06x05 - He Knew What He Was

[bunniefuu]

Even though it is obvious
how much everyone has suffered,

we're southerners.

And there's
an old southern expression...

"a man cries at night."

That's how we deal with it.

No one has ever talked about it.

I see the same thing with Patty.

Patty has never
really verbalized

any of what it meant to her.

I've tried to keep it
at a distance.

I've tried to block it.

You know,
and I've kept it blocked.

I had to.

It was just easier
just to block it

and just try not
and think about it, you know?

Because it's too hard.

I know the evil he's done,

but I'll never really
truly understand

why he did what he did.

It's just something in him.

My brother is actually
someone who has done things

that are so terrible

that they shake me to my core.

Evil leaves a stain.

You can't look into
the heart of darkness

without darkness looking back.

- -Captions by vitac...
- www.Vitac.Com

captions paid for by
discovery communications

this picture
was in scottsmoor, Florida...

Me on the left.

Gene is in the middle.

Patty's on the right.

In my family,
gene is the oldest.

I was born one year after him.

Patty was born one year
after me,

and then our younger brother,
he was born five years later.

I can see the smile
on my sister's face,

really big smile on my face.

The same with gene.

The person I was always
closest to was always gene.

He was the person
I could always talk to.

He's the person
I always trusted.

And I loved him very much.

I'm looking at
a picture of gene,

and he looks like
a little angel.

It's hard to imagine
the little boy I'm looking at

has done horrific things,

things that just shock the soul.

I want to know why he has done
what he has done.

We lived in a small town,
very rural.

You're it.

And when we first moved in,
there was literally

a water pump in the backyard,
a hand pump,

and what it meant was
that water was exposed.

You're it.

One day, it was just a day
like any other day,

and my mother was upset.

She had found palmetto berries
in the water pump.

Who did this?!

And she thought
they were poison.

What? don't give me that.

All of you,
over here, right now!

I love my mother.
I love my father.

They just weren't
very good at being parents.

Their solution
to any discipline problem

they had with any child

was being beat with a switch,

beat with a belt,
beat with the back of the hand.

And this had really,
really pushed her over the edge.

Are you trying
to k*ll us all? Huh?

Who did this?

Was it you?

Was it you?

She then explains to us,
"I'm going to take the switch,

and I'm going to beat you
with it

until one of you
tells me who did it."

No one's gonna
tell me?

I'm gonna get it out of you
one way or the other.

No!

She then proceeded to one
at a time just wale on us.

Do you have anything
to tell me yet? Huh?

Gene then says to my sister,

"I know you did it.
Confess."

Come on, Patty...
Tell her.

I didn't do it!

He figured that
I wouldn't get punished

as bad as the rest of them would
because I was a girl.

And I told him, "no.

I'm not gonna say I did that,
'cause I did not do that."

Do youhave anything
to say to me?

I didn't do it!

I didn't do it.

Gene, the person who was trying
to talk her into confessing,

was the person who had actually
put the berries in the pump.

What do you want to say?

Fine.

One...

And somewhere
within the process,

gene finally says...

Wait!

..."I did it."

"I put the berries in the pump."

I put them in there.

And at that point,
it all stops

because all my mother wanted
was a confession.

I was angry
because he had really failed

as an older brother.

I wanted him to protect me.

But when I looked at my
older brother when we were kids,

I just could not see him
as a bad person.

When we were children,
our games were violent

because our household
was violent.

Violence was almost...
Was normal.

We would be bored,
and someone would suggest,

"well, let's play
the pillow game."

And we were all very excited.

We loved it.

We would gather all the sheets,
all the pillows, the comforters,

and we'd put them on one bed,

and we would crawl under this
big mound of pillows and sheets,

and one person
would remain outside.

I'm gonna be
on the outside.

Again?

Gene was normally the person
that was on the outside.

He wanted to be the perpetrator.

And he would have a belt,

and he would hit the pile.

It was great fun.

But he saw a little, thin place
in the pillows and the covers

and suspected that
that was human flesh

just beneath those covers.

Stop!

He would bring the belt down
on that spot

with all his vim
and vigor and strength.

Stop!

And it hurt like hell.

It was painful.

When it came to violence,
gene was always more.

Stop!

Even when we were kids,
we always knew

gene was operating on a whole
different plane than us.

On some level,
he was always different from us.

Our home seemed to be the focus
of the other children.

All the kids would come over
and play with us.

And of all the crazy games

and all the things
we would come up with,

the author, it seemed,
always was gene.

And there was a little girl
that lived down the street,

and she was playing with gene,
and they were in a closet,

and they were playing this game
called k*ll the witch.

And part of the game
is where my brother

would put his hands around
her throat to strangle her.

He pretends to k*ll the witch.

Nobody thought anything of it.

We were just children playing,
going in and out of rooms.

And I'm sure that
when she had finished

playing this game with gene

that she just probably
two seconds later

was in the next room, playing
with a doll with my sister.

But years later,
my brother explained to me

when he pretended
to strangle her

that he felt an extreme
state of excitement.

You would even call it arousal.

As an adult, you think of that,

and that is, like,
that's off the chart.

I mean,
that's dangerous and hostile

on a level that's almost
even hard to comprehend.

The way he described it,

gene said
that he knew what he was,

that whatever that thing was...

That monster, he knew it.

He was aware of it.

I was looking for something,

and in the back of the closet,

this was hidden.

My brother wasn't
Hannibal Lecter,

but it was Hannibal Lecter-Ish.

My brother wasn't
Hannibal Lecter,

but death and decay
fascinated him.

One day, we saw an animal,

and this animal
had been hit by a car,

and the animal
was suffering.

What is that?

It's horrific. I don't know how
to deal with it.

I think it's
still alive.

I was at a loss.

And my brother, gene,
walked over to the animal...

...took it by its back legs,
lifted it above his head,

and then smashed
the animal several times,

just smashing its head,
k*lling it.

The act of k*lling the animal
was so brutal,

it just shocked my senses.

I just stared
'cause I was so stunned

at what I was seeing.

And then he just
tossed it off the road.

Nothing was said.

Gene was very stoic.

No emotion.

And we just walked away
in silence.

Never...

...never discussed it.

One day in high school,

a mutual friend of gene and me
walked up to me,

and he said he needed a favor.

Hey, Ron. Hey, man. What's up?

Hey.
Can you help me out?

Yeah, sure.

And he says to me,
"your brother bought my soul,

and I want it back."

Here's gene's money.

I want my soul back.

And I went, "what do you mean
gene bought your soul?"

What are you
talking about?

Please, Ron.

Then he said that gene and him
were talking,

and he asked this kid,

"do you believe
you have a soul?"

And the kid said, "no, there's
no such thing as a soul."

So my brother said,
"well, if it means nothing,

then clearly, you don't mind
selling it to me."

He then had a contract
he had drawn up,

and this young man then signed
his name on the bottom

to sell his soul.

Just do it.
Okay?

Okay, sure.

Thanks.
Yeah.

I thought it was just...

He was just messing with him.

But the more I learned,
the darker it was.

Hey.

What's up, Ron?

I finally asked gene,
"what are you doing?"

And he said,
"one day, when I go to hell,

I will gather
all the souls I own.

They will form a ladder,

and I will climb them
to escape the heat."

Check it out.

Well, what is this?

Legally signed contracts.

Looking back,
he is becoming something.

He is going toward something.

He can feel it.

Well, I was given this
to give to you.

Well,
I'm not returning them.

He knows it's a really bad place
that he's going,

and, "I might as well go
to hell with bargaining chips."

Tell him
to keep his money.

At the time, I wrote it off
as this is just the way

he had decided
to goof on people.

He was just messing with them.

Gene was a gifted artist.

His artwork was all
over the room.

One morning, I'm in the bedroom
I shared with gene,

and I was looking for something,

and in the back of the closet,

I noticed a couple
of pieces of paper.

And I lift them up,
and I see that they're drawings.

And the drawing
that I remember the most,

it was a drawing of a woman

whose head is being held
beneath water...

...while the male in the drawing

is having sex with her
and strangling her.

It's an extremely violent
piece of art.

And with as much detail
as there was in the drawing,

the female figure had no face,

the victim not being human,
being dehumanized...

This was the most disturbing,

the most shocking piece
of artwork

I had ever seen
that he had done.

I didn't know what to do,

and I immediately put it
back undisturbed where it was

so that gene would not know
that I'd ever seen it.

I never confronted him with it

'cause my thinking was that it
would have been humiliating.

But still, at that point,

it was unimaginable that
anything could be that wrong.

It just couldn't be that wrong.

This is

just a classic picture
of my family.

Gene was a good-looking kid.

Women liked him.
He dated a lot.

But in this picture, gene has
reached a point in his life

where he's got that scowl.

I was 19, gene was 20.

Both of us had left home
at this time.

Gene was living with his wife
and his infant daughter.

She was only a few months old.

All of his peculiar behavior,
I thought it was a phase.

That was all behind him now,

and from here on,
it was just going to be...

He was gonna have a good life.

That's what I thought
was gonna happen.

To this day, I cannot imagine
that she has any idea at all

how close she came
to a horrible death.

I have not seen this picture
in a long, long time.

That's how we used to be.

We were very close
when we were little.

Gene could be sweet
when he wanted to be sweet, yes.

He could be gentle.

That's part of what
I don't understand,

is where all that went,
you know?

I know he's done bad,
I know the evil he's done,

but he's my brother.

He'll always be my brother.

That's a lifetime ago.

That's in scottsmoor.

When I'm in this picture,

I'm only a year or so away from
when I started hitchhiking.

I hitchhiked during the '70s.

Everybodydid to get
where you needed to go.

I had no fear of hitchhiking.
None of my friends did.

But I was hitchhiking one day
with my thumb out...

...and a cop pulled over.

The officer told me
it wasn't safe.

Slow down, ma'am.

What?

You know this
isn't safe, right?

He told me, "you better be
very careful hitchhiking"...

You've heard about
all the murders, right?

...that there had been a girl's
body found in scottsmoor.

It had been dumped
beside the road.

Somebody was k*lling girls
that were hitchhiking,

and he offered to take me
where I needed to go.

But I didn't take the ride.

I'm good. Thanks.

You sure?

Yeah. Uh, I'm already
almost home, so...

Just like everybody else,
I didn't listen.

You be safe, okay?

I was right back
with my thumb stuck out.

I was young and stupid,

and it didn't scare me
like it should have.

One day, I talked gene into
taking me to the movie theater,

and there was a hitchhiker
off the side of the road.

He pulls over.

She hops in... very, very,
very beautiful girl.

She really stood out.

Hey, thanks so much.
I've been walking for miles.

No problem. Get in.
We're just headed to town.

Oh, perfect.
I'm not going far.

We're driving along.
We're talking to her.

I'm... I'm Ron.

Hey, Ron.Hi. Nice to meet you.

This is gene.
Hey.

That's my brother. Nice to meet you guys.

And it's clear to me
that he was attracted to her.

We should go catch
a movie sometime.

Yeah, maybe. Depends on
how long I'm in town for.

Okay.

We came to the turnoff
to go to the movie theater.

So he pulls off the road,
she gets out of the car,

and then he takes me on
to the movie theater.

And I'm looking
at all the movie posters,

and I didn't see anything
I liked.

And I just thought,

"if I rush, I can get back
to the parking lot quick enough

and I can catch gene
before he takes off."

And to my amazement,
he's still in the parking lot.

His car didn't turn over,
and he was in the process

of trying
to get it to turn over.

He's upset.

Hey. There wasn't
anything good playing.

Can you drive me home?

What?

Sorry.

You okay?

Just get in!
Yeah.

The best way to describe it
is a quiet heat.

You could almost physically feel
the heat come off of him.

I simply attributed it
to he was just angry

that he basically,
"I have to babysit my brother.

I'd rather do anything
but this."

And at this point,
the car turns over.

And we leave.

It seemed like he was
disproportionately upset.

It was like, "you know,
I'm sorry to be a burden,"

but he was not
only upset with me.

He was upset with the situation.

And I didn't know why,

but years later,
I'm visiting gene in prison,

and he says to me,
"do you remember the day

that I was taking you
to the movie theater

and we picked up a hitchhiker?"

He then explained to me
he was so attracted to her

that at that point, gene was
trying to get back to U.S. 1

as quick as he could
to pick her up.

She would have been
one of his victims.

And just because
his car wouldn't start,

that I couldn't find a movie,

those combination of things
saved that young woman's life.

To this day, I cannot imagine
that she has any idea at all

how close she came
to a horrible death.

The woman who was saved, I hope
she lived a wonderful life.

She is the only happy ending.

One day, gene was at my home.

Eh, I got to head out.

And before he left...

I almost forgot.

...he says, "would you mind
if I just leave this here?"

Gene was always working
with leather,

and he had a small bag
filled with leather...

Thin, long strips.

This was something
that I had seen

in his possession many,
many times.

It was strange
because he had a home,

he had more than space
in his home,

so why would he want me
to keep this for him?

You don't have room
at yourplace?

Oh, it's not
so much that.

It's just that we're
cleaning our place out,

and I just don't want it
to get thrown out.

But at the time,
he didn't act suspicious.

Yeah. No problem.

Thanks, buddy.

Yeah. Anytime.

Once gene had
given them to me,

I just took them
into the kitchen,

opened the pantry,
put it in the pantry,

and just... Forgot about it.

Until the day there was
a knock at the door

and there were detectives

who were looking
for those leather straps.

Could you go
pull it up for me?

What I've just done is help
a serial k*ller escape

from being trapped
at a crime scene.

One night,
I get a call from gene.

He had been driving his car
on a dirt road,

and he got it stuck in mud.

This had to be maybe a mile
or maybe less from his home.

Stuck again?

Just get over here
and help me out.

It's pitch-black,

and the only light
is the car's headlights.

Normally, how something
like that works is

gene would tell a joke.

We would work, and there would
be a banter as we worked.

But in the entire process of
getting his car out of the mud,

it was never a light moment.

All right.

He was verynervous.

He was irrationally nervous.

He was kind of look-around,
you know,

look-over-your-shoulder nervous.

You okay?

I'm just trying to get
out of here. That's all.

Could you go
pull it up for me?

Yeah.

In fact, it was a crime scene.

The entire time we're there,

there is the body
of a young woman,

and it's just
a short distance away.

I literally was walking through
the k*lling fields,

and I had no idea.

We get the car out of the mud,
and we leave.

Thanks, Ron.

Now, you get back home,
all right?

What I've just done is help
a serial k*ller escape

from being trapped
at a crime scene.

And I had no idea.

Sometimes, you can just be right
in the middle of something

and have no idea at all
what is really going on.

One day, I went by gene's
to visit with him.

He asked me did I want
to go for a walk.

And we walked down the dirt road

down through
the orange grove there,

and we walked down
for a long way, just talking.

Hey, do you know where there's
a g*n store around here?

He asked me
was there any stores open

where he could buy b*ll*ts.

Uh, like...
One that's open right now?

And I told him,
"not that I know of,"

'cause I didn't know.

In a way, it seemed very odd.

I was kind of wondering,
"what do you need b*ll*ts for?"

You know, on a Sunday...
"what are you gonna sh**t?"

I figured he's just being weird.

Yeah,
he was being strange.

It's no big deal.
I'm... Just curious.

There were bodies out there,
and I didn't know it.

All that time we were out there
walking around,

there were bodies out there
in those orange groves.

But he just acted like nothing.

And I never knew.

I went home that night, and I
didn't think anything about it.

I mean, why would I?

This is a crime-scene photo

of the orange grove
where they found bodies.

And this is the same
orange grove I walked through.

I didn't know that he had
victims stashed out there.

It's like his playground,
like, you know?

He'd had all his victims
out there and everything,

and you're gonna
take your sister

walking out through there?

Who does that?
You know, why would you do that?

Why do that?

Why walk me out in a place

where you've got
your victims out there?

Why do that, you know?

One afternoon, gene's wife
shows up at my front door.

I don't understand.

She's very upset.

What's going on?

Gene's been arrested.

I was at home, and...

The details
were very sketchy...

Something about somehow
there's a girl involved.

I understood
gene was in serious trouble.

Gene had been arrested
for a reason.

And this.

She pulls out a black bag, and
she says she's found something.

I found it
in his closet.

Gene's wife showed me
what was in it.

The first thing I could see
was a jacket with a hood on it.

And there were some
electrical ties, some duct tape.

And I know that gene has left
a bag of leather at my home.

I almost forgot, but you mind
holding on to this for me?

Up until that moment, these were
just loose straps of leather.

They then, in my mind,
became something much darker...

Something that you could use
to bind a person's hands with.

Thanks, buddy.

Yeah. Anytime.

A very short time later,

the police showed up at my home
with a search warrant.

So we just took the police
officers to the pantry,

said, "this looks like
what you're looking for."

At that moment, I understood

something was really,
really wrong.

This wasn't going to turn out
to be a misunderstanding.

This was going to be
very, very bad.

He was just, like, dumping
bodies all over the place.

Like most serial K*llers,
my brother was given a name,

and his name was
the orange grove k*ller.

When gene was
originally arrested,

the details were very sketchy.

But in a very short period
of time,

everything he did was public.

Because as quickly as they
arrested him, he confessed.

He kidnapped...

He r*ped...

And he m*rder*d women.

And he was just, like, dumping
bodies all over the place.

And there didn't seem
to be a rhyme or reason.

It is very likely

that he then returned
to the sites of the murders,

which is a whole
nother level of ghoulish.

He has done things that can
only be described as...

...they're just monstrous.

This picture would be
gene's mug shot.

The way that he got caught...

He literally
picked up two hitchhikers

and tried to r*pe and k*ll
two women at the same time.

And they got away.

They were able to escape.

And probably an hour or two
later, he was arrested.

In all the time
that I knew my brother,

I have never seen
what I'm seeing in this picture.

And I think if there was ever
a picture of sadness for gene,

this is that picture.

I have never seen his eyes
look that sad.

There is no doubt at all
in his mind.

It's over.

Gene m*rder*d five women,

and these are photographs
of three of those women.

There's a time in my life that
it would have been impossible

to look at these pictures.

It would have ripped a hole
straight through me.

They were in the wrong place
at the wrong time,

and something terrible
was done to them.

I'll never understand

how he could take
everything away from them...

...every future that any one of
these women was gonna have.

I know they found no peace
in this life.

I only hope they find peace
in the nextlife.

- Prison for the rest of his life?
- Yeah, that's fair.

That's fair.

I mean, he took life.
His should be taken from him.

Fair is fair, you know?

I'm sorry.

I love him, and I hate it,
but he chose his path,

and once you choose it,
you live by it.

But you still love that person.
People don't understand that.

They think you should hate him.

But you can't.

On some level,
I still love my brother.

I will alwayslove my brother.

But when my brother
was sentenced,

there was a part of me

that just felt,
"let's be done with it."

I visited gene because
I wanted to see him.

That was still my brother.

I walked in the room,
I sit down,

and I expected
to see somebody else...

The monster.

And the only thing I see
is gene.

Hey, buddy.

The same voice,
the same sense of humor.

It doesn't make sense.

How are you?

I'm okay.

And it was like, "where
the hell is the other guy?

Where is the other guy?"

"You're gonna have to
explain this to me.

What the hell happened?

You have to tell me what was
going through your mind.

What would make you
do the things that you did?

You have to explain this."

I-I got to know
why you did it.

I-I-I... I'm your...
I'm your... I'm your brother.

What am I missing?

He said, "try to think of it
as a vampire"...

I don't expect you
to understand.

..."when a vampire
must have blood

and cannot stop
from the pursuit of feeding."

He said, "try to think of it
that way."

"It felt like
being possessed."

And that's it.

I continued seeing him
for 2 1/2, 3 decades...

For a very long time,

but it took its toll.

It was like living in a grave.

At some point, I decided...

That I had to let go.

He's been incarcerated
for over 40 years.



was probably the last time
that I saw him.

He looks like hell
in this picture.

He looks lifeless
in this picture.

His eyes look dead.

This is a picture
of a husk of a human being.

He doesn't even look like
he wants to live anymore.

And after 40 years in prison,

I can't imagine how he
would look any other way.

He's an old man now.

Makes you wonder, doesn't it...

What he thinks about
when he's by himself?

Maybe he should've just taken
the death penalty.

It would have been easier
than this...

Year after year
after year in prison.

In his eyes, he looks like
he's had enough.

He looks like he's tired.

Last time I seen him was,
like, 6 years ago, I think.

I don't think
I'll ever see gene again.

I don't really believe
we have a whole lot left

to say to each other.

And I love him. I do.

But there's just nothing left
for us to say to each other.

For me, I go
in and out of anger.

Most of the time, the pain
just turns into just sorrow...

Just a terrible sorrow.

There may be a time

when he and I are
very, very, very, very old men,

barely standing,

with the grave
an arm length away

that we may be in the same room
one last time... maybe.

Just two old men saying goodbye.

But other than that,

it's probably doubtful
I'll ever see him again.