The Baytown Sun (Baytown, Tex.), Vol. 80, No. 307, Ed. 1 Sunday, September 29, 2002 Page: 6 of 29
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daughter, not only shared first names with
turn, allegedly because it was failing financially.
police link Olney and McManus to the Cantrell
police were looking for a man with a beard in
years probation and a $3,000 fine. Strapps
At one point, Tabor said McManus and Olney
“I told them I didn’t know if I could find one
friend Vernon Olney.
decided I was going to beat them for their money ping drunk saddled with a failing business —
“He said he didn’t want to work a day in his
According to Derese, a simple comment to
teacher and, like Derese, had a 2-year-old child.
In May 1980, McManus appealed his death
Indeed, Smith married McManus’ ex-wife
head coach at McArthur High School in San
tion, Smith said he filed the divorce petition at the
“The killers are in the area and three’s a crowd,”
Derese spent the evening at a concert in
After the murders, Derese testified McManus
She also alleged the accused killer warned her
west of Barrett Station. Police found his billfold
See CANTRELLS on Page 7A
f
I
tea
45®!
“You’re the maggot at the core
of the apple of your daddy’s eye"
remembered.
An all-state linebacker and co-captain of the
who had gone to school with Derese and knew
er. “All throughout she reacted poorly. Her emo-
onal display seemed fake.”
der.
Detectives suspected Derese from the start.
culties and no union hassles. The couple was
financially stable and police could find no one
who might wish them harm.
However, from the beginning, police suspected
the killer was not a stranger.
The day before his trial,
McManus disappeared
and his wife and denied the inmate a new trial.
“I felt it was the most effective cross-examina-
tion I’d ever seen then, and I do now,” McMaster
said of Smith’s performance.
by Tabor’s parents were submitted as well.
Furthermore, Dan Janowski, a local man who
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“Her emotional display
seemed fake"
A whole new bend
For a while, it seemed that the Cantrell murder
case had been settled. Few knew it was about to
ing television. He was still there, asleep, Vernon
Olney added, when Olney woke around 6 a m.
“1
this case,” Chief Wilkerson told reporters after
Qpl
To Testify Madrid Rioting Continues ,-r -
Against - ■ i
McManus
. HOUSTON ($p> - h
pn« mow about ! p.r
<1»». P»ub Cantrell uerese —. r-
' chanjed her fnxn nut pwl- MADRID. Spam (API *21>e peendtm o( 1:, feuth fcwuom ended by afwnwxt •
ty to a charrr u( rapuai murder Spam’, top military oArf was kidnaped today Tbw were no immediate reports o( aerious , * '
• io the »b>iiMt o( her pnrentr m and po; polhx-battled klt-irin( demonitmton miuriff. ......................................J..**,?*
iptoton £>u
to rn READERS EvritY DAY -
'^<■7. ■ riwwff, imrit, iw j ,,..
was the Cantrells only child. She had been active he baited the pair with a phony stolen whisky Plaskett was convicted and sentenced to five
and popular at Ross S. Sterling High, but at 26, scheme. Tabor alleged he shared “profits” from j . ’ " ’ ~
she had already ended two short-lived, unhappy the bogus plot with them in order to gain their received immunity from prosecution for her help.
not been in the house at the time of the slayings.
Olney reportedly considered the offer, but, after
conferring with his attorneys, turned it down.
Despite the evidence against him, however,
Olney proved more complicated to convict. Juries
in two trials deadlocked — the first 8-4 in favor
of conviction, the second split 6-6. After two mis-
trials, the state ceased to pursue him further.
■
1
conspirators and partners in the crime.
But, as the trial progressed, circumstantial evi-
dence piled up against McManus.
The car parked in front of the Cantrell home
From the start, police were sure of a scam, that night had been rented by McManus from
‘ 5 a
PaulaLii
DireeUy To Murders
lr>-r—iPrribp Rules (isf/W Play - -______ i
on local hardware stores, cleaning out their stocks
of deadbolts, chain door guards, locks and burglar
bars. Merchants reported sales of security items
had jumped 50 percent in the days after the
killings.
Meanwhile, police probed the Cantrells’ per-
sonal lives, particularly Paul’s business dealings.
An ex-Golden Gloves boxer, Tabor made his football star jump bail because she had fallen for and shaved it off the day after. After reportedly
itinerant pool and golf hustler. When him. She also admitted providing a syringe he giving conflicting accounts as to why he shaved,
“ n ~ ■________________s
was hustling as a confidence man. Though the hoped police would believe was his murder. police were looking for a man with a beard in
: Plaskett, who had known both Vernons for connection with the Cantrell murders.
On June 20, 1977 the jury found Vernon
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cManus
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Guilty In Murder Case
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bulletin
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„ Military Court Head SSS
Manus’ ......:.......J ........■■■......---
S:=In Spain Is Kidnaped gSw
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Continued from Page 1A rj
Cantrells had been beaten, strangled and stabbed
repeatedly. Gaping neck wounds indicated the ||
couple’s throats had been slashed.
As Baytown police investigated, it quickly M
became apparent robbery was not a motive. The hl
couple had more than $300 in cash as well as I
credit cards and jewelry, none of which were dis- . h
turbed. Nothing of value was missing.
Police also found little physical evidence of the I
killer or killers at the scene. They could not find I
even a single bloody fingerprint. I
Hoping to turn over some leads before the trail IB
cooled, Baytown Police Chief John Wilkerson put
12 officers on the case, working round the clock.
Detective Sgt. R.P. Merchant coordinated the
investigation.
“Merchant was obsessed with the case,”
Shaffer remembered. “He and P.J. Kuehn pushed
themselves to the brink working on it.”
Word of the brutal double homicide sent panic
tearfully recounted the conspiracy to kill her par- and Olney met and sometimes hung out. s’
ents, implicating McManus as the killer. The two Baytown men, he said, came to him back.
Derese, an attractive, petite, green-eyed blonde, interested in making some money. Tabor testified
him up for questioning in the case. McManus. Strapps would tell a jury in Plaskett’s McManus guiltv and later sentenced him to
When police interviewed Derese, she flunked a approached him in February 1976 at the was vengeance. Plaskett’s two sons were serving
polygraph test, cracked under questioning and Thunderbird Tavern, a Houston bar where Tabor jail sentences for violent offenses at the time and —-oc—
she, reportedly was seeking to pay authorities Cantrells and proclaimed, “We know the system
For her part in McManus’ aborted getaway,
marriages. Paula and her 2-year-old son had been confidence and set them up for a bigger score,
living in the Cantrell home for a little less than a At one point, Tabor said McManus and Olney
year after she separated from her second husband, asked if he knew of someone who could commit
Shortly after returning to Baytown, Derese had a murder for them.
gone to work for McManus as a receptionist for
SHERIFFS DEPT
HARRIS COUNTY
HOUSTON TEXAS
1575 4G
9 29 76
year-
the police picked him up was the last of the roll, old son if she tried to reconcile with her ex-hus-
Tabor said he was in Odessa when he read
football team at Robert E. Lee High School in about the Cantrell murders. He promptly went
1960, McManus was a tornado on the gridiron. underground, using an assumed name before
“I coached a long time and have been around police nabbed him in September.
football all my life,” former REL head football
coach Pete Sultis said. “I can tell you he was the
only player I have ever seen move up the ladder so
quickly. He started on the freshman team, the next
day he was elevated to the junior varsity and the
day after that he moved up to the varsity. As a
sophomore he was a two-way varsity starter.”
McManus would go on to win Little All-
American honors as a senior linebacker at Lamar exchange, prosecutors agreed to reduce her sen-
1977, Paula Derese made a surprise about-face was no backing out.”
and changed her plea to guilty, agreeing to turn f
the state’s witness against McManus. 'In.. of the Cantrell estate.
“You mean,” prosecutor L. H. Stewart asked ; _
in 1965. In the late 1960s, he had a short stint as tence from capital murder to first-degree murder, her, “you sat there and listened to that and didn’t McManus began after the jury’s verdict In addL
J----L tion, Smith said he filed the divorce petition at the
“No sir,” Paula responded, “I didn’t really request of Vernon McManus and not on behalf of
believe he was serious.” " - ---- - * * * *
Derese also testified that the afternoon prior to
. . - ■ - ....... ,
—.............
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-------•-----------------------------------......- ......................................— . ......
„r„&HTER, EX-GANDER GRID STAR
■ . ■ ’ r -.A -1 ' • ■
CHAR(,ED IN CANTRELL MURDERS
f Ufto-math ()f Trogerh ■ ■ Say
■SwlT7— - UneasyJBaytouians Cause ‘ ^^^Murderers Hired-
^^Iffi’Onboor Locks, Bars'^ ;
.mw t>» they'., l.iirlc Kn 4 t><MS VlTORI bl 1200 NoflhwiXk?, lii |
Cantrells: 25 years after Baytown couple slashed to death, the mystery remains
that if she talked, he would kill Derese and her
young son.
However, defense attorney Don Smith charac-
terized Derese as a party girl with a rock where
her heart should be.
“You’re the maggot at the core of the apple of
your daddy’s eye,” Smith said.
In his testimony, Tabor said he expressed shock
that Derese was willing to have her own parents
killed. McManus responded that Paula was, “very
cold” and quite capable of the deed herself.
“I never saw Paula shed a tear over the deaths
of her parents,” Bill Guiles would state, describ-
ing her post murder demeanor as “placid.”
Since police never found any weapons used or
hard evidence placing McManus at the scene of
the killings, Smith offered no defense, confident
his client could beat the rap. Instead, Smith
THE SUSPECTS: A few days after the Cantrells’ funeral, Baytown police arrested Paula Derese and her S0Ught to implicate Derese and Tabor as the real
employer, Vernon McManus, center, charging them both with capital murder. Later, Vernon Olney, right,
was indicted on charges of criminal conspiracy to commit capital murder.
through to® Uneasy Baytonians made a run ^fore we jt Up -pyj js one case j want nearby.
nn Inrql hardwarp ctnrpc pjpanma nnt fnpir ctnrLc r M r .a
death penalty on. ----------
In late September 1976, Olney was indicted on Their suspicions were confirmed a few days later Intercontinental (now Bush) Airport using
charges of criminal conspiracy to commit capital when a North Shore waitress named Dinah Lamar University credit card,
murder. Strapps told them she helped McManus set up the
It was the difference between living with a pos- do anything?”
kilitx/ rxnrrJp and dpath in flip plppfrin nhair “Mn cir” 1
“My friends automatically assumed I was believe he was serious.” Regina McManus.
.my I Derese also testified that the afternoon prior to >qf j did that,” Smith remarked to reporters at
inearly 1976. interview with reporters the day before she impli- the killings, McManus telephoned her to warn her the time, “I’d be the dumbest lawyer in history”
McManus told police he was with his friend cated McManus. “I will never forget the deaths of away from the house. McManus’ prosecutors seized upon the two
Vernon Olney and Olney’s wife in the couple’s my parents or the attitude of people around me.” “The killers are in the area and three’s a crowd,” points t0 that no conflict of interest existed
apartment on the night the Cantrells were killed. Jury selection for McManus’ trial began in she claimed was McManus’ warning. At a hearing into the question district Judge
------- ------—- - r-., 1 :: J “ F " 7*’ r ^“3 Derese evenin8 at a concert in l.D. McMaster ruled that McManus’ defense did
McManus was reportedly on their couch, watch- a Harris County record for the number of jurors Houston with a friend. not suffer from the entanglement between Smith
• • * -- 1—x 1—..— J Daracn XXnk/nMiin . . . . - . - .
And then, the day before his trial in late April, told her he had the help of two other men whom
‘We are going to continue our investigation of McManus, out on a $50,000 bond, disappeared, he would not identify The trio, she testified he
■■ - -j™ ?..r His car, the interior smeared with blood, was told her, held guns on the Cantrells then knocked
announcing the arrests. “I want to make sure in eventually found abandoned on a deserted road them out with a pipe before slitting their throats,
my own mind that no one else was involved Barrett Station. Police found his billfold She also alleged the accused killer warned her
. Several witnesses testified to seeing McManus
Olney, 34, married and the father of a teenage scene and make his get away. Another woman, in the rental car at several points near the Cantrell
daughter, not only shared first names with Strapps said, a Baytown convenience store clerk home the day of the slayings. Others saw him cir-
- - ~ McManus, but also bore a strange physical like- named Betty Jean Plaskett, allowed the accused cling the Cantrells’block in the car.
Paul Cantrell, they round, had no business di i- ness to his boyhood friend. Olney had also been a murderer to use her car in the escapade. Banking records corresponding with Tabor’s
football and baseball star at Lee. Six days later, police broke m the door to room money claims were also produced. Telephone
He had recently pulled out of the plywood ven- 14 of the Sea Ranch Motel in Jacksonville Beach, records showing calls having taken place from the
ture, allegedly because it was failing financially. Fla. and arrested McManus, who was asleep in plywood business offices to a lake home owned
Police would later note they scheduled three bed with a teacher from Cincinnati. The woman - -
meetings with Olney to talk about the Cantrell expressed amazement that she had slept with a
murders. However, each time he allegedly backed murder suspect, though she noted, he had not laid had gone to high school with McManus, testified
a finger on the $400 in traveling money she had the accused had also asked him about finding
someone to commit a murder.
It was also pointed out that McManus had a
Antonio where he was the youngest prep coach in sibility of parole and death in the electric chair,
the state. He returned to Lamar as an assistant -
coach from 1970-75, then came back to Baytown guilty because 1 was charged,” Derese said in an
in early 1976. j—j- l-a— -u- —-n
McManus told police he was with his friend cated McManus. “I will never forget the deaths of away from the house.
Vernon Olney and Olney’s wife in the couple’s my parents or the attitude of people around me.” “The killer? ere “-----------
_r " 'J2.1 Jury selection for McManus’ trial began in she claimed was McManus’warning.
When the Olneys turned in at about 10 p.m., early 1977 and dragged on for six weeks, setting
interviewed.
out and refused to talk. (
A fourth person, Ben Milton Tabor, helped stashed in her purse.
ILL 21 j 1 LLLI ~ .11 Strapps, who had known McManus only a few
A few days after the couple’s funeral, police killings. weeks, later confessed she had helped the ex- beard the day before the Cantrells had been killed
arrested Paula Derese arid her employer, Vernon ' ” ’ ’ ' ” ’ ’ * ’ • •' ” -
McManus, charging them both with capital mur- living as an itinerant pool and golf hustler. When him. She also admitted providing a syringe he giving conflicting accounts as to why he* shaved,
he was not on the links or at the billiard table, he used to draw blood from his hand to fake what he a witness testified McManus told her it because
“I interviewed Paula that night,” said Shaffer, affable Tabor had not held a straight job in five
' ’ ’ years, he was carrying $3,000 when police picked years, reportedly obtained a false identity for
c™ case McManus. Strapps would tell a jury in Plaskett’s McManus guilty and later sentenced him to
Tabor told detectives McManus and Olney trial the clerk’s motive in aiding the accused killer death.
When the verdict was announced, Bill and Ruth
Guiles tearfully hugged other friends of the
works.”
Shortly after McManus’ conviction and sen-
tencing, Derese was convicted and sentenced to
two consecutive life sentences.
With two down in the Cantrell murder case, the
state went to work on the alleged third member of
the trio.
At one point in the investigation, Vernon Olney
When his capital murder trial finally began in dons: if he would tell the whole truth about what
was offered immunity by the state on two condi-
the plywood brokerage firm he operated with his but I’d look around,” he would later testify. “I May 1977, McManus was painted as a bar-hop- he knew about the Cantrell killings and if he had
friend Vernon Olney. decided I was going to beat them for their money ping drunk saddled with a failing business — a ....
Derese and McManus first met at Lamar so I later told McManus I had talked to the hit compulsive womanizer who had sunk low enough
University in Beaumont in the early 1970s. She man — (they) didn’t bat an eye when 1 told them to commit cold-blooded murder.
worked as a secretary in the football office while it would cost $12,000.” . “He said he didn’t want to work a day in his
he was an assistant football coach. The hired killer was nothing more than another life,” Derese testified.
At the time of his arrest, 33-year-old Vernon creation of Tabor’s imagination. Posing as the According to Derese, a simple comment to
Eugene McManus was married to a local school- middleman between the non-existent hired killer McManus one afternoon set in motion the plot to
7 -- ~ , 2 , and the two Vernons, Tabor took their $12,000 kill Paul and Mary Cantrell.
For most Baytonians, McManus, the grizzled from them and left town. Tabor said he blew Derese said her parents were attempting to con-
suspect with the diamond-hard stare, was a far cry much of the money at a horse track in Louisiana trol her life. At one point, she testified, they
from the crew-cut high school football star they and on his pick-up truck. The $3,000 he had when threatened to secure legal custody of her 2-year-
band, of whom they disapproved.
“1 was still upset about (the argument),” Derese go around a whole new bend.
told the court. “I told (McManus) about the situ- I- mon ----- . • • • ■ ■
ation and said I’d do anything to be free to think sentence, charging that Smith* his lead defense
for myself. He told me he knew a way it could be attorney, had an affair with his wife during his
taken care of and I wouldn’t have to worry about trial.
it anymore — he said he knew people who killed McManus stated, at the time, he thought Smith
for money and there had already been a payment had done a good job of handling his defense,
On the day her trial was to start in late January made to them to have my parents killed and there “But, I also thought collusion was a car wreck.”
177 n,..u rtorACA „„„ „„ „..»;> Indeed, Smjth married McManus’ ex-wife
She added that McManus demanded one-third Regina and had even handled her divorce from
le death row inmate after his murder conviction.
’But, Smith maintained, the affair with Regina
6A The Baytown Sun
Sunday, September 29,2002
Sun
•2
'T*
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Cash, Wanda Garner. The Baytown Sun (Baytown, Tex.), Vol. 80, No. 307, Ed. 1 Sunday, September 29, 2002, newspaper, September 29, 2002; Baytown, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1185065/m1/6/: accessed July 9, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Sterling Municipal Library.