‘Our hearts break for them.’ Victim’s and killer’s families embrace after guilty plea
After Glen McCurley entered a surprise guilty plea to the 1974 murder of Carla Walker and was sentenced to life Tuesday, a Tarrant County courtroom was filled with people hugging one another and wiping their eyes.
McCurley’s son Roddy McCurley walked across the room and approached Carla’s brother, Jim Walker. They embraced for several minutes — Roddy McCurley cried into Walker’s collared shirt, and Walker whispered into his ear and held him.
Glen McCurley, 78, changed his plea Tuesday after two days of testimony in his capital murder trial and admitted to killing 17-year-old Carla after kidnapping her from outside a Fort Worth bowling alley. Her body was found three days later in a culvert near Benbrook Lake. She had been raped, beaten and strangled.
Glen McCurley’s wife, Judy, was also in the courtroom and talked with Carla’s family members. After everyone flowed out of the courtroom and into the hall, she said she thought of her own son’s death during the trial. She said the drunk driver who killed her son Craig told them at the time, “There is nothing I can say, and nothing I can do to bring your son back.”
“And that’s how I feel,” she said.
Judy’s sister, Barbara Adams, said they are “so sorry that a member of our family has caused so much pain for another family.”
“And our hearts break for them,” she said.
During the victim impact statements they read to the court Tuesday morning, Jim Walker and his sister Cindy Stone told Glen McCurley how he had not only hurt the Walker family for years, but he had also victimized his own family. During a previous interview, Walker talked about his compassion for the family of the man who murdered his sister, and how they are victims of McCurley’s malice as much as he is.
Adams said her brother-in-law not only shattered Carla’s family, but his own, as well. All their memories together, her photo albums of the family, are tarnished by McCurley’s guilt.
Walker’s immediate thoughts after the trial, just minutes after his sister’s killer had finally been held accountable, were for the McCurley family.
Walker and McCurley’s son have been in touch for several weeks, Walker said, and he wants to have a good relationship with him. That compassion comes straight from God, Walker said.
“His world is shattered,” Walker said. “My heart goes out to him. All I can do is give all the glory to God.”
Prosecutor Kim D’Avignon said it was “a tribute to the Walker family and to the McCurley family that they were willing to walk across the aisle and really understand that what happened in this courtroom and what happened in 1974 was not about Mr. McCurley’s children. It was not about his wife. It was about him.”
“If we could take one takeaway for the whole world on this case, it would be that Jim Walker and Cindy (Stone) have nothing but love for the son of the man who killed their sister,” she said. “Sometimes you see beautiful things in the courthouse. And that might be one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen.”
When asked how he felt after the trial, Walker said, “Peaceful. Peaceful. Peaceful.”
“We’re glad and happy, and I feel happy for our community,” he said. “I feel sadness for the McCurleys that are survivors of this. But overall, I feel peaceful.”
This story was originally published August 24, 2021 at 2:13 PM.
