Latest / Crime Stories with Nancy Grace / College student heads home for Christmas, never seen again. WHERE'S JASON?

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College student heads home for Christmas, never seen again. WHERE'S JASON? · Crime Stories with Nancy Grace

0:05
Speaker 1: Crime Stories with Nancy Grace and incredible boy, an incredible boy.
0:21
Speaker 1: You know. I call my son John David my wonder boy.
0:25
Speaker 1: I call my little girl angel girl because that's what
0:28
Speaker 1: they are to me, A wonder boy and an angel girl.
0:32
Speaker 1: Now true, they're almost fourteen now, but they're a boy
0:37
Speaker 1: and a girl to me. That's how I'm gonna probably
0:40
Speaker 1: always see them. I've got a father with me right now.
0:47
Speaker 1: It sees his twenty one year old son Jason as
0:52
Speaker 1: his wonder boy, and I want to find him. Crime
1:04
Speaker 1: Stories with Nancy Grace. Twenty one year old Jason Landry
1:13
Speaker 1: was driving home from San Marcus to visit his parents
1:16
Speaker 1: in the Houston area on the night of December thirteenth,
1:19
Speaker 1: a trip that was mysteriously cut short. The Caldwell County
1:23
Speaker 1: Sheriff's Office says a volunteer firefighter found Landry's abandoned car
1:27
Speaker 1: on Salt Flat Road in Luling. Investigators trying to find
1:31
Speaker 1: a Texas State University student after they found his car
1:35
Speaker 1: crash near Luling just after midnight last night. Loved one
1:39
Speaker 1: say Jason Landry was on his way to the Houston
1:41
Speaker 1: area for the holidays, but did not make it home.
1:44
Speaker 1: Now they're hoping someone finds him. My hope as well.
1:48
Speaker 1: How do you have a crash car and you're not
1:52
Speaker 1: in it? How does that happen? Where is twenty one
1:58
Speaker 1: year old Jason Landry with me an all star panel
2:02
Speaker 1: to try to make sense of this seemingly senseless situation.
2:07
Speaker 1: Doctor Angela Arnold, renowned psychiatrists, joining me out of Atlanta.
2:11
Speaker 1: You can find her at Angela Arnold MD dot com.
2:15
Speaker 1: High profile lawyer joining me out of Atlanta as well.
2:18
Speaker 1: Randy Kessler, Emory Law Professor, author of Divorce, Protect Yourself,
2:23
Speaker 1: your Kids, in your Future, and you can find Randy
2:26
Speaker 1: at k S Family Law dot com. No stranger to
2:31
Speaker 1: a courtroom Professor Forensics, Jacksonville State University, author of Blood
2:36
Speaker 1: Beneath My Feet on Amazon, star of a brand new
2:39
Speaker 1: hit series on True Crime Network, Poisonous Liaison Death Investigator.
2:44
Speaker 1: Joseph Scott Morgan, Senior Digital Forensic Examiner, Counterintelligence President, CEO
2:51
Speaker 1: of National Digital Forensics Wow. Giovanni Masucci is with us
2:58
Speaker 1: Special Guests joining us. Cheryla point cousin of the victim
3:02
Speaker 1: in this case, the young man we're looking for. She's
3:06
Speaker 1: a genetic genealogist. The gene Hunter at the gene Hunter
3:10
Speaker 1: dot com and I mean ge ne not blue jeans.
3:16
Speaker 1: Very special guests joining me, Kent Landry. You can find
3:21
Speaker 1: Kent on Facebook at Facebook dot com, slash Fine Jason
3:27
Speaker 1: Landry but straight to Alexis Rustchuk Crimeline dot com and
3:32
Speaker 1: investigative reporter also with lead Stories dot com. Alexis, I
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Speaker 1: don't understand how a young man who has finally decided
3:44
Speaker 1: on his calling. His dream was to be a sound engineer,
3:49
Speaker 1: and he was a new student at Texas State University.
3:53
Speaker 1: Everything going on all cylinders, everything's fine. He leaves around
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Speaker 1: ten pmishon night to drive home to his parents for Christmas,
4:04
Speaker 1: and he never shows up. What can you tell me
4:07
Speaker 1: about those facts, Alexis terres Chuck. So, it was December thirteenth,
4:12
Speaker 1: just left last year, right a little bit after ten o'clock.
4:15
Speaker 1: He leaves ten fifty five to drive home. It's only
4:18
Speaker 1: a three hour drive to his parents. Who so, and
4:20
Speaker 1: you know he had to finish up school. You got
4:22
Speaker 1: to wrap up stuff at the end of the semester,
4:24
Speaker 1: and he's gonna go home for Christmas. Break gets in
4:26
Speaker 1: the car, he chats on the phone with one of
4:28
Speaker 1: his friends. What every normal person does, he writings suspicious
4:33
Speaker 1: He chats on the front on the phone with a friend.
4:36
Speaker 1: Is that on his cell phone? Yes, of course yes.
4:39
Speaker 1: And the conversation was normal, correct, Yes, nothing wrong going
4:45
Speaker 1: looking forward to Christmas? And what time was that conversation,
4:48
Speaker 1: Alexis I'm trying to build a timeline. It was shortly
4:51
Speaker 1: before ten fifty five pm. Now you know the reality
4:55
Speaker 1: is for a young guy, this age, twenty one year
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Speaker 1: old college unit hopping at car at ten thirty ten
5:01
Speaker 1: forty five to drive home to your parents, that's no
5:04
Speaker 1: big deal. A lot of us might say, Wow, that's
5:06
Speaker 1: too late to be on the road. Not for a
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Speaker 1: twenty one year old guy heading home for Christmas holidays.
5:11
Speaker 1: You just heard our friends Rebecca Thomas at Fox seven
5:14
Speaker 1: Austin and our friends at kV U E ABC. But
5:17
Speaker 1: take a listen to Jacob raskin k r PC Houston.
5:22
Speaker 1: Jason's father, Ken, the senior pastor at a Presbyterian church
5:26
Speaker 1: in Missouri City, as well as Jason's older brother and
5:30
Speaker 1: many other extended family members and friends have been searching
5:34
Speaker 1: alongside investigators all day, many wondering why would he have
5:38
Speaker 1: left his belongings in the car. His father tells me
5:42
Speaker 1: he believes Jason probably suffered a concussion. Maybe he doesn't
5:46
Speaker 1: even know who he is. Maybe he's hurt, he was
5:49
Speaker 1: in a car accident, but he's not with the car,
5:51
Speaker 1: and we just don't know. So any help of me
5:53
Speaker 1: greatly appreciated. Let's go straight out to this young man.
5:57
Speaker 1: Jason Landry's dad joining us right now. It's Kent Landry.
6:02
Speaker 1: And again, please go to Facebook dot com forward slash
6:07
Speaker 1: find Jason Landry or go to crime online dot com
6:11
Speaker 1: to see photos and find out more. Can't tell me
6:15
Speaker 1: what happened when you you knew he was on his
6:18
Speaker 1: way home, correct and not that morning? Actually I knew
6:22
Speaker 1: he was coming home. So I have three kids there,
6:27
Speaker 1: my oldest, their big sister was she worked in Chicago
6:30
Speaker 1: and she was coming home. And the two boys, ones
6:34
Speaker 1: at a m and once at Texas State, were both
6:37
Speaker 1: waiting till their big sister gets home. Before they headed home.
6:40
Speaker 1: They were both finishing up finals and then you know,
6:43
Speaker 1: hanging out with friends and kind of finishing up everything
6:46
Speaker 1: for the semester before they headed home. So I knew
6:49
Speaker 1: Jason was coming home. I didn't know which a particular
6:52
Speaker 1: day because he was also waiting for another friend to
6:56
Speaker 1: come into town first, so you knew they were coming.
6:59
Speaker 1: How of a drive is it from Texas State University?
7:02
Speaker 1: Did you live in a dorm or an apartment? In
7:04
Speaker 1: an apartment, how far was it from Jason's apartment to
7:07
Speaker 1: your home? Depends on how fast you drive in traffic.
7:11
Speaker 1: Somewhere in the range of two and a half to
7:13
Speaker 1: three hours, okay, going leaving at about ten till eleven
7:19
Speaker 1: that night. He should have been home at least by
7:23
Speaker 1: two thirty two thirty in the morning, and you didn't
7:26
Speaker 1: know he was coming, so you didn't realize anything was
7:28
Speaker 1: actually wrong until when until we got a call from
7:32
Speaker 1: the highway patrol at around two in the morning. Tell
7:35
Speaker 1: me about that call, mister Andrey. Well, um, you know,
7:42
Speaker 1: I've gotten plenty of calls in the you know, in
7:45
Speaker 1: the wee hours, whether when I was practicing law or
7:50
Speaker 1: as a pastor. That that comes with the territory. So
7:54
Speaker 1: wasn't that unusual. But when it's when it's the police
7:58
Speaker 1: and they call about your child, that's you know, that's
8:02
Speaker 1: kind of the nightmare of any parent, you know. To
8:07
Speaker 1: all we were told is, you know, the car's crashed
8:10
Speaker 1: he's not there, And we went back and forth with
8:14
Speaker 1: the officer, and I got in the car and drove there.
8:18
Speaker 1: I probably left with him about thirty minutes of the
8:21
Speaker 1: first phone call to go see what I could find
8:24
Speaker 1: out Time Stories with Nancy Grace. Guys, we were talking
8:41
Speaker 1: about the phone call that no parent wants to get.
8:47
Speaker 1: That phone rings at two o'clock in the morning and
8:51
Speaker 1: somebody tells you they found your boys car crashed, but
8:58
Speaker 1: he's not in it along in a two and a
9:01
Speaker 1: half hour ride that strip of road and nobody can
9:06
Speaker 1: find him. What do you do? I mean to doctor
9:12
Speaker 1: Angela Arnold psychiatrists, I will never forget. And I told
9:15
Speaker 1: this story, Jackie can close your ears. When my son
9:18
Speaker 1: John David went missing in a big superstore. It was
9:21
Speaker 1: a Babies are Us superstore, huge and I was look
9:28
Speaker 1: I had both of them with me and I was
9:30
Speaker 1: looking for of all things, organic suntin lotion, and I
9:35
Speaker 1: was down on the very bottom. They had shelves that
9:38
Speaker 1: I felt like they went up to the ceiling. And
9:41
Speaker 1: I looked and looked and looked if I said, well, Twins,
9:45
Speaker 1: I just can't find it. And I got up and
9:47
Speaker 1: turned around. There was Lucy and know John David, And
9:52
Speaker 1: in that moment, it felt like the whole world just stopped. Angela,
9:57
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, you know, Nancy, these are the kinds of
9:59
Speaker 1: thing things that when they happen, they shake our They
10:02
Speaker 1: shake us to the very core, They shake our sense
10:07
Speaker 1: of of just security that we all have to live
10:11
Speaker 1: with on a daily basis. And now this poor boy
10:14
Speaker 1: is missing, and there and there it does. It sounds
10:20
Speaker 1: like they're no answer. So how can I mean? I
10:22
Speaker 1: don't I've lost my children in stores before, and you
10:26
Speaker 1: feel like you you literally think your whole life passes
10:31
Speaker 1: in front of you, doesn't it, Nancy, I just don't
10:33
Speaker 1: even have a clear recollection of thinking anything. It just
10:36
Speaker 1: felt like my whole body was I was outside my body,
10:42
Speaker 1: but I could hear myself screaming to lock the doors.
10:45
Speaker 1: And I had Lucy under one arm like a football,
10:48
Speaker 1: like Tom Brady running for the touchdown, you know, but
10:52
Speaker 1: trying to find John David. Kent Landry is Jason's dad.
10:57
Speaker 1: He gets this call to am and here's that his
11:01
Speaker 1: son's car is wrecked on the way home. But no, son,
11:05
Speaker 1: You get in the car and you take off. What
11:06
Speaker 1: was going through your mind can't as you were trying
11:09
Speaker 1: to get to that location. Well, um, it's I don't know,
11:17
Speaker 1: it's it's hard to explain. It's it's a nightmare you
11:20
Speaker 1: never wake up from. Um, and it's been fifty three
11:25
Speaker 1: days and hasn't ended. Um. It was it was very surreal. Um.
11:30
Speaker 1: Driving You're trying to get there, trying to think of
11:33
Speaker 1: anything that can happen. And this is Loling is a
11:37
Speaker 1: small town, you know, between Saint Marcus. It's it's the
11:41
Speaker 1: only the reason you pass through Louling is to get
11:44
Speaker 1: to High ten to get home, and trying to figure out, okay,
11:49
Speaker 1: well what am I going to do to get there?
11:51
Speaker 1: Where was it? My wife stayed at home in case
11:54
Speaker 1: Jason called or and to find out, you know, information
11:59
Speaker 1: from from the officer and stuff like that. So it
12:02
Speaker 1: was I don't really remember. It was a blur. I
12:06
Speaker 1: got there about five in the morning and it was clear, cold,
12:12
Speaker 1: windy and dark, and trying to find my son, trying
12:20
Speaker 1: to find anything someone to talk to. Five am in
12:24
Speaker 1: the morning in small town there's not a lot of
12:27
Speaker 1: people to talk to or even try to find where
12:29
Speaker 1: the accident is and stuff like that. How did you
12:32
Speaker 1: find the crash. Well, I knew who was the officer
12:37
Speaker 1: had told me who was going to be towing the car,
12:40
Speaker 1: the name of the tow truck company. I found their
12:42
Speaker 1: location online, put it in my phone. It said it
12:45
Speaker 1: was twenty four hours a day. So I went directly
12:47
Speaker 1: there and I found a tow truck driver there and
12:52
Speaker 1: he said he wasn't the one who towed it, but
12:54
Speaker 1: he gave me the location. He said, it's off this
12:57
Speaker 1: one of the highways that kind of runs out of
12:59
Speaker 1: out of the town. So he gave me directions how
13:02
Speaker 1: to get there, and I'm running up and down this highway.
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Speaker 1: My wife I have located. We have locators on her phone,
13:08
Speaker 1: you know, she can watch where I am. And I
13:10
Speaker 1: knew where Jason's car was, where his phone was. It
13:14
Speaker 1: was in the storage lot at the parking at the
13:17
Speaker 1: tow truck place, but they couldn't They wouldn't open it
13:19
Speaker 1: until seven in the morning. So waiting before seven, I
13:24
Speaker 1: was going to see, you know, go look for Jason,
13:27
Speaker 1: and Lisa was able to. I went down the room
13:31
Speaker 1: road first. I knew that I couldn't see anything, so
13:34
Speaker 1: I called my wife and said, I don't think he's
13:36
Speaker 1: on this road. I'm almost to another town, you know,
13:39
Speaker 1: called the officer and find out exactly what the location was.
13:42
Speaker 1: What she called him, he was already in bed. He
13:46
Speaker 1: gave her the name of the road we found it
13:48
Speaker 1: on the found it on the map, and was driving
13:52
Speaker 1: down that road at five am. So let me understand,
13:55
Speaker 1: the officer, the investigator, got the car toad and then
14:00
Speaker 1: went to bed. Yes, okay, I wish they hadn't towed
14:08
Speaker 1: the car just that fast. Joe Scott, Morgan, Professor forensic
14:12
Speaker 1: Jacksonville State University. In such a long list of credentials,
14:16
Speaker 1: I'm I'm losing you know, my voice. So, Joe Scott,
14:21
Speaker 1: why did they tow the car? Well, I guess they
14:24
Speaker 1: come upon the car, they see a crash, they're told
14:26
Speaker 1: to tow it, and they don't realize that every tiny
14:29
Speaker 1: bit of evidence is important. What do we need to
14:33
Speaker 1: be looking at in that car? Oh? You know you
14:36
Speaker 1: have to first thing I would be looking for personally
14:39
Speaker 1: is to see if there's any any evidence so trauma
14:43
Speaker 1: that the driver may have sustained. By a minute, let
14:45
Speaker 1: me get another fact for you, Joe Scott, to use.
14:48
Speaker 1: Alexis dress shut. There was a crash, but a crash
14:51
Speaker 1: into what was it a single carp and it's not
14:53
Speaker 1: like into a tree or a fence, or was there
14:55
Speaker 1: another car involved. The policea said they're down't believe that
14:58
Speaker 1: there was another car are involved. They think that something
15:02
Speaker 1: made Jason swerve and he perhaps maybe hit something with
15:07
Speaker 1: the right i'm sorry, the left front tire, the driver's
15:10
Speaker 1: side of the time, and then the car spun around
15:12
Speaker 1: and maybe hit something else. But so far they haven't said,
15:17
Speaker 1: you know what, all of our minds would go to,
15:19
Speaker 1: like maybe somebody was chasing him in a car hit him.
15:21
Speaker 1: Because the back of the car, the rear bumper is
15:25
Speaker 1: very damaged, as is the front. Well that's is that right,
15:29
Speaker 1: can't landry. The back of the car's damaged and the
15:32
Speaker 1: front left fenders damaged. Yes, if you actually look at well,
15:37
Speaker 1: if you look at there was only there were no
15:39
Speaker 1: pictures taken by the officer at the scene of the accident.
15:42
Speaker 1: The only picture we have of the car to my knowledge,
15:45
Speaker 1: is a picture taken by that young man who actually
15:48
Speaker 1: found the car, the volunteer fireman who was coming home.
15:51
Speaker 1: He lives down this road. He was coming home from
15:54
Speaker 1: i think from a fire call and saw saw the car.
16:00
Speaker 1: Check looked inside. There wasn't anyone there. I think he said.
16:04
Speaker 1: He touched the hood it was already cold, but it
16:06
Speaker 1: was in the thirties that night, and called it in
16:11
Speaker 1: and waited. So he waited the whole time that he
16:15
Speaker 1: was there. And the picture doesn't really show much damage.
16:20
Speaker 1: It's it's from the side of it. Looking at the
16:22
Speaker 1: passenger side doesn't show a lot of damage to the trunk.
16:25
Speaker 1: And you can, of course look at the pictures online
16:28
Speaker 1: the car as it is sitting in the toe lot.
16:33
Speaker 1: The rear end is significantly damaged and the front left
16:37
Speaker 1: ender correct correct. Well, that doesn't even make sense. If
16:40
Speaker 1: you have a crash, how do you get damage on
16:43
Speaker 1: the front left ender and the backside? And here's the
16:47
Speaker 1: really odd part to me. To Shara la Point genetic genealogists,
16:54
Speaker 1: founder of the gene Hunter and cousin of this family, Shara,
17:00
Speaker 1: his clothes, Nancy, there are many more questions going through
17:06
Speaker 1: my head than there have been any answers. I just
17:10
Speaker 1: cannot make sense of any of the clothes. Shara Jason's clothes.
17:16
Speaker 1: Where were they? They were strewn in the road. His
17:21
Speaker 1: dad is the one who found his clothes about nine
17:25
Speaker 1: hundred yards from the crash scenes. Why are these clothes
17:31
Speaker 1: that obviously Jason was wearing strewn nine hundred yards from
17:37
Speaker 1: the wreck time stories with Nancy Grace. Guys, for those
17:56
Speaker 1: of you just joining us, please help us. Let me
17:59
Speaker 1: give you the chip line for Cobble County Sheriff's five
18:02
Speaker 1: one two three, nine eight, six, seven seven seven repeat
18:07
Speaker 1: five one two, three, nine, eight six seven seven seven.
18:14
Speaker 1: Randy Kessler, you're the high profile trial lawyer. You've tried
18:19
Speaker 1: many a case involving crashes in your day. That doesn't
18:25
Speaker 1: even make sense. I mean, there's so many questions. As
18:28
Speaker 1: Sheryl point just said, why did the investigator go home
18:31
Speaker 1: and go to sleep when they couldn't find the victim?
18:34
Speaker 1: Why did the dad have to find his son's clothing,
18:37
Speaker 1: all of his clothes we're off his body and nine
18:41
Speaker 1: hundred yards oh way, Why it's bizarrened him? And I'm sorry.
18:49
Speaker 1: And the father should not have found any of that.
18:50
Speaker 1: It should have been whether it's a crime investigation or
18:54
Speaker 1: a civil case, an accident investigation, that kind of stuff.
18:58
Speaker 1: How do you not find that, especially when it's one
19:00
Speaker 1: that's not paper cutter kind of you know, cookie cutter
19:03
Speaker 1: kind of cakes where yep, someone ran a red light
19:06
Speaker 1: and here's what happened in the three witnesses. There are
19:08
Speaker 1: no witnesses at the time of day. I mean, this
19:11
Speaker 1: investigation should not have ended with the officer being in
19:13
Speaker 1: bed and the father having to go out there and
19:15
Speaker 1: find this evidence. Forget the emotional aspect of finding the
19:18
Speaker 1: stuff about a loved one. He's not an expert. That's
19:22
Speaker 1: what we have. Actually, I just don't understand how what
19:25
Speaker 1: plausible explanation is there for a crash with damage from
19:30
Speaker 1: our front, left fender and back squished in to Kent Landry.
19:35
Speaker 1: This is Jason's dad. Please go to Facebook dot com
19:39
Speaker 1: forward slash Fine, Jason Landry, how did you think to
19:45
Speaker 1: walk nine hundred yards to find the clothing? Well, I was,
19:51
Speaker 1: I knew where the accident was, and I'm driving up
19:53
Speaker 1: and down the road looking for my son, and I'm
19:56
Speaker 1: I'm continuing to drive down the road looking more kind
19:59
Speaker 1: of off to the side, and frankly, I expected to
20:05
Speaker 1: see Jason maybe walking down the road or someone, you know,
20:10
Speaker 1: I didn't know I was the only person out there looking.
20:13
Speaker 1: I mean, I just but I'm I'm gonna look it's
20:16
Speaker 1: it's you know, it's my son. And I'm driving down
20:21
Speaker 1: this road and as I'm driving along, in my headlights,
20:27
Speaker 1: I see clothes and and I look at I stopped
20:30
Speaker 1: and I'm like, what is that? You know, because as
20:32
Speaker 1: I'm driving along, I was driving slow because, oh gosh,
20:35
Speaker 1: I think I'd seen at least three different set of
20:37
Speaker 1: deer run in front of me at Coyote m there's
20:40
Speaker 1: only three miles out of Louling, but lou Liegan's very
20:43
Speaker 1: quickly and you get you're in country. So I was
20:46
Speaker 1: driving slow, thinking, you know, he probably sort of to
20:49
Speaker 1: avoid a deer, and I was going to avoid him also,
20:52
Speaker 1: And I see clothes. Well, I see something in front
20:56
Speaker 1: of me, and I stopped, and I look at the
20:58
Speaker 1: headlights and I'm like, those are clothes, And then I
21:00
Speaker 1: look at the clothes and I can recognize him as
21:03
Speaker 1: my sons. Um, you know, some closes as relatively distinctive.
21:09
Speaker 1: Jason wore he loved novelty socks, so I knew the
21:14
Speaker 1: socks the minute I saw him. I think these were
21:17
Speaker 1: some SpongeBob ones. Oh you just spoke to me, because
21:21
Speaker 1: my son's favorite pair of socks. One is bacon in
21:25
Speaker 1: the other sock is eggs. He loves crazy socks, so
21:31
Speaker 1: you see realize the socks were there too, Yes, socks, socks,
21:38
Speaker 1: t shirt, socks, shorts, underwear, his slide, sandals, and his
21:45
Speaker 1: watch and his watch. So it wasn't a theft, you know,
21:51
Speaker 1: Joe Scott just recently, you know, my sister drove all
21:56
Speaker 1: the way from California didn't want to fly because of
21:59
Speaker 1: COVID to Atlanta to see my mom and all of us.
22:04
Speaker 1: On the way back. She's a really careful driver, like
22:08
Speaker 1: overboard twenty miles an hour driver. A deer jumped out
22:13
Speaker 1: in Murfreesburg, Tennessee. I think it was totaled her car.
22:19
Speaker 1: But wouldn't there have been blood or some evidence of
22:23
Speaker 1: a deer? That's what I just heard Kent Landry hypothesize.
22:27
Speaker 1: Wouldn't we have evidence of that? Yes, if if the
22:32
Speaker 1: vehicle actually impacted the animal. You know, I worked a
22:35
Speaker 1: lot of cases actually involving deaths of individuals that hid deer,
22:39
Speaker 1: and you'll find tufts of hair, you know, like in
22:42
Speaker 1: the grill, around around the light, headlight housing all this.
22:45
Speaker 1: But you know the impact on Jason's car is to
22:48
Speaker 1: the rear left, and my understanding is it was found
22:51
Speaker 1: against a tree? I think that what I'd like to
22:54
Speaker 1: ask Kent is this is a rural I'm familiar with
22:57
Speaker 1: this area of Oh is it You're familiar with every
23:01
Speaker 1: single area travel I travel a lot. I've uh, you know,
23:06
Speaker 1: a true story. I've been to the Schinerbach Brewery quite
23:08
Speaker 1: a bit, and so at any rate, Uh, it's a
23:12
Speaker 1: It's an agricultural area, isn't it, Kent? And so the
23:16
Speaker 1: road is paved, but are there light? Is it real
23:19
Speaker 1: gravelly on both sides like soft shoulders if you will.
23:24
Speaker 1: Where this section of Sultflight Road starts paved right outside
23:29
Speaker 1: of blue Ling, but it turns into gravel. So where
23:32
Speaker 1: this accident occurred is actually all gravel. Oh boy? And
23:36
Speaker 1: this is um This an area that is actually sitting
23:39
Speaker 1: on a oil and gas field from about the twenties.
23:43
Speaker 1: So it's not farming as much as people run cattle
23:47
Speaker 1: and there's a lot of oil field activity. It's it's
23:50
Speaker 1: out in the country. It's it's the road real like
23:52
Speaker 1: they refer to washboarding. I mean, it's like it is washboard.
23:58
Speaker 1: This is my question. I know that know that Jason
24:01
Speaker 1: was new to Texas state. You said it was his
24:04
Speaker 1: first semester. Had he made this trip home very many times?
24:09
Speaker 1: Come from Sam, coming from Sam mark because you know,
24:11
Speaker 1: saw a flat road. It's well, guys, wait a minute,
24:16
Speaker 1: we're putting the cart before the horse here. Even if
24:19
Speaker 1: he was swerving to overcorrect, if he saw a deer
24:23
Speaker 1: and hit a tree, if that's what happened, where is he.
24:29
Speaker 1: Whether there's evidence of blood from a deer or a
24:32
Speaker 1: tuft of hair from a deer, or paint from another car,
24:36
Speaker 1: that still doesn't tell me where is he? Crime Stories
24:53
Speaker 1: with Nancy Grace joining you right now. Giovanni Massucchi's Senior
24:58
Speaker 1: Digital Forensics Examine or m CEO National Digital Forensics at
25:05
Speaker 1: nat LDF dot com. Giovanni Masucci, thank you for being
25:10
Speaker 1: with us. What can we learn from any GPS in
25:15
Speaker 1: the car and from Jason's cell phone? Yes, thanks for
25:20
Speaker 1: having me. I appreciate it. Thank you. M one of
25:23
Speaker 1: the One of the things is I'm gonna look at
25:25
Speaker 1: if on the phone and so and the phone of
25:28
Speaker 1: what I understand was between your drive receiving the Center Council.
25:31
Speaker 1: So one of the things I'm gonna look at um
25:34
Speaker 1: is the phone. But also you mentioned the GPS depending
25:38
Speaker 1: on the car making model um an ear what type
25:44
Speaker 1: of entertainment system was located in that vehicle. And what
25:48
Speaker 1: I mean by entertainments entertainment system is the I call
25:52
Speaker 1: that the communication center, so you can connect with it
25:55
Speaker 1: with your with your mobile device, and most people nowadays
25:58
Speaker 1: do a lot of work and talk using that impertainment
26:02
Speaker 1: system that's in the car, which also may have a
26:05
Speaker 1: navigation system which can do your mapping, but also you
26:10
Speaker 1: can call, do text message, search social media and so on.
26:14
Speaker 1: So we've got two areas to look at. Taking back
26:17
Speaker 1: to the mobile phone. If I'm going to the scene,
26:21
Speaker 1: what I'm going to do is I'm going to pull
26:22
Speaker 1: that into evidence right start my chain of custody, and
26:25
Speaker 1: I'm going to look to see once I bring it
26:27
Speaker 1: back to the lab. And of course you'd have to
26:29
Speaker 1: have a warrant to actually do the analysis part of it,
26:32
Speaker 1: depending on what's happened in the case. In this case,
26:35
Speaker 1: we have a missing individual young man, and so once
26:39
Speaker 1: the law enforce and obtains the search warrant to go
26:42
Speaker 1: ahead and do the phone do the analysis on it,
26:45
Speaker 1: they're going to look for it depending on the type
26:48
Speaker 1: of tool that they use too. So what kind of
26:50
Speaker 1: search did this law enforce and agency do Did you
26:53
Speaker 1: do just a physical search gain meaning that they just
26:56
Speaker 1: opened up the phone and start looking at it, which
26:59
Speaker 1: we typically from against that. As a forensics individual, you
27:02
Speaker 1: want to use a forensic software or forensic tool to
27:06
Speaker 1: write and look at the digital data and to actually
27:09
Speaker 1: was called to an acquisition of that phone. So you're
27:12
Speaker 1: pulling as much data you can off that phone to
27:15
Speaker 1: next be able to analyze that data. So you're gonna
27:19
Speaker 1: look for GPS data, You're gonna look for location data.
27:23
Speaker 1: Was the phone location data on? Is the time of
27:26
Speaker 1: data stamp correct? It's on the phone in the same
27:29
Speaker 1: zoning period? Did he do any text messaging with anybody?
27:34
Speaker 1: You know what, I've got a little information on that
27:38
Speaker 1: to aid you in your analysis with me. Giovanni Massuchi
27:43
Speaker 1: with National Digital Forensics to can't Landry. This is Jason's
27:48
Speaker 1: dad who's been searching for his son NonStop since his
27:53
Speaker 1: car was found on a lonely stretch of road on
27:56
Speaker 1: his way home for Christmas break around eleven twenty four.
28:01
Speaker 1: Much I say this is coming from the phone or
28:04
Speaker 1: it may have been coming from the car navigational system itself. Yes, Well,
28:08
Speaker 1: Jason enters Luling on Texas Highway eighty. He stops using
28:12
Speaker 1: the Waves app and opens up Snapchat. Passes through Magnolia
28:17
Speaker 1: and East Austin, and that is where his digital footprint stopped. That's,
28:25
Speaker 1: you know, that's the big question. I'm pretty comfortable saying,
28:29
Speaker 1: based on everything that the last relatively certain, because there's
28:35
Speaker 1: almost no certainty here. But sitting at the light in
28:40
Speaker 1: Luling where normally you would turn right if you were,
28:43
Speaker 1: you know, heading the correct way, you would turn right,
28:47
Speaker 1: and then a couple of blocks later you turn left
28:49
Speaker 1: and then you head out High ten. Sitting at that
28:52
Speaker 1: light at about eleven twenty four is the last kind
28:55
Speaker 1: of point in time we feel pretty certain. What is
28:59
Speaker 1: going on after that point the sixty seven minutes until
29:04
Speaker 1: that young man finds his car wrecked on the side
29:07
Speaker 1: of the road. Absolutely anybody's guests. And then, of course
29:13
Speaker 1: the bigger question, the one I really care about, is
29:15
Speaker 1: what happened after that and where's my son? But no,
29:19
Speaker 1: after that point in time, it could be anything from
29:25
Speaker 1: a carjacking to a road rap. I mean, it could
29:27
Speaker 1: be I just you know, could he wreck and be
29:30
Speaker 1: completely gone in just sixty seven minutes? Guys, take a
29:34
Speaker 1: listen to our friend Jacob Rascaran at k r PC Houston.
29:40
Speaker 1: It was finally time for Jason Landry to come home
29:43
Speaker 1: for Christmas. He left Texas State in San Marcus Sunday night,
29:48
Speaker 1: but didn't get far. Just after midnight, the local sheriff's
29:51
Speaker 1: department got a call about a total sudan along Salt
29:55
Speaker 1: Flat Road. It was Jason's Nissan Ultimu with his wallet,
30:00
Speaker 1: phone and other belongings inside, but no Jason at the moment.
30:04
Speaker 1: They're using dogs to trying to search for him by
30:08
Speaker 1: scent there, and he's trying to helicopter us in the
30:11
Speaker 1: infrared light and didn't have any luck. You can imagine
30:15
Speaker 1: Lisa Landry, his mother, is worried, sick, and in a
30:19
Speaker 1: bit of shock that this is all really happening. He's alone,
30:22
Speaker 1: he doesn't have his phone or his wallet, and it's
30:27
Speaker 1: cold outside, and I just I don't know where he
30:30
Speaker 1: is and I'd like to find him. You were hearing Lisa,
30:34
Speaker 1: Jason's mother to Jason Landry's dad, joining me, Kn't Landry,
30:41
Speaker 1: what toll is this search taking on your family? Well
30:48
Speaker 1: say it's hard. As the world's greatest understatement you know, honestly,
30:55
Speaker 1: the thing that's keeping us going is the prayers of
31:00
Speaker 1: thousands of people. I mean, it's been amazing. Our church
31:04
Speaker 1: started a prayer chain. When this started, in every fifteen minutes,
31:08
Speaker 1: someone knew was praying for us, and it's happened. It's
31:12
Speaker 1: been that way since the very beginning. And here we
31:14
Speaker 1: are in day fifty three. We've got thousands of people
31:17
Speaker 1: praying for us. And you know, our faith and our family,
31:21
Speaker 1: we know that no matter what happened, we know God knows,
31:29
Speaker 1: and we're just continuing to hope and pray and trying
31:32
Speaker 1: to do the best we can given the circumstances. Is
31:40
Speaker 1: it correct to Cheryl a Point, the cousin of the
31:43
Speaker 1: lantern every family, you know her as the gene hunter,
31:48
Speaker 1: that a small amount of blood was found. Yes, Nancy,
31:53
Speaker 1: there were spots of blood found, one believed the band
31:58
Speaker 1: of his underwear and also on a tag um on
32:04
Speaker 1: an article of clothing. And I don't believe there was
32:09
Speaker 1: any blood found in the core um when it was analyzed,
32:14
Speaker 1: so um those that blood is being analyzed for DNA evidence.
32:21
Speaker 1: Um is what I understand at this point, but no,
32:25
Speaker 1: nothing has been finalized yet. Too ken't Landry, this is
32:29
Speaker 1: Jason's dad. A little bit of blood found on the
32:32
Speaker 1: band of his underwear in the front the side of
32:35
Speaker 1: the back. Um. It was found on the tag of
32:38
Speaker 1: his hit two dots of underwear blood and by that
32:42
Speaker 1: I mean dot like the tip of a racer of
32:45
Speaker 1: a pen pencil um on the the tag on his shorts,
32:51
Speaker 1: which is I guess would be your probably left tip
32:56
Speaker 1: area on those shorts, maybe right hip one around your
33:00
Speaker 1: hip and then right around the waistband at the top.
33:04
Speaker 1: So probably the car came to rest on the driver's
33:08
Speaker 1: side against a barbed wire fence. If Jason pushed the
33:12
Speaker 1: door open and tried to kind of scoot along the
33:13
Speaker 1: side of the door to get out easily, the barbed
33:20
Speaker 1: wire could have you know, pricked him and be that
33:24
Speaker 1: small amount of blood just thinking about that, was the
33:29
Speaker 1: barb wire ever tested, mister Royatry, I don't know the
33:32
Speaker 1: answer to that question. I do not know. I mean,
33:35
Speaker 1: the whole the whole scene of the car accident, to
33:40
Speaker 1: my knowledge, has never been accordinged because I know there
33:44
Speaker 1: were pieces of his car there for weeks on end,
33:47
Speaker 1: and probably if you went out there right now, I
33:49
Speaker 1: don't know. People have been going by, I think collecting them.
33:52
Speaker 1: I don't know if any would be left, but there
33:54
Speaker 1: were some last time I was there. And no blood
33:57
Speaker 1: on the inside of the car, not to my knowledge.
34:00
Speaker 1: Okay to you, JESSICTT. Morgan, that speaks volumes to me.
34:03
Speaker 1: I think mister Landry's assessment is correct. If there's no
34:06
Speaker 1: blood on the inside, he had to get those tiny
34:10
Speaker 1: bits of dropped a bit of blood on his hip
34:13
Speaker 1: area from somewhere, and that makes perfect sense. Yeah. The
34:18
Speaker 1: likely candidate, like mister Landry had mentioned, could be that
34:21
Speaker 1: barbed wire that the car was resting against. And you know,
34:25
Speaker 1: this impact that he sustained in this vehicle could have
34:28
Speaker 1: disoriented him to a great degree. And it's still very
34:33
Speaker 1: curious though for me as to why his clothing would
34:37
Speaker 1: be off of his person. My understanding was was that
34:41
Speaker 1: the shirt that he was seen wearing earlier in the
34:44
Speaker 1: evening was actually found at the scene. Is that correct,
34:48
Speaker 1: mister Landry. That's correct, and we know that because of
34:51
Speaker 1: those recently released photos. Is the same shirt in the photos,
34:57
Speaker 1: mister Landry, Yes, that's is a shirt. I know. I
35:01
Speaker 1: mean because he was snapchatting and instagramming with one of
35:05
Speaker 1: his friends while he was packing up to leave and
35:07
Speaker 1: it just changed into that shirt and watching the video
35:12
Speaker 1: and so I'm assuming that's what he was wearing. And
35:17
Speaker 1: you know it, for me as a parent to you
35:23
Speaker 1: can't even imagine we're talking about yes, ma'am, yes, ma'am.
35:27
Speaker 1: Just what why? You know, it's it's an interesting intellectual
35:32
Speaker 1: exercise for a lot of people, but for me, it
35:34
Speaker 1: hurts my heart to think that my boy is and
35:37
Speaker 1: it was cold, it was cold, and Wendy, why would
35:40
Speaker 1: he take his clothes off in the middle of the
35:43
Speaker 1: road in this kind of temperature. The airbags didn't deploy
35:47
Speaker 1: on the car. There's no side impact on this car.
35:51
Speaker 1: And this is an old car. Pastor, you don't get
35:54
Speaker 1: to make a lot of money, so kids get to
35:56
Speaker 1: drive old cars. This is a two thousand and three,
35:59
Speaker 1: So there's no And I understand mister that hundreds of
36:04
Speaker 1: hours of security videos from in and around Louling were reviewed.
36:08
Speaker 1: No evidence at all. What are the what's the police
36:11
Speaker 1: working theory right now, mister Landry, you'd have to check
36:15
Speaker 1: with them. I don't I don't think they the case.
36:19
Speaker 1: And just to be clear, the case was originally handled
36:22
Speaker 1: by Texas State Highway Patrol. About a week later they
36:26
Speaker 1: turned it over to the Caldwell County Sheriff's Office. The
36:30
Speaker 1: Caldwell County Sheriff's Office, you know, starting late, and of
36:34
Speaker 1: course with the issues with destructure of evidence and everything else,
36:38
Speaker 1: has kind of been running a race from behind, which
36:41
Speaker 1: is I think one of the reasons they've shared so
36:44
Speaker 1: much information so that they can get that one person
36:48
Speaker 1: to come forward who might shed light on something and
36:52
Speaker 1: make it make clear is this a tragedy? And in
36:56
Speaker 1: terms of you know, someone disappearing and they've searched from
37:00
Speaker 1: miles and miles and they're they're searching right now as
37:02
Speaker 1: we speak. Are they using tracker dogs? They started with dogs, people,
37:11
Speaker 1: drones kind of a specialized Mini Predator drone which is
37:15
Speaker 1: a new one. Helicopter's fixed wing aircraft have all been used.
37:18
Speaker 1: And horses, horse and ATV and stuff like that. Where
37:23
Speaker 1: is this why? Jason Landry, twenty one years old, driving
37:30
Speaker 1: home for Christmas break. We find his car, we find
37:34
Speaker 1: his cell phone, we find his clothes, his back back,
37:38
Speaker 1: but no Jason Tipline five, one, two, three, nine, eight, six, seven,
37:44
Speaker 1: seven seven. We wait as justice sun falls. Nancy Grace
37:50
Speaker 1: crime story, signing off goodbye friend,