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Hell and Gone Murder Line: Connie Townsend Part 2 · Hell and Gone: Murder Line

0:46
Speaker 1: School of Humans.
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Speaker 2: Helen Got Murder Line actively investigates cold case murders in
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Speaker 2: an effort to raise public awareness invite witnesses to come
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Speaker 2: forward and present evidence that could potentially be further investigated
1:00
Speaker 2: by law enforcement. While we value insights from family and
1:03
Speaker 2: community members, their statements should not be considered evidence and
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Speaker 2: point to the challenges of verifying facts inherent in cold cases.
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Speaker 2: We remind listeners that everyone is presumed innocent until proven
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Speaker 2: guilty in a court of law. Nothing in the podcast
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Speaker 2: is intended to state or imply that anyone who has
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Speaker 2: not been convicted of a crime is guilty of any wrongdoing.
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Speaker 2: Thanks for listening.
1:30
Speaker 3: On January seventh, nineteen ninety five, forty three year old
1:34
Speaker 3: Connie Townsend's home burned to the ground in Brockwell, Arkansas,
1:38
Speaker 3: in front of over twenty witnesses. Connie was moving out
1:42
Speaker 3: of her house that day. He had separated from her
1:44
Speaker 3: estranged husband, David Townsend.
1:47
Speaker 1: Years earlier.
1:48
Speaker 3: David had been staying with his parents, Dale and Ramona,
1:51
Speaker 3: and also with his girlfriend of three years, joe Anne Ellis,
1:56
Speaker 3: But according to Connie's daughters Stacy and Amber, David was
1:59
Speaker 3: angry that day and had threatened Connie. They also said
2:03
Speaker 3: that David had threatened to burn the house down in
2:06
Speaker 3: the past. Connie's body was found in a utility room.
2:11
Speaker 3: She was lying face down with a pair of sewing
2:13
Speaker 3: scissors underneath her body. Investigators said that Connie had died
2:18
Speaker 3: of smoke and soot inhalation, and according to the autopsy report,
2:22
Speaker 3: there was basically no tissue left and it seemed like
2:26
Speaker 3: after investigators went through the charred remains of her trailer,
2:30
Speaker 3: they had a lot more questions. Was Connie's death due
2:34
Speaker 3: to an accidental fire or was this a murder an arson?
2:40
Speaker 3: Thirty years later, her daughters still have no Joe justice
2:44
Speaker 3: and no answers. And if you ask around Brockwell, Arkansas,
2:48
Speaker 3: a lot of people will tell you police know who
2:51
Speaker 3: did it, but that there will never be justice. I
2:54
Speaker 3: don't believe that. We've only had this case file for
2:58
Speaker 3: about two weeks, and in that time we have managed
3:01
Speaker 3: to answer a lot of the questions that we had
3:03
Speaker 3: last week, and a lot of people have reached out,
3:07
Speaker 3: but there's still more to uncover. Last week we talked
3:11
Speaker 3: about someone named Eddie. Eddie was a name mentioned in
3:15
Speaker 3: the handwritten note in the case file. We wondered why
3:19
Speaker 3: was his name mentioned in connection to joe Anne Ellis.
3:22
Speaker 1: We found Eddie.
3:24
Speaker 3: He was the coroner at the time of Connie's death,
3:27
Speaker 3: so he was the first one to examine Connie's body.
3:30
Speaker 3: Obviously it's been thirty years, and he said he doesn't
3:33
Speaker 3: remember a lot, but he did have some information that
3:37
Speaker 3: we've never heard before. We had heard from Connie's daughters
3:41
Speaker 3: and from the case file that Connie's body was found
3:45
Speaker 3: in a junk room, a bedroom that the family used
3:48
Speaker 3: as an extra utility room. Eddie told us that Connie
3:53
Speaker 3: was found in a closet.
3:55
Speaker 4: Thirty years later. I can't even remember what they said
3:57
Speaker 4: because of death was but I do remember toxicology was
4:01
Speaker 4: negative for any Incoxicans. I know she was found in
4:04
Speaker 4: a closet. I remember that she was leaving, moving out,
4:09
Speaker 4: and had her sister and brother in law coming to
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Speaker 4: help her move stuff. What I understood she was making
4:14
Speaker 4: trips in now that's carrying stuff out to her car.
4:17
Speaker 4: That was the middle of the day, and it just
4:19
Speaker 4: struck me there, you know, you're not going to get
4:21
Speaker 4: caught up at a house fire if you're going in
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Speaker 4: and out and leaving and got somebody coming to help
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Speaker 4: you and all that stuff. So I always felt that
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Speaker 4: it was really suspicious.
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Speaker 3: If there was a fire, why would Connie shut herself
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Speaker 3: into a closet in the back of a utility room,
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Speaker 3: into a place where there was no escape or could
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Speaker 3: someone have put her in that closet it I'm Catherine Townsend.
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Speaker 3: Over the past seven years of making my true crime podcast,
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Speaker 3: Helen Gone, I've learned that there is no such thing
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Speaker 3: as a small town where murder never happens. I have
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Speaker 3: received hundreds of messages from people all around the country
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Speaker 3: asking for help with an unsolved murder that's affected them,
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Speaker 3: their families, and their communities.
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Speaker 1: If you have a case you'd like me.
5:07
Speaker 3: And my team to look into, you can reach out
5:09
Speaker 3: to us at our Helen Gone Murder line at six
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Speaker 3: seven eight seven four four six one four five. That's
5:15
Speaker 3: six seven eight seven four four six one four five,
5:20
Speaker 3: or you can send us a message on Instagram at
5:23
Speaker 3: Helen gonepod. This is Helen Gone Murder Line. The Arkansas
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Speaker 3: State Police said they're done with this case file. They've
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Speaker 3: labeled Connie Townsend's case inactive. Connie's daughter Stacey emailed the
6:19
Speaker 3: Arkansas State Police in two thousand and seven and in
6:22
Speaker 3: two thousand and nine asking for a copy of the
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Speaker 3: case file. She also spoke to Arkansas State Police investigator
6:28
Speaker 3: Dennis Simons. Now side note here, if you've listened to
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Speaker 3: season one of Helen Gone or followed the Rebecca Gould case,
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Speaker 3: you'll know that I have my own history with Dennis Simons.
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Speaker 3: So I'm going to refrain on commenting on what he
6:42
Speaker 3: did or did not do in conn investigation because I
6:45
Speaker 3: truly don't know, And to be fair, he wasn't the
6:49
Speaker 3: only investigator saying that they had exhausted all investigative leads.
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Speaker 1: As we said last week, TJ.
6:55
Speaker 3: Hively and the prosecutor's office had also said there was
6:58
Speaker 3: nowhere else that they could go with this investigation. I
7:02
Speaker 3: just want to go back and go over the case
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Speaker 3: file with a fine tooth comb and see if there
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Speaker 3: are any questions that we can answer. Thirty years later,
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Speaker 3: I want to go back to the timeline. I want
7:13
Speaker 3: to go back in time to January seventh, nineteen ninety five.
7:17
Speaker 3: Connie Townshend was moving out of her trailer. She had
7:19
Speaker 3: told people that she was afraid of her estranged husband,
7:22
Speaker 3: David Townsend, both of Connie's daughters told us that David
7:27
Speaker 3: had verbally abused their mother in the past and that
7:29
Speaker 3: he had made threats. Though Connie and David had been
7:34
Speaker 3: separated for years, there was a lot happening that week.
7:37
Speaker 3: Because Connie had just filed for divorce. David would not
7:41
Speaker 3: get the divorce paperwork until January eleven, four days after
7:45
Speaker 3: the fire.
7:47
Speaker 1: This was intentional on Connie's part.
7:49
Speaker 3: Connie had hired a lawyer, and she had a conversation
7:52
Speaker 3: with her lawyer about serving David after she left home.
7:56
Speaker 3: She did not want to escalate the situation.
7:59
Speaker 1: The police talked.
8:00
Speaker 3: To Connie's attorney on January eighteenth. He said that he
8:03
Speaker 3: looked for her case file but was unable to locate it.
8:07
Speaker 3: He told police he believed someone may have broken in
8:11
Speaker 3: and stolen it, which honestly is a bit of a
8:13
Speaker 3: bizarre answer in my opinion. But then there's no follow
8:17
Speaker 3: up by police in the case file. But we found
8:20
Speaker 3: out something else from the case file. Even though Connie
8:24
Speaker 3: had that conversation with her lawyer about serving David after
8:27
Speaker 3: she left home, something happened that morning before she died.
8:32
Speaker 3: Connie told her sisters that she had let it slip
8:36
Speaker 3: to David Townsend's mother, Ramona that she was filing for divorce.
8:50
Speaker 3: We went back and tried to piece together everyone's interviews
8:53
Speaker 3: to see if there are gaps in the timeline or
8:56
Speaker 3: any conflicting information about the morning of the fire, and
8:59
Speaker 3: we have found a lot of inconsistencies, places where facts
9:03
Speaker 3: don't match, gaps of time where it seems as though
9:07
Speaker 3: either someone is misremembering or someone is lying. As we
9:12
Speaker 3: said last week, Connie called both of her sisters on
9:15
Speaker 3: the morning of the move.
9:16
Speaker 1: She wanted her brothers in law to come and help.
9:19
Speaker 3: This was a point of conflict between Connie and her
9:22
Speaker 3: estranged husband David and his parents, Ramona and Dale Townsend.
9:27
Speaker 3: We talked to Connie's sister, Dolores Brown about what she
9:30
Speaker 3: remembers from the day her sister died.
9:33
Speaker 5: Connie called me somewhere around ten or ten thirty on
9:38
Speaker 5: Saturday morning and she said that her and David had
9:41
Speaker 5: got into it again, and she says that David said
9:44
Speaker 5: she had to get out right away, so she said
9:46
Speaker 5: I stayed as soon as possible.
9:50
Speaker 3: The night before the fire, both of Connie's daughters, Amber
9:53
Speaker 3: and Stacy spoke to their mom remember Amber was moving
9:57
Speaker 3: with her mother, so her stuff was packed along with Connie's.
10:01
Speaker 3: At two am on the morning of the seventh, Amber
10:04
Speaker 3: showed up at Connie's trailer.
10:06
Speaker 1: Her mom was in the process.
10:07
Speaker 3: Of moving out, but Amber said that because of icy roads,
10:11
Speaker 3: they decided to stay one last night in the trailer.
10:15
Speaker 3: The next morning, Amber loaded her stuff into Connie's car
10:18
Speaker 3: and left to go to her grandmother's house. At around
10:20
Speaker 3: seven to fifty five am. She clarified to police that
10:24
Speaker 3: she was planning to shower at her grandmother's so she
10:26
Speaker 3: could get ready for the day because the hot water
10:29
Speaker 3: was not working at the trailer. She drove back by
10:32
Speaker 3: the trailer at around nine am, and she said that
10:35
Speaker 3: at that time she saw David's two tone brown Cadillac
10:39
Speaker 3: park there. When she saw that, she just honked and
10:43
Speaker 3: drove on one. She said, quote, my mom didn't want
10:46
Speaker 3: me there when he was there end quote. This would
10:50
Speaker 3: match David's statement he told police, which was that he
10:53
Speaker 3: left his parents' house some time after nine am and
10:56
Speaker 3: that he drove over to Connie's. David said that he
10:59
Speaker 3: and Connie argued about who was going to help her move.
11:03
Speaker 3: Connie's daughter, Stacy told police that she called her mom
11:06
Speaker 3: at around ten am. She said that by that point
11:09
Speaker 3: David was gone. Connie told Stacy that when David was there,
11:13
Speaker 3: they had an argument and that at that time David
11:16
Speaker 3: had threatened her with bodily harm. Connie had rented an
11:21
Speaker 3: apartment with Amber, and she had actually just gotten the
11:23
Speaker 3: keys to her new place a couple of days earlier,
11:26
Speaker 3: on January fifth. For Connie, this was going to be
11:29
Speaker 3: a new start. But after David came by the trailer,
11:34
Speaker 3: then his parents went over. His father, Dale, told police
11:37
Speaker 3: that he and his wife Ramona, drove over to Connie's
11:40
Speaker 3: at around eleven am. At this point, Connie broke down.
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Speaker 3: She had talked to her sister Dolores on the phone
11:46
Speaker 3: about five times that morning, and this time when she called,
11:50
Speaker 3: she was in tears.
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Speaker 5: She called and she was crying. She was upset. David's parents,
11:57
Speaker 5: Ramona and Dale, were there and they were concerned about
12:02
Speaker 5: what she was gonna take, and they were telling her
12:06
Speaker 5: she couldn't do this and couldn't do that, and Connie said,
12:09
Speaker 5: I guess you've got to get out.
12:11
Speaker 4: It's bad.
12:11
Speaker 5: And then I've tried to calm her down, and then
12:14
Speaker 5: I asked to speak to one of them, and Ramona
12:18
Speaker 5: came to the phone. I asked her what we could
12:22
Speaker 5: do about that situation that we were coming, if they
12:25
Speaker 5: couldn't just go home and just let us get her
12:28
Speaker 5: out of there and then everything would calm down. And
12:33
Speaker 5: she said they were gonna stay there make sure we
12:36
Speaker 5: didn't take anything, and I said that would be fine.
12:40
Speaker 5: I asked her if maybe if she could go home,
12:42
Speaker 5: and then I would call her whenever we left here
12:46
Speaker 5: and they could meet us back over there and let
12:48
Speaker 5: Connie have some peace. And I talked to Connie again,
12:52
Speaker 5: and she was calming down and explained to her what
12:55
Speaker 5: they were going to do.
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Speaker 3: Dale's told police that he and Ramona stayed for a
12:59
Speaker 3: little while and then left, and that they got back
13:02
Speaker 3: to their own home at noon. At some point after
13:05
Speaker 3: heated arguments, Dolores said that the situation at Connie's house
13:09
Speaker 3: seemed to have calmed down, or so she thought.
13:13
Speaker 5: And so she got feeling better about it. We hung
13:16
Speaker 5: out that Ramona and Dale did not leave right away.
13:20
Speaker 5: I called just to check to see if they're gone.
13:24
Speaker 5: I waited not very long because I was nervous about
13:27
Speaker 5: it all, and Dale answered the phone, so I asked
13:31
Speaker 5: him where Connie was, and he said, well, she's outside.
13:34
Speaker 5: I think I think she's putting her purse in the
13:37
Speaker 5: car and she's loading the car, you know, and all
13:40
Speaker 5: this stuff. And I said, well, I'm just gonna hang
13:42
Speaker 5: on until she came back in nan and I want
13:44
Speaker 5: to talk to her because I was not quite sure
13:47
Speaker 5: he was telling me the truth. So in a little
13:50
Speaker 5: bit she came back in though, and I talked to
13:53
Speaker 5: her and she said, yeah, she would say little better
13:55
Speaker 5: about it, you know. So we hung up again, and
13:58
Speaker 5: I called Connie for about twelve thirty and told her
14:01
Speaker 5: we were on our way, and she said, don't be
14:03
Speaker 5: in any hurry, eat some lunch if you want to
14:06
Speaker 5: or whatever. I'm okay now, I'm okay. And this was
14:09
Speaker 5: the last conversation I had with her. And so we
14:13
Speaker 5: were there quickly, and when we talked, that hill that
14:18
Speaker 5: home was already in plazes. It was already really burning.
14:23
Speaker 3: The fire department was dispatched at one eleven PM, which
14:27
Speaker 3: means that shortly after Dolores hung up the phone with
14:30
Speaker 3: her sister, the fire broke out. Delores said that by
14:34
Speaker 3: the time she got to Connie's trailer, she was shocked
14:37
Speaker 3: to see the raging fire. Her sister Marlene showed up
14:42
Speaker 3: shortly after she did.
14:44
Speaker 5: We were trying to figure out how to get inside,
14:47
Speaker 5: but then it was already so bad. Everything was hot,
14:50
Speaker 5: the door knob was the hutch, couldn't touch it, and
14:52
Speaker 5: there just wasn't enough windows. We couldn't get in. We
14:55
Speaker 5: couldn't see in even because of the smoke, and of
14:58
Speaker 5: course we didn't know for a while whether Connie was
15:00
Speaker 5: in there or not. We started searching around outside Marlene
15:04
Speaker 5: and I did, hoping that she was outside somewhere, and
15:08
Speaker 5: it took off running.
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Speaker 3: We asked another question last week, what happened to Connie
15:15
Speaker 3: and David's big black dog, Bobo. Connie was an animal
15:19
Speaker 3: lover and had several cats that she let into the home,
15:22
Speaker 3: and the dog didn't roam free normally. He was either
15:25
Speaker 3: tied up by the carport or he was inside the house.
15:29
Speaker 3: Dolores believed that the dog might be significant because when
15:33
Speaker 3: she called Connie that last time, she heard the dog bark,
15:38
Speaker 3: and she said he normally only barked when people came
15:41
Speaker 3: to the trailer.
15:43
Speaker 5: Org had started barking when we were fixing to hang
15:47
Speaker 5: up from that last phone conversation. At that last phone
15:51
Speaker 5: conversation when I told her we were on our way
15:54
Speaker 5: and we were actually driving when I called her, and
15:56
Speaker 5: I thought about that later. It didn't hit me until
15:59
Speaker 5: I threw you know, of course, until it was over
16:01
Speaker 5: with and I got home and was thinking about that,
16:04
Speaker 5: and then I thought I heard that dog start barking
16:07
Speaker 5: off the phone. He only barked when someone came in and.
16:10
Speaker 3: Drove in the drive, so was someone outside Connie's trailer
16:15
Speaker 3: When they hung up, Dolores mentioned seeing something else a witness,
16:20
Speaker 3: someone who she said, spoke to David Townsend at the scene.
16:25
Speaker 6: David did make a statement at least to one or
16:29
Speaker 6: two people that at least he untied that gd dog
16:34
Speaker 6: and didn't let it burn up in the fire too.
16:37
Speaker 6: I spoke to Billy and she told me that the
16:41
Speaker 6: front door was locked, but that the side by the
16:44
Speaker 6: carport was not, and to say opened that and several
16:50
Speaker 6: cat went running and one cat came out and it
16:53
Speaker 6: was on fire.
16:55
Speaker 3: We checked the case file and found that reference. Police
16:59
Speaker 3: did talk to a witness. It was a witness named
17:02
Speaker 3: David Herron, and he told police that David made a
17:05
Speaker 3: comment to him about the dog The witness told police
17:09
Speaker 3: that on the day of the fire, David said something
17:11
Speaker 3: to the effect of quote, well, at least I turned
17:15
Speaker 3: the goddamn dog loose so he wouldn't burn up.
17:17
Speaker 1: Too end quote.
17:19
Speaker 3: The witness told police that another friend of his name,
17:21
Speaker 3: Scotty Mast, was also there at the time, and that
17:24
Speaker 3: Scotty had apparently heard David say the same thing, but
17:28
Speaker 3: there's no record of an interview with Scotty in the
17:30
Speaker 3: case file. Was the fire arson or not? We said
17:37
Speaker 3: last week that an electrician did go in with law
17:40
Speaker 3: enforcement and looked at the service box and found that
17:43
Speaker 3: the service box had been shorted, So the electrician stated
17:46
Speaker 3: the short could have contributed to or caused the fire
17:49
Speaker 3: that destroyed the trailer. But in late February, police brought
17:54
Speaker 3: in a specially trained dog named Gallagher from Little Rock.
17:57
Speaker 3: This dog could detect accelerants, and the dog alerted for
18:01
Speaker 3: accelerants at several different parts of the house, but no
18:06
Speaker 3: actual accelerant was found in the samples taken from the
18:08
Speaker 3: crime scene or from the samples that were taken from
18:11
Speaker 3: Connie's body at the medical Examiner's office, so investigators could.
18:15
Speaker 1: Not be sure.
18:18
Speaker 3: One of the handwritten notes that we were talking about
18:20
Speaker 3: last week referred to the arson theory. The note was
18:23
Speaker 3: hard to decipher, but part of it reads quote, they
18:26
Speaker 3: started at the living room and went to the kitchen
18:29
Speaker 3: throwing diesel gas end quote. Also in the emails from
18:33
Speaker 3: the Arkansas State Police to Stacy, Connie's daughter, they referred
18:37
Speaker 3: to Connie's investigation as an arson homicide investigation. Connie's daughters
18:42
Speaker 3: told us the Arkansas police felt that David was their suspect,
18:46
Speaker 3: but that they told them they just didn't have enough
18:49
Speaker 3: evidence to prosecute him. David did have an alibi at
18:53
Speaker 3: the approximate time of the fire. Remember David's son, David
18:57
Speaker 3: Lynn said they drove to Caligo Rock together and went
19:00
Speaker 3: fishing after leaving David's parents' house.
19:03
Speaker 1: But could there be any holes in this alibi?
19:17
Speaker 3: Police did investigate leads other than David Townsend. There are
19:21
Speaker 3: two other names in the case file, names I'd never
19:23
Speaker 3: heard before, Tony Montgomery and Stanley Montgomery. One handwritten note
19:28
Speaker 3: read that Stanley and Tony quote had to leave Little
19:31
Speaker 3: Rock because of arson problems. We tracked down the police
19:35
Speaker 3: report regarding Stanley Montgomery. Connie's trailer burned down on Saturday.
19:40
Speaker 3: On Monday, Stanley showed up at the hospital with severe
19:43
Speaker 3: burns to his arms, and according to the police report,
19:46
Speaker 3: quote told three different stories about how he got the burn.
19:50
Speaker 3: Police were apparently suspicious and they did a search of
19:52
Speaker 3: Stanley's residence. There's a search warrant for his house in
19:55
Speaker 3: the case file, stating they seized several items from his
19:58
Speaker 3: residence and that one of the items seized was a
20:01
Speaker 3: charred bathrobe. But police tested that bathrobe and found no
20:05
Speaker 3: traces of accelerant on it, So it seems as though
20:09
Speaker 3: Stanley and anyone connected with him was ruled out. When
20:14
Speaker 3: I look through the police interviews with Connie's daughter Amber,
20:18
Speaker 3: the timeline, in my opinion, becomes more and more heartbreaking
20:22
Speaker 3: because she did everything in her power to make a
20:26
Speaker 3: safe plan to cut her ties with an abusive relationship.
20:31
Speaker 3: It's obvious that Connie was terrified of David, but on
20:35
Speaker 3: that very last day, she seemed to relax. At twelve thirty,
20:39
Speaker 3: when Dolores talked to her sister for the last time,
20:42
Speaker 3: calling Connie to sa say that she and her husband
20:44
Speaker 3: were on their way. She told police that Connie seemed
20:48
Speaker 3: calmer and said that there was no Rush. Amber said, quote,
20:52
Speaker 3: my mother was in real good spirits and she was
20:55
Speaker 3: moving and told me to go ahead and go on
20:57
Speaker 3: to work today end quote. One question that we had
21:00
Speaker 3: from last week was who was driving the black truck
21:04
Speaker 3: with the rainbow stripes. One possibility is David Lynn, David's
21:09
Speaker 3: son and Connie's stepson. At the time, David Lynn drove
21:13
Speaker 3: a black truck with bright red stripes. Obviously, he's not
21:17
Speaker 3: the only person who drove a vehicle somewhat matching this description,
21:21
Speaker 3: but it is interesting that there's no real record of
21:24
Speaker 3: his location before noon. That's when Dale and Ramona Townsend
21:28
Speaker 3: told police he arrived at their place to eat lunch
21:31
Speaker 3: with them and his father. David Townsend was at Connie's
21:35
Speaker 3: at around nine am in his two tone brown Cadillac.
21:38
Speaker 3: Connie confirmed this, and Amber saw his car park there
21:41
Speaker 3: when she drove by on her way to work in
21:43
Speaker 3: Mountain Home. After that, David left Connie's trailer and told
21:47
Speaker 3: police that he drove back to his parents' house. Then
21:50
Speaker 3: Dale Townsend told police that he and Ramona went to
21:53
Speaker 3: Connie's at around ten am, but this was before David
21:58
Speaker 3: Lynn came to their house in his vehicle. Dale was
22:01
Speaker 3: driving his own vehicle that day, a maroon truck. Where
22:04
Speaker 3: was David Lynn that morning before noon? It's a question
22:08
Speaker 3: that's not answered in this case file. And this is
22:11
Speaker 3: when we've found even more discrepancies because Ramona also reportedly
22:16
Speaker 3: told witnesses a slightly different story. A witness told police
22:21
Speaker 3: that they were there when the fire broke out. They
22:23
Speaker 3: said they saw David's mother, Ramona, and they were asking
22:26
Speaker 3: what happened, who lived there, et cetera. They said that
22:29
Speaker 3: Ramona told him that she and her husband had been
22:32
Speaker 3: to Connie's trailer earlier that day, but she said she
22:36
Speaker 3: brought Connie some wood. This was never mentioned in any
22:40
Speaker 3: other report. David told police that he and David Lynn
22:48
Speaker 3: stopped at Harp's grocery store when they went fishing. This
22:51
Speaker 3: was confirmed by a witness who worked at Harp's grocery store.
22:55
Speaker 3: This person said that they saw David Lynne between two
22:57
Speaker 3: and two thirty pm. That would have been before David
23:01
Speaker 3: and his son said they passed Dale townshend on the
23:03
Speaker 3: road after three pm when he supposedly told them about
23:06
Speaker 3: the fire. She said that he bought cigarettes and a
23:10
Speaker 3: pack of coke at that point. She asked if Connie
23:13
Speaker 3: was heart in the fire, and he said no, that
23:16
Speaker 3: someone was bringing Connie back from Mountain Home. This is
23:20
Speaker 3: very confusing because if this is true, that would mean
23:23
Speaker 3: that David Lynn already knew about the fire before three pm,
23:28
Speaker 3: which is when David claims they ran into his father
23:31
Speaker 3: on the road and first learned about the fire. But again,
23:34
Speaker 3: it's very frustrating because there's no record that police ever
23:37
Speaker 3: explained this discrepancy. Joe Anne Ellis also had a different story.
23:42
Speaker 3: Joe Anne told she had been living with David Townsend
23:45
Speaker 3: for three years, but that he had been married to
23:47
Speaker 3: Connie for fifteen years. She said that David told her
23:51
Speaker 3: that he loved Connie and that he married her for
23:53
Speaker 3: the kids. She said that David did not talk to
23:56
Speaker 3: her about his and Connie's problems. She said, quote, someone
24:00
Speaker 3: called Dale and told him that the trailer was on fire,
24:04
Speaker 3: and David was at Dale's when the call was made.
24:07
Speaker 1: End quote.
24:08
Speaker 3: Now that's a totally different story than the one that
24:11
Speaker 3: David and Dale told police about David and David Lynn
24:14
Speaker 3: being out fishing, Dale, finding out about the trailer and
24:16
Speaker 3: running into them on the road and breaking the news.
24:18
Speaker 3: Then Joanne said she was home alone on January seventh,
24:23
Speaker 3: nineteen ninety five. She said she didn't find out about
24:26
Speaker 3: Connie's death until later, but then the page after that
24:29
Speaker 3: from her interview is missing, like so many of the
24:32
Speaker 3: other pages in the Arkansas State Police file. David Townsend
24:39
Speaker 3: took a voice stress test, on which, according to police reports,
24:43
Speaker 3: invested gators believed that he was being deceptive. He got
24:46
Speaker 3: a lawyer and refused to take a light detector test.
24:49
Speaker 1: His son, David.
24:50
Speaker 3: Lynne, also told police he wasn't going to take a
24:53
Speaker 3: polygraph test because his dad failed.
24:55
Speaker 1: One, But in the end, neither.
24:57
Speaker 3: Polygraph tests nor stress tests are admissible in court. David
25:02
Speaker 3: Townsend hired a lawyer, and police told Connie's daughters they
25:06
Speaker 3: did not feel as though they had enough information to
25:08
Speaker 3: charge him. We said last week that we were looking
25:13
Speaker 3: for a mystery man, a curly haired, reddish blonde haired
25:17
Speaker 3: stranger who was driving a blue truck. Monica Jones, one
25:21
Speaker 3: of the first people on the scene who tried to
25:23
Speaker 3: break into the trailer before the fire got too intense,
25:26
Speaker 3: told police that Dale Townsend was at.
25:28
Speaker 1: The scene talking to the curly haired man.
25:31
Speaker 3: Her note read quote Dale Townsend was standing there and
25:34
Speaker 3: he seemed to know this person and spoke his name.
25:37
Speaker 3: I don't remember his name, but Dale did say he
25:40
Speaker 3: was from Horseshoe Bend End quote. As we said last week,
25:52
Speaker 3: most of the people in the case file are now deceased.
25:55
Speaker 3: Joe Anne Ellis is dead, and so were David Townsend
25:59
Speaker 3: and his son David Lynne, as well as both of
26:02
Speaker 3: David Townsend's parents. But the mystery man, possibly from Horseshoe Ben,
26:07
Speaker 3: might still be out there somewhere, and if he is,
26:10
Speaker 3: does he know something and could we find him. Connie's daughters,
26:15
Speaker 3: Amber and Stacey know that justice will not be served
26:19
Speaker 3: in the traditional way, but if David or David Lynn's
26:23
Speaker 3: relatives are out there, maybe one of them talked to someone.
26:27
Speaker 3: And Connie's daughters said last week that just knowing what
26:31
Speaker 3: happened to their mother would help bring them some peace.
26:35
Speaker 3: We are also looking for Michael, joe Anne's son, who
26:38
Speaker 3: told police that David had told him that he killed
26:41
Speaker 3: Connie one night while he was drunk. So far we
26:45
Speaker 3: haven't found him, but if he's out there, we would
26:47
Speaker 3: love to talk to him, and maybe if David or
26:51
Speaker 3: anyone in his family or anyone he talked to over
26:55
Speaker 3: the years, heard something about what happened to Connie. Maybe
26:58
Speaker 3: someone he encountered talked to someone else over the years.
27:02
Speaker 1: I really hope.
27:03
Speaker 3: That if there is someone out there, that they will
27:05
Speaker 3: reach out, Dolores told us, even after all this time,
27:10
Speaker 3: sometimes she catches a glimpse of someone who reminds her
27:13
Speaker 3: of Connie. As long as Connie's family is alive, they
27:18
Speaker 3: continue to hope for answers and justice.
27:22
Speaker 5: And now she's been gone so long, it's not like
27:25
Speaker 5: I think that's her anymore. It's just the fact that
27:28
Speaker 5: it reminds me of her. The way someone's got their
27:31
Speaker 5: hair done, or just the back of their head or
27:34
Speaker 5: something like that, You know that reminds you of them,
27:37
Speaker 5: But everybody goes through that. But it's also brings the
27:42
Speaker 5: good memories back, so as you go through life yourself
27:46
Speaker 5: and try to live life the best you can.
27:52
Speaker 3: In the meantime, I'm going to keep looking for inconsistencies
27:56
Speaker 3: in this case file, because killers can make one tiny
28:00
Speaker 3: mistake that can break the entire case. Which brings me
28:07
Speaker 3: to the final shocking fact. David told police that on
28:12
Speaker 3: the day of the fire, while he and David Limb
28:14
Speaker 3: were fishing, that they stopped by Harps and Calico Rock,
28:18
Speaker 3: and that David Lynn bought a can of corn. The
28:21
Speaker 3: cashier working at Harp's Calico Rock that day, Misty Jones,
28:25
Speaker 3: said that she remembered David Lynn. She said he came
28:28
Speaker 3: in to buy a can of corn. This would have
28:30
Speaker 3: been some time after eleven am when she started her shift.
28:34
Speaker 3: During this time, another witness saw David Townsend in the
28:37
Speaker 3: parking lot, sitting in the passenger seat of David Lynn's
28:40
Speaker 3: black truck with the red stripe. So it does seem
28:43
Speaker 3: as though they were at Harps together. But were they
28:47
Speaker 3: just there to buy fishing gear and snacks because Misty
28:50
Speaker 3: Jones said something else. She said that while David Lynn
28:54
Speaker 3: was in the store buying corn, David Lynn asked if
28:57
Speaker 3: they had another very particular item and she told him
29:00
Speaker 3: they didn't. What David Lynn asked for was lighter fluid.
29:06
Speaker 3: I'm Katherine Townsend. This is Helen Gone Murder Line. Helen
29:13
Speaker 3: Gone Murder Line is a production of School of Humans
29:15
Speaker 3: and iHeart Podcasts. It's written and narrated by me Catherine
29:19
Speaker 3: Townsend and produced by Gabby Watts. Special thanks to Amy
29:23
Speaker 3: Tubbs for her Research Assistance and James Wheaton for legal review.
29:27
Speaker 3: Noah Kammer mixed and scored this episode. Our theme song
29:30
Speaker 3: is by Ben Sale. Executive producers are Virginia Prescott, Brandon Barr,
29:35
Speaker 3: and L. C.
29:36
Speaker 1: Crowley.
29:37
Speaker 3: Listen to Helen Gone ad free by subscribing to the
29:39
Speaker 3: iHeart True Crime Plush channel on Apple Podcasts. If you
29:43
Speaker 3: were interested in seeing documents and materials from the case,
29:46
Speaker 3: you can follow the show on Instagram at Helen Gonpod.
29:50
Speaker 3: If you have a case you'd like me and my
29:51
Speaker 3: team to look into, you can reach out to us
29:54
Speaker 3: at our Helen Gone Murder Line at six seven eight
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Speaker 3: seven four four six one four five at six seven
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Speaker 2: School of Humans