The kids were homeschooled, Terry was training to be a minister, and a Bible verse was etched into a wooden sign hanging above their driveway. Her homeschooling had begun when she was thirteen, after the family had moved to Alba from Celeste, a small town about an hours drive away. I'm here. I mean, for what? Now, one year later, Terry is remarried, the adoptive father of two young sons, and working to rebuild his relationship with his 17-year-old daughter, who is currently serving two life sentences in a Texas state penitentiary for her involvement in the crimes. Terry found a good listener in Sonja Webb, a pretty divorce he met in the course of his work as a home health aide. Its over, Terry told her. I went back to our property as soon as I was better. Her parents decided to take to the internet to learn more about this bad-news boyfriend. Oxygen Insider is your all-access pass to never-before-seen content, free digital evidence kits, and much more. The . Erins desire to have her parents killed did not appear to be motivated by any mistreatment or trauma; her court-mandated psychological evaluation failed to point to any evidence of abuse in the Caffey home. Two nights before the murders, they had forbidden her to see him again. I was scared shitless.) Erin had seemed elated after the killings, Johnson explained, and said that she was free. In fact, Johnson said, Erin had wanted to get out of the car to make sure that everyone was dead. I wanted to find these guys; I wanted to strangle them. Worst of all, as far as Erin was concerned, Charlies weekly visits to the house were suspended. He began searching the back bedroom where Charlie had been found. In the end, Caffey, Wilkinson, Waid, and Waids girlfriend were all charged with three counts of capital murder. They brought along Waids girlfriend, a bubbly high school senior named Bobbi Johnson, whose silver Dodge Neon they were driving. Terry started dating Sonja 4months after the horrific murders of his entire family & they were married just 7 months after the tragedy. Password recovery. He feels that God has restored what the enemy had stolen. That's probably better than being all alone in this world. "But that hope would be short-lived because just within a half an hour of finding out she was alive, my sister came to me and told me [Erin] had been arrested and had been charged with murder.". There was no overhead light, so he pulled a blanket off one of the windows to illuminate his view. He now travels the country preaching what he has become good at, forgiveness. ", "I am sound asleep in my bed and just immediately the gunshots went off," he said. What I knew of Charlie, he seemed like a nice boy, said Pastor McGahee. After Erin Caffeys parents told her to break up with her boyfriend, Charlie Wilkinson, she suggested a dark plan: murdering them and her two younger brothers. Terry began allowing them to go out for dinner every now and then, with the assurance that Charlie would have Erin home no later than nine-thirty. Her parents did not approve of the relationship and worried that The murders shocked the nation especially when the police revealed that Erin Caffey was the mastermind behind the entire massacre. Virginia Daily became hysterical and grabbed Erins face. He had stumbled and crawled five hundred yards from his home, where he had been left for dead, to Gastonsa journey that had taken him nearly an hour, all told. Just a few minutes into the drive, however, Sanders cell phone rang. He considered suicide several times. This was not the most brutal or cold-blooded case I had ever prosecuted, she told me. Terry cried a lot and kept asking, Why? He said, I dont understand. . She spoke with tears in her eyesGod will save me. The patriarch, Terry Caffey, lived to tell what he heard that night, and the . I showed him photos of the suitcase that Erin had packed and the burned-out lockbox that was open to the combination that she had given Charlie. It made me question a lot of things, Charlie said, his voice trailing off. At 3:00 a.m. on March 1, 2008, Terry Caffey awoke to find his daughter's boyfriend standing in his bedroom with a gun. I still long for the day when I know what was hurting her bad enough to make such a decision., Erin declined my interview requests, but the three other defendants each agreed to sit down with me and revisit the early morning of March 1, 2008. Yet despite her effect on boys, she struck people as hopelessly naive. It was a question that preoccupied him more than his doubts about her innocence. Here, the Caffey family is shown in an undated photo. At 3:00 a.m. on March 1, 2008, Terry Caffey awoke to find his daughter's boyfriend standing in his bedroom with a gun. I dont remember anything after that. Around one-thirty the next morning, he told Almon, he and a friend had gone to the Caffey home. Charles Dickerson was the only officer on duty on March 1, 2008, when the call came into the Rains County sheriffs office just after four-thirty in the morning that there had been a shooting at the Caffey residence. She carried out her plans on March 1, 2008. However, he still visits Erin in prison in Greenville, according to ABC News. He made an hour-long crawl to his nearest neighbors home to call for help and soon authorities were on their way. Terry Caffey has maintained a relationship with his daughter, even after the massacre. Their detailed accounts of the night were consistent with Charlies. Now, one year later, Terry is remarried, the adoptive father of two young sons, and working to rebuild his relationship with his 17-year-old daughter, who is currently serving two life sentences in a Texas state penitentiary for her involvement in the crimes. Where am I?, Erins pastor, Todd McGahee, once joked that if he had five more of her, he could fill his church on Sundays. "Then I had something to live for, I had some hope, so I began to fight," he said. I wanted them to pay for what they did., I have met people that have gone through a lot less than what I have and theyve grown into bitter, angry people, and thats not who I am, and I saw myself coming that, he said. Were you involved in this? Fischer asked. Throughout the fall, Charlie visited the Sonic to see Erin. I joined the Army to do whatever needed to be done without thinking. As for her parents, he said, I intended to kill them because I thought I was in love.. The phone calls, she told her father, were to dissuade Charlie from coming at all. Mr Caffey believes Charlie Wilkinson carried out the attack as Erin's parents wanted her to break up with him. And thats when I decided to move on. 3, Couple Mistakes Abstract Painting For An Interactive Exhibit And Paints Over The Artist's Work, What Stephen Hawking Thinks Threatens Humankind The Most, 27 Raw Images Of When Punk Ruled New York, Join The All That's Interesting Weekly Dispatch. he was a student at Rains Middle School. I watched the "Final Witness" on ABC on Sept 14, 2010. The Slaughter Of The Caffey Family Unearthed A Dark Love Affair, Serena Booth: Erin Caffey, Charlie Wilkinson Had Time To Change Their Minds, Terry Caffey's Shock At Learning The Murders Were Erin's Fault. How Florence ButtNot Her SonLaunched the H-E-B Empire. TOP 5%. I honestly believe she was not the mastermind. "I am trying to climb over the bed but that's where the flames are and that's where I found Penny, and when I saw her, it was a terrible scene, her nearly decapitated head. Link your TV provider to stream full episodes and live TV. They were shocked and asked me why. The Caffeys Terry and his wife, Penny, their two young sons, Tyler and Matthew, and 16-year-old Erin lived to serve in their church. The Campaign to Sabotage Texass Public Schools. terry caffey today remarried. Terry Caffey, his wife Penny, and their children, Tyler, Matthew 'Bubba' and Erin (Family Handout/ABC ) A Texas man who is the only survivor of a cold-blooded home invasion that left his wife. I would never be able to honour my family if I let this destroy me. And I was blown out of bed," he said. As Wilkinson and Waid did the killing the girls waited in a car. Im here. November 16, 2022 2 Mins Read. Article continues below advertisement Watch Killer Women with Piers Morgan tonight at 8 p.m. on Investigation Discovery (ID). 11yo reads from porn book at school meeting, Teens bizarre excuse for bashing teacher, Homeless man executed in broad daylight. At school, where she enrolled as a freshman, she and Charlie were inseparable; they ate lunch together and walked down the hall hand in hand, and sometimes they slipped away to Erins pickup to fool around. With Erin and Bobbi nearby, the two Charlies break into the house in the middle of the night, March 1, 2008. The twenty-year-old needed money, and Charlie had promised him $2,000 if he would help him kill the Caffeyscash that Erin had told Charlie he would find in a lockbox inside the house. After months of pushing me and convincing me and all this, I got to thinking that maybe all I was was just a tool. He had not spoken to her since the morning of the crime, and he is barred from communicating with her ever again; he will forever have to wonder if she wanted her parents dead so that she could be with him or simply so that she could be free of her familys control. Ive got so many questions, and I dont want to hit her with them all at once, he said. The tragic fate of the Caffey family was set in motion five months before they were killed, when Erin Caffey began dating 18-year-old Charlie Wilkinson. Height, Age,. She told the police she had been kidnapped. He only wanted to run away with Erin, he told a buddy. It was so loud and its even hard to describe, he said. Terry Caffey miraculously gained consciousness as the fire engulfed the house and crawled out of a window. Of the Caffeys, he painted a nostalgic portrait. Erin Caffey today, seven years after the event that left her mother and brothers dead and her father gravely wounded on March 1, 2018, at the family's home in Alba. But the teenage Christian ended up masterminding the evil murder of her own family after she was barred by her parents from dating a boy they thought unsuitable. I told them that killing these boys will not bring my family back. Johnson, who is serving a forty-year sentence, recalled how Charlie had repeatedly asked Erin to consider running away as the group had driven around before the murders. Along the way, he had fallen into a creek, where he had almost drowned, but he had kept moving, staggering toward Gastons house as the fire behind him grew more intense. According to Charlie, Johnson did not know what the boys plans were but had insisted on coming with them. Her voice faltered, and her cousin, who did not have her natural talent, outshone her. Fischer told them he needed to talk to Charlie Wilkinson. They shoot and murder Terry and Penny Caffey, the parents, in their bed. She did not want to be identified, but did want to talk about the man she married. Then she drank some stuff that was offered to her at the trailer, and she could not recall anything afterward. They entered through the front door, which Erin had left open. The patriarch, Terry Caffey, lived to tell what he heard that night, and the perpetrators shocked even seasoned investigators, according to Killer Couples on Oxygen. His gut was right. Caffey said his wife had been shot first. Later that night, he told the detective, Waid dropped him and Erin off at the trailer, where they had sex. A former special-ed student with a heavy-lidded gaze, Waid showed no remorse, and he casually recounted how he had killed the two boys. But Terry and Penny, who separated the two teenagers that day at Miracle Faith, were deeply embarrassed by her behavior. After the killing spree, Charlie told the detective, he had carried a suitcase of Erins belongings, which she had previously packed, out to the car. Almon clambered out of the ambulance and shared what he had learned with chief deputy Kurt Fischer. There was so much blood that Dickerson could not tell where he had been shot. Penny informed her daughter that she was grounded. A freelance writer from the UK, Danielle Tinning studied media & communications at the University of Cumbria before beginning her career at a small publishing house in 2013. The days and weeks that followed, the grief, I cannot put it into words. When I leave, it will be when Im ready and when Gods ready for me to leave. Some nights it was pitch-black by the time I got home, and I had to work up the courage to get out of the car. Now, one year later, Terry is remarried, the adoptive father of two young sons, and working to rebuild his relationship with his 17-year-old daughter, who is currently serving two life sentences in a Texas state penitentiary for her involvement in the crimes. They had nearly decapitated her. 16 year old Erin Caffey made her first appearance before a Rains County Judge Monday. When we pulled away from the house, she was happier than a kid on Christmas morning., One afternoon this spring, I visited Charlie at the Polunsky Unit, in Livingston, the imposing, maximum-security prison that is best known for housing death row. When I came round I heard commotion and two voices. The brief account, put down in her girlish handwriting, echoed what she had told Chief Sanders: There had been smoke and strangers with swords, and she could not remember much else. Charlie Wilkinson, I want to say to you today, I forgive you. An instant later the teen opened fire, killing Terry's wife, his two sons, and wounding him 12 times, before setting the house ablaze. There were just things about him that didnt sit right with me, he later said. They met at a sonic fast food joint where Erin was working as a waitress. He survived being shot five times and the arson that burned down his Alba, Texas, home. On March 1, 2008, most of the deeply religious Caffey family, of Emory, Texas, was slaughtered in the dead of night with .22 caliber bullets and swords before their humble, cabin-style home was burned to the ground. I could not do it, he said, covering his face with his hands. Shortly after that he worked up the nerve to ask her out. I dont know why she wanted it done, why it had to be like that, but she was a very nice person. Weeks after the killings, when he was being held at the county jail on $1.5 million bond, he had been devastated to learn from his defense attorney that Erin had, in fact, asked a previous boyfriend to kill her parents too. Fischer walked from room to room, stepping over piles of dirty clothes and empty beer cans as he went, startling Waid and his girlfriend from their sleep. She was very smart. If I could just get to my neighbours, Tommy and Helen, they would make everything alright. Cookies are small text files that can be used by websites to make a user's experience more efficient. The pastors wife, Rebecca McGahee, was deeply troubled by her demeanor later that month, when she sang at her grandfathers funeral. Her accomplices were her boyfriend Charlie Wilkinson,. Tanner was in the difficult position of briefing the victim of a crime who also happened to be the parent of the perpetrator. Armed with a .22-caliber pistol and two samurai swords, they moved through the house with brutal efficiency. Why are you doing this?. The sound of gunfire had woken Bubba and Tyler, who called out for their parents and then locked themselves in Erins room. We were going to get married.. Erin Caffey - Teen Plans Family Murder. Find out more about our policy and your choices, including how to opt-out. I heard footsteps going up the stairs and I began to panic. Terrifying video footage has emerged of the moment a gunman killed a homeless man in an execution-style attack in the USA. So two or three days I pondered on this. I wanted them to have the chance to find remorse, he explained. Terry and Penny worked as ministers at a conservative Baptist Church in Celeste, Texas. I mean, its over now. To their surprise, she did not protest. I have my moments, my days, where I cry but those days come further and further apart. We report on vital issues from politics to education and are the indispensable authority on the Texas scene, covering everything from music to cultural events with insightful recommendations. The seven-part series, which combines documentary and drama elements, focuses on a different real-life murder each week from the victim's point of view.Each episode includes interviews with the victim's family and friends, real witnesses, prosecutors, and law enforcement officers, as well as . Hurry up. It took me about an hour to crawl the lengths of about four football pitches. He was engulfed in grief. I couldnt have got up if Id wanted to. Check out never-before-seen content, free digital evidence kits, and much more! Bubba used to witness to whoever would listen, and Erin cried tears of joy when she sang her Sunday church solosso much so that sometimes she had to stop, mid-verse, to collect herself. Erin stood wide-eyed in her pajamas, bewildered, as she surveyed the room. Due to the town's small size, the family was well-known in the community, specifically for their faith. Terry and his wife, Penny, had three children together, 16-year-old Erin, 13-year-old Matthew, and 8-year-old Tyler. One was shot in the face and the second was killed with a sword, according to Texas Monthly. She seemed confused, repeatedly telling the officers that she was fourteen years old. YouTubeErin Caffey being interviewed by Piers Morgan for his show Killer Women. The cabin appeared to have been burning for some time; the structure was engulfed in flames, and the metal roof had begun to buckle under its own weight. The hardest thing [was] to hear that. Filled with lovesick rage, she ordered her boyfriend and his buddy to carry out her revenge. Upon visiting his burned-out property, Terry noticed a . Knowing that he will never be able to walk his daughter down the aisle reduces him to tears. What they found convinced them that they had to separate him from their daughter. The pair then headed upstairs to where Tyler and Matthew were hiding. I brought all of the relevant documents and pictures, and we went through everything. Too much has been lost already, it seems, for him to give that up as well. A US school student read out loud sexually explicit passages from a library book as he raged against its content at a school board meeting. To strangle them March 1, 2008 in love family terry caffey today remarried house with efficiency. 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