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My Journey Down the Rabbit Hole

Chapter 1

By Jimmie Lee StaleyPublished 3 years ago 4 min read
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Everybody’s gotten so de-sensitized towards people being arrested and claiming they’re innocent. Aren’t we all guilty of glossing over a story of some poor sap who got arrested for something “he didn’t do”? I know I am guilty of doing that--numerous times. However, fate had other things in mind & threw a monkey wrench my way. I didn’t see it coming and damn sure wasn’t prepared for it but my life was turned sideways by corruption. I never really paid attention to the news stories that featured the word “corruption” in them. I always believed the word was related to white-collar, victimless crimes. That could not be further from the truth. As a crime junkie, I never saw “corruption” listed as a cause of death, but it should have been. A double murder case with national media attention brought corruption to my front door and it will bring it to yours too.

Sitting in a suburb of Detroit, I saw the news story that changed my life. The story I am talking about happened in July 2009. No one ever expects to see someone they know on the national news being referred to as a “mastermind” of a murder. When it happened to me, I almost fell out of my chair. Could someone I had hung out with be capable of murder—not just locally televised murder but murder that impacted the entire country? Holy Shit! Really? Could this be happening?

Patrick Gonzalez, a man I knew a lifetime ago, was on my TV. If there ever was a “WTF” moment, it was then. I was mesmerized by the story. I called mutual acquaintances, but everyone I knew was just as floored as I was. The victims, Byrd (Bud) and Melanie Billings, were a married couple that had several disabled kids. This crime took place in Pensacola, Florida, which is the vortex of all the bizarre shit ever. Pensacola is the place Ted Bundy was caught in 1978. Judy Buenoano, the “Black Widow” was convicted of murdering her husband, drowning her paraplegic son and attempting to blow up a boyfriend in 1984. She is suspected of killing another boyfriend many years earlier. She was the first woman executed in Florida since 1957, being the 2nd in Florida history. One of the unexplained deaths of individuals suspected in the JFK assassination happened here as well. One of the close friends and a co-worker of a former roommate of Lee Harvey Oswald, Hank Kilam, died in Pensacola of a “suicide”. It was suspected he had overheard details of the assassination plot and a few months after the assassination, Kilam became extremely paranoid. He left Dallas to go to spend some time at his mother’s house in Pensacola. He claimed “men in black” had been following him. He continued to believe he was being followed in Pensacola. Four months after the assassination in March 1963, he got a call at 4 am. He left his mother’s home. He was found later, on a sidewalk in front of the Thiessen Building with his neck slashed and several cuts in front of a broken first floor window. His death was ruled suicide. Police said he jumped out a first-floor window. No one knows how he got into the closed business and the window was only a foot or two off the ground and glass was on the inside of the window not on the sidewalk. I know, I know, it’s not possible but that is how it was ruled. On a personal note, in April 1995, sitting at home, I saw the FBI raid a house of a school mate of mine. This was the day after the Oklahoma City Bombing. Jennifer McVeigh, Tim McVeigh’s sister, sat next to me in freshman English, in 1990. Anybody that is familiar with the area and the people there, will understand how fitting it is that this crime came out of Pensacola.

Going back to the Billings murder, being a thousand miles away was literally driving me crazy. It was surreal to be this close to the eye of this storm, but not being able to jump in the middle of it. I just watched and my life was forever changed after seeing this case play out. I jumped feet first into a death penalty case that involved, the DEA, ATF, Homeland Security, FBI, Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE), in addition to local law enforcement, Mexican cartels, gun-running & “Fast & Furious” gun walking fiasco. The more I found, the more questions there were.

Take a trip through the looking glass with me. Good is evil. The good guys are the bad guys.

investigation
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About the Creator

Jimmie Lee Staley

My life is a juxtaposition of contradiction. My passion is slaying dragons & fighting the good fight. When the cape is in the laundry, I blog & write about corruption & injustice, providing a voice for those who don't have one.

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