Questionable Conviction

ID: 2821 ~ Source: Smith, David F. Jr. Interviewed by Rebecca Sharpless, 2005-2006, in Waco, TX. Baylor University Institute for Oral History, Waco, TX. Access full interview here.
This file appears in: Lake Waco Murders

David F. Smith worked as city manager of Waco from 1971-1989. Here, he remembers the 1982 Lake Waco Murders and states that the local police department remained uncertain about the arrest, conviction, and eventual execution of David Wayne Spence.

This file appears in: Lake Waco Murders

By Allie Roberts
On a muggy, Texas summer night in 1982, tragedy struck. Three Waxahachie teenagers—Raylene Rice, Jill Montgomery, and Kenneth Franks—were murdered in Speegleville Park, near Lake Waco, on July thirteenth. In the following months, a complex criminal…