Latest / Crime Night / The 40 Year Hunt for Tyra Garcia

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The 40 Year Hunt for Tyra Garcia · Crime Night

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: So I want you to picture this. It's June 7th, 1985,
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: and you're in Moorpark, California.
• 0:06
  Speaker 2: Right in the middle of summer.
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: Exactly. You're standing out in this vast orange orchard, and
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: it is sweltering. I mean, the kind of midday heat
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: that just bakes the soil, making the air actually shimmer
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: in front of you. Farm workers are moving through the rows,
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: doing their jobs, but there's this heavy, deeply disturbing scent
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: hanging in the dead air.
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: Oh, man.
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a smell that literally stops them in their tracks.
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: It's the unmistakable sweet and sour stench of decomposition.
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: Which is just every investigator's absolute worst nightmare. Because when
• 0:42
  Speaker 2: first responders finally wade deep into that brush to find
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: the source of the smell, what they uncover is horrific.
• 0:49
  Speaker 2: Lying right there in the dirt is a human figure.
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: Just left out in the elements.
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: Right, and the body is wrapped incredibly tightly in this
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: faded floral motel-style comforter, and it's bound completely shut with
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: a heavy-duty electrical extension cord, which is wrapped around five
• 1:06
  Speaker 2: times and then tied off.
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: It's just so brutal. Because the reality of an outdoor
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: crime scene in that Southern California heat, I mean, the
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: remains have been baking for so long and subjected to
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: so much insect activity that the coroner's investigators standing over
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: the body Can't even tell if the victim is male
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: or female.
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: It is the absolute ground zero of a cold case.
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: You know, you have no immediate identification. There's no discernible
• 1:33
  Speaker 2: cause of death. And you have a crime scene that
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: has been severely compromised by environmental degradation. I mean, every
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: single hour a body sits outside, vital forensic evidence is
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: literally just evaporating. Exactly.
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: And that's why today we are opening up a massive
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: stack of cold case files, witness transcripts and forensic reports.
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: For a deep dive into a 40-year-old unsolved mystery, we
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: are essentially going to act as your personal criminal investigators today.
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: We're taking you step-by-step through the fatal final hours of
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: 15-year-old Tyra Garcia.
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: It's a heavy one.
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: It really is. But as we reconstruct this timeline, you
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: need to keep something in mind. True crime isn't solely about,
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: you know, unmasking a killer. It is so frequently about
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: examining the cracks in the system that allowed the killer
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: to walk away.
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and the systemic failure in this specific investigation is
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: just glaring. It operates as this tragic masterclass in how
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: a single dismissive assumption made by authority figures can entirely
• 2:33
  Speaker 2: derail a homicide investigation before it even gets off the ground.
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: Right, so to understand that assumption, we have to look
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: at the days leading up to that gruesome discovery in
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: the orchard. So the timeline actually starts 11 days earlier,
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: May 27, 1985. Memorial Day. Memorial Day, yeah. Tyra's family
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: is having a completely normal holiday barbecue at her oldest
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: sister Teresa's house. The mood is light. Everyone's having a
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: good time. By 11.30 p.m., they are back at their
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: own home, just winding down. But Tyra suddenly announces she
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: needs to run out to a neighbor's house to ask
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: about a babysitting job.
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: At 11.30 at night. Right.
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: Which, naturally, her mother, Parky, and her sister, Tanya, push
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: back on.
• 3:14
  Speaker 2: Yeah, because it's late, and Tyra is actually scheduled to
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: start a brand new after-school job the very next day.
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: So.
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: They tell her, you know, to stay in, get some
• 3:23
  Speaker 2: sleep and just worry about the babysitting gig later.
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: But Tyra is insistent. She's not letting it go. And
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: this disagreement leaves the family with an incredibly haunting final image.
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: They have this large picture window in their living room.
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: Tyra walks out the front door, strolls past that big window,
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: turns back to her family, waves and says, I'll be
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: right back.
• 3:48
  Speaker 2: It's the kind of mundane, everyday farewell that families exchange
• 3:51
  Speaker 2: thousands of times a day. Yeah. Except this specific moment
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: gets permanently burned into their memories because she never walks
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: back past that window. Never.
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: The next morning, the alarm bells start ringing immediately. Tanya
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: wakes up and sees Tyra's bed is perfectly made. It
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: hasn't been slept in at all. But what really elevates
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: the panic is what Tyra left behind. Her purse, her hairbrush...
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: Her makeup.
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: Her essentials. Right.
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: All of her daily essentials are sitting right there on
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: her dresser.
• 4:21
  Speaker 2: Which behaviorally is a massive red flag. A 15-year-old girl
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: planning to leave home for any extended period of time
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: does not leave her purse and her makeup behind. It
• 4:31
  Speaker 2: completely contradicts the idea of a planned departure.
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: Absolutely. And then the family experiences something that sounds like
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: it's straight out of a horror film.
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah. This part is wild.
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: While they are frantically trying to figure out where she is,
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: A framed portrait of Tyra hanging on the stairwell wall
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: suddenly detaches and just shatters on the floor.
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: Jesus.
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: Her mother, Parky, views this as a terrifying omen. She
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: feels it in her bones that her daughter is in
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: critical danger. So she rushes to the local police precinct
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: to file a missing person report. And they turn her away.
• 5:05
  Speaker 2: They just, they refuse to take the report. And it's
• 5:08
  Speaker 2: because of a specific detail in Tyra's file. She had
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: a documented history of running away. Four times, actually, in
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: the previous two years.
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: But context matters so much here.
• 5:17
  Speaker 2: Exactly. To understand that, you have to look at the
• 5:20
  Speaker 2: psychology of adolescent trauma. Two years prior to this, Tyra's
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: father had abandoned the family. And he didn't just leave.
• 5:26
  Speaker 2: He explicitly told his children he didn't want them anymore.
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: Which is just devastating.
• 5:31
  Speaker 2: Right. That level of profound rejection fundamentally rewires a child's brain.
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: So Tyra's subsequent behavioral changes— you know, acting out, experimenting with drugs,
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: and running away— Those were textbook trauma responses. She wasn't
• 5:44
  Speaker 2: just some delinquent. She was a vulnerable kid in a
• 5:46
  Speaker 2: lot of pain.
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: But the police didn't see a traumatized teenager. They saw
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: an administrative nuisance. So they enforced this strict 48-hour waiting period,
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: insisting she'll come back when she cools off. And the
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: logic here is incredibly flawed.
• 5:59
  Speaker 2: Oh, completely.
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: Think of it like a doctor in an emergency room.
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: If a patient comes in clutching their chest, sweating, experiencing
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: a literal heart attack, you don't send them to the
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: lobby to wait it out just because their chart says
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: they have a history of heartburn.
• 6:12
  Speaker 2: Right. You look at the symptoms presenting right in front
• 6:14
  Speaker 2: of you.
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: Exactly. How does a history of running away justify ignoring
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: the hard physical evidence that she left without her money
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: or belongings?
• 6:22
  Speaker 2: Well, you're looking at the destructive power of confirmation bias
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: combined with 1980s law enforcement culture. During that era, the
• 6:30
  Speaker 2: country was experiencing a massive cultural panic about teenage runaways.
• 6:34
  Speaker 2: Police departments were overwhelmed, so they instituted these rigid 24
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: to 72 hour waiting periods as a filter.
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: A completely broken filter.
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Once that runaway label was stamped on Tyra's file,
• 6:47
  Speaker 2: it acted as a pair of blinders. Every piece of
• 6:50
  Speaker 2: information the mother provided was filtered through the assumption that
• 6:53
  Speaker 2: Tyra was just being rebellious. Even when Parkey returned days
• 6:56
  Speaker 2: later on May 30th to finally force them to take
• 6:59
  Speaker 2: an official report, the desk officer actually argued with her,
• 7:02
  Speaker 2: just diminishing her concerns.
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: And the tragic reality is that while the police are
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: telling a mother to just go home and wait, nobody
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: is looking for her daughter. It isn't until 12 days later,
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: Parkey is reading the Ventura County Star Free Press, and
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: she spots a tiny buried headline about a Jane Doe
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: discovered bound in an orange orchard.
• 7:24
  Speaker 2: Oh, my God.
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: Yeah. The floor just drops out from under her. She
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: has to go to the medical examiner's office. And because
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: of the extreme decomposition, she can't even identify Tyra by
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: her face. She has to recognize her own 15-year-old child
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: by her jewelry, the scraps of her clothing, and eventually
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: her dental records.
• 7:45
  Speaker 2: It's unthinkable. And the investigative cost of that 12-day delay
• 7:50
  Speaker 2: is catastrophic. I mean, I want you to imagine a
• 7:53
  Speaker 2: crime scene as a sculpted block of ice sitting in
• 7:55
  Speaker 2: the sun. The moment the crime occurs, the ice begins
• 7:58
  Speaker 2: to melt. Evidence degrades. Witnesses' memories fade. Suspects dispose of clothing. Right.
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: In a homicide, the first 48 hours are crucial because
• 8:08
  Speaker 2: the ice is still relatively intact. But by slapping the
• 8:11
  Speaker 2: runaway label on Tyra, the police gave her killers a
• 8:14
  Speaker 2: 12-day head start. The ice had completely melted. Now investigators
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: have to scramble to work backward and piece together the
• 8:22
  Speaker 2: puddle of water left behind.
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: So they finally start trying to trace her final footsteps.
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: They talk to the neighbors and realize Tyra never actually
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: made it to the house she was supposed to visit
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: for the babysitting job. Instead, she bumped into a neighborhood
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: friend named Renee. And the two teenagers decided to scrap
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: their plans and walk to a local 7-Eleven.
• 8:42
  Speaker 2: Which, you know, it's approaching midnight. Two teenage girls hanging
• 8:46
  Speaker 2: out at a convenience store. Today, investigators would immediately pull
• 8:51
  Speaker 2: the high-definition security footage from the store and the surrounding intersections.
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: Oh, easily.
• 8:56
  Speaker 2: But in 1985, you are entirely reliant on the memories
• 9:00
  Speaker 2: of whoever happened to be standing around in the parking lot. Yeah.
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: And while Renee is inside grabbing a snack, a tan-colored
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: car pulls into the parking lot. Witnesses later describe it
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: as either a Monte Carlo or a Buick Regal. Inside
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: are two Hispanic males. The passenger gets out and immediately
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: approaches Tyra, who's just standing near the door.
• 9:21
  Speaker 2: He zeroes right in on her.
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: Exactly. He starts bragging, flashing a wad of cash, and
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: tells her he has the best coke. And then he
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: asks if she wants to party.
• 9:31
  Speaker 2: And Tyra makes a fateful decision here. She agrees. She
• 9:35
  Speaker 2: tells her friend Renee that these two men are going
• 9:38
  Speaker 2: to drive off, pick up the drugs, and come back.
• 9:40
  Speaker 2: And she asks Renee to wait with her. Now, you
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: have to put yourself in the psychological shoes of a
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: 15-year-old who feels deeply rejected by her own father. When
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: older men approach with money, attention, and the promise of
• 9:53
  Speaker 2: a good time, it exploits a massive vulnerability. She's seeking
• 9:57
  Speaker 2: validation in the most dangerous possibilities.
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: Place. So the two girls retreat to a dark alleyway
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: that runs behind their houses, which is directly across from
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: the 7-Eleven. They stand in the shadows for 45 minutes.
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: Renee is deeply uneasy. She begs Tyra to just ditch
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: the plan and go home, but Tyra refuses. Finally... That
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: same tan car backs into a spot facing the alley.
• 10:22
  Speaker 2: So Tyra walks up to the window while Renee hangs
• 10:24
  Speaker 2: back in the darkness. Renee actually overhears one of the
• 10:27
  Speaker 2: men say they couldn't get the cocaine.
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: But she doesn't leave.
• 10:31
  Speaker 2: No, Tyra doesn't leave. She accepts a beer from them instead.
• 10:35
  Speaker 2: A few moments later, she turns back toward the alley,
• 10:38
  Speaker 2: looks at Renee, and flashes a thumbs-up sign. That is
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: the signal that she's fine, and Renee walks away, heading home.
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: That thumbs-up is absolutely chilling in hindsight.
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: It really is.
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: But Renee's departure isn't the final sighting. A neighbor named
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: Sally happens to be looking out her window later that night.
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: She spots Tyra down in that same alleyway area. According
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: to Sally, Tyra is making out with one of the men.
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: But then the dynamic shifts. It looks like an argument
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: breaks out. And then Tyra gets into the tan car.
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: The doors close. The car drives off into the dark.
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: And she is never seen alive again.
• 11:15
  Speaker 2: So finally, investigators have a starting point. They have a
• 11:18
  Speaker 2: description of a tan vehicle, two Hispanic males, and a
• 11:21
  Speaker 2: rough composite sketch based on the memory of the 7-11
• 11:24
  Speaker 2: clerk who overheard the initial interaction. Right. Now, the immediate
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: procedural step in any homicide is to clear the victim's
• 11:32
  Speaker 2: inner circle. You look at the people closest to them,
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: statistically speaking, before you start hunting strangers.
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: So they immediately look at Tyra's on-again, off-again boyfriend, Jimmy.
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: But Jimmy has a rock-solid alibi. He had been arrested
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: in the early morning hours of Memorial Day. He was
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: literally sitting in a jail cell under police supervision when
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: Tyra vanished.
• 11:52
  Speaker 2: Well, that rules him out pretty definitively. Yeah.
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: And they also look at a young man named Mark,
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: who had taken Tyra on a date a few days prior.
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: Mark had just been released from juvenile hall, but he
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: cooperates fully. He passes a polygraph test and even joins
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: the volunteer search parties looking for Tyra. He is cleared.
• 12:12
  Speaker 2: So with the inner circle ruled out, the police are
• 12:14
  Speaker 2: staring at a blank slate. They are forced to rely
• 12:17
  Speaker 2: on neighborhood street chatter, which plunges the investigation into an
• 12:20
  Speaker 2: incredibly frustrating maze of unverified informants. Tips start rolling in
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: about two teenagers from the nearby town of Santa Paula,
• 12:29
  Speaker 2: known only as Birdo and Jesse. Word on the street
• 12:32
  Speaker 2: is that they drive a tan Monte Carlo and closely
• 12:35
  Speaker 2: match the physical descriptions. Another local known to law enforcement,
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: Daniel Cabral, is also thrown into the mix.
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: So you have names and you have a vehicle match.
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: But when you comb through these cold case files today,
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: the follow-up is non-existent.
• 12:51
  Speaker 2: Wait, really? Yeah.
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: The police apparently never track down or interview Berto, Jesse,
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: or Daniel. They never even establish last names for Berto
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: and Jesse. They hold the leads in their hands and
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: just let them slip through their fingers.
• 13:04
  Speaker 2: That is... I mean, the documentation suggests that investigators simply
• 13:09
  Speaker 2: abandoned the street rumors to pivot entirely toward the physical
• 13:12
  Speaker 2: evidence recovered at the crime scene, which... You know, they
• 13:15
  Speaker 2: were likely hoping the physical evidence would deliver a concrete,
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: undeniable suspect, sparing them the tedious work of chasing down
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: teenage aliases. And from an evidentiary standpoint, what they had
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: recovered from the orchard was highly specific.
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: They had the heavy-duty extension cord, and they had that
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: floral comforter Tyra's body was wrapped in. And the comforter
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: is the golden ticket. Investigators find a commercial wash tag
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: sewn into the hems. This isn't a blanket you buy
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: at a department store. It belongs to a hospitality business.
• 13:48
  Speaker 2: So they systematically canvass local motels.
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: They hit a Motel 6, they check the Shores Motel,
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: and then they strike gold at the Wagon Wheel Motel, which, chillingly,
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: is located right across the freeway from Tyra's neighborhood.
• 14:03
  Speaker 2: Just right there. A maid at the wagon wheel confirms
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: that a specific room on her cleaning route is missing
• 14:09
  Speaker 2: its towels, its blankets, and a floral bedspread that perfectly
• 14:14
  Speaker 2: matches the one recovered from the crime scene.
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: So investigators obtain a warrant and step inside that specific
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: motel room. And it's an eerie scene. The room feels
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: hollowed out. But one detail immediately catches their attention. There
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: is a lamp that has been pulled far away from
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: the wall. It's positioned so far out into the room
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: that its power cord cannot possibly reach the electrical outlet.
• 14:39
  Speaker 2: It requires an extension cord to function. The exact type
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: of heavy-duty extension cord found wound tightly around the neck
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: and torso of Tyra Garcia. The physical evidence is just
• 14:51
  Speaker 2: screaming at the investigators, pointing directly at whoever occupied this room.
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: And the motel registry shows the room was rented by
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: two construction workers from Arizona. employed by a heating and
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: plumbing company. In the case files, they are referred to
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: by the pseudonyms Jake and Brian. Brian is a white
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: male with strawberry blonde hair. During questioning, he casually admits
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: to taking the floral comforter, claiming he simply wanted it
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: to lay on while doing mechanical work on his car.
• 15:21
  Speaker 2: Unbelievable.
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: Jake, however, is Hispanic, and Jake had recently purchased a vehicle,
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: a gold-colored Buick Regal.
• 15:30
  Speaker 2: I mean, let the specificity of that sink in. A
• 15:32
  Speaker 2: gold Buick Regal is a near-perfect match for the tan
• 15:35
  Speaker 2: Buick Regal or Monte Carlo spotted at the 7-Eleven.
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: I have to stop you there, because my mind is spinning.
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: You have two men occupying the room where the murder
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: weapon and the body wrapping originate. One man matches the
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: suspect's ethnicity and drives the exact suspect vehicle. The other
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: man literally confesses to possessing the blanket used to conceal
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: the victim's body. How do you not arrest them on
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: the spot? How do they just walk away? Right.
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: It's baffling. And the entire investigation hinges and ultimately collapses
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: on a polygraph test. Investigators administer a polygraph to Jake. Now,
• 16:12
  Speaker 2: to understand why this is a catastrophic failure, you need
• 16:15
  Speaker 2: to understand what a polygraph actually does. It does not
• 16:19
  Speaker 2: detect lies. It detects physiological arousal, changes in heart rate,
• 16:23
  Speaker 2: blood pressure and sweat gland activity. Sociopaths can pass them
• 16:27
  Speaker 2: easily by remaining calm, while innocent people can fail them
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: simply out of sheer terror. Despite this, 1980s law enforcement
• 16:33
  Speaker 2: treated them as infallible truth machines.
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: But surely they kept records of the interrogation, like a
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: transcript or something.
• 16:41
  Speaker 2: You would think so. But when cold case detectives opened
• 16:44
  Speaker 2: the file decades later, there are no audio recordings. There
• 16:47
  Speaker 2: is no transcript of the questions asked. There are no
• 16:50
  Speaker 2: notes detailing Jake's answers. there is literally a single blank
• 16:54
  Speaker 2: piece of paper in the file with the word truthful
• 16:57
  Speaker 2: handwritten across it.
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: Are you kidding me?
• 17:00
  Speaker 2: I wish I was. Based on that single word, and
• 17:03
  Speaker 2: because Brian was white and didn't match the 7-Eleven sketch,
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: investigators just stopped pushing. On June 5th, just days after
• 17:11
  Speaker 2: Tyra vanished and mere days before her decomposing body was discovered,
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: Jake and Brian check out of the Wagon Wheel Motel
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: and drive back to Arizona.
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: It is investigative malpractice. I mean, they had the puzzle
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: nearly assembled and just swept the pieces off the table.
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: But the story doesn't end in 1985, thankfully. Fast forward
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: to the modern era. Forensic technology has evolved light years
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: beyond polygraphs and assumptions. Detective Guy Moody and forensic scientist
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: Kristen Kanko are assigned to the cold case unit, and
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: they pull that heavy-duty extension cord out of the evidence locker.
• 17:46
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so in 2013... They attempt to test the knot
• 17:49
  Speaker 2: of the cord for DNA, but the sample is too degraded. However,
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: by 2023, the science of DNA amplification has completely transformed.
• 17:57
  Speaker 2: We are talking about touch DNA.
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: Wow. OK. Right.
• 18:01
  Speaker 2: Because when a person ties a tight knot, the friction
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: ridges of their fingers shed microscopic epithelial cells, skin cells.
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: Because the cord was tied so tightly, those cells became
• 18:12
  Speaker 2: trapped deep within the weave of the knot, effectively sealing
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: them away and protecting them from the UV light and
• 18:18
  Speaker 2: moisture that destroyed the rest of the crime scene. So
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: Kristen Kanko extracts a viable male DNA profile suitable for CODIS,
• 18:26
  Speaker 2: the national database, along with a secondary incomplete profile.
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: That is incredible.
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: It is.
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: Science finally delivers a concrete lead. But finding DNA on
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: a cord doesn't instantly result in a murder conviction, does it?
• 18:41
  Speaker 2: No, it actually introduces a massive legal hurdle. The DNA
• 18:45
  Speaker 2: on the knot proves who handled the cord. It proves
• 18:48
  Speaker 2: who packaged and disposed of the body. But remember the
• 18:51
  Speaker 2: condition of Tyra's remains. Because of the 12 days she
• 18:54
  Speaker 2: spent baking in that orchard, the medical examiner could not
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: draw blood or perform toxicology screenings.
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: So there is no medical cause of death. Exactly.
• 19:03
  Speaker 2: And without a cause of death, a defense attorney can
• 19:06
  Speaker 2: argue a highly plausible alternative narrative. What if Tyra willingly
• 19:11
  Speaker 2: went to the motel room, voluntarily consumed the cocaine the
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: men offered, and suffered an accidental, fatal overdose?
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: Well, yeah, I see where this is going. Right.
• 19:22
  Speaker 2: If she died of an overdose and the men panicked,
• 19:25
  Speaker 2: wrapped her body, and dumped it to avoid drug charges,
• 19:27
  Speaker 2: that is a distinctly different crime than premeditated murder. The
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: DNA connects a suspect to the disposal— but it cannot
• 19:35
  Speaker 2: legally prove they committed a homicide.
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: That ambiguity is a heavy burden for a prosecutor. But,
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: you know, the heaviest burden of all is carried by
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: Tyra's family. We spend so much time analyzing forensic reports
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: and questioning investigative tactics, but behind all of this data
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: is a family living with a ghost. The generational trauma
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: of an unsolved murder just fundamentally alters the people left behind. Yeah.
• 20:03
  Speaker 2: Tyra's sister, Tanya, has actually spoken openly about the profound
• 20:06
  Speaker 2: psychological cost The sheer terror of not knowing what happened
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: to her sister rewired her entire approach to motherhood. She
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: lived in a state of constant suffocating hypervigilance, terrified that
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: her own children could simply vanish off the street just
• 20:21
  Speaker 2: like Tyra did.
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: And to manage that fear, Tanya went to heartbreaking lengths.
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: She systematically collected her children's baby teeth. She saved their
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: fingernail clippings. She even stored their umbilical cords in a
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: safe place. All of this was a desperate, frantic insurance policy.
• 20:39
  Speaker 2: God, that's heavy. Yeah.
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: She wanted to guarantee that if her children were ever
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: abducted and left in an orchard somewhere, she would have
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: the forensic materials necessary to identify them. So they would
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: never become a Jane Doe. She wouldn't have to rely
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: on a police department that might turn her away.
• 20:56
  Speaker 2: And that is the collateral damage of a cold case.
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: It really is. But there is momentum today. This is
• 21:03
  Speaker 2: an active, breathing investigation. Jake and Brian, the men from
• 21:08
  Speaker 2: the Wagon Wheel Motel, are still alive.
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: Wow. Okay.
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Detective Moody is actively hunting down interviews and pushing
• 21:16
  Speaker 2: to secure voluntary DNA samples from them to compare against
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: the profile extracted from that extension cord knot. So the
• 21:23
  Speaker 2: net is tightening.
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: Jimmy and Mark have been definitively cleared by DNA. So
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: the focus is narrowing with laser precision on the occupants
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: of that motel room. And it leaves you with a
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: chilling philosophical question to just turn over in your mind.
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: We began this deep dive by examining a misdiagnosis. A
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: police department looked at a struggling, traumatized 15-year-old girl and
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: lazily slapped a runaway label on her file.
• 21:50
  Speaker 2: And we see the result of that.
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: Exactly. How much did that single instance of systemic bias cost?
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: It cost the investigators their golden window. It allowed the
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: vital physical evidence to literally rot away in the sun.
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: And it cost a family four decades of peace. It's
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: a stark, terrifying reminder that the most dangerous weapon in
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: a crime isn't always the cord or the gun in
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: the hands of the killer.
• 22:15
  Speaker 2: Sometimes it's the system itself. Yeah.
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: Sometimes the most destructive force is the apathy of the
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: very people tasked with protecting us. The casual dismissal that
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: leaves a mother waiting for the truth for 40 years.
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: Keep your eyes on this case. because the science is
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: finally catching up. And that truth might just be knocking
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: on someone's door very soon.