On August 31, 1974, Joseph Ronald Akins, 38, and his new wife, Juanita Knight Akins, 29, were killed by close-range shotgun blasts in a secluded area of a new housing development in Bibb County, Georgia. The couple, married only twenty days, were ambushed in their car after being lured to the site under the pretense of a job to install a television antenna; a note found on Joseph Akins’ body contained directions to the spot where they were to be met.

Investigators tied the murders to a plot led by Joseph’s former wife, Rebecca Akins Smith Machetti, who lived in North Miami Beach, Florida, and stood to benefit through life insurance and other proceeds for herself and her three daughters. Rebecca’s then-husband, John Eldon Smith (also known as Anthony Isalldo Machetti), and a third man, John Maree, accompanied Smith to Macon; Maree testified that Smith fired the shotgun. Maree was paid $1,000 and later became a prosecution witness.

Rebecca Machetti and John Eldon Smith were arrested and convicted on two counts of murder; Maree received a life sentence after cooperating. Rebecca’s death sentence was later commuted to life; John Eldon Smith was executed by electric chair on December 15, 1983. Does anyone have information about the victims’ lives in Macon or who might remember the development where the ambush occurred?