 a texas-based petty criminal named thomas holcomb bam there's the last key remember up to this point

01:18:35.420 we they had not known who the actual shooter was

01:18:42.860 holcomb would be paid twenty thousand dollars to murder judge sherry and his wife

01:18:47.100 gillich had also helped provide the car with the help of locksmith linny swetman

01:19:02.620 twenty thousand dollars guys in 1987 is the equivalent purchasing power of fifty two thousand

01:19:08.780 four hundred sixty six dollars and ninety cents today god damn so he pretty much got well over 50k

01:19:14.380 to do this in today's money 0.95

01:19:35.260 so

01:19:43.740 in october of 1996 agents arrested hitman thomas holcomb in texas on murder charges

01:20:00.220 that same month also saw the arrest that agent bell had anticipated and worked nine years to achieve

01:20:05.500 i'm an innocent man and you're going to put the cuffs on me

01:20:09.980 if you read you your rights the arrest of pete halat for the murders of the sherrys

01:20:14.140 you can anything you say can and we'll be held against

01:20:24.140 kirksey nix and laray sharp were indicted on 52 counts including fraud money laundering and murder

01:20:33.980 halat was tried and convicted in the summer of 1997 a full decade after the crimes were committed

01:20:39.820 and that's the real footage right there as y'all can see there he is

01:20:45.820 he was sentenced to 18 years in federal prison

01:20:50.940 also tried and convicted were kirksey nix

01:20:54.540 and thomas holcomb the hitman both were sentenced to life

01:20:58.220 the race sharp nix's girlfriend got five years 0.98

01:21:05.980 bam only five years god damn it i think a lot of citizens in beluga she probably cooperated so you

01:21:12.460 now realize that there are a lot of dedicated professional law enforcement people who will 0.82

01:21:18.780 do everything they can to protect the community and work hard to solve major crimes perhaps the

01:21:28.860 legacy you might say of the case for the criminal element is that they realize after seeing this

01:21:34.700 case that they can commit a crime one day and think they're getting away with it a year later

01:21:40.300 but it could come back uh 10 years later and get them

01:21:43.420 while the sherry's killers were finally brought to justice margaret sherry's dream for biloxi free of

01:21:51.820 gambling was never realized instead biloxi has become a resort town filled with casinos and neon lights

01:22:04.060 the sleepy southern town is gone forever along with the woman who lost her life trying to save it

01:22:11.420 yeah now guys just so you guys know pete hallat here he is right um he's still alive um he actually

01:22:22.140 got out of prison not too long ago well actually about a decade ago he got released uh in 2013

01:22:28.460 after serving 15 years nine months and seven days in jail at the age of 70 years old and here's

01:22:32.220 obviously his co-conspirators you got here uh kirksey mccord nix jr right we know he's he's serving life

01:22:38.060 in prison at federal correction institute in at el reno oklahoma and uh mike gillage died of cancer

01:22:43.260 in 2012 thomas leslie holcomb a texas-based contract killer was convicted of carrying out the killings

01:22:47.660 and died in prison in 2005 john ransome and sherry le shere sharp were both convicted in 1991 on federal

01:22:53.260 conspiracy charges related to the two murders ransom was a dixie mafia hitman who supplied the gun used

01:22:59.020 in murders of vincent and margaret sherry sharp was kirksey nix's girlfriend who worked as a legal 0.99

01:23:03.900 aid and helped him run his lonely hearts dating scam while he was in prison the scam involved

01:23:08.620 placing fraudulent ads in national ggp magazine the advocate pretend to be young single homosexual men

01:23:13.980 in legal trouble who needed money okay and then obviously this episode we just broke down 1999 okay

01:23:19.980 i i uh i thought it was in the year 2000 but yeah 1999 um but yeah speaking a lot right here guys he's

01:23:27.020 alive he's 80 years old um he was elected mayor in 1989 lost the re-election 1993 the fbi investigation

01:23:32.540 eventually ended up this ended the city's long tolerance for wide open illegal gambling and

01:23:36.700 striptease clubs with uh exorbitantly priced drinks the purchase of which served as a front for

01:23:42.140 prostitution 1997 halal was convicted for his involvement in a criminal conspiracy which led

01:23:46.220 to the 1987 murders of halal's former law partner mississippi judge vincent sherry and sherry's wife

01:23:50.780 margaret the biloxi city councilwoman he was found guilty and sentenced 18 years in prison of which he served

01:23:55.900 8 15. so uh yeah guys that is the episode uh christina what are your thoughts on this uh let me

01:24:03.500 go ahead he he honestly just messed up and he said both of them were dead at the door

01:24:11.980 like that was kind of an l actually that was

01:24:18.380 yeah that was kind of just massive you could be like oh my god is he dead or like he could have

01:24:21.740 been like call the police call the police yeah he's like they're both dead went outside of like

01:24:25.500 the book dead and and the thing that made it crazier was that she was all the way on the on

01:24:29.500 the other side of the house so like bro how would you know that like that right there is just yeah

01:24:36.300 el halal right there el halal but anyway guys hope you enjoyed that episode man uh we it's been a while

01:24:43.260 since we did a public corruption episode man you guys actually requested this one i saw quite a few

01:24:47.260 people say yo cover the dixie mafia dixie mafia dixie mafia dixie mafia y'all got what you asked for

01:24:51.900 hope you guys enjoyed this episode i'll be back with another episode probably to cover the fdx scam

01:24:58.140 uh with your boy sam friedman whatever his name is and uh yeah and i also cover the school shootings

01:25:03.900 from the university out there in the midwest as well but uh christina any last words for the people

01:25:10.380 um just contact betta 1811 if you want any cases to be done and your location because we do need

01:25:16.540 people in different states bam all right cool hope you guys enjoy that man i'll catch you guys in the

01:25:20.940 the next episode of fed it peace love y'all as always man

01:25:27.100 i was a special agent with homelands investigations okay guys hsi the cases that i did mostly were

01:25:31.980 human smuggling and drug trafficking no one else has these documents by the way here's what fed it

01:25:38.460 covers dr lafredo confirmed lacerations due to stepping on glass murder investigation

01:25:46.540 you see i'm reaching in this jacket you don't know and he's positioning been on february 13 2019

01:25:51.100 you're facing two pounds of two meditative millions racketeering and rico conspiracies young slime 0.94

01:25:56.700 life here and after referred to as ysl the defendants uh six nine and then this is billy seiko right

01:26:01.740 here now when they first started guys six nine ran with

The Debrief With MyronGainesX - January 20, 2023

Murder For Hire & Political Corruption In Mississipi! Fed Explains The Dixie Mafia!

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