Latest / Hell and Gone: Murder Line / Dead in the Water

Transcript

Dead in the Water · Hell and Gone: Murder Line

0:08
Speaker 1: School of Humans. Hey, good morning together. I did not
0:16
Speaker 1: sleep last night. I slept for about an hour and
0:20
Speaker 1: then I like, we'll grab him. Oh. We've been in
0:26
Speaker 1: mountain View for about a week now, and I feel
0:29
Speaker 1: like we've gotten a pretty good grip on the main
0:31
Speaker 1: facts of the case. We've met Rebecca's sister Danielle and
0:35
Speaker 1: her dad Larry, and the journalist George Jared, who has
0:38
Speaker 1: spent countless hours investigating this case. We've also met Dennis Simons,
0:43
Speaker 1: the lead investigator for the Arkansas State Police. Since he
0:47
Speaker 1: won't share the case file with us, we're on our
0:49
Speaker 1: own to piece together exactly what happened and to embed
0:53
Speaker 1: ourselves in the community to gain people's trust. In September
1:01
Speaker 1: of two thousand and four, twenty two year old Rebecca
1:04
Speaker 1: Gould was brutally murdered in a remote area of the
1:07
Speaker 1: Arkansas Ozarks. Fourteen years later, her killer is still out there.
1:14
Speaker 1: I've come back to Mountain View with one mission to
1:17
Speaker 1: get justice for Rebecca. I'm Catherine Townsend, and this is
1:22
Speaker 1: Helen Gone. It's been a week and it seems like
1:30
Speaker 1: everyone in town has heard of the case and knows
1:32
Speaker 1: exactly why we're here. Even the guy who comes in
1:36
Speaker 1: to fix the hot water heater. Lisia went to Mountain View.
1:38
Speaker 1: I'm not sure if Rebecca went to Melbourne or she
1:41
Speaker 1: went to Mountain View. I don't sure it worked together.
1:43
Speaker 1: It's one of the sonics. I don't know about one
1:45
Speaker 1: in Melbourne or one in Mountain Deere or something. In news.
1:48
Speaker 1: He tells us that his daughter Alisia went to school
1:50
Speaker 1: with Rebecca. He also tells us that his catfish pond
1:53
Speaker 1: has been connected to three different murders. Yeah, they told
1:57
Speaker 1: the well, they told the police officers that there was
1:59
Speaker 1: a body in my pond, so that they come out
2:01
Speaker 1: and drained it. Well, we drained it, but that didn't
2:04
Speaker 1: find anything. So why did they Why do you think
2:06
Speaker 1: the psychic focused on your pond. I've got no idea.
2:09
Speaker 1: There's a lot of ponds around there, so I've got
2:11
Speaker 1: no idea. Is it visible from the road and you
2:14
Speaker 1: know it's off the road broadways. It's pretty weird. And
2:18
Speaker 1: what what's what's happened to the pond now? Well, right
2:21
Speaker 1: now it's a golf covered up. Had those who come
2:24
Speaker 1: out covered up? So it's another psychics conbuggy. Yeah, it's
2:27
Speaker 1: been twice. When was another killing? That when they stabbed
2:31
Speaker 1: the boy. But that's they found a knife in the
2:33
Speaker 1: pond when they drained it that time. This is what
2:36
Speaker 1: I mean when I say Mountain View is a place
2:38
Speaker 1: where bad things can happen. For the record, that's one
2:42
Speaker 1: small catfish pond connected to three different murders. Yeah, I'm
2:49
Speaker 1: happenings later. Good look, thank you. It's eerie like how
3:01
Speaker 1: everyone in town seems to have some connection with this case.
3:04
Speaker 1: You know, either than you one of this potential suspect
3:06
Speaker 1: that you see who was involved. They knew the victim,
3:10
Speaker 1: their family, I remember their family, the victim. It's not
3:12
Speaker 1: even like six degrees of separation. It's like one degree
3:14
Speaker 1: of separation, do you know what I mean. Alicia went
3:16
Speaker 1: to school with Rebecca and she knows several of the
3:19
Speaker 1: other people that have been brought up in connection with
3:21
Speaker 1: this case. Hi, Alicia, Yeah, Hey is Taylor? Sorry? I
3:25
Speaker 1: just missed your call. Okay, I figured here. I'm sorry.
3:29
Speaker 1: I'm kind up. I had to do an inn service
3:31
Speaker 1: with my past today. Alicia works as a registered nurse
3:34
Speaker 1: in the area. Well, myn he of the Sonics in
3:40
Speaker 1: Melbourne and that's where sure then and them too, and
3:46
Speaker 1: she looked their fun, but not a lot of times
3:50
Speaker 1: that she went. She was working at Melbourne Sonic. You
3:55
Speaker 1: don't think sobout what happened to, especially somebody that you
3:59
Speaker 1: euro up with and you know, and you know, I
4:02
Speaker 1: was in her sister Daniel. In my opinion, I think
4:08
Speaker 1: it was a matter of Chelsey and I don't think
4:10
Speaker 1: it was just one person a ball. There was a
4:14
Speaker 1: lot going on with that group of people and they
4:16
Speaker 1: were some of those people are very vindictive, and Chris,
4:26
Speaker 1: I can't imagine, you know, again, he is the worst
4:29
Speaker 1: of all of them. Alicia brings up Chris the town
4:32
Speaker 1: black Sheep. Well, Chris, I don't think Chris would be
4:36
Speaker 1: close to anybody. He's not a good person. He uh,
4:41
Speaker 1: he was really involved in a lot of drugs and
4:45
Speaker 1: just bad stuff. Simmy was Chris. All friends, Siddy and
4:52
Speaker 1: Chris kind of capture themselves a lot of you know,
4:56
Speaker 1: unless they were out, like at a part of a year,
5:00
Speaker 1: you know, something like that was that was other people,
5:02
Speaker 1: and then they might associate with other people, but they
5:04
Speaker 1: look pretty private. Cindy was Chris's girlfriend at the time
5:07
Speaker 1: of the murder. She eventually became his wife. He was
5:12
Speaker 1: in prison I don't know what he's out, but Alicia
5:18
Speaker 1: tells me a story that I've heard several times while
5:20
Speaker 1: researching this case. He ended up getting in trouble. I'm
5:26
Speaker 1: not sure if somebody off the load and he's got
5:31
Speaker 1: a lot of truck. You know, he's got me in
5:33
Speaker 1: trouble for that. But it was, you know, sometime after
5:38
Speaker 1: that it happened. I don't know, I don't know what
5:41
Speaker 1: you you know what I can't imagine or Alicia knows
5:49
Speaker 1: several people in Rebecca's social circle, which centered around the
5:52
Speaker 1: Melbourne Sonic at the time of her death, and her
5:55
Speaker 1: insights about Chris and Cindy definitely start to paint a
5:57
Speaker 1: picture of the people that Rebecca was hanging around with.
6:01
Speaker 1: These are people that even today people in Mountain View
6:04
Speaker 1: are afraid of. It's become clear that we have to
6:14
Speaker 1: get more information on Chris, so we head into town
6:17
Speaker 1: to the offices of the Stone County Leader, one of
6:20
Speaker 1: the small town papers that reported on Rebecca's death and
6:28
Speaker 1: two thousand and four, the big ones over there before
6:31
Speaker 1: we started splitting them into two. Well, this is super
6:34
Speaker 1: helpful because it's been hard to find, like, not everything's online,
6:37
Speaker 1: there's no telling what's there. That case was kind of strange.
6:43
Speaker 1: She was found in our county, so right, well, it
6:48
Speaker 1: was like within a stone's throwers. I mean, it's just
6:52
Speaker 1: right there. And there's also like a lot of connections
6:54
Speaker 1: because her sister went to high school here. Rebecca's murders
6:59
Speaker 1: straddled to counties and affected people all over the state.
7:04
Speaker 1: She hung out and had friends in Mountain View, which
7:07
Speaker 1: is in Stone County. She also hung out in Melbourne
7:10
Speaker 1: and at Casey's house. Both of those are in Izard County,
7:13
Speaker 1: and Rebecca's body was also found in Iszard County. So
7:17
Speaker 1: the Izard County Sheriff's Department led the investigation until it
7:20
Speaker 1: was taken over a few days later by the Arkansas
7:22
Speaker 1: State Police. There was a follow up story to this.
7:25
Speaker 1: I think they found a story in a follow up
7:27
Speaker 1: if I remember this scene September twentieth, so she was
7:30
Speaker 1: reported missing, I believe on the twentieth, and then the
7:32
Speaker 1: twenty first is probably when it first came out, so
7:35
Speaker 1: it may not have been until like the twenty seventh,
7:38
Speaker 1: when you guys would have we probably ran a story
7:41
Speaker 1: of when she was missing. Oh yeah, here's another one. Yeah, Okay,
7:45
Speaker 1: it's a real of the homicide. Rusty is the owner
7:47
Speaker 1: and publisher of the weekly newspaper, The Stone County Leader.
7:50
Speaker 1: He invites us then to talk about the history of
7:52
Speaker 1: the town and how he feels it's changed. Do you
7:55
Speaker 1: know the population just twenty seven hundred. I think populi
8:00
Speaker 1: the whole county is about twelve thy four hundred. I
8:02
Speaker 1: believe for the last census. If anything, we've lost a
8:06
Speaker 1: little population. What do you think that is? We lost
8:09
Speaker 1: a lot of jobs, We lost a lot of young
8:11
Speaker 1: people that had to move away to find work. And
8:14
Speaker 1: the Stone kind of antworks at one time had five
8:16
Speaker 1: hundred people if you count their mc cali barock Land
8:19
Speaker 1: and they had about three hundred and fifty here for
8:21
Speaker 1: almost four hundred year and it's down to twenty five people.
8:26
Speaker 1: Maybe in a lot of ways, the story Mountain View
8:28
Speaker 1: is one that's playing out in small towns all across
8:30
Speaker 1: America's heartland. Jobs have disappeared, drugs including methanopiates, or crisis
8:36
Speaker 1: that terrors of the town seems we're not really equipped
8:41
Speaker 1: to be like investigative journalists on something like a murder.
8:44
Speaker 1: I mean, we had to rely on the police, and
8:46
Speaker 1: I didn't go to the scene where she was murdered,
8:50
Speaker 1: but it was a bloody mess, so there was some
8:53
Speaker 1: kind of a struggle that went on. You know, all
8:58
Speaker 1: the police are just unanimous in their beliefs that there
9:03
Speaker 1: was drug involved, so only motive that could come up with,
9:05
Speaker 1: and they're all kind of involved in drug culture. If
9:10
Speaker 1: you have moved drugs from the equation, the only crime
9:16
Speaker 1: we would have here would be domestic violence of some
9:19
Speaker 1: sort or another, and a lot of that strugg related
9:22
Speaker 1: money and drugs are kind of tied. You know, I
9:26
Speaker 1: bulgarized a house to get money from my myth is
9:30
Speaker 1: that the big problem down here? It has been in
9:33
Speaker 1: the past. You know, that's a landscape that changes all
9:36
Speaker 1: the time. And I'm not sure that I'm crying on
9:38
Speaker 1: you right now, but a couple of years ago, I
9:41
Speaker 1: was convinced that prescription drugs, primarily opioids, are having to
9:47
Speaker 1: replaced myth and everything else has the number one problem here.
9:51
Speaker 1: Over the years, Russy's developed a great relationship with local
9:54
Speaker 1: law enforcement. He knows what they're thinking. He sort of
9:58
Speaker 1: speaks in code. He's happy to share, but he's not
10:01
Speaker 1: going to tell us too much like many other people
10:04
Speaker 1: in town. You refer to Dennis's huge binder of information
10:07
Speaker 1: on Rebecca's case. Well, I know what the police are thinking,
10:10
Speaker 1: you know what the prosecutor's thinking. Anyway, the police thought
10:14
Speaker 1: they had enough evidence to prosecute, but the prosecutor disagreed.
10:19
Speaker 1: And if there were indeed more than one people involved
10:23
Speaker 1: in the murderer, then what they're hoping is somebody were. Well,
10:29
Speaker 1: the more people that know about what really happened, the
10:32
Speaker 1: better the eyes of somebody down the road talking. But
10:36
Speaker 1: aside from that, they still don't have a good enough case,
10:39
Speaker 1: and without new evidence or additional evidence, they're dead in
10:44
Speaker 1: the water. These cold cases sometimes get solved by someone
10:49
Speaker 1: who comes forth and talks about it. The police all
10:51
Speaker 1: think they know who did it. This is a cold case,
10:59
Speaker 1: something you could happen, though, And the reason, according to
11:02
Speaker 1: my theory anyway, is I do not see how one
11:04
Speaker 1: person could have done that by themselves without being detected somewhere. Now,
11:08
Speaker 1: they had to have a system or a couple, and
11:12
Speaker 1: it's almost certainly that they were drugs involved somewhere or another.
11:17
Speaker 1: With Rusty's references to drugs, multiple people, and the habitual offender,
11:21
Speaker 1: I feel pretty confident he's referring to Chris and JB.
11:25
Speaker 1: This is the same theory we keep hearing time and
11:27
Speaker 1: time again, that Chris killed Rebecca while he was high
11:31
Speaker 1: on meth and that JB, his friend, helped him clean
11:34
Speaker 1: up the crime scene. Both Chris and JB have been
11:38
Speaker 1: questioned extensively by the police, so if we want to
11:40
Speaker 1: figure out what happened, getting their stories will be key.
11:44
Speaker 1: But these guys both have criminal records, and I don't
11:47
Speaker 1: want to reach out to them without finding out exactly
11:50
Speaker 1: what their relationship was like with Rebecca just before she
11:52
Speaker 1: was murdered. So we go back to Danielle, Rebecca's sister,
11:55
Speaker 1: to ask her about their relationship hate Chris. I had
12:00
Speaker 1: always liked Rebecca for many years, but I isn't sure
12:06
Speaker 1: if they had seen each other in a long time,
12:09
Speaker 1: So like liked her as a person or liked her
12:12
Speaker 1: crush on her kind of thing. He liked her both both,
12:17
Speaker 1: But I mean he was with Cindy, and I mean
12:22
Speaker 1: I don't think she'd seen Chris in a long time.
12:25
Speaker 1: She never had anything to do with them romanical or
12:28
Speaker 1: nothing like that. But have you talked to Chris at
12:30
Speaker 1: all over the years since Anita's happened. No, just during
12:38
Speaker 1: that time a little bit and then since then. No, No,
12:42
Speaker 1: if Chris was there, to me, he would have rode
12:46
Speaker 1: with JB d That's the only way of me thinking
12:51
Speaker 1: that Chris would be there. Yeah, so some people think
12:55
Speaker 1: that Chris was obsessed with Rebecca. Danielle seems to at
12:58
Speaker 1: least confirm that he had long standing feelings for her.
13:01
Speaker 1: I keep coming back to, like, what was Jabi's can
13:05
Speaker 1: I It wasn't like a main friend or nothing, but
13:08
Speaker 1: she was friends with him. Danielle said that JB was
13:11
Speaker 1: Rebecca's source for pot back in the day, and that
13:14
Speaker 1: she thought Rebecca may have owed him some money. Of course,
13:18
Speaker 1: I don't think it was just Christian jab. Yeah, if
13:22
Speaker 1: Chris was involved, Cindy knows, And I think Cindy was there.
13:26
Speaker 1: Cindy was Chris's girlfriend at the time of the murder
13:28
Speaker 1: and they've had an on again, off again relationship ever since.
13:32
Speaker 1: I'm hoping this will end up working our advantage and
13:34
Speaker 1: that maybe she can give us some new information on Chris,
13:37
Speaker 1: like I can't imagine like Cindy would have that much
13:39
Speaker 1: loyally to Chris. Now, yeah, they got married after that,
13:46
Speaker 1: they're divorced, I think now. But they had a few kids,
13:50
Speaker 1: I believe, and if she thinks that, like, she could
13:53
Speaker 1: go away and this might be a good moment for
13:56
Speaker 1: her to turn on him. I mean, I'll be honest,
13:57
Speaker 1: I'm scared of these people. Yeah, I don't mention so
14:01
Speaker 1: much because I'm being recorded, because I'm not scared. I've
14:05
Speaker 1: talked to Chris before a couple of years back. I
14:08
Speaker 1: went to see him in Stone County Jail while he
14:10
Speaker 1: was behind bars on a different charge. But I have
14:13
Speaker 1: no clue where he is now. We'll be right back.
14:22
Speaker 1: So I was just calling all the auto parts stores
14:25
Speaker 1: in Mountain View. That's Sandy. She's part of our research team.
14:28
Speaker 1: She's helping us to track down possible leads and locations
14:31
Speaker 1: where Chris and JB might be working. I would and
14:33
Speaker 1: like I got close to the end of the list
14:35
Speaker 1: and everybody was just like, nobody here looks here with
14:37
Speaker 1: that name. I was just asking, Hey, do you JB
14:39
Speaker 1: or Chris? Are Davey and Chris working today? And then
14:43
Speaker 1: I got to this guy, I said, are JB and
14:45
Speaker 1: Chris endday? And he said no, And I was like,
14:46
Speaker 1: do you know when they'll be in? And he said
14:48
Speaker 1: hopefully tomorrow morning. I was like, you think both of
14:50
Speaker 1: them will be in tomorrow and he said yeah, hopefully,
14:54
Speaker 1: so he like he it sounded like he that they
14:57
Speaker 1: work there. To me, yeah, well probably JB. I mean
15:00
Speaker 1: there could be another Chris, I guess y, Yeah, that's
15:03
Speaker 1: what I was thinking, Like, Chris is such a common name. Yeah,
15:08
Speaker 1: And I found a couple of app possible addresses for Chris.
15:11
Speaker 1: I just don't know how reliable they are. And I
15:13
Speaker 1: also found one number linked with his name, but I
15:16
Speaker 1: highly doubt that's it's a number. Cool, thank you for that.
15:20
Speaker 1: That Purple Road, of course, it's Purple Road. That's like
15:23
Speaker 1: the one bad neighborhood. We could go there in the morning.
15:25
Speaker 1: Somebody could go there in the morning and just like
15:28
Speaker 1: bullshit a little bit, ask about a tire prices or something,
15:30
Speaker 1: just to make sure it's the right Chris. Ex if
15:32
Speaker 1: we can see that that's Chris and JB right, because
15:35
Speaker 1: it could be another Chris. Since I did meet Chris
15:37
Speaker 1: in person a couple of years ago, I don't want
15:39
Speaker 1: to tip either of them off that I'm looking for them.
15:41
Speaker 1: So one of our producers drives through town and goes
15:44
Speaker 1: in pretending to have a flat tire? Good, all right? Yeah,
15:52
Speaker 1: how you doing? Man? Got flat? Yeah I got it's
15:56
Speaker 1: a rental car. I'd love to know if you got one.
15:58
Speaker 1: I'd love to pull a fast one on him. And yeah,
16:00
Speaker 1: we got one to be a loud we'll get to
16:02
Speaker 1: you appreciate it. Well, he's not inside, all right, Well
16:17
Speaker 1: this is a bust. Well yeah, I got a little
16:21
Speaker 1: spoop balking in there though. Yeah. I tried to look
16:24
Speaker 1: in and like some other dude that's blowing hair. Yeah,
16:28
Speaker 1: not him, all right. I mean it's not to say
16:32
Speaker 1: he doesn't work there, but he wasn't there. Yeah, neither
16:34
Speaker 1: of them. When we first pulled up, there was a
16:36
Speaker 1: young guy that from the from him back from behind
16:39
Speaker 1: looked just like him, and I was like, oh shit,
16:40
Speaker 1: oh my god, it was maybe it was a son.
16:43
Speaker 1: Who knows. It was neither of them. Then now the
16:46
Speaker 1: old guy that owns the place is Charliet like long
16:49
Speaker 1: white hair. We'll find him. You know, you gotta try stuff.
16:53
Speaker 1: They ain't good though. Yeah, I mean it's good to
16:56
Speaker 1: have that checked off our list. Yeah. Whatever. It's It's
16:59
Speaker 1: also like it gets people comfortable doing, you know, the
17:02
Speaker 1: more surveillants who do like the easier it Gees. I
17:07
Speaker 1: talked to someone else who knows Rebecca, my sister's friend, Jesse.
17:11
Speaker 1: He told me that he saw Rebecca just a few
17:13
Speaker 1: days before her murder. Jesse, I don't think he's I
17:15
Speaker 1: don't know if he's in with Chris, but I know
17:17
Speaker 1: that like he so I know he was really good
17:20
Speaker 1: friends with Rebecca. Also, I think he might have seen
17:22
Speaker 1: her like as recently as Friday, like that weekend. That yeah,
17:28
Speaker 1: he'll probably have a better idea because he's lit forever,
17:30
Speaker 1: so he'll probably a better idea of like who works
17:32
Speaker 1: aware And I'm final face I think so. But that's
17:35
Speaker 1: what I'm just saying is like anyone who you know
17:36
Speaker 1: who has possibly maybe seen Chris, you know, just to
17:38
Speaker 1: ask to try to put eyes on So like if Jesse,
17:42
Speaker 1: which is great because since he's been here and he
17:43
Speaker 1: lives here, he may have been like, oh, yeah, Chris
17:45
Speaker 1: does work at CNA tire. I went there the other
17:47
Speaker 1: day to get a tire and I saw him. Hey,
17:50
Speaker 1: how you doing? Mah good are you? Jesse? Yeah, you
17:56
Speaker 1: haven't made Rebecca went to the side class yet her
17:58
Speaker 1: in school and with pretty good friends. Yeah, whenever I
18:01
Speaker 1: was last hanging out with her, which is right before
18:03
Speaker 1: she got murdered, she was staying over there, or she
18:07
Speaker 1: was actually working a little bit in Sonic at Melbourne,
18:10
Speaker 1: and she's just starting back to she's going to go
18:12
Speaker 1: to school, her and her sister Danielle back in Fayetville.
18:14
Speaker 1: I'm pretty sure y'all had Barry with me. This's ben
18:17
Speaker 1: years ago. They found her phone or whatever, you know,
18:19
Speaker 1: and my number was on her forty eight hours from
18:22
Speaker 1: when she you know, it come up missing. So they
18:25
Speaker 1: called me and she her car was broken down over
18:28
Speaker 1: there at her house, at his house, and she got
18:32
Speaker 1: up with me because my cousin and stuff owns a
18:35
Speaker 1: salvageyard out about fifteen miles west of Mountain of Mew,
18:38
Speaker 1: and I was trying to get an alternator rigged up.
18:39
Speaker 1: I told her that he didn't have one at that time,
18:42
Speaker 1: you know, closing time, and she said, well, she'd found
18:44
Speaker 1: one from another friend, which is I think that's how
18:48
Speaker 1: Chris come involved. He supposedly took an alpnator over there
18:52
Speaker 1: if Rebecca needed someone to fix her car. Could that
18:55
Speaker 1: explain what Chris and JB could be at Casey's house
18:57
Speaker 1: that morning. Well, see this guy named JB B. And
19:01
Speaker 1: Chris supposedly went over there to work on her car.
19:04
Speaker 1: That's the last hour. So the only thing I can
19:07
Speaker 1: maybe think, of course this is just a scenario I've
19:09
Speaker 1: made up my head, is maybe they went over there
19:13
Speaker 1: and probably induced that they was going to work on
19:15
Speaker 1: her car, and whatever happened happened. Then it is just
19:20
Speaker 1: probably them being all drugged out and thinking one thing
19:23
Speaker 1: when it really wasn't and they may went over there
19:26
Speaker 1: and fixed your car and expected payment in that way.
19:29
Speaker 1: You can't tell, you know what I mean, because these
19:30
Speaker 1: dudes ain't They're not like us sitting here talking. They's
19:33
Speaker 1: way different. Jesse's version of events matches what I've heard before,
19:38
Speaker 1: and I have to take it seriously because he knows.
19:40
Speaker 1: Chris may be better than anyone I've talked to so far. Yeah,
19:43
Speaker 1: he's been in drouble his whole life. First time I
19:46
Speaker 1: ever made him, I was about fifteen and I'm thirty
19:49
Speaker 1: five now, so about twenty years ago. Down to him. Yeah.
19:53
Speaker 1: Nick daniels X his dad's names Tim, and Chris lived
19:58
Speaker 1: with them. Nick is daniels x husband and the father
20:01
Speaker 1: to her two girls. Nick said he and Chris were
20:04
Speaker 1: best friends and even others. Literally. Nick's dad legally adopted Chris,
20:09
Speaker 1: but when Rebecca was murdered, Nick felt Chris was involved
20:13
Speaker 1: or knew more than he was saying, and they had
20:14
Speaker 1: a major falling out. They haven't spoken since. Exactly talked
20:21
Speaker 1: to him. Yeah, I mean, he probably ain't gonna be cooperative. Yeah.
20:25
Speaker 1: Most of the time people are guilty that shy away
20:27
Speaker 1: from stuff like that was their afraid. They might say
20:29
Speaker 1: something that when tramp them his ex girl friend, she
20:32
Speaker 1: might know where to find me, and she worked right
20:35
Speaker 1: down in her language, thank you so much. Good love.
20:42
Speaker 1: Finding JB isn't proving to be any easier. But since
20:45
Speaker 1: I've been connecting with what seems like half the town
20:48
Speaker 1: on social media, I find him on Facebook and send
20:51
Speaker 1: him a message. I decided to be direct. I tell
20:55
Speaker 1: him I'm investigating Rebecca's murder. I let him know that
20:58
Speaker 1: I think the cops have him in the frame, but
21:00
Speaker 1: I think they have it wrong. I need your help,
21:03
Speaker 1: all right, it's the truth. Later on my phone rings,
21:09
Speaker 1: it's JB. Like I said, I didn't say Rebecca mysh
21:12
Speaker 1: those days, and uh, I figured she'd turned out, you know,
21:15
Speaker 1: hanging out with somebody or something, and then they turned
21:18
Speaker 1: out that you know, they found her like shovel days later.
21:21
Speaker 1: I mean, were you hanging out with Chris during that
21:23
Speaker 1: weekend or or like how did I'm just trying to
21:25
Speaker 1: figure out how they got you guys involved in this
21:27
Speaker 1: or said you were involved when I got on a
21:31
Speaker 1: cab and I don't think I know what come out
21:33
Speaker 1: and you goes live me well, cause so we had
21:35
Speaker 1: sort of heard that you were you looking for him?
21:37
Speaker 1: The next week or a few days later, print went
21:41
Speaker 1: around telling everybody that I've done name, that I don't
21:43
Speaker 1: do student shit. That's not what I think. Chris hoping
21:47
Speaker 1: his name about and said that I did that or
21:50
Speaker 1: said I didn't do that again, and I'm gonna fucking
21:53
Speaker 1: up and they believe a Christian state to do it
21:56
Speaker 1: and get away waited. They believe he did it, and
21:58
Speaker 1: then they called me to help cover it, and I'm not.
22:02
Speaker 1: I would have nothing. No, that's not me. I don't
22:05
Speaker 1: do it. Reacca with my brand. We might not hang
22:09
Speaker 1: out every day, and U of my brand and mine
22:12
Speaker 1: are found out. Who don't good I meet out here?
22:15
Speaker 1: I got none. I asked him if we can meet
22:17
Speaker 1: in person. He agrees, and I start driving toward Baldnob
22:20
Speaker 1: to his house. It occurs to me that meeting someone
22:23
Speaker 1: who the police think could be involved in the murder
22:25
Speaker 1: in an area with no cell reception may not be
22:28
Speaker 1: the smartest move I've ever made. And is an investigator,
22:31
Speaker 1: so I make a judgment call. When he opens the door,
22:34
Speaker 1: He's friendly and open, and I'm immediately at ease. Now
22:38
Speaker 1: at that time, though I've got didn't selling the math
22:41
Speaker 1: and stuff in my eyes, I've never could out with
22:44
Speaker 1: my life. I bought it from other people and I
22:45
Speaker 1: resettled it, you know. I mean, that's what I'm good at.
22:48
Speaker 1: But JB now works on oil pipelines and has cleaned
22:52
Speaker 1: up his act. However, he's pretty open about his days
22:55
Speaker 1: as a drug dealer. So I had to say Rebecca
22:58
Speaker 1: for to talk to her, and I don't know, I've
23:01
Speaker 1: been a long time. And then she just showed up
23:03
Speaker 1: at my house that week with and asked for sack weed.
23:09
Speaker 1: And I didn't keep it at my house, so I
23:12
Speaker 1: told her, you know, well I don't have any She
23:14
Speaker 1: knew I did, and I always kept it like hiding
23:15
Speaker 1: in a ditch or something, you know. Yeah, but uh
23:19
Speaker 1: I actually had a stashing cooler out of the woods somewhere,
23:22
Speaker 1: and uh so I told her she had to ride
23:25
Speaker 1: with me out there, you know, to get it and stuff.
23:27
Speaker 1: And uh well, I was walking out toward my vehicle
23:29
Speaker 1: and I've seen some movement in her car. No, you
23:33
Speaker 1: got something with you and she's like, yeah, uh it
23:36
Speaker 1: told me, you know it was her boyfriend and dude
23:38
Speaker 1: from Melbourne and stuff. Well, he can't sit here my
23:43
Speaker 1: driveway in the car. You know, he's gonna have to
23:45
Speaker 1: ride woods. And she's like okay, you know, and so
23:49
Speaker 1: here right wood is that? You know. I don't think
23:50
Speaker 1: he ever said a word. He just sitting the back seat.
23:53
Speaker 1: Kevin mouth shut and went after and got to weed,
23:56
Speaker 1: come back and they got their vehicle left and she
23:59
Speaker 1: come back to next week. She's coming from wherever she's
24:02
Speaker 1: living at the time, going to Melbourne to his place
24:06
Speaker 1: and paid me my money is like, I don't know, fifteen,
24:09
Speaker 1: twenty bucks, twenty five bucks one at I've heard these
24:13
Speaker 1: rumors of Rebecca's drug debt, but fifteen or twenty dollars
24:16
Speaker 1: hardly qualifies as a debt worthy of murdering your friend.
24:18
Speaker 1: She said she's going to either drop some movies off
24:21
Speaker 1: for rents and movies and then she's headed to Melbourne
24:25
Speaker 1: and that was Do you remember if that was that
24:27
Speaker 1: weekend that she like felt the weekend she before she
24:30
Speaker 1: was murder day before. I would think it would have
24:35
Speaker 1: been on like a Thursday or Friday, because because like
24:38
Speaker 1: the next day I went to Cabot for the weekend. Right.
24:42
Speaker 1: Cabot is a town on the outskirts of Little Rock.
24:44
Speaker 1: It's about an hour and a half away, So I'm thinking,
24:47
Speaker 1: you know, I would have went down there the party
24:49
Speaker 1: and stuff like that. You know, it probably was a
24:52
Speaker 1: Friday night when I went down there when I was
24:54
Speaker 1: a cabbot. I was actually going down Highway five when
24:58
Speaker 1: going up the big hill there at Graystow, and I
25:01
Speaker 1: got a call from my wife, well my girlfriend at time,
25:04
Speaker 1: and she's said, I want to know if i'd heard
25:06
Speaker 1: of anything about Rebecca. And I was like no. She's like, well,
25:10
Speaker 1: she's missing and everybody's looking for If you hear anything,
25:13
Speaker 1: you let somebody know. I said, well, I so we'll
25:16
Speaker 1: tell them that I've seen her, you know the other
25:18
Speaker 1: day when she come down. You know, she's supposed to
25:20
Speaker 1: be heading the Melbourne. It's the last that I heard
25:23
Speaker 1: anything from her. And when did you start to hear
25:27
Speaker 1: that like they might be looking for you for some reason?
25:30
Speaker 1: The cops never never no, well, I mean I guess
25:35
Speaker 1: I eventually did, but because uh, I think they. I
25:40
Speaker 1: think they left a note or something at our house
25:42
Speaker 1: or something anyway to contact them. And then we ended
25:46
Speaker 1: up going up earlier to the station there in Mountain
25:50
Speaker 1: View to talk to the state detective have been coming
25:53
Speaker 1: from and take a lot of detective tests. And then
25:55
Speaker 1: after that they involved me no more. I think they said, uh, one,
26:00
Speaker 1: it wasn't that it fail, but it wasn't like that,
26:02
Speaker 1: you know, it was just passed with flying colors or something,
26:04
Speaker 1: you know, but they did so that they gave me
26:08
Speaker 1: one anyway, They told me if they didn't think I
26:11
Speaker 1: had anything to do with it as far as her dead,
26:14
Speaker 1: but they knew to Christian front of my house, and
26:17
Speaker 1: that's why they wanted to talk to me. And they
26:19
Speaker 1: felt like he went over and done it and then
26:21
Speaker 1: called me tocome helping clean it up because he was
26:24
Speaker 1: too dumb to get away with what the hell I'm
26:26
Speaker 1: about murder? You were cleaning it up, you know what?
26:29
Speaker 1: I mean, I sell drugs. Yeah, well, and Rebecca was
26:32
Speaker 1: my friend, so I wasn't you know that was messed up. So,
26:35
Speaker 1: according to JB, Chris told the cops that JB killed Rebecca,
26:39
Speaker 1: and I talked to him, I think one time after that,
26:43
Speaker 1: because I went by a friend's house and they told
26:46
Speaker 1: me that he was owre telling everybody that I was
26:49
Speaker 1: the one that did that crap. And I told him
26:52
Speaker 1: if they see him by guy again, tell him my
26:55
Speaker 1: name Bonny. Never come out of his mouth again before
26:58
Speaker 1: I go by punched him in the face. You know.
27:01
Speaker 1: When JB found out what his former friend had told
27:04
Speaker 1: the police, they had a major falling out and they
27:06
Speaker 1: haven't spoken since. I mean, do you think Chris is
27:09
Speaker 1: capable of doing it? If you had to guess, I mean,
27:11
Speaker 1: I think he was capable of it. I mean, I
27:13
Speaker 1: really don't see why he would. I mean because he
27:15
Speaker 1: always told me that he grew up with her family.
27:18
Speaker 1: They helped praise him and stuff like that. Chris maintained
27:23
Speaker 1: very well for somebody that he was a needle. Yeah,
27:25
Speaker 1: I mean, he didn't just get out there where he's
27:28
Speaker 1: in a different world, like you know, the first guy
27:30
Speaker 1: ever saying it was on a needle. He was out
27:33
Speaker 1: there wreaking the field of rocks. Not only why I say,
27:38
Speaker 1: Chris dinners if he's just gotten out there, you know,
27:41
Speaker 1: but everybody made very suspicious to him because why would
27:44
Speaker 1: he be saying that I did it? You know, there
27:47
Speaker 1: was a rumorshire about his car. Chris and JB also
27:50
Speaker 1: have another connection a car. Shortly before the murder, Chris
27:54
Speaker 1: bought a white Chevy Lumina from JB's girlfriend. This car
27:57
Speaker 1: was crushed shortly after the murder. About the fact that
28:00
Speaker 1: like his car got crushed, because I'd heard that, I
28:02
Speaker 1: went up to auto graveyard and everything, and I know
28:04
Speaker 1: it was far less fear. I even went to the
28:06
Speaker 1: auto graveyard to look for the car, but they told
28:09
Speaker 1: me that it was long gone. Oh I mean, it
28:11
Speaker 1: did disappear. He bought that car off my life, which
28:15
Speaker 1: was my girlfriend at the time, and Chris wanted to
28:18
Speaker 1: bias and she decided a town fly. I don't know,
28:20
Speaker 1: thirty four hundred dollars she'd like, you know, I can't
28:24
Speaker 1: even tell you one time I ever seen to drive
28:26
Speaker 1: my car. He took it somewhere and that's where it
28:28
Speaker 1: sat unless they got the brakes fixed. On that stuff.
28:31
Speaker 1: I don't ever see driving a car rooming places. But
28:33
Speaker 1: the car disappeared, KY wanna know about my DNAVN in
28:38
Speaker 1: it if there would be any reason because it was
28:40
Speaker 1: on its way back from Tennessee, that they located it,
28:44
Speaker 1: and that the trump had blood all in it, and
28:47
Speaker 1: they wanted to know for any reason my DNA being
28:51
Speaker 1: it is Some people speculated that Rebecca's body could not
28:55
Speaker 1: have been on the side of the road for a
28:56
Speaker 1: week with no one finding it, that her body had
28:59
Speaker 1: been kept somewhere and later moved to the dump site.
29:02
Speaker 1: Could the body had been kept in the trunk of
29:04
Speaker 1: a car My DNA in that car. The only place
29:07
Speaker 1: that would be would be when I leaned across the
29:10
Speaker 1: front of that car one time. Maybe some sweater or
29:13
Speaker 1: hair fell off in the front, but that would be
29:15
Speaker 1: the only time that the only way my DNA could
29:18
Speaker 1: be in that car, because I've never wrote because when
29:21
Speaker 1: she met her met that car didn't have no brasure
29:24
Speaker 1: or nothing. See it's weird because if they're saying that
29:28
Speaker 1: they found it in the trunk, had blood in it,
29:30
Speaker 1: then why don't they have any DNA? I got pulled over.
29:36
Speaker 1: I don't know, like a week or so after this,
29:41
Speaker 1: I'd hit a deer within around this time frame, and
29:45
Speaker 1: I put it photo back of my blazer and I
29:48
Speaker 1: carried it over to my farm laws. Well I can't
29:52
Speaker 1: think I mean, it killed a deer, but that I
29:56
Speaker 1: cannot think of so much as a sin and drop
29:59
Speaker 1: of blood come off at deer. And I get pulled
30:01
Speaker 1: over like a week or so after this, and the
30:04
Speaker 1: cops searched my my vehicle and they can find an
30:07
Speaker 1: old can that had blood on it. I don't think
30:11
Speaker 1: I was, you know, I just shiit this deer, you know,
30:13
Speaker 1: and so they're gonna take it and check it to
30:15
Speaker 1: safe ashement or not, which I reckon had come out
30:18
Speaker 1: to be animal bloods. I never heard back from. But
30:21
Speaker 1: I can't think of any time that where that blood
30:26
Speaker 1: could have got on that from that deer. And I
30:29
Speaker 1: got the strangest feeling one night like somebody had put
30:33
Speaker 1: that in back of my blazer. So I just I
30:37
Speaker 1: got rope. You know. It just seemed like everybody fun
30:40
Speaker 1: there at Mace. I'll packed my crap up and I left.
30:43
Speaker 1: I got out of there. I can just feel set
30:45
Speaker 1: up coming. And I learned a long time ago, you
30:48
Speaker 1: don't listen to your gut' you're you know you're messing up.
30:53
Speaker 1: So after the murder, JB feels like everyone is pointing
30:56
Speaker 1: their fingers at him, Chris the cops, so he does
31:00
Speaker 1: what anyone might do. He gets out of town and
31:03
Speaker 1: moves the way to work in Texas. Eventually he came
31:07
Speaker 1: back to Arkansas, but he refuses to step foot in
31:10
Speaker 1: Mountain View. We'll be right back. JB said that Chris
31:37
Speaker 1: is staying with Cindy right now. We need to see
31:40
Speaker 1: if we can confirm and address for her to see
31:42
Speaker 1: if maybe they're extra cars that could be Chris's. I
31:46
Speaker 1: don't know where Cindy's house is, but she's not hard
31:48
Speaker 1: to find. She's a waitress at Anglers, the town's only
31:52
Speaker 1: watering hole. Both Stone and Lizard Counties are dry counties.
31:56
Speaker 1: The only place where you can buy a drink is
31:59
Speaker 1: an Angler's restaurant on the White River. They have specials
32:02
Speaker 1: like fried pickles and catfish and alligator on the men
32:05
Speaker 1: unite and the owner kept two trout named Buttonwiser and
32:08
Speaker 1: a temperature controlled tank in the front. You have to
32:10
Speaker 1: walk through the gas station to get to the restaurant.
32:13
Speaker 1: It's kind of hard to explain. So I know where
32:16
Speaker 1: Cindy works, but it's not like I can just go
32:18
Speaker 1: up and ask her if she murdered someone while I'm
32:20
Speaker 1: ordering an appetizer. So it looks like it's time for
32:23
Speaker 1: a stakeout. That night, Chad, Taylor and James head to
32:27
Speaker 1: see if they can find out where she lives. Go
32:29
Speaker 1: at dinner at Anglers, and then we'll we'll see if
32:32
Speaker 1: Cindy's working, and if she is, then said eight to eleven.
32:37
Speaker 1: Right now. The good thing is is I think she
32:40
Speaker 1: was the only waitress wearing a black shirt. I think
32:42
Speaker 1: I may have put down like at least like a
32:44
Speaker 1: suspected address for her. Oh really, there's some people coming out.
32:48
Speaker 1: Looks like dudes, but it looks like everyone's kinda a
32:53
Speaker 1: lot of people leaven Yeah, no, further that way, that
32:58
Speaker 1: would be helpful. I would just park as far down
33:00
Speaker 1: as we can, close to that white van. Yeah, this
33:05
Speaker 1: is a much better man. Oh yeah, because we can
33:08
Speaker 1: see in the back way now. Yeah, I just saw
33:10
Speaker 1: her walk by the cook you're the eyes. I'm gonna
33:15
Speaker 1: get away a car. Yeah, I think we stay back.
33:17
Speaker 1: I mean, at the very least we find out what
33:19
Speaker 1: car she drives, go by tomorrow, get the plate grown up.
33:23
Speaker 1: Maybe there's an address. It's seven. Now what do we
33:36
Speaker 1: know about her? She's got two kids with Chris eighty three,
33:40
Speaker 1: and they were together as soon as I mean less
33:43
Speaker 1: than a year ago. Yeah, yep, just turn nine. That
33:52
Speaker 1: must be the time everyone leaves. Yep, we got a
33:55
Speaker 1: light out in the kitchen now, yeah, I mean the
34:00
Speaker 1: good thing is is like in any direction she goes,
34:02
Speaker 1: there's not really any like. I mean, she's gonna be
34:05
Speaker 1: on that road for the next ten miles. Yeah, exactly. Oh,
34:08
Speaker 1: black shirt, this does look promising. Nice nine twenty she
34:18
Speaker 1: is knitting in something. Yeah, she's got Oh shit, stay down,
34:23
Speaker 1: stay down. All right, there I go. She's in the
34:28
Speaker 1: White Star. She's going right towards Oh no, she's going left.
34:34
Speaker 1: She's going up towards Mountain View. Yeah. Yeah, let's go.
34:37
Speaker 1: She's cooking. She's going pretty fast. Ye give my trying
34:42
Speaker 1: to get my seat back up. Good. Yeah, we gotta
34:52
Speaker 1: catch up. She probably knows these roads so well. Yeah,
35:01
Speaker 1: and she's a small just go, go, go go. I'm
35:04
Speaker 1: going That is a bit ship here, I got eighty
35:08
Speaker 1: is forty five. Yeah, that looks like a car too.
35:12
Speaker 1: Is that her? Or is that the truck? That might
35:14
Speaker 1: be a truck go? But yeah, that's not her, man,
35:18
Speaker 1: that's the truck. Was that truck behind her? No, the
35:21
Speaker 1: truck was in front of her. If it was the
35:23
Speaker 1: red truck, that was our our waitress. Yeh shit, then
35:27
Speaker 1: that means it's since we turned off, she got the
35:32
Speaker 1: fuck out of town. Didn't she keep an eye out too,
35:36
Speaker 1: because like, maybe, shit, she could even live in a
35:38
Speaker 1: house right off the road. That's true. White car in
35:42
Speaker 1: that parking Oh shit, that house has a white car
35:45
Speaker 1: right up front. It sure does. She fucking shook us, dude,
35:52
Speaker 1: So the stakeout is a bust. We head back to
35:54
Speaker 1: the cabin to open a bottle of bourbon and update
35:57
Speaker 1: the murder board with what we know so far. I mean,
36:01
Speaker 1: JB is the one person that has been like, I
36:04
Speaker 1: didn't have anything to do with it, and let me
36:06
Speaker 1: tell you everything I know. I know, yeah he has,
36:10
Speaker 1: And I'm hopeful that as we talk to some more
36:14
Speaker 1: of the core people, those names that are floating around,
36:17
Speaker 1: I'm hopeful that more of them will be like that.
36:19
Speaker 1: In this whole region, there's a huge drug problem, and
36:22
Speaker 1: meth does make you do crazy things, and it really
36:27
Speaker 1: something can start out as a simple robbery and it
36:29
Speaker 1: just gets ratcheted up so fast as some psychotic, crazy murder.
36:33
Speaker 1: You know, Chris, I mean everyone one thing everyone says
36:37
Speaker 1: is that at that time he was really messed up
36:38
Speaker 1: on drugs. He's a he's a sinister guy. Like he's
36:43
Speaker 1: not a big guy, but he's got the look in
36:46
Speaker 1: his eye something about it, like he's a scary guy.
36:48
Speaker 1: I find him scary. No, he looks a lot tougher
36:51
Speaker 1: than I actually had imagined. Oh he's tough. He'll fuck
36:54
Speaker 1: you up in a second. He would, he would, he
36:55
Speaker 1: would not think twice about hidding any one of us
36:57
Speaker 1: in the face probably or words. Also, we've got to
37:02
Speaker 1: just we can't say enough for stress enough. I feel
37:04
Speaker 1: that once you add meth to the mix, not to
37:07
Speaker 1: say these people are doing it, but even the potential
37:09
Speaker 1: for people to be on meth like you're, the situation
37:12
Speaker 1: can spiral out of control just so fast. I do
37:16
Speaker 1: think that there's a lot of distrust at this point.
37:19
Speaker 1: And also they might have gone through this before. I mean,
37:22
Speaker 1: what JB went through was terrible. He was made to
37:26
Speaker 1: feel like either we're gonna be charged. He was very
37:29
Speaker 1: scared and worried. He was so freaked out by this.
37:31
Speaker 1: And this is a big guy, you know, who's no
37:34
Speaker 1: stranger to like dealing with the walks. He was dealing
37:36
Speaker 1: drugs at the time. And this guy left town and
37:38
Speaker 1: never came back. I mean, that's pretty telling. That's how
37:41
Speaker 1: that's how freaked out he was. And if he was
37:43
Speaker 1: that freaked out, then all these people have to be
37:45
Speaker 1: at least that freaked out because they still live here
37:47
Speaker 1: and this still could come back on him. But you're right,
37:50
Speaker 1: that's I know that it's risky, but that's all the
37:51
Speaker 1: more reason why you want to get out there and
37:53
Speaker 1: clear your name, because if you don't and you still
37:55
Speaker 1: live here, then it's just a matter of time. You're
37:58
Speaker 1: just like waiting for them to shoot, to drop, for
38:00
Speaker 1: them to charge you with something or something else to
38:02
Speaker 1: get said. It's just it's just bizarre. What we have
38:06
Speaker 1: is the fact that we're not the cops. We don't
38:08
Speaker 1: automatically think everyone's bad and a criminal because they did
38:11
Speaker 1: some drugs, and we only care about finding who did this.
38:16
Speaker 1: All right, Well, I guess I should go on before
38:18
Speaker 1: I drink like a bottle of bourbon without heart evidence,
38:21
Speaker 1: we're really chasing ghosts. We need to get access to
38:24
Speaker 1: the autopsy report and really dig into the scientific facts
38:27
Speaker 1: of the case and talk to some experts to see
38:30
Speaker 1: if we can clean any information that will help us
38:32
Speaker 1: determine a potential motive and find the killer. And more importantly,
38:37
Speaker 1: we have to find Chris. I'm Catherine Townsend and this
38:43
Speaker 1: is Helen Gone. Hell and Gone is a joint production
39:03
Speaker 1: between How Stuff Works in School of Humor. It is
39:06
Speaker 1: written and recorded by me, Catherine Townsend. Taylor Church is
39:10
Speaker 1: our producer and story editor. Audio editing and design by
39:14
Speaker 1: Jonathan Sleeve, mix engineer Glenn Mattulo, Audio mixing and love
39:19
Speaker 1: by Tunewelders. Executive producers Brandon Barr and Els Crowley for
39:23
Speaker 1: School of Humans and Connell Byrne and Chuck Bryant for
39:27
Speaker 1: How Stuff Works. Our field producer is James Morrison. Our
39:31
Speaker 1: researcher is Sandy Klosterman. Themon original score by Ben Solee
39:37
Speaker 1: available wherever you get your music. To dig into the investigation,
39:43
Speaker 1: please visit helengonepodcast dot com or follow us on social media.
39:58
Speaker 1: School of Humans