Latest / Crime Stories with Nancy Grace / Killers Amongst Us: Teen barista Samantha Koenig kidnapped at gunpoint (Part 3)

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Killers Amongst Us: Teen barista Samantha Koenig kidnapped at gunpoint (Part 3) · Crime Stories with Nancy Grace

0:04
Speaker 1: Hi, guys, Nancy Grace here, Welcome back to Killers amongst Us,
0:08
Speaker 1: a production of iHeartMedia and Crime Online. The disappearance of
0:14
Speaker 1: a beautiful young barista, Samantha Koneg. She vanishes into thin
0:19
Speaker 1: air and into sub zero temperatures. Joining us to help
0:24
Speaker 1: crack the case. Investigative reporter Casey grow from Alaska and
0:30
Speaker 1: FBI special agent Bobby Chicone, who's actually in on the
0:35
Speaker 1: FBI investigation, joining us to analyze the clues left behind.
0:39
Speaker 1: Cheryl McCollum, director of the Cold Case Research Institute, and
0:43
Speaker 1: doctor Bethany Marshall, renowned La psychoanalysts. As you know by now,
0:50
Speaker 1: a major break occurs in the hunt for Samantha and
0:54
Speaker 1: her kidnapper. Investigators tracking Samantha's debit card across the country.
1:00
Speaker 1: Detectives were kind of shocked because there was a withdrawal
1:07
Speaker 1: from an ATM in Wilcox, Arizona. Then there was another
1:14
Speaker 1: withdrawal in Lordsburg, New Mexico. The next withdrawal was March
1:19
Speaker 1: tenth in Humble, Texas. Nancy Grace Killers amongst Us, Eighteen
1:30
Speaker 1: year old Samantha Sammy Coning vanishes on a Wednesday night
1:34
Speaker 1: from her coffee stand workplace surveillance video shows an armed
1:40
Speaker 1: man dressed all in black forcing her out of the
1:44
Speaker 1: coffee shop. What happened this little girl? Samantha goes missing
1:50
Speaker 1: in the cold night air of Alaska. At this time,
1:54
Speaker 1: after the ransom note comes in, the devastated father up
1:58
Speaker 1: the reward from twelve thousand, five hundred to forty one
2:02
Speaker 1: thousand dollars. Forty one thousand dollars. He ups the reward
2:08
Speaker 1: and still no one can identify where is Samantha Koenik
2:15
Speaker 1: until a break in the case. A ransom note with
2:20
Speaker 1: a frea key photo of Samantha, her hair obviously done
2:27
Speaker 1: by your kidnapper in braids, with the chilling words ain't
2:32
Speaker 1: cheap party written underneath. And another fact to Cheryl McCollum
2:39
Speaker 1: is he didn't hide this. He actually posted it on
2:45
Speaker 1: the bulletin board, the photo of Samantha underneath the missing
2:50
Speaker 1: dog Albert Flyer. He wanted people to see Samantha in distress.
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Speaker 1: What about that, Cheryl? Of course, Nancy, the focus was
3:02
Speaker 1: not about the money. The focus is about her and
3:07
Speaker 1: every detail that he's selected personally is even more sinister.
3:12
Speaker 1: The fact that he would use the phrase ain't she
3:15
Speaker 1: Pardy kind act like, Oh, I'm ignorant, I'm a hill village,
3:19
Speaker 1: when that's probably not the case. The fact that he
3:21
Speaker 1: would choose any newspaper he wanted, but he selected the
3:24
Speaker 1: date the thirteenth, like it's bad luck for her. Everything
3:29
Speaker 1: he's doing, from the scheme mass to being an All
3:32
Speaker 1: Blacks to hiding it under the picture of a dog,
3:35
Speaker 1: because that's about what she's worked him. She's a doll,
3:38
Speaker 1: She ain't nothing. Everything is telling you a story from him,
3:43
Speaker 1: and I'm telling you he's watching the news. He knows
3:46
Speaker 1: all the principal players, and he's playing a game police, community, family,
3:52
Speaker 1: her father on edge, and a race against time. Really,
3:57
Speaker 1: could they get the money to the purpose, could they
4:00
Speaker 1: find the purp? Could they save Samantha? In the midst
4:05
Speaker 1: of this a bizarre twist in the case, there were
4:09
Speaker 1: three withdrawals in the city of Anchorage of five hundred
4:12
Speaker 1: dollars the daily limit in all of the ATM situations
4:16
Speaker 1: where he was using the debit card. As soon as
4:18
Speaker 1: the alerts came, we dispatched law enforcement there as quickly
4:21
Speaker 1: as we could, but there were literally minutes behind him.
4:27
Speaker 1: Then the account went silent, and on March seventh, detectives
4:33
Speaker 1: were kind of shocked because there was a withdrawal from
4:39
Speaker 1: an ATM in Wilcox, Arizona. Then there was another withdrawal
4:46
Speaker 1: in Lordsburg, New Mexico. The next withdrawal was March tenth
4:51
Speaker 1: in Humble, Texas, and then shortly after there was a
4:55
Speaker 1: withdrawal in Shepherd, Texas. Each time this money was withdrawn,
5:00
Speaker 1: it was withdrawn by a person wearing a mask. In
5:06
Speaker 1: the ATM video footage, we're able to see footage of
5:08
Speaker 1: the vehicle to suspect is driving, and we're able to
5:10
Speaker 1: determine that it's a white Ford focus traveling East Fountain.
5:14
Speaker 1: Just hearing from our friends at Oxygen, that gave me
5:17
Speaker 1: chills all on my arms and legs straight out to
5:21
Speaker 1: Cheryl McCullum, director of the Cold Case Research Institute, joining me,
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Speaker 1: Dotor Bethany Marshall, Casey Grove, John Limley, and FBI special
5:28
Speaker 1: agent Bobby Chicken. Cheryl, you know why because that means
5:33
Speaker 1: at the very best, he the kidnapper is on the
5:38
Speaker 1: run with Samantha, and we also know which way he's going.
5:43
Speaker 1: He is now far away from home, apparently holding her
5:48
Speaker 1: a hostage in the car. We've got an eye on
5:51
Speaker 1: a white Ford escort, but he's gone from Anchorage to Wilcox, Arizona,
5:55
Speaker 1: to Lord's Burden, New Mexico, Humble Texas, Shepherd Texas. They
6:00
Speaker 1: are on him, but that has got to send chills
6:05
Speaker 1: down Samantha's father's spine. This guy is on the run
6:09
Speaker 1: with his daughter. What is she enduring? Maybe this is
6:11
Speaker 1: what we call a money tree. Not only do we
6:14
Speaker 1: know the directions, we have his actual location in real time,
6:20
Speaker 1: so we not only know where he's at, we know
6:23
Speaker 1: how fast he's traveling with her. And another thing we
6:26
Speaker 1: know Doctor Bethany Marshall, renowned California's psychoanalyst. This guy is
6:30
Speaker 1: no idiot, no idiot at all, because he wears a
6:35
Speaker 1: mask when he goes to the ATM. He knows her
6:40
Speaker 1: ATM card Samantha is gonna hit and they're gonna pull
6:43
Speaker 1: that video and they still can't get an idea on him.
6:46
Speaker 1: He's outsmarting not only the cops, but no offense. Bobby
6:49
Speaker 1: Chicon the FBI, Well, Nancy, this is what we call
6:52
Speaker 1: a spree, right, a crime spree where there's extraordinary energy
6:57
Speaker 1: put into withdrawing money from all these ATMs. What I
7:01
Speaker 1: would worry about at this point from a psychological perspective.
7:05
Speaker 1: Is he high? Is he using amphetamine? Is he in
7:08
Speaker 1: a manic state? Is he fragmented? You know, he's very
7:13
Speaker 1: methodical because he wears a ski mask, but he is moving, moving, moving.
7:18
Speaker 1: That extraordinary energy that goes into all those withdrawals and
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Speaker 1: all about traveling could also be going into accosting her.
7:26
Speaker 1: So this puts her at greater risk, I think than
7:29
Speaker 1: if he were just really low key and in one spot.
7:32
Speaker 1: You know, the cops call the dad and they go,
7:35
Speaker 1: we got good news he used their ATM. Bad news
7:40
Speaker 1: is he's wearing a mask. We also know in the
7:45
Speaker 1: ransom note he took the time to braid her hair
7:51
Speaker 1: for the photo, and that I always want to vomit
7:56
Speaker 1: because I'm thinking what he is doing too some antha
8:01
Speaker 1: on the road taking her from Anchorage to Arizona to
8:05
Speaker 1: New Mexico to Texas. I mean, Bobby Chicone, no offense
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Speaker 1: to the Fbi'm big fans most of the time, but Bobby,
8:15
Speaker 1: at this point, had you ever seen anything like this
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Speaker 1: guy out smarting everybody at every turn, still wearing a
8:24
Speaker 1: ski mask. He thinks to thwart you all the way
8:28
Speaker 1: into Mexico. Well, let's take a step back and understand
8:31
Speaker 1: what the investiators actually know at this point. So, with
8:34
Speaker 1: an abduction like this, usually when there's a ransom demand,
8:37
Speaker 1: the victim is with one person and the ransom collectors
8:40
Speaker 1: with another. So we don't even know if there's a
8:42
Speaker 1: single person at work here or there's multiple people at work. Now,
8:45
Speaker 1: we know that abductions are hard. To abduct someone and
8:47
Speaker 1: keep them as even harder to abduct them, to keep
8:49
Speaker 1: them and travel with them is even more difficult than that,
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Speaker 1: So we don't know at this point whether the person
8:55
Speaker 1: using this ATM card is in concert with other perpetrators who,
9:00
Speaker 1: you know, maybe still have Samantha closer to a last
9:02
Speaker 1: schoo where she was abducted. We don't know any of
9:04
Speaker 1: that yet. All we know is that card is being used.
9:08
Speaker 1: We don't know who's using it if if that card
9:10
Speaker 1: has been sold or transferred to someone else, we don't know.
9:13
Speaker 1: At this point. All we know is the card is
9:15
Speaker 1: being used and we're following the card. But there's a
9:18
Speaker 1: world of other possibilities that the investigators are still tracking
9:21
Speaker 1: with abductions like this, which means the possibility is that
9:26
Speaker 1: she still could be with someone else closer to the
9:29
Speaker 1: abduction site. We just don't know at this point. You know,
9:31
Speaker 1: something struck me, Bobby chicoan about what doctor Bethany Marshall said.
9:34
Speaker 1: I'm gonna throw this to you, Cheryl McCollum. The incredible
9:37
Speaker 1: energy he's putting into keeping up the chase. He is
9:44
Speaker 1: on it. He has managed to get this squirrel out
9:47
Speaker 1: of a coffee shop in a populated area. Nobody sees
9:52
Speaker 1: a thing. You get the video. You can't tell who
9:54
Speaker 1: he is. You can't tell a thing about him. Now
9:57
Speaker 1: he's caught on cameras all across the kind tree and
10:00
Speaker 1: multiple jurisdictions. We still can't figure out who is he?
10:05
Speaker 1: What does he look like? Put out an apb All
10:07
Speaker 1: points a bullet on him. Nothing. I mean, apparently Bobby
10:11
Speaker 1: chicon is not as worried about it as I am.
10:13
Speaker 1: But to me, that tells me this is a criminal mastermind. Nancy.
10:17
Speaker 1: There's no question he's done a lot of preparation and
10:22
Speaker 1: a lot of plans, even possibly mapping out where he's headed. Now,
10:27
Speaker 1: no doubt about it. Let me tell you this, Nobody
10:31
Speaker 1: ever accused the Devil of being stupid. In fact, he's
10:35
Speaker 1: got to be brilliant, to have his own kingdom right,
10:39
Speaker 1: ruling over evil throughout the universe. And here is this guy.
10:43
Speaker 1: He is no idiot, but I guarantee you he is
10:46
Speaker 1: nothing but pure evil. I can only imagine what Samantha's
10:59
Speaker 1: father is going through the phone rings. He's got caller ID.
11:02
Speaker 1: He knows it's the cops. He knows it's the fads.
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Speaker 1: They say, good news, we got a hit. We know
11:08
Speaker 1: here he is. Oops, wait a minute, he's not an
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Speaker 1: Anchorage anymore. He's in Wilcox's. Wait. No, he's not in
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Speaker 1: Wilcox's Arizona. He's in Lordsville. No, no, he's not in
11:16
Speaker 1: New Mexico anymore. Now he's in Humble No, no, no, no, no,
11:19
Speaker 1: he's in Shepherd, I mean. And then to tell him
11:23
Speaker 1: the news. The guy who took your daughter still can't
11:27
Speaker 1: be identified. He's still outsmarting us. But then another break
11:32
Speaker 1: in the case. There was a Texas Highway Patrol corporal
11:36
Speaker 1: and he saw a white Ford focus. He thought, this
11:41
Speaker 1: looks kind of like the car they're looking for. The
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Speaker 1: vehicle makes a traffic in fraction and he's able to
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Speaker 1: pull him over. The police officer is handed an Alaska
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Speaker 1: driver's license. The corporal knew that this is the guide.
12:07
Speaker 1: In the search of this vehicle, they found clothing that
12:10
Speaker 1: matched the description of the clothing of the person who
12:12
Speaker 1: was using the various ATMs. There's a gun in the
12:17
Speaker 1: trunk of the car as well, But the big thing
12:19
Speaker 1: is Samantha's cell phone. And then Samantha's debit card has
12:22
Speaker 1: also recovered. Okay, now we have a glimmer of hope
12:26
Speaker 1: out of the blue in this it reminds me so much,
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Speaker 1: Cheryl McCollum of Timothy McVeigh, the Okay City bomber who
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Speaker 1: had murdered so many people. And he gets pulled over
12:40
Speaker 1: because he has a rear signal malfunction on his car,
12:45
Speaker 1: and then something didn't sit right with a cop and
12:49
Speaker 1: then they find out he is Oklahoma City bomber that
12:55
Speaker 1: stole so many lives, just ruthlessly. And remember the building,
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Speaker 1: the building that had a daycare in it, little babies
13:02
Speaker 1: were there. Remember him. Now in this case, out of
13:06
Speaker 1: the blue, still don't have an id, a visual or
13:10
Speaker 1: who this guy is that took Samantha. But then a
13:12
Speaker 1: cop across the country sees a Ford focus pulls it
13:17
Speaker 1: over on a traffic violation and Samantha's things are recovered
13:23
Speaker 1: in the car. This gives them hope Samantha is being
13:27
Speaker 1: stashed somewhere. Listen, they had him on a federal case
13:32
Speaker 1: of using a credit card illegally and could arrest him
13:36
Speaker 1: on that. However, the one thing missing is Samantha. He
13:45
Speaker 1: did not say anything about the kidnapping other than denying
13:49
Speaker 1: that he had anything to do with When they found him,
13:52
Speaker 1: we had no clue with his mamas, never seen his
13:56
Speaker 1: face before. What if any, is his connection with Samantha
14:00
Speaker 1: Knig Because Dr Bethany Marshall's stranger on stranger abduction in
14:05
Speaker 1: this scenario is highly highly rare, less than one percent nancy.
14:10
Speaker 1: So the fact that this perpetrator could target Samantha, take her,
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Speaker 1: go on a crime spree, procure her atm all the
14:22
Speaker 1: while having no links or no ties, that's unusual. And
14:25
Speaker 1: what happens for the police in a situation like that
14:29
Speaker 1: is that they have absolutely no clues. Think about it.
14:32
Speaker 1: They cannot go through her computer or her cell phone
14:36
Speaker 1: and see if there's anybody stalking her. They can't look
14:38
Speaker 1: at people she went to high school with to see
14:40
Speaker 1: if anybody had some kind of an obsession or a
14:43
Speaker 1: preoccupation with her. This is literally, as you said earlier,
14:48
Speaker 1: pure evil staring her in the face. Somebody who targeted her,
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Speaker 1: abducted her, took her ATM, went on a crime spree,
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Speaker 1: and now she's nowhere to be found. I were her dad,
15:01
Speaker 1: I would be so sick and so terrified. I mean,
15:05
Speaker 1: wouldn't you hope at least when he was pulled, think
15:08
Speaker 1: about it, Think think think think think but John dot
15:12
Speaker 1: com instore, John Only. The reality is we've got him.
15:17
Speaker 1: He's got her ATM card, he's got her stuff. Clearly
15:20
Speaker 1: he's not going to take her. According to her uncle,
15:23
Speaker 1: she was very feisty in his words, not mine. You
15:26
Speaker 1: don't want to take a feisty kidnap victim around locally
15:32
Speaker 1: when you're stashing her somewhere else, because she could jump
15:34
Speaker 1: out of the car and it all be over, John.
15:37
Speaker 1: It's so true. And again focusing on what they do
15:40
Speaker 1: have in the trunk of that car, Samantha's cell phone
15:44
Speaker 1: and her ATM card. As we've heard, you know, that
15:48
Speaker 1: gives the detectives a major shoe in the door because
15:53
Speaker 1: using an ATM card illegally, well that's a federal offense.
15:57
Speaker 1: No matter what state the person in Casey Grove joining
16:01
Speaker 1: us with Alaska public Media Casey weigh In. The first
16:05
Speaker 1: thing we heard about any sort of suspect or arrest
16:10
Speaker 1: or anything in this whole thing charges was actually a
16:15
Speaker 1: TV station down in Texas called the Anchorage Daily News,
16:19
Speaker 1: and I talked to a reporter down there who just
16:22
Speaker 1: had a kind of a wild tip from you know,
16:26
Speaker 1: some public safety official off the record saying that this
16:30
Speaker 1: guy who had been arrested something like, you know, just
16:33
Speaker 1: outside of Luskin, Texas, was connected to an abduction in Alaska,
16:40
Speaker 1: and everybody kind of knew in Alaska like which one
16:44
Speaker 1: that was, because it was the biggest case going on
16:46
Speaker 1: at the time that involved any kind of abduction. It
16:50
Speaker 1: took some time before there was any real news about
16:53
Speaker 1: the charges or any details from the charges. So they
16:56
Speaker 1: they you know, released this charging document up on the
17:00
Speaker 1: federal the Federal Courts System website, and it's not for
17:06
Speaker 1: you know, murder or kidnapping or anything like that. It's
17:08
Speaker 1: it's for you know, misusing this ATM card. Fraudulent use
17:12
Speaker 1: of access device, I think is what they call it.
17:15
Speaker 1: But it's you know, access device as an ATM card
17:18
Speaker 1: that he had stolen from her and had been, according
17:23
Speaker 1: to these charges, had been using this card to make
17:26
Speaker 1: withdrawals in I think New Mexico, Arizona, Texas. There I
17:31
Speaker 1: think there was one withdrawal you know, earlier on in Anchorage,
17:34
Speaker 1: even which was always a very strange part of this
17:40
Speaker 1: that you know, he had been getting a few hundred
17:43
Speaker 1: dollars at a time and sort of gave the police
17:49
Speaker 1: a way to track him. Yes, you're right, Casey, he
17:51
Speaker 1: did give them a way to track him, um like
17:54
Speaker 1: cancel and gratulating bread crumbs across the country. But every
17:57
Speaker 1: time he thwarted them by going to a new location
18:00
Speaker 1: before they can catch him and covering up his face.
18:03
Speaker 1: But bizarrely, when they do get him for a traffic
18:07
Speaker 1: violation of all things, nobody's ever seen him before. He
18:11
Speaker 1: has no criminal history, nothing, And it's hard for me
18:14
Speaker 1: to believe that you go from zero to one twenty
18:18
Speaker 1: mph and one fell swoop. So who is this guy?
18:24
Speaker 1: We get a name, keys to FBI Special Agent Bobby
18:28
Speaker 1: Chicone joining us. Bobby. Now is the time that this
18:32
Speaker 1: guy that nobody knows, nobody recognizes, no fingerprint on file,
18:37
Speaker 1: nothing in napa's nothing in codas. Nothing needs to cough up.
18:41
Speaker 1: Where is Samantha? How do we get it out of him? Bobby, Well,
18:45
Speaker 1: the first thing we do is get him from Texas
18:46
Speaker 1: back to Alaska where the case resides, and get him
18:49
Speaker 1: into the hands of the agents and detectives who are
18:52
Speaker 1: most familiar with the Samantha's case. And so that's what happens.
18:57
Speaker 1: He is basically extradited from Texas back to Alaska and
19:02
Speaker 1: within a day or two and then is made to
19:05
Speaker 1: sit down with the people, mostly meliar with the case,
19:07
Speaker 1: who can then start interrogating him on why he had
19:10
Speaker 1: a card, who is he the one that actually took
19:14
Speaker 1: the card? So we have to determine a lot. So
19:16
Speaker 1: he's charged with the initial charge that we have on him.
19:18
Speaker 1: Right as a prosecutor know where you can only charge
19:20
Speaker 1: what you have. Right now, we only have the fact
19:22
Speaker 1: that he used her at m which is the federal crime.
19:25
Speaker 1: So he is extradited back to Alaska on that particular crime,
19:29
Speaker 1: and then we can start looking into his connection to
19:32
Speaker 1: Samantha and what those threads are that we can find.
19:35
Speaker 1: You know, it's amazing to me that he never says
19:38
Speaker 1: a word in when he's pulled over for the traffic stop.
19:42
Speaker 1: When he's being held for extradition, He never says a
19:45
Speaker 1: word the entire extradition process, which is either driving in
19:50
Speaker 1: a pattiwagon or bipline where you literally are handcuffed to
19:55
Speaker 1: the chair, to the seat, or to the federal agent.
19:58
Speaker 1: Never said a word about Samantha. He doesn't reveal where
20:03
Speaker 1: he's hiding her. Is she being fed? Is she being
20:07
Speaker 1: tortured to some other guy? Have her shockways through the community.
20:11
Speaker 1: Take a listen to law enforcement, Anchorage police and the
20:15
Speaker 1: FED speaking to KTU. If the strongest words yet from
20:18
Speaker 1: investigators looking into the abduction of Samantha Konick, APD Chief
20:22
Speaker 1: Mark Muse says they think Israel Keys, a man arrested
20:25
Speaker 1: in Texas for allegedly using a stolen debit card, is
20:28
Speaker 1: involved in her abduction. Channels choose. Jason Lamb joins us
20:31
Speaker 1: now from outside the federal courthouse in Anchorage, where that man,
20:34
Speaker 1: Israel Keys, based to judge today, Jason, what did Keys
20:37
Speaker 1: have to say in court today, Oh, Maria Mike, nothing
20:41
Speaker 1: specifically related to the abduction of Samantha Kohonick. He spoke
20:45
Speaker 1: very briefly short phrases. Yes, your honor, No, your honor,
20:49
Speaker 1: things like that he did plead not guilty to the
20:53
Speaker 1: charge of access device fraud using that stolen debit card
20:57
Speaker 1: to try and get money. Keys sat in the room
21:00
Speaker 1: today facing the judge as he read off that charge
21:02
Speaker 1: against him. The most we heard from Keys was him
21:05
Speaker 1: explaining why he didn't have enough money for a lawyer,
21:08
Speaker 1: his voice quivering during that explanation. Afterwards, at a press
21:12
Speaker 1: conference with investigators, they said they want more information about
21:16
Speaker 1: the truck Keys was driving at the time of Koenig's abduction.
21:19
Speaker 1: Toward the beginning of last month. They say they think
21:21
Speaker 1: a large utility rack on the truck might have been
21:24
Speaker 1: removed at the time of Koenig's abduction, and they want
21:27
Speaker 1: to know if anyone helped remove that utility rack off
21:30
Speaker 1: of keys car and Police Chief Mark News said in
21:32
Speaker 1: the strongest way we've heard so far, that APD thinks
21:36
Speaker 1: Keys is involved in Konig's abduction, and the US Attorney's
21:39
Speaker 1: office back that up today by giving you the significance
21:44
Speaker 1: of the connection between the investigation of Miss Koenig's abduction
21:49
Speaker 1: and not only are the charges that were issued today
21:54
Speaker 1: in which mister Keys was arraigned upon. I think it
21:57
Speaker 1: lets people know the seriousness with which everybody hears taking it,
22:00
Speaker 1: and it gives people a reason to calling and providing
22:03
Speaker 1: information that they may be aware of associated with that
22:05
Speaker 1: truck or with mister Keys. Now beyond that, investigators wouldn't
22:10
Speaker 1: answer any more questions about anything, including what the connection
22:15
Speaker 1: is between Israel Keys and Samantha Koenig. They say they
22:18
Speaker 1: have to keep that information close to their chest. To
22:21
Speaker 1: Cheryl McCollum, director of the Cold Case Research Institute, Cheryl,
22:25
Speaker 1: we've got the guy in our grasp. Still no, Samantha.
22:31
Speaker 1: How do you get somebody like this guy to talk?
22:35
Speaker 1: Nitthy You're gonna want to get him by himself, with
22:38
Speaker 1: just maybe one interrogator and let him talk, let him brag,
22:43
Speaker 1: Let him talk about what he's done the past several days,
22:46
Speaker 1: how he got her card, how he got her cell phone.
22:49
Speaker 1: The best thing you can do is keep him talking
22:52
Speaker 1: and asking very few questions. Well, here's the problem. You
22:55
Speaker 1: can't beat him, you can't torture him. You can't give
22:58
Speaker 1: him sodium pentathal. Our constitution, the truth serum can't do it.
23:03
Speaker 1: If you do it, that confession, that statement will be
23:07
Speaker 1: thrown out. Then you'll have nothing. Everything you gain as
23:10
Speaker 1: a result of that statement, ie the location of Samantha
23:13
Speaker 1: and all the evidence that will be thrown out of
23:16
Speaker 1: court under the fruit of the poisonous tree doctrine because
23:19
Speaker 1: you got it from an illegal confession. So the cops,
23:23
Speaker 1: there's really no nice way to put it, are screwed.
23:26
Speaker 1: He won't talk. He's got the car, he's got the mask,
23:31
Speaker 1: he's got Samantha stuff. Only thing missing Samantha. So how
23:37
Speaker 1: does a candy bar and a cigar play into this?
23:42
Speaker 1: First he makes a few demands. The mood significantly change.
23:46
Speaker 1: Once we first got to hear from from Israel Keys,
23:49
Speaker 1: it was clear just how cold and calculating he was.
23:54
Speaker 1: I can give you the rest of the story, like
23:56
Speaker 1: you know, everything that happened if I get a cigar.
24:00
Speaker 1: He wanted an Americano when he wanted a peanut butter
24:06
Speaker 1: Snickers bar, and he wanted an opportunity to smoke a cigar,
24:09
Speaker 1: which at the time we thought were pretty silly. But
24:13
Speaker 1: if that's what it was going to take for him
24:15
Speaker 1: to talk with us, we were willing to do that.
24:17
Speaker 1: That was when he began relating details of the kidnapping
24:22
Speaker 1: of Samantha Cone. He had a shed in his driveway,
24:26
Speaker 1: and ultimately he puts Samantha in the shed and she's
24:29
Speaker 1: bound in the shed. There he was drinking alcohol and
24:34
Speaker 1: smoking cigars and then turned up the music so that
24:40
Speaker 1: any sounds that were irregular wouldn't be here by his
24:43
Speaker 1: girlfriend daughter who were in the house or the neighbor,
24:47
Speaker 1: and he sexually assaulted her through the night. Considering the
24:51
Speaker 1: horrific ordeal Keys claims to have been acted right outside
24:54
Speaker 1: his home, the FBI is shocked to find out that
24:56
Speaker 1: Keys has a living girlfriend and a ten year old daughter.
25:00
Speaker 1: His girlfriend and their child had absolutely no clue about
25:04
Speaker 1: what he was up to. He indicates of Samantha that
25:07
Speaker 1: his goal is to get money and if he gets
25:09
Speaker 1: money that he intends to let her go. And while
25:11
Speaker 1: she's in the shed is when he goes back to
25:13
Speaker 1: the coffee standbut to get her phone, get her debit card,
25:16
Speaker 1: and actually goes to an ATM to see how much
25:18
Speaker 1: money is in her account and then returns to the shed.
25:21
Speaker 1: What a cold blooded devil this guy is. He puts
25:25
Speaker 1: Samantha Koenik in a shed and rapes her, turning up
25:30
Speaker 1: the music high, high, high, so neighbors and his girlfriend
25:35
Speaker 1: and daughter cannot hear her screaming, while, of course, the
25:40
Speaker 1: FIDS make a bee line racing to the shed. Tacy
25:44
Speaker 1: grab joining me Alaska Public Media tell me about the
25:47
Speaker 1: shed and the cops the FIDS descending upon it. I
25:50
Speaker 1: got a call from one of the neighbors at on
25:53
Speaker 1: Israel Keith's Street where he lived with his girlfriend, and
25:58
Speaker 1: like we had before, you know, and other reporters went
26:01
Speaker 1: down and kind of just stood there on the street
26:05
Speaker 1: watching FBI agents mostly working right around a shed right
26:10
Speaker 1: in the front yard. We had seen them there before,
26:13
Speaker 1: kind of searching around generally and not on the property,
26:16
Speaker 1: but they were real focused on this shed and kind
26:20
Speaker 1: of became apparent that they were digging it out. You know.
26:23
Speaker 1: We thought at first maybe they were like digging in
26:25
Speaker 1: the ground. It was frozen ground, you know, and like
26:27
Speaker 1: digging maybe trying to dig something up. So, you know,
26:32
Speaker 1: definitely just standing there for I don't know how long,
26:34
Speaker 1: a couple of hours at least, and then what they
26:38
Speaker 1: are actually doing was they were digging up the entire shed.
26:40
Speaker 1: They like, you know, dug out around it, got it
26:44
Speaker 1: loose from the ground, and then they used a forklift
26:46
Speaker 1: to pick it up and put it on the back
26:48
Speaker 1: of this slapbed truck, and they strapped it all down.
26:52
Speaker 1: I mean, it was, you know, a real precarious situation
26:55
Speaker 1: that seemed like on snow everything with this shed balanced,
26:58
Speaker 1: not forklift, but they got it on there and took
27:01
Speaker 1: it downtown. Me and a couple other reporters soon as
27:05
Speaker 1: following him, following the slap ed truck with a shed
27:08
Speaker 1: on it downtown to the FBI building. Bobby, did you go?
27:10
Speaker 1: An FBI special agent on the scene, Bobby. Now we've
27:15
Speaker 1: got the shed, We've got the shed where he kept her,
27:19
Speaker 1: where he raped her, repeatedly turning up the music so
27:22
Speaker 1: nobody could hear. We've got her clothes, but where is
27:26
Speaker 1: she being held? You give him a candy bar, Snickers?
27:30
Speaker 1: You give him a cigar. The guy is so chilled.
27:35
Speaker 1: Did you hear him? He was actually laughing asking for
27:40
Speaker 1: a cigar, as everybody's on pins and needles about Samantha,
27:44
Speaker 1: and then what happens. Well, you know, as as as
27:47
Speaker 1: much as that sounds like bad news, that he's that,
27:50
Speaker 1: he's so cold and calculating and wants the cigar and
27:52
Speaker 1: things in some respect as an interrogator, You know, this
27:56
Speaker 1: guy is so narcissistic that he wants to talk. He
28:00
Speaker 1: wants to be in control. And you have to assess
28:02
Speaker 1: each person you're interrogating differently, determine what their wants and
28:05
Speaker 1: needs are. This guy wants to talk, he wants to
28:08
Speaker 1: be in control, he wants to show us what a
28:11
Speaker 1: professional he is, and so he's not trying to deny,
28:13
Speaker 1: he's not trying to hide. So that's that's actually for
28:16
Speaker 1: us a good thing, the fact that he wants things
28:19
Speaker 1: and he's going to in turn give up something for
28:22
Speaker 1: the things that he gets that he wants. So in
28:24
Speaker 1: some respects for us and as interrogators, that's a good sign.
28:28
Speaker 1: We know he wants to talk now hasn't talked yet,
28:30
Speaker 1: but the indications are that he wants to be in
28:33
Speaker 1: control and he wants to talk. He knows that won't
28:35
Speaker 1: last forever. So he knows he'll have to give up
28:37
Speaker 1: something to get something and to keep this thing going.
28:42
Speaker 1: And so we know that it's only a matter of
28:44
Speaker 1: time that as long as we can be you know,
28:46
Speaker 1: as we can give him a little bit of what
28:48
Speaker 1: he wants, we can start demanding things that we want.
28:51
Speaker 1: And so that's the process they're in right now. Dodgor
28:53
Speaker 1: Bethany Marshall, what does it mean to you that at
28:57
Speaker 1: this juncture, at this point, he's actually the puppet here.
29:01
Speaker 1: He's playing federal ages like puppets. They're running around getting
29:06
Speaker 1: him cigars and candies and whatever he wants to try
29:09
Speaker 1: to find out where Samantha is. And he still hasn't
29:11
Speaker 1: coughed up Nancy. He's a pig and dirt. He is
29:15
Speaker 1: rolling around, rooting around and loving this. Now. Remember when
29:19
Speaker 1: they first arrested him and put him in the so
29:21
Speaker 1: called pattiwagon, he had nothing to say. The reason for
29:25
Speaker 1: that is he felt diminished, inferior, and as if he
29:29
Speaker 1: had lost his power. But the minute he asked for
29:32
Speaker 1: the candy bar, the cigar, the Americano, now he was
29:36
Speaker 1: getting them to serve his needs and not the other
29:39
Speaker 1: way around. In a way, he was recreating the crime
29:43
Speaker 1: scene right where he was smoking a cigar, he was
29:45
Speaker 1: drinking alcohol. He's back to like it's his world and
29:49
Speaker 1: everyone's living in it. Now. Remember, sociopaths are quite grandiose,
29:54
Speaker 1: So if you appeal to their narcissism, you can get
29:58
Speaker 1: them to talk about almost any thing. Once in my office,
30:01
Speaker 1: I said to a grandpa who had molested his grandchild,
30:04
Speaker 1: and I was afraid he was going to continue to molest.
30:07
Speaker 1: I said to him, think about how everybody's going to
30:10
Speaker 1: look up to you and admire you if you never
30:13
Speaker 1: touch a child again. In fact, you could be the
30:16
Speaker 1: most important person in your community. You could be a
30:19
Speaker 1: great man. Everybody will revere you. That was I felt.
30:23
Speaker 1: The only deterrent to him molesting again was to appeal
30:26
Speaker 1: to his narcissism. That's what these investigators are doing, and boy,
30:30
Speaker 1: it really works. I mean he folded and he just
30:33
Speaker 1: started to talk and talk and talk, because now he's
30:36
Speaker 1: in his glory days. Oh yeah, he is basking, basking
30:39
Speaker 1: in the attention for the federal agents, especially from female
30:42
Speaker 1: agent Bobby Chicone. You get the shed, obviously, Samantha still
30:47
Speaker 1: not in there. Then we find out after he has
30:51
Speaker 1: Samantha in the shed, raping her, getting her atm cars,
30:56
Speaker 1: stealing her money, he goes off on a two week cruise.
31:00
Speaker 1: He leaves Samantha in the shed two weeks to go
31:04
Speaker 1: on a cruise. What did the fans learn from the shed? Bobby?
31:09
Speaker 1: They dig the whole thing up, put it on a truck,
31:11
Speaker 1: strap it down and take it away. What did they
31:13
Speaker 1: learn from the shed? You know? The first thing I
31:15
Speaker 1: learned when I stepped into that shed and looked at it. Um,
31:18
Speaker 1: what I learned was it was already outfitted for an abduction,
31:23
Speaker 1: and so it had restraining devices already screwed into some
31:27
Speaker 1: of the beams in it. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. See
31:31
Speaker 1: you gotta talk, not FBI talk. You've got to talk
31:35
Speaker 1: regular people talk. What do you mean by restraining devices?
31:39
Speaker 1: He's had already put things in that shed that would
31:43
Speaker 1: make it easier to restrain somebody, to tie them down.
31:47
Speaker 1: He'd had what looked to me like, um, you bolts
31:51
Speaker 1: into the walls of the shed that could be used
31:53
Speaker 1: to tie rope through, and that you could restrain somebody
31:56
Speaker 1: in there. So we already know that no one is
31:59
Speaker 1: going to vibe in a shed like that in February
32:02
Speaker 1: for two weeks and anchor ch Alaska, I mean, you'd
32:04
Speaker 1: freeze to death. And so we knew that Samantha had
32:07
Speaker 1: been probably in there and tied up in there, you know,
32:12
Speaker 1: But now it's anybody's guests as to where she is currently.
32:15
Speaker 1: How far was the shed from the house where his
32:18
Speaker 1: girlfriend and daughter were. It was basically in the driveway
32:21
Speaker 1: of the house when I stepped into it, and had
32:23
Speaker 1: already been removed to the FBI office in the garage
32:26
Speaker 1: of the FBI office, that's when I first saw it.
32:29
Speaker 1: But it had been dug up from what was basically
32:32
Speaker 1: right next to his house. And the girlfriend and the
32:35
Speaker 1: daughter never heard a thing. All they could hear was
32:38
Speaker 1: music blaring. Even the neighbors could hear it. And in
32:41
Speaker 1: the midst of you examining the shed, you get a call.
32:46
Speaker 1: You get a call about, of all things, the ransom
32:49
Speaker 1: note and the photo the photo of Samantha clearly taken
32:54
Speaker 1: in the shed after he had braided her hair, and
32:59
Speaker 1: in that phone hall. What do you learn? So the
33:03
Speaker 1: phone call or the report from the friendship photography unit,
33:06
Speaker 1: Quantico determined that Lynn, looking at the photograph and examining
33:11
Speaker 1: it very closely, it appeared that Samantha's eyes were somehow
33:17
Speaker 1: artificially held open, probably through the use of some kind
33:20
Speaker 1: of sewing of string to keep those eyes open. Of course,
33:24
Speaker 1: then it was in the photograph. It looked like it
33:26
Speaker 1: was then covered up with makeup. Let me just interpret
33:36
Speaker 1: what Bobby Chicon FBI special agent has just laid on me,
33:42
Speaker 1: Cheryl McCollum, my longtime friend and colleague. He stitched her
33:49
Speaker 1: eyes open, then covered them with makeup, then blurred the photo. Cheryl,
34:00
Speaker 1: she's dead. She's dead. She's dead. If he stitched her
34:05
Speaker 1: eyes open, she's dead. The level of horror that that
34:12
Speaker 1: would serve for that family is astronomical. I mean, there
34:17
Speaker 1: are absolutely no words to describe what this monster has
34:22
Speaker 1: now done to their child and what Bobby's going to
34:27
Speaker 1: be faced with. At this point, we have a crime
34:30
Speaker 1: scene at the coffee shop, one in his truck, and
34:33
Speaker 1: now want at the shed, and Bobby's got to find
34:36
Speaker 1: the fourth crime scene. You know what, Cheryl, I don't
34:40
Speaker 1: know how you just did that. How you can talk
34:42
Speaker 1: about finding the crime scene, because all I can think
34:45
Speaker 1: about is him hunched over her body that he's raped,
34:50
Speaker 1: probably in life and postmortem, then braiding her hair in
34:57
Speaker 1: life or postmortem, and then st itching. Hunched over her
35:01
Speaker 1: with the light on and the shed with the music blaring,
35:04
Speaker 1: and his girlfriend and the daughter fifty feet away, and
35:08
Speaker 1: he has a needle and thread and he's actually holding
35:12
Speaker 1: her eyelids to her brow and stitching her eyelids open,
35:17
Speaker 1: all right, now, I just I've prosecuted a lot of murders.
35:21
Speaker 1: I've seen a lot of horrible things. I've seen torture,
35:24
Speaker 1: I've seen people buried alive, children buried. I've seen it all,
35:29
Speaker 1: I think. And now here comes Israel Keys and he
35:33
Speaker 1: does this to this girl in a shed, in a shed,
35:38
Speaker 1: just feet away from people that could have saved her
35:42
Speaker 1: if they dared. Bobby Shall, I mean, what do you
35:45
Speaker 1: do with that when you find out from the Federal
35:49
Speaker 1: photography unit in Quantico her eyes are stitched open. Then
35:53
Speaker 1: he puts some heavy makeup on her to try to
35:56
Speaker 1: make her look alive, and that was used in the
36:00
Speaker 1: ansome note. Well you know it. You know, as investigators,
36:03
Speaker 1: we remove ourselves from the emotional elements that that entails,
36:07
Speaker 1: at least at the time. And you have to tell
36:10
Speaker 1: yourself what this tells us about this person, because everything
36:13
Speaker 1: you can learn about this person can be used basically
36:15
Speaker 1: back in the interrogation of the person. So we now
36:18
Speaker 1: know how cold and how calculating, and how brutal, how
36:22
Speaker 1: evil this person is. So so now we know with
36:27
Speaker 1: the planning that we know went into it, with the
36:29
Speaker 1: brutality that's been carried out during it, we know that
36:32
Speaker 1: there's a lot more to this evil person than what
36:37
Speaker 1: we know. This took a lot of time, a lot
36:39
Speaker 1: of forethought, a lot of planning, and God help me,
36:43
Speaker 1: I hope not a lot of practicing before he did
36:46
Speaker 1: this thing to Samantha Coning. But now we know she's dead,
36:52
Speaker 1: and we know that because photography experts at Quantico have
36:58
Speaker 1: somehow figured out this polaroid. It was a polaroid, as
37:02
Speaker 1: I recall that her eyes had been stitched open. And
37:08
Speaker 1: you know, when I was trying cases, doctor Bethany, I
37:12
Speaker 1: couldn't remove myself from the facts, and sometimes to get
37:17
Speaker 1: through it, I would have to just not think about it,
37:20
Speaker 1: which became very handy in life, the ability not to
37:24
Speaker 1: think about something. But I made my juries think about it,
37:28
Speaker 1: and when I would make them think about it, I
37:30
Speaker 1: had to think about it because I had to tell
37:32
Speaker 1: them in detail. I mean holding her eyelids, think about it,
37:38
Speaker 1: holding her eyelid, her dead eyelid open, and stitching through
37:43
Speaker 1: it to her brow. Nancy. He turned her into a human,
37:51
Speaker 1: non living, dead human doll, stitching her eyes open, braiding
37:57
Speaker 1: her hair, putting makeup on her, and that's just what
38:01
Speaker 1: we know from the neck up. I don't even want
38:03
Speaker 1: to think what he did to the neck down. He's
38:06
Speaker 1: probably a necrophiliac. He probably desecrated her corpse. He had
38:12
Speaker 1: the ultimate triumph and the ultimate control over her to
38:17
Speaker 1: do whatever he wanted with her body, and she wouldn't protest.
38:22
Speaker 1: That shed. Nancy was his party pad. He was obsessed
38:27
Speaker 1: with the shed. He had been outfitting it. I would
38:30
Speaker 1: imagine for months. He probably chose that house because the
38:34
Speaker 1: shed was in front. I can't even imagine the equipment
38:37
Speaker 1: on the walls, chains, things to hide people, to restrain them,
38:43
Speaker 1: and then restraining them in life is not enough. Now
38:46
Speaker 1: he has to restrain them in death. It's the ultimate power.
38:50
Speaker 1: It's the ultimate degradation and triumph over the love object.
38:55
Speaker 1: That's what it is. The FBI now are on the mission,
38:59
Speaker 1: not to save Samantha, but to recover her body. Did
39:07
Speaker 1: keys ever divulge where her body was? Yes, he did.
39:13
Speaker 1: He let them. He let the agents know in the
39:16
Speaker 1: interrogation that he had taken her to a lake about
39:21
Speaker 1: forty miles north of Anchorage. Remember this is still the winter,
39:26
Speaker 1: and he went out onto this frozen lake that's used
39:29
Speaker 1: to ice. Fishermen use it all the time. So you
39:31
Speaker 1: see these these tents that are put up by these
39:33
Speaker 1: ice fishermen so they can sit around a fishing hole
39:37
Speaker 1: in the cold and fish. So he got himself one
39:41
Speaker 1: of these tents. He put it up, He drilled a
39:43
Speaker 1: hole through the ice, and he put Samantha's body through
39:47
Speaker 1: that hole to rest on the bottom of that lake.
39:50
Speaker 1: Listen to this. The FBI dispatches their cold water dive team.
39:56
Speaker 1: Special Agent Bobby Shicone is tapped to lead the recovery efforts.
40:02
Speaker 1: It's still late winter and anchorage and the conditions we're
40:06
Speaker 1: going to be operating under extreme. We can get to
40:09
Speaker 1: Lake Manauska and some FBI agents they're kind of standing
40:14
Speaker 1: watch over a spot on the lake. The keys had
40:16
Speaker 1: directed them too. It was a fishing hole that was
40:19
Speaker 1: frozen over. I looked at that and I said, if
40:23
Speaker 1: she's here, we're going to find her. We'd put her
40:26
Speaker 1: under what a robot in and as soon as the
40:30
Speaker 1: video camera went on, we saw obvious human remains and
40:36
Speaker 1: I could turn to the detective in the case agent
40:39
Speaker 1: and say, tell your boss, as we've found him on
40:42
Speaker 1: you're hearing our friend Bobby Shicon speaking with Oxygen and
40:45
Speaker 1: he is with us now. Bobby FBI special agent you
40:49
Speaker 1: can find at Bobby shakon dot com. Bobby, just imagining
40:53
Speaker 1: you looking out at that frozen lake, trying to figure
40:59
Speaker 1: out where is she, knowing her body is under all
41:03
Speaker 1: that ice somewhere. I mean, what did he do? Go
41:05
Speaker 1: out there, pretend he was fishing, and then get cut
41:10
Speaker 1: a hole and stick her body down there. As gruesome
41:13
Speaker 1: as that sounds, you're exactly right, that's exactly what he did.
41:17
Speaker 1: Because we know his meticulous planning. He did exactly what
41:21
Speaker 1: you said. He pretended he was fishing. He got himself
41:24
Speaker 1: one of these ice fisherman tents that would basically hide
41:27
Speaker 1: him from any outside eyes. He had Samantha's body on
41:31
Speaker 1: a sled, and everything he was doing at that point
41:34
Speaker 1: looked just like a number of other fishermen that would
41:38
Speaker 1: be doing the same kind of activity, except that he
41:40
Speaker 1: had Samantha's body under tarp on his sled. And when
41:43
Speaker 1: he took her into that that ice tent that he
41:46
Speaker 1: had set up and filled the hole, you know inside
41:48
Speaker 1: the tent, it's through the ice. I want you to
41:50
Speaker 1: hear the Killer Keys describing how after he puts this
41:58
Speaker 1: girl's body that icy water. He actually catches fish. He
42:04
Speaker 1: goes fishing, and he brings the fish home to his
42:09
Speaker 1: girlfriend and daughter and they eat the fish. He tried
42:13
Speaker 1: to find a deep lake near the Anchorage area, and
42:16
Speaker 1: he had found Mattnuska Lake and he actually went to
42:19
Speaker 1: where on the map he felt one of the deepest
42:21
Speaker 1: areas was in the lake. A lot of ice fishermen
42:23
Speaker 1: out there, so he used that as a ruse to
42:25
Speaker 1: cut a hole in the ice and ultimately disposed it
42:28
Speaker 1: for body there. So I asked him, kind of like
42:30
Speaker 1: his apropos of nothing, I just well, did you catch
42:32
Speaker 1: any fish? And he said yeah, I called fishing. Well
42:35
Speaker 1: what did you do with him? He goes, I took
42:36
Speaker 1: him home and ate them. So that really kind of
42:38
Speaker 1: turned my stomach as well, that this guy, would you know,
42:41
Speaker 1: kind of he's disposing of a body, catching fish and
42:44
Speaker 1: going home and serving him to his family. Cheryl, I'm
42:47
Speaker 1: imagining the moment that he gets her body. He's got
42:51
Speaker 1: it all planned, he's outsmarted everybody. He gets her body,
42:55
Speaker 1: he's cut the hole in the ice, looks like he's fishing,
42:59
Speaker 1: and the moment that body Samantha goes into the water.
43:05
Speaker 1: It's almost like flushing a kamade or throwing the trash
43:10
Speaker 1: in the dumpster. Nancy, she would slowly think and just
43:16
Speaker 1: fade away, I guess. And here's what's so astronomical for
43:21
Speaker 1: me again, is the level of twisted evil that it
43:29
Speaker 1: would take that again, transporting her body, the preparing to transport,
43:35
Speaker 1: the in plane view, having her under this tart, but
43:38
Speaker 1: still if people can see him, and then going into
43:41
Speaker 1: something that he again has taken great time to prepare,
43:46
Speaker 1: and he's very meticulous. And I agree with Bobby that
43:50
Speaker 1: to me is the most unbelievable thing is the time
43:54
Speaker 1: that he has taken before the crime has actually happened. Again,
44:00
Speaker 1: did and thick beyond anything that I think we've seen too,
44:04
Speaker 1: Bobby Chicon, You're out there on the ice. There's no
44:07
Speaker 1: sign of where he drilled nothing. How do you figure
44:11
Speaker 1: out where to start? How did you recover you, Bobby Chicon,
44:16
Speaker 1: recover her body? Well, we went right to the edge
44:21
Speaker 1: of the water, well, at the edge of the lake
44:23
Speaker 1: where Keys said he entered the lake. So he described
44:26
Speaker 1: in detail by the investigators had him draw a picture
44:29
Speaker 1: of the lake and where he actually set foot on
44:31
Speaker 1: that ice, what direction and approximately how far out he went.
44:35
Speaker 1: The thing is, after he said he was done, he
44:38
Speaker 1: had a piece of wood, a small piece of plywood
44:41
Speaker 1: that he for some reason said on fire and probably
44:46
Speaker 1: because it had blood on it, and he left it
44:50
Speaker 1: there and that piece of small piece of plywood melted
44:53
Speaker 1: itself into the ice, which then refroze over it. But
44:56
Speaker 1: the agents in Alaska had located that. They followed this path.
45:00
Speaker 1: We followed this path that he told us, and we
45:02
Speaker 1: found this half burnt, frozen piece of plywood in the ice,
45:07
Speaker 1: and we realized we're at the point. And then we
45:10
Speaker 1: saw a frozen over fishing hole. Do you see these
45:13
Speaker 1: plugs of ice that have frozen over when the fishermen
45:16
Speaker 1: have used We found a plug of ice frozen over
45:20
Speaker 1: very near that piece of burnt plywood, and we realized
45:25
Speaker 1: this is the hole he probably used. And so let's
45:27
Speaker 1: start looking right here. And as Cheryl McCollum just pointed
45:30
Speaker 1: out again, it's a race against time. First it was
45:33
Speaker 1: a race to find Samantha, and then it was a
45:35
Speaker 1: race to hopefully save her and get her out of
45:37
Speaker 1: the shed she was in. Then it's a race to
45:41
Speaker 1: find her body before her remains. Just as Cheryl said,
45:45
Speaker 1: vanish just fade away, get fed on by fish and
45:50
Speaker 1: other creatures underwater, or degenerate to the point that she
45:54
Speaker 1: can no longer be recovered. So how do you go
45:57
Speaker 1: about it? You dig a hole in the ice, and
45:59
Speaker 1: then what do you do? I mean, I've a diver,
46:02
Speaker 1: but I've never died, and all the hundreds of times
46:05
Speaker 1: I've died, and that kind of cold water, how do
46:08
Speaker 1: you And it's got to be murky, how do you
46:11
Speaker 1: find her? And in the middle of this giant, massive
46:15
Speaker 1: ice covered lake. So what we do is we employ
46:18
Speaker 1: and this this is not an uncommon scenario for us
46:20
Speaker 1: looking under ice. So and the water under ice is
46:24
Speaker 1: normally more clear because there's less fish life. Everything is
46:27
Speaker 1: dormant in the winter. So what we do is, once
46:30
Speaker 1: we drill a small hole, we put a sonar device
46:34
Speaker 1: down and it starts looking at objects on the bottom
46:37
Speaker 1: to give us an idea of you know, is this
46:39
Speaker 1: a rocky bottom? Is there a lot of debris down there?
46:41
Speaker 1: And what we learned from the sonar was that it
46:44
Speaker 1: was a very clean, flat bottom at about fifty feet
46:47
Speaker 1: of depth. And so after the sonar gives us really
46:52
Speaker 1: five individual targets. Targets being shadows. Sonar gives you shadows
46:58
Speaker 1: of shapes. So we have five different shapes on the
47:01
Speaker 1: bottom in this general area. Below this hole that we
47:04
Speaker 1: think he used, we put our underwater robot and we
47:07
Speaker 1: draw us another hole bigger to fit the underwater robot.
47:10
Speaker 1: The underwater robot we pilot that very close to one
47:15
Speaker 1: of these objects that we saw on the sonar. Now
47:19
Speaker 1: there's a lot of pressure on the dive team to
47:21
Speaker 1: identify because the entire city and the investigative reporters have
47:24
Speaker 1: done a good job and they know that we're on
47:26
Speaker 1: that lake, and the police chief and the mayor and
47:29
Speaker 1: the FBI boss are all telling me that the minute
47:32
Speaker 1: I can confirm that it's her, I have to let
47:35
Speaker 1: them know because they're about to give a press conference
47:37
Speaker 1: and let the community know. But I will not confirm
47:40
Speaker 1: that it is a person or a human remains until
47:43
Speaker 1: I am one hundred percent sure, because the last thing
47:45
Speaker 1: I want to do is give people, you know, some
47:48
Speaker 1: kind of bad information. And so it isn't until I
47:51
Speaker 1: put the second of our three methods to work, and
47:54
Speaker 1: that is the second method is the robot. And then
47:58
Speaker 1: once the dust is Basically, the silt on the bottom
48:01
Speaker 1: kicks up when the robot lands. We have to wait
48:03
Speaker 1: a few minutes, and then that silt ultimately settles and
48:07
Speaker 1: I can turn on the video camera on my robot,
48:10
Speaker 1: and then I can identify it positively as human remains.
48:13
Speaker 1: Still can't say it's Samantha. But what I can tell
48:16
Speaker 1: them is, we have a body, or you have something
48:19
Speaker 1: that looks like it could be a body, for all
48:21
Speaker 1: you know at this point, it's a tree limb, it
48:25
Speaker 1: could be rocks, it could be some sort of debris.
48:27
Speaker 1: You don't know yet. It could be Samantha. Nancy Grace
48:34
Speaker 1: signing off goodbye,