0:01

Murder in Miami is a production of

0:03

iHeartRadio previously

0:07

on Murder in Miami. So

0:10

you offered Lamar a million

0:13

dollars to land at his island and

0:15

to bring the coke back to the United

0:17

States. Right. One

0:19

of the most significant things in

0:22

this whole case was

0:24

Lamar Chester's appearance before

0:27

a Royal Commission of Inquiry in

0:29

the Bahamas. So at

0:31

the time that the inquiry

0:34

was happening in the Bahamas, were you

0:36

even aware that it was going on? Well,

0:38

it was shortly after this that the

0:41

mysterious Morgan Cherry mentioned

0:43

that I got a call from Bob who

0:45

said that Lamar wanted to hire

0:48

me as a consultant.

0:50

There was going to be a pre trial

0:52

hearing in Atlantic. You

0:54

didn't worry that you were

0:56

getting into something that you might not escape

0:59

from. I just sort of walked

1:01

right into it. Here's Chester

1:04

talking to CB about Phil

1:06

Stanford. I am a guy

1:09

him.

1:13

I am not by any

1:15

man active,

1:24

all right. So it's the fall of nineteen eighty four, and

1:27

basically you agree to

1:29

go to Georgia to help Lamar Chester,

1:31

who you fully believe as a drug smuggler,

1:34

and who fully believes that you were in

1:36

the CIA create a

1:38

gray male defense pretty much.

1:40

Yeah, and your girlfriend

1:43

Mickey's okay with all that, not exactly.

1:46

You remember, Bob and I were at the Mutiny

1:48

to meet Lamoire and drinking pretty

1:51

much all afternoon before finally

1:53

got to see him, And when we're finish,

1:55

we're both drunken and skunks. We drove back

1:57

to the apartment I got out. It

1:59

was getting dark by then, so I guess

2:01

I figured I had time to take a

2:04

nap. Is So I dozed off and

2:08

when I wake up, for some reason, I

2:10

decide I need to call this girl I

2:12

met in Washington, DC when I

2:14

was up there, and it's dark

2:17

in the apartment and I'm still

2:19

so out of it. I don't hear Mickey opened

2:21

the door, and she's probably standing there for

2:23

several minutes before I hang up,

2:26

and there she is. By the time

2:28

the call was over. I guess

2:31

that was it for Mickey and me. Oh,

2:35

Phil, I'm sorry, that's kind of awkward.

2:38

And the funny thing is the girl

2:40

in DC didn't even remember my

2:42

name when I called her. I'm

2:45

Lauren bry Pacheco and this is

2:47

murder in Miami. So

3:03

I moved out of the Amsterdam palace and ended

3:05

up renting a room from Jack McClintock,

3:08

writer friend who who actually did the piece

3:10

you referred to earlier about the Cardoza.

3:13

He and his girlfriend had a place in south

3:16

of Miami. So when Bob

3:18

called about the pre trial hearings, you

3:21

were basically available for

3:23

a consulting gig, whatever that

3:26

might be. Yeah, Bob said, I was supposed

3:28

to look for inconsistencies in

3:30

the daily transcript, and I'd be paid

3:32

a couple hundred dollars a day plus travel, So

3:35

it didn't sound like such a bad idea. Bob

3:38

said, I could stay at Lamar's place in

3:40

Cleveland while I was up there, and he was going to get

3:42

the tickets and we'd fly up. I mean not

3:45

to sound like a broken record, but you

3:47

seriously didn't have any hesitation

3:49

about getting messed up with a federal

3:52

investigation. You've got to realize I still

3:54

didn't quite believe that what was going

3:56

on was even real. But if Lamar

3:59

thought I was with the CIA, and I told

4:01

him the God's honest truth that I wasn't,

4:04

who was I to turn down the money? Mostly

4:06

though I was just going which every way the

4:08

wind was blowing well, you know, at

4:10

this point you had to have put some

4:13

thought into why he would have thought that you

4:15

were actually a CIA operative. I

4:17

mean, those guys weren't exactly

4:19

naive or stupid. It has

4:21

taken me years to get my head around

4:24

O one. But here's what I think they were

4:26

thinking. Now, here's this guy down

4:28

here from Washington, DC. He's written

4:31

for the New York Times on national

4:33

security matters, for Christ's sakes, and

4:35

everyone knows the agency uses journalists

4:38

cover all the time. He's even worked for

4:40

congressman on the House Arm

4:42

Services Committee and for a think

4:44

tank in DC. It would

4:47

be easy enough for them to have looked it

4:49

up. So here's what

4:51

they're thinking. Here's this guy. He's

4:53

not down here writing, he's not asking questions,

4:56

and he's obviously not interested in

4:58

the money. No one's that dumb,

5:01

so he must be with the CIA. Well,

5:04

you know there's another possible reason too.

5:07

Here's the recording of the taped phone

5:09

call between Chester and CB

5:11

Hackworth. I

5:14

have a guy made

5:16

together at our

5:23

agreement, cooperate

5:27

with I

5:32

am not by any mean

5:34

com currently

5:37

and actor. Call

5:43

me and with

5:46

your own attourney. Guy guy,

5:54

I don't know who this guy is Russell Burns or Russell

5:56

Burke. I never met him. There was a

5:58

Russell Burke who is in the indictment,

6:01

so he would have testified in the Lone

6:03

Star grand jury or have

6:06

been a subject of the Lone Star brand jury.

6:08

But whatever it was,

6:11

I have no idea how he could have come to that conclusion.

6:13

Probably just the same as Lamar

6:16

and Bob. No one can be that dumb,

6:18

so he must be with the CIA for

6:21

background. Operation Loan Star

6:23

was a sprawling federal investigation of money

6:25

laundering, but it began in nineteen

6:28

eighty one as a probe of oil

6:30

price manipulation in Houston.

6:32

One of the principal targets of the initial

6:34

probe, Miami tax lawyer Lance

6:37

Eisenberg, also happened

6:39

to represent Lamar Chester, which

6:42

is how the former Miami based Eastern

6:44

Airlines pilot and his opulent

6:47

lifestyle caught the attention of

6:49

the US Customs and Internal Revenue

6:52

Service agents assigned to the Lone

6:54

Star task Force. As at scope

6:56

widened, Lone Star spread to Atlanta,

6:59

Charleston, West Virginia, Pittsburgh,

7:02

New York City, and Florida, Eisenberg

7:05

was indicted in Houston, Atlanta, and

7:07

Charleston. He was suspected

7:09

of mastermining the funneling of billions

7:11

of dollars of laundered money through

7:14

the Bahamas, Grand Cayman Islands and

7:16

South Florida banks. That's

7:19

also why his client, Lamar

7:21

Chester's involvement with a Nassau

7:23

trust company and ownership of islands

7:26

became the focus of the sprawling investigation

7:29

that continued into Atlanta. And

7:33

so you fly to Atlanta. Yeah,

7:35

And when we land, Bob gets a rental

7:37

car and we drive out to Lamar's place in

7:40

the countryside outside Cleveland, which

7:43

was what's left of a tiny

7:46

old town in the Georgia Hills, about seventy

7:48

five miles north of Atlanta. A

7:50

gas station, hardware store, little

7:53

diner with a fifties rock and roll theme.

7:55

What was the atmosphere at Chester's place when

7:58

you arrived? It was kind strange.

8:00

First thing, they put Bob up in the guest house

8:03

on their property, drop him off there, and

8:05

I'm staying at the main house with

8:07

Lamar and artists as wife, who

8:10

I can tell right off really doesn't want

8:12

me there at all. Why did you get that impression?

8:15

I remember her as sort of a glowering

8:17

presence, very dark, always in the background.

8:20

I don't think she said a word to me the whole time

8:22

I was there. Sounds welcoming.

8:25

It was kind of strange, and I guess

8:27

starting then, but certainly over the years, I've come to

8:30

think of her as sort of a driving

8:32

force beyond all. This sounds

8:34

to me like she sort of egged Lamar

8:37

on, and she was quite capable of doing

8:39

that. Lamar was always trying to please her. Her

8:42

previous marriage was to a

8:44

guy from a mob family. Happy

8:46

and Elliott both told me that Lamar

8:49

got started buying airplanes with mob

8:52

money, which is a big thing to consider

8:54

here when we're considering possibilities that

8:57

sometime later, when everything was

9:00

going downhill, Ron Elliott showed

9:02

up and there was that previous husband

9:04

coming out of the Chester's house in

9:07

Georgia. So, you

9:09

know, my impression that she was making

9:11

it easier for Lamar to fulfill

9:15

his fantasies. Drug smuggling

9:17

were part of it. Women were part of it. A

9:21

quick note here, I did request an interview

9:23

with the artist through her daughter, A. J. Henderson,

9:26

who declined my request to speak with either one

9:28

of them or to comment on Phil's characterization.

9:31

It's interesting though to me that when

9:34

you got there, you're the one staying

9:36

in the main house and Bob staying in the guesthouse.

9:39

Yeah, it didn't make much sense to me at the time.

9:42

Actually, nothing about this was making

9:44

any sense. What I eventually figured

9:46

out was that they must have done this to

9:49

make it easier for me to talk to Lamar

9:52

about what my boss is back at CIA

9:54

headquarters had in mind for

9:56

him. What was your interaction like

9:59

with Lamar? What did you guys talk about? Not

10:01

too much for sure, because I, for one

10:03

thing, I didn't say that much. One

10:06

time though, I remember we were driving around

10:08

the grounds there. He had about five hundred

10:10

acres there, rolling hills

10:12

and pasture, and we passed

10:14

by this pond, an irrigation

10:17

project that he was having some work done on

10:19

at the time, and for some reason,

10:22

it reminded him. This was right

10:25

out of the blue, because we've never spoken about

10:27

the subject before of Clay Williams,

10:29

the intercept detective who was found

10:32

dead in the Everglades. We will wait. I'm

10:34

sorry he brought up Clay Williams. Why

10:37

didn't you mention that before? It just

10:39

came to my mind when we were talking about driving

10:41

around with Lamar asked this irrigation

10:44

project, and he said, you

10:47

know, when they found him there, a lot

10:49

of people thought I did it, which I didn't.

10:52

But it sure gained me a lot of respect, I'll

10:55

tell you that, and sort of laughing when he said

10:57

it. Not exactly comedic.

10:59

Five. But did you push him for more

11:01

details about what had happened?

11:04

Like I said before, I didn't

11:07

ask too many questions. I think that's one

11:09

of the reasons I was able to get

11:11

along so well. But I don't

11:13

know then, and I certainly didn't know now

11:16

exactly why he brought it up. You

11:18

know, Lamar was always working the angles.

11:21

Was efficient for information from me? Or

11:24

was it a warning? I don't know. Speaking

11:28

of Clay Williams, let's pause

11:31

here for a quick update. At this

11:33

point, I'd poured through newspaper clippings

11:35

that covered the Atlanta leg of Lone Star's

11:37

grand jury hearings. In them, there

11:40

were multiple mentions of a man murdered

11:42

and left to alligators in the Everglades.

11:45

Leslie Bickerton, a controversial

11:47

witness who is in accounts described

11:49

as Chester's former accountant, tax

11:52

consultant, and or mistress, recounts

11:55

conversation she had with Chester that

11:57

involved a Clayton. Sometime in

12:00

Ed Clayton quote and

12:02

two other men had been murdered and fed to

12:04

alligators unquote, and that

12:07

quote Lamar was very mad

12:09

at him. I

12:11

was now pretty convinced that Ed Clayton

12:14

could be Clayton Williams, as

12:17

the timing also checked out. Miss

12:19

Bickerton's testimony placed that conversation

12:22

in the fall of nineteen eighty one. After

12:24

making little headway with my initial records

12:26

request, I reached back out again

12:29

to Jeff Lewis, the former Miami Dade

12:31

detective I interviewed in our first episode

12:33

who kindly linked me with a man you're

12:36

about to meet. My

12:38

name is David Denmark, and I'm a detective

12:41

with the Miami Dade Homicide coal casing

12:43

it. I've been a cop since

12:46

nineteen ninety three, so going on thirty

12:48

years, and I spent twenty of those in homicide.

12:51

Although the records Department had done a thorough

12:54

search, they were unable to locate

12:56

the police report on clay William's death.

12:59

It was complicated by the fact that the

13:01

department recycled case file

13:03

numbers in those days, and when they pulled

13:05

what they initially thought was the correct one.

13:08

It contained the report for an entirely

13:11

different murder. Frustrating but

13:13

somewhat understandable given the time. According

13:15

to Detective Denmark, there's

13:18

over ten thousand goal

13:20

cases in Miami date, which is a staggering

13:22

number. I would tell you that the

13:25

eighties were a very large

13:28

part of the ten thousand cases.

13:31

Compared to other years. They were

13:33

handling two and three a day,

13:35

and that lasted for quite some time, particularly

13:39

since eighty one and eighty

13:41

two saw record numbers

13:43

of homicides in Miami.

13:46

Yes, and to speak on that, the

13:48

type of homicides that they were receiving were

13:52

in vehicles or in pools, meaning

13:55

they would come out to the scene and three people

13:57

unidentified in a pool, bound

14:00

and gagged and shot in the head. Or they would

14:02

come into an apartment and there'd be two or

14:04

three people bound and gagged, but they'd opened up

14:06

a trunk of a car and find two people bound

14:08

and gagged. So it was rough

14:10

on them. They were really a

14:13

different type of investigator

14:15

as to the investigator today because they

14:17

didn't have the technology that we have today with

14:20

advancement DNA. DNA in general

14:23

une passes, tag readers,

14:25

computers, websites, and

14:28

so those reports compiled pre

14:31

computer era were contained in

14:33

folders consisted of physical paper

14:35

clippings and photos stored in files

14:38

and warehouse storage

14:40

that has withstood physical relocation

14:42

due to moves and catastrophes

14:44

like hurricanes and flooding, all

14:46

of which makes locating older case files

14:49

much more complicated than simply searching

14:51

a database. There's a process

14:54

that we follow as goal case detectives to

14:56

locate files, and that includes our

14:58

archived files. We contact

15:00

our property Avidance Bureau along with warehouse personnel

15:03

and we'd give them the case number. Sometimes

15:06

it takes two to three weeks with them to go through

15:08

everything documentation folders

15:11

that were created back in a day. We

15:13

try to exhaust all of that before digging

15:16

into the medical examiner records. And

15:19

that's the point we'd gotten to. As

15:21

Detective Denmark pursued tracking down

15:23

the medical records for Clay Williams, I

15:25

continued to look for anything that linked

15:27

him to lamar Chester, back

15:39

to Phil Stamford and this nineteen eighty

15:41

four visit to lamar Chester's five hundred

15:44

acre farm in Cleveland, Georgia.

15:47

Looking back on it, all. I guess one of the

15:49

reasons he thought I threw more

15:52

than I did was because I never said that

15:54

much. Most of the time, I just listened. Another

15:57

time, we were sitting in

15:59

their living room, nothing fancy about the place,

16:02

shag carpets, heavy wooden furniture,

16:04

big picture window, overlooking the

16:07

gravel parking lot, listening to country

16:09

music, and Lamore, for some reason,

16:12

starts talking about this valuable

16:14

German pistol he's recently acquired

16:17

and brings it out to show. Actually, he says

16:19

he's got two of the matching pair, and

16:21

I say, Lamar, you're pretty good shot, and

16:25

he says, yeah, not bad, at

16:27

which point I say, hey, Lamar, why

16:29

don't we go out and get some target practice? Which

16:32

was really a strange thing for me to say.

16:35

I don't know where it came from, because I'm not a

16:37

gun person. I've been to the target range

16:39

in Miami with Bob and some

16:41

of the other Intercept guys maybe twice,

16:44

but I'm really less than an average shot. And

16:46

here I am challenging Lamar to a shooting

16:49

contest. What happened, well,

16:51

I remember Lamar an artists. It was

16:53

in the living room, then looking at each other exchanging

16:56

glances. I even thought I saw

16:59

a flicker of fear or at least uncertainty

17:02

in his eyes. No, I don't

17:04

think so, he said, because, as I realized

17:07

now, he was probably worried that

17:09

I'd take the opportunity to shoot him and

17:12

say it was an accident. As he

17:14

was telling everyone at the time, they

17:16

were either going to have to drop the charges against

17:19

him or they were going to have to kill him. So

17:21

do you think maybe at this point he was getting

17:24

a little paranoid? And to this

17:27

day, I have no idea

17:29

how consciously I was playing on Lamar's

17:31

fears or his belief that

17:34

I was a CIA agent who

17:36

had come to help him with his Gray Meal defense. But

17:40

I can see now I was really getting into it too.

17:42

Wow. So how long

17:45

were you a HouseGuest in that dysfunctional

17:47

dynamic before the pre trial

17:50

hearings began in Atlanta. It

17:52

couldn't have been too long, you know, just three or

17:54

four days, and Bob

17:56

flew back to Miami and

17:59

Lamoire moved operations

18:01

to Atlanta. Pre trial hearings were

18:03

going on, and here I am staying at the rich

18:06

Carlton Hotel, which I know is

18:08

costing more per night than I'm probably

18:11

paying a month in rent back

18:13

in Miami watching these proceedings

18:16

in federal court exactly

18:18

why? I don't know. I'm

18:20

supposed to be a consultant, but no one Lamar

18:23

or anyone else ever asks me to do anything,

18:26

So I just watch. Did any of the

18:28

testimony really stick out as noteworthy?

18:30

Oh? Yeah, the star witness.

18:33

In fact, the whole point of the hearings

18:36

was this tall, slim woman

18:38

in her thirties, Leslie Bickerton,

18:41

who the newspapers were billing

18:44

as Lamar's bookkeeper and

18:46

mistress. Do you remember

18:48

seeing her testify? What do you remember

18:51

about her? Lamar's lawyers

18:53

are trying to get the case thrown out before it

18:55

even gets to trial, and this is their claim.

18:58

They say that Leslie, who

19:00

at one point had skipped out on Lamar and

19:02

gone over to the Feds, gave them some phony

19:05

documents to make Lamar look even guiltier

19:07

than he was. That they actually created

19:10

some false documents and along

19:13

with the investigator in Houston, inserted

19:15

them into a collection of actual

19:18

documents she'd kept from her time working

19:20

for Lamar, and those documents

19:22

were used as evidence for the grand jury

19:24

and after that, they say she'd had a

19:26

change of heart and gone back to Lamar and told

19:28

his lawyers all about it. Yeah,

19:32

from what I've read, she seemed

19:34

kind of caught in almost a tug of

19:36

war in terms of her loyalty

19:39

between the prosecution and the defense. You

19:41

know, I did go back through old newspaper

19:44

archives and looked into the testimony she'd

19:46

given in Houston, and

19:48

it would appear that Leslie Bickerton

19:51

had gone to Georgia to help set up that

19:53

college campsite River Hills

19:56

for Chester, and that she

19:58

ends up moving to and

20:00

becomes a paid witness for the government

20:03

there. You know, the papers do

20:06

fluctuate between calling her Chester's

20:08

mistress, bookkeeper, or

20:10

accountant. But you know, the

20:12

interesting thing to me anyway, is that she

20:15

also mentioned that Chester had

20:18

told her that he quote got rid of a

20:21

man and fed him to the alligators.

20:24

And she says that he mentioned

20:26

the man's name as Ed Clayton. So

20:29

if the timing works out, that's a pretty

20:32

big coincidence, don't you think.

20:35

Oh yeah, it's

20:37

extremely important, And it sounds to me like she's

20:40

someone we definitely ought to talk to her. I

20:42

haven't talked to her by the way, Yeah, you know,

20:44

I've been trying to track her down. The

20:47

problem is that in the paper they mentioned that

20:49

she may or may not be in the witness

20:51

Protection Plan. I mean they spell

20:54

her name in several different ways

20:56

given the different publication. But

20:59

I've tried every single possible

21:02

combination to search for

21:04

her and reached out to even people

21:06

I think are possible relatives in multiple

21:09

states. I mean, I'll keep you

21:11

posted if I can and get in touch

21:13

with her. But CB

21:15

Hackworth was also covering at

21:17

the same time that you were that pre trial

21:20

hearing in Atlanta, and he shared some

21:22

pretty interesting stories about driving

21:25

Lamar to the Ritz Carlton to

21:28

meet Happy Miles. I

21:34

had never done anything

21:36

in close proximity to

21:39

Lamar other than in

21:41

the Bahamas under the circumstances

21:44

I had described before, so it

21:46

was totally unexpected that he wanted

21:48

me to give him a ride back to his hotel,

21:51

which was the Ritz Carlton. Of course,

21:54

my car was the

21:57

car of a reporter who was making nine thousand

21:59

dollars a year, and I

22:01

lived in my car. It was full of trash

22:04

and it didn't even know if another person

22:06

could fit in the passenger seat. So I was

22:08

embarrassed to begin with. I

22:11

might have made excuses

22:15

not to do it, except that

22:17

he wanted to introduce me to Happy

22:20

Miles. I recognized

22:22

the name from the indictment.

22:25

He was not indicted, but

22:27

he was an unindicted co

22:29

conspirator in the case. I

22:32

didn't know a great deal about him.

22:35

The name kind of drew attention

22:37

to itself. I was trying

22:40

to be a reporter to gather information,

22:43

so yes, I wanted to meet Happy

22:45

Miles for whatever it was worth. As

22:47

it turned out, it was well worth the trip.

22:51

But first Cbe had to deal with the

22:53

issue of his cluttered car and

22:55

rather empty wallet. There was

22:57

some embarrassment and professional

23:01

tight rope that I felt

23:03

like I was walking there for a minute,

23:05

because I knew

23:08

that I had barely enough money to

23:10

get out of the parking lot that my car was

23:13

parked in at the Federal

23:15

Courthouse, and I

23:17

knew that I was not going to have enough money to

23:20

park at the rich Carlton and get out,

23:23

So in addition to being

23:25

embarrassed about the transportation

23:29

situation period, I didn't

23:31

know what to do about the money. People

23:34

today may have difficulty

23:37

placing themselves in my circumstances,

23:40

but ATMs were

23:43

not a thing. I did not have

23:45

access to run and get money somewhere.

23:48

Even if I had it, I don't know that I did.

23:52

So all of this is running through

23:54

his head as Cbe walks to his

23:56

cluttered car with an international

23:59

drug smuggler, Lamar Chester, did

24:01

you rush before him and try to clear a space

24:04

on the see My recollection

24:06

is that I did not have time to even

24:09

attempt to clean up my car. But

24:12

at that point in my life again,

24:15

I lived in my car and

24:18

I had valuable things.

24:20

In the middle of the trash McDonald's

24:23

rappers was just a pile

24:25

of garbage. You opened the door and it spilled

24:27

out because like something

24:29

out of a comedy, Except

24:32

to me, it wasn't. On top of the

24:35

embarrassment, I was

24:38

not entirely comfortable giving

24:40

him a ride, period, because

24:42

I wanted to keep him at arm's length, and

24:45

he was closer than arm's

24:47

length in my car. Lamar

24:52

folded himself into my car. Somehow

24:55

he didn't seem to mind sitting

24:57

in my used McDonald's.

25:01

I believe it was before we even left

25:03

the parking lot. I brought up

25:05

to Lamar that I

25:08

wasn't going to be able to do

25:10

this without borrowing

25:13

enough money for parking, and

25:17

I think seeing my car, he understood

25:19

it perfectly well. And

25:23

this was one of the more disconcerting

25:27

moments to me of my entire

25:30

experience of knowing Lamarchester,

25:34

because I was so careful

25:36

to try to keep that professional

25:39

distance. He said he would

25:41

loan me the money, no problem,

25:44

and he was in the passenger

25:47

seat. He held out

25:49

his wallet, opened it and

25:52

it was full of large

25:54

bills, and he turned

25:57

his head in the other direction in

25:59

a almost exaggerated

26:01

manner. I cannot even imagine

26:04

that moment. It was a moment that

26:06

I was not really prepared for.

26:09

And by that I don't mean

26:12

in any way that I was tempted to take

26:14

any of that money for myself. It

26:18

was that it was so

26:20

obvious to me what he was

26:22

doing. He was turning his head,

26:25

and it was a tacit invitation

26:27

to take whatever I wanted. I

26:30

had written enough articles about

26:33

other people who had come

26:35

under his influence, the chief

26:38

of police of Cleveland, others

26:41

who were literally on his payroll,

26:44

Dan Davis, who had been a

26:47

reporter at one time and ended

26:49

up as an officer of

26:52

the company that held River

26:54

Hills, with Leslie Bickerton basically

26:57

working as a publicist almost I are

27:00

you aware of Dan and his

27:03

transgressions, certainly

27:05

as a reporter, because he

27:08

continued to write about

27:11

Lamar after he

27:13

had was working for Lamar.

27:16

You just don't do that. You certainly

27:18

don't do it without telling your

27:21

readers that you have that conflict.

27:24

Dan wrote the notorious

27:26

article in the Telegraph

27:29

that had a glaring headline

27:31

that said unglued agents pursue

27:34

White County farmer. As

27:36

if that was as simple as

27:39

the government's investigation of Lamar

27:41

Chester was. I was very

27:44

keenly aware of people

27:47

like Dan Davis and Charlie

27:50

Harrington, the chief of police, who

27:52

had become financially

27:56

beholden to Lamar Chester. I

27:59

had written at it. I certainly

28:03

was not going to be one of them. So

28:06

I was quite uncomfortable taking

28:09

even the money for

28:12

parking. So he held

28:14

out his wallet. It was full

28:16

of large denomination bills, hundreds,

28:20

and I looked

28:23

while his head is turned, for

28:26

a small bill, and I

28:28

believe it was a ten dollar bill. I

28:31

reached in there with my fingers,

28:34

my forefinger and my thumb. If

28:37

I had a pair of tweezers with me.

28:39

I would have tried to use them to pull it

28:42

out. I so did not want

28:44

to touch any of the real

28:46

money in the drug smuggler's

28:48

wallet. But I got this ten

28:50

dollar bill out and I said

28:52

something like okay, And when

28:55

he looked back at me, I was holding

28:57

the ten dollar bill in my four

29:00

finger and thumb for him to see

29:02

what I had taken. What happened

29:04

after he saw you holding a ten dollar bill, he

29:07

was grinning. I think that there

29:09

was an unspoken understanding

29:12

of what had just happened. That

29:15

he gave me the opportunity to be

29:17

bribed and I did not take

29:19

it, and he was kind of amused.

29:23

I told him profusely

29:26

that I was going to repay this

29:28

ten dollars, the ten

29:30

dollars that I borrowed. Aside,

29:33

I wasn't sure why I was going to

29:36

the Ritz Carlton to meet this fellow.

29:39

I didn't know why he wanted me to. This

29:42

is all sort of, you know, back

29:44

room drug smuggling buddy

29:46

stuff, and he's inviting

29:49

me to have an inside view

29:51

at it. In my

29:54

car, he's telling me that

29:56

Happy Miles could cut

29:59

a deal with the government in

30:01

exchange for immunity, and he

30:04

was supposed to testify against

30:06

Lamar and other defendants

30:09

in the case. Yet apparently

30:13

happy Miles was in Lamar's

30:15

hotel room. I really

30:18

couldn't quite reconcile

30:21

that if the guy is gonna be

30:24

testifying against you, why

30:26

have you got him in your room? As

30:29

CB Chaufford Chester to the Ritz

30:31

Carlton, his thoughts were spinning.

30:33

I mean, are there people in his room waiting

30:36

to kill me? You know, those kinds of

30:38

thoughts flash in your mind when you're

30:40

dealing with someone who was accused of

30:42

the things that Lamar was accused of, and

30:45

that had the kind of testimony that had arisen

30:47

in the case. A quick aside, in

30:49

addition to the mention of a man fed

30:52

to alligators who may or may not have been

30:54

Clayton Williams, I discovered

30:56

that in pre trial transcripts, a

30:58

prosecutor involved in the Houston Lake

31:00

of Lone Star specifically refers

31:03

to Clayton Williams by

31:06

name as a potential witness against

31:08

Lamar Chester. This lends

31:10

extra weight to possible motive for his

31:12

murder, particularly since Chester was quoted

31:15

as calling him a snitch who

31:17

had to be gotten rid of because

31:19

information he possessed made him a threat.

31:22

In addition to Williams, there were also

31:25

several other Lone Star witnesses who died

31:27

prior to or shortly after

31:29

testifying. I'll let Phil Stamford

31:32

explain yeah. One of them was

31:34

Sibley Riggs, Papers described as

31:36

a beautiful young yacht salesman

31:39

whose body was found stuffed in a trunk

31:42

of a Mercedes in the Fort Lauderdale

31:44

Airport in late nineteen

31:46

eighty one, shortly after she'd been subpoenaed

31:50

to appear before the Grand Jury in Houston.

31:52

Another was her boyfriend, mobster

31:55

named Alan Rivenbark by all accounts,

31:58

a slightly crazy, dangerous

32:00

person who had already testified

32:03

before the Grand Jury. He died

32:05

in a plane crash on his weight

32:08

with some others to a mob hang out in Colorado.

32:11

There was also an Alfred J. Miller, a

32:14

business associate of Chesters with ties

32:16

to River Hills, who died under suspicious

32:18

circumstances in Nashville and was

32:20

cremated almost immediately as

32:23

in the next day. This happened

32:25

in nineteen eighty two, shortly after he learned

32:27

he was about to be subpoena to testify

32:30

before Lone Stars Atlanta Grand

32:32

Jury. So the question

32:34

is, you know, were these connected if

32:36

they had testified against Lamar, where they have been

32:39

a further danger to him? If

32:41

Lamar wasn't involved, was the

32:44

mob because the mob certainly didn't

32:46

want anyone expanding the scope

32:48

of the investigation. Whatever

32:50

the answer is, certainly it would

32:52

have weighed heavily on Lamar's

32:55

mind at the time, whether it was involved or not. Because

32:57

of the additional deaths on

33:00

him, he was quite worried about his own future.

33:12

Back to sebhalf Worth meeting mister Happy

33:14

Miles at the Atlanta Ritz Carlton in

33:16

nineteen eighty four, mister Miles

33:19

having just returned from a sort of two year

33:21

exile that was part of his immunity deal,

33:23

two years basically spent sailing

33:26

around the world. Lamar

33:28

was happy, no pun intended.

33:31

He could not have been more pleased

33:34

that Happy Miles had made a

33:36

deal that got him

33:39

off the hook, even at

33:41

Lamar's expense. What Lamar

33:44

had to say about that was

33:46

that he wasn't worried. He

33:48

had nothing to hide, that

33:51

whatever Happy was going to testify

33:53

to truthfully was

33:56

not anything that

33:58

would get Lamar in trouble. According

34:01

to Lamar, as Lamar

34:03

escorted CB through the hotel lobby,

34:06

they were met with a rather warm reception.

34:09

It's hard to tell where Lamar

34:11

ended and the Ritz Carlton began because

34:14

their customer service is so good

34:17

they know their guests. As

34:19

we walked in, somebody who

34:21

worked at the Rich Carleton did say, welcome

34:24

back, mister Chester. He

34:26

stayed at the Rich Carlton when he was

34:29

in Atlanta four of those prolonged

34:32

pre trial hearings. There was his home

34:34

away from home. I

34:37

want to hear your first impressions of Happy

34:40

Miles when the door opens, I

34:42

would say his name suits

34:45

him, almost like something

34:48

Carl Hyacin would come up with for

34:50

a novel. I'm

34:52

not at all sure that Lamar had even

34:54

told Happy that I was

34:57

coming, or who I was.

35:00

It may have been a surprise to Happy. Didn't

35:03

really matter. We got this warm

35:06

reception. I think Happy

35:09

had already had a few drinks

35:11

and was making one for himself.

35:14

Happy was not physically what

35:16

I had imagined. The other

35:19

codefendants who I had seen, like

35:22

Ron Elliott, they

35:24

were all what you would expect an

35:26

airline pilot to look like, you

35:28

know, a former airline pilot. I

35:30

could always picture Lamar wearing an

35:33

Eastern Airlines uniform. I

35:35

could picture Ron Elliot wearing

35:38

an Eastern Airlines uniform. I

35:40

saw Happy Miles, and I could not picture

35:43

him wearing an Eastern Airlines uniform.

35:46

I'm not sure I could have pictured him wearing an

35:48

Eastern Airlines Mechanics

35:52

outfit. Happy

35:55

radiated good times.

35:58

Without knowing his biography,

36:01

you could infer from

36:03

his physical appearance that he

36:06

was a guy that liked to have a good time, a

36:09

persona that didn't seem too dampened

36:11

by the current circumstances. It's

36:14

hard to say what I expected, but

36:17

it was not laughter

36:19

and this gregarious

36:23

reception from somebody

36:25

who was so immersed in

36:28

consequential legal

36:31

actions with the United States government.

36:34

Here, I've got on one hand, Lamar Chester,

36:37

who is flaunting practically

36:39

his relationship with a

36:42

member of the news media, and you've

36:44

got Happy Miles, who

36:46

is virtually flaunting the

36:49

fact he's just got the deal

36:51

of a lifetime. And in true

36:53

form, that's not all Happy was

36:56

flaunting. These days, you'd

36:58

use the word bling. I

37:00

don't think that was a thing then. It

37:03

was unusual in my experience

37:05

to see someone wearing so much of

37:07

it. He had a rolex,

37:10

he had something gold around

37:12

his neck. He had a bracelet

37:16

that spelled out his name in what

37:19

I took to be diamonds. And

37:22

I assumed that all this jewelry

37:25

that looked like it was gold probably

37:28

was gold. And again,

37:31

what little I knew from Lamar

37:34

on the way over to the hotel was

37:36

about an immunity deal. I

37:39

learned more about it in the room.

37:42

Federal prosecutors in

37:45

this case obviously did

37:47

not make public developments

37:50

like immunity deals. First

37:53

of all, often it would get someone

37:55

killed. But they

37:57

didn't want us knowing anything that

38:00

wasn't in open court. And

38:03

yet here was a very happy Happy

38:05

Miles, happily sharing his story

38:08

with a young reporter on the record.

38:11

I mean, you couldn't make this fella up

38:13

as a character, and he's real,

38:16

and he is in Lamar Chester's hotel

38:19

room. So

38:23

Happy basically backed up what

38:25

you had heard Chester testify

38:28

to in the Bahamas, his claim that

38:30

he had done everything with

38:33

the understanding of the

38:35

DA and the CIA. Happy

38:38

absolutely backed up

38:41

Lamar's claims. Happy

38:43

backed up everything Lamar said in

38:46

terms of general

38:48

statements about the drug

38:50

smuggling having been done

38:53

in concert with different

38:55

government agencies and agents.

38:59

That agent supposedly

39:02

got information from Lamar, passed

39:04

it on, acted on it successfully,

39:07

according to Lamar, and in

39:10

turn they let him continue

39:12

to smuggle marijuana after

39:16

all these years. What sticks out most

39:18

to SEB Hackworth about the surreal gathering

39:20

at the RITZ Carlton was the way

39:22

it contrasted with the reality that

39:25

other potential witnesses involved with the investigation,

39:28

like Clay Williams, wound up

39:30

dead. They didn't know who

39:32

killed who, but there were dead people.

39:35

It bothered me. I was

39:38

a lot younger and braver

39:42

than I am now. I wouldn't

39:44

say I was ever reckless, but I didn't

39:46

take as many precautions as I probably

39:48

wouldn't now. But here I am

39:50

in this room with two

39:53

of the major players, and I can't

39:55

believe that Happy Miles is

39:58

in the room if he's going to testify

40:01

against Lamar Chester. If

40:03

even a small amount of what has

40:05

been either implied

40:08

or outright stated about

40:10

Lamar Chester being dangerous

40:14

is true, then how

40:17

can you be a witness

40:20

against him? A newly

40:23

agreed upon I'm getting immunity

40:25

and I'm going to testify against you, witness,

40:29

and they're sitting there yucking it up about

40:31

old times. I

40:33

mean, Lamar could have killed him in front of me for

40:36

all Happy Nude, but I

40:38

did take that to mean that Happy

40:41

Miles literally was not afraid of Lamar

40:43

Chester, but cb

40:46

he was beginning to fear. The real danger

40:49

involved the information Chester had

40:51

shared and the people linked

40:53

to it. I'm the person

40:55

he called in the middle of the night. I

40:59

worried that I knew too much.

41:03

It's really interesting to feel like you're

41:05

the confidant of somebody

41:08

who knows things that

41:10

may or may not have gotten people killed, and

41:13

you're now on the receiving end of that information.

41:16

Yes, on

41:20

the next murder in Miami, Perseverance

41:23

pays off on double fronts in a

41:25

connection with a mysterious key player

41:27

in the Lone Star legal proceedings. I

41:30

can understand she would have been worried

41:32

back then, for sure, bodies

41:35

turning up all over the place, and

41:37

a major break in the search for information

41:40

about the murder of Clay Williams, this

41:43

man who was trying to turn

41:46

on him and try to

41:48

get rid of him. Murder

41:51

of Miami is a production of iHeartRadio.

41:54

Executive producers are Lauren Bright Pacheco,

41:57

Taylor Chicoine, and Phil Stanford.

42:00

Written by Phil Stamford and Lauren Greg

42:02

Pacheco, Audio editing

42:04

and sound designed by Nicholas Harder, Evan

42:06

Tyre and Taylor Chacogne, featuring

42:09

music by Evan Tyre, Phil Mayer, John

42:11

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