Latest / Crime Stories with Nancy Grace / Body Bags with Joseph Scott Morgan: Teen Missing Two Months, Found Naked, Shot in Back of Head

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Body Bags with Joseph Scott Morgan: Teen Missing Two Months, Found Naked, Shot in Back of Head · Crime Stories with Nancy Grace

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Body Facts with Joseph Scott. Three years ago, I was
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: asked at my university to start a cold case class,
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: and knowing what I know about cold cases, and knowing
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: where we are in this world that we inhabit now
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: in forensic science and in investigations, I felt that it
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: was incumbent upon me, someone that had been on cold
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: case squads in the past, that I should initiate this
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: class and introduce my students, at least at an undergraduate level,
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: through the process of cold case because it is highly
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: complex and for me, I wanted to introduce my children.
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: My kids at Jacksonville State University fill up my children
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: sometimes to the methodologies they are employed. And I got
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: to tell you something. Two years in a row, independent
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: of one another, my students selected the same case without
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: knowing about the other group, to present in class, to
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: run down the leads, to try to understand it, to
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: try to make sense of it. And I knew at
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: that moment time when I had a second class that
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: chose this same case, I knew that it was something
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: I needed to talk about on bodybacks and it's an
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: absolutely heartbreaking case. So today we're going to talk about
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: the death the murder of Blake Chappelle. I'm Joseph Scott
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: Morgan and this welcome to Crime Con twenty twenty four Nashville,
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: and thank you to our host here at Gaylord. I
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: really appreciate it, and thank you for all of our
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: fans that have turned out, Dave, all of our friends,
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: we'd like to call you guys friends as opposed to fans.
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: We get such great comments from you, all encouragement which
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: we need on a regular basis. And today, Dave, I
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: want to discuss a case that is actually not too
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: far away from where we live in Alabama, just literally
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: across the state lines over in a place called Coweda County.
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: And it might be a case that I think that
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: if we have if we have parents in this classroom,
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: I mean in.
• 2:36
  Speaker 2: This boy, I guess just play one on radio.
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: If we have parents, which I know that we do here,
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: we can identify with the struggles of life. We can
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: understand what it's like not to have much money at
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: the end of the month, and are we going to
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: be able to provide a living for our children? And
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: today I want to talk about Blake Chappelle and his
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: life with his mama that he you know he'd been
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: with for all of these years and uh, hey they
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: were on hard times.
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: Just so you know, this case has multi levels to it.
• 3:18
  Speaker 2: It's the murder of Blake Chappelle. It starts in twenty
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: eleven with his murder and it just had an it's unsolved,
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: but a new break in the case in March of
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: this year. So we're talking a couple of months ago.
• 3:33
  Speaker 2: Police were serving search warrants on this case. When we
• 3:36
  Speaker 2: were prepping for crime con we saw this and went,
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: holy moly, good timing. Maybe we'll have something to add, which,
• 3:41
  Speaker 2: by the way, we'll get into in a minute. But
• 3:43
  Speaker 2: he was somewout Blake Chappelle and his mom, Melissa, and
• 3:46
  Speaker 2: they didn't have much money. To give you an idea,
• 3:49
  Speaker 2: Blake found it very important as a teen to help
• 3:54
  Speaker 2: his mom in any way could. So this is a
• 3:57
  Speaker 2: kid who didn't complain about it. He went to a
• 4:00
  Speaker 2: convenience store on his way to school and bought Monster
• 4:02
  Speaker 2: drinks because parents say your kids can't have them, but
• 4:05
  Speaker 2: when they get to school, hey, who's got one? And
• 4:07
  Speaker 2: what he did he marked him up. So he's picking
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: him up at the old convenience store and up selling
• 4:13
  Speaker 2: him by a bucket piece and he's making money that way.
• 4:15
  Speaker 3: I don't know about you.
• 4:16
  Speaker 2: There aren't too many kids that think that way Blake did.
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: He's also one of those kids that everybody liked. Nobody
• 4:23
  Speaker 2: ever said anything bad about Blake, and they said he
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: liked everybody.
• 4:26
  Speaker 3: So we've got a kid.
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: And by the way, his mother, she couldn't have been
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: forty ish, right, yeah, has an She had a stroke.
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: So we're already impoverished. My mom has a stroke. I'm
• 4:41
  Speaker 2: selling monster drinks at school to have some spending money
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: and buy some shoes. That's the kind of kid Blake
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: Chappelle was. When he's in tenth grade, he writes an
• 4:49
  Speaker 2: essay called poverty, and he said, most of you don't
• 4:52
  Speaker 2: know this, but I used to not have a place
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: to live. I'm paraphrasing. He says it three months homeless,
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: and yet they had overcome that, And that was a
• 5:03
  Speaker 2: perspective he was writing from. And his perspective as a
• 5:07
  Speaker 2: sixteen seventeen year old kid was that sometimes people end
• 5:10
  Speaker 2: up impoverished through no fault of their own. And now
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: he has sympathy and empathy for that because he's lived it.
• 5:17
  Speaker 2: But he'd already grown The maturity in that essay was phenomenal,
• 5:21
  Speaker 2: and all I could think of, This is the kid
• 5:24
  Speaker 2: I would want my kids to hang out with, and
• 5:27
  Speaker 2: to see what happened to him breaks your heart. The
• 5:31
  Speaker 2: fact that all these years later we're talking about this
• 5:35
  Speaker 2: and his mom doesn't know.
• 5:37
  Speaker 3: Who did it. The police don't know who did it.
• 5:41
  Speaker 2: The only people they've ever even thought about, they haven't
• 5:45
  Speaker 2: even told us their names. And they've cleared two of
• 5:48
  Speaker 2: the three people. The third person they know wasn't there.
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: So they got three persons of interest, They've cleared two
• 5:54
  Speaker 2: of them and the third one they know wasn't there.
• 5:57
  Speaker 2: That's how unsolved this case is.
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: So we're coming into it cold in this sense, and
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: it is a cold case. And to go ahead and
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: kind of give you a little preview, Blake's body was
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: actually found tossed away like garbage in a stream in
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: a creek adjacent to and this is kind of the
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: irony of it. I find it's a relatively affluent area
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: where he was found. As a matter of fact, the
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: little road there was a little bridge where his body
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: was found adjacent to it was adjacent to a golf course.
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: And you know, Blake is probably the kid that would
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: never have an opportunity to join a golf club, but
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: here he is. His mortal remains are found there and
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: they're in a state of decomposition. And here we have
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: this young man whose life has been snuffed out. But
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: I think that it's important to understand as well, you know,
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: kind of how it all started relative to when he disappeared,
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: when Blake. Actually this whole thing starts, you know, like
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: we'd mentioned.
• 7:04
  Speaker 2: It actually begins way before that and begins the story
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: that we have to break out.
• 7:07
  Speaker 3: And the reason it's so confusing is Blake.
• 7:10
  Speaker 2: Had a girlfriend that ran away from home in May.
• 7:14
  Speaker 2: This happened in October, and if you back up to May,
• 7:19
  Speaker 2: that's where one of your suspects comes from.
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it does. And here's here's the rub, if you will.
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: This young lady got a Skuyler that he was involved with,
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: had a stepfather who was a convicted felon.
• 7:36
  Speaker 2: This is the guy you see on TV shows where
• 7:38
  Speaker 2: you go you know, that's the guy that did it. Yeah,
• 7:41
  Speaker 2: you know, you're ten minutes into the Lifetime movie going. Okay,
• 7:43
  Speaker 2: he's the only going to jail.
• 7:45
  Speaker 3: That's him.
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: He has the news coming on now, So yeah, Oh.
• 7:48
  Speaker 3: My gosh, what trailer park are they hiding in now?
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: Yeah?
• 7:50
  Speaker 3: Is this guy packing a gun?
• 7:52
  Speaker 2: And what he?
• 7:54
  Speaker 3: Oh my gosh, that's why the girl ran away.
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: Yeah. And if you can imagine, Blake was not the
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: biggest kid, but she had.
• 8:02
  Speaker 3: He was tried to nine.
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: She was trying to track He was trying to track
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: her down, and he was essentially trying to inject or
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: interject himself into the situation to get her safe. And
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: he finds her.
• 8:17
  Speaker 3: He did well.
• 8:18
  Speaker 2: They actually had been dating, but they had broken up
• 8:21
  Speaker 2: and she had run away from home. This shows you
• 8:24
  Speaker 2: the heart of Blake. They're not even an item. Blake
• 8:28
  Speaker 2: goes to find her. He knows pretty much the place
• 8:30
  Speaker 2: that she would probably go.
• 8:32
  Speaker 3: He finds her.
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: He's trying to convince her to go back home, because
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: this doesn't end well when you runaway and your parents
• 8:38
  Speaker 2: are looking for you, even if it is a bad stepfather.
• 8:41
  Speaker 2: Problem is stepdad and two of his buddies are also
• 8:44
  Speaker 2: looking for Skyler, and they find her and Blake. Because
• 8:51
  Speaker 2: Blake found her first, stepdad and two of his redneck
• 8:54
  Speaker 2: buddies show up at the same time, and this stepfather
• 9:00
  Speaker 2: seeds to beat this sixteen year old kid, and I
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: said five nine one five, that's a very slight young man.
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: That's not a heavy eye. And this man beat him.
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: And then this stepfather filed charges against Blake. It was
• 9:21
  Speaker 2: custodial interference. This stepfather convinced the police that Blake convinced
• 9:27
  Speaker 2: Schalar to run away with him and he was hiding
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: her from her parents, and they arrested him. And because
• 9:34
  Speaker 2: Blake was in such a financial situation, not very well off,
• 9:38
  Speaker 2: the kid spent sixteen days in jail because he couldn't
• 9:41
  Speaker 2: make bail. When it finally got in front of a judge,
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: they dropped the charges. But this sixteen year old spent
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: sixteen days in jail because the stay.
• 9:50
  Speaker 3: The stepfather was never charged.
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: No, he wasn't. And if memory serves me correctly, he
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: had actually presented with a weapon. Oh yeah, at one point,
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: Tom he And if you can imagine this, you're just imagining.
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: I think back to that period of time in your life.
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: You know, when you were sixteen, you were you thought
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: you knew everything that you really didn't. And sometimes life
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: will throw you curveballs, want it And suddenly the big
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: curveball in Blake's life is the fact that he's got
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: this ogre of a guy that's there convicted that felon.
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: I'm sure he knows this guy's history because it's coming
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: from his girlfriend. And this big, robust guy pulls up
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: his shirt like this and he's demonstrating a weapon to Blake. Now,
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: Blake later relates all of this, but he's he's beat
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: He's beaten significantly by this man. And it was at
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: that point in time that this guy actually has a
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: nerve to go and file charges against Blake. And as
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: Dave had mentioned, and we have to go back to
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: the situation with Blake and his mother. I don't know
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: if any of you guys have ever experienced poverty in
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: your life. I come from a family that's like that,
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: that's broken. We had nothing, me and my mom, and
• 11:07
  Speaker 1: I understand what it's like to live off of baloney sandwiches.
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: If you have that or a sandwish you ever had
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: a sandwich where we have two pieces of bread nothing
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: between it. Can you imagine Mom has a stroke five
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: six years earlier. She's got a son who desperately loves her,
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: wants to provide for her. He hears how. I don't
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: know if we're going to be able to make the
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: note on the rent this month. I don't know if
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: we're going to be able to keep lights on this month.
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: You can forget about internet, own your phone. You can't
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: have a phone. He didn't get a phone until sometime later.
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: And then it was a pay as you go text phone.
• 11:46
  Speaker 2: Yeah, text only. Does the phone we're going to talk
• 11:49
  Speaker 2: about in a few minutes, Yeah, it was text only.
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: It was text only. So they're scraping by. Can you
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: imagine what it would be like for to be a
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: mama that is greatly debility as a result of a stroke,
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: and she has no way to really truly take care
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: of her son. There's not a dad necessarily in the picture.
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: But yet her son becomes almost like a surrogate husband
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: at that point in time where he's trying to provide,
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: and you know, the best way he can do this
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: is to try to scrape together any kind of pennies
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: that he can. And I think that you know, when
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: you have a child like Blake Dave, that they want love,
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: they want adoration, so desperately they go around and they
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: try to find families that they can integrate into where
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: they can just feel that and Unfortunately, it seems like
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: Blake is certainly the first run at least with scholar's
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: family chose the wrong one in the bunch.
• 12:43
  Speaker 2: And you give you an idea. His bill was twenty
• 12:45
  Speaker 2: five hundred dollars. It's two hundred and fifty to a bellman.
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: They didn't even have that, so he spent sixteen days
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: in jail rather than come up with two hundred and
• 12:54
  Speaker 2: fifty bucks. Now we tell you all that because that
• 12:58
  Speaker 2: happened in May. After Blake gets out of jail, and again,
• 13:02
  Speaker 2: like I told you, as soon as it got in
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: front of a judge, they did charges, raw dropped and
• 13:07
  Speaker 2: everything went away. But his mom realizes what First of all,
• 13:11
  Speaker 2: her son was beaten by a man and nobody charged
• 13:14
  Speaker 2: him with a crime. Her son spent two and a
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: half weeks in jail, so she moves. She's like, we're
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: out of here now. Things had gotten a little bit
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: better for them financially, but you know, paycheck to paycheck,
• 13:25
  Speaker 2: moving not not a cheap thing to do on a
• 13:28
  Speaker 2: good day. And she did it anyway because she was
• 13:30
  Speaker 2: worried about Blake's physical safety from a man who beat
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: him up and then got him put in jail.
• 13:35
  Speaker 3: Do you matters.
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: I understand that, Yeah, I do too, And she's trying
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: to protect it the best way she can. And they
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: move from If you're not familiar with the kind of
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: the metro Atlanta area, if you think about Atlanta on
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: a clock face down at about the seven clock position,
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: I guess they lived where this initial incident took place.
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: Took place in there called Clayton County, that's immediately due
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: south of Atlanta, she decides, and probably the best that
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: she could do, because any kind of little network of
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: support that she would have would still be kind of
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: accessible to her. They moved to Kylweda County at that
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: point in time. And this is where and so, not
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: only is Blake having to condemnd with being in jail,
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: being beat up by a felon who demonstrates a gun
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: to him, he's broken up with his girlfriend, his mother's
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: had a stroke, they don't have any money. Oh, he's
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: got to integrate into a new school now, right, and so,
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: and if any of you guys have ever been to
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: new kid in a school, can you imagine to show
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: up in this set of circumstances. But yet, from everything
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: that we can surmise from his history. He's making friends
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: everywhere he goes. He has this kind of bright affect.
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: He gets along with people, he integrates into this environment.
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: But unfortunately, I got to tell you folks, when they
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: moved to Calwitah County, it seems as though the Flakes
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: death weren't the serve for everybody in the audience. Close
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: your eyes and just think back to what it was
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: like in high school and maybe you can still remember
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: the excitement of prom or the excitement of homecoming, and
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: those moments in time that you know, you're excited about
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: the possibilities that were going to occur that night, hanging
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: out with friends, going to dances. Uh, you know, back
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: in my day, we used to give cressages. I don't
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: know if they do. I think it might be a
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: southern homecoming, a.
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: Big deal like outside of the Southeast. Okay, it's a
• 15:55
  Speaker 2: deal where.
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: You are no matter where you are. But I don't
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: think they do cressages anymore.
• 15:59
  Speaker 2: So they okay, okay, wait a minute. Now it's become
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: bigger than when we were in school.
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I guess it is. Yeah, they have limos now
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: they take them to home Point, so yeah, yeah, well
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: that's right. Oh, yeah, just don't have to unaccompanied. Yeah,
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: but you know I mentioned I mentioned there you go,
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: I mentioned, uh limos? Right, Yes, what do you think
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: the chances are that Blake Chapel had a limo that
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: was going to pick him up and it was going
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: to take his date. You know who his limo was? Mama,
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: Mama was his limo? Yeah, that night and it was October.
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: Well, okay, to make sure we're on the same page here.
• 16:39
  Speaker 2: You know, we told you about Skyler, the ex girlfriend
• 16:41
  Speaker 2: who ran away and led to the beating that led
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: to the move.
• 16:44
  Speaker 3: Now we're in October.
• 16:45
  Speaker 2: He's in a new school, he's got a new group
• 16:47
  Speaker 2: of friends that they love him, they talk great about him,
• 16:50
  Speaker 2: and he's got a new girlfriend.
• 16:51
  Speaker 3: And Ryan it's spelled r I o N. Why do
• 16:57
  Speaker 3: parents do to their kids? I don't know.
• 17:00
  Speaker 2: Oh, but I'm just thinking I wish I'd done that
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: to mine, you know, so they'd have a real reason
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: to be mad at me instead of just making stuff up.
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: But Ryan Rio N and and they just they just clicked.
• 17:11
  Speaker 2: They just in a good way. They really clicked. And
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: now I don't know if Melissa was giving them a
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: ride or if it was Ryan's mother there. It depends
• 17:19
  Speaker 2: on There's a lot of mixture here, but the bottom
• 17:21
  Speaker 2: line is that Blake didn't have a car. His mom
• 17:26
  Speaker 2: was his car, and mom took them to eat. They
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: went to this really nice Japanese steakhouse. Mom picked them
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: up after dinner and then took them to the dance,
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: which was at Kalwita High schoolast Kawita, right, yeah, and
• 17:40
  Speaker 2: he's quit Kalweita High School and they went in And
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: the best part of all is I became a DJ
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: because I have no rhythm, can't dance, and the only
• 17:49
  Speaker 2: way you're gonna meet girls if you can't dance is
• 17:51
  Speaker 2: be the guy playing the music. And back when we
• 17:53
  Speaker 2: played records and stuff, that's pretty cool. It's different now
• 17:56
  Speaker 2: when you're a DJ. Back Vinmint playing records. Now, I
• 17:59
  Speaker 2: mean making up music as you go. But he could dance,
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: and he did. And I'm watching this. There's videos of
• 18:07
  Speaker 2: him online, you know, from the dance, and he's he
• 18:10
  Speaker 2: had such a great time that night. This is a
• 18:13
  Speaker 2: kid that is not pretentious by any stretch of the imagination.
• 18:18
  Speaker 3: His mom, he's so close with her. He shares with
• 18:20
  Speaker 3: her these.
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: Videos of him dancing and tell it this is the
• 18:24
  Speaker 2: greatest night of my life. That's probably one of the
• 18:27
  Speaker 2: things I wish my children would have said to me
• 18:29
  Speaker 2: if they had gone to a high school. And I've
• 18:31
  Speaker 2: had so much fun, this is the best night. On
• 18:35
  Speaker 2: top of everything else, they have to get her, you know.
• 18:38
  Speaker 2: Mom comes and picks them up after the dance and
• 18:40
  Speaker 2: they go back to Ryan's house to watch a movie. Now,
• 18:44
  Speaker 2: while they're at Ryan's house, it's still early. Okay, they'll
• 18:47
  Speaker 2: let the dance. Remember it is a high school homecoming dance,
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: So they're done by about ten o'clock or so.
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: Yeah. She actually picks them up at ten thirty pm exactly.
• 18:56
  Speaker 3: And they go back to Ryan's house to watch a movie.
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: Now, already ahead of time, he was planning on going
• 19:02
  Speaker 2: to his buddies Austin. After going and hanging out with
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: Ryan for a while, he was going to go back
• 19:07
  Speaker 2: to his buddy's Austin's house, and so Ryan's mom took
• 19:13
  Speaker 2: him from Ryan's house to his friend Austin's house. Once there,
• 19:20
  Speaker 2: that's when he actually it was then when he actually
• 19:22
  Speaker 2: told his mom, this is the greatest night of my life.
• 19:24
  Speaker 2: Thank you very much, thank you mom, you know, and
• 19:27
  Speaker 2: he actually talked her into letting him spend the night
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: at Austin's. It was something they had discussed earlier, and
• 19:33
  Speaker 2: according to Melissa, after talking to him about how great
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: of a night had been, she said, sure, you can
• 19:38
  Speaker 2: spend the night with Auso.
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: But Austin did not go to the home con dance
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: that night. He was not there. So he's introduced into
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: the picture now deducing this.
• 19:49
  Speaker 2: It's important when you know everything else that comes next,
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: it's important to no, he did not go to the dance.
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: Yeah, he did not. And here's something interesting. What do
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: teenagers have a proclivity for doing when they say that
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: they're going to spend the night at somebody else's house.
• 20:04
  Speaker 2: Yeah, well, well he said they went to a Bible conference.
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: Yeah they didn't do that. It wasn't Bible study, that's
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: for sure. But Blake, Blake went to Austin's house. Mom
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: dropped him off. So guess what Blake does. He doesn't
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: have a car. He starts walking.
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: Well, first they walked to a convenience start to get
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: a pack of smokes.
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: Pack of smokes, and the place was closed. They go
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: back to Austin's at this point in time, and it's
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: from there that they depart. That he departs on foot,
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: and guess where he's going. He's going back to Ryan's house,
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: his date from that night. And that's where things really
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: take kind of a sinister turn, because it's at this
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: moment in time that when you graft this out and
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: you begin to understand that this child is on foot.
• 20:51
  Speaker 3: It's several miles too.
• 20:53
  Speaker 2: It is okay, after they went to the convenience store
• 20:56
  Speaker 2: first where they were going to buy smokes, but it
• 20:57
  Speaker 2: was closed. It was what a mile and a half,
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: So you know, that's nothing for a couple of kids
• 21:03
  Speaker 2: this age to walk back and forth. But walking from
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: Austin's house to Ryan's house, yeah, three miles.
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's at least three. There's one estimate, depended upon
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: the way he went, it could have been four. So
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: he's got it bad. He wants to go back to
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: Ryan's house, and he is there. He sneaks into her home.
• 21:26
  Speaker 3: In her bedroom, in her bedroom the middle of the night.
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and well, there you go.
• 21:32
  Speaker 2: As the father of two daughters, I can tell you
• 21:35
  Speaker 2: the three o'clock in the morning outfit of every dad
• 21:37
  Speaker 2: with the daughter underwear and a louisvillswugger.
• 21:41
  Speaker 3: That's what you're seeing.
• 21:42
  Speaker 2: You're going to see an overweight, middle aged guy that
• 21:44
  Speaker 2: doesn't fear prison anymore. You know, grab a shovel, I
• 21:47
  Speaker 2: got property.
• 21:48
  Speaker 3: You're done and he knows me.
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: So there you go.
• 21:52
  Speaker 3: And that's what happened.
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: But it wasn't the dad that made the discovery. It
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: was Grandma who lived and so we were told in
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: Grandma of course is shocked.
• 22:02
  Speaker 2: Dumb or this shows you how smart sixteen year old
• 22:05
  Speaker 2: kids are. He's snuck in, but they make so much
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: noise they wake up granny.
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: Granny.
• 22:10
  Speaker 3: Yeah, he's snuck in through her window. Yeah, I know,
• 22:13
  Speaker 3: Granny catches him.
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: He dives.
• 22:15
  Speaker 2: This is like a Beverly Hibbey's episode or Up the Man.
• 22:18
  Speaker 2: He dives out the window. We don't even know if
• 22:20
  Speaker 2: he has his clothes on because he's.
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: Out, but he is. And he then he starts on
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: this journey where he's leaving. But he's got this this
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: phone that we had mentioned that is a text only phone.
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: And guess who he's texting. It's not his mother, it's
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: not Austin. It's actually Ryan's mother. And what he is
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: attempting to do is to apologize. He's apologizing for disrespecting
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: their home for behaving like this.
• 22:48
  Speaker 2: He actually said, I'm sorry, I broke your rules. That's
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: the character of Blake Chappelle. I'm sorry, I broke your rules.
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: He's acknowledging he knew the rules, that they had acknowledged
• 23:02
  Speaker 2: it with him, and he broke them. I do I
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: don't know too many adults that take that kind of
• 23:07
  Speaker 2: accountability anything.
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: No, I don't either. But you know, I think that
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: in a world like this that he occupies, where every
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: relationship that Blake has along this continuum that he lives
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: in is valuable to him. He doesn't have much in
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: the way of material items, so every relationship that he
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: has to me at least, is an indication that there
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: is value there. You know, even if you go back
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: to the relationship that he had with Skyler, now they
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: were no longer an item, but yet they were staying
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: in touch, and he wanted to find her because she
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: had run away and there's there's an undercurrent with that
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: relationship relative to her family situation.
• 23:48
  Speaker 3: He thinking about how important that was to him.
• 23:49
  Speaker 2: I didn't think about it though right now, that that's
• 23:51
  Speaker 2: why he was reaching out, because he wanted him end
• 23:53
  Speaker 2: that fence before it got totally torn down.
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I know you're talking about a kid that just
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: has been introduced into this environment. It's new. He's trying
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: to make friends. He's been at the home, and can
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: you imagine going to the heights of joy of being
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: able to express this out on the dance floor to
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: enjoy your friends. You're laughing, you're carrying on, and you
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: make that one final decision where you're going to say,
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: you know what I think I'm gonna. I'm gonna I'm
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: gonna push all in here and see what happens. See
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: what happens. Can I make it back to her house
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: and engage in whatever kind of activity they were engaging
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: at that moment, Tom.
• 24:37
  Speaker 2: This is what happens when you do Nancy Grace's show
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: so often you have to act like you don't know
• 24:41
  Speaker 2: what they were really doing. No, they were. They were
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: telling stories, they were trading jokes. That's what they were doing.
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: Dave, talk to me in normal, normal people speak.
• 24:53
  Speaker 3: I'm just a.
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: So we're he's in this position and where he's literally
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: pleading to be in her life. He's made a friend,
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: he's made probably an intimate friend at this moment in time,
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: and that's the one thing in value, these friendships that
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: he has. But here's the problem. When he exits that house,
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: when he starts back on this journey, this trek to
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: his home, he's never seen again. A lot if you
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: are in a situation where you don't know where your
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: child is. And I think that all of us have
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: experienced this over the courses of our lives collectively. I
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: know where my son is. He's here on the front
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: row right now, but I don't have to worry about
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: him anymore because he's in a adult But those moments
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: in times reflect back, just for a second, when you
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: have children and you have this overwhelming fear that kind
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: of seeps into your soul, It kind of corkscrews into
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: your spine. We were thinking, oh my gosh, where's my child?
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: Where's my child? And no matter how much you scream,
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: how much you plead, there's no bringing them back at
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: this point. And I think that most of the time,
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: and I think that this is the way the police
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: began to view this day, is that when you have
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: a sixteen year old that admittedly has this kind of
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: unbalanced life, I won't necessarily say troubled. Now he's spent
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: time in jail. But that doesn't mean he's a bad kid.
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: And so, but for a mom trying to find her child,
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: I think that the authorities, and we know this for
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: a fact, they viewed this. They viewed his absence as
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: a runaway. And so you've got a sixteen year old
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: that And there are many of them you hear about
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: them here at crime con that are missing out there
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: that no one knows where they are, and everybody's searching
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: for them. But in this particular case, people, for the
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: longest period of time thought thought that Blake was actually
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: a runaway.
• 27:13
  Speaker 2: And I remember he left the house sometime around four
• 27:17
  Speaker 2: point thirty. You know, we've gone through this timeline of
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: when they got back home, when he left to go
• 27:24
  Speaker 2: back to Ryan's house, when dad or grandma caught them,
• 27:27
  Speaker 2: and when he left.
• 27:28
  Speaker 3: But what we do have is the text messages. You know,
• 27:31
  Speaker 3: he had the phone.
• 27:31
  Speaker 2: We mentioned it was a prepay text only plan at
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: the time, this twenty eleven, and he was texting Ryan
• 27:38
  Speaker 2: while he was after he had left. He texted the mom,
• 27:40
  Speaker 2: I'm really sorry I broke the rules texting Ryan. He
• 27:43
  Speaker 2: actually texts her between five and five thirty that morning
• 27:46
  Speaker 2: while he's walking and he tells her I've been stopped
• 27:49
  Speaker 2: by the popo around five o'clock, he says, a police. Now,
• 27:53
  Speaker 2: there are two different things serving that area. One is
• 27:56
  Speaker 2: the County Sheriff's Department Kwiedi County, and then there's the
• 27:58
  Speaker 2: police department that could also been stopped.
• 28:00
  Speaker 3: But nobody has a record of that.
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: Nobody. And that's one of the striking things about this
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: case is that why why would a sixteen year old
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: state that he had been stopped by the police at
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: that time of day. Why would they have a record
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: of that? But yet the police, I mean, who would
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: even begin to think that up unless it's just this
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: fanciful thing that he's talking to Ryan about to try
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: to I don't know, get sympathy or whatever the case
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: might be. But he did complain in that text about
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: being cold he's walking.
• 28:33
  Speaker 3: Think about it.
• 28:34
  Speaker 2: Now, we're talking in the middle of October in the South.
• 28:36
  Speaker 2: I mean, it does get cold here and October fifteenth.
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: Yeah, October fifteenth, Yeah, that's davy chilly.
• 28:42
  Speaker 3: You know, it's not gonna be freezing.
• 28:43
  Speaker 2: But yeah, he's not wearing well, we know that he
• 28:45
  Speaker 2: left his overcoat and jacket. We know the only thing
• 28:49
  Speaker 2: he wore when he went to Ryan's house, was this
• 28:51
  Speaker 2: long sleeve shirt. He left his other stuff at Austin's house.
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: So when we're kind of assuming here because we don't know,
• 28:59
  Speaker 2: we have to put together because we know that the
• 29:02
  Speaker 2: police and Sheriff's purnt don't have any record of an
• 29:04
  Speaker 2: officer coming into contact with any teenager that time, no
• 29:08
  Speaker 2: record of that anywhere. We just have the text messages
• 29:11
  Speaker 2: between Blake and Ryan.
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: And procedurally, what in case you're not aware of it
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: anytime and you see these only these procedural show well
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: procedural let's just say that it's cops or something like that,
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: where if a police officer pulls somebody over, and in
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: this case they're stopping a pedestrian, most of the time
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: they'll say, uh, you know, the police officer of the
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: traffic would go something like, yeah, headquarters be vized, I've
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: got a young white male. Uh, he's a pedestrian. I'm
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: going to step out and talk to him.
• 29:45
  Speaker 3: Because what if the guy pulls a gun and shoots him? Yeah,
• 29:47
  Speaker 3: and if he doesn't call it in, nobody knows, and.
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: There's a record of that most of the time. But
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: you know, you can have these events where a police
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: officer might see somebody walking down the street. And just
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: keep in mind every time that you record that many
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: times deepending upon the department, you're going to have to
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: write a report. All right. So did a police officer
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: pull up adjacent to him and say, hey, son, why
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: are you out at this time? What are you doing
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: out here? Because it doesn't make sense, there's no one
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: around here, why are you here this sort of thing?
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: And of course there's no record of it. And that's
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: that's where you know, raw, I mean, that's where Blake
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: at this point in tom except for this interaction that
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: he had with Ryni, he kind of falls off of
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: the face of the planet. We don't know what's happened
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: to him.
• 30:33
  Speaker 2: Done at that moment, all contact with Blake ceases. And
• 30:39
  Speaker 2: by the way, from that moment on, nobody talked to him,
• 30:45
  Speaker 2: nobody saw him. There was no tax message, nothing after
• 30:48
  Speaker 2: five point thirty in the morning on that time, right
• 30:50
  Speaker 2: after you say he saw the police.
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and so this is October. We've gone into the
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: morning from October fifteenth, which the dance was on that night.
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: Now we're into the morning of October sixteenth. He's not
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: seen so they put out a bolo for him.
• 31:05
  Speaker 2: Well, and it actually shows for the family, remember, yeah,
• 31:08
  Speaker 2: Because first it's like, yeah, they're checking because well, Brian,
• 31:11
  Speaker 2: we know we pushed him out of our house at
• 31:13
  Speaker 2: the you know, in before the sun was up. Did
• 31:16
  Speaker 2: he make it back d Austin's house. He didn't make
• 31:18
  Speaker 2: it back Dawston's house. So now Ryan and her parents
• 31:21
  Speaker 2: know that where's Blake. Now they don't call his mom
• 31:25
  Speaker 2: right away, And this is a little frustrating for me
• 31:27
  Speaker 2: as a parent. You don't know where my kid is
• 31:29
  Speaker 2: and he was in your house and you're telling me
• 31:32
  Speaker 2: at eleven thirty in the day. It took hours before
• 31:35
  Speaker 2: they notified Melissa that they didn't know where he was.
• 31:38
  Speaker 2: Matter of fact, Ryan's dad went out hunting at eight
• 31:42
  Speaker 2: o'clock that morning. I don't know about you being in
• 31:44
  Speaker 2: the southeast. I'm talking to Joe about it. Men don't
• 31:46
  Speaker 2: go out hunting at eight in the morning. You go
• 31:48
  Speaker 2: out hunting at four in the morning. You don't leave
• 31:50
  Speaker 2: the house at eight in the morning. But that's what
• 31:52
  Speaker 2: Ryan's dad did. He went hunting at eight in the morning.
• 31:55
  Speaker 2: He's already out there when they call him and say, hey,
• 31:58
  Speaker 2: we can't find Blake. You need come home. They still
• 32:01
  Speaker 2: haven't called Melissa. All the talking has been between Ryan,
• 32:05
  Speaker 2: her mom, Grandma, her dad, and Austin and that's all
• 32:09
  Speaker 2: we've got. Then they finally when they can't find him,
• 32:12
  Speaker 2: you know, they drive the route between the houses, can't
• 32:14
  Speaker 2: see him anywhere. Then they notify Melissa. She finds out
• 32:18
  Speaker 2: and immediately calls police. Hey, my son is missing. Go
• 32:22
  Speaker 2: find him, and to be honest with you. For the
• 32:28
  Speaker 2: next six weeks, seven weeks, eight weeks, they're not really
• 32:32
  Speaker 2: even looking for him. Oh, they did the basics right.
• 32:34
  Speaker 2: They checked the route that he went on. They might
• 32:37
  Speaker 2: have walked it, they drove. They didn't see anything. He
• 32:40
  Speaker 2: ran away because he had been involved with Skyler six
• 32:43
  Speaker 2: months earlier and she had run away and he was
• 32:47
  Speaker 2: with her, and oh, my goodness, he's probably just running
• 32:50
  Speaker 2: away from a bad situation.
• 32:51
  Speaker 3: That's how they played it. He was not a bad kid.
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: December rolls around, Yeah, December nineteenth throlls around, and you
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: have you have pedestrian traffic that's adjacent to this golf
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: course and to the driving range, and someone happens to
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: look down over this tiny little bridge that's in this
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: kind of bucolic looking setting. The leaves are you know,
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: are changing. You know, in December you still have leaves
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: on the trees in this area of the country. It's
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: cool out. They look over look down in the creek
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: and there they spy something that doesn't quite fit with
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: the rest of the scenery, if you will. And that's
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: where they found this young man's body, adjacent to the
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: shoreline of this little creek. It's hung in brush. He's
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: only wearing an undershirt and a pair of underwear, his pants,
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: I'm sorry, his shorts, his shorts, and he's absent everything else.
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: There's no phone, there's no money, there's no idea, there
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: is absolutely nothing now at this point in time, no
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: shoes whatsoever. And this is a big question, I think
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: from a forensic standpoint when I begin to contemplate this
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: and kind of the actions that go hand in hand
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: with this, would you dump somebody right there? Or could
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: they narrow down the location where he was last seen?
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: Is this part of the route? There's all kinds of
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: things that play into this, because you know, I've worked
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: cases over the years where people have just taken bodies
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: and thrown them into bodies of water. What do you
• 34:38
  Speaker 1: think the number one I'm asking this question truly, this
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: is not rhetorical. What do you think the number one
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: reason is that people like to take bodies and toss
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: them into water. They need back to get rid of evidence,
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: to get rid of evidence, and to make that trace
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: evidence or anything that's there disappear essentially. And I've contemplated
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: this about Blake's case, and I've really wondered had someone
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: taken him and driven him about, had someone you know,
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: attempted to terrify him or terrorize him, because you know,
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: when they finally got his body back to the State
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: Medical Examiner's office, Blake had an intermediate gunshot woman to
• 35:31
  Speaker 1: the back of his head.
• 35:32
  Speaker 3: You say, intermediate, how far are we talking to him?
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: Yeah, well, with an intermedia it's really we measure it in inches.
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: So when you begin to think about firearms and a
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: lot of it, you can't. This is not a static number,
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: all right, So people will have very there. There's variability
• 35:50
  Speaker 1: here when someone is fired upon like this and they're
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: shot the you know, the project is not the only
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: thing coming out of the weapon. You guys have been
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: at crime com long enough to understand that you also
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: have what remains behind as far as unburnt powder, any
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: kind of other debris that might be in the barrel
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: of the weapon, and so you're going to have this
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: deposition on the area that is being struck by the projectile,
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: and it will kind of rain in. It loses velocity
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: really quickly. So if you're thinking about perhaps unburned powder
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: which leads to stipling, you've heard that term that it
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: surrounds the injury, it's not. It doesn't have the same
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: aerodynamic qualities as say, for instance, a projectile lead core projectile.
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: And you can do this at home. If you'll just
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: take a bit of baby powder and put it in
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: your hand like this and blow it, and it, particularly
• 36:55
  Speaker 1: in front of a mirror, you'll see it begin to
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: kind of rain down. You think, God, Morgan, that's kind
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: of simplistic. Well, it's science, and it's very simplistic. It's
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: we understand this. The aerodynamic qualities of this powder kind
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: of drift down. So you have to be close enough,
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: now get a hold of this concept. You have to
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: be close enough so that when that weapon is initiated,
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: it's going to imprint, imprint that unburned powder onto the
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: surface of the skin. Okay, so it'll be just underneath
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: you'll see these little flecks of powder that are there microscopically,
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: we can take them out. We can also take tissue
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: sections and take a look at this, and depended upon
• 37:32
  Speaker 1: how close it is, you'll have like within underneath the scalp,
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: you can actually see smoke that's there that's deposited. It'll
• 37:41
  Speaker 1: sometimes you'll have a greasy ring. Sometimes you'll have this
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: kind of staining that goes on. So dependent upon how
• 37:47
  Speaker 1: far away you are is going to dictate the amount
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: of this debris that winds upon the skin. So with
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: an intermediate round, you've got a projectile that's entering the
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: head and the rest of the breeze following away. But
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: there is essentially enough there to get an idea of
• 38:03
  Speaker 1: range of fire. That's why they're calling it an intermediate round. Now,
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: to this date, the police have not released the actual
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: caliber of the weapon that was used. I think one
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: of my big questions because they haven't released the autopsy
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: report on Blake's remains, is well, what type of caliber
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: was this? They're saying pistol caliber, so that can mean
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: anything from you know, a twenty two caliber pistol all
• 38:31
  Speaker 1: the way up to you know, there's fifty caliber pistol.
• 38:34
  Speaker 1: So you've got that broad of a spectrum here. Now,
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: if I were a betting man, I'd say, you know,
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: you're probably one of the most the most common caliber
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: relative to a semi automatic, it's going to be a
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: nine millimeter. That's what most most people are going to carry.
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: You'll have forty's if people still carry revolvers, you might
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: have a thirty eight. But that's a very common round
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: to have. So did they recover around out of Blake's skull?
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: They haven't stated. Is it a throw and through wound?
• 39:04
  Speaker 3: It was just one shot though, right.
• 39:05
  Speaker 1: It's a single shot.
• 39:07
  Speaker 3: Ain't that odd?
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: Though?
• 39:07
  Speaker 2: That somebody that is shot and not right up against
• 39:11
  Speaker 2: the head. But you're talking a little distance away. Normally
• 39:14
  Speaker 2: we have multiple shots, even if it is to the head.
• 39:17
  Speaker 2: Just to make sure, you know, could you always talk
• 39:18
  Speaker 2: about the kill shot but not in this case.
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and this is a proximity So shot in the head, yeah,
• 39:24
  Speaker 1: shot in the back of the head from what we understand.
• 39:26
  Speaker 1: And so you've got this And I always talk about
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: in relation to firearms, always talk about a symmetry. So
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: if you've got someone that is actually being killed. You
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: will have the perpetrator, and this is kind of obvious.
• 39:40
  Speaker 1: You have them in a dominant position over the victims,
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: so they're firing down many times. So you'll have these
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: trajectories that enter on the posterior aspect of the skull,
• 39:49
  Speaker 1: for instance, and they proceed, you know, forward, So you'll
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: have this kind of above to below, a front to back,
• 39:55
  Speaker 1: and then you can say whether or not it's from
• 39:57
  Speaker 1: left to right or from right to left directionality. But
• 40:01
  Speaker 1: why is that important? Well, it's important because it gives
• 40:04
  Speaker 1: you an insight into the intimacy of the relationship between
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: the victim in this case, Blake, and the perpetrator. So
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: who would have the ability to take this young man,
• 40:17
  Speaker 1: the sixteen year old, and put him into a position
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: where they are dominant over him with a weapon. We
• 40:24
  Speaker 1: already know he's had one weapon presented to him at
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: some point in time within the last few months in
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: his life. Okay, so there's probably an indwell in fear.
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: I don't know about you, guys, but I can speak
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: to myself. If somebody presents with a weapon in my
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: face or adjacent to me, there's a chance, you know,
• 40:41
  Speaker 1: a lot of us can be real bold and we
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: can say things, but when you're staring down the barrel
• 40:44
  Speaker 1: of a weapon, you're going to, at least to a
• 40:47
  Speaker 1: certain degree, you're going to submit. Okay, And you're talking
• 40:50
  Speaker 1: about sixteen year old kid. So what do you do.
• 40:53
  Speaker 1: Do you take him and put him on the ground
• 40:56
  Speaker 1: and stand over him and fire into him. Do you
• 40:59
  Speaker 1: have him in the back seat of a car. Do
• 41:01
  Speaker 1: you go into the backseat of the car with him
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: and fire into him. Do you take him to some
• 41:07
  Speaker 1: other location, perhaps shoot him there, maybe leave a casing.
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: Maybe you're smart enough to recover the casing. Then you
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: put him into a vehicle and you transport him to
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: that location. Either way, I think that there is probably
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: we can surmise that there's probably a vehicle involved in this.
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: And what would be really interesting, and we're so far
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: down the road now, I don't know if it would
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: be possible to recover this, but any kind of biological
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: evidence or firearms evidence that you could find in a
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: suspected vehicle. But you know, we're I don't know, Dave,
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: We're many years down right.
• 41:39
  Speaker 2: Thirteen years, yeah, thirteen is October. I'm thinking is if
• 41:41
  Speaker 2: he's in the car. And well, first of all, time
• 41:44
  Speaker 2: of day. Okay, you're talking about controlling somebody that for
• 41:49
  Speaker 2: no reason. I mean again, talk five o'clock in the morning.
• 41:52
  Speaker 2: Let's just use that as a as a time. Okay,
• 41:54
  Speaker 2: between five and five thirty am. Who knows he's walking
• 41:58
  Speaker 2: on the road at that time?
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah? Who would know that? This child?
• 42:01
  Speaker 3: Yeah? Is it going to be alone?
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah? Is going to be alone that there's not going
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: to be anybody else around him. He's already been in
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: a very distressing Can you just vision this for a moment.
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: You've got a kid, and I know I mentioned this earlier,
• 42:14
  Speaker 1: but just imagine he's at the height, he's at the
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: ultimate ecstasy in his life relative to this dance. Right,
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: we already know that he's he's reached out to Mama
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: and told her this best night of my life. And
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: then all of a sudden, you know, he makes this
• 42:29
  Speaker 1: decision with this young lady, goes into a room. He's
• 42:32
  Speaker 1: horribly embarrassed. Of anybody in here ever been embarrassed like this?
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: I have. You're in these circumstances, you're humiliated. Now you're
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: you're hoping that you can just hold on to some
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: semblance of this new life.
• 42:46
  Speaker 2: It kind of depends on the interrupted as to how
• 42:49
  Speaker 2: he really felt about it.
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: Any Yeah, I know exactly, and you don't know. I
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: can tell you a whole.
• 42:53
  Speaker 3: Little bit earlier than it's a little different than if
• 42:55
  Speaker 3: it's later.
• 42:56
  Speaker 1: Right, But either way, saying you've got you've got somebody
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: from an older generation that comes in into this room.
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: How embarrassing himse is I forgot about Granny? Yeah, there
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: you got?
• 43:05
  Speaker 3: And so you imagine that scream.
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: I know, and he's totally he's totally humiliated at this
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: point in time or relative to relative to what has
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: occurred in his life in this very short period of time.
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: And now he's cast out of the house. He's on
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: his own. He's reaching out to this young lady and
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: to her mother, and then he vanishes off the face
• 43:29
  Speaker 1: of the planet here. You know, there's all kinds of
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: rumors that have kind of floated around about about Blake's death.
• 43:38
  Speaker 1: And Dave, you laid this one on me real quick.
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: You had mentioned this. H there's actually this this blurb
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: that came out.
• 43:46
  Speaker 3: What was it?
• 43:46
  Speaker 2: I said that there's a podcast And this is why
• 43:49
  Speaker 2: you kind of have to be careful of what you
• 43:51
  Speaker 2: listen to there's a podcast who's claiming that the autopsy
• 43:55
  Speaker 2: report that the police said the body had only been
• 43:59
  Speaker 2: in the creek for a week. Now, If Blake's body
• 44:02
  Speaker 2: had only been in that creek for a week, where
• 44:05
  Speaker 2: was he for the seven weeks between the time he
• 44:07
  Speaker 2: was last heard from until the time they found him.
• 44:10
  Speaker 3: Now.
• 44:10
  Speaker 2: I'm telling you this because I hit him up with
• 44:12
  Speaker 2: it this morning when we were just you know, you
• 44:13
  Speaker 2: want to get updated. I want to come in here
• 44:14
  Speaker 2: and not have the most current stuff for you guys.
• 44:17
  Speaker 2: And I saw that. He said, hey, have you seen
• 44:18
  Speaker 2: this anywhere? So I spent an hour today trying to
• 44:21
  Speaker 2: verify this. I'm talking about calling the police, calling the sheriff,
• 44:24
  Speaker 2: calling anybody I could of the GBI, and I can't
• 44:26
  Speaker 2: find anybody that'll verify They said, the autopsy report hasn't
• 44:30
  Speaker 2: been released, period. So whoever is claiming this and a
• 44:34
  Speaker 2: podcast is making it up so we can throw that
• 44:38
  Speaker 2: out the window. It doesn't make sense that because you
• 44:41
  Speaker 2: realize that if that's the case, then somebody had his
• 44:43
  Speaker 2: body stashed for seven weeks and then.
• 44:46
  Speaker 3: Decided to kill him.
• 44:48
  Speaker 2: I think most of us would believe that he was
• 44:49
  Speaker 2: probably killed the last night he made that last text.
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: Yeah, And what we have learned is that his body
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: was actually beginning to change colors. And that's that's a
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: marker for us from a medical legal perspective. There's desiccation
• 45:05
  Speaker 1: even though he's just follow me here just for a second,
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: give me some rope. Even though he's in a water,
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: an aquatic environment, and he's not fully submerged.
• 45:15
  Speaker 3: He was floating, that's anyways, on the brush there in.
• 45:18
  Speaker 1: The brush he is. Oh and by the way, the
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: location where he is found is not a location that
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: you would walk down to the bank. And the reason
• 45:31
  Speaker 1: I know this is that the first group, the first
• 45:34
  Speaker 1: group of my students that presented this case two years ago, now,
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: they physically drove out there. They went to the site
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: my students did. And you can't access the water this way.
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: You would have to go through so much brush in
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: order to do so. That leaves us with one conclusion
• 45:54
  Speaker 1: right relative to the bridge, that more than likely there's
• 45:58
  Speaker 1: a high probability that.
• 45:59
  Speaker 3: He was pushed Williams.
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah, pushed pushed off the bridge, and he's there in
• 46:04
  Speaker 1: the water, and he is hung in the brush. His
• 46:07
  Speaker 1: body is in a state if if we are to
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: believe what has been reported that the body is decomposed
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: so badly. He had a lip ring that was right
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: here that he got into a lot of trouble over
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: with his mother, and additionally into that he had gotten
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: a Playboy Bunny tattoo.
• 46:26
  Speaker 2: It was one of the ways they identified him, and
• 46:28
  Speaker 2: he was really not happy about that.
• 46:30
  Speaker 1: And I think that it was an older brother that
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: was not in his life that had signed for it.
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: And so he's undressing at one moment, Tom and she's like, what.
• 46:39
  Speaker 3: What is that?
• 46:39
  Speaker 1: What is that on you? You know, and he's like, oh,
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: you know, I went and got a tattoo. So that's
• 46:44
  Speaker 1: how they had to identify him. Okay, a chrome ring
• 46:48
  Speaker 1: in his lip and also the fact that he had
• 46:52
  Speaker 1: this tattoo on his person, and that's what they went with.
• 46:55
  Speaker 1: I think they bolstered that with with dental records later,
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: but it puts them on the right path at that
• 47:03
  Speaker 1: point in time relative to relative to who they thought
• 47:07
  Speaker 1: this might be. And there were you know, there were
• 47:09
  Speaker 1: posters about at this sort of thing and this sort
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: of thing, you know, relative to they were looking for him.
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: But here's the thing when he's found and going back
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: to the condition of the body. He's only found in
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: his underwear, and he has no personal belongings with him,
• 47:27
  Speaker 1: including shoes, which I think is is really something to
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: look at and cases that I've covered in the news
• 47:34
  Speaker 1: and also things that I have worked. We talk about
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: embarrassment just a little while ago. Is there any other
• 47:44
  Speaker 1: kind of situation? I know that there are many, but
• 47:47
  Speaker 1: where immediately you could really humiliate somebody and threaten them
• 47:51
  Speaker 1: by making them strip all of their clothes off because
• 47:53
  Speaker 1: you feel, you know, very vulnerable before the world, and
• 47:56
  Speaker 1: that that's an active event that has to take place.
• 47:59
  Speaker 1: Take your clothes off, take your shoes off. That's an
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: action event where you're having and you're essentially putting him
• 48:07
  Speaker 1: into submission at that point time. Now, I guess it,
• 48:10
  Speaker 1: and I could say, I could say they stripped the
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: clothes off the body, but why leave the underwear. So
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: when you see this young man humiliated like this and
• 48:21
  Speaker 1: his body is dumped off like refuse off of this
• 48:24
  Speaker 1: bridge and he's found floating out there in the water,
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: it really gives you insight into I think the person
• 48:32
  Speaker 1: that may have done this, And go ahead.
• 48:36
  Speaker 2: What if Dad caught him after Grandma caught him in
• 48:38
  Speaker 2: the bedroom with his sixteen year old daughter and dear
• 48:42
  Speaker 2: old dad. He's got his underwear on, he's able to
• 48:44
  Speaker 2: pull that up. He barely got his shirt on. He
• 48:46
  Speaker 2: doesn't have shit, nothing, and Dad loses it and takes
• 48:50
  Speaker 2: him off. He loads him up in the truck, dumps
• 48:53
  Speaker 2: him over the side of the river. He gets rid
• 48:54
  Speaker 2: of the clothes because he didn't have him on to
• 48:56
  Speaker 2: start with. He just finished up with my sixteen year
• 48:58
  Speaker 2: old daughter, you're dead. And then I'm going to stage
• 49:01
  Speaker 2: all this in case they decided to test me for Jess. Sorry,
• 49:03
  Speaker 2: I'm going to go hunting at eight in the morning.
• 49:06
  Speaker 1: And that's certainly something that has to be and I
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: hope that that is something that's being factored into the investigation.
• 49:11
  Speaker 2: It passed a polygraph test, so did his wife, said Ryan,
• 49:14
  Speaker 2: and they searched their house.
• 49:16
  Speaker 3: No evidence of anything.
• 49:17
  Speaker 1: However, I have to say this to you. When my
• 49:23
  Speaker 1: kids chose to do this case, Dave was in this
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: past January. That's when this semester started, this previous semester.
• 49:32
  Speaker 1: Thank god it's over with now. When in January, when
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: I had my kids go through the process of selecting
• 49:42
  Speaker 1: the cold case they were going to cover, they chose
• 49:46
  Speaker 1: Blake's case as we were walking and you kind of
• 49:49
  Speaker 1: gave a hint at this earlier as we were working
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: our way through this case. My kids were at the time.
• 49:55
  Speaker 1: They came to me and they said, Professor Morian, you're
• 49:58
  Speaker 1: not going to believe this. But they served search warrants
• 50:03
  Speaker 1: in a place called Sharpsburg, Georgia. And this was back
• 50:07
  Speaker 1: in March.
• 50:08
  Speaker 3: When we were talking about the newest evidence.
• 50:10
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and this came out and if you can expand
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: on that.
• 50:13
  Speaker 2: Just twenty fourth they had There have been two things
• 50:16
  Speaker 2: that have happened since this case. Okay, two big things,
• 50:20
  Speaker 2: one in twenty eleven, so it has to be between
• 50:24
  Speaker 2: December nineteenth and the end of the year. Police have
• 50:26
  Speaker 2: said in twenty eleven they received an anonymous tip that
• 50:30
  Speaker 2: in an information about the murder, actually real information. Years later,
• 50:37
  Speaker 2: they received a second anonymous tip letter. They believe it
• 50:41
  Speaker 2: is from the same person, and I believe it is
• 50:44
  Speaker 2: the combination of these tips that have led them to
• 50:46
  Speaker 2: what they have done. In the most recent search. In March,
• 50:50
  Speaker 2: they searched three separate locations in Sharpsburg, Georgia, and it
• 50:56
  Speaker 2: wasn't in any of the places that you would think.
• 50:59
  Speaker 2: And Joe and I were looking at this, going, well,
• 51:01
  Speaker 2: wait a minute, do the same people live in those
• 51:03
  Speaker 2: homes in the places that were searched, that were there
• 51:06
  Speaker 2: in twenty eleven. If they're not, they're searching in the backyard.
• 51:13
  Speaker 1: So what would be buried in the backyard. What could
• 51:15
  Speaker 1: they recover back there? You know, how much effort does
• 51:18
  Speaker 1: it take to get rid of a young man's clothing
• 51:20
  Speaker 1: and also a phone? Not much. I mean, that could
• 51:24
  Speaker 1: have been burned up, It could have been disposed of
• 51:26
  Speaker 1: in any other number of ways. But why go to
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: that location and say that this does in fact have
• 51:31
  Speaker 1: something to do with the death of Blake.
• 51:34
  Speaker 2: But for the students did such an incredible job on this.
• 51:37
  Speaker 2: I have to tell you that for those of you
• 51:39
  Speaker 2: who have come to me and asked me about forensics,
• 51:41
  Speaker 2: to JAYSU the work. I had a chance to look
• 51:43
  Speaker 2: over this work that Joe sent me that they did.
• 51:47
  Speaker 2: I do it for a living, and I went to
• 51:51
  Speaker 2: school on the report they did. That's how good this was.
• 51:54
  Speaker 2: It was very thorough, it was professional, it was wonderful.
• 51:57
  Speaker 2: I thought, Okay, I'm hiring one of these guys now.
• 52:00
  Speaker 3: It was good.
• 52:01
  Speaker 1: Well, I'm very pleased, and I'm very proud of my
• 52:03
  Speaker 1: students for bringing this case to us. And I felt
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: that again, you know the fact that two years in
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: a row, I had still a group of students that
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: chose this particular case. And trust me, we've got a
• 52:17
  Speaker 1: lot of cold cases in Alabama. There's a lot of
• 52:19
  Speaker 1: cold cases in Georgia. But you know, this is not
• 52:23
  Speaker 1: too far away from our campus in Jacksonville, Alabama. And
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: to have this happen two years in a row, and
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: actually I have students that have The students from the
• 52:36
  Speaker 1: first group came to a few different conclusions than second groups,
• 52:40
  Speaker 1: so they weren't, you know, kind of feeding off of
• 52:42
  Speaker 1: one another. It really kind of gave me, I don't know,
• 52:46
  Speaker 1: it kind of gave me a chill, thinking this is
• 52:49
  Speaker 1: probably something that I need to explore with all of
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: our friends. There are fans of body bags, and certainly
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: everybody here at Crime com I'm Joseph Scott Moore, and
• 53:00
  Speaker 1: this is body bags.
• 53:04
  Speaker 2: Mhm.