Criminal logo

Something Wicked (Part 3)

Defective Melton

By Phoenixx Fyre DeanPublished 5 years ago 6 min read
2
Brent Melton, Lead Detective on the Aleah Beckerle Case

Evansville, Indiana, is the home of the best of the best and the worst of the worst. Pizza King? Best Stromboli, ever. Zesto's? Let me lay out the picture for you. Your take-out order is handed to you in a paper bag, and by the time you get home, you can see through the bag. You open the burger and take a bite, and it's a mess. A greasy, artery-clogging, salty, delicious mess. Best burger, ever. Mesker Park Zoo is a must-see and you simply cannot visit Evansville without stopping in at the Hilltop Inn for the best brain sandwiches in the Midwest. (Or so I'm told. Brains? Yuck!) You find the most selfless and giving within the Evansville Fire Department and the Evansville Police Department certainly has some well decorated officers within their employ. Super cops. The ones you know better than to mess with. They take the job of law enforcement seriously. Their only purpose is to serve their people, and they love their people.

The worst of Evansville can be found stuffed inside the Vanderburgh County Jail, stuck in endless cycles of unattainable and unrealistic probation or parole standards that land them back in jail and lack of help for the mentally ill and those who have brains that have been altered by the methamphetamine that courses through their blood. It can be found in the endless stop lights and potholes that you may lose your vehicle in. It can also be found in the Evansville Police Department. It is said that if you want to get away with murder, move to Evansville, Indiana. With officers the likes of Brent Alan Melton, it is easy to understand why. He's not the only offender within the police department though, in fact, in the same month in 2002, three officers were reprimanded, suspended or fired altogether. The first came when an officer was accused of fondling dispatchers. The second officer placed a false call to 911 dispatchers to claim there had been a shooting in an effort to keep a female officer from catching a group of male officers "cleaning their batons" with the aid of an adult video inside the Fraternal Order of Police building. The third was none other than lead detective in the Aleah Beckerle case, then patrol officer, Brent Melton. Melton was suspended for three days, without pay, for an incident in which he drew a picture of members of the Ku Klux Klan looking down on a black man, who was at the bottom of a well. His drawing would bring forth the laughs he was expecting from some of the officers. The ones that found it as disturbing as you and I turned him in.

It boggles the mind why he was promoted through the ranks after an incident like that, but nonetheless, Melton responded in his capacity as detective in June 2016 to the East Iowa home of Cara Beckerle when a shots fired call came into dispatch. Responding to the call, Melton found bullet holes in the home that had been fired by Cara's live-in boyfriend, Demarco Roach in an apparent methamphetamine-induced psychotic break. One of the bullets lodged in the door frame of the room where Aleah laid her head. Although police found evidence of drug use and glaringly obvious child abuse and neglect, Cara was found to be a victim and that is where Melton's heart, I'm sure, was when he started the Aleah Beckerle case. Poor Cara had been victimized again. It is the opinion of this author that, perhaps, in his quest to be the hero in the tragic story of Aleah, Melton may have grabbed the first person he could pin it on so that his psyche may be satiated. In fact, I'm certain that is what happened.

Melton had this to say about the time he spent on the Aleah case in an interview with Brad Byrd after a jury found his prime suspect, Terrence Roach not-guilty of her murder, "I felt like that, uh, two years of my life had just, in an instant, went away. You know, the work and the dedication and uh, you know, it takes me back to the first time I met Aleah in June of 2016 on a shots fired run. And then, of course, when I realized she was abducted it became very personal – from day one it has."

Then why, Detective Melton, did you not look at the glaringly obvious? Why didn't you do your job when the shots were fired? I suppose I would take Aleah's case personally too. You are, after all, partly to blame.

Although the confession by Terrence Roach included nothing that could have possibly happened, and evidence supported such, Melton went forward with his insistence that Roach was culpable. Melton would like you and I to believe that a 130 pound man was able to reach over his head, through a window that showed no disturbance, standing on grass that showed no evidence of human traffic, pulling Aleah through without touching a thing or waking up the other two people that were asleep, by their own testimony, in the room at the time. It is also worthy to note that though the Beckerle family possesses a pitbull that is known for its incessant, loud barking the dog never made a sound that night. The public watched for eight long months, the citizens of Evansville coming together for long and exhaustive searches for the then missing Aleah while Cara, mother of the missing child, attended birthday parties. Although testimony was given by Terrence Roach that Cara did drugs with him and they engaged in sexual intercourse in the presence of Aleah, nothing further was followed up and Cara remains free to endanger other lives that she is responsible for.

Though evidence continued to mount that Terrence Roach was guilty of defiling the body of Aleah when he raped her after her death, the evidence also continued to point, glaringly, away from young Terrence Roach and where the rest of the sane and logical thinking world thinks it belongs. Squarely on the shoulders of Cara Beckerle. During the same interview with Brad Byrd, Melton is quoted as saying, "Brad, I can tell you that in my 22 years of doing this, I’ve never had a murder trial with this much evidence. It was astounding."

It was astounding Brent Melton. It was staggering and astounding evidence that pointed directly to the person responsible and you ignored it. No worries, Melton! You sit and sip your sweet tea, extra ice. I'll handle it from here.

jury
2

About the Creator

Phoenixx Fyre Dean

Phoenixx lives on the Oregon coast with her husband and children.

Author of Lexi and Blaze: Impetus, The Bloody Truth and Daddy's Brat. All three are available on Amazon in paperback format and Kindle in e-book format.

Reader insights

Be the first to share your insights about this piece.

How does it work?

Add your insights

Comments

There are no comments for this story

Be the first to respond and start the conversation.

Sign in to comment

    Find us on social media

    Miscellaneous links

    • Explore
    • Contact
    • Privacy Policy
    • Terms of Use
    • Support

    © 2024 Creatd, Inc. All Rights Reserved.