Latest / Crime Stories with Nancy Grace / Killers Amongst Us: Real Life "Hell's Kitchen," Gorgeous Restauranteur Disappears. What happened to Dawn? (part 3)

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Killers Amongst Us: Real Life "Hell's Kitchen," Gorgeous Restauranteur Disappears. What happened to Dawn? (part 3) · Crime Stories with Nancy Grace

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Hi, guys, Nancy Grace here, welcome back to Killers amongst Us,
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: the production of iHeart Media and Crime Online. Do you
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: ever pull up at a red light and look around
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: at the cars beside you also waiting and wonder who
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: are they? Or walk through a mall as people pass you,
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: you may or may not catch their eyes and you
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: wonder who are these people? I'm Nancy Grace, thank you
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: for being with us and joining us Killers amongst Us?
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: What happened to Dawn? Thence? Beautiful, young, healthy and a fun,
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: exciting marriage, just starting off a brand new hot restaurant,
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: the place to be there in the California community where
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: they relocated. Then suddenly she disappears. Take a listen. As
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: the investigation continues, cops talk to Don's friends. Or she
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: unhappy lately or depressed more exhausted. It's a tough business.
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: Did she ever mentioned like want to leave or leaving
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: all the time? So you feel it's unusual for disappealing? Yeah,
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: unusual but understandable. Where do you think she might be?
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: I'm hoping a ski lodge with the boy's toy friends.
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: Basically back up what David says. They're really sure that
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: she took off on her own, that she's somewhere with
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: a margarita on hand and enjoying herself, and she'll come
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: back when she's ready. If Dawn really has taken a
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: trip somewhere and police should be able to track her,
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: they run her credit card, see there's any credit card history.
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: Investigators also check US customs to see if maybe Don
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: had taken a flight out of town. There was no
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: sign of Donna. Hearing our friend Bill Graves, I read
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: the perfect murder. So did she just take off for
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: the beach? Is she's somewhere right now enjoying an awesome margarita? Uh?
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: Take a listen to what we learned from a friend
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: named Monica. Finally, a friend named Monica comes to police
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: with a real clue. Hi, what can we do for you?
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: My husband and I have been friends with David and
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: Don since they got here. We're regulars at the restaurant. Anyway,
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: you know that she's disappeared. But I actually just got
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: a test from her. What does it say? It says,
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: I'm okay, I'm in Florida. I'm starting over Pixie. Pixie
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: which is the nickname that David gave on that text message.
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: And of itself would explain where Don was and it
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: should relieve the worry from her friends. So she text
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: a friend that she's quote starting over. But of course
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: the first place you start with any missing person investigation
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: is talking to the spouse. Here's day Matt crime online
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: dot com. The investigation into Don Vienne's disappearance began weeks
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: after she was last seen. Her sister, Dana Pappen, and
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: friends went to the police on November eighteenth, two thousand
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: and nine to report her missing. Police talk to Don's husband,
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: David Vienn's. He tells detectives that on October eighteenth, he
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: argued with his wife about her excessive drinking. He said
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: that earlier in the day they'd gone to eat at
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: California Pizza Kitchen, and that he dropped her off at
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: home and returned to work. When he got home from
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: work that night, Vienns tells police that Don wasn't home,
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: says he takes an ambient goes to bed. He also
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: says Don wasn't home the next day. Ann Vienns tells
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: police that he texted and called her a number of times.
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: Police ask why he didn't contact police. Vienne says that
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: maybe a week or two after he got a text
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: message from her saying she was okay, and then she
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: was with a friend. Vienn says that he talked to
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: Don on the phone and that she came home on
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: October twenty fifth, begging him to leave Lomita and run
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: away to the mountains. David Vienn's claims he told her
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: to check into rehab in the next day she was gone.
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: Where is Dawn Thens Joining me an all star panel,
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: first of all a crime reporter or Daily Breeze at
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: the time, now freelance journalist. Larry Altman, Professor Forensics, Jacksonville
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: State University, author Blood Beneath My Feet, Star Poisonous Liaisons
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: on the True Crime Network. Joseph Scott Morgan, former police
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: Chief John's Creek twenty five years on the force, now
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: PI and polygrapher Chris Buyers at Chris Buyer's Investigations and
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: polygraph dot com. Renowned psychologist at junct professor Columbia University At.
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: Debbie Joffe Ellis dot com. Former prosecutor now defense attorney
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: Joining me out of the Atlanta jurisdiction. Darryl Cohen and
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: special guests Joining me. The Brother and sister of Dawn Vins,
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: David and Dana Pappen. David and Dana, especially you and
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: all our guests, thank you for being with us when
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: you learned Dana that Dawn, according to the husband, had
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: been drinking a lot. Were you surprised? No, I wasn't surprised.
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: To David Pappen, did she have Was she having a
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: drinking problem? I definitely think the restaurant business has something
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: to do that, you know, I think our heredity has
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: something to do with that. It was, you know, always
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: around growing up. She definitely had a drinking problem. Her
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: and I discussed a numerous times, but yeah, she definitely did.
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: I'm thinking about that. You said hereditary. Why did you
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: say that, David? You know, growing up, you know, growing
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: up in the eighties, you know our family, you know
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: we drank, you know, well, not us then, but you
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: know the haunts and uncles, everybody having a good time
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: at Christmas parties and Da da Da Da da. But
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: I think, you know, I personally, you know, had a
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: drinking problem in my twenties. M Fortunately, M I stopped
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: in my late twenties and haven't had a drink in
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: a number of years. But I definitely feel like there's
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: something in the bones of the pappens that that you
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: know that you know, we like that fun. I hear
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: you in the background while you in Diana. You know, David,
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: Dre We have a big family and we had lots
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: of get togethers growing up, and it was always a
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: part of it. You know, there's numerous relatives who have
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: high drinking problems who no longer drink. You know, um
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: an aunt of ours. We find out later in life
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: that Don would hang out with her when she was
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: a teenager at a local bar m So it was
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: just something that we were exposed to early on. And
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: I think also for Don in the late in the
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: last few years, I noticed that she wasn't ever drunk,
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: but she was constantly drinking. So it became a way
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: to stay balanced and normal, not necessarily to be drunk,
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: if that makes sense, but it was a need that
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: needed to be filled. What is that called to doctor
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: Debbie Joffey Ellis Psychologists Joining me at Junk Professor Columbia
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: at Debbie Joffe Ellis dot com. Where you may not
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: be drunk, but you always have a drink in your hand,
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: You're always drinking well, it sounds like addiction to me.
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: You know that the body will crave what it's become
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: used to it, it becomes a habit, and then it
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: sometimes takes more of the substance to maintain the equanimity
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: that the person temporarily feels as the results of ingesting
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: whatever substance. Exactly what about it, Joe Scott Morgan jump in, Yeah,
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: there's I think that in order to maintain kind of
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: kind of a balance in life, this dependency develops over
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: a period of time. And also I think that witnessing
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: generations before you engaging in the same behavior to kind
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: of cope with what's going on, particularly in times of
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: high stress, it's something that's that is part of a
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: learned behavior. I don't know. Some people put forth the
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: idea that there's a genetic predisposition to it, maybe to
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: addictive behavior, but I think that you know this learning,
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: you know, you're seeing how to cope with these stresses.
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: And man, I've got family members that own restaurants and
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: it is a high pressure environment to Larry Altman joining me.
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: Former crime reporter for The Daily Breeze at the time
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: of her disappearance, currently freelance journalist Larry. I just wonder
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: if her drinking didn't have something to do with the
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: way the case was treated. It was almost just like
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: a you know, a throwaway as she's out having a
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: margarita somewhere. Well, it may have been. And I think
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: what her husband told the police that you know, he
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: wanted her to go to rehab, she didn't want to go,
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: and you know, so she took off and I think
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: they took that face value. Guys, we were talking about
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: the disappearance of a beautiful young woman don Vin's with
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: her world in front of her. They had just starting
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: she and her husband David, a hot new restaurant. It
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: was the place to be. There's one in every town
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: that that's the place everybody seems to want to go.
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: But I want you to take a listen to reporting
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: on HLN, Deborah. The recent information that we got over
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: this past weekend is that after our show Friday night,
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: cops have now gone out and started re interviewing people,
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: interviewing friends. We also learned about the possessions being thrown
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: in a dumpster, the jeep being towed away almost immediately
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: after she goes missing. About a week and a half later, Nancy.
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: After she disappeared, a friend of hers saw her husband's
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: daughter and his new girlfriend taking her stuff. They were
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: in a car. They drove to the restaurant, took stuff
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: out of the car, and started throwing things into the
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: dumpster allegedly. You know, there was a few things they
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: decided to keep, but most of the things were just
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: thrown away. Okay, so you're telling me that they basically
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: went shopping and the missing woman's closet. They kept some
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: of her belongings for themselves. I have no idea if
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: it was for themselves, but they certainly did keep some things.
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: What I mean, She's only being gone a couple of weeks,
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: not even two weeks, and you see Dawn Van's husband,
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: daughter and his what new girlfriend throwing her stuff away.
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: Take a listen to our friends over at Perfect Murder.
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: In the Missing person's case of Don Van's detectives now
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: suspect David's new girlfriend, Nancy, who replaced down at the restaurant.
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: If someone's going to go into rehab and come home,
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: you don't throw away her close you put in storage.
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: Dave was not ashamed of the relationship, and it was
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: just it was just part of life when they talked
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: to the hostess to confront her. You know he has
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: a wife, of course, Tina, she left them. Is that
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: why you threw her clothes in the dumpster? Helper, Let's
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: see him a little crazy? Tennis investigators are taken aback
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: themselves by her candor. But you can't arrest someone for
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: being the jealous type. And you can't put someone behind
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: bars for dating a missing woman's husband. Well they're aren't
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: about that, But I'm curious about so many things. To
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: Larry All, i'mand crime reporter for Daily Breeze at the time.
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: Now freelance journalist, Larry, You're reporting alerted me about the case.
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: Why did it take our reports to heat up the
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: cops investigation? Well, that's that's where I say. You know,
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: I didn't believe they were doing a lot, And I
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: think all of the publicity that I provided initially and
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: then then that you did, made them have to do something.
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: And there was a point along the way where I
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: went into the restaurant and I spoke to David, and
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: I think that what she said and the way he
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: spoke of Dawn that all led to the police realizing
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: they have to do something and then you did the
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: story and and that's when it all really came together. Yeah,
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: I'm thinking about the girlfriends saying that she was jealous,
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: Daryl Cohen, So many times have you had a case
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: where a jealous husband throws out the wife's stuff or
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: a jealous wife takes all the husband's clothes and burns
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: them in the front yard. That's not that unusual. Actually,
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: it's not unusual at all. It reminds me of the
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: husband who takes off and the wife is unhappy, and
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: the husband says, please have the porch painted before I
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: come back, and the wife has his Porsche painted by
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: a house painter. Yeah, vindictiveness is not at all unusual.
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: It's I'm shocked and that I'm going to be vindictive,
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: and vindictiveness means throwing out his stuff, throwing out her stuff,
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: destroying his life, destroying her life. And now social media
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: can do the same thing. So, yeah, Nancy, it's not
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: at all unusual. It's unfortunately, very sad, but it's very commonplace. Yeah.
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: Chief Buyers with Me, Chief Foremen, Chief of Police, John's Creek,
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: Chris Buyers, now PI and polygrapher Chief. I've seen it
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: a million times. Well, not a million a thousand, where
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: jealous girlfriend, jealous boyfriend or spouse will slit somebody's tires,
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: will burn up their clothes, will I don't know, let
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: their dog go in the park and leave it, things
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: of that nature. I know you had to see that
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: on the four. Oh. Absolutely. I can remember when I
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: was very young police officer getting called to a fire
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: in a house in a very nice neighborhood here in
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: Metro Atlanta and got there and there was a new
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: girlfriend having a bonfire with the ex wife scoff in
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: the front yard. So yeah, it definitely happens. Well, okay, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait,
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: stop right there, I gotta hear that whole thing. Just
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: what happened. I got to the scene and there was
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: a pretty good fire burning in the front yard and
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: started looking for stuff, and it was a lady's clothing,
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: purses and all type of other things. And so I
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: actually wound up charging the girlfriend with arson because she
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: was destroying her stuff. But yeah, this happens all the time. Okay,
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: now you've got that against this dichotomy, y'all. Remember the
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: name Drew Peterson, former police officer convicted of killing third
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: wife Kathleen Savio. Her body was found looked like she
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: slipped in the bathtub. Oh whoops, except her whole body
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: was covered in bruises. She would have had to have
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: a fight with a soap dish. Plus, plus the bathtub
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: was bone dry. M Then the next wife, Stacy Peterson,
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: she goes missing. Her body has never been found, although
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: I've got a pretty good idea where I think it is. Anyway,
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: turns out Drew Officer Drew Peterson had gone through Stacy's
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: closet and take it out, her fur coat, lingerie bikinis,
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: and was giving it to his new girlfriends, Like why
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: would I want to wear somebody else's underwear? I just Okay,
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: that's a whole nother can of ORMs that we will
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: not go into right now. But the point is, you've
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: got this innocent, Well, there's no innocent burning somebody's clothes
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: in the front yard, but burning someone's clothes out of
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: spite and then giving away somebody's clothes because you know
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: they're never coming back to get their stuff. So cops
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: are stuck here, they've got no evidence, but they see
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: the girlfriend, and they see David Van's daughter with a
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: girlfriend throwing out Dawn's stuff. What about that, Dana. You've
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: got the daughter, the step daughter in on the act. Yeah,
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: and that is something that's been very heartbreaking for me.
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: When information came out later that she arrives to California
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: almost immediately after my sister went missing, it was the
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: heartbreaking to me. Though she participated. To Larry Altman, crime
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: reporter Daily Breeze at the time, currently freelance journalist, Larry,
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: that's kind of tough to take. Not only did they
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: throw out don stuff, clean out her place, and I
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: could see the husband being angry and his daughter piling
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: on because Daddy's upset, the girlfriend piling on because she's jealous,
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: but they also kept articles of clothing. Was that for themselves? Well? Yes,
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: but I think that if you talk about the new girlfriend,
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: Don had just left and so she was throwing out
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: the belongings that they didn't need anymore. Let's go to
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: our cut twenty seven. Guys. Take a listen. He says
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: he expects her to come back after ski season. I
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: believe is what he said. But then he suddenly moves
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: his girlfriend in and props her up as the restaurant host.
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: Is where your sister worked? Yeah, Yeah, how quickly did
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: that happen? Very quickly? Right, too quickly? A month, a week,
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: a day. I was told it was within a week
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: or two that they were seeing together and there was
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: suspicion that something was going on. Wow, something was going on,
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: all right, he moved her in, you know, some rebound.
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: It took him two weeks before he quote fired his wife.
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: I don't know how you fire your wife in the
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: restaurant you're running together, but he fires Dawn, tells her
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: to go to rehab. She takes off, and within two
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: weeks he's replaced her as the glamorous hostess at the
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: restaurant and moved the lover into the home. Now that's
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: quite the rebound, Dana Pappen, were you surprised at the
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: quickness that he had any girlfriend? Oh? No, unfortunately not.
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: I really, I really wasn't, David. Were you surprised that
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: he he quote fired Dawn and already had a girlfriend? No, no, no, no,
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: I wasn't. I wasn't surprised at all what happened to
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: Dawn Van's We now know that the husband is saying
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: she took off a rehab, But then he also said
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: Larry Altman he expected her to come back after ski season.
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: What does rehab have to do with ski season? Well,
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: a lot of time passed and we got through the winter,
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: and uh, like I said, I went into the restaurant
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: to confront him one day and I said, where is
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: your wife? And he he blamed it her disappearance on
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: the alcohol and said he had expected her to come
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: back after the ski season, that she probably had been
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: in the mountains, and so that was his explanation. And
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: when I asked him if you know he was concerned
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: about her, he said he just wanted her to be safe.
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: And I asked him, do you love your wife? And
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: he said, I loved my wife. You know, I want
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: to go to doctor Debbie Joffe Ellis. If it were
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: me and my husband was missing, I'd be laying on
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: the front of the courthouse steps begging for help. But
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: isn't it true, Larry Altman, that v's basically kitch out
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: of the restaurant when you came asking questions? Yes, I
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: knew when I walked in there that you know, I
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: had maybe two minutes. There was a lot of stuff
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: going on in there too. He was renovating the place
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: they were expanding into the next business to make the
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: restaurant larger, and there was construction going on and plumbing,
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: and I walked in there, and you know, I'm only
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: five foot four, Nancy, and he's a bigger man than me,
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: and I I'm alone, and I just I got what
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: questions I could get out quickly and and went on
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: my way. So, you know, it was I was a
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: little nervous doing it, but I just felt that day
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: like something has to happen here. Well, I mean, first
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: of all, he's got to decide did she go to
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: ski the ski season or did she go to rehab?
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: But you know, I can understand if she wants out,
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: she leaves no word left behind. But she didn't call David,
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: Dana or Derek to Dana pappened? Did you try to
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: reach her? I did try to call. I knew it
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: was a feudal effort, but I did make that effort.
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: Why do you say you knew it was feudial. I
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: was a gut feeling, I suppose was the amount of
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: time that had passed by the time that I was notified.
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: After speaking to other family members. You know, Mike got
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: was telling me that that's something bad had happened. What
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: about it? David? Did you try to reach her? Um?
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: I did? I did? Um? You know, I called, I texted,
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: you know, did what I could? I talked to David. Um.
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: You know he told me, you know, she left. He's like,
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: she finally she finally did it. And you know he uh,
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: you know, he was seeming pretty broken up about it
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: when I when I confronted David, it was in March
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: of twenty ten, so about six months later. He broke
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: down in tears, which for me was something I'd never seen,
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: and he said, you know, I had nothing to do
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: with it. To dactor Debbie Joffey Ellis. Um. It has
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: been argued a million times in court and other places
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: that there is no playbook for grief or anger or
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: how people at when their wife walks out on them.
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: What do you make of that? Well, I agree each
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: one of the scrieves in different ways. And if David
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: and Dawn had been having issues in their relationship, maybe
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: he wasn't grieving at her departure. Clearly, since he had
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: a girlfriend, he had moved on, so there's no evidence
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: he was grieving, nor that it necessarily meant that there
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: was anything sinister going on, Well, you're right about that.
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: The case goes dead. Listen, this case late dormant until
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: we reported on it, and then suddenly Corps A point
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: a brand new investigative team and start reinvestigating the case.
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: And now suddenly they've dug out of the bottom of
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: the husband's restaurant. Right, Nancy Well on October eighteenth, two
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: thousand and nine, is the last time anybody saw Don Vian's.
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: Her husband said that he actually fired her. They gotten
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: an argument. Whoa, yeah, the husband fires his wife from
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: the family restaurant. Okay, go ahead, right right. Her friends
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: claimed that he fired her that day. He says she
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: just walked away, took a Louis Vatton bag with her.
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: That was the last time he saw her. So, what
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: happened to Larry Oltman? You told me that there was
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: a lot of construction going on at the restaurant. Now
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: I find out the cops go in and dig up
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: the floor. What happened exactly, Well, the police suspected that
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: Don's remained might be in the concrete in that restaurant.
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: It had gone under a lot of myself. I saw
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: the new concrete, I saw workers doing things. When I
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: had gone in there and there was a chance that
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: she had been buried in there, and so they took
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: jackhammers and they just destroyed that place looking for her.
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: But as it turns out, Dawn as not in the
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: cement in the restaurant, they found nothing. But in an
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: unusual twist, Listen, Larry Altman had the big scoop last
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: week when he reported that blood had been found in
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: the couple's home. The husband and his new girlfriend had
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: moved out. Police went in with luminol. They found blood
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: spatter in the house. That was what kind of got
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: this whole new bit of activity going. And as Larry explained,
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: there's been this massive search the past two days trying
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: to figure out if Dawn's remains were entombed in that restaurant. Okay,
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: back to Larry Altman, who broke the story about blood
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: spatter being found around the family home. You know, Larry again,
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: you just can't put a price tag on a good
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: cleaning service. These two, the husband and the girlfriend move out,
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: Cops go in, I believe you said under the gall
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: they might rent the place, and they do investigative work
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: and find blood spatter throughout the home. Microscopic blood spattered
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: that the husband obviously did not see. Wow, that's some
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: good police weren't to former police chief of John's Creek,
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: Chris Buyers. They go in pretending as if they're going
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: to rent the home. Now, here's the legal aspect of that.
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: Nobody was living there. It's not like they invaded a
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: private individual's home and start testing with luminol. The place
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: was up for rent, so they act like they're interested
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: and they go in and test and find blood spattered
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: with luminol. That's a pretty good police work, Chris Buyers. Yeah,
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: it's great. I mean, as long as you have a
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: legal right to be standing where you are, any evidence
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: that you obtain is admissible. So yeah, that's great, great
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: investigative work. Hey, Nancy, this is David so. Detective Rodriguez
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: I believe was the detective in charge. He actually him
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: and his partner flew from California to Florida to meet
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: with my father and myself and he told us all
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: of this, and then he said, we're going to call
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: the Daily Breeze and put this in a newspaper. So
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: he actually pre warned the family what they were doing. Wow,
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: you know, to you Joseph Scott Morgan, Professor Forensics, jacksonvill
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: State University and star of a new hit series Poisous
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: Liaisons on True Crime Network. Jose Scott explained how luminol works. Well,
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: Luminol is what referred to as a re agent. And
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: so let's say, for instance, that someone has wiped away
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: a surface where we suspect there may have been bloodstack
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: that occurred. Well, what's blood loaded with. Well, the one
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: reactive agent that it's our element that it's loaded with
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: is iron. You know, think about it. How many times
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: do people tell you when you're a kid, eat your
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: vegetables you need to iron. Well, that iron is actually
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: a big clue because that gives us an indication that
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: blood was present. So that reagent reacts with that iron.
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: And you know, it's important what you said, because microscopically,
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: you might not be aware that, for instance, there was
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: some blood stain there. Say, for instance, you've left some
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: remnant behind, maybe you try to wipe it up. Listen,
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: you're never gonna get everything up. So when luminol is
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: applied and it begins to react with that blood with
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: that iron, it luminesces. Hence the term, and what does
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: that allow us to do well. We can photographic, We
• 28:55
  Speaker 1: can photograph that area. It lumines is blue. It's quite
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: remarkable if you've never seen it. And it gives us
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: an indication as to the dynamics of the stain itself.
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: Was it just passively dripped or was it sprayed? Wow,
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: so much to determine from blood found in the home
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: where the husband, David Vin's and the girlfriend move out.
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: But wait a minute, wait a minute, don't get too excited. Listen,
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: the excitement is short lived. Not good. What it was?
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: The lab the results for inconclusive. There wasn't enough there
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: for any DNA or any analysis at all. The kid.
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: It means now what, let's be true to follow again,
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: Maybe we missed something. They start going over the cell
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: phone records again, looking at all the text messages that
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: she sent out, Hey, that have a little jack dropped off?
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: Didn't it have a note? Here's the new thank you? Wow? What?
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: Thank you? Look this well? God pixie? Yes? And then
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: old Dawn send she spells a pixie and the text
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: stet Monica. Did she spells a pixy? So who sent
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: the text message to Monica? And suddenly investigators get that
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: break in the case they are looking for. You don't
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: misspell your own name, even if it's a nickname. Maybe
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: somebody else could send the text message wow. So the
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: blood text is nowhere? Why is that? Joe Scott Morgan.
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: Usually we think we create the case when we find
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: blood spatter. Well, yeah, and that's that's one of the
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: things we've run up against Nancy. You remember, what they're
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: saying here is that there wasn't enough for typing. There
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: wasn't enough certainly for a DNA examination. So the blood
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: sample that is left behind, there's an indication, like we
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: mentioned that the iron was there, but there's not a
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: what we refer to as a viable sample where you
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: can go in and you can kind of find that
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: genetic roadmap relative to what that information was it was
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: contained in the blood, because that blood has been compromised.
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: Maybe just maybe the individual that was attempting to clean
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: up Vie some kind of agent that compromised the integrity
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: of the sample that had been left behind. But here
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: is the kicker. Dana Pappen David Pappen, the brother and
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: sister of Dawn Van's with us. I would never spell
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: Nancy with an eye at the end I wouldn't make
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: that mistake in a NCI is in a nc Why
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: what about this text that went to friend Monica. I
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: played it for you at the very beginning. Her nickname
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: was Pixie Pixie, but in the text she spelled it
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: p i X. Why would she have ever done that, Dana,
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: I don't think so. No. She was a particular kind
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: of person when it came to certain things, very organized,
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: very thorough, and it stood out to me when I
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: found that out, for sure, it was weird. It wasn't
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: something that she would have done. Well. The blood evidence
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: may have taken us in nowhere, but it ain't over yet.
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: Nancy Grace killers amongst us, signing off goodbye friend,