10 Things We Learned From Dark Side Of The Ring: Billy Jack Haynes
3. A Grieving Mother and PI Believed Him
But wait, there's more.
The mother of one of the victims, Linda Ives, told the media that Billy Jack must be telling the truth, because nobody would willingly link themselves to a murder case. Meanwhile, the family’s own private investigator also said Haynes was putting his liberty at risk, so he must be right. After all, who'd make something like this up for attention...right?
That's when a message flashed up on the show saying: “Billy Jack has claimed the videotape he made that night was stolen or destroyed”. Both Linda and the PI have since passed away. Legally, police didn’t take Billy Jack’s statements seriously, because they noticed that some details were getting more and more over the top, and the case remains open to this day.
VICE included news report footage of Haynes sitting with Linda on camera and claiming he just wanted justice for her. It's all very, very confusing, and it isn't clear exactly what Billy Jack was hoping to get out of this in the first place. The fact investigators and police couldn't fathom what role he did or didn't play in the deaths of two teenagers really says it all.
Incredibly, as journo Phil Stanford revealed later, this wasn't even an isolated incident. Haynes had a strange habit of placing himself at the site of some shocking murders or moments in history, and one of his close personal friends said he'd often carry around a binder full of newspaper clippings or other documents.
Perhaps no-one will ever know the real story of what happened to Don Henry and Kevin Ives.