Latest / Crime Stories with Nancy Grace / Court filing reveals how Tad Cummins pressured Elizabeth Thomas

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Court filing reveals how Tad Cummins pressured Elizabeth Thomas · Crime Stories with Nancy Grace

• 0:08
  Speaker 1: Breaking right now. The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation confirms the
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: signing a fifteen year old Elizabeth Thomas and Tach Cummings.
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: Tb I says Cummins use cash to purchase food items,
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: but did not buy anything else of significance. Elizabeth Thomas
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: was brand new to the Coloca School in Murray County.
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: She started as a freshman this year, entering the public
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: school system for the very first time. She's fifteen. He's fifty.
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: This is crime Stories with Nancy Grace to the Austins.
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: The Cummins was a teacher. A student reported seeing Cummins
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: kissing Elizabeth in his classroom in late January. Police arrested
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: Elizabeth's mom, Kimberly Thomas, last year. They charged her with
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: five counts of child abuse and neglect. Cummins told two
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: students he's a father figure to Elizabeth. He stole my
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: daughter from me. As sheriff's deputies race to Mitchell International
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: Airport in the search for Elizabeth Thomas, a schoolgirl abducted
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: by her pervy teacher, Tad Cummins. Bob Shell now in
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: brand new court filings, send a strong message from Elizabeth's
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: father claiming the pervy teach Tad Cummins threatened Elizabeth she
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: did not want to go with him, and more more
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: facts coming out in the search for Elizabeth Thomas. I
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: Nancy Grace, this is Crime Stories, thank you for being
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: with us. Anthony Thomas, Elizabeth Thomas's father, has gone to
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: court to depose witnesses who claim they have knowledge about
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: Tad cummins inappropriate relationship with his daughter. This as Milwaukee
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: deputies race to the International airport on a tip that
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: Elizabeth was en route on a flight with Tad Cummins.
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: An early morning tip came from a passenger on a
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: Delta flight from Minneapolis who reported that Tad Cummins and
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: the girl kidnapped girl Elizabeth Thomas, were on the plane.
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: Officers raised to the airport to find out the latest
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: on Deputies and t s A agents were on the case.
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: Media showed up. According to a passenger from Louisville, Cassandra Miller,
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: as we all know, fifteen year old Elizabeth Thomas has
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: been taken by her teacher, Tad Cummins. I'll get back
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: to you on what's going on at that airport and
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: what went down. But Alan Duc is with us. Let's
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: talk about what the father is saying this morning, Alan,
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: what do you know about these court documents. It's a
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: real bombshell what he's claiming. What this does is it
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: sets the stage for Jason watt Lay, the lawyer that
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: we've been talking to for the father, to do some questioning.
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: Repeatedly when we've talked to him, he's made a comments
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: and well, they're now not talking to me. There they've
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: shut down. I can't talk to these witnesses to find out.
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: So this is his way of getting a subpoena for
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: witnesses to force them to disclose details that might help
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: find Elizabeth Thomas. What I'm learning in this filing is incredible,
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: including the fact that catch this, Alan, Now this is
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: after after the school is put on alert that pervy
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: teacher Tad Cummings is kissing a student on the lips
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: in class. Commins was a chaperone, possibly the only chaperone
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: on a student field trip that Thomas was on in
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: late January. Remember Peoplessing incident was January twenty three. I
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: saw the patriots, but I didn't know that Elizabeth is
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: they Tim was on the trip. Not only that he
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: went repeatedly to the girls home without the parents knowledge,
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: and pressured her to go out on dates with him,
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: threatening quote repercussions at school if the girl didn't go
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: along with him. That Elizabeth told her friends, even her siblings,
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: she felt overwhelmed and quote over her head with the teacher,
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: that she was afraid of him, but was afraid of
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: what would happen if she said no. That he would
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: repeatedly show up where she worked at Chick fil A,
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: sometimes against the girl's wishes, and many times she asked
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: coworkers to lie when he would pull in and say
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: she wasn't there. That he told Elizabeth that her future
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: college and work career was ruined because of the kissing
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: incident and tried to make her feel guilty about basically
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: his suspension from the school. That you know her, the
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: whole feature was down the crapper. Another student found Elizabeth
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: sleeping alone on a hospital bed in Cummins classroom early
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: early one morning before classes began, indicating they had been
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: spending time alone before the school was open to students.
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: That repeatedly she told the friend who dropped her off
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: at that Showne's that morning that she did not want
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: to go and that she didn't even want to spend
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: the whole day with him, and she told the friends
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: she was meeting someone other than Tad. Comings I mean,
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: it goes on and on. I'm just touching. I'm just
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: hitting the tip of the iceberg. Allen, What do you think?
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: What are we going to find out next? That's what
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: I'm wondering, and that's what this is all about. As
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: I said, some of these people are hesitant now to
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: talk to Elizabeth's father's attorney. In fact, here's a quote
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: from the statement that the family put out. Perhaps the
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: most concerning element has been the hesitancy of some persons
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: to fully cooperate in sharing information that they know. What
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: we heard Jason tell us was that the father of
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: this student refused to allow him to talk to her.
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: That kind of thing. But we keep every day another
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: shoe drops, and we still don't know where Tad Cummins
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: has taken this child. You know, I've got the documents
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: right here in my hand. First of all, I want
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: to thank Simply Safe, our sponsor today in our continued
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: efforts to find Elizabeth Thomas. We're not giving up on her.
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: Other media may, other investigators may, but we are not
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: giving up the hunt for Elizabeth Thomas. Her life has
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: already been forever altered. She's never going to be the
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: same girl she would have been if she had not
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: been kidnapped by her teacher that said, what can we
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: do now to help Elizabeth? Simply Safe is helping us
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: do that. Simply Safe makes home security affordable and available
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: for regular people, not just millionaires living in gated community somewhere,
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: but regular working people like me and you that work
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: for a living and have a family to support and protect.
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: If you go to simply safe dot com slash Nancy,
• 7:26
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• 7:31
  Speaker 1: And one of the many things I like about simply Safe,
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: it's not married to your home landline or your cell phone.
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: So many cases I've covered the home invaders or the burglars.
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: They cut your line and then get into your home.
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: You pick up your phone, it's dead. Okay, that's not
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: just in the movies. Not so was simply Safe. They
• 7:54
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• 7:58
  Speaker 1: easy to install. Have a video. I looked to the video.
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: My nine year olds could do it probably better than me. Actually,
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: simply say thank you for being our partner and our sponsor.
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: I'm proud to be your partner. Now, Alan, I'm gonna
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: go back to these documents and and in paragraph A
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: it says the morning Elizabeth disappeared, she told her little
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: friend that she was seeing another team. Okay, she wouldn't
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: even divulge to her friend who was really meeting her,
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: but she did say she was having second thoughts and
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: that she wanted to go home. She made up a
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: name for that person, Thomas used the name Thomas. That
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: Tad Cummins, beknownst to the dad, had been showing up
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: over and over at his home, threatening the little girl
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: if she didn't go with him, she would flunk out
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: of his class at school. I mean, this girl had
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: never even been in public school before. She'd been homeschooled
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: her whole life. And then a teacher tells her that, heck, y'all,
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: I'll go out to lunch with you if you're gonna
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: throw me out of school if I don't. She didn't
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: even know any better. She told her sister and friends
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: she was scared of Tad Cummins and felt that she
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: couldn't say no to him. You know, this makes me sick,
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: And can you believe that according to this document, Tad
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: Commins and they were on his Facebook. I saw the
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: pictures of him with all these other young girls taking
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: them on a quote field trip, and Elizabeth was on
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: the trip. And this is after he's been caught kissing
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: her on the mouth at school. What was the school thinking?
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: It defies my understanding. And I don't know. And I
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: hope that the fact that his wife, Jill Cummins, worked
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: at the Board of Education as an executive assistant. I
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: hope that had nothing to do with it. Well, let
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: me tell you something. My twins today went on their
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: very first away from school out of the city field trip. Okay,
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: and I'm about had a fit. Let me tell you something.
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: You know where mommy was this morning at six am
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: up in that school parking lot, smelling the breath of
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: the school bus driver. Oh yes, I did. I got
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: right up interface and said, oh, thank you so much,
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: smelling extra friendly? Why this Nancy? And then um, then
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: I walked all over that school bus. I mean it
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: was a charter bus, and because there's so many they
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: wouldn't fitness school bus. It was all the third grade
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: stuff together, and um looked at the bathroom, looked at
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: every seat, walked up and down, you know, like I
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: was just going, oh hey, I was looking everywhere to
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: see if there were any adults in there that I
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: didn't know, checked out all the chaperonnes. Of course, if
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: parents had been invited out have been right up in there, Allen,
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: But sadly it was just the teachers. I checked them
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: all out, looked at them, saw who all was going,
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: where my children were sitting, and then I sadly and
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: irritably went and sat in my car until they left.
• 11:07
  Speaker 1: I started to follow them, but Lucy and John David
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: are onto me. I mean, I know they look out
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: the back window and see me. You know. So I
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: didn't do it, but I wanted to. Alan. But can
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: you imagine a teacher has kissed your girl in the
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: mouth and then they have him chaperoning a field trip
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: with her? Uh uh m? No, Alan in Oh, where
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: was the disconnect on this? Something disconnected someplace? Don't don't
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: throw your California phraseology on me. Disconnect that's just outright stupid. Okay,
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: I'm putting it out there. You've lived in l A
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: long enough, it's rapped out. I didn't go to some
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: middle Georgia School. I went to Carrollton, Georgia, Carrolton High School.
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: We learned that at West Georgia College. I learned those
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: big words disconnect. So it's just flat out s t
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: U P. I d to send this child on a
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: trip with him? Why is he taking anybody anywhere after
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: he's been caught kissing a girl in the mouth. If
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: I were all the other two parents, I'd be mad
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: to not just Elizabeth's parents. Disconnect. That's the only word,
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: and that's that's that's the word that I learned my my,
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: my grammar teacher taught me that one putting perfume on
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: the pig. So tell me what is the latest that
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: law enforcement is saying. Check the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation,
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: and they've not said anything about this case, at least
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: on social media or really publicly now for more than
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: a week. The last thing that we've heard from them
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: was the confirmed sighting in Oklahoma City that dates back
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: to March, and then the false alarm in Nebraska a
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: week ago, and then the other false alarm this week.
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: This brings up this question, what do you do if
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: you think you see Tad and Elizabeth? What do you do.
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: Don't try to call the t B. I forget about it. Now,
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: hold on to the moment. I want to go back
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: to that woman who tried her best. The passenger aboard
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: a Delta flight from Indian Minneapolis who reported Cummins and
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: Thomas were on the plane. I mean, how could they
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: Let's just say they were They were not on the plane.
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: Let me just say that right now. They were not
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: on the plane. But thank you lady who called it
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: in for trying. But let's just say they try to
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: take a flight they have to. I don't know. I mean,
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: I don't know if T. S A would catch it
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: or not. If they came in with his driver's license
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: and his I D. If you have a minor, you
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: don't have to have I D for the Meyer. I
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: think it would have done all kinds of red flags.
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: I don't think that they cannot get spotted and get
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: on a commercial flight in the USA. I don't think
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: that can happen. Well, they're living somewhere, and they're eating somewhere,
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: and nobody has spotted them since that signing in the
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: walmart in Oklahoma, Oklahoma City, and that was just two
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: days after they vanished. The other Nebraska McDonald's signing, which
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: looks so much like them. I don't think that was
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: not them. See I thought it did. The guy had
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: the sport chopped beard, and his belly was a little
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: bit bigger, believe it or not than tads. Well you're
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: paying a lot more to attention to his belly than
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: I am. I thought it looked like them with a
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: change of hair. But when you look, when you really look,
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: you see that it's not them. So that was a
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: false siding. This delta signing was a false sighting. So
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: are we just gonna lay down and accept that they're
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: gone and there's nothing we can do about it now.
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: I think that the sidings, the even the false sightings
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: are a good sign because it means people are aware
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: all over the country and they have a general idea.
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: But please, people, look at the pictures that are posted
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: on crime line dot com. Look at those and get
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: a really get that in your head, because they could
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: be down the street, They could be in your backyard
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: in the woods camping. You may see them. Who knows.
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: I think that they're they're probably changing their appearance even more. Well,
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: another thing is I'm sure he's intimidating her in line
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: to her. You know that, because he's already lied to
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: everybody else, why not? Why would he stop now? I
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: think he's probably gone ahead and shaved his face completely.
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: There's some reason that he chose to color his goatee
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: as opposed to cutting it off, and I wonder what
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: that is. Must have been one of those CIA tricks
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: he learned, Vanity, Vanity. That name is Tad Cummins. Cummins, white, male,
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: six ft tall, about two hundred pounds, brown hair, and
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: I think he more than two hunds. He does. He
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: looks like he's two ft. Believed to be armed with
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: two handguns tipline D T B I find or nine
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: one one. And if they're going to be sided, it's
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: going to base somewhere like Walmart, getting provisions. He loves Walmart,
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: a superstore, summer like Walmart. As the days pass, this
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: is going to be more and more under the radar,
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: But I for one, have not forgotten it. That is
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: the important thing. The reason the lawyers and the prosecutor
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: and the police talk to us and let us know
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: things is because we need information to keep you interested
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: in this case, because out of sight, out of mind,
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: we're gonna keep following this. You may get tired of it,
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: but I don't think people are. We don't need to
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: let this guy go under the radar and be forgotten.
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: You know. I hope I never see him again, except
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: when he's handcuffed and looked. But for her, I mean,
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: she's got a chance that a real life. Not so
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: much for him, but it's amazing to me he can
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: just turn his back on his wife, his children, his grandchildren,
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: everything for what. We're not giving up on Elizabeth. Yes,
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: there are other cases that have bubbled up to the
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: surface since Elizabeth was kidnapped by her school teacher, but
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: we're not giving up as we also cover those cases.
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: Please don't give up on finding Elizabeth Thomas and bringing
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: her home again. Simply say thank you so much for
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: making this podcast possible and being our partner and finding
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: Elizabeth Thomas and so many others we are searching for,
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: finding missing people, solving unsolved Thomas sides, highlighting crimes and
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: social injustice. That's what Crime Stories is all about. I
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: want to thank you for being with us. Alan is
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: always Thank you. Friend. Nancy Grace Crime Stories signing off,
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: goodbye friend,