{"id":102822,"date":"2017-11-14T22:14:00","date_gmt":"2017-11-15T05:14:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/experts-photo-of-billy-the-kid-and-his-killer-is-real-deal\/"},"modified":"2017-11-14T22:14:00","modified_gmt":"2017-11-15T05:14:00","slug":"experts-photo-of-billy-the-kid-and-his-killer-is-real-deal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/experts-photo-of-billy-the-kid-and-his-killer-is-real-deal\/","title":{"rendered":"Experts: Photo of Billy the Kid and his killer is real deal"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"This
This photo provided by Frank Abrams shows what historians believe is a photo of outlaw Billy the Kid, second from left, and Pat Garrett, far right, taken in 1880. Frank Abrams, who bought the photo at a flea market says experts in forensics and facial recognition have verified the picture after several months of examination.<\/span>Courtesy of Frank Abrams via AP<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Frank Abrams, a North Carolina attorney, first spotted the tintype photo in Asheville in 2011. The self-described history buff said the group picture of five men was part of a set and sat on his wall for several years.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow, it\u2019s in a safe deposit box,\u201d Abrams told The Associated Press in a phone interview Tuesday. \u201cI don\u2019t travel with it.\u201d<\/p>\n

After seeing a TV program in 2015 about the discovery of a photo of the outlaw playing croquet, Abrams was inspired to research him further. That\u2019s when he thought he recognized Pat Garrett, Billy the Kid\u2019s former friend and the sheriff who gunned him down.<\/p>\n

Abrams approached Robert Stahl, a retired professor emeritus at Arizona State University who is no stranger to the history of Billy the Kid. In 2015, Stahl filed a petition in New Mexico Supreme Court in pursuit of a death certificate for the Kid, also known as William Bonney, from the state\u2019s medical examiner.<\/p>\n

Stahl said he thought it was a \u201chigh probability\u201d that it was Garrett in the photo, but he wasn\u2019t sure if another man was Billy the Kid.<\/p>\n

\u201cI told him \u2018The biggest thing you could do right now is get the picture out and let people look at it and give you feedback,\u2019\u201d Stahl said. \u201cTo me, it\u2019s one of the most intriguing and historically significant of those tintypes of the Old West.\u201d<\/p>\n

Abrams, who lives in Arden, told Albuquerque\u2019s KRQE-TV that he spent the next several months consulting various forensic experts. Several said the tintype was likely taken between 1879 and 1880, which coincides with the Aug. 2, 1880, date someone had written on the photo, Abrams said. A Los Angeles forensic video expert said facial recognition software indicates that it is most likely Garrett and Billy the Kid in the picture, according to a signed declaration. A handwriting expert in Texas compared a signature from Garrett on the photo with 10 documents with his known handwriting. He declared them matching in a notarized letter in September.<\/p>\n

The Kid and Garrett were close friends until Garrett became Lincoln County sheriff. Garrett ended up fatally shooting the outlaw in Fort Sumner in July 1881.<\/p>\n

The photo of the Kid discovered in 2015 has since been estimated to be worth $5 million. Experts believe a picture that shows the New Mexico outlaw with Garrett would be worth much more. However, Abrams isn\u2019t interested in finding out anytime soon.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne day it may end up at an auction house somewhere. We\u2019ll see what happens,\u201d Abrams said. \u201cRight now, that is not the first thing on my mind. I\u2019ve always been somebody who\u2019s interested in history and background.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

photo provided by Frank Abrams shows what historians believe is a photo of outlaw Billy the Kid, second from left, and Pat Garrett, far right, taken in 1880. Frank Abrams, who bought the photo at a flea market says experts in forensics and facial recognition have verified the picture after several months of examination.Courtesy […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":102823,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5736,5735],"tags":[198],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-102822","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news","category-news","tag-history"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102822","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=102822"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102822\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/102823"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=102822"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=102822"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=102822"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=102822"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}