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221. “Brothers” - The Case of Tina Livernash Heins - Mayport, Florida · Least of These

0:02
[SPEAKER_00]: Welcome to least of these, where I cover the cases that need it most, because every life matters and everyone deserves justice.
0:10
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm your host Leah D. and today I'll be covering the case of Tina Livernaish Hines and Mayport, Florida.
0:16
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's get right to it.
0:55
[SPEAKER_00]: In 1994, Tina Levernash Heinz Life was just beginning.
1:00
[SPEAKER_00]: She was a 20-year-old first semester sophomore at UW-Stout University and had enrolled in a cooperative education program.
1:08
[SPEAKER_00]: The program allowed students to earn credit while working in a position related to their particular field of study.
1:14
[SPEAKER_00]: For Tina, that was hospitality and tourism management.
1:18
[SPEAKER_00]: So when she left her hometown of Wisconsin Rapids and headed to Mayport, which is a community in Jacksonville, Florida, she continued working towards her degree by taking a job at the sea turtle and in restaurant and nearby Atlantic Beach, all this according to Done County News.
1:35
[SPEAKER_00]: Anyhow, prospects for a new career wasn't the only new thing in Tina's life.
1:41
[SPEAKER_00]: She also had a new husband.
1:44
[SPEAKER_00]: On December 30th of 1993, Tina had married 21-year-old Jeremy Hines and a quick courtroom ceremony.
1:52
[SPEAKER_00]: Jeremy was in the United States Navy, which is what had brought the couple to Mayport.
1:57
[SPEAKER_00]: He was stationed at Mayport Naval Station aboard the USS Le Tacole.
2:03
[SPEAKER_00]: The Hines lived in Heron Point Apartments, which were conveniently located near the Naval
2:09
[SPEAKER_00]: The newlyweeds were already expecting their first child, Tena was pregnant and due in October of 1994.
2:15
[SPEAKER_00]: A new marriage, new apartment, and a baby on the way was a lot to take in all at once, and of course with Jeremy being active duty in the Navy, there were times he'd be away at sea and unable to be home with Tena.
2:31
[SPEAKER_00]: At the same time, back home in Wisconsin, Jeremy's 19-year-old brother Chad had landed himself in a little bit of trouble.
2:40
[SPEAKER_00]: It all started several years prior in 1992 when according to records obtained by the Daily Tribune, Chad was charged with sexual assault after his 17-year-old girlfriend ended up pregnant.
2:52
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, if you do the math, Chad himself was either 17 or 18, but for whatever reason he was charged, likely because she was a minor at the time, and this was before Romeo and Juliet laws were on the books, which of course were enacted for cases just like this.
3:09
[SPEAKER_00]: Ultimately, investigators determined that the sexual interactions between Chad and his girlfriend were consensual, and prosecutors deferred the charges for a year and eventually ended up dropping them all together.
3:20
[SPEAKER_00]: At some point Chad married the girlfriend and they had two children in total together.
3:26
[SPEAKER_00]: But Chad's troubles didn't end there.
3:29
[SPEAKER_00]: The following year so in 1993, he was convicted of driving a motor vehicle without the owner's consent and also retail theft, apparently for shoplifting two packs of cigarettes.
3:41
[SPEAKER_00]: It seemed Chad was struggling to find his way in life.
3:45
[SPEAKER_00]: He was on probation for the 1993 charges when his older brother Jeremy came up with what seemed like a perfect plan.
3:52
[SPEAKER_00]: Chad could come and stay with him in Tena and Mayport.
3:55
[SPEAKER_00]: For Chad, it would be a fresh start in a new place.
3:58
[SPEAKER_00]: And Bertina, she'd have someone around the house to help during the times Jeremy was at sea, or working long hours on the ship.
4:06
[SPEAKER_00]: Everything seemed to be going along just fine, but all that changed just after 6am on April 17, 1994, when Chad placed a frantic call to 911.
4:18
[SPEAKER_00]: Chad was sobbing as he begged for help, stating to the dispatcher, helped me.
4:23
[SPEAKER_00]: There's been a murder here.
4:49
[SPEAKER_00]: Moments after Chad placed that call to 911, officers arrived to a horrific scene.
4:55
[SPEAKER_00]: 20-year-old Tina Heinz, who was four months pregnant by that time, was found in a pool of blood in the bedroom.
5:01
[SPEAKER_00]: Tina had been stabbed multiple times.
5:05
[SPEAKER_00]: Her throat had been cut and a pillow case had been placed over her head.
5:08
[SPEAKER_00]: She was naked from the waist down, and it was clear that she had been sexually assaulted.
5:14
[SPEAKER_00]: Unfortunately, there was nothing anyone could do for Tina or her unborn child.
5:20
[SPEAKER_00]: They were pronounced dead at the scene.
5:22
[SPEAKER_00]: The medical examiner would later determine that Tina had been stabbed at least 27 times, and she had tried to fight off her attacker.
5:31
[SPEAKER_00]: Tina had multiple defensive wounds to her hands and arms.
5:35
[SPEAKER_00]: The murder weapon had obviously been a knife, but the knife used to murder Tina wasn't found in the apartment.
5:41
[SPEAKER_00]: There was also no sign of forced entry and nothing had been stolen.
5:45
[SPEAKER_00]: As investigators processed the scene and collected what evidence they could, they turned to the only living witness, and that was Chad Hines, Tina's brother-in-law.
5:56
[SPEAKER_00]: He told police that his brother Jeremy was on duty aboard the USS Lady Golf that night, and he, he being Chad, had been out drinking.
6:05
[SPEAKER_00]: He had drank several large beers, and then in around 1230 AM, he drove back to the apartment and passed out on the couch.
6:12
[SPEAKER_00]: A few hours later, around 230 AM, he heard Tina coming back into the apartment, but he wasn't fully awake due to all that drinking.
6:26
[SPEAKER_00]: screaming fire alarms and the smell of smoke woke him up.
6:30
[SPEAKER_00]: He told police that the front door of the apartment was wide open.
6:33
[SPEAKER_00]: Not only had Tina been murdered, but multiple fires had been set inside the apartment.
6:39
[SPEAKER_00]: The daily tribune reported that the actual sofa where Chad was sleeping had been set ablaze, and there were not one, not two, but three small fires burning in the living room in kitchen.
6:52
[SPEAKER_00]: Chad claimed he put the fires out, disabled the smoke alarm, and went to go check on Tina, and that's when he found her in the bedroom covered in blood.
7:01
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, this was an apartment, and it wasn't all that big.
7:06
[SPEAKER_00]: According to what Chad told police, he was asleep only a few feet away from where a violent murder had occurred, and three separate fires had been set.
7:14
[SPEAKER_00]: One on the couch he was sleeping on, but somehow he had slept through it all.
7:19
[SPEAKER_00]: Investigators had a hard time buying that story.
7:23
[SPEAKER_00]: But I mean, do you blame them?
7:26
[SPEAKER_00]: Again, there was no sign of forced entry, nothing had been taken from the apartment, and Chad claimed he was only feet away when a violent murder had occurred in the next room.
7:35
[SPEAKER_00]: And he had heard nothing?
7:39
[SPEAKER_00]: In addition to all of that, a police official told the Daily Tribune that Chad had a blister on his hand that may have indicated he had been using a butane lighter for a prolonged period of time.
7:50
[SPEAKER_00]: It seemed like a cut and dry case.
7:53
[SPEAKER_00]: Police believe Chad was the one who had murdered Tina and set the fires to destroy evidence.
7:59
[SPEAKER_00]: Days after Tina was murdered, Chad Hines was arrested and charged with murder and sexual assault.
8:05
[SPEAKER_00]: He pled not guilty and was held in the Duball County jail awaiting trial.
8:10
[SPEAKER_00]: But Chad Hines adamantly denied murdering Tina, and as he awaited trial, he seemed to point the finger at his older brother Jeremy, Tina's husband.
8:20
[SPEAKER_00]: The Heinz Brothers' mother Dorothy spoke to the Daily Tribune and revealed that the two brothers had last spoken March of 1995 when Jeremy visited Chad and Jail and was questioned by attorneys.
8:32
[SPEAKER_00]: She went on to say that each brother suspected the other, telling the outlet that Jeremy had called her recently and said, I know Chad did it.
8:42
[SPEAKER_00]: So Jeremy thought it was Chad and Chad thought Jeremy had something to do with it, but what the two brothers thought didn't matter in the grand scheme of things.
8:51
[SPEAKER_00]: Police and prosecutors believed it was Chad and Chad alone, so much so that the state was seeking the death penalty.
8:58
[SPEAKER_00]: In December of 1996, Chad Heinz murder trial began.
9:03
[SPEAKER_00]: The Daily Tribune reported heavily on the proceedings.
9:08
[SPEAKER_00]: Prosecutor Steve Blegslow told the jury that all of the evidence pointed only to Chad Heinz, who was alone in the apartment with Tina that night, and theorized that the reason he had murdered her all came down to lust, stating it's about this defendant sexual desire for his brother's wife.
9:26
[SPEAKER_00]: He went on to say that there could be no other reason, Tina had been sexually assaulted and there was no sign of an intruder, no forced entry and nothing had been taken.
9:36
[SPEAKER_00]: The prosecution's theory was that Chad had assaulted Tina, murdered her, and then left the apartment with the murder weapon in hand.
9:44
[SPEAKER_00]: Through it and an nearby swamp took a shower to clean up and change clothes.
9:48
[SPEAKER_00]: Set the fires, put the fires out, and then called 911.
9:53
[SPEAKER_00]: And then there were the confessions, two jailhouse informants testified and told the jury that Chad had spontaneously confessed that he was the one who had murdered Tina while he was in jail.
10:04
[SPEAKER_00]: The Daytona Beach News Journal would later report that a third and make came forward who said that he heard those two Joe House informants plotting to lie against Chad.
10:14
[SPEAKER_00]: You know what they say.
10:15
[SPEAKER_00]: There's no honor among thieves.
10:18
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm not exactly sure if this third end made came forward before or after trial.
10:23
[SPEAKER_00]: The reporting wasn't that clear.
10:24
[SPEAKER_00]: And in the end, it wasn't that important either.
10:27
[SPEAKER_00]: Because the prosecution claimed Chad had not only confessed to two inmates, he had confessed to his brother Jeremy when they first saw each other after Tina's murder.
10:37
[SPEAKER_00]: According to Jeremy's testimony, Chad stated,
10:43
[SPEAKER_00]: Of course, prosecutors believe this was a confession, but the defense said that this was no confession at all, just an apology to his brother for failing to protect Tina.
10:54
[SPEAKER_00]: It seemed when Jeremy testified he agreed more so with the defense, despite the fact that he had previously told his mother that he knew Chad had murdered his wife.
11:04
[SPEAKER_00]: The Daily Citizen reported that Jeremy Heinz testified that Chad cried the first time they saw each other after the murder, and that he thought the statement Chad had made was more of an apology and less of a confession.
11:16
[SPEAKER_00]: And when it came to DNA evidence, DNA evidence had been found at the scene.
11:22
[SPEAKER_00]: Three hairs had been collected from Tina's body, and testimony revealed that all three of those hairs came from one person.
11:29
[SPEAKER_00]: That person was not Tina Hines, and it also wasn't either of the Hines' brothers.
11:36
[SPEAKER_00]: It wasn't Jeremy's and it wasn't Chats.
11:39
[SPEAKER_00]: Prosecutors didn't know who the hair was belonged to.
11:43
[SPEAKER_00]: And as I'm here telling you this story, that seems like pretty important evidence.
11:48
[SPEAKER_00]: But back in 1994, DNA was in its infancy.
11:52
[SPEAKER_00]: Of course, the technology we have today didn't exist.
11:55
[SPEAKER_00]: And DNA wasn't understood in the way it is now.
11:58
[SPEAKER_00]: Not by the general public, not by juries and not even by police, prosecutors, defense attorneys, or DNA analysts.
12:06
[SPEAKER_00]: The testimony regarding the Harris found on Tina's body was deemed to be faulty at best because the analyst who testified in this case failed to give statistics for what person of the population would match the hairs.
12:20
[SPEAKER_00]: So they knew it didn't belong to Chad, but there was no indication given in testimony as to the small percentage of the population whom it could have belonged to.
12:28
[SPEAKER_00]: And therefore the fact that unknown DNA had been found at the crime scene on the victim's body didn't carry the weight that it would in a modern day courtroom with the knowledge and understanding we have today of DNA evidence.
12:43
[SPEAKER_00]: The defense claimed they didn't know who had killed Tina, but whoever it was, it wasn't Chad Heinz, and they started by poking holes in the prosecution's theory.
12:52
[SPEAKER_00]: Like how if Chad was the one that had murdered Tina, there was no murder weapon found at the scene.
12:59
[SPEAKER_00]: Or the fact that though Tina had fought for her life, Chad didn't have a scratch on him.
13:04
[SPEAKER_00]: Tina had been stabbed 27 times and she had defensive wounds on her body.
13:10
[SPEAKER_00]: Clearly she had fought her attacker, but when police arrived that night, Chad didn't have a scratch on him.
13:16
[SPEAKER_00]: There was no blood on his clothes and no indication that he had been in an altercation.
13:21
[SPEAKER_00]: Of course, the prosecution had the theory of the swamp and the shower and the clean clothes.
13:27
[SPEAKER_00]: But there was no evidence Chad had been out wandering around in the swamp, or showered and changed into clean clothes.
13:34
[SPEAKER_00]: No bloody, your freshly laundered clothes were found at the apartment.
13:39
[SPEAKER_00]: Chad had fully cooperated with homicide investigators from the very beginning.
13:43
[SPEAKER_00]: He had voluntarily given them hair and blood samples and anything else they asked of him and sat for hours giving interviews.
13:52
[SPEAKER_00]: When did he have time to discard all of this evidence?
13:56
[SPEAKER_00]: As far as there being no forced entry into the apartment, the defense contended that that could be easily explained.
14:03
[SPEAKER_00]: There was a spare key tucked away in an outdoor light fixture, and plenty of people that knew Tina and Jeremy knew this.
14:11
[SPEAKER_00]: testimony was also presented that the reason Chad had no woken when Tina was attacked was because he had a sleep disorder and was very difficult to rouse, especially after he had been drinking, as he had been on the night of the crime.
14:25
[SPEAKER_00]: The defense played the 911 call for the jury.
14:28
[SPEAKER_00]: Chad was distraught and sobbing as he frantically begged for help.
14:32
[SPEAKER_00]: Stating helped me, there's been a murder here.
14:35
[SPEAKER_00]: Chad told dispatchers the same story he took the stand to tell the jury in his own defense.
14:41
[SPEAKER_00]: Chad denied sexually assaulting and stabbing Tina.
14:44
[SPEAKER_00]: According to News4Jack's Chad stated, there ain't no way I could have did it, I loved her too much.
14:51
[SPEAKER_00]: He repeated the same story he told anyone who would listen all along, that he drank several large beers, drove home and passed out on the couch.
15:00
[SPEAKER_00]: He heard Tina come home at around 2.30, but didn't wake up until 5.45 a.m. with the sound of the fire alarms.
15:07
[SPEAKER_00]: When he did, he put out the three fires and went to check on Tina, found her deceased and called 911.
15:15
[SPEAKER_00]: And then he said something that shocked the courtroom, while he said he didn't believe his brother and Tina's husband Jeremy was the one who had physically stabbed her.
15:23
[SPEAKER_00]: He said that he thought Jeremy had something to do with her murder, and that Tina and Jeremy fought constantly.
15:30
[SPEAKER_00]: Chad found a convenient that on the 19th was attack, Jeremy was safe and sound on the ship.
15:37
[SPEAKER_00]: But just like police and prosecutors, the jury didn't believe Chad's story.
15:41
[SPEAKER_00]: And on December 20, 1996, Chad Hines was convicted of first-degree murder and attempted sexual battery.
15:49
[SPEAKER_00]: He avoided the death penalty and was sentenced to life in prison, and that should be where the story ends, where I sign off and tell you how to be good to each other.
15:59
[SPEAKER_00]: But this is not the end of the story far from it.
16:29
[SPEAKER_00]: Despite his conviction, Chad Heinz maintained his innocence, which I mean most of them do don't they.
16:37
[SPEAKER_00]: But with Chad, it was different.
16:39
[SPEAKER_00]: He had always maintained his innocence, and it was true.
16:42
[SPEAKER_00]: He had cooperated fully with police, telling them he'd do anything to prove his innocence, and that didn't change after his conviction.
16:50
[SPEAKER_00]: And then there was that whole thing about the
16:57
[SPEAKER_00]: From behind bars, Chad fought to prove his innocence, and as Chad fought, major advancements were made in DNA technology.
17:04
[SPEAKER_00]: Five years after his conviction in 2001, Chad wrote a letter to the New York-based innocence project.
17:11
[SPEAKER_00]: After reviewing his case, a New York innocence project along with the Florida-based branch, agreed to take Chad's case and an appeal was filed.
17:20
[SPEAKER_00]: As it turned out more DNA evidence than was presented at trial had been collected and preserved from the crime scene.
17:26
[SPEAKER_00]: In addition to the hairs, there were skin cells collected at autopsy from under Tina's fingernails and seamen found on the bedsheets.
17:35
[SPEAKER_00]: So in 2003, the Innocence Project, along with Chad's Defense Attorney Robert Beckham, who worked alongside the project Pro Bono on Chad's behalf.
17:50
[SPEAKER_00]: Remember, Tina had fought for her life, and the DNA of her assailant had been there all long.
17:56
[SPEAKER_00]: The testing showed that the DNA underneath Tina's fingernails was male, but it didn't match Jeremy or chat hines.
18:04
[SPEAKER_00]: Robert Beckham filed a motion to had the unknown male DNA found underneath Tina's fingernails compared to the three Harris found on Tina's body.
18:12
[SPEAKER_00]: The three hairs shown at trial to belong to that unknown male.
18:16
[SPEAKER_00]: And in 2005, that testing was complete.
18:19
[SPEAKER_00]: And it showed that the profile from the hairs was consistent with the DNA underneath her fingernails.
18:25
[SPEAKER_00]: Long story short, all of the DNA belonged to one single unknown male.
18:30
[SPEAKER_00]: Pretty compelling, right?
18:33
[SPEAKER_00]: But that wasn't all.
18:35
[SPEAKER_00]: During the appeals process, Chattine's team also learned that a fingerprint had been discovered before trial on the faucet of the bloodstained sink in the Heinz bathroom.
18:45
[SPEAKER_00]: We're according to the Innocence Project, it was undisputed that the perpetrator had attempted to clean up at that sink after the murder.
18:53
[SPEAKER_00]: Anyhow, both police and prosecutors apparently knew before a trial that this print came from someone other than Chad Hines, Lisa or Jeremy, but the jury was never informed of the print and it's unclear whether Hines defense attorney a trial knew either.
19:08
[SPEAKER_00]: It was looking like this bloody fingerprint was omitted from evidence for a reason.
19:13
[SPEAKER_00]: I'll let you come to your own conclusion on why.
19:17
[SPEAKER_00]: But it went a step further, while you think DNA testing with new technology and such a horrific murder case would be welcomed by the prosecutor, it wasn't.
19:27
[SPEAKER_00]: The Naples Daily Herald reported that the prosecutor's office fought against testing the DNA.
19:33
[SPEAKER_00]: But it was a fight they ultimately lost, and based on the new evidence, Duval Circuit Judge L. Page Haddock vacated Chad Hines conviction, and ruled that he should get a new trial.
19:43
[SPEAKER_00]: His conviction had been vacated, however he remained behind bars on a $1 million bail awaiting that new trial.
19:52
[SPEAKER_00]: But for the Innocence Project, Chad Hines and Justice, this was a huge win.
19:57
[SPEAKER_00]: As Chad and his team began to prepare for a retrial, the Innocence Project had further DNA testing done on the Seaman found on Tina's bedsheets.
20:07
[SPEAKER_00]: In November of 2007, that DNA testing was done.
20:10
[SPEAKER_00]: The result showed that the Seaman found on the bedsheets came from the same unidentified male as the hairs and the skin cells found on her Tina's fingernails.
20:20
[SPEAKER_00]: If there was any doubt that this unidentified male had sexually assaulted in murder Tina,
20:28
[SPEAKER_00]: but who was he?
20:29
[SPEAKER_00]: According to DNA solves, an STR profile was developed from that DNA, and that profile was ran through codice, however, no match was found.
20:40
[SPEAKER_00]: Whoever he was, they knew for certain that he wasn't either of the Heinz Brothers.
20:46
[SPEAKER_00]: And with that, then State Attorney Harry Shorestein agreed not to prosecute Chad Heinz again, as long as Chad waved his right to a speedy trial and the statute of limitations.
20:57
[SPEAKER_00]: Waving his rights would allow prosecutors the chance to reopen the case.
21:01
[SPEAKER_00]: If new evidence ever came to light that they felt implicated Chad, with no time limit on when he could be charged.
21:09
[SPEAKER_00]: Chad was 19 years old when he walked into the Duball County jail.
21:13
[SPEAKER_00]: He served three years there waiting trial and then after his conviction served ten years in prison.
21:19
[SPEAKER_00]: He was 19 when he walked in and 33 years old when he walked out the doors a free man.
21:25
[SPEAKER_00]: Even after everything he had been through, he still had some grace for the system that led to his conviction.
21:32
[SPEAKER_00]: At his release, he spoke to the Daily Citizen and said, it, speaking of the system, it didn't work in the beginning, but it worked at the end.
21:41
[SPEAKER_00]: I made it one day at a time and watched my back.
21:43
[SPEAKER_00]: I just want to go home to my family and get out of the state of Florida.
21:47
[SPEAKER_00]: He bulked a flight to Wisconsin as soon as he could.
21:51
[SPEAKER_00]: The Palm Beach Post reported that on the day he was released, Chad was wearing a green bay Packers jersey and joked with the press that the only thing that hadn't changed during his incarceration was that Brett Farve was still the Packers quarterback.
22:05
[SPEAKER_00]: After Chad's exoneration, investigators were back to square one.
22:10
[SPEAKER_00]: Sure, Chad was innocent, the DNA proved it.
22:13
[SPEAKER_00]: But someone had brutally murdered Tina and her unborn child, and had evaded justice as an innocent man set behind bars.
22:22
[SPEAKER_00]: According to a press conference held by the State Attorney, the DNA profile of the unknown male was ran through codus weekly.
22:34
[SPEAKER_00]: those weeks turned in a month and those months into years and those years into a decade when the Florida office for the State Attorney began to re-examine the case in 2017.
22:44
[SPEAKER_00]: And by 2021, what little DNA was left was sent to a laboratory and Woodland's Texas.
22:52
[SPEAKER_00]: You might have heard of it before.
22:54
[SPEAKER_00]: It was a little laboratory known as authorum labs.
22:57
[SPEAKER_00]: They've helped solve thousands of cases and they'd solved this one too.
23:02
[SPEAKER_00]: This case would become the 45th case, authorum help solve in the state of Florida.
23:35
[SPEAKER_00]: Forensic scientists that authorim labs received the DNA collected from the scene of Tina Heins murder.
23:41
[SPEAKER_00]: That little bit of DNA was enough for a successful extraction, and a forensic grade genome sequencing was used to build a DNA profile.
23:49
[SPEAKER_00]: Authorim's genetic genealogists took it over from there and used a profile and a genetic genealogy search.
23:57
[SPEAKER_00]: They worked alongside investigators and identified potential relatives of the suspect.
24:03
[SPEAKER_00]: Reference samples from one of those relatives was compared to the DNA profile of the unidentified suspect.
24:09
[SPEAKER_00]: And being go, investigators had found their guy.
24:12
[SPEAKER_00]: Four years after the DNA had been sent to authorum, on September 25th, 2025, Florida State Attorney Melissa Nelson held a press conference to announce breaking developments in the case.
24:27
[SPEAKER_01]: When I returned to the state attorney's office in 2017, our goal to identify the man under Tina's nails on her body and in her sheets was a priority.
24:37
[SPEAKER_01]: In 2021, after the breakthrough in the Golden State Killer case, we sent a recommendation of the Florida Department of Law Enforcement what little DNA remained in this case to a lab in Texas whose work was known to be highly successful in the identification of individual profiles
24:56
[SPEAKER_01]: which was the case here.
24:58
[SPEAKER_01]: A profile was developed in the lab to get genetic genealogy searches.
25:02
[SPEAKER_01]: Through genetic genealogy, often labs identified a likely match.
25:07
[SPEAKER_01]: Our detectives and forensic experts can firm the match.
25:11
[SPEAKER_01]: Michael Shane Zeeblur.
25:14
[SPEAKER_01]: Michael Shane Zeeblur is now 52 years old.
25:18
[SPEAKER_01]: He was living with his mother outside of Atlanta, Georgia.
25:21
[SPEAKER_01]: He is a retired merchant marine.
25:24
[SPEAKER_01]: We learned that in 1994, Michael Ziegler was here in the Navy stationed at Mayport aboard the USS Lady Gulf.
25:33
[SPEAKER_01]: We also learned this.
25:35
[SPEAKER_01]: He was on a stranger to Tina Hines.
25:38
[SPEAKER_01]: Michael Ziegler was her husband, Jeremy's very close friend.
25:41
[SPEAKER_01]: In fact, he stood with this at their courthouse wedding just five months before Tina was killed.
25:47
[SPEAKER_01]: And they're difficult to see.
25:48
[SPEAKER_01]: He's on the far right there, a picture taken
25:53
[SPEAKER_01]: For three decades, Ziegler remained under the radar, but is biological footprint endured.
25:59
[SPEAKER_01]: And with persistence and advancements in science, we finally caught up to him and caught him.
26:07
[SPEAKER_01]: On August 28th, this past year, this year, Alan Mizrahi presented this case to a Duball County grand jury, the grand jury and died at Michael Ziegler for the first degree murder and sexual battery of Tina Hines on September 4th.
26:21
[SPEAKER_01]: Thanks to the good work of the Georgia Bureau of Investigations, the Clayton and Newton County's Sheriff's Office, the U.S.
26:29
[SPEAKER_01]: Marshals Regional Fugitive Task Force, and the Georgia State Coral Patrol.
26:33
[SPEAKER_01]: His Eglur was arrested near his home and coming to Georgia without incident.
26:38
[SPEAKER_01]: He was returned here last week to Jacksonville, and today he sits in the Dubel County Jail without bond.
26:45
[SPEAKER_00]: 30 years after Tina Heinz had been murdered, police finally had her alleged killer in custody.
26:50
[SPEAKER_00]: 52-year-old Michael Shane Ziegler had stood as a witness at the marriage of his close friend and shipmate five months before he brutally murdered the woman he was standing next to.
27:02
[SPEAKER_00]: Jeremy Hines had suspected his brother, and it turned out he was right in a way.
27:08
[SPEAKER_00]: His biological brother wasn't the killer, but his shipmate, his brother in arms, the one he had served alongside, was the one who had taken away not only his wife, but what would have been his firstborn child.
27:22
[SPEAKER_00]: And for three decades, he had flown under the radar, his name never surfaced during the earlier investigations, likely because Jeremy nor anyone else had any reason to suspect Ziegler was involved.
27:35
[SPEAKER_00]: This betrayal was on a whole other level.
27:38
[SPEAKER_00]: Michael Ziegler had murdered Tina Hines and then just went on with his life.
27:44
[SPEAKER_00]: After his time in the Navy, he became a merchant marine, ultimately retired from that job, and at some point moved to Covington, Georgia, which is just outside of Atlanta with his mother.
27:55
[SPEAKER_00]: A secret grand jury had indicted him for murder and sexual assault on August 28, 2025.
28:01
[SPEAKER_00]: According to police documents one week later on September 4th at approximately 1045 AM, a traffic stop was conducted in Covington, Georgia, and he was taken into custody without incident and transported to the Newton County jail.
28:18
[SPEAKER_00]: The following day he waved his right to an extradition hearing, and a few days later he was extradited from Newton County to Jacksonville, Florida, where he is still currently awaiting his trial at the John E. Good Pre-Trial Detention Facility.
28:32
[SPEAKER_00]: He has entered a plea of not guilty.
28:36
[SPEAKER_00]: Chad Hines is still reportedly living in Wisconsin,
28:40
[SPEAKER_00]: The family of Tina Levernash Heinz still waits for true justice to be served.
28:46
[SPEAKER_00]: At 20, Tina was robbed of everything.
28:49
[SPEAKER_00]: Her career, motherhood, the life goal she was working so hard to achieve.
28:55
[SPEAKER_00]: It's beyond time that Tina-Liber Nash Heinz gets the true justice she deserves.
29:01
[SPEAKER_00]: Over the years her family has honored her memory through the Tina-Liber Nash Memorial Scholarship, which helps low-income students attend the assumption Catholic school Tina once attended.
29:12
[SPEAKER_00]: A year before Michael Ziegler was charged with murder, the USS Laitakel was decommissioned in a ceremony on board Naval Station Norfolk.
29:21
[SPEAKER_00]: The ship, a Tikuranda class-guided missile cruiser, was in service for 37 years, and led the way an air defense throughout 17 deployments around the world.
29:32
[SPEAKER_00]: She now sits still in a shipyard in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, her whole heavy-wae secrets.
29:38
[SPEAKER_00]: Once a symbol of strength and service, the late eagle was also unknowingly the backdrop to a devastating betrayal.
29:45
[SPEAKER_00]: While she sailed the seas under the banner of duty and honor, a crime was unraveling in the shadows of her crew, a murder that would remain unsolved for decades.
29:56
[SPEAKER_00]: She was more than just a warship, for a time she was the silent center of a murder investigation that would span generations, and like so many things in this story, she carried truth beneath the surface, truth that only time, science and perseverance finally brought to light.
30:15
[SPEAKER_00]: and that my friends is all I've got for this week.
30:17
[SPEAKER_00]: I'll be sure to keep you all updated when Michael Ziegler goes to trial.
30:22
[SPEAKER_00]: As always, be sure to join me next Thursday, same time, same place for an all new episode.
30:28
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30:34
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30:38
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30:44
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30:51
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30:55
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for listening.
30:57
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for caring.
30:58
[SPEAKER_00]: If you know something, say something.
31:47
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, hey there, I am so glad you stuck around.
31:50
[SPEAKER_00]: This case is heartbreaking for so many reasons.
31:54
[SPEAKER_00]: Tina was pregnant and 20 and a newlywed and she had her whole life ahead of her.
32:00
[SPEAKER_00]: And as it always does, her murder shattered not only her family's life and Jeremy's life, it shattered the bond between brothers.
32:10
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, you really can't blame Jeremy.
32:12
[SPEAKER_00]: His brother was home.
32:15
[SPEAKER_00]: It's hard to believe that Chad could have slept through such a brutal attack, but everything points to that being the case.
32:22
[SPEAKER_00]: And for Chad, I mean, it had to somewhat feel like a setup, you can see how they both got it in their minds and started pointing the finger at each other.
32:32
[SPEAKER_00]: It seems they had a good relationship before the murder.
32:36
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, Jeremy was willing to have Chad move in and trusted him to be there with his pregnant wife.
32:43
[SPEAKER_00]: It's just a devastating and all along it was his shipmate.
32:48
[SPEAKER_00]: most of y'all know that my husband served 20 years in the military.
32:51
[SPEAKER_00]: And I can tell you that they're definitely was also a high-to-key at my house over those years and so many marines came to stay at our house and we never gave it a second thought.
33:03
[SPEAKER_00]: There's a brotherhood that comes with serving in the military and you never expected to be.
33:07
[SPEAKER_00]: your shipmate, especially in the Navy because they're like stuck on the boat all the time or the submarine or, you know, whatever they're on, they're stuck there with each other and it doesn't take long for you to get close.
33:21
[SPEAKER_00]: Like I said in the episode, the betrayal is just on another level.
33:26
[SPEAKER_00]: and it's heartbreaking that evidence was ignored.
33:28
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, the fact that three hairs were found on her body and they were not Jeremy's and they were not chads and that wasn't investigated further is kind of crazy.
33:40
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I know DNA was in its infancy, but they weren't his.
33:45
[SPEAKER_00]: and he was yet still convicted of her murder.
33:49
[SPEAKER_00]: And I was kind of confused with the DNA analyst talk, like I read all the old articles I could and it never fully explained, it never fully explained why the analyst didn't give the probability whether they weren't capable of doing that, the lab that it was sent to wasn't because that was a capability back then or whether it was just omitted out of testimony.
34:10
[SPEAKER_00]: And if it was, then that falls on the prosecution
34:15
[SPEAKER_00]: because that should have been brought up.
34:18
[SPEAKER_00]: Like it wasn't just, she didn't just have three hairs on her body that were from some random person she saw at work or whatever, she was attacked.
34:28
[SPEAKER_00]: There were three unidentified male hairs on her body that should have been looked into a lot closer.
34:35
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm sure it'll come out at trial, but I just wanna know like, what was Michael Seekler doing all this time?
34:41
[SPEAKER_00]: Was he around?
34:43
[SPEAKER_00]: Was he comforting Jeremy?
34:45
[SPEAKER_00]: Lord, I sure hope not, but you know often murderers do that.
34:50
[SPEAKER_00]: That is what they do.
34:51
[SPEAKER_00]: They stick around to see what, you know, police know.
34:54
[SPEAKER_00]: So I'm not going to be shocked if that's the case.
34:57
[SPEAKER_00]: I hope that Chad and Jeremy hopefully over these years they've been able to repair their relationship.
35:04
[SPEAKER_00]: I sure hope so, because that's tough.
35:08
[SPEAKER_00]: But we will definitely wait and see what happens with this trial.
35:11
[SPEAKER_00]: If it goes to trial, if you don't take a plea deal, it's a hard pill to swallow that he's just been out there for 30 years doing whatever.
35:18
[SPEAKER_00]: And I did see in one of the articles he had like a nickname, I think it was diggy, according to a, and the article cited, according to a Georgia arrest records.
35:30
[SPEAKER_00]: But the state of Georgia is kind of funny when it comes to records.
35:33
[SPEAKER_00]: I tried to pull what I could, but I couldn't find anything and I didn't find any articles where he'd been arrested for anything major.
35:39
[SPEAKER_00]: But I would like to know what his criminal history is and why the hell he was nicknamed diggy.
35:46
[SPEAKER_00]: We're going to hopefully we're going to find that out at trial because I'm going to be following this one y'all for sure, but that's about all I got to say about that, and I'm going to hop off of here, y'all know I love you more and my luggage and I can't wait to talk at you next week, but until then, bye, bull thing.