Todd C. Peppers

Just before midnight that Sunday, William Bill Deans and a friend had driven by Bill's mother's home, who lived in the same neighborhood as him, and noticed the lights were on, and there was a strange car in the driveway.

According to the book A Courageous Fool, by Todd C. Peppers and Margaret A. Anderson, Bill's mother, 52-year-old Evelyn Penny Deans, and her young daughter weren't expected back from vacation for a few days.

So everything about the house and the car didn't make sense.

Bill pulled in to take a closer look.

There was another witness from South Carolina too, though she didn't really testify.

Prosecutors called Penny's young daughter to the stand, apparently intending to ask her about the man she had seen the night her mother was killed.

The scene is described in writings by Penny Dean's daughter-in-law, Marie Deans, included in the book A Courageous Fool by Todd C. Peppers and Margaret A. Anderson.

The young girl stepped up to the witness stand, took one look at Wayne Northup, and crumbled into tears from the trauma of it all.