People in this chapter · Betty Jean Baucom

On February 20, 1994, Barbara Rippy went to Vanessa Little Mack’s apartment to pick up Mack’s youngest daughter. The Sunday routine allowed Mack, who worked at Carolinas Medical Center, to go to work. When Mack did not answer, Rippy found her and called 911. The medical examiner determined she had been strangled. Wallace later told investigators he had taken Mack’s bank card and tried using it at several ATMs. Photos from those attempts became evidence investigators put to him during the interrogation. Court record

In March, Brandi June Henderson and Betty Jean Baucom were found in the same apartment complex. Henderson’s infant son survived an assault. Baucom was an assistant manager at the Bojangles on Central Avenue. When she failed to come to work, her supervisor, Jeffrey Ellis, called her, checked with colleagues and relatives, and went to her apartment with another employee. Detectives comparing the Henderson and Mack deaths noted similarities, including the absence of forced entry and the use of a ligature. At a March 10 meeting to discuss the cases, investigators learned of Baucom’s death. Interviews with friends and relatives about whom the women might have let in put Wallace on the list of possible suspects. Court record

Baucom’s car gave police a physical lead. On March 11, a palm print lifted from the vehicle matched Wallace. The following day, Debra Slaughter’s mother found her daughter dead. The opinion uses “Deborah” in its list of indictments and “Debra” in the account of her death. Officers searching for Wallace arrested him late that afternoon on an outstanding misdemeanor larceny order. Local reporting ties that order to an allegation of shoplifting at Eastland Mall. The arrest came on March 12 according to the court’s findings, and the recorded admissions and recovery of Caroline Love’s remains followed on March 13. Court record · The Charlotte Observer

Detectives Mark Corwin and Darrell Price began speaking with Wallace at the Law Enforcement Center that evening. The trial court found that they advised him of his rights at about 10 p.m. before asking about the murders. After 5 a.m., Tony Rice joined them, asked whether Wallace would mind if he prayed, and did so. Wallace wrote out names and later gave recorded statements. Some names came from cases detectives had never connected to one another. The Observer also reported his confession in the death of eighteen-year-old Tashanda Bethea in Barnwell, South Carolina, and that the case did not go to trial. She was outside the Charlotte count. Court record · The Charlotte Observer