[Alabama] The Murder of Charlotte Waites

Cara (0:21)

Hey everyone, welcome to Bless This Mess Southern True Crime Podcast. I'm Cara here with Stu. Say hey, Stu.

Stu (0:24)

Hey.

Cara (0:25)

All right. This week we are going to Lanett, Alabama.

Stu (0:29)

Is that how you pronounce it? Are we going to get in a Valdosta, Valdosta problem?

Cara (0:35)

Alabama, where a beloved educator and the wife of the town's acting mayor was found murdered inside her own home, and it would take eight years before a jury would finally convict somebody.

Stu (0:50)

You stop it.

Cara (0:51)

I would never lie.

Stu (0:54)

Yes, this is the murder of Charlotte Waites.

Cara (0:58)

Now, before we pull up a rocker, a rocking chair, I got a rocker. Yeah. Here is a quick reminder of our weekly schedule. On Mondays, we step outside the south for our Little Less Mess mini episodes, and Thursdays are for our regular full-length cases right here on the main feet. Now, if you want to get those episodes early and ad free, plus our Friday bonus show Sit and Sippin and Bullshitin, come join our Patreon family. This last one was off the rails on that one.

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Stu (1:51)

Did you? How long is that going to go on?

Cara (1:54)

I don't know. We'll see. We had our first club meeting this past week and so-

Stu (1:58)

What do you mean a club meeting? People actually- you FaceTime with people? No.

Cara (2:02)

What happened? No, it's just like a virtual club. We're just like, this is the club, the club.

Stu (2:10)

You just talked to everybody else on a video?

Cara (2:12)

I just post a video and recommend a Lifetime style 1990s, 2000s, the movies I used to watch on Lifetime growing up. My mom used to spend all Saturday, you just have a Lifetime on those, like based on a true story made for TV movies.

Stu (2:28)

So that's what's wrong with you. That's where it all started.

Cara (2:30)

Probably. That and Dateline.

Anyway, so I've got that one going. It's not an actual club, Stu, that Everett P. No, no one showed up at our house and we didn't all just watch a movie together.

Stu (2:42)

You were like the neighbor and you just do like a video thing where people participate and chat.

Cara (2:46)

That's what we're talking about next.

Sit and sip and bullshit and I'm doing a deep dive for all of you into our neighbor. Except for Stu saw that he had a neon sign turned on in his window on Sunday and he didn't. I said, well, what did it say? By the time I saw it, the light was off so you couldn't see it. I told Stu, I was like, what did it say? He's like, I don't know. I'm like, how did you not take a picture of it? I was doing some investigating.

Stu (3:12)

It looks like a bar neon sign. I don't know what's on it. It just looks like a yellow shield of some sort.

Cara (3:18)

That's because that's his moniker for his organization that he has.

Stu (3:25)

It's a shield?

Cara (3:26)

Yes.

Stu (3:27)

Yes. It's a yellow shield looking thing. I'm too far away and too blind.

Cara (3:31)

Well, I think I know what it probably is written on it, but we're going to make up a different name for the thing so we can talk about it and respect his privacy.

Okay. Try to. Try to, yes. As always, the absolute best free way to support the show is to take a second to rate, review, and subscribe wherever you're listening right now. So grab your mason jars and let's get into today's case.

Stu (3:57)

It was Tuesday, August 4th, 1998 in Lanett, Alabama.

Lanett sits in Chambers County right along the Alabama-Georgia state line. It's the kind of place where people tend to know one another, kind of like this neighborhood these days.

People are just showing up introducing themselves.

Cara (4:15)

Yes.

Stu (4:16)

They know who works at the schools, who serves on the city council, who has lived in the town for years, and whose family has roots in the community going to the way back winds.

Charlotte Waites was 49 years old. She worked in education and had served in Chambers County and Lanett School Systems for years. She was familiar to people in her town and not a stranger passing through, but a mother, educator, and community member whose absence would be noticed.