Latest / Crime and Horror / BYU coed murder took 25 years to solve

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BYU coed murder took 25 years to solve · Crime and Horror

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Speaker 1: One evening in March of nineteen seventy four, an investigator
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Speaker 1: in Salt Lake City, Utah, sat across an interrogation table
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Speaker 1: from a man who claimed he had psychic powers. Now,
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Speaker 1: the investigator had naturally been quite skeptical of this man
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Speaker 1: and his powers, but the man began giving him a
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Speaker 1: bunch of very specific visions about the case the investigator
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Speaker 1: was trying to solve, and in fact, some of the
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Speaker 1: information he was revealing was enough to make the investigator
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Speaker 1: wonder could this man actually be a psychic or was
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Speaker 1: he the killer? But before we get into today's story,
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Speaker 1: if you're a fan of the strange, dark and mysterious
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Speaker 1: delivered in story format, then you've come to the right place,
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Speaker 1: don't miss any of our weekly uploads. Okay, let's get
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Speaker 1: into today's story. On March eleventh, nineteen seventy four, twenty
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Speaker 1: two year old Barbara Rocky sat at a desk in
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Speaker 1: her bedroom in Provo, Utah, writing furiously as she was writing.
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Speaker 1: Eventually she paused for a minute to reread what she
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Speaker 1: had written, but she wasn't quite happy yet, so she
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Speaker 1: added a few more lines. The letter she was writing
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Speaker 1: was for her roommates, and she knew it had to
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Speaker 1: be perfect because Barbara was saying goodbye. So Barbara was
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Speaker 1: a junior at Brigham Young University or BYU, which was
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Speaker 1: a very religious school where most students were practicing Mormons,
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Speaker 1: but not Barbara. She had chosen to go to BYU
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Speaker 1: because of religion, but really just because she was fascinated
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Speaker 1: by it and thought going to a school structured around
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Speaker 1: faith would be very interesting. But when she actually got there,
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Speaker 1: she immediately felt out of place because her classmates went
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Speaker 1: to church every week for hours at a time, and
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Speaker 1: they all followed a pretty strict set of behavioral rules
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Speaker 1: and values, which wasn't really Barbara's thing. Barbara was from
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Speaker 1: California and considered herself more of a free spirit who
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Speaker 1: liked exploring new ideas and trying new things, so Over
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Speaker 1: the last three years, Barbara had felt both frustrated and
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Speaker 1: also alienated by the other students' very rigid lifestyles. She'd
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Speaker 1: been hoping that that would change with her new living situation.
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Speaker 1: She'd just moved in with seven other girls in January,
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Speaker 1: but now just two months into that, it was already
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Speaker 1: very obvious that those girls did not like her. They
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Speaker 1: were just as religious as the rest of the kids
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Speaker 1: at BYU, and they seemed to think Barbara was weird
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Speaker 1: for doing things like dating around and experimenting with different religions.
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Speaker 2: It just didn't make sense to them.
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Speaker 1: So Barbara had decided that instead of trying to change
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Speaker 1: her roommate's minds, she would just lean into this kind
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Speaker 1: of weird behavior, as they called it. Barbara basically started
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Speaker 1: making them uncomfortable on purpose, like by saying she prayed
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Speaker 1: to the devil, which totally shocked them. And after a while,
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Speaker 1: Barbara had really got the sense that these girls they
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Speaker 1: weren't just weirded out by her, they were now actively
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Speaker 1: scared of her, which really alienated Barbara a whole lot more.
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Speaker 1: And so all of that was why Barbara was now
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Speaker 1: writing this letter. She was telling her roommates that she
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Speaker 1: was just going to go ahead and leave campus for
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Speaker 1: a while to be with people that actually understood her.
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Speaker 1: And the people she was thinking of were people like
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Speaker 1: Richard find Her, they self proclaimed psychic that Barbara had
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Speaker 1: connected with after she had called into a radio show
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Speaker 1: where Richard had been giving psychic readings, and the two
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Speaker 1: of them had connected immediately because even though Richard was
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Speaker 1: almost a decade older than her, he understood Barbara in
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Speaker 1: a way that no one else in her life did,
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Speaker 1: and ever since they'd had this really intense relationship that
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Speaker 1: felt both romantic and spiritual at the same time. But
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Speaker 1: since Richard lived far away, most of their relationship so
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Speaker 1: far had been over the phone, and so Barbara thought
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Speaker 1: it might be nice to be physically closer to Richard
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Speaker 1: and also his circle of friends. But there was another
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Speaker 1: reason Barbara wanted to get away from BYU, and that
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Speaker 1: was because she had started to feel unsafe being a
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Speaker 1: young woman on a college campus. So recently there had
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Speaker 1: been some scary national news stories about college women being
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Speaker 1: attacked on campus. One student in Washington State had been
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Speaker 1: beaten and almost killed in her dorm room in January,
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Speaker 1: and another woman had gone missing the following month, and
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Speaker 1: even though these attacks had not literally happened to BYU,
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Speaker 1: it still freaked Barbara out. I mean, especially because these
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Speaker 1: women who had been targeted just looked a lot like
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Speaker 1: her physically, with long, dark hair and sort of similar features.
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Speaker 1: And so as a precaution, Barbara had been taking judo
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Speaker 1: classes at school and even got her best friend, Jerry Hicker,
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Speaker 1: to help her buy a gun. Except Barbara had actually
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Speaker 1: lost her gun recently. She'd not been able to find
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Speaker 1: it for the last few weeks. She'd reported it missing
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Speaker 1: to the campus police, but she really had no idea
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Speaker 1: where it went. But for now, Barbara forgot about the
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Speaker 1: gun and just took a deep breath and finished up
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Speaker 1: her goodbye letter. Then she glanced over at the clock
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Speaker 1: and saw it was almost ten am, and so she
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Speaker 1: had to.
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Speaker 2: Get to class.
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Speaker 1: So she grabbed the letter and put it inside of
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Speaker 1: her purse, where she also was holding a turquoise necklace,
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Speaker 1: which she planned to sell that day. It was the
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Speaker 1: single most valuable thing that she owned, and she was
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Speaker 1: going to pawn it to get some seed money to
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Speaker 1: leave town. She'd figure out her actual destination based on
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Speaker 1: how much she got for it. As Barbara threw her
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Speaker 1: bag over her shoulder and got ready to leave, she
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Speaker 1: heard a car pull into the driveway outside, which was
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Speaker 1: a relief because she'd actually let her best friend Jerry
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Speaker 1: borrow her car to go skiing the other day, and
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Speaker 1: she had been hoping he would drop it off before
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Speaker 1: she left her class, and so clearly that's what he
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Speaker 1: was doing. And so Barbara hurried out her front door,
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Speaker 1: and sure enough, there was her car, and there was
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Speaker 1: Jerry climbing up and waving her keys, basically being like.
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Speaker 2: Hey, I'm back.
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Speaker 1: As Jerry handed the car keys back over to Barbara,
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Speaker 1: he asked her if they were still on for hanging
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Speaker 1: out later. But Barbara was busy thinking about getting to
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Speaker 1: class and the logistics of selling her necklace. She had
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Speaker 1: decided that Salt Lake City would have more pawn shops
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Speaker 1: that would pay better, and it was also less than
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Speaker 1: an hour north, and so now that Jerry had dropped
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Speaker 1: her car off, she could drive up there right after class.
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Speaker 1: And so, you know, Barbara just kind of nodded at
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Speaker 1: Jerry and whatever he was saying, and then she took
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Speaker 1: the keys, jumped in her car, and she was off.
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Speaker 1: Over an hour later, Barbara was sitting in her social
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Speaker 1: work class waiting for the teacher to dismiss them, and
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Speaker 1: as she was sitting there, she began to hear some
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Speaker 1: students whispering behind her, and as they did, even though
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Speaker 1: she couldn't quite hear what they were saying, she began
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Speaker 1: to feel her face get red because even though she
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Speaker 1: didn't know if they were talking about her, if they were,
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Speaker 1: it certainly would not be the first time people talked
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Speaker 1: about her a lot, so Barbara just did her best
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Speaker 1: to try to ignore them, and then as soon as
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Speaker 1: the teacher said they could go, she jumped up and
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Speaker 1: shoved her books into her back, and then she hurried
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Speaker 1: out of the building to where her car was parked.
7:05
Speaker 1: She got in and pulled out of the lot, and
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Speaker 1: as she made her way down the street, she actually
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Speaker 1: felt a wave of excitement. She couldn't wait to sell
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Speaker 1: this necklace and finally get out of this place. About
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Speaker 1: three hours later, Barbara's best friend, Jerry, walked up the
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Speaker 1: sidewalk to Barbara's house. He thought they had plans to
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Speaker 1: meet up that afternoon, but Barbara never showed, and Barbara
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Speaker 1: did not usually just blow off plans without calling, so
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Speaker 1: now he was actually at her house just to make
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Speaker 1: sure she was okay, and now Jerry noticed that her
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Speaker 1: car was not in her driveway, so he just stood
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Speaker 1: there for a minute, wondering if maybe he should go
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Speaker 1: in and ask her roommates where she was, but he
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Speaker 1: ultimately decided against it and just instead headed back to
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Speaker 1: his place. But after beginning the walk back to his place,
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Speaker 1: he passed by an apartment complex down the street from
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Speaker 1: Barbara's place, and he stopped because he could clearly see
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Speaker 1: Barbara's car parked in the lot, which was definitely out
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Speaker 1: of the ordinary because Jerry was sure she did not
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Speaker 1: know anybody who lived there, and so, now really starting
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Speaker 1: to worry about Barbara, Jerry walked up to her car
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Speaker 1: to check it out, and when he looked inside, he
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Speaker 1: saw there was a note, and so he just opened
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Speaker 1: up her car because he found it was unlocked, and
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Speaker 1: he grabbed the note and he began to read it,
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Speaker 1: and as he did, he felt his heart rates start
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Speaker 1: to pick up. An hour later, Jerry ran into the
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Speaker 1: campus police station, with Barbara's roommates following right behind him.
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Speaker 1: After finding the note inside of Barbara's car, Jerry had
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Speaker 1: gone back to Barbara's house to show it to her
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Speaker 1: roommates and ask if they had seen her, because now
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Speaker 1: he was worried that this note was some kind of
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Speaker 1: suicide note. The note was a goodbye letter that Barbara
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Speaker 1: apparently had written, and it said that she was leaving
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Speaker 1: to be with her people, and the tone of it
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Speaker 1: was just kind of alarming. Now Jerry could tell her
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Speaker 1: roommates thought that he was overreacting to this note, but
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Speaker 1: they had ultimately agreed to come with him to the
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Speaker 1: police to just make sure everything was okay. And so
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Speaker 1: as soon as the officer on duty came out, Jerry
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Speaker 1: explained to him that he had had plans with Barbara
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Speaker 1: that day and she had not shown up, which was
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Speaker 1: very uncharacteristic, and then he explained how he found her car,
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Speaker 1: and then also this letter and his concerns about this letter,
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Speaker 1: and the officer on duty said, okay, you know, we'll
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Speaker 1: look into it. And so over the next few hours,
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Speaker 1: the campus police did look into it. They reached out
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Speaker 1: to some other kids on campus and also to Barbara's family,
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Speaker 1: but nobody had seen or heard from Barbara since that morning,
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Speaker 1: and so the police continued to look into this. You know,
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Speaker 1: realizing this could be a missing person's case, but technically
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Speaker 1: not enough time had passed to officially call it that,
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Speaker 1: so in this first day, it was all just kind
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Speaker 1: of preliminary. The next day, almost fifty miles north of
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Speaker 1: the BYU campus, a worker for a Utah utility company
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Speaker 1: hiked up a trail in Big Cottonwood Canyon, a hilly
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Speaker 1: nature preserve on the outskirts of Salt Lake City.
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Speaker 2: Officially, he was there to check.
9:57
Speaker 1: On some water lines, but he was also, oh, you know,
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Speaker 1: taking his time and enjoying himself. I mean, this area
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Speaker 1: was beautiful. It was high up in the mountains and
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Speaker 1: very remote and peaceful. So this guy was genuinely shocked
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Speaker 1: when he reached the top of the trail and saw
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Speaker 1: he was not alone.
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Speaker 2: There was a woman up there.
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Speaker 1: But at first, the way his brain processed what he
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Speaker 1: was seeing is he saw this woman who was lying
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Speaker 1: on the ground and she appeared to be nude or
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Speaker 1: partially nude, and he thought, oh, she's sunbathing, like that's
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Speaker 1: what she's doing up here.
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Speaker 2: But then he's like, it's.
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Speaker 1: March, it's cold, and she's face down and she's definitely
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Speaker 1: totally naked. And then he took a few more steps
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Speaker 1: forward and his brain kind of processed what he was seeing,
10:37
Speaker 1: at which point he just gasped, turned around, and ran
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Speaker 1: back to his car to go alert the police. Within
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Speaker 1: the hour, Captain Pete Hayward with the Salt Lake City
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Speaker 1: Sheriff's Office, drove his cruiser along a remote act access
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Speaker 1: road that led to Big Cottonwood Canyon. So Hayward normally
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Speaker 1: loved being in nature. All he really did in his
11:06
Speaker 1: spare time was hunt and fish, but right now the
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Speaker 1: scenery and remote location were actually kind of an inconvenience
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Speaker 1: because he needed to get to his destination quickly and
11:15
Speaker 1: that was just very hard to do out here. Hayward
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Speaker 1: had just gotten a call about a woman who'd been
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Speaker 1: found dead in the canyon by a worker for a
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Speaker 1: utility company, and while a few responders were actually already
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Speaker 1: there securing the scene, Hayward knew they wouldn't be able
11:30
Speaker 1: to really do anything until he got there, because when
11:33
Speaker 1: he worked a murder case, every single detail had to
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Speaker 1: go through him. A few minutes later, Hayward saw some
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Speaker 1: police cars up ahead on the side of the road,
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Speaker 1: and also a deputy waiting by a trailhead and so
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Speaker 1: he pulled over, got out, and then followed the deputy
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Speaker 1: up a steep trail for about three hundred yards, and
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Speaker 1: he was pretty out of breath by the time he
11:51
Speaker 1: saw a few other crime scene texts and officers gathered
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Speaker 1: around a bush, where underneath the bush there was a
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Speaker 1: body of a naked woman lying face down on the ground.
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Speaker 1: Hayward walked over and crouched down to examine the body,
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Speaker 1: and right away he could see at least three bullet
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Speaker 1: wounds in the woman's back, but other than that, he
12:09
Speaker 1: didn't see any other injuries, and there were no clear
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Speaker 1: signs of decomposition. His best guess was that this woman
12:15
Speaker 1: had been there for maybe a day or so, which
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Speaker 1: was actually sort of a miracle when he thought about it.
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Speaker 1: I mean, this time of year, nobody came out to
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Speaker 1: this area, and if it hadn't been for that utility worker.
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Speaker 2: I mean, she might not have been found for months.
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Speaker 1: Hayward looked next to the body and he saw the
12:30
Speaker 1: woman's clothes and shoes were right nearby, and each item
12:33
Speaker 1: was actually folded very neatly, which struck him as a
12:35
Speaker 1: little bit strange. Hayward pulled on a glove and began
12:38
Speaker 1: examining the clothing, and he could see that there was
12:40
Speaker 1: really nothing ripped or damaged. And also, as Hayward kind
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Speaker 1: of walked around the immediate area, he noticed the whole
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Speaker 1: scene was just as neat as the clothes. There was
12:49
Speaker 1: no gun anywhere, and no marks in the dirt or
12:52
Speaker 1: signs of a struggle or a fight, and there was
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Speaker 1: no indication that the body had been dragged around, and
12:57
Speaker 1: so Heyward felt pretty confident that this woman was likely
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Speaker 1: shot and killed in the exact spot she was found in.
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Speaker 1: Hayward stood in the middle of the trail and considered
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Speaker 1: everything he was seeing. The neatly folded clothes could have
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Speaker 1: been removed during consensual sex and then maybe things turned violent,
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Speaker 1: or that could mean the woman was maybe forced to
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Speaker 1: undress at gunpoint. Either way, Hayward's got told him that
13:19
Speaker 1: this woman's killer.
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Speaker 2: Was someone she knew.
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Speaker 1: Because the thing was getting up here from the road
13:24
Speaker 1: was not easy. I mean, Hayward was pushing fifty and
13:27
Speaker 1: knew he was not in the best shape. But even
13:29
Speaker 1: for somebody who was young and fit, it would be
13:31
Speaker 1: hard to force another person all the way up a
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Speaker 1: trail like this. It made more sense that this woman
13:37
Speaker 1: had first walked up willingly with someone she likely trusted,
13:42
Speaker 1: and then that person killed her once they.
13:44
Speaker 2: Were up there.
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Speaker 1: But Hayward knew, you know, his theory didn't mean much
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Speaker 1: until he figured out who this woman was. She didn't
13:50
Speaker 1: seem to have a purse with her, and there was
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Speaker 1: no idea in the pockets of her folded clothes. So
13:55
Speaker 1: Hayward waved some other officers over to help him flip
13:57
Speaker 1: her body over so they could look underneath, and when
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Speaker 1: they did that, Hayward saw there were a few bullets
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Speaker 1: gathered in the dirt. They had clearly gone straight through
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Speaker 1: this woman from the shots in her back, and so
14:09
Speaker 1: Heyward quickly told a tack to go ahead and photograph
14:12
Speaker 1: and bag the bullets for testing, and also to get
14:14
Speaker 1: some of the dirt that the bullets had been lodged
14:16
Speaker 1: in in case there was some other evidence mixed in.
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Speaker 1: So investigators in the nineteen seventies did not rely on
14:22
Speaker 1: DNA yet, but they could test for things like clothing
14:25
Speaker 1: fibers or hares and potentially connect that material to suspects.
14:29
Speaker 1: And so after giving his team their marching orders, Hayward
14:32
Speaker 1: took a deep breath and then headed back down the trail.
14:35
Speaker 1: He needed to go find this woman's name. The next day, Wednesday,
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Speaker 1: March thirteenth, Hayward hustled down a hallway towards a meeting
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Speaker 1: room at the Salt Lake City Sheriff's office. He was
14:48
Speaker 1: bleary eyed and basically running on adrenaline because he'd been
14:51
Speaker 1: working this case non stop since the day before, and
14:55
Speaker 1: he'd just come from a meeting with the ballistics expert
14:58
Speaker 1: who told him the gun that killed this woman was
15:01
Speaker 1: likely a three fifty seven caliber. Now, this was obviously
15:04
Speaker 1: great for the investigation. However, a three fifty seven was
15:08
Speaker 1: not particularly uncommon, so it didn't really narrow things down.
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Speaker 2: A whole bunch.
15:12
Speaker 1: However, Hayward had uncovered something that was major for the investigation,
15:17
Speaker 1: and that was the victim's identity. It was twenty two
15:21
Speaker 1: year old Barbara Rocky. So Hayward's team had put a
15:25
Speaker 1: broadcast out over the news the night before about the
15:28
Speaker 1: discovery of this body. And after they had put that out,
15:31
Speaker 1: they had gotten a call from the BYU Police about
15:34
Speaker 1: a student of theirs who had gone missing a day earlier,
15:37
Speaker 1: and just a few hours ago, some of this missing
15:40
Speaker 1: student's classmates had come up to Salt Lake City to
15:43
Speaker 1: identify the body, and they had confirmed it was Barbara.
15:46
Speaker 2: Now, Hayward had.
15:47
Speaker 1: Spoken to some of those kids already, Andy had some
15:49
Speaker 1: other officers contacting Barbara's family, but right now Hayward was
15:54
Speaker 1: on his way to get a formal statement from a
15:56
Speaker 1: young man named Jerry Hicker. Jerry was one of the
15:59
Speaker 1: people who identify the body, and he was the first
16:02
Speaker 1: person to report Barbara missing, so Hayward was hoping he
16:06
Speaker 1: would have information that could point them towards Barbara's killer.
16:10
Speaker 1: Minutes later, Hayward sat down at a conference table across
16:13
Speaker 1: from Jerry, and from the looks of it, Jerry was
16:15
Speaker 1: very rattled. He kept shaking his head and looking away like.
16:18
Speaker 2: He was trying not to cry.
16:21
Speaker 1: But Hayward was not a particularly gentle interviewer, so he
16:24
Speaker 1: didn't waste time with condolences or tissues, especially because Jerry
16:28
Speaker 1: was an obvious suspect. He was Barbara's closest friend at school, apparently,
16:33
Speaker 1: and Hayward was sure Barbara was killed by somebody she trusted,
16:37
Speaker 1: so he just bluntly told Jerry that he needed to
16:40
Speaker 1: know every single thing that happened on the day Barbara
16:43
Speaker 1: went missing. Jerry was sort of caught off guard by
16:45
Speaker 1: this level of bluntness, but he took a shaky breath
16:49
Speaker 1: and then explained how he'd borrowed Barbara's car the day
16:52
Speaker 1: before and then dropped it back off at her place
16:54
Speaker 1: on Monday morning around ten am, and then he went
16:57
Speaker 1: to the library for a few hours. He then said
16:59
Speaker 1: he was supposed to meet up with Barbara. They had
17:01
Speaker 1: plans for later that day to hang out, but Barbara
17:04
Speaker 1: didn't show up, and when he went to her house
17:06
Speaker 1: to check on her, her car was gone, and so
17:08
Speaker 1: he began walking back home again when he actually saw
17:12
Speaker 1: her car down the block outside of an apartment complex
17:15
Speaker 1: that he didn't understand she would be at, like he
17:17
Speaker 1: didn't think she knew anybody who lived over there, and
17:19
Speaker 1: he said he walked up to the car, looked inside
17:22
Speaker 1: and saw there was a note.
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Speaker 2: He tried the door handle, it was open.
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Speaker 1: He reached inside, got the note out, and he read
17:27
Speaker 1: it and he said it was a pretty disturbing note.
17:29
Speaker 1: He thought it was maybe a suicide note. Hayward nodded
17:32
Speaker 1: he had seen the note the BYU police had given
17:35
Speaker 1: it to him. It did seem to be from Barbara
17:37
Speaker 1: telling her roommates she was leaving town to be with
17:40
Speaker 1: people who she fit in with. But the note was
17:43
Speaker 1: kind of vague, and Hayward really wasn't sure what to
17:45
Speaker 1: make of it just yet. You know, it could be
17:47
Speaker 1: a suicide note, or it could be something entirely ordinary.
17:50
Speaker 1: And the truth was, he wasn't actually even sure that
17:52
Speaker 1: Barbara had really written the letter. Maybe her killer had
17:56
Speaker 1: written the letter. Maybe whoever murdered Barbara was attempting to
17:59
Speaker 1: make her disappear aphearance look like a suicide, or maybe
18:02
Speaker 1: imply that she had run away in the hopes that
18:05
Speaker 1: police would never find her body. And so Heyward had
18:07
Speaker 1: sent the letter off to a handwriting expert to see
18:10
Speaker 1: what they thought. Now, Heyward asked Jerry about his relationship
18:13
Speaker 1: with Barbara, and Jerry explained that the two of them
18:16
Speaker 1: hung out a ton, and she had gravitated towards him
18:18
Speaker 1: since she felt sort of unwelcome at school and around
18:21
Speaker 1: her roommates, who didn't really like her because she wasn't
18:24
Speaker 1: religious like they were. Jerry also told Hayward that Barbara
18:27
Speaker 1: had made the conflict with her roommates much worse by
18:31
Speaker 1: intentionally saying sacrilegious things in order to freak them out.
18:34
Speaker 1: So he said there was a lot of tension between them,
18:37
Speaker 1: and it had gotten so bad that at one point
18:39
Speaker 1: he had tried to find Barbara another place to live.
18:42
Speaker 2: This made Hayward perk up.
18:44
Speaker 1: I mean, knowing that Barbara had a potential domestic conflict
18:47
Speaker 1: was an interesting lead. Even though a group of young
18:49
Speaker 1: devout Mormon women were not necessarily obvious murder suspects, it
18:54
Speaker 1: was definitely worth looking into. Maybe one of them had
18:56
Speaker 1: been so horrified and outraged by Barbara's teasing that they
19:00
Speaker 1: had snapped and tried to hurt her. Hayward didn't have
19:02
Speaker 1: any other questions for Jerry, so he stood up and
19:05
Speaker 1: told him he could go. He wasn't ready to eliminate
19:07
Speaker 1: anybody as a suspect just yet, but so far Jerry
19:10
Speaker 1: seemed pretty unlikely. He had an alibi, and he was
19:13
Speaker 1: also the one who reported Barbara missing, and considering it
19:16
Speaker 1: was complete luck that her body was even found at
19:19
Speaker 1: all in the area that it was, you know, it
19:21
Speaker 1: really would have been in the killer's best interest to
19:24
Speaker 1: keep quiet and hope her body was never found. So
19:27
Speaker 1: why would Jerry go to police at all? If he
19:29
Speaker 1: was the killer, so Hayward headed out the door to
19:31
Speaker 1: wrangle some officers. They needed to go to Provo and
19:34
Speaker 1: have another word with Barbara's roommates. The next afternoon, just
19:46
Speaker 1: two days after Barbara was found in the canyon, Hayward
19:48
Speaker 1: pulled up to a pawn shop on the outskirts of
19:50
Speaker 1: Salt Lake City. If he thought he was tired yesterday, well,
19:54
Speaker 1: he was absolutely exhausted now because a lot had happened
19:57
Speaker 1: in the last twenty four hours. They'd got in touch
20:00
Speaker 1: with Barbara's family, who were obviously shocked and devastated, but
20:04
Speaker 1: they didn't have any useful information for the investigation.
20:08
Speaker 2: They didn't know.
20:08
Speaker 1: Much about Barbara's friends or life at school, so they
20:11
Speaker 1: couldn't say if anybody would have wanted to hurt her,
20:13
Speaker 1: and they'd had no idea if she had been planning
20:16
Speaker 1: to leave campus for any reason. But apparently she was
20:20
Speaker 1: because the handwriting expert had come back and confirmed the
20:24
Speaker 1: note was authentic and Barbara did write it, so her
20:27
Speaker 1: plans to leave appeared to be genuine, which is what
20:30
Speaker 1: the note basically was about if you read it literally.
20:32
Speaker 1: But for Hayward, after speaking to Jerry, who talked about
20:36
Speaker 1: the tension between Barbara and her roommates and how she
20:39
Speaker 1: didn't fit in. And also after Hayward literally spoke to
20:42
Speaker 1: all seven of Barbara's roommates and they all actually admitted
20:46
Speaker 1: they did not like Barbara, it made Hayward think that
20:49
Speaker 1: the letter from Barbara should be interpreted literally, that she
20:53
Speaker 1: was just trying to flee campus and get away in
20:56
Speaker 1: particular from her roommates. But the roommates all had all
21:00
Speaker 1: at Alibi's for the day Barbara went missing, so for now,
21:03
Speaker 1: you know, Hayward basically had.
21:05
Speaker 2: To rule out the roommates.
21:06
Speaker 1: But Hayward was not that upset about this because the
21:09
Speaker 1: roommates had actually given him another lead. According to one
21:13
Speaker 1: of the roommates, right before Barbara had disappeared, she had
21:16
Speaker 1: mentioned that she planned to pawn a turquoise necklace that
21:19
Speaker 1: she owned in Salt Lake City. Soh Hayward and some
21:23
Speaker 1: other officers had spent the whole day canvassing pawn shops
21:26
Speaker 1: in that area to see if maybe she had actually
21:29
Speaker 1: gone through with it. Now, so far, Hayward had not
21:32
Speaker 1: found the necklace or you know, found the pawn shop
21:35
Speaker 1: that maybe Barbara went to, but he was very hopeful,
21:38
Speaker 1: maybe too hopeful in some ways, because you know, aside
21:41
Speaker 1: from this necklace lead, the investigation really was kind of
21:45
Speaker 1: losing steam. They had searched and fingerprinted Barbara's car but
21:48
Speaker 1: had not found anything significant. They'd also gotten the autopsy
21:52
Speaker 1: back and it was mostly unhelpful. The medical examiner had
21:55
Speaker 1: actually counted five gunshot wounds, not just three, so more
21:59
Speaker 1: than Hayward, but they couldn't confirm whether or not Barbara
22:02
Speaker 1: was sexually assaulted. And also the forensics report had come
22:06
Speaker 1: back and they had not been able to collect any
22:09
Speaker 1: fingerprints at the scene, and so all of this was
22:11
Speaker 1: swirling around in Hayward's head as he stepped into this
22:14
Speaker 1: particular pawn shop and he asked the woman behind the
22:17
Speaker 1: counter if they had recently purchased a turquoise necklace, and
22:21
Speaker 1: to his shock, the woman said yes, and then she
22:24
Speaker 1: gestured towards a glass case behind the counter, where Hayward
22:27
Speaker 1: could see a long, white necklace lined with turquoise stones
22:32
Speaker 1: on a red felt pad. About a half an hour later,
22:36
Speaker 1: Hayward was back behind the wheel of his cruiser, and
22:39
Speaker 1: his heart was pounding and his mind was racing so
22:42
Speaker 1: fast he could barely pay attention to the road because
22:45
Speaker 1: Hayward finally had.
22:47
Speaker 2: A real trail here.
22:49
Speaker 1: The shop clerk's description of the person who had sold
22:52
Speaker 1: that turquoise necklace matched Barbara perfectly. Not only that the
22:57
Speaker 1: shopkeeper also had a receipt for the sale that showed
23:00
Speaker 1: Barbara was at the store on March eleventh at twelve
23:03
Speaker 1: fifty pm, the same day she went missing. But the
23:07
Speaker 1: most incredible part of this new lead was that Barbara
23:11
Speaker 1: had apparently told this clerk that she was in a
23:13
Speaker 1: hurry because her boyfriend was circling the block outside. And
23:18
Speaker 1: this was huge because Hayward and his team had spoken
23:21
Speaker 1: to a lot of people in Barbara's life and no
23:24
Speaker 1: one had mentioned a boyfriend. Now, unfortunately, the pawnshop worker
23:28
Speaker 1: had not gotten a look at this person, this boyfriend that.
23:31
Speaker 2: Barbara was talking about.
23:33
Speaker 1: So Heyward had just taken the necklace and the receipt
23:35
Speaker 1: for evidence, and now he was rushing back to the
23:38
Speaker 1: precinct to make some calls. He needed to see if
23:41
Speaker 1: anybody in Barbara's life knew about this boyfriend and maybe
23:44
Speaker 1: had just failed to mention it for some reason. But
23:47
Speaker 1: as soon as Hayward parked and hurried inside, the precinct.
23:50
Speaker 1: He was stopped by a deputy, and this deputy seemed
23:53
Speaker 1: as excited and frazzled as Hayward felt. The deputy told
23:57
Speaker 1: Hayward that he wasn't going to believe this, but they
24:00
Speaker 1: had been continuing their background interviews and some of Barbara's
24:03
Speaker 1: friends said that Barbara had mentioned a boyfriend named Richard.
24:08
Speaker 2: This was great news for Hayward.
24:09
Speaker 1: I mean, he was literally looking for exactly this information.
24:14
Speaker 1: But this actually was not the reason why the deputy
24:16
Speaker 1: was so worked up, just the fact that she had
24:18
Speaker 1: a boyfriend. He explained that Richard was Richard Finder, a
24:23
Speaker 1: supposed psychic from California who just happened to be in
24:27
Speaker 1: town on a ski vacation at the same time Barbara
24:31
Speaker 1: was killed. And the reason they knew that was because
24:34
Speaker 1: Richard had just called the station completely out of the
24:37
Speaker 1: blue and offered to help. A few hours later, Hayward
24:44
Speaker 1: sat down across an interrogation table from thirty year old
24:48
Speaker 1: Richard Finder. Richard had on glasses and he had a goateee,
24:51
Speaker 1: and he seemed very confident and also quite eager to help.
24:55
Speaker 1: But to Hayward, he just felt like he was putting
24:57
Speaker 1: on an act. He felt certain that Richard had to
25:00
Speaker 1: be Barbara's killer. After all, it actually was not unusual
25:04
Speaker 1: for murderers to actually insert themselves into the murder investigation
25:09
Speaker 1: to sort of, you know, see what's going on and
25:12
Speaker 1: maybe deflect blame away from themselves, and so for Hayward,
25:15
Speaker 1: he felt like that was exactly what Richard was doing,
25:17
Speaker 1: you know, calling in to offer up his supposed psychic services.
25:21
Speaker 1: But also Hayward had spent the last couple of hours
25:24
Speaker 1: digging into Richard, and he also discovered that he owned
25:27
Speaker 1: a three point fifty seven pistol, the same kind of
25:29
Speaker 1: gun that had killed Barbara. And on top of that,
25:33
Speaker 1: he found out the place where Richard was staying was
25:35
Speaker 1: in Salt Lake City, very close to Big Cottonwood Canyon,
25:38
Speaker 1: where Barbara's body was found. It was just too many coincidences,
25:42
Speaker 1: and so Hayward was prepared to get extremely tough with
25:45
Speaker 1: Richard to get a confession. But Hayward got a few
25:49
Speaker 1: of his background questions out of the way first, and
25:52
Speaker 1: after asking Richard how he knew Barbara, Richard explained that
25:55
Speaker 1: they had connected after she had heard him speak on
25:57
Speaker 1: the radio, and he said that they'd actually never been physical,
26:01
Speaker 1: but they'd had a deep spiritual relationship. After that, Hayward
26:05
Speaker 1: cut to the chase and just asked Richard point blank
26:07
Speaker 1: why he had called the station. And at that point
26:10
Speaker 1: Richard became very serious and said that he needed to
26:13
Speaker 1: come forward because he had a feeling about what had
26:16
Speaker 1: happened to Barbara. He said, you know, he was a psychic,
26:19
Speaker 1: and he had a vision that the gun, the murder weapon,
26:22
Speaker 1: had been thrown in some water somewhere. Hayward couldn't believe
26:26
Speaker 1: what he was hearing, because, you know, the police had
26:29
Speaker 1: not announced the murder weapon was missing. Richard shouldn't have
26:32
Speaker 1: known they were looking for the murder weapon, but clearly
26:35
Speaker 1: he did so. At this point, Hayward did not ask
26:38
Speaker 1: more questions about what his vision said. Instead, he demanded
26:42
Speaker 1: that Richard account for every single hour of his day
26:45
Speaker 1: on Monday, March eleventh, the day that Barbara went missing,
26:48
Speaker 1: And for the first time, Richard actually seemed genuinely thrown off.
26:52
Speaker 1: He just sort of stared back at Hayward in what
26:54
Speaker 1: seemed to be complete shock, and then he said he
26:57
Speaker 1: didn't kill Barbara. He said he couldn't. He was with
27:00
Speaker 1: his friends the whole day Hayward just kind of glared
27:03
Speaker 1: at Richard and then slid a pad of paper over
27:05
Speaker 1: to him to write down his friend's informations they could
27:08
Speaker 1: follow up. And as you watch Richard hurry to jot
27:10
Speaker 1: down some names and numbers, Hayward felt sure this was
27:14
Speaker 1: their guy. There was just a mountain of circumstantial evidence
27:18
Speaker 1: here against him, but he knew they needed something more
27:20
Speaker 1: concrete to actually make an arrest. So Hayward first would
27:24
Speaker 1: have to check out Richard's alibi and then also test
27:27
Speaker 1: Richard's personal gun, his three point fifty seven against the
27:30
Speaker 1: bullets that had killed Barbara. So he told Richard that
27:33
Speaker 1: for now he could go, but they would need to take.
27:36
Speaker 2: A look at his gun.
27:38
Speaker 1: A few weeks later, Hayward sat at his desk in
27:40
Speaker 1: the Sheriff's office staring at some ballistics results from Richard's gun,
27:44
Speaker 1: and it would turn out it was definitely not the
27:47
Speaker 1: gun that killed Barbara, and Hayward literally couldn't remember a
27:50
Speaker 1: time when he'd been more frankly shocked and disappointed.
27:54
Speaker 2: I mean, he really.
27:55
Speaker 1: Had Richard pegged as the killer. Richard basically was his
27:59
Speaker 1: only son suspect, and he was a great one, especially
28:02
Speaker 1: since they had checked on his alibi and it didn't
28:05
Speaker 1: really hold up. The friends he said he was with
28:08
Speaker 1: that whole day actually said, well, we were with him,
28:11
Speaker 1: but not the whole day. So basically there were large
28:13
Speaker 1: chunks of time on the day she went missing. When
28:17
Speaker 1: Richard was unaccounted for, Hayward sighed and reminded himself that,
28:21
Speaker 1: you know, just because the gun he owned wasn't a match,
28:25
Speaker 1: it didn't mean Richard was innocent. I mean, it's possible
28:28
Speaker 1: he used a different three fifty.
28:30
Speaker 2: Seven and then just ditched the weapon.
28:32
Speaker 1: Still, though Hayward couldn't believe they were back to square
28:35
Speaker 1: one like this, he felt like he had done everything
28:38
Speaker 1: he could. At this point, he talked to who he
28:40
Speaker 1: needed to talk to, He'd analyzed the evidence they'd gotten,
28:43
Speaker 1: and he had really nothing.
28:44
Speaker 2: To show for it.
28:45
Speaker 1: Hayward was used to closing cases in giving families the
28:48
Speaker 1: answers they wanted, and now he was worried he was
28:51
Speaker 1: not going to be able to do that. And sure enough,
28:54
Speaker 1: over the coming months and then years, you know, Hayward
28:57
Speaker 1: did continue to investigate this case, but the leads got
29:01
Speaker 1: fewer and fewer, and then eventually he got promoted and
29:04
Speaker 1: then before long he was pulled into other cases, and
29:08
Speaker 1: eventually Barbara's case just went cold. In the fall of
29:21
Speaker 1: two thousand and five, so over twenty five years after
29:25
Speaker 1: Barbara's murder, Detective Todd Park sat on the floor by
29:28
Speaker 1: his desk in the Salt Lake City Sheriff's Department. Around
29:31
Speaker 1: him on the floor it was covered with crime scene
29:34
Speaker 1: photos and interviews and evidence logs from the nineteen seventy
29:38
Speaker 1: four investigation of Barbara Rocky's murder. Park was a brand
29:41
Speaker 1: new homicide detective and he had taken on this case
29:44
Speaker 1: after getting a call from one of Barbara's sisters begging
29:47
Speaker 1: the Sheriff's office to reopen it, and Park wasn't sure
29:49
Speaker 1: if it was maybe just new guy enthusiasm, but he
29:53
Speaker 1: was already pretty obsessed with trying to solve it. He
29:56
Speaker 1: really wanted to find some answers for the Rocky family
29:58
Speaker 1: since they'd been wondering what happened to Barbara for now
30:01
Speaker 1: over two decades, and Park actually felt pretty optimistic about
30:05
Speaker 1: it because even though during the original investigation they hadn't
30:09
Speaker 1: relied on DNA testing, they couldn't really even do DNA testing.
30:13
Speaker 1: Despite that, the investigators at the time had done a
30:17
Speaker 1: rape kit and saved all the evidence from the scene,
30:20
Speaker 1: like Barbara's clothes and even the dirth that was underneath
30:23
Speaker 1: her body, which meant that with the current advancements in
30:27
Speaker 1: DNA technology, there was a good chance they could actually
30:30
Speaker 1: solve this thing. Park had already sent a few items
30:32
Speaker 1: over for testing, but while he waited for the results,
30:36
Speaker 1: he was going over the details of the case to
30:38
Speaker 1: get a sense of how it was investigated back in
30:40
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy four, and he found it was a pretty
30:42
Speaker 1: unusual case.
30:43
Speaker 2: The murder had initially been.
30:45
Speaker 1: Investigated as a personally motivated crime, but while the case
30:49
Speaker 1: was cold, police had also begun to consider the idea
30:52
Speaker 1: that maybe Barbara had been murdered by the notorious serial
30:55
Speaker 1: killer Ted Bundy, that this was not personal, that she
30:58
Speaker 1: was just one of many victim. Ted Bundy had been
31:01
Speaker 1: arrested less than an hour away from where Barbara lived
31:04
Speaker 1: in Salt Lake City in nineteen seventy five, just one
31:07
Speaker 1: year after her murder, and he had been killing college
31:10
Speaker 1: women all over the West Coast, including several in Utah
31:15
Speaker 1: the same year Barbara was killed. But investigators in the
31:18
Speaker 1: late nineteen seventies had ruled ted Bundy out after determining
31:22
Speaker 1: he'd been committing a different murder in Washington State at
31:25
Speaker 1: the same time Barbara was killed, so he could not
31:28
Speaker 1: have been her killer, but it was still possible that
31:31
Speaker 1: Barbara had been killed by a different serial killer in
31:34
Speaker 1: the area. Nineteen seventy four is notoriously known as the
31:37
Speaker 1: Year of Fear because there were so many killers operating
31:41
Speaker 1: in the United States at that time. But as Park
31:43
Speaker 1: read through the notes, he found himself agreeing with the
31:46
Speaker 1: original investigator's first instincts that Barbara's murder must have been personal.
31:51
Speaker 2: Also, just the amount of times.
31:52
Speaker 1: Barbara was shot seemed emotionally charged, and so Park believed
31:57
Speaker 1: Barbara's boyfriend, Richard Finder, had to be the killer. I mean,
32:00
Speaker 1: after all, Richard had been in the area at the
32:03
Speaker 1: time of the murder. He basically had no alibi, and
32:06
Speaker 1: you know, he brought up the fact that there was
32:08
Speaker 1: a missing murder weapon when the public didn't even know that.
32:11
Speaker 1: So he knows things about the crime scene that he
32:13
Speaker 1: shouldn't know. But Park felt like there were some other
32:17
Speaker 1: people in this case that also deserved a second look,
32:20
Speaker 1: like Barbara's best friend Jerry Hicker. It was true, he
32:22
Speaker 1: did have an alibi, and Barbara had told that pawn
32:25
Speaker 1: shop owner, you know, before she was killed that she
32:28
Speaker 1: was with her boyfriend, which she would not have referred
32:31
Speaker 1: to Jerry as. But if this was as emotional a
32:34
Speaker 1: crime as Park thought it was, Jerry had to be considered.
32:38
Speaker 1: After all, he was Barbara's closest friend at school, and
32:41
Speaker 1: maybe he heard she was leaving town and got mad
32:43
Speaker 1: at her. And then Barbara's roommates, they all seemed to
32:46
Speaker 1: have solid alibis, but maybe one of them had gotten
32:49
Speaker 1: somebody else to kill Barbara. I mean, Park knew the
32:51
Speaker 1: original investigators hadn't found any evidence of that, but they
32:55
Speaker 1: also hadn't seemed to spend much time on the roommates.
32:57
Speaker 2: One way or another, they just kind of quickly ruled
32:59
Speaker 2: them out.
33:00
Speaker 1: But Park also knew it could be someone that they
33:03
Speaker 1: hadn't even considered yet, like the utility worker who actually
33:07
Speaker 1: found the body, or maybe another student at BYU who
33:10
Speaker 1: didn't like Barbara and considered her an outsider or a weirdo.
33:14
Speaker 1: Park wasn't sure yet, but he was confident that they'd
33:17
Speaker 1: be able to pick up some DNA somewhere in the evidence,
33:20
Speaker 1: and once they did they'd find their killer. Two years later,
33:29
Speaker 1: on an afternoon in October of two thousand and seven,
33:32
Speaker 1: Park paced around his office and periodically stopped to look
33:35
Speaker 1: at the phone on his desk. He was waiting for
33:37
Speaker 1: a call from the lab, and with each passing moment
33:40
Speaker 1: he got more and more anxious. So at this point
33:43
Speaker 1: in Park's reinvestigation of Barbara's murder, the DNA testing had
33:48
Speaker 1: basically gotten them nowhere. Over the last two years, the
33:51
Speaker 1: medical lab had gone over almost every single item from
33:54
Speaker 1: Barbara's case, like her rape kit, swabs, and her clothes,
33:57
Speaker 1: but they hadn't been able to get any DNA from anything.
34:01
Speaker 1: It either wasn't there or was just too old and
34:04
Speaker 1: not preserved well enough, and so the only thing left
34:07
Speaker 1: to test was the dirt that the original investigators collected
34:11
Speaker 1: from underneath Barbara's body. Park actually had not originally sent
34:15
Speaker 1: in the dirt because he didn't think it would have
34:17
Speaker 1: any DNA inside of it, but it was now the
34:20
Speaker 1: only piece of evidence that he had left. So Park
34:23
Speaker 1: knew that when the lab called this time, he'd either
34:25
Speaker 1: be on his way to finding the killer's name or
34:28
Speaker 1: his case would basically be over. But then Park's phone
34:31
Speaker 1: finally rang. He immediately picked it up and his mouth
34:34
Speaker 1: went dry when he heard it was the lab on
34:37
Speaker 1: the other end. And before Park could even ask them,
34:39
Speaker 1: they told him they had a profile. They'd been able
34:43
Speaker 1: to find traces of DNA in that dirt sample taken
34:46
Speaker 1: from under Barbara's body. And when Park finally got his
34:49
Speaker 1: hands on that DNA profile and he ran it through
34:51
Speaker 1: their criminal database, he got a name based on DNA
35:01
Speaker 1: evidence in a decades long investigation. Here is a reconstruction
35:05
Speaker 1: of what police belief happened to Barbara Rocky On March eleventh,
35:09
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy four, just before noon, the killer watched Barbara
35:21
Speaker 1: pull up to the sidewalk in her car. The killer
35:24
Speaker 1: immediately walked over and jumped inside and smiled at Barbara,
35:27
Speaker 1: and she smiled right back, and together they drove to
35:30
Speaker 1: the pawn shop in Salt Lake City that Barbara wanted
35:33
Speaker 1: to go to. When they got there, Barbara hopped out
35:37
Speaker 1: of the car and went inside, and once she was inside,
35:40
Speaker 1: the killer moved over to the driver's seat, and so
35:43
Speaker 1: they basically were going to drive the car from that
35:45
Speaker 1: point forward. And as the killer sat in the driver's
35:48
Speaker 1: seat waiting for Barbara. Their heart was racing. They couldn't
35:51
Speaker 1: wait for her to get back outside and get in
35:54
Speaker 1: the car because the killer was in love with her
35:57
Speaker 1: and they had decided that today they were finally going
36:00
Speaker 1: to make their relationship physical. So when Barbara came outside
36:04
Speaker 1: and hopped in the passenger seat of the car after
36:06
Speaker 1: selling her necklace, the killer very excitedly turned to her
36:09
Speaker 1: and said, Hey, there's some trails nearby.
36:11
Speaker 2: Why don't we go for a hike.
36:13
Speaker 1: Barbara clearly hesitated, like she didn't really want to do this,
36:17
Speaker 1: But the killer knew Barbara was leaving Utah, and they
36:20
Speaker 1: knew she had written a goodbye note and was selling
36:22
Speaker 1: the necklace for funds to leave for good, so they
36:25
Speaker 1: kind of guilt tripped her. They said, look like, let's
36:27
Speaker 1: go enjoy the beautiful countryside before you leap down. Barbara
36:31
Speaker 1: shrugged and said okay, fine, and so the killer very
36:34
Speaker 1: excitedly drove the car over to the canyon and parked
36:37
Speaker 1: near a picnic area. Then the two of them got out,
36:40
Speaker 1: and as they began walking towards a trail, the killer
36:43
Speaker 1: reached down and touched the outside of their pocket just
36:46
Speaker 1: to make sure the gun that they had stolen from
36:48
Speaker 1: Barbara was still there.
36:50
Speaker 2: Now.
36:50
Speaker 1: They didn't know if they were going to use the
36:52
Speaker 1: gun or not, but they just wanted to make sure
36:53
Speaker 1: it was there and ready. And so for a while,
36:56
Speaker 1: the killer and Barbara just hiked along this trail, you know,
36:59
Speaker 1: just chatting and making their way up and enjoying the scenery.
37:03
Speaker 1: But at some point, the killer just they couldn't wait
37:05
Speaker 1: any longer. They had to make their move, and so
37:08
Speaker 1: they stopped Barbara and the killer after making sure nobody
37:11
Speaker 1: else was around, they moved forward and kind of made
37:14
Speaker 1: their move. They touched Barbara in a way that was
37:17
Speaker 1: very clearly meant to be romantic, but immediately Barbara kind
37:21
Speaker 1: of recoiled and jumped back and told the killer that
37:24
Speaker 1: she didn't want that, which immediately made the killer incredibly angry.
37:29
Speaker 1: And so the killer stepped towards her again and could
37:31
Speaker 1: see Barbara had this alarmed look on her face, which
37:34
Speaker 1: made them even more angry. So they pulled out Barbara's
37:37
Speaker 1: gun and they aimed it at her and then told
37:39
Speaker 1: her to take off her clothes. And Barbara, I mean,
37:42
Speaker 1: she was horrified, but you know, she did as she
37:44
Speaker 1: was told, but she intentionally was taking her time, as
37:47
Speaker 1: she took off a piece of clothing, she would painstakingly
37:50
Speaker 1: fold it very neatly, all the while begging the killer
37:53
Speaker 1: not to do this. And then after taking off all
37:57
Speaker 1: of her clothes and stacking them next to her, you know,
38:00
Speaker 1: she continued to plead with the killer. But the killer
38:03
Speaker 1: was so humiliated and so angry that they decided enough
38:07
Speaker 1: was enough, and they shot Barbara right in the chest
38:11
Speaker 1: and she crumpled to the ground, and they fired wildly
38:13
Speaker 1: several more times until Barbara went still. And then once
38:17
Speaker 1: Barbara was either dead or dying on the ground, the
38:21
Speaker 1: killer just panicked and turned and ran back down the
38:24
Speaker 1: trail back to Barbara's car. They hopped in and they
38:26
Speaker 1: drove back to Provo and the BYU campus. But on
38:30
Speaker 1: the way there they stopped and ditched Barbara's purse and
38:33
Speaker 1: the gun. And then when they actually got to Provo.
38:36
Speaker 1: The reason they parked Barbara's car down the road near
38:39
Speaker 1: that other apartment complex was so that when the killer
38:41
Speaker 1: got out of the car, Barbara's seven roommates would not
38:44
Speaker 1: see them doing so. Then they fled, leaving Barbara's note
38:48
Speaker 1: in the car. Barbara's note was not a suicide note.
38:51
Speaker 1: It was a literal goodbye note that she had written
38:53
Speaker 1: for her roommates, but the killer figured it sort of
38:57
Speaker 1: seemed like a suicide note. So if they left it here.
39:00
Speaker 1: When they came back to find the car and find
39:03
Speaker 1: the note inside of it, they could tell the police
39:05
Speaker 1: that this seems like maybe maybe Barbara has killed herself,
39:09
Speaker 1: it would send the police in a direction that would
39:11
Speaker 1: hopefully not lead back to the killer. It would turn
39:14
Speaker 1: out Barbara's killer was her best friend, Jerry Hiccker. The
39:19
Speaker 1: original investigators didn't suspect Jerry at first, mainly because of
39:23
Speaker 1: his cooperation and since he was the one who also
39:26
Speaker 1: first reported her missing, but they did begin to get
39:29
Speaker 1: suspicious of him when he eventually revealed his violent streak.
39:33
Speaker 1: The year after he killed Barbara. He was connected to
39:36
Speaker 1: a few different rape cases on campus, but they didn't
39:40
Speaker 1: have enough evidence to make an arrest until decades later,
39:43
Speaker 1: when the lab finally found DNA in the soil from
39:46
Speaker 1: the nineteen seventy four crime scene. They were able to
39:49
Speaker 1: match that profile to Jerry's DNA, which they had on
39:52
Speaker 1: file from his involvement in another unrelated crime, and so
39:56
Speaker 1: ultimately Jerry killed Barbara with her own gun, which he
40:00
Speaker 1: had helped her buy so she could protect herself from
40:03
Speaker 1: killers just like him. By the time Jerry was arrested
40:07
Speaker 1: in two thousand and seven, he was dying of cancer.
40:10
Speaker 1: He confessed to Barbara's murder for a reduced sentence and
40:13
Speaker 1: served five years before he was released. He died in
40:16
Speaker 1: twenty fourteen. Thank you so much for watching. Let me
40:28
Speaker 1: know what you thought of today's episode in the comments.
40:31
Speaker 1: And remember, we have a whole playlist of true crime
40:33
Speaker 1: episodes ready for you to binge right now, so click
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Speaker 1: here and give them a watch.
40:38
Speaker 2: All right, until next time, see ya,