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3 Girl Scouts Raped, Murdered at Camp: Case Reignited · Crime Stories with Nancy Grace

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Speaker 1: Crime Stories with Nancy Grace Sunday, June twelve, The Outskirts
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Speaker 1: of Tulsa, Oklahoma. Three little girls at Scout Camp, ages eight, nine,
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Speaker 1: and ten huddled in their tent when lightning cracks through
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Speaker 1: the air. That night. The three Girl Scouts, Laurie Lee Farmer,
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Speaker 1: Doris Denise Milner, and Michelle Heather Goosey dragged from their
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Speaker 1: tent and murdered. But why, I'm Nancy Grace. This is
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Speaker 1: Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us here on
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Speaker 1: Fox Nation and Serious eleven today and all this week
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Speaker 1: we follow the exclusive new Fox Nations series The Girls
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Speaker 1: Scout Murders. Take a listen to this. These woods in
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Speaker 1: northeastern Oklahoma are the site of one of the worst
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Speaker 1: crimes imaginable. Two busloads of Girl Scouts left Tulsa headed
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Speaker 1: for Camp Scott, a girl Scout retreat located on the
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Speaker 1: Cherokee Reservation some fifty miles away. Among the girls were
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Speaker 1: ten year old Denise Milner, nine year old Michelle Gouse
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Speaker 1: an eight year old Laurie Farmer. What happened next is unthinkable.
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Speaker 1: Three young girls being sexually assaulted, murdered. There are children's
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Speaker 1: names you always remember Laurie and Anisa, Michelle. They're there
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Speaker 1: and they're never going to go away, never going to
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Speaker 1: go away. Those names forever ingrained in our memories. But
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Speaker 1: what happened, What happened that night? Again, I'm Nancy Grayson,
2:04
Speaker 1: this is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us,
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Speaker 1: with me and All Star panel to make sense of
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Speaker 1: what we know right now. But first I'm want to
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Speaker 1: go out to a special guest, Carla will Hide, former
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Speaker 1: camp counselor there at the campgrounds at the time of
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Speaker 1: this triple homicide. Carla, thank you for being with us.
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Speaker 1: Thank you, Nancy. Carla tell me, first of all, I
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Speaker 1: dropped my twins at Scout camp every year for a
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Speaker 1: Scout summer camp, to earn their merit badges, to work
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Speaker 1: toward Eagle. As a matter of fact, this particular case
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Speaker 1: had me so scared I forced my husband to join
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Speaker 1: me to train. It's a volunteer and go to Scout
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Speaker 1: camp and stay there. It's sleeping on the ground in
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Speaker 1: a tent the entire first year of Scout camp. Of course,
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Speaker 1: they had nothing but a wonderful time. But I want
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Speaker 1: to go back to the time that these girls were
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Speaker 1: at Girl Scout camp. Tell me about the camp itself. Well,
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Speaker 1: it's a beautiful property in northeastern Oklahoma, in what we
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Speaker 1: call the Green Country. And I had spent every summer
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Speaker 1: there from nineteen seventy one through till nineteen seventy seven
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Speaker 1: and started out as a camper and became a counselor
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Speaker 1: and training and was really excited to start my first
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Speaker 1: year as a counselor. The camp is just beautiful. It's
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Speaker 1: in the rolling hills, forested, just beautiful greens, tall trees.
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Speaker 1: There's just nothing like it. Crystal clear streams running through
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Speaker 1: the property. It was just every year was like going home.
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Speaker 1: And you know, back in nineteen seventy seven, security was
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Speaker 1: a lot different for scouting, and you know now as
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Speaker 1: much as you depicted, it need a lot of volunteers
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Speaker 1: to be there to watch out and make sure the
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Speaker 1: kids are safe. It's interesting that you just said that
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Speaker 1: Carlo will Hi Carlos with me, former camp counselor at
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Speaker 1: this camp. During this time period, when I take the
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Speaker 1: twins to camp there or and when I camp there
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Speaker 1: myself with them as a volunteer, there were just as
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Speaker 1: many parents as there were scouts, and we were all
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Speaker 1: around position in tents around the children. My husband went
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Speaker 1: to my son's camp site, and I went to my daughters.
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Speaker 1: I also was a camp counselor. And when you said
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Speaker 1: it feels like coming home, that's exactly what it feels like.
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Speaker 1: We were in a beautiful national forest and there was
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Speaker 1: There's nothing like it. I still think about it. How
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Speaker 1: has this incident changed your memories? Well, you know, for
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Speaker 1: a long time, it changed my memories for the worst.
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Speaker 1: You know, I just remembered the murders and the aftermath.
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Speaker 1: But over the years, as you know, I've recovered from
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Speaker 1: the trauma, and I imagine that it did take years.
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Speaker 1: What is Camp Scott like? Take a listen to this,
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Speaker 1: just like it is today, I mean exactly like it was.
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Speaker 1: The sounds, smells, It's just beautiful place to be. About
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Speaker 1: four hundred and ten acres in total, so it was vast.
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Speaker 1: There was one road in and one paper road out,
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Speaker 1: one road in and one road out. Let's backtrack to
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Speaker 1: our cut one. What happened? Two busloads of girl Scouts
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Speaker 1: left Tulsa headed for Camp Scott, a girl Scout retreat
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Speaker 1: located on the Cherokee Reservation some fifty miles away. Among
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Speaker 1: the girls were ten year old Denise Milner, nine year
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Speaker 1: old Michelle Gouse an eight year old Laurie Farmer. What
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Speaker 1: happened next is unthinkable. Three young girls beaten, sexually assaulted, murdered.
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Speaker 1: There are children's names you always remember, Laurie and denisea Michelle.
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Speaker 1: They're there and they're never going to go away with me.
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Speaker 1: Is Fate Phillips, Cherokee screenwriter and author of Now I
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Speaker 1: Lay Me Down Faith. Thank you for being with us
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Speaker 1: way in on the area and the camp and that
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Speaker 1: night the three girls were drive from their tents and murdered. Well,
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Speaker 1: that night, it was a really stormy night. It started
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Speaker 1: out a beautiful day, as Carla will Height described so well,
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Speaker 1: a beautiful day in the Cherokee Nation, and then eventually
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Speaker 1: the storm. There's Oklahoma's famous for our thunderstorms and our tornadoes.
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Speaker 1: But that night a huge thunderstorm rolled in, and so
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Speaker 1: it changed the plans of all of the campers. So
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Speaker 1: they all huddled in the Great Hall, which is where
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Speaker 1: they went to eat in the evening around seven pm,
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Speaker 1: and they went out on the porch and they just
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Speaker 1: kept waiting for the storm to pass, and girls were
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Speaker 1: out singing and singing they called it Singing Porch, and
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Speaker 1: the rain just kept falling in the thunder kept rolling,
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Speaker 1: and then eventually it did pass, but it had been
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Speaker 1: such a great thunderstorm that the leaves were still dripping
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Speaker 1: with rain, and so rather than continue with their regular
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Speaker 1: activities that they would have normally done, and the girls
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Speaker 1: just all went back into their tent. Yeah, I could
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Speaker 1: see that, you know. I was just thinking about what
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Speaker 1: Carl will hit and Faith Phillips was saying about this
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Speaker 1: idyllic setting, and I want to go to Doctor Sean Robertson,
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Speaker 1: Licensed Psychologists joining us out of Edmund, Oklahoma, Professor a
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Speaker 1: Forensics Science Institute in Psychology Department, University Central Oklahoma at
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Speaker 1: doctor Seawan Robertson dot com. Doctor thank you for being
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Speaker 1: with us. The dichotomy of such a beautiful camp where
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Speaker 1: parents feel safe in leaving their children at these ages eight,
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Speaker 1: nine and ten. This is probably the first time some
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Speaker 1: of these girls have ever slept away from home before. Well,
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Speaker 1: the setting of where crimes can happen as really anywhere,
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Speaker 1: as you know, you can't necessarily feel safe just because
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Speaker 1: the setting is Christine absolutely to Joe Scott Morgan joining me,
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Speaker 1: Professor forensics Jacksonall State University and author of Blood Beneath
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Speaker 1: My Feet on Amazon. Joe Scott the dichotomy of when
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Speaker 1: you think you're leaving your child somewhere safe in this
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Speaker 1: bucolic setting, only to get that call in the night
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Speaker 1: it's something horrible has happened. I mean, it's not like
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Speaker 1: I'm you have a child living going to school in
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Speaker 1: inner city of New York City or inner city Chicago.
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Speaker 1: There you know there's a very high crime rate, not
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Speaker 1: that you want it to happen, but it's likely to happen.
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Speaker 1: But in a place like this on the outskirts of Tulsa, Oklahoma,
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Speaker 1: at a girl's Scout camp. Joe Scott, Yeah, you mentioned
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Speaker 1: the word be colic. There's something I like to mention
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Speaker 1: many times when I'm speaking to folks and teaching, and
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Speaker 1: that is, as investigators, we often have to view and
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Speaker 1: assess the abnormal in the context of the normal. And
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Speaker 1: it's a real shock to your system many times, because
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Speaker 1: you know, there's a lot of us out here, myself included,
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Speaker 1: that went to camp when we were kids. Can you
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Speaker 1: imagine being an investigator and having to figure this out?
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Speaker 1: And plus it's isolated uhha, very important Joe Scott as
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Speaker 1: to the mind of the killer and the way a
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Speaker 1: scene is processed. The isolation of this camp adds in
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Speaker 1: a whole another factor crime stories with Nancy Grace back
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Speaker 1: to you, Carla will hide Scout camp counselor there at
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Speaker 1: Camp Scott. What do you recall about that evening? All
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Speaker 1: the girls go to their tents after unexpected rain. Then
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Speaker 1: what happens when we got back to our unit, Kayla,
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Speaker 1: been quite a bit of time just trying to dry off.
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Speaker 1: As Faith mentioned, the trees were just dripping rain. We
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Speaker 1: put the tent flaps down just in case it, you know,
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Speaker 1: continued to rain and helped the girls kind of get
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Speaker 1: settled in, and you know, from there it was just
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Speaker 1: kind of a lively evening. You've got girls giggling, shrieking, flashlights,
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Speaker 1: you know, shine in every witch direction, counselors getting tired
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Speaker 1: and sleepy, and you know it's time to go to bed.
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Speaker 1: And we finally got everybody settled down and everything got
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Speaker 1: you know, really quiet. Were they having at the time
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Speaker 1: of cracker barrels that's what they call now anyway, after
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Speaker 1: the Scouts finish all their classes and what they're doing
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Speaker 1: during the day. They go back to their tent site,
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Speaker 1: but you're talking about Carla, and they have the giggling
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Speaker 1: and the flashlights and snacks and drinks and kind of
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Speaker 1: a little scout party, and then they go to bed. Yeah. Absolutely,
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Speaker 1: imagine everybody being in high spirits. And then after they
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Speaker 1: go to their tents, you still see a lot of
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Speaker 1: flashlights in there and giggling and laughter or in a
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Speaker 1: couple of screams, and then somehow, mysteriously everything suddenly gets quiet.
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Speaker 1: And I imagine that's what happened that night. Absolutely that
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Speaker 1: paints a perfect picture of it. Who are these three
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Speaker 1: little girls? Just think about it? Ages eight, nine and ten,
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Speaker 1: take a listen to this. Among the campers is a
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Speaker 1: precocious eight year old named Laurie Farmer, a natural leader,
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Speaker 1: protective of her four younger siblings. There's also Michelle Goose,
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Speaker 1: a third year scout. She has a passion for competitive sports,
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Speaker 1: particularly sonker. She sat in her mother's lap the night
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Speaker 1: before camp started and said that she would miss her
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Speaker 1: well she was gone. And there's Denise Milner, one of
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Speaker 1: only a few African American girls attending Camp Scott this summer.
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Speaker 1: Like her tentmates Loria Michelle. She is multi talented, participating
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Speaker 1: in gymnastics, tap dancing, and the church choir. Wow, I'm
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Speaker 1: just imagining these three little girls in their tents right now.
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Speaker 1: But some of them, as always at camp, knew they
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Speaker 1: were going to be homesick. Listen. As I began to
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Speaker 1: board the bus, I saw Denise and her mother. Denise
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Speaker 1: was visibly crying an upset, So I walked over and
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Speaker 1: introduced myself, said, Hey, Michelle, what's your name. Come on,
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Speaker 1: we're gonna go have a great time. You can ride
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Speaker 1: with me. And we climbed on the bus and she
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Speaker 1: was setting by the window and I was telling her
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Speaker 1: all the great things that we're going to do at camp,
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Speaker 1: and her mother came on the bus. Betty. She was like,
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Speaker 1: I could tell she was worried about her right, so
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Speaker 1: she can call me she gets homesick, But I was like,
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Speaker 1: I'll make sure she's taken care of. I'm just imagining
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Speaker 1: that Carla will hight with me. A former Camp Scott counselor,
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Speaker 1: an interesting thing happened last summer when I was a
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Speaker 1: volunteer at Scout camp much like this camp. A little
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Speaker 1: boy came down the road. There's no streets, they're all dirt,
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Speaker 1: and he was just crying his heart out. And I
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Speaker 1: noticed none of the counselors or none of the adults
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Speaker 1: were going to him. And I went to him and
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Speaker 1: I hope. I'm like, what's wrong? And he goes, I
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Speaker 1: want to go home. I missed my mom. And all
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Speaker 1: of a sudden, like three adult volunteers came and said
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Speaker 1: let go. I went what's wrong? And I let go
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Speaker 1: because of all the rules now, you can't touch a scout,
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Speaker 1: even if they're crying and snodding and they're homesick. But
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Speaker 1: guess what. The very next day, I went back where
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Speaker 1: the little boy had been, and he was having a
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Speaker 1: great time. He didn't want to go home. And I
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Speaker 1: will also added they get very homesick. Horrible cell phone coverage,
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Speaker 1: of course, but my entire batteries used up every night
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Speaker 1: with girls wanting to call home to their moms. Now,
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Speaker 1: some people have viewed this when you went over in
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Speaker 1: comforted Denise as some type of a premonition. I think
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Speaker 1: she was just afraid to be alone. I would agree
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Speaker 1: with that. I mean, I think all of us are homesick.
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Speaker 1: The first night away at Girl Scout Camp. I know
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Speaker 1: I was, but by the end of the two weeks,
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Speaker 1: I didn't want to go home. Yeah, that's the way
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Speaker 1: it always seems to be, Carla. So as we're trying
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Speaker 1: to was Joe Scott Morgan was talking about this isolated area,
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Speaker 1: figure out what happened that night? What is the layout? Listen,
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Speaker 1: when the bus stops end up at a staff house,
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Speaker 1: you're going to find out what unit you're in Wampa, Ohiowa.
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Speaker 1: Who was Comanche? And the youngest girls were in Cherokee.
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Speaker 1: The tents are arranged, typically in a somewhat circle or
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Speaker 1: U shape, with the councilor sent by the trail that
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Speaker 1: came into the camp tent one, two, three, four, five, six, seven. Lorie, Denise,
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Speaker 1: and Michelle were assigned to ten number seven. Thinking about
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Speaker 1: that layout and the fact that this camp, of course,
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Speaker 1: like all Scout camps, is very isolated in the woods.
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Speaker 1: Joining right now, another special guest, can't fred Us an
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Speaker 1: attorney out of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, former minority leader in
16:54
Speaker 1: the Oklahoma House and author of Oklahoma's most Notorious Crimes.
16:58
Speaker 1: Now Here is a guy that knows what he's talking about.
17:02
Speaker 1: Is the author of Oklahoma's most notorious crimes and of
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Speaker 1: Oklahoma hiking trails, So that's the perfect marriage to discuss
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Speaker 1: this incident, a triple homicide of three little girls, ages eight,
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Speaker 1: nine and ten. Ken Fred's thank you for being with us.
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Speaker 1: I'm sure you're familiar with this case. Tell me about
17:30
Speaker 1: the layout of the campsite and the isolation of this
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Speaker 1: remote location and how that played into trying to catch
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Speaker 1: the killer. Let me first say that this is clearly
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Speaker 1: one of the most notorious cases in the history of
17:45
Speaker 1: the state, and it was at the time. It was
17:49
Speaker 1: both a notorious case in Oklahoma and nationally. And as
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Speaker 1: the facts developed, you'll see that all of the factors involved,
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Speaker 1: and not only just the hideousness of the crime, are important.
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Speaker 1: But as far as the layout of the camp I
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Speaker 1: think it was very important because it was four hundred
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Speaker 1: acres of wooded land, It was completely rural, there was
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Speaker 1: no nothing nearby except a few isolated farm houses to
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Speaker 1: that night, and the hideous nature of these crimes, you know,
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Speaker 1: I'm just thinking of kids sitting around a camp fire
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Speaker 1: and everybody's telling ghost stories. They started right here. They
18:40
Speaker 1: started right here with Camp Scott and this story. Except
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Speaker 1: this is not a story. These are real little girls
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Speaker 1: ages eight, nine to ten that lost their lives that night,
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Speaker 1: their families destroyed. And the lore around this as kent fright.
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Speaker 1: It says hideous crime has affected scouting and hiking in
19:12
Speaker 1: general camping from this moment on. Take a listen to this.
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Speaker 1: And I did go out later that night because I
19:26
Speaker 1: heard a noise didn't really sound like an animal, didn't
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Speaker 1: really sound like a person. It just kept going on
19:38
Speaker 1: and it was kind of over across the fence, and
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Speaker 1: I went out with my flashlight and I started walking
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Speaker 1: over that direction, kind of trying to shine my light
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Speaker 1: and see what it is. When I would shine my light,
19:56
Speaker 1: the noise would stop, So I like, okay, turn around,
20:04
Speaker 1: start walking away. The noise starts again. So I do
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Speaker 1: this a few times, and I could just feel this
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Speaker 1: apprehension growing in me because I don't want to tangle
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Speaker 1: with whatever that is. I can't see what it is.
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Speaker 1: I don't know what it is. I guarantee you if
20:23
Speaker 1: she knew what that voice was, if it was associated
20:27
Speaker 1: with what was happening, she would have given her lun
20:30
Speaker 1: little second you're hearing the voice of Carla will hit
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Speaker 1: camp counselor at the time of this triple murder of
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Speaker 1: three young girl scouts, Carla, could you describe the sound? Yeah,
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Speaker 1: it was as I said, it didn't sound like any
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Speaker 1: animal it ever her, or like a human. It was
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Speaker 1: just a low, kind of raspy sound, like a like
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Speaker 1: almost like a moan, and it would kind of trail
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Speaker 1: off and stop when I shined my light over toward it.
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Speaker 1: And as I said, I mean, I did become frightened
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Speaker 1: and I didn't want to go any further than I had.
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Speaker 1: So you're saying it didn't sound like a person and
21:29
Speaker 1: it didn't sound like an animal, right, It really hard
21:33
Speaker 1: to describe in retrospect when you look back. What do
21:37
Speaker 1: you think it was? Well, because of its proximity to
21:40
Speaker 1: where I found the girls in the morning, I am
21:45
Speaker 1: guessing it was someone that it was possibly a human
21:51
Speaker 1: being at that time. Did you had any reason to
21:54
Speaker 1: suspect that the girls were in danger? Absolutely not. I
21:58
Speaker 1: really believed it was, you know, an animal, even though
22:04
Speaker 1: I couldn't identify it. And what time was this, Carla?
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Speaker 1: I would say it was probably about two in the morning.
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Speaker 1: Why were you up at two? I heard the noise.
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Speaker 1: It woke you up? Yeah? Did you ever hear screams
22:18
Speaker 1: no never, not no. Okay, guys, take a listen to this.
22:23
Speaker 1: And I looked over to my right and I saw
22:27
Speaker 1: some sleeping bags in the road, and the first thing
22:32
Speaker 1: that I thought was, oh, my gosh, you know, some
22:35
Speaker 1: sleeping bags must have fallen off the truck when they
22:38
Speaker 1: delivered all the girl's luggage. I better get it. But
22:42
Speaker 1: then as I started walking closer, I could see a body,
22:50
Speaker 1: and then closer could see it was a young girl.
22:57
Speaker 1: And recognized as I approached that this young girl, she
23:04
Speaker 1: was motionless, she wasn't breathing. It was just an overwhelming
23:10
Speaker 1: recognition that, you know, this child is dead. Carla. I
23:19
Speaker 1: cannot even imagine what you went through finding this. Describe
23:24
Speaker 1: for us why you were there in that spot, what happened.
23:30
Speaker 1: For the most simple of reasons, I had set my
23:33
Speaker 1: alarm for six o'clock so that I could get to
23:36
Speaker 1: the staff house and take a shower with warm water,
23:41
Speaker 1: because all we had were cold water showers. And so I,
23:45
Speaker 1: you know, put on my glasses, got a dry towel,
23:49
Speaker 1: and went out down the steps of my tent and
23:53
Speaker 1: started walking up the road. And there's a you know,
23:57
Speaker 1: a little um intersection of one road with another, and
24:02
Speaker 1: that's where I've found the children. I can't even imagine
24:06
Speaker 1: what went through your mind when you realized this was
24:09
Speaker 1: actually a little girl's body. At first I thought from
24:13
Speaker 1: terrible accident had happened. I mean I literally was trying
24:17
Speaker 1: to make sense of it, that somehow someone got scared
24:21
Speaker 1: during the night, and I mean as a ran into
24:26
Speaker 1: a tree and you know, died as a result. I mean,
24:31
Speaker 1: you're just trying to make sense of the unsensible. To
24:37
Speaker 1: doctor Sean Roberson, I hear that from so many crime
24:43
Speaker 1: victims and tangential victims of crime, like carl will Height.
24:47
Speaker 1: They're struggling to make sense of what their mind, what
24:50
Speaker 1: they see. It's like the eye is tricking the mind.
24:54
Speaker 1: Like her thought was was there an accident? Did this
24:56
Speaker 1: girl hit a tree? And that explains what I'm seeing.
25:01
Speaker 1: What is that some sort of a mental self defense? Well,
25:04
Speaker 1: most people just aren't. You aren't exposed to the violence
25:08
Speaker 1: and evil that happens in this world, and so when
25:13
Speaker 1: they run across it's a brutal crime. They they're looking
25:17
Speaker 1: for an explanation for how it could have happened, and
25:20
Speaker 1: especially out there in a remote area, like that, you
25:23
Speaker 1: would never suspect that a sexual psychopath may have been
25:28
Speaker 1: in the campground. Listen to this. One of the girls
25:31
Speaker 1: was out of a sleeping bag and the other two
25:34
Speaker 1: were zipped up in the bag. The one that was
25:38
Speaker 1: out of the bag had a blow to her head.
25:43
Speaker 1: The other two sleeping bags were zipped up, but when
25:47
Speaker 1: they were unzipped, they discovered the other two girls who
25:50
Speaker 1: had also been beaten, and all three of them were dead.
25:55
Speaker 1: They had been restrained with duct tape in one way
25:59
Speaker 1: or another, and one of them had a piece of
26:04
Speaker 1: cord around her neck that had something on it that
26:07
Speaker 1: they later determined was a gag. You were hearing the
26:11
Speaker 1: voice one of our special guests, Can't fretis former minority
26:17
Speaker 1: leader in the Oklahoma House and author of Oklahoma's Mastatorious Crimes.
26:22
Speaker 1: That's why no one heard any screams, Can't They were
26:26
Speaker 1: duct taped across the mouth. Well, that's correct, and also
26:30
Speaker 1: at least one of them was killed very quickly with
26:35
Speaker 1: a massive blow to the head. The other thing was
26:42
Speaker 1: that not only were they duct taped, but in one
26:46
Speaker 1: case one of the girls was tied with a cord.
26:54
Speaker 1: And that will become increasingly important the bodies. You stated
27:01
Speaker 1: one girl was killed very very quickly. Had she been raped?
27:06
Speaker 1: That's correct, there is. All three of them had been
27:10
Speaker 1: sexually assaulted. When you say assaulted, do you mean raped. Yes.
27:16
Speaker 1: Take a listen to this. The first responders observed that
27:19
Speaker 1: both Laurie Farmer and Michelle Gouz had very likely been
27:23
Speaker 1: knocked out by blows to the head with blunt instruments,
27:27
Speaker 1: while Denise Milner appeared to have survived longer than the
27:30
Speaker 1: other two girls because her body was still warm when
27:33
Speaker 1: the authorities arrived. All three girls were sexually assaulted and
27:39
Speaker 1: found about one hundred and fifty yards away from ten
27:42
Speaker 1: to seven. The bodies still warm, okay. Joseph Scott Morgan
27:47
Speaker 1: death investigator and host of a new hit series Body
27:51
Speaker 1: Bags with Joe Scott Morgan on iHeart. What does that
27:53
Speaker 1: tell you, Joe Scott, Well, obviously, you know you begin
27:57
Speaker 1: to think about the environmental temperature that night. Do you
27:59
Speaker 1: remember before and we have talked about how it had
28:02
Speaker 1: rained and that's going to cool the environment. The ambient
28:07
Speaker 1: environmental temperature will so that really focuses in on this
28:14
Speaker 1: one body that is still warm, because you know, after death,
28:17
Speaker 1: one of the things that we look for is the
28:20
Speaker 1: post mortem interval, and if the ambient environmental temperature is
28:25
Speaker 1: at a point where it is so cool and the
28:27
Speaker 1: body is still warm, you know, you know that she
28:30
Speaker 1: had survived for some time, particularly comparison to her two companions.
28:35
Speaker 1: Needs Time Stories with Nancy Grace. Joining me is Fate Phillips,
28:54
Speaker 1: a Chucky screenwriter and author of Now I Lay Me Down.
28:58
Speaker 1: You can find her on Facebook at Fate Philip's Fate
29:01
Speaker 1: Philip's Way in Well. I think this is one of
29:05
Speaker 1: the most disturbing parts of the crime, and there are
29:08
Speaker 1: so many disturbing elements to it, but the fact that
29:13
Speaker 1: one of the girls was kept alive for some time,
29:16
Speaker 1: I think indicate something even more sinister. Murders bad enough,
29:22
Speaker 1: but here we have something that indicates torture of some sort,
29:27
Speaker 1: and that takes it through an entirely different level of crime.
29:31
Speaker 1: What do you mean by that, Well, we have someone
29:33
Speaker 1: who is intentionally inflicting torture on a child, and so
29:39
Speaker 1: that that would indicate And I'm not a psychiatrist of
29:42
Speaker 1: any sorts, but when I consider that just as a
29:45
Speaker 1: human being of the kind of mental state it would
29:49
Speaker 1: take for an adult to take an innocent child from
29:53
Speaker 1: a tent and to intentionally keep them alive to inflict
29:57
Speaker 1: pain on them. This is beyond most people's imagination. And
30:02
Speaker 1: certainly when I learned about the details, I had known
30:06
Speaker 1: about the case for some time. In fact, people had
30:08
Speaker 1: asked me to write a book about the case, and
30:11
Speaker 1: I'd always said no because I felt like it had
30:13
Speaker 1: already been covered. And when I really started looking into
30:17
Speaker 1: the case and I learned more and more details about
30:19
Speaker 1: what actually happened, the horror of what happened that night,
30:23
Speaker 1: it just keeps getting worse and worse the more you
30:26
Speaker 1: learn about the crime. It really does. The three girls
30:30
Speaker 1: in their tents, all raped, all martyred in the middle
30:35
Speaker 1: of the night, and no one heard a thing. The
30:38
Speaker 1: forensic experts start their mission listen at the crime scene.
30:46
Speaker 1: Police begin collecting evidence, looking for possible clues. They find
30:50
Speaker 1: a red flashlight left by the bodies, its lens covered
30:55
Speaker 1: by plastic with a hole in it to make it
30:57
Speaker 1: harder to be seen at night, and prints a bloody
31:01
Speaker 1: bootprint on the tenth floor, along with the print of
31:05
Speaker 1: a tennis show. Wow, you know, Jessica Morgan, forensic expert,
31:09
Speaker 1: I'm all forgetting she prints. But that's really not a
31:13
Speaker 1: lot to go on, No, it's not. But what it
31:16
Speaker 1: does indicate to me, Nancy, thinking about the flashlight and
31:19
Speaker 1: thinking about the nature or the mode in which these
31:23
Speaker 1: lo angels died. I think it's it's significant in the
31:27
Speaker 1: fact that this individual showed up prepared, Nancy. You know
31:32
Speaker 1: when you think about you know, there was some cutting
31:35
Speaker 1: that was involved relative to the canvas on the tent
31:38
Speaker 1: to get access to the tent. The individual obviously had
31:41
Speaker 1: a sharp instrument with them to get access to the
31:43
Speaker 1: backside of the tent. But then you know what has
31:46
Speaker 1: been alluded to are these bludgeoning tools. This is the
31:49
Speaker 1: tool that this individual chooses to end their lives with
31:53
Speaker 1: and it escalates it up to a certain level of violence.
31:56
Speaker 1: So you would have blood evidence there, and there's quite
31:59
Speaker 1: a bit of it. And another thing, Joe Scott clearly
32:03
Speaker 1: the perpetrator, the killer of three girls eight, nine and
32:06
Speaker 1: ten years old sleeping in their tents a girl's scout camp,
32:11
Speaker 1: came prepared. This was not spur of the moment, this
32:16
Speaker 1: was planned. Take a listen to this. Law enforcement announces
32:21
Speaker 1: that two squirrel hunters have come across a remote cave.
32:26
Speaker 1: In the coming days, authorities say two more caves with
32:29
Speaker 1: clues to the investigation are discovered, and inside them, law
32:33
Speaker 1: enforcement says our photographs. A photographer at the prison had
32:39
Speaker 1: taken the photographs, and one of hard prison jobs had
32:44
Speaker 1: been to assist that photographer. If he had been in
32:47
Speaker 1: that cave and left things there, it would have tied
32:50
Speaker 1: him to the murder scene. And then in the third cave,
32:56
Speaker 1: somebody had scratched a note on the wall that said
32:59
Speaker 1: the killer wash hair I had a date. Ten days
33:05
Speaker 1: after the girls were found in their sleeping backs, and
33:08
Speaker 1: based on the evidence the police said was found in
33:11
Speaker 1: the cave, the authorities charged Jean Leroy Hart with first
33:15
Speaker 1: degree murder in the deaths of Laurie Farmer, Michelle Gouse,
33:19
Speaker 1: and Denise Milner. To Carla will Hike, joining us, she
33:24
Speaker 1: was camp counselor at Camp Scott at the time of
33:28
Speaker 1: the three murders and rapes of three little girls. There's
33:32
Speaker 1: really no way you could possibly know that out far
33:37
Speaker 1: away from the camp a guy is living in a cave.
33:43
Speaker 1: Just as astounding to think that someone that's actually known
33:49
Speaker 1: to be escaped from jail is living near a girl.
33:53
Speaker 1: Scout camp. It still just feels unreal. How far away
33:59
Speaker 1: from the camp was this cave. This is Faith Phillips.
34:03
Speaker 1: That cave is just about a mile south of the
34:07
Speaker 1: Girl Scout camp and and it's very remote. You have
34:10
Speaker 1: to walk through some woods to get to it. So
34:13
Speaker 1: most people probably didn't even know. Even locals probably didn't
34:16
Speaker 1: even know that that cave was there. And it had
34:21
Speaker 1: we call it a cave, but it was actually a
34:23
Speaker 1: root seller. So there had been an old homestead there
34:25
Speaker 1: and the house was gone and it was like a
34:28
Speaker 1: root seller in the side of a creek bank. And
34:31
Speaker 1: so they call it a cave, but it's actually a seller. Wow.
34:35
Speaker 1: I mean, how can you possibly protect children against something
34:41
Speaker 1: you don't know about? Well, I mean, what about it? Faith,
34:44
Speaker 1: Who would imagine to go a mile away and look
34:48
Speaker 1: for as it's being called a cave. And it's a
34:51
Speaker 1: good point. It's it's something to consider. I think that
34:53
Speaker 1: most people are pretty naive, I myself included, and so
34:57
Speaker 1: I living in the Cherokee Nation, I have always I
35:00
Speaker 1: grew up there, I always felt safe, and so I
35:04
Speaker 1: share that same sense with Carla that you would never
35:07
Speaker 1: imagine that something like this could happen. But On the
35:13
Speaker 1: other hand, having spoken to locals, I've found out that
35:17
Speaker 1: it was known that people would gather around that camp
35:22
Speaker 1: teenage teenagers and hooliganza is the word that they often used,
35:26
Speaker 1: but that was a source of entertainment. They knew that locals,
35:30
Speaker 1: some of the locals knew that that people would gather
35:33
Speaker 1: around the camp for entertainment. And in fact that Harold Barry,
35:38
Speaker 1: who was a highway patrolman, would go and scatter the
35:42
Speaker 1: people that were the teenage boys. I expose you would
35:46
Speaker 1: probably the best way to describe the people that would
35:49
Speaker 1: gather around there just to try and scare the girls.
35:52
Speaker 1: And so it wasn't known that that there were people
35:56
Speaker 1: that should that weren't authorized to be around the camp,
35:59
Speaker 1: not by Harla or by camp director, but by locals.
36:03
Speaker 1: They knew that people sometimes gathered around there that shouldn't
36:07
Speaker 1: have been there. I don't know that I would call
36:08
Speaker 1: them authorized, but I agree it was known. But imagine
36:13
Speaker 1: some guy living in a cave or an old roots seller. Guys,
36:18
Speaker 1: we are following the very latest developments in the exclusive
36:22
Speaker 1: new Foxtation series The Girl Scout Murders. Were following it
36:27
Speaker 1: here on Crime Stories all week long tomorrow. Clues emerge
36:33
Speaker 1: as the man hunt for this guy living in a
36:35
Speaker 1: cave Jane Hart heats up. Plus are more alleged killers
36:42
Speaker 1: on the run. Nancy Grace signing off goodbye friend,