Love of Flame in Kennadale: The John Hummel Murder Case | Signal 51 Chronicles Case 7 Pt. 1

This is the Signal 51 Chronicles. Love of Flame in Kennadale. I'm John Henry. To my left here is my compadre, retired sergeant of the fourth Police Department, Jake White. I'm sure you have one there. Thanks, man. I probably have worn this before. Is that pink or orange? Oh, man. I've had other people ask me. In my eyes, it's clearly- Salmon. Think it's orange. I've actually done a side by side comparison to a true color orange. It is orange. I'm telling you it's salmon. That voice you hear on the other side is our producer extraordinaire, Ashley. Hello, boys. Good afternoon. Something like that? Yeah, we are afternoon timing it right now. We're somewhere. Somewhere in the We come to you from an undisclosed location in Fort Worth, Texas. In the throws, in the heart of. Pretty much in the heart of. Yeah, I think so. Yeah. So yeah, we're calling that salmon, salmon shirt. I wanted orange. You don't remember getting into an argument about this on Saturday, do you? Man. No? Are you serious? Yes. I don't remember that. It there the the the conversations jump so much. Yeah. Yeah, you were adamant that this was orange. It is orange. It is 100% orange. Not pink. Get a freaking orange and hold it up next to it, and you tell me. And what really kind of miffed you about the whole thing is you were you looked to from all appearances to match to be matching your your beloved wife that evening. You're both in pink. No. Alright. I'm well, I'm gonna I will solve this before the day is over, after we get done recording this, and you will see. It's orange, and that's it. Alright. You already took a picture for me. You don't remember any of that, D. I do now. That's why. That's why you had a picture of it in your phone. That makes sense. I thought it was like an accidental, oh man. Oh my goodness. I have gotten a couple of good pictures lately driving around this fine town. Yeah, saw one. Yeah. You sent to me. I finally found saw somebody in Fort Worth in the Fentanyl Fold. Yeah, they were there full. Noticed you showed it to me. Yeah. Two guys? Yeah. Yeah, on the bus stop, on the bricks. I'd never seen that before. Yeah. In Fort Worth. I've seen it like in San Francisco and other places. Never seen it here. I think we'll start seeing more of it. You see, you made that prediction. I did. And I'm standing by it. Wouldn't surprise me. I'm surprised I haven't seen it already. I know. Ashley, what do you know no good? What do I what? Know no good. Oh, I'm kinda lame lately, y'all. I don't know no I don't know much about nothing besides I'm gonna they got some shadows on your face I'm about to fix. Uh-oh. Oh. They might be helping me. I have the I have the light set out just wide enough that it puts a shadow on y'all's faces. That's the shadow of doubt, John Henry. Well, that's what I'm here for. And that's those are the things we look out for is we look for verdicts beyond a shadow of a doubt. Mhmm. Well, we have one today. Boy, we one today indeed. We do have one today, I think. Oh, that's so Let's go to blotter first. Stolen water media is making a move. After two plus years, it's time to change and keep up with our growth. You can continue to view all eight of our podcasts on our Patreon pages, but now you can get all episodes at stolenwatermedia.com. That's right. All StolenWaterMedia productions, Your Dark Companion, Just Wondering with Norm Hitskas, Al Maximo, Beer 30, The Clubhouse Podcast, Ingle Angle, Signal 51 Chronicles, and Sunset Soccer Club are all available on our website. It is a developing story, but you can begin consuming all of our content now at stolenwatermedia.com. Continue to find all audio wherever you find your favorite podcasts and some places you've never heard of. And of course we are available on YouTube. You all continue to support us in our success. We feel and appreciate the love as always, please rate us and leave a review wherever you follow us, Share us on social media and recommend us to your family and friends. Thank you. You're familiar with Young County? Yeah, I am actually. Not too far from here. Two hours east and a little south. Yeah. Towards Longview. Yeah. You've been out there? I've been through there, yeah. Selling houses? No, not in Young County. I can't remember what took me out through that way, but I have. You happen to know a JP out there? No, I do not. Well, a Young County justice of the peace is under investigation. After a late night fight with a teenage boy outside a Whataburger. That sounds not good. Fight happened about 1AM Sunday at the Whataburger and Graham, and Graham is West. I'm thinking of something else. Graham is West. That's what I was I thought yeah. Yeah. It's West. Graham is West. Correct. I'm thinking of another county out near Longmont. Northwest, I believe. It is. Graham. Graham. That's out Northwest. Fort Graham. It's about 90 miles west of Fort Worth. Yep. Fact. So justice of the peace precinct one, Jason Hearn and a group of teens began arguing inside the restaurant after the youngsters had posed for photos with social media influencer Danny Duncan. Are you familiar with Danny Duncan? Me either. Apparently he's a YouTuber. And he was in Gram? Yeah, It's popping out there, y'all. I guess so. He's a YouTuber with more than 8,000,000 subscribers. He came here to Fort Worth. Did he? Originally. Yeah, think so. I think that's him. Anyway, he was in the restaurant with a film crew. The witness said Judge Hearn made a homophobic remark to one of the teens about taking a photo with another man. One of the teens said, told KFDX, He started talking about if it's cool to take pictures with another dude, basically calling us gay and stuff. This is a direct quote? Yeah. Okay. From the teen anyway. Yes. Sounds very teenage. When their arguments spilled into the parking lot, that's when witnesses said, Judge Hearn threw the first punch and the brawl began. Videos of the fight have reportedly circulated online including one video showing Hearn walking toward one of the teens. The teens can be seen with his fist raised saying, Come on big boy. I don't care who you are accompanied by foul language. Terry Rhodes, a district judge coordinator, told KFDX on behalf of district judge Philip Gregory that Gregory was aware of the circumstances believed the matter was under investigation. What do you think about the future of Judge Hearn? You get off with this? Mean, You said he's young. How young is he? Well, must be young if he's starting fights. Had a Whataburger. He's Young County. Oh. That's what you're thinking of. Yeah, I'm getting a con yeah, but that does bring up the question, how old is this judge? He's at a Whataburger, right? At one in the morning. At 01:00 in the morning, so you know more than likely where he was at before. He wasn't at Oscar's Pub, but he might have been at something of the equivalent. A strip club. Wonder if Graham is zoned for strip clubs. Probably not. Okay. So growing up, you didn't realize that there were strip clubs in certain places, but there were. Oh, Nasal in Springtown at least. Oh, yeah. Bet. You know, it's kinda like the old during prohibition you had the old speakeasies where Had to have the password. Had to have the password, yeah. So yeah, I could see there being a strip club in Springtown. Danny Duncan, never heard of Danny Duncan. Yeah, think he's the one. It was a big to do a couple of years ago. He is huge. I don't know anything about him, but So one witness is a fellow named Preston Birch, who said he was present at the Whataburger. He said that Danny Duncan got up to leave and we were like, we should get a picture with him. So we asked for a picture and he kindly gave us pictures. And as he walked off PJ, one judge of Young County was in there with his family. He started talking about if it's cool to take pictures with another dude basically calling us gay and stuff. As they stepped outside, Cade turned around to look at him, talked to him and he just punched him in the face. Cade being one of these kids. And Cade also defended himself, he punched back, Birch said. Locally, some residents said the video and reports are concerning. I watched the video and honestly, it was kind of shocking. It appears that he initiated physical contact from the videos that are circulating. Said Ms. Jennifer Flores, the Graham resident. I just think as a public official, he should definitely hold some accountability. I believe that that is not the level of conduct that I would expect from someone in that position. The position of adult or of mean, is fighting a kid? What adult is fighting a kid? Don't know the positions even Judge though or otherwise. Anyway, another Graham resident Larry Nanez, he had something to say about it. He said, well, fighting never solves anything. There's always somebody gonna be tougher than you, so fighting doesn't solve anything. Well, we wish the best of luck to judge Hearn. We have not reached out for comment from him. Do you really wish him luck? Yeah, he's gonna need it. I mean, yeah, mean, yeah, I mean, what an idiot, but yeah, he's gonna. I just I struggle with taking a fight with a bunch of teenagers. Silly, ain't it? Yeah. Let's go off to Kennadale, Texas. Kennadale. Which is where our case emanates today. They've probably had some good blotter stories down in Kennadale over the years. Some what stories? Some good blotter stories. Oh, no doubt happened. 100 hike down at that racetrack. Well, know, grew up not far from there. Not far. Uh-uh. You ever run across any Kennadale Rogues when you were growing up? No, there wasn't. No. No. I never had too many I never had any run ins with the laws out there or nothing. No. No. No. No. Not I mean, it was really kind of a nothing town. Yeah. But they have that racetrack that you can hear from West Fort Worth from time to time. Not like the not like the the convenience store racetrack. No. The actual racetrack. Actual racetrack. I didn't know about that. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Kennedydale Raceway. Yeah. Safe from here. I know you can hear from somewhere ridiculously far. I don't remember where. I know it's Kennedy Kennedydale Raceway. Yeah. Everybody just died out there recently too. At the racetrack? Yeah. I think so. But it's on the border of Fort Worth and and Kennedydale where a great barbecue restaurant is. Oh yeah. You've waited in the line, haven't you? No, haven't. I got there before the line, but Press pass? Did you have press pass? No, no. Before it became famous. Goldies. Yeah, oh yeah. Barbecue. Yeah, I know you know what I'm talking about. It's right there on where that street is? Dick Price Road. Dick Price Road. Have you ever press passed your way into somewhere? What do you mean? Like sporting event or something No, like no. That's a good way to get banned. It is? Oh, yeah. Oh, okay. I didn't know. I don't know how that world works. Yeah, Jake. We operate on the highest ethical standards. Okay, well, good. I'm glad to hear this. All right, so what have we got in Kennedale, Texas? This happened some fifteen, sixteen, seventeen years ago. Yeah, what about sixteen years ago ish? Yeah. Seventeen ish? '17. Yeah. 2009, I think was a year. Yeah. Just after midnight, a quiet neighborhood in Kennandale was shaken awake by the glow of fire. At first, it looked just like a house fire, a tragic house fire, just like a house fire. Flames ripped through the home on Little School Road as as smoke poured into the cold December sky. We are a week before Christmas. Neighbors stepped outside in confusion. Sirens echoed down the street. Police and firefighters respond. The firefighters made entry and almost immediately they realized this was something far worse than just a fire. Inside the house were bodies, three of them. A pregnant mother, a five year old little girl, and a 57 year old man. Soon investigators would discover something chilling. The victims had not died in the fire. Someone had killed them first. And the man who reported the tragedy may have known far more than he claimed. This is the story of the Kennandale murders and the case against John Hummel. Kennandale, as we mentioned, is about, what, fifteen minutes from here, Southeast? Yeah. It's kind of a place that is not known for violent crime. Be curious to see those statistics. We should dig those up. Relatively low, obviously. But it's a small suburb tucked between Fort Worth and Arlington. It's quiet streets, it's family homes. There is high school football, of course. In fact, they've been pretty good over the years. They've been to the state finals once or twice in the last ten years. And it's the type of community where neighbors know each other. And that's what made the events starting on 12/17/2009 and extending into December 18 so shocking. Shortly after midnight, emergency dispatchers began receiving calls about this house fire on Little School Road. It was a passerby who noticed that the home was burning. In approximately fifteen minutes after the 09:11 call, police officer Joshua Worthy arrived. Worthy attempted to enter the home, but the smoke and flames were too much. Worthy called out for any occupants inside to exit, but no one responded. Officer Worthy noticed that the back of the house was open. Firefighters arrived on scene and extinguished the blaze. Then came this horrifying discovery. Inside the home firefighters located three victims in their bedrooms. 34 year old Joy Hummel, her five year old daughter Jody, and Joy's father, 57 year old Clyde Bedford. All three were deceased. About four hours later, 04:30AM, officer Worley's still there. It's a fire crime scene. There's people dead. They don't know the exact cause of death, but there's three people inside this house. So officer Worthy, he's still there. A man approaches officer Worthy. This man was John William Hummel. He was the the husband, the father, and the son-in-law. At first glance, John Hummel didn't necessarily look like the obvious suspect. He was a former Marine. We'll get into that some. Like I said, he was a husband and a father. He was a security guard, worked at a hospital down in Cleburne. Hummel asked, quote, if everyone made it out. Worthy was uncertain, told him he didn't know, but asked if he could speak more in-depth with Hummel. So they went to Hummel's minivan that was parked in a nearby church parking lot. Hummel told Officer Worthy that he lived in the house with his pregnant wife, daughter, and father-in-law. During this initial interview conversation, however you want to describe it, Hummel's emotions were a little uncertain, not consistent with one who would pull up to their house and see their house, had been completely engulfed in flames. As he's talking as he's talking to officer Worthy, Hummel's smoking a cigarette. And at one point, he places his head in his hands a few times. He wasn't crying. And as officer Worthy said, quote, basically just sitting there. So a little bit on the emotionalist side under the circumstances. And Joshua Worthy is just your standard patrol officer? Yeah. Not a detective or anything like that? Not a detective. Short time later, so sometime after 04:30 or around 04:30, Kennandale Police Captain Daryl Hull arrives. It was here where Hummel tells the investigators that he had not been home during the fire. Captain Hull asked Hummel where he had been, and Hummel replied that he had gone to a local retailer to check on prices for Christmas presents. Christmas season. Seems logical that between midnight and 4AM. It's a Walmart. It was actually. I know it. So they need, they want more details, right? I think some red flags are starting to go off a little bit or they're at least suspicious. So they ask Hummel to go back to the police department for a more formal statement. Hummel agrees and follows the investigators to the Kennan Dale Police Department station. They arrive there at around 05:30 in the morning. And it was there Hummel provided a more detailed count account of his night in a written statement to them. In part, the statement said, So I left my home around 9PM. I drove to Joshua to visit a friend, but he was not home. I drove around for a while to wait and see if we would come home, but he didn't. I stopped and got gas, drove around some more. Then I began visiting Walmarts to price things for Christmas. I came home a little after 5AM and found it burned down, and firemen and policemen were there. So this investigation now, you're you're you know, you're at the the police department. They're still on scene. Know, Kennandale, kind of like what we're saying, it's a bedroom community, if you will, right? Hamlet. Only you would describe it as a hamlet, but it is a small town. They don't have the resources that their nearby counterparts, your Fort Worth's, your Arlington's, your Dallas have. So in a case like this, they have to notify the ATF. At one point in time, I suppose they didn't even have a fire department. I bet they were volunteered. Yeah. I think at this, you know, at this point they were Yeah. They're time. Yeah. Full time. Yeah. An ATF arson investigator made the scene, and he starts assisting in the investigation. So as the investigations continue, on scene, what's important is the ATF fire investigator noticed that Joy, the wife, had injuries on her hands and body that were something more than caused by a fire, presumably something more than wounds that were caused by a fire. So the detectives continue to interview Hummel, Detective Jason Chardonnay, Sergeant Eric Carlson, and ATF Special Agent Steve Steele. It was here where Steele, the ATF Special Agent, notices something. He notices blood on Hummel's pants. There's some back and forth. The police, the investigators want the pants. I mean, again, the guy's house is on fire. There's three people dead. So they work out some kind of exchange where they give Hummel a change of clothes. That's something he doesn't have to do, I presume. Wouldn't have to. They would have to go get a warrant, I suppose, if he wanted to play difficult with them. Yep. So he agrees, does. As he's changing clothes, it was here that investigators noticed blood on the bottom of Hummel's sock and scratches on his back. Everything we've described, there's suspicious elements to Hummel, his actions, his reactions to what he knows, but they still needed more. So at the scene, initially, they still had no clue what had happened other than Steele sees some injuries on her hands. There's a fire. But they don't know any other specifics. And there's three dead people. And there's three dead people. So now they've got to wait for the autopsies. That can take, you know, a day, two days, whatever the case may be. So after Hummel's interview with police, he leaves. This is about 08:00 in the morning. So remember, gets there at around 05:30, interviews, gives the story that he's police around eight got to the police? Department at 08:30. Yeah. I'm sorry. He got to the police department at 05:30. He leaves there at around 8AM. He's in his clothes. Continues to go to get to continues. His actions are continually strange. Ordinarily, if you come upon a fire and you discover your wife is and your daughter are both deceased. Yeah. You wouldn't think you would attend work and go pick up your paycheck. Right. Well, that's what he does. So he goes to his office wherever it was a security company. They're based out of Arlington. He goes there. He attends some kind of work meeting, picks Not up Grief 101. Not Grief 101 at all. But while he's there, the coworkers don't notice anything suspicious. He's not necessarily acting strangely. He's not acting distraught like one would think. So they kind of go about their day. But it wasn't until later that day, a friend from church tries to get ahold of Hummel. Here's about the tragedy, here's about the fire, the deceased people that were inside. Checking in on him. Can't get ahold of him. So they complete a missing persons report about his disappearance. The fire investigators were able to were dealing, you know, eight, ten, twelve hours later, they're starting to piece together some of the evidence at the fire. And what they find first was this fire was no accidental fire. The fire was described as a quote incendiary fire. In fact, the arson investigator from ATF eventually testified that there were actually three separate fires inside the house. As investigators combed through the evidence from the crime scene, we've got the autopsy process underway. Starting first with the autopsy of Joy Hummel, it revealed that she was in fact, she was pregnant, fourteen to fifteen weeks pregnant. But there's some gruesome details prior to the fire that emerged during this autopsy. Joy Hummel had been stabbed 35 times all over her body with damage to her internal organs. The autopsy also revealed that she had six lacerations on her skull indicating that she had been struck multiple times with a hard object. Fire doesn't do any of that. Fire does not do this. And here's where that part gets interesting. So the medical examiner rules Joy's death was caused from multiple stab wounds, possibly the the skull fractures. We just learned of the stab wounds. The murder, according to the evidence, though, happened before the fire was set based on the lack of soot in her airways and a lack carbon Father-in-law, Clyde, five year old daughter, they also victims of a violent death. Both had multiple skull fractures and they too lacked soot in their airways, which indicated they were murdered prior to the fire. Because they were not breathing by that time. Not breathing by that time. Now one of the other things obviously based on the injuries to all three, investigators believed clearly there were multiple weapons used in this attack. So one of these days, we need to have an arson investigator on. Yeah. Those guys are pretty interesting. That's pretty how they determine that Belt patterns, ventilation pass, areas of deepest char. And they also had these accelerant detection dogs. I was reading about this morning. You ever met one of these guys? Yeah, know a couple of them actually. Retired now, but. Law enforcement agencies are in search of this Mr. Hummel, John Hummel. And investigators now are believing that he actually might be responsible for this. Yes, he may actually be the guy. Just a hunch. And they tracked him west. No idea where this guy went, but they find him out west. Three days later, he had approached the border checkpoint on foot near San Sidro, I think is how you say that, San Sidro, California. He's got no passport, valid ID. He identified himself to Customs and Border Protection Officer Jorge Bernal. Bernal, conducting a routine check, entered Hummel's information in the system. And of course, a return notification popped up listing Hummel as a missing person who was possibly armed and dangerous. He was taken into custody without incident. Border patrol officials notified investigators in Texas. The detectives told border patrol officials to hold him for an arson charge. Of interest was that investigators in Texas had not yet obtained an arrest warrant for Hummel, but he was still held until the warrant was secured in Texas. That part is kind of interesting. Yeah. He's a missing person armed and dangerous. He's being detained. They know that this originates out of Kennandale, Texas. And they call and say, Why, just probably hold them as long as you can. Legally can. We're working on this warrant. Just whatever you got to do, hold them until we can get this warrant signed. It could have been mean, who knows how long? I mean, it could have been thirty minutes. It could have been three hours. I don't know. But, you know, there was probably some tap dancing to How many yeah. Bet. Stalling him, talking to him, being, you know How many detectives do you think are murder detectives are in Kennadale? Well, there's none that would be exclusive to it. Yeah, okay. So they're just detectives and they handle They run the gamut. Some of them probably specialize in certain stuff, but I mean, again, I mean, it's what a town of, I don't know, 5,000 people maybe? Kennadale, Texas is a town of it's got to be a little bigger than that now. It's growing like everything else is. 8,500 as of 2020. All right. So definitely not a big city by any stretch of the 11,000. So they've gone from 80 what? 8,500. And 2020 to 11/2025. Assuming that that kind of lack of bureaucracy in this case slows things down. Like trying to get a warrant for his arrest. What does that entail, Getting a warrant for one's arrest. Well, this one, it's again, it's so it's 05:48. I don't know if that's what time zone we're dealing with. 05:48AM. AM. Okay. On December 20. Right. Right. They're still piecing this together. I mean, this is barely I mean, is forty eight hours later. Yeah. Right? So they're still piecing everything together. They're probably working more or less around the clock. At some point, they probably go home and they're, you know, there's always a chance, I suppose, he could get pulled over or stopped or whatever. But at 05:40 in the morning was probably the least, you know, when they suspected it at least. So my guess would be, my gut would be that they were probably going to work on the warrant that day anyway because they've got to present all the probable cause to a judge. The judge has to review and sign it into effect. This one has a lot, there's a lot of evidence on here, right? I mean, again, you have the evidence of the fire, you have the autopsy, you even have his behavior, his suspicious responses. I think they're suspicious. So you're compiling all of that into an arrest warrant affidavit. So it can take a little bit of time. I mean, you can bang out a warrant pretty quick, I mean, if you have to, but I just don't think they were ready to do it at forty in the morning. Well, he also went missing. They knew that Yeah, exactly. And they've got the ATF working, helping them investigate this thing. So anyway, so then now they've got a, I don't know what it takes to put out an all points bulletin for this guy. I don't have any idea what that takes, but. Just entering into it. It's a nationwide database. Database. So anyway, later that night on December 20, Sergeant Carlson, Detective Charbonnet, and a fellow named Rizzy. I think he's a DA investigator. A DA investigator arrived at the San Diego Jail. There Hummel was read his Miranda rights and he agreed to speak with investigators. And according to investigators and later court testimony, Mr. John Hummel gave a confession. He admitted to killing his wife, his daughter, and his father-in-law, then setting the house on fire to cover his tracks presumably. But the horror of the case stunned even veteran investigators. This wasn't robbery, wasn't gang violence, it wasn't a random attack. According to prosecutors, this is a father who systematically wiped out his own family. When police in Kennadale began piecing together the final hours before the murders, investigators weren't just trying to solve a crime. They were trying to understand how an entire family had been wiped out inside their own home. Because what happened on Little School Road wasn't random violence. According to prosecutors, this was indeed deeply personal. And as detectives dug deeper into John Hummel's life, they uncovered signs that all was not well inside the household in Kennadale. But exactly what triggered the murders remains one of the most disturbing questions in the entire case. So let's break it right there. Come join us next week in this case. Make sure to follow us. Click the follow button. This is a Stolen Water Media production.