the Kid. Billy - Cold case: Billy the Kid: investigating historys mysteries

Cold Case

BILLY

THE KID

Investigating

Historys Mysteries

W. C. Jameson

An imprint of The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc.

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Distributed by NATIONAL BOOK NETWORK

Copyright 2018 by W. C. Jameson

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote passages in a review.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data available

ISBN 978-1-4930-3170-2 (hardcover)

ISBN 978-1-4930-3171-9 (e-book)

The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information SciencesPermanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.

Printed in the United States of America

Foreword

By W. C. Jameson

I first met Steve Sederwall in 2006 at a book signing in Capitan, New Mexico. The book I was doing a reading from and signing was Billy the Kid: Beyond the Grave , which provides powerful and compelling evidence that the famous outlaw was not shot and killed as alleged by Sheriff Pat Garrett, but lived a long, not necessarily happy, life, passing away from a heart attack in Texas on December 27, 1950. Because the contents of the book took issue with the prevailing notions about the Kid, it upset, even angered, those who professed to be experts and vigorously supported the legend. To date, while a handful of so-called authorities have argued against the findings I presented in the book, none has ever presented evidence sufficient to support their positions.

I knew Sederwall by reputation. He had generated newspaper headlines as well as television appearances relating to his aggressive investigations into a variety of Billy the Kidrelated events. His findings were based on solid police work, and they differed, sometimes dramatically, from the established history laid down by writers who claimed to be historians. As a result, Sederwall was also irritating a number of self-anointed experts on the outlaw and his life and times. Sederwall ignored them all and continued with his work. I was hoping he would be at the book signing; I wanted to meet the man.

Following the signing of books, a pleasant gathering ensued with snacks and wine. I visited with the guests and engaged in conversations about Billy the Kid, Pat Garrett, and New Mexico history. Though I had never seen Sederwall before, I knew it was him the minute the crowd parted to allow this six-foot-five-inch, broad-shouldered man wearing a Stetson, a badge, and a pistol to approach. He stepped up to me, introduced himself, and confronted me on a few findings in my book with which he took issue.

Twelve years later, we still argue and disagree, but what became clear from that first meeting was that, though we have our differences, we are both interested in the same thing: the truth. We just chase it down in different ways.

I have learned a lot from Sederwall. His tenacity and thoroughness when taking on the study of historical topics is exceeded by no one I have ever encountered. I have spent more years than I care to admit in academic settings and have never encountered anyone with research and investigation abilities equal to Sederwalls. His talent for ferreting out evidence and facts long overlooked or ignored by the Billy the Kid establishment researchers is nothing short of amazing. His ability to deconstruct and analyze evidence is astounding. He is tenacious, determined, efficient, and thorough.

Steven M. Sederwall comes by all of this honestly. He has been a cop for most of his adult life. He served in police departments in Texas and California and as a criminal investigator for the United States government. He has been involved in hundreds of investigations and worked dozens of crime scenes. With every assignment he gained more experience, more expertise. After decades of law enforcement and criminal investigation adventures, he has developed a keen sense for identifying and separating evidential fact from perception and myth. As an investigator he has recorded numerous successes. Today, Sederwall operates his own investigative agency. He is a private detective, but unlike most detectives, he specializes in investigating western cold cases, decades-old crimes and mysteries that either have never been solved or were bungled. In 1998 he decided to take on a series of major cold cases related to the mishandling of the life and times of the outlaw Billy the Kid.

There are, and have been, a number of doyens who do not hesitate to inform the likes of Steve Sederwall, me, and others that a crime scene investigation, as well as other forensic applications, cannot be conducted relative to events that took place a hundred or more years ago. They are wrong. The truth is, the literature is filled with examples of investigations of decades-old, even centuries-old, events that have succeeded in bringing to light certain facts heretofore missed, and which have resulted in the presentation of new truths.

Deoxyribonucleic acidDNAis a genetic fingerprint inherited from our parents, and has proven to be a virtually irrefutable forensic investigation tool. Useful DNA has been extracted from bones and teeth millions of years old.

A variety of chemical analyses can be applied to age-old crime scenes and mysteries. It had long been suspected that President Zachary Taylor, who died in office in 1850, was a victim of arsenic poisoning. His remains were disinterred and tested, the result being that no arsenic was found. Certain chemicals can be employed to locate decades-old bloodstains invisible to the human eye.

Site analysis is another important forensic tool. All events occur in a place, and the geography of that place can provide clues as to how a situation unfolded, even determine what could have happened. While researchers and writers have examined historical events over the centuries, precious few, we have learned, actually traveled to the location of an occurrence and conducted an appropriate site analysis. Site analysis contributed to a greater understanding of the Battle of the Little Bighorn as well as the assassination of Pat Garrett.

Such tools and techniques as described above are part of Sederwalls investigation kit, and he applies them with the skill expected of a professional. His results have yielded heretofore unknown information and facts relative to selected mysteries.

All history is mystery, says author Dale L. Walker, and historians have not done a particularly good job of unraveling them, and in many cases misinterpret and misreport them. Matthew Arnold puts it less kindly; he insists that history is a huge Mississippi of falsehoods. Napoleon pulled no punches when he stated that history is fraud agreed upon.