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Hell and Gone Murder Line: Amanda Tusing · Hell and Gone: Murder Line

0:08
Speaker 1: School of Humans. On June fourteenth, two thousand, there was
0:16
Speaker 1: a huge storm brewing in northeast Arkansas. It had been
0:19
Speaker 1: raining heavily all day, and according to local weather data,
0:22
Speaker 1: tornadoes had hit. Over one hundred trees were downed, power
0:27
Speaker 1: lines were down, and homes were destroyed. Twenty year old
0:31
Speaker 1: Amanda Tussing, who went by Mandy, was hanging out with
0:34
Speaker 1: her fiance, Matt Irvin, at his apartment in Jonesboro. Amanda
0:38
Speaker 1: lived forty miles away in Dell, Arkansas, which is in
0:41
Speaker 1: Mississippi County. She lived with her father, ed, her mother, Susan,
0:45
Speaker 1: and her twin brother Andy. She also had an older
0:48
Speaker 1: brother who worked out of state. Matt did not want
0:51
Speaker 1: her to go home that night. It was about a
0:54
Speaker 1: forty five minute drive on a good day and the
0:56
Speaker 1: weather was bad, but Amanda wanted to get home, so
0:59
Speaker 1: she left Jonesboro at around eleven thirty PM, so even
1:04
Speaker 1: if she drove very slowly, she should have gotten home
1:07
Speaker 1: around twelve thirty am at the latest. Amanda told Matt
1:11
Speaker 1: she would call him from her parents' landline as soon
1:14
Speaker 1: as she got home. She did have a cell phone,
1:16
Speaker 1: by the way, but her family said she never kept
1:20
Speaker 1: it charged, and it was always dying. Matt never got
1:24
Speaker 1: that call. By one thirty am, he was concerned. Matt
1:28
Speaker 1: called Amanda's mother, Susan tussing and woke her up. Susan
1:34
Speaker 1: told Matt to hang on a second. She said she
1:36
Speaker 1: would check to see if Amanda was in bed, but
1:39
Speaker 1: when she went into Amanda's bedroom, she saw that Amanda
1:43
Speaker 1: was not home. This was totally unlike Amanda. Her family
1:47
Speaker 1: knew something must have happened on that road, so her dad,
1:51
Speaker 1: Ed and her brother Andy got in the car together
1:54
Speaker 1: and drove toward Dell. Meanwhile, Matt left his house in
1:57
Speaker 1: Jonesboro and started driving down Highway eighteen in the opposite direction.
2:02
Speaker 1: Their plan was they would meet in the middle and
2:05
Speaker 1: hopefully see Amanda. Somewhere along the way, Matt saw Amanda's
2:10
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety two Pontiac grand am parked under a street light.
2:14
Speaker 1: It was on the shoulder of Arkansas Highway eighteen, about
2:17
Speaker 1: a mile west of the small town of Monette. Amanda's
2:21
Speaker 1: car was on the side of the road. It looked
2:24
Speaker 1: like it had been parked there intentionally, in other words,
2:27
Speaker 1: not like she randomly swerved over. Matt got out of
2:30
Speaker 1: his car, stepped out into the darkness, walked over and
2:35
Speaker 1: looked inside. I'm Catherine Townsend. Over the past five years
2:40
Speaker 1: of making my true crime podcast, Helen Gone, I have
2:43
Speaker 1: learned that there is no such thing as a small
2:46
Speaker 1: town where murder never happens. I have received hundreds of
2:50
Speaker 1: messages from people all around the country asking for help
2:54
Speaker 1: with an unsolved murder that's affected them, their families, and
2:57
Speaker 1: their communities. If you have a case you'd like me
3:00
Speaker 1: and my team to look into, you can reach out
3:02
Speaker 1: to us at our Helen Gone Murder Line at six
3:05
Speaker 1: seven eight seven four four six one four five. That
3:09
Speaker 1: six seven eight seven four four six one four five.
3:13
Speaker 1: This is Helen Gone Murder Line. Matt called the police.
4:07
Speaker 1: They met him and Amanda's father out on Highway eighteen
4:11
Speaker 1: by the car. Law enforcement showed up shortly after two
4:15
Speaker 1: thirty am. At first, police were thinking maybe her car
4:19
Speaker 1: broke down. The keys were still in the ignition. When
4:22
Speaker 1: they started it up, the car ran perfectly. There was
4:25
Speaker 1: also gas in the tank. They noticed some other things too.
4:30
Speaker 1: There was a coke can in the drinkholder that was
4:32
Speaker 1: half to three quarters full and it was still chilled
4:35
Speaker 1: with condensation on the side, which police believed indicated to
4:40
Speaker 1: them that someone had taken a drink out of that
4:43
Speaker 1: can pretty recently. They also noticed the radio was turned
4:47
Speaker 1: to Amanda's favorite station with the volume turned down, and
4:50
Speaker 1: the windshield wipers had stopped midwipe on the windshield. The
4:55
Speaker 1: interior of the car did not show any signs of
4:57
Speaker 1: foul play. Amanda's stuff was inside, her cell phone and
5:01
Speaker 1: her billfold were on the passenger seat. Her cell phone
5:04
Speaker 1: was dead, but again and her parents said that that
5:07
Speaker 1: wasn't necessarily a red flag because it was very often dead.
5:10
Speaker 1: She had a habit of letting her phone run down.
5:13
Speaker 1: And this, by the way, was back way before smartphones.
5:16
Speaker 1: Back in two thousand, cell phone reception was very spotty
5:20
Speaker 1: in those areas. In some of those areas it still is.
5:24
Speaker 1: I talked to Amanda's cousin, Jonathan, about the case. Her
5:28
Speaker 1: cousin was born after Amanda disappeared, but Amanda's family has
5:33
Speaker 1: never stopped trying to figure out what happened to her.
5:35
Speaker 2: The weird thing about the case is that like her
5:40
Speaker 2: car wasn't it didn't look like somebody had like pulled
5:45
Speaker 2: her over and dragged her out of the car or
5:47
Speaker 2: anything like that. Everything was like in place, but she
5:50
Speaker 2: had left all her stuff there. So people like to
5:55
Speaker 2: say that like Amanda would never have pulled over for
5:58
Speaker 2: no reason, you know.
6:00
Speaker 1: Investigators and her family believed that she may have pulled
6:04
Speaker 1: over to stop for some reason or been pulled over
6:08
Speaker 1: by someone. Amanda's family and friends and volunteers came out
6:12
Speaker 1: to search, but they saw no sign of Amanda for days.
6:16
Speaker 1: Then three days later, on June eighteenth, two thousand, Father's Day,
6:21
Speaker 1: a couple, Trent and Fonda Davis, were coming back home
6:24
Speaker 1: after a trip to Jonesboro. They drove over the twin
6:27
Speaker 1: bridges on Arkansas Highway one thirty five that ran over
6:31
Speaker 1: a body of water called Big Bay Ditch. The couple
6:34
Speaker 1: saw what they thought were some clothes floating in that water.
6:38
Speaker 1: Then they realized that they were looking at a body.
6:42
Speaker 1: It was Amanda Tussing. Amanda Tussing's body had been found.
6:53
Speaker 1: This was twelve miles in the opposite direction of where
6:56
Speaker 1: she was driving. She was driving east. Her body was
7:00
Speaker 1: found to the west. An autopsy revealed that Amanda had
7:03
Speaker 1: water in her nasal passages, but not her lungs. Law
7:07
Speaker 1: enforcement have said publicly that they believe Amanda was dead
7:11
Speaker 1: before her body was thrown into the water, but they
7:15
Speaker 1: reportedly could not decide on a definite cause of death
7:18
Speaker 1: because it could have been a dry drowning where the
7:21
Speaker 1: victim dies of choking on the water but water never
7:24
Speaker 1: actually gets into the lungs. Amanda had no visible injuries
7:29
Speaker 1: except a small bruise on the back of her head.
7:31
Speaker 1: There were no obvious signs of sexual assault, but because
7:35
Speaker 1: she had been in the water for days, it must
7:38
Speaker 1: have been very hard to know for sure. The police
7:41
Speaker 1: also had more bad luck. The heavy torrential rains had
7:45
Speaker 1: washed away a lot of potential clues. Gary Etter, the
7:52
Speaker 1: original detective on the case, told kait Regionate News quote
7:57
Speaker 1: the medical Examiner's office checked and said that she had
8:00
Speaker 1: no physical injuries other than being in the water and
8:03
Speaker 1: the impact of the elements. I think whoever did this
8:07
Speaker 1: probably did it before. That's what I'm thinking, due to
8:10
Speaker 1: no evidence end quote Detective Etter. By the way, in
8:15
Speaker 1: my opinion, from what he said in public, it really
8:18
Speaker 1: does seem like he deeply cared about this case. Last year,
8:22
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty three, the Craighead County Sheriff's Office assigned
8:27
Speaker 1: a new detective named David Bailey to this case, and
8:30
Speaker 1: he has said that he's reviewing everything with a fresh eye.
8:34
Speaker 1: So who left Amanda there floating in that ditch while
8:39
Speaker 1: they were figuring this out? By the way, law enforcement
8:42
Speaker 1: did not say there's no immediate danger to the public,
8:45
Speaker 1: which is what they say a lot during these cases.
8:48
Speaker 1: In fact, they said kind of the opposite in Mississippi County.
8:53
Speaker 1: In Craighead County, they told women traveling alone to be
8:56
Speaker 1: careful and to take extra precautions. Mississippi County Sheriff Leroy
9:01
Speaker 1: Meadows told a local paper, quote, I would urge people
9:04
Speaker 1: traveling alone to be careful. It would be wise to
9:07
Speaker 1: make sure you know who is trying to stop you,
9:10
Speaker 1: or drive to a lighted area before stopping. End quote.
9:15
Speaker 1: This is very good advice. I just want to point
9:17
Speaker 1: out that Amanda did stop under a street light, and
9:23
Speaker 1: her parents said she was very safety conscious and they
9:25
Speaker 1: had told her they had drilled it into her she
9:27
Speaker 1: should only park in well lit areas late at night.
9:31
Speaker 1: So even if she had followed that advice, I'm not
9:33
Speaker 1: sure that it would have helped her. Amanda's car had
9:37
Speaker 1: some partial fingerprints inside, but according to police, nothing usable.
9:42
Speaker 1: According to law enforcement, her car did not look like
9:46
Speaker 1: it had been wiped clean. This led investigators to believe
9:50
Speaker 1: that the perpetrator probably did not get inside the car.
9:55
Speaker 1: Detective Etter said something else in that interview with the
9:58
Speaker 1: news channel. He told them, quote, the first thing that
10:01
Speaker 1: comes to your mind, and I'm not saying it was
10:03
Speaker 1: a law enforcement officer, first thing that comes to your
10:07
Speaker 1: mind is that a law enforcement officer would know how
10:10
Speaker 1: to conceal the evidence.
10:12
Speaker 2: End quote.
10:17
Speaker 1: Amanda's family laid her to rest, and the funeral procession
10:20
Speaker 1: was three miles long. Everyone loved this young woman who
10:24
Speaker 1: had dreams of being a veterinarian, and her father told
10:29
Speaker 1: Channel eight news that because Amanda loved the song tie
10:32
Speaker 1: yellow ribbon around the old oak tree, the town actually
10:36
Speaker 1: ran out of yellow ribbons because there were so many
10:39
Speaker 1: of them that had been tied to trees in her honor.
10:42
Speaker 1: This murder brought the town together but also terrified locals
10:46
Speaker 1: all at the same time. Police did take a close
10:50
Speaker 1: look at Matt Amanda's fiancee, which is completely normal. According
10:54
Speaker 1: to Amanda's family, they got along very well. They had
10:58
Speaker 1: occasional minor arguments about things like where he was going
11:01
Speaker 1: to go to school, but they apparently had a very good,
11:04
Speaker 1: loving relationship and were very happy. They were supposed to
11:08
Speaker 1: get married the next year. In June. Amanda's cousin said
11:13
Speaker 1: that Matt did not appear to be a person of
11:16
Speaker 1: interest for long.
11:18
Speaker 2: I know that at the time, they obviously first suspect,
11:23
Speaker 2: you know, is always going to be the spouse, and
11:28
Speaker 2: so they questioned him and he was really I'm pretty
11:30
Speaker 2: sure he was very cooperative, and then I think they
11:35
Speaker 2: ruled him out.
11:37
Speaker 1: Also, Matt was the person who reported Amanda missing. Matt
11:41
Speaker 1: told investigators he and Amanda had dinner at Dixie Cafe
11:44
Speaker 1: that night the night she went missing, and later stopped
11:47
Speaker 1: at a grocery store before going back to his apartment.
11:50
Speaker 1: One of Amanda's school teachers was able to confirm that
11:53
Speaker 1: they had seen the couple at the Dixie Cafe that night,
11:56
Speaker 1: so police were able to confirm her activities. Then they
12:01
Speaker 1: went back to Matt's apartment. It was getting late and
12:04
Speaker 1: the weather was bad, and Matt did not want Amanda
12:07
Speaker 1: to get on that road. Amanda still lived at home
12:10
Speaker 1: with her parents, and she had a curfew, so if
12:13
Speaker 1: Amanda normally called her parents before heading home. Why did
12:17
Speaker 1: she head out so late that night? Could she and
12:19
Speaker 1: Matt have been arguing? They grilled Matt hard. They questioned
12:24
Speaker 1: him several times, but police said he was totally cooperative,
12:27
Speaker 1: that he had passed polygraphs three separate times. Police also
12:32
Speaker 1: considered another possibility very early on, that Amanda could have
12:36
Speaker 1: been pulled over by a member of law enforcement.
12:40
Speaker 2: So they think it was There's been a theory that
12:43
Speaker 2: it was someone in law enforcement that pulled her over
12:47
Speaker 2: and then got her out of the car and then
12:50
Speaker 2: took her or people think that it might have been
12:53
Speaker 2: someone impersonating law enforcement and got her out.
12:58
Speaker 1: Detectives were processing Amanda's body in the clothes that she
13:01
Speaker 1: was found in when her body was recovered from that ditch.
13:04
Speaker 1: She was still wearing the same jeans and white gap
13:07
Speaker 1: T shirt she had been wearing when she went missing.
13:10
Speaker 1: Her driver's license was in the front pocket of her genes.
13:13
Speaker 1: Now I wondered at first if that had some kind
13:16
Speaker 1: of significance. Could that be evidence that Amanda got pulled over?
13:21
Speaker 1: But her mother said not necessarily. She told police that
13:25
Speaker 1: Amanda normally kept her driver's license like that in her
13:29
Speaker 1: front pocket. Apparently she never kept it in a purse
13:32
Speaker 1: or a billfold. Amanda was wearing her diamond engagement ring
13:36
Speaker 1: when she was found, so between that and the wallet
13:39
Speaker 1: that had been left on her seat, detectives took this
13:41
Speaker 1: as even more evidence. The motive was obviously not robbery.
13:46
Speaker 1: Investigators believed Amanda was killed somewhere else and then thrown
13:49
Speaker 1: into the water, but the question is where and why,
13:53
Speaker 1: because the only injury they found was a bruise on
13:56
Speaker 1: the back of her head. A few years after Amanda disappeared,
14:00
Speaker 1: law enforcement gave photos to the TV station Regionate News,
14:05
Speaker 1: and they are haunting. You could see one of the
14:10
Speaker 1: clues that can of coke in the drink holder that
14:12
Speaker 1: was partly empty. It was chilled with condensation on the
14:16
Speaker 1: night she disappeared. Now a lot of people have wondered
14:20
Speaker 1: if the coke can was a clue that maybe she
14:22
Speaker 1: had stopped somewhere on the road during her drive. It
14:27
Speaker 1: was late at night, and that is a pretty remote
14:29
Speaker 1: strip of highway. There are only a couple of gas
14:32
Speaker 1: stations along it. Police did apparently check surveillance footage from
14:36
Speaker 1: one of these convenience stores and said they did not
14:39
Speaker 1: see Amanda on it, but that's not proof that she
14:43
Speaker 1: wasn't there. And someone else also brought up another interesting possibility.
14:47
Speaker 1: I was reading a lot of online comments and they
14:49
Speaker 1: mentioned the were vending machines at a couple of these places,
14:53
Speaker 1: So even if she didn't go in, maybe she stopped
14:56
Speaker 1: at a vending machine. Now, Matt apparently told investigators he
15:01
Speaker 1: wasn't sure if she had taken the drink from his
15:03
Speaker 1: house or not, so that's another part possibility she might
15:06
Speaker 1: have taken it from her fiance's home because she was
15:10
Speaker 1: not in the car that long before something stopped her
15:13
Speaker 1: on that dark stretch of road. There was a witness
15:18
Speaker 1: who reportedly said that he saw her at a gas station,
15:22
Speaker 1: but police couldn't confirm this, and again they reportedly pulled
15:25
Speaker 1: surveillance footage and didn't see her in it. I don't
15:28
Speaker 1: know times or details, because remember this is still an
15:31
Speaker 1: open investigation, so we don't have access to any of
15:33
Speaker 1: the case files. In the photos that were released to
15:37
Speaker 1: the media, you can see a basketball on the foreboard.
15:41
Speaker 1: Amanda played sports in high school. She was an accomplished athlete.
15:47
Speaker 1: There's also a Bridle magazine in the car. She was
15:51
Speaker 1: clearly excited about her upcoming wedding and probably looking at dresses.
15:56
Speaker 1: Both Amanda's parents say they believe she may have been
15:59
Speaker 1: stopped by someone, maybe someone impersonating a police officer, or
16:03
Speaker 1: that she had some kind of car trouble.
16:06
Speaker 2: The law enforcement theory is a good one, but then
16:10
Speaker 2: there's been other people who have said, maybe it was
16:14
Speaker 2: a serial killer that was just you know, passing through
16:18
Speaker 2: that came and did it, because just the evidence at
16:23
Speaker 2: the car, there was basically no evidence to go off of.
16:27
Speaker 1: Over the years, law enforcement have debated and investigated a
16:32
Speaker 1: lot of these theories. Like so many cases, this one
16:36
Speaker 1: has been the subject of several rumors over the years.
16:39
Speaker 2: There's a ton of people in the community, I mean
16:41
Speaker 2: a ton of people that want this case to be solved.
16:45
Speaker 2: And there's a ton of people who think that it's
16:47
Speaker 2: like literally like we're right there and they're they're close.
16:52
Speaker 2: But that's just all hearsay. I mean, it doesn't mean anything.
16:56
Speaker 2: But there's people who say who swear up and down
17:00
Speaker 2: they know who did it. They just don't have evidence,
17:03
Speaker 2: enough evidence to book the guy.
17:06
Speaker 1: The strip of road between Jonesborough and Dell is pretty remote,
17:10
Speaker 1: especially back then. It passes through a couple of small
17:13
Speaker 1: towns like Manila and Black Oak, and there are only
17:16
Speaker 1: a couple of gas stations that would have been opened
17:18
Speaker 1: during that time. Over the years, a lot of people
17:21
Speaker 1: came forward with tips, but most of them led to nothing.
17:24
Speaker 1: In two thousand and three, the sheriff in a neighboring county,
17:28
Speaker 1: Jack McCann of Craighead County, said that they had gotten
17:31
Speaker 1: a major tip that someone had told them there was
17:35
Speaker 1: some sort of note in Amanda's coffin. I don't know
17:38
Speaker 1: if it was a confession or information, but it was
17:40
Speaker 1: apparently something that could have helped lead to the killer's identity.
17:45
Speaker 1: Amanda's body was exhumed, there was no note or anything
17:49
Speaker 1: else inside that casket besides her remains. To me, this
17:54
Speaker 1: really does show how police were willing to act on
17:57
Speaker 1: any tip. I'm sure that after going through the trauma
18:00
Speaker 1: of unearthing their daughter's body, the fact that the coffin
18:03
Speaker 1: had no evidence must have been another devastating blow for
18:07
Speaker 1: Amanda's parents. Around that same time, a psychic detective rolled
18:11
Speaker 1: into town with a court TV show called Haunting Evidence.
18:15
Speaker 1: I'm sure many of you know how I feel about psychics.
18:18
Speaker 1: On this podcast, Apparently their paranormal investigation did not provide
18:22
Speaker 1: any credible leads. Then, in two thousand and seven, an
18:26
Speaker 1: anonymous person told the Sheriff's department that they had heard
18:29
Speaker 1: people allegedly discussing Amanda's murder, but nothing came to that either.
18:34
Speaker 1: In so many of these cases, we see this over
18:37
Speaker 1: and over. People over the years will claim either that
18:40
Speaker 1: they did it or they know someone who did it.
18:42
Speaker 1: They'll do it sometimes for their own reasons. Sometimes if
18:46
Speaker 1: they're incarcerated, they may want to impress other inmates, and
18:49
Speaker 1: the more publicity a case has, the more rumors start flying.
18:53
Speaker 1: But police were willing to listen because there was a
18:56
Speaker 1: real lack of physical evidence. In this case. There were
18:59
Speaker 1: zero suspects and no clear motive. There was one single
19:03
Speaker 1: hair found on Amanda's body. They did DNA testing, but
19:07
Speaker 1: it turned out that it was Amanda's own hair. The
19:11
Speaker 1: Sheriff's department admitted that law enforcement was up a creek,
19:15
Speaker 1: and what I take from that is that they were
19:17
Speaker 1: just stuck no forward movement on the case. Amanda's father
19:21
Speaker 1: did an interview with kt Channel eight, and it was heartbreaking.
19:26
Speaker 1: He talked about the fact that Amanda was found on
19:29
Speaker 1: Father's Day. The reporter asked him if he was affected
19:32
Speaker 1: every single Father's Day. He got tearful and said, yeah,
19:37
Speaker 1: but it's no different from other days. He's affected every
19:41
Speaker 1: single day by his daughter's murder. So police are left
19:47
Speaker 1: with a few different possibilities. Was Amanda killed by someone random,
19:52
Speaker 1: maybe someone who was just passing through the area. Detectives
19:55
Speaker 1: don't think so. They think the location of the body
19:59
Speaker 1: is a big clue. They point out that it's near
20:02
Speaker 1: an access point that they believe only someone local would
20:05
Speaker 1: know about. But what about a local serial killer. Several
20:18
Speaker 1: people have suggested that Amanda might have been killed by
20:21
Speaker 1: someone impersonating a police officer. Now, there was one very
20:25
Speaker 1: high profile case a serial rapist who was preying on
20:28
Speaker 1: women in Arkansas in the late nineties. The papers gave
20:31
Speaker 1: him the name the blue Light Rapist. His real name
20:35
Speaker 1: was Robert Todd Birmingham. He was convicted of raping two
20:38
Speaker 1: women in eastern Arkansas in nineteen ninety seven. The reason
20:42
Speaker 1: he was given that nickname was because he had blue
20:45
Speaker 1: lights on top of his car. He pulled women over
20:48
Speaker 1: and impersonated a police officer. One of Robert's victims, a
20:52
Speaker 1: seventeen year old whose first name was Shannon, told detectives
20:56
Speaker 1: he pulled her over while she was traveling alone on
20:58
Speaker 1: a state highway. She said at first she thought she
21:02
Speaker 1: was going to get a speeding ticket. After he signed
21:05
Speaker 1: for her to pull over and she did, Robert came
21:08
Speaker 1: up to the window of her car carrying a gun.
21:11
Speaker 1: He told her to cover her face with a shirt
21:14
Speaker 1: and to get out of her car, then he forced
21:17
Speaker 1: her into his vehicle. Once he got Shannon into his vehicle,
21:21
Speaker 1: he claimed that his buddy was going to take her
21:23
Speaker 1: to Little Rock to pick someone up, but instead he
21:27
Speaker 1: drove her to a remote location and raped her. He
21:30
Speaker 1: told her that if she would kiss him back, he
21:32
Speaker 1: wouldn't hurt her. After the assault, he forced her to
21:36
Speaker 1: redress and took her to a field. He made her
21:39
Speaker 1: lie down and wait until he was gone. Robert was
21:44
Speaker 1: convicted of those two rapes, but he was suspected of
21:46
Speaker 1: committing more. There were other attacks women who were pulled
21:52
Speaker 1: over in the same area with blue Mars lights and
21:55
Speaker 1: then sexually assaulted, but Robert was never convicted of those attacks.
22:00
Speaker 1: Side note. In twenty seventeen, lawmakers passed Shannon's law name
22:05
Speaker 1: for Shannon. This law increased the penalty for anyone caught
22:09
Speaker 1: illegally possessing blue emergency lights. Robert was sentenced to life
22:15
Speaker 1: in prison. He died in prison of COVID related complications
22:19
Speaker 1: in May twenty twenty. But Robert was convicted in nineteen
22:24
Speaker 1: ninety seven, which of course, was three years before Amanda's death.
22:28
Speaker 1: But there were still lingering questions about these other alleged
22:32
Speaker 1: blue light assaults. Were these copycat rapes or could there
22:36
Speaker 1: have been another blue light rapist out there one who
22:40
Speaker 1: wasn't caught. There was another young woman, eighteen year old
22:46
Speaker 1: Dana Stidham, who went missing from Bella Vista, Arkansas, on
22:50
Speaker 1: July twenty fifth, nineteen eighty nine. On that day, Dana
22:53
Speaker 1: was on her way home. She had gone out to
22:57
Speaker 1: run some errands for her dad, who wasn't feeling well.
23:00
Speaker 1: He asked her to pick some stuff up for him,
23:03
Speaker 1: so she went to Phillip's food store Bella Vista. She
23:06
Speaker 1: bought some Alka seltzer and some dishwashing soap and sugar.
23:10
Speaker 1: This is all according to receipts. She left at three
23:12
Speaker 1: seventeen PM. Now there was another grocery store closer to
23:17
Speaker 1: her house. But later one of the detectives on the
23:20
Speaker 1: case talked to reporters and said that Dana avoided that
23:23
Speaker 1: store because a guy whose parents owned the store back
23:25
Speaker 1: then hung out there a lot. Now, apparently this guy
23:28
Speaker 1: had a crush on Dana, but the feelings were not reciprocated.
23:33
Speaker 1: The last time that Dana was seen alive was when
23:36
Speaker 1: she left that food store after running her errand for
23:38
Speaker 1: her dad. She used to work at Phillip's Food store,
23:42
Speaker 1: so she knew a lot of people there and they
23:44
Speaker 1: all remembered talking to her. She talked to people she
23:47
Speaker 1: knew in the store and in the parking lot. Police
23:50
Speaker 1: said they also talked to another witness, someone who was
23:52
Speaker 1: apparently doing some landscaping near the store. Now, this person
23:56
Speaker 1: apparently told police that they saw Dana lee, but they
23:59
Speaker 1: weren't sure which way she turned when she drove out.
24:03
Speaker 1: After that, Dana never came home home. On July twenty sixth,
24:08
Speaker 1: at around six thirty am, a police officer was driving
24:11
Speaker 1: southbound down US Highway seventy one when they saw Dana's
24:15
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty four Dodge Omni abandoned on the shoulder near
24:19
Speaker 1: Wellington Road. The keys were still in the ignition, the
24:23
Speaker 1: driver's side window was halfway down and the rear tire
24:26
Speaker 1: was slightly deflated but not totally flat. Again, there was
24:30
Speaker 1: no obvious sign of anything being wrong with the car,
24:34
Speaker 1: and no sign of foul play. But this time Dana's
24:37
Speaker 1: purse was missing and the driver's seat was way back,
24:41
Speaker 1: as if a taller person had been the last one driving.
24:45
Speaker 1: Dana had been doing laundry that day, and her laundry
24:48
Speaker 1: was found scattered several feet away from the car. The
24:51
Speaker 1: search for Dana went on for months, then in September
24:55
Speaker 1: of nineteen eighty nine, a hundred found Dana's remains in
24:58
Speaker 1: a creek bed near the Arkansas Missouri border. Her clothes
25:01
Speaker 1: were buried in a shallow grave nearby. She had a
25:05
Speaker 1: cut on the her left shoulder blade. It's been reported
25:08
Speaker 1: that detectives were not sure of the actual cause of death,
25:11
Speaker 1: but they are withholding details, so I can't be sure
25:13
Speaker 1: about that, and obviously this is still an open investigation.
25:17
Speaker 1: But they have made some facts public, like the fact
25:20
Speaker 1: that detectives had suspicions about that guy, the one who
25:22
Speaker 1: had a crush on Dana, the one who attended the
25:25
Speaker 1: same high school she did. They questioned this person, but
25:28
Speaker 1: in the end, the Benton County Prosecutor, Brad Butler, said
25:32
Speaker 1: he didn't believe he had enough physical or circumstantial evidence
25:35
Speaker 1: to file any charges. We're going to talk more in
25:38
Speaker 1: depth about Dana Stidham's case in a future episode, And
25:42
Speaker 1: I just want to be clear. I always hate when
25:44
Speaker 1: people make really tenuous connections between cases that are obviously
25:47
Speaker 1: not connected. I have no reason to believe right now
25:51
Speaker 1: that these two cases are connected. Dana was found in
25:54
Speaker 1: a grave. Amanda was found in a body of water.
25:57
Speaker 1: Dana's clothes were buried nearby. So, at least from what
26:00
Speaker 1: we know what's come out publicly, it does seem like,
26:04
Speaker 1: at least on the surface, there could be more evidence
26:06
Speaker 1: that Dana's case may have been some type of a
26:10
Speaker 1: sex crime. Amanda disappeared at night, Dana disappeared in the
26:15
Speaker 1: middle of the day. But there were also some similarities.
26:18
Speaker 1: Both women were petite, Dana was five foot two and
26:21
Speaker 1: one hundred pounds with short dark hare. The crimes happened
26:25
Speaker 1: near each other. Both women's cars were found abandoned on
26:29
Speaker 1: the side of the road with the keys and the ignition,
26:32
Speaker 1: and there were similar theories discussed in both cases, including
26:35
Speaker 1: the possibility someone impersonating a police officer could have pulled
26:39
Speaker 1: them over. I found something very interesting in the court documents.
26:43
Speaker 1: After the blue light rapist's conviction, the circuit court allowed
26:48
Speaker 1: a second victim to testify in court. They allowed this
26:52
Speaker 1: so that they could establish the rapist pattern his MO.
26:56
Speaker 1: So what's interesting here is that two of Robert's victims
26:59
Speaker 1: had some similarities. The reason this is interesting to me
27:03
Speaker 1: is not because Robert kill Amanda, we know he didn't,
27:06
Speaker 1: he was in jail at the time, but because maybe
27:10
Speaker 1: the methods he used can give us some insight into
27:12
Speaker 1: other predators. Robert would tell these women they were being
27:15
Speaker 1: charged with DWI, but he said perhaps he could work
27:19
Speaker 1: something out with them. He also apparently would do body searches,
27:23
Speaker 1: and then that was the excuse he used to put
27:26
Speaker 1: his hands on these women and cross the line physically.
27:28
Speaker 1: He did not get into the women's cars, he followed
27:31
Speaker 1: them in his car. Also, both of Robert's victims had
27:35
Speaker 1: families that were out of town at the time when
27:37
Speaker 1: their attacks took place. And this is something that piqued
27:40
Speaker 1: my curiosity. Was this something he knew beforehand because he
27:43
Speaker 1: recognized these women or was this something he found out
27:47
Speaker 1: while questioning them initially and used his advantage. So the
27:51
Speaker 1: killer could have been someone impersonating a police officer, but
27:54
Speaker 1: there is also another possibility the killer could have been
27:57
Speaker 1: a real police officer, either one that was on duty
28:00
Speaker 1: at the time or off duty in a patrol car.
28:05
Speaker 1: Law Horrisment definitely seemed to consider this possibility. The sheriff
28:09
Speaker 1: made the comment to news station eight that a police
28:11
Speaker 1: officer would know how to hide evidence. In fact, detectives
28:15
Speaker 1: spoke to several police officers from Mississippi County and Craighead County.
28:21
Speaker 1: They apparently ruled a lot of people out and gave
28:23
Speaker 1: a lot of polygraph tests to members of law enforcement.
28:26
Speaker 1: One person they focused on was reportedly a police officer
28:29
Speaker 1: who lived in the nearby town of black Oak. That
28:33
Speaker 1: would have been one of the towns that Amanda Tussing
28:36
Speaker 1: would have gone through on her way home. True crime
28:40
Speaker 1: author George Jared, who we worked with on the Rebecca
28:43
Speaker 1: Gould case, discussed this theory in his book Whispers and
28:46
Speaker 1: the Willows, and in his book he said that he
28:50
Speaker 1: discovered through his law enforcement sources that that officer's name
28:54
Speaker 1: was Johnny Williams. Apparently a lot of women were complaining
28:58
Speaker 1: back in the day that Johnny would follow them home.
29:02
Speaker 1: He wrote in the book that police interviewed Johnny Williams
29:04
Speaker 1: multiple times. Amanda's cousin wasn't sure about the name when
29:08
Speaker 1: we brought it up, but the family has said over
29:11
Speaker 1: the years they have heard that there was someone in
29:14
Speaker 1: law enforcement who police apparently suspected, couldn't get enough evidence
29:19
Speaker 1: on and hoped would give a deathbed confession when he
29:22
Speaker 1: began to get sick. Johnny got a terminal illness in
29:26
Speaker 1: two thousand and nine. He passed away the following year. Now,
29:32
Speaker 1: Johnny Williams was never publicly named a suspect, never arrested
29:36
Speaker 1: or charged in connection with anything involving Amanda's case. We
29:40
Speaker 1: have no idea if he had any information at all,
29:43
Speaker 1: but any information he would have had went to the
29:45
Speaker 1: grave with him in twenty ten. So who killed Amanda Tussing?
29:56
Speaker 1: There are still a lot of possibilities to consider. One
29:59
Speaker 1: is that Amanda did stop at a convenience store on
30:02
Speaker 1: her way home and got that can of coke. Maybe
30:05
Speaker 1: so someone saw her there and followed her out of
30:07
Speaker 1: the store. Now that person might have been a police officer,
30:10
Speaker 1: or it's also possible that the person who got her
30:14
Speaker 1: to pull over wasn't a police officer at all. Maybe
30:17
Speaker 1: it was someone faking car trouble, maybe they got her
30:20
Speaker 1: to pull over another way, or maybe she pulled over first.
30:26
Speaker 1: It was raining really heavily that night. Maybe she was
30:29
Speaker 1: sitting in her car until the rain passed and someone
30:33
Speaker 1: saw her park there. In that moment, sitting inside that
30:36
Speaker 1: dark car with zero visibility, she was very vulnerable. Whether
30:41
Speaker 1: it was a law enforcement officer, someone impersonating a police officer,
30:45
Speaker 1: or just a sick and twisted random person. It seems
30:50
Speaker 1: likely that it was someone who lived in the area
30:53
Speaker 1: and they could be still out there. I'm Catherine Townsend.
30:58
Speaker 1: This is Helen Gone Murder Line. Helen Gone Murder Line
31:10
Speaker 1: is a production of School of Humans and iHeart Podcasts.
31:13
Speaker 1: It's written and narrated by me Catherine Townsend and produced
31:16
Speaker 1: by Gabby Watts. Music contributed by Ben Sale Special thanks
31:21
Speaker 1: to Amy Tubbs for her research assistance. Noah Camera mixed
31:25
Speaker 1: and scored this episode. Executive producers are Virginia Prescott, Brandon Barr,
31:30
Speaker 1: and Elsie Crowley. Listen to Helen Gone ad free by
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Speaker 1: subscribing to the iHeart True Crime Plush channel on Apple Podcasts.
31:38
Speaker 1: You can follow the show on Instagram at Helen Gone Pod.
31:41
Speaker 1: If you have a case you'd like me and my
31:43
Speaker 1: team to look into, you can reach out to us
31:45
Speaker 1: at our Helen Gone Murder Line at six seven eight
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