GIRL SCOUT MURDERS: INSIDE CARLA WILHITE'S PRE-TRIAL TESTIMONY — PART ONE

CAMP SCOTT — We know several of y'all have been anxiously waiting for the next installment of our Girl Scout Murders series. The first pretrial transcript (Volume 1) we're diving into, which covers the testimony of two counselors, is more than 180 pages long. So it's taken us a little time to read through it and summarize it for y'all.

We are also going to have to split Carla's pretrial testimony into two parts because we're already at five pages long, and we don't want to make this one any longer than it already is so y'all's eyes don't get tired trying to read a novel on Facebook. So, with that being said, we'll be back with Part Two of her testimony later tonight.

Thank y'all for sticking with us. We don't want to rush through these transcripts because we want to present y'all with all the facts and give them the time and attention they deserve.

And just a quick recap for those who are new here: in the last installment of this series, we covered the pretrial testimony of Dee Elder, the chief counselor of the Kiowa Unit. Today, we're picking up with the pretrial testimony of Carla Wilhite.

Carla Wilhite had been involved with the Girl Scouts for 11 years by the time of her pretrial testimony and had attended summer camp at Camp Scott several times as a Scout herself over the course of about five to six years. She later joined the Girl Scouts as a counselor and attended the CIT (Counselor in Training) session twice, once during the summer of 1975 and again during the summer of 1976 before. She was hired again as a counselor in 1977, attended the training again, and was assigned to the Kiowa Unit.

So now that you've got a little background on Carla, we're going to jump right into it.

According to the pretrial testimony, Carla attended the pre-camp campout the week prior to the arrival of the Scouts on June 12th. She spoke about how they learned and taught other counselors how to properly handle saws and axes and discussed first aid. They also reviewed how to properly run the mess hall, the units, and their duties there as well.

She then said she took a day off after pre-camp was over, went home, and then returned back to Camp Scott at approximately 12:30 p.m. on June 12th, carpooling with Jody Davis and some of Davis' friends. She was assigned to the Kiowa Unit and then stated that she knew prior to that day that she was going to be assigned there. Because of that, instead of going the day of camp, she went to the unit on the last day of pre-camp to check it out. When asked if she noticed anything unusual about the equipment or the tents while she was there, she stated there was one tent that had been ripped approximately six inches on the front flap and said it was Tent Three.

She was asked regarding approximately what time it was when the Scouts arrived that day, and she stated it was around the afternoon time. Normally, she said she would have had twenty-eight Scouts, but that time she only had twenty-seven. After they gathered their Scouts from the bus, they took them all to the Kiowa Unit and let them pick out their tents. The luggage apparently hadn't arrived yet, so they were waiting for it to get there. After they picked their tents, they showed the Scouts how to put the mattress covers on them. The attorney interrupted to ask if they were allowed to choose their roommates as well, and Carla said yes. When asked if she remembered who occupied Tent Seven, she stated "the Milner girl," Michele, and Lori Lee Farmer. And yes, she literally said "the Milner girl," so that's why we are putting that here as a direct reference.

After that was done, they took all the Scouts to the unit kitchen and played games for a bit before supper so they could break the ice, so to speak. She also went over the Scouts' work assignments and stated that they have "unit capers," and they are typically broken up into patrols. That night, they had volunteers go up to the mess hall to get the tables set for the Kiowa Unit. They called those "Hoppers." Carla took them around 5:45 or so to prep, while the other two counselors, Elder and Emery, stayed with the rest of the Scouts.

When asked if there was anything unusual during supper, the only thing Carla stated was that it started raining. It wasn't a full-blown storm, but it was pretty heavy. As a result, they sang songs on the front porch for a bit, which is called the Singing Porch, and taught the Scouts camp songs while they waited out the rain. Once the rain lightened up a bit, they took their Scouts back to the Kiowa Unit.

Upon arriving back at the unit, they instructed the Scouts to get in their tents and put the flaps down so the rain would stop coming inside. They also told the girls to change into dry clothes. She then stated that Elder and Emery went around to each tent to fasten the sides using the hooks and loops.

Around 8:00 p.m., the rain had pretty much stopped, and whatever was left was "dripping off the nearby trees", so they then gathered the Scouts and had a meeting in the unit kitchen. Carla then said Elder went up to the Great Hall to grab the Scouts some cookies so they could snack on them while they went over camp rules and other "camp stuff". When asked who passed the cookies out, she stated it was "the Milner girl."

She then stated that around 9:00 p.m., they then sent the Scouts to their tents to go to bed. She mentioned that Elder was "sitting hill," which meant she was in charge of the unit that night while the other two counselors got the opportunity to have some "time off." So while Elder stayed behind with the unit, she and Emery went to the staff house and then to the Arapaho Unit to visit with some of her friends.

They got back to the unit around 11:30 p.m., and she stated that when she got back into her tent and started getting ready for bed, some of the Scouts were giggling and laughing. Elder was going to get up, but since Carla still had her shoes on, she told Elder she would go quiet the Scouts down herself. She walked out of her tent with a flashlight and told the Scouts in the noisy tents to be quiet. She also stated that she didn't say anything to the Scouts whose tents were already quiet, and it was noted that Tent Six and Tent Seven were quiet.

Then, when asked what she did after that, Wilhite stated that she actually got into bed this time. She said after she laid down, all of the Scouts in Tent One went to the latrine, which is the bathroom, and it sounded really noisy, like they were banging doors or toilet lids. So Wilhite got up and met them on the path to the latrine as they were headed back to their tents. She then said she "got onto them" for making so much noise. And at this point in time, she was right across from Tent Six and Tent Seven, and she stated she still didn't hear any noise coming from those two tents. After she addressed the Scouts from Tent One and told them to hush, they then proceeded to head back to their tents to go back to bed. She noted they stayed quiet after that.

Wilhite then went to lay back down and attempted to fall asleep, but she said she couldn't quite doze off. As she lay there, she began hearing giggling from Tent Four and then heard something over by the fence. This was a little after 1:00 a.m., according to Wilhite's account. She stated she woke Elder up and asked if she heard the noise by the fence. Elder said she did. When she asked Elder if she knew what the noise was, Elder stated she had never heard that noise before and thought maybe it was some type of animal. So Wilhite then got up and decided to go see what that noise by the fence was, and on her way back she was going to stop by Tent Four to quiet them down.

According to Wilhite's account, there's a little trail that runs from the staff tent to the road, so she walked that trail and crossed over the road to where the fence was. When she got over to the fence, she flashed her flashlight and the noise stopped. So she began to walk back, and the noise resumed, so she started going toward it again, this time getting a little closer. It stopped again, so she chalked it up to being an animal because she said it did not sound like anything she had ever heard before. After that, she went to Tent Four and told them to be quiet. She said she then again walked past Tent Six and Tent Seven and went back to her tent. She noted that there was nothing unusual about Tent Six or Tent Seven at that time. She also stated none of the other tents were making noise; it was just Tent Four. By the time she got back into the staff tent to sleep, it was approximately 1:30 a.m. or so, and she eventually dozed off into a deep sleep.

The next thing Wilhite stated was that she woke up to the sound of her alarm at 6:00 a.m. She got up and was heading to the staff house to take a shower. She said she put her glasses on, shook out her tennis shoes, and grabbed her flashlight because it was dark in the staff tent. She then got her towel out of her trunk, put her flashlight away, and proceeded to walk out of the staff tent toward the staff house, which is the same trail she described earlier that runs from the staff tent to the road.

That's when she saw two sleeping bags lying in the fork of the road. Initially, she thought that maybe sometime during the night more luggage had been delivered and the sleeping bags had happened to fall out there, so she was going to pick them up and put them in the unit kitchen for the Scouts to claim. As she got closer, that's when she saw a body. She then stated she realized it was a little girl, but she didn't know if she belonged to her unit. She said she assumed the little girl was dead because her eyes were open and her legs were spread apart. She then ran back to the staff tent and woke up both Elder and Emery. She told them they needed to start counting their Scouts because she had found a body in the road.

Wilhite then stated she told Elder to start with Tent Seven while she would begin with Tent One. When asked how she counted the Scouts, she stated she went into each tent and touched each bed to make sure there was a Scout in it because the tents were so dark. When she got to Tent Three, she said Elder came running and told her there was no one in Tent Seven. She also stated that Elder told her there was blood. Wilhite said her first thought was that maybe one of the Scouts had started her monthly cycle.

She was then shown a photograph and asked if it was a true representation of what she saw when she walked over to the two sleeping bags, and she said yes, but at first it wasn't exactly like that because the camp director's husband had pulled part of the sleeping bag over the little girl's body. She also stated she initially thought there was only one body at the fork in the road, so she told Elder and Emery to stay with the unit to make sure none of the other Scouts got up or left their tents. She then ran to get help, first going to the infirmary to wake the camp nurse, Mary Ann Alaback, and then continuing on to the staff house to notify the camp director. She testified that she told the nurse there was a body at the fork in the road and that she needed to get there as quickly as possible. By the time the nurse had left, Wilhite had already made it to the staff house, where she woke Camp Director Barbara Day and her husband, Richard Day.

Wilhite said she and the Days then got into the camp station wagon and headed back to the Kiowa Unit. When they got back, Alaback met them at the top of the road and informed them that there were actually three bodies. The Days and Wilhite then went to the area where the bodies were, and that's when she realized that the "Milner girl" was one of the victims. She then stated that Richard Day, who was a nurse, said it looked like one of the girls may have been r*ped, but it wasn't for sure. Barbara Day then instructed someone to call the police, and Richard then covered one of the girls so she wasn't exposed.

Wilhite testified that by this point, Elder and Emery had left the scene because they had started to feel sick. Barbara then instructed Alaback to stay with the victims and told Wilhite to get the Scouts out of the Kiowa Unit as quickly as possible because the Oklahoma Highway Patrol was expected to arrive at any minute. Wilhite said she knew she couldn't get all of the Scouts out of the unit by herself, so she asked Alaback to stay with her unit while she ran to the Arapaho Unit to get her friend, who was a counselor in training, to help her.

When asked what she told the Scouts, Wilhite stated they weren't supposed to be up for another hour and that it was around 6:30 a.m. by then. She testified that she yelled for the Scouts to wake up, telling them it was time for breakfast and to hurry over to the unit kitchen. She said the Scouts grumbled a little because they were tired, but they were given about 10 minutes to get dressed.

After they all gathered at the unit kitchen, Elder and Emery told Wilhite they could not take the path where the bodies were located. Wilhite testified that she then told the Scouts that since they hadn't let the counselors sleep the night before, they were going to take a "tour" of all the camp latrines, with the Great Hall as their final destination. She described it as "very smelly business."

Wilhite also testified that, to her knowledge, the other Scouts never knew what was going on or what had happened at that point in time...

And we'll stop there.

As promised, we'll be back later tonight with Part Two of Carla's pretrial testimony, which goes more in depth into some of Carla's missing items and the defense's cross-examination of her testimony.

Source: Official pretrial court transcripts.