MONTICELLO, Ga. — The victim of a Jackson Lake drowning over the Labor Day weekend played a prominent role in the court case that became the basis for the famed book and movie “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil.”
Deppish Kirkland, 72, of Savannah, was found Sunday morning about eight hours after he reportedly fell off the side of a boat at Bear Creek Marina, a Georgia Department of Natural Resources spokesman said.
Georgia game wardens responded to a report of a possible drowning in the creek Sunday, Sept. 4, at about 2:30 a.m. The victim had fallen overboard while riding on the gunwale — the upper edge — of a Sea Hunt center console boat, the spokesman said.
The boat operator turned around to pick up the man but was unable to locate him. He then marked the location on GPS and called 911, the spokesman said.
The Covington and Newton County Fire Service dive teams helped game wardens search using side scan sonar. The body was located and recovered at 10:31 a.m.
The boat operator, Bruce Kirkland Phillips, 64, of Covington, was charged with boating under the influence in the incident and was booked into the Jasper County jail.
Kirkland was a former Chatham County chief assistant district attorney who was key to the Jim Williams' murder case featured in “Midnight,” the Savannah Morning News reported.
The book's popularity in the 1990s helped spur significant interest in Savannah architecture and culture.
Kirkland was at Williams' home, called Mercer House, on May 2, 1981, just hours after Williams shot and killed Danny Hansford, 22, the newspaper reported.
Then-District Attorney Spencer Lawton led a team that included Kirkland and prosecuted the first of what would become four murder trials. Kirkland gave the state's closing argument in that trial and the jury convicted Williams. The Georgia Supreme Court later overturned the conviction.
A second trial ended in another conviction that was again overturned by the Georgia Supreme Court. Later trials ended in a mistrial and an acquittal.
John Berendt wrote "Midnight," which was published in 1994. The book became a New York Times Best-Seller for more than four years following its debut. Clint Eastwood then adapted the book for a 1997 film of the same name.
In 2015, Kirkland published “Lawyer Games, After Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil" in which he reports "facts never introduced in a courtroom," the newspaper reported.
Kirkland later served on the Consumer Utility Council, which represents consumer interests before the Georgia Public Service Commission, before settling on a writing and acting career in his later years, the Savannah newspaper reported.
