Justin Adams Walks

The deal was struck and yesterday both parties held up their ends of it.

In today's, The Oklahoman, Matt Dinger reports that on Wednesday, Justin Dewayne Adams pleaded guilty to two counts of first degree manslaughter then walked out into a bright February sun, for all practical purposes, free as a bird.

It has been a long trip--one that began on December 9th, 2011. That was the night Jaymie Adams, age 25 and pregnant with her fifth child, went off to meet a john at a Midwest City McDonalds. She never came home. Her body was found in south east Oklahoma City near Lake Stanley Draper on January 7th, 2012. She had been stabbed 18 times in the back, 29 times total, and her jaw had been broken in three places.

Justin Adams notified police his wife was missing on the 10th of December and the investigation almost immediately homed in on him. There were a couple of reasons it did. Adams first told the cops his wife had gone to meet a friend, but then his story began to shift. After some questioning he admitted they were swingers who advertised on Craig's List for partners. Then finally, he fessed up to the hard truth, which was Jaymie Adams was pulling down tricks and basically he was a soft core version of a pimp. There were also questions about his actual location the night she went missing. In addition the cops knew the odds. In this country if a wife is murdered chances are better than 50-50 the husband did it.

Adams was arrested and chucked away while the police and DA's office tried to complete their case against him.

It wasn't happening though. Try as they might they couldn't come up with a smoking gun that would either slam the door on Adams for life, or get him the hot shot on a gurney down in McAlester. In late January of 2012 police and the DA admitted to the media they were still searching for additional evidence. By July of that year a judge let him out on $100,000 bond even though he was still charged with two counts of first degree murder,

It turned out the police had begun looking at another guy for the killing. His name was Joseph Cyr. He had been interviewed by the authorities as early as ten days after Jaymie Adams disappeared. Cyr maintained then and still does, he had exchanged text messages and emails with Mrs. Adams on the 9th, but after trading photos and finding out what her going rate was, decided not to meet her.

However, police obtained a sample of Cyr's DNA and according to press reports, matched it with DNA found on the body. That was in July, 2012. For reasons, which remain unexplained, Cyr wasn't arrested and charged with the death until early April of last year.

At the same time the charges against Adams were lessened to first degree manslaughter--the logic being he had facilitated criminal behavior and aided and abetted in a felony which put his wife in a position to be murdered. Adams' attorney, Irven Box basically called the manslaughter charges bull shit. His opinion hasn't changed. 

In Dinger's story today Box stated he advised Adams not to plead guilty, but his client is so distrustful of the justice system he didn't want to face a jury. Well, that and he probably didn't want the DA to show them an ad he wrote on Craig's List which read: I am letting any willing man come and have his way with my wife with a little compensation for us to help with our holiday funding we need.

Yes, one can easily imagine a jury of 12 outraged Southern Baptists taking one look at that, then throwing him in the slammer just for being the ultimate sleaze--not to mention a lesser charge of gross illiteracy.

As it stands now Justin Adams is beginning to serve two 10 year suspended sentences with two years of supervised probation. Cyr is still in the county jail. Dinger writes his preliminary hearing will be held on April 4th.

So one chapter in the tragedy of Jaymie Adams is seemingly over, but we're a long way from the conclusion. Given how things have gone so far, it feels like we're equally as distant from the final answers to the mystery of her death.

Indeed, where are Lenny Briscoe and Jack McCoy when we need them?


sic vita est


2-13-14