A father was killed in a Missouri bar brawl. His twin daughters’ podcast helped lead to an arrest 35 years later

On October 13, 1989, Jimmie Wade Martin went for a drink at his neighborhood bar in Bonne Terre, Missouri. His bloodied body was later found nearby, but no assailant was ever convicted. So years later, his twin daughters began investigating the case themselves.

On the night of October 13, 1989, Jimmie Wade Martin went for a drink at a neighborhood tavern in his hometown of Bonne Terre, Missouri. He never made it back home. Martin’s bloodied body was discovered lying in a nearby street in the predawn hours. He’d suffered a fatal blow to the head during a bar fight that spilled outside, authorities said at the time. His 11-year-old twin daughters, Angela Williams and Andrea Lynn, learned the horrible news when they were awakened during a sleepover in a family friend’s camper. Their father had promised to take them to a yard sale that day. For weeks, the twins rode their pink bikes to local newspaper stands to read stories about their dad’s death. In their town of 6,000 people, once famous for its vast lead mines, murders were so infrequent that they made lots of headlines. A man was arrested in connection with Martin’s death but later freed when the charges were dropped days before his trial, the twins said. Months turned to years with no more arrests. Some witnesses died, while others moved out of town.  The case went cold.