Belinda and David Temple - Part 2

0:00 Hi. I'm Tina, and I'm Rich. And if there's one thing we've learned in over twenty years of marriage, it's that some days you'll feel like killing your wife, and some days you'll feel like killing your husband. Welcome to love, Mary Kill, Hey Rich, Hey Tina. How are you? I'm great? How are you? I'm good. I'm a little little little sleepy. We're just talking about how it's the perfect time of day to take a nap. It is. I have a joke for you. I'll wake you up. Sure, Okay. A Mobias strip walks into a bar and the Mobia strip is crying. The bartender says what's wrong? And the Mobias strip says, where do I even begin? It's pretty good? Huh No, you don't get it. I know. Do you know what emmobius is? Should I be embarrassed that you don't know? Or maybe it's a bit of a geometry joke, but amobia strip has no beginning or end.

1:10 It's a strip. Okay, I'll show you one later. I'll make all right, and I look forward to that. I also have an embarrassing admission to make. Okay. In part one, you talked about golden Birthday. I didn't know what that was. I thought it was like, oh, a thirtieth birthday? Is that called the golden birthday? Ye? Why didn't you should say, darling wife? I just kind of assumed, like, oh, thirtieth birthday must be called the golden birthday. But I thought that was kind of weird, like why would a thirtieth birthday be the golden birthday? But now I know it's the age. Wait, what is it? It's your birthday whatever the day I would also be the thirtie. Yeah, because your birthday is November thirtyeth your golden birthday would have been the twelfth.

1:53 Yeah, Okay, well I learned something new. I was up late last night preparing for this podcast, and I have a really hard time going from like working on a podcast to going to sleep. Sure, and I was like three and I still couldn't get to sleep, but eventually I did. But then then I sensed, well I think I heard the noise first, and then I sensed you were gone. Yeah, do you want to see what happened our smoke detector. Apparently the battery decided it was time to go dead, and it was going to start beeping intermittently. We live in uh, smoke detector. Hell, like it's we have a lot of them, like a lot, a lot, like too many. I don't know why there's so many, so many. Then there's like carbon monoxide detectors, and then we have our security system. It's all wired in go was off sometimes for no reason. So yeah, it's not unusual that we have and it's really so frustrating. It's very difficult to track down when it happens, like which one is it? And because you hear the beeping from all over the house and I don't know if it echoes or they they just play off each other. Yeah, I woke up at four thirty. You were heroic because I heard you with the step stool like going around. I was like, it was gonna come and help you. But then I was just really tired because I've been up too late. But you found it fairly quickly, relatively quickly. But my heart was like beating so fast because A, like you

3:23 just get woken up in the middle of the night by that, Yeah, and B I was like, is this going to start? I thought it was going to start, the whole system like going off, and I was just kind of panicking trying to find it out. Then sometimes their security system goes off, and when that goes off, there's just no one. None of our neighbors are sleeping, like it's really loud. So yeah, so thank you for taking care of that. I'm surprised you woke up because it actually wasn't that usual annoying chirp. It was. It was kind of a muted chart or it was a beep, not a church. Yeah, and it was pretty far apart, and I was like, I analyzed the situation, like, I'm pretty sure I can slip through this, so I'm just gonna go. Actually, but then the cat, oh beloved. I think the cat freaked out a little bit because of the beeping. And yeah, he needed he needed someone to be there for him, and there you were.

4:14 Well, and I love him so much, like I've had I need to stop doing this, but he like wants me to put him all night long, so he wakes me up every few minutes to to put him, and I do. He's very sweet. Anyway. I came just for the snacks, right, Yes, you're gonna be super excited. Real you ready for this? Yes, okay, I have for you. Beaver twists, also from the buckets, but I have never one to skimp on details. I have dark chocolate, milk chocolate, and white fudge beaver twists. Oh, actually some of them are beaver nuggets. Why do we have last time with the nuggets? Did you polish off that bag by the way where you and I did eat quite a few more. One of our children walked into the room and they were like, no, I don't they're gross. I don't like them, but don't take their word for it. They're really good.

5:11 They're really good. So, yeah, the two of these are beaver The chocolate are beaver nuggets, but the twists are white fudge and they look on off a lot like a bugle and a little suspicious. Do you want to try them? And we'll come right back? Sure? Are you sure you want to try them? What did you think of the BUCkies chocolate snacks? I'm they were good, but I'm going to say the original beaver nuggets that we had in part one were better. Interesting because I was going to say the same thing, Yeah, yeah, they're good, But if you're going to have chocolate, I don't know. I think I would rather just have chocolate. But I mean, I wouldn't say no to them, You know, no I would, but yeah, I'm glad you discovered buckets.

5:59 Oh that was thanks to our friend jayc all Right, should we get to work. Let's get to work. Should we dive in? I guess we wanted to Sorry one of them. I think we're both tired a little bit. We are going to rally and we are going to be uh, we're going to get it done. All right? Should we do like a quick synopsis? Yes, we should. Would you like to dive into that? I can give attempt at not a ton happened. We just talked about their background. Belinda and David Temple. They were They met in college. They were married. He was like football star in high school and played football in college. His whole life revolved around football. They got married, they had a child. They both were working in the schools as teachers and he and coaches. He met another woman started having an affair. There was a little bit of a love entangle, as we called it, because they were friends with another couple, Quinton and Mutin Tammy. Tammy and this other woman, Heather. She was kind of playing both Quinton and David off of each other, but she was definitely having an affair with David, and I think where we ended part one was when David found Belinda Dad at home with a gunshot in that in their closet. Yeah. The only thing I would add is

7:30 David is alpha, alpha male. And when Quintin started a flirtation with Heather, I don't know if what his intent was, if he would have had an affair with her, but David just had to have her right. It was very competitive and so once his friend showed an interest in this woman, that, yeah, he was all over it. We are still on January eleventh, nineteen ninety nine. Detectives were on the scene within the hour of the nine to one to one call. David was given a gunshot residue test and put in a squad car, where while the investigation began. His stoic demeanor and lack of tears were noted. So I was kind of surprised that they put him in the car right away, not that he was arrested, but they're like, you stay here, we're going to do the investigation.

8:18 We don't want you to impede that at all. Maureen and Ken Temple, David's parents arrived on the scene too, shocked and emotional over the loss of their daughter in law and granddaughter. I do believe that they loved Belinda, and I don't think they knew anything, and I think they were really shocked and sanded. They were crying and hugging David, yet he lacked the emotion one would expect from a young father whose life had just been torn apart. David gave his approval for the house to be searched, but he was told he needed to remain in the squad car until police could take his official statement. Initially, it was thought that Belinda may have committed suicide, but that was quickly ruled out. She was shot in the back of the head with one bullet from a shotgun, and small lead pellets were found on the carpet, and they're pretty sure that the gun was pressed to the back of her head. When Belinda didn't show up at Bunco, her friends thought maybe she'd gone into labor. She'd explain what bunk or do you think everyone knows?

9:16 It's just I don't really know what it is. I assume it's a card game of some sort, but I think it's a dice. I've never played it myself, but it's a dice game. A lot of women play, you know, they have snacks and drink cause it's just, you know, like just a reason to get together and have fun. When no one answered the home phone, Tammy and another friend drove to the Temple house. Seeing all of the flashing lights from the emergency vehicles, Tammy quickly assessed the situation. She said she knew that David had murdered her friend for an alleged break in. The Temple home was exceptionally tidy. Investigators found a huge drawers opened, but they weren't rifled through. We've had a couple of cases like this where it's been kind of like a staged break in. Yeah, it's like, you know, you can't just open you have to make it look like someone went through it. A TV lay on its side, but it wasn't broken or unplugged. Nothing in the house was broken or stolen other than the window and the TV. It was just kind of weird because it was like, you know, David didn't or I'm assuming that it was David, Like he didn't want to break the TV. He just put it gently on its side, Okay. Cast jewelry and other valuables were found in plain sight throughout the house. Paul Looney, David's attorney, later told the press that there were several pieces of Belinda's jewelry missing, as many as twelve pieces a necklace, sapphire and diamond earrings, and a bracelet with Evan's name. Pawn chops were later checked and nothing was found there. The glass from the broken window was off to the side, not in front of the door. Investigators thought

10:48 it looked as if the glass the window had been broken when the door was open, because otherwise the glass would have, you know, shattered right in front, but it was off to the left. Belinda's keys were found on the stairs of the home. She normally normally kept them in a bowl by the door. And why were the keys on the stairs? That was really strange. Stranger David said, Oh, that's where she That's where she kept them, right, I just put the stairs with my three year old walking around. Yeah, I just that's where I keep my keys. Remember the last episode, we talked about how Belinda's shoes were still she was fully clothed.

11:28 Her shoes were on her glasses that she only wore when she drove were found broken in the closet and you know, a pregnant woman that far along, she wouldn't probably keep her shoes on. So it almost seemed as maybe she had been marched up the stairs with a you know, like David or whoever, like marched up the stairs and said, you know, go to the primary bedroom, go to the closet, because that was probably the most sound proof room in the house to shoot someone. Yeah, and the keys being on the stairs, could they have fallen out of her pocket when she was being marched up stairs or was someone chasing her with the gun and when she came in the door and she had to run up the stairs. Because there was also a phone found in the what do you what do you remember what you call a cordless phone? What you're talking about? That a long time since we've had like, you know, actual phone. But yeah, so the cordless phone was also phoned in the closet. So could she have grabbed the phone and you know, tried to call nine one one and then she was shot in the closet. We don't know. Investigators questioned how a burglar could have gotten past Shaka the dog when he was so terrifying to everyone else. The police were so intimidated by Shaka when they first arrived at the temple home that they considered shooting him to gain entry before David came out to restrain the dog. And the dog was in the backyard. He was in the backyard, and the back door was the one that was broken. That's

13:00 a little it's a little questionable, right. David was driven to the police station in a squad car. His parents followed and they were to be interviewed too. Ken Temple tried to call Belinda's parents but wasn't able to reach them. They were still at the hospital with Tom, Lucas's father. Do you remember he had had an accident that same day. Ken called Brenda and staid she screamed and cried, incredulous that her twin could be dead. That must be so hard to lose a sibling to loisure twin. Eventually we Linda's parents, Tom and Carol learned the news. The news gutted them. They sobbed as they clung to each other. A neighbor did report seeing a man jump a fence in the Temple's neighborhood, but it was later discovered to be a meter reader who wasn't in the area. During the time of Belinda's murder.

13:48 I actually I did check the So it's David called nine one one, I think at five forty six pm, and the sun goes down at that time in Katie around five, so likely it was there was daylight during the time that alleged intruder could have entered the home. Staff members at Hastings High School where David were interviewed. The only thing that detectives learned was that David never complained about his marriage to his coworkers and fellow coaches. A few people did suspect he was having an affair. When detectives went to Katie High School, where Belinda worked, more people seem to know that the temple's marriage wasn't a very happy one or fulfilling for Belinda. During questioning, David admitted to owning two rifles, but no shotgun. Do you know the difference between a rifle and a shotgun? Yeah? Okay, I really didn't, because when I read that, I was like, well, well, actually, no, I guess I don't rifle. I was I didn't realize you said rifle and a shotgun. No, I don't. What's the difference you're thinking about pistol.

14:50 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, we're just not gunn no. So yeah, what is the difference. I'm nervous to answer this question. Rifles are meant to hit a single target at a further distance, and shotguns shoot pellets and a scatter shot pattern closer up. I'm not sure if that's right or not. But it's more, you know, it used to kill an animal, where you know, the scatter shot is more likely to like you know, does that make sense? It does? Yes, I think I did know that. I just didn't. I didn't think about the fact that those were two different things. Yeah, two different purposes. I guess learned so much and we're gonna forget it and we're gonna have a conversation again. In a couple of weeks, probably Blinda had been shot with a shotgun, not a rifle, and there were two rifles found. Did I already say this? There were two rifles found in the closet with Belinda. Just I think that's where they kept them, mm hmm. But no shotgun, but no shotgun. David was asked to disrobe and he was checked for cuts and bruises. He didn't appear to have any. I think they thought that if he broke the window he have some cuts on his hands or something, but he didn't. David told investigators that he took Evan to the park that afternoon so Belinda could rest when she got home. David first said he took Evan to the neighborhood park, but later recanted that and said he went to We went to this bigger park that was closer to the grocery store that they ended up, and Evan was three years old. Evan was three, so he probably wouldn't be able to say much. Well, no, not really, and remember Evan was sick, right, he'd had some motron. Blinda

16:25 had left a note on the counter that said, I don't know what time it was, but you know, last motron at twelve thirty pm or whatever, and it's been a while since we've had like a little one with you know, liquid motron. But it makes it does make baby sleepy, and you know, he could have been napping. No one could corroborate that David and Evan were at the park. After the park, David said that they stopped at the grocery store for a cat litter and drinks, and then they went to home depot cameras do show them entering the grocery store at four thirty two pm and exiting at four thirty eight, and they entered home depot at five fourteen, which seemed like if it should have been sooner, like there was some time that no one knows where they could have been ok Yavid said that there was a lot of traffic when they returned home. David claimed that Evan was riding his bike in the garage when he went into the house and noticed the broken window, But when police inspected the garage, they noted that there wasn't enough space in the small garage to ride a bike and the little yellow bike was hanging from the ceiling. After seeing the broken window, David then grabbed Evan. He rushed over to the neighbors. We had talked about this the last episode. He grabbed him and he took him to the neighbors and he was like call nine one one, take care of Evan. And then he ran back to his house and that's when he went upstairs and found Belinda in the closet. Ken and Marine Temple were questioned together. When Maureen would talk, Ken often corrected her. At one point in the interview, marine cried and blurted out, I just could not have raised a son who

17:59 would kill his wife. Ken was asked if David had a shotgun. He said he had bought him one in high school, but later he would say that David had sold the shotgun. As the interrogation continued light into the night, everyone at the station was tired. David was asked if he would take a light detector test. He flew off the handle, refused under any circumstance, and demanded a lawyer. Which we talked about this a lot. It's okay you should ask for a lawyer, should but it always does look just a little suspicious. David and Evan slept at his parents' house that night, and they actually never slept in their old house again. They had already contacted a defense attorney who met them at their house at one thirty am. Investigators thought there was a lack of blood spatter at the crime scene. Belinda was shot at close range with a shotgun. There should have been more blood.

18:53 After Belinda's body was moved, detectives continued to examine the closet for blood. They parted the clothing in the closet and found more A lot more blood and brain matter behind the clothing, as if the shooter had parted the clothing before the shooting and then slid the clothes back on the rod. After Belinda was shot, a wet towel was found in the bathroom, as if someone had just taken a shower. Belinda's purse was found in a closet under the stairs, which isn't where she normally would have kept it. Do you know where I keep my purse? No, Okay, that's what I was just curious, Like I think that most men don't really know where they're going in the laundry room. Well, we have like a laundry moder room, so it sometimes I just leave it in my car. But yeah, so you know, yeah, but if you put it in a closet, that would be weird, like a lot some people, like I think her sister was, like, she'd never put her purse in the closet. As you mentioned earlier, a cordless phone was found in the closet near Belinda's body. The last number dialed was the Ruggy Arrows. They who are the neighbors? That's the neighbors that David had gone into taken Ovan Yet so I was curious about that, And I don't have any information about the time that the call was made.

20:04 But instead of calling nine one one, could Belinda have called the neighbors be like, you know, help, I'm being attacked or something like that. Yeah. The soup that Belinda had picked up from Maureen remained on the counter, as if she hadn't had time to put it in the refrigerator. Two rifles were found in the bedroom closet, but what detectives wanted to most find was a twelve gage shotgun, thought to be the murder weapon. It was never found or verified to have even existed. Investigators wondered if David could have ditched the murder weapon when he and Evan left the house. An acquaintance of David's claimed he saw him on the day of the murder around five pm near his parents' house, the opposite direction from the home depot. Could David have disposed of the weapon at his parents' house or on their vast property that he knew so well. So there were acres and acres of property, and they were streams, and there the woods and the rice fields, and they were searched, but nothing was ever found. But you know, especially in like mucky swampy water. It's really hard to find anything right. I'm not sure if the interior of David's parents' house was ever searched. I don't think it was. I don't think they had issued a search. Weren't. But his parents did seem legitimately surprised, and so I don't think that he probably had the gun in their house. They're probably not covering up for him.

21:30 No, I didn't get that sense. The school district was subpoenaed for all of David and Heather's email histories. Baffling to detectives was the relationship between Quinton and Heather. She was in a relationship with David, but still emailing Quinton too. In one email sent to Quinton from Heather, she wrote, please make it three o'clock already. I want to go home and hug the bear you gave me. I guess it is safe to talk to him. Meanwhile, friends, family, and stu ud all missed Belinda horribly. Her parents were searching for answers. They were sure of David's innocence initially, but as time went by, their opinions shifted, as did Quintin's Ken Temple suffered a heart attack. He said it was from grieving his daughter in law. He loved her too, he said. The next day the community awoke to the news that a beloved teacher had been murdered. Some wondered who could have killed a sweet, funny, eight month pregnant woman, but others were sure they knew who killed Belinda Temple. David's attorney, Paul Looney, was a high profile attorney from Houston. He'd represented Timothy McVeigh and Woody Harrelson's father. Did you know he wash? Yeah, it's a very interesting story. We should talk about that sometime. He withdrew David's consent to search his home. Not a big deal because police could easily get a search warrant. It just made David look uncooperative. The search continued and investigators found a golf shirt in the laundry that appeared to have on it and it was later confirmed to bee blood.

23:03 The house was fingerprinted, nothing unexpected was found. The bathroom sinks and traps tested positive for blood when luminol was sprayed. There were no bloody footprints in the house. Despite the crime scene being bloody. David made an appointment with a child psychologist for Evan to help him deal with Belinda's death. The DA decided to have a psychiatrist talk to the three year old too. The child psychologist's records were subpoenaed after and they did not believe that Evan had witnessed his mother's murder, which is good. That is good. By the end of the day, the police were informed that David had been having an affair with a woman named Heather Scott. The next day, they paid her a visit at the townhouse she shared with her friend Tara Hall. They both were taken to the police station for formal questioning. Heather described her relationship with David as casual and romantic. Heather gave a statement to the police admitting that she and David were in a relationship. She admitted that a week before Belinda's murder, she had told David that she didn't want to continue with the way our relationship is going. She agreed to take a polygraph. The results indicated that she was withholding information. Heather was insistent that she believed in David's innocence.

24:18 Tara corroborated Heather's story, but days later Tara returned to the police it had been weighing on her that she hadn't told them everything she knew. She told police that David had spent New Years at the townhouse and that David had told Heather he had fallen completely in love with her. What police needed to hone in on was what happened between three p twenty when Belinda left Katie High to five forty six when David called nine to one one. Those two hours and eighteen minutes were the key to the whole case. The gunshot residue test came back inconclusive. There was evidence of gunshot residue, but it was very minimal. The blood in the sink trap was two di looted to be typed, and the blood on the golf shirt was determined to be David's. The gunshot residue test we're referring to is just the one from David's hands and body.

25:10 Okay, Tom and Carol Lucas were interviewed by Detective Tracy Shipley. She got a sense that they had been greatly disappointed by the relationship they had with Belinda. They never saw her, David or Evan on holidays. They thought that the marriage between Belinda and David was healthy but they only talked to their daughter once a week. During their brief phone calls. They thought David was a good man, although their feelings were hurt that he hadn't called them since Belinda's death and they weren't asked to help with funeral arrangements. Which that's so sad. Yeah, that really, Tom told Detective Shipley, quote, my daughter and son in law were happily married. I want you to catch the man who killed our daughter, but when you make an arrest, you need to make sure it's the right man. I don't want you to put an innocent man in jail. End quote. So at that point, the Lucas family really did stand behind David, even though he was pretty crappy to them.

26:00 Yeah, it's a little surprising. Will be right back after a break. The autopsy found Belinda to be healthy. Her hyoid bone was intact. Baby Erin was eighteen inches long and six pounds, so she was ready to big enough to be born. She was fully formed and healthy. The medical examiners surmised that Belinda had been shot once, with the gun touching the base of her head. The bullet exited Belinda's eye, her cranial cavity was empty. The cause of death was the shot to the head. The method of death was murder. The murder weapon was a twelve gage shotgun and the ammunition was buckshot. Her death was immediate, and Aaron died moments later. The exact time of death could not be determined during the autopsy. Belinda and Aaron relay to rest. On January fifteenth, nineteen ninety nine, at Hastings High School, a student posted a sign that read killer Coach Katie. High School closed at eleven thirty so students and staff could attend the funeral. All twelve hundred seats in the Baptist church were filled. David didn't seem to shed a tear.

27:15 Later that day, Evan was taken to the psychiatrist. In his report, he said that he didn't believe Evan had witnessed any traumatic events. He said that it was possible because he'd been given motron he'd slept through any commotion at the house. David's attorney said this pointed to David's innocence. How does that point to David's innocence because Evan hadn't heard anything or witnessed it any I mean, yeah, it's just an attorney being. The town of Katie was split, some remembering David Temple as the hometown hero and one of the best football players to ever represent their town, but there was also there were also plenty of people who remember David Temple as an entitled bully who got away with more things than he should have. What could David's motive have been? Was there insurance money? Yes, Belinda did have a sixty thousand dollars life insurance policy from the teacher's union, but that's hardly enough to want to murder someone over. Yeah, I don't know. Do you think the motive Well, I guess we're assuming it was David at this point, But do you think the motive was I always mean to like reserve my judgment, but I can never do that. Yeah, I mean, unfortunately it's No, it doesn't seem like it would be any surprise. But do you think it was because he wanted to be with Heather? Yes, I believe I believe that was the case because it was just a matter of days before he said I'm completely in love with you. Yeah, and then you know, Belinda, I guess having a second child would just complicate that and make it harder for him to separate from Belinda, and some people said that he was not excited about

28:48 having a second child. When Evan went back to preschool, his teacher noticed that he had become quiet and withdrawn. He'd always been sweet and playful before his mother's death. His teacher saw him playing with the dollhouse one day with one of his friends. He had the father doll in his hand and was angrily pushing the mother doll in his friend's hand, and he said, I don't like you anymore. You can't come back here. Wow, it's so sad. Meanwhile, David returned to work at Hastings High School. A police car followed him everywhere he went. Within weeks, David bought a new Silverado pickup truck and put his house up for sale. For years, he had wanted a new vehicle, and Belinda was always like, no, we can't afford it. He moved his belongings to storage and planned to stay with his parents for a while. When friends were helping him move, one of them noticed a box of shotgun shelves. The box had a slight rattle to it, as if some were missing. Police were relentlessly interviewing and reinterviewing friends and neighbors of the temples. The boys who lived in the house behind the temples got off the school bus every day around four pm. They were watching a movie when they heard what they described as a boom, but another neighbor would later describe it as a truck backfiring. And the boys were actually witnesses at the trial later on, and it was you know, people were like, oh, well, if it was at so they were watching, what was the movie they were watching. They were watching Doctor Dolittle, and they could describe the scene when they heard the boom. So investigators were able to pinpoint

30:22 at the time that they heard the boom was at about four thirty pm. Interesting, and at four thirty pm they knew that David was not at home, that he was at the grocery store. Okay, so you know, they gave a little, a little reasonable doubt. Yeah, in the neighborhood where the house is fairly close together, because I would imagine like a shotgun blast, I think is very loud. Then I think the houses were pretty close together. But she was in an interior room and maybe the clothing, you know, made made the sounduffled, it uffled, it I did. I did want of the same thing myself, like did they do a task to see, like did they try to shoot a gun in the house and to see if you could hear it from the neighbor's house? Right, But there was someone else on the street that said, well, I heard it.

31:08 I was looking out my window when I saw a shuck backfire. Yeah. I can't remember the last time I've heard of vehicle backfire. No, he's not anymore, but it is a very distinctive loud sound. Police soon landed on a potential suspect, the temple's teenage neighbor, Joe Sanders. Joe was a chronic truant and pot smoker. He attended Katie High School. Belinda had talked to Joe's parents about his problem skipping classes. He'd missed one hundred and thirty one classes for that year. Isn't it shocking one hundred and thirty It's only January, oh man. Belinda was understanding to Joe and didn't come down too hard on him, but he did have access to a twelve gage shotgun. He took three polygraphs that were inconclusive, but police thought that could be because he was trying to hide his drug use from parents. The Sanders turned over their shotguns and they were determined not to be a match. Eventually, the police moved on from Joe and his friends. There was no forensic evidence tying them to Belinda's murder. I believe Blinda had also gone over to their house and he'd had a party when they were out of town, and there were some beer bottles that had been thrown in the temple yard, and she did kind of rat them out for that. H But Belinda was known to be like a really nice person, and he said that he had nothing against her. He understood why she did that, and yeah, he didn't have any even data against her. On Valentine's Day, a month after Belinda's

32:39 death, David sent Heather a large bouquet of roses and began spending weekends at her townhouse. A month after Belinda's death. Yeah, yeah, that's that's shocking to me. It's also shocking to me that Heather would be okay with that. I mean, it's shocking, but it's like so sad, Yeah, because Belinda was a really lovely person. Belinda's best friend Tammy, began trailing David. She's not proud of it, but she was obsessed, saddened by losing her friend, and enraged that David was moving on so quickly. She even went through Heather's garbage looking for clues. One day, Heather and David both called in sick. Tammy found out and drove to the townhouse to see if David was there. Sure enough, there he was. She pounded on the door, yelling, but no one answered. She left a note on his truck that said, quote, I saw you. I know what you're doing unquote at like Tammy, Oh yeah. By fall, Heather and David were openly a couple. When football season began, Heather showed up at the first game. When Tammy saw her, she said, You've got to be kidding me, how dare you? Tammy knew that Heather had openly flirted with her husband and their marriage had been struggling ever since. After the first game, Heather began sitting with Evan and the Temple family. Heather liked to tell people that her relationship with David had started months after Belinda died, but most people knew that wasn't the case. She liked to portray David as the

34:10 perfect man, but her roommate Tara Hall said the relationship was volatile. They fought frequently and David was aggressive. They broke up, only to get back together days later. I think it's important to point out that Heather wanted everyone to think they had this perfect relationship they but it really wasn't. Yeah, David was just I think he was hard to be with. Sounds like it. Prosecutors met with Carol and Tom Lucas, Belinda's parents. They carefully laid out all of the evidence for them. After the meeting, their minds were changed and they no longer supported David. Tom considered killing David. He said, quote, fathers are supposed to protect their little girls, but Carol and my family convinced me not to. They said having me in jail wouldn't help anyone end quote. I can kind of understand that. I understand Tom and Carroll became obsessed with getting justice for Belinda and Aaron to such an extent that the other Lucas kids had a hard time spending time with them and distanced themselves even further from their parents. David allowed them to see Evan occasionally in the beginning, but never without one of his family members present. In the fall, the Lucases gave an interview to a TV station. In the interview, they said they thought David might have murdered Belinda. David severed ties with them after the interview. Mark Schmidt, one of the police officers who was working the case, is kind of a hero to this story. He was the cop with a bone that wouldn't let go. He was as dedicated to Belinda

35:44 as a family member. He said, quote, I thought about Belinda Temple's murder before I closed my eyes at night, and the first thing in the morning. It was my first big homicide, and it looked like the killer might get away with murder end quote. For years, he continued to interview people and sent evidence to the FBI for testing. As testing methods improved, he would resubmit items for testing. Prosecutors were in no hurry. Prosecutor Wilson said, quote, we had one chance at David Temple. If he was guilty and we tried him unsuccessfully, we'd never be able to try him again. We didn't see that there was a hurry. There's no statute of limitations on murder end quote. Good for them, Good for them, but that weight it must have been excruciating for the familyating In March nineteen ninety nine, a grand jury was convened to hear the evidence. Many friends and neighbors testified, including Tammy, Quinton, and Heather. David temple pleaded the fifth and refused to testify. The grand jury ruled the case against David as too weak to continue. However, prosecutors got what they wanted. Most witnesses on the record before their memories faded, They did say that that was their number one goal. They knew that they at that point they didn't have what they needed.

36:58 Days later, David called Tammy and Quinton and told them they needed to keep their mouth shut. Shortly after the grand jury, someone broke into the Harlan's house. That's Quinton and Tammy's house. It rattled Tammy. After the incident, she bought a gun and carried it with her all the time. David followed Tammy in his truck on multiple occasions in an attempt to intimidate her. They even moved out of their house for several months. Quinton is still working with David at this time. Quinton talked to detectives around the one year anniversary of Belinda's death. He told them about a box of shotgun shells that he'd seen when he'd help David move things into storage. Police went to the storage facility with a search warrant, but they were not able to find the shotgun shells. Quentin had come first full circle and was now convinced David had killed Belinda. It had been nearly impossible to work with David since Belinda's murder.

37:52 David wasn't passive aggressive with him. He was aggressive aggressive. Quinton wasn't an anonymous source. In a local news article, David went to the school administration to complain. They told Quinton he needed to find a new job. The police department was concerned for the Carlin's safety after the article was published and escorted them out of town. They left Katie and moved to Fort Worth. Oh So, apparently being an anonymous source is not super anonymous. Well, I think David knew that. I knew, Yeah, they were out for him, But I can't believe they had to leave town because of David. Well, I can't believe the school administration told Quinton he needed to find a new job. I mean, I would think they would have put David on leave or something, right until discount resolved, A second grand jury was convened, and they too didn't think there was enough evidence to bring charges against David.

38:42 As the days turned into months and the months into years, Belinda's father, Tom Lucas called the police frequently, aching for an update on his daughter's case. He wrote to the governor, and he asked the Texas Rangers and the FBI to take up the case. He also wrote to America's most wanted no one was will need to help with the case, which good for him. I mean, it just sounds like the local police weren't. I mean, I think they were trying really hard, but they just taking We could talk about the evidence. Really, there really wasn't a lot. I mean a lot of it was circumstantial, but circumstantial evidence is still evidence. And with no gunshot residue on him, I mean, really, what was the evidence against him? And there really wasn't much other than who else would have wanted Belinda dead? Right, I mean, no one one. Thing that they invested, the investigators said was they had never come across a victim that was so talked, talked about so glowingly as Belinda. They said, literally, no one had a bad thing to say about her. She was that kind and lovely of a person. Yeah, so really, no one, No one had an agendative. In January two thousand and one, two years after Belinda's death, Heather and David were engaged and married a June Oh congratulations, And they actually had a wedding and people went. They bought a new house in Richmond, Texas, near Katie. After the wedding, Evan began

40:14 calling Heather, mom, Oh no, she's the only mother. He remembers that poor kid. Now, it's so devastating. Heather and David never had a child of their own, which I think is kind of telling because they're still pretty young. In December two thousand and one, Lacey Peterson went missing. You remember Lacey. Of course, America then realized how vulnerable pregnant women were in their marriages. The public and media looked at Boland as unsolved murder with renewed interest. The similarities in the two cases were eye opening. In April two thousand and three, after years of working through nine to eleven evidence and identifying victims, the FBI was able to work on backloged items, among them items from David Temple, several items of his clothing were found to contain gunshot residue, a shirt, jacket, sneakers, and pants. So after nine to eleven, the FBI was completely overwhelmed for years, and that's why it took so long. And it's still I think takes a long time for them to analyze evidence a lot. There's just this huge backlog, and the FBI is the only one that can perform certain tests. Okay, I guess I didn't realize that that the gunshot residue test on his clothing would have had to go through the FBI. And so and she was killed in nineteen ninety nine. Yeah, so it was just right. I mean, yeah, it was. But maybe they didn't immediately. Yeah, I'm sure there's always a backlog, and I think there always is a backlog. I don't think I think two years might be kind of extreme, right. A new prosecutor,

41:46 Kelly Siegler, was assigned to the case, and she decided to move forward with the case against David and have him arrested. She knew it would be an uphill battle. The evidence against David was sparse. There was no DNA or fingerprints, no eyewitnesses, and no murder weapon. Kelly Siegler went on to star in the true crime TV show Cold Justice, where she tried to solve cold cases. During her tenure on the show, sixteen crimes were solved and thirty people were arrested. David was arrested on November thirtieth, two thousand and four. A Texas law enacted in September two thousand and three classified the killing of a pregnant woman with a viable fetus as a double murder, but because Belinda was killed in nineteen ninety nine, David was charged with a single murder and not the death penalty. He was released on a thirty thousand dollars bond. Had that law been in place earlier, he would have been charged with two murders and therefore the death penalty. Yeah, that makes sense.

42:46 The Temples hired a team of lawyers among the best in Texas, including the legendary Dick de Geran who most famously represented David Koresh, and Robert Durst. You watch The Jinks, right, Yes, A long time ago. I don't think I watched it, but I think he's featured in The Jinks. Yeah, And I don't want to give anything away, but people said that the fact that he got Robert durst off, he must be a really good You're really good lawyer. Yeah. Yeah. The case was delayed multiple times due to pre trial motions, primarily stemming from disputes regarding the admissibility of evidence, the relevance of David's past, and the selection of permissible witnesses.

43:29 David was suspended from his coaching and teaching job at Hastings High School with pay as the delay extended. He was eventually given a job at an alternative school in the district, working with at risk youth. Lucas has appeared on Nancy Grace's new CNN show. They were her first ever guests. The same day, the Temple family appeared in front of Belinda and Aaron's grave with TV cameras rolling. David's brother, Darren said, quote, this district Attorney's office has decided to choreograph an ill prosecution against David. It is not a coincidence that David's arrest was a few days after the Lacy Peterson verdict. Darren said David was completely innocent. Before the trial began, information was received that confirmed that in nineteen eighty five, Ken Temple had purchased a twelve gage shotgun. Remember previously he had said when his sons were in high school, he gave them a twelve gage shotgun. And then he was like, oh no, I never said that. In a huge blow to the prosecutors, in September of two thousand and five, the FBI ceased metallurgy testing, calling it junk science.

44:37 The National Academy of Science called the testing deeply flawed and said that the test results were misleading. The prosecutors asked for an extension so the items could be retested. It took months for the test results, and they were far less conclusive the second time around. Only one item was returned positively for metal fragments, and it couldn't be ruled out that it had been contaminated. The FBI's testing site shared a ventilation system with the shooting range. David's attorneys requested to throw out all the GSR evidence, claiming that the FBI lab was unreliable. Let me explain about the metallurgy tests. I'm going to try to.

45:19 I think it's like a gunshot residue test, but more invasive, and it doesn't just say that there's a presence of gunshot residue. It analyzes like the metal fragments that are remaining from gunshot residue. Okay, so that would help them like tie it back to the type of gun and the type of ammunition, and they would be able to analyze like the garments from David versus Belinda's, and then they u to tie them back together. So just the presence of gunshot residue, you know, that's one thing, but to say decisively it's this, you know, it's the same matter from you know, the same So the doubt that was thrown in here was that they weren't they wouldn't be able to match it up, but they could still say that he had gunshot residue on his clothing. Yeah, but it wasn't necessarily the exact same.

46:09 Yeah, it's not as strong, right, Yeah, But they are kind of, you know, saying that all this test testing is junk science. It's weird how many things, how much blowback there has been on so many different forensic tests recently, like they want to call it, you know, blood spatter is drunk science and writing analysis. Yeah, yeah, it's all it's all junk. I mean, I should be looked at it carefully and closely, but I don't think all of it is drunk science. Why not? Finally on October sixteenth, two thousand and seven, So this is you know. Blinda was killed January of nineteen ninety nine. On October sixteenth, two thousand and seven, the trial began, three years after David had been arrested and nearly nine years since Belinda and Aaron's murder. Dick de Garan and Kelly Siegler had sparred in court twice before. He'd lost both times.

47:02 Some coined their latest courtroom battle the Clash of the Titans. Much of their battle was fought in pre trial hearings, delaying the start of the trial. Heather, You remember Heather, right, of course. Heather testified she was aggressive, claiming that she and David had been friends after Belinda's death, and she hadn't been in love with him. Then, Heather said that David was in love with his wife and happy with her. He saw a future only with Belinda. The judge had to warn her twice to answer the questions asked and not argue with prosecutors. The judge ruled that the gunshot residue should not be allowed in his evidence. An old friend of the Temple Boys was called as a witness. He testified that Kevin Temple, one of David's brothers, had left him a message cautioning him not to mention any guns the Temple's owned to the police. Undeterred by the threat, he testified that he had often hunted with the Temple on their property and he knew for a fact that they owned for twelve gage shotguns. Really bothers me that the family that David's family is trying to cover for him, really, Like, I understand wanting to be on the side of your son or your brother and not believe that they committed murder. But I would never lie to the police about something that important.

48:22 I wouldn't either. And if you love Belinda, I mean she and Aaron deserve justice. So it's really disturbed. And they did intimidate multiple people, and I don't believe any charges were ever filed wow against any of them, which I think is wrong. Yeah. Brenda was the last witness for the prosecution. She was adamant that her sister's marriage was not a happy one. The prosecution rested, The defense requested the trial be adjourned, as they usually do. They said that the prosecution did not prove their case and the motion was denied. Can Temple, David's father, a preacher, testify that he had never bought David a twelve kh a shotgun. He became belligerent like Heather. The judge had to warn him to answer the questions. He was being asked, I'm just to get on the witness stand and lie, especially being yeah, yeah, it's just crazy to me. David Temple testified on week five of the trial. He talked about the love he had for his family. He claimed that he'd given Belinda a purse for Christmas and perfume for her birthday, and that he'd helped paint the nursery. He denied that he'd ever told Heather that he loved her. Closing arguments began on November fourteenth.

49:36 The jury began their deliberation just two hours before they called it today, but by the next afternoon a verdict was reached. They deliberated for about eight hours. What do you think the verdict was? If I wasn't looking at your script, I would say not guilty. Because it was so fast and because of the gunshot residue being not admitted as evidence, he was found guilty wept, as did his family behind him. His mother fainted. As David was led from the courtroom in handcuffs, he mouthed, oh shit to his family. He was sentenced to life in prison. Mark Schmidt. Remember he's the heroic police officer who wouldn't let the case go said later, regarding the verdict, quote, we still had a dead woman and child. David Temple was going to prison, but we had no reason to celebrate. There's always such a good point. Yeah, no matter what happens. It's like Belinda and her daughter should still be here in the in the words of the wire, the show we're watching right now. He seems like good police. Yeah, he does. Evan thirteen. When David went to prison, got to meet with Belinda's parents. He was quiet but sweet. He lived with Heather.

50:47 David wouldn't be eligible for parole until twenty thirty seven, when he was sixty nine. However, in twenty sixteen, a Court of appeal has determined that David's trial was unjust due to Brady violations and prosecutorial misconduct. No defense alleged that they'd been denied to fourteen hundred pages of crucial discovery, much of the evidence involved Joe Sanders, the Temple's neighbor and Belinda's formal former student. I mean, remember, he did fail three polygraph tests and he did have access to a twelve twelve gage shotgun. Belinda had had talked to his parents on more than one occasion about his truancy and told him about a party he'd had when they were out of town. The withheld of evidence revealed that at one point during the investigation Joe was a viable suspect. Kelly Siegler had quashed the investigation and he was cleared. She admitted she withheld some evidence because she thought it was irrelevant. Kelly Siegler was charged with thirty six counts of prosecutorial misconduct.

51:50 November twenty sixteen, granted a new trial. David Temple was released from prison to await a new trial. The Harris County DA recused themselves from the case, citing conflict of interest, and the state Attorney General took over the case. A second trial began in twenty nineteen. Is that crazy? Yes, that is crazy, and there was another three year delay there. Evan Temple, Belinda, and David's son gave compelling testimony. Evan Temple said on the witness stand quote, I want my dad out of prison. I lost my dad once. I don't want to lose him again. My father was a big influence. Even when he wasn't present, he got to write letters, calls maybe three or four times a week end. Quote. He called his dad his hero and said he has never wavered in his belief that his father is innocent. I'm not going to talk much more about the trial other than Evan's testimony. That was the first time that he had testified. The jury voted to convict David, but was deadlocked on the sentencing portion. Ten voted for life in prison and two were holdouts for a lesser sentence. The judge was forced to rule a mistrial. Here is never Yeah, I've never heard of it. They found him guilty, but they just couldn't agree on anything the sentence. Oh Man. A retrial of the punishment phase was scheduled for twenty twenty before the COVID outreak, but it was delayed until April of twenty twenty three. On April twenty first, twenty twenty three, David, now fifty four, was sentenced to life in prison. Wow. So the

53:22 twenty four years after Belinda and Aaron were murdered. Good lord, but he had spent you know, a fair amount of time in prison. Still, yeah, that's really a big delay of justice. But I guess I misunderstood. So when you said the judge was forced to rule a mistrial, it was a mistrial for the punishment hearing, not for the guilty verdict. Yeah, it wasn't. Didn't. He didn't have to do the whole trial, Thank goodness. Okay, here is a clip of Mark Schmidt. Came out here a lot during the investigation. Yes, as often as I could. When the investigation was ongoing, I'd stop by and visit the grief safe, say a prayer for her and Aaron, and pray that we would someday get a conclusion and get justice for them. When you're out here, what did you feel that it helps center you? Yep, exactly exactly needed that that occasional reminder come out here and just just be here for a few minutes.

54:34 Just feel different being out here now. I'll admit it's been a long time since I've been here, but we got closure to a degree. It'll never go away. We're never going to forget this. And as Andy was saying, nobody's going to ever forget this, but at least we got the closure for Belinda and Aaron. Good police just breaks your heart, doesn't break your heart when you hear like you know, it just makes me really happy when I hear a police officer who obviously cares so much. You know, you hear too many other stories on the other side, So it's really nice.

55:23 I agree with you one hundred percent. But it also it makes me sad though that it haunted him to such a degree, to where he really was just kind of obsessed. Right, you need to find you know. And it's silly. We are not police, but we're podcasters and sometimes I do carry some of the cases with me, and you know, it is it's hard to hear these stories and process them and you know, in a healthy way and not obsessively think about them. Yeah, So that is the sad story of a David and Belinda Temple. And so Evan is still like he lives with Heather as his mom. Well, he's an adult, he's like almost there. He is married, he's married, he lives in El Paso, and he works as an accountant. So it seems like he's you know he's doing as well as he could be. And you know, we can poke at Heather and you know a little bit, but I think she tried her best to be a good mom to him, and you know, sadly, she's the only hope. I hope he knows more about his mom.

56:24 I didn't talk about this, but one of her good friends that she worked with, like she had some really great friends, like everyone who knew her loved her, who made like the scrap Book of Belinda and had people write stories about it. And I hope she was able to give it to him. She really wanted to give it to him so he could get to know his way through that. Belinda's tombstone it reads temple at the top and then it says Belinda Tracy her you know, death and birth dates. Aaron Ashley is underneath that. They're buried together, and the tombstone says mother and child. We feel that much of angel wings nice. I wonder if David could have had CTE, which a lot of football players get, oh, chronic traumatic and cephalopathy. Did I say that it sounded great? Okay? But yeah, but I mean he I don't think he was He was a hothead, even back in high school though before he would have had any traumatic brain I'm just drawing that out there. I think that you know a lot of aggressive football players, do you suffer from it? And the steroid thing too, I think there's definitely an argument to be made that steroids can cause you to, you know, even anger issues you stop using them. I mean, did he stop using him? I mean I think I think he did.

57:43 I think when he wasn't playing football anymore, he had no reason to use them. Yeah, that makes sense. I'm just wondering if how well planned out this could have been. Did he plan on hiding the murder weapons somewhere? I mean it's still never been found. And then so where was Evan when Belinda was shot? Like maybe he put Evan in the in the vehicle and then went up and I don't know, right, Yeah, Yeah, the murder weapon is interesting. I do wonder if it is at his parents' house. It sounds like that would be the most natural place for him to hide it, and it would probably be difficult to be found if it was like in a swampy area. Yeah, and it's hard to imagine a burglar could have gotten into the house or the teenage neighbor. They probably wouldn't have been able to get Doss the dog. The dog really was vicious.

58:34 Although I didn't say this, but this was kind of funny. The David's attorney at one point was talking about how picture perfect their life was and how David would never have wanted to harm his beloved wife, and he talked about how they He literally said they had the friend a friendly dog, and everyone who knew the Temples was like, no, that dog was not friendly. I wanted to mention again the number one cause of death for pregnant women remains homicide by their partner. That's just so so mind blowing and tragic and so horrible. Heather divorced David in twenty nineteen amid the second trial. I think she owned she stayed with him when he was in prison for nine years.

59:17 She stayed with him. Prosecutor Kelly Siegler's show was later canceled after they were sued twice for defamation of character, but it was later picked up by Oxygen, and I think it. I don't think it has run continuously, but I think it's kind of aired a few different times. Oh, this one, this one blew me away. You know how I'm always digging for more information. This one kind of shocked me. Tammy Harlan, You remember Tammy Quinton's wife. Quinton's wife, Belinda's very good friend who coined the phrase Barbie bitch. She was arrested in twenty nineteen for a twenty sixteen hit and run offence involving a nineteen ten year old Baylor University student, David Grotberg. So she had this incident happened in twenty sixteen, and so for three years it was an unsolved case. The police received an anonymous letter in twenty nineteen saying, hey, I think you need to look at Tammy, and then they were able to look at her. She had her car repaired like a month after the incident, and she, yeah, she hit this poor young man who was on a bicycle. She had been at a party and she'd been drinking some wine with some friends. She said, she told someone the next day, I hit a kid. She's like, I think I hit a kid. I'm not sure if I hit a kid, it might have been a stop sign. That's a saying he killed. Yeah, he was killed.

1:00:46 Wow, she was sentenced. I think that during this phase she must have. She and Quentin must have divorced because in the articles that I read, like her name changed. She went from Tammy Harland to Tammy Blankenship. So this just happened in early February that the trial happened. It was a two week trial, and then she was sentenced to ten years in prison. Wow, which I'm not sure if ten years in prison for a hit and run is I don't know. That seems like kind of a light sentence a little bit. Yeah. I mean, you took someone's life, even if it was an accident, but you took their life and you fled. See yeah, that's yeah. And she was also convicted in twenty eighteen of another dw I oh wow. So yeah, we'll rest in peace, Belinda and Aaron so so sad. Yeah. I want to mention my source once again.

1:01:43 It is a book called Shattered by Catherine Casey c A. S. E. Y. It was an excellent book. It was very well bought out, so great job well. As always, thank you very much for listening. We appreciate all of you. Are we going to drive to BUCkies real quick, real quick? In five hours? Yeah? Well did you google that? How far away is it? Five? Hours. I didn't see one in Ohio. I saw one in Kentucky. Maybe that's what I met hold On. It was about a five hour drive to Like. It was just south of Lexington. What else are we going to do? Sleep? Let's go on the road. Please rate, review, follow and subscribe. Find us on social media or send us an email at Lovemarykill at gmail dot com, and please consider supporting us on Patreon dot com, slash Lovemrykill one tier five dollars a month for early ad free access and a monthly bonus episode. Thank you so much for listening. We love you guys. Until next time, don't kill your husband and don't kill your wife. To the

1:03:15 topick the co