Bio

John Roscoe Garland was born on July 22, 1942. By 1997, at age 54, he had previously been in a relationship with Willa Jean Ferrier, 26, who by that time was dating another man, Gary Roberts. An audiotape recovered after the murders captured Garland expressing his belief that Jean was pregnant and that Roberts was the father. His son, Roscoe Garland, later testified that about a month before the murders, his father told him he intended to kill Jean.

Murder Story

On the night of Saturday, March 9, 1997, Jean Ferrier, 22-year-old Crystal Conaster, and 16-year-old April Sexton left McCreary County, Kentucky, for a country music dance hall in Somerset, as they routinely did on weekend nights. Jean was reportedly afraid Garland might be there, and the group circled the parking lot before going in. At the dance, they met Chris Boswell, who danced with Crystal and later rode home with the group. After dropping off Sexton around 12:30 or 1:00 a.m., the remaining three drove past Gary Roberts's home and honked before continuing on to Jean's mobile home trailer.

According to trial testimony from Roscoe Garland, he and his father had originally planned to attend the London Auto Auction that night, but a traffic jam changed their plans, and they instead followed Jean's vehicle back to her trailer. Garland went inside while Roscoe waited, Roscoe testified he heard arguing and went in to find both his father and Jean, along with the interior of the home, disheveled as though a struggle had occurred. When Chris Boswell emerged from the bedroom, Garland shot him. Garland then shot Crystal Conaster, shot Boswell again, shot Conaster again, and finally shot Jean Ferrier. Jean had also been choked prior to her death. All three victims died in the rear bedroom of the trailer, where their bodies were discovered by Kentucky State Police the following afternoon in Whitley City, Kentucky.

Garland instructed his son to hide the murder weapon in a bag. The following day, aware that people knew he typically carried a firearm, Garland had his son procure a similar replacement gun; Roscoe's girlfriend was given money and purchased another .357 Magnum from a man named Clayton Stephens to serve as a substitute.

Garland denied committing the murders, claiming his son was lying and that the murder weapon belonged to Roscoe, not him. He gave conflicting accounts of his own whereabouts that night, first telling officers he had spent the night with Roscoe, then later claiming he had instead gone to visit his ex-wife, Eula Isgrigg, in London, Kentucky. Isgrigg's account also shifted over time: she initially told investigators she had not seen Garland for some time before the murders and that he had come to her home the Monday afterward, but later changed her story to say he had actually arrived at her home around 2:00 a.m. that Sunday morning, claiming she had initially lied out of fear.

Roscoe Garland served as the prosecution's key witness against his father. A McCreary County jury convicted John Roscoe Garland of murdering Willa Jean Ferrier, Crystal Conaster, and Chris Boswell, and he was sentenced to death on February 15, 1999.

John Roscoe Garland was never executed. He died on April 22, 2018, at Baptist Health Hospital in Paducah, Kentucky, while his death sentences remained in force.