LAWRENCE/WABASH/RICHLAND COs., Ill. - We get beseiged a lot more by whiny readers than we let you know about.
However, response to the article about the wreck Derek "Hootie" Wells, 32 of Bridgeport, was involved in earlier this week is going to be an exception, because it came from his own momma.
Wells, as one of Lawrence County's foremost methslingers at a very young age years ago, painted a target on his back at that time. He was slick, he was running a major operation, he was recruiting young pretty girls to be his mules or to pick up precursors (which group he jokingly called his "harem," this from a number of the young girls themselves. They thought it was funny and cute, but those in the know in Lawrence County, including officers of the court, put it a little more bluntly - they called him a 'pimp' and the girls his 'stable'). One of his harem girls, it was reported to us in 2012, is the reason he has only one eye: We were told that in a fit a jealous rage, she stabbed him with a sharp object, resulting in the loss of the eye. This, we later learned, wasn't the story he gave those who were investigating the incident. His story to them was something along the lines of he was opening a box with something he shouldn't have been using for the task (like a pair of scissors or a pocketknife, as opposed to a boxcutter) and was sliding it away from him rather than toward him. He lost his tracking on one particular slice, and up it went, and he popped himself in the eye. Authorities stated point-blank to us that this was "a likely story"....but they bought it, and the young lady in question (our source advised us that she was no lady; we're being polite) was never called on it.
When in 2011 he finally caught enough of a felony to get his skank rear hemmed up in IDOC, he spent his last couple of days of freedom advising those in his circle (all the best dopeslingers in Lawrence, including the still-out-and-about Cameron Jones) that when he got out of DOC, he was going to be "going natural." That, we were told, meant that when he got out of prison, he would no longer be dealing in meth, but instead in weed. Considering our new governor is probably going to be decriminalizing cannabis within the next four years, we're wondering if Hootie just shrugged his shoulders and changed course, which is why he was driving a trash truck for Atkins Sanitation when he allegedly ran a stop sign and killed a Mt. Carmel woman Monday afternoon, March 4.
Interestingly when Saundra Neal (we're sure she's wondering how we figured out it was her; we have ways) began her nastygram tirade on our Google Voice feature, that was enough of a prompting for us to go to IDOC inmate lookup to see what was up, since she insisted we were "lying" about something (we don't take kindly to such an accusation, in case you aren't familiar with our tact). We noticed that Hootie isn't exactly off parole yet.
So Hootie's been out and about since December 2017, free to do what he wishes including procreate with whomever he wants, get a job with whomever will hire him, etc...but he isn't allowed to get into any kind of trouble. And allegedly running a stop sign is 'trouble.'
Well, that's the problem momma had yesterday (Thursday, March 7). She apparently believes he didn't run any stop sign, and wanted to know where we got that. Here's her first message, robotranscribed from an answering machine recording:
Transcribed: "Okay, so whenever you guys post things online or you do anything in the paper, I think that you guys should get your stories straight and your facts right before you go and slender. Somebody's f *****g name." (it's "slander" that she's referring to, but the transcription robot only transcribes what it hears, and if you talk like a hick or like you have a mouthful of mush, that's what it hears, hence "slender" instead of "slander." At least it didn't read it in our favorite language, Hickinese, at which point it would have been spelled "slayunderr." Hickinese is phonetic.)
So after we determined who the caller was, we opted to play nice....at first.
"Almost all of our material comes from press releases for the website. Do you mind telling me which article you're referring to so I can check it?" we asked. Nicely.
"Where did you get your information about Derek "hootie" wellls. Because for one him being a methslinger in the past had nothing to do with the accident that happened monday. Oh and him having multiple wrecks is incorrect because he has never had one before now. And it wasnt even his fault. That lady pulled out in front of him. If people were smart they would realize that lady pulled out in front of him because I ain't the smartest crayon on the box but if he pulled out in front of her he would have hit the passenger side not the driver and also the double skid marks on the HIGHWAY. So you tell me how he would have pulled out in front of her? I want that shit fixed asap" she shot back, not nicely.
We decided to play nice despite her vulgarity and ridiculous demands. It's that new leaf we have, you know.
"That's what ISP said," we advised. "Take it up with them. I'm guessing you haven't contacted any of the other media that ran the exact same information about who pulled out in front of whom? Because they had it too.
"As to the rest of it: High-speed chase, resulted in a wreck according to Lawrence officials; maybe they lied: https://www.disclosurenewsonline.com/2011/09/12/pimp-busted-sunday-night-after-chase-stuff-confiscated-monday-morning/
"As to the bad driving record, a total of 14 traffic citations in 2011 alone should probably have gotten his license revoked; you can review them here: http://www.judici.com/courts/cases/case_search.jsp?court=IL051015J&case_number=&litigant_name=wells%2C+derek&charge_text=&sort=case_number&order=DESC
"As to the methslinging, that's pretty apparent from his IDOC record, which is accurate....and, I'm seeing, he's not exactly off parole yet (could be a follow up article): https://www2.illinois.gov/idoc/Offender/Pages/InmateSearch.aspx"
She didn't have anything to say to that. So we wrapped it up:
"So all of your points are moot when it comes to 'slander,'" we told her, "which shows your utter ignorance, as 'slander' is a spoken untruth; LIBEL is printed untruth, and none of this is untrue, so that doesn't hold, either. There are encyclopedias available on Google, which you can use to look up these terms that you obviously have no clue about as to proper use, Saundra. So go away…and tell Hootie we're thinking about him.
"He'll know why."
And that was the end of it (until this post hits, at which time we'll probably be beseiged again. That's kinda how it happens.)
In the meantime, it's apparent that ol Hootie one-eye is up to his old tricks, lying and getting other people to rag at folks on his behalf because he's SECHA GRAYTT GAH, dontchano. We're pretty sure she didn't complain to all the OTHER media outlets that ran the EXACT SAME DETAILS of the wreck, because they all came from the same source so of course they're going to be the exact same. And a 66-year-old Mt. Carmel woman is dead, and these fools think they can change reality by tossing out there that the crash reconstruction was "wrong," but that doesn't make Mrs. Morehead any less dead. It just makes Hootie look brain-dead, and his momma doubly so.
Let's look at the wreck:
As you can see, if Hootie rolled through the stop sign and north into Highway 15, OF COURSE he struck the westbound Mrs. Morehead's car in the driver's side, killing her. Yet as HootieMomma said, "If people were smart they would realize that lady pulled out in front of him because I ain't the smartest crayon on the box but if he pulled out in front of her he would have hit the passenger side not the driver and also the double skid marks on the HIGHWAY. So you tell me how he would have pulled out in front of her?" Um, Saundra...? Did you even READ the report?? NOWHERE in any report did anything indicate that "he pulled out in front of her." Only that he "failed to stop at the stop sign." The physics of it make sense. HootieMomma does not.
This is par for the course, however. HootieMomma, we're told, was the one who was busy flipping us off and shouting vulgar comments at us when we went to shoot pics of Hootie's Hovel for an article in 2011 following his last arrest. For some reason, these people think that the louder and nastier they say things, the more likely they'll be believed.
They should try the truth on for size. It's quieter, it's not nasty, and, well...it's the truth.