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Caleb Diehl Part 1: The Disappearance · Gone Cold - Texas True Crime

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The Gone Cold podcast may contain violent or graphics subject matter. Listener discretion is
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advised. On the last weekend of March twenty fifteen, eighteen year old Caleb
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Deal was in his hometown of Nakona, Texas, celebrating his birthday with family
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and friends. It was two weeks past the date, but Caleb was living
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with his sister Courtney in an apartment in Bedford, so the late birthday celebration
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was nothing out of the ordinary. That Monday, March thirtieth, twenty fifteen,
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Caleb skipped school to stay in Nakona for an extra day. Courtney wasn't
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happy about that. I know you've got senioritis, she sternly said, but
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you can't miss any more class if you want to graduate. Are you coming
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home tonight? Caleb, sitting on his mom's couch tying his shoes, never
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looked up. Yes, I'm coming home. At about five pm, Caleb
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told his sister he was going to swing by his friend Christian's place before heading
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back to Bedford. He collected his things, climbed into the Chevy pickup truck
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his boss loaned him while his vehicle was being repaired, and drove off.
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Caleb deal was never seen again. After they realized he was gone, Caleb's
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siblings and parents imagined every possible scenario, a car wreck, a prolonged hangover,
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and although he wasn't known to use drugs, they wondered if he'd gotten
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into something and was in over his head. But it was the series of
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increasingly bizarre behaviors of a close family friend and absolutely abhorrent acts it was later
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discovered he committed that shocked Caleb's loved ones into theorizing a previously unthinkable scenario.
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Caleb has never been found, and the man almost certainly responsible has eluded punishment
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for his disappearance. Nakona, Texas isn't known to many folks around the world
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or even the United States, but it's a place rich with history. Located
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in the northern portion of Montegue County, the heart of Nakona is around ten
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miles south of the border that separates Texas from Oklahoma, the Red River.
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It's also about one hundred miles northwest of Dallas. It was known as Jordanville
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when the area was first conceived as a town site, named for the man
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who donated a portion of his for the railroad, but the name was changed
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when a Texas ranger suggested the town instead be named in memory of Comanche Chief
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Peta Nakona, who was among the raiding natives who took five captives at Fort
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Parker in May of eighteen thirty six. One a child named Cynthia Ann Parker
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would essentially become a Comanche. Eventually Mary chief Peta Nacona, and gave birth
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to the last Comanche chief. The physically gargantuan Peta Nacona led a group called
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the Nikonies on raids across Texas for nearly thirty years. Nakona. The town
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began with around three hundred and eighty residents, but the major staple of the
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local economy, leather goods, was enormous. It was a necessity to provide
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this service. As the last stop in Texas before crossing the Red River on
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the Chisholm Trail. Hermann Justin moved his famous boot company there almost immediately upon
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the establishment of a rail line across the small town, and when his sons
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took Justin Boots to Fort Worth, his daughter Enid stayed behind and began Nakona
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Boots, which was the first female owned boot company whose products are arguably of
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a finer grade than her father's ranching. Cotton farming, Nakona baseball gloves,
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and of course, oil production all contributed to Nakona's economy. Murders carried out
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by Nurse Vicki Don Jackson are among the unfortunate events for which Nakona, Texas
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is known. The disappearance of Caleb Deal is another. By the time the
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Deal family moved to the small North Texas town, the population was approximately twenty
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nine hundred. Caleb Ray Deal was born to parents Tammy and Chad Deal on
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March fifteenth, nineteen ninety seven. The youngest of four children, Caleb was
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the only Deal kid to be born in Nakona, or in Texas for that
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matter. As the youngest child, Caleb grew up doing everything he could to
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keep up with his older siblings. He was adventurous and afraid of nothing.
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Caleb would climb just about anything in sight. He rode dirt bike's fault rottele
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fell off of them, shook off the fog, and got right back on.
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I'm not so sure he believed in breaks, his father said. He
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lived fast and fearless. Growing up, Caleb and his father, Chad had
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a close bond. He wanted to be doing what dad was, fixing something
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or mowing the grass. But make no mistake, Caleb Deal was also a
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mama's boy from day one. As a child, he got out of trouble
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by pulling the cute car, and as he grew up, he began taking
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care of his mom Tammy. When they vacationed at the Grand Canyon, Caleb
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wasted no time running ahead of everyone, but on the way back up he
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stayed with his mom, who was lagging behind. He was empathetic and compassionate,
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his family said, and his gifts were always the best as he was
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genuinely and naturally thoughtful. The Deal family had kept to themselves for the most
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part after first coming to Nakona, Texas. For a while, Chad and
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Tammy Deal attempted to homeschool the kids, but it turned out to be far
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more work than they anticipated, so they enrolled them in their respective schools and
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grades in the Prairie Valley Independent School District. The kids going to public school
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opened them up to the community far more than they were early in their children's
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lives. Chad and Tammy Deal became friends with their neighbors, the Howards.
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The Howard's two boys were close in age to the two Deal boys, and
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they all became thick as thieves in no time. And it wasn't only the
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kids who grew close. Ricky Dale Howard, the Howard family patriarch, and
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Chad Deal also got along great. The Howards and the Deals attended events together
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in Nakona and also vacation together away from the area. They began considering each
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other family, and Ricky and he, Chad later said, were like brothers.
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A farming and cattle ranching family, the Howards many large properties were favorite
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haunts of Caleb Deals from an early age as a tried and true adventurer.
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So when Caleb was twelve years old and in middle school, it seemed only
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natural for Ricky Dale Howard to offer Caleb part time work doing odd jobs around
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the farmland. Caleb surveiled the properties, including an oil lease, checked in
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on the cattle, and even helped Ricky heard them Texas like jobs. His
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sister later said, Ricky, she continued, was like a mentor to her
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brother. The Deal boys and the Howard boys were inseparable and almost always together,
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almost always. Ricky Dale Howard was a big Deal around town. Mister
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Nakona, as some called him, a well known businessman and part of a
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family that had been in the area for decades. Everyone liked and respected him.
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Howard was an active member of the community, heavily involved in his kids
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sports teams, a member of the school board, and a banker, A
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pillar of the community one might call Ricky Dale Howard. There were not a
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ton of folks in Nacona, Texas, which was a quintessential example of a
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mostly rural Texas community, so for certain aspects of Howard's checkered past to go
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unknown by their best friends, the Deal family seemed impossible. While the unavoidable
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voice of the media detailed some of Ricky Dale Howard's criminal activity, whispers about
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the most depraved side of him, his true side never reached Chad in Tammy
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Crime pod. A crime such as bank fraud carried out by the president of
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the Nakona branch of First National Bank in nearby Bowie is something that gets around.
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The FBI began looking into bank fraud allegations against Ricky Dale Howard in the
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year two thousand and one. They discovered he'd been falsifying loan collateral applications,
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among other fraud and along with a few other people. In November two thousand
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and six, by then well aware the heat was on from federal authorities and
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facing charges, Howard was electrocuted in an allegeaged accident, after which he claimed
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to have lost all memory of working for a bank. He miserably failed a
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polygraph examination not long after, and his attorney pushed him to take a plea
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deal. After a lengthy investigation, in two thousand and seven, Ricky Dale
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Howard pleaded guilty to one count of bank fraud. Others who took part were
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also convicted. Howard agreed to pay four point five million dollars in restitution and
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was sentenced to forty six months in prison. He was released in two thousand
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and nine after serving two Now, in the case of Rickey Dale Howard,
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folks in the area didn't seem to care much about the bank fraud. After
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all, he was a prominent member of the community and he'd served his time
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for screwing up. But there were other discoveries made by FBI Special Agent David
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Burns that were far more disturbing and far lef less forgivable than theft. There's
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a lot to the bank fraud charges against Howard, but only a handful of
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discoveries during the investigation are relevant here. It started with one of his bank
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clients. During the course of his investigation, Agent Burns, of course,
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was conducting interviews with many folks connected with Howard. The FBI agent was shocked
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when one of the man's clients told him that Howard had sexually abused her underaged
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son when he worked at his ranch, and there was one other boy she
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knew of who Howard also abused. She told Burns. It hit the agent.
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This wasn't just a guy committing fraud. Ricky Dale Howard was also a
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guy committing fraud and ordered to sexually molest boys without getting caught. He was
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offering work to clients young boys on his ranch, and when their parents agreed,
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began molesting them there and at his Nakona Lake cabin. As the boys
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got older, particularly of driving age, Howard would offer to give them loans
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for cars or scholarships to college. The FBI suspected the loans were being made
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to relatives of the boys so they'd remain silent about Howard's sexual abuse. The
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FBI nabbed Howard, but there was a catch. According to Special Agent David
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Burns, federal authorities could prosecute the charges of bank fraud, but not the
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allegations of sexual abuse and assault. The judge in the case was privy to
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the allegations, however, and ordered Howard to attend two years of sex offender
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counseling upon his release from a federal penitentiary, the conditions of which required that
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he undergo regular polygraph examinations. Remember that, anyway, Howard was not sought
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for prosecution for the sexual abuse on any other level, neither city nor county.
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Whether that fact is contingent on his standing and or power in the community
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is anyone's guess. At this point, but it should be noted that we
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found nothing suggesting the FBI ever properly relayed the severity of the crimes, or
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even the crimes themselves to city or county authorities. These crimes, the rapes
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of boys at the hands of Ricky Dale Howard, are reprehensible and will not
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be gone over in much detail here. The following accounts are according to arrest
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warrant affidephits. In nineteen ninety four, when one complainant was twelve years old,
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Howard performed sexual acts on him multiple times and repeatedly warned him not to
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say anything. This individual said he would try to tell people Howard was raping
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him, but apparently no one listened. One time, after abusing the boy,
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Howard took him home and wrote him a check for fifty bucks to keep
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quiet. Keep that fact in mind as well. Ricky Dale Howard began abusing
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another boy who worked for him in nineteen ninety six. When this boy was
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thirteen. He underwent several acts of rape forced upon him and in which he
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was forced to perform. He told monteg County Sheriff's Office investigator Chris Hughes that
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Howard had sexually assaulted him more than five hundred times over the course of four
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years, each year progressively worse than the last. He was afraid to run
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when Howard began abusing him, taking note that the man always carried a triple
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two rifle in his truck as a young man. This individual explained that when
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he was a boy, he was afraid to say anything because he thought his
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father would kill Howard and then he'd lose his dad to prison. As the
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result the two years of sex offender counseling Ricky Dale Howard underwent in the two
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years prior to his release from prison wasn't much more than a game to him.
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He seems to have had no intention of stopping. Although Howard made multiple
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admissions of previous sexual contact with underage boys, he would not go into specifics
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regarding them for fear it might come back and cause him criminal or civil problems.
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Later, also during counseling, Howard was hooked up to a plethismograph,
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an instrument that determines and registers variations in the size of a body part that
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results from the amount of blood pressure present or passing through. As it pertained
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to Ricky Dale Howard, this device was used to determine what stimuli he reacted
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to, including particularly descriptors such as gender, age, and sexual activity.
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The counselor referred to Howard as a clever man who tried to trick the test,
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but in his professional opinion, the pallethismograph showed he was indeed strongly interested
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in sexual contact with underaged boys. During these sessions. Howard also spoke of
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becoming sexually aroused while wrestling with his fourteen year old nephew. He masturbated while
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thinking about his nephew, Howard said, and even had dreams so vivid that
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he'd get up in the middle of the night and look for the boy who
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he thought might be in the house. There was another boy who Howard sexually
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assaulted previous to the above two, at twenty five years old in nineteen ninety
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seven. This individual had worked for Ricky Dale Howard as a boy at the
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Howard ranch. They'd be on the job till around lunchtime, the young man
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said, and after that they'd end up at Howard's lake cabin. The man
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would molest, abuse, and rape him. Even when Howard was a young
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man, his family's community status no doubt a factor. He was using a
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power dynamic to hide the rapes. As First National Bank Nakona's president, he
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was a powerful and influential man in the community and would tell this particular boy
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the same thing. He'd tell others that their fathers would come kill him if
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they were to find out about the sexual abuse. As the result, Howard
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continued, they'd go to prison and the boys would have no father. He
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also warned them that if anyone were to find out, their families would lose
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their farms or homes. All the victims FBI special agent David Burns discovered five
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of them total had been accessed through the bank the children of clients. Besides
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the threats to keep them quiet, it gave Howard the opportunity for an explanation
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when rumors began deniability. He'd say that the allegations were the result of foreclosures
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on the boy's parents' homes or vehicles, but no one in town who knew
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of the allegations investigated that, opting instead to just believe Howard. Because the
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boys also struggled with behavioral issues or depression as the direct result of the sexual
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assaults at the hands of Ricky Dale Howard, which often resulted in them lashing
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out. It seemed to be the word of troubled teens or young men versus
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the word of a pillar of the community. The last example here, the
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young man who in nineteen ninety seven told his parents about Howard's sexual abuse of
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him as a boy, ended up also going to the police. Authorities sent
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him into First National Bank to speak with Howard in his office while wearing a
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wired microphone and tape recorder. As he can fronted the man, Howard confessed,
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but when he returned to give the cops the recorder, they discovered it
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had not recorded the conversation at all. There is perhaps one recording that exists
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publicly that captures the devastating effects of Ricky Dale Howard's abuse. The video of
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Caleb Deal's eighteenth birthday party. While his family joyously sings him Happy Birthday,
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Caleb struggles to smile on what should have been a momentous occasion. In photographs
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of Caleb, his smile was so natural and always looked as if it came
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easily. Not this time. He seems despondent. His eyes looked tired,
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as if his age was well beyond his years, not sleepy, rather It's
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as if the weight of the world was resting on his shoulders. No one
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knew the burden he bore except other boys. Ricky Dale Howard sexually abused.
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In early twenty fifteen, a couple months before Caleb's birthday, he stopped at
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his father, Chad Deal's home. Caleb had been in the process of moving
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out of Chad's place in Grapevine, Texas, a mostly middle class suburb town
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about twenty miles northwest of Dallas and about ninety five miles southeast of Nakona.
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Caleb had come to get the remainder of his belongings as he'd moved into his
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sister's apartment in Bedford because he and his father were butting heads. As a
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late teenager, Caleb Deal was going through both the typical confusing emotions that come
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along with burgeoning adulthood and feelings that were brought on by something that was anything
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but normal. Chad asked his son if he could give him a hug.
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Caleb said yes, and the two held each other for a moment. I
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love you, Chad told his son he'd never see Caleb again. Then,
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two weeks after his birthday, on the last weekend of March twenty fifteen,
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Caleb visited his mother and some friends in Nakona. He hung out with friends
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while he was in town, borrowed his old boss, Ricky Dale Howard's Chevy
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pickup truck, and had a small eighteenth birthday get together with some of his
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family and friends. Caleb's head was somewhere else during the celebration. On Monday
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the thirtieth, the high school senior missed classes, but around the time he
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was leaving his mother's to get back to Bedford, Caleb told his sister he'd
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be at school the next day. He left, telling her he was going
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to stop and see his friend Christian before heading back home. About four hours
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later, fifty four year old Ricky Dale Howard showed up at Caleb's mom,
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Tammy Deal's house. He gave Tammy a two hundred dollars check for her to
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give to Caleb for the work he'd done over the weekend. It struck Tammy
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as strange. She had tabs on Caleb all weekend and he'd performed no work
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duties for Howard. To add to the oddity, Howard had never delivered one
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of her son's checks to her, but these were only a couple steps out
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from the usual and minor, at least at that point, and Tammy didn't
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think much of it for too long. Back in Bedford at the apartment he
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shared with his sister, Courtney, Caleb never arrived back home. Courtney was
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disappointed, but her brother was a teenaged boy who was always off running around
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with friends. There was nothing she could do, and the situation was not
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out of the ordinary enough for her to be too worried. Even the following
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morning, when Courtney got up, got ready and went to work without seeing
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Caleb, it wasn't that unusual. He was supposed to be at school by
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then anyway, and other than hoping he actually went, there was little more
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she could do. Caleb's mother, Tammy, had received a call from Caleb's
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high school counselor on Tuesday, March thirty first, twenty fifteen, informing her
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that he'd not made it to school that day or the previous day. She
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assumed he skipped again. Tammy promised the counselor to speak with him about the
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absences. Then that evening, Caleb didn't show up at home. Worry began
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to set in. Courtney tried calling Caleb than others in the family to see
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if they knew where he was. None did, and they all called his
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phone as well. Every single call went straight to voicemail. Caleb Deal was
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an eighteen year old kid who was, they believed at the time, kind
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of rebelling and pushing the boundaries as far as he could as the result of
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teenage hormones and a struggle for independence. But there was more going on than
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that. The following day, Wednesday, April first, twenty fifteen, Caleb's
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family began phoning all his friends, and a guy named Christian was high on
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the list since Caleb was supposed to go see him before heading home Monday night.
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But Christian, Caleb's mom found out hadn't even been home that night.
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No one had heard from the eighteen year old and the friends who called him,
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and the friends who called him also got voicemail without any ringing. He'd
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taken nothing from his home, nothing to change into, nor any other possessions
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for that matter. The only items missing, other than the clothes on his
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back, were his cell phone and the true he was driving, the one
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he'd borrowed from Ricky Dale Howard. Caleb Deal was only as unpredictable as any
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normal teenager, meaning his family might not know where he is at any given
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moment, but it wouldn't be long before they did. It had been too
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long. Had Caleb been in some sort of terrible accident. Had he secretly
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gotten into something over his head, like a drug deal. It didn't make
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sense, but nothing was normal, not anymore. After hearing nothing from Caleb
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for a couple days, his family called the police. Both monteg County Sheriff's
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Office deputies and Nakona City policeman began searching. Nacona Police Chief Kent Holcomb was
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worried about Caleb's lack of cell phone and social media use. Kids his age
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live on their phones and social media accounts, Chief Holcomb said, and the
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fact that Caleb hadn't was worrying, or perhaps more aptly, disturbing. Word
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got around a ConA fast, and theories and rumors flooded sites like Facebook.
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None made much sense. Caleb had gone to California or was it Colorado?
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Friends speculated based upon things Caleb had said in the past, some recent,
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some long ago. But he wouldn't have gone anywhere without letting his mom,
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Tammy or sister Courtney know somebody, as Caleb was considerate and the last thing
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he'd have wanted was for his family to worry about him. The family believed
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there must be an explanation, and their minds weren't allowing their emotions to imagine
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a worst case scenario. At this point, there was one person who was
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able to account for caleb Deals whereabouts. Close family friend Ricky Dale Howard.
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Howard told Tammy that she didn't need to worry about her son disappearing. He'd
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be back. Caleb had met a girl that weekend, Howard claimed. The
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teenager told him, and he'd gone to Oklahoma to work for her uncle for
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a couple weeks. It was strange and unlike Caleb to go off without telling
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anyone, and he had a job interview coming up. Still, it was
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a relief to hear a situation in which Caleb was okay, irresponsible for not
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telling them, but also fine. Upon calling the friends her son had been
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with the previous weekend, however, Tammy discovered they had not met any girls
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at all, and Caleb had been with them the whole time, just like
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she thought. Why, Tammy wondered, would Ricky Dale Howard attempt to ease
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her mind with a false narrative. Next time on Gone Cold, Texas True
29:56
Crime, Caleb Deal's disappearing gets more complicated until a simple, yet dark and
30:03
unimaginable theory makes it clearer. If you have any information about the disappearance of
30:11
Caleb Ray Deal, please contact the montege County Sheriff's Office at nine four zero
30:18
eight nine four two eight seven to one. If you like Gone Cold's mission
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by searching at Gone Cold podcast. You can also find a link in bio
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in the episode's description. Thanks for listening, y'all.