The Cold Case Murder of Fred Wilkerson: Untangling the Black Widow's Web in West Georgia

By Clay Bryant and Tracie Wilkerson Campbell

Nearly two decades after the fact, tragedy meets justice. One day in 1987, Fred Wilkerson up and vanished in Troup County, Georgia. It was a mystery beset with suspicious circumstances, but the evidence never led anywhere, and the case went cold, Wilkerson's whereabouts unknown. That is, until a remarkable set of circumstances allowed author and investigator Clay Bryant to breathe life back into the case nearly two decades later. Diving into what had previously been overlooked, Bryant was able to locate and recover Wilkerson's remains and successfully prosecute the killer, who'd crafted a calculating plot to take everything the victim had and murder him in order to keep it. The story concludes with the Wilkerson Family finally getting closure and the killer getting sentenced to life in prison. Join Byrant as he unravels this West Georgia cold case.

• Language: English
• Publisher: The History Press
• Release date: May 8, 2023
• ISBN: 9781439677841

Clay Bryant

Lewis Clayton (Clay) Bryant was born and raised in Troup County, Georgia, and began his career in law enforcement in 1973 as a radio operator with the Georgia State Patrol. In 1976, at the age of twenty-one, he became the youngest trooper on the Georgia State Patrol. In 1980, he became police chief of Hogansville and stayed in that position for twelve years until resigning in 1992 and going into the private sector. He has been recognized as the most prolific cold case investigator in the United States for single-event homicides. His cases have been chronicled on 48 Hours Investigates , Bill Curtis?s Cold Case Files and Discovery ID Murder Book and featured in the Atlanta Journal Constitution , as well as articles in many local and regional newspapers.

Book preview

1

FRIDAY NEVER CAME

The last time Tim and Tracie Wilkerson saw their father, Fred, was at Thanksgiving dinner in 1987 at the home of Fred’s sister Jewell and her husband, Clarence Lee, on Sanders Road in LaGrange, Georgia. As the afternoon wore on, Fred, who drove a truck for Fast Food Merchandisers, told the family he was going home to get some sleep. He was to leave at five o’clock the next morning to make deliveries in Tennessee. This trip was somewhat special to Fred, as Tim was going to make the trip with him to keep him company, as he did occasionally when their schedules would allow it.

Tim and Tracie told their father goodbye, with Tim telling his dad he would be home later in the evening, as he was going to visit with some friends before they embarked on their trip the next morning. Little did they know that afternoon would be the last time they would see their father alive, beginning a seventeen-year-long journey of disappointment, frustration and heartbreak as they searched for their father and answers about what happened to him.

Tim got home to his and his father’s apartment shortly after midnight on Friday, November 28, 1987, the day after Thanksgiving. He fully expected to find his father, Fred, asleep in the apartment upon his arrival, but to his surprise, Fred was not at home. At first, Tim wasn’t overly concerned, as his dad was often gone for some reason or other when Tim got home, but he would always show