All language subtitles for 4kfgnvlishgblshgirs

♪ slow, somber music ♪

♪♪♪

[Roxanne]
The girls,

I cared for
every last one of them.

You know, they call me Mom
at my house.

They would say,
"Oh, it's safe in here.

No dick-sucking, no pimping,
no streetwalking.

It's so good just to be
at peace, and all alone."

♪ slow, suspenseful music ♪

♪♪♪

And then they would leave off
for about two or three days.

When they would leave,

their hair would be nice,
they would be dressed nice.

Go off to the motels

to hustle up more drugs.

They were all young girls.

Very green. They didn't know
what they were doing.

They thought it was just,
like, a big hustle.

They would find guys
with the drugs,

they'd smoke up their drugs,
then go to the next guy.

It'd be on like that
until they'd just get worn out.

Three days later,
coming back all tired

and-and look like
a totally different person.

After hearing
all of the killings,

I said,
"What's really going on?

Why those girls?"

Why not the girl that was
the good girl that was walking

down the street
or through the park?

♪♪♪

Why them?

[crow cawing]

[engine running]

♪ slow, somber music ♪

♪♪♪

We're on East Racca Road

on the outskirts of Jennings.

This is the part of town
where you go to do drugs.

Folks would say, when
they talked about a loved one

who was out running around doing
drugs, they would say, you know,

"Crystal's out
running the roads,"

or "Frankie's out
running the roads."

And when they said that,
this is exactly

what they were talking about.

This is territory
that really only you'd know

if you were in that scene.

On the left here is the spot

where Frankie's trailer
used to be.

Frankie had this trailer
at the height of the homicides

in the 2007 period.

He'd come out here with women,
including some of the victims,

party and do drugs.

♪ pulsing, dramatic music ♪

[lighter clicks]

[interviewer]
During the 2000s,

when you were hanging out
with Loretta, Kristen,

all these girls,
what drugs were you on?

[chuckles]

Every fucking thing I could
put in my hand, you know?

I was doing pills,
I was doing crack,

I was doing powder,
I was doing speed.

And through all those years,
you were dealing as well, right?

Yes.

[Teresa] These were women
that had drug addictions

and didn't care if they had
to have sex for their drugs.

They had sex so they didn't have
to pay for the drug.

It was crack.

Everybody was on crack.

Everybody smoking crack,
everybody smoking dope.

I mean, that's...
it-it was coming and going.

♪ haunting music ♪

[Roxanne]
That's all it was about,

sex and drugs.

These girls was always high.

Every week, not just on
the weekends, you know.

When you get paid, you party.

Only time I would get a lot
of drugs is when I get paid.

I'd go buy me $300 worth
of drugs, you know.

This was everyday,
all-day drugging.

Where were they getting
all this drugs from?

Who was giving these drugs out?

♪ contemplative music ♪

♪♪♪

[Ethan] Jennings sits
almost directly on I-10,

and I-10 is a potent conduit,

a kind of artery of vice,

bringing enormous amounts
of drugs

from Houston to New Orleans
on a daily basis.

Literally, if you,
if you were to draw a line

between Houston and New Orleans,
Jennings is the...

right in the middle of that.

It just leaves Jennings
in a really vulnerable position.

[Campbell]
I didn't know that Jennings

had any sort of reputation
one way or the other

before I got there.

But everybody seemed
to understand

and talk about, almost eagerly,
about how much drug traffic

went back and forth
and stopped at Jennings.

Small towns by the interstate,
you know,

it's like an old port town.

It's just, it's convenient.

♪ haunting music ♪

♪♪♪

[Ethan]
When drug busts are made

on I-10 in the Jeff Davis
Parish area,

we're talking kilos
upon kilos of cocaine

or multiple pounds of marijuana

or thousands of pills.
Drug seizures

that would be...

sort of at home in a huge city
like Los Angeles or New York

is in a town of 10,000 people.

♪♪♪

[Barb Ann] This town,
especially this side,

is infested with fucking drugs.

Like, like, serious.

Meth, heroin,

marijuana, pills.

You name it, you got it.

You can get it
from 13-year-old kids.

Truly.

♪♪♪

[Ethan] The enormous amounts
of drugs flowing

through Jeff Davis Parish

have an incredibly
corrupting influence

on law enforcement.

The temptation to take a piece

of a drug seizure is enormous.

[newswoman]
All of this is cocaine.

It's what officers found on
one man during a traffic stop.

That amount of cocaine
could value anywhere

from three million
to $18 million dollars.

[Ethan]
You talk to people

and they say,
"Sure, you see on the news

the seizure of enormous amounts
of drugs,"

but what they say is, "The
drugs that you see on the table

don't stay on the table."

Quite a bit of that goes
right back out onto the street.

[Cormier]
People talk about, you know,

law enforcement involvement
in the drug trade.

Just because
there's a-a drug problem

doesn't mean that law
enforcement is involved.

I don't recall anybody
that's ever been arrested

or-or looked into
for being a drug dealer

that's in law enforcement.

Can't say that it never happens;
it does.

[Ethan] The chief of police
during the Jeff Davis 8 era,

Johnny Lassiter,
was later indicted

for pilfering the evidence room

for drugs,
cash and other items.

♪ dramatic music ♪

♪♪♪

[Sarah] The cops arrest
somebody, and if it's not

nothing that they're gonna
get caught for,

I believe they'll get
put back on the street.

More dope comes from them

than it pr-pretty much does
from the dudes on the streets.

Real talk.

People talk.

They want you
to sell drugs for them.

You don't sell drugs for them,

they're gonna try to
fuck you over any way they can.

If you not working for them,
you working with them.

I mean, they've had... they
don't have a good track record.

The corruption goes back
years ago.

[man]
He's pulling you over?

[man 2]
Yeah, he's pulling me over.

[host] You are watching
an actual traffic stop

along Interstate 10
in Louisiana.

-How you doing, sir?
-[man 2] How you doing?

Step out of your vehicle.
Step back here for me, please?

[host] But what this officer
doesn't realize

is that the car is rigged
with Dateline's hidden cameras,

and so is the driver.

In 1997,
NBC's Dateline came to town

and did an exposé

of the Jeff Davis Parish
Sheriff's Department.

[host] Up and down I-10,
our cameras recorded

out-of-state motorists pulled
off to the side of the road

and detained.

Dateline had been receiving

an enormous amount
of tips and complaints,

where people are saying, "I'm
driving on this section of I-10.

I'm getting pulled over
and literally robbed

by the sheriff's office."

[host]
What's going on here began

as what many thought
was a good idea

to help win the drug war.

Police across the country
were given a new weapon.

It's called asset forfeiture.

[Ethan] When Ricky Edwards
takes office,

there is a big increase

in civil asset forfeiture
on I-10.

Civil asset forfeiture

allows law enforcement
to take assets

of people who are suspected of,

but not convicted of, a crime.

That in itself opens up

enormous avenues of abuse.

The Dateline team used

a bait car that's set up

to not go
above 65 miles per hour.

They send this car down I-10

through Jeff Davis Parish,

and almost instantaneously

the vehicle is pulled over.

They would just invent reasons
to stop people.

That's illegal.

[host]
Ricky Edwards is the sheriff

-of Jefferson Davis Parish.
-Would it surprise you

to know that your deputies
pulled us over?

No, it wouldn't surprise me.

I-I don't know, I wasn't there.

If he said you were speeding,

I would have to assume
that you were speeding.

Edwards's response is,
essentially:

That's not
what's happening there.

There's financial incentive

for the officers
to pull these people over

and take away money and cars.

There's financial incentive
in the war on drugs, yes.

Doesn't that seem odd?

No.

♪ dramatic music ♪

[Ethan]
The Dateline NBC episode

gets over 12 million viewers.

Louisiana state officials

find themselves having
to respond to the episode

and do damage control.

[newsman] A Dateline report that
touched close to home tonight

and raised some questions.

Are the stories true?

[Ethan]
But Ricky...

does not give an inch.

Okay, Sheriff, you had
a chance to review

the Dateline piece tonight.

What's your take on it?

Do you think that
they were accurate?

Uh, I think that they've showed
the negative side to everything.

I don't think that they've shown
a positive side to anything.

[Scott] The parish's response
to the Dateline piece was

to kind of rally back around
the department, just kind of...

Their feeling was that we were
just kind of unfairly...

hit by it.

[Ethan]
It's remarkable.

It did nothing

to change the power structure
in Jeff Davis Parish.

Ricky Edwards remained in power

for years later.

And I think...

that response has
very profound echoes

in how they responded

to the Jeff Davis 8 case.

[interviewer] Ricky, it's been
four years and five months

since Loretta Chaisson died.

Describe the progress
that has been made.

Well, uh, unfortunately,
I'm not going to get into

the investigative part of it.

But progress has been made
by utilizing tons of resources

made available to a small
department like ours.

Uh, we don't have an answer yet,
and, uh, w-we will continue

to work for the resolution
of these homicides.

Let's talk about Ricky a second.

Ricky...

...to me, he wasn't no kind
of sheriff at all, I'm sorry.

He didn't do anything.

This town is so corrupt

that it doesn't make any sense.

You want to get away
with something?

Go to Jennings.

I'm just gonna call it
for what it is.

Crooked.

♪ quiet, suspenseful music ♪

♪♪♪

[Frankie]
Jennings is...

the Wild, Wild West.

These motherfuckers...

...want their cut.

I don't give a goddamn
if it's...

a parking meter

or a hamburger joint.

They want their cut.

[Ethan] What was Jennings like
when you came back here

in 2002, 2003 or so?

[Ethan]
What do you mean by that?

[Frankie]
I mean...

[interviewer]
Let's talk about your history

as a drug dealer in the area.

What you want to know?

[interviewer]
What was your relationship

with the police
during those years?

My relationship with the police

in them years...

...is about the same as it is

with the police today.

Not worth a fuck.

I didn't trust them,

I didn't like 'em,

and I goddamn sure
wasn't gonna give them

some of my money
that I fucking worked for.

I had a habit to support,
you know?

I wasn't making
enough fucking money

to support their habit, too.

[Ethan] Frankie has
this enormous rap sheet.

Things that he's
been charged with

and has walked away from.

The biggest question
that hangs over Frankie is:

how has he been able to skirt

so many allegations
against him?

[interviewer]
In our research on Frankie,

we've determined that
in Jeff Davis Parish alone,

he has been
arrested 23 times

with zero convictions.

As law enforcement,
our job is to investigate crimes

and arr...
make arrests when warranted,

and then we submit information
to the D.A.'s office.

If somebody has multiple arrests
and no convictions, then...

that'd be a question
for the D.A.'s office.

But it's a... that's
a large number of arrests,

obviously.

♪ ominous music ♪

♪♪♪

[Sarah]
I've always heard that

Frankie works
for the damn cops.

Do I believe it? Yeah.

Because he got out
of a lot of trouble.

I mean, and especially
with these murders.

[Ethan] We know for a fact
that Frankie has

cooperated numerous times
with the task force.

There's a relationship there
in the recordings that you hear

with his interviews
with the task force

where it's very buddy-buddy.

[Ethan]
It really poses the question

of what is
the exact relationship

between Frankie
and the task force?

♪ dramatic, percussive music ♪

♪♪♪

In 2009,

the sheriff's office

had learned
of an alleged theft ring

in town.

Homes were being broken into.

Weapons were being stolen.

And those weapons
were then being moved

to Chad's Pawn Shop

and pawned off there.

There was a raid

on Frankie's mother's home.

Coins, weapons,

cash and other items
were taken.

Frankie and his mother
were arrested.

There seemed to be

strong evidence against Frankie.

And very quickly

evidence began to disappear.

An internal investigation

was initiated,

and the result
of the investigation was that

Paula Guillory,
the ex-wife of Terrie Guillory

and a core member of
the task force at that point,

had mishandled the evidence.

And Paula Guillory
was terminated

from the Jeff Davis Parish
Sheriff's Office.

Were you ever given a chance
to give your side

or your account
of what happened?

[Ethan] What is your account
of what happened

to the approximately $4,000
that went missing?

[Ethan]
Okay.

[Ethan] So, you were
in the evidence room.

[Ethan] Who was the evidence
custodian at the time?

Gary?

After the evidence
went missing,

the charges against Frankie
and his mom disappeared.

This was part of a pattern
of cases where

there seemed to be
strong evidence against Frankie

and suddenly that evidence
was no longer there.

By that point,

there were seven bodies.

And there was
about to be eight.

When Necole Guillory's body
was found

just off I-10,

the fact that it had come
so closely after

a case against Frankie
fell apart again

created a wave of anger.

All of the fears,
skepticism and cynicism

surrounding law enforcement

all came to fore at once.

♪ slow, dramatic music ♪

♪♪♪

[Frankie grunting softly]

[Ethan]
What do you make of the fact

that things happen to cases
that involve Frankie Richard

that lead to those cases
falling apart

and ultimately lead to him

just sitting
on his front porch right now

in South Jennings
as a free man?

[Ethan]
That's my question, yeah.

[Ethan] You know,
as I mentioned earlier,

there were task force witnesses

talking about your ex-husband

being involved in prostitution
at the parish jail

and things like that.

[Ethan]
Terrie Guillory

comes up repeatedly

in interviews with witnesses

and family members alike.

We know he had deep
relationships with these women

that were often sexual
in nature.

In the case
of Crystal Shay Benoit Zeno,

Terrie was aware

of tattoos in personal areas

that only someone intimate
with Crystal

would have known.

[Roxanne]
Loretta Chaisson told me

she had an affair
with Terrie Guillory.

I don't know how old she was,
but she said she was young.

He would come and pick her up

and have sex with her
and drop her off.

[Ethan] We know
a witness told the task force

that Terrie Guillory
was having sex with Loretta

in a jail cell

just weeks
before she was murdered.

She knew things about Terrie

that nobody else knew
but her and Terrie.

[Ethan] I learned
that Terrie also used most

if not all of the women
of the Jeff Davis 8

as informants.

[Frankie]
I always felt

that the girls

would inform the law

about one thing or another

to either get their ass
out of a bind

right then and there

or for future references.

♪ quiet, dramatic music ♪

♪♪♪

[Ethan]
A place like Jennings,

where there's so much drugs
and drug use,

has a thriving
informant culture.

This is
a very informal relationship

with law enforcement where

you may be a drug user yourself,

but you provide information

to the police
in exchange for something.

In exchange
for the dropping of charges.

Often in exchange
for being permitted

to engage in criminal activity.

The informant culture
in a small town like Jennings

creates this sense

of a kind of limitless tentacle

of the police state.

I was a confidential informant.

I was a confidential informant

for Danny Semmes,

who was the detective
at the time.

I got in trouble
selling an ounce of weed.

Danny gave me a choice.

Either I do
what he wants me to do,

or he's gonna call welfare
and have my kids picked up.

♪♪♪

He wanted me to bust
a few people in town.

And I did it.

I busted six people for him.

Then, when I seen just how much
trouble I could get in,

I got out of it.

'Cause I got scared.

♪♪♪

It's very dangerous.

Drug dealers don't want you
on the streets

if you informing the law
what they doing.

♪ slow, dramatic music ♪

[Jessica]
All it takes is one person

to say one mistake about you.

You having anything to do
with the law enforcement.

You gonna get jumped.

You gonna probably get beat
half to death

or you're gonna die.

♪♪♪

[Ethan]
Family members and friends

told me that the women
of the Jeff Davis 8

would provide a steady flow
of information to the police.

♪♪♪

As informants,

the women were squeezed

between law enforcement

and the most dangerous people
in South Jennings.

♪♪♪

[Nick]
The last time

that I saw Loretta alive
was on Mother's Day,

and we had a gathering
at my-my aunt's house.

And Loretta had just gotten out
of jail after a month,

month and a half, maybe two,
something like that.

My aunt asked her why she
had gotten out of jail so early,

when she was supposed
to be in there for about a year.

She said, "Well, I'm not
supposed to tell anyone."

She says,
"But I'm-I'm gonna be a witness

against a drug dealer."

So they let her
out of jail, and...

she made it for, like, two,
three weeks and then she died.

♪♪♪

[Sarah]
When Crystal went missing,

I called Terrie Guillory,

and I told him
Crystal was dealing drugs

for a-a drug dealer
in Jennings.

He said
he had already knew that,

that Crystal had done told him
what she was doing.

Why would Crystal tell Terrie
what she was doing

for this certain person
if she wasn't his informant?

Terrie told me

that he had picked Crystal up
in Lake Arthur,

and he said
he dropped her off in town.

And I s... I was like, "Terrie,

you dropped her off
on that side of town,

and, you know, you're a cop.

You know, that's not cool."

And he was like,
"Well, it was all right.

Nobody was around."

But, still, somebody's lurking.

Somebody sees something.

It takes just one person to see
you get out of a cop car.

Then it's all over town
that you're narcing.

♪ slow, suspenseful music ♪

But the cops put 'em out there.

When they're done with 'em
and they get what they want,

they throw 'em out there
in the streets like... animals.

You know?
"We don't need you no more.

We're done." They-they can do
whatever they want to you.

[birds chirping]

♪♪♪

[Ethan]
Years before

the Jeff Davis 8 murders
began happening,

there are other examples

of informant murders
in Jeff Davis Parish.

♪♪♪

[Lakesha Myers] My mother's name
was Sheila Comeaux.

On February 14th of 1998,

she was found
in an abandoned building

down South Main Street
in Jennings.

She was found by a man
that lived behind the building,

and she was beaten brutally.

♪♪♪

[Ethan]
Sheila Comeaux is kin

to both Jessica Kratzer

and Barb Ann Deshotel.

[Barb Ann] I refer to her
as my sister-in-law.

And her kids are my nieces
and nephews.

Sheila's kids.

[Lakesha]
I believe very strongly

that my mom's death
is connected

to the disappearances
and deaths of these women.

The cases are so related.

They lived the same...
she lived the same lifestyle

as these other women
and these young women,

you know, these young girls.

It's very much related.

It should be investigated
right alongside...

the rest of 'em.

♪♪♪

[Ethan]
Comeaux was out

by Fondel's Funeral Home
in Jennings

making a drug buy

when it went bad somehow.

[Barb Ann]
She had been beaten,

hit with something,
beat with something.

And from what I'm understanding,

the only thing
that kept her alive at the time

is because it was so cold
that it clotted her blood

and it stopped her
from bleeding to death.

She had to wear this...

helmet thing on her head

'cause her hea...
her head was dented in.

[Ethan] Before she succumbed
to her injuries,

Comeaux was hospitalized
for about one year.

[Lakesha]
Every time she would

start talking
about what happened,

they would call the police
to come in

so that they could question her
about it.

And every time
that the detective

that was working her case
showed up,

she would stop talking.

She-she wouldn't say
anything else.

[interviewer]
Was she afraid?

No, I-I do believe
she was afraid.

Are people that scared
of the authorities here?

Mm, I believe
that some of 'em are.

Why? What-what
do they hold over them?

[chuckles]

I'm not gonna answer that.
[chuckles]

-Uh, that's okay. That's okay.
-I'm-I'm sorry. That's...

-That's okay. That's okay.
-[clears throat]

♪♪♪

[Ethan]
Her family insists

that Sheila Comeaux
was an informant

and that she was wired up
for this drug buy

by the Jennings Police.

♪♪♪

[Barb Ann]
The thing with Sheila

goes back to the police.

Now, the rumor is
that she was an informant.

First, she turned informant.

Then, when...
then, when she doesn't...

didn't want to...

tell or whatever anymore
is when

this happens.

♪♪♪

♪ tense music ♪

♪♪♪

[Ethan] The informant culture
in a small town like Jennings

left the women
of the Jeff Davis 8 vulnerable.

♪♪♪

As drug users,

they were vulnerable
to arrests,

constantly.

They were in and out
of the jail regularly.

Terrie Guillory had
enormous power over them

in the jail.

They would engage in all sorts

of informal deals with Terrie

to get out of trouble.

♪♪♪

Outside of the jail as well,

he was a go-to man

if they needed help
of any kind.

♪♪♪

To be a part of this
very informal relationship

with law enforcement,

it's an incredibly precarious
place to be.

♪♪♪

[Lorritta LaCoste]
My boyfriend Steve,

him and Terrie
was always together

at the bars
when they would go out.

And Terrie would do

favors for Steve.

Like, Steve would
get in trouble.

Say he'd got a DUI.

Got locked up in the parish.

Next day, he was out.

I don't know anybody
that goes to jail for a DWI

and gets out the next day,

unless you're an informant
and you're helping the police.

♪♪♪

Steve would set up busts
for Terrie,

'cause that's what Steve
would help him with.

♪ pulsing, dramatic music ♪

[Beth Trahan]
My brother Steven

was happy-go-lucky,

fun.

But he liked to party and drink.

♪♪♪

It was Saturday.

I was at my brother-in-law's.

And when my husband and I

got back in the car
to come home,

I checked my phone,
and I had, like,

20 missed calls

from our son Johnnie.

♪♪♪

So I called Johnnie, and...

Johnnie said,

"Steven's dead."

♪♪♪

[interviewer]
Deputy Guillory, if you will,

uh, just identify yourself
by name and position, please.

Terrie Guillory. I'm a warden
at Jeff Davis Parish Jail.

[interviewer]
Okay.

And I just need you to explain

how you were notified
of the incident

which occurred in Lake Arthur.

[Terrie]
I got a phone call

from Detective Chad Romero.

He advised me that, uh,

Steven Gunter had pointed
a weapon

at a police officer
in Lake Arthur.

Told him I'd meet him
in Lake Arthur.

♪ slow, dramatic music ♪

[Ethan]
On June 9, 2007,

Steven Gunter and his partner,

Lorritta LaCoste,
had been arguing.

♪♪♪

Lorritta was worried
about Steven's drinking.

They had been arguing
the day before.

And the argument had kind of
stretched into the next day.

The argument spilled out
into the street,

and the police were called.

The Lake Arthur Police
was first on the scene.

When they arrived,

both Gunter and LaCoste said,

"Everything's okay.

We don't need any help."

Steve told 'em,
"I don't want to talk to you.

Nothing happened.
Nobody's pressing charges.

Get out my house."

And he shut the door
and he locked the door back.

Somehow the incident
kept escalating.

More and more police officers
were called to the scene.

Terrie Guillory

was called to the scene.

♪♪♪

Terrie really takes control
of the scene,

even though he has
no background in negotiating

with someone
in mental health distress

or negotiating
with someone who is armed.

[Terrie] I knew
his girlfriend who was there.

She was telling us that he had
a twent... .22 rifle.

They asked me if there was
a gun in the house.

I said yes, but his gun was
nowhere where he could find it,

'cause I hid it
when he was gone.

I was told
that if I didn't get away,

that I was going to jail.

So I walked to my backyard.

At this point
he was in the house alone.

And Steve refused
to come out the house.

[Terrie] He just kept saying,
"Y'all-y'all go.

Y'all leave, y'all leave."
Or "go home."

That's what he kept saying.

[Ethan] Steven is begging
the officers,

including Terrie,

to leave him alone.

He just wants to be left alone.

They started shooting
tear gas bombs in the...

I mean cannons.

Like cannisters.

And then Terrie entered
through the back door.

[Terrie] When I came in,
I started shouting, "Steven."

I said,
"Steven, this is Terrie."

I said, "Where you at?"

I kept asking, "Where's he at?"

[Ethan]
Terrie Guillory claims

Steven raised a weapon at him.

[Terrie]
As I was coming out,

he was already standing up,

had the gun pointed
straight down at him.

And at that point,
they had no choice

but to fire upon him.

[Terrie] He fired a round
same time I fired.

I shot him again.

When I shot him,
he fell on the couch

hollering, "He shot me!
He shot me!" or "I'm hit!"

or something of that nature.

We grabbed him by the waist,

and we drug him out
the front door.

♪ suspenseful music ♪

[Ethan]
Steven's lifeless body

is placed in the front yard.

It's a very hot

June day in Louisiana,

and Steven's corpse is

left there for hours.

♪ melancholy music ♪

♪♪♪

[Beth] We went to the
Lake Arthur Police Department.

And a gentleman,
an older gentleman,

he introduced hisself
as Richard DuPont, the coroner.

And he said,

"I'm gonna be blunt."

He said, "I'm tired
of this shit.

I'm tired of covering up
for these people."

♪ haunting music ♪

♪♪♪

[Ethan]
After Steven was killed,

there was an autopsy.

When you look at the autopsy,

you see there are

multiple gunshot wounds...

in Steven's hands...

[Lorritta]
I seen the autopsy.

He had holes in his wrists.

I believe his hands

was up
when they started shooting.

[Ethan]
His family says

that it was hard to imagine

Steven's hands wrapped
around a weapon.

And if those hands were
not around a weapon,

then law enforcement's

entire narrative
of the case collapses.

[Beth]
All the news reports

had said he shot
at police officers,

he hit a police officer
with his fire from his .22,

but that's not the true story.

They told us it was actually

their own officer's ricochet
that hurt the officer.

And then Mr. DuPont called

and said, "Miss Trahan,
I have some information

I was told by the
Lake Charles coroner

I could give it to you."

He said, "There was
no gun residue

found on your brother's hands."

I said, "What?"

And he's like,
"There was no gun residue

found on your brother's hands."

Twenty, 25 minutes later,

Richard DuPont calls us back.

He said,

"The coroner of Lake Charles
just called me back

to ask me how much information
I gave you off the autopsy,

and I told him,

and he was very upset with me.

He said that they actually
didn't test for gun residue

because, since they shot him,

he would have residue
all over his whole body,

so there was no reason
for him to test the hands even."

"But 20 minutes ago, you told me
they did test the hands,

and there was no gun residue
on his hands."

That hit me wrong.

♪ haunting music ♪

Our investigator, he wanted
to look at the gun hisself,

and when he requested
the gun...

it was lost.

It was lost out of
the evidence locker.

I find it suspicious.

♪ haunting music ♪

♪♪♪

You feel in your heart
something ain't right.

Like your brother is dead

because him and his girlfriend
got in an argument?

♪♪♪

My brother knew Crystal.

My brother knew
all those girls.

My brother would party
with those girls.

I believe my brother knew
too much about Terrie.

Steven was his neighbor
in Hathaway.

Steven was locked up
at his jail all the time.

Steven was his informant.

♪♪♪

[Ethan]
In a deposition, under oath,

Terrie admitted that
Steven Gunter worked

as an informant
for the sheriff's office.

♪♪♪

In that deposition,

there was a lot of interest

in questioning Terrie

regarding his relationship
with Gunter.

Questions about
the drinking together,

about "Were you
in bars together?"

And yet,

perhaps the most important
piece of this--

that Steven was
an informant for Terrie--

went unexplored.

♪ percussive, jarring music ♪

There was a Louisiana
State Police investigation.

The police concluded

that Terrie Guillory's use
of force in that case

was reasonable and justified.

It was also looked at
by a grand jury.

But the grand jury declined

to bring an indictment

against Terrie Guillory.

♪ dramatic music ♪

[Beth] I hope to get justice
for my brother,

to get justice for the girls.

God don't sleep.

You may not get it in this life,

but you may get it
in your next one.

You reap what you sow
in the end.

♪♪♪

[Ethan]
In the earliest stages

of my reporting on this case,

I pulled every incident report

or criminal case

related to both the Jeff Davis 8

and any of their friends,
relatives, associates.

♪ soft, somber music ♪

♪♪♪

[Ethan]
Very quickly I began to see

a specific address pop up

on Highway 26.

Right off of I-10.

I just ran a basic search
on the address and found

that it was a shuttered motel

called the Boudreaux Inn.

And then I spent quite a while

talking to people
about the Boudreaux Inn.

And they explained that

in the Jeff Davis 8 era,

the Boudreaux Inn
was the place in town

to go for sex and drugs.

[Sarah]
I worked at the Boudreaux Inn,

at the café.

It was known as

a cheap motel in town
to go have a good time.

You know, if you wanted
to get high,

uh, whatever you was
looking for was there.

♪ haunting music ♪

Ernestine worked
at the Boudreaux Inn.

She was a maid.

Loretta hung out
at the Boudreaux.

That was Loretta's spot.
That was her spot.

[Roxanne]
Loretta Chaisson,

she always knew how
to hustle up the drugs.

She would go out at
the Boudreaux's Inn

and stuff
and come back with it.

If we ran out,
she'd go and get some more.

My brother lived next
to the Boudreaux Inn.

My brother would get drugs
from the Boudreaux Inn.

My brother would party
with those girls.

[Frankie]
If a female would

want to make some money,

she could go into the bar

at the Boudreaux Inn and...

be able to hustle some money.

Even in the days
before Kristen's murder,

Frankie talks about how he took

Kristen and Tracee Chaisson

to the Boudreaux
to make some money.

He was deeply involved

and at times ran
the sex trade there.

I never forced...

one of them girls
to do something

they didn't want to do.

I took them girls off the street

where they was jumping
from car to car for ten, $20.

It was convenient

that they had rooms
for rent, you know?

I mean, better than going to
another bar and hustling a chick

and going out in a car
and getting a blow job

or something, you know,
in the back seat.

[Ethan] Everybody knew that
you went to the front building

to purchase drugs
or purchase women.

And then, at that point,

you took the drugs and the women

to the back building

to have sex and use the drugs.

[Letitia] Boudreaux's Inn
made a lot of money.

It was $25 a room
for three hours.

I can flip those rooms
all night long.

Sometimes I had three or four
of 'em going at a time.

[Ethan]
Frankie Richard used

the Boudreaux Inn

with many of the women
of the Jeff Davis 8,

as a kind of ATM
for the sex business.

I decided to pull
literally every

incident report and every
single call for service

to the Boudreaux Inn during
the Jeff Davis 8 era.

There were thousands
of pages of materials.

[Ethan]
Somebody calls

the police because there's

a crack party happening
at the Boudreaux Inn.

Frankie Richard
and Andrew Newman,

Kristen's father,
are in a fight.

Muggy Brown is in there,
pulling a fire alarm.

Whitnei is stabbed

in there at one point.

The entire universe

of the Jeff Davis 8 are...

enveloped in this
Boudreaux Inn world.

The mountains
of police reports raise

enormous questions about

what the Jennings police

or the sheriff's office
knew about this place.

[Cormier] Obviously,
law enforcement was aware

that the Boudreaux Inn
was a location that

people involved in drugs
and prostitution were...

were known to-to go to.

As for what connection
that had to the murders,

the Jeff Davis 8,

to the degree that
those things were connected,

I-I don't...
I can't tell you that.

[Ethan]
You had poor women

who struggled
with substance abuse

engaging in sex work
at the Boudreaux Inn,

while at the same time,

these women are being murdered

and having their bodies
dumped all around town.

And yet
the Boudreaux Inn continued

to be operated unencumbered.

Why?

♪ suspenseful music ♪

[Ethan]
Throughout this case,

I was repeatedly warned,
you had to be careful

of that shuttered motel
called the Boudreaux Inn,

because it was maintained

or operated or owned even

by powerful people.

♪ haunting music ♪

♪♪♪

♪ suspenseful music ♪

♪♪♪