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Hell and Gone Murder Line: Brittany Phillips Part 1 · Hell and Gone: Murder Line

0:46
Speaker 1: School of Humans. Helen Got Murder Line actively investigates cold
0:52
Speaker 1: case murders in an effort to raise public awareness invite
0:55
Speaker 1: witnesses to come forward and present evidence that could potentially
0:58
Speaker 1: be further investigated by law enforcement. While we value insights
1:03
Speaker 1: from family and community members, their statements should not be
1:06
Speaker 1: considered evidence and point to the challenges of verifying facts
1:10
Speaker 1: inherent in cold cases. We remind listeners that everyone has
1:14
Speaker 1: presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.
1:17
Speaker 1: Nothing in the podcast is intended to state or imply
1:21
Speaker 1: that anyone who has not been convicted of a crime
1:24
Speaker 1: is guilty of any wrongdoing. Thanks for listening.
1:30
Speaker 2: On Monday, September twenty seventh, two thousand and four, eighteen
1:34
Speaker 2: year old Britney Phillips, a student at Tulsa Community College,
1:38
Speaker 2: drove home from campus with a friend of hers, Lydia.
1:41
Speaker 3: They had just taken.
1:43
Speaker 2: A chemistry to test, and Brittany was looking forward to
1:45
Speaker 2: hanging out and celebrating her nineteenth birthday, which was coming
1:49
Speaker 2: up on October fourth. When we talked to Lydia, she
1:53
Speaker 2: said that Brittany met Lydia at her apartment that night
1:56
Speaker 2: and that they rode in Lydia's car. After class, they
2:00
Speaker 2: went back to Lydia's apartment, which was a short ride
2:03
Speaker 2: away from Britney's. This was at around eight pm. Brittany
2:07
Speaker 2: got into her own vehicle, said goodbye to Lydia, and
2:10
Speaker 2: drove home.
2:12
Speaker 4: I have to drag my memory now for such a
2:14
Speaker 4: while ago, but we met me and we started studying together,
2:19
Speaker 4: and then we realized she was a chemistry major and
2:23
Speaker 4: I was a biology major, so we needed to take
2:26
Speaker 4: some of the same science bosses together. So we decided
2:29
Speaker 4: to do our schedules together and take all of our
2:32
Speaker 4: classes together. We became friends. We were hanging out, We
2:36
Speaker 4: even were on a trip together. We had a night
2:38
Speaker 4: class and we got home to my apartment. Her birthday
2:42
Speaker 4: was coming up, her plans.
2:45
Speaker 2: But then as the week rolled on, Lydia said, Brittany
2:49
Speaker 2: never called her, and then she noticed that Brittany didn't
2:53
Speaker 2: show up for their next class on Wednesday.
2:56
Speaker 5: I remember calling her. I remember trying to get a
2:59
Speaker 5: hold of her and she didn't answer, and I was like,
3:02
Speaker 5: that's so weird. I was like, maybe she doesn't feel good.
3:06
Speaker 5: And so I went to school Wednesday night and she
3:08
Speaker 5: wasn't there. I was just like, that's so weird. She's
3:11
Speaker 5: not here, and she didn't tell me she wasn't going
3:13
Speaker 5: to be here, you know what I mean.
3:14
Speaker 4: But I didn't know exactly what kind of thing going on.
3:18
Speaker 4: And then come Thursday, I still hadn't heard from her,
3:23
Speaker 4: and I just was like, what's going on? Where are you?
3:27
Speaker 6: Are you?
3:28
Speaker 5: God at me?
3:28
Speaker 4: Are you upset? Are you having a problem?
3:31
Speaker 2: Lydia was unsure if she was overreacting or what to do,
3:35
Speaker 2: but her gut told her that something was wrong.
3:39
Speaker 4: So I was like, I wonder where she at. And
3:42
Speaker 4: so I remember driving by her, so I was like,
3:44
Speaker 4: I'm just gonna drive by and see, and her car
3:48
Speaker 4: was there, her car window was down. That's weird. And
3:51
Speaker 4: then I walked up to her friend's door and it
3:54
Speaker 4: was dark. And the way that her apartment is, you
3:56
Speaker 4: have to walk around to the back of the buildings,
3:59
Speaker 4: very not safe for a young girl by herself, so
4:03
Speaker 4: you have to walk in, you have to walk upstairs.
4:05
Speaker 4: So I walked up to her door. I even like
4:08
Speaker 4: cracked her door open real quick, and I said, Brittany,
4:10
Speaker 4: and I heard her cat me out and then I
4:13
Speaker 4: set the door because I got nervous. It was just dark.
4:17
Speaker 4: It's crazy out back there by myself, I was nervous,
4:20
Speaker 4: so then I called my dad.
4:23
Speaker 2: Lydia's father had been a district attorney in Rogers County.
4:27
Speaker 5: That's my dad.
4:28
Speaker 4: I just can't get a hold of my friend. You know,
4:30
Speaker 4: I haven't seen her in a few days. Her boat's
4:32
Speaker 4: going straight to voicemail. I'm just and Murry's about her,
4:35
Speaker 4: and I don't know.
4:36
Speaker 5: I just I have no idea why.
4:38
Speaker 4: I just thought this is so randomly odd.
4:42
Speaker 2: Lydia's dad explained to her how to call the authorities
4:45
Speaker 2: for a welfare check, and when first responders and police arrived,
4:50
Speaker 2: they found Britney's body in the bedroom of her apartment.
4:54
Speaker 2: News reports said that Brittany had been raped and strangled.
5:00
Speaker 3: In the two decades since, ex.
5:02
Speaker 2: Boyfriends and strangers have been questioned, sex offenders have been
5:06
Speaker 2: investigated and DNA swabs have been taken, but there's still
5:10
Speaker 2: no suspects. And the information that we've found so far
5:15
Speaker 2: has made me question if a lot of the facts
5:17
Speaker 2: that have been reported about this case are true at all.
5:21
Speaker 2: We're going to be going back to the beginning and
5:24
Speaker 2: asking some fundamental questions, including could the timeline of Britney's
5:29
Speaker 2: murder be off by up to forty eight hours. Was
5:32
Speaker 2: Brittany definitely raped? Was this the work of someone who
5:35
Speaker 2: knew her and staged the crime scene or could it
5:39
Speaker 2: have been a serial killer? And could that person still
5:42
Speaker 2: be out there? And finally, could police have been on
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Speaker 2: the wrong trail all this time? I'm Catherine Townsend. Over
5:52
Speaker 2: the past seven years of making my true crime podcast,
5:55
Speaker 2: Helen Gone, I've learned that there is no such thing
5:58
Speaker 2: as a small town where murder never happens. I've received
6:02
Speaker 2: hundreds of messages from people all around the country asking
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Speaker 2: for help with an unsolved murder that's affected them, their families.
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Speaker 3: And their communities.
6:11
Speaker 2: If you have a case you'd like me and my
6:12
Speaker 2: team to look into, you can reach out to us
6:15
Speaker 2: at our Helen Gone Murder Line at six seven eight
6:18
Speaker 2: seven four four six one four five. That's six seven
6:21
Speaker 2: eight seven four four six one four five, or you
6:25
Speaker 2: can send us a message on Instagram at Helen gonepod.
6:30
Speaker 2: This is Helen Gone Murder Line. Britney's mother, doctor Marjorie Zingman,
7:19
Speaker 2: will never forget the day that she got a call
7:22
Speaker 2: about her daughter's body being found. Since Britney's death, Maggie,
7:26
Speaker 2: a psychologist who specializes in trauma and works with veterans,
7:30
Speaker 2: has been relentless in trying to find answers and she's
7:34
Speaker 2: gotten very creative about her methods. We met Maggie at
7:38
Speaker 2: the True Crime Conference Crime Con. She was driving a bright,
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Speaker 2: pink and purple Kia Carnival with a huge picture of
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Speaker 2: Brittany on it and the side is emblazoned with a
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Speaker 2: phone number where people can call in tips. She calls
7:51
Speaker 2: the vehicle Caravan to catch a killer, and over the
7:54
Speaker 2: years she has driven all around America, traveling thousands of
7:59
Speaker 2: miles and talking to multiple media outlets to bring attention
8:02
Speaker 2: to Britney's case. Maggie is now seventy years old. She
8:07
Speaker 2: tells us that her greatest hope is to see this
8:10
Speaker 2: case salved and the killer caught before she dies. Britney
8:15
Speaker 2: grew up in Tulsa, and after graduating from high school,
8:18
Speaker 2: Britney moved to Florida to attend Eckard College in Saint Petersburg,
8:23
Speaker 2: but after a year, she moved back to Oklahoma. She
8:26
Speaker 2: began attending Tulsa Community College. Brittany loved her major chemistry
8:31
Speaker 2: and according to her family, was hoping to someday work
8:35
Speaker 2: in cancer research. She also loves sports and music and
8:40
Speaker 2: planned to eventually transfer to Oklahoma State University to continentnew
8:44
Speaker 2: her studies. Friends and family say she was very focused
8:47
Speaker 2: on her goals and was a good student. The last
8:50
Speaker 2: time that Maggie spoke to her daughter was earlier that day,
8:53
Speaker 2: on Monday, the twenty seventh. This is also the last
8:57
Speaker 2: day that Lydia saw or spoke to Brittany. Maggie told
9:01
Speaker 2: us that Brittany had allergies and that on that day
9:04
Speaker 2: Brittany went to an urgent care near campus to try
9:07
Speaker 2: to get an appointment.
9:09
Speaker 6: That day, she couldn't even go to her last cliff
9:12
Speaker 6: because she was so stuffed up. And then she also
9:16
Speaker 6: had this little little pug nose. It just was so
9:19
Speaker 6: small that it also caused proms, But it was the
9:22
Speaker 6: allergies that were just making her totally sick. And so
9:25
Speaker 6: she sat in that urgent care about halfway between the
9:30
Speaker 6: pampus and her apartments and sat there for two or
9:34
Speaker 6: three hours. And that's when she called me when she
9:38
Speaker 6: got upset to meet like a little girl, you know,
9:40
Speaker 6: just graying, I've been waiting here for hours type of thing.
9:44
Speaker 3: Britney's friend.
9:45
Speaker 2: Lydia tells us she doesn't remember Brittaney mentioning being sick
9:49
Speaker 2: or her mentioning urgent care, but she does remember that
9:53
Speaker 2: they went to class together that night. She remembered what
9:56
Speaker 2: Brittany was wearing when she dropped her off, a white
9:59
Speaker 2: shirt with a floral print and pants. Maggie told us
10:03
Speaker 2: that to her knowledge, Britney was not seeing anyone seriously,
10:08
Speaker 2: but Lydia said Britney had recently told her she had
10:12
Speaker 2: started seeing someone.
10:14
Speaker 4: She had a boyfriend.
10:15
Speaker 5: I had never met him.
10:16
Speaker 4: They had only been talking for like a month. Can
10:19
Speaker 4: I remember her telling me about him? And then she
10:21
Speaker 4: had told me that he's worked at some restaurant and
10:23
Speaker 4: forgot the name of it now and started with the
10:25
Speaker 4: best and there were two locations.
10:28
Speaker 2: Lydia called one of the restaurant's locations and was told
10:31
Speaker 2: that the boyfriend worked at the other location. So she
10:34
Speaker 2: called the other restaurant and talked to the boyfriend and
10:37
Speaker 2: told him what was going on.
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Speaker 4: I was like, I am looking for Britney.
10:41
Speaker 5: I'm her friends.
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Speaker 4: He's like, I can't get a hold of her either,
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Speaker 4: and I was like, oh my gosh. So I told
10:46
Speaker 4: my dad all that, and my dad said, okay, Paul,
10:49
Speaker 4: the non emergency have them come over and do a
10:52
Speaker 4: Commonwealth pro check. And I said, okay, so if the
10:55
Speaker 4: boyfriend actually met me out there too, we have.
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Speaker 5: The cop come.
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Speaker 4: They go upstairs and then they come back and they
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Speaker 4: can they tell us? You know, I was just completely shocked.
11:09
Speaker 2: Britney's case is still an open investigation, so we have
11:13
Speaker 2: not been able to access information through FOYR requests. But
11:16
Speaker 2: according to what Lydia said, Britney's boyfriend seemed upset and
11:20
Speaker 2: was cooperative with police. We don't know anything about the
11:24
Speaker 2: interview process that police had with him. Lydia said she
11:27
Speaker 2: does believe police interviewed him, but we don't know anything
11:31
Speaker 2: about how police were ruling out suspects at that point.
11:37
Speaker 2: In the apartment, officers found Britney dead on the floor.
11:42
Speaker 2: Britney was lying near the foot of the bed, Her
11:44
Speaker 2: head was turned to the right. She was wearing only
11:47
Speaker 2: a shirt, the same shirt that Lydia described her wearing
11:51
Speaker 2: when Britney dropped her off, and she was naked from
11:54
Speaker 2: the waist down. We were able to get a copy
11:57
Speaker 2: of the medical report from Britney's mother first responders pronounced
12:02
Speaker 2: her dead on September thirtieth at ten nine pm, and
12:05
Speaker 2: the medical examiner arrived on the scene at one.
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Speaker 3: Forty five am.
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Speaker 2: It was noted in the report that there were numerous
12:12
Speaker 2: towels and items of clothing adjacent to her body. Investigators
12:17
Speaker 2: stated there seemed to be no rhyme or reason to
12:19
Speaker 2: the piles of clothes scattered around.
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Speaker 3: Police also said there.
12:24
Speaker 2: Didn't appear to be anything obvious missing from the apartment,
12:27
Speaker 2: and Tulsa Police Department Cold case Detective Jeremy Styles said
12:31
Speaker 2: no one that police interviewed remembered seeing anything out of
12:35
Speaker 2: the ordinary outside the apartment either. When Britney's toxicology report
12:39
Speaker 2: came back, it was negative for alcohol or any kind
12:42
Speaker 2: of drugs. One of the main things that you'll find
12:47
Speaker 2: if you google this case is the fact that Brittney
12:50
Speaker 2: was raped and strangled.
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Speaker 3: But is that true.
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Speaker 2: We talked to one of the former detectives on the
12:56
Speaker 2: case to try to figure out why police believed that
12:59
Speaker 2: Britney had been raped. He told us that because of
13:02
Speaker 2: the way her body was found, and because of the
13:05
Speaker 2: fact that she wasn't wearing pants, that indicated to him
13:08
Speaker 2: a possible sexual assault. There was also a dried used
13:13
Speaker 2: tampon found near Britney's body and a small amount of
13:16
Speaker 2: dried menstrual blood in her vagina, but in the autopsy
13:20
Speaker 2: report there is no mention of any seamen being found
13:24
Speaker 2: inside Brittany. So, barring any other evidence, I have to
13:28
Speaker 2: disagree with the detective's assessment. To me, it does not
13:31
Speaker 2: appear that there was any definitive proof of rape. We
13:35
Speaker 2: asked the detective about this, he replied via text. He
13:39
Speaker 2: told us he believed if there was semen, that it
13:42
Speaker 2: may have degraded in the time between when Brittany was
13:45
Speaker 2: killed and the time when her body was found. But
13:48
Speaker 2: the autopsy report also specifically states that there is no
13:52
Speaker 2: sign of either external or internal vaginal or anal trauma,
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Speaker 2: and there is no mention of a sexual assault examination
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Speaker 2: of any kind. Is it possible that Britney's killer removed
14:04
Speaker 2: the tampon to stage the crime scene to look like
14:06
Speaker 2: an assault, or that they were in the process of
14:09
Speaker 2: sexually assaulting her but were interrupted. We don't know, but
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Speaker 2: in my opinion, the fact that there is no definitive
14:17
Speaker 2: indication in the medical examiner's report of rape or sexual
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Speaker 2: assault might change the killer's mo and presumably might widen
14:25
Speaker 2: the pool of suspects. But then, because nothing was taken
14:31
Speaker 2: from the scene, what was the killer's motive and was
14:35
Speaker 2: it someone who Britney knew or a stranger possibly a
14:39
Speaker 2: serial killer. Lydia did say that because of the chemistry
14:43
Speaker 2: test that night, she and Brittany had left class a
14:45
Speaker 2: little earlier than usual. Could the killer have known Britney's
14:49
Speaker 2: schedule and been stalking her. One thing that detectives used
14:53
Speaker 2: to determine if the killer was known or unknown to
14:55
Speaker 2: the victim is whether or not entry to the crime
14:58
Speaker 2: scene was forced. Many media outlets have reported over the
15:02
Speaker 2: years there was no sign in a fourth century. So
15:05
Speaker 2: how did Britney's killer access the apartment? One theory investigators
15:10
Speaker 2: had was that the killer could have gotten in through
15:13
Speaker 2: an attic space that was accessible to all of the
15:15
Speaker 2: apartments in that complex, which might suggest that the killer
15:20
Speaker 2: was familiar with Britney's apartment complex. But it turns out
15:24
Speaker 2: Britney's apartment was much easier to access than initially reported.
15:30
Speaker 2: A few weeks before her murder, Britney had been locked
15:33
Speaker 2: out of her apartment. She had had to get someone
15:35
Speaker 2: to boost her up to her second four balcony so
15:38
Speaker 2: that she could get in, and when Britney's body was found,
15:42
Speaker 2: it was noted that the balcony doors of her apartment
15:45
Speaker 2: were open. Also, Lydia told us that when she went
15:48
Speaker 2: into Britney's apartment that the door was unlocked. In the
15:52
Speaker 2: early stages of the investigation, police seemed to believe that
15:56
Speaker 2: this was some kind of robbery gone wrong. In two
16:00
Speaker 2: thousand and seven, police went public with a piece of evidence,
16:04
Speaker 2: a light purple lavender pillowcase found at the scene that
16:08
Speaker 2: did not match any of Britney's other bed linens. According
16:12
Speaker 2: to Tulsa World, Police theorized that the robber may have
16:15
Speaker 2: broken into Britney's apartment and was using their own pillowcase
16:19
Speaker 2: to steal things, and then the robber was either interrupted
16:23
Speaker 2: by Britney walking in or just got frazzled and forgot
16:26
Speaker 2: the pillowcase. Investigators at the time said they were releasing
16:30
Speaker 2: the information about the pillowcase because there had been robberies
16:34
Speaker 2: in the area, robberies where the perpetrators used pillowcases to
16:38
Speaker 2: gather up the stuff they stole. Police released photos of
16:42
Speaker 2: this pillowcase and they that maybe someone out there might
16:45
Speaker 2: recognize the linens. We asked Maggie about the pillowcase. She
16:50
Speaker 2: tells us that the police found no DNA on it
16:53
Speaker 2: and that eventually they discovered that it either belonged to
16:55
Speaker 2: Brittany or to someone she knew. They now don't believe
16:59
Speaker 2: that it was related to Britney's murder. It seemed to
17:02
Speaker 2: be just another red herring. There was some DNA of
17:08
Speaker 2: in it's found in Britney's apartment. According to information that
17:11
Speaker 2: law enforcement has released over the years, there were traces
17:14
Speaker 2: of seamen on Britney's sheets, a small amount of blood
17:18
Speaker 2: on a wall, and DNA underneath Britney's fingernails. Maggie said
17:23
Speaker 2: that she believed that the DNA under Britney's fingernails indicated
17:27
Speaker 2: that her daughter may have fought for her life. She
17:30
Speaker 2: believes that the killer was either waiting for Brittany when
17:33
Speaker 2: she came home, or possibly that he broke in while
17:37
Speaker 2: she was sleeping. Maggie tells us she started investigating the
17:43
Speaker 2: possiblity that Britney's killer had been a serial killer and
17:47
Speaker 2: that he may have killed again or possibly left the area.
17:51
Speaker 2: That's why she started sharing Britney's story. With people across
17:55
Speaker 2: the country. Maggie said she estimated she's traveled over three
18:00
Speaker 2: hundred thousand miles. She told People magazine that she has
18:04
Speaker 2: spent a massive amount of money, approximately one hundred and
18:07
Speaker 2: twenty thousand dollars, to keep Britney's story out there. She
18:12
Speaker 2: also told the magazine her travels have given her a
18:14
Speaker 2: new purpose in life. They've allowed her to process her
18:17
Speaker 2: grief and to connect with other families, in some cases,
18:21
Speaker 2: people who have also lost family members to violent crime.
18:25
Speaker 2: She's also gotten multiple tips over the years she's shared
18:29
Speaker 2: them with police. Unfortunately, none of them have panned out
18:32
Speaker 2: so far. Although Maggie remains hopeful that one day Britney's
18:37
Speaker 2: killer will be brought to justice, she has said that
18:40
Speaker 2: her travels have also become about another purpose. She wants
18:44
Speaker 2: to connect with the victims of other homicide cold case families,
18:48
Speaker 2: and she wants to change legislation to allow more DNA
18:52
Speaker 2: testing to be done, hopefully without waiting years or decades.
18:57
Speaker 2: But Maggie has also never given up on getting the
19:00
Speaker 2: break that will bring Britney's killer or killers to justice.
19:07
Speaker 2: In twenty twenty three, Maggie got a call one that
19:11
Speaker 2: she said could change everything that she thought she knew
19:13
Speaker 2: about the timeline leading up to when Britney's body was found.
19:25
Speaker 2: In twenty twenty three, Britney's mother, Maggie got a call
19:29
Speaker 2: from her ex husband, Britney's father. He told her that
19:33
Speaker 2: he found a birthday card that Brittany had mailed to
19:35
Speaker 2: him in two thousand and four. He was supposed to
19:37
Speaker 2: forward it to her grandfather. That was apparently their routine
19:41
Speaker 2: every year. In twenty twenty three, Maggie was on private
19:45
Speaker 2: investigator Cheryl McCollum's podcast Zone seven, and they talked about
19:50
Speaker 2: on the podcast the fact that Cheryl had investigated the
19:53
Speaker 2: stamp and found out that the stamp was bought from
19:56
Speaker 2: a Kiosk machine, which means that the stamp was printed
20:00
Speaker 2: from that machine on the day it was mailed. But
20:03
Speaker 2: the weird thing is the post office stamp was dated
20:06
Speaker 2: September twenty ninth, and up until that point, police's working
20:11
Speaker 2: theory was that Britney was killed sometime between the night
20:14
Speaker 2: of the twenty seventh, after she dropped Lydia off and
20:17
Speaker 2: the morning of the twenty eighth. Maggie believes that could
20:21
Speaker 2: change the timeline. Brittany could possibly still have been alive
20:25
Speaker 2: on the twenty ninth, at least a day after the
20:28
Speaker 2: police's timeline. She is also considered the possibility someone else
20:32
Speaker 2: could have mailed that letter for Brittany, possibly one of
20:35
Speaker 2: her friends.
20:36
Speaker 3: Or less possibly the killer.
20:40
Speaker 2: Over the years, Maggie has talked to a lot of
20:42
Speaker 2: Britney's friends, so she hasn't found anyone who remembers being
20:46
Speaker 2: asked to drop off a letter. So that is still
20:49
Speaker 2: a big unanswered question. We're going to be diving more
20:52
Speaker 2: into that question next week in Part two. Other than
20:56
Speaker 2: the material under Britney's fingernails, which is not conclusive, there's
21:00
Speaker 2: no sign of defensive wounds anywhere else on her body.
21:04
Speaker 2: Now we should say the body had been there for
21:07
Speaker 2: an estimated possibly two or three days by the time
21:10
Speaker 2: she was found, and everything including DNA evidence, deteriorates during
21:15
Speaker 2: that time. But the medical examiner's report does not mention
21:20
Speaker 2: any evidence of beating or defensive wounds. There were no
21:23
Speaker 2: injuries to Britney's face or nose. The medical examiner also
21:27
Speaker 2: noted that rigor mortis was absent in Britney's jaw and extremities,
21:31
Speaker 2: and that liver mortis or blood pooling was fixed and
21:34
Speaker 2: non blanchable on the back side of her body. Now
21:38
Speaker 2: normally blood pooling becomes fixed around eight to twelve hours
21:42
Speaker 2: after death. Fix just means that if the body is moved,
21:45
Speaker 2: the blood will stay in the same place. The medical
21:48
Speaker 2: examiner did not indicate a time of death, which isn't
21:51
Speaker 2: that uncommon. Often, in cases where a body has been
21:54
Speaker 2: at a scene for days or weeks, the time of
21:57
Speaker 2: death is determined by the time the victim was last seen,
22:00
Speaker 2: rather than exact forensics.
22:02
Speaker 3: But we do know that it takes.
22:04
Speaker 2: About twenty four hours for rigor mortis to pass, which
22:07
Speaker 2: would indicate that Brittany had almost certainly been dead for
22:11
Speaker 2: at least a day or more. On Britney's neck there
22:16
Speaker 2: were three irregularly shaped oval bruises, bruises that were about
22:20
Speaker 2: the same size as fingers. She was wearing a white
22:23
Speaker 2: metal necklace and it was broken. Her hyoid bone showed
22:27
Speaker 2: signs of trauma but was not broken, which, while not conclusive,
22:32
Speaker 2: is more common in manual strangulation than ligature strangulation. Brittany
22:37
Speaker 2: had hemorrhaging in her throat and broken blood vessels in
22:40
Speaker 2: her eyes, which both.
22:41
Speaker 3: Can be indicative of strangulation.
22:44
Speaker 2: The autopsy concluded Britney's death was violent and that the
22:47
Speaker 2: cause of death was asphyxia due to net compression. Given
22:52
Speaker 2: the evidence, I believe that so far it seems to
22:56
Speaker 2: point to suffocation caused by manual strangulation. DNA samples were
23:01
Speaker 2: taken from Britney's apartment and compared in its CODIS the
23:04
Speaker 2: Combined DNA Index system, and there was no match. Maggie
23:10
Speaker 2: began raising funds to do private DNA testing. She reached
23:14
Speaker 2: out to every person she could think of in an
23:16
Speaker 2: effort to make it happen. In twenty eighteen, Eddie Majors,
23:20
Speaker 2: a cold case investigator with the Tulsa Police Department, announced
23:25
Speaker 2: that he was inspired by the way the police had
23:28
Speaker 2: caught the Golden State Killer in California using genealogy websites.
23:33
Speaker 2: He told Tulsa World that over the years he had
23:36
Speaker 2: developed a close friendship with Maggie. He wanted to help
23:40
Speaker 2: her find answers in any way that he could. Emitted
23:44
Speaker 2: samples from Britney's crime scene, the blood and seamen on
23:47
Speaker 2: the wall to Parabond Nanilabs, a Virginia based DNA company
23:51
Speaker 2: that is able to run familial DNA samples there, Maggie
23:55
Speaker 2: and Eddie started working with the chief genetic.
23:58
Speaker 3: Genealogist, C. C. Moore, and they got a match.
24:02
Speaker 2: Maggie told us the DNA from the blood and semen
24:05
Speaker 2: wasn't just a familial match, They got an exact match.
24:09
Speaker 2: But then there was another twist. Law enforcement discovered the
24:14
Speaker 2: DNA profile lay built from blood and seamen was from
24:17
Speaker 2: someone the police had already talked to. He was the
24:20
Speaker 2: boyfriend of one of Britney's friends, and he and his
24:24
Speaker 2: girlfriend had spent the night at Britney's apartment the weekend
24:27
Speaker 2: before the murder, and Maggie told us investigators have told
24:31
Speaker 2: her that this man had an airtight alibi and that
24:34
Speaker 2: they had already interviewed him. Police have confirmed this, which
24:39
Speaker 2: meant that the phenotype of the killer came from the
24:42
Speaker 2: wrong DNA profile. Only the blood and seamen contributor was tested,
24:48
Speaker 2: but apparently the DNA found underneath Britney's fingernails came from
24:52
Speaker 2: a totally different person.
24:55
Speaker 3: Eddie Majors confirmed this in an interview.
24:57
Speaker 2: With Tulsa World, saying, quote, through information we received from
25:01
Speaker 2: him and corroboration we got for his story, we are
25:04
Speaker 2: no longer looking at the suspect. Based on the forensic
25:06
Speaker 2: composite drawing that we released, This means the DNA profile
25:10
Speaker 2: that we have used for fifteen years developed from blood
25:14
Speaker 2: and semen at the crime scene. The blood and seamen
25:17
Speaker 2: was not our killer. It was found at her apartment
25:20
Speaker 2: because Brittany let this young man and his girlfriend sleep
25:22
Speaker 2: over end quote. This was a huge blow from Maggie
25:28
Speaker 2: and the rest of Britney's family and friends, because, in
25:32
Speaker 2: her opinion, that meant this investigation had to start back
25:36
Speaker 2: at the very beginning. Next week, we're going to try
25:40
Speaker 2: to answer a lot more questions, including does that stamp
25:44
Speaker 2: really change the timeline and if so, does that mean
25:48
Speaker 2: that all alibis have to be questioned. We're also going
25:52
Speaker 2: to take a look at the murder of another young
25:54
Speaker 2: woman that happened right across the street from Brittany, again
25:58
Speaker 2: a case with robbery but no sexual assault. If Britney
26:02
Speaker 2: wasn't raped and the killer isn't limited to someone who
26:05
Speaker 2: knew her apartment complex, well does that change the entire
26:09
Speaker 2: direction of the case. Meanwhile, Maggie continues to drive around
26:14
Speaker 2: the country in her pink and purple car with her
26:16
Speaker 2: daughter's pictures on the side, hoping that someone somewhere will
26:20
Speaker 2: have a lead that could help close this case, or
26:23
Speaker 2: that eventually the DNA from underneath Britney's fingernails will be
26:27
Speaker 2: tested and could help identify a suspect. If you have
26:32
Speaker 2: any information about the murder of Britney Phillips, please call
26:35
Speaker 2: Tulsa Crimestoppers at nine one eight five nine six cops
26:41
Speaker 2: or email Homicide at Ciftulsa dot org. I'm Catherine Townsend.
26:47
Speaker 2: This is Helen Gone Murder Line. Helen Gone Murder Line
26:52
Speaker 2: is a production of School of Humans and iHeart Podcasts.
26:55
Speaker 2: It's written and narrated by me Catherine Townsend and produced
26:58
Speaker 2: by Gabby Watts. Special thanks to Amy Tubbs for her
27:02
Speaker 2: research assistance and James Wheaton for legal review. Noah camer
27:07
Speaker 2: mixed and scored this episode. Our theme song is by
27:10
Speaker 2: Ben Sale. Executive producers are Virginia Prescott, Brandon Barr, and
27:14
Speaker 2: LC Crowley. Listen to Helen Gone ad free by subscribing
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Speaker 2: to the iHeart True Crime Plush channel on Apple Podcasts.
27:22
Speaker 2: If you are interested in seeing documents and materials from
27:25
Speaker 2: the case, you can follow the show on Instagram at
27:28
Speaker 2: Helen Gonepod. If you have a case she'd like me
27:31
Speaker 2: and my team to look into, you can reach out
27:33
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Speaker 1: Five school Of humans