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The Wisconsin Suitcase Murders · Murder Files Unsealed

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Imagine you're doing the most mundane, repetitive job imaginable.
• 0:05
  Speaker 2: Right. Like totally mind-numbing.
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: Exactly. It's June 5th, 2014. You're a highway worker in
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: rural Walworth County.
• 0:13
  Speaker 2: Down in Wisconsin, right?
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: Yeah, Wisconsin. About 50 miles southwest of Milwaukee. It's early summer.
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: The sun is beating down.
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: Just a totally normal day.
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: A completely normal day. Your entire universe is basically just
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: the hum of a tractor mower and like the tall
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: grass on the shoulder of Highway 50.
• 0:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: And right there in the middle of this absolute banality,
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: you stumble upon something that just it doesn't belong.
• 0:39
  Speaker 2: Something completely out of place. Right.
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: Two suitcases just sitting there in the weeds.
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: Wow.
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: You open them and the normalcy of that sunny afternoon,
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: really the normalcy of that entire community, it just shatters completely.
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: Because of what's inside.
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: Exactly. Because inside those suitcases are the bodies of two women.
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: It's one of those visceral scenarios that really forces you
• 1:06
  Speaker 2: to realize how thin the veil is, you know?
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: The veil between everyday life and horror?
• 1:10
  Speaker 2: Yeah. The veil between our everyday routines and just absolute horror.
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: I mean, the juxtaposition of a summer afternoon in rural
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: Wisconsin and what was hidden in that grass, it's staggering.
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: It really is. So today, we are pulling apart a
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: pretty chilling CBS News report from August of 2014.
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: This is the one about the Wisconsin suitcase murders?
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: Right. But our mission here on this deep dive isn't
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: just to, like, recount a true crime story.
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: No, we don't just want to read a police blotter
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: to you.
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: Exactly. We are going to completely deconstruct the architecture of
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: this crime.
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: Because there's so much more to it than just the
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: act itself.
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: There is. We're looking at how a former police officer
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: manipulated systemic loopholes... how he attempted to disguise cold-blooded murder
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: as a tragic quote-unquote accident.
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: An accident, yeah. That's a huge part of his defense.
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: Right. And we'll look at how a surprisingly careless trail
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: of digital and physical evidence ultimately unraveled his entire timeline
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: of deception.
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: We really want to understand the mechanics beneath the surface
• 2:14
  Speaker 2: of this tragedy.
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: Because when you only look at the headlines, you know,
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: you just see the monster.
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: Exactly. But when you look at the mechanics of the case...
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: you see the system that allowed the monster to operate.
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: You see the blind spots.
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: You really do. We are going to look closely at
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: this case through the lens of institutional failure.
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: Which is so important here.
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: Right. Examining how someone entrusted with public safety, I mean,
• 2:37
  Speaker 2: someone who literally wore a badge, becomes the ultimate threat
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: to that very safety.
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: So to understand how this horrifying house of cards collapsed,
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: we kind of have to start with the physical reality
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: of what those highway workers found.
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: Because the geography and the timeline, they just defy basic logic. Totally.
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: The victims were eventually identified as 37-year-old Laura Simonson of Farmington, Minnesota,
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: and 19-year-old Jenny Gomez of Cottage Grove, Oregon.
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: So these are two women from entirely different states.
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: Right. Hundreds of miles away from Wisconsin and hundreds of
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: miles away from each other.
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: And the timeline of when they disappeared versus when they
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: were found, that's the first major red flag that investigators hit.
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: We have to keep a very firm grip on the
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: dates here because they're, well, they're crazy.
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: They are. According to the criminal complaint detailed in the sources,
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: Jenny Gamez, the 19-year-old from Oregon, she was killed in
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: August of 2012.
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: August 2012. And the suitcases are found in June 2014.
• 3:35
  Speaker 2: That is an enormous gap of time.
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: Almost two years.
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: Almost two years. And the CBS report tells us exactly
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: what the suspect, this man named Steven Zelich, did during
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: that gap.
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: And I honestly, I struggle to even process the logistics
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: of it.
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: It's horrifying. He admitted to police that after he killed
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: Jenny Gamers, he put her body into a suitcase.
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: Specifically, the very luggage she used to pack her belongings
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: for their trip.
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: Right. Her own suitcase. He then took that suitcase to
• 4:06
  Speaker 2: his apartment in West Allis.
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: Which is a suburb of Milwaukee, right?
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: Yeah, a Milwaukee suburb. And he put it in his refrigerator.
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: Wait, hold on. A refrigerator?
• 4:18
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: Yes. I need to stop you there because I'm trying
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: to wrap my head around the daily physical reality of this.
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: It's a lot to take in.
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: You're telling me he went into his kitchen, you know,
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: to get milk for his coffee or to grab a
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: beer every single day.
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: Every day.
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: For over 400 days with a victim inside the appliance.
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: Well over a year, in fact.
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: How does a human brain not completely... shatter from the paranoia.
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: Like from fear of getting caught?
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: Yeah, like what if the landlord does an inspection or
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: a maintenance worker comes in to fix a leaky sink?
• 4:52
  Speaker 2: What you are reacting to is the sheer scale of
• 4:55
  Speaker 2: his cognitive compartmentalization.
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: It's just unnatural.
• 4:58
  Speaker 2: It is. When we think of someone hiding a body,
• 5:01
  Speaker 2: we typically imagine this frantic, panic-driven event.
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: Right, a hasty burial in the woods in the middle
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: of the night.
• 5:08
  Speaker 2: Exactly. Where the perpetrator flees the scene and tries desperately
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: to put, you know, geographic and psychological distance between themselves
• 5:15
  Speaker 2: and the crime.
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: Because panic is chaotic.
• 5:17
  Speaker 2: Panic is chaotic. It's a burst of adrenaline that eventually subsides.
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: Right. You make a terrible mistake, you panic, you hide
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: the evidence out of sheer terror, and you run.
• 5:26
  Speaker 2: But a refrigerator is the center of a domestic environment.
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: It's the kitchen.
• 5:30
  Speaker 2: What we are looking at in this timeline is sustained,
• 5:33
  Speaker 2: methodical control. It's chilling. It is an adaptation to a
• 5:37
  Speaker 2: gruesome reality. He normalized the presence of a deceased human
• 5:41
  Speaker 2: being in his kitchen.
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: I can't even fathom that.
• 5:44
  Speaker 2: That level of compartmentalization requires a profound disconnect from empathy.
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: And extreme confidence.
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: Absolute supreme confidence in his own ability to maintain the secret.
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: He wasn't hiding from the reality of what he did.
• 5:58
  Speaker 2: No, he was managing his environment around it.
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: Here's where it gets really interesting. It's like a macabre
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: set of nesting dolls.
• 6:05
  Speaker 2: That's a good way to put it.
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: He kills her. puts her in her own luggage, puts
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: the luggage in his fridge. Right. And then, according to
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: the complaint, in November of 2013, he brings the body
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: of the second victim, Laura Simonson, home.
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: And that changes the dynamic.
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: Totally. At that point, he moves both bodies, still in
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: their suitcases, into the trunk of his car.
• 6:30
  Speaker 2: He just puts them in his car?
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: He's just driving around the Milwaukee suburbs with them in
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: his trunk, like going to the grocery store.
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: And notice what prompts the change in his behavior.
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: What do you mean?
• 6:42
  Speaker 2: He doesn't move them out of guilt or, you know,
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: because his conscience is suddenly weighing on him.
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: Oh, right.
• 6:47
  Speaker 2: He moves them and eventually dumps them on the side
• 6:49
  Speaker 2: of Highway 50, strictly because of environmental physics.
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: The weather.
• 6:54
  Speaker 2: Exactly. He kept them in his trunk until the weather
• 6:56
  Speaker 2: warmed up in the spring and early summer of 2014.
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: And the heat caused the bodies to begin decomposing more rapidly.
• 7:03
  Speaker 2: Producing an odor. So his hand was forced by nature,
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: by the changing of the seasons.
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: Not by a sudden burst of remorse.
• 7:10
  Speaker 2: Not at all.
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: So if the physical evidence points to this incredibly meticulous
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: long-term concealment.
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: I mean, living with a body for a year.
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: Right. And managing the logistics of moving them to a
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: car trunk?
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: How on earth does his defense attorney attempt to explain
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: this away? Like, what was his official statement to the
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: police when they finally caught him?
• 7:31
  Speaker 2: Okay, so the narrative he attempts to establish is that
• 7:33
  Speaker 2: this was all a tragic accident. An accident.
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: An accident. After a year in a fridge. Right.
• 7:39
  Speaker 2: According to the CBS News report, Zelich tells the police
• 7:42
  Speaker 2: that he met both of these women online. Okay. He
• 7:45
  Speaker 2: says he set up consensual dates for sex.
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 7:48
  Speaker 2: And his central defense for the deaths of both Jenny
• 7:51
  Speaker 2: Gomez and Laura Simonson is that they died accidentally during
• 7:54
  Speaker 2: what he called breath play.
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: Which the report describes as a choking game.
• 7:59
  Speaker 2: Exactly. He claims he simply, quote, lost control.
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: Okay. Let's unpack this. He wants to frame this as
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: a dangerous game that went too far.
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: That's his angle.
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: But the specifics of what he confessed to doing in
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: that Kenosha hotel room in August of 2012 completely shatter
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: that narrative.
• 8:15
  Speaker 2: Absolutely. The details are horrifying.
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: He admitted to police that he handcuffed Jenny Gomez.
• 8:20
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: He blindfolded her.
• 8:22
  Speaker 2: He did.
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: He put a ball gag in her mouth and he
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: tied a rope around her neck.
• 8:27
  Speaker 2: We have to really look at the mechanics of those restraints.
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: Because they severely contradict his defense of an accident, right? Yes.
• 8:32
  Speaker 2: Even in the extreme world of BDSM or edge play,
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: which is the context he is trying to hijack for
• 8:38
  Speaker 2: his defense, safety is the foundational paramount requirement.
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: Right. There has to be an emergency brake, a safe word.
• 8:46
  Speaker 2: Exactly. The absolute core rule of these practices is the
• 8:50
  Speaker 2: ability of the participants to communicate distress and stop the
• 8:53
  Speaker 2: activity immediately.
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: So if you can't speak, Right.
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: If speech is impeded, there has to be a physical signal,
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: like dropping a heavy object or tapping a specific way.
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: But look at the anatomy of the trap Zelich built.
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: It's methodical. By applying handcuffs, he completely removed her ability
• 9:12
  Speaker 2: to use her hands to signal distress.
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: She couldn't tap out.
• 9:15
  Speaker 2: She couldn't tap out. She couldn't physically defend herself.
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: Wow.
• 9:19
  Speaker 2: And by applying a blindfold, he eliminated her visual orientation.
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: So she could no longer see his physical cues or
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: assess the immediate threat level in the room. Right.
• 9:29
  Speaker 2: And crucially by forcing a ball gag into her mouth.
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: He systematically removed any possible way for her to vocalize
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: a safe word.
• 9:36
  Speaker 2: To bargain or to cry out for air.
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: You're saying the very act of applying these restraints isn't
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: just a detail of the crime scene.
• 9:43
  Speaker 2: No, it's not just a detail.
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: It's the physical manifestation of his intent. He systematically eliminated
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: every single survival mechanism she had.
• 9:52
  Speaker 2: He silenced her entirely.
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 9:54
  Speaker 2: An accident implies a variable you didn't foresee going wrong.
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: Right, like a knot slips.
• 9:59
  Speaker 2: And not slip. trips, a medical emergency happens.
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: But this isn't that.
• 10:03
  Speaker 2: What the physical evidence shows here is the intentional, methodical
• 10:07
  Speaker 2: removal of the victim's agency.
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: When you remove a person's ability to see, speak, and
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: move while simultaneously placing a rope.
• 10:16
  Speaker 2: Around their neck, You are not engaging in a game
• 10:19
  Speaker 2: where an accident might happen.
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: You are creating a controlled environment where survival is entirely
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: dependent on your whim.
• 10:26
  Speaker 2: Exactly.
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: I just, I can't get past this phrase he used
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: with the police. I lost control.
• 10:31
  Speaker 2: It's such a calculated phrase.
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: Right. Think about the sheer physical time and effort it
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: takes to apply that many restraints to another human being.
• 10:40
  Speaker 2: It takes minutes. It's a process.
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: Handcuffs, blindfolds, ropes... Doesn't the meticulous step-by-step preparation required to
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: put all of that in place completely contradict the idea
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: of suddenly losing control?
• 10:53
  Speaker 2: It absolutely does.
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: Losing control is a crime of passion. It's a sudden
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: strike in an argument.
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: A moment of blind rage.
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: Exactly. You don't accidentally tie a rope around someone's neck
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: after you've already spent 10 minutes making sure they can't see, speak,
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: or move.
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: It is the absolute antithesis of losing control.
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: It's total control.
• 11:11
  Speaker 2: It is the exertion of total, absolute control. The application
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: of each of those restraints requires time, intent, and conscious action.
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: So his defense relies on the police and eventually a
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: jury believing that the fatal outcome was an unintended byproduct
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: of the situation?
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: That's his bet. But the physical reality of the restraints
• 11:31
  Speaker 2: proves that the environment he created was designed to be
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: lethal if he chose not to stop.
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: And he deliberately chose not to stop.
• 11:39
  Speaker 2: He did.
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: So the question naturally becomes, you know, where does a
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: person learn to be this methodical?
• 11:45
  Speaker 2: That's the million-dollar question.
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: Where does someone learn to think about control, physical restraint,
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: and the manipulation of an environment in such a systematic way?
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: Because this is where the story shifts from a horrifying
• 11:56
  Speaker 2: true crime narrative into a profound indictment of institutional failure.
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: This is a crucial pivot for you listening because we
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: are not just looking at a private citizen who snapped. No.
• 12:08
  Speaker 2: We are looking at a man who was trained by
• 12:10
  Speaker 2: the state.
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: The CBS News report details Stephen Zelich's professional background, and
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: it is a massive red flag.
• 12:18
  Speaker 2: Huge.
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: From February of 1989 until August of 2001, Stephen Zelich
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: was a police officer.
• 12:24
  Speaker 2: He worked for the West Allis Police Department.
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: He wore a badge.
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: He carried a gun.
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: He had the full authority of the state behind him.
• 12:31
  Speaker 2: Which means he was intimately familiar with the law.
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: Intimately.
• 12:35
  Speaker 2: And with how evidence is gathered.
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: Right. How crime scenes are processed.
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: And, crucially... with the power dynamics of physical control.
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: But his career didn't end with, you know, a gold
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: watch and a retirement party.
• 12:47
  Speaker 2: Far from it.
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: In 2001, there was an internal investigation into his conduct
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: as an officer.
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: And the findings of that investigation, as reported, are chilling
• 12:56
  Speaker 2: when you look at what he went on to do.
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: What did they find?
• 12:58
  Speaker 2: The investigation found that Zelich was stalking women while he
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: was on duty.
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: On duty.
• 13:05
  Speaker 2: While in uniform. Furthermore, He was using his position as
• 13:08
  Speaker 2: a police officer to get access to their personal information.
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: We have to unpack exactly what that means mechanically, right?
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: He wasn't just following people around.
• 13:17
  Speaker 2: No, he was using the tools provided to him for
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: public safety to hunt.
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: Police officers have access to highly sensitive databases.
• 13:25
  Speaker 2: Like the NCIC or State Department of Transportation databases.
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: With just a license plate number, an officer can pull
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: up a home address.
• 13:32
  Speaker 2: Physical descriptions.
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: Background details. Daily routines.
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: He was utilizing these state-sanctioned tools to target women.
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: It is a profound predatory abuse of power.
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: It really is.
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: But here is the systemic loophole. Here is the absolute
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: failure of institutional accountability that the CBS report highlights.
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: This is the part that makes you angry.
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: He was investigated. They found he was stalking women on
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: duty using police resources.
• 13:58
  Speaker 2: And yet he wasn't fired.
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: Unbelievable. He was allowed to simply resign in August of 2001.
• 14:04
  Speaker 2: This is a devastating administrative practice, often referred to as
• 14:08
  Speaker 2: the quiet resignation.
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: Or the golden parachute.
• 14:12
  Speaker 2: Right. It happens across various institutions, but in law enforcement,
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: the stakes are life and death.
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: Why on earth would a department do that? If you
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: catch a guy stalking women, why not fire him publicly
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: and aggressively?
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: Because formal termination is messy. How so? It often triggers
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: costly union grievances, arbitration hearings, and potential lawsuits. Right.
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: It becomes a whole legal battle.
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: Exactly. And it forces the department to publicly admit they
• 14:37
  Speaker 2: hired and trained a bad actor, which is a public
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: relations nightmare.
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: So by allowing the officer to quietly resign, it saves
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: the department the embarrassment of a public scandal.
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: It avoids the legal fight.
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: And it immediately makes the problem go away for that
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: specific precinct.
• 14:52
  Speaker 2: But the problem doesn't go away for the public.
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: Exactly. It just gets released back into the wild.
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: Precisely. It preserves the institution's image at the direct expense
• 15:00
  Speaker 2: of public safety.
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: Because he was allowed to resign, he avoided formal on-the-record discipline.
• 15:06
  Speaker 2: His personnel file wouldn't reflect a termination for criminal conduct
• 15:10
  Speaker 2: or egregious policy violations.
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: And the mechanical consequence of that loophole is staggering. The
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: report explicitly states the consequence.
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: Which is?
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: Because he resigned and wasn't officially disciplined on his public record,
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: he was able to pass state background checks.
• 15:24
  Speaker 2: Let that sink in.
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: When he was arrested on June 25, 2014, for hiding
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: these bodies.
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: He was actively working as a licensed private security officer.
• 15:35
  Speaker 2: We have to look at how background checks actually function
• 15:37
  Speaker 2: to understand how he slipped through.
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: Because people think background checks catch everything. Right.
• 15:42
  Speaker 2: But background check systems, especially at the state licensing level,
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: are largely siloed databases.
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: Okay, so what are they actually looking for?
• 15:50
  Speaker 2: They look for criminal convictions and formal legal judgments.
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: They don't dig into internal HR drama. Exactly.
• 15:56
  Speaker 2: Exactly. They do not have automatic access to the internal
• 15:59
  Speaker 2: HR files or sealed internal affairs investigations of the municipal
• 16:03
  Speaker 2: police department.
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: So the state licensing board for private security runs his name.
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: And what do they see?
• 16:09
  Speaker 2: They see a man with 12 years of law enforcement experience.
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: No criminal convictions.
• 16:14
  Speaker 2: And a voluntary resignation on his record.
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: On paper, through the lens of a standard background check,
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: he looks like an ideal, highly qualified candidate for private security.
• 16:23
  Speaker 2: The system doesn't flag him because the police department chose
• 16:25
  Speaker 2: to keep the red flag inside their own building.
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: It's like catching a bank teller skimming thousands of dollars
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: from the vault.
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: Catching them right-handed on camera.
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: And instead of calling the police, the bank manager just says, hey,
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: why don't you quietly resign so we don't cause a
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: panic in the lobby?
• 16:40
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: And then you stand there on the sidewalk and watch
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: that exact same person walk across the street and instantly
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: get hired to guard an armored truck.
• 16:48
  Speaker 2: It's maddening. How does a system designed to protect you
• 16:51
  Speaker 2: rely on such fragmented information?
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: It happens because the priority is often institutional self-preservation.
• 16:57
  Speaker 2: This case perfectly illustrates the evolution of a predator, facilitated
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: by a system that refused to hold him accountable.
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: The behavior documented in 2001, stalking women, abusing his authority
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: to gain access to their lives, it's a clear precursor
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: to the murders.
• 17:13
  Speaker 2: It is the exact same psychological drive. The need to monitor... control,
• 17:19
  Speaker 2: and overpower women.
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: He just changed his methodology.
• 17:22
  Speaker 2: When he lost access to the police databases, he pivoted
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: to the internet.
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: He started hunting his victims on online forums.
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: It gives you this terrifying realization about the people in
• 17:33
  Speaker 2: uniforms walking around our daily lives.
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: You see a security badge, and you assume a massive
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: apparatus of vetting is behind it.
• 17:40
  Speaker 2: We are deeply conditioned to trust those symbols.
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: A uniform, a badge, a state license.
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: But this case demonstrates that those symbols of authority can
• 17:49
  Speaker 2: be exploited by individuals who understand how the system works.
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: And they use it as camouflage.
• 17:55
  Speaker 2: Exactly.
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: But despite his background, you know, despite his training as
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: a police officer and his intimate knowledge of how the
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: system works.
• 18:03
  Speaker 2: This house of cards he built over years of deception
• 18:06
  Speaker 2: finally collapsed.
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: And it's deeply ironic. For someone who knew exactly how
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: police investigate crimes, he made amateur, almost staggeringly arrogant mistakes.
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: He left a massive digital and physical trail.
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: He really did. And it was the investigation into his
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: second victim, Laura Simonson, that ultimately broke the entire case
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: wide open.
• 18:27
  Speaker 2: Let's trace how the authorities closed the net around him,
• 18:29
  Speaker 2: because it's a fascinating look at modern investigative work.
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: Laura Simonson, a 37-year-old mother from Minnesota, goes missing.
• 18:37
  Speaker 2: Zelich and Simonson had met online.
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: And they set up a date at a hotel in Rochester, Minnesota.
• 18:42
  Speaker 2: Now, think about the environment of a modern hotel. A
• 18:46
  Speaker 2: former police officer knows exactly what a hotel represents from
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: an investigative standpoint.
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: Right. It's a fortress of surveillance.
• 18:54
  Speaker 2: It is a closed-circuit network of data. You have lobby cameras,
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: hallway cameras, parking lot cameras.
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: Furthermore, you have a massive digital footprint.
• 19:03
  Speaker 2: When you check into a hotel, you leave credit card records.
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: IP logs if you connect to the Wi-Fi.
• 19:09
  Speaker 2: Key card swipe logs that timestamp exactly when a door
• 19:12
  Speaker 2: was opened.
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: And license plate records in the garage.
• 19:16
  Speaker 2: And the police investigating her disappearance very quickly identify Stephen
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: Zelich as a suspect. Why?
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: Because the hotel surveillance video literally caught the two of
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: them checking in together.
• 19:27
  Speaker 2: The sheer hubris of the suspect here is astounding.
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: He knows all of this.
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: He knows hotels are saturated with cameras. Yet, he brings
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: a victim to a heavily surveilled public space to commit
• 19:38
  Speaker 2: a murder.
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: He genuinely believed he was smart enough to beat the surveillance.
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: Or perhaps he just didn't care.
• 19:44
  Speaker 2: He thought he was untouchable.
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: And the investigation didn't stop at the video.
• 19:47
  Speaker 2: No, it didn't.
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: In March of 2014. And remember, this is months before
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: the bodies were even found on the side of the highway.
• 19:53
  Speaker 2: Investigators from Minnesota interviewed Zelich about Laura Simonson's disappearance.
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: So he was officially on their radar.
• 19:59
  Speaker 2: And during that interview, they secured a DNA sample from him.
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: And this is where the intersection of physical evidence and
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: digital tracking becomes the fatal blow to his deception.
• 20:08
  Speaker 2: When the suitcases are finally discovered in June by those
• 20:11
  Speaker 2: highway workers, investigators have the bodies.
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: And crucially, they have the physical evidence from the crime
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: scene that was packed inside those suitcases.
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: The report states that the DNA taken from Stephen Zelich
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: back in March matched the DNA found on the ropes
• 20:26
  Speaker 2: used to bind the first victim, Jenny Gomez.
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: We need to explain how profound that match is. Because
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: gathering DNA from a piece of rope isn't always like,
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: you know, gathering a pool of blood. Right.
• 20:37
  Speaker 2: Investigators are often looking for what is called touch DNA
• 20:40
  Speaker 2: or friction DNA.
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: Explain how that works.
• 20:44
  Speaker 2: When you handle a rough, porous surface like a braided rope,
• 20:48
  Speaker 2: especially if you are applying force.
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: Say, pulling it tight around someone's neck.
• 20:53
  Speaker 2: Yes. The friction scrapes microscopic epithelial cells, skin cells, from
• 20:59
  Speaker 2: your hands and embeds them into the fibers of the rope. Wow. Wow.
• 21:04
  Speaker 2: It is incredibly difficult to completely clean touch DNA off
• 21:08
  Speaker 2: of a porous surface.
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: This is a masterclass in how one victim unknowingly provides
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: the key to achieving justice for another.
• 21:16
  Speaker 2: Think about the sequence of events.
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: Jenny Gomez was killed first in August 2012. She was
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: a 19-year-old from Oregon killed in Wisconsin.
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: He hid her perfectly in his refrigerator for over a year.
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: Without a connection to the area, finding her killer is
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: like finding a needle in a haystack.
• 21:33
  Speaker 2: But then he gets careless with Laura Simonson.
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: The hotel footage from Simonson's case puts Zelich on the radar.
• 21:40
  Speaker 2: It gives the police the legal justification to interview him
• 21:44
  Speaker 2: and obtain that DNA swab.
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: When the bodies are found in the suitcases, they run
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: the touch DNA extracted from the ropes binding Jenny Gomez.
• 21:52
  Speaker 2: And it pings directly to the sample taking during the
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: Simonson investigation.
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: If he hadn't been caught on camera checking into that
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: hotel with Simonson, Gomez's identity and certainly her killer, might
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: have remained a mystery for decades.
• 22:06
  Speaker 2: But I keep coming back to the rope itself. Why
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: keep it?
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: That's the part that blows my mind. He literally kept
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: the physical murder weapon.
• 22:16
  Speaker 2: He packaged Jenny Gamas up with the very evidence of
• 22:18
  Speaker 2: his crime.
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: He didn't burn the rope. He didn't throw it in
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: a river. He didn't bury it.
• 22:22
  Speaker 2: He kept it in the suitcase in his fridge.
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: Did he feel invincible because he had gotten away with
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: his bad behavior back in 2001?
• 22:29
  Speaker 2: I think so.
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: Did that systemic loophole, that quiet resignation, teach him that
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: he could get away with anything?
• 22:36
  Speaker 2: I believe it absolutely shaped his psychology. How? When you
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: cross a major boundary, like using state law enforcement databases
• 22:44
  Speaker 2: to stalk women, and the consequence is just a polite
• 22:48
  Speaker 2: meeting with HR where they ask you to quietly resign,
• 22:52
  Speaker 2: you learn a very dangerous lesson.
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: You learn that the rules don't apply to you.
• 22:56
  Speaker 2: You learn that systems are weak and easily manipulated by
• 23:00
  Speaker 2: those who know how to play the game.
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: So he kept the ropes because he fundamentally did not
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: believe he would ever be caught.
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: He didn't view himself as a criminal who needed to
• 23:08
  Speaker 2: evade capture.
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: He viewed himself as a superior predator who was smarter
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: than the prey and smarter than the detectives chasing him.
• 23:17
  Speaker 2: Keeping the bindings, much like keeping the bodies themselves, is
• 23:20
  Speaker 2: an ultimate expression of dominance and arrogance.
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: It's a trophy.
• 23:24
  Speaker 2: It's absolutely a trophy.
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: But the arrogance finally caught up with him. With the
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: suspect in custody and this mountain of physical and digital
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: evidence gathered, the deep dive naturally moves to the final stage.
• 23:36
  Speaker 2: The legal strategy.
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: Because the justice system now has to ensure he doesn't
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: slip through the cracks a second time. They have to
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: make this stick.
• 23:44
  Speaker 2: And the way the prosecution is approaching the charges is
• 23:46
  Speaker 2: very deliberate and highly strategic.
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: According to the CBS News report, Zelich is facing corpse
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: hiding charges in Walworth County, where the suitcases were actually dumped. Right.
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: But the major development is that he is newly charged
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: with first-degree intentional homicide in Kenosha County for the death
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: of Jenny Gomez.
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: Because that is where the hotel was located where she
• 24:06
  Speaker 2: was killed.
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: And authorities fully expect more homicide charges to follow in
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: Minnesota for the death of Laura Simonson.
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: It is critical to focus on the specific legal language
• 24:15
  Speaker 2: of the charge in Kenosha County. First-degree intentional homicide.
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: Kenosha County District Attorney Robert Zapp is the one making
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: this call. And he deliberately chose the most severe charge possible.
• 24:27
  Speaker 2: It's a bold move.
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: I want to read you exactly what DA Zapf told
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: reporters because it is a powerful indictment of Zelich's entire
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: defense strategy.
• 24:35
  Speaker 2: Let's hear it.
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: Zapf said, quote, killing two women over the span of
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: 15 months under the circumstances in which the defendant acknowledged
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: by gagging them with a ball gag in the mouth,
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: ropes around the neck, hands tied behind their back, blindfold
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: over their face. He may call that accidental. I call
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: it murder.
• 24:52
  Speaker 2: That quote isn't just rhetoric. It is the cornerstone of
• 24:55
  Speaker 2: the prosecution's entire legal strategy.
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: Explain that for us.
• 24:59
  Speaker 2: By charging first-degree intentional homicide instead of manslaughter or reckless
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: homicide or some lesser charge that might account for a
• 25:06
  Speaker 2: game gone wrong, the deity is choosing to take on
• 25:09
  Speaker 2: the absolute highest burden of proof.
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: For those who aren't lawyers, when we talk about proving
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: a crime like this, we're talking about proving men's right,
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: all right? Right.
• 25:17
  Speaker 2: Which translates to guilty mind.
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: You don't just have to prove he physically caused the death.
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: You have to prove he formed the specific psychological intent
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: to kill before the act happened.
• 25:28
  Speaker 2: Exactly. First-degree intentional homicide requires premeditation.
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: It requires a conscious design to affect death.
• 25:36
  Speaker 2: Manslaughter or reckless homicide implies that your actions were incredibly
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: dangerous and disregarded human life, but perhaps you didn't mean
• 25:43
  Speaker 2: to kill them.
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: Zelich thought he was being clever by admitting to the
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: bindings but claiming it was an accident.
• 25:48
  Speaker 2: He thought he was giving the police a plausible narrative
• 25:51
  Speaker 2: of a sex game to secure a lesser charge.
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: He thought he was building himself a life raft.
• 25:56
  Speaker 2: He did. But DA's app is brilliantly weaponizing that very
• 26:00
  Speaker 2: defense against him.
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: How so?
• 26:01
  Speaker 2: The DA is arguing that the extreme nature of the bindings,
• 26:05
  Speaker 2: the ball gag, the handcuffs, the blindfold, the rope, is
• 26:09
  Speaker 2: not evidence of a consensual game.
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: It is the very proof of premeditated intent.
• 26:13
  Speaker 2: Exactly.
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: You do not systematically disable a human being's ability to breathe, see, move,
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: or cry for help unless your intention is to have total,
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: unmitigated power over their life and death.
• 26:24
  Speaker 2: The meticulous, time-consuming application of those restraints is the premeditation. Yes.
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: Think about the incredible legal gamble DA Zapp is taking here.
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: By going for first-degree intentional homicide, he is drawing a
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: line in the sand.
• 26:38
  Speaker 2: It is a massive risk.
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: Is it if a jury sitting in a courtroom somehow
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: gets confused by a slick defense attorney bringing in experts
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: on edge play?
• 26:48
  Speaker 2: Or if they get tangled up in the messy reality
• 26:50
  Speaker 2: of online meetups and consensual dates?
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: Could the top charge backfire? If a jury hesitates on
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: the word intentional, could he walk?
• 26:59
  Speaker 2: That's the inherent unpredictability of juries.
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: Or is the physical reality of a ball gag and
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: hands tied behind the back just too insurmountable for any
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: defense attorney to explain away?
• 27:10
  Speaker 2: There is always a risk when you swing for the
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: top charge. The defense will undoubtedly try to muddy the waters.
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: They'll bring up the online dates.
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: They will emphasize the consensual nature of the initial internet meetups.
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: They will try to introduce reasonable doubt regarding his specific
• 27:26
  Speaker 2: state of mind in those final moments in the hotel room.
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: But DA Zapp is betting heavily on human common sense.
• 27:33
  Speaker 2: He is betting that 12 ordinary people will look at
• 27:36
  Speaker 2: the totality of the circumstances.
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: The extreme bindings.
• 27:40
  Speaker 2: The complete removal of agency.
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: The fact that he did it twice to two different women.
• 27:44
  Speaker 2: And the chilling logistical reality that he lived with a
• 27:48
  Speaker 2: victim's body in his refrigerator for a year.
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: And conclude that this was not an accident.
• 27:54
  Speaker 2: The behavior before, during, and after the crime points unequivocally
• 27:57
  Speaker 2: to a man who knew exactly what he was doing
• 28:00
  Speaker 2: and relished the control.
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: It is a profound and deeply disturbing case.
• 28:04
  Speaker 2: It really is.
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: It's incredibly easy to distance yourself from true crime, you know,
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: to think of it as something that happens in the
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: shadows far away from your own life.
• 28:12
  Speaker 2: But this case shatters the illusion of safety we so
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: often place in professional titles and trusted institutions.
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: It forces a confrontation with uncomfortable realities about how we
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: vet the people we trust.
• 28:25
  Speaker 2: A police badge, a uniform, a state-issued security license. These
• 28:30
  Speaker 2: things are supposed to be symbols of extreme vetting.
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: They are supposed to mean... A person has been checked, cleared,
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: and deemed safe by the state to hold authority over others.
• 28:41
  Speaker 2: But Steven Zelich proves that those symbols can be entirely hollow.
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: They do not negate the profound dangers of meeting strangers online.
• 28:50
  Speaker 2: And they certainly don't guarantee that the person behind the
• 28:52
  Speaker 2: license isn't a predator actively exploiting the system.
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: It is a stark reminder of the absolute necessity for
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: institutional transparency and accountability.
• 29:02
  Speaker 2: Because when systems fail to discipline their own.
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: When a police department chooses a quiet resignation over a
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: public documented firing simply to save face and avoid a lawsuit.
• 29:13
  Speaker 2: The problem isn't solved. It is just relocated into the
• 29:16
  Speaker 2: civilian population.
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: And in this case, when the system failed to flag
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: a predator, the public paid the ultimate devastating price.
• 29:24
  Speaker 2: The lives of Jenny Gomez and Laura Simonson were stolen
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: because a dangerous man was allowed to maintain a state-sanctioned
• 29:30
  Speaker 2: facade of normalcy.
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: As we wrap up our analysis of this CBS report,
• 29:35
  Speaker 1: there is one final, incredibly provocative detail I want to
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: leave you with.
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: A detail that lingers just beneath the surface of the
• 29:42
  Speaker 2: timeline we've discussed today.
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: It is a chilling realization drawn directly from the dates
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: in the text. Let's look at the timeline of his
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: life one more time.
• 29:53
  Speaker 2: Stephen Zelich walked away from his police badge under active
• 29:56
  Speaker 2: investigation for stalking women In August of 2001.
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: August 2001.
• 30:01
  Speaker 2: And according to the criminal complaint, he met his first
• 30:04
  Speaker 2: known murder victim, Jenny Gomez, online in August of 2012.
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: August 2001 to August 2012.
• 30:13
  Speaker 2: That leaves an 11-year void.
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: An 11-year gap.
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: You have a man who was already documented stalking women
• 30:20
  Speaker 2: in 2001.
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: A man who retained a private security license, giving him
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: continuous access and authority.
• 30:27
  Speaker 2: And a man who possessed the chilling, cold-blooded capability to
• 30:30
  Speaker 2: methodically murder a woman, fold her into a suitcase, and
• 30:34
  Speaker 2: keep her in his kitchen refrigerator for months without breaking
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: a sweat.
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: The question isn't just how he was finally caught in
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: 2014 by a highway mowing crew. The real question, the
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: thought that is truly terrifying to consider, is what exactly
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: was he doing during those missing 11 years?
• 30:51
  Speaker 2: A predator with that level of meticulous control? That level
• 30:55
  Speaker 2: of psychological compartmentalization doesn't usually just lay dormant for a decade.
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: It is highly improbable that his escalation to violence began
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: abruptly in 2012 out of nowhere.
• 31:06
  Speaker 2: The mechanics of his behavior suggest a long, practiced evolution.
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: When we look at a case like this, we want
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: a clean narrative.
• 31:14
  Speaker 2: We want to believe that when we catch the monster,
• 31:16
  Speaker 2: we have seen the full extent of the damage.
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: We want to close the book.
• 31:20
  Speaker 2: But as we look at those 11 missing years, we
• 31:22
  Speaker 2: are forced to admit that the record is incomplete.
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: We only know what the evidence forced into the light.
• 31:27
  Speaker 2: And we may never truly know what else is hiding
• 31:30
  Speaker 2: in the dark.
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: Thanks for joining us as we explored the depths of
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: this case. We'll see you next time.