Is One of Connie's Killers Still Walking Free? - 10/23/23 Update

 

She was born on the Fourth of July...1956, in Athens, Alabama. Connie Jane Patterson Williams Ridgeway left this world on Friday, October 23, 2015. The twice married Ridgeway had lived her entire life in Northwest Alabama, residing at the Meadowland Apartments in Rogersville at the time of her brutal stabbing death. The apartment complex was located in a highly visible area directly across from the Lauderdale County High School's football stadium. 

Connie Ridgeway was known as a soft spoken and caring woman who attended Clements Baptist Church just across the county line in Limestone and who was pronounced a blessing by those who knew her. Was it her involvement with the less fortunate that ultimately led to Connie's demise?

At the time of her death, Connie's second husband Thomas Randall Ridgeway was deceased, as well as her beloved dog Rambo. Perhaps living alone made her an easy target for local thugs... or was it something more personal? The Rogersville Police Department and the Lauderdale County Sheriff's Department weren't ruling anything or anyone out.

Weeks and months passed with no breaks in the case, and the State Bureau of Investigation took over the case of the 59 year-old Ridgeway's death. Connie's sons Cameron and Austin Williams offered a reward for the apprehension of their mother's assailant. When, after three years passed with no arrests, Rogersville hosted "Connie Ridgeway Day" in 2018. Besides her family and friends, the event was attended by Lauderdale District Attorney Chris Connolly and Sheriff Rick Singleton. Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall sent a special statement indicating the state's dedication to bringing Ridgeway's murderer to justice.

Many speculated that Ridgeway was murdered to keep her from testifying in an upcoming grand jury hearing involving the financial exploitation of a friend. Others thought perhaps she had simply attempted to help the wrong down-on-his-luck person who took advantage of the situation.

Still more time passed. Mark White, the host of a local news oriented radio show, kept the unsolved murder fresh in the public's mind. By early September 2020, the case was almost five years old, and there had been little to no progress in the investigation. 

Two months after Ridgeway's violent death, Casey Cole White was charged in Limestone County with a violent crime spree that included a home invasion, two carjackings and multiple shootings in North Alabama and South Tennessee that left a dog dead and a woman injured. White was convicted of a total of nine crimes and sentenced to 75 years in the William Donaldson Correctional Facility.

Then in August 2020, White penned an unsolicited letter to the Lauderdale District Attorney's office confessing to Connie Ridgeway's murder. According to insiders, White presented facts that would have been known only to someone present at the brutal crime.

The confession wasn't the only bombshell in the missive; the 38 year-old White also announced that he had been paid to commit the murder. DA Chris Connolly was quoted as saying the public could expect more arrests.

Yet slightly over one year later, no other arrests have been made. The 6'9" White remains in the Donaldson facility confined to maximum security. Even if he should escape charges in the Ridgeway death, he's not scheduled for release until the end of 2090.

What of the man whom White accused of placing the hit on Connie Ridgeway? No more information has been forthcoming in the past 14 months. Does he still walk freely among the citizens of Eastern Lauderdale County?

Connie Ridgeway was buried in the Mitchell Cemetery near Anderson. Let's hope by the next anniversary of her death, the public has more answers.

Today marks eight years since the murder of Connie Ridgeway. There are few who don't know the story of Casey Cole White and Vicky White. 

If Casey told the truth concerning Connie's death, one of her killers remains free. If he lied, at least one killer still walks free today.

As for Casey, whether he's prosecuted in Connie Ridgeway's death or not, he has a home in the Alabama prison system until at least January 2061 when he will be eligible for parole. He will be 77 years old. 

Casey's DOC page gives his physical description. On his left wrist is tattooed the name "Vicky."

The Death of Brandon Hydrick: Beer & Guns Don't Mix - 2023 Update

Special Report from Crime Writer Nick Ireland

The Berg:

Belle Mina. Now that’s a classy name. Too bad this spot on the Limestone County map doesn’t live up to expectations. Nothing in Belle Mina but a few old houses and the occasional store. Then there’s the stream.

Land that borders on the small stream running through Belle Mina is marketed as water front property. Sure. If it rains enough. Just like my backyard.

Who buys these choice lots? Locals call them Yankees and that about sums it up. Families that work in Huntsville or Madison just love the prices on these backwoods hideaways.

The Murray family was no exception. The daughter, that’s the Babe to us, considered it the ideal spot to entertain her Huntsville friends. That’s just what she did on Friday, September 28, 2012.

The Bash:


It was billed as a Halloween party. No matter that it wasn’t even October. It was cool at night and just right for what passed as a country cookout. Wieners, marshmallows, and beer? Probably plenty of beer judging from the Hydrick family photos on Facebook. What else was served? You can be sure the state’s pathologist knows what was in Brandon Hydrick’s system when he died.

The bash ended around midnight. Guests began to go their separate ways and the Beard (B. Hydrick) took the Babe back to her parents’ front door. The Babe says the date ended with a chaste kiss.

Then the Beard drove off into eternity.


The Bro:


The Beard’s brother Ryan wasn’t even close to him in looks. Doesn’t seem to have had as good a job either. You can bet your pickup truck that he was only invited to the Babe’s bash because he was the Beard’s brother.

The Bro left in his own vehicle when the Beard exited the cookout. What happened between midnight and three o’clock Saturday morning is anyone’s guess. The Bro knows, but he’s not giving out any of the details to the Beard’s adoring fans and mourning friends.


The Beard:


Brandon Hydrick often sported a bushy beard. Yeah, doesn’t sound too kissable, does he? But apparently the Babe was so taken with him that she picked him up at a charity run in Huntsville. The Beard was younger than the Babe and didn’t quite travel in the same social circles, but hey, a good man is hard to find.

Friends thought this relationship would go the distance, but it ended that Saturday morning when the Bumpkin put a bullet through the Beard’s chest.


The Bumpkin:


Joel Moyers had lived in the same manufactured home since he was in grade school. He was now a rode hard 52 and had lived alone since his mother married the year before and moved to Cullman

The Bumpkin was afraid. The Limestone County sheriff stated there was little crime in the area, but actual reports say something else. Maybe there had to be a death before Mike Blakely considered it real crime He got that death early in the morning of September 29th.

The Bumpkin heard a truck around three o’clock. The Bro was now driving the Beard’s truck and they had returned to the scene of the cookout for reasons unknown. When the duo decided to turn around on the Bumpkin’s desolate corner, they made the mistake of their lives.

An SKS kept the Bumpkin company as he first followed them in his own truck and later marched toward the Beard’s vehicle in full confrontational mode. He flashed a light in the Bro’s face and told him to stop. The Bro hit the accelerator.

As the pickup passed the Bumpkin, Moyers raised the heavy SKS and fired. The question is where the Bumpkin aimed. Heck, maybe the question should be was he even strong enough to aim. His bullet traveled through the back of the truck’s tailgate, entered the cab, and finally juggernauted through the Beard’s chest. The Bro panicked and hit the accelerator again. He met with a tree that refused to get out of his way as he attempted to navigate a corner. The Bumpkin retired to his home and called the sheriff.

The Babe:


Bronwen Murray was as yuppie as you get in Alabama. She was going places and picked up the Beard to tag along. Good men are hard for those bluestocking babes to find and lasso. Now her man was dead.

The sheriff originally charged the Bumpkin with a manslaughter type crime, but the Babe was having none of it. Where would she ever find a replacement, and her eggs weren’t getting any younger.

Don’t worry. The Babe had a trump card. She worked for the Big Shot. He’d handle it while she made the appropriate mewing noises to play the sympathy card.


The Big Shot:


Parker Griffith was a prominent Huntsville doc and a former U.S. representative. Easy for him to place a few well-chosen words in the ear of the Limestone County D.A. Yeah, the D.A. knew which side his political funding was greased on.

The indictment comes down, and the Bumpkin is charged with Capital Murder. Hey, it’s Alabama. Justice is still scarce and usually a political tool. Yeah, we call it JuJu man justice around this state.

The trial? It’s coming. Let’s grab the beer and popcorn. Okay, no beer. Limestone County is dry. Too bad the Bro and the Beard grabbed their beers; maybe they’d both be alive right now and the Bumpkin tatting a new doily for his mother.

Obituary for Brandon Longoria Hydrick:

Brandon Longoria Hydrick, age 26, of Athens, passed away Saturday. Brandon was employed with Halo Monitoring.

He was preceded in death by his grandfathers: Col. Ezekial Longoria and James Hydrick.

He is survived by his parents: Phillip and Donna Hydrick; sister: Jessica Hydrick-Nichols (Matt); brother: Ryan Hydrick; grandmothers: Robbie Longoria and Nancy Hydrick; three aunts: Jan Chambers (Lynn), Kay Clark and Charmaine Burgin (Kenny); cousins: Amber, Matt, Melissa, Eddie, Leah, Morgan, Chase, Lydia, J.D. and Haleigh.

Visitation will be Thursday from 5:00-8:00pm at Berryhill Funeral Home. Funeral services will be Friday at 11:00am at Faith Chapel with Rev. Joel McGraw officiating followed by burial at Valhalla Memory Gardens.

Bronwen Murray now lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and states on her Facebook page that she's in a relationship...and is a "homicide survivor." She is a member of the Everytown Survivor Network and lobbies for more sensible gun control. Murray also has a second career as an actress and is planning on authoring a mystery based on her life experiences.

Joel Moyers was convicted of Capital Murder in May 2015. He died in prison in November 2015. 

Lust, Jealousy, & Murder in Grassy

 

If you blink while traveling on Highway 64 in northeast Lauderdale County, you may miss the Grassy community. It consists of a Baptist Church, cemetery, park, and a retail farm supply. Houses dot the farmland surrounding this hamlet that's relegated to a Lexington postal route. The community hasn't changed more than a micron since a murder that rocked the area almost 40 years ago. 

James Russell Thames Jr. moved to Grassy in 1970 to work just across the Tennessee River as a control room supervisor at Champion International Corp. in Lawrence County. With him, Thames brought his wife Trudy Holley Lavender Thames. After their arrival in the Shoals, Holley gave birth to four sons. By 1984, Jim had joined the Lexington Rescue Squad and was coaching his older sons in Dixie Youth League baseball.

This should have been a happy time for the family, but unfortunately it wasn't for the 35 year-old Holley. Was she bored? Having delivered her last child only months before, did she have a form of postpartum depression? Or had she simply allowed herself to become caught up in gossip of something that she never intended and didn't know how to squelch?

It was Monday, May 21, 1984, and Jim's youth league team was playing at Lexington City Park. As the former Army sergeant from Montgomery looked casually up into the stands, he saw Holley with the married man local gossips said was her lover. The exact give and take between the husband and wife was not memorialized that night, but witnesses who were called to testify at Jim Thames' murder trial stated he called his attractive young wife to the dugout where he told her to leave the man, leave the game, and go home. 

Holley laughed at Jim.

According to trial testimony, Holley returned to the stands and appeared shaken. Friends, including her alleged paramour, encouraged her to spend the night anywhere but with her husband, but Holley stated she was resigned to the inevitable confrontation. Once home in Grassy, Jim and Holley Thames became involved in a verbal argument that lasted at least 20 minutes. Their three oldest sons heard their father say he would blow his wife's brains out, to which Holley responded "I don't care." It was then that the sons heard three gunshots; however, an autopsy indicated Holley Thames had been shot four times in the back, falling across the couple's bed where rescue squad members found her.

The boys testified that their father left the bedroom and relocked the door. He told one son that he had shot Holley in the arm and they needed to drive to a friend's to secure medical help. It's unclear from court records why no phone communication to the small Lexington Rescue Squad was available at the Thames home, but precious time was wasted in finding help for the mortally injured Holley.

Once rescue squad personnel arrived, they immediately began to perform CPR until an ambulance arrived to take the dying young wife to Eliza Coffee Memorial Hospital. Jim Thames was ultimately left alone in the house with his sons and one Lexington police officer. The officer later testified that Thames stripped the bed, placed the linen in the washer, and inverted the mattress, stating he didn't want his sons to see the copious amount of their mother's blood. Thames repeatedly alternated between saying he didn't mean to do it and that his wife made him do it.

The Lexington officer then drove James Thames to the Lauderdale County Sheriff's office where he was formally charged. The trial was held five months later, and a jury of nine men and three women convicted Thames not of Felony Murder as the district attorney asked, but of Manslaughter. While Judge Ned Suttle could have given the young father a 20 year sentence due to a firearm being involved, he instead decreed that Thames would spend ten years in the Alabama State Prison System.

After an incarceration of ten months, Thames asked for a transfer to work release. Both the Lauderdale District Attorney's Office and a group of Lexington citizens opposed Thames' transfer, forcing him to serve his sentence in a literal prison setting.

After he completed his sentence, James Russell Thames Jr. moved to Missouri where he passed away ten days after his 63rd birthday, survived by his four sons who had been raised by their maternal grandparents in Montgomery. He was interred in the veterans' cemetery in Springfield.

Holley Lavender Thames lies buried in Greenwood Cemetery in Montgomery where she grew up. 

"Jealousy is the worst of all faults because it makes a victim of both parties."