matched lonnie jr. s. when questioned, lonnie told police he was not surprised his 9 millimeter gun was used as the murder weapon. he claimed the gun had been stolen two weeks earlier. we thought that was kind of strange. he never reported that gun stolen to law enforcement. it all of a sudden re-appears underneath the mattress and in the house. police perform a gunshot residue test on both the victim s brother lawson and the victim s son, lonnie jr. lawson tested negative and also passed a polygraph. and he had no motive. no real reason for him to have shot his brother. but gunshot residue was found on lonnie s hands. he said this probably happened because he grabbed his .38 caliber handgun for protection before calling police. to check lonnie s alibi, investigators first had to estimate the time of his father s murder.
investigators were troubled by the movements of the victim s son, lonnie jr., and the victim s brother, lawson, on the night of the murder. lonnie jr. said he came home, found his father injured in the bedroom. then grabbed his gun and cell phone, called police and drove to the police station. by his own admission, lonnie said he called police without even checking to see if his father was still alive. we started asking him, well, why didn t you go check on your dad? was he still breathing? was he trying to say anything to you? and lonnie didn t even do that. it just didn t make sense. it didn t ring clear at all. it was one of the strangest stories i ve had from a murder suspect, and i ve heard strange stories. even stranger was what happened next, shortly before lonnie jr. left, but before the police arrived.
none of those items seemed to have been touched. at the police station, the victim s son lonnie jr. told police he had no idea who would have done this. do you know anybody who would have wanted to hurt your dad or do something like this? but police were confused by the stories given by the victim s brother lawson, and by the victim s son who had left the scene after calling police. and those stories were about to get even stranger.
uncle lawson entered the house since he planned to spend the night. when he heard no answer he assumed his brother was out on business. and when police arrived, he was in the kitchen making a sandwich, completely unaware of the crime. james white s father, who was also the victim s best friend, remains convinced that lonnie jr. was involved. i think that it s fair for my son to be in prison for this murder because he said he pulled the trigger. but i would like to see lonnie jr. there also because my son didn t have anything to profit from this. but junior is the one who profit everything. in july of 2005 james white accepted a plea bargain, admitted his complicity in the crime, and was sentenced to 25 years in prison. without the forensic evidence
around the holes for the eyes and the mouth was and able to identify a dna profile which she compared to lonnie jr. s dna. the results surprised everybody. the result was that lonnie jr. was excluded as a contributor to the profile. the dna from the mask was also compared to the victim s brother, lawson. his dna also did not match. in looking for other suspects, police knew one thing. the killer was familiar with the house and the family. lonnie sr. always left the back door open. we figured somebody knew about the layout of the house, knew the back door was unlocked. and there was only one other person that fit that profile. 19-year-old james white, lonnie sr. s godson, who often helped out at the funeral home.