Latest / Crime Stories with Nancy Grace / Body Bags with Joseph Scott Morgan: Buried with Head Sticking Out of Ground: The Brutal Murder of Sam Holthaus

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Body Bags with Joseph Scott Morgan: Buried with Head Sticking Out of Ground: The Brutal Murder of Sam Holthaus · Crime Stories with Nancy Grace

0:01
Speaker 1: Quality bouts with Joseph Scott More. I want you to
0:11
Speaker 1: think about a number really quick. A number I'm going
0:13
Speaker 1: to give you. It's not some kind of mind reading
0:16
Speaker 1: trick or anything. Here. Think about a number two, one, six,
0:20
Speaker 1: two hundred and sixteen. Now take that number and think
0:25
Speaker 1: about it in terms of years. I can tell you
0:29
Speaker 1: two hundred and sixteen years from now, I ain't gonna
0:32
Speaker 1: be here. I think I'd be just absolutely too tired
0:36
Speaker 1: to be here. But imagine, imagine if you will. You've
0:42
Speaker 1: committed in multiple crimes. They're so incredibly heinous that the
0:50
Speaker 1: courts in California have sentenced you to two hundred and
0:57
Speaker 1: sixteen years. Day. We're going to talk about an individual
1:04
Speaker 1: that has recently been sentenced and story I'm gonna lay
1:08
Speaker 1: on you today and what he did to wind up
1:11
Speaker 1: where he is, well, it's nothing short of a horse.
1:17
Speaker 2: Sorry.
1:19
Speaker 1: I'm Joseph Scott Morgan and this is body Backs. So
1:29
Speaker 1: two hundred and sixteen years from now, Dave, if my
1:33
Speaker 1: calculations are correct, we will be in the year two thousand,
1:38
Speaker 1: two hundred and forty two. It reminds me of this
1:40
Speaker 1: what was that song from the sixties.
1:42
Speaker 2: In the year twenty five, twenty five, twenty five. By
1:47
Speaker 2: the way, Trivia Trivia, Zagar and Evans have the only
1:51
Speaker 2: song in the history of the Top forty that went
1:54
Speaker 2: from number one to completely.
1:57
Speaker 3: Off the charts. Never have noant No, it hadn't happen, se.
2:01
Speaker 1: I mean, it's just like it was.
2:04
Speaker 3: It was big forever.
2:05
Speaker 2: I mean it was like huge, huge, huge, big for weeks,
2:08
Speaker 2: I mean, number one song forever. And then it was
2:11
Speaker 2: like everybody stopped playing it the same day they went, Okay,
2:14
Speaker 2: we're done and it was gone.
2:15
Speaker 3: So from number one to off the charts, there you go.
2:19
Speaker 3: And now that I've.
2:20
Speaker 1: Ever really taken time to dissect that song, mate, is
2:23
Speaker 1: it was it too? I mean when you compare it
2:25
Speaker 1: to like the Archie Sugar Sugar, was it just too
2:28
Speaker 1: existential for everybody? I don't know. I'm just asking for
2:33
Speaker 1: a friend, all right, I'm trying to understand.
2:35
Speaker 2: I'll give you more trivia. Do you know who originally
2:38
Speaker 2: was supposed to record Sugar Sugar?
2:41
Speaker 3: The Monkeys? It was written for the monk.
2:43
Speaker 1: That kind of makes sense, that kind of makes sense.
2:46
Speaker 2: They refuse to record it. So the writers all said,
2:49
Speaker 2: the brillsty guys, it's fine don Kirscher, we'll do it ourselves.
2:52
Speaker 3: We don't need you.
2:53
Speaker 2: So they just got a bunch of studio people, get
2:55
Speaker 2: Ron Dante and a few others to go sing it.
2:57
Speaker 1: There you go and friends, do you see while love other? Dave, Oh,
3:01
Speaker 1: I could sit around with this man and have discussions
3:03
Speaker 1: with him about all kinds of things, particularly dealing with
3:08
Speaker 1: pop culture in the sixties and seventies, and particularly music.
3:11
Speaker 1: It's something that we both share a love for. But
3:14
Speaker 1: I got to tell you, Dave, there ain't too much
3:16
Speaker 1: love for the subject the centerate. Well, there was a
3:20
Speaker 1: lot of love for our victim, a lot, and that's
3:23
Speaker 1: evidenced in everything that came out afterwards about this. But
3:27
Speaker 1: I got to tell you this, this individual, this monster
3:30
Speaker 1: that committed these crimes, ain't too much love there.
3:34
Speaker 2: Let me tell you that family members said of Samuel Holtis,
3:39
Speaker 2: who is our victim, that he was a generous man
3:44
Speaker 2: who often cooked meals for homeless people. He was devoted
3:49
Speaker 2: to helping mankind. He cooked meals for homeless people. He
3:55
Speaker 2: didn't give him a dollar to go to McDonald's. He didn't,
3:58
Speaker 2: you know, he went and cooked me specifically for people
4:02
Speaker 2: without That's the kind of person our victim is today
4:07
Speaker 2: and when you hear what was done to him. It
4:10
Speaker 2: happened in Elkoholma, California, which is just outside of San Diego,
4:14
Speaker 2: southern California, when deputies responded to reports of a suspicious
4:20
Speaker 2: death on a property. The suspicious death was that basically,
4:29
Speaker 2: somebody tripped over a head sticking out of the dirt.
4:32
Speaker 2: Is that about right, Joe?
4:34
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah it is. And can I tell you it's
4:37
Speaker 1: kind of getting in the wayback machine. And I think
4:40
Speaker 1: the name of this movie is correct. There was a movie,
4:44
Speaker 1: one of these horror movies, kind of schlocky kind of things,
4:47
Speaker 1: but it was really popular. I think it was called
4:49
Speaker 1: Motel Hell. Came out in the eighties and it was
4:54
Speaker 1: these people were burying people in the backyard and I
4:57
Speaker 1: think their heads were sticking up out of the ground.
4:59
Speaker 1: And got to tell you, Dave, when I when I
5:02
Speaker 1: heard about this, these circumstances, and listen, the burial part
5:06
Speaker 1: of it is the least of it. Oh yeah, and
5:11
Speaker 1: you know this, you know this mental moron here, uh
5:17
Speaker 1: he he didn't even have the ability to create a
5:20
Speaker 1: really good grave, right, So he's he's doing one or
5:24
Speaker 1: two things he's either ineffective at digging a grave or
5:29
Speaker 1: he's a sadist, the ultimate in sadist, where he's you know,
5:33
Speaker 1: it's almost like taunting the dead that you could be
5:36
Speaker 1: this disrespectful to the dead. And yeah, our victim here
5:39
Speaker 1: dave his head. He was buried so that his head
5:42
Speaker 1: was protruding up out of the ground in the shallow grave.
5:47
Speaker 2: Think about the effort, okay, of what you're doing a
5:52
Speaker 2: lot of times and I don't I don't try to
5:54
Speaker 2: get into the mind of those who would do murder.
5:57
Speaker 2: But you know, oftentimes when people do a crime and
6:01
Speaker 2: they dig a shallow grave, they put the body and
6:03
Speaker 2: cover it up in hopes that they'll get away. But
6:06
Speaker 2: this one, he went out to all the trouble to
6:09
Speaker 2: bury the body, but make sure the head was sticking up,
6:13
Speaker 2: so it wasn't It wasn't like he got in a hurry.
6:15
Speaker 3: He did it on purpose.
6:17
Speaker 2: And the thing is, in this area that we're looking
6:20
Speaker 2: in outside of alcohol Alcoholma, California, it was a six
6:25
Speaker 2: acre area that had a number of trailers house trailers
6:29
Speaker 2: on it and Ran Kenneth McNally Junior. He's the guy
6:35
Speaker 2: who was living in several different trailers over a period
6:40
Speaker 2: of time. He was not well liked, Joe. Kenneth McNally
6:44
Speaker 2: junior had problems with everybody, it seems, but he kept
6:50
Speaker 2: bouncing around. You know, he'd stay over here at this
6:52
Speaker 2: trailer for a little while, and then he'd go to
6:54
Speaker 2: another one for a while, and just continued to wear
6:56
Speaker 2: out his welcome. But I want you to take a
7:01
Speaker 2: look at what was taking place in the weeks before
7:04
Speaker 2: Samuel Haltis at the age of fifty nine, a guy
7:06
Speaker 2: who cooked meals for the homeless before he was killed.
7:10
Speaker 2: Kenneth McNally Junior has a lengthy criminal history. He was
7:17
Speaker 2: on probation for a conviction of attacking a dog with
7:24
Speaker 2: an axe. Think about that for just a minute. It
7:28
Speaker 2: wasn't enough to just you know, kick a dog or something. No, No,
7:32
Speaker 2: he attacked a dog with an axe and was convicted
7:35
Speaker 2: and was on probation for that.
7:39
Speaker 1: On his.
7:42
Speaker 2: Post release community service. You know when you have a
7:45
Speaker 2: probation officer, right, and he was on probation for attacking
7:47
Speaker 2: the dog with the axe.
7:49
Speaker 3: He had two documented attacks against his probation officer.
7:55
Speaker 1: Joe.
7:56
Speaker 2: Now, I thought that if something went bad with your
8:01
Speaker 2: probation officer that probably pulled your work and you pulled
8:04
Speaker 2: your paper, but you're back in jail, right, that's what
8:06
Speaker 2: I assumed happen.
8:07
Speaker 1: Yeah, back into the joint because you know, you have
8:10
Speaker 1: to think about this is demonstrative violence, obviously, I think
8:16
Speaker 1: that that's I'm the master of understatement today. All right,
8:19
Speaker 1: So when you come after a parole officer like this
8:26
Speaker 1: and you're going to attack them, I don't understand unless
8:30
Speaker 1: it just goes to the point of, well, it's easier
8:33
Speaker 1: just to keep him on the street because our prisons
8:35
Speaker 1: are full, you know, we can't accommodate him. Or in
8:40
Speaker 1: today's world with governmental oversight bosses this sort of thing.
8:46
Speaker 1: I can imagine a world where a government supervisor would
8:50
Speaker 1: look at a probation officer that was attacked and say,
8:53
Speaker 1: this is probably your fault, Like this happened to you
8:57
Speaker 1: at the hands of this person. It's not his fall.
9:01
Speaker 1: Well he has to be exsed.
9:02
Speaker 3: Let's add some more things that weren't his fault. Joe.
9:06
Speaker 2: You know I told you that he was living in
9:07
Speaker 2: the six acre compound with a number of different trailers.
9:10
Speaker 2: Well he threatened one resident with a handgun. Now, remember
9:14
Speaker 2: he's on probation for attacking a dog with an axe.
9:18
Speaker 2: Now he's threatening a human being with a gun. He
9:22
Speaker 2: fired sho several shots into another person's van and people
9:28
Speaker 2: living in the same compound with him in some of
9:32
Speaker 2: the trailers that he was living in from time to time,
9:35
Speaker 2: and he strangled a roommate while making incoherent statements before
9:41
Speaker 2: someone intervened. Now this is while on probation for attacking
9:47
Speaker 2: the dog, resisting a police officer, attacking the people that
9:54
Speaker 2: are providing him with shelter, and then the only reason
9:57
Speaker 2: he doesn't kill this one person is because somebody got
10:01
Speaker 2: in the middle of it and intervened, and he was
10:03
Speaker 2: still not put back in jail.
10:07
Speaker 1: This seems to be a theme that's running through a
10:09
Speaker 1: lot of cases that we're covering recently. Yeah, and listen,
10:14
Speaker 1: I know it goes without saying that this happens all
10:17
Speaker 1: the while. And I hate to use the term epidemic.
10:20
Speaker 1: Epidemic is that's a term that is used without much
10:26
Speaker 1: thought to it. You know, they will apply the term
10:28
Speaker 1: epidemic to other events and other things that occurring that
10:32
Speaker 1: are not There's not there's no underpinning from a scientific standpoint.
10:38
Speaker 1: This is this is an organizational behavior problem that leads
10:43
Speaker 1: to this. So you know, all signs point back to
10:46
Speaker 1: those that are in charge relative to how individuals are
10:50
Speaker 1: being handled. You know, it's it's amazing that people will
10:54
Speaker 1: sit back and say, I can't believe this happened. Well,
10:56
Speaker 1: you've been living in another universe, you're saying, and you
11:00
Speaker 1: can't believe this happened. And over and over again, we
11:03
Speaker 1: see violent offenders that are cut loose on the rest
11:07
Speaker 1: of us that are just trying to get by, trying
11:09
Speaker 1: to live our lives, trying to live in peace. And
11:12
Speaker 1: yet these people go uninterdicted, and it's a constant thing.
11:18
Speaker 1: They're always allowed, they're given more latitude, they're given more range,
11:23
Speaker 1: you know, to go out and bully people around, to
11:25
Speaker 1: make their lives horrible. How many women do we talk
11:28
Speaker 1: about on this show that are living in fear of
11:31
Speaker 1: domestic violence all the time, and nothing ever happens relative
11:36
Speaker 1: to the people until you know, those women, of course,
11:39
Speaker 1: they wind up on our show because they're murder victims,
11:42
Speaker 1: and you know, we wind up talking about some ghastly
11:44
Speaker 1: thing that has happened to them, and the forensics is unbelievable.
11:48
Speaker 1: You know, we sit there and you know, and we'll
11:50
Speaker 1: stand back and we'll say, wow, this is really really horrible. Well, Holmes,
11:55
Speaker 1: let me tell you something horrible could have been avoided.
11:58
Speaker 1: All right, it could have been avoided early on. But
12:01
Speaker 1: unfortunately we handle people like this with kid gloves and
12:04
Speaker 1: we don't want to do anything about it, or the
12:07
Speaker 1: authorities don't want to do anything about it because they're
12:09
Speaker 1: afraid that they're going to offend somebody, or they're afraid
12:12
Speaker 1: that they're going to violate I don't know whatever community
12:16
Speaker 1: norms there might be. Well, the one norm that we
12:19
Speaker 1: have as human beings is an expectation that we're going
12:22
Speaker 1: to be able to live a peaceful and fruitful life.
12:25
Speaker 1: You know, I'm sure that if you're living on six
12:27
Speaker 1: acres out outside of San Diego, you're not thinking that
12:31
Speaker 1: you're going to be living next door to a raving
12:34
Speaker 1: lunatic that attacks dogs with hatchets. And also you're not
12:39
Speaker 1: going to live adjacent to somebody who, for all that
12:42
Speaker 1: we know, was one of the most benevolent people around.
12:47
Speaker 1: That would help the least among us, who knew that
12:51
Speaker 1: the most benevolent could coexist in a world and in
12:56
Speaker 1: a space with the most malevolent brother Dave. Sometimes I
13:11
Speaker 1: sit back and I think, you know, she was. I
13:15
Speaker 1: see these cases that we talk about, particularly from a
13:23
Speaker 1: scientific standpoint, you think about just all of the havoc
13:28
Speaker 1: that has been visited upon victims, and you know, it's
13:33
Speaker 1: really easy to go through the science of it, I
13:35
Speaker 1: think to a certain degree. It can be rather complex
13:38
Speaker 1: many times, obviously, but the science part is the easy part.
13:42
Speaker 1: The explaining how we wound up where we're having to
13:44
Speaker 1: use science to explain things is the hard part to
13:47
Speaker 1: it right, And in this particular case, this poor man
13:52
Speaker 1: was subjected to just the ultimate in brutality day.
13:57
Speaker 2: Well, you know, we mentioned the type of man fifty
14:00
Speaker 2: nine year old Samuel Haltus was, but the type of
14:04
Speaker 2: man that Kenneth McNally Junior was. Well, here's what was
14:09
Speaker 2: happening September third, twenty twenty three. Okay, we've mentioned he's
14:13
Speaker 2: living in a compound, a six acre area with a
14:16
Speaker 2: number of trailers where people live, and McNally has lived
14:20
Speaker 2: amongst these people for a while. They know what kind
14:23
Speaker 2: of person he is. This is not going to be
14:25
Speaker 2: one of those scenes show where you're going to have
14:27
Speaker 2: a reporter talking to a neighbor that says he.
14:30
Speaker 3: Was such a quiet guy. I never expected anything like this.
14:33
Speaker 2: As soon as the reporters got on, seen anyone that
14:35
Speaker 2: wanted to talk to you, like, oh, man, we can't believe
14:37
Speaker 2: he was walking amongst us. Kenneth McNally September third, twenty
14:42
Speaker 2: twenty three, was terrorizing people that lived in the area,
14:47
Speaker 2: people he would call friends or acquaintances. McNally was demanding
14:52
Speaker 2: somebody drive him off the property, get me out of here.
14:57
Speaker 2: They said he was acting erratically and and aggressively in
15:01
Speaker 2: demanding somebody give him a right out of the place,
15:03
Speaker 2: and that he was intimating holding his holding his hands
15:08
Speaker 2: in a certain way to make them believe that he
15:10
Speaker 2: was armed, that he was holding a weapon, that he
15:13
Speaker 2: was willing to use said weapon to get his way.
15:16
Speaker 2: His way being get me out of here. Now, we
15:20
Speaker 2: don't know what was going on in his head to
15:24
Speaker 2: make him feel like that, but we know that this
15:27
Speaker 2: is a guy who has no boundaries, no physical boundaries,
15:30
Speaker 2: to anything anywhere, anytime. And I gotta be honest with you, Joe,
15:35
Speaker 2: if I was one of those people living in those
15:37
Speaker 2: trailers in this six acre compound, I'd be afraid of McNally.
15:42
Speaker 2: Kenneth McNally Junior would have frightened me because he doesn't
15:45
Speaker 2: seem to care. You know, you can usually reason with somebody.
15:49
Speaker 2: You can reason with animals.
15:51
Speaker 3: Not this guy. He could not be reasoned with.
15:53
Speaker 2: So September third, twenty twenty three, that is the day
15:58
Speaker 2: that Kenneth McNally decided to kill the one person on
16:05
Speaker 2: planet Earth that if Kenneth McNally was homeless and needed food,
16:10
Speaker 2: Samuel Holts would have made him the meal.
16:13
Speaker 3: He would have made the meal and fed the man.
16:17
Speaker 3: But what he got.
16:20
Speaker 2: I had to reover the police report a couple of
16:23
Speaker 2: times show because we do have the physical reports of
16:28
Speaker 2: what was seen, what happened, but we also have statements
16:33
Speaker 2: made by Kenneth McNally Jor Talking about what he did.
16:38
Speaker 2: I don't know if he was bragging or confessing or both,
16:42
Speaker 2: but we have an idea of what he did, and
16:45
Speaker 2: it's all bad. He Kenneth McNally Jr. Shot Samuel Holtis
16:51
Speaker 2: in the face with a gun. He then McNally tied
16:57
Speaker 2: an extension cord around Samuel Holtas neck. He attached the
17:05
Speaker 2: other end of the extension cord to a pickup truck.
17:12
Speaker 2: Kenneth McNally Junior then dragged, dragged Samuel Holtis cord wrapped
17:20
Speaker 2: around his neck, dragging him with the truck three hundred
17:24
Speaker 2: and twenty nine feet. He drug him to the area
17:31
Speaker 2: where he was going to use a shallow grave to
17:34
Speaker 2: put his body in the dirt, not all of his body,
17:39
Speaker 2: but about seventy five eighty percent. But Joe, that's what
17:43
Speaker 2: Kenneth McNally junior did to Samuel Haltis You already know
17:48
Speaker 2: he left his head sticking up out of the shallow grave.
17:51
Speaker 2: Now I don't know how much had because we know
17:53
Speaker 2: that he was shot in the face, Joe, And you're
17:54
Speaker 2: gonna have to shed some light on this for me
17:56
Speaker 2: because I've been trying to figure out it was it
18:00
Speaker 2: just the top of his head like you know, hair
18:03
Speaker 2: or bald spot or was it his head you know,
18:06
Speaker 2: neck out right?
18:07
Speaker 1: Yeah, And that's that's something that's This is quite interesting
18:11
Speaker 1: to me because there have been events over over over
18:16
Speaker 1: time where people have literally been buried up to their necks, okay,
18:20
Speaker 1: and it was it was kind of like a form
18:22
Speaker 1: of torture, Uh, to do that and left alive.
18:28
Speaker 3: Isn't that when the pirates used to do that on
18:30
Speaker 3: the beach. They would.
18:31
Speaker 1: I think that there's it's been It's been done over
18:34
Speaker 1: multiple civilizations for a long long time. I don't know
18:39
Speaker 1: if they'll do it in the year twenty five, twenty five, but.
18:42
Speaker 3: He's in the year twenty three they did.
18:45
Speaker 1: Yeah the year yeah, no, kidd and uh when you see,
18:49
Speaker 1: you see what has been done to this victim. And
18:52
Speaker 1: let's back up just just a second, because I want
18:54
Speaker 1: to go back to the gunshot one. Yeah, I think
18:57
Speaker 1: that that folks beloe leave that if you shoot someone
19:02
Speaker 1: in the face that death is instantaneous. That's not the case.
19:07
Speaker 1: I want to tell you a quick little side story here.
19:12
Speaker 1: Actually had a guy that worked as he had been
19:15
Speaker 1: contracted to kill to kill a family, and he shot
19:22
Speaker 1: the father and two sons in their home, killed them
19:26
Speaker 1: and then I guess I don't know what happened at
19:29
Speaker 1: the end, but he took a forty five sorry caliber
19:38
Speaker 1: handgun that he had brought to the residence inside of
19:42
Speaker 1: a binder that had a star foam cutout where he
19:45
Speaker 1: could put the weapon inside of the binder, and also
19:48
Speaker 1: extra magazines, and after he had shot the father and
19:53
Speaker 1: his two sons, killed them both. He takes the weapon
19:58
Speaker 1: and puts it beneath his chin and pulls the trigger
20:01
Speaker 1: and does it kill himself. And this is a forty
20:05
Speaker 1: four caliber I'm sorry I keep saying forty four caliber,
20:08
Speaker 1: forty five caliber Colt semi automatic pistol. He did succeed
20:14
Speaker 1: in blowing off the lower portion of the leading portion
20:17
Speaker 1: of his mandible, took out part of his maxilla, his nose,
20:24
Speaker 1: and survived. I actually testified in that case, and really yeah,
20:30
Speaker 1: I did. And the guy still still lived. He lived
20:35
Speaker 1: through it. In an interesting little aside, while they were
20:38
Speaker 1: doing reconstructive surgery on his face, and the reconstructive surgery
20:42
Speaker 1: took place at Charity Hospital. Many of you guys might
20:45
Speaker 1: remember Charity Hospital. It was the big hospital in New
20:48
Speaker 1: Orleans got wiped out with Patrina, and they had a
20:51
Speaker 1: plastic surgeon that was working on him. These are residents
20:56
Speaker 1: led by a staff physician. They actually and they were
21:00
Speaker 1: reconstructing his face and along his neck and re routing
21:05
Speaker 1: things and all that sort of stuff they do. They
21:08
Speaker 1: actually wound up clipping his vocal cords in there and
21:11
Speaker 1: he didn't have the ability to talk. And to make
21:14
Speaker 1: matters worse, He's Korean and didn't speak English, and so
21:17
Speaker 1: it was this really bizarre case. But the reason I'm
21:20
Speaker 1: telling you this is it's possible, and I've had it
21:23
Speaker 1: happen on other k had a guy with a shotgun
21:25
Speaker 1: as well, and that was shot self inflicted and didn't
21:28
Speaker 1: die immediately wandered about. So the idea that he shot
21:33
Speaker 1: this fellow in the face and that he automatically died
21:39
Speaker 1: is not necessarily the case every single time. Just because
21:45
Speaker 1: you score a head shot doesn't mean the person is
21:49
Speaker 1: necessarily going to die. It all depends on where they're shot.
21:52
Speaker 1: Because you can be shot in the face without it
21:54
Speaker 1: impacting your brain. That's that's a possibility, right, And so
21:59
Speaker 1: you have to take that into account and the fact
22:02
Speaker 1: that beyond that level of violence that he would have
22:07
Speaker 1: subjected this victim today, he goes and gets an electrical cord.
22:13
Speaker 1: Now right now, you know, I'm kind of thinking, well,
22:17
Speaker 1: when you wrap an electric cord, because he's using he
22:22
Speaker 1: is using the neck itself as a point of contact.
22:27
Speaker 1: So if he is using that as a point of contact,
22:31
Speaker 1: he's anchoring this. It's essentially literature, right, right, He's essentially
22:37
Speaker 1: tying this off around his neck. Did you know that
22:40
Speaker 1: you're going to have features on this guy's neck that
22:43
Speaker 1: will approximate what hanging would look like, because with this
22:47
Speaker 1: you would actually get and you and I have talked
22:49
Speaker 1: about tinting feature in the past. We've talked about it
22:52
Speaker 1: with Epstein over and over and over again. Right, and
22:56
Speaker 1: you get that presentation that goes up in the back.
22:58
Speaker 1: It sharply goes up behind the ears. In a dragon
23:02
Speaker 1: case like this, where you have an individual that is
23:05
Speaker 1: anchored by their neck, you're actually going to get this
23:08
Speaker 1: because the weight is pulling against the rear of the truck.
23:11
Speaker 1: This is absolutely horrific because you're talking about this individual
23:15
Speaker 1: having been shot, tied off by the neck and the
23:20
Speaker 1: other end of the cord being tied to essentially the
23:23
Speaker 1: bumper or the trailer hitch, and then being drug three
23:26
Speaker 1: hundred and twenty nine feet. Now I am imagining right now,
23:31
Speaker 1: I'm imagining right now that the surface that he was
23:35
Speaker 1: drug over is probably not an improved surface. Okay, So
23:41
Speaker 1: his body is going to be making contact with the
23:46
Speaker 1: underlying road surface. So if you're talking about even if
23:50
Speaker 1: it's it's fine sand, all right, that's still going to
23:55
Speaker 1: ubraid the back when we see people that have been
23:59
Speaker 1: drug by vehicles, you'll get these kind of long curve
24:02
Speaker 1: what will refer to as curve linear abrasions that depended
24:07
Speaker 1: upon the side that they're on. Let's say they're on
24:12
Speaker 1: the anterior side, you know, on the chest and the abdomen,
24:15
Speaker 1: you'll still get them. If they're wearing clothing that will
24:20
Speaker 1: add some level of protection. But even clothing gets torn
24:23
Speaker 1: away and you can actually see that presented at autopsy.
24:27
Speaker 1: It'll catch hold of rocks, this sort of thing. If
24:29
Speaker 1: they're on the back, same thing, you'll get these curveliney
24:32
Speaker 1: or superficial marks to be really red. There won't be
24:37
Speaker 1: a tremendous amount of blood unless they go over like
24:41
Speaker 1: really sharp rocks, which I've actually seen happen where you know,
24:45
Speaker 1: the rocks acts like they're penetrating particular areas. What's really
24:50
Speaker 1: haunting is when you get a body into the moor
24:54
Speaker 1: that has been drug over surface like this. And remember
24:58
Speaker 1: we take the bodies out of the backs at the autopsies, right,
25:02
Speaker 1: and I have distinct memories of this, taking bodies out
25:05
Speaker 1: of bag that had gravel all of the body and
25:08
Speaker 1: just for a moment, you can hear that gravel striking
25:12
Speaker 1: the stainless steel surface of the table or the tray
25:15
Speaker 1: you know, where you're doing autopsy, and it really it
25:18
Speaker 1: really captures you for a moment. You know, you hear
25:21
Speaker 1: that you're kind of connected to that event. So the
25:24
Speaker 1: layers of terror and horror that you have here are
25:28
Speaker 1: pretty significant. I think one of the big prevailing questions
25:32
Speaker 1: here about these injuries that he has sustained. One of
25:36
Speaker 1: the things that we would want to know in this
25:38
Speaker 1: particular case is was he still alive as he was
25:44
Speaker 1: being drugged down this road? Well, Dave, just just the
25:59
Speaker 1: whole of this, this action that started three hundred over
26:05
Speaker 1: three hundred feet away, that's only part of the tail here, right, Yeah,
26:10
Speaker 1: from a processing standpoint, we still have where his remains
26:14
Speaker 1: wound up.
26:16
Speaker 2: I want to ask you a question about when you
26:19
Speaker 2: were talking about how getting a body on the table
26:22
Speaker 2: and having you know, sand and grit, when when you
26:27
Speaker 2: have a body that's been drug and then put into
26:32
Speaker 2: a shallow grave and.
26:36
Speaker 3: When you're on.
26:36
Speaker 2: The scene, I'm trying to figure out in my head
26:42
Speaker 2: first responders show up. I mean they're called because well,
26:45
Speaker 2: we've got a body. They're going to determine that the
26:48
Speaker 2: person is dead fairly quickly. Are they going to dig
26:52
Speaker 2: that person out before to see if they can render eight?
26:57
Speaker 2: Are they going to okay, so they're going to term
27:00
Speaker 2: this person is dead their head sticking up. But I
27:03
Speaker 2: mean because look, man, you could be beaten to a
27:05
Speaker 2: pulp and still be alive.
27:06
Speaker 3: We have seen you.
27:07
Speaker 1: You could know and this, yeah, this goes to and
27:10
Speaker 1: I've been threatening that we were going to do an
27:11
Speaker 1: episode on the seven cardinal signs of death, but this
27:14
Speaker 1: would go to one of those initial things that we
27:16
Speaker 1: would look for. We're gonna check for uh, for the
27:20
Speaker 1: status of the eyes to see if they're going to
27:22
Speaker 1: respond to light, right, and something that you see people
27:25
Speaker 1: do on television and these sorts of things. Right, if
27:28
Speaker 1: you know, if the pupils are blown out and non
27:30
Speaker 1: reactive to light, and you can also access one of
27:34
Speaker 1: the strongest pulse points in the body, which is going
27:37
Speaker 1: to be the crot even if you have to go
27:40
Speaker 1: subsurface slightly to feel to palpate for this, and they
27:45
Speaker 1: would they would probably you know, there's actually you know
27:48
Speaker 1: we talk about responding to pain stimulus, right, that's one
27:52
Speaker 1: of the seven cardinal signs. When we talk about responding
27:56
Speaker 1: to pain stimulus. Generally, there's like a sternll rub if
28:01
Speaker 1: you've ever had that, if you've ever had an EMT,
28:03
Speaker 1: try to get your attention. They'll do that. Did you
28:05
Speaker 1: know that there is a way to do pain stimulus
28:10
Speaker 1: and get them to respond. And remember how I talked
28:12
Speaker 1: about the eye to see if the pupil was blown.
28:15
Speaker 1: There's also something else you can do. Yeah, if you
28:20
Speaker 1: want to try to do this, see if you can
28:23
Speaker 1: touch your own eyeball without blinking. And one of the
28:25
Speaker 1: things that happens that will be done by some people
28:29
Speaker 1: is that they will attempt There are clinicians out there
28:34
Speaker 1: that will attempt to touch the eye of an individual
28:37
Speaker 1: if they have questions as to whether or not they're alive. Now,
28:41
Speaker 1: that's not one hundred percent guaranteed, because you can have
28:43
Speaker 1: brain brain injuries where you won't have this responsiveness with
28:47
Speaker 1: the eyes, but it's just kind of a confirmatory you
28:50
Speaker 1: reach and if they don't react, if they don't blink
28:52
Speaker 1: or retract, that's one of the boxes that is ticked.
28:56
Speaker 1: And you couple that with checking for a created pulse,
29:00
Speaker 1: then you know, right right then you're in the you're
29:04
Speaker 1: in the neighborhood, so e m ts. And granted it's
29:07
Speaker 1: a very bizarre situation, but EMTs roll up on bizarre
29:10
Speaker 1: situations all the time. People don't think about all the
29:12
Speaker 1: folks that are penned in cars, you know, or that yeah,
29:18
Speaker 1: impaled on a fence. That does happen. It happens frequently,
29:22
Speaker 1: more frequently than people think.
29:24
Speaker 2: Uh.
29:25
Speaker 1: Uh, people that are trapped inside of uh debris where
29:31
Speaker 1: house has collapsed. There's all manner. There are people out
29:34
Speaker 1: there that have been shot multiple times and you might
29:38
Speaker 1: walk up on them and think that they're dead. Uh,
29:41
Speaker 1: but they still have you know, kind of agonal respirations. Uh,
29:44
Speaker 1: there's still life there. So they're going to go through this.
29:47
Speaker 1: But once the e mts have determined, look, this guy's buried,
29:52
Speaker 1: we see that there's some kind of trauma going on here.
29:56
Speaker 1: We're visualizing in this case if his head is sufficient
29:59
Speaker 1: and Deepending upon on where the entrance wound is, we
30:03
Speaker 1: see he's got a gunshot wound to the face.
30:05
Speaker 3: Well, and that's okay.
30:06
Speaker 2: The call that came in at three point thirty pm
30:09
Speaker 2: on September third, twenty twenty three was a.
30:13
Speaker 3: Suspicious death, all right.
30:15
Speaker 2: That was the call that was made now, and that's
30:17
Speaker 2: why I was kind of curious, because I know that
30:23
Speaker 2: people survive odd things. So somebody made the call suspicious death.
30:28
Speaker 2: Now I want to make sure I get this exactly right,
30:30
Speaker 2: because this is what officers found. Okay, San Diego County
30:36
Speaker 2: Sheriff's deputies arrive on the scene. A witness noticed a
30:44
Speaker 2: human head protruding from the dirt and told them. When
30:49
Speaker 2: they get there, they found halt Is partially buried in
30:54
Speaker 2: a shallow grave. And they found the extension cord was
30:58
Speaker 2: wrapped around his neck and it hadn't been removed.
31:02
Speaker 3: Okay, he.
31:05
Speaker 2: Still had the cord around his neck. Joe, he's buried
31:07
Speaker 2: his head sticking out. But a gunshot one into his
31:11
Speaker 2: face was obvious as well. So now I'm thinking he's
31:14
Speaker 2: buried from here up, well here up the extension cord
31:17
Speaker 2: around his neck, so they could see like from here up.
31:20
Speaker 2: This gets worse as you look into it. That officers,
31:24
Speaker 2: the deputies on the scene, they're able to ascertain that
31:28
Speaker 2: he arrived in this place where his body was placed
31:31
Speaker 2: in the shallow grave by dragging, you know how, they
31:35
Speaker 2: could see the extension cord drag marks of the body.
31:40
Speaker 2: Yea and a truck that had blood. The drag marks
31:49
Speaker 2: even led to another location, so he wasn't shot in
31:55
Speaker 2: the face, you know, and buried right there. They were
31:58
Speaker 2: able to quickly determine that Samuel Halters was shot in
32:03
Speaker 2: the face somewhere else, and as they followed the drag trail,
32:08
Speaker 2: they found the spot where a lot of coagulated blood
32:13
Speaker 2: was there and it's like, okay, he was shot here,
32:17
Speaker 2: but then he was tied up drug to hear and
32:22
Speaker 2: he wasn't even buried completely. He was buried so he
32:25
Speaker 2: could be found in this most heinous of ways. That's
32:29
Speaker 2: what deputies saw. This is why I I don't think
32:34
Speaker 2: people understand what some law enforcement individuals go through on
32:40
Speaker 2: their daily life. I'm in fo honest with you, Joe
32:43
Speaker 2: this right now talking. This is my crappy day at work.
32:48
Speaker 2: You know, their crappy day at work that day was
32:52
Speaker 2: being called to a death where a nice guy's head
32:57
Speaker 2: is sticking out above the ground. He's been a face
33:00
Speaker 2: blown away, and there's a electro cord tied around his
33:03
Speaker 2: neck like a noose, and he was drug to that
33:06
Speaker 2: location before he was buried.
33:08
Speaker 3: That's what their crappy day at work looked.
33:10
Speaker 1: Like, well, yeah, and it's it's a horrible thing to
33:14
Speaker 1: have to go out and reconstruct this and try to
33:16
Speaker 1: understand what happened. But here we are, and it's one
33:19
Speaker 1: of the things that we have to do, it seems.
33:22
Speaker 1: So let me tell you about these drag marks, which
33:24
Speaker 1: is kind of interesting. Uh, one thing you're going to
33:27
Speaker 1: be looking for and a bit several pieces of the
33:30
Speaker 1: evidence here. If you have an individual that is being
33:34
Speaker 1: drug behind a vehicle and you've got tire tracks, so
33:37
Speaker 1: you've got these bilateral tracks that are running in a
33:42
Speaker 1: in a specific direction. Correct, Okay, So they're going up
33:45
Speaker 1: a hill down a road. Okay, Now they are making
33:48
Speaker 1: impressions on the soil surface. Let's say it's soft. It's
33:53
Speaker 1: a soft surface, and they're making making their own impression
33:57
Speaker 1: going up the road well in tandem and running behind.
34:02
Speaker 1: Depended upon how much slacked was in that extension cord
34:05
Speaker 1: and to what length, there will be concurrent drag marks
34:10
Speaker 1: being generated by the body that is actually going in
34:15
Speaker 1: some spots. In some spots it's going down the mid
34:18
Speaker 1: line of these tracks right in the center. Now you
34:21
Speaker 1: can what's interesting if you want to try to understand
34:25
Speaker 1: which vehicle did this, and scientifically, you have to demonstrate
34:29
Speaker 1: this in court. You can't just say yeah, it was
34:31
Speaker 1: this vehicle. You would have to go in and first off,
34:35
Speaker 1: you would have to measure. You would have to get
34:38
Speaker 1: an idea of the tire tread pattern itself. Entire tread
34:42
Speaker 1: patterns are just like shoe patterns. Okay, So think about
34:45
Speaker 1: the tires on your car. The longer you use them,
34:48
Speaker 1: the more worn they wouldcome. And you have to get
34:50
Speaker 1: new tires, right, Okay, so let's just say let's just
34:54
Speaker 1: pull Let's just say they're good ears.
34:56
Speaker 3: Okay, having tread like if I mean, yeah.
35:01
Speaker 1: They make a very distinctive pattern. Yeah, because you'll have intermitte.
35:04
Speaker 1: You'll have intermitte tread patterns relative to wear. And let's
35:10
Speaker 1: say you have brand a good year and you get
35:16
Speaker 1: a set on your brand new truck and you drive
35:18
Speaker 1: it for a month. Well, I go out and buy
35:20
Speaker 1: the same truck, the same truck by the same tires
35:24
Speaker 1: or maybe it's what's called hang on, let me get
35:29
Speaker 1: quite OA, which is called original equipment. That's a term
35:32
Speaker 1: that she used in forensics, like OA. Those are the
35:37
Speaker 1: tires that the truck comes with from the dealership that
35:40
Speaker 1: you know, if Goodyear has a contract with Ford or Chevy,
35:43
Speaker 1: whoever it is, they supply those tires and you can
35:46
Speaker 1: go out and customize them and get whatever kind of
35:47
Speaker 1: tires you want, you know, but that's the OA. Well,
35:50
Speaker 1: if I go out and I order the same truck
35:52
Speaker 1: as you, you've been driving yours for a month, Well,
35:54
Speaker 1: our tread pattern, even though it's the same tires, same
35:56
Speaker 1: wheelbase of the truck, they're going to look different because
36:00
Speaker 1: we drive different we gover different surfaces. So those treadmarks
36:04
Speaker 1: are unique to that vehicle. So when you marry that up,
36:08
Speaker 1: when you marry that up, that's going to be something
36:11
Speaker 1: that's demonstrative. Right then when you take the victims back
36:16
Speaker 1: or his front or his side and you compare it
36:20
Speaker 1: to the marks in the soil. One of the things
36:23
Speaker 1: that they will ask the pathologists on the stand, you know,
36:27
Speaker 1: doctor Jones, do these marks on the body do they
36:31
Speaker 1: appear consistent with an individual having been drug behind a
36:35
Speaker 1: vehicle for three over three hundred feet? And we actually
36:40
Speaker 1: have pictures here, we're showing the pictures in court. We
36:44
Speaker 1: have pictures of what are being called drag marks on
36:48
Speaker 1: the ground. Does what you're scene right here. Compare to
36:52
Speaker 1: Exhibit one A, which is an image of the victim's
36:56
Speaker 1: back at autopsy. Yes, the doctor says, yes, within a
37:00
Speaker 1: reasonable scientific certainty, that would compare well to this. And
37:05
Speaker 1: then they'll say, now, could this particular surface create these
37:09
Speaker 1: kinds of injuries. It's a core surface, it's not improved,
37:13
Speaker 1: it's got loose gravel, it's got sand, it's composed of debris.
37:17
Speaker 1: And doctor Jones would say, yes, that type of surface
37:21
Speaker 1: would in fact create, within a reasonable scientific certainty, these
37:25
Speaker 1: kinds of injuries. So all the while, when they're out
37:28
Speaker 1: there and they're having to behold all this horror that
37:32
Speaker 1: you were just discussing just second ago, a day in
37:35
Speaker 1: the life, right, they're having to go back and reconstruct
37:38
Speaker 1: this from where it started. My suspicion is is that wherever,
37:44
Speaker 1: wherever this gentleman was shot in the face, there is
37:46
Speaker 1: going to be a focal area of blood there. There
37:50
Speaker 1: will probably be bits of biological material dispersed throughout those
37:55
Speaker 1: dragon marks. You have to look careful for him though,
37:58
Speaker 1: And then wherever the body came to rest, because the
38:00
Speaker 1: body could still be seeping blood at that point. Top.
38:03
Speaker 1: I don't know if he survived the dragging, but even
38:06
Speaker 1: if he didn't, the body still will probably seek blood
38:10
Speaker 1: or will seek blood from injuries that might be caused
38:14
Speaker 1: by the dragging. You can have injuries like the well
38:17
Speaker 1: the primary injury is this gsw to the face where
38:21
Speaker 1: it could be seeping from there as well. So you'll
38:25
Speaker 1: have these kind of beginning points and ending points, which
38:28
Speaker 1: he's kind of fascinating scientifically.
38:30
Speaker 2: You mentioned that just getting shot in the face is
38:34
Speaker 2: not and it's not enough to say that's what killed him.
38:36
Speaker 2: Would you be able to determine if that if that
38:40
Speaker 2: was you know, the gunshot to the face, or was
38:43
Speaker 2: he strangled? Was that the electric cord around his neck?
38:46
Speaker 2: Is that what killed him? He strangled by being towed
38:48
Speaker 2: around him?
38:49
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that the marks on the neck are
38:51
Speaker 1: going to be as close as you're going to get, brother, Okay,
38:54
Speaker 1: And this is why we have to make an assumption.
38:57
Speaker 1: You know what they say about as soon, but we
38:59
Speaker 1: have to make an assumption here that if in fact
39:04
Speaker 1: he was not dead with a gunshot wound, we would
39:09
Speaker 1: look for indwelling hemorrhage in here. Because I guarantee you
39:12
Speaker 1: dollars to donuts through here through the neck, the soft tissue,
39:16
Speaker 1: the strap muscles, there is going If he is a lot,
39:20
Speaker 1: there will be hemorrhage here. Okay, okay, Now he can
39:24
Speaker 1: just have agonal respirations. But if this is traumatized to
39:27
Speaker 1: the point where these vessels are disrupted in any way,
39:31
Speaker 1: you will have hemorrhage to this created here. They'll bleed
39:34
Speaker 1: out into the interstitial tissue, the muscle tissue, all this
39:37
Speaker 1: sort of things, and that will be existing now if
39:40
Speaker 1: he is shot. If he is shot and he dies
39:43
Speaker 1: at that moment in time, okay, the gunshot wound, you'll
39:47
Speaker 1: have marks on the neck, but they will not be hemorrhagic.
39:49
Speaker 1: You're not going to have like, you'll have a furrow,
39:52
Speaker 1: but the furrow is not going to have any associated hemorrhage.
39:55
Speaker 1: Then you reflect or dissect the neck and you're not
39:58
Speaker 1: going to have any hemorrhage in here. Does that mean
40:01
Speaker 1: that you're that the net cannot be traumatized, No, it doesn't.
40:06
Speaker 1: You can still have like, you can still have the
40:10
Speaker 1: larynx being fractured. Possibility though remote depend upon how up
40:17
Speaker 1: it went. You know what I'm gonna say here, You
40:19
Speaker 1: could fracture the hyoid if it slips up high enough
40:22
Speaker 1: because there's so much force being put behind it, and
40:24
Speaker 1: it goes so high, you don't know how secure the
40:27
Speaker 1: knot may have been. If it's secured in a one
40:29
Speaker 1: focal point like that, it's not going to move a lot.
40:32
Speaker 1: And it all depends a lot of it depends on
40:34
Speaker 1: at this pace at which the vehicle is being driven.
40:38
Speaker 1: And one other thing. If this guy is swerving back
40:43
Speaker 1: and forth, keep this in mind. The body swerving back.
40:47
Speaker 2: And he was just so you know, that was one
40:52
Speaker 2: of the eyewitness accounts that he was driving erratically with
40:56
Speaker 2: the body behind him.
40:59
Speaker 3: Believable.
40:59
Speaker 1: And so you're gonna have debris, you're gonna have vegetation
41:03
Speaker 1: on sides of the road. Perhaps that will be disrupted.
41:06
Speaker 1: They can call that drag marks as well. If let's
41:09
Speaker 1: just say that he goes over vegetation, okay, any of
41:12
Speaker 1: the local flora, if you will. He's still wearing clothes,
41:16
Speaker 1: You'll see. It's just like when we were kids, you know,
41:19
Speaker 1: and we would fall in the grass and you know,
41:22
Speaker 1: our seious tough skin jeans that we would wear and
41:25
Speaker 1: Mom would have to get the grass staines out of
41:27
Speaker 1: our knees, right, and so does grass stains or that debris,
41:31
Speaker 1: whether it's cracked up wood or bits of grass or anything,
41:35
Speaker 1: that's still going to be on him. And that's something
41:38
Speaker 1: that we use in road investigations as well, where we
41:41
Speaker 1: have pedestrians struck by vehicles, individuals that are being dragged
41:46
Speaker 1: by vehicles, will look and see if anybody's gone off
41:49
Speaker 1: of the road with this while they're dragging the person
41:51
Speaker 1: they've been knocked off into vegetation is going to be
41:54
Speaker 1: critical as well.
41:55
Speaker 3: All right, well, there are a couple of things we have.
41:57
Speaker 2: Now you've gotten us from finding the body, determining how
42:02
Speaker 2: this individual died cause and then one other thing came
42:08
Speaker 2: into this, and that was before it got to trial.
42:14
Speaker 2: Mister McNally decided to confess. He gave multiple stories about
42:21
Speaker 2: what actually took place. One witness said that McNally described
42:26
Speaker 2: shooting Samuel Haltis, dragging him with a noose wrapped around
42:31
Speaker 2: his neck, and burying him. That was confession number one.
42:35
Speaker 2: Confession number two witnesses observed McNally driving Haltis truck erradically
42:42
Speaker 2: before parking it near the grave where he buried mister Holtis.
42:46
Speaker 2: And then we have the third witness. Now, this witness
42:49
Speaker 2: did not come forward at first, Joe, Remember how I
42:51
Speaker 2: told you this guy was kind of terrorizing everyone in
42:54
Speaker 2: this little compound. This witness did not come forward until
42:58
Speaker 2: months later, but this witness provided a detail account of
43:02
Speaker 2: what he saw he or she saw.
43:04
Speaker 3: Okay stated that.
43:08
Speaker 2: McNally shot Haltis and was witnessed by this person. This
43:15
Speaker 2: person witnessed McNally tying the electrical cord around mister Halti's neck.
43:21
Speaker 2: He witnessed McNally tying the cord to the truck and
43:25
Speaker 2: then watched him as he drove three hundred and twenty
43:29
Speaker 2: nine feet dragging mister Holton's body to the burial site.
43:35
Speaker 2: Those were the three eyewitness accounts or stories of confession
43:40
Speaker 2: that were told to individuals who later testified in court
43:44
Speaker 2: at the trial of Kenneth McNally Junior. So there was
43:48
Speaker 2: a lot of evidence going into this show.
43:51
Speaker 1: Yeah, and there would have been, you know, relative to
43:53
Speaker 1: the grave once once this gentleman's body was removed or
43:58
Speaker 1: extricated from that site, and it froze that moment in
44:05
Speaker 1: time for the investigators that were out there so that
44:08
Speaker 1: they could see, you know, what had what was the
44:12
Speaker 1: end result of all of the horror that this man
44:14
Speaker 1: had reaped, you know, over this entire community, and Lord
44:18
Speaker 1: only knows how many other people in his life over
44:22
Speaker 1: the years that he was willing to do violence to.
44:26
Speaker 1: And it's a very sad end because the thing about
44:28
Speaker 1: is is that a light has been snuffed out in
44:33
Speaker 1: an otherwise kind of dark, dark world that the light
44:36
Speaker 1: went into for a long period of time. But yet
44:39
Speaker 1: another light shines on. It shines on in a prison
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Speaker 1: in California where this individual has been sentenced to two
44:47
Speaker 1: hundred and sixteen years. Let's see how violent and intimidating
44:54
Speaker 1: he is in that environment where he doesn't have a gun,
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Speaker 1: he does don't have a truck or an extension cord,
45:02
Speaker 1: he doesn't have a shovel. Let's see how that works.
45:06
Speaker 3: Out for him.
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Speaker 1: I'm Joseph Scott Morgan and this is body bags.