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Justin Burgwinkel Pt. Two · The Path Went Chilly

0:28
Speaker 1: Welcome back to the Path went Chile for part two
0:30
Speaker 1: of our series about the disappearance of Justin Bergwinkle, Robin,
0:34
Speaker 1: do you want to catch everyone up? And we talked
0:36
Speaker 1: about in our previous episode.
0:38
Speaker 2: Well, Justin Bergwinkle was twenty one years old and had
0:41
Speaker 2: been enlisted in the Army for a couple of years.
0:43
Speaker 2: He was hoping to earn a spot as an Army
0:46
Speaker 2: ranger and he had also been in the Defense Language Institute,
0:50
Speaker 2: but his career hit a major snag when he was
0:52
Speaker 2: caught shoplifting, so he wound up being demoted and wound
0:55
Speaker 2: up doing kitchen duty instead and wound up being transferred
0:59
Speaker 2: forward or in California. By nineteen ninety three, he had
1:02
Speaker 2: been transferred to Fort Lewis and Washington State and was
1:05
Speaker 2: maintaining a long distance relationship with his girlfriend, Yolanda Antunez,
1:09
Speaker 2: who still lived in California. But Justin was getting a
1:12
Speaker 2: bit discouraged because he was unable to rise above the
1:15
Speaker 2: rank of private. He was still stuck doing kitchen duty,
1:18
Speaker 2: and it just seemed like he was just going to
1:20
Speaker 2: fill out his years and then be discharged. But he
1:23
Speaker 2: started dropping all these cryptic statements that he had been
1:25
Speaker 2: recruited for some sort of secret mission. He would show
1:28
Speaker 2: up to see his girlfriend with this briefcase, which supposedly
1:31
Speaker 2: contained classified documents. He was tearing up, and there was
1:34
Speaker 2: one time when somebody left a message with his girlfriend
1:38
Speaker 2: saying tell Justin the missions off. And when Yolanda told
1:42
Speaker 2: Justin about it, he kind of had a breakdown, but
1:43
Speaker 2: he would not tell what was wrong with him, and
1:47
Speaker 2: he kind of implied that he was involved in this
1:48
Speaker 2: top secret mission involving the CIA, And things got to
1:52
Speaker 2: the point where he actually went a wall from Fort
1:54
Speaker 2: Lewis and left without permission and then transferred to California
1:58
Speaker 2: to spend some time with Yolanda. And once it became
2:01
Speaker 2: a parent that he was going to get in trouble,
2:02
Speaker 2: he said he was going to return to Fort Lewis
2:04
Speaker 2: to sort everything out, but then he just vanished without
2:07
Speaker 2: a trace, and a couple weeks later, his parents would
2:10
Speaker 2: find his abandoned car next to a motel with a
2:13
Speaker 2: lot of his personal items in there, including his dog tags.
2:16
Speaker 2: But curiously, the only items that were never accounted for
2:19
Speaker 2: were a pair of guns he had recently purchased, so
2:22
Speaker 2: there was speculation that he might have died by suicide
2:25
Speaker 2: and they just never found his body. But Justin has
2:28
Speaker 2: been missing for thirty years, and the military has always
2:31
Speaker 2: denied that he was ever involved in some sort of
2:33
Speaker 2: top secret mission. But because he has never been found,
2:36
Speaker 2: his family just isn't sure what really happened to him,
2:39
Speaker 2: and it's still a big mystery. So I think that
2:42
Speaker 2: would be a good time to compare Justin's story with
2:45
Speaker 2: another unsolved mysteries case we recently covered on The Path
2:48
Speaker 2: Went Chile, and that's the disappearance of Paul Whipkey. Only
2:52
Speaker 2: a few years after enlisting in the Army, Whipkey had
2:54
Speaker 2: reached the rank of first lieutenant, and, much like Justin,
2:57
Speaker 2: he was stationed at Ford Ort. Driving away from the
3:01
Speaker 2: base in July nineteen fifty eight, Whipkey went a wall
3:04
Speaker 2: and was eventually declared a deserter. Over a month after
3:07
Speaker 2: he went missing, Whipkey's abandoned car was discovered nearly five
3:11
Speaker 2: hundred miles away in a desolate, remote section of Death Valley,
3:14
Speaker 2: and the Army believed that he suffered some sort of
3:16
Speaker 2: mental breakdown before he wandered out into the desert and died. However,
3:21
Speaker 2: Whipkey's body was never found, and there was evidence to
3:23
Speaker 2: suggest that someone else abandoned his car at that location
3:27
Speaker 2: to stage his disappearance. Whipkey's family believed that he may
3:30
Speaker 2: have been recruited by the CIA and sent on some
3:32
Speaker 2: sort of secret mission, but for security reasons, the government
3:36
Speaker 2: cannot reveal the truth about what happened to him. Well,
3:38
Speaker 2: I'm not going to say with one hundred percent certainty
3:41
Speaker 2: that this is what actually occurred, but I do find
3:43
Speaker 2: the scenario to be a lot more plausible in Paul
3:46
Speaker 2: Whipkey's case than Justin Burgwinkle's. Prior to his disappearance, Whipkey
3:50
Speaker 2: had a pretty distinguished career in the army and was
3:53
Speaker 2: a decent candidate for an important secret mission. But by comparison,
3:57
Speaker 2: Justin Bergwinkle seemed like an average soldier at BET.
4:01
Speaker 3: That's where this case is really interesting to me, is
4:03
Speaker 3: because there is this conspiracy theory that was justin part
4:07
Speaker 3: of a secret mission. But with Burwinkle, you saw, you
4:11
Speaker 3: see this person who's struggling, right, that he was demoted,
4:15
Speaker 3: that he made poor decisions, That yes he had the
4:19
Speaker 3: ambition and yes he probably had the talent to succeed
4:23
Speaker 3: in the military. But because of poor decisions. He failed
4:27
Speaker 3: in that kind of goal, and so to say that
4:29
Speaker 3: he'd be the person that they would chase down for
4:32
Speaker 3: a secret mission, it just doesn't line up. But for
4:35
Speaker 3: Paul Whipkey it did. He was someone who had a
4:39
Speaker 3: career in the military, he was a distinguished serviceman, and
4:43
Speaker 3: it made sense except for the fact that he was sick.
4:46
Speaker 3: If you remember in that case, he was sick from
4:48
Speaker 3: the radiation poisoning. So would they pick a sick individual
4:52
Speaker 3: to go on a secret mission either, possibly, But for
4:56
Speaker 3: Justin it just doesn't seem to fit here.
4:59
Speaker 2: Yeah, because Justine, his major downfall was the shoplifting incident,
5:02
Speaker 2: like it was as only in fraction, But when you're
5:04
Speaker 2: in the military, that's one of those things that's used
5:06
Speaker 2: as a huge mark against you because it shows you
5:09
Speaker 2: have poor impulse control and you possibly cannot be trusted.
5:12
Speaker 2: So even if you just make this one offense, it
5:15
Speaker 2: could prevent you from being promoted to anything like an
5:17
Speaker 2: army ranger or like a top secret spy. And even
5:21
Speaker 2: though he was pretty good at language skills he knew
5:24
Speaker 2: some Korean, he really didn't have anything that made him
5:26
Speaker 2: stand out and seem like a candidate that they would
5:29
Speaker 2: want to recruit to go on some sort of top
5:31
Speaker 2: secret mission.
5:32
Speaker 1: It reminds me of that pivotal point in the Maa
5:36
Speaker 1: Murray story when we see Maura leave West Point after
5:39
Speaker 1: the shoplifting incident. It was obviously serious enough that we
5:43
Speaker 1: saw her enroll in another university because she didn't want
5:47
Speaker 1: to stay and I guess pay the price for what
5:51
Speaker 1: would be considered to be a serious offense because integrity
5:54
Speaker 1: is considered incredibly important within the military. And it's not
5:59
Speaker 1: to say that she didn't have integrity. I think obviously
6:01
Speaker 1: it was a cry for help and she didn't want
6:03
Speaker 1: to be there. And it's interesting with Bergwinkle because we
6:06
Speaker 1: do see, like Ashley said, he's got that ambition and
6:09
Speaker 1: he's got that ability, but he doesn't seem to have
6:11
Speaker 1: the fortitude to be able to buckle down and carry
6:15
Speaker 1: it out and to be able to control his impulses
6:18
Speaker 1: for things like shoplifting. So I just don't see an
6:22
Speaker 1: organization like the CIA or any secret organization tapping him
6:28
Speaker 1: to be somebody to be included in one of those missions.
6:31
Speaker 1: It just doesn't seem to be an alignment. Whereas we
6:34
Speaker 1: talked about in part one with Whipkey. It really does
6:37
Speaker 1: seem to line up, But there was also the possibility
6:39
Speaker 1: that maybe he was taking part in some kind of
6:42
Speaker 1: experimental medical treatment and then he died while he was
6:46
Speaker 1: being treated. In Whipkey's case, we mentioned in our last
6:50
Speaker 1: episode that Justin was pretty skilled at language training, but
6:54
Speaker 1: completely derailed his career when he was caught shoplifting in
6:57
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety one. This incident led to him being kicked
7:00
Speaker 1: out of the Defense Language Institute and he would be
7:03
Speaker 1: reassigned to work as a culinary specialist. I don't get
7:07
Speaker 1: the impression that he possessed any other special skills which
7:10
Speaker 1: would have led him to be recruited for a clandestine operation.
7:14
Speaker 1: In fact, it sounds like Justin's work ethic declined after
7:17
Speaker 1: he was kicked out of the language Institute. So I
7:19
Speaker 1: don't see the CIA or any government agency gravitating towards
7:23
Speaker 1: a twenty one year old cook with no special skills
7:26
Speaker 1: or experience. Now, another parallel between Justin's case and the
7:30
Speaker 1: disappearance of Paul Wikei is that Wiki had also been
7:33
Speaker 1: displaying erratic behavior before he went missing. But there's actually
7:37
Speaker 1: an explanation for that. The previous year, Wikey had been
7:40
Speaker 1: assigned to work on some nuclear weapons testing and was
7:43
Speaker 1: likely exposed to radioactive fallout, which caused a great strain
7:47
Speaker 1: on his physical and mental health. So it's possible that
7:50
Speaker 1: Wiki really did wander off into the desert and die,
7:53
Speaker 1: But the Army still did a lot of shady things
7:55
Speaker 1: to cover up his disappearance to avoid admitting their own
7:58
Speaker 1: culpability in what happened to him. By comparison, I see
8:02
Speaker 1: no indication that the Army did anything to cover up
8:05
Speaker 1: Justin's disappearance, and it sounds like he went a wall
8:08
Speaker 1: and vanished completely on his own accord.
8:11
Speaker 3: Do you guys think it's possible that we talked about
8:13
Speaker 3: this a little bit on episode one, but that Justin's
8:16
Speaker 3: mental health also was fading and failing because of the
8:21
Speaker 3: reality of his military career, because his whole life he
8:24
Speaker 3: had kind of had this dream where he's chasing this
8:27
Speaker 3: ambition in a goal of achieving, and yet he seems
8:32
Speaker 3: to continue to be struggling to meet any of those
8:35
Speaker 3: challenges he sets for himself. He's kind of been demoted
8:38
Speaker 3: without a clear path back towards a successful military career,
8:42
Speaker 3: and the way he had envisioned it. That is also
8:45
Speaker 3: a very important role in the military, so not minimizing that,
8:48
Speaker 3: but he had his eyes set on something much bigger
8:51
Speaker 3: and feeling that that wasn't possible. Is it a chance
8:55
Speaker 3: that he did take his own life. But in that case,
8:59
Speaker 3: what do you think would have happened to his body?
9:02
Speaker 2: I mean, if he went out into a remote area
9:04
Speaker 2: to do it, I guess I could see it not
9:06
Speaker 2: being found for thirty years. But I do think he
9:09
Speaker 2: probably was struggling mentally because he may have been wondering, like,
9:13
Speaker 2: what am I going to do with the rest of
9:14
Speaker 2: my life? Because at this point he was probably only
9:16
Speaker 2: going to be in the Army for a couple more
9:18
Speaker 2: years doing culinary duty and then he would probably be discharged.
9:22
Speaker 2: But he probably thought, if I'm not going to be
9:24
Speaker 2: an army ranger, if I'm not going to continue serving
9:26
Speaker 2: my country, what am I going to do? He was
9:29
Speaker 2: almost like he was having a midlife crisis, even though
9:31
Speaker 2: he was still in his early twenties. So I could
9:34
Speaker 2: see someone like that, if they feel they have no future,
9:37
Speaker 2: maybe electing suicide to be the option, but still planting
9:40
Speaker 2: the seeds so that your family and friends believe that
9:43
Speaker 2: you might be dying for your country because you're on
9:45
Speaker 2: some sort of top secret mission.
9:47
Speaker 1: I wonder if he felt like the walls were closing
9:50
Speaker 1: in as well, because it seems like he fabricated a
9:53
Speaker 1: lot of details about his life in the military. And
9:56
Speaker 1: then if he's discharged and it becomes blatantly obvious that
10:01
Speaker 1: his role wasn't what he said that it was. They
10:04
Speaker 1: aren't knocking on his door having him participate in these
10:07
Speaker 1: secret missions. He isn't as important in his role as
10:10
Speaker 1: he led those close to him to believe that he was.
10:14
Speaker 3: I was actually just about to ask that, like, to
10:16
Speaker 3: what extent did his family know about the problems he
10:20
Speaker 3: was having in the military, To what extent had they
10:22
Speaker 3: been given a different story or were they kind of,
10:26
Speaker 3: you know, being fed information that wasn't accurate. Because, like
10:29
Speaker 3: you said, Jules, if those walls are coming in, if
10:32
Speaker 3: he's caught in one of his lives, does he start
10:34
Speaker 3: to feel like either he's a disappointment to his family
10:37
Speaker 3: or that he's going to be quote found out and
10:40
Speaker 3: therefore starts to have that kind of stress and anxiety
10:45
Speaker 3: about what am I going to do to get myself
10:46
Speaker 3: out of this?
10:48
Speaker 2: Well? I know that his parents and his brothers lived
10:50
Speaker 2: on the other side of the country in Massachusetts, so
10:52
Speaker 2: I don't know how often they would have seen him
10:54
Speaker 2: face to face. So they're pretty much like just going
10:57
Speaker 2: by what he told them, just saying that I'm doing
10:59
Speaker 2: him work on being recruited for some sort of top
11:02
Speaker 2: secret mission. But if he gets a discharge a few
11:04
Speaker 2: years later and then the Army doesn't come calling back
11:07
Speaker 2: and he's not being sent on any more missions, I'm
11:10
Speaker 2: sure it's going to look suspicious and make them realize
11:12
Speaker 2: that he probably wasn't telling the truth before. So there's
11:17
Speaker 2: another case which was featured on Unsolved Mysteries around the
11:20
Speaker 2: same time period which also has similarities to this one,
11:23
Speaker 2: and that's the death of SPC. Chad Langford, who was
11:26
Speaker 2: shot to death while performing his patrol as a military
11:29
Speaker 2: policeman at Alabama's Redstone Arsenal in March of nineteen ninety two.
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Speaker 2: I covered this one in episode number three thirty four
11:36
Speaker 2: of The Trail Went Cold But Long story short. Even
11:39
Speaker 2: though the circumstances of how Langford's body was found were
11:42
Speaker 2: very strange, the military still ruled his death to be
11:45
Speaker 2: a suicide and concluded that he shot himself in a
11:48
Speaker 2: very unusual fashion in order to make his death look
11:51
Speaker 2: like a homicide. However, Chad's loved ones believed he was
11:54
Speaker 2: the victim of foul play because he had told them
11:56
Speaker 2: he was doing secret undercover work for the Army to investigate.
12:01
Speaker 2: The Army denied that any undercover operations were taking place,
12:04
Speaker 2: so Langford could have been fabricating these stories in order
12:07
Speaker 2: to make his family believe he was more important than
12:09
Speaker 2: he really was, and stage thinks to make it look
12:12
Speaker 2: like he was killed in the line of duty. Indeed,
12:15
Speaker 2: it is possible that Chad Langford and Justin Bergwinkle were
12:19
Speaker 2: both suffering from psychological problems and were secretly ashamed about
12:23
Speaker 2: their lack of advancement in their military careers, so they
12:26
Speaker 2: wanted to end their lives in a manner which made
12:28
Speaker 2: it look like they died heroic deaths. Of course, one
12:31
Speaker 2: of the key differences is that, unlike Justin, I do
12:34
Speaker 2: not believe that Chad had any serious disciplinary infractions on
12:37
Speaker 2: his record which would have harmed his career. And most importantly,
12:42
Speaker 2: Justin's body has never been found, so we still can't
12:45
Speaker 2: even be certain if he went through the act of suicide. Yeah.
12:49
Speaker 3: And what's hard too is if his family's not close,
12:51
Speaker 3: depending on how much communication he had with them, we
12:54
Speaker 3: really don't know if he was involved in anything else
12:56
Speaker 3: nefarious that could have actually led to him being hurt
12:59
Speaker 3: by somebody either. So, you know, you have this kid
13:02
Speaker 3: who went out there. He's by himself, he's trying to
13:05
Speaker 3: create a life, but it's not going the way he wants.
13:07
Speaker 3: And if he's struggling with mental health, there is a
13:10
Speaker 3: potential that he, you know, reached out to other vices gambling,
13:16
Speaker 3: you know, sex workers, drugs, and so if any of
13:20
Speaker 3: that was something that he was starting to dabble in
13:23
Speaker 3: or get involved, and you have no idea what kind
13:25
Speaker 3: of person he could have come across.
13:27
Speaker 1: If he's having mental health issues, some kind of delusions
13:31
Speaker 1: of grandeur, it sounds like what he's telling his family
13:35
Speaker 1: isn't in alignment with what's actually happening, and that he
13:38
Speaker 1: wants to have this James Bond type of persona or
13:42
Speaker 1: life that he's you know, somebody that's desired by the CIA,
13:46
Speaker 1: And so if he can't make that persona happen in
13:50
Speaker 1: the military, then I think you're absolutely right Ash. Maybe
13:53
Speaker 1: he reached out to or somebody reached out to him
13:57
Speaker 1: from some criminal organization and maybe he was involved in traffic,
14:01
Speaker 1: weapons trafficking, or drug dealing or something to that effect.
14:06
Speaker 2: Well, you mentioned in our last episode that when he
14:08
Speaker 2: would visit his girlfriend, Yolanda, he would often take off
14:11
Speaker 2: from her place for long periods of time and never
14:13
Speaker 2: explain where he was going. And even though he implied
14:16
Speaker 2: that he was doing some sort of top secret work
14:19
Speaker 2: with the military, it's very possible that he was conducting
14:22
Speaker 2: some criminal activity during the time periods he was gone.
14:26
Speaker 3: Either that or having an affair as well. We talked
14:28
Speaker 3: about that potential. So if he was having let's say
14:32
Speaker 3: another relationship that was secret, then that could also lead
14:36
Speaker 3: to another lover being angry with him or something to
14:39
Speaker 3: that extent as well.
14:42
Speaker 1: And it would be nice to know more about who
14:44
Speaker 1: he had access to, like his friend group or acquaintances,
14:48
Speaker 1: to know that if there was anybody who was in
14:51
Speaker 1: reach that was involved in criminal activities, because it's not
14:55
Speaker 1: like you can just go up to an area where
14:57
Speaker 1: there's known criminals and be like, hey, I want to join.
15:01
Speaker 2: I mean, he was visiting his girlfriend in Santa Clara
15:04
Speaker 2: and before he moved to Washington State. He would often
15:07
Speaker 2: be at Ford Ord, which I think was a couple
15:10
Speaker 2: miles outside of Santa Clara. So he very well could
15:12
Speaker 2: have had a friends group from or some criminal associates
15:15
Speaker 2: that he met during his time at Ford Ord.
15:17
Speaker 1: And I've watched documentaries too on like criminal organizations, especially
15:22
Speaker 1: like sex trafficking type things where they're like pimping out
15:26
Speaker 1: girls on base on several different military bases. And I'm
15:30
Speaker 1: not saying this happens on all bases, but military members
15:33
Speaker 1: are just like regular people, and it's just like police
15:36
Speaker 1: officers are, and a lot of them will conduct legal activities.
15:41
Speaker 1: And especially when you look at some of these bases,
15:42
Speaker 1: they're as big as like a large town, like they're huge,
15:47
Speaker 1: So of course you're going to have some bad apples
15:49
Speaker 1: that are going to be involved in criminal activity. And
15:52
Speaker 1: maybe the connections that he made were people on the base. However,
15:58
Speaker 1: we definitely think there's a strong to be made that
16:01
Speaker 1: Justin was having serious delusions of grandeur. I mean, I've
16:04
Speaker 1: never served in the military or been assigned to do
16:07
Speaker 1: top secret work for them, but I have to think
16:10
Speaker 1: that if I was on a date with my spouse,
16:12
Speaker 1: I wouldn't just be casually mentioning, Oh, by the way,
16:16
Speaker 1: I'm involved in some sort of secret mission, but I
16:19
Speaker 1: can't tell you much about it. I'm sure that someone
16:22
Speaker 1: who's trained in this sort of work would know to
16:24
Speaker 1: keep their mouth shut and not say anything like that
16:26
Speaker 1: at all in front of a civilian. The bit where
16:30
Speaker 1: Justin was carrying around this mysterious looking briefcase in front
16:33
Speaker 1: of Yolanda and pulling out small pieces of paper to
16:36
Speaker 1: tear up really comes across as something that he did
16:38
Speaker 1: for show in order to make her think that he
16:41
Speaker 1: was working on something important. When he asked Yolanda to
16:44
Speaker 1: turn around while he opened it, it's like he was
16:46
Speaker 1: practically inviting her to take a quick peek. I have
16:50
Speaker 1: to assume that if you're working on an important, top
16:52
Speaker 1: secret operation and have a briefcase containing classified information, you're
16:57
Speaker 1: not going to take it to your girlfriend's apartment on
16:59
Speaker 1: a two furlough, and if you do, you're a pretty
17:02
Speaker 1: terrible operative and likely never would have made it past
17:06
Speaker 1: the screening process to begin with.
17:08
Speaker 3: It's really true. I mean, he's showing a level of
17:11
Speaker 3: and I mean I'm not trying to be disrespectful at all,
17:13
Speaker 3: but of immaturity, that he's really striving to be viewed
17:17
Speaker 3: as someone with grandeur and almost like an he has
17:20
Speaker 3: an insecurity about him that he's carrying himself with. If
17:23
Speaker 3: you were tasked, I don't know if you wouldn't share
17:26
Speaker 3: with your partner. I mean, I know you're not supposed to,
17:29
Speaker 3: but there are marriages and relationships where I think you
17:31
Speaker 3: share it more than you should. But I don't think
17:34
Speaker 3: that you would have the props and the kind of
17:38
Speaker 3: irresponsible behavior to coincide with that information. So when he
17:42
Speaker 3: is toting around this little briefcase and he's ripping up
17:45
Speaker 3: little pieces of paper, I mean, if that's classified details,
17:48
Speaker 3: you don't just sit there and rip it up by
17:51
Speaker 3: hand and you know, hope that no one can put
17:52
Speaker 3: it back together. And you don't just walk around with
17:55
Speaker 3: the briefcase full of top secret information. So it does
17:58
Speaker 3: seem like he's almost acting a character or a part
18:02
Speaker 3: because of this feeling of that he just doesn't feel
18:05
Speaker 3: fulfilled in what he's doing, and he needs to be loved,
18:08
Speaker 3: he needs to be respected and appreciated, and because he
18:11
Speaker 3: doesn't feel like he's fulfilling that or doing something that
18:15
Speaker 3: allows him to get the attention he wants. He's starting
18:17
Speaker 3: to fabricate these things, and honestly, if he's struggling with
18:20
Speaker 3: mental health, he might believe it. We've seen cases like
18:23
Speaker 3: that as well, where the person gets into these lies,
18:28
Speaker 3: but it's sad because they actually start to become part
18:31
Speaker 3: of that lie and believe it.
18:34
Speaker 2: Yeah, because Yolana would talk about there were some episodes
18:37
Speaker 2: where Justin would get very emotional and appear to have
18:39
Speaker 2: some sort of breakdown, And even though he was giving
18:41
Speaker 2: the oppression that it was tied to his top secret
18:44
Speaker 2: mission or something and he was under a lot of stress,
18:46
Speaker 2: it really looks like he was just having mental health
18:49
Speaker 2: episodes and maybe just the weight of what he was
18:51
Speaker 2: doing was just kind of overwhelming him because he knew
18:54
Speaker 2: he was living a lie and may have even got
18:56
Speaker 2: to the point where he convinced himself that it was true. Now,
19:00
Speaker 2: the most absurd part of this story is undoubtedly the
19:03
Speaker 2: phone call Yolanda received from the unidentified man who asked
19:06
Speaker 2: her to tell Justin quote the missions off. Once again,
19:10
Speaker 2: We've never worked on any covert, secret missions for the military,
19:13
Speaker 2: but if your superiors need to get in touch with you,
19:16
Speaker 2: I seriously doubt they're going to leave a message with
19:18
Speaker 2: your girlfriend to say that your mission has been canceled.
19:22
Speaker 2: But on the other hand, since Justin was out with
19:24
Speaker 2: friends when this incident took place, who actually made the
19:27
Speaker 2: phone call? Sure Justin could have made the call himself
19:30
Speaker 2: in order to enhance this fantasy he was selling to Yolanda,
19:33
Speaker 2: But wouldn't she have recognized his voice well? Interestingly enough,
19:37
Speaker 2: the Sacramento b article that was written about this case
19:40
Speaker 2: in November of nineteen ninety three contained some comments from
19:43
Speaker 2: a soldier named John Aaron Barnett, who worked on kitchen
19:47
Speaker 2: duty alongside Justin at Ford Ord. According to Barnett, there
19:51
Speaker 2: was one incident where Justin asked him to call Yolanda
19:54
Speaker 2: and tell her that Justin was on some sort of
19:56
Speaker 2: secret mission and was unable to see her. Barnett said
19:59
Speaker 2: that Justin sounded serious when he made this request. He
20:02
Speaker 2: thought it was nothing more than a joke at the time. Now,
20:05
Speaker 2: it's not entirely clear to me if Barnett was referring
20:08
Speaker 2: to the missions off call or an entirely different phone
20:12
Speaker 2: call Yolanda received at a different time, But either way,
20:15
Speaker 2: this shows that Justin had a history of getting other
20:18
Speaker 2: people to make phone calls to her on his behalf
20:21
Speaker 2: about secret missions. Since Justin was out with friends in
20:24
Speaker 2: the night, yelan to receive the missions off call, I
20:27
Speaker 2: find it totally plausible that he could have convinced one
20:30
Speaker 2: of them to phone her. Sure, no one has ever
20:32
Speaker 2: come forward to admit to doing this, but since Justin
20:35
Speaker 2: eventually went missing, the caller may have feared they would
20:38
Speaker 2: end up under a cloud of suspicion and elected to
20:40
Speaker 2: stay silent. However, I suppose an alternate possibility is that
20:44
Speaker 2: if Justin was involved in something illegal which was unrelated
20:47
Speaker 2: to the military, somebody he was working with could have
20:50
Speaker 2: left that message, and the missions off was some sort
20:53
Speaker 2: of code. After all, Yolanda said that Justin got really
20:57
Speaker 2: distressed when he returned to the apartment and she gave
20:59
Speaker 2: him the me so if he orchestrated the phone call himself,
21:03
Speaker 2: it sounds like he was going all out to sell
21:05
Speaker 2: the whole situation to her. We also have to remember
21:07
Speaker 2: that Yolanda later found Justin sobbing at her apartment, so
21:11
Speaker 2: he's either really upset about something or suffering from some
21:14
Speaker 2: serious mental health issues.
21:16
Speaker 3: Here's the other thing I want to know is why
21:18
Speaker 3: weren't there communications with his family if there really was
21:22
Speaker 3: some kind of secret mission more so than you know,
21:26
Speaker 3: focused on his girlfriend. I get he's with his girlfriend
21:28
Speaker 3: and hanging around her, but his calls to her and
21:32
Speaker 3: the way that you see him interacting with her, leaving frequently,
21:36
Speaker 3: all this it really does make me feel like there
21:38
Speaker 3: could have been someone else and he needed a justification
21:42
Speaker 3: for sporadic, infrequent, kind of unpredictable behavior from him. The
21:48
Speaker 3: instability that she was starting to see from him because
21:50
Speaker 3: he's trying to balance another relationship. Another relationship could make
21:54
Speaker 3: a man break down and cry as well if it
21:58
Speaker 3: wasn't working out, if he had gotten dumped, if the
22:01
Speaker 3: person he was dating was married and said I'm staying
22:03
Speaker 3: with my husband. You know, all these things could lead
22:06
Speaker 3: to him kind of having reactions that she sees a
22:10
Speaker 3: breakdown on one side, but then he's also in this
22:13
Speaker 3: top secret mission on the other. I think it's more
22:16
Speaker 3: to allow him flexibility, so he's not tied to her
22:19
Speaker 3: as often. Does that make any sense?
22:21
Speaker 1: I agree, that's what I think too. Like when we
22:24
Speaker 1: talked about it in part one, it's like the relationship
22:27
Speaker 1: angle makes more sense than he's actually involved in some
22:30
Speaker 1: clandestine mission and telling his girlfriend that that's what he's doing.
22:35
Speaker 1: It's just like, you're not gonna do that if you're
22:37
Speaker 1: actually an operative involved in secret missions, You're gonna make
22:40
Speaker 1: up some other excuse. So it to me as well,
22:43
Speaker 1: it seems like the walls might have been closing in
22:46
Speaker 1: as far as all the lies that he was telling,
22:48
Speaker 1: not only about his profession but within his relationship. And
22:52
Speaker 1: there's this infidelity, and who knows what if there is
22:55
Speaker 1: another woman what he's telling her. Is she saying, Hey,
22:59
Speaker 1: if you don't leave Yolanda, I'm gonna tell her about it.
23:02
Speaker 1: We don't know. There's a million different potential scenarios that
23:05
Speaker 1: could have been playing out that could have led to
23:07
Speaker 1: him feeling like he needed to unburden himself and cry.
23:12
Speaker 1: But this just adds more fuel to the buyer of
23:17
Speaker 1: this disappointment of not reaching his full potential in the military.
23:21
Speaker 1: And then if he feels like he may be destroying
23:25
Speaker 1: his relationship and he just doesn't have that impulse control
23:28
Speaker 1: and that ability to stop doing these destructive acts, then
23:32
Speaker 1: that could make you feel pretty terrible and could lead
23:35
Speaker 1: to mental health issues.
23:37
Speaker 3: What if the person making the phone call that the
23:39
Speaker 3: quote missions off is one of his friends or someone
23:43
Speaker 3: else that they hang out with. Right, And let's say
23:45
Speaker 3: he's seen another girl, or he's with a girl who's
23:48
Speaker 3: married to another man they all hang out with and
23:50
Speaker 3: when he gets those calls that the mission's off, it's
23:53
Speaker 3: codeword for like she showed up with her significant other
23:57
Speaker 3: and hey, man, like I saw her again with him,
24:00
Speaker 3: you know, or your chances with her are off? Like
24:03
Speaker 3: what if that's code for something where he was actually
24:06
Speaker 3: distraught because he was like, dang it when he got
24:08
Speaker 3: that phone call from a friend saying the missions off
24:11
Speaker 3: because it was top sicker for something social and not criminal.
24:15
Speaker 1: Yeah, that person could be an intermediary who could be
24:19
Speaker 1: a mutual friend who broke the meetings between him and
24:22
Speaker 1: his girlfriend so that it gives this layer of protection
24:25
Speaker 1: so that Yolanda isn't privy to the details. When Yolanda
24:31
Speaker 1: kept pressing Justin about what he was involved in, he
24:34
Speaker 1: told her to watch the movie White Sands. So I'll
24:37
Speaker 1: share a few details about the film's plot. Williem Dafoe
24:40
Speaker 1: plays a new Mexico deputy sheriff who becomes embroiled in
24:44
Speaker 1: an intriguing mystery when a man carrying a briefcase containing
24:47
Speaker 1: five hundred thousand dollars is found shot to death in
24:50
Speaker 1: the desert in an apparent suicide. A piece of paper
24:54
Speaker 1: containing a phone number is found in the victim's stomach,
24:57
Speaker 1: so Defoe decides to launch his own independent under cover
25:00
Speaker 1: operation in which he calls the number and impersonates the
25:03
Speaker 1: dead man. After going to a pre arranged meeting, the
25:06
Speaker 1: briefcase full of money has stolen from him. Defoe soon
25:10
Speaker 1: learns that the victim was an undercover FBI agent and
25:13
Speaker 1: he's stumbled upon a complicated operation involving an international armstealer
25:18
Speaker 1: played by Mickey Rourke, who is planning to use the
25:21
Speaker 1: five hundred thousand to arm some freedom fighters in South America.
25:25
Speaker 1: It's eventually released that Rorke's character is actually a CIA
25:28
Speaker 1: agent who orchestrates the sale of weapons to America's enemies
25:32
Speaker 1: to ensure the survival of the military industrial complex. White
25:36
Speaker 1: Sands originally came out in theaters in April of nineteen
25:39
Speaker 1: ninety two, just over a year before Justin went missing,
25:43
Speaker 1: and in retrospect, it's kind of a weird film for
25:45
Speaker 1: Justin to reference, since it got mixed reviews and didn't
25:48
Speaker 1: make much of a dent to the box office. In
25:51
Speaker 1: Robin's original Trail wunk Hold episode, he even said that
25:54
Speaker 1: if it wasn't for this case, he probably would have
25:57
Speaker 1: forgotten that the movie even existed. But the plot is
26:00
Speaker 1: based around a briefcase full of money, and Justin was
26:03
Speaker 1: often seen carrying a briefcase, so if you saw white fans,
26:07
Speaker 1: maybe he was using it as an inspiration for an
26:09
Speaker 1: elaborate fantasy. Curiously, even though it involves the FBI and
26:13
Speaker 1: the CIA, the Army's not part of the film at all.
26:16
Speaker 1: But I think you could draw some parallels between Willem
26:19
Speaker 1: Dafoe's character and Justin. At the start of the film,
26:22
Speaker 1: Defoe's pretty bored with his life, as being a deputy
26:25
Speaker 1: sheriff in rural New Mexico is not providing him with
26:28
Speaker 1: much excitement, so this is why he takes the initiative
26:31
Speaker 1: to impersonate the dead FBI agent and eventually finds himself
26:34
Speaker 1: in way over his head. Perhaps Justin felt the same
26:38
Speaker 1: way about his own life, which is why he constructed
26:41
Speaker 1: a fantasy about becoming involved in a government operation. I
26:45
Speaker 1: know that Justin specifically told his parents to pay attention
26:48
Speaker 1: to Mickey Rourke's CIA agent arms dealer character, but I
26:52
Speaker 1: seriously doubt that the CIA is going to recruit a
26:55
Speaker 1: twenty one year old soldier with an average service record
26:58
Speaker 1: for a secret operation involving international arms dealing.
27:03
Speaker 3: What is super interesting is that he tells him pay
27:06
Speaker 3: attention to Mickey Rorick's character. But like you said, Jules,
27:09
Speaker 3: he's actually modeling Defoe's character, it seems like, and so
27:14
Speaker 3: it's almost kind of cryptic of like, oh, don't look
27:17
Speaker 3: at this guy who's kind of doing exactly what I'm doing.
27:20
Speaker 3: Make sure you pay attention to the big dog in
27:23
Speaker 3: this movie and this really important mission he's on, because
27:26
Speaker 3: that's me, you know. And he really is kind of
27:29
Speaker 3: using White Sands as a script, but he's putting himself
27:33
Speaker 3: into the character that he wishes he was while he
27:36
Speaker 3: actually saw the inspiration and felt connected to the film
27:39
Speaker 3: because he identifies with Defoe's character.
27:42
Speaker 2: It is kind of funny because I only saw this
27:44
Speaker 2: film like a couple of years ago for the first time,
27:46
Speaker 2: and while I was watching it, all I could think
27:48
Speaker 2: about was justin Bergwinkle, because, like I said, that's the
27:51
Speaker 2: only reason I know this movie exists, because of this case,
27:54
Speaker 2: and I'm seeing how his character is like living this
27:57
Speaker 2: boring life and he wants to get himself involved in
27:59
Speaker 2: this exciting misty even though he solely unqualified for it,
28:02
Speaker 2: and I'm just seeing it. I'm like, yeah, Justin, it's
28:04
Speaker 2: almost a wish fulfillment fantasy for him, and he kind
28:07
Speaker 2: of wishes he was exactly like Defoe's character in real life.
28:11
Speaker 2: All that being said, it's worth mentioning that there were
28:13
Speaker 2: a few incidents from this time period where military weapons
28:17
Speaker 2: from ford Ord and Fort Lewis wound up in the
28:19
Speaker 2: hands of street gangs. In fact, in May of nineteen
28:22
Speaker 2: ninety two, the newspapers reported that members of both the
28:26
Speaker 2: Crips and the Bloods, two rival gangs from Los Angeles,
28:29
Speaker 2: had arranged deals in which personnel from ford Ord would
28:32
Speaker 2: provide them with a surplus of hand grenades and handheld
28:35
Speaker 2: rocket launchers in exchange for drugs. Now, there's no evidence
28:39
Speaker 2: to indicate that Justin was involved in anything like this,
28:42
Speaker 2: But if these so called secret missions Justin was referring
28:46
Speaker 2: to were not just paranoid delusions, maybe they were a
28:49
Speaker 2: cover for illegal activity involving weapons or drugs or others.
28:53
Speaker 2: Stolen goods. One interesting detail from the Sacramento b article
28:58
Speaker 2: which I did not know before, is that one of
29:00
Speaker 2: Justin's former army friends claimed that Justin often liked to
29:03
Speaker 2: flash around a military id which had his photo on
29:06
Speaker 2: it but someone else's name. These IDs were apparently quite
29:11
Speaker 2: difficult to counterfeit and likely would have landed Justin in
29:14
Speaker 2: serious hot water if he got caught. So was there
29:17
Speaker 2: a reason he was carrying around something like that while
29:20
Speaker 2: he was stationed at Fort ord Yolanda said that Justin
29:23
Speaker 2: would sometimes abruptly end their dates and say that he
29:26
Speaker 2: needed to go back to Monterey, But he would do
29:28
Speaker 2: this completely out of the blue, without receiving any phone
29:31
Speaker 2: calls or messages. And after he went a while from
29:35
Speaker 2: Fort Lewis, Justin spent a week at Yolanda's apartment, and
29:38
Speaker 2: on several occasions he left on what he claimed were
29:41
Speaker 2: important trips to Monterey before he disappeared. I mean, for
29:45
Speaker 2: all we know, Justin could have just been staging the
29:47
Speaker 2: whole thing as part of his fantasy. But where exactly
29:50
Speaker 2: did he go when he left on all these trips?
29:53
Speaker 2: Did he just go off and do his own thing
29:54
Speaker 2: for several hours before he returned, could he be could
29:58
Speaker 2: he have been involved in something else which had nothing
30:00
Speaker 2: to do with a secret mission. Well, on our last episode,
30:03
Speaker 2: we made mention of some comments from the Unsolved Mysteries
30:06
Speaker 2: message board by a poster known as MPI Guy, who
30:10
Speaker 2: said there were rumors that Justin might have had another
30:12
Speaker 2: girlfriend in the town of Seaside and she got involved
30:15
Speaker 2: in a bad situation he was trying to rescue her from. Again,
30:19
Speaker 2: it sounds like this was nothing more than rumor, and
30:21
Speaker 2: we have no idea if this other girlfriend actually existed,
30:25
Speaker 2: But since Seaside is near Moterey, that could provide an
30:28
Speaker 2: alternate explanation for all of Justin's trips.
30:32
Speaker 3: Okay, now we've talked about this a lot. But when
30:34
Speaker 3: you talk about the idea that this other girlfriend, if
30:37
Speaker 3: she existed, could have been involved in quote something bad, right,
30:41
Speaker 3: that he was trying to rescue her from. When you
30:44
Speaker 3: think about people who are having affairs, or you think
30:47
Speaker 3: about people who are you taking advantage of someone who
30:51
Speaker 3: might be going through their own crisis and manipulate them,
30:55
Speaker 3: you'll hear people use claims of domestic violence or you know,
30:59
Speaker 3: I'm married this horrible man. He's awful. He doesn't treat
31:02
Speaker 3: me right, and it's really manipulating someone who they view
31:06
Speaker 3: as weak and easy to control, and they'll make accusations
31:12
Speaker 3: against their partner that's not even true. To try to
31:14
Speaker 3: lure somebody to do things for them, right, whether it's
31:18
Speaker 3: buy things for them or do their bidding for them
31:20
Speaker 3: or things like that. And so if she was getting
31:23
Speaker 3: calls that she was desperate in this bad situation, I
31:26
Speaker 3: wonder if it's someone who's picking up on his kind
31:29
Speaker 3: of immaturity or easy the way he's influenced pretty easily,
31:34
Speaker 3: it sounds like, and is trying to actually manipulate him,
31:37
Speaker 3: and that could have led him into some trouble as well.
31:40
Speaker 2: So, yeah, that would make sense to me because maybe
31:42
Speaker 2: in his own mind he's kind of taking on the
31:44
Speaker 2: role of a hero or something like that, where even
31:47
Speaker 2: if he can't do anything exciting in the military, he's
31:49
Speaker 2: found this other girl who's in like a lot of
31:51
Speaker 2: trouble and he thinks he can rescue her from maybe
31:54
Speaker 2: some legal problems or domestic violence or something, and that's
31:57
Speaker 2: why he's making all these trips to see her. But
31:59
Speaker 2: maybe he realizes he's being manipulated or it's not going
32:02
Speaker 2: as he expected, and this is what causes him to
32:05
Speaker 2: have these mental breakdowns.
32:07
Speaker 1: And what if these secret missions are him like spying
32:10
Speaker 1: on this guy that he thinks is a really bad
32:12
Speaker 1: guy and up to some kind of nefarious activities in
32:16
Speaker 1: order to try to rescue this mystery woman from that
32:20
Speaker 1: that could also be in alignment with him having an
32:22
Speaker 1: affair but also doing something that he could, I guess say,
32:27
Speaker 1: and he would be half telling the truth that he
32:29
Speaker 1: was involved in a secret mission.
32:32
Speaker 2: And also, as you recall, he went a wall from
32:34
Speaker 2: Fort Lewis and Washington to come down to Santa Clara
32:38
Speaker 2: and spend time with Yolanda, and that's when he would
32:40
Speaker 2: make more of these trips to Monterey. And you think
32:43
Speaker 2: going awall means he's going to land himself in serious troubles.
32:46
Speaker 2: So what could he be doing to risk his military
32:49
Speaker 2: career like that? And if he was involved in a
32:51
Speaker 2: relationship with another woman and he thought he was coming
32:54
Speaker 2: back to California to rescue her for something, that could
32:57
Speaker 2: provide an explanation why he was willing to just abandon
33:00
Speaker 2: in his post.
33:01
Speaker 1: It's worth noting that Fort Ord officially closed in nineteen
33:04
Speaker 1: ninety four, less than a year after Justin disappeared, but
33:09
Speaker 1: the original recommendation to close the base had been made
33:12
Speaker 1: years earlier, and the plan was to gradually transfer all
33:15
Speaker 1: the personnel to Fort Lewis, so Justin was not sent
33:18
Speaker 1: there because of issues with his service record or anything
33:21
Speaker 1: he might have done so. Obviously, if Justin was involved
33:24
Speaker 1: in some sort of clandestine operation which required him to
33:28
Speaker 1: keep making trips to Monterey, why would the military transfer
33:31
Speaker 1: him to Washington in the first place rather than keep
33:34
Speaker 1: him close to home. However, I'm sure the transfer was
33:37
Speaker 1: very inconvenient for Justin, since his relationship with Yolanda was
33:41
Speaker 1: getting more serious and he was now being sent to
33:44
Speaker 1: another post located over eight hundred miles away. For all
33:47
Speaker 1: we know, this could have taken a toll on his
33:49
Speaker 1: already fragile mental health and made him even more unhappy
33:52
Speaker 1: with the state of his military career. Of course, if
33:55
Speaker 1: the rumors are true and Justin really did have a
33:58
Speaker 1: second girlfriend in Seaside, then the transfer would have made
34:01
Speaker 1: things even more inconvenient for him and desperate enough to
34:05
Speaker 1: go a wall to travel back to California. We still
34:08
Speaker 1: don't know where Justin went when he left Yolanda's apartment
34:11
Speaker 1: on all those secret trips, but we know he made
34:14
Speaker 1: at least one trip to Monterey, since his abandoned car
34:17
Speaker 1: was found in the parking lot of the Monterey Marina
34:19
Speaker 1: Bay Travelodge. If Justin was the victim of foul play,
34:23
Speaker 1: I could see someone leaving his car there, but it
34:25
Speaker 1: seems odd that an outside party would go to the
34:28
Speaker 1: trouble of placing all of Justin's personal items, including his
34:31
Speaker 1: wallets and dog tag it is briefcase inside the trunk.
34:35
Speaker 1: I really get the impression that Justin staged the scene
34:38
Speaker 1: and left the items there himself, particularly when you remember
34:42
Speaker 1: his previous conversation with Yolanda. He said that if his
34:45
Speaker 1: dog tags were ever found, then that would mean that
34:48
Speaker 1: he was dead. Of course, the only items of Justin's
34:51
Speaker 1: that could not be found were the handguns and ammunition
34:54
Speaker 1: that he'd recently purchased, meaning that he may have gone
34:57
Speaker 1: off to a remote area and shot himself in his
35:00
Speaker 1: His body has never been found.
35:02
Speaker 3: Is it possible too, that he did stage all this,
35:05
Speaker 3: but not to complete suicide, but to actually start over.
35:08
Speaker 3: If you look back at what you guys just shared,
35:11
Speaker 3: and he has this fake military ID that looks pretty authentic.
35:15
Speaker 3: What says he couldn't have also falsified a passport or
35:19
Speaker 3: gotten a different driver's license, or fled to Mexico, which
35:23
Speaker 3: would make sense to take your weapons with you, but
35:25
Speaker 3: to leave all identification behind. He also could have just
35:29
Speaker 3: left a life that he was tired of having to
35:31
Speaker 3: pretend to be somebody he wasn't and to try to
35:34
Speaker 3: not be the quote failure. He felt like he was
35:38
Speaker 3: he was living a double life. He might have felt
35:40
Speaker 3: like he was getting constricted with the truth soon going
35:42
Speaker 3: to be coming out, and he just wanted to leave
35:44
Speaker 3: it all behind. It's pretty convenient that you kind of
35:47
Speaker 3: pack all your identification, your dog tags and things like that,
35:50
Speaker 3: just for everyone to find, and you're never found.
35:54
Speaker 2: That's certainly what makes sense, because, as we said, the
35:56
Speaker 2: walls seemed to be closing in where he might have
35:59
Speaker 2: been paranoid that all his lies about going on secret
36:02
Speaker 2: missions were about to be exposed. But rather than choose suicide,
36:06
Speaker 2: he just decided to disappear and start over and start
36:09
Speaker 2: a new life. But of course that they've never found
36:11
Speaker 2: any paper trail to indicate that he's still alive over
36:14
Speaker 2: the past thirty years, but still back in nineteen ninety three,
36:17
Speaker 2: it was still easier than it is now to start
36:20
Speaker 2: all over under a new identity. So I suppose he
36:22
Speaker 2: could have pulled it off, particularly if he made it
36:25
Speaker 2: down over the border in New Mexico or something where
36:28
Speaker 2: he would be much harder to track.
36:30
Speaker 1: But wouldn't it be hard to get weapons across the border?
36:33
Speaker 1: Like that's this totally makes sense to me what you said, Ash.
36:37
Speaker 1: Just the one thing I can't get past is why
36:40
Speaker 1: he needed to order all this ammunition and buy these
36:44
Speaker 1: weapons prior. Because if we're supposed to believe, like Yolanda said,
36:49
Speaker 1: if the dog tags are found, then he's dead. Then
36:53
Speaker 1: he doesn't need to convince anybody that he went off
36:55
Speaker 1: to end his own life with these weapons. And if
36:59
Speaker 1: he was indeed contracted by the CIA or something, wouldn't
37:02
Speaker 1: they then provide the weapons?
37:05
Speaker 2: That is true, Yeah, And the thing that has always
37:07
Speaker 2: bugged me is that if he was planning suicide, why
37:09
Speaker 2: would he need two weapons like he only need one.
37:13
Speaker 2: So it does make me wonder alternatively that maybe he
37:16
Speaker 2: may not have been involved in anything with the military
37:18
Speaker 2: of the CIA, but he still got himself involved in
37:21
Speaker 2: something dangerous which made him think that he would need
37:24
Speaker 2: these weapons. So, like I just said, if Justin had
37:27
Speaker 2: always been planning suicide, you have to ask why would
37:30
Speaker 2: he feel the need to buy two handguns in over
37:32
Speaker 2: one hundred rounds of ammunition. It's also odd that he
37:35
Speaker 2: would purchase gun cleaning equipment alongside those items if the
37:39
Speaker 2: guns were only going to be used for the express
37:41
Speaker 2: purpose of shooting himself. So I don't think we can
37:44
Speaker 2: completely rule out the possibility that Justin legitimately bought those
37:48
Speaker 2: guns for the purpose of protecting himself. The whether it
37:51
Speaker 2: was protection against something real or imaginary is another matter.
37:55
Speaker 2: But even if Justin did end his own life, he
37:57
Speaker 2: doesn't necessarily have to go to a remote area in
38:00
Speaker 2: order to do so. For all we know, his body
38:03
Speaker 2: may have been found at one point, but since he
38:05
Speaker 2: wasn't carrying any identification, he was buried in a pauper's
38:08
Speaker 2: grave as a John Doe somewhere. Justin also happened to
38:12
Speaker 2: go missing right next to the Pacific Ocean, so if
38:15
Speaker 2: he drowned himself or jumped off a bridge into a
38:17
Speaker 2: body of water somewhere, that could also account for why
38:20
Speaker 2: his body has never resurfaced. Another possibility is that Justin
38:24
Speaker 2: did not kill himself, but decided to start over and
38:27
Speaker 2: live off the grid, which is why he left all
38:30
Speaker 2: of his identification and personal items behind in his car.
38:33
Speaker 2: For all we know, Justin could have lived as a
38:35
Speaker 2: transient for a while, but if so, the odds of
38:38
Speaker 2: him still being alive after more than thirty years are
38:41
Speaker 2: not great.
38:43
Speaker 3: Nobody could have crossed over the Mexican border and built
38:46
Speaker 3: himself a new little life and been somebody totally different
38:49
Speaker 3: and actually been okay. I mean, it's crazy to think about.
38:53
Speaker 2: It.
38:53
Speaker 3: Sounds crazy right now in twenty twenty five, but back
38:57
Speaker 3: then was it as difficult said It was a lot
39:01
Speaker 3: easier to hide your tracks and to false fight identification
39:05
Speaker 3: records and things like that. So with very little money,
39:09
Speaker 3: I feel like he could have found a space to
39:11
Speaker 3: start over as somebody, as a completely different man.
39:15
Speaker 1: And who knows even if he did do that. He
39:18
Speaker 1: may have He may have, like you said, Ash, he
39:20
Speaker 1: may have thrived, he may have done very well. Or
39:23
Speaker 1: his mental health issues. He might have realized that he
39:26
Speaker 1: couldn't run away from them. He might have got geographic
39:29
Speaker 1: he might have got some geographical distance between him and Yulanda,
39:33
Speaker 1: and maybe this other girlfriend and his issues with the military,
39:36
Speaker 1: but it didn't fix the problems, and maybe then he
39:40
Speaker 1: chose to end his own life, or he may have
39:42
Speaker 1: encountered somebody because of his mental health issues that chose
39:46
Speaker 1: to prey upon him and ended his life. Even though
39:50
Speaker 1: I believe there's no truth at all to the idea
39:52
Speaker 1: that Justin went missing is part of some secret mission,
39:55
Speaker 1: I would not completely rule out the possibility that he
39:58
Speaker 1: got himself involved in something illegal which put his life
40:01
Speaker 1: at risk and led to him being murdered. However, there's
40:04
Speaker 1: just no evidence of that, and until we see something
40:06
Speaker 1: more concrete, I'll continue to lean towards Justin being responsible
40:10
Speaker 1: for his own disappearance. I know that Justin was never
40:13
Speaker 1: officially diagnosed with any mental health issues, but you have
40:17
Speaker 1: to wonder if he might have started suffering from paranoid schizophrenia,
40:20
Speaker 1: as Yon said of that illness generally starts affecting young
40:23
Speaker 1: males when they're in their late teens or early twenties.
40:26
Speaker 1: He may have legitimately believed that he was working on
40:29
Speaker 1: a secret mission for the government and that his life
40:32
Speaker 1: was in danger, but things may have reached the point
40:34
Speaker 1: where he ultimately decided that suicide or disappearing off the
40:37
Speaker 1: grid were his only options, but until we find Justin's body,
40:41
Speaker 1: we'll never know for certain.
40:43
Speaker 2: What I find so frustrating is that I'm not sure
40:46
Speaker 2: if anyone is still actively investigating this case, or if
40:49
Speaker 2: they're even doing so. To begin with, Justin's family claimed
40:52
Speaker 2: that the police and the army you wouldn't do anything
40:55
Speaker 2: to help them. And if you go to Justin's profile
40:57
Speaker 2: page with the Charlie Project, the instigating agency is listed
41:01
Speaker 2: as the Clinton Police Department. That's the burgwinkles original hometown.
41:06
Speaker 2: But I'm not sure how thoroughly a police department from
41:08
Speaker 2: Massachusetts will investigate a missing person's case from California. It
41:13
Speaker 2: would be one thing if Justin's death had been ruled
41:15
Speaker 2: as suicide and the authorities had closed the investigation, but
41:18
Speaker 2: he is technically still a missing person, and even if
41:21
Speaker 2: he did kill himself, it would be nice to recover
41:23
Speaker 2: his remains and provide resolution for his family. So if
41:26
Speaker 2: you happen to have any information about the unsolved disappearance
41:30
Speaker 2: of Justin Bergwinkle, please contact the appropriate authorities. Jules Ashley
41:35
Speaker 2: any final thoughts on this case.
41:37
Speaker 3: It is really interesting that the investigating agency is listed
41:40
Speaker 3: as his hometown because, like you said, all of these
41:43
Speaker 3: actions occur on the West coast, and so when you're
41:48
Speaker 3: looking at the different agencies that could be part of
41:52
Speaker 3: researching and figuring out investigating where this man went, it
41:57
Speaker 3: would not be someone in the Clinton Blaze Department.
42:00
Speaker 2: Right.
42:00
Speaker 3: You have Massachusetts trying to look into some actions that
42:04
Speaker 3: originated in California. So the fact that the army and
42:09
Speaker 3: law enforcement there isn't helping is devastating, right, whether it's quote,
42:14
Speaker 3: you know, it's my role or it's your role to
42:16
Speaker 3: do So there's a family that's saying, please help us,
42:20
Speaker 3: and they never got the help that they were begging for.
42:24
Speaker 3: No matter what was going on with Justin, whether he
42:26
Speaker 3: was in criminal behavior, whether he was having an affair,
42:29
Speaker 3: whether he completed suicide, or he you know, ran away
42:33
Speaker 3: and started a great new life. His family has no
42:36
Speaker 3: idea what happened, and so they're grieving as son that
42:39
Speaker 3: could have still been alive, or could have been hurt,
42:44
Speaker 3: or could have hurt himself, and all those what ifs
42:47
Speaker 3: had to have plagued them their entire life. And so
42:50
Speaker 3: that's the real tragedy here is that you know, if
42:54
Speaker 3: Justin did take his own life, there's a prayer that
42:58
Speaker 3: he found peace that he was looking for. And if he,
43:01
Speaker 3: you know, ran into criminal behavior, there's danger that the
43:04
Speaker 3: community is still at risk because there's criminals active. Or
43:08
Speaker 3: if he ran off to create a new life, how
43:09
Speaker 3: sad that his family is left to handle the grief
43:12
Speaker 3: and he got to escape the life that he created,
43:15
Speaker 3: you know. So it's the whole situation is absolutely tragic.
43:19
Speaker 3: No matter what the actual scenario was, the only thing
43:23
Speaker 3: I'm sure of is that it was not a secret
43:24
Speaker 3: mission with the military, and that the grief here for
43:28
Speaker 3: the surviving family members is something that didn't get to
43:31
Speaker 3: get resolved.
43:33
Speaker 1: I echo your sentiments here, Ash. No matter what the
43:36
Speaker 1: outcome ended up being, this family suffered immensely not having
43:40
Speaker 1: a resolution and not knowing what happened to Justin. I
43:44
Speaker 1: really have no idea, Like we've talked about all these
43:46
Speaker 1: different possibilities, and I don't lean one way or the other.
43:50
Speaker 1: But my heart really is with the family here because
43:53
Speaker 1: I can't imagine what it would feel like not to
43:56
Speaker 1: know what happened. And if he chose to leave on
43:59
Speaker 1: his own accord, why did he do this? Why didn't
44:03
Speaker 1: he let us know? And I think you get that
44:06
Speaker 1: in that situation, people experience that guilt where like, what
44:09
Speaker 1: if I could have done something to intervene, and people
44:13
Speaker 1: unfairly punish themselves for somebody else's choices. And I just
44:18
Speaker 1: really wish at the end of the day that we somehow,
44:21
Speaker 1: like Robin mentioned earlier, that there's a possibility that Justin's
44:25
Speaker 1: body may have been found and maybe it's in a
44:27
Speaker 1: pauper's grave somewhere, that with all of these John and
44:30
Speaker 1: Jane does being identified, that Justin Bergwinkle, maybe he's out
44:36
Speaker 1: there somewhere and the family will get the answers that
44:38
Speaker 1: they deserve.
44:40
Speaker 2: Yeah, we mentioned our last episode that tragically, Justin's mother, Diane,
44:44
Speaker 2: died in two thousand and six at the young age
44:46
Speaker 2: of fifty three, So I think that the stress of
44:48
Speaker 2: losing her son may have played a role in in
44:50
Speaker 2: her dying and not getting to find answers about what
44:54
Speaker 2: happened to him. And yeah, I remember watching this on
44:56
Speaker 2: Unsolved Mysteries back in the day that this was the air,
44:59
Speaker 2: when they were doing a lot a lot of military
45:00
Speaker 2: conspiracy theme stories and a lot of them involved like
45:04
Speaker 2: suspicious suicides, and allegations of a cover up. But this
45:07
Speaker 2: one was a lot different because Justin did not go
45:10
Speaker 2: missing near his military base. He went missing after he
45:12
Speaker 2: was a wall and his body was never found, and
45:15
Speaker 2: there was really no evidence to support the allegations that
45:19
Speaker 2: he was involved in a secret mission because the sole
45:21
Speaker 2: source of that was Justin himself, and judging by me
45:24
Speaker 2: his behavior, it's clearly showed that he was not in
45:26
Speaker 2: his right mind at that time. So this is one
45:28
Speaker 2: where I don't blame a military conspiracy, but I am
45:32
Speaker 2: kind of surprised they haven't tried harder to find him,
45:35
Speaker 2: because usually they go all out trying to find soldiers
45:38
Speaker 2: who went a wall. But I'm not sure they did
45:40
Speaker 2: much of an investigation at all. It seems like the
45:42
Speaker 2: family had to do all the searching on their own,
45:45
Speaker 2: and I don't know how much investigation has been done
45:48
Speaker 2: by law enforcement either. So that's why I don't think
45:51
Speaker 2: it's implausible that if Justin did disappear voluntarily, he could
45:55
Speaker 2: be living as a transient, He could be living off
45:57
Speaker 2: the radar somewhere under a new identity, or he could
46:00
Speaker 2: have just died as a John Doe and no one
46:02
Speaker 2: ever put two and two together and buried him in
46:05
Speaker 2: a pauper's grave. But it is a sad story because
46:08
Speaker 2: no matter what happened, it appears that Justin either was
46:10
Speaker 2: having mental health issues or just got himself involved in
46:13
Speaker 2: something else where he wound up weighing over his head,
46:16
Speaker 2: and someone outside the military was responsible for his disappearance.
46:20
Speaker 2: We just don't have any evidence either way, and hopefully
46:23
Speaker 2: one of these days they'll find something. We'll bring a
46:26
Speaker 2: conclusive resolution to Justin's family.
46:29
Speaker 4: Robin, do you want to tell us a little bit
46:31
Speaker 4: about the Trail Went Cold Patreon?
46:33
Speaker 2: Yes. The Trail Cold Patreon has been around for three
46:35
Speaker 2: years now, and we offer these standard bonus features like
46:39
Speaker 2: early ad free episodes, and I also send out stickers
46:43
Speaker 2: and signed thank you cards to anyone who signs up
46:46
Speaker 2: with us on Patreon. If you join our five dollars
46:48
Speaker 2: tier tier two, we also offer monthly bonus episodes in
46:52
Speaker 2: which I talk about cases which are not featured on
46:55
Speaker 2: The Trail Went Cold's original feed, so they're exclusive to Patreon,
46:59
Speaker 2: and if you join our highest tier tier three, the
47:02
Speaker 2: ten dollars tier, one of the features we offer is
47:05
Speaker 2: a audio commentary track over classic episodes of Unsolved Mysteries
47:09
Speaker 2: where you can download an audio file and then boot
47:12
Speaker 2: up the original Unsolved Mysteries episode on Amazon Prime or
47:15
Speaker 2: YouTube and play it with my audio commentary playing in
47:19
Speaker 2: the background, where I just provide trivia and factoids about
47:22
Speaker 2: the cases featured in this episode. And incidentally, the very
47:25
Speaker 2: first episode that I did a commentary track over was
47:28
Speaker 2: the episode featuring this case. So if you want to
47:31
Speaker 2: download a commentary track in which I make more smart
47:34
Speaker 2: ass remarks about Jewel Kaylor, then be sure to join
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Speaker 2: Tier three.
47:38
Speaker 4: So I want to let you know a little bit
47:39
Speaker 4: about the Jeweles and Ashley Patreons. So there's early ad
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Speaker 4: free episodes of The Path Went Chili. We've got our
47:45
Speaker 4: Path Went Chili mini's, which are always over an hour,
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Speaker 4: to turn into a series, and we're really enjoying doing those,
47:54
Speaker 4: so we hope you'll check out those Patreons. We'll link
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Speaker 4: them in the show notes.
47:58
Speaker 2: So I want to thank you all for listening, and
48:00
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48:05
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48:09
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48:11
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48:14
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48:17
Speaker 4: Music by Paul Rich from the podcast Cold Callers comedy