Latest / Luke's English Podcast / S1E10 - Interview with Sunshine State Sonar - Ian Rogers Missing Person Case(M4A_128K)

Transcript

S1E10 - Interview with Sunshine State Sonar - Ian Rogers Missing Person Case(M4A_128K) · Luke's English Podcast

0:00
Speaker 1: In Tragedy, a True Crime Podcast, we discuss crimes that
0:04
Speaker 1: may be violent in nature. At times, we may cover homicides,
0:08
Speaker 1: missing people, and other topics that may be unsettling. Listener
0:12
Speaker 1: discretion is advised. Welcome to episode ten of Tragedy, a
0:34
Speaker 1: True Crime Podcast. I'm Elisa and I'm Michael. We had
0:38
Speaker 1: the unique opportunity to speak with Shelley McKinney. Shelley works
0:41
Speaker 1: with Sunshine State Sonar. This is one of the organizations
0:45
Speaker 1: that has been involved in the search for Ian and
0:48
Speaker 1: the truck he was driving when he went missing. We
0:50
Speaker 1: want to give a special shout out to Mike, the
0:53
Speaker 1: owner of Sunshine State Sonar, who put us in touch
0:56
Speaker 1: with Shelley. Today we are speaking with Shelley McKinney. Shelley
1:11
Speaker 1: is a cartographer with Sunshine State Sonar. And thank you
1:16
Speaker 1: for being with us this evening, Shelley. We really appreciate it.
1:20
Speaker 2: Thank you for having me.
1:22
Speaker 1: Yeah, so we just have a few questions. We're going
1:24
Speaker 1: to jump right into it, and first we want we
1:27
Speaker 1: want you to tell us about the mission of Sunshine
1:30
Speaker 1: State Sonar.
1:34
Speaker 3: So what we try to do is bring answers or
1:38
Speaker 3: some kind of resolution to families that have missing loved
1:41
Speaker 3: ones across the state of Florida.
1:45
Speaker 2: We would love to go outside of Florida at.
1:46
Speaker 3: Some point, but right now we are overwhelmed with the
1:49
Speaker 3: amount of cases in Florida. We primarily works out of Florida,
1:55
Speaker 3: but overall, in the past two years, we've had good success.
2:01
Speaker 3: We brought home eighteen missing people somewhere there was more
2:05
Speaker 3: than one person. We usually focus on people missing with
2:09
Speaker 3: their vehicles and go that route, but we have found
2:14
Speaker 3: people that were not missing with the vehicle and.
2:18
Speaker 2: It's just something we're extremely passionate about.
2:20
Speaker 3: This is it's almost like a full time, full time
2:23
Speaker 3: job for us, and we enjoy it. We put a
2:27
Speaker 3: lot of time into it and that's where we sit.
2:32
Speaker 3: I think our oldest case right now that we've solved
2:34
Speaker 3: was a fifty year cold case. It was a mom
2:35
Speaker 3: and a daughter missing from Plantation, Florida, and then down
2:41
Speaker 3: to two weeks. This is the earliest or least amount
2:45
Speaker 3: of time missing.
2:46
Speaker 1: So, so can you tell us a little bit more.
2:50
Speaker 1: You highlighted a couple of cases, but I'd really like
2:52
Speaker 1: to hear more about the case that just was a
2:54
Speaker 1: big highlight for your team, like something that just made
2:57
Speaker 1: the team really proud.
3:02
Speaker 3: I mean, each one I think kind of resonates with
3:05
Speaker 3: us differently. Honestly, the first case that we solved Karen Moore.
3:14
Speaker 3: She had been missing for almost twenty two years, and
3:18
Speaker 3: I think that's kind of what it really set in,
3:19
Speaker 3: is like, Okay, this is possible, we can do this,
3:22
Speaker 3: because in the beginning we were just trying. We were like,
3:26
Speaker 3: let's see what we can accomplish. And ironically enough, we
3:29
Speaker 3: had Britain from depths of history with us on that one,
3:32
Speaker 3: and then we just kept going and it just kind
3:36
Speaker 3: of went from there. It just snowballed and we just
3:40
Speaker 3: keep doing it and we usually do trips. It's on average,
3:44
Speaker 3: we do one weekend trip a month, so it's a
3:46
Speaker 3: Thursday through Sunday, and you know, in between sometimes there'll
3:52
Speaker 3: be like a one or two day trip. But this
3:55
Speaker 3: isn't something that we get, you know, paid, or funded
3:58
Speaker 3: to do anything like that. We're just doing it with
4:02
Speaker 3: our own funding.
4:03
Speaker 2: We pay our own way.
4:05
Speaker 3: I live in Virginia, so I fly down or drive
4:07
Speaker 3: down when we do these trips. Mike is from Saint
4:10
Speaker 3: Petersburg and its brother John's from Lakeland, and then we
4:12
Speaker 3: have a few others that will step in from time
4:14
Speaker 3: to time and help out, and we usually have a plan.
4:18
Speaker 3: We get together, we put a map together, and that's
4:22
Speaker 3: usually where I come in. We all look at the maps,
4:25
Speaker 3: we pick different locations strategically looking for whether it's we
4:30
Speaker 3: believe it could be accident or if it's foul play.
4:34
Speaker 3: We specifically pick locations and then if we're not sure,
4:38
Speaker 3: we just start their last no location and we start
4:40
Speaker 3: adding locations to the map. So we already have a
4:42
Speaker 3: pre planned out idea of what we're kind of doing
4:46
Speaker 3: before we go on these strips, and then we just
4:49
Speaker 3: we hit it hard all weekend long and get as
4:51
Speaker 3: much done as we can.
4:53
Speaker 2: And that's normally kind of how we operate.
4:56
Speaker 4: Okay, how do you how do you get your cases? Like,
4:59
Speaker 4: how do you know which cases to engage in? And
5:01
Speaker 4: how do you get your information on location her last
5:04
Speaker 4: known locations?
5:07
Speaker 3: It varies a lot of it is either through the
5:09
Speaker 3: Charlie Project or names. There's also Map the Missing, which
5:14
Speaker 3: is a resource. It's a website specifically with people missing
5:19
Speaker 3: with vehicles, airplanes, things of that nature, and it's a
5:24
Speaker 3: geographical map that has pins all over the country. That'll
5:27
Speaker 3: show you. And now she's expanded to worldwide people missing
5:31
Speaker 3: with vehicles, airplanes, things in that nature, and.
5:35
Speaker 2: That's all there.
5:36
Speaker 3: So that's a nice resource for people that kind of
5:39
Speaker 3: do what we do, and we'll find cases there. Sometimes
5:43
Speaker 3: law enforcement will reach out to us, family members will
5:46
Speaker 3: reach out to us when it comes to last known
5:49
Speaker 3: location information, stuff like that. If it's not included with
5:51
Speaker 3: their case file, we get it from the family members, detectives,
5:55
Speaker 3: things like that. So if they're willing to share that
5:57
Speaker 3: information with us. Sometimes they are very open willing to
6:00
Speaker 3: share that information. It depends on the department. Some have
6:04
Speaker 3: been a lot easier to work with than others. Some
6:08
Speaker 3: absolutely are like they don't want to share information because
6:12
Speaker 3: it's supposedly on ongoing investigation and it could be years
6:17
Speaker 3: or even decades old. So it's just it's it definitely
6:21
Speaker 3: varies between you know, county or department. How we get
6:25
Speaker 3: that information.
6:26
Speaker 4: Okay, that's really interesting. We were curious because, yeah, you know,
6:29
Speaker 4: when we started our process. In both of our scenarios,
6:31
Speaker 4: we've been working with the Waucala County Shriff's Office and
6:35
Speaker 4: we've actually found getting information from them very difficult. So
6:38
Speaker 4: we've had to take a lot of different routes and
6:41
Speaker 4: do these interviews like this one to kind of start
6:43
Speaker 4: painting a picture.
6:46
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, some are definitely more than others.
6:51
Speaker 1: So I'm from Colorado, spent my entire life in Colorado. Michael,
6:54
Speaker 1: as I mentioned, is from Walcola County, And when we
6:58
Speaker 1: started talking about this case, this idea of a vehicle
7:03
Speaker 1: and a sinkhole was sort of foreign to me. I
7:06
Speaker 1: didn't understand it. We don't have sinkholes in Colorado, and
7:09
Speaker 1: you're not necessarily going to find a vehicle and a
7:11
Speaker 1: body of water unless someone's driving in the canyon and
7:16
Speaker 1: you can just see it right there. So I'm just
7:18
Speaker 1: really curious, like, how many vehicles have you actually found
7:23
Speaker 1: in bodies of water along the course of your work?
7:28
Speaker 3: US just US hundreds in Florida, particularly South Florida. Probably
7:37
Speaker 3: close to one thousand, if not more. It's at this
7:40
Speaker 3: point we've kind of lost count there. There's been several
7:44
Speaker 3: bodies of water, but a few in particular, like I
7:47
Speaker 3: know one we found down in Miami there was forty
7:51
Speaker 3: four plus cars in there, forty four for sure that
7:53
Speaker 3: we know of. When there's a couple of little coves
7:55
Speaker 3: that we still need to like really look at and
8:00
Speaker 3: that was just that was one lake. You know, in
8:02
Speaker 3: over forty four cars and a lot of them are stolen,
8:05
Speaker 3: they're dumped out there. It's something that the kids do.
8:08
Speaker 3: They joy ride them, they steal them, they dump them,
8:11
Speaker 3: and so hundreds and hundreds of cars. But there is
8:17
Speaker 3: a lot of water. I mean, we have a lot
8:19
Speaker 3: working against us with what we do in the state
8:23
Speaker 3: of Florida. It's different if you're outside the state of
8:25
Speaker 3: Florida and you're working with a that has one big
8:28
Speaker 3: river rolling through it a couple of small ponds. But
8:31
Speaker 3: we definitely have to put in double the work when
8:34
Speaker 3: it comes to trying to find people to all these cases.
8:36
Speaker 3: And that's where Mike has got He's really got it
8:41
Speaker 3: nailed down well. With the sized boat that we have,
8:44
Speaker 3: it's a very small boat. I think it's an eight
8:47
Speaker 3: foot It's like a like a dinghy boat, and we
8:52
Speaker 3: can pull it out of the back of the truck,
8:54
Speaker 3: get it in the water, mount the motor in less
8:57
Speaker 3: than a minute, and then beyond the water. We have
9:00
Speaker 3: to do that and be efficient so that we can
9:03
Speaker 3: check multiple bodies of water. I know one case that
9:05
Speaker 3: we've worked up in Jacksonville in two days.
9:09
Speaker 2: It was kind of an.
9:10
Speaker 3: Abbreviated trip more than normal, and it was just a
9:13
Speaker 3: two day search and we cleared eighty bodies of water
9:16
Speaker 3: in two days.
9:19
Speaker 4: Wow, that is efficient. It's very quick.
9:24
Speaker 1: So tell us about the work you did on Ian's
9:26
Speaker 1: case specifically and how you became aware of his case.
9:31
Speaker 3: So we had so I had been seeing this case
9:35
Speaker 3: online and I know Mike as well, and you know,
9:40
Speaker 3: normally when cases pop up like this and they're new,
9:42
Speaker 3: we try to give them a little bit of time
9:45
Speaker 3: just because sometimes the vehicles will show up, you know,
9:47
Speaker 3: they'll find them abandoned and a parking lot, or they'll
9:52
Speaker 3: find it at a tow yard. Something usually comes of it.
9:55
Speaker 3: But given a little bit of time a month, two months,
9:59
Speaker 3: that's when it kind of piques our interest a little bit.
10:02
Speaker 3: And when I seen that he had still been missing,
10:07
Speaker 3: I know he went missing in August, August twenty sixth,
10:11
Speaker 3: and our search was we didn't start the search until December,
10:15
Speaker 3: and I had brought the case back up to Mike.
10:18
Speaker 3: I said, hey, you know, this is an area that
10:20
Speaker 3: I know we're not super familiar with because we normally
10:22
Speaker 3: stick to South Florida, But what do you think about
10:25
Speaker 3: this case?
10:26
Speaker 2: And he was all for it.
10:28
Speaker 3: He's like absolutely, He's like, I'm down to do it.
10:31
Speaker 2: Let's go, let's make a plan to do this. And
10:33
Speaker 2: I was like, okay.
10:34
Speaker 3: So, you know, obviously Tom Brown Park was a big
10:39
Speaker 3: area of interest. We had kind of limited information.
10:42
Speaker 2: At the time.
10:43
Speaker 3: I believe Mike had was able to get in touch
10:46
Speaker 3: with I want to say it was.
10:47
Speaker 2: The girlfriend ex girlfriend.
10:49
Speaker 3: I'm not sure of the exact relation at the time,
10:53
Speaker 3: but and was getting some information from there, and then
10:58
Speaker 3: we had gotten the information of a cell phone and
11:01
Speaker 3: we're kind of working off that. But the problem with
11:03
Speaker 3: cell phone pings is that they can depending on the
11:06
Speaker 3: areas that they're in, Like if it's a more rural,
11:08
Speaker 3: spread out kind of wooded area opposed to very city,
11:13
Speaker 3: very dense, the cell phone pinks can range upwards of
11:18
Speaker 3: fifteen miles out, you know.
11:19
Speaker 2: So it's this one.
11:20
Speaker 3: Was a tricky one for us. I wasn't sure if
11:22
Speaker 3: it was going to be a huge help. But it's
11:24
Speaker 3: good to have no matter what, because I mean, cell
11:27
Speaker 3: phone pings have been fruitful in helping us solve cases.
11:31
Speaker 3: We had one where a lady was missing for twelve years,
11:33
Speaker 3: and the family fought tooth and nail to get them
11:36
Speaker 3: to release that cell phone ping and they didn't want to.
11:39
Speaker 3: There's a Freedom of Information Act filed on that case
11:44
Speaker 3: and they redacted everything. Everything was blacked out, and I
11:47
Speaker 3: don't want to give out any information on the.
11:49
Speaker 2: Case because they bleue to as foul play.
11:52
Speaker 3: We were able because the family stepped up and really
11:57
Speaker 3: expressed their frustration about the situation. They finally released this
12:00
Speaker 3: el phone ping to us and we were able to
12:03
Speaker 3: find her within six hours and she had been missing
12:05
Speaker 3: for twelve years, so they can really make huge So
12:12
Speaker 3: we definitely take that kind of information into account for
12:16
Speaker 3: for everything.
12:20
Speaker 2: So I know that they did.
12:21
Speaker 3: Search the that lake right there at Tom Brown Park.
12:25
Speaker 3: There was other sinkholes around the area of the cell
12:27
Speaker 3: phone ping off an old plank road.
12:31
Speaker 2: There was.
12:33
Speaker 3: I believe seven in that area, and then there was
12:37
Speaker 3: a few north of Tram Road that were searched. And
12:44
Speaker 3: then a couple of little random odd bodies of water,
12:48
Speaker 3: one right there north of easter Wood Drive, right north
12:52
Speaker 3: of Tom Brown Park that was right off the main road.
12:56
Speaker 3: And then I think there was some boat ramps to
12:59
Speaker 3: the elf that we're searched as well, because we had
13:03
Speaker 3: to keep in mind the the issue that we had
13:05
Speaker 3: with Tallahassee, this was not like South Florida. This is
13:08
Speaker 3: this isn't like Miami. This a lot of these waters
13:11
Speaker 3: were shallow. We were having that issue where a lot
13:14
Speaker 3: of waters that we were searching were shallow. The Pineesy Lake, Uh.
13:20
Speaker 3: I think the issue with that is we couldn't find
13:23
Speaker 3: as much where it looked like there was a way
13:25
Speaker 3: for him to have accidentally driven in there. And same
13:29
Speaker 3: thing shallowish around the edges. So that was about what
13:36
Speaker 3: they were able to get done on that, with the
13:38
Speaker 3: exception of the boat ramps to the south, which we're
13:41
Speaker 3: on the Wacola River, Yeah, most of them, we're along
13:46
Speaker 3: that route, and the Saint Mark's River.
13:50
Speaker 4: And then the river I'm sorry, was it the Wacola River?
13:54
Speaker 4: The was sister River?
13:56
Speaker 3: I believe it's the Wacla River because that's what I'm see.
14:03
Speaker 4: Yes, Yeah, we were just clarifying because we heard was
14:10
Speaker 4: in the mix here that was.
14:11
Speaker 1: Somewhere on Facebook.
14:12
Speaker 3: Yeah, so where is that? I know I know that
14:20
Speaker 3: there was some that Britain had searched too. It's been
14:26
Speaker 3: a little bit since I physically had looked at the
14:28
Speaker 3: map on this one, so that could have been searched
14:31
Speaker 3: by us or could have been done by.
14:34
Speaker 2: By Britain. I'm trying to see what this one.
14:37
Speaker 3: I think you're right about that because we did watch
14:39
Speaker 3: that YouTube clip and that might be.
14:41
Speaker 1: Where we all lost us out because he may have
14:43
Speaker 1: said it.
14:46
Speaker 2: Right.
14:47
Speaker 3: Yeah, So we do have a map, and of course,
14:49
Speaker 3: you know, we're in contact with Britain, and for us,
14:53
Speaker 3: it's like whatever we could do, even though he's got
14:57
Speaker 3: his own search team and then we're our own, you know,
15:00
Speaker 3: in city as well. You know, we kind of try
15:03
Speaker 3: to compile everything, like this is the map we have
15:06
Speaker 3: on here, what we've searched, let me know what you've searched.
15:09
Speaker 3: We'll update it and this can be used, you know,
15:13
Speaker 3: hopefully in the future if any of us go back
15:16
Speaker 3: or another search team or you know, saw on and
15:18
Speaker 3: so forth, they can know kind of what was done
15:20
Speaker 3: or at least if they want to double back put
15:22
Speaker 3: eyes on it. You know, we wouldn't be offended by
15:24
Speaker 3: that because, like we searched stuff. If somebody says they
15:27
Speaker 3: searched it, we're probably gonna research it just to double check,
15:30
Speaker 3: just to make sure. But that was about I think
15:35
Speaker 3: all besides the sinkholes, and there was a lot of
15:38
Speaker 3: areas like that that were checked because we were really
15:42
Speaker 3: focusing closest to that cell phone ping. So yeah, I
15:49
Speaker 3: don't know exactly one thing I am not sure of,
15:52
Speaker 3: and I don't know if this information was ever released
15:54
Speaker 3: or ever found out exactly where in Killer and Lakes
15:59
Speaker 3: he was headed, like if there was a physical address
16:03
Speaker 3: to this supposed job site that he was heading to,
16:06
Speaker 3: because if there was, then that could really help pinpoint
16:08
Speaker 3: because if this was just an accidental, you know, I
16:12
Speaker 3: accidentally drove into a body of water, that could really
16:15
Speaker 3: help narrow down the area because that's kind of a
16:17
Speaker 3: large area and there are some bigger bodies of water
16:19
Speaker 3: out there. And this was during the day, And that's
16:22
Speaker 3: another thing that we usually don't see, is, you know,
16:27
Speaker 3: somebody going missing during the day in their vehicle. Most
16:29
Speaker 3: of the cases that we've worked or solved have been
16:32
Speaker 3: people that have gone missing at night, whether it's an
16:34
Speaker 3: accident or drinking and driving or dementia, things like that.
16:40
Speaker 3: They tend to focus more so at night. So for
16:43
Speaker 3: something like this to have accidentally happened during the day
16:45
Speaker 3: there couldn't have been much of anybody around to see it,
16:50
Speaker 3: and that's just an accident scenario.
16:52
Speaker 4: We do have this scenario. The general location of where
16:56
Speaker 4: he was supposed to go for the job.
16:57
Speaker 1: Site, we have one street we don't have cross so
17:00
Speaker 1: we spoke with Ian's former boss and he gave us
17:06
Speaker 1: the street called wood Gateway in the Kolar neighborhood.
17:11
Speaker 2: So I don't know if that's helpful.
17:12
Speaker 1: For you guys.
17:12
Speaker 2: We don't have the other.
17:15
Speaker 1: But maybe you can figure out where wood Gateway goes
17:18
Speaker 1: through Klarn because that seems to be where the job
17:20
Speaker 1: site was that day.
17:23
Speaker 3: Okay, No, that could definitely definitely be helpful.
17:28
Speaker 4: M h.
17:29
Speaker 3: So, I see there's a woodgate there, but this is
17:35
Speaker 3: over in like kind of the Benton Hills area.
17:41
Speaker 2: I think the right are.
17:43
Speaker 4: Well, we can double check our map as well, but
17:45
Speaker 4: that was whenever we were describing it, and him entering
17:47
Speaker 4: will supposedly should have been entering intough Centerville road. That
17:51
Speaker 4: makes sense.
17:55
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, I see Centerville. Okay, there you go.
17:58
Speaker 3: When when you put if you just put a random
18:01
Speaker 3: pinpoint on the map in the Killer and Lakes area
18:04
Speaker 3: and you just pick another random spot before where the
18:08
Speaker 3: Tom Brown Park. Is you do like, it automatically will
18:12
Speaker 3: do directions for you and show you what route that
18:14
Speaker 3: person would have taken from point A to point B.
18:18
Speaker 3: It actually does take you through Cotter Boulevard, which is
18:24
Speaker 3: I believe where he was seen turning into Tom Brown
18:27
Speaker 3: Park in that area, but or at least up and
18:31
Speaker 3: around that area. So I'm not sure as far as
18:35
Speaker 3: cutting through Tom Brown Park, but it kind of made
18:39
Speaker 3: sense looking at it. But yeah, having that exact or
18:43
Speaker 3: at least one of the cross streets could be a
18:45
Speaker 3: huge help because you got it would have to be
18:48
Speaker 3: a deeper body of water to hide a vehicle of
18:50
Speaker 3: best size.
18:52
Speaker 4: Well, what we can do is we can reach back
18:54
Speaker 4: out to Joe and see if we get across the precision.
18:59
Speaker 2: Yeah, even just even just the one is a help.
19:01
Speaker 2: But yeah, across street.
19:02
Speaker 3: It wouldn't have to be in you know, a full address,
19:04
Speaker 3: but you know, little things like that could change the
19:08
Speaker 3: route enough to where it may help himpoint specific areas
19:14
Speaker 3: of interest. And if something's like, you know, we can
19:17
Speaker 3: look at depth charts and say, hey, you know, we
19:20
Speaker 3: know that this lake's only two feet deep. We know
19:22
Speaker 3: this one's twenty feet deep. Is it worth going back
19:25
Speaker 3: and double checking and looking at this one, you know,
19:28
Speaker 3: because a lot of what we did was kind of
19:30
Speaker 3: centered around where the ping was and then it's like, okay,
19:34
Speaker 3: what's deep enough to hide that vehicle. So that's why
19:38
Speaker 3: we kind of started looking at the at the boat
19:41
Speaker 3: ramps and whether it's accident foul play. You know, we
19:44
Speaker 3: don't unless we know one hundred percent, and that's rarely
19:48
Speaker 3: the case. We don't want to rule anything out. There's
19:52
Speaker 3: no paths that were the detectives were convinced it was
19:56
Speaker 3: foul play and we ended up finding them and it
19:58
Speaker 3: was simply an accident. They were speeding on the road,
20:00
Speaker 3: lost control of the curve, you know. So it's like
20:03
Speaker 3: we try not to we try to stay open minded.
20:16
Speaker 1: Do you also do any work with drones?
20:22
Speaker 3: So we have an underwater drone, but not as much
20:27
Speaker 3: aerial drones. I know Britain does the aerial drones. I
20:31
Speaker 3: did have a drone and I accidentally flew it into
20:34
Speaker 3: a canal, so I was like this is not Yeah,
20:38
Speaker 3: it was like slow motion, it just boom right down
20:41
Speaker 3: in front of the boat.
20:42
Speaker 2: So, you know, we have talked about that.
20:45
Speaker 3: At some point we would like to get aerial drones
20:49
Speaker 3: and really get some practice in with those, because there's
20:52
Speaker 3: been times where we're like, we feel like it could
20:54
Speaker 3: be extremely helpful.
20:57
Speaker 2: But we do have the underwater drones.
21:01
Speaker 4: I mean, obviously we're talking now because you know, nothing
21:04
Speaker 4: was really found, and so did you discover anything any clues,
21:08
Speaker 4: any relevant, irrelevant evidence, or anything interesting through the process
21:14
Speaker 4: of searching these points that you that you.
21:17
Speaker 3: Did expert.
21:20
Speaker 2: With what we did?
21:22
Speaker 3: I think there it was there wasn't really anything found,
21:27
Speaker 3: you know, not even a not even another vehicle. I
21:31
Speaker 3: don't think any vehicles were found on this search, which
21:33
Speaker 3: is rare with what we do because in Florida, that's
21:36
Speaker 3: in South Florida, that's kind of what it's. It tends
21:38
Speaker 3: to slow us down a little bit if we're diving
21:40
Speaker 3: on stolen dumped vehicles. So we knew if we found
21:42
Speaker 3: something in this area it would be significant because we're
21:45
Speaker 3: searching all these spots and there's no vehicles. And there's
21:49
Speaker 3: actually another man in Tallahassee that is missing with his
21:53
Speaker 3: truck as well, and he's he went missing back I
21:58
Speaker 3: want to say, in two thousand and four. I'd have
22:01
Speaker 3: to pull his case. But so there's the there was
22:05
Speaker 3: the opportunity there, Like you could find if you find
22:08
Speaker 3: a truck, it could be one of the two.
22:10
Speaker 2: You know, got it?
22:12
Speaker 3: Okay, what do you do with.
22:13
Speaker 1: The information that you compile?
22:18
Speaker 3: Let see, are you speaking on if we find the
22:21
Speaker 3: vehicle that we're looking for?
22:23
Speaker 1: So no, sorry, that's a good clarifier. So all this
22:26
Speaker 1: information that you're gathering, what do you do with it?
22:30
Speaker 3: So I have a spreadsheet that I keep all the
22:34
Speaker 3: cases with the names, the day that they went missing,
22:40
Speaker 3: the vehicle, make model, the color, the city they went missing,
22:46
Speaker 3: any other relevant information. So we have that, and then
22:48
Speaker 3: of course I have maps like I have. There was
22:53
Speaker 3: there's a lot of overlap in South Florida where we're at,
22:56
Speaker 3: particularly Miami and Broward County, and there's a lot of
23:00
Speaker 3: overlapping cases. So normally I would make one map for
23:04
Speaker 3: each case, but it got to the point where we
23:07
Speaker 3: just started an all inclusive map for South Florida because
23:14
Speaker 3: there was so much overlap that it was just it
23:16
Speaker 3: would have just became confusing. So and that area we
23:20
Speaker 3: just have one map. But for for for like Ian's case,
23:24
Speaker 3: we just it's just the one.
23:26
Speaker 2: Particular map that we have.
23:27
Speaker 3: But I have several maps all over the country different cases,
23:34
Speaker 3: So we keep that pictures flyers. You know, we we
23:40
Speaker 3: sit and we talk about these cases. I'll take notes,
23:46
Speaker 3: make itineraries for the trips. You know, this is this
23:49
Speaker 3: is kind of our game plan. This is what we
23:52
Speaker 3: want to accomplish on the strip, the areas that we
23:54
Speaker 3: want to focus in on. Yeah, we just kind of
23:59
Speaker 3: compile it that way. Like we have our own separate maps.
24:01
Speaker 3: We have our own kind of database that we have
24:03
Speaker 3: started with the areas the different quadrants of Florida and
24:07
Speaker 3: the missing persons in those areas. I know, with me
24:11
Speaker 3: like Facebook, if like we fall a lot of different
24:14
Speaker 3: missing persons pages and organizations and groups, and anytime somebody
24:19
Speaker 3: new goes missing with a vehicle, I'll put it in
24:22
Speaker 3: a saved fold or I'll save that posting to like
24:26
Speaker 3: Florida Newly Missing or Florida Silver Alert, things like that,
24:29
Speaker 3: and then I go back and I reference them about
24:31
Speaker 3: a month later, and if they are still missing, then
24:33
Speaker 3: they get added to the spreadsheet or like you know,
24:36
Speaker 3: our little database.
24:39
Speaker 4: Okay, one thing, I haven't said it yet, so it's
24:42
Speaker 4: kind of waiting for an opportunity. But I've gotten more
24:45
Speaker 4: and more fascinated. Just listen to what you guys do
24:48
Speaker 4: and what you're talking about to the point to where
24:50
Speaker 4: I'm like, I kind of want to see it in
24:52
Speaker 4: person if I ever had.
24:53
Speaker 2: The opportunity, right like the ride along, right along.
24:58
Speaker 3: Absolutely, Yeah, it's fast paced, it's sometimes it's pretty exciting,
25:06
Speaker 3: and sometimes there's just long periods of time where you know,
25:10
Speaker 3: Mike and John are on the boat and you know,
25:12
Speaker 3: running along canal and you know, I'll wait in the
25:16
Speaker 3: vehicle and we usually have two vehicles and I'll meet them.
25:19
Speaker 3: I'll take the truck and meet them at the other end,
25:20
Speaker 3: pick them up. You know, just everything we can do
25:22
Speaker 3: to make what we're doing more efficient, just to get
25:25
Speaker 3: us so that we can accomplish as much as we
25:28
Speaker 3: possibly can, because, like I said, we kind of cram
25:30
Speaker 3: everything into a weekend long search and.
25:33
Speaker 2: We go from there.
25:36
Speaker 4: What do you do when you're not doing this?
25:40
Speaker 2: So I was when I started doing this.
25:45
Speaker 3: I was a tattoo artist for fourteen years and I
25:48
Speaker 3: kind of really got burnt out on it. And now
25:51
Speaker 3: I work in a psychiatrist's office. I treat patients with
25:54
Speaker 3: major depressive disorder and treatment resistant depression.
25:59
Speaker 2: That's ateresting. See.
26:00
Speaker 1: I like that kind of work. You can go on
26:03
Speaker 1: the ride.
26:03
Speaker 2: Along on the phone.
26:04
Speaker 4: I'm all about getting out there, getting dirty. None of
26:07
Speaker 4: that bothers me.
26:07
Speaker 2: I just want to get into people's minds.
26:11
Speaker 1: The information that you gathered. Do you send it to
26:13
Speaker 1: law enforcement? They ask for it.
26:17
Speaker 2: Yeah.
26:18
Speaker 3: So we have been reached out to from different organizations
26:23
Speaker 3: or different counties where they'll be like, hey, you know,
26:27
Speaker 3: we want to see how you're doing this. You know,
26:29
Speaker 3: what you're doing is amazing and it's we're seeing you're
26:32
Speaker 3: you're you're getting a lot of results. You know, a
26:34
Speaker 3: lot of results in a small period of time, just
26:38
Speaker 3: in about two years eighteen cold cases. So like Miami,
26:43
Speaker 3: they had reached out to us. They wanted to see
26:44
Speaker 3: So we brought their dive commander along with us and
26:48
Speaker 3: had them on the boat, showed them our sonar setups,
26:50
Speaker 3: showed them the boat set up because it is you know,
26:54
Speaker 3: you need something that you can get in and out of,
26:56
Speaker 3: not just rivers and larger canals, anything with like boat ramps.
26:59
Speaker 3: I mean, we have put this boat into smaller ponds
27:04
Speaker 3: and we have to do it efficiently. So we've done
27:07
Speaker 3: that with different counties as well and shown them to
27:09
Speaker 3: set up and how we do things. Or if they say,
27:14
Speaker 3: you know, hey, do you know where there's dumped vehicles
27:17
Speaker 3: at that you've already cleared and you know we can
27:20
Speaker 3: use them for dive training. So I put together a
27:23
Speaker 3: separate map for some of the dive commanders where they
27:25
Speaker 3: can reference where we found vehicles, but they're not related
27:29
Speaker 3: to anything that we're looking for, and that way they
27:32
Speaker 3: can use them as part of their dive training. They
27:33
Speaker 3: go out, they pull them, things of that sort.
27:37
Speaker 1: That is familiar to me. We're both dive certified.
27:40
Speaker 2: Mine.
27:41
Speaker 1: I did mine in Colorado and a very murky lake
27:43
Speaker 1: that they sunk a plane in. But you can't you
27:47
Speaker 1: got to put your hand in front lake. As soon
27:49
Speaker 1: as somebody swipes the bottom, you're in trouble. You can't
27:51
Speaker 1: see anything.
27:53
Speaker 2: But that's how I did.
27:54
Speaker 1: The search and rescue dive was this, and so they
27:56
Speaker 1: put it down there on purpose because there are not
27:58
Speaker 1: very many large bodies of water in the Denver area.
28:01
Speaker 2: True, so that's where we all go for it.
28:03
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's always just been recreational diving. But one kind
28:06
Speaker 4: of fun fact is my grandfather, back when he was
28:09
Speaker 4: really young, he was a. He was a diver for
28:12
Speaker 4: Leon County Sharf's office, and so he would go down
28:15
Speaker 4: and help search for bodies things like that. That was
28:17
Speaker 4: pretty much I think he did that for a number
28:19
Speaker 4: of years.
28:20
Speaker 2: My mom too.
28:21
Speaker 1: Yeah, if somebody wanted to reach out to you all,
28:26
Speaker 1: what would be the best way for them to connect
28:28
Speaker 1: with you? If they're listening and they're like, oh, I
28:30
Speaker 1: didn't know about this organization, maybe they can help us.
28:32
Speaker 2: How would someone connect with you? So a lot of.
28:36
Speaker 3: Times they usually reach out to either our Facebook, the
28:40
Speaker 3: Sunshine State Facebook we do get a lot of messages
28:44
Speaker 3: on there, or the Sunshine State email which is just
28:47
Speaker 3: Sunshine statesonar at aol dot com. I have one as well,
28:51
Speaker 3: it's just Shelley dot Sunshine statesonar at aol dot com.
28:56
Speaker 3: And they can reach out to either one of those because,
28:58
Speaker 3: like I said, the the main one tends to get
29:01
Speaker 3: bombarded with emails. But you know, Facebook, message or anything
29:09
Speaker 3: like that is they're all good ways, you know, And
29:11
Speaker 3: if it's a case or we feel like that we
29:13
Speaker 3: can be helpful or useful, we will try to do
29:17
Speaker 3: our best to help. But there we've definitely been reached
29:20
Speaker 3: out to on cases where we did not feel like
29:23
Speaker 3: there was something that we could do much justice for
29:25
Speaker 3: it unfortunately, or if we felt like another organization was
29:29
Speaker 3: more suited for it, we would refer them to them. Yeah,
29:33
Speaker 3: normally just through email or Facebook, like we have other platforms,
29:37
Speaker 3: but Facebook is the.
29:38
Speaker 2: One that we utilize the most.
29:41
Speaker 1: Gotcha and is there anything that we haven't asked you
29:45
Speaker 1: that's important for our listeners to know about what you
29:49
Speaker 1: did on Ian's case?
29:55
Speaker 3: The biggest thing is, you know, we we did try
29:57
Speaker 3: to hit as many of the deeper or what we
30:00
Speaker 3: could find as far as deeper bodies of water in
30:02
Speaker 3: the area that he was last known to be the
30:09
Speaker 3: best thing to do is I guess anybody locally that
30:12
Speaker 3: may have a boat or fishing or sonar and they're
30:16
Speaker 3: in these areas. You know, we notice a lot of
30:20
Speaker 3: boaters don't tend to turn their sonar on until after
30:22
Speaker 3: they leave the boat ramp, sometimes until they get into
30:25
Speaker 3: the area that they want to be fishing. You know,
30:28
Speaker 3: if you can turn that so in a honestly as
30:30
Speaker 3: you put it in the water, because you never know
30:33
Speaker 3: what you may see at the boat ramps or along
30:36
Speaker 3: the edges of like a causeway or something where somebody
30:38
Speaker 3: could have where the road runs close to the water.
30:42
Speaker 3: And if you see something, report it you know, because
30:45
Speaker 3: it may not just be a dumped or stolen vehicle,
30:47
Speaker 3: It could be something significant.
31:00
Speaker 1: As far as we can determine. Ian Rodgers was last
31:03
Speaker 1: verifiably seen around seven thirty on the morning of August
31:08
Speaker 1: twenty sixth, twenty twenty four. At that time, he was
31:11
Speaker 1: picking up tools for work from his mother's home in Crawfordville, Florida.
31:16
Speaker 1: Somewhere close to eight a m. Ian spoke with his
31:19
Speaker 1: boss to report that the work truck he had just
31:21
Speaker 1: been given was overheating. It seems at least two text
31:26
Speaker 1: messages were sent from Ian's phone some time after eight
31:29
Speaker 1: a m. And before two pm. Ian never made it
31:33
Speaker 1: to the JOMP site that day. At the time of
31:36
Speaker 1: his disappearance, Ian was wearing a black hat, sunglasses, a
31:41
Speaker 1: blue long sleeve dry fit shirt, a white undershirt, tan
31:46
Speaker 1: cargo shorts, and brown work boots. Ian has a half
31:50
Speaker 1: tattoo on his right forearm, which consists of two gorillas
31:55
Speaker 1: and a sault shaker, a tribal tattoo on his left calf,
31:59
Speaker 1: and a scroll tattoo with the word mom on his
32:02
Speaker 1: right calf. If you have any information, please call the
32:06
Speaker 1: Wacola County Sheriff's Office at eight five oh seven four
32:11
Speaker 1: five seven one zero zero, or you can email us
32:15
Speaker 1: at tragedy at True Crime podcast at gmail dot com