Body Hunter (8 page)

Chapter Ten

The realization of what he had done and how his family was going to take the news of his confession to murder ate away at Faryion Wardrip. He had to soften the blow. Make up some excuse for his actions.

“Bryce, I killed her,” Wardrip told his younger brother from the Wichita Falls jail. “I had given her more than one hundred thousand dollars of drugs to sell. I went to her apartment, there were no drugs and no money. I told her I'd give her a couple of hours to get the money; then I called my connection in Mexico. He told me to take care of her, then go to Mexico. He told me I'd be okay. But he set me up and I was arrested.”

Bryce was overwhelmed by his brother's confession. Faryion hadn't always been admirable, especially when he was on drugs, but Bryce couldn't imagine that his brother could possibly be a killer.

 

 

Although Faryion Edward Wardrip was the fourth child of nine born to Diana and George Wardrip of Marion, Indiana, he often felt as though he were an only child. He frequently had feelings of depression and loneliness. As a boy, he'd cried easily. When he'd tried to reach out for help, he'd been told it was merely a phase he would soon grow out of.

School hadn't offered much more than his family in the way of support. Classmates made fun of Wardrip's hand-me-down clothing and he experienced a sense of worthlessness compared to more affluent students. Wardrip wanted to fit in, but he always felt he had come from the “wrong side of the tracks.” His father worked in a local factory; his mother was a homemaker responsible for raising the nine Wardrip children. Although there was always food on the table, clothes on their backs, and toys for their enjoyment, Faryion Wardrip wanted more. He wanted the respect of others. In his mind he failed to live up to the wealthy, macho American ideal. He felt like a failure.

Increasing his feelings of inadequacy, Wardrip had a history of academic failure due to a learning disability. He spent the majority of his academic years in special-education classes. The lack of success in school had created in Wardrip a sense of low self-esteem, and no vision for the future. His melancholy spirit and sense of disconnection with his family grew with each passing year. He felt he was falling into an abyss of despair from which he couldn't emerge. His frustrations were manifested in rebellious, unacceptable ways.

At thirteen, young Wardrip was arrested for shoplifting. The juvenile court believed justice would be best served by the youthful offender picking beans in a Marion, Indiana, downtown community garden. It hadn't seemed like much of a punishment to Wardrip, who actually enjoyed harvesting the crops each Saturday. He walked the rows of beans, stripping them from their vines with a new-found sense of accomplishment.

Later, stealing a bicycle from a neighbor's yard and not getting caught hadn't taught Wardrip any lessons either. Young Wardrip thought he was indestructible. Unaccountable.

At fourteen, Wardrip began to drink a little alcohol, smoke a little pot. As he aged, Wardrip graduated to harder, more destructive drugs. Acid took him on trips far away from the frustrations of school and family. He would argue with his father, take a hit of that day's drug-of-choice, then argue with his father even more. It had become a vicious circle.

Wardrip's only school successes came in athletic venues rather than in the classroom. He was a competitive swimmer, played basketball, and ran track. However, his small sports victories didn't make up for his great classroom failures. Feelings of inadequacies became a cloak Wardrip wore throughout the seasons.

Wardrip's bomb of discontent detonated at home. He and his father seemed to be at odds most of the time. The younger Wardrip's anger, stuffed just below the surface, had grown like a snowball gaining momentum as it tumbled down a steep slope. The avalanche of emotions erupted when George Wardrip finally demanded that his oldest son move out of his house.

Faryion Wardrip had been seventeen years old at the time. His father had paid a couple of hundred dollars for his son's first car. When the car was missing for several days, George Wardrip demanded to know where it was.

“My friend blew his engine in his truck so I pulled the engine out of my car and stuck it in his truck,” young Wardrip explained, wondering why his father was so irritated.

George Wardrip was more than irritated, he was furious. It had been one more example of Faryion's irresponsibility.

“Go upstairs and pack your stuff. I want you out,” George Wardrip said angrily.

His son walked up the stairs of the Wardrip home, packed his clothes in paper bags, and walked out the front door. He couldn't believe his parents were throwing him out. None of the other Wardrip children had ever been asked to leave the family home. Tears rose in his eyes.

“Faryion, come back,” his mother called from the front porch.

Relief flooded her son.
They were just trying to scare me. They aren't really throwing me out,
Faryion thought.

He turned and walked happily back to the house. Relief relaxed his tense shoulders and put a bounce in his step.

“Give me your key,” his mother said, her hand outstretched.

“Ya'll mean it?” the stunned teen asked.

“Yes, we mean it,” his father said.

Their son handed the house key to his mother, turned, and walked away. Clutching the sacks of clothes tightly, he cried like a baby. It was time for him to set his own course.

Faryion Wardrip dropped out of high school, having only completed the tenth grade. He was restless and on his own. He spent the majority of his time taking a hit from a marijuana joint or experimenting with speed. He needed a direction to his life, a focus.

The army seemed the key to Wardrip's problem. He enlisted in the Indiana National Guard and was shipped off to boot camp. But instead of helping him develop a positive attitude, the discipline and structured regiment was too much for Wardrip to handle. He didn't like drills or orders. He made it through the grueling six-week program with the aid of a few joints and a handful of black mollies. Then Wardrip was shipped back to Indiana to serve his meager commitment of one weekend a month and two weeks during the summers.

The pledge he had taken to protect his country was all but forgotten when he stepped foot in his home state. For months he failed to show up for monthly maneuvers. Finally, the army released him with a “less than honorable” discharge.

Wardrip bounced from job to job. He didn't work to build a career. He worked to buy drugs.

George Wardrip moved his family to Texas in search of work. Faryion tagged along, adrift in a sea of indecision and irresponsibility.

While living in Wichita Falls, Wardrip met Johnna Jackson at a local club. The short, plump, dark-haired girl took an instant liking to the tall, lanky Wardrip. Within a short time they were married.

It was a rocky union from the beginning. Wardrip couldn't keep a steady job and Johnna was content to lounge on the sofa, watch television, and have babies. He wondered where the fun-loving girl he met in the bar had gone and when Johnna had turned into a wallflower, someone who didn't speak until spoken to. He had encouraged her to get a job, but she didn't want to work. Her greatest ambition was to be a mother and housewife. That would have been okay with Wardrip if the bills didn't need to be paid. There were responsibilities—obligations he himself neglected in favor of an instant high. He needed Johnna to help out. He needed her to listen to him, to hear his concerns. But instead, she shut him out, barely speaking to him when he was home. When she did listen, he felt as though she never really heard what he was saying.

The old familiar anger of his youth returned. The drugs took over his thinking. He wanted to lash out. Johnna became a convenient target.

They fought often about his inability to keep a job, and his failure to provide for his family. He more often than not used their money for drugs, not food.

Johnna's mother and stepfather attempted to help. They had let the struggling couple move in with them on several occasions. Floyd Jackson had even given Faryion five thousand dollars to help them out, but within two weeks it was gone. Smoked up or shot up, Wardrip couldn't remember. Floyd had been furious.

“Faryion is the type of person who would climb a tree to tell a lie rather than stand on the ground to tell the truth,” Floyd told his wife. “He's lied about almost everything and every story has come back to haunt him. It's like when he told us he ran into a sign post; then we found out a friend had beat the hell out of him.”

Wardrip had worked ten different jobs during Johnna's first pregnancy. Then, trying to appease the Jacksons and regain Johnna's trust, Wardrip had taken a job at Wichita General. He thought he was too good to be pushing a mop and quit soon after a young nurse named Toni Gibbs was found murdered in an Archer County field.

He tried fast-food jobs, working at a Pizza Inn near Sheppard Air Force Base, then quit as suddenly as he had at Wichita General.

During his latest unemployment streak, the Jacksons had taken Johnna and Wardrip's two children into their home, but refused to let Faryion live with them. It had been an ugly scene. Jackson had tired of paying their rent, and buying their groceries while his son-in-law bounced from job to job. He finally put his foot down.

“I'll come get you and the kids,” Jackson told Johnna, “but Faryion is not coming back to our home.”

Johnna had talked with her husband and he reluctantly agreed.

Jackson had arrived at his daughter's and son-in-law's apartment, ready to pack up Johnna and the kids to take them home. Faryion was nowhere in sight, then suddenly appeared as they were almost ready to leave.

“Hi,” Wardrip said, obviously high from a fresh dose of drugs. He bitterly sneered at his father-in-law. “You can't take my family.”

Without warning Wardrip grabbed his baby daughter, refusing to give her up.

“You don't have any money,” Jackson said. “Johnna and the kids need a place to live.”

Jackson's reasoning fell on deaf ears. Wardrip was angry. Mad at Jackson for being right. Furious at himself for putting drugs before his family.

Suddenly, Wardrip tossed the baby in the air toward Paulette Jackson. The loving grandmother caught her, then pressed her protectively to her breast.

“I always wanted a piece of you,” Wardrip sneered at Jackson, taking a step forward.

Before Wardrip could react, Jackson hit his son-in-law squarely in the face. Wardrip's knees buckled and he slumped to the ground.

“I'm going to get help,” Wardrip said, his large hand covering his face. He bolted up the stairs.

Floyd, Paulette, Johnna, and the children were in the Jacksons' car pulling away from the apartment when Wardrip reappeared, a butcher knife grasped in his right hand. He angrily waved the weapon in the air at his departing father-in-law.

A short time later, Wardrip showed up at the Jacksons' home.

“Come out here!” Wardrip shouted from the porch.

Jackson opened the door, a .357 Magnum in his hand. Police sirens screeched in the background as Wardrip fled.

After three years of a rocky marriage, Johnna filed for divorce. Wardrip loved his wife, but at the same time hated her. He didn't understand why she couldn't help him or why she couldn't stick it out. The anger inside him grew to an intense, overbearing level. He wanted to hurt her. Hurt her as much as he felt hurt. But Johnna was the mother of his children; there was no way he would ever harm her.

In the midst of his intense anger, frustration, and drug-induced stupor, Wardrip had happened upon Tina Kimbrew. It hadn't been Tina's pretty face that looked up at him with terror in its eyes, it had been Johnna's. It wasn't Tina he had strangled the life out of. It had been Johnna.

 

 

As Bryce Wardrip hung up the phone after talking to his older brother, he shook his head. He couldn't believe his brother had committed murder. There had only been one time in recent years that he had seen his brother display any violent behavior.

Bryce had been at his brother's and sister-in-law's apartment when Faryion struck Johnna, blackening her eye.

“If you want to be a man, take on a man,” Bryce had barked at his brother. The two Wardrip brothers commenced to “get it on,” as Bryce later described the incident.

But Wardrip wasn't in jail for a domestic spat that ended in a black eye. This was murder.

“We were both on drugs. It just got out of hand,” Wardrip said. “Bryce, you have to tell Mom and Dad.”

A knot the size of a Texas horse apple formed in Bryce's stomach. How on earth was he going to tell his mother and father that one of their children had just confessed to murder?

Chapter Eleven

A withdrawn Faryion Wardrip sat at a table in the Wichita County courthouse as members of the grand jury filed in and took their seats. The district attorney was prepared to present evidence against Wardrip, but the jury would determine whether the facts and accusations presented by the prosecutor warranted an indictment and eventual trial of the accused for the murder of Tina Kimbrew.

District Attorney Barry Macha reviewed for the panel a copy of the arrest warrant which indicated that Faryion Wardrip admitted knowing Tina Kimbrew and having gone to her apartment the day her body was discovered. The warrant also cited a witness who had identified Waldrip's clothing as that worn by a man seen going into Kimbrew's apartment at eleven-thirty
A.M
., the last time Tina had been seen alive.

In a written document, Wardrip stated that he had gone to Tina Kimbrew's apartment to solicit drugs and that she had answered the door wearing a light-colored nightgown. He asserted that murder had not been on his mind.

“I didn't mean to kill her. I just went to get drugs. It was an accident—she was my friend,” Wardrip's statement read.

A somber and seemingly remorseful Faryion Wardrip dropped his head and averted his eyes from the jury. He was indeed sorry for the death of Tina Kimbrew. He knew he would probably spend some time in prison, but he couldn't bear the thought of spending the rest of his life there.

The evidence, the confession, the witnesses' statements all asserted that Wardrip was the killer. The grand jury had no recourse but to indict him for the murder of Tina Kimbrew. A bond of seventy-five thousand dollars was set.

In a separate action, having nothing to do with the case against Wardrip, the same grand jury also considered evidence in the murder of Ellen Blau. It was the third time in June of 1986 that jurors reviewed the case. There was no new information. No solid suspects. The investigation had been hampered by the lack of physical evidence, including the cause of death. The jury wasn't privy to the statements by private investigators Granger and Cannedy concerning their suspicions of the man the jury had just indicted for the murder of Tina Kimbrew. They were unaware that Wardrip had told Wichita Falls officers that he knew Ellen Blau. For lack of any specific information concerning the identity of Ellen Blau's killer, the grand jury took no action. Grand jurors were disappointed at the stalemate in the Blau case, but pleased that they had indicted at least one of the killers of young women in and around Wichita Falls. Faryion Wardrip would stand trial for the murder of Tina Kimbrew and Danny Laughlin would be retried for the murder of Toni Gibbs. Jurors only hoped the killer or killers of Sims and Blau would soon be apprehended.

George Wardrip and his wife, Diana, were devastated by their son's indictment. The couple tearfully clung to one another for strength in facing some of their darkest days. They had known for some time that their son was troubled—his drug and alcohol addictions had signaled that—but they couldn't conceive that Faryion had taken the life of another person. In their minds he wasn't a killer. He was good with kids, often served as the mediator in family disputes, and was a fun-loving jokester. Even with his addictions, how could their son be capable of killing someone?

The Wardrips finally had to accept the fact that Faryion had indeed taken the life of Tina Kimbrew. But they vowed not to abandon him. They visited him in jail, sent money for commissary items like snack foods and toiletries, and kept in touch by phone. They would do all they could to help Faryion out of the dismal pit of sin he had plummeted into.

 

 

In December 1986, Faryion Wardrip, after pleading guilty to the murder of Tina Kimbrew, was sentenced to thirty-five years in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) institutional division. Thirtieth District Court Judge Calvin Ashley pronounced the sentence after Faryion's public defender, Christine Harris, and District Attorney Barry Macha informed the court of a plea agreement between their two offices.

“Faryion's always been willing to take responsibility for Tina's death. It's just been a matter of what the sentence will be,” Harris told reporters following the sentencing.

Wardrip had informed his attorney of his desire to turn his life around and to pursue an education while in prison.

“He has one of the better attitudes I've ever seen as far as the outlook of what he's facing,” Harris said. The young attorney was convinced that her client would seize all the opportunities afforded him at TDCJ.

Wardrip had successfully persuaded his attorney that he sought change in his life; convincing her to go to bat for him. Wardrip knew that after serving only a portion of his sentence, unlike Tina Kimbrew, he would be able to go home again.

 

 

The tall pine trees along Interstate 45 reached toward the sky like prisoners grasping for freedom. Wardrip watched the stately pines, covered at the base of their trunks with a drape of blue bonnets, yellow black-eyed Susans, and red Indian paintbrushes, pass by his window. The Texas wildflowers and regal pines reminded him of Christmas trees hugged by colorful tree skirts. He was on his way to Huntsville, headquarters for the largest state-operated prison system in the United States.

Wardrip's first stop was at the diagnostic unit, where he was given both physical and psychological assessments, as well as a haircut and shave. Under the TDCJ rules, male offenders had to be clean shaven and had to keep their hair trimmed up the back of their necks and head, and neatly cut around the ears.

Wardrip's longish-brown hair fell to the floor as the prison barber gave him a TDCJ-issue trim. It reminded Wardrip of his brief and not so memorable time in the army.

Once Wardrip had been judged physically sound, except for diabetes that was under control, the TDCJ psychologist began a battery of tests.

Wardrip sat at the table across from the counselor. His dark hair was neatly parted and combed to the left, the close cut making his face appear longer and thinner than before. Without the scraggly beard and mustache, Wardrip was somewhat handsome.

“This is the block design test,” the female psychologist said, spreading blocks and a board in front of Wardrip. “I want you to put each of the blocks in the proper hole. This is a timed test. Do you understand?”

Wardrip nodded. The psychologist pressed the button on the chrome-plated stopwatch. Wardrip worked with lightning speed, his long, thin fingers maneuvering the blocks into the proper slots. He completed the task in under six seconds.

“That's the fastest I've ever had anyone put the blocks in the correct slots,” the psychologist said, smiling. “Do you mind doing it again?”

Wardrip, who had rarely been praised, was elated by the compliment. “Sure,” he said.

Again the button on the chrome watch was compressed and the sweeping hand on the watch began to move.

“Six seconds,” she said again.

Wardrip swelled with pride. “What's this test for?” he asked.

“It's to determine your space perception and planning skills,” she said. “To be able to put the patterns together so we can determine how your brain works. It'll help in determining what kind of work you are best suited for. In your case, you are very mechanically minded and are probably artistic.”

“That's right,” Wardrip said proudly. “I'm an artist.”

Wardrip finally received his TDCJ classification and was assigned to one of the more than one hundred facilities operated by the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. At twenty-seven, Wardrip was one of just under a hundred thousand inmates incarcerated in the TDCJ system and he fell into the twenty-eight percent of Caucasians.

Wardrip sat in his cell staring at the institutional green walls. He knew he had to do something to change his circumstances. He wanted to be free of confinement. He had a choice. He could become bitter and resentful toward the system, as many of his fellow prisoners had obviously become, or he could work toward making the most of the time he had to serve. He glanced at the black-bound Bible on the bed beside him. Someone had left the book in his cell shortly after he had arrived. He picked up the Bible and began to read.

Passages surged through Wardrip like bolts of lightning striking a rod.

Wardrip rested the open book in his lap.
If I know the truth, the truth will make me free,
he thought. He wanted to be free, released from the burdens of his sins and the nightmares of seeing Tina Kimbrew's face in his restless sleep. And most of all he wanted free of the steel bars that restricted him. He read on.

That was it. Wardrip knew what he had to do to turn his life around.

 

 

 

Although Faryion Wardrip was safely behind bars, Danny Laughlin nervously waited to find out when, or if, Barry Macha would take him back to court for Toni Gibbs's murder, and Ken Taylor continued to be harassed by the Fort Worth Police Department and shunned by his family, the victim count continued to climb.

The family of Terry Sims agonized over her death. Their world had been shattered. Their loss was intensified by the lack of information on the unsolved killing. Who could have done such a horrible thing? And why? The questions were constantly asked by the Sims.

There appeared no reason for the senseless slaying.

“She wasn't a girl who walked the streets in a short skirt and makeup. She was the opposite of that,” her agonized mother said. “She loved to help people. She worked with autistic children and visited patients in the hospital in her free time.”

The family couldn't understand why someone would take the life of a person like Terry. No one understood.

Sims's mother cried for her daughter every day. The steady stream of tears seemed to have no beginning, and no end. They were a visible manifestation of her intense grief.

Terry's death shattered the family unit. The Simses divorced as a result of Terry's murder, neither parent able to cope with the loss. Mrs. Sims went through several periods she described as “not being well.” Depression ravaged her spirit. “It doesn't get easier with time,” she told friends mournfully.

The investigations of the murders of Sims, Blau, and Taylor continued separately without success. Every lead was being investigated. The search for the killers was not isolated to the North Texas area; suspects outside their geographical locations were also scrutinized.

When a man in Tucson, Arizona, raped three women, then killed himself, Wichita Falls lawmen investigated possible relationships between the man and any of the local victims. It turned out to be yet another in a growing list of dead ends.

Frustration ran through each agency department. Their defeat seemed to narrow their tunnel vision even further and reinforce their notions that they were searching for several killers. They feared that the murderers could erupt again at any time and claim the lives of more young women.

Toni Sims was the only victim who attracted interagency cooperation, but only because she had been abducted in Wichita County and killed in Archer County.

In a darkened Wichita Falls garage, Archer County deputies sprayed Luminol on the rusted bus abandoned not far from the body of Toni Gibbs.

The chemical causes bloodstains, otherwise undetectable, to be visible to the naked eye. Sheriff Pippin of Archer County knew it was literally like “fishing in the dark,” but he had to give it a shot. Luminol testing had not been an investigative tool available when Gibbs was murdered seven years earlier. Although Pippin had little belief that the test would yield any evidence as to who had committed the murder, he hoped that it might help paint a picture of what happened to Gibbs on the night she died.

The shell of the bus had been transported to a long, silver-metal building and nestled between antique trucks and retired Wichita Falls fire vehicles. The chemical test required a darkened location to be best effective, so deputies covered the windows with carpet and wooden boards. The deputies were looking for some thin strand of evidence that would reignite the investigation.