Conversations with a hit man

[keiferski]

Interesting story, worth reading if you’re interested in crime and corruption in the South circa 1960-1980. The atmosphere reminded me of the first season of True Detective, also set in Louisiana.

[genewitch]

As someone who lives here now, the corruption is still alive and well. We're - the citizens - currently fighting against having CO2 "pumped in via pipes" and injected into "geological formations". Every citizen in the state gets their water from a well. Injecting refuse "CO2" into the ground will contaminate our water supply; but as the person at the meeting i went to on Monday said, "When there's money involved the politicians stop thinking about the citizens."

I don't know. I don't really like it here, but my kid's family live here. And on the other side of the coin, where isn't there corruption?

[RickJWagner]

Nicely written, and enjoyable. Thanks for sharing, OP.

[crossroadsguy]

I found an article[1] which apparently relates to this hitman (even if it's not my doubt doesn't depend on this specific person). So is this how it works? A murderer can strike a "deal" with the state and the judge can do jackshit about it?

And what is that deal? That you make us work less to prove your did the crime and you just confess and we will give you ¼ or ½ or hell one tenth of the sentence?

[1] https://www.shreveporttimes.com/story/news/crime/2016/03/30/...

[snypher]

This is like the outrage with the bryan kohberger case. A defendant shouldn't be able to plead not guilty, then switch to a guilty plea to avoid sentencing repercussions.

[garaetjjte]

Eh, he's old man sitting in prison probably spinning tales to anybody who will listen. He didn't tell them anything that wasn't publicly available, and on details that they needed to dig for into archives actually contradicts them ("Imagine that. Nobody’s ever seen him." about Rick, but he appeared before grand jury). Neither do they explain why such apparently notorious criminal would appear in the investigation only under alias in this case, but not in the many others mentioned (and why nobody that previously saw him as Rick noticed).

[hattmall]

Yeah, was there no physical description of Rick Roberts? Did the other guys not know Thompson? If he was friends with Marcello it seems like he would be well known.

[Neywiny]

This was a good read. I'm not sure I'm fully appreciating its role on this site specifically, but it's worth it nonetheless

[toomanyrichies]

https://archive.ph/UneK9

[Communitivity]

This brings back memories. I enjoyed following the travels described in the She's a Flight Risk series. I never did quite buy that it was a hoax either, though perhaps I am too gullible. If Isabella V. was real, then I hope she's chilling on a tropical beach in Buenos Aires, or somewhere else.

[fipar]

She'll need a lot of help from climate change before Buenos Aires gets a tropical beach though :)

[tomhow]

> I quit before I got to anything interesting

This is the kind of shallow dismissal we don't want on HN.