Key dates in KFC slaying case

By The Associated Press Here are some key dates in the KFC slayings case: Sept. 21, 1983: Convicted burglar Romeo Pinkerton of Tyler is paroled. Sept. 23, 1983: Five people — four employees and one friend of a worker — are reported missing at 11:30 p.m. from the Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurant in Kilgore. The restaurant was to have closed at 10 p.m. A Rusk County couple reports hearing gunshots about 11 p.m. Sept. 24, 1983: An oilfield worker at 10:20 a.m. finds the bodies of the five missing people along an oil lease road near a well off Rusk County Road 231 just northwest of Henderson, about 15 miles south of Kilgore. All had been shot in the head. Sept. 26, 1983: Pinkerton's cousin, Darnell Hartsfield, commits aggravated robbery in Smith County. Sept. 27, 1983: Reward for information about the slayings reaches $50,000, half of the total offered by the restaurant chain. It is never claimed. Nov. 10, 1983: Hartsfield commits burglary in Smith County. Feb. 13, 1984: Hartsfield is sentenced to nine years for burglary and 25 years for robbery.

May 8, 1984: Pinkerton is sent to prison for 25 years for January 1984 Smith County burglary while on parole.

Jan. 27, 1988: Pinkerton paroled.

June 8, 1989: Pinkerton parole revoked for April 1988 burglary while on parole. He gets 50 years.

March 6, 1992: Hartsfield paroled.

May 31, 1994: Hartsfield parole revoked.

Oct. 7, 1994: Hartsfield released on mandatory supervision.

March 1995: Rusk County grand jury begins hearing KFC testimony.

April 27, 1995: James Earl Mankins Jr., son of a former state legislator, indicted on five counts of capital murder after fingernail recovered from clothing of KFC victim said to match Mankins.

Aug. 11, 1995: Hartsfield mandatory supervision revoked; taken to prison with 40-year sentence from Smith County for delivery of controlled substance and engaging in organized criminal activity.

Nov. 13, 1995: Charges against Mankins dropped after fingernail evidence determined to not be his.

Dec. 1, 1998: Pinkerton paroled.

December 2000: Rusk County Sheriff James Stroud hires a former FBI agent, George Kieny, to work on the KFC case. He finds evidence scattered at labs from Austin to Dallas.

Sept. 11, 2001: Kieny requests DNA test on bloodstained box that held cash register tape rolls at KFC restaurant. The splatter on the white box, about the size of a dressshirt gift box, had never been tested. Hartsfield's blood is identified.

Sept. 2003: Rusk County grand jury begins hearing KFC testimony. Five months later, grand jurors released.

Nov. 10, 2004: Hartsfield indicted on aggravated perjury charges for lying about whether he was in KFC restaurant the night of the abductions in 1983.

Dec. 8, 2004: Pinkerton paroled.

July 30, 2005: Pinkerton arrested in Tyler for burglary of school.

Oct. 26, 2005: Jury convicts Hartsfield of aggravated perjury; sentenced to life because of six earlier felony convictions.

Nov. 17, 2005: Texas attorney general announces capital murder indictments against Hartsfield and Pinkerton for the KFC slayings.

Aug. 5, 2006: Pinkerton's capital murder trial moved from Henderson to New Boston on change of venue approved by State District Judge J. Clay Gossett.

Aug. 6, 2007: Jury selection begins in New Boston.

Oct. 29, 2007: Pinkerton admits to the killings and receives a life sentence for each of the five deaths in a plea deal with prosecutors.

Dec. 5, 2007: KFC Corp. reinstates $25,000 reward for information leading to arrest and conviction of a third suspect.

Jan. 22, 2008: Hartsfield's request to remove trial judge J. Clay Gossett denied.

May 16, 2008: Prosecutors say they won't seek death penalty against Hartsfield.

Sept. 8, 2008: Jurors report to Brazos County Courthouse in Bryan for Hartsfield's capital murder trial.