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Hell and Gone Murder Line: Melissa Witt [From the Archives] · Hell and Gone: Murder Line

0:46
Speaker 1: School of Humans. Helen Gon Murder Line actively investigates cold
0:52
Speaker 1: case murders in an effort to raise public awareness, invite
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Speaker 1: witnesses to come forward and present evidence that could potentially
0:58
Speaker 1: be further investigated by law enforcement. While we value insights
1:03
Speaker 1: from family and community members, their statements should not be
1:06
Speaker 1: considered evidence and point to the challenges of verifying facts
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Speaker 1: inherent in cold cases. We remind listeners that everyone has
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Speaker 1: presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.
1:17
Speaker 1: Nothing in the podcast is intended to state or imply
1:21
Speaker 1: that anyone who has not been convicted of a crime
1:24
Speaker 1: is guilty of any wrongdoing. Thanks for listening.
1:27
Speaker 2: Over the past five years making my true crime podcast,
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Speaker 2: Helen Gone, I've learned that there is no such thing
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Speaker 2: as a small town where murder never happens. I have
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Speaker 2: received hundreds of messages from people all around the country
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Speaker 2: asking for help with an unsolved murder that's affected them,
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Speaker 2: their families, and their communities, and now they have a
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Speaker 2: new way to reach out. I'm Catherine Townsend. This is
1:52
Speaker 2: Helen Gone Murder Line. If you have a case you'd
1:56
Speaker 2: like me and my team to look into, you can
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Speaker 2: reach out to us at six seven eight seven four four,
2:02
Speaker 2: six one four or five. That's six seven eight seven
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Speaker 2: four four sixty one four or five. Thursday, December first,
2:13
Speaker 2: nineteen ninety four started out as just a normal day
2:16
Speaker 2: for Melissa missy Wit. Melissa was a nineteen year old
2:21
Speaker 2: college student who still lived at home with her mom,
2:23
Speaker 2: mary Anne Whitt, on a quiet street in a quiet
2:26
Speaker 2: neighborhood in Fort Smith, Arkansas. Melissa was Marianne's only daughter,
2:30
Speaker 2: and Melissa was her whole world. In interviews later, Marianne
2:35
Speaker 2: talked about how she'd been almost forty years old when
2:37
Speaker 2: Melissa was born. Melissa's dad, Johnny, was fifty four at
2:40
Speaker 2: the time. Today that's more common, especially in places like
2:44
Speaker 2: New York City, where I've spent a lot of my
2:45
Speaker 2: adult life, but back then, in small town Arkansas, it
2:49
Speaker 2: was definitely not. Because they were so close. Mary Anne
2:54
Speaker 2: was always very protective of Melissa. She always thought about safety.
2:58
Speaker 2: Fort Smith had around seventy five thousand people living there
3:02
Speaker 2: back in the early nineties with a military base. It
3:06
Speaker 2: was much larger and more diverse than say a lot
3:09
Speaker 2: of towns in the Ozarks, but it still had that
3:12
Speaker 2: small town feel when Melissa was growing up. It was
3:15
Speaker 2: the kind of place where kids rode their bikes around
3:18
Speaker 2: town and entertained themselves after school. On that December morning
3:22
Speaker 2: in nineteen ninety four, Melissa asked mary Anne if she
3:25
Speaker 2: could borrow twenty dollars. Mary Anne was trying to teach
3:29
Speaker 2: Melissa about smarter budgeting, so she said no. Melissa and
3:33
Speaker 2: mary Anne actually got into a little argument over this,
3:36
Speaker 2: and Melissa left the house that day without them resolving it.
3:40
Speaker 2: After Melissa left, mary Anne felt bad about the argument,
3:43
Speaker 2: so she left Melissa a note telling her to come
3:46
Speaker 2: to Bowling World that night, where mary Anne was part
3:49
Speaker 2: of a ladies bowling league. In the note, Marianne apologized
3:53
Speaker 2: for getting upset with her and offered to buy her
3:55
Speaker 2: a Hamburger when they saw each other that night. She
3:57
Speaker 2: signed the note, love Mom. Melissa did go to meet
4:02
Speaker 2: her mom that night at Bowling World, but she never
4:05
Speaker 2: made it inside. Instead, Melissa disappeared, and Marianne never saw
4:11
Speaker 2: her daughter alive again.
4:14
Speaker 3: For days.
4:15
Speaker 2: No one noticed that Melissa's brand new white nineteen ninety
4:18
Speaker 2: five Mitsubishi Mirage was parked in a far corner of
4:21
Speaker 2: that parking lot, and no one noticed the blood.
4:25
Speaker 4: Alan it's being lookout for a Melissa Whit me a
4:30
Speaker 4: white female nineteen years of age five one point five
4:35
Speaker 4: have hazel eyes, brownish blond hair. When I've seen Thursday
4:41
Speaker 4: December First.
4:44
Speaker 2: I'm Catherine Townsend. This is Helen Gone Murder Line.
5:32
Speaker 5: Hi Catherine, this is LaDonna.
5:34
Speaker 6: I just wanted to talk to you about the Melissa whitcase.
5:38
Speaker 2: I was introduced to the Melissa whitcase through Loadonna Humphrey,
5:41
Speaker 2: a private investigator and native Northwest Arkansas. We've been talking
5:46
Speaker 2: about Melissa's case for a couple of years now. LaDonna
5:49
Speaker 2: has devoted years of her life to investigating the case
5:53
Speaker 2: and to getting justice from Melissa's family and friends. She's
5:56
Speaker 2: also written two books about Melissa called The Girl I
5:59
Speaker 2: Never Knew and Strangled, and made a documentary about the
6:03
Speaker 2: case called Uneven Ground The Melissa Whit Story.
6:06
Speaker 7: I have been a part of.
6:07
Speaker 6: A nonprofit that I had founded called Let's Bring Them Home.
6:11
Speaker 6: We offered support to families who had adult cases that
6:16
Speaker 6: had gone missing, and we acted as a liaison between
6:19
Speaker 6: the family and law enforcement.
6:21
Speaker 5: And we wanted to film a documentary.
6:23
Speaker 6: Our team got together and everyone kept bringing up the
6:27
Speaker 6: Melissa Whit case, and I was really actually against it
6:30
Speaker 6: in the beginning because obviously she's not a long term
6:33
Speaker 6: missing case.
6:34
Speaker 5: They found her body.
6:35
Speaker 6: Six weeks after she disappeared, but the team out voted me,
6:39
Speaker 6: sent me to Fort Smith, and really kind of the
6:41
Speaker 6: rest is history.
6:42
Speaker 5: Once I met with law Enforce and realized how passionate.
6:45
Speaker 6: They were about the case, I knew that I needed
6:47
Speaker 6: to get involved, and it was initially just for the documentary,
6:52
Speaker 6: and then it really morphed into me being more involved
6:54
Speaker 6: in the day to day things that were happening with
6:56
Speaker 6: her case.
6:58
Speaker 2: Loa Donna had a unique experience. She was able to
7:01
Speaker 2: gain the trust of J. C Ryder, who was the
7:03
Speaker 2: lead investigator on Melissa's case for years. Donna got access
7:08
Speaker 2: to the case file.
7:10
Speaker 6: I had brought some information to them in my initial
7:14
Speaker 6: work with the documentary that started putting some pieces together
7:17
Speaker 6: for them and kind of led them back to a
7:22
Speaker 6: suspect that they'd had all along, okay, because he started
7:26
Speaker 6: contacting me.
7:26
Speaker 5: Because this was before I was a private investigator. I
7:29
Speaker 5: was just.
7:29
Speaker 6: Normal citizen filmmaker doing my thing, and I think that
7:33
Speaker 6: they realized that this could be a perfect storm really
7:37
Speaker 6: for the WIB case because it was bringing renewed interest.
7:40
Speaker 6: But not only that, there was information that was coming
7:43
Speaker 6: into the case that was valuable that I was turning.
7:46
Speaker 5: Over to them that they had never gotten before.
7:49
Speaker 6: And they made a decision then as a department that
7:53
Speaker 6: they were going to allow me to see the case files.
7:55
Speaker 5: There was a bunch of rules around it that couldn't
7:57
Speaker 5: take any of it with me, you know, I.
7:59
Speaker 6: Couldn't share the information in the film, some of it,
8:04
Speaker 6: but they felt like I needed to know some of
8:05
Speaker 6: the information basically because I was dealing with some of
8:08
Speaker 6: the characters that they were looking at really closely in
8:12
Speaker 6: Melissa's murder. But yeah, it was interesting because that doesn't
8:15
Speaker 6: happen very often, and they allow me to stay to
8:19
Speaker 6: continue to stay involved in the case because now it's
8:22
Speaker 6: more of a partnership than anything else to you know.
8:25
Speaker 5: Get justice from Melissa.
8:27
Speaker 2: We're going to go through some of the theories in
8:29
Speaker 2: the case, but first we have to go back to
8:32
Speaker 2: the beginning, to the last twenty four hours of Melissa's
8:36
Speaker 2: life to see if there's anything that we missed. Melissa
8:40
Speaker 2: was pretty bubbly, friendly and kind. Her friend Tara, talked
8:44
Speaker 2: to local news channel News five about how she became
8:47
Speaker 2: fast friends with Melissa when they were around five or
8:50
Speaker 2: six years old. She said that they would ride their
8:53
Speaker 2: bikes around town and go to local fast food restaurants
8:56
Speaker 2: like KFC and Hardy's. They would buy candy cigarettes and
8:59
Speaker 2: pretend to smoke them. When they got to high school,
9:02
Speaker 2: Tara said Melissa always retained that friendly innocence. They would
9:06
Speaker 2: cruise around town on the weekends. Melissa would talk about
9:10
Speaker 2: boys who she thought were cute, but for the most part,
9:13
Speaker 2: Tara said, Melissa remained focused on school. Melissa was an
9:17
Speaker 2: honor student and a cheerleader. She didn't have a regular
9:20
Speaker 2: boyfriend in high school, but she did have lots of friends.
9:24
Speaker 2: After graduation, Melissa enrolled at West Dark Community College, which
9:28
Speaker 2: is now part of the University of Arkansas at Fort Smith.
9:31
Speaker 2: Melissa also had a part time job at a dentist's office.
9:35
Speaker 2: She was studying to be a dental assistant. On that Thursday,
9:39
Speaker 2: after leaving home, Melissa had classes in the morning, then
9:43
Speaker 2: she had lunch with a friend at the mall. That afternoon,
9:46
Speaker 2: she went over to Family Dentistry. The dentist office where
9:49
Speaker 2: she worked. The dentist, doctor Jennings, and the rest of
9:52
Speaker 2: her colleagues said Melissa was her happy and normal, bubbly self.
9:57
Speaker 2: Nothing seemed out of the ordinary that day. Melissa left
10:00
Speaker 2: work a little after five pm. But then something out
10:04
Speaker 2: of the ordinary did happen because when she got outside,
10:08
Speaker 2: her car wouldn't start. Now a woman Melissa worked with
10:11
Speaker 2: told five News that what happened was Melissa had left
10:15
Speaker 2: her lights on for too long, so she needed to
10:17
Speaker 2: get a jump. This coworker said they were looking for
10:20
Speaker 2: someone with jumper cables. They went next door and found
10:23
Speaker 2: a guy who worked at a business there. This was
10:26
Speaker 2: the person l Donna called the Good Samaritan in her book,
10:30
Speaker 2: The Good Samaritan helped Melissa jumpstarter car. The coworker told
10:34
Speaker 2: the news station that she stayed to watch Melissa start
10:37
Speaker 2: the jump process. Then when the cables were attached, she
10:40
Speaker 2: told Melissa to just leave her car running for like
10:43
Speaker 2: fifteen minutes to make sure the battery was charged. Then
10:46
Speaker 2: the coworker left. Now, in her book and in multiple
10:50
Speaker 2: media reports, we learned that the Good Samaritan was cleared
10:54
Speaker 2: by police pretty early in the investigation. But as we
10:58
Speaker 2: know from previous seasons of Helen Gone, we can't assume anything.
11:03
Speaker 2: I asked the Donna about the Good Samaritan.
11:06
Speaker 5: You know, obviously when someone goes missing, as you know,
11:09
Speaker 5: they're going to look at the day's activities pretty closely.
11:12
Speaker 6: And of course that was pretty suspicious to law enforcement
11:15
Speaker 6: because to have her car not started, and they looked
11:19
Speaker 6: at that really really closely. The Good Samaritan, who they
11:22
Speaker 6: try not to name just to not disrupt.
11:24
Speaker 7: His life, he worked nearby to the dental office, and
11:29
Speaker 7: as it turns out, she had left her lights on
11:32
Speaker 7: her car most of the day, starting from when she
11:34
Speaker 7: had been at the mall to have lunch, and that's what.
11:37
Speaker 5: Killed the battery. And so they looked at him so closely.
11:41
Speaker 6: In fact, I think he was probably interviewed maybe half
11:45
Speaker 6: a dozen times, and he just.
11:48
Speaker 5: Had no connection to what had happened to her.
11:50
Speaker 6: It was one of those things that you know, he
11:53
Speaker 6: was a good smart and he helped her, but it
11:55
Speaker 6: was almost like he was at the wrong place at
11:56
Speaker 6: the wrong.
11:57
Speaker 5: Time because she went missing that day. But he was
12:00
Speaker 5: completely cleared by law enforcement.
12:02
Speaker 2: After getting her car started, Melissa drove home, which was
12:06
Speaker 2: just a few minutes from the dental office. She left
12:09
Speaker 2: work at five point fifty, so this would have put
12:11
Speaker 2: her home a little after six Her dental scrubs were
12:15
Speaker 2: found crumpled up on her bedroom floor, like she had
12:18
Speaker 2: taken them off to do a quick clothing change, and
12:21
Speaker 2: her mom later told investigators that, based on the clothes
12:24
Speaker 2: that were missing, Melissa changed into jeans, a white V
12:28
Speaker 2: neck sweater, silver hoop, earrings with a wavy pattern on them,
12:32
Speaker 2: and a Mickey Mouse wristwatch. Police figured out later that
12:37
Speaker 2: Melissa must have seen her mother's note because Melissa then
12:41
Speaker 2: headed out to Bowling world Sstigators estimated Melissa arrived at
12:45
Speaker 2: Bowling World between six thirty and seven PM. Now, at
12:49
Speaker 2: that time, the parking lot would have been pretty full.
12:52
Speaker 2: The bowling league was popular by the time Melissa got there,
12:56
Speaker 2: pretty much everyone would have been inside, which is part
12:59
Speaker 2: of the reason why police later could not find many witnesses.
13:03
Speaker 2: But Melissa never made it inside. Mary Anne, of course
13:08
Speaker 2: noticed that Melissa never showed up at Bowling World, and
13:11
Speaker 2: after she got home and saw Melissa's car was not
13:14
Speaker 2: there at the house, she got worried. Mary Anne called
13:18
Speaker 2: Melissa's friends, but no one had seen her. The next morning,
13:22
Speaker 2: Friday morning, Melissa's friend Tara said that her mother walked
13:26
Speaker 2: into her room and asked if she'd heard from Melissa.
13:29
Speaker 2: Her mom said Maryanne had called the house looking for Melissa.
13:32
Speaker 2: Tara said no, but she said they were supposed to
13:35
Speaker 2: go out on that Friday night. She figured they would
13:38
Speaker 2: catch up later. Then Tara went to class. They had
13:42
Speaker 2: a biology class together, and when Melissa didn't show up
13:44
Speaker 2: in that biology class, Tara immediately suspected something bad had happened.
13:50
Speaker 2: This was not like Melissa. Melissa was extremely responsible. That's
13:54
Speaker 2: when Marianne went to the police. But then the first
13:58
Speaker 2: officer to talk to mary Anne, in my opinion, made
14:00
Speaker 2: a crucial and unfortunately a far too common error. We
14:05
Speaker 2: see this over and over in this podcast and in
14:07
Speaker 2: our investigations. Mary Anne was talking about what happened that morning,
14:11
Speaker 2: and she mentioned that small argument she had gotten into
14:14
Speaker 2: with Melissa over the twenty dollars that apparently led the
14:17
Speaker 2: officer to believe that Melissa could.
14:20
Speaker 3: Have been a runaway.
14:21
Speaker 2: Since Melissa was over eighteen and was an adult, of course,
14:26
Speaker 2: she did have the right to disappear voluntarily, but mary
14:29
Speaker 2: Anne and all Melissa's friends kept telling police there was
14:32
Speaker 2: no way she would do that. This was not like Melissa.
14:35
Speaker 2: This was completely out of character. She would not just disappear.
14:39
Speaker 2: Because of this delay by police, crucial hours in the
14:43
Speaker 2: beginning of the investigation were lost. Melissa's family did not
14:47
Speaker 2: want to wait, so they got together with some of
14:50
Speaker 2: her friends and other members of the community and they
14:52
Speaker 2: started searching for her. They printed thousands of flyers with
14:55
Speaker 2: Melissa's picture on them. They also put her picture on
14:58
Speaker 2: billboards around town. Local news media took the story and
15:02
Speaker 2: ran with it, and once that story hit local news,
15:05
Speaker 2: a crucial tip came in. A Bowling World employee called
15:09
Speaker 2: the police and told them that on the night Melissa
15:11
Speaker 2: went missing, a construction worker and his family turned in
15:15
Speaker 2: a set of keys they found in the parking lot.
15:17
Speaker 2: This happened at around seven forty five pm, so this
15:21
Speaker 2: would have been just a few minutes after police say
15:23
Speaker 2: Melissa arrived at Bowling World. The key ring had Missy
15:27
Speaker 2: written on it. The keys belonged to Melissa. Later forensic
15:31
Speaker 2: testing would reveal they had tiny specks of blood on them.
15:35
Speaker 2: At that point, police did suspect foul play. They turned
15:39
Speaker 2: the case over to the Fort Smith Major Crimes Unit,
15:42
Speaker 2: and that's when investig Gator J. C. Rider took over
15:45
Speaker 2: the case. Now should mention here that J. C Ryder
15:48
Speaker 2: has his own checkered history. Ledonna has worked with him
15:52
Speaker 2: for years. She presents him as a competent, carrying investigator
15:56
Speaker 2: who's been instrumental in getting the word out about Melissa
15:59
Speaker 2: WIT's case and never giving up. But as you all know,
16:04
Speaker 2: I don't take anything for granted, including the backgrounds of
16:07
Speaker 2: the people investigating the case. The allegations against J. C
16:11
Speaker 2: Rder go back to a man named Ron Fields. He
16:14
Speaker 2: was the deputy prosecuting attorney in Fort Smith from the
16:17
Speaker 2: late seventies until two thousand and five. Back in nineteen
16:20
Speaker 2: ninety five, when J. C Ryder was police captain, the
16:23
Speaker 2: FBI investigated claims that Ron Fields was dealing drugs and
16:27
Speaker 2: operating basically a hit squad that some people compared to
16:30
Speaker 2: the movie That Departed Inside the Fort Smith Police Department,
16:34
Speaker 2: the FBI investigated allegations that Ron Fields ordered J. C
16:39
Speaker 2: Ryder to kill a woman named Laurie Murchison and to
16:42
Speaker 2: get rid of her body. We're actually going to do
16:45
Speaker 2: an entirely separate episode about Lourie Murchison. It's way too
16:49
Speaker 2: complex and comprehensive to cover here, but needless to say,
16:53
Speaker 2: Ron Fields later became a suspect in Laurie's disappearance. J
16:58
Speaker 2: c Ryder, through his attorneys, has always maintained that those
17:01
Speaker 2: federal charges were completely ridiculous and not true. Jac's lawyer
17:06
Speaker 2: at the time told the Arkansas Democrat Gazette that their
17:09
Speaker 2: quote absolutely nuts. The lawyer said the FBI basically went
17:13
Speaker 2: in and intimidated and threatened people to give them information.
17:17
Speaker 2: The lawyer said the whole thing was a witch hunt.
17:21
Speaker 2: The police detective who led the investigation into Lourie's death
17:24
Speaker 2: also back j c.
17:25
Speaker 3: Rider.
17:26
Speaker 2: The detective said the evidence pointed to Lourie dying of
17:29
Speaker 2: a drug overdose and that there was a suspect in
17:33
Speaker 2: that case, someone who was imprisoned in Oklahoma, a place
17:35
Speaker 2: where Lourie traveled often. But the detective said they just
17:39
Speaker 2: didn't have enough evidence to charge that person in connection
17:41
Speaker 2: with Laurie's death. Going back to Melissa with so now
17:46
Speaker 2: it's December fourth, three days after Melissa disappeared, j c
17:50
Speaker 2: Ryder was assigned to the case. He and his fellow
17:53
Speaker 2: detectives immediately searched the parking lot of Bowling World, and
17:57
Speaker 2: they found Melissa's white car abandoned there in the northwest
18:00
Speaker 2: corner of the parking lot, so her car had been
18:04
Speaker 2: sitting there for three days.
18:06
Speaker 6: Now.
18:07
Speaker 2: This seemed a little bit weird at first that no
18:09
Speaker 2: one noticed that, but Melissa's mom hadn't seen it because
18:13
Speaker 2: again it was in the outer part of the lot
18:15
Speaker 2: when she came out and didn't see Melissa that night,
18:18
Speaker 2: she just assumed that Melissa never came to Bowling World.
18:22
Speaker 2: Officers searched around that car, and they found drops of blood.
18:26
Speaker 2: Melissa's blood had never been tested, so they couldn't confirm
18:29
Speaker 2: then that it was a match. But the drops of
18:31
Speaker 2: blood led pretty much from Melissa's vehicle over to the
18:35
Speaker 2: next row of cars. So the police theory was that
18:39
Speaker 2: Melissa was attacked and thrown into someone else's vehicle, and
18:43
Speaker 2: that the blood blood either came from her being hit,
18:46
Speaker 2: probably with a blunt force object, or when her head
18:49
Speaker 2: hit the parking lot pavement. Now police had what they
18:53
Speaker 2: believed to be the primary crime scene, they started looking
18:58
Speaker 2: for witnesses. Initially, there were reports that witnesses had seen
19:03
Speaker 2: Melissa with someone they described as a black, six foot
19:06
Speaker 2: two male. Rumors were flying that she had been involved
19:09
Speaker 2: in drug deals or sex trafficking, mainly because at the
19:13
Speaker 2: time there were a lot of people who dealt drugs,
19:15
Speaker 2: especially methamphetamines, near Fort Chaffee, the military base, but that
19:22
Speaker 2: sighting was later confirmed to be a totally erroneous mistake.
19:27
Speaker 2: Police did eventually find someone who was a credible witness,
19:30
Speaker 2: a ten year old boy who was actually the son
19:33
Speaker 2: of one of mary Anne's friends. While his mom was
19:37
Speaker 2: playing with mary Anne in the bowling league that night,
19:40
Speaker 2: she sent him out to the car to get some
19:41
Speaker 2: textbooks so he could start doing his homework. When the
19:44
Speaker 2: boy came back in, he said that he saw a
19:47
Speaker 2: man and a woman fighting in the parking lot. At
19:50
Speaker 2: the time, his mom didn't think too much about it,
19:53
Speaker 2: but police later believed that he witnessed Melissa with her abductor. Unfortunately,
20:00
Speaker 2: the boy didn't see enough of the kidnapper's appearance to
20:03
Speaker 2: make a full sketch. Another early missing poster said Melissa
20:07
Speaker 2: had been spotted quote possibly in nineteen eighty one gray
20:11
Speaker 2: Oldsmobile cutlass with a tall, white male with black, wavy
20:14
Speaker 2: hair and an earring end quote. I saw this tip
20:18
Speaker 2: on a missing poster from an old news report, and
20:20
Speaker 2: I still don't know who reported it or where that
20:22
Speaker 2: came from. As with so many investigations that get a
20:26
Speaker 2: lot of press, thousands of tips were flooding in, so
20:30
Speaker 2: now police had to figure out which ones were good
20:32
Speaker 2: leads and which ones were dead ends. Everyone in town
20:36
Speaker 2: had a theory about who could have killed Melissa. Was
20:39
Speaker 2: it a drug deal gone bad? Was it a random
20:41
Speaker 2: serial killer who came in off Interstate five while passing
20:44
Speaker 2: through town, or was it someone she knew. Melissa's personal
20:48
Speaker 2: life didn't seem to offer a lot of clues. At first,
20:52
Speaker 2: she was well liked, She didn't have any enemies. She
20:55
Speaker 2: also didn't have any turmoil in her personal relationship. No
20:59
Speaker 2: fighting with boyfriends, or at least not ones that anyone
21:02
Speaker 2: knew about. The holiday season passed mary Anne's first one
21:06
Speaker 2: without her daughter.
21:08
Speaker 3: No one had a clue what happened to Melissa.
21:12
Speaker 2: Almost six weeks later, on January thirteenth, nineteen ninety five,
21:16
Speaker 2: two hunters were near Turner Bend in the Ozark National
21:19
Speaker 2: Forest when they saw a nude body. Dental records proved
21:24
Speaker 2: this was Melissa Wit. Melissa had been found. This was tragic,
21:30
Speaker 2: but detectives hope now they would be able to gather
21:33
Speaker 2: evidence from her body, hopefully evidence that would get them
21:36
Speaker 2: closer to finding her killer. Melissa was naked, so all
21:40
Speaker 2: of her clothing, shoes, and jewelry, including her other earring
21:45
Speaker 2: and her Mickey Mouse watch with a brown band, were
21:47
Speaker 2: all missing. Her autopsy revealed blunt forest head injuries, either
21:53
Speaker 2: from an object she was struck with or possibly from
21:56
Speaker 2: her head hitting the ground. Then Melissa's killer or killers
22:00
Speaker 2: probably put her into a vehicle in the next row
22:03
Speaker 2: of cars. Someone drove her to that area where her
22:06
Speaker 2: body was found. Investigators believe that remote location is where
22:11
Speaker 2: Melissa Whit died. It's located down a single lane dirt
22:15
Speaker 2: road that's used for logging. The autopsy revealed that the
22:19
Speaker 2: cause of death was exphyxiation by strangulation. When I spoke
22:24
Speaker 2: to her, le Donna talked about how she retraced Melissa's
22:27
Speaker 2: root and how horrifying it must have been for her
22:31
Speaker 2: to be riding in that car with a head wound bleeding,
22:35
Speaker 2: knowing that something horrible was about to happen to her.
22:38
Speaker 5: Love for sand.
22:39
Speaker 6: They take me out to its remote site in the
22:41
Speaker 6: Ozark National Chorus, and I had a sense of dread.
22:45
Speaker 6: The whole way there because it's it's just this, you know,
22:48
Speaker 6: there's a lot of beauty to look at, but knowing
22:52
Speaker 6: how remote it was as we're you know, winding around
22:54
Speaker 6: and seeing like there was nowhere for her to go,
22:57
Speaker 6: nowhere for her to escape.
22:59
Speaker 5: And when we parked the car and I got out,
23:02
Speaker 5: one of the first things that j. C Ryder looked
23:05
Speaker 5: at me and said was, if you.
23:07
Speaker 6: Screamed right now, Ladna, Hon'll bring nobody would hear you.
23:11
Speaker 5: And I remember being just almost to the point of tears.
23:18
Speaker 6: And I'm not like a crier, really very easy, but
23:22
Speaker 6: realizing this nineteen year old girl was out there at
23:26
Speaker 6: night was someone who had already attacked her in a
23:29
Speaker 6: parking lot.
23:29
Speaker 5: She had to have known what was going to happen next.
23:32
Speaker 6: The amount of fear that she had, and that part
23:37
Speaker 6: of the case really broke me, especially seeing where he
23:40
Speaker 6: left her, you know, eventually left her body like.
23:43
Speaker 5: She didn't matter.
23:45
Speaker 2: Investigators said they found pieces of leaves in Melissa's lungs
23:49
Speaker 2: and grass and other vegetation that was native to the
23:51
Speaker 2: Ozark National Forest in her windpipe. This led them to
23:55
Speaker 2: believe that after Melissa was kidnapped from the Bowling World
23:58
Speaker 2: parking lot. She was immediately driven to that location in
24:01
Speaker 2: the forest, then sexually assaulted and killed there. Because Melissa's
24:08
Speaker 2: body was nude, investigators assumed that there had been a
24:10
Speaker 2: sexual assault. According to the autopsy report, there was another
24:15
Speaker 2: strange twist of the case. Melissa's body had been moved. First,
24:20
Speaker 2: it was put behind a large rock that was kind
24:22
Speaker 2: of shaped like a tombstone. The body was covered with
24:25
Speaker 2: pine leaves and that's where it stayed for several weeks,
24:29
Speaker 2: but then just a few days before the body was found,
24:32
Speaker 2: someone moved it. Over the years, JC Riders offered up
24:37
Speaker 2: a couple of theories about why he believes someone would
24:40
Speaker 2: have moved Melissa's body. He said, either it's because as
24:44
Speaker 2: the killer wanted credit for the kill, so they wanted
24:47
Speaker 2: the body to be found so that it would be
24:48
Speaker 2: written about and they would get some kind of celebrity status.
24:51
Speaker 2: Or maybe the move was out of sympathy. Maybe it
24:55
Speaker 2: was someone who knew Melissa and wanted to make sure
24:58
Speaker 2: that she was found so that her friends and family
25:00
Speaker 2: would have some kind of closure. There's also a third possibility,
25:03
Speaker 2: by the way, that someone who was not Melissa's killer
25:06
Speaker 2: or involved in her murder, found the body and decided
25:10
Speaker 2: to move it, but didn't want to admit that because
25:13
Speaker 2: maybe they lived nearby or had history law enforcement and
25:17
Speaker 2: were just scared to talk to police for some reason.
25:20
Speaker 2: This theory was bolstered a little bit when police got
25:22
Speaker 2: a mysterious phone call the day before the body was found.
25:26
Speaker 2: In that call, it sounded like there were two people talking.
25:30
Speaker 2: You could hear an older woman. Police later said, it
25:33
Speaker 2: sounded like a grandmother and a grandson, and you can
25:36
Speaker 2: hear the woman saying, tell them what you found, Tell
25:38
Speaker 2: them what you found.
25:40
Speaker 3: Then the caller hangs up.
25:42
Speaker 2: Police cannot def say that that caller was connected to
25:46
Speaker 2: Melissa whit, but the timing seems like a pretty big coincidence.
25:51
Speaker 2: Police never found that caller, and back then they had
25:54
Speaker 2: no way to trace them.
25:56
Speaker 3: Le Donna has said.
25:57
Speaker 2: By the way, that she does not agree with law
25:59
Speaker 2: enforcements theory because the night Melissa was killed was a
26:03
Speaker 2: really cold night. She thinks it's possible Melissa was sexually
26:07
Speaker 2: assaulted somewhere else, maybe even kept somewhere for days or weeks,
26:12
Speaker 2: and then was murdered near where the body was dumped.
26:15
Speaker 2: When I look at these cases, I always go back
26:17
Speaker 2: to the very beginning. I asked myself if it was
26:20
Speaker 2: possible that Bowling World was not the primary crime scene.
26:24
Speaker 2: Maybe Melissa had left that parking lot with someone and
26:26
Speaker 2: later they took the car back and parked it there.
26:29
Speaker 2: After all, it wasn't found for three days. I have
26:32
Speaker 2: seen this in other cases. Anyone who has basic knowledge
26:35
Speaker 2: of crime scenes. No, if you can waste police time
26:39
Speaker 2: by staging a false crime scene, you can throw them
26:41
Speaker 2: off the trail for quite a while. But Melissa's keys
26:46
Speaker 2: and the spots of blood made me think this is
26:48
Speaker 2: much less likely because those keys were turned in at
26:51
Speaker 2: around seven forty five pm.
26:53
Speaker 3: But the fact that the.
26:54
Speaker 2: Body was moved and some other little odd tidbits about
26:58
Speaker 2: this case made me think it's definitely possible that the
27:01
Speaker 2: crime scene was stage. Maybe sexual assault wasn't the motive.
27:07
Speaker 2: Maybe someone was angry with Melissa and hit her and
27:10
Speaker 2: then took her out to the dumb site and took
27:11
Speaker 2: her clothes off, even to conceal evidence, or also maybe
27:15
Speaker 2: to make it look like a random serial killer did it.
27:18
Speaker 2: So let's go back to what could have happened that
27:21
Speaker 2: night in the parking lot at Bowling World. Melissa got
27:25
Speaker 2: to Bowling World. The parking lot was pretty full because
27:27
Speaker 2: of the Ladies' leak. Almost everyone was inside. Melissa got
27:31
Speaker 2: out of her car, and whatever happened had to happen
27:35
Speaker 2: really quickly because she had her keys in her hand.
27:38
Speaker 2: Presumably she didn't take the time to lock her car
27:41
Speaker 2: and put them into her purse, because her purse was missing,
27:44
Speaker 2: but the keys were there. Melissa started arguing with someone.
27:48
Speaker 2: The argument got heated. Maybe she got scared and went
27:52
Speaker 2: to get back inside her car, but before she had
27:55
Speaker 2: time to put the keys in the door and to
27:57
Speaker 2: get back in her car to safety, the killer hit
27:59
Speaker 2: her over the head with a blunt fors object, grabbed
28:02
Speaker 2: her and threw her into their vehicle. This would have
28:06
Speaker 2: taken just a few seconds, just long enough for the
28:09
Speaker 2: keys to slip out of her hands, and that would
28:11
Speaker 2: also explain another piece of evidence they found there, Melissa's
28:14
Speaker 2: crushed hair clip. The killer or killers grabbed Melissa's bag
28:18
Speaker 2: and threw it in the vehicle with them, but probably
28:21
Speaker 2: in their panic, they didn't notice those keys. Almost every
28:26
Speaker 2: single theory that has been mentioned in connection with this case,
28:30
Speaker 2: all of them have one thing in common. This was
28:32
Speaker 2: not a planned attack. This was something probably an argument
28:35
Speaker 2: that got out of control and escalated, which brings us
28:38
Speaker 2: back to who would have known that Melissa was going
28:41
Speaker 2: to be there that night. The years police have gotten
28:45
Speaker 2: thousands of tips, there have been a few people of
28:48
Speaker 2: interests who've come up over and over, and we're going
28:50
Speaker 2: to go over those now. One person of interest who
28:54
Speaker 2: was mentioned pretty early on was a guy named Larry Sweeringin.
28:58
Speaker 2: He was convicted of the nineteen ninety nine murder of
29:01
Speaker 2: a young woman named Melissa Trotter in Texas. Le Donna
29:04
Speaker 2: wrote in her book there were actually a lot of similarities,
29:07
Speaker 2: at least on the surface, between Melissa Trotter's case and
29:10
Speaker 2: Melissa Whit's case, other than the obvious, which is they
29:13
Speaker 2: had the same first name. Both Melissa Trotter and Melissa
29:16
Speaker 2: Witt were nineteen years old, Both of them were strangled.
29:20
Speaker 2: Both were found several weeks after they disappeared in national
29:23
Speaker 2: forest areas. Melissa Trotter's body was found on January twenty second,
29:28
Speaker 2: nineteen ninety nine, in sam Houston National Forest in Texas.
29:32
Speaker 2: Melissa Trotter had a knife wound on her neck, her
29:35
Speaker 2: throat had been cut, and the pockets of her shorts
29:38
Speaker 2: were torn, exposing her red underwear. She had been strangled
29:42
Speaker 2: with a pair of panny hose. Larry Swaringen was twenty
29:45
Speaker 2: seven years old, he was married, and he had a
29:48
Speaker 2: long criminal history with allegations of sexual assault against multiple women.
29:53
Speaker 2: It turned out that there were a lot of issues
29:56
Speaker 2: with the case against Larry Swaringen. There were serious problems
30:00
Speaker 2: with the physical evidence, though, actually the biggest issue in
30:03
Speaker 2: the case against Larry Swaringen was the timing. The Houston
30:07
Speaker 2: medical examiner who conducted the autopsy testified during Larry Swaringen's
30:12
Speaker 2: trial that Melissa Trotter had been dead the entire time
30:16
Speaker 2: that she was missing, so for almost three weeks. But
30:19
Speaker 2: in two thousand and seven, the medical examiner recanted her testimony.
30:24
Speaker 2: Now she said that Melissa Trotter had been dead for
30:27
Speaker 2: no longer than two weeks when her body was found.
30:30
Speaker 2: The problem with that is that three days after Melissa
30:33
Speaker 2: went missing, the police picked him up on an outstanding warrant,
30:35
Speaker 2: and he was in jail when her body was found.
30:38
Speaker 2: I absolutely believe that if Larry Swaringen were charged with
30:41
Speaker 2: that murder today, he would not be convicted. Not only
30:45
Speaker 2: do I not believe he's a viable suspect in Melissa
30:48
Speaker 2: Whits case. I think it's highly unlikely that he killed
30:51
Speaker 2: Melissa Trotter. But even with all the questionable evidence, Larry's
30:57
Speaker 2: Swaringen was convicted and he was sentenced to death.
31:00
Speaker 3: After the Innocents.
31:01
Speaker 2: Project took up the case, his execution was stayed five times,
31:05
Speaker 2: but finally Larry Sweringen was executed by lethal injection in
31:09
Speaker 2: two thousand. His last words and a final statement were
31:13
Speaker 2: quote today.
31:15
Speaker 3: The state of Texas murdered an innocent man.
31:19
Speaker 2: While police were investigating Melissa Whits case, another possible person
31:24
Speaker 2: of interest came up. His name is Travis Dale Crouch.
31:28
Speaker 2: He was also known by his nicknames Tramp or Skull.
31:32
Speaker 2: Travis is from Ozark and did time for the rape
31:35
Speaker 2: of a twenty year old woman in Colorado in nineteen
31:38
Speaker 2: ninety seven. Travis was panhandling in a mall parking lot.
31:42
Speaker 2: He started chatting with his victim, then he attacked her
31:45
Speaker 2: in her own car. He forced her to drive to
31:48
Speaker 2: this remote location on a mountaintop, and over a period
31:51
Speaker 2: of hours, he subjected her to a brutal sexual assault. Somehow,
31:56
Speaker 2: his victim escaped. She was dazed, and she ran out
31:59
Speaker 2: of there completely naked and got help. Law enforcements saw
32:04
Speaker 2: similarities between this case and Melissa Whits case, and they
32:09
Speaker 2: figured out that around the time Melissa disappeared, Travis was
32:12
Speaker 2: in Arkansas. Actually, Travis was a carpenter at a church
32:16
Speaker 2: camp a few miles from the remote area where Melissa's
32:19
Speaker 2: body was found. He was seen driving as Chevrolet Caprice
32:22
Speaker 2: near Bowling World around the time when Melissa disappeared. Travis
32:27
Speaker 2: was also a deer hunter, so he would have known
32:29
Speaker 2: the forest well. Police safe fibers in his car were
32:33
Speaker 2: tested at one point, but then nothing more was ever
32:36
Speaker 2: reported about the results of those tests. Travis was sentenced
32:40
Speaker 2: to sixty four years in prison for the rape of
32:42
Speaker 2: the twenty year old victim in Callraer Hto. He becomes
32:45
Speaker 2: eligible for parole next year, twenty twenty four. According to
32:50
Speaker 2: multiple reports, Travis has also always denied any involvement in
32:54
Speaker 2: Melissa Whits murder, which in a way brings us back
32:58
Speaker 2: to where we started. We can eliminate some possibilities. None
33:03
Speaker 2: of the rumors about drugs or sex trafficking rings made sense.
33:07
Speaker 2: Melissa never did drugs. No drugs were found in her system.
33:11
Speaker 2: Police later publicly said that the whole black male suspect
33:16
Speaker 2: and Fort Chaffee connection were just red herrings and had
33:19
Speaker 2: been a complete waste of time. Also, sex traffickers don't
33:24
Speaker 2: drive into full parking lots and kidnap random women. It's
33:29
Speaker 2: sad to say this, but sex traffickers do not have
33:32
Speaker 2: a problem finding young victims. They groom at risk young
33:36
Speaker 2: teens and runaways, but they don't randomly kidnap people from
33:40
Speaker 2: parking lots. Over the years, a number of armed shared
33:44
Speaker 2: detectives on podcasts have mentioned possible suspects. The podcast True
33:48
Speaker 2: Crime Garage talked to Lodonna a few years back about
33:51
Speaker 2: a guy named Gary Hilton, aka the National Forest serial Killer.
33:55
Speaker 2: But in my opinion, this doesn't make a ton of sense.
33:59
Speaker 2: On the surface, there are a few similarities, but Gary
34:02
Speaker 2: Hilton's mo was abducting women from remote areas. For example,
34:06
Speaker 2: one victim's car was found abandoned in a field, another
34:09
Speaker 2: was on a hike. Over the years, LaDonna has devoted
34:12
Speaker 2: countless hours to researching what could have happened to Melissa Whitt.
34:17
Speaker 2: A few years back, she was contacted by a woman
34:20
Speaker 2: who said years ago when the woman was twenty three
34:22
Speaker 2: and living in the Pacific Northwest. This woman had been
34:26
Speaker 2: in a fetish video and this was a very creepy story.
34:29
Speaker 2: The woman said that this creepy director wanted a video
34:33
Speaker 2: where the young woman was wearing a Mickey mouse Watch.
34:37
Speaker 2: He wanted her to pretend that she was dead and
34:39
Speaker 2: in a morgue. As a result of this, LaDonna did
34:42
Speaker 2: a deep dive into some very disturbing internet forums. I've
34:47
Speaker 2: been on a lot of those same forums, and there
34:48
Speaker 2: are some definite violent creeps in there. But I don't
34:52
Speaker 2: think that this direction will ultimately lead to Melissa's killer.
34:56
Speaker 2: There are a lot of people who enjoyed dark fetishes
34:59
Speaker 2: who never cross the line. I also don't think that
35:03
Speaker 2: Melissa WIT's killer was a random stranger. First of all,
35:06
Speaker 2: I find it hard to believe that a random stranger
35:09
Speaker 2: would trawl through a packed parking lot to find a victim.
35:13
Speaker 2: This wasn't two am in a car garage. This was
35:15
Speaker 2: prime dinner time in the middle of the Ladies bowling League.
35:20
Speaker 2: Over the years, some people have suggested the Mickey mouse
35:23
Speaker 2: Watch might be some kind of important connection, like maybe
35:26
Speaker 2: Melissa Trotter and Melissa Witt were both targeted because they
35:29
Speaker 2: wore Mickey Mouse watches. AY magazine did a story about
35:33
Speaker 2: the case. They called it the Mickey Mouse Killer. I
35:36
Speaker 2: get why people might focus on the watch, because both
35:39
Speaker 2: Melissa Trotter and Melissa Wit wore that style of watch,
35:42
Speaker 2: and they were missing when the bodies were found. But
35:45
Speaker 2: in my opinion, this is also just a coincidence because
35:49
Speaker 2: that style of watch was everywhere in the eighties and nineties,
35:51
Speaker 2: lots of young women wore them. I just don't believe
35:55
Speaker 2: that there was a serial killer targeting young women because
35:58
Speaker 2: they wore Mickey Mouse watches. Now, I could, of course
36:02
Speaker 2: be totally wrong, and if other evidence points in that direction,
36:05
Speaker 2: I will change my mind. But I think that the
36:08
Speaker 2: killer taking Melissa Whit's clothes was more of an attempt
36:11
Speaker 2: to not leave blood or saliva or anything else that
36:14
Speaker 2: could connect them to Melissa. J. C Ryder seems to
36:18
Speaker 2: agree Melissa's killer knew her, they knew her routine, and
36:22
Speaker 2: they were waiting for her in the parking lot that night.
36:25
Speaker 2: But when I talked to Ldonna, she was focused on
36:27
Speaker 2: a suspect much closer to home, someone she says, who
36:31
Speaker 2: knew Melissa well, someone who contacted her early in the investigation.
36:37
Speaker 6: So this particular guy, I guess he was the one
36:41
Speaker 6: that's called me and kind of creepy called me for many.
36:43
Speaker 5: Many years, and it started out with.
36:45
Speaker 6: Him calling me weeping over Melissa, you know, wanting me
36:49
Speaker 6: to go with him to the grave side, those kind
36:52
Speaker 6: of things.
36:52
Speaker 5: But it was definitely, yes, he's someone that knew Melissa,
36:55
Speaker 5: and his name is definitely in that diary.
36:57
Speaker 6: Because of that, and because he had been reaching out
37:00
Speaker 6: to me and there was no possible way for me
37:02
Speaker 6: to know that name. You know, it wasn't something that
37:04
Speaker 6: I could have gone to law enforcement and just make up.
37:07
Speaker 5: This was, you know, information that really just kind of
37:10
Speaker 5: fell into my lap.
37:11
Speaker 6: They realized how critical this piece could be because I
37:14
Speaker 6: could literally gather some information for them and give it
37:17
Speaker 6: to them as intel that they.
37:18
Speaker 5: Were never going to have with him because he had
37:21
Speaker 5: lawyered up.
37:22
Speaker 6: Even though I wasn't acting as an agent of the
37:25
Speaker 6: police or even as a private investigator at that point,
37:28
Speaker 6: as a filmmaker and doing an investigative journalism piece part
37:32
Speaker 6: of it, I was still able to go ahead and
37:34
Speaker 6: talk with him. And reading that case file helped me
37:37
Speaker 6: because I at least knew some of the statements he made,
37:40
Speaker 6: and then I would know immediately if he was being
37:42
Speaker 6: honest with me. And for the most part he was live,
37:45
Speaker 6: which was really really interesting and intriguing to the case.
37:50
Speaker 2: I believe something scared Melissa. She got into an argument
37:53
Speaker 2: with her abductor, either because she said no to some
37:56
Speaker 2: kind of sexual advance, or maybe because they were having
38:00
Speaker 2: some kind of a fight, maybe even a lover's quarrel.
38:03
Speaker 2: Maybe Melissa Witt was seeing someone secretly. It could be
38:07
Speaker 2: someone who might have had a girlfriend or even a wife.
38:11
Speaker 3: Then when Melissa.
38:12
Speaker 2: Witt raised her voice and they started getting into a
38:15
Speaker 2: more heated argument the one the ten year old boy witnessed,
38:18
Speaker 2: her killer wanted her to be quiet, so they hit her,
38:22
Speaker 2: then panicked and threw her into their vehicle. Maybe her
38:26
Speaker 2: killer took her into the Ozark National Forest, sexually assaulted
38:30
Speaker 2: her and strangled her. Or maybe they hit her, panicked,
38:35
Speaker 2: threw her into the car, then went to dump her
38:37
Speaker 2: in the forest. Maybe they thought she was dead, but
38:40
Speaker 2: when they realized she was still alive, they knew they
38:43
Speaker 2: had finish the job. In either scenario, I think Melissa
38:48
Speaker 2: Whitten knew her killer that it was someone local, or
38:52
Speaker 2: maybe more than one person.
38:55
Speaker 5: What's the missing piece?
38:56
Speaker 3: What can people do to help at this point?
38:59
Speaker 5: I think that there's a couple of things. One is
39:03
Speaker 5: that this.
39:04
Speaker 6: Guy has had lots of problems with drugs and alcohol
39:07
Speaker 6: over the years, and I.
39:08
Speaker 5: Do believe that he's talked to different people in his life, and.
39:10
Speaker 6: I think that those people are probably very fearful of coming.
39:13
Speaker 5: Forward, and you know, we need those people to come
39:16
Speaker 5: forward because I know they exist.
39:18
Speaker 6: We also need any of the women that were connected
39:20
Speaker 6: to him to come forward. I do believe that this
39:26
Speaker 6: alibi can be negated he has. I believe that there's
39:29
Speaker 6: a lot more there and a lot more violence that
39:31
Speaker 6: got swept under the rug that he was never prosecuted for,
39:36
Speaker 6: and we need those people.
39:37
Speaker 5: To come forward.
39:40
Speaker 2: Marianne Whitt passed away in twenty eleven without ever knowing
39:43
Speaker 2: who killed her daughter. She was seventy five years old,
39:46
Speaker 2: and she was buried right next to Melissa. J c
39:50
Speaker 2: Ryder has said the case has followed him over the years.
39:54
Speaker 2: He said he's never forgotten about it. That's why, even
39:57
Speaker 2: after retirement, he continues to work for justice and closure
40:01
Speaker 2: for Melissa and her family. Over the years, Leadona Humphrey
40:05
Speaker 2: has teamed up with j c Ryder. She's continued to
40:08
Speaker 2: push forward on this case. She's seen the case file
40:11
Speaker 2: and she's seen Melissa's diary. In her book, she writes that,
40:15
Speaker 2: in her opinion, there are some other people who need
40:18
Speaker 2: to be investigated.
40:19
Speaker 3: Further, he's given an alibi.
40:21
Speaker 8: He has had not had anybody come forward to help
40:24
Speaker 8: to negate that alibi, and that's the piece that we
40:29
Speaker 8: really need to crash. And I think that a lot
40:32
Speaker 8: of people that are around.
40:33
Speaker 6: This particular individual are very afraid of him. He's a
40:36
Speaker 6: very volatile, very violent person, and so it's stands to
40:42
Speaker 6: reason that you know, people are afraid or that now
40:45
Speaker 6: they're afraid that they've kept information to themselves for so
40:49
Speaker 6: long that they're afraid to come forward.
40:51
Speaker 7: Now.
40:52
Speaker 6: I'm not hurting anybody except Melissa in my opinion, for
40:55
Speaker 6: the quest to get justice from Melissa Witt.
40:57
Speaker 5: I mean, they would really.
40:58
Speaker 6: Just be a hero and would help take somebody off
41:01
Speaker 6: the street. So I believe very well may do it again.
41:05
Speaker 6: He is a very dangerous, violent man and it all
41:10
Speaker 6: comes down to that.
41:19
Speaker 2: Ldonna co founded a nonprofit organization called All the Lost Girls.
41:24
Speaker 2: It's dedicated to finding justice for female strangulation cold cases
41:27
Speaker 2: in the United States, and police say they are still
41:31
Speaker 2: working on Melissa WIT's case. Captain Daniel Grubbs of the
41:35
Speaker 2: Fort Smith Police Department talked to News five and in
41:39
Speaker 2: that interview, Captain Grubbs said that they do have items
41:43
Speaker 2: that they can test for DNA. I would love to
41:46
Speaker 2: get more details about exactly what is in the case file.
41:50
Speaker 2: I wonder if they could test familial DNA, or maybe
41:54
Speaker 2: someone will be scrounging through in a state sale or
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Speaker 2: in a relative's old basement. Maybe they'll find that Mickey
42:00
Speaker 2: mouse watch with a serial number that could match it
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Speaker 2: to Melissa Wit. In the past, when I've seen news
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Speaker 2: reports of updates in Melissa WIT's case, I've seen a
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Speaker 2: lot of descriptions of the police looking at known criminals
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Speaker 2: in the area, including local sex offenders. But after everything
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Speaker 2: that I've looked through on this case, I am convinced
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Speaker 2: that Melissa Witt knew her killer and that the answers
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Speaker 2: to who killed Melissa Witt will only be found by
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Speaker 2: taking a closer look into her life. Do you think
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Speaker 2: that this person is still in the area.
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Speaker 5: It's still an Archecias.
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Speaker 2: So if you were friends with Melissa Witt, please get
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Speaker 2: in touch. I'm Katherine Townsend. This is Helen Gone Murder Line.
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Speaker 2: Helen Gone is a production of School of Humans and
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Speaker 2: iHeart Podcasts. It's written and narrated by me Catherine Townsend
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Speaker 2: and produced by Gabby Watts. Music is by Ben so Lee.
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Speaker 2: Executive producers are Virginia Prescott, Brandon Barr, and Els Crowley.
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Speaker 2: If you have a case you'd like me and my
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Speaker 2: team to look into, you can reach out to us
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Speaker 2: at six seven eight seven four four six one four five.
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Speaker 2: That's six seven eight seven four four six' one four.
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Speaker 1: Five school Of humans