Latest / The Path Went Chilly / Alonzo Brooks Pt. One

Transcript

Alonzo Brooks Pt. One · The Path Went Chilly

0:30
Speaker 1: Welcome back to the Pathway Chili. I'm Robin, I'm Jules.
0:34
Speaker 2: And I'm Ashley. Let's dive right into this week's case.
0:39
Speaker 3: April third, two thousand and four, Laucine, Kansas, While attending
0:44
Speaker 3: a party at a farmhouse, twenty three year old Alonso
0:47
Speaker 3: Brooks vanishes without a trace, and his body is discovered
0:51
Speaker 3: on the banks of a nearby creek. Nearly one month later, well,
0:55
Speaker 3: a forensic pathologist is unable to determine Alonzo's exact cause
0:59
Speaker 3: of death, rumors start circulating that he was a victim
1:03
Speaker 3: of a hate crime before his body was placed at
1:05
Speaker 3: that location. In twenty twenty one, after Alonzo's body is
1:10
Speaker 3: exhumed and given a new autopsy, it is announced that
1:13
Speaker 3: his death has officially been reclassified as a homicide, but
1:17
Speaker 3: there are still no conclusive answers about how he was killed.
1:22
Speaker 1: After that, the path went Chile. So this week we're
1:26
Speaker 1: going to be exploring a case which was featured on
1:28
Speaker 1: the Netflix reboot of Unsolved Mysteries, the two thousand and
1:31
Speaker 1: four Unexplained Death of Alonzo Brooks, or I guess we
1:35
Speaker 1: can now officially call it the Murder of Alonzo Brooks.
1:39
Speaker 1: This is the story of the young man who went
1:40
Speaker 1: missing after attending a party at a farmhouse in rural Kansas,
1:44
Speaker 1: before his body was discovered on the banks of a
1:46
Speaker 1: nearby creek nearly one month later. While Alonzo's exact cause
1:50
Speaker 1: of death cannot be determined, there was no direct evidence
1:53
Speaker 1: of foul play, but since Alonzo was one of the
1:55
Speaker 1: only persons of color attending this party in a predominantly
1:59
Speaker 1: white area, the authorities did explore the possibility that he
2:02
Speaker 1: was the victim of a hate crime. There was also
2:05
Speaker 1: some controversy over the fact that the area where Alonzo's
2:08
Speaker 1: body was found had been extensively searched during the twenty
2:11
Speaker 1: seven day period he was missing, leading to speculation that
2:15
Speaker 1: someone planted his body there at a later time. It's
2:18
Speaker 1: now been over five years since the Unsolved Mysteries Netflix
2:22
Speaker 1: reboot was launched, and a number of their episodes have
2:24
Speaker 1: featured cases where a victim's death was officially ruled to
2:27
Speaker 1: be a suicide or an accident, but their loved ones
2:30
Speaker 1: were certain that they had been murdered and were seeking justice.
2:33
Speaker 1: One of the biggest criticisms the reboot has received is
2:36
Speaker 1: that it has often been accused of twisting its narratives
2:39
Speaker 1: and leaving out key details about these stories which do
2:43
Speaker 1: point towards the death being suicide or an accident after all. However,
2:47
Speaker 1: the Alonzo Brooks case may be the exception to this,
2:50
Speaker 1: because shortly after the Unsolved Mysteries episode aired, his body
2:54
Speaker 1: was exhumed for a new autopsy and new evidence was uncovered,
2:57
Speaker 1: which led the authorities to officially reclaimed sify his death
3:01
Speaker 1: as a homicide. Of course, this took place just over
3:04
Speaker 1: four years ago, and there have not been any new
3:06
Speaker 1: developments in the investigation since then, but at the very least,
3:09
Speaker 1: we now know that there is an actual crime to
3:12
Speaker 1: solve and a perpetrator or perpetrators to bring to justice.
3:16
Speaker 1: The details of how Alonso was killed and how his
3:19
Speaker 1: body wound up on the banks of that creek are
3:21
Speaker 1: still unclear, so we're going to have a lot to
3:23
Speaker 1: analyze on this episode.
3:25
Speaker 2: This is so interesting, especially when you talk about the
3:28
Speaker 2: fact that there was a twenty seven day period that
3:30
Speaker 2: he was missing and then his body finally shows up
3:34
Speaker 2: in a place where it was extensively already searched, and
3:38
Speaker 2: he was still ruled a suicide or an unknown death originally.
3:42
Speaker 1: Just an accidental death like they thought then he might
3:44
Speaker 1: have been intoxicated and passed out, so they did not
3:46
Speaker 1: initially suspect foul play, but in recent years they have
3:50
Speaker 1: officially reclassified it as a homicide.
3:53
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's really interesting because if they had extensively searched
3:56
Speaker 2: that and this body shows up twenty seven days later,
3:59
Speaker 2: and you say, well, I bet he was intoxicated and
4:01
Speaker 2: stumbled off and passed away, there would be so many
4:04
Speaker 2: question marks of how did he get there and was
4:06
Speaker 2: he intoxicated For twenty seven days, I'm assuming people didn't
4:10
Speaker 2: really raise suspicion about that search not resulting in a body,
4:14
Speaker 2: and then twenty seven days later it just happened to
4:17
Speaker 2: turn up. But that seems like an incredible red flag
4:20
Speaker 2: to me. That says he didn't just stumble away that night,
4:22
Speaker 2: or he would have been easily located.
4:24
Speaker 1: As we're going to talk about, this area was extensively searched,
4:27
Speaker 1: and it seems like a weird coincidence that when Alonzo's
4:30
Speaker 1: family decided to perform their own independent search of the property,
4:33
Speaker 1: that's when the body magically turns up, which questions wasn't
4:37
Speaker 1: really there the whole time?
4:39
Speaker 3: This one really stuck with me when I saw it
4:41
Speaker 3: on Unsolved Mysteries, and I think, Ashley, it's going to
4:44
Speaker 3: stick with you if you haven't already seen it, just
4:46
Speaker 3: because of so many bizarre elements and the fact that
4:50
Speaker 3: Alonzo was a black man, and how a lot of
4:54
Speaker 3: the people that he was dealing with that evening were white,
4:57
Speaker 3: and so there's a race element that kind of underscores
5:01
Speaker 3: this entire case.
5:03
Speaker 1: Actually, I know you've watched the Unsold Mysteries reboot. Do
5:06
Speaker 1: you recall watching this episode?
5:08
Speaker 2: I vaguely remember, I think seen an episode. I want
5:11
Speaker 2: to say he was wearing a flannel shirt walking up
5:13
Speaker 2: to the house party or something like that, But I
5:15
Speaker 2: don't remember this case in the specifics. I really don't
5:18
Speaker 2: remember a body not being discovered for twenty seven days.
5:21
Speaker 2: That alone would raise hairs on the back of my neck.
5:24
Speaker 2: But I want to say I might have watched it,
5:27
Speaker 2: but I surely don't recall the specifics.
5:31
Speaker 3: Our story begins in Kansas in two thousand and four,
5:35
Speaker 3: and our central figure is twenty three year old Alonzo Brooks.
5:39
Speaker 3: Alonzo was born in Tapika to an African American father,
5:42
Speaker 3: Billy Brooks Sor and Mexican mother, Maria Ramirez. He was
5:47
Speaker 3: the youngest of their five children and described as being
5:50
Speaker 3: a quote surprise baby since he was born many years
5:53
Speaker 3: after his brother and three sisters. At some point, Billy
5:57
Speaker 3: Senior and Maria got divorced and she got remarried and
6:01
Speaker 3: moved to the town of Gardner, while Alonzo remained into
6:04
Speaker 3: Peka and worked with his father until he was in
6:07
Speaker 3: his early twenties. He ultimately decided to relocate to Gardner
6:11
Speaker 3: and move in with his mother and got a job
6:14
Speaker 3: as a custodian for a stepfather's janitorial company. Alonzo was
6:18
Speaker 3: always described as a home body who loved spending time
6:21
Speaker 3: with his family. While he was a bit shy, he
6:24
Speaker 3: was also known for being a very nice person who
6:27
Speaker 3: got along with everyone and never caused any trouble. On
6:31
Speaker 3: the evening of April third, Alonzo and his circle of
6:34
Speaker 3: friends made plans to attend a party, as one of
6:37
Speaker 3: them was leaving to join the military and they wanted
6:40
Speaker 3: to celebrate his departure. The party would take place at
6:43
Speaker 3: a rural farmhouse on Highway K one fifty two just
6:47
Speaker 3: outside Lacene, a small town located in Lynn County with
6:51
Speaker 3: a population of around one thousand, one hundred people. Lucene
6:55
Speaker 3: is forty seven miles south of Gardner, so the group
6:58
Speaker 3: of friends would travel to party in separate vehicles, and
7:02
Speaker 3: since Alonzo did not drive, he hitched a ride with
7:05
Speaker 3: a friend named Justin Sprague. Before he left, Alonzo told
7:09
Speaker 3: his mother that he would return home later that night,
7:12
Speaker 3: but this would turn out to be the last time
7:14
Speaker 3: she ever saw him alive. When Alonzo and his friends
7:18
Speaker 3: arrived at the farmhouse for the party, they apparently thought
7:22
Speaker 3: it would only be a small gathering, but throughout the
7:25
Speaker 3: course of the evening, it's believed that upwards of one
7:27
Speaker 3: hundred people showed up and trickled in and out of there.
7:31
Speaker 3: The attendees appeared to be between the ages of sixteen
7:34
Speaker 3: and twenty five, and while Alonzo and his friends recognized
7:38
Speaker 3: a few of them from Gardner, they did not know
7:40
Speaker 3: most of the people. Regardless, everyone described Alonzo as being
7:45
Speaker 3: more outgoing than usual at the party, as he drank
7:48
Speaker 3: a lot of alcohol and appeared to be having a
7:50
Speaker 3: great time. However, one of Alonzo's friends, Daniel Boone, would
7:55
Speaker 3: later describe an incident in which he noticed that Alonzo
7:58
Speaker 3: had gotten into an argument with enough partygoer until Daniel
8:02
Speaker 3: managed to intervene and pull Alonzo away before the confrontation
8:05
Speaker 3: could get physical.
8:08
Speaker 2: Okay, so we know a couple things are going on here.
8:10
Speaker 2: There's a lot of people that they do not know
8:12
Speaker 2: at this party. Like you said, it's also Alonzo stands out.
8:16
Speaker 2: He's the only black man who's there and there's one
8:19
Speaker 2: hundred people in this very white farm ruled town. So
8:23
Speaker 2: are there people at that party who are not welcoming
8:26
Speaker 2: of Alonzo? There's a high possibility of that. Is there
8:29
Speaker 2: also the idea that this person who he gets into
8:32
Speaker 2: a fuss with wants to get revenge or wants to
8:35
Speaker 2: retaliate against him. What do we know about Justin and Daniel.
8:39
Speaker 2: They're the two buddies who are mentioned just a second ago.
8:43
Speaker 2: Justin drove him and Daniel is the one helping intervene
8:46
Speaker 2: in this fight. Did either of them get concerned at
8:49
Speaker 2: the end of the night when they couldn't find Alonzo.
8:51
Speaker 2: He didn't drive, so they had to know that he
8:54
Speaker 2: couldn't get home without them.
8:56
Speaker 1: Well, I'm going to start talking about that momentarily. But Daniel,
9:00
Speaker 1: Justin and another friend of theirs named Tyler would be
9:02
Speaker 1: interviewed on the Unsolved Mystery segment, and they provide more details,
9:06
Speaker 1: and it sounds like there was just kind of a
9:08
Speaker 1: horrible miscommunication that happened where they assumed that Alonzo was
9:12
Speaker 1: going to get a ride with somebody else, but it
9:14
Speaker 1: didn't happen, and then at one point he just seemed
9:16
Speaker 1: to vanish without a trace. And that's the big mystery
9:19
Speaker 1: is what ultimately happened to him and why did he
9:22
Speaker 1: not turn up until twenty seven days later. So, like
9:25
Speaker 1: I just said, when the case was featured on Unsolved Mysteries,
9:28
Speaker 1: Daniel Foon and another friend of Alonzo's named Tyler Bogard
9:32
Speaker 1: agreed to be interviewed. They both discussed leaving the party
9:35
Speaker 1: at different points throughout the night and saying goodbye to Alonzo,
9:38
Speaker 1: but said there appeared to be nothing out of the
9:40
Speaker 1: ordinary when they last saw him. Alonzo was supposed to
9:43
Speaker 1: get a ride home with Justin Sprague, but when the
9:46
Speaker 1: two friends both ran out of cigarettes, Justin offered to
9:48
Speaker 1: step out and drive somewhere in order to buy some.
9:52
Speaker 1: There's been a lot of dispute about what happened next,
9:54
Speaker 1: and we'll discuss this in more detail later on in
9:56
Speaker 1: the episode, but for now, here's the version of events
10:00
Speaker 1: that Justin shared during his interview on Unsolved Mysteries. According
10:04
Speaker 1: to Justin, after he drove away from the farmhouse, he
10:07
Speaker 1: took a wrong turn on some gravel roads and got
10:09
Speaker 1: lost until he wound up getting his car stock about
10:12
Speaker 1: thirty minutes away from Lacine. Since Justin did not want
10:15
Speaker 1: to go to the trouble of finding his way back
10:17
Speaker 1: to the farmhouse, he used his cell phone to call
10:20
Speaker 1: another friend of his at the party named Adam. Justin
10:23
Speaker 1: wanted Adam to tell Alonzo that he had got lost,
10:26
Speaker 1: and Justin said that he could even hear Alonzo joking
10:28
Speaker 1: about it in the background. Justin said that Adam promised
10:32
Speaker 1: him he would give Alonzo a ride home, but for
10:35
Speaker 1: reasons that are still not entirely clear, this never took place.
10:39
Speaker 1: It seems like Alonzo and Adam lost track of each
10:41
Speaker 1: other or there may have been a miscommunication of some sort,
10:45
Speaker 1: but Adam wound up leaving without him. Media outlets at
10:48
Speaker 1: the time reported that a fight took place at the party,
10:50
Speaker 1: sometimes between two and three am on the morning of
10:53
Speaker 1: April the fourth, though it could not be confirmed if
10:56
Speaker 1: Alonzo was involved. In it. They reported that the last
10:59
Speaker 1: time a lot was seen with some time between three
11:02
Speaker 1: and four am, But what actually happened to him would
11:04
Speaker 1: become a major unsaw mystery.
11:08
Speaker 2: Do you know if that fight that they described was
11:10
Speaker 2: the same one that Daniel Fune would say had happened
11:13
Speaker 2: with Alonzo that he had to break up.
11:15
Speaker 1: I don't think so, because this took place a couple
11:17
Speaker 1: hours after Daniel already left, when apparently none of Alonso's
11:21
Speaker 1: friends with there, and Alonzo should have been the only
11:24
Speaker 1: one still there, but it's unclear if he was nearby
11:27
Speaker 1: when this fight took place.
11:29
Speaker 2: Interesting, okay, And we know that Justin wasn't even at
11:32
Speaker 2: the party, so he's excluded from this. Adam is the
11:35
Speaker 2: one who says he would take Alonzo home. But we've
11:38
Speaker 2: all been at a party where friend says like, now, man,
11:41
Speaker 2: leave me, I'm going to hang out some more. No, man,
11:43
Speaker 2: I got another guy who will take me home, and
11:46
Speaker 2: you leave right against your better judgment. But we're assuming
11:50
Speaker 2: all the friends have nothing to do with this since
11:52
Speaker 2: they participated. I'm sure they were cleared by police as well.
11:56
Speaker 1: Yeah, I know we're going to talk about it later
11:58
Speaker 1: on that some details about Justin's story would have changed,
12:01
Speaker 1: but it does sound like he has a pretty solid
12:03
Speaker 1: alibi which shows that he was nowhere near the house
12:06
Speaker 1: when Alonzo disappeared. And even though these friends have gotten
12:09
Speaker 1: a lot of criticism on social media and read it
12:11
Speaker 1: for leaving Alonzo behind, I do not believe they were
12:14
Speaker 1: covering anything up more involved than his death. And I
12:17
Speaker 1: think they genuinely have no idea what happened to him.
12:20
Speaker 3: And I think sometimes when stories change, we have to
12:23
Speaker 3: question why. And it's not always because they're hiding some
12:28
Speaker 3: kind of guilty knowledge. I think it's sometimes, in maybe
12:32
Speaker 3: the case of Justin here that he received criticism or
12:37
Speaker 3: people had come up with points like places in his
12:40
Speaker 3: story where they're trying to poke holes, and so he's
12:43
Speaker 3: trying to assuage any objections and edit his story ever
12:48
Speaker 3: so slightly, and that could come off as being deceptive
12:51
Speaker 3: when he's just trying to appear a certain way when
12:54
Speaker 3: he thinks that people are saying like, oh, he could
12:57
Speaker 3: be guilty or he could have something to do with that.
13:00
Speaker 1: Yeah, And I think that's what happened, because as we're
13:02
Speaker 1: going to talk about, he was probably driving drunk that
13:04
Speaker 1: night and doing stuff he wasn't supposed to, so I
13:07
Speaker 1: can see him being motivated to change his story a
13:09
Speaker 1: bit to pain himself in the best possible light, But
13:12
Speaker 1: that doesn't mean that he was complicit in Alonzo's death.
13:16
Speaker 3: So later that morning, one of Alonzo's friends called his
13:20
Speaker 3: residence and spoke to his mother. Maria had assumed that
13:23
Speaker 3: Alonzo returned home in the middle of the night, but
13:26
Speaker 3: when she checked his room, she discovered that Alonzo was
13:29
Speaker 3: not there and his bed had clearly not been slept in.
13:33
Speaker 3: Alonzo's friend suggested that he might have spent the night
13:35
Speaker 3: at someone else's house, but Maria immediately became concerned, since
13:40
Speaker 3: he was out of character for him to do this
13:42
Speaker 3: without contacting her. When Maria called Alonzo's other friends, she
13:46
Speaker 3: could not find anyone who could confirm having given him
13:49
Speaker 3: a ride from the party, and no one seemed to
13:52
Speaker 3: know where he was. This prompted Justin and some of
13:56
Speaker 3: Alonzo's other friends to drive back to Lacine. They were
14:00
Speaker 3: also joined by Rodney English, a childhood friend of Alonzo's
14:03
Speaker 3: from Topeka who had not attended the party who was
14:07
Speaker 3: concerned about his absence. They proceeded to perform a search
14:10
Speaker 3: of the area surrounding the farmhouse, but could not find
14:13
Speaker 3: any trace of Alonzo. A long driveway separated the house
14:18
Speaker 3: from the highway, and while looking around there, Rodney came
14:21
Speaker 3: across Alonzo's hat and one of his boots in the
14:24
Speaker 3: ditch across the road. It wasn't long before Rodney found
14:28
Speaker 3: Alonzo's other boot in a ditch on the opposite side
14:30
Speaker 3: of the road, several feet away. Since these items were
14:34
Speaker 3: lying out in the open, it did not appear that
14:36
Speaker 3: anyone had made an attempt to conceal them, and Rodney
14:40
Speaker 3: suspected that they were thrown from a moving vehicle. While
14:44
Speaker 3: Rodney and the rust of Alonzo's friends attempted to continue
14:47
Speaker 3: their search, a man driving an ATV suddenly showed up
14:51
Speaker 3: and told them to leave the property. While this was
14:54
Speaker 3: going on, Maria attempted to contact the police and file
14:57
Speaker 3: a missing person's report for Alonzo, but was told that
15:00
Speaker 3: she would have to wait at least forty eight hours.
15:04
Speaker 2: Oh goodness, that is so frustrating. I totally understand why
15:08
Speaker 2: they say that, but it's incredibly upsetting when you think
15:11
Speaker 2: about the circumstances here and Maria saying, my son told
15:14
Speaker 2: me he was going to be home. He never didn't
15:16
Speaker 2: show up. His friends said that he was coming home,
15:19
Speaker 2: and he never showed up. And then you find the
15:22
Speaker 2: boots scattered in these different places in his hat. I mean,
15:25
Speaker 2: could someone be intoxicated and be silly and be in
15:28
Speaker 2: the back of someone's truck or something and just throw
15:30
Speaker 2: their shoes off. Maybe, But when you look at the
15:33
Speaker 2: fact that these boots are dispersed these two different areas
15:37
Speaker 2: and his hat's missing, I wonder if that sent off
15:41
Speaker 2: alarm belts automatically. My first default would not be some
15:45
Speaker 2: intoxicated kid just got rid of these things. Where's he
15:47
Speaker 2: going to walk without his boots? How's he going to
15:50
Speaker 2: get anywhere without his shoes on? Because if you're in
15:52
Speaker 2: rural farmland, you're sure not wanting to walk without shoes
15:55
Speaker 2: for miles or to get somewhere. I would have immediately said,
15:58
Speaker 2: this doesn't seem right. They're in different.
16:00
Speaker 1: Location, yeah, exactly, because I could see someone becoming drunk
16:05
Speaker 1: enough to toss off their boots just as a lark.
16:08
Speaker 1: But obviously they're not going to go very far without
16:11
Speaker 1: them walking. So it makes you think either he left
16:13
Speaker 1: in a vehicle with someone else. But if that's the
16:16
Speaker 1: case where is he because he doesn't really know anyone
16:18
Speaker 1: from the area, and none of his friends gave him
16:20
Speaker 1: a ride home, so that's why they were immediately concerned
16:23
Speaker 1: that it was probably someone else who tossed them from
16:26
Speaker 1: a moving vehicle to dispose of evidence. On April the fifth,
16:29
Speaker 1: Alonzo's brother Billy Brooks Junior and sister in law Cindy
16:33
Speaker 1: decided to travel to the farmhouse in Lacene. They learned
16:37
Speaker 1: that the house was a rental and the tenants were
16:39
Speaker 1: four men in their twenties who were not from the area,
16:42
Speaker 1: but the place was empty when Billy and Cindy arrived.
16:45
Speaker 1: The identities of these four men have never been released publicly,
16:48
Speaker 1: but it's been reported that they were evicted from the
16:50
Speaker 1: house a short time after Alonzo went missing. Billy and
16:54
Speaker 1: Cindy tried searching through Lacene and the surrounding area for Alonzo,
16:58
Speaker 1: but cannot find him. No notice that they seemed to
17:00
Speaker 1: draw suspicious looks from the local residents. They finally decided
17:04
Speaker 1: to travel to nearby Mound City in order to pay
17:07
Speaker 1: a visit to the Lynn County Sheriff's office. Billy and
17:10
Speaker 1: Cindy both spoke with Sheriff Marvin Stites, who did not
17:13
Speaker 1: seem overly concerned about Alonzo's disappearance and said that he
17:17
Speaker 1: was probably just quote unquote out walking around. Well. Needless
17:21
Speaker 1: to say, Billy and Cindy did not believe this, since
17:24
Speaker 1: both of Alonzo's boots were found lying in separate ditches,
17:27
Speaker 1: and he had recently suffered an ankle injury while playing basketball,
17:31
Speaker 1: which made it difficult for him to walk long distances.
17:34
Speaker 1: In spite of this, the sheriff's office did eventually agree
17:37
Speaker 1: to open a missing person's investigation for Alonso, and on
17:40
Speaker 1: April the seventh, they turned the case over to the
17:42
Speaker 1: Kansas Bureau of Investigation aka the KBI.
17:48
Speaker 2: Yeah, when you look here and you have this idea
17:49
Speaker 2: that he had recently suffered this ankle injury. So in
17:52
Speaker 2: addition to you're in a place you don't know, you're
17:55
Speaker 2: in a rural area. This isn't like, oh, we have
17:57
Speaker 2: these nice sidewalks, you know, and these really lovely places
18:00
Speaker 2: to walk. No, he is miles away from where he's
18:03
Speaker 2: supposed to be, he doesn't know anybody there, and he
18:06
Speaker 2: has an injury, and you're telling me that this is
18:09
Speaker 2: just some drunk kiddo that stumbles away and gets lost
18:13
Speaker 2: and passes away because of it. Immediately it says, that's
18:17
Speaker 2: not what happened. I don't like the idea that race
18:21
Speaker 2: could play a role here. You have people who are
18:24
Speaker 2: ignorant and drinking and doing things that you know puts
18:27
Speaker 2: you in a heightened level. He's already getting into fusses
18:30
Speaker 2: with people at this party that he does not know.
18:32
Speaker 2: And again with drug with you know, alcohol and maybe
18:35
Speaker 2: drugs being present. What does that do and how does
18:38
Speaker 2: that amp up people to feel pretty empowered to do
18:41
Speaker 2: whatever they want, especially when Alonzo's friends leave him and
18:44
Speaker 2: he's isolated and alone.
18:47
Speaker 1: And that's the thing is Alonso is a stranger. He's
18:49
Speaker 1: not from the area, so the majority of people at
18:51
Speaker 1: that party wouldn't have known him before and may have
18:54
Speaker 1: just had an issue with the fact that a black
18:56
Speaker 1: man showed up there. And if he doesn't have his
18:58
Speaker 1: friends around to protect him, I'm sure the thinking that
19:01
Speaker 1: he could have gotten himself into some trouble if he
19:03
Speaker 1: was alone.
19:04
Speaker 3: And correct me if I'm wrong, Robin, And maybe we're
19:06
Speaker 3: going to talk about this later. But wasn't it in
19:10
Speaker 3: the original? Not the original? It's the reboot of Unsolved Mysteries.
19:14
Speaker 3: But when they talked about the boots, wasn't a big
19:17
Speaker 3: deal made about the fact that the boots were found
19:20
Speaker 3: because I think his mom or somebody else had said
19:23
Speaker 3: something along the lines of these are the only footwear
19:27
Speaker 3: that he wears. He even plays basketball in these boots.
19:32
Speaker 1: They might have. I don't recall that specific thing, but
19:34
Speaker 1: apparently they were very distinct. So they're thinking to themselves
19:37
Speaker 1: that if he's just leaving these laying around in a
19:40
Speaker 1: rural area, that's just not something that he would do.
19:43
Speaker 1: So that's why the instantly thought that something bad might
19:45
Speaker 1: happen to him.
19:47
Speaker 3: Well, rumors started circulating throughout the area that Alonzo's disappearance
19:52
Speaker 3: might have been race related, as Lucine was a predominantly
19:56
Speaker 3: white area and Alonzo was only one of three persons
19:59
Speaker 3: of color who had attended the party that night. Some
20:03
Speaker 3: witnesses would claim that after Alonzo's friends left the party,
20:06
Speaker 3: a number of racial slurs and threats started getting tossed around.
20:11
Speaker 3: Alonzo was supposedly seen flirting with a white girl, which
20:15
Speaker 3: may have escalated some tensions, and one witness would claim
20:18
Speaker 3: they overheard someone say that Alonzo quote won't get out
20:22
Speaker 3: of here alive. Even though Alonzo was known for being
20:26
Speaker 3: an easygoing guy, his friends believed that he was capable
20:30
Speaker 3: of getting mad and starting a fight if someone used
20:32
Speaker 3: a racial slur in his presence. For this reason, the
20:36
Speaker 3: KBI brought in the FBI to assist them with their
20:39
Speaker 3: investigation and look into the possibility that Alonzo may have
20:43
Speaker 3: been the victim of a hate crime. They conducted hundreds
20:46
Speaker 3: of interviews with witnesses who attended the party and extensively
20:50
Speaker 3: questioned Alonzo's friends who went there with him that night.
20:54
Speaker 2: So for me, when you talk about the friends, like
20:56
Speaker 2: you said they had left, at that point, there was
20:59
Speaker 2: confirmation that these friends had been in communication with one
21:02
Speaker 2: another that they had left. I was originally suspicious when
21:06
Speaker 2: Justin says he turned the wrong way, got lost and stuck.
21:10
Speaker 2: But then when you said that he called back and
21:13
Speaker 2: asked for people to help organize Alonzo getting home, and
21:16
Speaker 2: he could even hear Alonzo being silly in the background.
21:19
Speaker 2: It really relieved a lot of worry I had about
21:21
Speaker 2: Justin being involved. And immediately all of the friends side
21:26
Speaker 2: with Maria and they say we need to go back
21:28
Speaker 2: and help you look for him. So there's no attempt
21:30
Speaker 2: to separate themselves from Alonso, there's no attempt to deny
21:34
Speaker 2: what happened. There, seeming to be pretty forthcoming and wanting
21:38
Speaker 2: to be a part of helping find him as well.
21:41
Speaker 1: The issue with a lot of the information we just
21:43
Speaker 1: shared is that it does sound like it's hearsay, because
21:46
Speaker 1: the only people who agreed to be interviewed on Unsolved
21:48
Speaker 1: Mysteries were Alonzo's friends, who left before a lot of
21:51
Speaker 1: these alleged incidents took place. But I yet to see
21:54
Speaker 1: any interviews where someone has gone on the record and
21:56
Speaker 1: said that, yeah, I saw someone use a racial slur
21:59
Speaker 1: with Alonzo, or I saw Alonzo flirting with a white girl.
22:02
Speaker 1: So even though we're hearing a lot of this information thirdhand,
22:06
Speaker 1: I'm not entirely sure if it's true or if it's verified,
22:08
Speaker 1: and if these incidents actually happened. So that's one of
22:11
Speaker 1: the most frustrating elements of this case is that we
22:13
Speaker 1: really don't have too many first hand accounts of what
22:16
Speaker 1: happened to Alonzo after his friends left the party.
22:20
Speaker 2: And because there is racial tension, or there is a
22:22
Speaker 2: potential or illusion that there could have been racial tension,
22:26
Speaker 2: there also could have been assumptions made by people that
22:29
Speaker 2: became these truths that they start to tell as well,
22:32
Speaker 2: because they're thinking, like, what could have motivated this, what
22:35
Speaker 2: could have driven this? And if race becomes part of
22:37
Speaker 2: the conversation, I could see people recalling things that maybe
22:42
Speaker 2: didn't even happen or didn't happen at that specific event,
22:45
Speaker 2: and feeling like those were factual.
22:48
Speaker 1: A large search effert was performed at the area, and
22:51
Speaker 1: even though the farmhouse was mostly surrounded by fields, there
22:54
Speaker 1: was also a large stream of water called Mill Creek
22:57
Speaker 1: located about two hundred and fifty feet away. On April
23:00
Speaker 1: the twelfth, the Lee's Summit Underwater Rescue and Recovery team
23:03
Speaker 1: were brought into search the creek as the water was
23:06
Speaker 1: only about three feet deep, but they failed to turn
23:09
Speaker 1: up any trace of Alonzo. While this was going on,
23:12
Speaker 1: the Brooks family constantly phoned the Lynn County Sheriff's office
23:15
Speaker 1: for updates, but were eventually told to stop contacting them
23:18
Speaker 1: because they were busy quote unquote working on things. Since
23:22
Speaker 1: the search effort was coming up empty, the Brooks family
23:25
Speaker 1: wanted to perform their own search of the property surrounding
23:28
Speaker 1: the farmhouse, but After the request was repeatedly denied for weeks,
23:32
Speaker 1: Sheriff's Tits finally granted them permission to do so. On
23:36
Speaker 1: May the eleventh, twenty seven days after Alonzo was last seen.
23:39
Speaker 1: Alonzo's friends and relatives started searching the property alongside around
23:43
Speaker 1: fifty volunteers. Well only about a half hour after they started.
23:48
Speaker 1: Some of the search volunteers started heading towards a white
23:51
Speaker 1: shed on the property, but while cutting through some brush
23:53
Speaker 1: in order to clear a path, they suddenly came across
23:56
Speaker 1: Alonzo's body on the banks of Middle Creek. It was
24:00
Speaker 1: lying on top of a pile of debris, and aside
24:02
Speaker 1: from his missing boots, Alonzo was fully clothed. Investigators from
24:07
Speaker 1: the KBI and the FBI were quickly summoned to the
24:09
Speaker 1: scene to recover his body.
24:12
Speaker 2: Okay, two questions. Do we know if he was wearing
24:14
Speaker 2: the same clothes that he was wearing the night.
24:15
Speaker 1: Of the party? I think so, yes, Okay.
24:18
Speaker 2: And then when you look at this idea that they
24:20
Speaker 2: had to cut down brush before they found him. Originally
24:24
Speaker 2: we said that this had been extensively searched. If they're
24:27
Speaker 2: having to cut brush down, do you think that he
24:29
Speaker 2: was just well placed inside that brush and that's why
24:32
Speaker 2: nobody found him.
24:33
Speaker 1: I'm not entirely sure because I just made mention of
24:36
Speaker 1: the Least Summit Underwater Rescue and Recovery team who searched
24:39
Speaker 1: this creek, and they were the ones who are adamant
24:42
Speaker 1: that if Alonzo's body had been there the entire time,
24:45
Speaker 1: they believed that they would have found it the first
24:48
Speaker 1: time around. And I know that people miss bodies during
24:50
Speaker 1: search efforts all the time, but this wasn't a particularly
24:53
Speaker 1: big creek and it was only like three feet worth
24:56
Speaker 1: of water, And because this was a professional search team,
24:59
Speaker 1: I do find questionable that they would have missed Alonzo's body.
25:03
Speaker 1: And it just seems weird to me that once Alonzo's
25:06
Speaker 1: family started performing their own search, they find them within
25:08
Speaker 1: a half hour.
25:10
Speaker 2: Really interesting fun fact. I have two friends that have
25:13
Speaker 2: served on the Least Summit Underwater Recovery Team before. They
25:17
Speaker 2: are deep sea divers and they're really big in a
25:20
Speaker 2: scuba diving and things like that, and so when they
25:22
Speaker 2: got the opportunity, they actually served on it for several years.
25:25
Speaker 2: So they do amazing work and it's a lot of
25:27
Speaker 2: volunteers who are doing incredible things and helping a lot
25:30
Speaker 2: of families, so very very interesting.
25:33
Speaker 3: Alonzo's autopsy would be performed by doctor Eric Mitchell, a
25:37
Speaker 3: forensic pathologist who was Douglas County's coroner at the time.
25:42
Speaker 3: Doctor Mitchell was unable to determine Alonzo's exact cause of death,
25:46
Speaker 3: as his post mortem examination turned up no broken bones
25:50
Speaker 3: or fractures, no penetrating injuries, no sign of blunt force trauma,
25:55
Speaker 3: and no gunshot or stab wounds. Mitchell could not rule
25:59
Speaker 3: out the possible ability that strangulation may have occurred, as
26:02
Speaker 3: the soft tissues of Alonzo's neck had been decomposed and
26:06
Speaker 3: damaged by animals and insects, and even though there was
26:10
Speaker 3: no water in Alonzo's lungs, Mitchell could not completely dismiss
26:14
Speaker 3: the idea that he drowned, but since there was no
26:17
Speaker 3: direct evidence of foul play, Alonzo's cause of death was
26:21
Speaker 3: officially ruled to be undetermined. Since Alonzo had been drinking
26:25
Speaker 3: at the party, one potential theory was that he became
26:28
Speaker 3: so intoxicated that he wandered away from the farmhouse towards
26:32
Speaker 3: Middle Creek before he passed out and died of exposure.
26:36
Speaker 3: While Mitchell could not say with any certainty that Alonzo's
26:39
Speaker 3: death was accidental, he did believe that the evidence found
26:43
Speaker 3: on his body was consistent with having been out there
26:46
Speaker 3: on the banks of the creek for nearly a month. Well,
26:49
Speaker 3: Alonzo's loved ones had a hard time believing that, as
26:52
Speaker 3: he only had a mild level of decomposition on his body,
26:56
Speaker 3: so it did not appear that he'd been out in
26:58
Speaker 3: the elements for twenty seven days. Mitchell theorized that Alonzo
27:02
Speaker 3: could have wound up in Middle Creek and was trapped
27:05
Speaker 3: under water in a clog of branches and other debris
27:08
Speaker 3: before a rainstorm caused the water levels to rise and
27:11
Speaker 3: his body was jarred loose and floated towards the bank
27:14
Speaker 3: where he was found. However, Alonzo's family did not think
27:18
Speaker 3: he was underwater for an extended period of time, as
27:21
Speaker 3: his body did not appear to be bloated and his
27:23
Speaker 3: skin complexion looked normal. Furthermore, Alonzo also had a number
27:28
Speaker 3: of personal items on him, such as a billfold, wallet,
27:31
Speaker 3: and a bandana, which showed no signs of water damage.
27:35
Speaker 3: The Lee's Summit Underwater Rescue and Recovery team were also
27:39
Speaker 3: certain that they would not have missed Alonzo's body during
27:42
Speaker 3: their initial search of Middle Creek, since the water was
27:45
Speaker 3: only a few feet deep. The fury provided by Alonzo's
27:48
Speaker 3: brother Billy, is that when Sheriff's sites gave permission for
27:52
Speaker 3: their family to perform their own search of the property,
27:55
Speaker 3: he may have told other people about it, and word
27:57
Speaker 3: eventually got back to those who were responded for Alonzo's death.
28:02
Speaker 3: They then responded by placing Alonzo's body on the banks
28:05
Speaker 3: of Middle Creek for his family to find. Indeed, one
28:09
Speaker 3: unconfirmed rumor, which is always circulated throughout the community is
28:13
Speaker 3: that Alonzo's body was kept inside a freezer during a
28:16
Speaker 3: twenty seven day window he was missing, which is why
28:19
Speaker 3: his body only had mild decomposition when it was discovered.
28:24
Speaker 2: I mean, I was going to ask that I was
28:27
Speaker 2: going to ask, is there a way that he could
28:29
Speaker 2: have been stored somewhere for twenty seven days? Because I
28:32
Speaker 2: find it really really interesting that when they find his body,
28:35
Speaker 2: there aren't evidence signs of abuse to the body. There's
28:39
Speaker 2: no significant bruising, there's no lacerations, there's no gunshot wound.
28:43
Speaker 2: I was really expecting you to tell me that there
28:45
Speaker 2: were some kind of injuries to his body, and they
28:48
Speaker 2: justified it like he fell or something. But he looked
28:50
Speaker 2: pretty pristine. And I'm wondering I don't know this. I
28:54
Speaker 2: should probably, but if you did freeze a body instantly
28:58
Speaker 2: after you killed, it, would bruising and everything have already
29:01
Speaker 2: set in? Or would that stop? Would the blood freeze
29:04
Speaker 2: so quickly that it couldn't saturate the skin or color
29:07
Speaker 2: the skin?
29:08
Speaker 3: I don't think you'd get like liver mortis and stuff,
29:11
Speaker 3: where the blood settles in a certain place. If it
29:14
Speaker 3: freezes quickly enough, you would think that the blood would
29:17
Speaker 3: freeze where it is. So if it's all in going
29:22
Speaker 3: through the veins at that point, somebody's put in there.
29:24
Speaker 3: I guess it just depends how quickly it freezes. Okay,
29:28
Speaker 3: so body is put in there, and then it's in
29:30
Speaker 3: there for twenty seven days in a freezer. You then
29:33
Speaker 3: take out the body and the body has mild decomposition.
29:37
Speaker 3: But then, because it had been frozen for that time,
29:40
Speaker 3: decomposition should hasten right Like it would catch up to
29:44
Speaker 3: the point where it should be once it's been out
29:47
Speaker 3: in the elements for a while, would it not.
29:50
Speaker 2: Yeah, like it would have rapid cell interioration and stuff
29:52
Speaker 2: like that and damage after it rewarmed. Yeah, I would
29:55
Speaker 2: think so too, because there's still damage to the quality
29:58
Speaker 2: of the tissu shoes and things into the cell formations.
30:02
Speaker 2: But I don't know, it's just the bruising might even
30:07
Speaker 2: come back or something to that effect, because it would
30:09
Speaker 2: have deep tissue bruising anyway.
30:11
Speaker 1: But I don't know.
30:12
Speaker 2: I really thought, as i'all were describing it, I'm like,
30:14
Speaker 2: what if he was frozen? But I would think that
30:18
Speaker 2: a pathologist could go through and look at that and
30:21
Speaker 2: maybe tell very interesting.
30:23
Speaker 1: I have no idea. Well, that's the thing is, we're
30:25
Speaker 1: going to talk about this later. But they gave Alonzo
30:27
Speaker 1: another autopsy a couple of years ago after his body
30:30
Speaker 1: was exhumed, which made them change the ruling, but they've
30:33
Speaker 1: been very secretive on what exact evidence they found. I
30:36
Speaker 1: was going to talk about doctor Mitchell as a doctor
30:38
Speaker 1: who has kind of questionable qualifications, so I could see
30:41
Speaker 1: him missing something during the original autopsy. So I do
30:45
Speaker 1: wonder after doing this second autopsy, if they did find
30:48
Speaker 1: some evidence which made them lean towards the idea that
30:51
Speaker 1: he could have been in a freezer for twenty seven days, is.
30:56
Speaker 2: It as bad as doctor Malick.
30:57
Speaker 1: No, nobody as bad as doctor Malick. Don't worry. He
31:01
Speaker 1: didn't say that Alonzo smoked twenty marijuana cigarettes, so we're
31:03
Speaker 1: free from that at least.
31:07
Speaker 2: Or three self inflicted gunshot wounds.
31:09
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly perfect.
31:11
Speaker 3: I thought of you, Robin. I heard the other day
31:14
Speaker 3: my husband was reading me something about how somebody in
31:17
Speaker 3: Russia had I guess, somebody who'd probably likely vne against
31:21
Speaker 3: Putin or whatever, had wound up dead and they were
31:24
Speaker 3: saying that he was decapitated, and they were saying that
31:27
Speaker 3: it was suicide.
31:28
Speaker 1: And I'm like, sounds like.
31:31
Speaker 3: Yeah right, I'm like, it is doctor Malick over there.
31:35
Speaker 1: Maybe he faked his own death. That is working for
31:37
Speaker 1: Russia now, because he did do one where someone was
31:39
Speaker 1: found with his head missing, and he said that he
31:41
Speaker 1: died of an ulcer or something like that, and the
31:43
Speaker 1: dog ate his head, so that's why it was missing.
31:45
Speaker 1: And I wish I was joking when I said that.
31:48
Speaker 3: That's what I thought of. When I thought about, Hi'm like,
31:50
Speaker 3: it's gotta be famy mel like, maybe he's a double agent.
31:54
Speaker 1: Yeah I never know, Oh my gosh.
31:55
Speaker 2: And no that guys, anyone listening, We're not laughing at
31:58
Speaker 2: the desk. I promise we're laughing at this doctor who's horrific.
32:01
Speaker 2: It's got a laugh or you just wouldn't know what
32:04
Speaker 2: to do with yourself.
32:06
Speaker 1: So, even though dozens of witnesses who had attended the
32:09
Speaker 1: party were interviewed by law enforcement, none of them provided
32:12
Speaker 1: information that led the investigation any closer to resolution, and
32:16
Speaker 1: some of these witnesses reportedly lawyered up before they could
32:19
Speaker 1: be questioned and declined to take polygraph tests. The case
32:22
Speaker 1: would remain dormant until June of twenty nineteen, when the
32:26
Speaker 1: KBI announced that they were unable to turn up any
32:28
Speaker 1: evidence that Alonzo had been the victim of a crime,
32:31
Speaker 1: so they were closing the investigation into his death. But
32:35
Speaker 1: one year later, on June the eleventh, twenty twenty, it
32:38
Speaker 1: was publicly announced that the FBI, the Department of Justice,
32:41
Speaker 1: and the United States Attorney's Office had reopened the investigation
32:46
Speaker 1: and were still exploring the possibility that Alonzo had been
32:48
Speaker 1: the victim of a hate crime. A one hundred thousand
32:51
Speaker 1: dollars reward was now being offered for information which led
32:55
Speaker 1: to the arrest and conviction of the individual responsible for
32:58
Speaker 1: Alonzo's death. According to Stephen McAllister, the US Attorney for
33:02
Speaker 1: the District of Kansas, the case had been brought to
33:05
Speaker 1: their attention by Unsolved Mysteries, who were about to launch
33:08
Speaker 1: a reboot of their show on Netflix. During an interview
33:11
Speaker 1: with Entertainment Weekly, one of the show's co creators, Terry
33:14
Speaker 1: dun Muir, confirmed that Alonzo's story had been on the
33:17
Speaker 1: radar since twenty seventeen and they were always hoping to
33:21
Speaker 1: feature it once they relaunched. While in July, the first
33:24
Speaker 1: the Unsolved Mysteries reboot finally dropped on Netflix, and Alonzo's
33:28
Speaker 1: episode was titled No Ride Home. As a result, a
33:32
Speaker 1: number of new tips came in and were passed on
33:34
Speaker 1: to the FBI. One new piece of information, which was
33:38
Speaker 1: later shared publicly, is that a second party had taken
33:41
Speaker 1: place in l Scene on the night Alonzo went missing.
33:44
Speaker 1: When a fight broke out there, a number of the
33:46
Speaker 1: attendees wound up leaving and heading over to the party
33:49
Speaker 1: at the Farmhouse. So investigators were hoping that anyone who
33:53
Speaker 1: attended both parties might have useful information and would come forward.
33:58
Speaker 2: And did they were. They Some of the people who
34:00
Speaker 2: called in and gave some of the new tips that
34:02
Speaker 2: hit when Unsolved Mysteries as.
34:04
Speaker 1: I'm not entirely sure unfortunately. I mean, they just said
34:06
Speaker 1: that they got tips, but I know that a lot
34:08
Speaker 1: of the time they don't like to share what a
34:10
Speaker 1: lot of these tips are unless they lead to a
34:12
Speaker 1: new development to the investigation. So still kind of a mystery.
34:16
Speaker 3: Just over three weeks after the release of the Unsolved
34:19
Speaker 3: Mysteries episode, the FBI had Alonzo's body exhumed and transported
34:24
Speaker 3: to Dover Air Force Base in Delaware for a new
34:27
Speaker 3: autopsy from the Armed Forces Medical Examiner. In April twenty
34:32
Speaker 3: twenty one, the FBI announced that this autopsy had allowed
34:35
Speaker 3: them to conclusively determine that Alonzo's death was not an accident.
34:41
Speaker 3: While they've been very secretive, as Robin mentioned about specific details,
34:45
Speaker 3: they did state this new examination revealed that Alonzo had
34:49
Speaker 3: injuries to his body which were quote inconsistent with normal
34:53
Speaker 3: patterns of decomposition. Therefore, his death was officially reclassified as
34:59
Speaker 3: a homicide. Timothy Langan, the Special Agent in charge of
35:03
Speaker 3: the Kansas City Branch of the FBI, stated, quote, we
35:06
Speaker 3: remained dedicated to uncovering the truth surrounding the murder of
35:10
Speaker 3: Alonzo Brooks and ensuring those responsible are held accountable for
35:14
Speaker 3: their actions. While the FBI has launched a new investigation
35:19
Speaker 3: into Alonzo's death, no new developments have been publicly released
35:23
Speaker 3: during these past four years, so the circumstances of how
35:27
Speaker 3: he was killed continue to remain an unsolved mystery.
35:31
Speaker 1: So I guess you could say the path went Chile.
35:35
Speaker 2: Do you guys think that the original autopsy just overlooked
35:38
Speaker 2: these things or do you think that some of the
35:41
Speaker 2: tips in information that came in gave guidance as to
35:44
Speaker 2: where to look or what to look for, and it
35:46
Speaker 2: just created more of a information basis for a new
35:50
Speaker 2: autopsy to reveal a different outcome. Because it takes a
35:54
Speaker 2: lot to change an original autopsy report. There's a very
35:58
Speaker 2: huge hesitation for any law enforcement agency to say we're
36:01
Speaker 2: going to change it to a homicide not undetermined, but
36:04
Speaker 2: to a homicide. So if it was that clear, was
36:08
Speaker 2: it just overlooked or was it it kind of impossible
36:11
Speaker 2: to find without details that perhaps some of these tips
36:14
Speaker 2: led to.
36:14
Speaker 1: I think it's a combination of both. I think that
36:16
Speaker 1: doctor Mitchell may have missed something during the original autopsy.
36:20
Speaker 1: And I'll reveal my new theory in our next episode.
36:23
Speaker 1: But I kind of have my own thoughts about what
36:26
Speaker 1: kind of new injury they discovered on Alonso that they
36:28
Speaker 1: might have missed the first time around. And I do
36:30
Speaker 1: think that it is a possibility that maybe some new
36:33
Speaker 1: tips came in, like they could have been nothing more
36:35
Speaker 1: than hearsay or unverified rumors about what happened to them,
36:38
Speaker 1: but it could have compelled the FBI to decide, we're
36:40
Speaker 1: going to perform a new autopsy and we're going to
36:43
Speaker 1: look for this specific injury, and that might be what
36:46
Speaker 1: they discovered to make them change the ruling and finally
36:48
Speaker 1: decide that yes, he was the victim of a homicide.
36:52
Speaker 1: So I still remember when the episode about this story
36:55
Speaker 1: dropped on Netflix and Unsaw Mysteries fans were instantly comparing
36:59
Speaker 1: it to one of the most memory cases from the
37:01
Speaker 1: original series, and that's the unexplained nineteen eighty one death
37:04
Speaker 1: of Kurt Sova. As you probably know, that story has
37:08
Speaker 1: also been featured on The Trail Went Cold and the
37:10
Speaker 1: Pathwent Chili and involved a seventeen year old kid who
37:13
Speaker 1: went missing while attending a party until his body was
37:16
Speaker 1: discovered in a nearby vacant lot five days later. Even
37:20
Speaker 1: though Kurt had supposedly been drinking a lot of alcohol
37:23
Speaker 1: in then I was last seen alive, the medical examiner
37:26
Speaker 1: was unable to determine an exact cause of death. This
37:30
Speaker 1: lot had also been searched on a previous occasion. During
37:33
Speaker 1: the five day window, Kurt was missing and his body
37:35
Speaker 1: was not there, so of course there was speculation that
37:38
Speaker 1: whoever was involved in Kurt's death planted him at that
37:41
Speaker 1: location to be found. Well, I'm sure you can already
37:45
Speaker 1: see the parallels with the Alonzo Brooks case, though I'd
37:48
Speaker 1: say this one is even more puzzling. Instead of five days,
37:52
Speaker 1: Alonzo had been missing twenty seven days before he was found,
37:55
Speaker 1: and his body was at a location which had been
37:57
Speaker 1: extensively searched by numerous law enforces agencies. And while the
38:01
Speaker 1: circumstances of how Kurt Sooba died are still a mystery,
38:05
Speaker 1: the consensus seems to be that it was accidental and
38:08
Speaker 1: possibly the result of something like alcohol poisoning. So I
38:11
Speaker 1: doubt that a homicide took place. However, that's certainly not
38:15
Speaker 1: the case with Alonzo Brooks, who was a person of
38:17
Speaker 1: color who went missing and was found dead in a
38:20
Speaker 1: predominantly white area that seems to have a reputation for
38:23
Speaker 1: racism among its residents. Now that it's officially been confirmed
38:28
Speaker 1: that foul play took place, there has been speculation that
38:31
Speaker 1: he was the victim of a hate crime. As you
38:33
Speaker 1: can imagine, this theory picked up a lot of steam because,
38:37
Speaker 1: by pure coincidence, the Unsaw Mysteries episode happened to drop
38:41
Speaker 1: just over a month after the murder of George Floyd, so,
38:44
Speaker 1: as you can imagine, racial tensions were running high in
38:47
Speaker 1: the United States at that time. Even though the Kansas
38:51
Speaker 1: Bureau of Investigation had closed Alonzo's case in twenty nineteen,
38:55
Speaker 1: the FBI and the Department of Justice still felt it
38:58
Speaker 1: was worth pursuing, and I fight it interesting that they
39:01
Speaker 1: publicly announced that they were investigating his death as a
39:03
Speaker 1: hate crime a few weeks before the Unsolved Mysteries episode
39:07
Speaker 1: came out. I'm sure they sensed that there would be
39:09
Speaker 1: a strong reaction to the presentation of Alonzo's story and
39:13
Speaker 1: wanted to preemptively assure the public that yes, they were
39:16
Speaker 1: working on the case and taking it seriously. And sure enough,
39:20
Speaker 1: it wasn't long before Alonzo's body was exhumed and given
39:23
Speaker 1: a new autopsy which uncovered new evidence to compel the
39:26
Speaker 1: authorities to officially reclassify his death as a homicide. All
39:31
Speaker 1: we know is that they made this determination based on
39:33
Speaker 1: a re examination of injuries on Alonzo's body, But I'm
39:37
Speaker 1: sure a lot of details have been withheld from the
39:39
Speaker 1: public and we have no idea what leads, if any
39:42
Speaker 1: then investigators may have looked into these past four years.
39:46
Speaker 2: You know what's interesting is that when you look at
39:49
Speaker 2: the idea that they reclassified it as a hate crime
39:52
Speaker 2: before the Unsolved Mysteries case came out on television, they
39:56
Speaker 2: must have had some pretty interesting information because I could
39:59
Speaker 2: see this changing big decisions like that, or again going
40:03
Speaker 2: back and exhooming the body and looking for something based
40:06
Speaker 2: on a tip they received. But to make conclusions like
40:09
Speaker 2: that we're investigating this as a hate crime prior to
40:13
Speaker 2: getting a renewal of this case and kind of a
40:16
Speaker 2: new look at this case is really interesting. Yes, law
40:19
Speaker 2: enforcement was looking at it before Unsolved Mysteries aired the episode,
40:23
Speaker 2: but I'm sure they got a lot of information, both
40:26
Speaker 2: valid and nonsensical, once that aired. So speaks volumes about
40:31
Speaker 2: what information they already had before the show, even broadcasts
40:35
Speaker 2: this episode, and.
40:36
Speaker 1: I can tell you that even though this case did
40:38
Speaker 1: get a whole lot of media coverage before Unsolved Mysteries,
40:41
Speaker 1: it was like a case I got a lot of
40:44
Speaker 1: unverified gossip and rumors online because there are always discussions
40:48
Speaker 1: about it on Reddit and various message boards, because it
40:51
Speaker 1: was one of those stories that took place in a
40:53
Speaker 1: small town where everybody had their own story about what
40:56
Speaker 1: they believed happened and would gossip about it. So I
40:59
Speaker 1: think law enforcement was aware that once this gets national
41:02
Speaker 1: exposure on Netflix, there's going to be a lot of
41:04
Speaker 1: discussion about this and we should definitely take it seriously
41:07
Speaker 1: because if we just ignore it, there's going to be
41:09
Speaker 1: a backlash. So we should assure the public that we're
41:12
Speaker 1: going to give it our full attention.
41:15
Speaker 3: So we mentioned in the intro that the biggest criticism
41:18
Speaker 3: of the Unsolved Mysteries reboot is that they've covered a
41:21
Speaker 3: number of cases involving suspicious suicides or accidental deaths and
41:26
Speaker 3: had a tendency to leave out key details which did
41:29
Speaker 3: not fit the foul play narrative. Like the original series,
41:33
Speaker 3: this reboot could potentially be used as a valuable tool
41:36
Speaker 3: to bring a resolution to unsolved crimes, but it doesn't
41:40
Speaker 3: really help much when you're focusing on a bunch of
41:42
Speaker 3: stories in which there is no actual crime to solve.
41:46
Speaker 3: Whenever new episodes have dropped on Netflix, it's become a
41:49
Speaker 3: tradition for media outlets to publish articles about the featured
41:53
Speaker 3: cases titled quote what unsolved mystery is left out? We've
41:58
Speaker 3: seen them publish this type the article for the episode
42:01
Speaker 3: on Alonzo Brooks, as the show did leave out some details,
42:05
Speaker 3: But to be fair, we haven't found any new information
42:09
Speaker 3: during our research which would point towards Alonzo's death being
42:12
Speaker 3: an accident or the show giving a dishonest presentation in
42:16
Speaker 3: order to fit their narrative. But out of all these
42:19
Speaker 3: cases featured on the Unsolved Mysteries reboot, I think the
42:22
Speaker 3: death of Alonzo Brooks is Probably Sorry is probably the
42:26
Speaker 3: one in which you're going to find the largest amount
42:29
Speaker 3: of rumors, gossip, and unconfirmed speculation online. They even acknowledged
42:34
Speaker 3: this during the episode and discuss some of the uncorroborated
42:38
Speaker 3: theories which have been shared on places like Reddit and
42:40
Speaker 3: social media these past two decades. Back in twenty ten,
42:44
Speaker 3: a blog called Cold Case Kansas published a post about
42:48
Speaker 3: this case, and its comment section is just flush with
42:52
Speaker 3: people claiming to be from the Lacine area, who share Lucine,
42:56
Speaker 3: from the Lacine area, who've all shared, who have shared
43:00
Speaker 3: all the rumors in gossip that have supposedly spread throughout
43:03
Speaker 3: the years. This case has often been described as one
43:07
Speaker 3: of those small town mysteries in which the entire community
43:10
Speaker 3: knows who did it, but a cover up has been
43:13
Speaker 3: orchestrated to protect the guilty parties, and the authorities lack
43:17
Speaker 3: the necessary evidence to make an arrest.
43:20
Speaker 1: Well.
43:20
Speaker 3: One thing the Unsolved Mysteries episode did not do is
43:23
Speaker 3: present the names of any potential suspects or persons of interest,
43:28
Speaker 3: and other than three of Alonzo's friends, we do not
43:31
Speaker 3: know the identities of anyone who hosted or attended the
43:34
Speaker 3: party which took place on the night Alonzo disappeared. But
43:37
Speaker 3: if you search hard enough online, you can find the
43:40
Speaker 3: names of some local residents who are rumored to be
43:43
Speaker 3: involved in Alonzo's death. Since their names have never been
43:47
Speaker 3: shared by law enforcement, we're not going to repeat them
43:49
Speaker 3: on this episode, but I will mention that a number
43:52
Speaker 3: of these people hail from a prominent family in the area,
43:56
Speaker 3: which is why there have been so many conspiracy theories
43:59
Speaker 3: about a cover up. One of the most prevalent rumors
44:02
Speaker 3: is that Alonzo's dad occurred because he flirted with a
44:05
Speaker 3: young white woman at the party who was a member
44:08
Speaker 3: of this family, which may have paid the way for
44:10
Speaker 3: a hate crime. During an interview she gave with Dateline,
44:14
Speaker 3: Alonzo's mother, Maria Ramirez, stated quote, I'm Mexican and his
44:19
Speaker 3: father is black, so he's mixed. They didn't just target
44:22
Speaker 3: one race or kill one race, they killed two. He
44:26
Speaker 3: was targeted because of the color of his skin.
44:29
Speaker 2: Do we know if these are just an extension of
44:32
Speaker 2: the rumors? Do you think that law enforcement has fed
44:35
Speaker 2: Maria information that supports the idea that this was racially motivated?
44:42
Speaker 2: Is it an assumption that people are making because of
44:44
Speaker 2: the dynamics of that party, because of the minority status
44:49
Speaker 2: of Alonzo, that he's in the middle of a rural
44:51
Speaker 2: farm town and he is not the same race as
44:55
Speaker 2: the other people who are at the party. Do we
44:57
Speaker 2: know if any of the fights were something where a
45:00
Speaker 2: racial slur or derogatory comments were made.
45:03
Speaker 1: Well, like, we've heard a lot of rumors about these
45:04
Speaker 1: fights and how one of them allegedly started because someone
45:07
Speaker 1: used a racial slur and Alonzo's presence, But we just
45:10
Speaker 1: don't have any like first hand accounts, like anyone who
45:13
Speaker 1: has gone on the record and said that, yeah, I
45:15
Speaker 1: saw this happen. It all seems to be like a
45:17
Speaker 1: lot of hearsay, gossip and rumors, so I don't know
45:20
Speaker 1: about how many of them are actually true. But that
45:23
Speaker 1: is a good question. I don't know if law enforcement
45:25
Speaker 1: has shared any information with Alonzo's family in which they've
45:28
Speaker 1: told them that yes, we have information that his death
45:31
Speaker 1: was a hate crime, or if that's just speculation, because
45:35
Speaker 1: of course it's all over the internet. A lot of
45:37
Speaker 1: people have been sharing rumors that this is what took place,
45:39
Speaker 1: But I don't know how much law enforcement has been
45:42
Speaker 1: able to deviate fact from rumor.
45:45
Speaker 2: You know, it's hard for a family who doesn't have
45:48
Speaker 2: answers because you want to know why, why would someone
45:51
Speaker 2: think that they could steal my son's life from him?
45:55
Speaker 2: What could have motivated this? They try to play the
45:57
Speaker 2: scenes in their head and in the most natural explanation
46:01
Speaker 2: is yes, it probably was racially motivated. But I'm wondering,
46:05
Speaker 2: is it something where their grief is leading to I
46:09
Speaker 2: need answers, and so I build narratives that make sense
46:12
Speaker 2: or that could explain the situation, or is it information
46:15
Speaker 2: that's been given to me? Because sometimes information is helpful,
46:20
Speaker 2: sometimes it further causes trauma that there's no solution to
46:25
Speaker 2: at the time, And then information can also be something
46:29
Speaker 2: that helps to heal and write the narrative that allows
46:31
Speaker 2: you to move forward and process even when you don't
46:34
Speaker 2: have a perpetrator. But I'm just wondering to what extent
46:37
Speaker 2: the poor families left with creating the narrative versus being
46:41
Speaker 2: fed certain information that could again complicate or help the
46:45
Speaker 2: grief that they're feeling.
46:47
Speaker 1: Well. I do know that during the early stages of
46:49
Speaker 1: the investigation, the family was quite frustrated because law enforcement
46:52
Speaker 1: didn't appear to be taking Alonzo's disappearance seriously or do anything.
46:56
Speaker 1: But I think they've been a lot more cooperative in
46:58
Speaker 1: recent years because it is the FBI the Department of Justice,
47:02
Speaker 1: So I would not be surprised at all if they
47:04
Speaker 1: had given the family information to keep them in the loop.
47:08
Speaker 1: And that's why the family has their own ideas about
47:10
Speaker 1: what happened. So I think that about brings an end
47:13
Speaker 1: to part one join us next week as we present
47:15
Speaker 1: part two of our series about the murder of Alonzo Brooks.
47:19
Speaker 4: Robin, do you want to tell us a little bit
47:21
Speaker 4: about the Trail Went Cold Patreon?
47:23
Speaker 1: Yes, The Trail Cold Patreon has been around for three
47:25
Speaker 1: years now, and we offer these standard bonus features like
47:29
Speaker 1: early ad free episodes, and I also send out stickers
47:33
Speaker 1: and sign thank you cards to anyone who signs up
47:36
Speaker 1: with us on Patreon. If you join our five dollars
47:38
Speaker 1: tier tier two, we also offer monthly bonus episodes in
47:42
Speaker 1: which I talk about cases which are not featured on
47:46
Speaker 1: the Trail Went Cold's original feed, so they're exclusive to Patreon,
47:49
Speaker 1: and if you join our highest tier tier three, the
47:52
Speaker 1: ten dollars tier. One of the features we offer is
47:55
Speaker 1: a audio commentary track over classic episodes of UNSAWD Mysteries.
48:00
Speaker 1: Download an audio file and then boot up the original
48:03
Speaker 1: Unsolved Mysteries episode on Amazon Prime or YouTube and play
48:07
Speaker 1: it with my audio commentary playing in the background, where
48:10
Speaker 1: I just provide trivia and factoids about the cases featured
48:13
Speaker 1: in this episode. And incidentally, the very first episode that
48:16
Speaker 1: I did a commentary track over was the episode featuring
48:20
Speaker 1: this case. So if you want to download a commentary
48:22
Speaker 1: track in which I make more smart ass remarks about
48:25
Speaker 1: jewel Kaylor, then be sure to join Tier three.
48:28
Speaker 4: So I want to let you know a little bit
48:30
Speaker 4: about the jeweles and Nashty patreons. So there's early ad
48:32
Speaker 4: free episodes of The Path Went Chili. We've got our
48:35
Speaker 4: Pathwent Chili mini's, which are always over an hour, so
48:38
Speaker 4: they're not very mini, but they're just too short to
48:41
Speaker 4: turn into a series, and we're really enjoying doing those.
48:44
Speaker 4: So we hope you'll check out those patreons. We'll link
48:46
Speaker 4: them in the show notes.
48:48
Speaker 1: So I want to thank you all for listening, and
48:50
Speaker 1: any chance you have to share us on social media
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48:55
Speaker 1: appreciate it. You can email us at the Pathwentchili at
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Speaker 1: gmail dot com. You can reach us on twit or
49:00
Speaker 1: at the Pathway. So until next time, be sure to
49:03
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49:07
Speaker 3: Music by Paul Rich from the podcast Cold Callers Comedy