Have you ever heard the word “no excellent deed is going unpunished?” This happened, but times ten worse than it had to be, to the loving and saintly couple Bud and Melanie Billings, after a group of armed men broke into their home and murdered them each execution style. It’s one of the worst true crime tales Florida has ever observed, so why did they do it?

It’s a savage crime that left investigators scratching their heads, and most of the people surprised by the brutality of it all. Like many crimes, things went sideways and the assailants didn’t even get what they were on the lookout for in the top.

Even worse, greater than ten of the couple’s disabled foster youngsters were in the home when the break-in came about. One of them witnessed their father get shot. A complete of five men broke into the house, with one waiting out of doors to drive everyone away. When it was in every single place, Bud and Melanie lay useless, and sooner or later all of the perpetrators involved were captured and given long jail sentences.

No one came out forward, and a bunch of particular needs kids lost their rich, loving parents. Let’s get to grasp them a little more.

Who were Bud and Melanie Billings?

Byrd “Bud” Billings was 66 years outdated when he passed and his spouse, Melinda, was 43. He was an entrepreneur who even owned a strip club ahead of settling in as a used car broker, a job that made him very wealthy.

He divorced his 2nd wife and married Melinda simply simply 4 months later. They lived in a really nice $700,000 home in Pensacola, Florida. Melanie cherished nation tune and feeding the homeless. She had a excellent center and that rubbed off on Bud, who had extra of a checkered past.

They met at Bud’s strip club when he hired Melanie as a waitress. They were given married in 1993, and each expressed a want to have a lot of kids. The couple both had two youngsters from earlier marriages. At one level, 13 children lived in their home, however across the time of the homicide, they lived with nine kids, elderly from Four to 11, with various developmental problems and particular wishes.

One circle of relatives friend said they were a “modern-life Brady Bunch.”

What happened at the evening Bud and Melanie Billings were murdered?

Melanie’s grownup child, Ashley Markham, made a call on July 9, 2009 to inspect her mom and her adopted siblings. It used to be round 7:30 p.m. and one of the kids, Jacob, who was once 10 on the time and had Down Syndrome, replied the phone.

He used to be in shock. He handed the phone to his autistic sister Ashley, and she relayed that her parents were simply laying on the floor. A distraught Ashley known as a neighbor to head check on them, and sped over to the home. The neighbor came upon the our bodies and referred to as police. When Ashley got there, it used to be an active crime scene, with police officers all over the place. No one knew exactly what had came about.

Less than an hour previous, Bud and Melanie were nonetheless alive. At around 7 p.m., a purple van pulled up to the house and seven men dressed like ninjas rushed into the home from the front and again doors. They have been making plans this heist for a month, and were instructed they were stealing from a drug dealer who stored hundreds of thousands in the home.

It used to be supposed to come off with military precision. It didn't. The Billings had Sixteen cameras around the house, not for safety, but to keep an eye on the children in case one thing went wrong. Those cameras would turn out to be pivotal in the eventual id of the robbers.

Bud was simply in his front room staring at TV when the assailants broke in. A surveillance digital camera caught that moment too. They broke the back door and the entrance door at the identical time, rushed in, and zip-tied Bud.

The assailants carried rifles, and were dressed in all black clothes.

For some reason why, Bud was shot in both legs, then dragged into the master suite – the only room in the house without cameras. One of the youngsters, elderly round 6 or 7, stood and watched as the man shot his dad in the legs and then dragged him off.

The complete thing took about ten mins. They were handiest in the house for 4 minutes, and in that time, both Melanie and Bud were murdered execution taste.

Nine youngsters were home when the burglars broke in. While none of them were physically harmed, the 3 that witnessed the break-in have had to cope with that mental trauma their entire lives.

So did the robbers make it out with thousands and thousands? Well, they were on the hunt for a protected that supposedly contained incredible quantities of cash. There were if truth be told two safes in the home. One protected contained $160,000 in money with some vintage jewellery to boot. Did they find that one? The 8 person staff (a driver and a woman who helped plan the heist incorporated) would’ve netted about $15k each.

Not really enough to justify what they ended up doing, but for sure better than not anything. Only they never found that safe. They found a different safe, this one complete of youngsters’s adoption paperwork, and some sentimental value.

Imagine planning a heist for months, botching it by killing two people, and then getting away with out a cash. That had to sting.

How did the Bud and Melanie Billings killers get stuck?

The main factor investigators needed to pass on was the van. The men, even if they didn’t break out with any cash, were in gloves and slightly cognizant of leaving clues. There was additionally a black boot mark on the door from when it was once kicked in, however the van confirmed essentially the most promise.

It confirmed up lovely clearly in the surveillance photos. The Escambia sheriff’s workplace talked to native news and sent out an alert for people to be in search of a red van matching that description. Then they were given a tip that any individual noticed in the back of a shed on somebody’s assets.

The call got here in on July 11, two days after the murders. It used to be at the home of a man named Leonard Gonzalez, who to begin with mentioned the van didn’t paintings. Investigators additionally discovered a shoe field for black combat boots similar to the boot mark they found.

When investigators told Leonard he used to be going through the dying penalty, he spilled the beans. He informed investigators about the six other men involved, together with his son Patrick. He said it used to be all about cash and never about murder, but issues went sideways.

Patrick denied the whole lot but investigators discovered Walmart pictures of Patrick buying black garments and boots. That led them to extra names: Wayne Coldiron, Donnie , and Gary Summer. Then Patrick broke. All left now were two more suspects: Rakeem Florence and Frederick Thornton.

Those two quickly became on Patrick, saying he was the ringleader and trigger man, and that they were each and every presented about $3,000 to help. There was just one more piece: Where were the guns, and the secure?

Turns out they needed to communicate to a realtor named Pamela Long Wiggins, who would hire Patrick as sort of an enforcer when she wanted rent accumulated. She was captured on her yacht, purportedly trying to flee to Mexico.

Wiggins was the ultimate arrest. She admitted to disposing of the guns, and the secure was found on her Florida belongings, after she agreed to a plea deal. In reality, everyone agreed to plea deals apart from Patrick, who would go to trial, lose, and be sentenced to loss of life. Leonard and Wiggins each died in prison. Patrick remains to be on death row.

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