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S2E6: The Disappearance of Bill Roland · Blood Trails

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: In the summer of nineteen ninety seven, Bill Rowland went
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: to his lake house for a quiet day of fishing
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: and never came home. But the trail he left behind, burned, scattered,
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: and deliberately hidden, left just enough evidence to suggest a crime,
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: but not enough to explain it. That's next on Blood Trails.
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: East Texas is a place where heritage runs as deep
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: as the tap root of a lob lolly pine. Family
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: is everything. Traditions are sacred, and the yearly cycles of
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: deer hunting and bass fishing make up the fabric of
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: daily life.
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: We love East Texas, We love going to the lake.
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: It's like my family is always done.
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: That's Jenna Sprinkle. She was born in Lufkin, a small
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: town in Angelina County, and her family has been there
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: for as long as she can remember. Jenna reached out
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: to me a few months ago because she heard I
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: was asking questions about another East Texas resident named Bill Roland.
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: Bill is my grandfather. That would be my dad's dad.
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: My dad is rusty, and so that was Bill's oldest son.
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: Like his granddaughter, Bill Roland was steeped in East Texas culture,
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: and that included a lot of hunting and fishing.
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: I've always heard that he was one of the best
• 1:20
  Speaker 2: of the best fishermen. If you want to catch the fishy,
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: better go with Bill. He also loved to hunt. His
• 1:25
  Speaker 2: two sons, Tobe and Rusty, they were big fishmen as well.
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: They loved to go with him. Yeah, that was one
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: of their favorite things to do with their dad.
• 1:33
  Speaker 3: He was a family man.
• 1:33
  Speaker 2: He loved his family things like that, but when it
• 1:36
  Speaker 2: was time to go fishing, he would go and fishing.
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: And yeah, Bill was a member of a bass fishing
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: club and he even fished competitively. But on Monday, July
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: twenty first, nineteen ninety seven, he was hoping to go
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: out by himself and catch some groceries crappy that is well.
• 1:52
  Speaker 4: The family had been after sunby before and they generally
• 1:57
  Speaker 4: put the boat up in a boat house, but they
• 2:00
  Speaker 4: left it out on the pull up on the bank.
• 2:02
  Speaker 4: Called Bill gonna come back in the morning to do
• 2:03
  Speaker 4: a little fishing, So that's why he was out there.
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: Don Morris was a Texas ranger and in nineteen ninety
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: seven he'd been with the Law Enforcement Agency sixteen years.
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: He told me that Bill owned a small lakehouse on
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: Lake sam Rayburn and the angler had planned to go
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: back out that day on his pontoon boat, but as
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: far as anyone knows, Bill didn't do any fishing that day.
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: No one had heard from Bill by ten o'clock that evening,
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: so Bill's wife, Lynette called to see when her husband
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: would be coming home.
• 2:33
  Speaker 4: She called a lake out which had a phone over there,
• 2:36
  Speaker 4: and they could didn't get out any answer, no answer
• 2:38
  Speaker 4: to whatever.
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: Lynette called a neighbor woman and asked her to walk
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: over and see whether Bill was still at the house.
• 2:44
  Speaker 4: She went over her in check and all the last
• 2:47
  Speaker 4: were out there. No pickup, no boat, no trailer. It
• 2:52
  Speaker 4: was just like nobody's there.
• 2:53
  Speaker 3: You know.
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: It wasn't like Bill to disappear without telling anyone. As
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: Jenna said, he was a family man. He wouldn't have
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: wanted to worry his wife. But it looked for all
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: the world like he'd hauled his boat out of the
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: water and left. I'm sure officials assumed at first that
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: he'd turn up before too long. He was known to
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: throw a party now and again, and maybe he'd dragged
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: himself back home the next morning after a night on
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: the town. But that didn't happen.
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: I'm just always Aready went fishing and it never came back.
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: As hours turned into days and days into weeks, it
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: became evident that either Bill had run away for good
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: or something much worse had taken place. That second possibility
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: started to look like the tragic reality when two weeks
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: later they found Bill's truck parked on a deer lease
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: thirty five miles from the lake house.
• 3:44
  Speaker 4: It had been abandoned, the front end that had been burnt,
• 3:48
  Speaker 4: and the last of place was gone, and the keys
• 3:51
  Speaker 4: were going.
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: The trailer was discovered about a month later in a
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: national forest twenty miles from the house. The location of
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: the boat remained a mystery until that October, when a
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: duck hunter found it tied off on a small cove
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: on the lake.
• 4:06
  Speaker 4: After we pulled it, that was able to determine that
• 4:09
  Speaker 4: the floaters and mounting floaters had been shot two thousand
• 4:15
  Speaker 4: on east side, and it was at an angle after
• 4:21
  Speaker 4: where somebody was owned a boat hmm it shot down
• 4:24
  Speaker 4: into it.
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: The burn truck, the abandoned trailer, and the shot up
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: boat strongly suggested that wherever Bill was, he wasn't in
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: great shape. But beyond these troubling signs. Investigators weren't able
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: to piece together what happened to the husband, father, and
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: avid outdoorsman, and they kind of did the best they
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: could do.
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: In that tom there were so many missing things that
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: no that made sense, so still doesn't.
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: It will soon be thirty years since anyone has seen
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: Bill Roland alive. What happened that hot summer day in
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: nineteen ninety seven remains a mystery, one that the Pine
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: Curtain of East Texas has yet to These forests offer
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: solitude for those seeking a reprieve from the rat race
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: of modern life, but the dense woods and deep lakes
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: can also hide secrets. In this case, those secrets have
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: spawned rumors of infidelity, drugs, poaching, neighborhood conflicts, and a
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: man who everyone seemed to know, but these days no
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: one wants to talk about. I'm Jordan Sillers and this
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: is Blood Trails, the Disappearance of Bill Roland, Part one,
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: the Fisherman. Whenever someone goes missing under suspicious circumstances, investigators
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: spend a huge amount of time digging into the life
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: of the missing person. In Bill's case, that wasn't difficult.
• 5:47
  Speaker 4: He is well known in Lufgen. Everybody in Lufkin knew
• 5:50
  Speaker 4: him and dubtod.
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: Bill worked alongside his wife at a construction company owned
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: by Lynnette's family. He was well respected as someone who
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: knew his trade, and he'd become a fixture in the
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: Lufkin area.
• 6:02
  Speaker 2: He was a big man who never met a stranger.
• 6:05
  Speaker 2: Everybody around here knew him.
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: He was known not only as someone who could build
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: you a sturdy metal building, but also as someone who
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: could catch a fish and shoot a deer.
• 6:14
  Speaker 4: He was a big fishman, big outdoorsman. He loved a car,
• 6:18
  Speaker 4: he loved the fish, he loved you know, anything outdoor
• 6:21
  Speaker 4: like he did. He did that all the time.
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: I live in East Texas and when we drove down
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: to speak to Jenna, we also got a chance to
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: meet Bailey, one of Bill's other grandchildren. Bailey brought photos
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: of his grandpa and virtually all of them involved the
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: field and the water. That's Bill, yes, sir, right, do
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: you know who that is?
• 6:39
  Speaker 2: Too?
• 6:39
  Speaker 5: To Henry?
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: Okay, who's that one of his friends? Okay, fishing buddies,
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah gotcha, Yeah, there was some big catfish man.
• 6:49
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 6:50
  Speaker 6: In fact, they're Rice and Boat Rice, good number on
• 6:54
  Speaker 6: the side.
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah, gotcha. So they did like boat races too, nice.
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: So just like a lot of stuff on the water.
• 7:02
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: On the woods. Bailey runs a tree service, but he
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: told me that, like his grandfather, he spends most of
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: his free time hunting and fishing. Like Jenna, Bailey is
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: too young to have personal memories of Bill, but he
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: still hears stories from people around town.
• 7:19
  Speaker 6: A lot of people, you know, just tell me, they
• 7:23
  Speaker 6: know they used to know Bill and stuff right right
• 7:26
  Speaker 6: anywhere from you know, I go a bit of job
• 7:28
  Speaker 6: or working somewhere, I'll be on like just anything, you know.
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, So people still remember him and they know
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: that grandson. Yeah, hey, they bring it up.
• 7:39
  Speaker 6: Yeah. I can't get on their laces because of it, but.
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: Oh you can't. Yeah, oh really, yes, sir oh man,
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: Why is that.
• 7:47
  Speaker 6: Pretty good outlaw? You know he liked keel stuff.
• 7:50
  Speaker 7: Bill Dave.
• 7:51
  Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, got chack.
• 7:52
  Speaker 6: He didn't really give a crat. What you know is
• 7:56
  Speaker 6: what I've heard, you know, right right. I don't know
• 7:58
  Speaker 6: if that's true. What was what I heard?
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: A pretty good outlaw. In East Texas and in much
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: of the South, this term isn't used to describe a
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: bandana wearing stagecoach robber on a most Wanted poster. It's
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: used to describe people who don't care much for wildlife
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: laws and, like Bailey says, prefer to do things their
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: own way. Bailey wasn't the only person I spoke to
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: who mentioned Bill's outlying ways, but we'll get to that
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: later in the episode. This also wasn't the only interesting
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: thing Bailey told me about his grandpa.
• 8:28
  Speaker 6: Her was pretty good. Lighty's Mandy, Oh really, yeah, how
• 8:32
  Speaker 6: did you hear that? Old Lighties? Oh yeah, yeah, I
• 8:39
  Speaker 6: gotta call like two days ago, and she wanted to
• 8:42
  Speaker 6: tell me a start word.
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: Bailey didn't elaborate, and I unfortunately wasn't able to track
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: down this woman. It sounds like she had a story
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: to tell, but I bet she wasn't the only one.
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: Bill was one of those guys who was larger than life.
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: He was literally a big man, don said, close to
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: three hundred pounds. But he was also garious, friendly, and
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: he liked to have a good time. He made an impression,
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: and even to this day, strangers will approach Jenna and
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: bring him up.
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: I mean they yeah, they asked, They ask us about it,
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: some like oh, that's your grandpa, right, and we're like, yeah,
• 9:13
  Speaker 2: that is. People like to almost make jokes in a
• 9:17
  Speaker 2: way like they've seen him in Vegas before and stuff,
• 9:19
  Speaker 2: and I'm like, that's not you don't really say that stuff.
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: You know. These kinds of comments put Jenna and Bailey
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: in an awkward position. There Bill's only living descendants, but
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: since they never knew him, they can't do much to
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: satisfy the curiosity of strangers. It also wasn't a topic
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: of much discussion in their households. Jenna's grandmother, the woman
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: to whom Bill was married before Lynnette, is still alive,
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: but she declined to be interviewed for this episode. Bailey
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: was close to his father, but he said he almost
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: never talked about Bill.
• 9:51
  Speaker 6: I mean nobody really talked about it much.
• 9:53
  Speaker 3: You know.
• 9:53
  Speaker 6: It wasn't something you talked about, yeah, you know, whenever.
• 9:58
  Speaker 6: It just was a sore subject. And right, nobody really
• 10:02
  Speaker 6: talked about it.
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: Jenna may not have known her grandfather, but his death
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: still had a devastating impact on her childhood. Bill had
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: two sons with Jenna's grandmother, Jenna's father, Rusty, and Bailey's
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: father Toby. Bailey's photos illustrate how close Toby and Rusty
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: were to Bill, and I was told his passing hit
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: them hard, even if they didn't always express it. Bill
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: Roland was many things to many people, a fisherman, a hunter,
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: a husband and father. But for all Bill was in life,
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: what defines him now is the mystery of his death.
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: The man who loved the lake, who knew every corner
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: and channel on sam Rayburn, disappeared into it, and the
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: people he left behind have spent decades trying to understand
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: how and why. Finding those answers would mean tracing the
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: last hours of his life, where he went, who he
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: talked to, and what or who he may have encountered
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: that morning at the lake House, Part two the search.
• 11:07
  Speaker 1: As we learned in the Bob Smith case from earlier
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: this season, a disappearance is often one of the most
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: difficult criminal cases to investigate. Unless there are obvious signs
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: of foul play, law enforcement sometimes doesn't do what they
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: normally would to interview suspects and collect evidence. This case
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: is still open, so we don't know everything investigators did
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: and didn't do in the days after Bill disappeared, but
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: Ranger Morris tells me that there wasn't anything in or
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: around Bill's lake house to suggest that Bill had been
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: the victim of a crime.
• 11:38
  Speaker 4: Nothing in the house, it gave any any case I
• 11:40
  Speaker 4: wish wherever. There was a half eaten sandwich in the
• 11:43
  Speaker 4: refrigerator and some dog food on the table, you know,
• 11:46
  Speaker 4: play there and his wife, Lynette said that wasn't there
• 11:51
  Speaker 4: Sunday when they were there, so it had to happen
• 11:54
  Speaker 4: sometimes were after Bill got there.
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: And then there was she said, dog food there. But
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: there was any sign of a struggle, No like blood anywhere.
• 12:04
  Speaker 4: It was just no suggle inside or outside either.
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: One Lynette's daughter told a local paper that Bill had
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: been going to the lake house to fish, but also
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: to feed a stray dog that had wandered onto the property.
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: This explains the dog food, but that and the half
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: eaten sandwich told investigators that Bill made it to the
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: lake house safely. The dog food also suggested that Bill
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: had been somehow interrupted, As Lynette's daughter pointed out to reporters,
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: he wouldn't have prepared the dog food and then just
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: left it on the table. Despite this evidence, sheriff's deputies
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: told local media that they didn't suspect foul play Bill's
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: relatives questioned this determination, but at that point, about a
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: week after anyone had seen the fishermen, it was still
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: plausible that Bill had had some kind of boating accident
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: or had just run away. His actions that morning didn't
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: indicate he was in trouble or afraid for his life.
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: Investigators determined that Bill had stopped at a vet clinic,
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: purchased fleet and tick medication, and then he purchased ice
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: at a small grocery store about two miles from the
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: lake house. The problem was the San Augustine County Sheriff's
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: Office was at the time ill equipped to deal with
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: the murder investigation.
• 13:14
  Speaker 4: They're a small organizational where they don't have a criminal investigator.
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: By the time Don was called in to help, deputies
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: had already been walking all around Bill's property.
• 13:24
  Speaker 4: You got to move now. When I got there, the
• 13:26
  Speaker 4: search team had done been there. They'd been looking and
• 13:28
  Speaker 4: walked around. They were and they hadn't been in the
• 13:31
  Speaker 4: house that much because it wasn't obvious nobody in the house,
• 13:33
  Speaker 4: but they'd been all walking around everywhere outside. If something
• 13:36
  Speaker 4: happened outside, it could be condaminated.
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: Law enforcement didn't initially believe Bill had been murdered, but
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: that doesn't mean they treated his disappearance casually. Within twenty
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: four hours of Bill being reported missing, friends, family, and
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: local law enforcement launched what local media described as a
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: massive search effort.
• 13:54
  Speaker 4: We did a numerous searches on the lake by aircraft.
• 13:57
  Speaker 4: The DPS flew of the helicopter sheval time looking for
• 14:02
  Speaker 4: the boat, you know, on the lake or pick up
• 14:05
  Speaker 4: what if we could find. And then they had numerous
• 14:08
  Speaker 4: land search over there and they searched, you know, around
• 14:11
  Speaker 4: where the boat was would have been lost, search around
• 14:13
  Speaker 4: the house. Everything had horses. They were riding through the
• 14:17
  Speaker 4: brosh and looking at everything, and nothing ever showed up.
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: The search drew officials from multiple agencies, including the Texas
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: Parks and Wildlife Department, the San Augustine and Angelina County
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: Sheriff's offices, and the Texas Rangers. Searchers used heat sensing
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: devices to peer through the thick brush around the house,
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: and they sent divers into the cove. Since Bill's truck
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: and trailer were both missing, searchers wondered if he'd driven
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: over to a local boat ramp to pull his boat
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: out of the water, but all local ramps were searched,
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: and no one could find any sign of the missing angler.
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: Tips came in claiming to have seen Bill or his
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: truck around Lufkin, as well as farther east into Louisiana.
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: Investigators followed up on these tips and looked in locations
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: Bill was known to free, but all their efforts came
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: up empty. I don't know exactly when investigators started to
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: suspect foul play, but the first time those words are
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: mentioned in media reports is August fifth, just over two
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: weeks after anyone saw Bill alive. That's when two teenagers
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: riding four wheelers stumbled upon a silver Chevy Z seventy
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: one pickup parked in the middle of the woods. It
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: was over thirty miles from Bill's lake house, but there
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: was no mistaking it. It was Bill's truck, and it
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: became the first real indication that this case was so
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: much more than a simple disappearance. Part three. The truck, trailer,
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: and boat. There were several reasons finding the truck sparked
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: serious concern about Bill's well being. The first, as you
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: already heard, was that the truck had been burned from
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: the seats through the engine bay.
• 15:58
  Speaker 4: Somebody's the lambs in there and maybe gas landa what
• 16:02
  Speaker 4: it was sitting for coase there was a cloth down
• 16:05
  Speaker 4: at a gas tame.
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: The other reason investigators were concerned is because before torching it,
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: someone had stolen most of the things Bill kept in
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: the back seat.
• 16:14
  Speaker 4: He had a lot of stuff in it. He had tools,
• 16:15
  Speaker 4: he had good I mean, he had a lot of
• 16:17
  Speaker 4: stuff in there, and it was pretty well, not not empty,
• 16:22
  Speaker 4: but it was. It was pretty clear, you know.
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: The truck had been burned and ransacked about a mile
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: and a half off of Neil Road in a heavily
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: wooded area. Ranger Morris described the location as a deer lease,
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: though he didn't mention whether that lease had any connection
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: to Bill. If you look at this location on on X,
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: which you can do by going to the Meat eater
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: dot com slash blood Trails, you'll see that it isn't
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: really on the way to anything. It's not like the
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: truck was dumped off a highway. As the perpetrator fled
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: the area. The vehicle was deliberately hidden, and investigators hoped
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: they'd find a clue in or around the chevy.
• 16:57
  Speaker 4: They did a search team out there. They got a
• 16:59
  Speaker 4: horse steam search and they didn't find nothing.
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: The Tyler Morning Telegraph reported that officials also flew a
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: helicopter over the area, but to no avail. However, they
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: did find something strange a few days later.
• 17:12
  Speaker 4: They were going to come back at Saturday, which they
• 17:14
  Speaker 4: did after this we found is And as they were
• 17:18
  Speaker 4: coming in, they started searching nowhere and they found a
• 17:21
  Speaker 4: whole kind of tools along the face over there.
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: Huh, how did they get there? What do you think happened?
• 17:26
  Speaker 4: I think who said the vehicle for us? They found
• 17:30
  Speaker 4: out we got a bid man tools?
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: Right, we don't want to take these? Yeah, if you
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: didn't quite catch it. Ranger Morris says he believes that
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: the people who set the vehicle on fire were also
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: the ones who took the tools, but he thinks they
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: didn't know whose tools they had taken until the paper
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: started reporting that Bill's truck had been found. Once that happened,
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: they realized it would look bad for them to be
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: caught with all of Bill's stuff, and so they went
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: back and dumped it. Do you think the same person
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: who was responsible for Bill's disappearance burn the truck or
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: could have been a different person, a different person. Oh,
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: so you think it was some kind of thief found
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: the truck. Well, juvenile was oh okay, okay, So some
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: kids found the truck. They said, let's take this stuff
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: that's in it and burn it. And then they realized, oh, oh,
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: like this could be this guy's truck that disappeared. We
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: don't want these things. Yeah, remember how I mentioned that
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: the truck had been found by a couple of kids
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: on ATV's Ranger Morris believes it was those kids that
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: burned the truck and took Bill's stuff, not because they
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: were responsible for his disappearance, but just because they were
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: a couple of hooligans. Ranger Morris didn't explain exactly why
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: he believes that, which isn't really surprising given the open
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: status of the investigation. It's possible those kids confess to
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: their crimes. That's the case. The burn truck is far
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: less suspicious than it first appears. But if they didn't confess,
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: if their responsibility is more of a theory than a
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: known fact, I can't help but wonder why would those
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: kids burn the truck and not try to drive it
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: or at least strip it and sell it for parts.
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: They might not have wanted to take that risk if
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: they knew it was the truck that belonged to the
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: missing man. But if that's true, why didn't they report
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: it as soon as they found it. It's also worth
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: pointing out that Bill had tools and guns in that
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: truck or Andre Morris didn't mention any guns being returned
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: in the days after the truck was found, So did
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: the teen steal those as well, or were they taken
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: by someone else. Whatever actually happened, whether the truck was
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: burned by the perpetrator trying to hide his crime, or
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: by a pair of board teenagers, that Chevy didn't provide
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: the answers investigators were looking for. Angelina County Chief Deputy
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: Jim Casper told the media that they were quote basically
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: back where we started. Even after they found the truck.
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: They weren't able to find any clues as to Bill's whereabouts,
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: and they weren't even willing to speculate. Casper said that
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: while they were considering foul play, they also thought it
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: was possible Bill had just left. So then the other
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: piece is the trailer, right, because the trailer wasn't with
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: the truck, even though it had been with the truck.
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: According to the family. When Bill was there, it was
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: no longer with the truck. The truck the trailer was
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: at the lakehouse. Oh, what I'm saying is it was
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: someone had take Yet the same time he took to
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: Picka and got rid of the trailer in the National
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: Forest and Broughtest Texas, which is on the way to
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: where the hudd Lease was to pickle Foul. Okay, so
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: they have the truck and trailer, and they dumped the
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: trailer one place, the truck another place. The trailer hadn't
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: been burned or damaged, at least as far as I know,
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: but it was clear that, like the truck, someone had
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: tried to hide it. What struck investigators as especially odd
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: was that Bill's pontoon boat wasn't on the trailer. Bill
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: had parked that boat on the bank of the lake
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: outside his house, but it wasn't there by the time
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: the search began. The location of that vessel remained the
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: biggest mystery of the case until October of nineteen ninety seven,
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: about three months after Bill's disappearance.
• 21:14
  Speaker 4: Ken hints to the sheriff Angelina can They called me
• 21:17
  Speaker 4: one night about ten o'clock, said, I think I found
• 21:19
  Speaker 4: Bill roll a boat, and what happened was a duck
• 21:23
  Speaker 4: clunter found a boat.
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: The boat had clearly been there a while. It was
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: tied off under a willow tree, and detectives found sap
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: on the deck that had dripped down over the preceding months.
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: It was also clear that someone had driven it into
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: the cove intentionally. It hadn't just drifted there from somewhere else.
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: It had been tied to the tree, and the boat's
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: top had been taken off and thrown into the water,
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: likely so it could be driven deeper into the brush.
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: Like the truck and the trailer, the boat had been
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: hidden in an apparent attempt to delay the investigation. Did
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: you find anything on the boat or about the boat
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: that indicated anything about what happened to Bill?
• 22:00
  Speaker 4: Well, there was some stuff about the boat that wasn't
• 22:03
  Speaker 4: like it was when they left it Sunday, Like them
• 22:06
  Speaker 4: past seats on the back back there where you see it,
• 22:09
  Speaker 4: and cast off like that. Well, they had been moved.
• 22:12
  Speaker 4: They had been moved over to a corner over there,
• 22:15
  Speaker 4: and right there at the edge there's a little strip
• 22:18
  Speaker 4: of that carpe had been tore out for some reason.
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: Rayner Morris said, the carpet had likely been torn out
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: to hide something such as a bloodstain or some other evidence.
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: The seat was one of those raised removable models that
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: make it easier to fish. Bill's family said he wouldn't
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: have removed the seat himself, though it's tough to be certain,
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: but what investigators knew without question is that someone had
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: tried to sink that boat.
• 22:43
  Speaker 4: Af we pulled it that we was able to determine
• 22:46
  Speaker 4: that the floaters and mounting floaters had been shot two
• 22:51
  Speaker 4: times on each side, and it was at an angle
• 22:56
  Speaker 4: to where somebody was on the boat shot into it.
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: Was it a rifle?
• 23:04
  Speaker 4: It appeared to be a twelve gay shotgun.
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: Okay, so someone was standing in the boat with a
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: shotgun shooting down at those pontoons. Do you think to
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: try to sink it? I assume so. I think.
• 23:15
  Speaker 4: Guess what that moative was? Yes, yeah, I didn't think
• 23:18
  Speaker 4: he won't sink. All they do is gather more water.
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: The boat being more seaworthy than the perpetrator had hoped,
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: he opted for plan B and drove the vessel to
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: the back of a cove and tied it off. Whether
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: he planned to come back later and sink it. We'll
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: never know, but as it turned out, that wouldn't have
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: been necessary.
• 23:35
  Speaker 4: I think the investigation was slow Gold There's if it
• 23:39
  Speaker 4: was hard to find his stuff because the boat had
• 23:43
  Speaker 4: no kind of blood, a thing like that on it
• 23:47
  Speaker 4: was anything sycamore tree or will it tree rather, and
• 23:50
  Speaker 4: we had all kind of samp on it. We took
• 23:52
  Speaker 4: several sample nothing come out of it.
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: Bill's nineteen ninety four low pontoon boat didn't lead investigators
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: to aspect, but it was nonetheless suggestive. Obviously something that
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: farious had happened related to that boat. Otherwise why would
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: anyone try to sink it? Before the boat was found,
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: detectives had to wonder whether Bill was kidnapped and then
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: taken somewhere else. Now they had evidence suggesting that Lake
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: sam Rayburn should be the focus of their search. That
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: assumption was bolstered by the absence of two items that
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: should have been found but never were.
• 24:27
  Speaker 4: You forgot to ask about a ladder.
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: Yes, tell me about the ladder, because Bill, Because that
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: is one thing that the news reports say from the
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: time is that when they're still looking for the truck,
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: we're looking for a truck and it usually has this
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: ladder in it. So particularly he had this sixteen foot
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: five of class letder right right, So he has the
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: ladder in the back of his pickup. But that's gone,
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: is that right? What do you think have not been found? Okay,
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: you know, of course, I'm telling you just a theory.
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: I don't know what it was mount the thing? Was
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: he truthful?
• 25:01
  Speaker 3: Not?
• 25:01
  Speaker 4: I have no way to prove it. But you know,
• 25:04
  Speaker 4: Bill weigh three hundred pounds, and when you put that
• 25:08
  Speaker 4: pontoon boat up all that the banker the foot part
• 25:12
  Speaker 4: up or gets high. Well you ever trying to lift
• 25:14
  Speaker 4: the three hundred pound me? You know I can't. But
• 25:17
  Speaker 4: if he got a ladder, he's trapped to the ladder.
• 25:21
  Speaker 4: He figured one end for the fire picked other than
• 25:24
  Speaker 4: enough of fire m hm. You got to move the
• 25:26
  Speaker 4: seats out of the way. And then there's some concrete
• 25:29
  Speaker 4: five gallon buckets that are missing. Really he used that
• 25:35
  Speaker 4: for anchors.
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: So picks him up into the boat, uses the concrete
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: buckets to sink. Bill's family said he had an orange
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: ladder in the back of his pickup, but it wasn't
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: there when his truck was discovered. Ranger Morris's theory is
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: that the perpetrator incapacitated Bill at the lake house, strapped
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: him to the ladder and used it as leverage to
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: get him into the pontoon boat. He had to move
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: the seat to get the ladder in the front of
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: the boat, and he used Bill's concrete anchors to sink
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: the man and the ladder in the lake. He tied
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: off the boat close enough to walk back to the house,
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: where he stole the truck and trailer and dumped them
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: at different locations to impede the investigation.
• 26:14
  Speaker 4: I assume they wanted to make sure that make you
• 26:16
  Speaker 4: seem that Bill wasn't there. I don't know, you know,
• 26:20
  Speaker 4: that makes sense.
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: So if they take the trailer and there's no boat,
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: then we assume Bill maybe took the boat out himself.
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: No pivot, right right. This theory explains the how, it
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: accounts for the evidence we have and proposes a plausible
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: sequence of events for Bill's disappearance, but it doesn't address
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: the who or the why. We still have no idea
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: who would have wanted Bill dead or whether more than
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: one person was involved. We don't know if this was
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: an argument gone wrong, a premeditated murder, or an attempt
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: to cover up some kind of accident. For all the
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: questions the truck, trailer and boat helped answer, they raised
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: three times as many. For Jenna and Bailey. Those questions
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: have never been abstract. Bill's disappearance cast a shadow over
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: everyone who loved him, including the sons who spent years
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: searching for answers they never found.
• 27:13
  Speaker 2: When I was eight years old, my dad took his life.
• 27:17
  Speaker 2: And I feel as though in the stories that I've heard,
• 27:20
  Speaker 2: like he just wanted his dad, he wanted to know
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: his dad, and it was just eating at him, like
• 27:24
  Speaker 2: he couldn't take it no longer. Like he wanted to
• 27:26
  Speaker 2: know what happened to his dad. He was thirty one
• 27:28
  Speaker 2: when it had happened, so there were lots of memories,
• 27:30
  Speaker 2: Like he was old enough to understand what has happened. Yeah,
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: So I feel as though like he would still be
• 27:36
  Speaker 2: here today if that didn't happen. Yeah, because I'm sure
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: himself searched forever over there where is hey, what has happened?
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: Rusty wasn't the only one searching for his father. I
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: was told that Lynette spent tens of thousands of dollars
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: hiring private investigators, but she couldn't find her husband, and
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: the small town attention and speculation turned her into a recluse.
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: She passed away in February of twenty twenty one, and
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: Toby followed her in December of that year. I'm sure
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: investigators know or think they know, the answers to some
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: of the questions that haunted Rusty, Toby, and now their kids,
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: But as with most cold cases, those detectives are hesitant
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: to release too many details, and they're not the only ones.
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: It was incredibly difficult to find people who knew Bill
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: and were willing to talk to us on the record.
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: Even those who did told us point blank that they
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: knew more than they were willing to share. In one instance,
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: someone seemed willing to talk to us but was shut
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: down by another person who said Bill's death wasn't a
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: topic we should be discussing. Part four, Catfish Junction. Part
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: of the reason I wanted to cover Bill's case is
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: because it happened in my backyard. Lufkin is only about
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: two hours from where I live in East Texas. I
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: was excited to drive down to the area and do
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: interviews in person. If you check out the video version
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: of this podcast on YouTube, you can see those interviews,
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: along with some amazing footage of Lake sam Rayburn, Bill's
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: old house, and the Angelina National Forest. I drove down
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: with my buddy and videographer David McDaniels, who you might
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: know from his articles in Bear Hunting Magazine or his
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: video work for Brent Reeves podcast This Country Life. I
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: tell you this because not only did David operate the
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: camera for this episode, he also did some pretty great
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: on the ground reporting and.
• 29:34
  Speaker 3: Met a guy today named Delwyn at the Catfish Junction restaurant.
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: David called me during a trip back down to Lufkin
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: a few weeks after we spoke to ranger Morris, Jenna
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: and Bailey. He was shooting more footage of the area
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: and he pulled over at a restaurant called Catfish Junction.
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: He asked an employee there, a guy named Delwyn, if
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: he could record video of the outside of the restaurant.
• 29:57
  Speaker 3: Dellin ended up sharing a lot of really interesting details
• 30:00
  Speaker 3: with me. He knew Bill personally knew a lot about
• 30:05
  Speaker 3: him that he shared and just wanted to tell.
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: Dylan explained that he and Bill had fished together on
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: a few occasions, and Bill was a frequent patron at
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: the restaurant. But David noticed that the Catfish Merchant chose
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: his words carefully.
• 30:18
  Speaker 3: Then he made some He also made some kind of
• 30:20
  Speaker 3: vague references. He was really kind of broken in some
• 30:23
  Speaker 3: of his communication around it, almost like he was trying
• 30:26
  Speaker 3: to sort through what details to share in which ones
• 30:30
  Speaker 3: he did not.
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: The details he did share were interesting, to say the least.
• 30:35
  Speaker 3: He also mentioned that somebody did not say who told
• 30:40
  Speaker 3: him that Bill was wrapped in some kind of fish
• 30:45
  Speaker 3: net and dropped in the lake.
• 30:47
  Speaker 4: Someone else said.
• 30:48
  Speaker 3: He said that he made it sound like another person
• 30:51
  Speaker 3: said that Bill was stuffed in an oil barrel and
• 30:55
  Speaker 3: buried underneath something. I couldn't tell if he was saying
• 31:00
  Speaker 3: it was underneath the structure or something, but he basically
• 31:03
  Speaker 3: referenced that he was buried out near where his pontoon
• 31:07
  Speaker 3: boat was found shot up. At the different point of conversation,
• 31:12
  Speaker 3: he also referenced that there was speculation around that Bill's
• 31:18
  Speaker 3: wife may have been involved. That I guess Bill had
• 31:22
  Speaker 3: a one million dollar life insurance policy.
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: These are the kinds of rumors that always circulate after
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: a disappearance. And trust me when I say there are more.
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: Where these came from For example, one of Bill's associates
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: told me that she believes Bill got on the wrong
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: side of the area's drug dealers. She thinks he saw
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: something he wasn't supposed to, the drug dealers killed him,
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: and law enforcement looked the other way. This associate declined
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: to be interviewed for this podcast, and Ranger Morris told
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: me he never found any connection between Bill and the
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: drug trade. Another particularly juicy rumor was that a guy
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: named Heath was having an affair with Bill's wife. I
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: saw this theory on an Internet forum, which normally I
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: wouldn't take too seriously, but when I looked into it,
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: the details checked out. This person said that Heath and
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: Bill were both working on building a bus stop for
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: a high school, and the theory is that Bill was
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: buried underneath that concrete. I asked Jenna about this, and
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: she knows the bus stop in question and remembers law
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: enforcement searching underneath. They didn't find anything, but the fact
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: that they looked lends at least some credence to the rumor.
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: This anonymous internet poster also mentioned that Heath was a freemason,
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: and so looking into Bill's death, they claimed would be dangerous.
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: The Masons are a secret of society that some view
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: as dangerous. I don't know about what the internet poster said,
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: but Jenna did confirm that the Masons performed a ceremony
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: at Heath's funeral. It's also worth noting that Heath was
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: good friends with Bailey's dad, Toby, and like Jenna's dad,
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: Heath died by suicide. I reached out to Heath's friends
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: and associates, but did not hear back by the time
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: of this recording. All these rumors are second or third hand,
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: but Delwyn did mention one thing he could speak to personally.
• 33:07
  Speaker 3: He shared that it was pretty well known that Bill
• 33:12
  Speaker 3: was messing around with one of the waitresses that worked
• 33:16
  Speaker 3: at the restaurant at the Catfis Junction, which he said
• 33:19
  Speaker 3: that his words were Bill light here every weekend. If
• 33:23
  Speaker 3: I understood him correctly, he literally made it sound like
• 33:28
  Speaker 3: that waitress like when they found out that Bill was
• 33:31
  Speaker 3: missing that a that he saw her like basically weeping,
• 33:36
  Speaker 3: and it sounded like she actually quit her job there
• 33:38
  Speaker 3: at the restaurant after that happened. It seemed like he
• 33:42
  Speaker 3: was insinuating that those things were actually related in some way.
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: Remember how Bailey mentioned that Bill was a bit of
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: a lady's man. Delwin insinuated the same thing, and it's
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: hard not to wonder if one of those alleged relationships
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: may have led to Bill's disappearance. Apparently law enforcement was
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: thinking the same thing. I called up San Augustine County
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: Sheriff Robert Cartwright, whose father was the sheriff when Bill
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: went missing. He wasn't involved in the investigation, but he
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: told me his father and Ranger Morris interviewed several people
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: in connection to the case. Two of them were a
• 34:17
  Speaker 1: husband and wife who lived in the county. The wife
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: was a nurse, and Sheriff Cartwright recalled that they thought
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: she might have been quote slipping around. The implication was
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: that she and Bill had some kind of relationship, and
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: maybe the husband was involved in Bill's disappearance. It's just speculation,
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: but when three unrelated people, one of whom is a
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: county sheriff, mentioned the same thing, you have to take
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: it seriously. But here's where things get a little weird,
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: if they aren't already weird enough. David left Catfish Junction,
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: called to tell me what he'd heard, and then went
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: back to the restaurant to see if Delwin would agree
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: to a recorded interview.
• 34:53
  Speaker 3: When I came back to the restaurant to try to
• 34:57
  Speaker 3: talk with Delwin Moore, the owner of the restaurant, was
• 35:00
  Speaker 3: there a guy named Danny. Really nice guy, but seemed
• 35:04
  Speaker 3: really interested in just dampening the conversation. Delwyn and I
• 35:09
  Speaker 3: were starting to engage in some more conversation, and Danny
• 35:13
  Speaker 3: jumped in a couple different times and said basically, yeah, man,
• 35:17
  Speaker 3: just really not good to speculate, really not wise to gossip.
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: David said he had a good conversation with Danny about
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: other topics, and he wasn't unkind or aggressive.
• 35:28
  Speaker 3: But definitely seemed like he was not interested in me
• 35:31
  Speaker 3: talking with him, or really with Delwin anymore about the
• 35:35
  Speaker 3: situation with Bill. I wasn't sure if there was almost
• 35:39
  Speaker 3: like an underlying if there was a fear there or
• 35:42
  Speaker 3: something associated with just not wanting to bring it up.
• 35:46
  Speaker 3: But it's interesting to say the least.
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: Stirring the pot in a small town has its downside.
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: So if that's actually the reason for Danny's hesitation, I
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: get it. Jenna told us that while she has her
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: own theories about what happened to her, grandfather. She decided
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: not to express them publicly. It's awkward to accuse someone
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: of murder if you might see them in line at
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: the grocery store. Still, it seemed like Delwin had things
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: to say, and I wasn't about to give up. So
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: about a week later I called Catfish Junction to give
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: it another shot. Catfish Junction, Delwin was there and he
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: agreed to be interviewed. He told me that yes, Bill
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: ate at Catfish Junction all the time, and Delwin and
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: his brother were part of the same bass fishing club.
• 36:30
  Speaker 5: The day he went missing, my little brother had sam
• 36:33
  Speaker 5: I will come a seven oh five, a little store there.
• 36:37
  Speaker 5: My little brother stopped in to get a beer, and
• 36:39
  Speaker 5: the Bill was in there by an aisle. Said he
• 36:40
  Speaker 5: was getting ready to go out on lake Coffee fishing.
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: This trip to by Ice was, as I mentioned earlier,
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: the last time Bill was ever seen in public. Was
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: he acting strangely at all? Or did he seem normal?
• 36:52
  Speaker 5: No, Adam said it just talk. Said he was in there, oh,
• 36:57
  Speaker 5: getting ie. He's getting ready to go on with light
• 36:59
  Speaker 5: go fishing.
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: I asked Delwin if he could tell me anything else
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: about the Diehard Angler. The first thing he mentioned was
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: that waitress he.
• 37:07
  Speaker 5: Out and eat with her all the time when he
• 37:09
  Speaker 5: come in. It was short of a lady's man away.
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 37:14
  Speaker 5: Yeah, he's a big old guy and worked hard, made
• 37:17
  Speaker 5: good money and he come in, eat and always leave
• 37:20
  Speaker 5: girl fifteen twenty dollars tail you know, mm hmm, yeah,
• 37:23
  Speaker 5: she was waitress.
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: Whether things went any farther than a generous tip and
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: a few jokes, Delwin couldn't.
• 37:29
  Speaker 5: Say no all just as he's always sitting down talking
• 37:33
  Speaker 5: to him and all that kind of stuff. I've never
• 37:36
  Speaker 5: seen him go out when a woman or anything like that.
• 37:39
  Speaker 5: He was a married man, but they just enjoyed talking to him.
• 37:42
  Speaker 2: You know.
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: That context is helpful, though it does still align with
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: Bill's reputation as a ladies man. I also wanted to
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: ask Delwin about the other thing Bailey told us about
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: his grandfather. One thing his grandson mentioned is that he
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: was a bit of an outlaw when it came to
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: h thing. Did you ever hear anything about that?
• 38:02
  Speaker 5: So yep, he did. He didn't follow.
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: Just like hunting maybe on like private private land stuff
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: like that, just.
• 38:14
  Speaker 7: Shooting off the road.
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah, gotcha, gotcha. Yeah, Yeah, he was a good sports.
• 38:21
  Speaker 5: But he's shooting while he's driving.
• 38:25
  Speaker 1: Yeah, well, you know it's the opportunities there right.
• 38:29
  Speaker 5: Back in the day on outlaw or big time. Yeah,
• 38:33
  Speaker 5: I'll do it Nowaday. They got it for coll too much.
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: I've never heard anything to indicate that Bill's disappearance is
• 38:40
  Speaker 1: related to his outline, but it nonetheless speaks to the
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: man's tendency to do his own thing, to have his
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: own way, and that aspect of his personality does factor
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: into the only law enforcement backed theory about who might
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: have killed Bill.
• 38:55
  Speaker 4: There was a neighbor in the clodes that Bill lived
• 38:57
  Speaker 4: in a culture sect and just this his outen the
• 39:02
  Speaker 4: neighbor's house here Bill's house here, than another one right apart,
• 39:06
  Speaker 4: and there was a culty sac and this neighbor lived
• 39:09
  Speaker 4: darned he was there all day long. He's been interviewed
• 39:12
  Speaker 4: a couple three times, and uh, he said he'd never
• 39:15
  Speaker 4: seen a Bill. Don't know what happened to him like that?
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: M do you do? You can you tell me anything
• 39:21
  Speaker 1: about what the conflict was there?
• 39:24
  Speaker 4: I don't know if any conflict, Okay, I don't know
• 39:27
  Speaker 4: if any Bill. It's never mentioned. You think Lynette by
• 39:29
  Speaker 4: any kind of conflict anything like it. I'm sure they've
• 39:32
  Speaker 4: seen or talk to him. Now it's time they spend
• 39:34
  Speaker 4: the time on the lake or right. But I don't
• 39:37
  Speaker 4: know if any conflict in Lynette, Like I said, didn't
• 39:39
  Speaker 4: know of any conflict.
• 39:40
  Speaker 1: We don't know this neighbor's name or whether he's still alive.
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: But Delwyn also mentioned this person, and after a little pressing,
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: he was more forthcoming about what was going on in
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: that secluded patch of lake front property.
• 39:52
  Speaker 5: Damn, his next door neighbor down on the lake was
• 39:55
  Speaker 5: always getting into it at the house on the lake.
• 39:59
  Speaker 5: Then I got into two or three times.
• 40:01
  Speaker 4: Oh yeah, pretty good.
• 40:02
  Speaker 1: All yeah, what do you know what they were fighting about?
• 40:07
  Speaker 5: No, not in not in particular, I don't. I just
• 40:11
  Speaker 5: know him and Bill didn't get along real good, that's
• 40:14
  Speaker 5: all I know.
• 40:15
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so Bill, Bill told you he just kind of
• 40:18
  Speaker 1: tried to keep to himself and not and not bother.
• 40:20
  Speaker 8: This guy, Bill was a drinker.
• 40:23
  Speaker 5: He drankd his beer and stuff, and he height though
• 40:26
  Speaker 5: partis dinner at the lake house, you know. And this
• 40:30
  Speaker 5: man didn't like the party. Didn't drinking going on next door,
• 40:35
  Speaker 5: I guess. And he said every time he needs to
• 40:37
  Speaker 5: get a party together. That man had come on and
• 40:39
  Speaker 5: tell him they needed to leave. He didn't like all
• 40:41
  Speaker 5: that party and drank and allow music, and Bill told
• 40:45
  Speaker 5: him to get all that a couple of times.
• 40:46
  Speaker 8: I think so.
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: A conflict over a house party might seem like a
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: weak motivation for murder, but as we saw in the
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: Mike Chrit's case, where a hunter was murdered after getting
• 40:57
  Speaker 1: into a neighborhood conflict, even a seemingly argument can spiral
• 41:01
  Speaker 1: into violence. It's also worth pointing out that the people
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: who live in a neighborhood like this do so for
• 41:07
  Speaker 1: the peace and quiet. There are more homes now than
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: there were in nineteen ninety seven, but when we visited
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: earlier this year, it was dead silent. No one came
• 41:16
  Speaker 1: out to talk to us or answered when we knocked.
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: It was honestly a little creepy, and I wasn't sure
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: what to make of it. But a big party would
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: have felt very out of place. So even though it's
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: still a weak excuse for homicide, I can see why
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: Bill's neighbor might have been upset. What's more, Delwin isn't
• 41:32
  Speaker 1: the only person to acknowledge that Bill was having an
• 41:35
  Speaker 1: ongoing conflict with his lake house neighbor. In two thousand
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: and five, Ranger Morris sat down with another Texas Ranger
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: to be interviewed for a book series published by the
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: Texas Rangers Hall of Fame. Ranger Morris was asked about
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: Bill Roland's case, which was one of the few he
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: didn't solve. And here's what he said. Quote, there was
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: another old boy in that same cul de sac he
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: lived in. That's a strange duck, and him and Bill
• 42:00
  Speaker 1: had so many problems over the last year or so.
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: And I feel certain that he killed Bill and dumped
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: him in that lake. As you heard just a few
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: minutes ago. Ranger Morris told me that he didn't know
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: of any conflict with that neighbor. The ranger hasn't seen
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: the case file since he retired in two thousand and two,
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: so you could chalk it up to a faulty memory.
• 42:21
  Speaker 1: I don't know how else to interpret it. Since Ranger
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: Morris was more than happy to talk to me, it
• 42:26
  Speaker 1: would be a weird move to agree to an interview
• 42:29
  Speaker 1: with a journalist to try to lie about a past
• 42:31
  Speaker 1: statement that anyone with an Internet connection can read. Whatever
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: the reason, he said, something else that suggests if there
• 42:38
  Speaker 1: was a conflict, Bill Roland wasn't about to back down.
• 42:43
  Speaker 4: And Bill is one of them guys too, for whatever
• 42:45
  Speaker 4: bet tals be. If somebody confronts him, he ain't backing down.
• 42:50
  Speaker 4: You know, he's gonna stand his ground. I've heard I
• 42:52
  Speaker 4: know one is that that told me it brought it
• 42:54
  Speaker 4: overhere way back Nobaldewin with a knife Toordy. So really so,
• 42:59
  Speaker 4: I mean he he's that type of individual.
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: Someone came at Bill with a knife, but Bill stood
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: his ground. That situation ended without anyone getting killed. But
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: you can imagine how a scenario like that goes very badly,
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: very quickly. If Bill's neighbor decided to confront him on
• 43:17
  Speaker 1: that Monday afternoon, who knows what could have happened.
• 43:21
  Speaker 4: If it had, something happened, it had to happen at
• 43:22
  Speaker 4: the house. I don't know what happened, what happened to
• 43:25
  Speaker 4: Bill there? If something had to happen.
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: Part five, Finding Bill. Investigators never found Bill's body, which
• 43:38
  Speaker 1: means there are still plenty of people in the Lufkin
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: area who think the East Texas man took off and
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: made a new life somewhere else.
• 43:46
  Speaker 5: I heard it somebody had used his credit card a
• 43:50
  Speaker 5: day after when missing on the other side of the
• 43:51
  Speaker 5: Look and Know Where to village. And I had a
• 43:55
  Speaker 5: picture of him, but show or s fight but they
• 43:58
  Speaker 5: said looking behind it big guy like he was, so
• 44:03
  Speaker 5: I thought it was him, but they've done down no
• 44:05
  Speaker 5: picture of him.
• 44:06
  Speaker 4: We've had people say, well, I see Bill with the
• 44:09
  Speaker 4: casino and Louisiana. You know, he tell me about a
• 44:12
  Speaker 4: month later, you know, right, And so I said, why
• 44:15
  Speaker 4: do you go up and say hi to him? He
• 44:16
  Speaker 4: ain't wanted for nothing, just cool hugues.
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: Next Bill, will you be The problem is none of
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: these sightings led investigators to the missing man. Rainger Morris
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: doesn't think Bill ran away, and the reason speaks to
• 44:28
  Speaker 1: the hunter's love of the outdoors and.
• 44:31
  Speaker 4: Reading us say that is called Bill. He got an
• 44:34
  Speaker 4: old rifle gave down to by his grandfather, and he's
• 44:39
  Speaker 4: he's married to Lynette and he's been married to another
• 44:41
  Speaker 4: one before and he brought that rifle from there. So
• 44:45
  Speaker 4: he's not going to run off. We'll leave that rifle.
• 44:48
  Speaker 4: You know, if he had plans to leave, he would
• 44:50
  Speaker 4: already got it out of the house something. And there's
• 44:53
  Speaker 4: nothing in the bank accounts to indicate any kind of
• 44:57
  Speaker 4: for we drawing money out or stuff like that. Nothing,
• 45:00
  Speaker 4: you know, right, So yeah, to me, I think he's
• 45:04
  Speaker 4: he's just see somewhere.
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: The question is, where as the years stretch on, the
• 45:11
  Speaker 1: odds of finding Bill and bringing his killer to justice
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: grow ever smaller. If Ranger Morris's theory is correct, Bill's
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: remains are still at the bottom of Lake sam Rayburn,
• 45:21
  Speaker 1: finding them will be a challenge, maybe a bigger challenge
• 45:24
  Speaker 1: than anyone is willing to undertake.
• 45:27
  Speaker 4: Well, let me tell you what, Sam Rayburn out, there
• 45:29
  Speaker 4: is a force underneath that water. You can't there's got
• 45:33
  Speaker 4: they got cuts in there. But most time it's a
• 45:36
  Speaker 4: force underneath that water. You go ten foot down, it's
• 45:38
  Speaker 4: just trees there were you know. That makes it hard.
• 45:42
  Speaker 4: It makes it difficult to try to find an anything
• 45:45
  Speaker 4: out there when you look at when divers are looking.
• 45:47
  Speaker 4: We had several dive teams looking, and you know, they
• 45:51
  Speaker 4: can't just do their normal search like they do from
• 45:54
  Speaker 4: a point you know, like that. We had to carry
• 45:57
  Speaker 4: them out into a boat and they had to come
• 45:59
  Speaker 4: back with the trees. I mean, it's terrible. Yeah, We've
• 46:04
  Speaker 4: done several dives, searches and hadn't found anything.
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: The Texas Rangers are a state level agency, so Ranger
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: Morris had the latest technology at his disposal in nineteen
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: ninety seven. Along with the dive teams, they used sonar
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: to scan the bottom of the lake for any sign
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: of human remains the ladder or the concrete buckets. They
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: couldn't search the entire lake, but they thought they had
• 46:26
  Speaker 1: a lead on where to start looking.
• 46:28
  Speaker 4: The lady that they called to come over with her
• 46:31
  Speaker 4: to check the sea if bills there are that now
• 46:35
  Speaker 4: she heard a pond tumboat go out and stop in
• 46:39
  Speaker 4: the area after she passed her points. She don't know,
• 46:42
  Speaker 4: she didn't see it. She don't know what it felt.
• 46:45
  Speaker 4: She heard of splash. Well, well that's true or not,
• 46:48
  Speaker 4: I don't know, but that's the best we had to
• 46:51
  Speaker 4: go on.
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: That location. Didn't reveal what they were hoping to find.
• 46:55
  Speaker 1: But technology has come a long way since nineteen ninety seven.
• 46:59
  Speaker 7: Be better they run nowadays. They could still if he's
• 47:01
  Speaker 7: still down there, they could probably find There's a lot
• 47:03
  Speaker 7: of ways we could find it now that we wouldn't have,
• 47:05
  Speaker 7: using resonance frequencies and using other things.
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: That's Michael Hadsl Michael operates a Florida nonprofit called Peace
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: River Search and Rescue. He's an experienced search and rescue diver,
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: canine handler, and expert on all things water recovery. I
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: asked him what searchers today could expect to find and
• 47:23
  Speaker 1: what techniques they could employ.
• 47:25
  Speaker 7: Yeah, at this point, it's just bones. What we would
• 47:28
  Speaker 7: hope for is to be able to find like the
• 47:30
  Speaker 7: mandible or some teeth along with some bone, and then
• 47:32
  Speaker 7: we can get DNA off of that, hopefully if they
• 47:35
  Speaker 7: wrapped them and they wrapped them in a tarp and
• 47:37
  Speaker 7: they chained them when they rank anchored him down. There's
• 47:39
  Speaker 7: a lot that we can find if we can find
• 47:41
  Speaker 7: that the.
• 47:42
  Speaker 1: Bones that are left have likely sunk into the muck
• 47:45
  Speaker 1: at the bottom of the lake. But believe it or not,
• 47:47
  Speaker 1: a dog's nose is strong enough to sense that odor
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: even from the deck of a boat. Once a dog
• 47:53
  Speaker 1: hits on a particular location, it's up to the divers
• 47:55
  Speaker 1: to swim to the bottom and start sifting through the mud.
• 47:59
  Speaker 1: The trees make that project more difficult, but still not impossible.
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: Searchers might also find some of the other items that
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: were possibly sunk with Bill, such as that orange fiberglass ladder.
• 48:11
  Speaker 7: It does have a sonar picture. I mean you can
• 48:13
  Speaker 7: see it if it's in an area where you can
• 48:15
  Speaker 7: see it. Of course, we've got a lot of vegetation
• 48:17
  Speaker 7: down there that's going to mask a lot of things.
• 48:20
  Speaker 7: But if it's in a place that it's open, yeah
• 48:23
  Speaker 7: we can. We'll see that from the high death sonar.
• 48:27
  Speaker 1: Those buckets would also appear on sonar, and Michael says
• 48:30
  Speaker 1: nylon rope could still be intact even all these years later.
• 48:35
  Speaker 1: Of course, whether any of those items are found depends
• 48:38
  Speaker 1: in large part on whether anyone is looking. Anglers on
• 48:41
  Speaker 1: Lake Sam Rayburn might find something by accident, and they
• 48:44
  Speaker 1: wouldn't be the first to discover a missing person using
• 48:47
  Speaker 1: modern fish finders. Texas Ranger Chris Perkins also told me
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: that if they learn new information searching the lake is
• 48:55
  Speaker 1: still in the cards.
• 48:56
  Speaker 8: It very well could be. Certainly wouldn't rule it out.
• 48:59
  Speaker 8: If it came up as something that we needed to do,
• 49:01
  Speaker 8: then certainly we would do it.
• 49:03
  Speaker 1: Ranger Perkins is the investigator currently in charge of Bill's case.
• 49:07
  Speaker 1: He works for the agency's Cold Case Division, and he
• 49:10
  Speaker 1: knows his stuff. We actually had to reschedule our first
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: interview because he had to attend a press conference announcing
• 49:16
  Speaker 1: a breakthrough in a nineteen eighty six murder investigation. He
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: told me, the same resources that were used to crack
• 49:22
  Speaker 1: that case can also be deployed to solve bills.
• 49:26
  Speaker 8: It is active, and this is one of the cases
• 49:28
  Speaker 8: that we still get tips on our website on a
• 49:32
  Speaker 8: pretty frequent basis. They are all actively looked into and
• 49:36
  Speaker 8: pursued as best we can. Sometimes the details may not
• 49:42
  Speaker 8: be enough to get us where we need to be,
• 49:44
  Speaker 8: but sometimes they are, and that's the whole purpose of
• 49:47
  Speaker 8: the website is to be able to finally get that
• 49:50
  Speaker 8: one break that just blows the case open.
• 49:53
  Speaker 1: I mentioned earlier that the number of years since Bill
• 49:55
  Speaker 1: disappeared makes his case more difficult to solve, but Ranger
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: Perkins point out out that time can be a double
• 50:02
  Speaker 1: edged sword.
• 50:03
  Speaker 8: People's relationships change, so we can go back and reinterview
• 50:07
  Speaker 8: people who may have had a close relationship with whoever
• 50:11
  Speaker 8: was involved early on and then maybe not so much now.
• 50:14
  Speaker 8: So the longer a case goes on, it can be challenging,
• 50:18
  Speaker 8: but it can also be a benefit to investigators because
• 50:21
  Speaker 8: there may be a level of complacency on the part
• 50:24
  Speaker 8: of vose involved where they're just not They get comfortable
• 50:27
  Speaker 8: and they go back to life and they think nobody's
• 50:29
  Speaker 8: ever going to find them, And that's usually when we
• 50:32
  Speaker 8: can make up that ground and identify somebody and bring charges.
• 50:36
  Speaker 1: You can read between those lines for yourself, But it
• 50:38
  Speaker 1: sounds to me like the rangers can guess who might
• 50:41
  Speaker 1: be involved, or at least who might know something, so
• 50:45
  Speaker 1: they're biding their time waiting for those people to slip up,
• 50:49
  Speaker 1: have a change of heart, or tell the wrong person
• 50:51
  Speaker 1: what happened to Bill, Because somewhere beneath the surface of
• 50:55
  Speaker 1: Lake sam Rayburn, past the down timber and the silt
• 50:58
  Speaker 1: and the dark water, Bill Roland may still be out there.
• 51:03
  Speaker 1: East Texas has a way of keeping its secrets. The
• 51:06
  Speaker 1: pines grow thick, the lakes run deep, and the people
• 51:09
  Speaker 1: who know things tend to hold them close. But even
• 51:12
  Speaker 1: though secrets carry weight, some of them eventually rise to
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: the surface.
• 51:18
  Speaker 8: People like this that may have been involved maybe thinking
• 51:22
  Speaker 8: that they're out of the woods and that they may
• 51:26
  Speaker 8: be getting complacent. But I would just remind them that
• 51:30
  Speaker 8: there are investigators out there who never stop and they're
• 51:34
  Speaker 8: always pursuing justice, So they need to keep an eye
• 51:38
  Speaker 8: in their rearview mirror because we're coming.
• 51:42
  Speaker 1: Figuring out what happens to Bill won't bring back Jenna
• 51:44
  Speaker 1: and Bailey's fathers, but for the last surviving Rolands, it
• 51:47
  Speaker 1: would help close the circle of the mystery that has
• 51:50
  Speaker 1: shadowed their lives. They heard Bill's name in parking lots
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: and on deer leases and from old women who still
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: remember his laugh. They lost their fathers to the unanswered
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: question that is Bill's disappearance, but they're still here in Lufkin,
• 52:05
  Speaker 1: in Angelina County, in the place their family has always
• 52:08
  Speaker 1: been waiting for answers.
• 52:11
  Speaker 2: It'd be huge for us.
• 52:13
  Speaker 6: There's me and Bailey.
• 52:14
  Speaker 2: We're all really the only Roland's left, and so that'd
• 52:18
  Speaker 2: be huge for us. We would love to see or
• 52:21
  Speaker 2: love to hear what truly happened. That'd be closure for
• 52:23
  Speaker 2: our family that our family has wanted for a long time.
• 52:25
  Speaker 7: Now.
• 52:31
  Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to this episode of Blood Trails. If
• 52:34
  Speaker 1: you have any information on what might have happened to
• 52:36
  Speaker 1: Bill Roland, you can submit a tip through the Texas
• 52:39
  Speaker 1: Rangers Cold Case website or through the Texas Crime Stoppers hotline.
• 52:43
  Speaker 1: That number is one eight hundred two five, two eight,
• 52:47
  Speaker 1: four seven seven. We'll post that number and links to
• 52:50
  Speaker 1: submit a tip on the case file for this episode,
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: which you can find by going to the meeater dot
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: com slash blood Trails. There you can also see images
• 52:59
  Speaker 1: of Lake Sam ray Bill and his sons, and the
• 53:01
  Speaker 1: neighborhood where he disappeared. You can also check out the
• 53:04
  Speaker 1: footage we captured of this area and our in person
• 53:07
  Speaker 1: interviews by watching the video version of this podcast on YouTube.
• 53:11
  Speaker 1: Huge thanks to everyone who contributed to this episode, Jenna Sprinkle,
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: Bailey Rowland, Texas Rangers, Don Morris, Chris Perkins and Sam Lattner,
• 53:20
  Speaker 1: Michael Hadsl, Delwyn Williams, and the Rayburn Country Resort. Also
• 53:25
  Speaker 1: shout out to David McDaniels for his incredible video work
• 53:28
  Speaker 1: and on the ground reporting. See you next time. Stay
• 53:32
  Speaker 1: safe out there,