had mentioned peggy to me and i didn t quite put two and two together. she made some comment about them being there at the funeral, and it just didn t click because i didn t want to acknowledge it. jean says she later found emails and letters from this peggy, and that the woman even called her home looking for jim. but jean says that jim told her peggy was simply a music contact who could get in gigs in las vegas. worrisome, to be sure. but jean says it was her husband s heavy drinking that really had her concerned. he started drinking constantly at home and drinking to obliterate himself, basically, to numb himself. and he started making trips out west. did you at the time think there was another woman? no. i had no idea. there is, of course, no cure for willful blindness. but bill hill, huden s faithful wing man, knew the truth about those out of town trips because sometimes he had been along for the ride.
russell douglas. peggy thomas told the detectives she had been visiting friends over the holidays and explained that she had simply contacted russell in order to ss on a present for brynna. she answered all my questions to my satisfaction. there was nothing about that phone call that made me include her in the suspect list. but then again, the detective s suspect list was essentially a blank page. there were no names on it from florida or nevada or new mexico, or any of the other places this investigation would eventually lead him. at least, not yet. the investigation begins close to home with the dead man s on again-off again wife. coming up i said, is he hurting you? is he hitting you? and she said, no, really, he isn t physical. it s just emotionally and verbal, but i ve hit him a couple times.
together, jean and jim got married in las vegas. and i was asked by jean if i would walk her down the aisle. was she happy? oh, yeah. all smiles. both of them were all smiles. but the smiles did not last long. in june 2002, jim huden returned here to washington state for the funeral of an old friend. and it was here that fate intervened. a tall red-haired beauty caught jim s eye. it was the beginning of a love triangle, one that would wreck the lives of a lot of people involved and some who were not. the woman in question was peggy thomas, a whi drdbey hairstylist who also dabbled in beauty pageants. in fact, she entered a las vegas
at the time we went to talk to her, it was basically a death notification. she was able to answer our questions for us. who didn t like russ douglas? nobody could think of someone who really, truly didn t like him. as winter turned to spring, the detective s investigation seemed to be going nowhere. but a routine check of the numbers in russell douglas cell phone had yielded a tiny clue. there were a few phone calls to a number with a las vegas area code. and we made a phone call to that number. there was no answer. it went to an answering machine. was it cell phone voicemail or a person s voice? it was a cell phone voicemail for a woman named peggy. peggy. that s a name you ll hear again. the detective made a mental note to have that number traced, but within minutes of hanging up, his phone rang. and there was a female who said she had just gotten a phone call from that number. and she identified herself as peggy thomas, explained that she was a friend of brynna and
we came out to las vegas. the reason he asked me to go was to cover for him. he was seeing peggy. yes. tell me about jim s relationship with peggy. it was all love and kisses. really. uh-huh. more so than with jean who was waiting for him back at home? yes. before long, other band members say they, too, began seeing the same changes in jim that troubled jean. heavy drinking and erratic behavior. he would go through a fifth of crown royal in a night, and one night i m calling chord changes to the bass player, and he hollers at me in the middle of a song, quit criticizing the bass player, or something like that, and i hollered back, why don t you keep your mouth quiet while i m doing my job over here, and he shut his guitar off and walked offstage, which is about the most unprofessional thing you can ever do. after that, the band s days were numbered, and seemingly, so were the days of jean huden s