Fred Jeter | 12/24/2020, 6 p.m. Ken Free
Donât be surprised if thereâs a spike in sales of old Negro League baseball gearâ and just in time for the holidays.
Former Negro Leaguer Ken Free suggests finances may be a motivating factor behind Major League Baseballâs deci- sion to give the Negro Leagues Major League status.
âA show of marketing genius,â Free, now 81, told the Free Press from his home in Greensboro, N.C.
What better present than a throwback jersey of the Birmingham Black Barons, the Kansas City Monarchs, the Detroit Stars, the Homestead Grays or others? It could be especially attractive if the jersey has a name like Josh Gibson, Ray Dandridge, Satchel Paige or Cool Papa Bellâall Negro League legendsâon the back.
reporter: early on the morning of saturday, january 7th, philadelphia s police s.w.a.t. team moved in, raiding the house and arresting ray dandridge and his uncle, ricky gray. richmond police chief rocky monroe held a new conference that morning to help calm the city s fears, but he only addressed the tucker-baskerville murders. the house has been ransacked, and numerous items appear to have been taken. at this time we are classifying the motive as robbery. we have good forensic evidence. we also have possible suspects who are now in custody in the state of pennsylvania. when we have more details, we will release the identities and information on the suspects. we were pretty happy they had them. a lot of people yelling and cheering and, you know, we felt good. felt like a lot of pressure was off.
also confessed to the tucker-baskerville murders. reporter: police also learned that ashley baskerville was a willing participant in the robbery of her mother and stepfather. part of their own little sick plan was to play a role in the robbery of her own family. reporter: ricky gray admitted, we had a robbery in progress, and things just went wrong. ray dandridge told the story a little differently. he got tired of the girl, so he decided to kill her and take her parents car so he could get out of there. that s why they died, too. ashley is who died. she used to be my girlfriend. later that day, chief rodney monroe held a second news conference to announce charges against gray and dandridge. these counts of conspiracy to commit murder stem from the new year slaying of the harvey family. my friend came in. he rushed in.
in the back of my mind i was waiting to hear the verdict involving the murder either of ruby or stella harvey because i figured those were the lynchpin cases. whethergit was stella or ruby, but the second involved one of the girls, and that was death. reporter: ricky gray was sentenced to death for the murders of stella and ruby harvey. and immediately i have a sense of relief. a nanosecond later i had a sense of sorrow because although i had taken a very integral role in securing a death sentence for this monster i shouldn t say that. for this guy. i was now part of a process that was going to culminate in another death. reporter: prosecutors decided not to try ricky gray for the tucker-baskerville murders after he received a death sentence for the harvey killings. a month later, in september 2006, ray dandridge went on trial for the three tucker-baskerville murders. prosecutors held off trying him