Blood Games (70 page)

LEFT: This burned, hand-drawn map, which miraculously escaped a fire set to destroy the evidence of Lieth Von Stein’s murder, led detectives to the murder plotters. RIGHT: Lieth Von Stein’s murder in this house on Lawson Road brought fear to Washington’s plushest subdivision and set off wild rumors and demands for a quick arrest. (JERRY BLEDSOE)

Bart Upchurch saw his trial as a game and was confident that he would be exonerated. His lawyers told him to bring his finger to his mouth to avoid the appearance of smirking. (MICHAEL BARKLEY)

Chris comforts his grandmother, Polly Bates, shortly before being taken away to prison for his role in the conspiracy. (MICHAEL BARKLEY)

LEFT: Chris’s voice choked and he wiped away tears when he testified that he conspired to have his mother murdered along with his stepfather so that he could inherit $2 million. (MICHAEL BARKLEY) RIGHT: Neal Henderson, the first to reveal his role in the murder, points out the unusual markings on the baseball bat used in the attack on Lieth Von Stein. (MICHAEL BARKLEY)

LEFT: Christy Newsom, Bart’s feisty probation officer, felt that Bart was mocking her and swore to have him sent to prison. (JERRY BLEDSOE) CENTER: When John Crone became Washington’s new police chief, he was given two directives: straighten out the police department and solve the Von Stein murder. (JERRY BLEDSOE) RIGHT: Attorney Wayland Sermons, a member of one of Washington’s privileged old families, had never tried a capital murder case. He rarely had indigent clients with names like James Bartlett Upchurch III. (JERRY BLEDSOE)

LEFT: John Taylor drove a pickup truck and wore blue jeans and cowboy boots to work as a Washington Police Department detective. He was just 27 when he was handed the job of solving the town’s biggest murder case. (JERRY BLEDSOE) RIGHT: Melvin Hope, the first detective assigned to the Von Stein case, was a former marine who sometimes was called the John Wayne of the Washington Police Department. (JERRY BLEDSOE)

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