The Cursing Spot

Franklin: There is a lonely, wind swept spot near a certain over pass on I-35 where truckers pull off to the side of the road. A few yards from the highway right of way, they visit a curiously barren patch of earth. Nothing grows there; no grasses, weeds-nothing. Just a ten foot diameter black stain on the ground. There, the truckers spit, curse, and even urinate upon the very place where Jack Lugham murdered Reggie Anderson and Martin Carmichael the night of July 21, 1989.

     "I always said Jack were jes defendin' himself from those two bastards," Trucker Gerald Rowley Jr. says as he surveys the barren area littered with cigarette butts and beer cans. "You know a man'll do any thing to protect his family from scum like those two. I told the judge that at the trial. The judge said the law doesn't see it like that. I think the law sucks, if you ask me."

     Jack Lugham was once a hard working middle-aged trucker, driving a steady run from Houston to Minneapolis for a precision steel bearing manufacturer. He had a wife and three kids living in Leon just outside Decatur City in south central Iowa and stopped by each time on his way past to spend time with his family. On March 30, 1989, he was running late out of Minneapolis and hadn't had a chance to get a shower and supper. Pulling into Shobe's Grove, he stopped at the Get 'N' Go Express truckstop, ate a burger and fries, and then entered the locker and men's shower room.

     Enter the villains, Reggie Anderson and Martin Carmichael. Both men were ex-Army Rangers, dishonorably discharged for deliberately entrapping superior officers with teenage boys and then blackmailing them with incriminating photos. Arriving back in the States, the two ex-soldiers continued their campaign. Learning about the income and families of possible targets, they selected the victim best suited to their method of operation. They then set up a humiliating encounter, entrapping their prey by recording it with a video camera.

     The two culprits had been watching Jack Lugham for a few months. By conversing with other truckers, they discreetly learned more about him, discovering him to be the devoted family man that proved their easiest prey. Finally, they arranged to ambush him at the Express .

     Lugham knew nothing of the two predators watching him enter the locker room. He stripped off and stowed his clothes in the rented locker and carrying a little bag of soap and shampoo made his way to one of the shower stalls. It wasn't until he had thoroughly lathered himself up that he suddenly felt a firm yet gentle hand squeeze one of his buttocks and a man's lewd-toned voice say, "I'm Mr. Lonely."

     Rage and revulsion drove Lugham's elbows and fists against Carmichael's stomach and face, knocking him to the wet tiled floor. Grinning, Carmichael launched himself against Lugham, the momentum carrying to two naked, soap-smeared men into the corner of the narrow stall. At that, point, Carmichael feigned a fall to the floor. He rose with his back to Lugham, who easily seized his opponent with an arm around his throat.

     "RAPE! RAPE!" Carmichael shouted.

     "Shut up, you goddamned faggot or I'll fuckin' kill you!" Lugham hissed, tightening his grip on Carmichael's throat.

     "RAPE!" Carmichael yelled. "RAPE!"

     "Hey you! Let him go or I'll call the police," shouted Anderson.

     "This goddamn faggot was trying to fool with me," Lugham protested, still holding Carmichael.

     "That's not what I got on this video tape, you fuckin' pervert," Anderson shot back. "Let him go-or you'll be some Bubba's sweety in the county jail tonight."

     "Betcha wouldn't want your pretty little wife or your kids to see that tape, either," Carmichael grinned.

     At that point, Lugham realized they had him.

     The two blackmailers demanded $100,000 from Lugham to keep their video from being seen by his family or employers. Lugham naturally protested he couldn't get the money. Carmichael and Anderson explained their "easy credit payment plan" in which he could begin by paying them $10,000 every month. Reluctantly, Lugham agreed.

     The months rolled on in an endless daze for Lugham. Obsessed by the need to pay off his blackmailers, he drove constantly, rarely stopping to see his wife and kids. His sudden change in behavior went unnoticed by his wife at first, but by late May, she began to suspect her devoted husband of having an affair with a roadside floosie.

     "I didn't know what was going on," Amy Lugham explains. "When he first got the route, he was here every two days like clockwork. But suddenly he was going out for a week and gave no explanation. And when he was home, it was like he wasn't there. Didn't pay attention to me or the kids and we never-well, he'd always fall asleep. Then he'd leave early the next day and be gone another week. What else could I think?"

     As the Lugham's marriage teetered and strained, Carmichael and Anderson decided it was finally time to cash in on Lugham. Their scheme probably was to take Lugham's rig, killing him if necessary, then drive it to Los Angeles and sell it. There, they could set up shop and continue their black endeavors in greener fields.

     Summer came. Lugham had not been home in over a month as he drove south on I-35 the night of the July 21, 1989. It was a wet night and he worried that his wife was serious when she threatened to leave him. He hoped he could make it up to her once he'd rid himself of the two fiends. They had given him instructions to call a phone number when he got to the Get 'n'Go Express . On the phone, Anderson told him to meet them just beyond the over pass 6 miles south to drop off the payment.

     During an interview in prison, Lugham says he "thought 'bout what keeping my family together meant to me an' that I should have killed these two bloodsuckers before lettin' it get so far. Then I figured these guys weren't meeting me in middle of nowhere just to pick up some cash. I felt real sick then-like I was cornered. Then I just got plain mad-really downright pissed-off-mad. And then I got this idea. It was an oddly cold, dank night; the kind of weather that creeps into your bones. I pulled over and sat for about ten minutes, cause I wanted those two bastards would be settin' in their car keeping warm, waiting for me. Now, I was hauling some landscaping timbers-them greenish 3x4 ones. These were all the broken and warped ones nobody wants and they were going to get turned into particle board. Couple of 'em had real nasty 3 foot long points; like spears. Well, I got moving again. Got up 80 miles an hour and cruised for about 5 miles. Then I ran it up to 100 even and headed for that overpass.

     Just as I came through, I saw the spot and their car just settin' there like I hoped. So I swung off the road right for 'em. I saw their faces lookin' at me jes before I plowed their car right under my rig like it were corn stubble. Right then, my load broke loose and few of them timbers smashed into the car. The coroner said Anderson was killed by the car crunching down on him, but that bastard Carmichael had one of those spear-tipped timbers go right through the windshield into his heart.

     God, it felt so damn good to do it! When I rolled over them, it was like breathing again after being underwater for a long time!"

     Lugham's rig was too damaged to drive. An electrical short started a fire in the flattened car and ignited its gas tank. It wasn't long before it attracted the Iowa State Police to the scene. A week later, Lugham was arrested and charge with second degree murder and vehicular homicide in the deaths of Carmichael and Anderson. One month later, Lugham was sentenced to 25 years at the Fort Madison Correctional Facility.

     But the spot itself has quietly become something of a mystery. Even tuckers who knew nothing of Lugham and his story feel strangely compelled to visit the area. Just two weeks ago, 132 trucks pulled over and their drivers visited the spot within a 10 hour period. At one point, 6 truckers, none of whom knew of Lugham's story, stalked solemnly around the blackened slick, shouting and swearing. One was Wendell Cassell of Lancaster, Ohio.

     "Don't know why-I just sort of stopped here," Cassell smiles self consciously. "I thought I'd stretch my legs and before you know it, I'm out in the middle of it swearin' my head off at the top of my lungs. Then, I seen all these these other guys doin' the same thing. Scared the crap out of me. I ran back to my rig. They did the same. And you know, when I got in, I felt-well, great."

     Curiously enough, other visitors to the spot who find themselves compelled into the same rage-venting behavior describe a similar sensation, some stating that they felt "cleansed". But psychic consultant Shirley Randall sees more to the strange behavior than those who visit.

     "It's sort of like people who visit graves to pray for the souls of the dead. But in this case, they're cursing the souls of Carmichael and Anderson. I feel that when Jack (Lugham) killed those two men, his rage and indignity-his hatred for these two men was so hardened and desperate that it transcended into a force of its own. It's not a spirit, nor is it conscious, but it has a purpose: to send those two souls to Hell. Forces like this one are very, very rare."

     "If that's true, then that's what those two black-souled sons of bitches deserve!" Rowley says hotly as he steps on to the inky patch. "Those bloodsucking bastards nearly ruined a good family man and got him doin' hard time for ridden the world of chicken-shitted pieces of filth like themselves!" At that point, he unzips his fly and urinates in the middle of the spot, shouting "An' I hope they roast in hell for it!"