Bugging Friends
Assuming that Riley was lying to the investigators, Walton and McCarty teamed up with the police and helped them lay a trap. On Tuesday night (just one day after Emma’s murder), detectives wired up Walton and McCarty with a microphone that allowed police to listen in to their conversations. A video camera was also hidden on a key chain. It was a planned sting operation to recover the suspected murder weapon.
“Those two young men contacted us and asked if they could help us get what they believed to be the murder weapon back,” Merritt said. “Obviously, there are concerns for safety. We went over all that with them, and they were still adamant, very adamant that they wanted to do this. They understood the dangers and the concerns, but they wanted to do it.”