The Three Minute Man

Book excerpt: March 12, 1985, Columbia, Mississippi, Police Station Dispatch Office, 8:58 PM "This is James Jackson at Red Carpet Motors. We've been robbed. My wife is hurt bad. I need an ambulance." Thus began, a yearlong investigation and prosecution into Mary Nell Jackson's killer, beginning with a crime scene containing no eyewitness, no murder weapon, very little physical evidence, and no motive. When the investigation began to focus on the husband, town and church, loyalties split . . . And when fate provided a clue, the question was whether this would be enough to prove murder against a man who represented the "model" church and community leader. The investigators and the prosecution had little choice but to use this clue, along with some unconventional investigation and trial tactics, to prove the truth to a jury and a small community torn by grief. This story is taken from the original files of law enforcement, the prosecution, the trial courts, and media coverage surrounding the death of Mary Nell Jackson. It is the inside story as told by the district attorney, Richard Douglass, who prosecuted a great deceiver, a man with a hidden second life . . . The Three-Minute Man.