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Hell and Gone Murder Line: Jennifer Judd · 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
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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: May eleventh, nineteen ninety two start out as an ordinary
1:33
Speaker 2: day for twenty year old newlyweds Justin and Jennifer Judd.
1:37
Speaker 2: Justin and Jennifer were high school sweethearts. They had met
1:41
Speaker 2: through friends when Jennifer was fifteen years old and Justin
1:44
Speaker 2: was sixteen, and they had only been married for nine days.
1:48
Speaker 2: In fact, they had just gotten back from their honeymoon
1:50
Speaker 2: in Branson, Missouri. These were busy times for a young couple.
1:55
Speaker 2: Justin and Jennifer had relocated from Pitcher, where they were
1:58
Speaker 2: both originally from to Baxter Springs, Kansas. They moved into
2:02
Speaker 2: their duplex at two nineteen North Park Avenue. Though they
2:06
Speaker 2: had been dating for years, this was the first time
2:09
Speaker 2: they had ever lived together. Justin left for work that morning.
2:12
Speaker 2: As usual. He worked as a guard at a nearby
2:16
Speaker 2: chemical plant, and his shift started at six thirty am.
2:20
Speaker 2: At the time, Jennifer also had a job at a
2:22
Speaker 2: convenience store, but she wasn't working that day. That morning
2:26
Speaker 2: she left the house. According to media reports, she ran
2:29
Speaker 2: some marins. Apparently Jennifer had an appointment at the tanning
2:33
Speaker 2: bed that day, among other things. Justin had called her
2:37
Speaker 2: in the morning, asking Jennifer to pack a lunch and
2:39
Speaker 2: drop it off for him at work, but Jennifer never
2:42
Speaker 2: showed up. When Justin came home from work at around
2:46
Speaker 2: two thirty pm, he walked into their apartment and found
2:50
Speaker 2: Jennifer on the kitchen floor, lying in a pool of blood.
2:54
Speaker 2: This had been a frenzied attack. Jennifer had been stabbed
2:57
Speaker 2: multiple times, and both of the weapons the two knives
3:01
Speaker 2: she had been stabbed with had come from her own kitchen,
3:05
Speaker 2: including the eight inch knife that was still sticking in
3:08
Speaker 2: Jennifer's back. The killer or killers had attacked Jennifer with
3:12
Speaker 2: so much force that one of the knives her wedding gift,
3:16
Speaker 2: broke off inside her body. Jennifer's friend's family, and the
3:21
Speaker 2: whole community, because this was a small town, were stunned
3:25
Speaker 2: at the violence of this crime. Everyone was scared, but
3:28
Speaker 2: all of them hoped that Jennifer's murder would be solved
3:31
Speaker 2: very soon. But it wasn't, and thirty four years later,
3:37
Speaker 2: Jennifer's killer is still out there. I'm Catherine Townsend. Over
3:42
Speaker 2: the past eight years of making my true crime podcast,
3:45
Speaker 2: Helen Gone, I've learned that there's no such thing as
3:48
Speaker 2: a small town where murder never happens. I've received hundreds
3:52
Speaker 2: of messages from people all around the country asking for
3:55
Speaker 2: help with an unsolved murder that's affected them, their families,
3:59
Speaker 2: and their communities. If you have a case you'd like
4:02
Speaker 2: me and my team to look into, you can reach
4:04
Speaker 2: out to us at our Helen Gone Murder Line at
4:07
Speaker 2: six seven eight seven four four six one four five.
4:11
Speaker 2: That's six seven eight seven four four six one four five,
4:15
Speaker 2: or you can send us a message on Instagram at
4:18
Speaker 2: Helen Gonepod. This is Helen Gone Murder Line. From the beginning.
4:55
Speaker 2: Once police arrived at the crime scene, they did not
4:59
Speaker 2: think that Jennifer's killing was just a random robbery gone wrong.
5:03
Speaker 2: First of all, no money had been stolen. Jennifer's purse
5:06
Speaker 2: was still at the house and she had money inside it.
5:09
Speaker 2: She was still wearing her wedding rings, and nothing appeared
5:12
Speaker 2: to be missing from inside the home. Also, the knives
5:15
Speaker 2: that were used to kill Jennifer came from inside her house.
5:19
Speaker 2: We had a chance to speak with Justin for this podcast.
5:23
Speaker 2: He talked to us about the horror he experienced that
5:25
Speaker 2: day and the shock of losing the woman he had
5:28
Speaker 2: married nine days earlier, someone who he had loved since
5:32
Speaker 2: he was sixteen years old. Justin, who is now in
5:36
Speaker 2: his fifties, told us about how he met Jennifer, in
5:39
Speaker 2: their relationship, and the timeline of exactly what happened on
5:43
Speaker 2: the day she was killed. Justin and Jennifer met at
5:46
Speaker 2: a high school party when Justin was sixteen. Jennifer was
5:49
Speaker 2: petene with brown hair and brown eyes. She was pretty
5:52
Speaker 2: and popular in high school. Jennifer was homecoming queen. The
5:56
Speaker 2: way that Justin described meeting Jennifer, it sounded like from
6:00
Speaker 2: his end it was pretty much love at first sight.
6:04
Speaker 3: I was at a party at a friend of mine
6:08
Speaker 3: just It was like two weeks after I turned sixteen.
6:10
Speaker 3: You know, I'd got my driver's lessons and my buddy
6:13
Speaker 3: had a bunch of friends over his house. His parents
6:15
Speaker 3: was gone, and he said, hey, goes, my girlfriend's got
6:20
Speaker 3: a friend that wants to meet you. And like, okay,
6:23
Speaker 3: you know, so we load up and truck and we
6:26
Speaker 3: go over to Picture and you know, it's selling four
6:28
Speaker 3: cell phones and everything. You know, I met her and
6:32
Speaker 3: we pretty much so dated until we got married.
6:35
Speaker 2: Justin and Jennifer dated for four years. They married in
6:38
Speaker 2: nineteen ninety two. Both of them were twenty years old.
6:41
Speaker 2: Justin mits that he and Jennifer had their share of arguments.
6:45
Speaker 2: He has called her a spitfire. Jennifer's sister, Amanda Davis,
6:49
Speaker 2: has stated in interviews with journalists that at one point,
6:52
Speaker 2: Jennifer considered calling the wedding to Justin off Justin admitted
6:57
Speaker 2: they both considered canceling the wedding during arguments, but he
7:01
Speaker 2: said neither of them were serious. He said leading up
7:03
Speaker 2: to the wedding, the conflicts they were having, in his opinion,
7:07
Speaker 2: could mostly be chalked up to immaturity. Justin did admit
7:10
Speaker 2: their relationship had its ups and downs, like any young
7:14
Speaker 2: couple about to take a big step, but he said
7:16
Speaker 2: they were very happy together. He described Jennifer as not
7:20
Speaker 2: only his wife, but his best friend.
7:23
Speaker 3: We both went through a little period where we thought,
7:26
Speaker 3: you know, maybe we shouldn't do this. You know, we're
7:28
Speaker 3: young and all that, and and you know, we both decided,
7:32
Speaker 3: you know that it is going to happen eventually, so
7:34
Speaker 3: we might as well just go ahead get married. So
7:35
Speaker 3: we did. If you can recall back when you were
7:38
Speaker 3: sixteen and stuff, you know, you got a lot of
7:40
Speaker 3: girl and pains, and we just, you know, we went
7:42
Speaker 3: through them together. We you know, justically grew in our
7:44
Speaker 3: teens together. And she wasn't, you know, just my girlfriend.
7:48
Speaker 3: She was pretty much so like my best friend. You know,
7:50
Speaker 3: you go through them stages where you know, jealousy stages,
7:55
Speaker 3: and you know, we went through all that. You know,
7:58
Speaker 3: we made we made it through all that stuff. So
7:59
Speaker 3: we figured, you might as well just get married now,
8:01
Speaker 3: so we did.
8:03
Speaker 2: Justin said that on the day Jennifer was murdered, looking back,
8:07
Speaker 2: there were some things that were unusual that day For
8:10
Speaker 2: one thing, Justin said, he ate breakfast that morning, then
8:14
Speaker 2: he fell back asleep and actually overslept, so he ended
8:18
Speaker 2: up waking up and leaving for work quickly, and in
8:21
Speaker 2: his haste he forgot to bring in his packed lunch.
8:24
Speaker 3: That morning for some reason. And that's something I never do.
8:28
Speaker 3: I got up and I ate breakfast, and I went
8:32
Speaker 3: and laid back down to bed, and I fell back
8:33
Speaker 3: to sleep, and they were called and said, hey, are
8:36
Speaker 3: you coming in? I was like, yeah, okay, so, and
8:39
Speaker 3: I didn't live very far from work, so I went
8:42
Speaker 3: and jumping the truck and left.
8:44
Speaker 2: So sometime between approximately nine and nine thirty am, Justin
8:49
Speaker 2: called Jennifer from work. He asked if she would bring
8:51
Speaker 2: his lunch in, which she agreed to do. But Jennifer
8:55
Speaker 2: never showed up that day, so Justin started calling the
8:58
Speaker 2: house and getting no answer. Justin was getting concerned. And
9:03
Speaker 2: then a few minutes before noon, something else out of
9:06
Speaker 2: the ordinary happened. A friend of Justin's, Charles Chuck Chance,
9:11
Speaker 2: who had actually been a guest at their wedding, stopped
9:13
Speaker 2: by Justin's work that day. This was something Justin said
9:17
Speaker 2: he thought was odd because Chuck had never come to
9:19
Speaker 2: his work before Chuck told Justin he had gone to
9:23
Speaker 2: Justin and Jennifer's house. He said he knocked on the
9:26
Speaker 2: front door, but that Jennifer didn't answer. Chuck was unemployed
9:30
Speaker 2: at the time and later told police he had spent
9:33
Speaker 2: the morning driving around going to job interviews. Chuck told
9:37
Speaker 2: Justin when he got to the chemical plant that he
9:39
Speaker 2: was concerned about Jennifer. To this day, this statement by
9:43
Speaker 2: There's Justin. After his shift finished at two thirty pm,
9:48
Speaker 2: Justin and Chuck rode separately back to Jennifer and Justin's home.
9:52
Speaker 2: When they got to the apartment, Justin said Jennifer's car
9:55
Speaker 2: was in the driveway. He looked inside it and saw
9:58
Speaker 2: his packed lunch. Later, when police searched Jennifer's nineteen eighty
10:03
Speaker 2: four black Mercury Cougar, they would bag up the sandwich
10:07
Speaker 2: and banana that was presumably meant to be Justin's lunch
10:10
Speaker 2: and label it as evidence. When Justin and Chuck got
10:14
Speaker 2: to the front door, Justin noticed the door was unlocked,
10:17
Speaker 2: which he says was very unusual.
10:21
Speaker 3: Got to work, and around ten o'clock or eleven o'clock,
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Speaker 3: Chuck showed up at my work and he stayed there
10:28
Speaker 3: till I got off at three and he went home
10:31
Speaker 3: with me, and her car was there. I remember reaching
10:33
Speaker 3: down and grabbing the door and opening the door, and
10:36
Speaker 3: it wasn't locked, and I and you know, it's always
10:39
Speaker 3: a big thing of mine, you know, with hers, you know,
10:41
Speaker 3: I always locked the door, you know. I walked and
10:44
Speaker 3: it was dark, and I believe I seen her keys
10:48
Speaker 3: in the floor, and for some reason, I turned and
10:52
Speaker 3: went to the bedroom. I guess I just you know,
10:53
Speaker 3: since all the lights off, I assumed that she was
10:55
Speaker 3: laying down. So I go in the bedroom and I
10:57
Speaker 3: noticed that it looked like the bed was made, but
11:00
Speaker 3: it looked like somebody had laid down on the side
11:03
Speaker 3: of the bed, you know, just laid back down on it,
11:05
Speaker 3: because it was kind of ruffled. And I turned around
11:08
Speaker 3: and walked over walked into the kitchen. And I walked
11:10
Speaker 3: into the kitchen. I've seen her laying on the floor,
11:12
Speaker 3: and my first thought was was she was which you know,
11:15
Speaker 3: I didn't know a whole lot about medicine and stuff
11:17
Speaker 3: back then, but I knew she was a knemi shed
11:19
Speaker 3: uh kind of a blood disorder, and I thought, well,
11:23
Speaker 3: she passed out, you know, and I reached over, I
11:26
Speaker 3: put the light on and and I seen that, you know,
11:29
Speaker 3: her eyes were outed and she was passed. I reached
11:31
Speaker 3: down and felt her neck and it was cold and hard.
11:35
Speaker 3: But the weird thing is is I I never seen
11:39
Speaker 3: any blood. And according to the KBI, there was a
11:42
Speaker 3: lot of blood everywhere and said that people will will
11:45
Speaker 3: block that out as a defense mechanism. Yeah, I didn't
11:51
Speaker 3: see any blood.
11:53
Speaker 2: What Justin witnessed was horrible. Chuck had walked into the
11:57
Speaker 2: apartment with him, and to this day, Justin said that
12:01
Speaker 2: what he described as Chuck's out of character behavior bothered
12:05
Speaker 2: him both before they discovered Jennifer's body and after when.
12:10
Speaker 3: We was walking into the house. He made a call
12:13
Speaker 3: and he said, I can here's the bitch. And now
12:15
Speaker 3: I'm thinking, and you know, that's kind of it's one
12:18
Speaker 3: of one of the things that just was just really odd.
12:21
Speaker 3: And then we go in and you know, we find
12:24
Speaker 3: her and stuff, and he just starts, I'm scared. I'm
12:29
Speaker 3: scared and shaking and stuff. And I wasn't, you know,
12:33
Speaker 3: I was just you knowing shock. And I said call
12:35
Speaker 3: nine one one, and he grabbed the phone and he
12:37
Speaker 3: couldn't call, so I get the phone and I call
12:40
Speaker 3: and I called nine one one, and don't I don't
12:43
Speaker 3: know what it was that I felt. I felt like
12:50
Speaker 3: when the paramedics got there, I felt like everything's gonna
12:52
Speaker 3: be okay. When they walked through, I felt like everything
12:54
Speaker 3: was gonna be okay, you know, And it wasn't. But
12:59
Speaker 3: the paramedics got there, and you know, we went outside
13:01
Speaker 3: and I never went back in.
13:32
Speaker 2: Once police arrived at the scene, they immediately figured out
13:35
Speaker 2: this had been a knife attack. Part of an eight
13:38
Speaker 2: inch kitchen knife was sticking out of Jennifer's back, but
13:41
Speaker 2: that knife and the other knife invested the Gators believe
13:44
Speaker 2: was used during the killing were never recovered, so police
13:48
Speaker 2: had no murder weapon, and they struggled to figure out
13:52
Speaker 2: a motive. Police interviewed a lot of people, but seemed
13:56
Speaker 2: to hit a dead end early on. One problem could
13:59
Speaker 2: have been the lack of physical evidence and the fact
14:01
Speaker 2: that DNA testing back in nineteen ninety two was not
14:05
Speaker 2: what it is today, so is there evidence that could
14:08
Speaker 2: be retested. They did find hairs at the crime scene
14:12
Speaker 2: on Jennifer's bed, and it has been reported that the
14:15
Speaker 2: hairs did not belong to anyone in the Judd family,
14:18
Speaker 2: but there hasn't been any information released about what happened
14:21
Speaker 2: to those hairs, whether they were tested against other suspects,
14:25
Speaker 2: and what the status of that evidence is today. There
14:29
Speaker 2: may have been other complications as well. Justin has stated
14:33
Speaker 2: in the past he believed that crime scene was not
14:36
Speaker 2: secured properly. He said that there were multiple people allowed
14:40
Speaker 2: inside his and Jennifer's home that Day's said he knows
14:44
Speaker 2: that because he saw what went down. Still in the beginning,
14:48
Speaker 2: Jennifer's family and friends were hopeful that her killer would
14:51
Speaker 2: be caught quickly. Jennifer was very well known in town.
14:55
Speaker 2: She was heavily involved in her community and dedicated to
14:58
Speaker 2: her Christian faith. She played softball and basketball, and she
15:02
Speaker 2: was an active member of her church, the First Baptist Church.
15:05
Speaker 2: According to newspaper reports, more than seven hundred and fifty
15:10
Speaker 2: people showed up for Jennifer's funeral at the First Baptist Church.
15:13
Speaker 2: So many people came to her funeral it was standing
15:16
Speaker 2: room only. People were actually spilling out onto the church lawn.
15:21
Speaker 2: Jennifer's autopsy has not been made public, but details and
15:25
Speaker 2: pages from it have been posted to several online sources.
15:32
Speaker 2: Jennifer was stabbed nine times. She was stabbed six times
15:35
Speaker 2: on the left side of her chest. One of those
15:37
Speaker 2: stab wounds went through her heart. Three more stab wounds
15:41
Speaker 2: were found on Jennifer's back on the left sid The
15:45
Speaker 2: actual cause of death was exanguination, meaning Jennifer blood to death,
15:51
Speaker 2: and the autopsy report estimated the time of death at
15:54
Speaker 2: approximately ten thirty am. A private investigator named Stephen M.
15:59
Speaker 2: Garrett worked on the case for a long time. He
16:02
Speaker 2: prepared an investigative report that included a lot of original documents.
16:06
Speaker 2: A lot of pieces of this report have been posted
16:09
Speaker 2: and quoted online. At some point, this report stated that
16:14
Speaker 2: Stephen had reached out to the medical examiner, who told
16:17
Speaker 2: him that, in their opinion, that Jennifer's killer hated her,
16:21
Speaker 2: calling the murder overkill. The stab wounds buried in depth.
16:27
Speaker 2: Two of the stab wounds to Jennifer's chest were one
16:29
Speaker 2: and three quarter inches deep, Another was one in a
16:32
Speaker 2: quarter inch steep. Other stab wounds were between one and
16:36
Speaker 2: one and a half inches deep. Some were even shallower,
16:39
Speaker 2: between five eighths of an inch to one inch deep.
16:43
Speaker 2: According to the autopsy report, Jennifer had other cuts on
16:47
Speaker 2: her left hand her left eye and her scalp. All
16:50
Speaker 2: of the abrasions, including the five inch abrasion on her scalp,
16:54
Speaker 2: were caused by quote blunt trauma by a heavy instrument,
16:57
Speaker 2: fist or foot end quote, So it appears as though
17:01
Speaker 2: Jennifer's killer hit her and then, judging by the abrasion,
17:04
Speaker 2: which is usually caused by some kind of friction, Jennifer
17:08
Speaker 2: probably hit her head on something, or the abrasion could
17:11
Speaker 2: have happened when Jennifer's head was against the floor. There
17:14
Speaker 2: was a struggle. The killer grabbed a knife. Once the
17:17
Speaker 2: struggle started, it was a fight to the death, judging
17:20
Speaker 2: by the stab wounds on Jennifer's front and back. The
17:23
Speaker 2: wounds on her back, by the way, were also all
17:26
Speaker 2: entry wounds. Whatever happened was an instant. It took time
17:29
Speaker 2: to kill Jennifer, and her killer had many moments when
17:33
Speaker 2: they could have paused or stopped, but they didn't. But
17:37
Speaker 2: why would someone kill Jennifer? Sexual assault did not appear
17:40
Speaker 2: to be the motive, at least not on the surface.
17:43
Speaker 2: The autopsy did not find any evidence that Jennifer had
17:46
Speaker 2: been raped or sexually assaulted in any way, and though
17:50
Speaker 2: Jennifer could be as her friend's family and husband described her, feisty,
17:55
Speaker 2: She was also very well loved. No one could think
17:59
Speaker 2: of anyone who would want to hurt her. It is
18:02
Speaker 2: possible that what some people believes the overkill aspect of
18:05
Speaker 2: the crime, the multiple stabbings, may not have been someone
18:09
Speaker 2: who had a hatred for Jennifer personally. It could also
18:12
Speaker 2: be someone who didn't know her at all. It could
18:14
Speaker 2: indicate a killer who was inexperienced and panicked. In nineteen
18:20
Speaker 2: ninety eight, the Kansas Bureau of Investigations got a cold
18:23
Speaker 2: case squad. They started looking into Jennifer's case. In two
18:27
Speaker 2: thousand and one, a local newspaper reported that Ray London,
18:31
Speaker 2: a KBI senior special agent and coordinator of the squad,
18:35
Speaker 2: told them the squad had been working on the case
18:37
Speaker 2: for two years straight at that point, and that quote,
18:40
Speaker 2: an arrest might come soon end quote then nothing happened.
18:45
Speaker 2: The KBI did more public outreach on the fifteenth anniversary
18:49
Speaker 2: of Jennifer's murder in two thousand and seven. Over the years,
18:53
Speaker 2: there have been several people named as possible suspects. One
18:57
Speaker 2: of the biggest questions in the investigation was was Jennifer's
19:00
Speaker 2: killer someone she knew and possibly invited inside. Remember the
19:05
Speaker 2: door was unlocked, but also Jennifer's keys were on the floor.
19:10
Speaker 2: Could someone have surprised her at the door and pushed
19:12
Speaker 2: her inside? Could someone have been stalking Jennifer. Jennifer's father,
19:29
Speaker 2: Dale Bryan, told the Joplin Globe he believed Jennifer might
19:33
Speaker 2: have had a stalker. He said, five days before her
19:36
Speaker 2: brutal murder, she told a friend someone was pounding on
19:40
Speaker 2: her door hard. She was so freaked out by that.
19:43
Speaker 2: Apparently she hid from this person. Jennifer's father also told
19:47
Speaker 2: the paper he had followed her home because she thought
19:50
Speaker 2: that someone was following her, though this happened several months
19:53
Speaker 2: before the murder. We asked Justin if Jennifer ever mentioned
19:57
Speaker 2: anything about anyone following her. Justin said that, from what
20:01
Speaker 2: he could remember, she had not. He also does not
20:04
Speaker 2: remember her ever saying anything about someone pounding on the door.
20:09
Speaker 2: Justin said, based on what the Kansas Bureau of Investigations
20:12
Speaker 2: said to him, he believed they were completely focused on
20:15
Speaker 2: his friend, Chuck Chance as the main suspect. Over the years,
20:20
Speaker 2: Chuck has been arrested multiple times and spent time in jail.
20:23
Speaker 2: For things like public intoxication, grand larceny, obstructing a police officer,
20:29
Speaker 2: escaped from jail, possession of a stolen vehicle, etc. There
20:32
Speaker 2: are court documents pertaining to fights he had with family members,
20:36
Speaker 2: but the court record as of now shows no arrests
20:40
Speaker 2: for other violent crimes. Pllice did talk to Chuck about
20:43
Speaker 2: what he was doing before he went to Justin's work
20:46
Speaker 2: that day. At the time, Chuck was married and had
20:48
Speaker 2: a one year old daughter. He lived about a ten
20:51
Speaker 2: to fifteen minute drive from where Jennifer and Justin lived.
20:54
Speaker 2: In twenty twenty four, there was a podcast called Who
20:58
Speaker 2: Killed Jennifer Judd, and the host was deputized as part
21:01
Speaker 2: of her research into the case, so she got access
21:04
Speaker 2: to the case files. On the podcast, she read from
21:07
Speaker 2: Chuck Chance's statements. According to what is said on the podcast,
21:11
Speaker 2: Chuck said that he left home that morning at around
21:13
Speaker 2: seven am and went to a fitness center. Once he
21:16
Speaker 2: was there, he spent about half an hour in a whirlpool,
21:19
Speaker 2: then took a shower and left. Then, he said he
21:22
Speaker 2: went to Jennifer and Justin's house. That's when Chuck told
21:25
Speaker 2: police Jennifer didn't answer the door. Chuck said something else.
21:29
Speaker 2: According to the podcast, he said that he saw a
21:31
Speaker 2: quote a woman who he assumed might be a saleswoman
21:34
Speaker 2: end quote. Chuck went on to say this woman actually
21:37
Speaker 2: came up to his vehicle and asked about Justin and Jennifer.
21:41
Speaker 2: Chuck claimed he told this person that Justin and Jennifer
21:44
Speaker 2: were his friends and they lived in the apartment complex. Now.
21:47
Speaker 2: Chuck claims that this woman was walking up to Jennifer
21:50
Speaker 2: and Justin's apartment and knocking on their door as he
21:53
Speaker 2: drove off. After that, Chuck said he went to Pittsburgh, Kansas.
21:57
Speaker 2: He claimed he stopped at a convenience store at nine am,
22:00
Speaker 2: and then he named a couple of businesses where he
22:02
Speaker 2: said he stopped in. His last stop was the Hicks Corporation.
22:06
Speaker 2: After filling out an application there, he said he left
22:10
Speaker 2: for Justin's work at around nine forty two am. He
22:14
Speaker 2: said he and Justin hung out there until Justin got
22:17
Speaker 2: off work at two thirty PM, and then they drove
22:19
Speaker 2: to Justin and Jennifer's home. According to the podcast, on
22:23
Speaker 2: the next day, May twelfth, Chuck called police and changed
22:27
Speaker 2: his story slightly. He told the authorities he'd actually left
22:31
Speaker 2: Pittsburgh between ten and ten fifteen am, not nine forty two,
22:36
Speaker 2: and he remembered he'd made a couple of stops on
22:38
Speaker 2: his roof, one in Commerce, where he said he stopped
22:41
Speaker 2: at the bank. He claimed he was at the bank
22:44
Speaker 2: in Commerce at exactly eleven thirty, And he claimed he
22:47
Speaker 2: remember that because at that time he was planning on
22:50
Speaker 2: depositing a check, but the teller was going on their
22:52
Speaker 2: lunch break, so he wasn't able to do it. Instead,
22:56
Speaker 2: he drove on to the chemical plant and got there
22:58
Speaker 2: at eleven forty five. The rest of the story about
23:01
Speaker 2: his getting to Justin's work right before lunchtime at around
23:04
Speaker 2: eleven forty five, was the same. He said he showed up,
23:07
Speaker 2: stayed until two thirty, and then they went back to
23:10
Speaker 2: Justin's place and found the body. According to a search
23:14
Speaker 2: warrant affidavit which we've seen, police interviewed Chuck. He quote
23:19
Speaker 2: admitted to the touching of certain knives located upon the
23:22
Speaker 2: counter in the kitchen and to being present in the
23:24
Speaker 2: bedroom where certain foreign hairs were discovered end quote. Police
23:29
Speaker 2: were clearly suspicious of Chuck, but that interview, in my opinion,
23:33
Speaker 2: is not a smoking gun. Chuck could have touched the
23:36
Speaker 2: knives and been in the bedroom. He was friends with
23:38
Speaker 2: Jennifer and Justin. That would not have been super out
23:41
Speaker 2: of the ordinary. In fact, told us Chuck had spent
23:45
Speaker 2: a lot of time in that apartment. He said Chuck
23:48
Speaker 2: actually helped him and Jennifer move into that place. In
23:51
Speaker 2: twenty twenty four, it was reported police had tested DNA
23:55
Speaker 2: hair and fingerprints from the crime scene, and based on
23:59
Speaker 2: this DNA evidence, police ruled Chuck out because his hair
24:04
Speaker 2: and prints were not a match to anything from the
24:07
Speaker 2: crime scene.
24:09
Speaker 3: The KBI Hanson Bureau investigations, they had me pretty well
24:12
Speaker 3: convinced of who it was, and since then, I just
24:20
Speaker 3: found out within the last year that there's DNA evidence
24:24
Speaker 3: that made him not the person. So I'd been thirty
24:32
Speaker 3: some years with that in my mind, having you know,
24:36
Speaker 3: thinking I had figured out, you know, what all had
24:38
Speaker 3: happened and stuff, and then that hit me and that
24:40
Speaker 3: was pretty pretty rough. So then it just opened up
24:42
Speaker 3: all this speculaums in my mind, you know, and you
24:45
Speaker 3: know of who it could be. But the DNA has
24:49
Speaker 3: been put in in the database and it didn't come
24:51
Speaker 3: up with the match. He got cleared by DNA, But still,
24:56
Speaker 3: I mean, and it's crazy, but still in my mind
25:00
Speaker 3: the way he acted that day and stuff, And I mean,
25:02
Speaker 3: who goes to somebody who work and sifts there half
25:04
Speaker 3: a shift with them? You know, whether it worked, I mean,
25:06
Speaker 3: it just and he'd never done that before, and he
25:09
Speaker 3: just acted really strange that day. And there's still in
25:13
Speaker 3: my mind there's still something there.
25:16
Speaker 2: So what evidence do they have. Over the years, police
25:20
Speaker 2: in Cherokee County and the Kansas Bureau of Investigation haven't
25:24
Speaker 2: talked much about it. They just made some statements saying
25:27
Speaker 2: there were items taken and that they have been tested.
25:31
Speaker 2: According to a May twelfth, nineteen ninety two search warrant,
25:34
Speaker 2: eighteen items were taken as evidence from the house. Those
25:38
Speaker 2: included a bed spread, blue shorts, purple night shorts, a
25:42
Speaker 2: minute made popcan, a knife rack holding eleven knives and
25:46
Speaker 2: a pair of scissors, a drawer with kitchen knives, sheet
25:49
Speaker 2: rock pieces, a red coat hanger, hair samples, and a
25:53
Speaker 2: piece of carpet from the kitchen area. Next week, in
25:56
Speaker 2: Part two, we're going to take another look at this
25:59
Speaker 2: evidence and try to find out what the test results were,
26:03
Speaker 2: what they mean, and if there is evidence that can
26:06
Speaker 2: be retested, and we'll take a look at some of
26:10
Speaker 2: the other suspects, including a serial killer. Jennifer Judd's case
26:15
Speaker 2: is still unsolved, and there is a five thousand dollars
26:19
Speaker 2: reward still active for any information leading to the arrest
26:22
Speaker 2: and conviction of Jennifer's killer. If you know anything about
26:26
Speaker 2: Jennifer Judd's murder, no matter how small, authorities asked that
26:30
Speaker 2: you reach out to contact the Baxter Springs Police Department,
26:34
Speaker 2: Cherokee County Sheriff's Office, or the Kansas Bureau of Investigation.
26:38
Speaker 2: Their number is one eight hundred KS crime. That's one
26:42
Speaker 2: eight hundred five seven into seven four six three.
26:46
Speaker 3: And then just after thirty some years of thinking you
26:51
Speaker 3: had something figured out in your mind, and then you
26:52
Speaker 3: find out that that's not the case, and you know,
26:55
Speaker 3: your mind just goes all over the place. But one
27:00
Speaker 3: thing that did happen is one night we was in
27:03
Speaker 3: bed and I woke up and I could tell she
27:07
Speaker 3: was dreaming. She was kind of jerking your own stuff
27:10
Speaker 3: in a dream, and she raised up on the bench.
27:12
Speaker 3: And because you know, back then, I always heard you
27:14
Speaker 3: don't wake somebody up when they're dreaming, you know, so
27:17
Speaker 3: I just laid there and she just raised up in
27:18
Speaker 3: the bed. I said okay, and she said, somebody's after me.
27:25
Speaker 2: I'm Catherine Townsend. This is Helen Gone Murder Line. Helen
27:31
Speaker 2: Gone Murder Line is a production of School of Humans
27:33
Speaker 2: and iHeart Podcasts. It's written, narrated by me Catherine Townsend,
27:37
Speaker 2: and produced by Etily's Perez Special thanks to Amy Tubbs
27:41
Speaker 2: for her research assistance and James Wheaton for legal Noah
27:44
Speaker 2: Kamer mixed and scored this episode. Our theme song is
27:47
Speaker 2: by Ben Sale, Executive producers of Virginia Prescott, Brandon Barr,
27:52
Speaker 2: and LC Crowley. Listen to Helen Gone ad free by
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Speaker 2: subscribing to the iHeart True Crime Plus channel on Apple Podcasts.
27:59
Speaker 2: If you were interested in seeing documents and materials from
28:02
Speaker 2: the case, you can follow the show on Instagram at
28:05
Speaker 2: Helen gonpod. If you have a case you'd like me
28:08
Speaker 2: and my team to look into, you can reach out
28:10
Speaker 2: to us at our Helen Gone Murder Line at six
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