Detailed Case Overview

“Every one of us has a breaking point. When the tactics make the suspect feel that continuing to assert innocence is futile, the suspect reaches a point of hopelessness and becomes easier to manipulate.”

Steven Drizin, Law professor Northwestern University

A detailed case overview

On the night of Tuesday June 9th, 1998 at approx 11:38pm while walking along the beach heading back to their hotel (Carolina Winds), husband Brent Poole (24) and wife Kimberly Renee Poole (21) were both robbed at gunpoint in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. After the robbery Brent would be subsequently shot twice in the head. At approx 11:43pm Kimberly flagged down beach patrol and at 11:45pm the call for help by beach patrol went out. Paramedics took Brent to the hospital where he passed less than an hour later. The police took Kimberly back to the station and interviewed her twice. Kimberly fully cooperated with both police interviews and was honest and forthcoming about her previous affair and troubles in her marriage.

The first police interview occurred at 12:45am (now Wednesday June 10th) by Detective Joyce. The second interview occurred at 3:37am by Detective King. Both just wanted more information on what happened and any description of the assailant. Kimberly’s version of events on what happened never changed in these two interviews;

That after the babysitter arrived (approx 15 minutes late because she got lost) they went out that night for dinner and drinks, this night being their anniversary. That they first went to Dick’s Last Resort but once there the wait time was too long. They decided to go somewhere else. That they went to Fast Eddie’s. That they ate ice cream, had a few drinks and played a little pool. That they left Fast Eddie’s to go back to their hotel. That on the way back to their hotel they stopped at an ATM to withdraw $50 to pay the babysitter. That they stopped at Wings to buy a beach towel (for relations on the beach). That they next stopped at a gas station nearby to both use the restroom. That they parked in their hotel parking lot and started leisurely walking north along the beach. That they walked past a small group of young adults hanging out near the beach access point on 82nd Ave. That they walked further and found a semi-secluded area to have relations a little ways past 82nd Ave (once a wooded area). That they had relations and afterwards noticed the young adults still there in the distance. That while walking south along the beach back to their hotel the young adults were no longer there and they passed a man walking north along the dunes in the opposite direction, and then noticed him following a bit behind them. That they then sped up their walking pace. That he suddenly appeared in front of them (by running to them from behind) and held them at gunpoint on the beach between 81st and 82nd Ave. That he was fully clothed, wearing dark clothing, wearing gloves and was wearing an assault type tactical ski mask with only one large opening for the eye area. That he made them both lie down. That he robbed them both of items. That he and Brent exchanged words. That she heard the gun click twice and then heard the first shot. That then she heard another shot. And that the man ran off in the direction of the sand dunes.

Detective King even noted in his logs that she talked openly about marriage troubles and her previous affair with a man named John Boyd Frazier. She even offered and did give the detectives John Boyd Frazier’s contact information. It was sometime during or after this 3:37am interview with Detective King that Detective Altman, now back from the hospital (he had gone to the hospital to get a statement from Brent if possible), spoke by phone with the Poole family (Bill and Agnes Poole, Brent’s parents). The Poole family insisted that Kimberly had to be involved and that the assailant had to be the man (John Boyd Frazier) with whom she had an earlier affair. This conversation by phone with the Poole family significantly influenced and convinced Detective Altman that Kimberly was involved to the extent that at 5:10am, less than 6 hours after the incident, both he and Detective King proceeded to interrogate Kimberly as a suspect.

Kimberly’s third encounter with the police the night they were robbed and her husband was shot and killed came at 5:10am. This was not a standard police interview to understand what happened and to get more information on possible suspects. This 5:10am encounter was an all out police interrogation, she was the suspect, with the Reid Interrogation Technique used. They told her they knew she did it and to save herself. Both detectives played off each other to apply psychological pressures. They lied to her in this 5:10am interrogation and told her they knew it was John Boyd Frazier, that the police checked his residence (in Winston-Salem, North Carolina approx 240 miles away) and he was not at home, when in fact the Winston-Salem police checked and he was found to be at home looking as if he had been sleeping. Through this all they never informed Kimberly of her Miranda rights. Kimberly denied any involvement with what happened and only could not rule out that it was not John Boyd Frazier. But that she did not think it was him because she didn’t think he’d be that stupid to do this, that the assailant was wearing an assault type tactical ski mask and was covered so she could not positively identify the assailant. They pushed hard and wanted her to confess right then and there that she was involved and did it, either she had shot Brent herself and just threw the gun in the ocean or she had Brent killed. They tested her hands for any gun shot residue (GSR test) and the test came back negative.

By 8am Wednesday June 10th, that third encounter, a full on suspect interrogation, was over and Kimberly’s parents arrived from the Winston-Salem, North Carolina area to take her and Katie (2) back home. By this time the Poole family (also from the Winston-Salem, North Carolina area) also arrived at the police station and the Poole family’s anger towards Kimberly was clearly evident. Upon seeing Kimberly the Poole family told the police, “You better keep her away from us.” The Poole family would meet with the detectives upon arrival. In this meeting the Poole family would paint Kimberly in the worst possible light by only telling the detectives one side of the two sided problems in their marriage and of her previous affairs. They pushed for the detectives to solely investigate Kimberly and the John Boyd Frazier connection. The Poole family were completely convinced that Kimberly had something to do with it and they wanted the detectives and the investigation as a whole to follow their lead. By this time the police had interviewed a few bystanders on the beach that night. 18 year old Chris Hensley would be walking south along the beach and passed Kimberly and Brent having relations a little ways off. He noticed Brent on top of someone (Kimberly) and that he had on a striped shirt. He kept on walking south and would eventually pass a man in dark clothing walking north. He gave the police a composite of the man he saw in dark clothing which did not look anything like John Boyd Frazier. Never-the-less the police would be steadfast in keeping their tunnel vision on Kimberly and John Boyd Frazier.

By mid afternoon June 10th the local media in Myrtle Beach picked up the story that a couple was robbed and the husband shot and killed on the beach. Being a tourist city, many vacationers were now in fear and worried which put more pressure on the Myrtle Beach police to quickly solve this case.

On Thursday June 11th the Myrtle Beach police would hold a large morning meeting and assign the bulk of their resources to this case. The only problem was that it was entirely focused on Kimberly and John Boyd Frazier. The Poole family put up a $50,000 reward for information and all sorts, from ex boyfriends to nosy neighbors to other exotic dancers were calling in with gossip about Kimberly. At times up to 7 detectives would furiously dig into all aspects of Kimberly’s life. Which brings us to Kimberly’s part time job.

Kimberly worked part time as an exotic dancer (stage name Carley) at The Silver Fox in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. She started dancing in early 1996, about a month after Katie was born. It was Brent who initially suggested and encouraged Kimberly to dance part time. Dancing part time enabled Kimberly to make almost as much as Brent did weekly working full time as an ASE certified master mechanic. However Brent’s family (the Poole’s), devoutly religious people, strongly disapproved (to be fair the Summey’s were not thrilled either) and were worried about their standing within the church should others find out. They did not like the changes they saw in their son and could not understand his moral choices in life. The Poole’s strictly forbade their son from watching R rated movies in High School and when he started to date Kimberly, they watched R rated movies together. Instead of trying to understand that maybe their son wanted to live his own life outside the constraints of the church, the Poole’s blamed it on Kimberly as being a bad influence on their son. It didn’t matter that it was Brent’s idea for her to dance, or that Brent enjoyed watching and collecting porn, or that Brent wanted to have a threesome with another girl, or that Brent wanted to wife swap with another couple, or that Brent told his friends to visit the club and buy dances from his wife. The Poole’s blamed Kimberly for the moral choices their son had wanted and made. This way of thinking is similar to blaming the woman for being raped.

Kimberly would be introduced to John Boyd Frazier in mid March 1998 while meeting up with a friend for dinner on a girls night out. John Boyd Frazier was just someone her friend knew and brought along. Kimberly had never met him before. After having dinner at the restaurant with them, John Boyd Frazier would aggressively try to pursue a relationship with Kimberly. He would do the little things that Brent had stopped doing and he made her feel appreciated. By April 1998 Kimberly would be having an affair with him. Brent had been ignoring her and spending more time on the computer or with his friends for the last few months. And it had also been a few months since they had relations together. Kimberly started dating Brent when she was 14, married Brent at 18 while a few months pregnant with Katie, and the love connection they once had was starting to fray. They needed that love rekindled. What was once a blazing fire, left unattended and neglected, had started to smolder, but the embers would still be there just waiting to be fanned. John Boyd Frazier would take advantage of Brent’s neglect but he was not someone with whom Kimberly wanted a serious relationship.

In early May 1998 Kimberly would briefly separate from Brent taking Katie with her. She moved in with John Boyd Frazier only as a temporary living solution. She didn’t want to move in with her parents because of the toxic environment there and the childhood of abuse. And John Boyd Frazier had assured her that he’d be working a lot and wouldn’t be home often anyways. Kimberly insisted he rent a storage unit so she could store her household items there until she could find a place of her own. Over the next few days and week, Brent would come to terms with the separation and affair, and worked hard to win Kimberly back. He would be fanning those once neglected embers, stoking that fire. He had Kimberly come over one afternoon and gave her two cards and a bouquet of flowers. In the cards he wrote a heartfelt apology for his actions, for the way he had been treating her and hoped she could give him another chance and work through the issues. “It wasn’t me. It was someone else,” he would write, feeling ashamed for the person he was to her previously. And this was all that Kimberly wanted and needed from Brent, to recognize there was a problem, to basically wake up and realize that things in their marriage needed to change. He woke up and realized and they agreed to start marriage counseling together.

By May 12th Kimberly would move back in with Brent and reconcile their marriage. On the outside at least, it appeared as if John Boyd Frazier accepted Kimberly’s decision to reconcile with Brent. It was no secret that he didn’t think fondly of Brent but respected Kimberly’s decision. Kimberly had hoped they could still remain friends, being that’s what they had started out as. On the night of Saturday May 30th John Boyd Frazier would run into the couple at The Silver Fox and cause a scene. He challenged Brent to a fight in the parking lot which Brent refused to do. Brent would pull over on their way home and tell Kimberly they couldn’t live like this. Kimberly agreed and suggested they get a restraining order. The next morning, Sunday May 31st, John Boyd Frazier would email Brent and try to persuade Brent that Kimberly wasn’t worth it, to leave Kimberly telling Brent that she will just keep cheating with others, that Brent was a fool to take her back, bashing Kimberly throughout the email. John Boyd Frazier would also write that he too was a fool to have an affair with her and imply that they shared something, a bro bond, in both being fools. In closing he wrote he had more information about things she had done without his knowledge in hopes that Brent would contact him. Brent didn’t take the bait and never replied to his email. It’s clear that John Boyd Frazier was trying to throw a wrench in their reconciliation by sending that email, bad mouthing Kimberly and trying to bro bond with Brent. John Boyd Frazier would memorialize this weekend in his dayplanner writing on May 30th “Renee gone forever” and then on May 31st “Fuck you Renee”. Kimberly’s suggestion that they could get a restraining order and John Boyd Frazier’s actions throwing Kimberly ‘under the bus’ support reasoning that by this point (end of May) there was no romantic feelings between the two. Given that John Boyd Frazier had basically written Kimberly off entirely by the end of May, it seems unlikely he would be the assailant in Myrtle Beach the night of June 9th.

Back then she had gone by her middle name being that ever since she was a small child her sister Brandy could pronounce Renee easier than Kimberly. In the state prison system they go by their first name, and she has been accustomed to going by her first name since.

Also on Thursday June 11th Detective Altman called Kimberly by phone and asked her if she remembered anything else about the assailant. The only information she could add was that the assailant did not sound black, was not black, but at certain times he possibly used what in her mind correlated with black slang just by the way he said some phrases to the both of them while pointing the gun. So in essence she was telling the detective that it was a white man using possibly a ‘gangsta’ type of slang at certain times. This phone call also clarified the 4 jewelry items, rings, that were stolen from her, with detailed descriptions of all items. They also talked about what was stolen from Brent- his wallet containing $80 to $90 in cash (he had roughly $30 to $40 already and then another $50 from the ATM withdrawal that night to pay the babysitter) and his watch. Brent’s wedding band was also stolen but was later found to be lying on his body, dropped by the assailant as he fled the scene. Detective Altman was also trying to set Kimberly up with this phone call and asked questions related to her as a suspect and was looking for possible answers that could solidify their case against her. One topic discussed in this phone call was why they had relations outdoors and if they just came to Myrtle Beach for relations outdoors. Kimberly had to correct Detective Altman that no this was not the only reason as to why they came, that they wanted to take their daughter Katie too so that they could celebrate their 3rd wedding anniversary as a family. And that having relations outdoors was something they discussed before they came to Myrtle Beach. There is new evidence which shows an email/letter from Brent about his excitement to go on this vacation and his initial suggestion to have relations outdoors sometime during, in line with what Kimberly had always maintained- that it was Brent’s idea to have relations outdoors.

All throughout these few days the Poole family were proactively targeting Kimberly, constantly contacting the detectives, offering tidbits of hearsay information about Kimberly, their thoughts on this trip to Myrtle Beach, faxing them information about Brent’s (and Kimberly’s) bank accounts, his life insurance policy, phone records, etc. The Poole family also let the detectives know that Brent’s funeral would be held Sunday June 14th. We believe passing this information was a passive reinforcement, a kind of ‘heads up’, so that Kimberly could hopefully be arrested before his funeral and not stain the solemn occasion.

That night, Thursday June 11th the Poole family would hold a gathering at their house to remember Brent. Both friends and family attended and so too did Kimberly. She noticed that there were no pictures of her with Brent in the collage of pictures shown, and that those pictures which she knew she also should have been in (pictures taken of them together) were altered to remove her from the frame.

By Friday June 12th the local news media in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, had also picked up the story. That night the detectives wanted to meet and speak with Kimberly again, but this time they drove up to Davie County, North Carolina. Kimberly’s parents wanted her to have an attorney present at this meeting. It was her mom’s idea, for some unknown reason, to bring a divorce attorney, a family practice attorney and not a criminal attorney, to this meeting. The divorce attorney knew nothing about Kimberly’s situation until less than an hour before the interview with the detectives began. Throughout this interview it is clearly evident that the divorce attorney got confused and did not understand who was who in the back story of Kimberly’s three previous affairs as the detectives honed in on that specific topic. The detectives were unrelenting on their suspicion that Kimberly had to have known who robbed them and shot her husband. That she must have known it was John Boyd Frazier. Kimberly did not know if in fact it was John Boyd Frazier. From day 1 she said that it could have been but she was not absolutely sure. From the pressure of the detectives, her parents, and the divorce attorney Kimberly convinced herself, momentarily, that it was John Boyd Frazier, influenced by the detectives who she thought were trying to help, but in reality trying to ensnare her. The detectives knew going in that if they could somehow get Kimberly to admit she knew the assailant was John Boyd Frazier, that they could build a case against her. This was what the detectives had planned for even if she didn’t really know who the assailant was, to confuse and deceive her into believing them that she must have known, that she could not have known it wasn’t him if it could be him, and to agree with them on this. This would lay the groundwork for their Obstruction of Justice charge and their claim that Kimberly changed her story of what happened.

Brent’s wake and viewing was held on Saturday June 13th. It would be at his wake, around 9pm, that the police would arrest Kimberly on an Obstruction of Justice charge. This is when the police would officially claim that she was a suspect, but she was an official suspect the night of the robbery and shooting, less than 6 hours after the incident, as evidenced by the 5:10am June 10th interrogation. A little before 11pm that night they would interrogate Kimberly, psychologically pressure her, yell at her, constantly lie to her, confuse her, keep repeating that she did this, then her denial sometimes shouting ‘No!’ back at them, then keep repeating that she did this, that she knew this was going to happen, to wear her down. They told Kimberly that the attorney she had the night before said they could speak to her without him present, a lie. They repeated that if she knew the assailant was John Boyd Frazier as she told them (even though she was really uncertain) the night before, how would he know which hotel they were staying, where they were going, that she had to have planned this and set Brent up. Again more denials. She was isolated, alone, tired and emotionally devastated.They told her that John Boyd Frazier was talking and said it was her idea, a lie. After a few more hours in the end they threatened to take Katie away from her unless she would agree, that John Boyd Frazier was pointing the finger at her and she would go down for this (a lie), that if she would agree they would be able to get John Boyd Frazier and put in a good word of her cooperation that would carry substantial weight that would allow her to keep Katie. The detectives used Katie only after her mom, for some unknown reason, told them they needed to be very hard on her. Kimberly most likely did not even know what she said ‘yeah’ to. They laid out the plot, the specifics to her and were just waiting for that ‘yeah’. She just wanted it to stop, and she wanted to keep Katie. It was a false confession known as a compliant false confession and the methods and tactics used (Reid Interrogation Technique) often illicit such false confessions in emotionally and mentally vulnerable people. Being that Kimberly suffered a childhood of emotional, sexual and physical abuse, and that this was the night of her husband’s wake made Kimberly emotionally and mentally vulnerable to such coercion. There is new evidence that an alternate suspect was criminally stalking and maliciously keeping tabs on her for at least the previous 6 months before the incident June 9th.

They would charge Kimberly with Murder, Conspiracy, and Obstruction of Justice. She would be charged with Capital Murder (death penalty) which prevents bail. Conveniently this held her in jail until her trial, away from Katie. The Capital Murder charge would be dropped a few weeks before trial which reinforces the thought that they only used that charge to keep her away from Katie. To rub it in, the prosecution served notice of the Capital Murder (death penalty) charge on December 1st, Katie’s birthday. To add insult to injury they scheduled her trial to start on November 8th 1999, November 8th being her birthday. Her mom would once again choose the attorney to defend. She could not have picked a worse trial attorney in Bill Diggs (now disbarred). The prosecution would offer Kimberly an impossible plea deal; a plea deal of 30 years which required her to admit to something she did not do (admission of conspiracy and murder) and required her to provide information on something she did not know (the location of the gun). The plea deal was a recommendation of 30 years pending approval by the presiding judge, Judge Cottingham, who was featured in the February 1994 edition of Redbook women’s magazine as one of the nation’s most sexist judges with whom a woman would never be able to receive a fair trial. The Poole family adamantly opposed any talk of a plea deal with Kimberly and only wanted John Boyd Frazier to be offered one. Orrie West, a public defender, would instruct and demand that Kimberly take the plea deal in the one meeting she ever had with Kimberly before trial. Kimberly maintained her innocence, rejected the plea deal and believed in the system even in the face of a possible death sentence (at the time the plea deal was offered the Capital Murder charge was still active).

Brent’s wallet would be found July 5th a few blocks away from the crime scene, soaking wet, with some items intact (bank cards, family pics) but with only $8 or $9 in cash (a $5 bill and some $1 bills) of the $80 or $90 that should have been in there. All the large bills were missing. An unanswered question is why the wallet was found soaking wet when it did not rain at all in North Myrtle Beach from the time of the incident, June 9th, to when the wallet was found, July 5th. But by this time, July 5th, Kimberly would already be arrested and charged for Brent’s murder. She would be arrested Saturday June 13th (the day before his funeral) and charged Sunday June 14th for his murder, roughly 2 weeks before Brent’s wallet was recovered. This would be the only item stolen that would ever be recovered. Still missing would be 4 rings, a watch, and roughly $70 in cash from the wallet.

Besides Chris Hensley there would be another potential eyewitness to the man in dark clothing on the beach that night, Mark and Donna Hobbs. The Hobbs’ were a middle-aged couple staying at the Carolina Winds and also celebrating their wedding anniversary that night. They too decided to take a romantic stroll. They noticed someone strange, wearing dark clothes near the hotel who then proceeded to walk north along the beach. They would testify at both trials, Kimberly’s and John Boyd Frazier’s, that the man they saw was John Boyd Frazier. The only problem was that it was at night, the person they saw was over 20 feet away and they only saw him for a few seconds. About a week later, now at home, they heard news stories about the robbery and shooting on the beach and called in. It would be another week before the police brought them a photo lineup. In all at least 2 weeks passing since they saw that strange man for just a few seconds, at night and over 20 feet away. Questionably they both picked John Boyd Frazier from the photo lineup, but could not remember details of their waiter the night of June 9th, with whom they had more interactions, longer interactions and whom was in close proximity mere feet away. And by the time they were shown the photo lineup Kimberly and John Boyd Frazier were already arrested and charged with Brent’s murder. It seemed convenient now that the police would have supporting eyewitnesses to their theory. The Poole family would improperly tamper before trial and pay Mark and Donna Hobbs $20,000, $10,000 each, we believe to pressure and solidify their cooperation at trial. An expert on eyewitness misidentification was not provided for Kimberly’s defense to argue that it would be almost impossible for them to make a solid identification of who they saw that night, just one of the many negligent errors and omissions that contributed to Kimberly having ineffective defense counsel at trial.

The police and prosecution would disregard Chris Hensley’s composite and description, but it would seem that Hensley’s were far more accurate, that he was more visually aware of his surroundings that night being that he noticed Brent and Kimberly having relations a ways off in passing them, that he correctly identified Brent’s striped shirt in that distance at night, and that the man covered in dark clothing walking north and him walking south passed within 10 feet of each other, so close that Hensley offered the passing man a greeting. And Chris Hensley’s composite and description would strongly resemble an alternate suspect who, through new evidence found, had been criminally stalking and maliciously keeping tabs on Kimberly starting at least 6 months prior. This alternate suspect had criminally installed a powerful spyware and remote access program on Kimberly and Brent’s home computer around November 1997. For at least the previous 6 months this alternate suspect had complete and total control by remote access of their home computer. This remote access program being so powerful that the alternate suspect could read their emails, their private chats, turn off/on their webcam, access all files and programs on their computer, all web sites viewed, and view their screen activity in real time. The alternate suspect could also send emails in their name from their computer, hold instant message chats in their name from their computer, essentially masquerade as them. It would be a massive criminal invasion of privacy by someone disturbed who wanted and was stalking Kimberly.

Other bystanders near the beach that night mention in their witness statements about seeing a white van with a number sticker on one of the windows. Kimberly also told the detectives about noticing a van when buying the beach towel at Wings. The police would negligently ignore these statements. This alternate suspect’s friend, living with him during this time, owned and drove a white van with a number sticker on it. Once this alternate suspect’s wife found out about what happened to Kimberly and Brent in Myrtle Beach she immediately and voluntarily checked herself into a psychiatric hospital. Two weeks later she would be almost killed in a car accident under mysterious circumstances and would divorce this alternate suspect soon after, moving across the country.

It seems the police wanted to mislead the public in saying that Kimberly was not a suspect until some time later and then only after certain events in order to cover up the fact they did no real investigation, and that they targeted Kimberly solely on the misplaced anger and suspicion of her inlaws.