Latest / The Path Went Chilly / Las Cruces Bowling Alley Massacre Pt. One

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Las Cruces Bowling Alley Massacre Pt. One · The Path Went Chilly

0:29
Welcome back to the Path Went Chile. I'm Robin, I'm Jules, and
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I'm Ashley. It's time to dive into this week's case. February tenth,
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nineteen ninety Los Cruces, New Mexico, a pair of armed gunmen enter a
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bowling alley called the Los Cruses Bowl and bring everyone into the manager's office.
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After stealing money from the safe, the assailants fire several bullets into seven people
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before fleeing the scene. Three of the victims, thirty three year old Idah
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hole Gean, thirty four year old Stephanie Senak, and her twelve year old
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daughter Melissa Repass, managed to survive, but the four others, thirteen year
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old Amy Hauser, twenty six year old Stephen Turan, his six year old
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stepdaughter Paula Holgeen, and his two year old daughter Valerie Tehran, are pronounced
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dead. While the crime generates a lot of publicity, the two perpetrators are
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never caught and their true motive for the murders remains up for debate. After
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that, the Path went chilly, So today we're going to explore a pretty
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infamous cold case, the Los Crusius Bowling Alley massacre. This is undoubtedly one
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of the most harrowing and senseless crimes we've ever covered on this podcast, as
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it took place at a bowling alley and a total of seven people, four
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of them children, were shot by two men during a robbery. Four of
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the victims were killed, and while three of them managed to pull through,
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one of the survivors wound up dying of complications from her injuries nine years later.
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This case was a pretty big deal when it happened, as I remember
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seeing it covered on a number of true crime shows, including Unsolved Mysteries and
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Americas Most Wanted, and the composite sketches of the two unidentified perpetrators were shown
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everywhere. The story was also the subject of a documentary titled A Nightmare in
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Los Crusis, which raised a lot of questions about the exact motive for this
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crime. The total takeaway from the robbery was only a few thousand dollars,
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but the gunman left some money behind and appeared to be searching for something else.
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Given that they had no hesitation about firing bullets into every single person there,
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including the children, you have to wonder if there's more to this story
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besides a simple theft. After more than thirty years, investigators seemed no closer
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to catching or identifying the perpetrators than they were back in nineteen ninety. So
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I thought it would be a good idea for us to take a look at
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this case. This one's really confusing because it does start like a typical robbery
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where you have these gunmen going in, pushing people towards the safe, taking
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money from the establishment where you would think there is a lot of cash transaction
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at a bowling alley. But then when they turn the guns onto seven people
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in the bowling alley, I'm assuming these are just guests. They're not employees
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and their kids or anything like that. Right, Some of the this was
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before the bowling alley opened, so some of them I'm employees, while others
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are kids that were brought there by the employees. Oh that's so sad,
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okay. See, So for me, once they start to open fire,
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especially on the children, it's not like they're targeting an employee out of rage
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or revenge or some disgruntled employee or anything like that. It seems as if
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they just don't have a sense of care about human life. And so that's
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where it really changes from a robbery where their behavior seems very lined out.
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We're going to make sure we get people towards the safe, we're gonna get
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the money, we're gonna leave. Maybe we would shoot an employee who's blocking
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our way, But when they turn and they shoot these helpless children, it
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just doesn't make any sense. Yeah, and this thing has haunted me for
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so many years because I remember seeing it on TV on Unsolved Mysteries in America's
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Most Wanted back in the day, and I just could not believe that these
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two guys could do this to these children. It was like everyone's worst nightmare.
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And we'll talk more about this, but the owner of the bowling alley
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was not present that day, and there's always been speculation that perhaps these two
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perpetrators might have had some sort of grudge against him. But after all these
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years, they've just never been able to turn up any evidence to the motive,
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even though they think it's something more than just a simple robbery. Well,
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if it was revenge against the owner, you would think that they would
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steal money, they might destroy property, they might do something to really cost
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him significantly. If he had been there, they would kill him or her.
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But they didn't. They didn't. They took some money and then they'd
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turned the gun on these families. That just doesn't make any sense. They
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didn't even just target the adults, which would have been more in line with
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a robbery or anger towards the bowling alley. But this is a family that
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they're killing, So it just does it changes the perspective so much. Is
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it possible that there was a target in the bowling alley and this attempt,
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this making it look like it could have been a robbery gone wrong where they
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just annihilated all these people. It was kind of subterfuge and they just killed
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all of these other people to disguise who their primary target. Was certainly possible
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because one of these seven victims could have been the primary target. But I
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know that investigators have looked extensively into the backgrounds of all these people, and
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most of them were just hard working, blue collar people with families who didn't
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really have any known enemies. So if one of them was targeted, they
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have no idea why. Our story begins in nineteen ninety in Las Crusis,
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New Mexico, a town which is located forty five miles north of the Mexican
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border and had a population of around fifty seven thousand people at this time.
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Our crime takes place at a local bowling alley known as the Los Cruses Bowl,
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located at twelve oh one East Amador Avenue. The current owner is a
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man named Ron Seenac who built it six years earlier, and his thirty four
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year old daughter, Stephanie Seenak, is the daytime manager. On the morning
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of Saturday, February tenth, the alley was not scheduled to open for business
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until nine am, but a number of people were already there one hour beforehand,
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including Stephanie Seenak, who was adding up the previous night's receipts in her
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office. Stephanie was joined by her twelve year old daughter, Melissa Repass,
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and Melissa's thirteen year old friend, Amy Hawser, who was planning to supervise
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the alley's daycare that day. The alley's thirty three year old snack bar cook,
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Idaho Geen, a mother of four who'd been employed there for six years,
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was also working inside the kitchen. However, at around eight twenty am,
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Melissa and Amy were about to get food from the vending machine when they
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were surprised to discover two armed gunmen carrying twenty two Oliver pistols had come through
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and unlocked the front doors. They would both later be described as Hispanic males,
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one of whoms boarded a mustache and appeared to be in his late twenties
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or early thirties and spoke perfect English with no detectable accent. The other man
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looked like he was in his late forties or early fifties and spoke English with
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a slight Spanish accent. While the older man led the two girls in Stephanie's
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office, the younger man rounded up Ida from the kitchen and brought her into
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the office as well. After the men ordered Stephanie to open up the safe,
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the four victims were forced to lie down on the floor with their heads
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down while the younger man proceeded to take the money out of the safe and
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place it inside a briefcase. However, it wasn't long before everyone However,
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it wasn't long before everyone was surprised by the unexpected appearance of three other people
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inside the office. One of them was twenty six year old Stephen Turan,
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who worked as the alley's mechanic, and he was accompanied by his two year
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old daughter Valerie Tran and his six year old stepdaughter, Paula Holgeen. Paula
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was not related to Idaho Geen, but her biological father just happened to be
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Stephanie Senak's current boyfriend. Stephen had gotten married to Paula's mother, Audrey Turan,
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on New Year's Eve in nineteen eighty six, before they eventually had their
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own child, Valerie together. Stephen also worked as a commander in chief for
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the Army National Guard and had recently graduated from New Mexico State University with a
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Bachelor of Sciences and Criminal Justice. Weeks earlier, he gave his notice to
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Los Cruse's Bowl and only had three days left to work there as he was
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planning to take the entrance exam for the Los Cruse's Police Department the following month.
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On this particular morning, Audrey was taking a class at Cosmatology school,
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and since Stephen was unable to find a babysitter for Paula and Valerie, he
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brought them to the Bowling Alley in order to leave them at the daycare.
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When Stephen entered the building with the two girls, he immediately took them to
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Stephanie's office, completely unaware that a crime was taking place. When he walked
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inside, the gunmen immediately forced Stephen, Paula, and Valerie onto the floor
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alongside everyone else. Once they finished what they were doing, the two men
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proceeded to fire over twenty five bullets into the heads of all seven of the
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victim's execution style. They then made an attempt to set fire to the office
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by lighting up some papers on the desk before fleeing the scene. Oh my
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gosh. First of all, when you look at the age of the perpetrators,
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to me, they're older than I would have expected. I was thinking
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these were late teens, twenties, and they were in this kind of panic,
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and maybe they opened fire to get rid of any witnesses. But this
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is so methodical that you already had four of the individuals lying on the ground
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while they're going through the safe and they're getting money out and they're putting that
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away. They're surprised by Stephen and these two itty bitty children, and they
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have Stephen and the kids lay on the floor as well. So in that
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moment, you know those seven victims are the adults at least, and the
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older kids are thinking we're okay, we're doing what they said. We're down
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on the floor, we can't see them. They're going to take their money,
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and they're going to leave, and then they shoot at them in a
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manner that says none of them are going to live. That's their ultimate goal.
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They shot what you said twenty five times into the heads of these seven
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individuals and kids and babies, and then they leave. But before they do
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that, they try to set it on fire to destroy all evidence. That's
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way more sinister and scary than what I thought when you first described it.
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I thought they were running out and just turn around and open fire kind of
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chaotically. But it was very planned. It was very strategic. Yeah,
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it definitely seemed calculated, and I get the sense they were completely thrown off
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when Steven and his two children just suddenly showed up in the office. I
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mean, I think they were playing you to kill the four victims that were
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already there anyway, But I think they were just You would think that most
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people, if they were faced with like a six year old and a two
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year old, they might think twice saying, okay, shooting these two little
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children is just taking things too far. But it sounded like they did not
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hesitate at all. They just decided, we're going to kill everyone in the
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office. And you can tell that it was just a lot more than a
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robbery because they wanted to make sure that everyone was dead even though they only
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got a few thousand dollars, And they were also deciding to set fire to
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the office, which is major overkill. So it definitely it does not seem
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like these were two guys who came in there with no idea what they were
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doing. It sounded like a very calculated plan, and as if maybe this
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wasn't the first time that they had done something. Maybe not with the killings
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and things like that, but it seems like they knew when we go in
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there, we're going to get the money. We're going to make sure that
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we get away without getting caught. And that's part of that older age I
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think as well, where they say, we have so much at risk at
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this point, we're getting this money and no one's going to be able to
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say what we did. Did anybody describe these men as being under the influence
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or did they seem like they were totally lucid? As far as I can
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tell, there wasn't anything off about them. They just sounded very like professional
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and calculated. None of the surviving witnesses said that they sounded like they were
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on drugs or under the influence er alcohol or anything. So you get the
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sense that they knew exactly what they were doing and were just very cold blooded
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people. So it wasn't likely born out of desperation where somebody was, you
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know, feeding their substance use disorder. This is very calculated and methodical.
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Somebody was likely the target and the money was just like a byproduct of whatever
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their objective was. I think so because as we're going to talk about,
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some money was left behind, and I think if this was desperate people who
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had substance abuse disorders, they would have taken all the money because they would
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desperately need it. But they seemed to think it was like a second priority.
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What's interesting is I wonder you know where that leftover money was, because
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if these are people that had any inside knowledge of the Bowling Alley, they
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would know what the income was for the previous day, or what kind of
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cap, what kind of deposit strategies these people had, and so if they
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had knowledge of where the money was, it's odd that they left it behind.
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But if you know there's money in the safe, and then let's say
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there's money in the cash registers and stuff like that, and they didn't check
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that they had the ability to shoot these seven individuals and try to light the
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office on fire. What would have stopped them from shooting these seven and taking
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their time to go around the bowling Alley. They could have locked the front
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doors and taken as much time as they wanted. I guess they also knew
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when the Bowling Alley opened, though, and they knew they only had a
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short way of a time before guests might start coming from the public. One
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thing I would say is I think it isn't very likely that most of the
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employees there knew how much money was being made and where the money was being
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kept, just because way back I used to manage a restaurant. I used
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to do night managing, and I remember unless you were a manager, you
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didn't know the types of totals that the restaurant made that day, and you
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also wouldn't know where the money was kept. So I'm just assuming the biggest
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I'm shure on my part that the Bowling Alley was likely run in a similar
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capacity you'd have the manager or the owner who would know where those cash deposits
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were, and maybe their assistant or like a couple other people, but like
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the people who were, you know, handing over the shoes or you know,
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cleaning the balls, they might not have any knowledge. So you could
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have a situation where somebody did have some inside knowledge, but they might not
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have known where the money was. I do think that if any of the
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employees did know, it would have been Stephanie Sinak because she was the daughter
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of the owner and the daytime manager, so it's possible that she knew.
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But from what I can tell is that some of this money left behind was
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not hidden anywhere. It was out there in plain sight, and that for
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whatever reason, whoever did this decided not to take it with them. Well.
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Incredibly, even though she was shot five times, Melissa was still alive
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as she had wrapped her arms around her head to protect herself, and one
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of the bullets wound up smashing two of her fingers. Melissa managed to make
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it to the office phone and call nine one one at eight twenty nine am.
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It wasn't long before emergency services arrived to the scene put out the fire
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in the office and provided a medical attention for the seven victims. Remarkably,
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not only had Melissa survived her wounds, but her mother, Stephanie and Idaholgeen
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were also still alive, so they were immediately rushed to the hospital and managed
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to pull through. But tragically, Amy Hauser, Stephen Tehran, and Paula
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Holgeen were all pronounced dead at the scene, and even though Valerie Tehran was
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taken to the hospital, she died about forty five minutes later. When Audrey
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Tran learned about what happened and rushed to the scene, she was informed that
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her husband and both of her daughters had been shot. Think about that poor
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family. That her husband was working so hard as a father and as a
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husband to get his degree, which is really hard when you have your own
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family, right, and you're not a traditional young student. He had graduated,
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He had already put in his notice at the Bowling Alley three more days,
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I believe you said, and he was going to leave so that he
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could get ready to take the test and test for admission into the local police
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department. This is a man who's working so desperately hard to provide a good
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life for his kids and his wife. His wife's doing the exact same thing.
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Remember, she was taking a test or working at the cosmetology school that
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day, and she couldn't take the kids. She was trying to also better
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her career. And Hubi says, that's okay, We've got the daycare at
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the bowling Alley. I'll take the girls up there. They're used to all
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those people, and so this is a normal day while they're gearing up for
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an amazing future as a family. And she shows up. Right here comes
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Audrey. She comes up and not only have they been hurt, but she
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learns that her husband and both of their children and are deceased. I can't
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even fathom what that would be like. You had so much promise, you
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had so much hope. You've got these two innocent little babies and your husband,
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and your whole life changes in that instant, everything's been taken away from
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her. What makes it even worse is that there is actually live footage of
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Audrey being informed about the murders of her husband and her daughters. That's shown
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in the Nightmare in Los Cruse's documentary. So I've watched her break down the
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footage of it, and it is one of the most heartbreaking things I've ever
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seen, to find out that you've had your entire family wiped out in the
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course of one morning. Unfortunately, since the fire department were forced to dowse
17:37
the flames inside Stephanie's office when they first arrived at the scene, they may
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have destroyed potential evidence. While the two gunmen did not wear gloves when they
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committed the crime, the building was a public bowling alley which was frequented by
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many people, so it was difficult to determine if any of the fingerprints found
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at the scene belonged to the perpetrators. Oddly, even though they took between
17:57
four and five thousand dollars in cash from the safe, they still left an
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undisclosed amount of money behind, and the surviving victims would later state that the
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gunmen appeared to have been searching for something else inside the office cabinets before they
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even opened the safe. Since there were survivors, they were able to provide
18:15
detailed descriptions of the attackers, but it turned out that there were other witnesses
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who had seen them that morning, including Stephanie Senac's brother, Steve Senac.
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Steve was on his way to school that morning, but stopped by the bowling
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alley because he had left his backpack in the office the night before. When
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he first entered the building, Steve was surprised that Stephanie had left the front
18:36
doors unlocked and mentioned this tour when he grabbed his backpack. When Steve left
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at around eight fifteen am, he claimed he saw two Hispanic men walking from
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the back of the building towards the front, and that the older man handed
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his partner a small briefcase. It was apparent that these men committed the crime
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only minutes after Steve drove away, and other witnesses report seeing two men matching
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their description running across Amidor Avenue that morning. By two thirty pm, law
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enforcement had set up roadblocks to check all motorists who were driving out of Los
19:07
Crucis. At one point, they pulled over a vehicle containing four individuals who
19:12
were carrying twelve hundred dollars in cash. Steve was brought to the scene and
19:17
asked to identify them, but said that none of these individuals were the men
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he had seen outside Los Cruse's bull In spite of these roadblocks, police were
19:25
unable to find the two perpetrators, and composite sketches of them were eventually circulated
19:30
by the media. But it is so hard is exactly what you said when
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you're inside that bowling alley. Yes, evidence was destroyed, but any other
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evidence that would have been left around, any kind of forensic evidence, any
19:41
kind of fingerprints. There's hundreds upon hundreds of people who go through that bowling
19:47
alley every week, even with a dedicated team, I don't think bowling alleys
19:52
are always the cleanest right that you have that where you're going to be able
19:56
to have a fresh slate and start over. It would have so much material
20:00
there from everyday guests who are at the bowling alley, from the employees there,
20:06
it would have been nearly impossible to say, oh, these are a
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unique set of fingerprints, this is a unique here. This is you know,
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even a piece of clothing that could have been left because people leave their
20:15
things at the bowling alley. So you have that problem. But you also
20:21
have a very very generic description. A Hispanic man in his thirties or forties,
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a Hispanic man in his twenties or thirties or thirties and forties, whatever,
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that's it, with a mustache, so that's twenty five percent of the
20:36
Hispanic men they would have pulled over while they were looking for people, So
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it really does leave them with a massive question mark. But the eeriness that
20:45
Steve was in the building with these men and that people saw them run across
20:51
the street. It's pitiful because everybody was so close to being able to either
20:55
provide an amazing description or actually help police apprehend them, and they just vanished.
21:02
And I don't mean to make light of the whole situation, but the
21:03
composite sketches of the two men have been available online for the past thirty years,
21:07
and whenever someone sees them they always joke about how the man and the
21:11
mustache is like a dead raer for Eddie Murphy. I mean, he looks
21:15
exactly like him, so you can tell how this is not helpful. He
21:18
just kind of looks like your generic dark skinned man with a mustache. Yeah,
21:22
exactly. When you hear you be on the lookout for a white man
21:26
in a white T shirt and blue jeans, you go, that helps none,
21:30
right there, just doesn't help us at all know who to look for.
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The community was left absolutely devastated by the crime, and when the Tehran
21:38
family was laid to rest at their funeral a few days later, the bishop
21:44
presiding over the service stated quote, this was not an act of God.
21:48
It was an act of evil, evil men. End quote. The case
21:52
received nationwide attention, and it was featured on an episode of Unsolved Mysteries,
21:56
which aret in April twenty fifth, just two and a half months after the
22:00
crime took place, and it wound up generating around three hundred phone calls from
22:04
viewers. America's Most Wanted also featured the story, and since it was never
22:10
solved, the show would continually produce new segments about the crime on multiple occasions
22:15
over the years. Even though Los Crucis Bull owner Ron Senak actually lived inside
22:19
his establishment, he'd been away on a weekend golfing trip to Tucson, Arizona,
22:25
on the day of the murders. In spite of the fact that his
22:27
own daughter was shot, Ron surprised everyone by reopening the bowling alley for business
22:33
only one week after the crime took place. He stated, quote, life
22:38
is for the living. Were determined not to allow this insane act of two
22:42
individuals to permanently alter the lifestyle of the community. End quote. However,
22:48
later that year, Ron would run into financial problems and Los Cruci's bull was
22:52
sold in a court ordered auction and renamed Sun Lanes. Ron would soon move
22:57
away from the area, claiming that the police had often treated him like a
23:02
suspect whenever they interrogated him. Indeed, rumors always circulated that Ron spent money
23:07
foolishly, was often out of town, and may have been involved in shady
23:11
business deals with shady characters. However, he was thoroughly investigated by law enforcement
23:18
who were unable to find any evidence that he had knowledge or involvement in the
23:22
crime or that he was engaged in illegal activity. As soon as you mentioned
23:27
that Ron had that he had financial problems, I initially thought, Okay,
23:32
is there a way that he could be involved with illegal activity? Could he
23:36
be making deals with people financially that weren't able to be fulfilled And in that
23:41
case, would somebody be out for revenge or for you to claim money or
23:45
to get something from his bowling alley. Now, if that was the case,
23:49
you would think that Ron was the first person who had come forward to
23:52
the police and say I'm not proud of this, but here's my concern.
23:56
I had this deal with this person. I had a drug deal going bad
24:00
with this person. I had sold false items to this person. I need
24:04
help. I think it's one of these people. And without him coming forward
24:08
with that kind of information, it does lead police saying we're going to try
24:11
to prove or disprove that maybe he has something to do with it, and
24:15
then that's a dead end for them as well. Yeah, I was thinking
24:18
that, like, maybe if Ron was involved in something illegal, he would
24:22
still keep his mouth shut for fear that even though people were shot and his
24:26
life might be in danger, he might figure that he was going to get
24:27
into a bunch of trouble if he came clean about everything. But I would
24:32
like to think that if he knew something, he would have said something because
24:36
his own daughter was shot and badly wounded. Yet he still maintained, like
24:40
over the course of the next thirty years that he had no idea who did
24:42
this, And like we just said, even though I personally had suspicions about
24:47
him when I first heard about Ron, when I watched The Nightmare and Los
24:49
Crusis documentary, law enforcement is pretty adamant they have not found anything in his
24:55
background to suggests that he was involved in anything illegal. Or that he might
24:59
have had knowledge about who actually committed this crime, though it is tempting to
25:03
think that given the circumstances, and although it's not a good look when multiple
25:08
people have been murdered inside your establishment and your daughter's been shot that you open
25:14
after a week, but it could have been due to financial desperation. If
25:18
he was really in dire straits financially, he may have been forced to open
25:23
up and to try to generate some kind of income. But as a result,
25:27
it made him look really suspicious, because it's like, you're sure moving
25:32
on quickly when the community is still mourning and you're saying life is for the
25:36
living, but people haven't fully grieved, and I'm sure some of the funerals
25:40
haven't even happened yet, so it seems a little bit quick. But if
25:45
your feet are being held to the fire, you've got bills to pay,
25:48
then maybe it kind of forced his hand into doing that. And I'll tell
25:52
you too, from a grief perspective, I think people handle things differently and
25:56
they want to cope with things differently. We just had a officer shooting in
26:00
my town and it resulted in the death of a man at a bar and
26:04
the next day the bar opened, and the community was kind of like,
26:10
wait, why is the bar opened because someone died there last night. And
26:14
they said, this is a place where people come to be happy and find
26:17
joy and peace, and so we're going to be open today for people who
26:19
knew him and provide this kind of place where they can come remember him and
26:23
be happy in a moment of grief. And so there was so much confusion,
26:27
and that was the talk of the town that day. But they were
26:30
very public about we will be open and here's why. I don't always understand
26:36
what people do. But there could have been something like that too, where
26:38
he said this is a place where community comes to be safe, and I'm
26:41
going to try to keep that where this was two evil men who came in
26:45
here. This is not what happens at a bowling alley. This is not
26:47
what happens when you come into our family establishment. So we're going to pretend
26:51
like this is a safe, happy place where people come to make memories and
26:55
not remember it as a place where people lost their lives. I'm probably more
26:59
inclined to think it a more financial move for him, but it's possible that
27:03
was also a motivation it's an important point. I think you can't put grief
27:07
in a box. And I think we so often want to say what should
27:10
be a typical response to grief, But it isn't this thing where you can
27:15
go, Okay, well, somebody isn't behaving in a way that I think
27:18
they should be behaving. And I think we've learned so much with even just
27:21
for example, with nine to one one calls. We see people, oh,
27:23
that person acted suspiciously on the call, and then we later find out
27:27
they were innocent, that they had nothing to do with it, And I
27:30
think it just shows that we really can't evaluate if somebody else is grieving properly.
27:36
And I do think your point about raw and possibly reopening the Bowling Alley
27:40
out of financial desperation does make a lot of sense, because even if he
27:44
was already experiencing financial problems, that he's already had four to five thousand dollars
27:48
stolen. I don't know how long it would take insurance to pay out if
27:51
you've had money stolen during a robbery, but he behaven thinking to himself,
27:55
if I keep this place closed for much longer, it's going to financially ruined
28:00
me. So even though it might not seem like the most sensitive thing to
28:03
do. I probably have to reopen and generate some income, so that could
28:07
have been his motivating factor for doing so, And for all we know,
28:11
later a month later or two months later, when he has to sell or
28:15
gets the Bowling Alley taken away from him, it could have been because he
28:19
doesn't he can't make his loan, or he can't do something like that because
28:22
it is a place where people were just killed. So there is a possibly
28:26
that even though they reopened, he wasn't bringing in money anyway. Suspicion would
28:30
also be directed towards Ron's youngest son, RJ Snak, who worked as a
28:34
bartender at Los Cruce's Bowl but was not present on the day of the crime.
28:40
There were rumors that RJ had a cocaine addiction and performed drug transactions at
28:44
the Bowling Alley, and the investigators would describe him as being very distant when
28:48
he was questioned, but they also failed to turn up any evidence to suggest
28:52
that RJ was linked to the murders, and he would dive an allege drug
28:56
overdose in May of nineteen ninety seven. As for Stephanie Senak, while she
29:00
survived the shooting, she was never the same and suffered from serious post traumatic
29:04
stress disorder. Stephanie rarely ever left her home, and on one occasion in
29:08
which she did venture out to attend a parade, she heard a noise which
29:12
sounded like a gunshot, causing her to freak out and start screaming. Stephanie
29:18
would pass away due to complications from her injuries in August of nineteen ninety nine.
29:23
What a sad tragedy for Ron's family too. Here you have. Not
29:27
only was his daughter's shot, she did survive, but later passes away about
29:32
nine years after the crime. His son also dies from an alleged drug overdose
29:36
two years before Stephanie's death. But if it was related to RJ's drug use,
29:42
it is possible that RJ has no knowledge or idea that it has something
29:48
to do with him, So he's acting aloof or distant because he's saying,
29:51
I have nothing to do with this, I didn't cause this. But those
29:55
people that came looking for RJ that day might have thought there were drug located
30:00
in that facility. They might have thought that there was something that RJ owed
30:03
them, and RJ might be oblivious to all of that. So it is
30:07
possible that they were out for revenge because of some drug deal gone wrong and
30:11
RJ just simply didn't know. But wouldn't you tell the person you're trying to
30:15
get revenge agains that you're responsible, so it then scares them into paying you
30:21
back whatever they owed you. I guess it would depend on the circumstances because
30:26
this was a pretty high profile of crime, So it's possible that the perpetrators
30:30
were feeling, well, we wanted to send a message to RJ, but
30:33
now we have all this attention and all these people trying to catch us,
30:36
So maybe we should just let it slide and stay underground, because if we
30:40
try to contact RJ again, that might lead to us being caught or they
30:44
say the message is loud and clear, I just destroyed your family, people
30:47
that y'all cared about, and your father's business, Like that's enough revenge for
30:51
us over a small drug debt or a lie you told us as your drug
30:53
dealers or things like that. And I think it's possible if he knew that
30:57
it was people associated with him due to a drug debt, that he might
31:03
just internalize that and he's not going to share that with anybody, because you
31:06
know the type of catastrophic damage these people can cause, So you'd be worried
31:11
about bodily harm that could come to you or anybody else in your family who's
31:17
left, because at that point, his dad's around and his sister has survived,
31:21
so he may just keep his mouth shut because he worries, well,
31:23
what else could they do if I decide to open my mouth and sing like
31:27
a canary. Another potential lead was provided by a woman named Irma Tirna,
31:33
who allegedly made a comment in a bar about how the day of the crime,
31:37
she'd encountered two men who matched the description of the shooters. These men
31:42
wound up staying at ti Arena's residence. At one point, one of them
31:47
heard police helicopters flying overhead and said, quote were under their noses and they
31:52
don't even know it end quote. Te Arena, who had her own history
31:56
of drug usage, seemed to believe that the two men had gone to Las
32:00
Cruse's bull because they believed a large stash of narcotics was there, but they
32:05
ultimately found nothing. Ti Arena was questioned by police and passed a polygraph,
32:09
but when she was later revisited by one of the detectives, she suddenly recounted
32:14
her story. Ti Arena wound up passing away of an accidental drug overdose in
32:19
May of two thousand and one, and her story was never substantiated. I
32:23
know that Irma has a drug issue, but this is one of the most
32:29
kind of spot on leads that we've heard so far. Right, everybody else
32:32
just described as kind of basic. Oh, there's these two Hispanic men.
32:36
Oh, I saw these two Hispanic running. This is someone who's saying,
32:38
these are other drug users dealers that came to my home. I heard the
32:45
commotion. I can link them to the commotion caused by the shooting. They're
32:50
talking about the crime, and they thought they were going to get to go
32:52
in there and recover narcotics and get money. That's what As soon as you
32:58
talked about RJ, the son of the own, having an issue with drugs,
33:02
I could easily see this being accurate. Yes, she recants, could
33:07
be because she's very scared or paranoid because of her drug use, or because
33:10
she truly does know the magnitude of the kind of people she hangs out with.
33:15
But unfortunately she passes away. So there's no way to even requestion her
33:20
about this or go back and say, Okay, yes, you took your
33:22
story back, but we have these innocent children who died. We need your
33:28
help, help us, and we'll protect you. That can't be done.
33:31
And the part about the story which is kind of weird is that I assume
33:35
that Tiarina never learned these men's names because she didn't share them with law enforcement.
33:38
So she makes it sound like she just has a chance encounter with these
33:42
men on the day of the murders and invited them back to her residence,
33:45
even though she didn't even know who they are, which seems kind of odd.
33:49
But I guess if she has addiction issues, or maybe they thought they
33:52
were going to have drugs together, maybe that's why she invited them back.
33:55
But that would be pretty terrifying though. If she didn't know who these guys
33:59
were and realizes after the fact that they were responsible for shooting all these people
34:04
at the Bowling Alley, it could just be a trap house or like a
34:07
kind of user den where people who use drugs in that area know that her
34:14
house is one of those places you can go, or she invites, like
34:16
you said, anybody who is in that world over because of her own addiction,
34:22
and doesn't I mean, do you really know all of the characters in
34:25
that scene. When you have an addiction that's so desperate, you'll feed it.
34:30
And a lot of people would go by their street names, they might
34:32
not go by their legal government name exactly. Yeah, So if she did
34:37
provide any names to law enforcement, it sounds like they've never released that to
34:40
the public. So in twenty ten, filmmaker Charlie Minn produced a feature length
34:46
documentary about the case, titled A Nightmare and Los Crusis, which was released
34:51
following the twentieth anniversary of the crime. It contained interviews with a number of
34:55
people associated with the case, including the two surviving victims, Melissa Repass and
35:00
Ida Holgeen. The year after the crime took place, Melissa was awarded the
35:06
g I. Joe Real American Hero Award for her courageous actions and received a
35:09
plaque medal, a box full of toys, and an all expenses paid trip
35:15
to Washington, d c. She would eventually get married and have two children.
35:20
Idah Holgeen spent three months in the hospital recovering from the shooting and had
35:23
to relearn simple tacts and had to relearn simple pass all over again. She
35:29
completely forgot how to cook and when she returned home, Ida did not even
35:31
recognize the place. Ida has been unable to work since the shooting and has
35:37
to take several different medications to deal with her constant headaches and PTSD. However,
35:43
Ida believes that she saw the two perpetrators at Las Cruce's Bowl on what
35:46
occasion prior to the shooting. She remembers that they never went bowling or used
35:52
any of the ali's services, and just sat at a table watching everybody.
35:57
Indeed, other witnesses have recalled seeing these two men at the alley at some
36:00
point that is so scary because their behavior is just that they're sitting there casing
36:07
the place. They're studying employee behavior, they're studying who's at the bowling alley.
36:12
They're strategizing where rooms are located and what they could get out of this
36:17
facility. And then they come back and they create this chaos and trauma,
36:22
and you take these lives of this family that has so much going for him.
36:29
It's it's horrifying. I love that Melissa gets this kind of second act
36:36
where she has the trauma that's never going to go away, but she's able
36:39
to say, look, I have a second chapter to live, right My
36:44
life didn't end that day, and so I'm going to live it with purpose.
36:46
And you see that with the way that she goes to Washington, see
36:50
gets this honor for being the person who is able to contact law enforcement and
36:53
get help for the survivors. And then she goes on and she gets married
36:58
and has two kids. Ida, your heart breaks for her because she didn't
37:04
have the same physical or mental health to be able to have a full second
37:09
chapter. She was disabled by her injuries, and her memory was foggy,
37:15
and she had to relearn how to do even the most basic task. What
37:19
an overwhelming challenge that she faced when she got home from the hospital. Yeah,
37:23
it's been very difficult for it. But I definitely commend her for appearing
37:27
on camera to be interviewed in the documentary because I know that for the first
37:30
couple of years after the crime, they kept the identities of the surviving victims
37:36
away from the public, and they were reluctant to do interviews, and if
37:38
they did, they would only do it in silhouette to conceal their identities.
37:43
But by this point twenty years had passed and Melissa and Ida finally felt courageous
37:46
enough to say, we're going to appear on camera and share our stories because
37:50
we want to spread awareness and increase the possibility of the perpetrators being caught.
37:55
Other interviewees in a Nightmare and Las Crusis included Tehran, who went on to
38:00
have two more children, as well as Amy Hauser's mother, stepfather, and
38:06
step siblings. In a twenty sixteen article about the case published in The Los
38:09
Cruses Son Stephen Taran's brother Andy Tehran stated quote, in this day and age,
38:16
things like this don't go unsolved. How did we not get these guys?
38:21
That's the question I asked myself every day. Numerous people saw these gunmen,
38:25
So someone out there knows something and they need to come forward. End
38:30
quote. In June of twenty eighteen, the former Los Cruse's Bowl, now
38:34
known as Sun Lane's finally closed down for good, with everyone still remembering the
38:38
tragedy which had taken place there. The Los Cruses Donna Anna County Crime Stoppers
38:45
would offer a twenty five thousand reward for information, but Charlie Minn would later
38:50
contribute some money to the fund, upping the total of the reward to thirty
38:53
two thousand. Men also frequently hold screenings of a Nightmare and Los Crusis throughout
38:59
New Mexico every year in hopes that the right person might watch it and provide
39:04
the necessary information to help bring the case to a resolution. But after more
39:07
than three decades, the two perpetrators have yet to be identified, and the
39:13
last crucious Bowling Alley massacre remains unsolved. It is one of those cases where
39:19
you think, look at the magnitude of how many people say they saw these
39:25
individuals at the Bowling Alley before the crime, at the Bowling Alley the day
39:30
of the crime, fleeing from the Bowling Alley after the crime, and how
39:37
long these two individuals have had to hold that secret, how the people around
39:43
them, the dynamics might have changed, how the relationship between the two perpetrators
39:47
might have changed, how one of them might have found Christ and needed to
39:52
free themselves of this burden. Right, like all of the things that could
39:54
have changed in the years and years since that crime, it's wild that no
40:01
one has come forward with information that no one's spoken. Right, they say,
40:07
never commit a crime with somebody else, because two people just can't keep
40:09
their mouth shut for years and years and years, and it sounds like here,
40:14
yes they have, and they haven't shared it with anyone else. That
40:17
seems wild to me. I think there is somebody somewhere that knows something.
40:22
But this is so heavy. There's so much collateral damage here, there's lives
40:27
that have been stolen, people could live in fear right. It would take
40:30
someone saying I will no longer have to deal with this perpetrator because let's say
40:36
they died or they're in prison for something else, and so there's no risks
40:38
to me anymore. Both of these men should be relatively older gentlemen now and
40:45
way less of a physical threat at this point. So I'm praying that the
40:50
passage of time in this case becomes a blessing to the case and is something
40:54
that a person feels the strength to be able to come forward and say,
40:59
I've been holding this for so long, I need to get it off my
41:00
chest, and they can help the police. We talked earlier about fingerprints being
41:06
left Bowling Alley and how it would be difficult to discern which prints belonged to
41:09
the perpetrators and which prints belonged to the employees. Or just random customers who
41:14
have been there. But the thing is is that they still have the prints
41:16
on file, so that they had any viable suspects to compare them to and
41:21
found out that their prints rea at the alley, that could be the type
41:23
of evidence to finally implicate them and file charges. But of course, the
41:29
big issue in this case is that we have never had any solid suspects,
41:32
so there's been no one to compare these fingerprints too. And like you said,
41:37
that's the main reason that we hope that someone has information that that can
41:40
point law enforcement towards some suspects in order to build a case against them.
41:45
Well, if I could compile a list of haunting, disturbing cases which I'm
41:49
shocked have still not been solved, this one would rank right near the top
41:52
of the list. Like I mentioned in the intro, I still have vivid
41:55
memories of watching this story get featured on episodes of Unsolved Metres and America's Most
42:00
Wanted when I was a lot younger, and I was really bothered by the
42:05
fact that these gunmen could shoot a bunch of children without hesitation. When it
42:08
comes to composite sketches of unidentified suspects, and cold cases. I'd say that
42:14
the drawings of the two perpetrators here are among the most memorable, and if
42:17
you showed them to your average true crime follower, they'd instantly recognize which case
42:22
are from. Yet here we are over thirty years later, and it seems
42:25
like investigators still don't have the faintest idea who the two guys from these sketches
42:30
are. While a number of cases we featured on this podcast are still unsolved
42:36
because the police botch things up, I really can't find any fault with how
42:39
law enforcement have handled this investigation. It sounds like they've done the absolute best
42:45
they can and whenever you see interviews with people who have worked on this case,
42:49
you can tell that they put their heart and soul into trying to catch
42:52
the killers, and it really bothers them that this is still unsolved. It
42:57
just seems that somehow the two monsters who did this managed to get lucky and
43:00
slipped through the cracks. Of course, there's been a lot of speculation over
43:05
the idea that this crime was a lot more than a simple robbery gone wrong.
43:08
There are many good reasons to believe that, which we'll get into in
43:12
our next episode, but I think the most chilling detail of this entire case
43:16
is how Valerie Uran was shot through the forehead. That means whoever did this
43:22
was looking directly at the face of a two year old girl when he decided
43:25
to pull the trigger, which is a special kind of evil. Even though
43:30
neither of these men were wearing masks. Is a two year old really going
43:32
to be able to provide much information to the police if you leave her alive
43:37
as a witness? What I was also thinking when you described her, and
43:44
you got to remember she's lying down on the ground next to her father.
43:47
Think about how small a two year old little baby is next to her father,
43:53
who's just praying to God in that moment, please let my kids live,
43:57
Please let my kids live. And this kiddo's scared to death, right
44:00
Their other little siblings sitting there, scared to death, and they're probably clinging
44:05
to their dad, and he has the ability to pull a trigger and shoot
44:08
this angel in the forehead. It's disgusting. I don't think the other child
44:14
would have been able to recognize them either. Like I said, it was
44:17
just so evil that they said, there's these seven people lying on the ground.
44:22
We will just continue to open fire into the heads of these individuals and
44:27
children and babies. These are two men who have no soul, so I
44:31
think this would be a good time to bring an in to part one.
44:35
But join us next week as we present part two of our series about the
44:38
Los Crusus Bowling Ali Max about the Los Crusus Bowling Alley massacre. Robin,
44:44
do you want to tell us a little bit about the Trail Went Cold?
44:46
Patreon? Uh? Yes. The Trail Cold Patreon has been around for three
44:50
years now, and we offer these standard bonus features like early ad free episodes,
44:55
and I also send out stickers and sign thank you cards to any one
45:00
who signs up with us on Patreon. If you join our five dollars tier
45:04
Tier two, we also offer monthly bonus episodes in which I talk about cases
45:08
which are not featured on the Trail Went Cold's original feed, so they're exclusive
45:13
to Patreon, and if you join our highest tier tier three, the ten
45:16
dollar tier. One of the features we offer is a audio commentary track over
45:21
classic episodes of Unsawved Mysteries, where you can download an audio file and then
45:27
boot up the original Unsolved Mysteries episode on Amazon Prime or YouTube and play it
45:31
with my audio commentary playing in the background, where I just provide trivia and
45:36
factoids about the cases featured in this episode. And incidentally, the very first
45:40
episode that I did a commentary track over was the episode featuring this case.
45:45
So if you want to download a commentary track in which I make more smart
45:49
ass remarks about Jewel Kaylor, then be sure to join Tier three. So
45:52
I want to let you know a little bit about the Jeweles and Nashty Patreon,
45:55
so there's early ad free episodes of The Path Went Chilly. We've bought
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very mini, but they're just too short to turn into a series and we're
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really enjoying doing those. So we hope you'll check out those patreons. We'll
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link them in the show notes. So I want to thank you all for
46:14
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