0:02 [SPEAKER_01]: Welcome listener. 0:04 [SPEAKER_01]: I'm glad you're here. 0:06 [SPEAKER_01]: Take a seat. 0:07 [SPEAKER_01]: Next to the fire. 0:11 [SPEAKER_00]: Welcome to Obscura, where we shine a light on the dark. 0:39 [SPEAKER_04]: Jackson, well nine on one, let's see how to serve your emergency. 0:43 [SPEAKER_07]: Um, my friend hadn't called me back. 0:45 [SPEAKER_07]: I just came into her house. 0:47 [SPEAKER_07]: She's on the floor. 0:48 [SPEAKER_07]: It looks like there's blood. 0:50 [SPEAKER_07]: Her car's missing. 0:53 [SPEAKER_07]: She's missing. 0:54 [SPEAKER_07]: She's missing. 0:54 [SPEAKER_04]: She's there, she missing. 0:56 [SPEAKER_07]: She's here. 0:57 [SPEAKER_07]: Her car is missing. 0:58 [SPEAKER_07]: And she's not answering. 1:02 [SPEAKER_07]: Please, sir. 1:03 [SPEAKER_07]: Somebody. 1:04 [SPEAKER_07]: Oh, my gosh. 1:06 [SPEAKER_07]: Um, uh, 49. 1:08 [SPEAKER_04]: All right. 1:10 [SPEAKER_04]: Um, is she breathing, man? 1:12 [SPEAKER_07]: I don't think so. 1:14 [SPEAKER_07]: It looks like her hands are turning purple. 1:18 [SPEAKER_07]: Yeah. 1:18 [SPEAKER_07]: I don't want her to come here. 1:20 [SPEAKER_04]: Do you think that she's beyond health memory if you think she's, I mean, if you think that we can help her, then we need to do CPR to help her. 1:29 [SPEAKER_07]: Um, isn't it? 1:32 [SPEAKER_04]: No, her skin is cold, cold, cold. 1:36 [SPEAKER_04]: I got you. 1:36 [SPEAKER_04]: Hang on, just a moment. 1:38 [SPEAKER_04]: Help us come and just stay with me for just a second. 1:41 [SPEAKER_01]: In a city as large and restless Jacksonville, violence rarely begins where the public first notices it, long before a case reaches headlines or courtrooms, there are smaller moments that pass quietly through police reports, and a rest-links, a domestic dispute, a charge that fades from memory after a plea, another name added to a docket in a courthouse, already 2:10 [SPEAKER_01]: Together, they can form a pattern that only becomes visible after something irreversible has happened. 2:18 [SPEAKER_01]: The story that follows carries the weight of that pattern. 2:22 [SPEAKER_01]: At its center, is Sebulon Lorenzo Perkins Sr., a Jacksonville man who's adult life had already been shaped by repeated contact with the criminal justice system. 2:34 [SPEAKER_10]: Okay, so you want to pay money to take it out of the cabinet, I'll leave it under the water right there. 2:42 [SPEAKER_10]: All the way down here, you mentioned that you wanted to come with the water. 2:49 [SPEAKER_10]: so that you did want to talk to us about how you got the car and all that. 2:54 [SPEAKER_10]: We'd like to talk to you about how you got the car also. 2:56 [SPEAKER_10]: But if you want to talk to your lawyer before you tell us any of that. 3:00 [SPEAKER_10]: Do you got his name? 3:04 [SPEAKER_02]: The mom has all the information. 3:06 [SPEAKER_02]: I'm going to call mom. 3:06 [SPEAKER_01]: Records stretched back years showing accusations of violence, confrontations that escalated beyond to argument, and in to harm. 3:17 [SPEAKER_01]: By the time the winner of 2019 arrived, the record surrounding him was not a single incident, but a long accumulation, yet a criminal history, rarely explains everything. 3:29 [SPEAKER_12]: Listener. 3:34 [SPEAKER_10]: If you're willing to do that and you're okay with telling us about the car and all this stuff without your lawyer or a bit of that's totally up to you. 3:41 [SPEAKER_10]: Okay. 3:42 [SPEAKER_10]: But we want to make sure you're comfortable with that. 3:44 [SPEAKER_13]: All right. 3:45 [SPEAKER_13]: But in the meantime, we are going to go over your rights so that you do know that even the more. 3:49 [SPEAKER_10]: Yeah, we always regrets. 3:51 [SPEAKER_13]: All right. 3:52 [SPEAKER_13]: All right. 3:52 [SPEAKER_02]: So I've made it once you've arrested. 3:54 [SPEAKER_02]: Now, I'm not necessarily. 3:55 [SPEAKER_10]: We're police detectives, we're in a police station, and we're asking you about a crown that we don't know if you have anything to do with or not. 4:03 [SPEAKER_10]: And that's what I really want to talk to you about. 4:05 [SPEAKER_10]: And before we ask you any questions, because we don't know if you're involved or not, we go over rights. 4:11 [SPEAKER_01]: A case like this unfolds through the lives that surround it, one of those lives belong to Vivian James, a chemistry teacher known to generations of students in local high schools. 4:23 [SPEAKER_01]: She spent years guiding teenagers through the difficult language of science. 4:27 [SPEAKER_01]: The careful logic of experiments and formulas, students remembered her as patient and encouraging. 4:33 [SPEAKER_01]: The kind of educator who believed knowledge should be shared rather than guarded in a profession built on routine and dedication or work was steady and deeply personal to the young people who passed through a classroom. 4:47 [SPEAKER_01]: Another life moving through the city at the same time was that of 4:57 [SPEAKER_01]: Friends described her as kind and vulnerable, someone navigating circumstances that often left her on the edges of everyday life. 5:05 [SPEAKER_01]: People in those situations can disappear into the background of a large city. 5:09 [SPEAKER_01]: Their struggle largely unseen until tragedy forces the world to notice. 5:15 [SPEAKER_01]: During the final days of 2019, these lives moved closer together. 5:20 [SPEAKER_01]: On Jacksonville's West Side, the holidays tend to give the city a brief sense of quiet. 5:26 [SPEAKER_01]: Schools close for the season, offices empty early, streets carry the soft glow of decorations, while families gather indoors, beneath that calm surface, however, the machinery of ordinary life continues, so to the dangers that move through it. 5:44 [SPEAKER_01]: Within the span of a single holiday weekend, events began to unfold that would draw the attention of investigators across to Vol County, 5:52 [SPEAKER_01]: What started as an isolated concern would soon widen into a case that carried elements of betrayal, violence, and the lingering shadow of choices made long before that December. 6:16 [SPEAKER_02]: I can point out to the guy and I can veto him or whatever. 6:21 [SPEAKER_02]: He said, Shard, Rashad, Rashad, Rashad Simmons. 6:27 [SPEAKER_02]: He's a car from 1100. 6:29 [SPEAKER_02]: 1100. 6:30 [SPEAKER_02]: I was getting to film my wife from my fiancee for Christmas. 6:34 [SPEAKER_10]: Okay. 6:36 [SPEAKER_10]: And today is the 28th. 6:38 [SPEAKER_10]: So that would be the 26th. 6:40 [SPEAKER_10]: Okay. 6:41 [SPEAKER_10]: That car, like last night and today. 6:45 [SPEAKER_10]: All right. 6:46 [SPEAKER_02]: On the 26th, I gave the money, and we got the car, it was at some time in night. 6:53 [SPEAKER_02]: Okay, that's what you mean to do. 6:54 [SPEAKER_13]: Do you bring it to you there at the hotel, which we need to somewhere up there? 6:57 [SPEAKER_02]: Nah, we bet. 6:58 [SPEAKER_02]: Right at the pool, right there. 7:00 [SPEAKER_13]: The pool, this, which one? 7:03 [SPEAKER_02]: Oh, there's a third. 7:17 [SPEAKER_10]: All right, did you call you and say, hey, I'm trying to sell a card. 7:22 [SPEAKER_10]: Yeah, we just talking earlier. 7:24 [SPEAKER_02]: I just, you just had to be there. 7:26 [SPEAKER_02]: There's an area where now does that move up. 7:29 [SPEAKER_02]: I'm looking. 7:30 [SPEAKER_02]: Okay, who was short? 7:31 [SPEAKER_13]: So yeah, I'm pretty pretty good. 7:32 [SPEAKER_13]: You got your own, you got your own polky? 7:34 [SPEAKER_13]: Yeah, sure. 7:35 [SPEAKER_13]: No? 7:36 [SPEAKER_13]: That's why you can always tell somebody's good if they don't sell a card. 7:40 [SPEAKER_13]: You just, you know what I was doing? 7:42 [SPEAKER_13]: That's, I'm pretty good too. 7:44 [SPEAKER_13]: I got my own stuff. 7:46 [SPEAKER_10]: Anyways, if you get a topic that I guess we both like to work with like just the main objective of the situation, we're just trying to find out where the car came from and what's up with the car. 8:03 [SPEAKER_13]: I mean, get you to do that. 8:07 [SPEAKER_13]: Facebook, Facebook, does that a Facebook name as Rashad Simmons? 8:10 [SPEAKER_13]: Yes. 8:11 [SPEAKER_13]: Is it Rashad or Rashad or Rashad, or Rashad with an R at the R-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-A- 8:37 [SPEAKER_02]: Everything is as is, you know, I play with just something like I seem to cut a cup of car because I don't want to do all the trash out that was going to be able to buy it in a bag. 8:49 [SPEAKER_02]: So that was it. 8:50 [SPEAKER_02]: How old is the shock? 8:51 [SPEAKER_13]: 20, 20, 24. 8:52 [SPEAKER_13]: What kind of hair is it? 8:56 [SPEAKER_13]: What kind of hair is it? 8:57 [SPEAKER_13]: What kind of hair is it? 8:59 [SPEAKER_02]: What kind of hair is it? 9:02 [SPEAKER_02]: What kind of hair is it? 9:04 [SPEAKER_02]: What kind of hair is it? 9:06 [SPEAKER_02]: What kind of hair is it? 9:07 [SPEAKER_10]: short and skinny. 9:13 [SPEAKER_10]: So you pay them $1,100. 9:14 [SPEAKER_10]: This could cash or play this. 9:17 [SPEAKER_10]: This is cash. 9:20 [SPEAKER_10]: And what about, I mean, where did you go after that? 9:26 [UNKNOWN]: Went to the hotel. 9:28 [UNKNOWN]: From the hotel, in my lady of the car, I say to get you to stuff. 9:41 [SPEAKER_01]: The details would surface slowly through interviews, evidence, and courtroom proceedings in the years that followed, but even before the full story emerged, one fact became clear. 9:55 [SPEAKER_01]: Two lives had been violently cut short, in the path that led there, had been forming far longer than anyone realized. 10:03 [SPEAKER_01]: This is the story of Zebulon Perkins, in the murders of Leia 10:10 [SPEAKER_01]: Little is publicly known about the early childhood of Debbie Law on the Renzo Perkins. 10:14 [SPEAKER_01]: Born around 1992, or 1993, in Jacksonville, Florida, he grew up in a city known for its sprawling suburbs, naval basis. 10:25 [SPEAKER_01]: in the largest city by area in the continental United States, Jacksonville, as neighborhoods that range from affluent coastal areas, destructing inner city zones, Perkins likely spent his formative years in one of the more modest parts of the west side, a region characterized by working-class families, strip malls, plenty of economic hardship. 10:47 [SPEAKER_01]: Public records and court documents offer scant details on his family life. 10:51 [SPEAKER_01]: During these early years, he had a mother who would later become involved in a periphery of his crimes as evidence was found at her home. 11:00 [SPEAKER_01]: Perkins was part of a larger family network. 11:03 [SPEAKER_01]: Those specifics about siblings or his father's involvement remains elusive. 11:08 [SPEAKER_01]: What we do know is that he attended local schools 11:16 [SPEAKER_01]: Education and Jacksonville during the 1990s and early 2000s was marked by efforts to improve literacy and graduation rates, but that didn't happen. 11:27 [SPEAKER_01]: One key figure from Perkins educational background emerges prominently. 11:31 [SPEAKER_01]: Vivian James, a beloved educator, James taught chemistry at Atlantic Coast High School, and had previously worked at Andrew Jackson High School. 11:40 [SPEAKER_01]: It is believed that Perkins was one of our students during his high school years, likely at Andrew Jackson High. 11:47 [SPEAKER_01]: James, or around 1970, was in her late 30s. 11:51 [SPEAKER_01]: When she might have taught a teenage Perkins, she was known for her passion for science, her ability to inspire students and her role as mentor. 12:00 [SPEAKER_01]: Former students described her as kind, patient, dedicated, 12:04 [SPEAKER_01]: often going beyond the classroom to help those in need. 12:08 [SPEAKER_02]: For Perkins, this connection would tragically resurface years later. 12:43 [SPEAKER_02]: I'm trying to play it on my bro. 12:46 [SPEAKER_11]: It's a... Um... Cramps seem to take this piece in here. 12:51 [SPEAKER_11]: This is the trashway. 12:53 [SPEAKER_11]: It should still get some good photos of your hands and all your clothes and all that. 12:57 [SPEAKER_11]: And then when she's done, we're gonna have your... bring her back a clothes in, you're gonna take those all. 13:04 [SPEAKER_11]: Same thing they're gonna do in jail, but we just have to do it right here, okay? 13:07 [SPEAKER_11]: Trying to figure out. 13:15 [SPEAKER_11]: All right, get him with a stolen bill. 13:19 [SPEAKER_11]: And you said it numerous times to see that, you know, of a stolen. 13:23 [SPEAKER_11]: And the board didn't wait for you, girl. 13:24 [SPEAKER_13]: I mean, no, it was stolen. 13:26 [SPEAKER_13]: I said this is a very sad situation on this baby, and she's a school teacher, obviously, and she's a good lady. 13:32 [SPEAKER_13]: And it is, but yeah, I said, we want to do for her. 13:35 [SPEAKER_02]: She could kind of take the sins. 13:37 [SPEAKER_02]: I didn't want to feel that was the main point at me. 13:40 [SPEAKER_02]: I said, that was pure for her. 13:42 [SPEAKER_02]: I'm saying, that's a good friend. 13:44 [SPEAKER_02]: But at the same time, you've, like, I feel like I'm against the wall then. 13:49 [SPEAKER_10]: We haven't, uh... 13:50 [SPEAKER_10]: Wanted to think her to you yet? 13:51 [SPEAKER_10]: I don't know which way to make the conversation kind of like Well, I mean you got to understand how it looks, have you learned? 13:56 [SPEAKER_02]: You are giving her a call or a bro? 14:00 [SPEAKER_02]: I don't know and I was in her house, bro, and then I was like, you know what she looks like? 14:06 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I met her driver's license in the room. 14:07 [SPEAKER_02]: I didn't see it as I don't see it. 14:09 [SPEAKER_02]: It is more in me on my lady's mouth because they deserve it. 14:12 [SPEAKER_02]: This is her driver's license, I was cleaning up and I was cleaning up and I didn't see it. 14:18 [UNKNOWN]: Okay. 14:19 [SPEAKER_12]: When you were inside this video in the house, I was in the living room, living room to the original. 14:25 [SPEAKER_12]: I'm gonna go back to the living room. 14:28 [SPEAKER_12]: Okay. 14:29 [SPEAKER_12]: We don't go out of room, we don't do none of that. 14:31 [SPEAKER_12]: Did you sit down on the couch and the living room? 14:33 [SPEAKER_12]: Yes, okay. 14:34 [SPEAKER_12]: which one because there's kind of two, there's like a cell on it. 14:37 [SPEAKER_02]: We're going to do a cell in that single person. 14:40 [SPEAKER_12]: And when you came to the door, you came to the front door or the door that's over there on the side because you got to do that side. 14:46 [SPEAKER_12]: It's not through the garage. 14:48 [SPEAKER_12]: Okay, through that door. 14:49 [SPEAKER_12]: Not through the garage. 14:51 [SPEAKER_01]: Jacksonville's west side where Perkins recited had historically faced issues with youth violence and gang activity. 14:59 [SPEAKER_01]: Public arrest records painted a picture of a young man increasingly entangled with a wall. 15:04 [SPEAKER_01]: His first documented brush with the justice system came in 2012 when he was around 19 or 20 years old. 15:11 [SPEAKER_01]: This marked the beginning of a pattern of arrests that would escalate over the next seven years. 15:17 [SPEAKER_01]: Between 2012 and 2019, Perkins was arrested nine times by the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office, which charges that revealed a propensity for violence. 15:27 [SPEAKER_01]: These incidents were not isolated, listen to her. 15:30 [SPEAKER_01]: They formed an escalating trajectory that foreshadowed the horrors of December 2019. 15:35 [SPEAKER_01]: In 2014, at age 21, Hurkins faced serious allegations in a domestic dispute. 15:43 [SPEAKER_01]: He was charged with domestic battery, domestic battery by strangulation, and domestic assault. 15:49 [SPEAKER_01]: These charges are particularly chilling in retrospect. 15:52 [SPEAKER_01]: A strangulation would become a method in his later crimes. 15:56 [SPEAKER_01]: Hurkins' case involved allegations of physical harm to his girlfriend. 15:59 [SPEAKER_01]: Though details of the victim's identity and the resolution remains sealed in many public records, at least those that I came across, he pleaded and was convicted in some capacity, leading to time served. 16:13 [SPEAKER_01]: By June 2015, Perkins was arrested again. 16:16 [SPEAKER_01]: This time on charges, including battery, causing bodily harm with a weapon, among other smaller charges. 16:23 [SPEAKER_01]: This was an escalation, 16:28 [SPEAKER_01]: Court documents from Duval County indicated that Perkins had multiple run-ins involving resisting officers with violence and general assault charges. 16:38 [SPEAKER_01]: Throughout his 20s, Perkins' life appeared to be a mix of instability and attempts at normalcy. 16:44 [SPEAKER_01]: He became a father earning the senior designation and had children who would later be mentioned in his courtroom statements. 16:51 [SPEAKER_01]: Family members, including his mother, remained in his life. 16:54 [SPEAKER_01]: Providing a support network that sometimes intersected with his criminal activities. 17:00 [SPEAKER_12]: That she is smoking cigarettes while you are there doing anything? 17:03 [SPEAKER_02]: I smoke a cigarette, a coin in, and then she was trained in a smoke festival. 17:09 [SPEAKER_02]: I got a smoke in another cigarette. 17:11 [SPEAKER_02]: Did you actually smoke in her house? 17:13 [SPEAKER_02]: No. 17:14 [SPEAKER_10]: Looks like she was smoking her house. 17:15 [SPEAKER_10]: More out that side part. 17:17 [SPEAKER_10]: Outside part. 17:18 [SPEAKER_10]: She was smoking her house. 17:19 [SPEAKER_10]: She was smoking her house. 17:20 [SPEAKER_10]: She was smoking her house. 17:21 [SPEAKER_10]: She was smoking her house. 17:22 [SPEAKER_01]: In May 2019, just months before the murders, Perkins was arrested once more on violent charges. 17:29 [SPEAKER_01]: He served time and was released in September 2019, a mere three months before the events that would define his legacy of terror. 17:37 [SPEAKER_01]: The release placed him back into the community without apparent intensive supervision. 17:43 [SPEAKER_01]: A point that later sparked discussions among criminal justice reform advocates, 17:51 [SPEAKER_10]: If you do answer questions, you have the right to stop by answering questions at any time and consult with a lawyer. 17:55 [SPEAKER_10]: Do your stands. 18:02 [SPEAKER_10]: Okay. 18:03 [SPEAKER_10]: I understand you don't want to talk with an lawyer. 18:06 [SPEAKER_10]: I respect that, that's your right. 18:08 [SPEAKER_10]: In our Constitution, okay. 18:10 [SPEAKER_10]: And we don't have to talk, I'm not going to ask you anything. 18:13 [SPEAKER_10]: I do need to bring you over and tell you we are charging you with murder. 18:19 [SPEAKER_10]: Okay. 18:20 [SPEAKER_10]: We're not going to talk about it because your water's not present. 18:25 [SPEAKER_10]: Okay. 18:25 [SPEAKER_10]: So give me a few minutes. 18:26 [SPEAKER_10]: I'm going to finish your arrest report and then we'll walk you back over. 18:29 [SPEAKER_10]: Okay. 18:32 [SPEAKER_10]: You got to wait until I finish that report. 18:37 [SPEAKER_10]: Okay. 18:38 [SPEAKER_02]: It'll soon be about five minutes. 18:40 [SPEAKER_02]: I'll leave now. 18:41 [SPEAKER_02]: Okay. 18:42 [SPEAKER_02]: I'll leave now. 18:42 [SPEAKER_02]: I'll tell you something. 18:43 [SPEAKER_02]: I'll leave now. 18:44 [SPEAKER_02]: We're going to finish our report and a lot of can I leave now? 18:50 [SPEAKER_02]: Well, not. 18:54 [SPEAKER_01]: As 2019 drew to a close, Perkins was 27 years old. 18:58 [SPEAKER_01]: A man with a history of violence. 19:01 [SPEAKER_01]: He was living transiently, staying at motels on Jacksonville's west side, an area dotted with budget accommodations, highways, and commercial strips. 19:11 [SPEAKER_01]: It was here amid the holiday season that his path crossed fatally with two women, 19:18 [SPEAKER_01]: Leah Klein was a woman whose life had its own share of struggles, worn around 1981 she grew up in Florida. 19:26 [SPEAKER_01]: Those specific details of her early years are limited. 19:29 [SPEAKER_01]: Friends and family described her as kind-hearted, but vulnerable, someone who had faced personal challenges, including periods of instability. 19:38 [SPEAKER_01]: At the time of her death, Klein was reported missing. 19:40 [SPEAKER_01]: This likely due to her transient circumstances, she was not a public figure like James. 19:46 [SPEAKER_01]: Instead, she represented the countless individuals who disappearances, often go under-reported. 19:52 [SPEAKER_01]: On Christmas Day, December 25th, 2019, Perkins and Klein were together at a Westside Motel. 19:58 [SPEAKER_01]: The exact nature of their relationship is not fully detailed in public records, but they were acquainted enough to spend the holiday in each other's company. 20:08 [SPEAKER_01]: We'll begin as perhaps a casual encounter escalated into something deadly. 20:13 [SPEAKER_01]: According to later admissions and evidence, 20:15 [SPEAKER_01]: Perkins strangled Klein during the altercation, cutting the oxygen off, and killing her within minutes. 20:22 [SPEAKER_01]: Klein's body was then callously disposed of in a nearby dumpster, treating her remains like refuse. 20:28 [SPEAKER_01]: Amid the festive season, the Motel, a non-descript establishment, off a busy road, became the scene of this horror. 20:36 [SPEAKER_01]: Investigators would later piece together the timeline through surveillance footage, witness statements, and forensic evidence. 20:42 [SPEAKER_01]: Hurkins did not immediately flee. 20:45 [SPEAKER_01]: Instead, he moved on to his next victim, seeking solace or advice in a twisted turn. 20:50 [SPEAKER_01]: The next day, after Christmas, Hurkins went to the home of Vivian James, on Glenn Allen Court, a quiet residential street off Ricker Road. 21:00 [SPEAKER_01]: On Jacksonville's West Side, James 49 was a pillar of her community. 21:05 [SPEAKER_01]: Born around 1970, she had dedicated her wife to education, 21:12 [SPEAKER_01]: She moved to Atlantic Coast High School, where she taught chemistry to hundreds of students, colleagues remembered her as vibrant, with a love of science that made complex topics accessible, James's home was a modest single story house, a place of safety until Perkins arrived. 21:28 [SPEAKER_01]: As his former teacher, she likely welcomed him in, unaware of the danger, Perkins confided in her, about the killing of Kline, seeking guidance, James, true to her character, advised him to turn himself into the police. 21:43 [SPEAKER_01]: This counsel, enraged Perkins, he beat her violently, and then strangled her with a cord, a deliberate and brutal act. 21:51 [SPEAKER_01]: He left her body in the home. 21:53 [SPEAKER_01]: Taking her Toyota Camry, televisions, computer monitor, and laptops, finally, he dismantled her surveillance camera, and then took that too. 22:04 [SPEAKER_01]: That same day, detectives located the Toyota Camry at West Side Motel where Perkins was staying. 22:11 [SPEAKER_01]: He was in the process of loading items into the vehicle when approached. 22:15 [SPEAKER_01]: A search of the car revealed Perkins' bag containing bloodied sweatpants with DNA from both Perkins and James, her three lap tops in the missing camera. 22:25 [SPEAKER_01]: At his mother's home, officers recovered James Televisions and Computer Monitor. 22:30 [SPEAKER_01]: These items painted a clear picture. 22:32 [SPEAKER_01]: Perkins was arrested initially on charges of tampering with evidence, dealing in stolen property, later upgraded to murder. 22:40 [SPEAKER_01]: During interrogations on December 28, 2019, and January 10, 2020, he maintained a defiant posture, detectives pressed him on his relationship with James. 22:52 [SPEAKER_01]: Noting her as his friend, when informed of her death, Arcan showed no motion, a detective challenged him. 22:59 [SPEAKER_01]: That's your friend? 23:00 [SPEAKER_01]: You know, I cry normally when my friend's die. 23:04 [SPEAKER_01]: Arcan's replied flatly. 23:06 [SPEAKER_01]: I couldn't. 23:07 [SPEAKER_01]: He denied involvement repeatedly, even as evidence mounted, alone in the interrogation room after being charged with murder on January 10th. 23:15 [SPEAKER_01]: Perkins dropped to his knees, bowed his head and prayed saying, you know the truth. 23:46 [SPEAKER_03]: This, of course, was disingenuous, that performance rather than remorse. 24:17 [SPEAKER_10]: All right, that's what's going to happen. 24:18 [SPEAKER_10]: Let's walk back, man. 24:20 [SPEAKER_10]: You all right? 24:21 [SPEAKER_10]: That's what you wanted to leave, man. 24:23 [UNKNOWN]: Bring it on, take them out of there for me, bro. 24:26 [UNKNOWN]: I want to go bare, but you're taking my life for me, bro. 24:30 [SPEAKER_02]: I can't, bro. 24:31 [SPEAKER_02]: And that dude is, let's walk you over there. 24:33 [SPEAKER_02]: We can't drop you, cause you said you didn't want to go. 24:34 [SPEAKER_02]: Oh, I want to go, but that's what you're going to pull me over you. 24:37 [SPEAKER_02]: No, that's what we say. 24:38 [SPEAKER_02]: That's what you're going to do. 24:39 [SPEAKER_02]: Please don't say, Jimmy, we have this point of view, no, too. 24:41 [SPEAKER_02]: When we go for trouble, we have to let you know. 24:43 [SPEAKER_01]: The investigation expanded when Klein's body was recovered from the dumpster, linking the two deaths. 24:50 [SPEAKER_06]: So you were like, well, like, so first you talked to me about this first incident with a female named creepy. 24:55 [SPEAKER_06]: She pulled me back across to a son like that. 24:57 [SPEAKER_05]: Okay. 24:58 [SPEAKER_05]: So let's talk about that. 24:59 [SPEAKER_05]: White black, did you tell you? 25:01 [SPEAKER_06]: She'll white girl. 25:02 [SPEAKER_06]: Okay. 25:02 [SPEAKER_06]: What do you say about this white female named? 25:07 [SPEAKER_06]: He was like, he was in hotel. 25:14 [SPEAKER_06]: He was like, oh yeah man, I want to hear like, you know what I'm sorry, I know a lot of I'm like, what was I supposed to say, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, 25:37 [SPEAKER_06]: I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I 26:05 [SPEAKER_05]: The strangulation and did he tell you that she died? 26:11 [SPEAKER_06]: Yeah, he told me she died. 26:12 [SPEAKER_06]: He put her back in the dumpster. 26:14 [SPEAKER_06]: Right outside of the hotel. 26:15 [SPEAKER_05]: The dumpster outside of the hotel. 26:17 [SPEAKER_06]: It was something that something happened to her car. 26:20 [SPEAKER_06]: I came in a little bit. 26:22 [SPEAKER_06]: I knew she had a sports car. 26:23 [SPEAKER_06]: Then we were talking about she had a sports car. 26:26 [SPEAKER_06]: But he had a key to it. 26:27 [SPEAKER_06]: So he never gave it to her. 26:29 [SPEAKER_07]: All right. 26:29 [SPEAKER_06]: So, him and me were telling him by that, and we saw it was like, we wanted to get from around him, because I never saw it like we saw him. 26:37 [SPEAKER_06]: You know, by the person we saw him, we were going to get from around him, so him and we saw it fight. 26:41 [SPEAKER_06]: I think it took a fight to go to Oregon and stuff, we saw it leave, you know, him and we saw it. 26:45 [SPEAKER_06]: Well, I, in some of the way he was telling me he was on the light, the heart called drool. 26:50 [SPEAKER_06]: But I found out that all he was on his eyes, he was doing eyes and stuff like that. 26:54 [SPEAKER_06]: He was like, I threw the cricket situation 26:58 [SPEAKER_06]: He was suffering from anxiety and stuff like that. 27:01 [SPEAKER_06]: So when he suffered from anxiety, he was like, you want to talk to somebody. 27:05 [SPEAKER_06]: You know, I'm pretty feel like you talked to him with the teacher day. 27:09 [SPEAKER_06]: That I guess he was his teacher, you know. 27:11 [SPEAKER_06]: But he always talks as soon as it's there, but as soon as the school council Okay, it's kind of like a mentor, so it's not like a mentor and they're like You know what's the matter? 27:20 [SPEAKER_06]: You look up to them. 27:21 [SPEAKER_06]: Talk to them. 27:22 [SPEAKER_05]: They do go too far away Okay, and did he go talk to the teacher? 27:26 [SPEAKER_06]: Yeah, after cricket For the wrong advice, right? 27:29 [SPEAKER_06]: That time, first you put it go too hard for love, right? 27:32 [SPEAKER_06]: He knows that like real problem like that's not that's the issue that he had so we don't tell her about the cricket situation But she gave him the best advice as you give and you are go to the police You know, saying like that's the only way I can help you instead of having that. 27:48 [SPEAKER_06]: I'll go to the police He's trying hard to say like okay, so he telling me about it. 27:53 [SPEAKER_06]: I'm like, but you won't put like make your teeth up 27:57 [SPEAKER_06]: So you know, when I almost speak my mouth, I told my very cute teeth to go, I know what's doing with my brain, I know what's to get mad, get mad. 28:06 [SPEAKER_06]: So I see going to get mad. 28:09 [SPEAKER_06]: So I'm sitting on the bed. 28:11 [SPEAKER_06]: He's flying on the first day I had to do. 28:15 [SPEAKER_06]: He was trying to be like, this is on every day I love. 28:17 [SPEAKER_06]: I first night, I think about that teeth. 28:20 [SPEAKER_06]: And I did the teeth to sign with it. 28:22 [SPEAKER_05]: So while the two of you were in the cell together, he put his hands on your throat. 28:27 [SPEAKER_05]: And was strangling. 28:27 [SPEAKER_06]: And it was strangling. 28:29 [SPEAKER_05]: Now before that happened, when he was talking about what happened at the teachers, did he give you any other details about things that he may have done inside the house? 28:41 [SPEAKER_06]: Yeah, he told me, when he was in the house, he took a TV. 28:47 [SPEAKER_06]: He took like, I think one cell bracelet. 28:50 [SPEAKER_06]: Some type of jury, some type, I can't, no quote me right now. 28:54 [SPEAKER_06]: I don't know, it was some type of jury to, it took a car because he got, he got a rest in the car. 29:00 [SPEAKER_06]: I want to sit in there, he got a rest in the car, he got a rest in the car, he got a rest in the car. 29:06 [SPEAKER_06]: He got a chair, he can't do a decent one. 29:10 [SPEAKER_06]: 20 and 19, decent one, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no 29:20 [SPEAKER_05]: So, what you were telling me before about how he went to go over and tell the teacher because she was a mentor and stuff. 29:27 [SPEAKER_05]: He's telling you that while the two of you were in the South together. 29:31 [SPEAKER_06]: So, it was a 6-3. 29:33 [SPEAKER_01]: No, it was a 6-3. 29:36 [SPEAKER_01]: It was a 6-3. 29:37 [SPEAKER_01]: On November 18th, 2021, a grand jury indicted Perkins on first-degree murder for clients killing, adding to the charges for James' death, he faced burglary, dealing in stolen property, tampering with evidence, and fraudulent use of a credit card. 29:53 [SPEAKER_01]: The case dragged through the pre-trial hearings for years, delayed by COVID-19, and legal maneuvers, community outrage was palpable. 30:02 [SPEAKER_01]: James Death in particular struck a chord. 30:05 [SPEAKER_01]: In March 2024, after over four years in custody, Perkins pleaded guilty to two counts of second-degree murder. 30:12 [SPEAKER_01]: This plea deal avoided a trial, sparing families the ordeal of reliving the details. 30:18 [SPEAKER_01]: The agreement stipulated a 70-year sentence, with credit for time served. 30:23 [SPEAKER_01]: At the sentence and hearing on April 26, 2024, before Judge Anthony Salem, Impact Statements were read. 30:31 [SPEAKER_01]: James loved ones, spoke of her legacy as a teacher, her kindness, and the void left by her absence. 30:38 [SPEAKER_01]: Client's family emphasized her humanity, urging justice. 30:42 [SPEAKER_01]: Hurkins' family attended, but did not speak on his behalf. 30:45 [SPEAKER_01]: Hurkins himself addressed the court. 30:48 [SPEAKER_01]: Quote, it's not my job to get the truth out. 30:51 [SPEAKER_01]: You know what I mean? 30:51 [SPEAKER_01]: I'm doing what's best for my family. 30:54 [SPEAKER_01]: My children, he then added, Justice had to be served, the judge responded, okay, I don't know what that means, but okay. 31:02 [SPEAKER_01]: Perkins was sentenced to 70 years in Florida State Prison, effectively a life sentence given his age. 31:08 [SPEAKER_01]: He receives credit for four years already served, but at 31, and a strict Florida justice system, he is unlikely to see freedom again. 31:17 [SPEAKER_01]: The case raises questions. 31:19 [SPEAKER_01]: Perkins' history of strangulation and battery should have been warning signs. 31:24 [SPEAKER_01]: Yet, his punishment was always relatively white. 31:27 [SPEAKER_01]: For the victims, lay a client and Vivian James. 31:30 [SPEAKER_01]: Their stories endure as reminders of vulnerability. 31:33 [SPEAKER_01]: Vivian James' students continue her legacy. 31:36 [SPEAKER_01]: Lay a client's memory, cause attention to those reduced to the margins. 31:41 [SPEAKER_01]: For years before the killing, the contrast between these two women, 31:45 [SPEAKER_01]: say something about the nature of violence itself, it is not sworded to victims by reputation or circumstance. 31:52 [SPEAKER_01]: It simply arrives where it can. 31:53 [SPEAKER_01]: Thank you for listening and keep the fire burning.
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