Transcript of Talking Dateline: The Betrayal of Kirby Carpenter

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Hi, everyone. I'm Blaine Alexander, and this is Talking Dateline. Today, I'm joined by Andrea Canning to talk about her episode, The Betrayal of Kirby Carpenter. Hi, Andrea.

Hey, Blaine.

This story takes us to a small town in Mississippi, where a successful businessman is found murdered outside of his home. What starts off as a possible robbery eventually leads investigators to a shocking betrayal involving people that Kirby trusted. But before we get into it, if you have not yet listened to the episode or watched the episode, make sure you do that. You can find it right below this one, or of course, you can go stream it right now on Peacock. So, go do that, and then come right back here. When you come back, we will hear more from Andrea's interview with Jeffrey Susskind, Spence's daughter, Carolyn Aguayo. And later, some of our producers will answer some of your questions from social media. All right, Andrea, let's talk Dateline.

Let's do it.

So Andrea, this was a— this was a great episode. This was one of the episodes that I was like, I don't know which way this is going to go. And I had my thoughts at the beginning and then circled back and they turned out to be true at the end. Before we dive too much in though, Andrea, I want to get you to just take a second and give us a very quick recap of the episode.

So, Kirby Carpenter was a 36-year-old, a father of 2. He was a quintessential entrepreneur. He had a gold and silver shop. He kind of sold everything in there. He had a steakhouse at one point. He had a liquor shop at one point. And he really dealt in cash. And so, then he turns up shot dead outside of his house. And given the fact that he had all these cash-based businesses, it appeared it could be a robbery at first. Of course, it turned out out he was not robbed by your average thief. It turned out that it was his girlfriend, the mother of his child, it was her father who had killed Kirby, Jeff Spence. And so, after going through a number of suspects, they landed on Jeff Spence. And not only was Jeff arrested, but his wife, Karen, was arrested. Caitlin...

Mm-hmm.

...his daughter, who was Kirby's She was also arrested. Kaitlin and Karen made deals with law enforcement, and then Jeff is in prison in Mississippi.

Yeah.

Wow. Just hearing you even kind of go through that, one of the big questions that viewers always ask a lot of us is, how do you guys come up with these stories, and where do you get these stories? And this is something that you had actually been covering for a while on True Crime Weekly, right?

Yeah, we had done the story. And so, it's always interesting when you do it on the podcast, and then it becomes an actual TV episode.

Yeah.

You know, so it's— you kind of bring the case more alive, you know, with when you go out and you actually start meeting everyone and shooting interviews.

You know, it was unbelievable. I, um— of all the interviews that you had in this episode, and there were so many that were good, I'm so glad that we got to hear from Kirby's mother. Because I think hearing her—

Oh, Patty Jane.

Yes!

Oh my gosh, I loved Mattie Jane. I loved her. First off, I was like, that's a good Southern name, Mattie Jane. Like—

Yeah, and she's—

She was— She has a slight twang.

Like Miss Mattie Jane. She's Miss Mattie Jane.

Absolutely.

Yes. Yes. My favorite line in the show was when she's like, you better up your game.

And they did, by the way. That second trial, they came with some significant new evidence that they didn't have the first time around. They sure did. I was thinking, I was like, they really did up their game.

They sure did. And that's where, you know, that's when like old-fashioned detective work comes in. You know, that they, they had these photos of the vehicles in Jeff Spence's yard, you know, where— at the house he was renting. And the detective looked at the tag numbers on some of these cars, right? 'Cause when you got a lot of cars, you're not necessarily driving them all the time. Some of them are junk, some of them are, you know— and he hadn't run all the tags through the tag reader system, you know, that you see. You know, tag reader systems are all over the country.

Sure.

They're on— light posts and who knows where else. And so, so yeah, he decided to run these tag numbers that he hadn't thought of running before. And lo and behold, he got a hit on one of them that was headed on a highway in, you know, in Tennessee toward Mississippi. So that, that was— that really put a, you know, a wrench into Jeff Spence's alibi.

But we're going to dive into that phone interview that you had with him later on because I have so many questions about that. And I just love the way you went about it. But let's talk about about the great state of Mississippi. I did a story from Mississippi earlier this year bringing Jay home. And we both interviewed the same DA. The same prosecutor. As soon as I saw— yes, as soon as I saw DA Ben Creekmore pop up, I said, what? There he is again. What are the odds of being on Dateline twice in less than a year?

I know, that is pretty amazing, huh? To be on twice.

Absolutely. So, one of the things you and I have in common is that we both worked in local news. You both started in small markets, and Mississippi was one of your first stops along the way.

It was my first, WXVT in Greenville, Mississippi. I was living in Los Angeles. I was working for the television show Extra behind the scenes, and I decided to make a reel, and I traded babysitting with one of the editors at Extra who put my reel together for me. And, and I had no local news experience at that point. And so I sent out 50 tapes, you know, I'm dating myself here, VHS tapes. And I got 2 calls, one from Nebraska and one from Greenville. And they, my old boss Terry had a phone interview with me because they didn't have the money to fly me out there.

Right.

And he gave me a current events quiz and said, you have to get at least 10 of these right or else you don't get the job. And I was like, oh. So anyway, ended up passing and he's like, you got, you got the job. So I packed up my car and headed south.

That is an epic first job story. I love that.

Yeah. So, you know, it was nice being back. I wasn't in the, the Delta is where I was an anchor. But, you know, this was Tupelo area and This is something that I think most Southerners will probably agree. They talk a lot. They talk about like a lot of things. They'll tell you what they had for breakfast. Yeah. They'll tell you that they walked the dog.

Exactly. It's all the Southern friendliness coming out. It is. It's like the chatting. It really is.

It is.

Mm-hmm. Absolutely.

I always say here, like in the Northeast, like if I go on a walk, you know, it's hard to even get someone to smile. You know, I'm always trying to engage like, hi. And like people are just looking down or they're, you know, it's, It's just a thing. I mean, I like people in the Northeast, but they are not like the people in the South where if you go for a walk, everyone, you know, they wanna stop and talk to you.

Can I say that's one of my favorite things about living in Atlanta?

I love that.

I've lived here for 15, 16 years and I love it.

I love the Northeast, but I, you know, you do want some of that friendliness, right?

It feels different. It feels different.

Yeah.

You can start that wave, Andrea Canning.

I, I can.

You, you can be the change. I'm trying. I make such an effort every single day to try to engage and smile and say hi to people. So I'm doing my part.

You're doing your part. That's all we can ask. I love it. Coming up, we're going to hear more from Andrea's interview with Carolyn Aguayo about the fallout within her family.

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You know, it's fun. One of those things where we always talk about how oftentimes the community itself can become a character in our Dateline episodes. And I think that this was the case. But also Kirby's personality seemed to fit that to a tee, right? It made sense that his store was Kind of this gathering place where people could come and just kind of explore interesting things because he was a very interesting guy. I found myself wanting to know so much more about him.

He was. And he, you know, he tried to go into the military.

Yeah.

But he had a heart issue. And so, you know, his, his mom told us that he had to, he had to leave because of that. And so he reinvented himself and turned into this, this Mississippi entrepreneur.

Yeah.

You know, in our episodes, there's always so much more about the person that we learn while we're kind of reporting on this than we're able to actually fit into the episode. I wonder if there's anything, when you think about Kirby Carpenter, what is it that stood out to you the most about him?

He definitely seemed to really like being a dad. His family talked about him. His son, Townes, who was apparently his little mini-me, he took him everywhere. They liked all the same things. He was involved in all of his sports, and they would go hunting, and they would do go out in the— because Kirby had a sprawling property, so they would always, you know, go out into the back and they'd go, you know, four-wheeling. He sounded like he really enjoyed that side of his life, was being a parent. So that's, that's really sad that, you know, um, both of these children are, are going to grow up without their father.

Of course. And such a, such a dedicated father at that.

Yeah. And, and, you know, that brings me to Jeff Spence. The, the daughters, his daughters Caitlyn and her sister Carolyn, they, they described Jeff as this very present father when they were growing up. That he was at all the sporting events. That he was the best dad they could ask for. That he was so engaged, and he was loving. And it's like, well, what happened?

What happened? What happened? I have to say that the final few minutes of the— of your episode, when we talked about the courtroom, and then the family kind of, you know, face-to-face with Jeff for the first time in 6 years, and then the sisters coming into contact, I mean, it was just so sad. to see how what seemingly was just a beautiful, normal nuclear family just was so broken apart. And there were so many things in this family. And I don't want to use the word dysfunctional when describing people, but I think you could look at that and say, this was not a well-functioning family, right?

I think it turned into that.

Yeah.

It definitely evolved into a dysfunctional family. You know, it was so interesting hearing from Carolyn and Gio, Talk about how they really, you know, Gio really liked Jeff. Jeff was nice to him, just like Kirby thought Jeff was nice, you know? And then what happened with Gio and Carolyn, how things just totally went off the rails when they invited them to come live with them, and they're doing this construction work, and then everything just falls apart, and you see him tearing the fence down, the dad, and— why are you doing that?

That was wild. That video was wild.

To your daughter. Like, what are you doing? And then Gio— Literally being afraid for his life.

Mm-hmm.

After that life insurance conversation, like, why don't you take out life insurance? I'll be the beneficiary.

Right after an argument.

Oh, okay. So why in the world would his father-in-law be the beneficiary of a life insurance policy? Like, oh, don't worry, I'll take care of it. I'll take care of Carolyn.

When he said, you know what, I might die today. If I die, here's what you need to do. Like, that was unbelievable to me, just that he— was so convinced that this person could try and end his life where he was just like, gosh, you know what?

Yeah.

He could come after me. Like, just, just be prepared.

So that, that was the sort of the, the indicator of like, am I— his thinking is, am I going to go move this stuff and I'm going to be ambushed, you know, while I'm moving these, these tree branches or whatever, you know? And I did a story in Kentucky in Bardstown, where an officer, Jason Ellis, in Kentucky, was gunned down because there were branches in the road. He was on his way home from his shift. He pulled over his cruiser. He got out to go move the branches, and there was a sniper in the tree, and he was ambushed and killed.

That's horrifying, by the way, because that's a common— I mean, most people wouldn't think twice about just, hey, let me get out. Let me clear this out of the road. And—

Right. Yeah. And this is Gio's account, of course.

Yeah.

Of course.

You know, this is what he says happened.

Right, right. You know, going through, I mean, when you were interviewing Carolyn, did she seem to have an idea as to what caused things to go off the rails?

No. Like, she didn't. She really didn't. She seemed very confused by her father's behavior because they welcomed him in.

Yeah.

So, they wouldn't have done that, you know, if there were these serious issues. Like, she, of course, she was, She was happy to help them.

Yeah.

So, she doesn't really have an explanation for it. You know, he's had a lot of, like— it seems like Jeff had a lot of failed businesses over the years and failed attempts to make money. And that's why they moved in in the first place, because of financial reasons. And I'm sure— I don't know if you want to talk about Goliath, but that was a really interesting— part of this story was the buck. Because the buck was like, this is part of Jeff's, one of his businesses was that he was a deer breeder. He was also like a, I think he bred German Shepherds. He had all these businesses, right? All the time, different things going on. And he was convicted of stealing Goliath, this million-dollar deer. Did you ever think that a deer could be worth a million dollars?

One would never think that. No. No. I never realized livestock could be so valuable. But yes. Unbelievable.

And so, he is convicted of taking this deer for the sperm, because you can breed with this powerful buck's sperm. Sperm and DNA.

Yeah.

So, that was— it's very odd.

The whole thing is odd. You know, can we talk about the dynamic between Carolyn and Caitlin? Because I was so sad to see— I mean, these 2 sisters, even their names are similar. I mean, they just seem to go together, right? Like, you kind of think about a sister bond and relationship. And my goodness, for it to kind of splinter into what it did was wild. It was just really heartbreaking to see. Right.

And then look who's at the center of that.

Yeah.

Jeff, right?

Their dad.

I mean, he's causing all these problems, right, with Carolyn and Geo. And then Caitlin gets upset at Carolyn and Geo. And then Jeff goes and ends up spending all this time, months, at Caitlin's place, and then her boyfriend ends up dead. And then she ends— Caitlin ends up arrested.

Right.

You know, Jeff is at the center of all of this.

In talking with Caitlin, I wonder if— because as I was watching this, and we heard Carolyn and Geo, of course, talk about what they say happened with Jeff, I wondered how Caitlin felt when it came to loyalty. Like, of course, she was like, oh my God, did you call the police on Dad? But also, do I believe my sister? I mean, it seemed like she— it seemed like one would've been torn in this type of situation. Do I side with my dad? Do I side with my sister? Which way do I go in this? Did you get that sense at all?

I mean, according to Carolyn, it seemed like she sided with her dad immediately. So, you know, I don't know if she was torn, 'cause it didn't— According to her side of it, it didn't seem like she was. But then Carolyn did reach out, you know, eventually, when she found out that Caitlin was pregnant. You know, she sort of gave— extended that olive branch to her sister.

You know, of course, you interviewed both sisters, and great interviews. Let's go to some extra sound because, I mean, we've talked so much about this family. And at one point, you asked Carolyn if she ever thought that there could be Any sort of reconciliation. Let's listen to some of that.

Where do you two go from here? Is there any chance that you will ever reconcile with Kaitlyn? Are you able to get your own sort of closure from this, from all you've been through?

I think, um, you know, with Kaitlyn, it would have to be a complete heart transformation, and I'm just not sure that she's done with it yet. I think that she has been comfortable with things over the years that, just like my parents, have been increasingly more criminal. And I don't think there would be a change unless there was a complete change.

Yeah. And it is still somewhat fresh, right? A lot can change with time. So, I mean, I wouldn't count them out that they will someday reconcile, but they've been through a lot.

Oh, yeah. Absolutely. You know, watching this, I was struck by several juxtapositions when you talk about family, right? Like, family just seems like a central theme in all of this. So, of course, you have the juxtaposition of, like, the doting father that Kirby was versus Jeff. I mean, 2 very different, you know, images of dads. And then you also have Miss Maddy Jane, who was just— such a clearly supportive mother. Like, just the back and forth, the juxtaposition between the 2 parental units was striking as well. Yeah.

And I mean, Kirby was Maddy Jane's world. You know, she loved her son so much. Yeah. And then you have Jeff, who is willing to, you know, just do these things. And then maybe there's accusations, there's feelings that he brought Caitlin into this?

Yeah.

You know, she was arrested. How much did she know? You know, she talks about this conversation at the waterfall about her dad, and, you know, that she read between the lines. He was sort of confessing, maybe. I mean, the whole thing is a little muddy.

Of course.

But the fact that there's even thought that maybe Jeff brought his daughter into this is not—

is not good.

It seems to me that money was more important to Jeff than his family unit because this was over money.

Yeah, absolutely. Let's talk about Jeff and your interview with Jeff. Can you give us a little behind the scenes? How did that interview, that phone interview from jail, come about?

Well, we were supposed to do it. I was all set up in Mississippi to do the interview. He was in Parchman Prison at the time when we were trying to do our first interview. And I had actually been inside Parchman Prison when I was in Mississippi. I went there and I did a story on a ministry that goes into the prison. And the wives of the members of the church, they cook a lot of food. And so they did end up getting a lot of participants in the prison, you know, engaging because they wanted the food. And then they ended up going to church. So I was in there before in Parchman. However, Fast forward how many years? Many years. They would not let us inside Parchman. You know, wardens change, policies change. And so, we were waiting because we were going to do this phone interview. We were all set up in Mississippi, and we waited and waited and waited, and he never showed.

Hmm.

So, we're like, okay, guess he changed his mind. And then finally, he agreed to do the interview. And then at the end, he said, I'm really glad I did that interview.

Hmm.

That behind the scenes is stunning to me. I think that so many of our viewers and listeners don't realize how much just goes into getting these people to sit down sometimes and agree to talk with us. I, um— when I did my jailhouse interview with Fred Tanzer for my episode that aired a few weeks back—

Who walked out on you.

He walked out. But I was— we were scared that he was going to walk out immediately because he came in and sat down, sat down with this list of rules, and I'm only going to talk about this and that. And of course, we don't agree to that, right? Like, we never agree to, we're not going to ask you this, or we're not going to ask you that. And so, I'm thinking, gosh, okay, let's keep him in the chair to— of course, not going to agree to these terms and conditions he's trying to put forth. Yeah.

Yeah.

But also, we want the interview. So, let's keep him in the chair. And it just, you know, it kept on going. But there is always that moment of uncertainty of, will this happen? Will it not? What's What's gonna happen here? Andrea, this was a, this was a fantastic episode. I love the people. I love the interviews. And just thank you. Thank you for talking Dateline with me and for bringing us this episode.

Always happy to talk Dateline with you, Blaine.

Okay, Andrea and I are both headed off in different directions. But don't go anywhere because we've got a treat for you. 2 of our very stellar producers are going to join us after the break to answer some of your questions from social media.

Hi guys, my name is Rachel White and I'm the producer of this episode. I'm here with my senior producer, Alison Orr, to answer some of your questions and comments from social media.

Hey, Alison.

Hey, Rachel. Hi. Hey, let's get into it. All right, so the first question we have here comes from BobbyG62 and he said, Why on earth would he carry that much cash? Probably the first question I asked you when you were— when we started talking about the story, like, what?

Yeah, it was a lot of money, um, a shocking amount of cash to carry for sure. But what you have to understand is that Kirby Carpenter dealt a lot in cash, in gold, in silver. And, you know, his family, the police told us that at any given time throughout the day, weekend, night, holiday, whenever someone might call him and say, hey, I have something you might be interested in purchasing, and he would just go and meet them to make the deal. So he needed it.

Okay, and then we have Up Reality Alley, and they're asking us, are flock cameras and license plate readers the same thing?

So flock cameras and license plate readers Are similar.

Yeah, like Flock is like a brand of license plate reader, right?

Correct. And they do more, so they have more technology than just your average license plate reader.

Got it. Okay, now we have a comment from No More Mando Fun saying, I think Jeff did it but see no direct evidence yet. I can see why the jury was split the first time. This is a weak case.

So, it's definitely a circumstantial case, and that is something that the prosecutors and the police knew going into it, which is why we, you know, saw that first trial, I think, end up with a hung jury. And it was split 6 to 6, which, if you watch a lot of trials, if you pay attention to the court system, that's a very big split. Typically, you have maybe 1 or 2 people holding out, but to have an evenly split jury is really rare.

Yeah.

So I think that that is largely a reason why is people thought that there wasn't enough circumstantial evidence. But then going into trial 2 with the, you know, addition of the Tracy Delp testimony saying that Jeff confessed to him, and you also had the tag reader finding Jeff Spence's van traveling south toward Mississippi. So I think those things helped the second jury feel more confident in their conviction.

All the things that Maddy Jane told them to step their game up.

Yes, exactly. She said it, and they did it.

And they did it. Yeah. All right. And, uh, now next, Joan Davis wants to know, why probation though? Talking about Caitlin. How about at least a year in jail or 5 years in prison? What about the mom?

So, right. So I think a lot of people had that sentiment. I know that Kirby's family was really surprised with the deal that Caitlyn was offered. I think, you know, her defense attorney Tony Fries makes the point in our show that the prosecution needed her testimony to get a conviction for the person who they theorized actually pulled the trigger.

That goes back to the other point you're making, that it was a weak circumstantial case. Without her testimony, what is the case?

Right, because you have that conversation that she tells jurors about where her dad essentially confesses to her. So, without that, the case is, you know, much less strong. So, I think that for the prosecution, they felt like they really needed her testimony.

Mm-hmm.

She had already served months in prison, so they were giving her time served with probation. And I think for her defense attorney, he knew that they needed her, so he worked to get her a deal that would mean that she could be released and be with her daughter. She pleaded guilty to accessory to murder after the fact.

That's good lawyering on his behalf.

It is.

And Mom, uh, the question also asked about what happened to Mom. She took an Alford plea, which means she did not admit wrongdoing, but she conceded that there would have been enough evidence to convict her of— what exact charge was that that she pled to?

So, she pled guilty to grand larceny after the fact. So, that is what her Alford plea was in reference to. Her charges in the beginning were capital murder as well. All 3, Jeff, Kaitlin, and Karen Spence, faced capital murder charges. So, Karen and Kaitlin now are free, and Jeff, of course, is serving a life sentence for first-degree murder.

Okay. MikeH1990 says, so sad that Kirby had the in-laws from hell right under his roof the whole time. What do we know about Kirby's in-laws?

So, the family says that in the beginning, they got along. And I think there was even maybe a little bit of relief from, you know, his and Kaitlin's perspective of them coming to help with the baby. I think they felt like they might need it, um, because remember, Kirby had a son who would also be with him every other week. So, the house was full, and I think that he and Kaitlin were very much grateful that her parents were there to lend a hand.

Yeah. And then, as time went on, I think every single young parent in the universe will understand how great it is to have some grandparents around.

For sure. Yes, for sure. So that was in the beginning. And I think that Kirby's family told me that in the beginning, he believed it was going to be short-term help when the baby first arrived until they got on their feet and kind of got into the groove of their new routine. And they say that they very much overstayed their welcome from his perspective. and that he was ready for them to go.

Got it. And then finally, we have a comment from Covib, C-O-V-I-I-B, who says, how do parents do their own children? Leaving debt, destroying things. I could never do this to my kids. This is a recurring thing in so many Datelines. These crimes, they tear apart families, and the children who had nothing to do with it are left to live their lives picking up the pieces.

Definitely. And I think, you know, in this circumstance, you've got, uh, at least one of Kirby's kids who, you know, will grow up seeing his family and without her father and understanding that his family believes that her mother was involved in his murder. And I think that that's a really, you know, unique circumstance. Um, and I think it's really difficult. I'm sure it's, it's been difficult. I know for— Both parties to manage custody and visitation. So I can only imagine that that, you know, will continue throughout her life, unfortunately.

You do see in the wake of these tragedies that the remaining parents and grandparents, when they can just rise above the most unforgivable thing for the sake of children to make their lives as normal as possible. And I just hope that that's the case here with this family. It seems like it will be.

I think so. I know that both Mattie Jane and Kayce, um, and Kirby's entire family really want to have good, long relationships with both of his children. And I know that it's really been kind of the strength that keeps them going, so to speak, to see him in his kids.

Okay. Um, well, that's it for the comments, Rachel. Great job working on this episode. It was a real pleasure to work on it with you. I know it was a years-long process with 2 trials. You stuck with it, and the show, Turned out really well, I think.

It was a pleasure to work on and to get to know the people involved. It was a really great family, and I'm very glad to have met everyone.

Yeah.

That's great. Thanks. And that's it for Talking Dateline this week. Thank you for listening. Remember, if you have questions about our stories, you can DM us your audio or video on our socials at @DatelineNBC, or leave us a voicemail at 212-413-5252. For a chance to be featured right here. And you can watch the video version of Talking Dateline on YouTube and the NBC News app. And don't forget to listen to Lester's podcast, Before and After. You can binge all 6 episodes now wherever you get your podcasts. We'll see you Fridays on Dateline on NBC.

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