THE
COAST GUARD MURDER CASE
©Lee Paul
Note to all relatives of Duncan Poirier: After losing my mother to murder, I totally understand your thirst for knowledge on your uncle, but I cannot put you in touch with Ranger Jim Peters because I have no way of verifying your credentials. He is a personal friend, but he is retired, so it is best for you to go through the proper channels to contact him. He remembers this case well, and he will answer any questions you have. The following link is for the Texas Rangers: Texas Rangers Law Enforcement Organization . Let them know who you are and what information you seek. They do have an archives, and they will help you all they can.
Note 2: Because of the unusual ending in this report, the murderer will be identified only as John. It is his real name, but his last name will not be used.
One of Texas Ranger Jim Peters’ first investigations working alone under Captain John Wood concerned a most unusual missing person case. It was an investigation that Peters has always maintained would make a good book or movie, especially since it incorporated all the elements of good fiction: good guy, bad guy, drugs, homosexuals, devil worship, plot twists, and a cast of unsavory characters a mile long. It also had outstanding sleuthing by all the investigators involved. The case began just before Christmas, on 23 December 1970. On that date at the Coast Guard Station in Port Aransas, a friendly young sailor disappeared.
Port Aransas was the last place anyone would ever suspect of harboring a mystery. Sure, people occasionally drowned in the surf, and shrimp boats occasionally sank, but residents didn’t vanish without a trace. Yet, that is exactly what happened when Seaman Apprentice Duncan Hugh Poirier walked out the front gate of the Coast Guard Station and never returned. He left behind everything he owned, including his bank book. At first listed as Absent Without Leave (AWOL), the case of the missing sailor took a sinister twist when investigators learned homosexuals, Satan worship, and drugs were involved. Before it finally concluded, it involved investigative agencies in two states, the Coast Guard Intelligence Office, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and Jim Peters. And from the moment he first entered the case, Peters was sure he knew the answer. All he needed was proof.
Port Aransas, or Port “A” as the locals like to call it, is a tiny, lazy fishing village located on the northern tip of Mustang Island, about 20 miles as the crow flies from Corpus Christi, Texas. As islands go, Mustang is no different than any other with its sand dunes, sea oats, and diamondback rattlesnakes. Yet, it is different. It is three miles wide and stretches eighteen miles along the Gulf Coast, a tiny barrier island in Texas’s barrier island chain. Over the years, silt has filled in the narrow channel once separating it from the longer Padre Island. Today, the two-island necklace is America’s largest barrier island and the longest section of undeveloped coastal wilderness, island OR mainland, in the United States outside Alaska. The two islands protect the mainland, bays, and inlets immediately behind them from storms.
Nothing much out of the ordinary ever really happens in Port Aransas. It is one of America’s few remaining, old-fashioned beach towns---the kind of place where everyone knows everyone else and even the tourist is no stranger. The population is 1,218 permanent residents with a few “snowbirds” arriving each season when the weather becomes too cold in the North. It’s known as a haven for deep-sea sports enthusiasts, but pleasure boating and other water activities are year-round events. There is plenty of sun, sky, sea, and sand---attractions guaranteed to entice even the most stalwart of landlubbers. Because the area is so water-oriented, so vital to the deep-water port behind it, the United States Coast Guard has maintained a presence here since the Civil War. The Port Aransas Station is one of the oldest in America.
The Commander of the Station at the time of Seaman Poirier’s disappearance was Chief Warrant Officer G.H. Yarrington. In November, as part of his duties, he affixed the duty roster for the upcoming holiday season. One of the applications he approved for Christmas furlough was the one submitted by Duncan Poirier. It was easy to grant the young sailor practically any request he wanted because he was so likeable, so Coast Guard oriented, so devoted to duty. Duncan Poirier’s leave was scheduled to begin December 27.
On the night of December 23, friends saw Duncan walk out the front gate, dressed in work clothes, presumably headed to his off-duty, part-time, civilian job at a small motel down the street. As an integral part of everyday life for the islanders, local businessmen routinely paid their respect to the Coast Guard by hiring the sailors as part-time help, thus giving the men as much opportunity as possible to earn a little extra spending money. That year, Hurricane Celia had blown in with a fury in early August, and there was all kinds of extra work in the odd-job cleanup process. Seaman Poirier had been working at his extra job for months, saving his money for his holiday trip home to Cleveland, Ohio.
Duncan Poirier was nineteen years old---a quiet, studious, friendly young man. He stood about five feet, eight inches tall, and was a little stocky at around 170 pounds. He had luxuriant brown hair, dark eyes, and at the time of his disappearance, he had just traded his bulky, black-rimmed eyeglasses for a pair of Benjamin Franklin gold-rimmed glasses that greatly enhanced the charming features of his youth. He was extremely courteous, well-liked, and completely devoted to duty and to the Coast Guard. Everyone who knew him said he was the nicest guy at the Station. When he failed to report to his duty assignment the next morning aboard the cutter POINT BAKER, Commander Yarrington was totally surprised. It was completely unlike Poirier not to show up, ready for work.
Yarrington ordered an immediate search of the Station. A check of Poirier’s quarters revealed that the young sailor had not slept in his bed the night before, nor did anything appear to be missing from his locker and personal effects. He was just gone---missing---nowhere to be found on the Station. His disappearance made no sense to anyone.
The Port Aransas Coast Guard Station is an open-base type facility. That is, it is fenced as all military installations are, but there are no guards on the gates. Sailors just checked in and out through the main office building inside the main gate. Even the civilians, if they have a mind to, are able to stroll in and out practically unchallenged. It’s this way partly because the people of Port Aransas love the Coast Guard, and the Coast Guard appreciates it, but mostly it’s because the Station is so small.
The whole compound is like looking at paradise. Unlike most military installations where the buildings are cold and impersonal, all the same size or all the same shade of gray, the structures at the Port Aransas station are warm and friendly with the wide, open-veranda appearance of a West Indies plantation. Each morning, dew glistens in the sunrise, and palm trees, flowers, and shrubs fill the air with a sweet, heady fragrance almost overwhelming to the senses. It’s seldom cold and never very hot, thanks to the balmy, offshore breezes tinged in salt spray blowing in from the Gulf year round. Squirrels and sea birds are everywhere. Even the fence ringing the perimeter seems natural and inviting. Because of this friendly, open-air appearance, it is practically impossible to hide anything---or anyone---at the Station.
It’s also a small, tight-knit facility with everything at the Station within easy walking distance. Port Aransas itself only covers a few blocks, and there is no need for public transportation. Although most of the locals own cars, visitors have to get around on foot. And in December 1970, many of the foot passengers also included some of the lower ratings of the Coast Guard population. For Seaman Apprentice Duncan Poirier to leave the area, he had to hitch a ride with someone.
Duty at the Station is always a beehive of activity for the men assigned there. Each year they perform hundreds of rescue missions involving all kinds of accidents. They also enforce water safety rules, aid vessels in distress, and help evacuate the island when killer storms sweep in from the Gulf to pound the coast with all of Nature’s fury. But it’s during the holidays when they are most strapped. It’s at that time when most people misplace common sense, and accidents are most likely to happen.
It was originally Commander Yarrington’s personal opinion that Seaman Poirier had met with some kind of an accident. In his own words, “Duncan Poirier had too much going for him to go over the fence.”
A check with the Duty Officer, however, revealed no accident report involving Duncan Poirier. All law enforcement agencies and hospitals in the immediate vicinity were then contacted and asked for information concerning Poirier, with negative results. It left Commander Yarrington with no other choice in the matter. Reluctantly, he proceeded according to the book. He filed a report to Communications Region 3 Coast Guard Headquarters advising them of the missing man’s status of AWOL. The message read: MISSING PERSON, DUNCAN POIRIER, WM, DOB 7-10-51, WEARING BLUE LEVIS, BRN JACKET, BLK SAFETY SHOES AND GOLD RIMMED GLASSES. LAST SEEN CORPUS CHRISTI 12-23-70. IF CONTACTED, ADVISE AUTHORITY. Commander Yarrington then called the missing man’s parents in Cleveland, Ohio, where he learned from Duncan’s mother that she had not heard from her son and still expected him home on furlough on December 27, as planned.
Puzzled, Commander Yarrington decided to investigate young Poirier’s disappearance by interviewing the personnel at the Station. He had just reached this decision when there was a knock on his door and one of Duncan Poirier’s close friends stepped into the office. Seaman Apprentice David Jenkins* had just learned of Seaman Poirier’s disappearance, and he had some alarming news to disclose. He claimed the missing man was acting as an undercover informer to a civilian law enforcement agency on a narcotics investigation.
This news took the Commander completely by surprise. He questioned Jenkins further, and learned that Jenkins suspected another sailor, John, of deliberately causing Poirier’s disappearance. Seaman Jenkins claimed that John was somehow mixed up with drugs and that Poirier knew about it. Supposedly, in a drunken stupor, Poirier had blabbed this information to an undercover cop, and it had eventually resulted in the arrest of two of John’s friends. John had then threatened to get even. Jenkins’s absolute belief in his story fostered suspicions in Commander Yarrington’s mind that Duncan Poirier might be the victim of foul play.
Yarrington began questioning all the personnel at the Station, including John, but he could discern nothing more about the missing man. One week passed, and still there was no trace of Seaman Poirier. The young man had made reservations on Braniff Airlines to fly with a shipmate to Cleveland, Ohio, on December 27, but he never showed up to use his plane ticket. His shipmate left as scheduled without him. Nor did the missing sailor apparently leave South Texas by any other commercial transportation or rental car. As far as everyone could surmise, Duncan Poirier still had to be somewhere in the immediate area.
On December 28, Commander Yarrington once again contacted the missing man’s mother, and in an effort to prepare her for what he felt would be worse news in the future, he revealed his suspicions of foul play. He then began another round of questioning of all of Poirier’s friends and acquaintances, civilian and otherwise. Again, he turned up nothing.
The next day, a representative from the 8th Coast Guard District Intelligence Office contacted Commander Yarrington by phone. The two men talked some length about the missing seaman, and Yarrington revealed that Poirier was a good worker, thought highly of the Coast Guard, and was just not the type to go AWOL. The Commander thought Poirier had met with foul play. He explained that Poirier had left around 1615 (4:15 p.m.) on the 23rd and failed to return to the Station prior to expiration of his authorized liberty at 0745 (7:45 a.m.), 24 December 1970. No trace of the missing man could be found anywhere. The young sailor appeared to have vanished from the face of the Earth.
After Yarrington told what he knew---and what he suspected---the officer in charge of the Corpus Christi Command decided to assign Intelligence Officers Nathan Eason and Chuck Calhoun to investigate the case. Their investigation opened a can of worms.
The two Intelligence Officers arrived at the Port Aransas Station the afternoon of December 29th. It was balmy and breezy, but not cold, and area residents were out repairing what was left of the storm damage caused by Hurricane Celia when it had blown in with a fury the afternoon of August 3rd. The great hurricane had come ashore between Corpus Christi and Port Aransas with peak wind gusts estimated as high as 210 miles per hour---no one knew for sure because the wind barometer at the Port Aransas Station had blown away. The surge tide in some places was greater than eleven feet. Although nearly everything in the storm’s path sustained damage or was destroyed, it was almost business as usual at the Coast Guard Station.
Sequestering themselves with Commander Yarrington, the two Intelligence Officers reviewed all the findings to date. Their reports, although detailed, did not reveal much. Seaman Poirier had left the Coast Guard Station December 23rd in work clothes to go to a civilian job down the street. Work clothes were Navy dungarees and denim shirt and were usually only permitted off-Station if a sailor was going to work at a civilian job in the immediate area. Poirier was not, therefore, in his dress military uniform or civilian clothes, as would have been the case if he were going on liberty or planning to go AWOL.
The investigators also discovered that Poirier had obtained a special liberty pass to attend a Christmas Eve party the night following his disappearance, on December 24th, in Port Aransas with another sailor. In fact, he had been planning on the dance for several days, but witnesses said that he had never shown up at the party. He just never returned to the Coast Guard Station after he had walked out the front gate on the evening of the 23rd. He had simply vanished into thin air.
Nathan Eason and Chuck Calhoun decided to begin a detailed interrogation of the missing man’s friends. They soon discovered that he had last been seen in the company of the same Seaman Apprentice named John that Seaman Jenkins had told Commander Yarrington about, only when John was brought in for further questioning, he couldn’t add much to his previous testimony. John claimed he had borrowed his civilian employer’s car and had driven Poirier ashore into Corpus Christi. John further said he had let the missing man out in front of the Texas State Optical Company on South Chaparral Street in the heart of downtown.
According to John, Poirier had just purchased new eyeglasses, and John assumed that the business Poirier claimed he was going to do somehow involved the glasses---“get them adjusted or something.” John then said Poirier claimed he would hitchhike to a “go-go” bar in the south part of town, where the two would meet and enjoy a few beers---only Poirier never showed up at the bar. After several hours of waiting, John said he had finally driven back to the Station alone.
Duncan Poirier’s trail seemed to end where John’s testimony said that he had left the missing man in downtown Corpus Christi, but Eason and Calhoun were suspicious. The Texas State Optical Company would not be open that late at night, so what kind of business could the young sailor be doing in a city whose downtown appeared to fold up at dark? And why hadn’t he returned to the Station and changed clothes prior to the trip ashore? John’s story just didn’t ring true. Yet, the investigators really had no concrete evidence to doubt the validity of John’s testimony.
Not knowing if Duncan Poirier was the victim of foul play or if he had simply gone into hiding, the two officers decided on a strategy to help find the missing man. After two long days of testimony, which gleaned all sorts of conflicting theories and facts, they drove back to Corpus Christi---to the Texas Ranger office in the Department of Public Safety building. Their plan was to ask for a Texas Ranger to assist.
Texas Ranger Jim Peters was in his office the day the two Intelligence Officers arrived. As offices go, his was nothing spectacular in construction or style, yet his office lived and breathed “Ranger” from every pore. One wall held pictures of the Coors Cowboys---cowboys in Arizona western garb with higher cut boots, leather shirt-cuffs, and creased cowboy hats along with their chaps, spurs, and cans of Coors beer. Directly opposite the cowboys were displays of barbed wire and old Ranger badges. A third wall held a painting of Mexican banditos, pistols blazing away, charging down main street in some nameless small western town.
A Conestoga covered wagon model sat on one table next to a tiny, plastic replica of modern-day law---an electric chair. On his desk stood a pair of bronze western boots filled with a brilliant array of pens and pencils. Next to the brass spittoon on the floor “grew” a plastic marijuana plant. The only things incongruous with the Old Ranger lore were the metal filing cabinets crammed to capacity. Early Texas Rangers may have been brief in their reports with epistles like, “A norther blew up. I pulled the cover off, and he froze to death,” in describing a campout on the Pecos, but not Jim Peters. He keeps meticulous notes, even if his reports to headquarters are impersonal.
Jim Peters is never surprised by what he sees or what he hears. Years of dealing with undesirable characters in the line of duty has left him prepared for practically everything. But when the two military men walked into his office, he was a tad curious, to say the least. Military matters were not normally within the scope of his jurisdiction, unless of course, some sort of crime had occurred on his turf.
He listened courteously to what the two Coast Guard intelligence officers had to say and then carefully read the reports turned over to him. He agreed with the two investigators that it was highly unlikely that Seaman Poirier had voluntarily left his duty assignment at the Coast Guard Station by going AWOL. Peters didn’t think Poirier had gone into hiding, either. Suspecting foul play, he readily agreed to enter the case.
During the first four days of the New Year of 1971, Peters covered virtually all the same ground as Commander Yarrington and the two Coast Guard Intelligence Officers. He began by interrogating and interviewing sailor after sailor at the Port Aransas Station. Perhaps it was his Ranger presence, as well as his interrogation technique, but all sorts of underworld characters began to turn up.
Jim Peters began with Seaman Jenkins, who had been the first to suggest to Commander Yarrington that Duncan Poirier might be a victim of foul play. Jenkins revealed that John was a user of narcotics and had for a friend, a former Coast Guardsman, nicknamed “Gizmo,” who had been living in nearby Ingleside since his discharge. Jenkins suspected “Gizmo” of being a narcotics user and pusher. Jenkins also gave Peters the same story about Duncan’s undercover work for a narcotics investigation. It was a strange tale, full of intrigue and intimidation, and it sent Peters’ sixth sense into overdrive.
“I knew then that Poirier was dead,” Peters said, “and I was pretty sure I knew where the body might be. I was also sure I knew who had killed him. But I didn’t have any proof.”
Seaman Jenkins said that on or about December 16th, while he was drinking in a local bar, John had approached him and demanded that he drive both John and Poirier into Corpus Christi. Jenkins claimed that John was extremely firm and just insisted that he “had to make the trip.” When Jenkins had asked John why, Jenkins claimed that John had replied, “I have to deliver Poirier.”
Jenkins said that he just didn’t like the tone of things, so he asked John to clarify the word “deliver.” John then said that Poirier had informed on two of his buddies concerning narcotics, and they had been arrested and were then in jail. John wanted to even the score. When Jenkins asked how John planned to even the score, he was told that Poirier was to be beaten up and held prisoner for a few days to make him AWOL. John then added, almost innocently, “We’re not going to kill him.”
The whole idea didn’t appeal to Seaman Jenkins. In fact, he was horrified by what he had just heard. He declined to assist John in any way. To say that John was displeased was an understatement. He glared at Jenkins and hissed a warning, “If you say anything about what I asked you to do to anyone, my friends will take care of you.”
At that moment the two sailors were joined by a third man from the Coast Guard Station, and the subject was closed. When Duncan Poirier turned up missing, Seaman Jenkins had immediately volunteered the information to Commander Yarrington, and it was this story that had fostered suspicions of foul play.
But for reasons known only to himself, Seaman Jenkins had not warned Duncan Poirier about John. Jenkins had also not divulged everything he knew to Commander Yarrington. It’s possible he still hoped Duncan Poirier would return, or maybe he suspected the worst and feared for his own life. Whatever the reason, when Jim Peters called for him, Jenkins revealed additional information which also pointed the finger of guilt at John.
According to Jenkins, John had undergone some really drastic personality changes in the past several months, which included getting angry over little things, fighting at the drop of a hat, sleeping a lot, and staying extremely nervous all the time. And with Commander Yarrington’s stepped-up, on-going investigation into Poirior’s disappearance, John also appeared jittery, moody, and completely high-strung. In Jenkins’s opinion, John was “not the type to beat up on anyone for fear of getting hurt himself, but he is not beyond setting someone else up.”
Jenkins then filled the tall Ranger in on the scuttlebutt circulating at the Station. According to the rumors that Jenkins had heard, John’s civilian employer at a local motel was a homosexual, and everyone thought John was also. The civilian employer had recently “turned John out,” and the sailor was making passes at others at the Station. John also always seemed to be broke and in need of money, and most of the other sailors believed John spent his paycheck on drugs. Jenkins then provided Jim with the name of another sailor who could substantiate the gossip.
Jim Peters pulled in the second sailor to corroborate the testimony. This man, Seaman Wayne Thompson*, voiced the opinion that John had set Poirier up, that the missing sailor was “entirely too intelligent to do such a stupid thing” as to go AWOL. He added other tidbits to the case, which had already turned black.
First, Thompson clarified the story about Seaman Poirier being an undercover investigator for a narcotics case. “It wasn’t true,” he claimed. “Poirier and John just used to run around alot together in their off-duty hours. That’s all.” It was Thompson’s opinion that John had a lot to hide. Also, like most young men when they drank too much, Poirier talked too much. Thompson thought Poirier might have revealed something that John wanted kept secret, or he might have witnessed some of John’s nefarious activities and “run his head about it after a few beers.”
Seaman Thompson further claimed that John was a homosexual, having made advances toward him on several occasions. It was “payment” for John getting him a civilian job at the same place where John worked. Thompson claimed that Poirier had the same trouble with John. “He [Poirier] had told me after I had started working at [the motel] to watch that place, and I told him I knew exactly what he meant. John had made homosexual advances toward him [Poirier] there.”
Thompson continued that he had later told John that homosexual acts were not normal and to leave him alone. This had infuriated John, who then exploded, “It’s you guys who are not normal. Just wait and see. One of these days we will take over.” The sailor ended his testimony by advising Ranger Peters to contact Seaman Apprentice Douglas Brunson* for corroborating testimony.
Jim Peters visited with Seaman Brunson, currently confined to the brig at the Corpus Christi Naval Air Station after having been convicted at a court martial, and learned that Seaman John was homosexual and could easily be mixed up in something. “He [John] had a lot of civilian friends with bad reputations,” Brunson said. Brunson also suggested the Poirier may have gotten on the bad side of a local motorcycle gang known as the “Banditos.”
This testimony didn’t surprise the Ranger all that much. After learning that drugs were involved, he knew other shady dealings might also be part of the case. But he was surprised that the “nicest guy in the Coast Guard” could have such unsavory characters as friends. Digging deeper and deeper, Peters began to uncover evidence which suggested that Seaman Duncan Poirier had stumbled into something he was not prepared to handle, something that had made him the victim of foul play.
Peters' investigation led him to Seaman Stan Smith*, another good friend of Poirier’s, for questioning. Seaman Smith also claimed he had heard rumors that John was a homosexual, but he personally did not know it for a fact. He did say, however, `that Thompson, John, and myself used to go to the motel where John worked to hear the stereo music and help out with odd jobs. Poirier was propositioned for homosexual activities by the manager there.’
Seaman Smith provided Jim with the name of a soldier on active duty in the United States Army, who was an addict and pusher. The soldier made his home in Port Aransas, while serving at a nearby military installation. When Jim Peters questioned the soldier, the man admitted knowing Poirier and suggested Jim talk to a man known as Danny. Danny was in custody in the Nueces County Jail in Corpus Christi for stealing dynamite to be used to bomb the Corpus Christ Police Department. Every lead led Peters further down the seedy path of unsavory characters.
In his methodical questioning of sailor after sailor, Peters discovered that Poirier did not intend to leave the Station permanently. One seaman had given Duncan a dollar to buy a cap emblem for him at the Navy PX, the Post Exchange. The quartermaster had also quizzed Duncan on why he was wearing work clothes on pass, and the missing man had answered that he was going to a civilian job. Another sailor proclaimed Poirier was to attend a party on the eve of December 24th, but had never shown up. The most convincing evidence of all, however, was that Seaman Poirier’s savings account showed no cash withdrawal prior to the 23rd. A man planning to go into hiding or AWOL would surely take money with him.
As Peters continued his investigation, he became extremely visible around the Coast Guard Station. In the next few days he, along with the Coast Guard Intelligence Officers Nathan Eason and Chuck Calhoun and Deputy Sheriff Jim Murray, also searched several locations between Port Aransas and Padre Island where a person could have been hidden.
They found nothing.
Jim Peters then asked several of the sailors to take a polygraph test, and the results of the testing indicated that they believed everything they had said. John, however, refused to take the test, which did not surprise Peters in the least.
Things took a strange turn when Peters learned from a probation violator confined in the Nueces County Jail in Corpus Christi that Poirier just might have been a drug dealer with John as the pusher. A hippie living on the beach claimed Poirier had been dealing in heroin. The hippie further said that Poirier had gotten into trouble with his suppliers and had been “rubbed out.”
But the more Peters investigated these allegations, the more he found evidence which pointed to Poirier’s innocence in all the nefarious activities. Everything was apparently all a smoke screen to pull Peters off the scent, and again he wondered how Poirier could have become entangled with such a group.
Peters decided to re-question John. The overall consensus at the Station was that John had murdered the missing man. Maybe, by confronting John with all the allegations against him, the man would confess.
John couldn’t know it, but it’s never wise to mess with Jim Peters. His face, as worn and weather-beaten as the trusty scabbard of a Winchester rifle (a friend once said that `if he can see you, he can hit you with it’) is sometimes about as friendly as a “Don’t Mess With Texas” sign, especially when confronting criminals and other unsavory types. He can’t stand liars, barely tolerates fools, and stupidity sends him stalking off in disgust. His stern expression and tall frame adds up to one intimidating character when he wants to be. Although the Ranger organization doesn’t need one, he’d make a fine recruiting poster for the force.
John, however, was not intimidated by Peters’ Ranger presence or the allegations against him. In fact, he was not even cooperative like the other sailors had been. When first introduced to the big Ranger several days earlier, he had refused to stand or even acknowledge the proffered handshake. Instead, he had stared sullenly at the floor with an attitude as disrespectful and surly as possible.
Now, in the re-questioning, in a sneering, snarling voice, he insisted that he had borrowed his civilian employer’s car, had driven Duncan Poirier to downtown Corpus Christi, dropped the missing man off on a street corner, and had then continued to the bar on the south side of town, where Poirier was supposed to have eventually ended up for a ride back to the Coast Guard Station. Only, “Poirier just never showed up, and I didn’t feel like waiting around for him.”
Then. inexplicably and totally out of character to the way he was behaving, John suddenly turned helpful by adding details he had not told in prior testimony. He claimed that Poirier had been interested in a barmaid at a tavern in Corpus Christi and hinted that Duncan may have run off somewhere with her. He also added that around 9:00 p.m. he had driven out to the Corpus Christi International Airport and had picked up his civilian employer. The two of them had then returned to Port Aransas together. He continued to insist that he had spent the night at the Coast Guard Station.
In interviewing John, Jim Peters knew he had his man. His gut instincts told him that John had killed young Poirier and had buried the body somewhere in the miles of sand along the beach. But finding the body would take a miracle. It had to be buried deep enough that the coyotes wouldn’t dig it up and far enough back in the dunes that beachcombers wouldn’t stumble over the grave. Or perhaps John had just simply tossed the body aside in a remote area of the island, intending to let Nature and the elements do the rest. The challenge of finding the body set Peters’ adrenalin flowing. But, where to begin?
The most unique feature to Mustang Island is in its accessibility, and it’s the main reason it is so popular. A twenty-four hour ferry connects it to the mainland on the north end, although it still takes some island-hopping and short stretches of causeway to reach the nearest small town of Aransas Pass. There is also another access forty miles down the beach where Corpus Christi intersects Padre Island. It is one of the few remaining islands in the United States where motor vehicles are allowed to drive on the beach. Locals and visitors alike think nothing of making the eighty mile round trip by entering and exiting the Island at either end. And with a four-wheel drive, it’s also possible to traverse clear down to the Mansfield Cut on the south end of Padre Island, more than 120 miles away. Jim Peters knew that John could have hidden Poirier’s body just about anywhere.
Peters also knew he had three other problems. First, he had to find the body before the annual influx of Spring Breakers destroyed the crime scene and any evidence which might link to John. In two months, the whole area, which is known as the Texas Riviera, the Crown Jewel of the Coastal Bend, would be crammed to capacity with nearly 300,000 party-goers from high schools and colleges located all over the United States.
Second, at the time of Seaman Poirier’s disappearance, the beaches were recovering from a devastating hurricane, which had struck in early August. There would be no way of distinguishing new damage to the dunes from the recent storm damage. John could dig a grave anywhere, and no one would be the wiser.
Third, people were driving the eighty mile circle in droves. Although some were looking at the storm damage, most were out collecting sea shells. It’s a known fact that the best time to shell hunt is after severe storms, and Hurricane Celia was the most severe storm to hit the area since 1919. For months, wave action had been depositing beautiful shells on the beach, making shell hunting a prime activity at low tide, which occurred once in the morning and again at night. How many shell seekers had seen a car parked on the beach late at night or witnessed activity back in the dunes?
Peters started his search by closely rechecking John’s movements for the night of December 23rd. If he could discover exactly how long John had been away from the Station and which way the sailor had taken to drive into Corpus Christi, he just might be able to localize a possible section of the island in which to start searching for a grave. It didn’t take long for Peters to uncover the first crack in John’s story.
John had claimed he had been at the tavern drinking beer for nearly two hours with a go-go dancer who entertained under the stage name of “Rumar,” while waiting for Poirier to show up. Peters finally tracked the girl down in San Antonio, and although she admitted to knowing both Poirier and John, she blew John’s alibi.
“I know John very well,” Rumar told the big Ranger, “and he did not come in the club on December 23rd, and I did not sit and drink beer with him. I remember the 23rd very well, and I am not mistaken.”
Bingo! Two hours of John’s tale were now unaccounted for. The puzzle was beginning to unravel. Peters knew it was only a matter of time before he had John in jail.
Although Jim worked on other cases, every free moment was devoted to the Poirier case. And in doing so, he demonstrated the two tactics that more than any other have made him famous for “getting his man.” First was his relentless pursuit of the case. John surely knew that Peters was not giving up. The second was the psychological aspect of Peters’ Ranger presence. As he probed and asked questions, his methodical investigative efforts elicited more evidence pointing to John’s guilt, even if Poirier’s body did remain hidden.
On January 7th, Jim Peters interviewed John’s civilian employer, and the plot thickened. Bob Jones claimed that John met him at the airport at 9 p.m. just as John had claimed, but that John appeared to be tired and groggy. In fact, he appeared to have been physically exerting himself to the point of exhaustion. John also did not smell of alcohol and did not appear to have been drinking. If John had spent all that time drinking in a bar as he had claimed, wouldn’t he have had beer on his breath?
Jones said he then offered to buy John a beer, but John refused, claiming he was too tired. The civilian wanted to know why John was so tired, and John had answered, “I’ve been rabbit hunting.” The motel owner was intrigued and asked where John had gone to go rabbit hunting. What route had John taken to come into Corpus Christi? Jones said that John replied, “South. I came via the Padre Island causeway.”
Jones told Jim Peters that he and John then drove to the Coast Guard Station where John got out, and the motel owner drove home. Jones was home approximately an hour when John phoned and requested the motel owner to return to the Station because John had left an important item in the car. Complying with John’s request, Jones pulled in the side gate and watched as John took a long-barreled shotgun from the floorboard of the back of the car. John said he had to turn it in the next morning, and Jones watched as John placed the weapon in a red box under the Coast Guard office. Jones then backed out the gate and drove back home.
Peters now had two more pieces to the puzzle. One, John had driven down the beach and entered Corpus Christi via the Padre Island access, and two, he had had in his possession a shotgun. Might not the shotgun be the murder weapon?
Peters took Bob Jones to the Station and had him point out the red box. “That is where John put the gun,” the man said, pointing to a red “crash” box under the building. Jim then checked the records in the Arms Room and interviewed the sailors working there. He discovered that John had checked out a 12-gauge shotgun on the 23rd, but no ammunition. When John had returned the weapon on the morning of the 24th, it had been fired, but not cleaned. It was still in this condition, and Peters confiscated it.
If John had checked out only the gun, no ammunition, and the gun had been fired and not cleaned when it was returned, where did John get the shells? It didn’t take long for Peters to discover that John had “borrowed” one shell, and only one shell, from an acquaintance in Aransas Pass. When asked if he had wanted more ammunition for his “hunting trip,” John had cryptically replied, “One is enough. I won’t need any more.”
It was now time to obtain a search warrant for John’s quarters and lockers. On January 10th, accompanied by FBI Agent Penrod Harris, Jim Peters thoroughly searched through John’s personal belongings, while John stood sullenly by on the sidelines. In one of the lockers, nestled among some articles of clothing, Peters found a small quantity of narcotics and pills, which he handed to Agent Harris, who bagged and tagged it. Peters found another locker crammed full of books on Satanism, the black arts, and occult practices. Seizing one of the books at random, Peters opened it to a marker and stared at the heading: “HAVE YOU EVER WONDERED WHAT IT WOULD BE LIKE TO KILL SOMEONE?”
Peters turned and looked searchingly at John. The sailor stood as if poised to attack. His brown hair had fallen down over his forehead, and his brown eyes were almost hooded behind his lids. With his shoulders hunched forward and his hands balled into fists, the man looked positively dangerous. But John’s demeanor didn’t faze the big Ranger. He calmly asked, “Did you ever wonder what it would be like to kill someone, John? Or do you already know?”
The answer was a primeval snarl from John similar to a wild animal caught in a trap. It took both lawmen completely by surprise, and they immediately stopped their search and marched the hostile sailor back into Commander Yarrington’s office for further questioning. When they got there, John refused to cooperate. He sat in sullen, raged silence, while Jim Peters studied him.
Finally, Peters spoke. “John, look at me when I talk to you.”
John looked up with sheer hate in his eyes, and his lips pulled back in an open sneer. “What do you want from me?” he snarled in defiance.
Although sullen and angry, John reluctantly began to answer Peters' questions, but under the pressure of the Ranger's pointed interrogation, he started contradicting himself. When the discrepancies were pointed out to him, he then refused to talk altogether.
Peters let the suspect sit in the festering silence a few moments, before speaking.
“Son,” Peters said.
John looked back at the Ranger with eyes full of fury.
“I believe you killed Duncan Poirier. I know you think he snitched you off for using drugs. I know you threatened to have him worked over. I think you buried his body in the sand dunes south of here. Why don’t you confess and get it over with?”
John stared at Peters in contempt for a moment, and then something straight out of a horror movie occurred. The suspect’s face twisted and contorted into a grotesque leer, and his eyes filled with venom and rolled around in his head. His lips curled back from his teeth like a vicious dog’s, and he emitted the deep, eerie snarl of an enraged, trapped animal. He then jumped to his feet and bolted for the door.
“Hold it,” Peters voice cracked like a rifle shot, and John turned with a maniacal look in his eyes. “You can go for now, but I’ll see you again.”
Before Jim Peters left the Station that afternoon, he went to the barracks to talk to John one more time, hoping to elicit a confession and discover the location of Duncan Poirier’s body. He found the sailor rared back on the top bunk with his hands behind his head. One look at John’s face, and Jim knew it was useless to talk to the man. John just sneered when the tall Ranger walked into the room. He didn’t even bother to move---just peeled his lips back over his teeth and snarled, eyes filled with hate.
“I’m going to get you, John!” Peters promised. “I know you killed him, and his body is somewhere south of here in those sand dunes. I know you shot him with a 12-gauge shotgun to the head. I’m going to search every square inch of this island until I find him, and when I do, I’m coming back after you.”
Although it was late afternoon, Peters’ adrenalin was at an all-time peak. He was so determined to find Duncan Poirier, so determined to bring the boy’s murderer to justice that he promptly went and checked out the Department of Public Safety helicopter, beginning a foot-by-foot ariel search of the fifty-four square miles of Mustang Island. It was a monumental task from the beginning, but he didn’t care. He planned to do everything in his power to put John in jail.
Unknown to Peters, at that very moment, two treasure hunters back in the sand dunes of Padre Island were already making a grisly discovery of their own.
Peters’ first cursory flights up and down the Mustang Island beach were without incident, just as he had suspected they would be. If the body had been anywhere near the beach areas, someone would have already found it. Also, contrary to what is depicted in western movies, buzzards don’t attack human flesh, at least not in South Texas where there are so many tasty morsels lying all over the ranch lands. The buzzards “swarming-in-the-sky-routine” wasn’t going to be of any help. Peters knew he was looking for a needle in haystack, but he was also determined to find the right haystack and, eventually, the missing needle. He just hoped that John had been so bold, so daring, as to have left Poirier’s body exposed in the dunes.
The helicopter flew at fifty to one hundred feet over the monotonous, barren landscape of Mustang Island, and Peters ordered it to land at every suspicious clump of tangled undergrowth, where he searched on foot through the marshes and gullys. He found nothing on Mustang Island, so he began flying southward to incorporate Padre Island in the search. If necessary, he was going all the way to the Padre Island access road of Corpus Christi, and then to points even further south. He was determined not to quit until he found the missing Duncan Poirier.
Peters had been in the air less than an hour before he received information that skeletal remains were found by two men exploring back in the dunes on Padre Island. The two men were searching for anything that might have turned up in the way of treasure after Hurricane Celia. When they stumbled upon the skeleton, they notified the National Seashore Headquarters. The Park Rangers promptly called the Department of Public Safety. The location was 6.5 miles south of the highly popular Nueces County Park, and about forty-five miles south of the Port Aransas Coast Guard Station.
That particular area of Padre Island lies in Kleberg County, which meant another law enforcement agency was now involved. All totaled, the agencies included the Coast Guard Intelligence, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the sheriff’s departments of Aransas, San Patricio, Nueces, and Kleberg Counties, the police department of Port Aransas, and the Texas Rangers. There was still more to come.
Jim Peters was methodically flying down the beach, covering Padre Island the same way he had just covered Mustang Island not more than a half hour earlier. In fact, he was only five minutes away from making the discovery himself. He flew immediately to the site, knowing instantly that the skeleton was Duncan Poirier’s. FBI Agent Penrod Harris and Deputy Sheriff Jim Murray also rushed to the scene.
A gruesome sight awaited the investigators. The body was lying face down in the sand and about 400 yards back in the brush. All the flesh had been stripped from the bones by foraging coyotes, except for the feet, which were still encased in service boots. One arm and hand was completely missing, probably carried off by animals, and the investigators never did find them. The skull was shattered by a single blast from a shotgun at close range, and Peters knew instinctively that it was the gun John had checked out of the Coast Guard Station, the shell being the one borrowed from the friend in Aransas Pass.
The clothing was all tattered and shredded by the coyotes. The dungarees were pulled down over the boots. Military serial numbers on the torn and rotted clothing and on the boots proved that the corpse was that of the missing sailor, Duncan Hugh Poirier. His billfold, found about seventy-five feet from the body, contained his papers and military identification. Lying nearby was an open pocket knife, subsequently identified as belonging to the victim. Duncan Poirier had attempted to fight for his life, but he had lost.
A Justice of the Peace was summoned to the scene by radio, and Jim Peters had the magistrate sign a warrant for the arrest of John. This was done in the sand dunes, where the magistrate used the tall Ranger’s back as a table to sign the document. Peters and Agent Harris then drove to the Port Aransas Coast Guard Station to arrest John on a charge of first degree murder.
John was still lying on his bunk with his fingers interlocked, his hands folded up behind his head on the pillow, when the lawmen arrived. It was 9:30 p.m., and he was sound asleep.
Jim Peters admits to having experienced a tremendous feeling of satisfaction when he walked in and slapped the sleeping sailor on the bottom of his bare feet, announcing, “We found him, John. I told you I’d see you again. You’re under arrest for the murder of Duncan Poirier.”
Peters and Agent Harris drove John to the Nueces County Jail in Corpus Christi where he was “Miranda-ized” and spent the night. The following morning, he was transferred to the Kleberg County Jail in Kingsville, headquarters of the famous King Ranch. There, John was formally arraigned on the charge of murder in the presence of Kleberg County Sheriff Jim Scarborough.
Although the chase had ended with Jim Peters catching his quarry, the case didn’t end then. It should have been over with the customary thoroughness which Peters provided to the prosecutors, namely the weapon, the spent shell and wading taken from the corpse, the FBI reports on the weapon and shell, the blood-stains on the muzzle of the weapon, as well as the dozens of fingerprints on the body of the weapon, along with all the evidence already stacked up against John. But incredibly, John wasn’t tried, convicted, and punished for his hideous crime.
As a military prisoner in a civilian court, there apparently was some sort of confusion on the part of court authorities as to John’s actual status. A civilian lawyer somehow obtained John’s release on a ridiculously low bail of $5,000, and John was then placed in the custody of Commander Yarrington at the Port Aransas Coast Guard Station. Although Commander Yarrington restricted John to the base, the officer soon realized that he had a really bad problem on his hands. Poirier had been deeply liked by everyone at the Station, and they highly resented John for the young sailor’s murder. The commander felt it was entirely possible that there was going to be another murder---this time with John as the victim. As a protective measure, he had John transferred to Coast Guard Headquarters in New Orleans, still under bond.
What occurred next has got to be one of the most senseless, most stupid, bureaucratic bungles in history. John, still under bond, still charged with capital murder, was discharged from the service and, for all intents and purposes, walked into society in New Orleans a free man.
John promptly returned to his former life by moving into an apartment with two men, one of whom was a prominent New Orleans attorney. One morning, the second roommate walked from the bathroom into the living room and witnessed John withdrawing a huge carving knife from the back of the attorney. John, discovering that he had been seen, then turned and attacked the other man, who managed to crawl away and use the phone to summon help. John, his bloodlust apparently satiated with the stabbing death of the attorney and the frenzied slashing he gave to the other roommate, who survived the attack, sat calmly in a chair to await the arrival of police officers. He was arrested and charged with that killing, but a Louisiana court ruled him non compus mentis, or mentally incapable of standing trial. Ruled hopelessly insane, he was confined to the Lake Jackson Hospital for the Criminally Insane.
Jim Peters never did find out what prompted Poirier’s murder, other than John thought Duncan was a snitch. Maybe that’s all the motive ever was. Considering John’s increasingly strange behavior, though, what ruse did he use to lure Duncan for a ride down the dark beach? How did John get Duncan to walk 1,300 feet back into the sand dunes so he could be killed with a shotgun blast to the head at close range? No one may ever find out.
“He [John] will never stand trial for the murders, but neither will he be free again,” said Jim Peters. “That’s my main concern.”