Speaker 1: He had this twinkle in his eye. I got the
Speaker 1: sense that he thought he was smarter than everybody. He
Speaker 1: would smile, He smiled into the camera. He would smile
Speaker 1: at witnesses. He tried to smile at Tracy. He tried
Speaker 1: to stare down Kathy in a way. I thought he
Speaker 1: found this was sort of a game.
Speaker 2: That's lead Assistant District Attorney Jeff Brickman talking about the
Speaker 2: demeanor of the defendant. I'm Nancy Glass and this is
Speaker 2: burden of guilt. Episode six, Battlefield. Tracy Raquel told the
Speaker 2: prosecution that she had seen some of her mother's testimony
Speaker 2: on television, and since witnesses weren't allowed to watch the
Speaker 2: court proceedings due to sequestration orders, the judge was left
Speaker 2: with no choice but to declare a mistrial. It was
Speaker 2: a heavy blow to the prosecution, and District Attorney j
Speaker 2: Tom Morgan had to decide if it was worth the
Speaker 2: time and money to take the decades old cold case
Speaker 2: to trial once again. Assistant District Attorney LeAnn Mangon.
Speaker 3: Jeff and I felt pretty deflated by the fact that
Speaker 3: the mistrial had been declared. When Judge Fuller declared the mistrial,
Speaker 3: he did make that ruling in a way that allowed
Speaker 3: us to make a decision about whether we wanted to
Speaker 3: retry the case.
Speaker 4: We are in the dumps.
Speaker 1: I mean, don't get me wrong, but you know, you
Speaker 1: look at each other and go, this guy killed a four.
Speaker 2: Month old district attorney j Tom Morgan.
Speaker 5: I was furious. I mean, all the work that Leanne
Speaker 5: and Jeff had put into it, and so my job
Speaker 5: as SADISC attorney was to get my two assistants in
Speaker 5: there and say, take a deep breath, let's do this again.
Speaker 3: After all of this had happened, I came into work
Speaker 3: to a voicemail message from Tracy saying please don't give up.
Speaker 6: I basically just called the prosecution and said, look, I'm sorry,
Speaker 6: I didn't mean to mess everything up. Could you do
Speaker 6: this again?
Speaker 1: After going in and talking about it with Jay Tom
Speaker 1: and looking at each other and realizing, you know, this
Speaker 1: doesn't change what happened, it doesn't change the facts.
Speaker 4: And as I told Leanne, you know.
Speaker 1: What, last time I checked, there's no such thing as
Speaker 1: the one free murder rule in Georgia.
Speaker 4: And we were back at it within a month.
Speaker 2: Supercharged out, the prosecution once again set out to prove
Speaker 2: that Jan Berry Sandlin killed four month old Matthew.
Speaker 4: We didn't really change the theory of the case at all.
Speaker 2: The theory a man was left alone with a baby.
Speaker 2: By the time the baby's mother came home and found him,
Speaker 2: he was near death. The child was a victim of
Speaker 2: the man's abuse. That man was Tracy Riquel's father, Jan
Speaker 2: Barry Sandlin, a person with a history of cruel and
Speaker 2: abusive behavior towards his children. And as we told you,
Speaker 2: Tracy Raquel has spent a lifetime dealing with the abuse
Speaker 2: she suffered at the hands of her father.
Speaker 6: You would just show up in the Millanite and throw
Speaker 6: us on the street. We spent lots of time just
Speaker 6: sleeping on a park bench. He put that camel cigarette.
Speaker 7: Off on me.
Speaker 6: I was in the car with Kathy and she said
Speaker 6: day after tomorrow is Matthew's birthday. And I just had
Speaker 6: this child like remark of you don't take me to
Speaker 6: the cemetery. Never speak to you, told Jan and he
Speaker 6: beat me terribly.
Speaker 2: He really enjoyed the belt, the wrong.
Speaker 4: End of the belt.
Speaker 2: We shared how he fed her roaches on toast as
Speaker 2: a form of punishment, and how Tracy Raquel spent much
Speaker 2: of her childhood navigating the emotional and physical abuse between
Speaker 2: Kathy and Jan. We told you how he beat Kathy
Speaker 2: and locked her in closets. For Tracy Raquel, those memories
Speaker 2: were like a bad dream.
Speaker 6: Nightmares are an ongoing thing for me. I never have
Speaker 6: nightmares about Matthew. I have a lot of nightmares that
Speaker 6: revolve around events in my childhood and just always being
Speaker 6: terrified and never feeling safe, and that comes from not
Speaker 6: being stable and getting thrown out of your house in
Speaker 6: the middle of the night, and people getting beat up
Speaker 6: and abuse, like all of these things don't go away.
Speaker 2: Lead A Jeff Brickman imagined how the series of events
Speaker 2: unfolded between Jan and the baby who was not his son.
Speaker 1: Leanne and I were recent parents of two year old.
Speaker 1: We had learned in the last couple of years what
Speaker 1: it's like to have a baby at home who can't speak.
Speaker 4: Who cries a lot. They're crying, they're upset, they won't
Speaker 4: shut up. You want to sleep.
Speaker 1: You're not real jazzed up about the fact that you're
Speaker 1: being left at home with this four month old. It's
Speaker 1: not even yours, and you just wanted to be quiet.
Speaker 1: Just like that, you'll get your quiet. Be dead, but
Speaker 1: you'll get the quiet. So we knew that one of
Speaker 1: the things we wanted to impress upon the jury was
Speaker 1: that this can happen just like that. And he had
Speaker 1: every reason to do that. And given the nature of
Speaker 1: the injuries, he decided just like that that he was
Speaker 1: going to shut him up.
Speaker 4: And as horrific as.
Speaker 1: That is to imagine, that's exactly what happened.
Speaker 2: Jeff Brickman knew if the prosecution was going to win
Speaker 2: this trial, the jury had to believe that's what happened.
Speaker 2: As for the defense, they learned something from the first
Speaker 2: trial and this time honed in on a single strategy.
Speaker 1: This time the defense was none too subtle, and we
Speaker 1: knew Krinn it was not going to be a well
Speaker 1: they just can't prove it beyond a reasonable doubt.
Speaker 4: It was one person did it. It was Kathy Allman.
Speaker 3: There was more of a focus on Kathy Allman as
Speaker 3: someone who may have had something to do with Matthew's murder.
Speaker 1: I distinctly remember talking to Kathy going, let me tell
Speaker 1: you what the defense is.
Speaker 4: You killed your four month old. You get it.
Speaker 1: Now it's up to you. I can't get up and testify.
Speaker 1: You need to be convincing.
Speaker 2: Ada. Jeff Brickman was saying Kathy could make her break
Speaker 2: this second trial, and he was worried about her state
Speaker 2: of mind and her lack of self assurance on the stand.
Speaker 1: Kathy was kind of damaged over the years, and she
Speaker 1: was very vulnerable. She was easy to pick on, and
Speaker 1: Karen was great at finding weaknesses.
Speaker 3: They were introducing a suggestion that perhaps there's not enough
Speaker 3: evidence to demonstrate that Jan Sanlin was solely responsible.
Speaker 2: On day one of the trial, Tracy Riquel was the
Speaker 2: second witness to be called. Assistant District Attorney Lee Ann
Speaker 2: man Gon asked Tracy Riquel about the time she contacted
Speaker 2: her father in prison.
Speaker 8: When you were younger. Did you make a telephone call
Speaker 8: to the defendant?
Speaker 9: Yes? I did.
Speaker 8: Did you ask him for an explanation for Matt's death?
Speaker 7: Yes?
Speaker 4: I did?
Speaker 8: And in that telephone call, what was his response?
Speaker 2: Ask your mother? She couldn't get a straight answer from
Speaker 2: Jan and her mother. Kathy wouldn't provide any clarity either.
Speaker 8: Do you and miss Rain have any information which would
Speaker 8: indicate that your mother is responsible for Matt's death?
Speaker 4: No?
Speaker 8: Can you tell the members of the jury, why it
Speaker 8: is you have worked so hard to find out what
Speaker 8: happened to that?
Speaker 9: Well, I always knew that he had died, and it
Speaker 9: was always a very evasive subject with everyone in my family,
Speaker 9: And I guess that just sparked me to think that
Speaker 9: something was wrong, and I thought, if there was something wrong,
Speaker 9: you needed to fix it. I had no idea of it.
Speaker 9: It was because they thought that I had.
Speaker 5: That was.
Speaker 2: That was obviously very emotional for Tracy Riquel. She regained
Speaker 2: her composure and lee Anne continued her questioning. She asked
Speaker 2: Tracy Riquel, what happened when she asked her mother to
Speaker 2: have Matt's death investigated.
Speaker 8: What generally was your mother's response when you were talking
Speaker 8: about that issue.
Speaker 9: That she didn't want to deal with the pain. She
Speaker 9: was not capable of dealing with the pain. She didn't
Speaker 9: have the support.
Speaker 4: That she needed.
Speaker 2: Kathy Almand's mother, Tracy Riquel's grandmother, Anne Davidson, took the stand.
Speaker 2: She testified about an incident that occurred when she came
Speaker 2: home with Kathy after Jan was alone with baby Matthew.
Speaker 7: We went in and matt was screaming, and Kathy said,
Speaker 7: what's wrong with the baby, and he said, oh, I
Speaker 7: was playing with him here on the table, and he
Speaker 7: picked up the pepper shaker, and I guess he got
Speaker 7: it in his eyes.
Speaker 10: Could you tell what the appearance was of this child?
Speaker 7: Boy was crying and his azar red.
Speaker 10: What did Kathy do? If anything?
Speaker 7: She took the baby and she got a washcloth and
Speaker 7: washed his eyes out, gave him a bottle, and pretty
Speaker 7: soon he stuck crying.
Speaker 10: Was there any further discussion that day as far as
Speaker 10: you remember about what happened?
Speaker 7: No, never was mentioned again.
Speaker 2: Then the questioning turned to the knight Matthew died.
Speaker 1: At any point once you got to the hospital, did
Speaker 1: you make any effort or attempt to talk to Kat?
Speaker 7: Yes, I did. I just went straight to her and said, Kathy,
Speaker 7: what happened? And Jan just came forward and said that
Speaker 7: Tracy threw little matt from the crib and he was hurt,
Speaker 7: real bad, and that's why they were there.
Speaker 11: Eighty eight.
Speaker 2: Jeff Brickman asked Kathy's mother, Anne Davidson, those questions to
Speaker 2: establish a history of abuse by Jan. On the other hand,
Speaker 2: defense attorney Korean Mulls seemed to say, if the pepper
Speaker 2: incident was so bad if there was abuse, why didn't
Speaker 2: anyone call the police?
Speaker 12: Davidson, what was the name of the police officer? Spoke?
Speaker 11: You been told about this pepper incident?
Speaker 12: After that died?
Speaker 11: I didn't speak. You didn't.
Speaker 12: You didn't happen to say, God, God, this land not
Speaker 12: only has he killed my child?
Speaker 11: Let me tell you about the pepper incident. No, didn't
Speaker 11: say that to anybody?
Speaker 7: Did you?
Speaker 12: First time you ever mentioned it is July nineteen ninety
Speaker 12: seven to these folks.
Speaker 2: Defense attorney Krin Maul pointed out that Kathy's mother didn't
Speaker 2: share that information with anybody until the second trial.
Speaker 12: Did you hear a sales soul besides your daughter's, say,
Speaker 12: Jane Mary Sandlin told them that this child was thrown out.
Speaker 11: Of the bed by his sister.
Speaker 7: No, I didn't, okay.
Speaker 11: And your daughter also said she didn't know if he
Speaker 11: did or not.
Speaker 12: Didn't she?
Speaker 7: That's right? Neither do I.
Speaker 2: Corin Mal had spent hours questioning Kathy during the first trial,
Speaker 2: and she had no plans to ease up in the second.
Speaker 2: In fact, she would press Kathy even harder about inconsistencies.
Speaker 12: You have told her, and you have told us that
Speaker 12: besides your initial different stories that you told her, the
Speaker 12: prim death, banging the head on the throwing out, crushing
Speaker 12: the baby shoes. Besides those different stories you have always
Speaker 12: you said, maintain what happened that day to everyone having you,
Speaker 12: and you maintained to everyone that you believed she'd thrown
Speaker 12: the baby out of the bed.
Speaker 8: That's what I thought for many, many years.
Speaker 2: The defense wanted to make the point that even while
Speaker 2: jan was out of their lives and in prison, Kathy
Speaker 2: continued to communicate with him. It seemed like she still
Speaker 2: wanted them to have a relationship.
Speaker 12: It was almen, you wrote a letter to your ex husband,
Speaker 12: correct written to them, Yes, and you wrote to him
Speaker 12: about Tracy making accusations, right. I don't really recall what
Speaker 12: I wrote in those letters. Isn't it true, miss Ahman,
Speaker 12: that you told in your letters, don't worry about Tracy.
Speaker 12: You know my parents they've just been saying some ugly
Speaker 12: things about you. I don't recall what was in those letters,
Speaker 12: so I can't say I was very depressed when I
Speaker 12: wrote him.
Speaker 4: I know that.
Speaker 9: I thought something's wrong with me.
Speaker 5: I don't know.
Speaker 11: In those letters.
Speaker 12: In the last letter that you wrote to mister Sandlin,
Speaker 12: do you recall telling him in there not to be
Speaker 12: concerned about Tracy because she just resented him not being there.
Speaker 6: I am, I don't know.
Speaker 2: In another letter, Kathy had expressed frustration about Tracy Riquel's
Speaker 2: younger brother, Jason. He was the second child Kathy had
Speaker 2: with jam.
Speaker 12: Didn't you tell Jason that you told mister Sandwin, he's
Speaker 12: bothering me, I'm going to beat him with a baseball.
Speaker 6: I don't recall that.
Speaker 2: Yes, that's what she wrote, that she was going to
Speaker 2: beat her son with a baseball bat.
Speaker 12: Let me show you something and see if that refreshes
Speaker 12: your recollection.
Speaker 4: A huh.
Speaker 12: Yes, I did say it in a joking way, and
Speaker 12: you did say in a joking way, I'm going to
Speaker 12: beat him with a baseball.
Speaker 7: Yes.
Speaker 2: The prosecution came back one last time with Kathy to
Speaker 2: put the focus back on Matthew's death.
Speaker 10: And on that day when you did leave matt for
Speaker 10: the second time with that man over, there was this
Speaker 10: child who was depicted in State five just two days
Speaker 10: before his death.
Speaker 12: In this picture.
Speaker 11: Was he healthy?
Speaker 7: Yes, he was healthy.
Speaker 10: Was he as alive as could be, live as could.
Speaker 9: Be, happy as could be?
Speaker 7: In a very good, wonderful.
Speaker 2: Baby When the prosecution finished, the defense left the jury
Speaker 2: with this.
Speaker 12: Isn't it truth that the accident, and it was an accident,
Speaker 12: was caused by Humasa.
Speaker 2: No, there was no more suggesting or circling around it.
Speaker 2: There it was. The defense put it on the line.
Speaker 2: It was your fault, Kathy. The defense never called a
Speaker 2: single witness and Jan never took the stand. Jeff Brickman
Speaker 2: remembers observing Jan's behavior as he watched the testimony.
Speaker 1: He had this twinkle in his eye. I got the
Speaker 1: sense that he thought he was smarter than everybody. He
Speaker 1: would smile, He smiled into the camera. He would smile
Speaker 1: at witnesses. He tried to smile at Tracy. He tried
Speaker 1: to stare down Kathy. He would stare back at us,
Speaker 1: and he just kind of stared through you.
Speaker 4: In a way.
Speaker 1: I thought he found this was sort of a game.
Speaker 1: I really do think he found pleasure in making everybody
Speaker 1: who came in there to testify against him.
Speaker 2: Hey, the last person to testify was the medical examiner
Speaker 2: who performed the second autopsy, doctor Burton. The prosecution strategically
Speaker 2: saved him for the end. He was their key witness.
Speaker 2: The prosecution's case was straightforward, Matthew's death was from unspeakable abuse.
Speaker 8: Do you have an opinion, doctor Burdon, as to whether
Speaker 8: these injuries could have been inflicted by a two year
Speaker 8: old child throwing the baby out of a crip.
Speaker 13: Well, First of all, a two year old child couldn't
Speaker 13: throw the baby out. It's a squirming, ten pound way,
Speaker 13: and so to throw it out would be virtually impossible.
Speaker 13: To say that a two year old could get in
Speaker 13: the bed and somehow tug it up over the edge
Speaker 13: of the rail and let the baby tip over the
Speaker 13: edge of the rail and fall. It's possible, but even
Speaker 13: that is not likely.
Speaker 2: In the last episode you heard, defense attorney Carin Mal
Speaker 2: questioned Kathy about Tracy Riquel's heavy baby shoes because Kathy
Speaker 2: had said she thought Tracy Riquel had stepped on Matthew's
Speaker 2: head with her heavy baby shoes and that led to
Speaker 2: his death. Ada Leeann Mangon showed doctor Burton a pair
Speaker 2: of those shoes.
Speaker 13: These shoes have leather soles and rubber hills on them.
Speaker 13: The soles and hills have edges on them. There's nothing
Speaker 13: in any of the records to describe any type of
Speaker 13: a pattern of bruise or abrasion to Matthew's head. This
Speaker 13: tells us that the impact happened on a surface smooth
Speaker 13: with no portray. Rubrin's is on it. There's not enough
Speaker 13: mass in the foot and leg of a two year
Speaker 13: old cause fractures on both sides of this baby's head
Speaker 13: to compress the head against the floor. It would be
Speaker 13: almost impossible for all the circumstances to exist for a
Speaker 13: shoe not to leave a mark on Matthew's head.
Speaker 2: Further emphasizing it was no accident, the prosecution asked how
Speaker 2: a child would sustain the injuries found on Matthew, so.
Speaker 8: That the jury better understands the force which must have
Speaker 8: been used in this case under what non abusive circumstances
Speaker 8: would you expect to see these types of injuries?
Speaker 13: Fractures like this that are bilateral complex fractures you see
Speaker 13: an automobile rex, you see them in children. Are people
Speaker 13: who fall heights like fifteen twenty feet?
Speaker 8: Do you, doctor Burton, have an opinion based on a
Speaker 8: reasonable degree of medical certainty as to the manner of
Speaker 8: death of Matthew Stephen Golder on December the twenty seventh of.
Speaker 7: Nineteen that anyone.
Speaker 13: I do the injuries that resulted in Matthew's death were
Speaker 13: inflicted or caused by another person.
Speaker 2: Carin Mal did not mince words during the cross examination.
Speaker 12: The scenario that you were given was mainly to disprove
Speaker 12: that this child had not been thrown out by a
Speaker 12: two year old onto the floor from a bed from
Speaker 12: a crib.
Speaker 11: Correct.
Speaker 13: Yes, I was trying to decide whether this was an
Speaker 13: accidental death or some other type of death.
Speaker 12: And it's true, Doctor Burton, that this injury could have
Speaker 12: been inflicted several different ways, and you have shown some
Speaker 12: of them, correct.
Speaker 13: And there may be others.
Speaker 12: But the bottom line is that this child is not
Speaker 12: thrown out of a bed by a two year old.
Speaker 12: This child died as a result of abuse from an adult.
Speaker 8: Correct.
Speaker 13: I think that's the probability, Yes, ma'am.
Speaker 2: So which adult was it? Would the jury believe it
Speaker 2: was jan or did the defense raise enough down by
Speaker 2: presenting Kathy as a culprit Ada LeeAnne Mangon went first
Speaker 2: in closing arguments.
Speaker 8: Ladies and gentlemen, this is a case about murder. This
Speaker 8: is a case about the murder of a four month
Speaker 8: old little boy, about the murder of a child.
Speaker 14: Who lived on this earth for less than twenty weeks.
Speaker 14: This is the case about a murder which could have
Speaker 14: been committed by only one person, and.
Speaker 8: That person is sitting right there.
Speaker 14: Jan Berry Sandlin is guilty of murder.
Speaker 2: Leanne held up a photo of Matthew.
Speaker 14: Matt Golder is speaking to you, ladies and gentlemen. He's saying,
Speaker 14: my name is Matthew Stephen Golder. I died when I
Speaker 14: was four months old. I was robbed of my opportunity
Speaker 14: to run, to jump, to laugh. My innocence was taken
Speaker 14: from me. It was taken from me by that man.
Speaker 14: Ladies and gentlemen.
Speaker 8: Matt Golder is crying out to you today as he
Speaker 8: must have cried in December of nineteen seventy one. But
Speaker 8: today he's crying very differently. He's crying for justice, ladies
Speaker 8: and gentlemen. He is asking that you send the loudest
Speaker 8: and clearest message that you can. He wants you to
Speaker 8: tell this man what you did was wrong, what you
Speaker 8: did was murder.
Speaker 7: Thank you.
Speaker 2: Defense Attorney Carin Maul gave her summation.
Speaker 12: While it is true that there's nothing worse than the
Speaker 12: death of a child, and those of us who have
Speaker 12: suffered it know how poignant that is, and know how
Speaker 12: debilitating that is. But second to that is to convict an.
Speaker 2: Innocent Carine mal then focused on Kathy's strange behavior, specifically
Speaker 2: towards Tracy Riquel. Cathy told the same story over and
Speaker 2: over again, even to Tracy Raquel's doctor when she was
Speaker 2: just a teenager.
Speaker 12: You're giving information to your child's doctor that you so
Speaker 12: badly wanted. You don't lie to that doctor. You tell
Speaker 12: them everything. You especially would not tell your child's doctor
Speaker 12: that your child had thrown the baby out of the
Speaker 12: bed when any fool could have seen that didn't happen,
Speaker 12: And you certainly wouldn't blame it on a child. From
Speaker 12: nineteen eighty two to nineteen ninety seven, when your child
Speaker 12: is in your face telling you, how could you do
Speaker 12: this to me? January nineteen ninety seven, what does miss
Speaker 12: Almond do? She brings the baby shoes.
Speaker 11: Still trying to blame Tracy Ray. She knows what happened.
Speaker 11: She's the only one that knows what happened. Miss Almond
Speaker 11: is responsible not for killing her child, but for the
Speaker 11: death of her job.
Speaker 2: There was no more to say. Arguments were finished. The
Speaker 2: trial concluded, and now the waiting began. I always knew.
Speaker 3: That it was up to those twelve citizens. We slept
Speaker 3: with a jury out. We went home one night and
Speaker 3: came back.
Speaker 2: The next morning.
Speaker 3: I don't remember them deliberating a long time, but I
Speaker 3: remember the call that we got being that there was
Speaker 3: a verdict.
Speaker 8: We the jury found the defendant, Jan Barry Sandlin.
Speaker 2: This case takes yet another turn, and it was a shocker.
Speaker 4: My stomach dropped.
Speaker 2: That's next time on Burden of Guilt. Stay tuned for
Speaker 2: Burden of Guilt at documentary coming in twenty twenty four
Speaker 2: and airing only on Paramount Plus. If you would like
Speaker 2: to reach out to the Burden of Guilt team, email
Speaker 2: us at burdenofguiltpod at gmail dot com. That's Burden of
Speaker 2: Guilt pod at gmail dot com. If you or someone
Speaker 2: you know is worried about maltreatment or suspect that a
Speaker 2: child is being abused or neglected, call the Child Help
Speaker 2: National Child Abuse Hotline. You can call or text one
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Speaker 2: Guilt is a production of Glass Podcasts, a division of
Speaker 2: Glass Entertainment Group, in partnership with iHeart Podcasts. The show
Speaker 2: is hosted and executive produced by me Nancy Glass, written
Speaker 2: and produced by Andrea Gunning and Carrie Hartman, also produced
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