Beth Shelburne

Colvin gives detectives multiple statements about what he heard and saw, and Tony Richardson interrogates him for hours about his movements inside the hotel the night of the murder, insisting that Colvin was involved.

Tony Richardson shows Yolanda Chambers four photos of possible suspects.

Yolanda picks out the photo of Leon Colvin and says he was involved in the alleged drug deal behind the hotel when Hardy was killed.

Leon Colvin is charged with hindering prosecution and taken to jail.

Police press ahead with Ardragus and DeForest as two of their main suspects, even though there is no record of any hotel witness describing a loud, two-door, black Monte Carlo leaving the scene or a man in a wheelchair.

There's another clue in the file that jumps out at me.

A police report from a day after the murder states that a hotel worker named Jerry McDaniel told detectives that he saw Deputy Hardy arguing with a group of young Black men who had been running around inside the hotel, especially the sixth floor.

There's even a description of one of these young men, six feet tall, slim, wearing a dark, baggy basketball jersey with the number 33 on it.

When I first read this, I was like, whoa, what?

This information seems super relevant.

Hardy was arguing with a group of people just hours before he was murdered?

Jerry McDaniel would later testify in court that he saw Hardy having this loud argument with the group of young men around 10 p.m.

and that he saw Hardy again before he left for the night around 11.30.

McDaniel said Hardy was standing at the back door of the hotel, propping it open with his foot.

He also spotted the same group of young men outside in the back parking lot as he left work to go home.

He said that after the confrontation, Hardy seemed mad, saying, I ain't never seen him like that before.

But detectives never identified the young men and later say their interview with Jerry McDaniel never led to any more evidence.

I want to pursue this if Jerry McDaniel is still around.

Maybe he can give us some new information about those last hours of Hardy's life.

Something about the young men he saw arguing with Hardy.