Latest / Gone Cold - Texas True Crime / The Disappearance of Elizabeth Ann Campbell Part 1

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The Disappearance of Elizabeth Ann Campbell Part 1 · Gone Cold - Texas True Crime

• 0:01
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  Speaker 1: Thanks y'all. Now onto the episode. The Gone Cold podcasts
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: may contain violent or graphics subject matter. Listener discretion is advised.
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: Located about sixty eight miles north of Austin, mostly in
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  Speaker 1: Corriel County, Copper's Cove, Texas, began as a small ranching
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: and cotton farming community in the eighteen seventies. By nineteen
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  Speaker 1: oh one, a variety of businesses lined the downtown streets
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: of the quaint, rugged town, including an opera house, general stores,
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  Speaker 1: a steam gristmill, cotton gin, and hotels, among many others.
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: Marred only by the difficult and desperate era of the
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  Speaker 1: Great Depression, the population of Coppera's Cove slowly but steadily grew,
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: speeding up substantially when the United States Military established the
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  Speaker 1: training center Camp Hood in nearby Bell County as a
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  Speaker 1: permanent fixture. Fort Hood is located just outside Colleen, which
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  Speaker 1: is just east of Copprace Cove. A couple towns over
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: to the west of coppers Cove lies Lampasas. These three
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  Speaker 1: cities are comprised of working class folks by and large,
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  Speaker 1: though each can boast humble, agriculturally based beginnings and quintessential
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  Speaker 1: picturesque early and mid century built country downtowns. As it
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: approached nineteen ninety, especially considering population, they couldn't have been
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  Speaker 1: more different then. Colleen, at approximately sixty thousand residents, was
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: home to a large community college called Central Texas College,
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  Speaker 1: a private college called American Technical University. Fort Hood essentially
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  Speaker 1: and by proxy, divisions of military contractor companies. Lampasas in Stark, contrast,
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  Speaker 1: had a population of just over six thousand. Most traveled
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  Speaker 1: out of town for work, as the largest employer was
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  Speaker 1: the modest sized school district. Copper's Cove sat somewhere in
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  Speaker 1: the middle of Lampasas and Colleen, with about twenty four
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  Speaker 1: thousand residents. Many were employed as either military or civilian
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  Speaker 1: workers at Fort Hood, the small city's largest employer. In
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  Speaker 1: April of nineteen eighty eight, a tragic case touched each
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  Speaker 1: of these three cities in different ways. As the investigation unfolded,
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: or perhaps failed to unfold, the disappearance of twenty year
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  Speaker 1: old Elizabeth Campbell only became further shrouded in mystery. Elizabeth
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: Ann Campbell was born on May thirty first, nineteen sixty seven,
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: to parents Tom and Samsoon Campbell, who met in nineteen
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  Speaker 1: fifty nine while he was stationed with the US Army
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  Speaker 1: in Korea. Elizabeth grew up in Lampasas, Texas, with her
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  Speaker 1: four siblings. She was the youngest of the Campbell family,
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  Speaker 1: the baby and was full of personality and talent. As
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  Speaker 1: a compulsive neat freak, she'd get on her siblings for
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  Speaker 1: their messy rooms. Her mom described her as a pistol.
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: Elizabeth could have a hot temper at times. Still, she
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: never really got into trouble, and if it looked as
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: though she might, Elizabeth knew how to get around it.
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  Speaker 1: Samson remarked that whenever she was mad, Elizabeth would turn
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  Speaker 1: sweet as could be, kissing her mother's cheeks repeatedly until
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  Speaker 1: it was impossible to be upset. A popular girl among
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  Speaker 1: her peers, Elizabeth never had trouble making friends, and unlike
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: plenty of children and teenagers, she treated her elders with respect,
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: which demanded that very thing in return. At Lampasas High School,
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  Speaker 1: where she graduated in nineteen eighty five, Elizabeth played saxophone
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  Speaker 1: in the band and was a member of the drama
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  Speaker 1: and Spanish clubs. Her sister, Carol remembers her as a
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  Speaker 1: beautiful girl and young woman perfect. She said. Elizabeth was
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  Speaker 1: close to her parents and siblings and often joked about
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  Speaker 1: raising her sister's kids for her, whom she adored. By
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  Speaker 1: nineteen eighty eight, Elizabeth still lived with her parents in
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  Speaker 1: Lampassas while attending college in Colleen, about twenty eight miles
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  Speaker 1: to the east. She'd been accepted into Texas A and
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: M In college station where she planned to attend the
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  Speaker 1: upcoming fall semester after finishing her last semester at SA
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  Speaker 1: Central Texas College, or CTC. It was quite a ways
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  Speaker 1: from home, but the prospects, no doubt, excited her as
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: much as the experience made her anxious. She planned to
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  Speaker 1: study marine biology there. Elizabeth didn't really party hard and
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  Speaker 1: had a boyfriend named Ricky Ray who she met at CTC.
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  Speaker 1: He was her first serious boyfriend. She lived a quiet,
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  Speaker 1: low key lifestyle typical of a dedicated, responsible and motivated
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  Speaker 1: college student. But there was a downside to her sort
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  Speaker 1: of sheltered, small town upbringing. Elizabeth was naive. Her mother Samson,
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  Speaker 1: told a reporter with the Austin American Statesman she wasn't
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  Speaker 1: knowledgeable about dangers in society. Monday, April twenty fifth, nineteen
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  Speaker 1: eighty eight, started out like any other day for twenty
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  Speaker 1: year old Elizabeth Anne Campbell. She attended classes at Central
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  Speaker 1: Texas College in Colleen. When those were done for the day,
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: she headed to the seven eleven at West Rancier Avenue
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  Speaker 1: and North Gilmer Street, where she worked part time as
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: a cashier. After her shift was over, maroon purse and
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  Speaker 1: school books in hand, Elizabeth headed to her boyfriend's house
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  Speaker 1: on Altamira Drive, a little less than two and a
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  Speaker 1: half miles away. She had a trigonometry test the next
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  Speaker 1: day and planned to study with him to prepare. Ricky, however,
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  Speaker 1: wanted to study English. A heated argument ensued, which paused
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  Speaker 1: briefly when Elizabeth called her parents in Lampassas to see
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  Speaker 1: if they could come pick her up. As they prepared
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  Speaker 1: to do just that, Ricky was heard in the background
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  Speaker 1: promising Elizabeth he'd give her a ride. She told her
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  Speaker 1: parents never mind and got off the phone. The next morning, Tuesday,
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  Speaker 1: April twenty sixth, nineteen eighty eight, sam Soon Campbell awoke
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  Speaker 1: and discovered Elizabeth's bed was empty. The porch light, too,
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  Speaker 1: was still on. Usually the last person to return home
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  Speaker 1: turned off the light, and the prior night that meant
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: Elizabeth Samson was instantly worried her youngest hadn't called to
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: check in and report a change in plans, something that
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  Speaker 1: all her children did without missing a beat, whether they
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: still lived at home or not. The long distance calls
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: were why she and Tom's phone bill was so high
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: Every month. Sam Soon woke up her daughter Barbara at
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  Speaker 1: around nine point fifteen and asked her to call Ricky Ray,
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  Speaker 1: Elizabeth's boyfriend. Though he'd given his word he'd take Elizabeth home,
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  Speaker 1: they began arguing again. Ricky told them she stormed outside
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  Speaker 1: to wait on him, but he was angry and was
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  Speaker 1: ignoring his promise. After waiting for Ricky for what she
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  Speaker 1: presumably felt was too long, Elizabeth took off on foot.
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  Speaker 1: That was sometime between nine thirty and ten pm. He said.
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  Speaker 1: Not only was Ricky the last person to see Elizabeth,
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  Speaker 1: he was also the last to hear from her. That
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: was about an hour later, when she called him from
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  Speaker 1: a seven to eleven in Copper's Cove, about twelve miles
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  Speaker 1: from his house, to see if he'd come pick her
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  Speaker 1: up and take her the rest of the way home
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  Speaker 1: because he had to work. Ricky declined to do so,
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  Speaker 1: even though the road between Copper's Cove and Lampassas was
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  Speaker 1: dark and desolate. When Barbara called him looking for Elizabeth,
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  Speaker 1: Ricky apparently suggested that she might have caught a ride
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  Speaker 1: to her other sister's house, which was at a CTC
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  Speaker 1: housing complex in Colleen, but she didn't have a phone.
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  Speaker 1: Sam soon asked her daughter Barbara to drive the thirty
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  Speaker 1: miles to see if Elizabeth was there. Ricky Ray also
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: rushed to her other sister, Carol's house. The two had
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  Speaker 1: worked the late shift together the night before, so Carol
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: was aware Elizabeth had taken off on foot earlier in
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  Speaker 1: the evening and was aware her sister had called Ricky
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  Speaker 1: from the seven to eleven in Coppra's Cove. When Ricky
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  Speaker 1: burst through Carol's door, he frantically asked if Elizabeth had
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  Speaker 1: been there. She hadn't. Then Elizabeth's sister, Barbara would later
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  Speaker 1: comment began their nightmare. When no one had heard from
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  Speaker 1: their daughter for twelve hours. Tom and Samsoon Campbell drove
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  Speaker 1: the seventeen miles to the police station in Copper's Cove
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  Speaker 1: to report her missing. Because Elizabeth Campbell was an adult,
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  Speaker 1: the policewoman at the front desk told them they couldn't
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  Speaker 1: file a report until she was missing for seventy two hours,
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  Speaker 1: which isn't and wasn't true. She isn't missing. Tom Laid
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  Speaker 1: recalled the officer as saying, you just don't know where
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  Speaker 1: she is. He and Samson knew their daughter and they
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  Speaker 1: knew she was missing. Tom tried to explain, but it
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  Speaker 1: was no use. As they turned away, they overheard the
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  Speaker 1: policewoman till another officer, we don't have time for hysterical parents.
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  Speaker 1: No official ground or aerial searches would be conducted. Not then,
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  Speaker 1: not ever. Confused, angry and disillusioned with law enforcement, Tom
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  Speaker 1: and Samson knew they couldn't wait seventy two hours, but
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  Speaker 1: they also had no idea what to do or where
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  Speaker 1: to start. There was no handbook. Regardless, the parents hit
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  Speaker 1: the ground running. They headed to the seven eleven. Ricky
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  Speaker 1: Ray told them Elizabeth had called him from Once there,
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  Speaker 1: they spoke with the clerks, one of whom remembered their
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  Speaker 1: daughter's dilemma The night before. She'd used the store's phone
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  Speaker 1: to call her boyfriend and Colleen, the clerk said, and
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  Speaker 1: it turned into an argument. Elizabeth then told the clerk
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  Speaker 1: she was going out to the payphone to call her brother,
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  Speaker 1: who also lived at Tom and Samsoon Campbell's place. She
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  Speaker 1: didn't want to use the store phone, Elizabeth told the
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  Speaker 1: clerk because the call to Lampassas was long distance. Samson
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  Speaker 1: remembered the phone ringing, but couldn't answer it Before it stopped.
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  Speaker 1: She'd unplugged the phone in her and Tom's room so
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  Speaker 1: they could sleep uninterrupted, something they did regularly. The clerk
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  Speaker 1: had one more key piece of information for the parents.
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  Speaker 1: Their daughter was dropped off at the store by someone
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  Speaker 1: driving a light green AMC Gremlin. Samson and Tom hopped
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  Speaker 1: in their car and headed to Colleen in search of
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: such a vehicle, and they finally found one in the
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  Speaker 1: parking lot of the campus of Central Texas College. They
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  Speaker 1: watched the car until the owner approached and then asked
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  Speaker 1: to speak with him. He did give Elizabeth a ride
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: home the night before. The man who owned the Grimlin
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: told them he'd been working late in the college's computer
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  Speaker 1: lab and saw her walking down the service road at
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  Speaker 1: the college's exit off Highway one ninety. Though he didn't
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: know her, the man recognized Elizabeth from school. He told
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  Speaker 1: Tom and Sam soon, so he turned back and offered
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: her a ride. He lived in Copper's Cove and let
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  Speaker 1: her out at the seven to eleven at Highway ninety
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  Speaker 1: and Martin Luther King Junior Drive before heading on home.
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: Armed with this new information, Elizabeth's parents headed back up
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  Speaker 1: to the police station. They also told the police that
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: their daughter hadn't been by her place of employment to
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: pick up her paycheck, which had become available early that day.
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: A missing person's case was finally filed. Still, it took
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: quite a bit more persuasion to get a detective to
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: look at the case. When they finally did decide to investigate,
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: Tom and Sam soon said they then had to convince
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: the Copperscope police to go to the last place Elizabeth
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: was seen and talk to the witnesses there. According to
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: the parents, that took another twenty one hours. Precious time
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: had been wasted for no good reason. The trail seemingly
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: already cold. Samson and Tom, on the other hand, wasted
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: no time printing up flyers with Elizabeth's photo and description.
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: They distributed them to area residents and businesses. But that
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: was only the beginning. On the flyers, twenty year old
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: Elizabeth Ann Campbell was described as looking younger than her age.
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: She's five feet two inches tall, the description continued, and
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  Speaker 1: weighs ninety seven pounds. Her hair is long and brown,
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  Speaker 1: which is also the color of her eyes. Elizabeth was
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  Speaker 1: wearing new blue jeans, white tennis shoes, and possibly a
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: white shirt. She's half Korean. The description was followed by
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: the Campbell's home phone number. Later flyers included other information
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  Speaker 1: Elizabeth should have been carrying or wearing a seven to
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: eleven smock with a name tag, a faded yellow vest jacket,
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: and carrying her school books, papers, and a maroon colored purse.
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: To the Campbell's surprise, a worker at one place they
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: visited had already clipped their daughter's flyer out of the
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: newspaper and hung it up in his store's window before
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: they'd even been there. To Samsoon and Tom's dismay, some
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: stores didn't want the missing person's poster displayed in their businesses,
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: some referring to it as a clutter. They felt they
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: needed all the help they could get, so the Campbells
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: wrote letters to state and federal politicians, other police agencies,
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: including the area sheriff's departments, and the Texas Missing Person's Clearinghouse.
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: They knew Elizabeth had been abducted. It might not have
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: been as obvious to police, perhaps due to lack of
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: training and experience, but saved the signs of a struggle.
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: All the signs were there because they were reluctant to
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: assign foul play to the case. The cops wouldn't devote
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: much manpower, not at first, but there was no more
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: time to waste. Tom Campbell took an extended leave from
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: his job at Houston and Galveston Tugboat Company to search
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: for Elizabeth. He and Sam soon began traveling across Texas,
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  Speaker 1: handing out flyers at police stations, under the windshield wipers
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: on cars at businesses, to folks walking around any given
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: city Houston, San Antonio, Dallas, and all the small cities
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: in between, anywhere and everywhere. Then seventy miles northeast of
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: Copper's Cove in Waco, they got a lead. In May
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: nighteen eighty eight, just a couple weeks after Elizabeth Campbell vanished,
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: her mother walked into a Waco gas station to ask
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: if she could hang a flyer in the window there.
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: Manager Roger Anyon took the flyer and immediately upon seeing
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: Elizabeth's photo, had a realization this was a woman he
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: had seen recently a couple weeks ago. Anyon told Samsoon,
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: a car drove up to the fuel pumps, an Asian
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: man got out of the driver's side door, went to
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: the passenger side, and pulled out a young woman sitting
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: there by the arm above the wrist it was different
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: than sweethearts holding hands, Anyon said. They walked into the store.
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: Anyon was working the counter, he continued, and not letting
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: go of the young woman's arm, the man single handedly
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: pushed a twenty dollars bill from a stack of cash,
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: presumably to pay for gas. He asked if there was
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: anything else the man needed, and he just shook his head.
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: At that time, the young woman looked up, Anyon said,
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: and he asked if he could help her. The man
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: said something in a language he didn't understand. The gas
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: station manager went on. The young woman dropped her head
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: down as if she'd been scolded, and they left the store.
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: That was the end of that. Anyon later told the
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: television show Unsolved Mysteries. Samson and Tom Campbell were stunned
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: by this witness account. It gave hope hope that their
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: daughter was still alive, and it wasn't the last time
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: such a witness account materialized. A composite sketch was made
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: of the man. Waco store manager Roger Anyon claims to
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: have seen holding onto the arm of a young woman
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: who matched the description of Elizabeth and Campbell. An individual
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: at a store in Lampassa's County reported to police that
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: a man resembling the sketch came in on both May
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: eighteenth and May twentieth. He bought a blue cream soda,
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: which Elizabeth's father Tom said is what his daughter drinks.
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: There were other supposed sightings that included Elizabeth. According to
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: Michelle Christensen, a clerk for a Copperscove store two miles
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: away from the seven to eleven where Elizabeth was last seen,
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: she also saw the missing young woman when Samsuon Campbell
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: showed Christensen a flier, she told the mother she recognized
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: the photo. About two weeks after she disappeared, an Asian
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: man came into the store holding a woman by the
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: wrist as they ordered ice cream, him strawberry and her vanilla.
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: The man never let go. When the a young woman
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: looked up, Christensen says she verbally observed that she looked sad.
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: The woman dropped her head, looking back down out of
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: eye contact. She was being pulled around by the man,
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: who had a mean, rough look to him. Christensen remarked.
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: She later told her story to Unsolved Mysteries, as did
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: another woman named Virgie Johnson. On July tenth, nineteen eighty eight,
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: one hundred and eighty three miles from Copper's Cove in Garland, Texas,
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: just outside of Dallas. Johnson said she parked her car
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: outside a gas station and headed in to pay for fuel.
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: As she walked in through the door, she bumped into
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: a young woman coming out. The woman said, excuse me.
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: Johnson said she felt like she wanted to say something else,
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: but was acting like she was being watched and shouldn't
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: be speaking to anyone. When she later saw a picture
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: of Elizabeth Campbell, Johnson says she knew it was the
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: girl she bumped into because both had a tooth overlapping
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: another on their right sides. The four witness accounts led
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: both Tom and Samsoon Campbell to believe that Elizabeth was
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: being held against her will, controlled by human traffickers. This
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: led them to begin visiting strip clubs and stocking the
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: streets where prostitution is known to take place. They began
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: asking truck drivers to haul and hand out their flyers
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: and sent them to major cities across the United States.
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: Though police departments they sent the flyers to were less
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: than helpful, the parents said many individual police officers were
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: by providing useful advice and tips. Samson and Tom hired
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: an unlicensed private investigator out of Dallas, who tried their
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: hand on proving the trafficking theory. The information the PI
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: provided only strengthened their belief that their daughter was still
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: alive but unable to contact them. What exactly that information
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: is is publicly unknown still, and although the Campbell's believed
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: in the sightings, they and police, who were much more skeptical,
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: were unable to confirm them. Of course, in the end,
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: the sightings did little to further the case. Elizabeth's boyfriend,
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: Ricky Ray, was eliminated after alibi witnesses confirmed his whereabouts.
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: A polygraph examination solidified his innocence in the eyes of police.
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: Ricky later expressed disappointment in himself for not picking up Elizabeth.
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: I was thinking of myself. I was a stupid ass,
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: he said. With his account of events in mind, the
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: Copper's Cove police wondered how Elizabeth Campbell got from his
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: house to the spot where a fellow student picked her up.
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: Had she walked it, it would have taken approximately two
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: hours to get to the Acts Road near Central Texas College. However,
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: she arrived there in less than an hour, meaning that
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: at some point on her walk, Elizabeth must have been
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: given a ride. Usually, the television show America's Most Wanted
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: requires a suspect to cover a story, but on September
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: twenty eighth, nineteen eighty eight, they ran a segment about
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: Elizabeth's disappearance. It was six months after the fact. Tom
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: Campbell continually contacted Unsolved Mysteries asking them to produce an
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: era segment on his daughter's case. They finally agreed to,
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: and the show aired twice, the earliest in November nineteen
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: eighty nine and the other in May of nineteen ninety.
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: Each time it aired, the episode generated around two hundred
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: calls of possible sightings all over the country, most of
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: which the Campbells themselves attempted to chase down. Nothing came
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: of them. By December nineteen eighty nine, less than two
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: years after Elizabeth's disappearance, the Campbell's sold a home Tom
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: inherited for half its market value, just to keep up
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: the funds they needed for travel flyers and to supplement
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: the family's income as Tom took extended absences from work,
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: their monthly phone bill in a time before cell phones
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: allowed you to call virtually anywhere without an extra charge
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: were unimaginably exorbitant, once setting them back over one thousand dollars.
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: Private eyes were just as expensive. A psychic the family
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: hired out of desperation provided nothing useful, less than nothing.
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: In fact, sam soon demanded her money back from the clairvoyant.
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: We're selling off everything we've got, piece by piece, Tom
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: Campbell told a reporter for the Austin American Statesman. I
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: finally had to go back to work. We're getting to
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: where we can't keep the lights on. But their search
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: was hardly over, and the family began contemplating selling virtually
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: everything else they owned to keep up their efforts, including
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: the house where Elizabeth had grown up their home. The
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: family had been through so much, done so much on
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: their own. Sometimes they slept in dingy motels or in
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: their car, and often put themselves in harms way, but
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: nothing had panned out. In December nineteen ninety one, Samson
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: and her daughter Barbara chased down a lead in Dallas.
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: A woman named Sue had called the toll free tip
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: line the Campbells had since set up, and said she
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: thought she'd seen Elizabeth in a strip club there. The
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: Campbells were familiar with the area. They'd spent time visiting
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: club after club, handing out flyers and asking folks if
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: they'd seen Elizabeth. No one had This time, too, Elizabeth
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: was nowhere to be seen. Media coverage of the case,
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: which was lacking to begin with outside of the local newspapers,
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: had slowed to a crawl and eventually stopped completely save
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: anniversary stories. The Austin American Statesman fortunately revisited the case
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: here and there, often concentrating on the family's plight with
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: genuine human interest articles. Samsoon and Tom Campbell continued to
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: devote everything they could afford monetarily, physically, and emotionally to
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: finding their daughter, but the media, besides a handful of outlets,
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: had long moved on. Then, in nineteen ninety two, a
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: major lead materialized nearly two hundred and thirty miles west
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: of Copper's Cove, a piece of evidence that, if acted
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: upon when it was originally discovered, might have been the
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: key to solving the case. That and another potential suspect
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: next time on Gone Cold, Texas True Crime. If you
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: have any information about the disappearance of Elizabeth Ann Campbell,
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: please call the Copper's Cove Crime Stoppers at two five, four,
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: five four seven one one one one, or Bell County
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: Crime Stoppers at two five, four, five, two six eight,
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: four seven seven. You can also submit a tip online.
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: We'll provide a link in this episode's show notes. If
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: you'd like to join gon Cold's mission to shine a
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: light on unsolved homicides and missing persons cases, get the
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: show at free and have access to bonus content, you
• 27:39
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• 27:44
  Speaker 1: can also support the show by leaving a five star
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: rating and written review on Apple Podcasts or wherever else
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: you listen. However you choose to support Gone Cold, we
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: appreciate you. Thanks for listening, y'all.