Possible murder weapon found

BARTOW - Detectives may have just found the knife that killed Ryan Skipper. He's an openly gay man who was stabbed to death a year and a half ago after allegedly made a pass at his attacker.

Joseph Beardon is on trial for Beardon's murder in Bartow. William Brown is still awaiting trial. The state says the men killed Skipper, took his computer, then dumped his body and car on remote country roads.

In court on Tuesday, the state handed the judge a note.

"Oh, you've got to be kidding me," said Judge Michael Hunter with a look of exasperation.

The note said one of Brown's relatives was watching coverage of the Beardon trial on television when he put two and two together. The realtive says right after the murder, Brown's father hid a knife in a tree on the realtive's property. He didn't think anything of it, until now.

"This is just unbelievable to me," said Judge Hunter. "That when the crime occurs he doesn't put it together, but puts it together 18 months later while watching televison. But none the less, there you have it."

Detectives found the knife, and will send it out to a lab to be analyzed.