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Hi, crime junkies. I'm your host, Ashley Flowers. >> And I'm Brit. >> And the story I have for you today isn't
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just one story, but it started that way for me with Sandra Burmore, which we covered in our last episode. I was
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shocked and outraged at how she was taken advantage of in the Police Explorer program because like my god,
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surely parents have to believe that sending their kids to learn from the police has to be the safest place for
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them. What a betrayal. But I began to wonder, was this the exception or was this just one example of a system with
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deep [music] rooted problems that lets abuse thrive? And just as I was asking [music] this very question, literally
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within like 2 weeks of Sandra's story breaking, I saw a local news article. It said, "IMPD officer tied to teens
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suicide ordered to write weekly journal in rare sentence. a teen who was part of
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the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department's Explorer program. And as I dug into her story, I realized that we
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were just scratching the surface of a much, much bigger problem. The more I looked, the more I found. And me and our
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reporter Nina have spent months uncovering a systemic issue with the Explorer [music] program that is
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required listening for everyone. Crime junkie or not, this is an episode that [music] must be shared because you won't
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believe what has been happening right under our noses for decades. For Mike Gatliff, time [music] stopped
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on Monday, November 2nd, 2015, right around 4:41 p.m. And now his life is split into before and after. Before, he
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was living out the most average day. Went to work at the Indianapolis Police Pawn unit. Came home to the house that
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he shared with his wife Janice, their 18-year-old daughter, Heidi, and their 21-year-old son. He'd just gotten out of
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his car and was bringing up some leaf bags from the yard when this familiar face came up to him. 29-year-old IMPD
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officer Francisco, known to him and most as Paco. Now, even though Mike's a civilian employee for IMPD, the only
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reason he really knew Francisco was because of Heidi. She had been a part of the department's explorer program for
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nearly 2 years, and he knew that she had done some ride alongs with Francisco over the past few months. And Francisco
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had never just shown up at their house before, unannounced. and not in uniform. But he says that he's there that day to
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talk to Heidi about a case. >> She's an explorer. What kind of case would you need to talk to? Like explorer
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part. They're not working cases. They're not officers. >> Yeah, you're right. They're not. But
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Mike isn't even concerned. Along with working for IMPD, he's also a fire department chaplain. So like their whole
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family trusts first responders. And IMPD was Heidi's life basically. [music] I mean, everything she's done has been
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working up to getting on the force. Maybe she's getting like a little inside peak. Like any crime junkie would love.
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>> Oh, for sure. It would be great. Whatever. >> So, he tells Francisco that, you know,
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he just got home, but Heidi's car is in the driveway, so she's got to be inside.
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So, like, come on in. He invites Francisco in through the garage, but Francisco stays at the entrance while
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Mike goes inside to [music] get Heidi. Now, inside, her bedroom door is closed. Mike knocks and then he walks in when
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she doesn't answer. And this is the moment that time [music] stops because once he opened that door, he would
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always be living in the after. [music] After he found Heidi laying in bed where he kissed her goodbye that morning.
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Before she was warm and alive, his beautiful daughter was so much potential. And after she is still and
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pale with a gun near her head and her hand close to it. Now, Mike [music] rushes to Heidi and calls out for
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Francisco, realizing that he hadn't followed him in. And Francisco comes running. But even though he's the
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trained officer, it's Mike who slips into first responder mode. He's the one that calls 911 at 4:41 p.m., and he's
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the one who gives dispatchers what they need, while Francisco is just like falling apart. Medics and IMPD officers
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arrive within minutes, and Heidi is pronounced dead there at the scene. And the rest of the night is just a blur of
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chaos. Mike calls Janice at work, bringing her into the after, and she remembers the moment that she collapsed
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and had to be driven home. There, friends and family gather while police seal off the house. Officers line the
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street in a show of respect for Heidi as one of their own, and everyone is left reeling, [music]
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trying to make sense of something that makes no sense. [music] I mean, the day before everything seemed pretty normal.
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The family went to church like always. Later, Heidi skipped baking cookies with her mom. She said she had plans with a
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friend. And then when she came home, she seemed a little upset, but nothing major. She went back out, came home
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again sometime later. Mike didn't see her get back, which was like a little odd,
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>> but there was nothing that like screamed crisis. >> Not even close. Mike is trained to
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recognize the warning signs of suicide, and he hadn't noticed any. Plus, like Heidi is known for her upbeat
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personality. She is bright and bubbly and driven. She loved helping people. I mean, that's what drew her to law
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enforcement. In middle school, she actually dreamed of the FBI, but over time, she set her sights on IMPD, the
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department that she got to know through the Explorers. Mike was actually the one
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who'd first heard about the program and thought it would be a good fit for her. [music] And he was right. Heidi had
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ADHD. She struggled with a traditional classroom, but exploring let her learn by doing. She worked security at the
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Indianapolis 500. She helped on mall patrols. I mean, her confidence was growing with every single shift. And her
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favorite part were the ride alongs. Sitting beside an officer, following calls, watching arrests unfold. It felt
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like the real thing. And it really cemented her desire to become a cop. And just days before her death, she had been
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promoted to post commander [music] and captain, something that she was thrilled about. So for Heidi's parents and her
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brother, like this isn't just grief. It is whiplash. But even in that grief and their darkest moments, her family has
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never disputed that Heidi's gunshot wound was self-inflicted. I mean, she even left a note on Mike's computer,
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which they found later. But there still are so many questions about what led up to her death and why.
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>> And the note didn't give any explanation. >> Not one that they fully understood or
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not one that like filled in all the gaps of how things ended up the way they did.
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Like in the note, she apologized to her parents. She said it wasn't their fault,
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but that she'd made some mistakes. She felt like she was hurting people's careers. It was vague. It was a little
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confusing for them. And there was nothing in recent memory that they could call back to that made this make sense.
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And listen, credit where credit is due for IMPD because they are going to get their fair share of heat in this
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episode, too. They did the thing that you're supposed to do. every death should be treated as suspicious [music]
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until you definitely rule that it's not. And even though everyone was in agreement that this was a suicide, there
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was still a mystery surrounding it. And it quickly becomes obvious that what led
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up to it might involve [music] one of their own. Now, Brad, I know you have a teenager.
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>> Mhm. >> What is the one thing that can give you insight into their life? The portal into
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their internal world. >> Their phone. >> Correct. Hidden in Heidi's calls and texts might be all the answers that her
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family is looking for. And that phone still playing music was near her head when her dad found her. So, police
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collected it and asked [music] her parents for the passcode. But Mike and Janice are kind of taken back. Like,
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passcode? Heidi's not supposed to have a passcode. They have a house rule against
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it. But detectives tell them the phone's locked. And listen, it's not like Heidi
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couldn't have broken that rule if there were things that she didn't want her parents to see or know after she was
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gone. So, they like toss out some guesses. Police try them, but nothing works. And eventually, the phone
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disables completely. And there's just something that feels wrong about this. You see, after Mike found his daughter,
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[music] Francisco had asked Mike to use Heidi's phone so that he could call the adviser
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who ran her Explorer post. Call them for what? And also use your own phone. >> Mike didn't know why he was asking. I
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mean, he had in that moment zero brain space to even consider the weirdness of the request. Yeah. I mean, he just found
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his daughter, but Francisco was able to place that call presumably without having a passcode to open the phone,
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which means >> Francisco locked the phone. >> Yeah. And there is only one reason that
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you would need to do that and that is if you don't want anyone to see what's on it.
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Some cases fade from headlines. Some never made it there to begin with. I'm Ashley Flowers [music] and on my
00:09:14
podcast, The Deck, I tell you the stories of cold cases featured on playing [music] cards distributed in
00:09:20
prisons designed to spark new leads and bring long overdue justice. Because these stories deserve to be heard and
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the loved ones of these victims still deserve answers. Are you ready to be dealt in? Listen [music] to the deck now
00:09:34
wherever you get your podcasts. Everything around Francisco is starting to stink. He came to talk to Heidi about
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a case, which makes no sense now that the blinders are off. He froze and freaked out in a moment of crisis and
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had her dad be the one to call 911. And then he used her phone to make a call after they found her. And now no one can
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get into the phone. Like come on. >> So for all those reasons, detectives have a conversation with Francisco
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pretty quickly, like the next day, Tuesday, November 3rd. And he tells them that he met Heidi when she was on a ride
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along with an [music] ambulance crew. That was back in January, just after her 18th birthday. And Janice told us it was
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actually maybe even earlier at a charity boxing event when Heidi was still 17. But either way, they started talking and
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Francisco encouraged her to join him on patrol. He worked a high crime area known as the swamp where something was
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always happening and Heidi jumped at the chance. >> So this was after she joined the
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explorers, >> right? She had actually already been in the program for over a year by that
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point. And Francisco had no official explorer role, but it like kept them in each other's orbit basically. So he says
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they grew close about 15 ride alongs, working out together a couple times a week and talking almost daily through
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text and Snapchat. That doesn't sound normal, right? >> It shouldn't be. >> Okay.
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>> I mean, like many explorer posts across the country, IMPD's program operates under Learning for Life, which is an
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affiliate of Scouting America. >> Okay? And that organization forbids close social relationships between
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leaders and participants no matter their age. But Francisco doesn't work with the
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post. So that rule technically wouldn't apply to him. And at the time IMPD didn't have a policy barring officers
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from getting involved with explorers. Like that was only added this year, 2025. Now, technically, since Heidi was 18, if
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something was going on between [music] them, it wouldn't have been illegal, >> but
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>> but ethically, yeah, it's a different story. Ethically, he is a unformed officer in a position of authority
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hanging out with a teenager who clearly looked up to him. So, even if you take Francisco at his word, which is that
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nothing sexual happened, >> it still feels wrong to me. >> But anyways, Francisco tells police that
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Heidi seemed fine Sunday night. They'd even made plans to work out that week. But by Monday afternoon, something had
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changed. He said that she called him out of the blue at around 1:00, told him she
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couldn't talk to him anymore, but that she loved him and it wasn't his fault. She thanked him for everything and then
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hung up, which rattled him, and he tried calling back and then finally drove to her house. And ultimately, he admits
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that he lied to Mike. He [music] didn't want to alarm him if this turned out to be nothing. So, he made up the whole
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thing about having to talk to her about a case. Yeah. So then he hangs back and lets her dad find her.
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>> Zero spying. >> Yeah. >> And lots of ick feelings about this for me. >> But still nothing illegal that we know
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of where he crossed a hard line in the sand. Was even touching her phone. >> I mean, this dude's been a cop for 10
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years. He knows not to touch evidence in an active death investigation. And if he
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really needed to contact the explorer advisor, he could have asked responding officers to reach out
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>> or use his own phone >> or like you said before, use his own phone. Yeah. Like it does not sit right.
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So this is when the case is bumped to IMPD's special investigations unit. And while they get their ducks in a row, a
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digital forensic expert is trying to get into Heidi's phone. And Mike and Janice
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are just trying to survive each day. And they are left in kind of an unclear position. Like they know that there is
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an ongoing investigation, something involving Francisco and Heidi's phone, but they're not getting any real
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details, and they don't fully understand why this is happening for a clear-cut suicide. So, one of the people that they
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lean on during this time is 32-year-old Daniel Bowman. He was Heidi's explorer adviser, her
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mentor, the cop running the meetings and taking her ambition seriously. And now that Heidi's gone, he really steps up
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for the Gatliff's personally. The explorers help with funeral arrangements. Daniel carries Heidi's
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earn and gives a speech. And he doesn't just forget about the family once those big moments are over. He keeps checking
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in. He keeps sharing stories about Heidi. And for Janice especially, he becomes a lifeline because Mike and
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their son grieve in a different way. Like they're very private. They're very quiet. But Janice needs to talk about
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her daughter. And Daniel is always available to listen. By the end of 2015, I mean, he is practically family. He
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seems like a steady source of support, someone who cared about Heidi's future and shares their pain and their
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questions. But he also said that he feels guilty because of how everything went down. According to Daniel, sometime
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the morning of November 2nd or like in the early afternoon, Heidi sent him a Snapchat saying that he was a great guy
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and she loved him, which wasn't like her. And then she sent another and he replied asking what was going on, but
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she never answered. Court records show that he sent her 16 messages over the next few hours and none of them were
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even read. And then later that day, his phone rang and it was Heidi's number calling, but the voice on the line was a
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man yelling that she was dead. Now, Daniel says he didn't recognize the voice as Francisco's. And he didn't like
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know him super well. Like Daniel might have seen him around, but they'd never spoken. He didn't really even know his
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name. He said that he didn't even connect the voice to him until they met at the Gatliff's that evening.
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>> So, if they didn't even know each other, then why did Francisco even reach out to
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him? >> Daniel says he doesn't know. But Francisco was obviously aware of him because that night he pulled Daniel
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aside and asked if they could talk privately in Daniel's car, even asked him to turn off his police radio. Daniel
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says Francisco told him that Heidi really cared about him, like him being Daniel, and then immediately asked she
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ever talked about Francisco or said anything about their relationship. And Daniel's like, "No, like I don't
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remember her mentioning anything." Now, eventually Francisco got out of the car.
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Daniel says that he watched him go into the Gatliff's house, which struck him as
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odd because it was still an active crime scene. And then when he came out, he stood in the driveway and in full view
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of officers and mourners urinated in the yard. >> I'm sorry, what? I know. It's like it's
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it's just weird behavior. >> Yeah. >> Now, Daniel says that he feels awful because he didn't realize how much Heidi
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was struggling. And he also tells Janice that he thinks Heidi and Francisco were
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involved in some way. Now, when we recently spoke to Daniel, he said that he didn't realize what was happening at
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the time. That all the ride alongs and contact Heidi had with Francisco went beyond what he had believed he approved.
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Like, he'd been running the post for a couple of years and says that he only ever authorized a handful of ride
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alongs, including one for Heidi. And the way that he tells it, they were tightly
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controlled for 18 and up explorers only, paired with another student and assigned
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to a short list of approved officers. But there was an earlier incident that stuck out. Daniel says that sometime
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around the spring of 2015, another explorer mentioned that Heidi went on a ride along that he hadn't approved out
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of uniform and outside of the normal process. As post adviser, Daniel should have filed a report, but he says that it
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didn't seem like a concern or a complaint, more like a misunderstanding. So, instead of documenting it, he talked
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to his supervisors, gave the group a refresher on the policy, and pulled the 18 and overs aside to remind them. He
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wanted all ridealongs to have his approval, and anyone using a police radio had to be logged with dispatch so
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that the department could know who was where. But he also told us that it felt complicated to him, like Heidi was
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technically an adult and he didn't think that he could dictate what she did on her own. So maybe out of all this guilt
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he's feeling or his own grief, whatever, he says that he's trying to be there for
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her family and for [music] the explorers. And on November 3rd, again, this is the day after Heidi's death,
00:18:00
Daniel brought a counselor in for an emergency explorers meeting. Now, he told us the department didn't help with
00:18:05
this. like there wasn't protocol for handling something like traumatic like this, but there was a surprise guest
00:18:11
that showed up, Francisco, and it didn't seem like he was there for the counseling. Daniel says that he was like
00:18:18
asking around trying to find out more about what had happened. And while the explorers were gathered with Daniel,
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there was this other group that was meeting at the home of one of Heidi's close friends named Corbin Meyers. He
00:18:30
invited their circle over so that they could try to process what happened. And while they were all together, one of the
00:18:37
girls got an Instagram message [music] from Francisco who wanted her to call him. And that's when Corbin's radar
00:18:44
started like going off. He knew that there had been some shady stuff happening over the past few months.
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[music] So Corbin, being in the beautiful one party state of Indiana, decided to record their conversation.
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And on the call, Francisco repeated much of what he told detectives. But he also
00:19:02
talked about his last call with Heidi. He said that she told him her life was a mess and that she'd been hurting people
00:19:09
and lying to them. And while he downplayed their relationship to police with her friends, he leaned into it
00:19:17
fishing trying to find out what they knew. Corbin actually gave those recordings to police and he also shared
00:19:25
them with us. I don't know how much of of everything you knew about her. Did you know
00:19:32
everything? >> For the most part, yeah. >> Okay. Well, what I didn't know about 3 weeks ago since we've been hanging out
00:19:42
and stuff and she told we never establish, she never said anything about liking me. She never
00:19:49
said anything about that. We're just hanging out. She told me that she was seeing two other guys besides me, like
00:19:57
just hanging out with two other guys. >> What was your reaction to that? >> Um, I was pretty upset in the beginning and
00:20:06
I told her that we should not probably see each other and she got really upset. >> Yeah.
00:20:14
>> And then she told me that she spoke to another guy which Do you know the two names? I don't know if I do you know
00:20:21
them. >> We know who they are. Yeah. >> Francisco seemed especially fixated on one of those men.
00:20:29
>> She told me about him and she said that that it uh that she felt she was hurting
00:20:38
him. And I'm not really sure what the relationship was prior to this, but she said she was hurting him.
00:20:45
>> He said he'd already compared notes with this other guy. according to what she
00:20:50
told me is that she was telling him that they she loves him. But unfortunately, she never said those things to me except
00:20:57
for the day that she called me. I wish you guys could tell me more. That's what I was hoping that maybe you guys had
00:21:03
some answers to help me. >> Hang on. So, Francisco admitted there was something going on between them.
00:21:10
Well, after they hung up, he called back. >> Like, what does she say about me? like
00:21:16
she she considered what we had in relationship. I heard you guys say that, but I want to know why she thought that.
00:21:23
>> It wasn't something like a romantic relationship. We never It wasn't like that. We just hung out.
00:21:31
>> As Francisco started backtracking, Heidi's friends followed his lead. >> He never said that to you guys that was
00:21:39
more than just your friend. >> Um, not as far as we know. No. cuz I wanted to know if she ever said that to
00:21:45
you because if she ever thought that we were more than just that. And it's not that I
00:21:51
would be mad or anything, but she just never ever said anything to me like that. Like, hey, she never even told me
00:21:58
she liked me. It was nothing like that. So, and I wish kind of she told you guys
00:22:03
is what she felt about me, but I guess not. >> Okay. >> She didn't ever say anything about me
00:22:10
like that to you guys? Not that we can not that we are aware of. >> No, >> it's not it's not it's not a big deal.
00:22:20
But what the reason I I asked is cuz I'm not really sure why she called me. I spoke to the other guy that she says
00:22:33
she's romantically involved with. I actually spoke to him yesterday and we kind of talked and
00:22:39
I don't really know what she was telling him and what she was telling me, but I I
00:22:43
just wanted to make sure that I wanted to see if that's what she meant when you said relationship if she thought that I
00:22:49
was more than >> just her friend, like someone she hangs out with. >> Now, obviously Corbin goes to Heidi's
00:22:58
parents with these calls. And by the way, just a side note, I love these kids. Corbin and his friends sounded
00:23:06
>> better on those calls than some seasoned investigators that I've heard. >> I know. I will send you the whole call
00:23:12
because honestly like these guys are chef's kiss. Like they sound like crime junkies who have been taking notes since
00:23:17
birth and they do not come to play. So anyways, Heidi's parents like get these recorded calls. They already have Daniel
00:23:24
in their ear talking about Francisco, but they didn't need him to turn them against the guy. between the way he
00:23:31
unraveled the day that Heidi died, his whole demeanor, and now Corbin telling them about the calls, like they are sure
00:23:38
something is up. So during this time, is Francisco in contact with Mike and Janice? Tries to be at first, but he's
00:23:44
not admitting to any inappropriate relationship with Heidi? And actually, while you have Daniel badmouthing
00:23:50
Francisco, Francisco is bad mouthing Daniel, telling Janice that the Explorer program should have been shut down, that
00:23:57
under Daniel's leadership, the teens were barely supervised. And someone must have agreed with Francisco on that point
00:24:03
at least, because Daniel says that within a couple of weeks of Heidi's death, he was moved to a new role.
00:24:09
Officially, on paper, it's a promotion, but to him, it felt like a punishment, even though he was told he could stay
00:24:14
involved with the explorers if he wanted to. But regardless of the explorers, he
00:24:20
still stays close with Heidi's family, even staying with them for a little bit while he and his wife are going through
00:24:25
a divorce. He vacations with them that spring. So, imagine the shock and the betrayal that they feel when they learn
00:24:34
who the other guy in Heidi's life really was. >> He's another IMPD officer. And not just
00:24:41
any officer. It was the man who ran the Explorer program. the man who lived with
00:24:47
them and vacationed with them, Daniel Bowman. In January 2016, Daniel's wife filed for
00:24:56
divorce. That's when he was staying with Heidi's family. But this was no amicable
00:25:01
divorce. In May, he ends up getting arrested on more than a dozen charges tied to domestic abuse against his
00:25:07
soon-to-be ex. Some stemming from incidents that happened years earlier. She tells police that he had been
00:25:13
violent and controlling, forcing her to bark like a dog, punching her, shoving her into walls, threatening her with his
00:25:20
service weapon, even pointing it at their sleeping daughter. And she says it got worse after Heidi died that Daniel
00:25:28
admitted that they had been involved and he just spiraled. She left because she feared what he would do next. So, in the
00:25:37
time between Heidi's death in November and then his arrest in May, dude had been unraveling. He moved to that
00:25:44
different position, which again he saw as punishment. Then his wife left him and word was starting to spread around
00:25:50
the station that he had a relationship with Heidi, too. Now, according to Daniel, those were just rumors. He says
00:25:56
started by Francisco and a couple of other officers. He told Nah that they were the ones who contacted his then
00:26:03
wife and planted this idea in her head. He says that he never implied that he and Heidi were involved to his ex or to
00:26:09
anyone else. But based on what we know, Heidi told friends, they believed that she and Daniel were involved, which
00:26:16
again, Daniel denies. He told us he cared about Heidi as a friend and mentor, but insists that nothing between
00:26:23
them was romantic or sexual. Okay, but why is a grown man friends with a teenage girl in his program? I mean, she
00:26:30
would have been like 16 when they met, >> right? which in Indiana 16 is the age of
00:26:37
consent, >> but to be >> like, who cares? >> Yeah. Like still a minor. He's still in
00:26:41
a place of authority. Like, I'm sorry. >> And he's saying nothing happened. So, like I agree, like he should not be
00:26:45
friends with a 16-year-old, especially when, like you're saying, he's in a position of power. But Daniel says that
00:26:50
he felt close to all of the older explorers, and he swears that he and Heidi were only alone twice briefly,
00:26:56
like as they left meetings. So, why is Heidi telling her friends things to make them believe that he and Heidi are
00:27:04
dating? >> Daniel told us that he's not sure what gave her that impression. Maybe she
00:27:09
misread his goofing around, something he says he did with everyone. But if your goofing around as a supervisory officer
00:27:17
gives a minor in your care the impression that she has a relationship with you, >> that's like the bigger problem, right?
00:27:24
Yeah. >> Yeah. You're the problem. And I guarantee that the goofing around that's
00:27:29
happening is highly inappropriate. >> Either way, Daniel basically blames Francisco and the other cops for all of
00:27:37
this. He says he documented what was happening and when he learned that one of the initial detectives working
00:27:42
Heidi's case might have ties to Francisco, he like sends this memo up the chain. He saw himself as the good
00:27:49
guy. And we know that because of text messages that he sent his wife. text that would later become part of the
00:27:55
probable cause affidavit for his domestic violence arrest. On April 6th, 2016, he texted her, quote, "I'll be a
00:28:03
hero, a whistleblower, fighting police corruption, and if not, I have nothing to lose. You've taken everything I've
00:28:10
ever worked for. He took my only friend." End quote. And then on May 9th, 2016, he says, quote, "Right now, I'm
00:28:19
only interested in going to there's another cop's name that I'm not going to say, and putting a bullet in their
00:28:26
heads. I'm furious. This department failed. This city needs more dead cops." End [music] quote. Those messages are a
00:28:33
big reason that his wife contacted police. Like, his communications were becoming more threatening. And those I
00:28:40
got straight from a legal document. But Daniel told us that he didn't write them.
00:28:46
>> Of course. Of course. Then please, Daniel, who did? >> He blames his now ex or like someone
00:28:54
close to her says that she had access to his iMac and like she could have sent them.
00:28:58
>> That's his story. >> Okay. Anyway, after Daniel's arrest, he postponed and goes home on electric
00:29:05
monitoring to await trial for the domestic violence charges. And still at this point, nothing had happened with
00:29:12
Heidi's case or with Francisco or the Explorer's program because they still have not been able to get into Heidi's
00:29:18
phone. It isn't until fall 2017 when new technology becomes available that they can finally crack it. And what they find
00:29:28
makes it clear why wouldn't want them to see their communications. It shows just
00:29:34
how manipulative he had been and how much they had been in contact. All told, they exchanged over 300 calls in the
00:29:44
month and a half, just the month and a half before her death and 177 texts in the final 3 days. Now, I haven't seen
00:29:52
most of them. This is a closed case with IMPD, but they're still withholding most
00:29:58
of the records, including a lot of the texts. And listen, we've worked with a lot of agencies over the years. IMPD has
00:30:06
consistently been one of the hardest to get records from. [music] >> And when I say hardest, I do mean
00:30:12
impossible. Which I hate to say about the agency that's in my own backyard. >> But I have way better relationships with
00:30:18
other agencies. Like why the f does it need to be so hard here? Like what are we hiding something,
00:30:23
>> right? Like my mind goes to like why not? But of the messages I can see, including some from a probable cause
00:30:30
affidavit. Francisco's tone goes from like flirty to furious, he berates her for lying and gaslights her about this
00:30:39
other officer and demands to know where they stand. They end up talking three times on the day that she died. And
00:30:46
after the last call, he flooded her with messages, texting things like, "You can't do this to me. You can't. and I'm
00:30:52
headed to your house right now and you're going to make me look so stupid in front of your family. You make me
00:30:57
feel like this is really all my fault. And the one thing that's more interesting than the texts is the data
00:31:05
showing that all of those messages between Francisco and Heidi were deleted around the time that he used her phone
00:31:13
to call Daniel. And after the messages were wiped, that is when the phone was locked. So that November, more than 2
00:31:21
years after Heidi's death, Francisco is arrested for felony obstruction of justice and misdemeanor computer
00:31:29
trespass. Both him and Daniel are off the force, suspended without pay, facing termination as their cases begin to
00:31:37
crawl through the court system. So, I'm kind of getting lost on like what the truth is or was like, was Heidi involved
00:31:46
with Daniel or Francisco or both? So, based on everything that we've learned from court records, from everyone we
00:31:54
spoke to who had direct knowledge of the situation, it appears that Heidi was involved with both men.
00:32:00
>> And that kind of dynamic, like one teen, multiple officers, is sadly not unusual.
00:32:06
I mean, it it really underscores how predatory some of the adults in these programs can be.
00:32:11
>> And did police find any texts between Heidi and Daniel when they got into her
00:32:16
phone? >> So, here's what's interesting. I don't know where they find them. His phone,
00:32:22
her phone, whatever. But I know that they find texts. However, they don't actually charge him with anything
00:32:31
related to Heidi. And those texts never make it into any record that we have access to
00:32:37
>> and IMPD won't share records, >> right? So in August of 2018, that is when Daniel goes to trial for his
00:32:45
domestic violence charges. Now he gets found guilty on eight of the 13 counts, but that's all involving his then wife,
00:32:52
not Heidi. >> So the only way I know that there were messages between him and Heidi that seem
00:32:57
suspicious is because of what happens next. So, in February of 2019, he gets deposed for Francisco's case, and the
00:33:07
prosecutor presses him on Heidi, reading their text aloud and basically saying that she thinks he's lying about the
00:33:14
nature of their relationship. But his attorney jumps in and shuts it down, arguing that it could expose him to new
00:33:21
charges and that that is not relevant to Francisco's case. >> Okay. if those texts could open him up to new
00:33:30
charges. >> Mhm. >> And the prosecutor has those texts. >> Mhm. >> I hate to ask this question, but what
00:33:38
are we doing here? >> Dude, I don't know. I like I I don't cuz I don't know what's in them.
00:33:44
>> I mean, maybe they knew they could only prove the DB charges and figured he'd
00:33:49
get like a long enough sentence for those that they wouldn't have to worry. Okay.
00:33:54
>> Yeah. No, about that. So, according to Indianapolis Star reporter Mark Alicia,
00:34:00
at Daniel's sentencing, the judge says that she thinks he has a [music] dark side, but also says that his police
00:34:06
background makes prison more dangerous for him. So, the judge considered it an extenduating circumstance, but still
00:34:13
sentences him to 8 years plus 4 years probation. That's something at least. >> Mhm. But hang on. He wasn't in prison
00:34:22
long before his lawyer asked for home detention, arguing that he wasn't safe behind bars. I guess the defense did
00:34:28
some research, found out that the judge had the option to offer home detention and that Daniel basically they're like,
00:34:34
"He has a job. He has a house. He has a baby on the way with his new wife. Oh, oh, by the way, he has a new wife. He
00:34:39
has older kids who depend on his paycheck." >> Prosecutors obviously objected, but a
00:34:45
different judge okayed it. And after less than four months, Daniel was released on electronic monitoring. So he
00:34:54
finishes the sentence in 2022. And since then, he has rebuilt his image in academia, branding himself as an
00:35:05
advocate for justiceimpacted students, working in a university lab that studies criminal, legal, and social
00:35:13
systems. And he's pursuing a PhD. To this day, Daniel insists that the judge got it wrong. He denies everything, the
00:35:20
abuse, the text, the threats, any inappropriate relationship with Heidi. I mean, people don't usually get parrolled
00:35:26
without admitting guilt. And and Daniel clearly hasn't. So, I know it's not quite parole, but like why did he get to
00:35:33
sit at home through all that? >> Dude, I wish I knew. The Marian County Prosecutor's Office told us that the
00:35:38
lenient outcome was unusual, and they don't seem to know why he got it. >> And what happened to Francisco? So, in
00:35:45
2022, Francisco pleaded guilty to a reduced misdemeanor obstruction of justice. He gets a year of probation,
00:35:54
240 hours of community service, and is ordered to submit weekly journal entries to the court.
00:36:00
Wait, just hold on. There are no police officers in trouble for having a relationship with a minor in the police
00:36:14
explorer program. Well, since we couldn't get records from IMPD, I don't know if they even explored
00:36:21
that [music] angle. Heidi was a minor when she entered the program, but she was 18 when she died, and the only texts
00:36:28
that we've seen are from when she was 18. So, what are we supposed to take that to
00:36:35
mean? Like, IMPD is just cool with allegations of officers grooming minors till they turn 18, right? Like,
00:36:41
>> like they're cool with the power dynamic of an officer having a relationship with
00:36:45
someone in their program as long as they're 18. I mean, there were at least internal affairs investigations in the
00:36:53
Sandra Birmore case. Like, that's something. Well, I mean, remember IMPD did add a policy this year, 2025. Heidi
00:37:01
2015, 10 years later, they added a policy this year saying they weren't cool with it.
00:37:05
>> Oh, good. >> But what is maddening to me is that more than a decade after Heidi's death, so
00:37:10
much is still unclear. What did IMPD know and when? >> Right. It's obvious that someone in
00:37:17
leadership saw something, at least with Francisco, because Janice told us that apparently in the spring of 2015, so
00:37:24
this is months before Heidi died, a highranking official pulled her aside and said that they were concerned Heidi
00:37:31
was riding with the same male officer a little too often. He suggested that she like, you know, maybe mix it up, ride
00:37:38
with some different officers. Now, Janice doesn't remember if he named Francisco specifically, but she knew
00:37:44
that's who he meant since Heidi often did ride alongs with him. So, she and Mike told Heidi, "Switch it up." They
00:37:50
assumed she did. So, they were worried enough to tell her mom, but not to actually do anything themselves. We
00:37:57
don't know what they did, >> right? Meanwhile, despite what Daniel told us, that he was in the dark about
00:38:03
Heidi's frequently tagging along with Francisco on patrol after she died, he told her mom that everyone knew that
00:38:10
they were going on too many ride alongs. Mike and Janice still don't feel like they got the full story, and they feel
00:38:17
betrayed knowing that two men who were supposed to protect Heidi failed her. And those guys walked away with barely
00:38:25
any consequences. Now, our team has spent the better part of a year trying to find out more. We filed multiple
00:38:31
requests with IMPD, and we got back a few records and like vague assurances that they're working on getting us more.
00:38:38
And at the same time, they claim that they're withholding some under an investigatory exemption, but they
00:38:43
haven't said what or why considering both criminal cases are closed, >> right? >> And they also declined an interview
00:38:50
saying that the answers are, wait for it, in the records. the records that they won't give us the ones. Okay. So,
00:38:57
we're just like in this little circle. >> Yeah. Now, we couldn't reach and neither he nor Daniel has ever
00:39:03
publicly admitted to anything beyond a friendship with Heidi. But the general feeling from people we spoke to, family,
00:39:09
friends, people in the mix, is that both crossed a line and they put Heidi in the
00:39:13
middle, pressuring her to choose between them. And that toxic triangle dynamic isn't just our interpretation, either.
00:39:20
We spoke to John Moore who is a former sergeant with the special investigations unit at IMPD. He worked the case against
00:39:27
Daniel. He told us that investigators broader takeaway was that Heidi was in an inappropriate relationship involving
00:39:34
both men and that they both groomed her using their authority and access as officers to build her trust and blur the
00:39:41
boundaries. Court files have some details but not enough to show how closely investigators looked at either
00:39:47
of them. We don't know how seriously they checked out Daniel's relationship with Heidi or how deeply they dug into
00:39:52
Francisco beyond the obstruction case. Between the delays and the denials and the no comments, IMPD has made it nearly
00:39:59
impossible to understand what really happened. And instead of answers, we got stonewalled. We don't even know how IMPD
00:40:06
supervised the Explorer post. But if Daniel's account is accurate, he ran it mostly on his own. There were about 30
00:40:13
teens on the roster, maybe 10 regulars, and he was the only sworn officer directly involved. There was a sergeant
00:40:19
who offered light oversight and a few adult volunteers that helped out, including former explorers. And when
00:40:25
Daniel took over, he was a patrol officer with zero youth experience. He basically says that he was handed the
00:40:31
post with a here you go and no manual, just learning for life handouts and IMPD's general orders, which he kind of
00:40:38
cobbled together into a rule book. And by the way, just as a reminder, Learning for Life is the organization that most
00:40:45
explorer programs in the country run through. >> And as I mentioned, Learning for Life is
00:40:50
an affiliate of Scouting >> America. >> Yeah. Aka the Boy Scouts. I don't know if you've ever heard of any abuse
00:40:56
problems with them, >> but quick download. In 2020, the Boy Scouts filed for bankruptcy after being
00:41:02
hit with over, wait for it, 82,000 sexual abuse claims. One of the largest abuse scandals in US history. The
00:41:10
organization had known about the abuse for decades, keeping internal records commonly known as the perversion files,
00:41:17
but often failing to report abusers to authorities. So, all that to say, I bet you would be surprised to know that in
00:41:24
2015, Learning for Life still had no guidance on adult communication with teens outside of meetings, no policy on
00:41:33
texting. Now, that same year, the Boy Scouts adopted a digital version of what they call too deep leadership, meaning
00:41:39
that no one-on-one contact between like adults and minors, including through texting, DMs, or gaming. But Learning
00:41:45
for Life has its own handbook, and the digital contact rule wasn't included that year, and we couldn't find it in
00:41:51
there until 2017. So, to me, this isn't just an Indianapolis problem. These programs seem to be built in a way that
00:41:59
makes them prime for grooming. And the failures we're seeing here are happening in agencies all over the country. And
00:42:06
there's no national public database for explorer misconduct. I mean, we know sexual abuse in general is notoriously
00:42:13
under reportported, >> but there have been reporters and researchers who tried to pin down how
00:42:18
widespread this problem is. A recent investigation by Lijra Chavis of the Marshall Project identified at least 217
00:42:25
abuse and misconduct allegations in law enforcement explorer programs going back
00:42:29
to the 1970s when girls were first allowed in spanning more than 100 agencies with officers grooming or
00:42:36
sexually abusing victims as young [music] as 13 or 14. A 2003 study by criminologists Samuel Walker and Don
00:42:43
Earlbe found that nearly half of all reported cases of officer sexual misconduct with teenagers happen in
00:42:49
explorer posts. So even though these programs are just one way that cops interact with teens, they account for a
00:42:56
disproportionate share of the known abuse. And while girls are more often targeted, boys and young men have been
00:43:02
victimized, too. Now supporters of the programs point out that these cases are rare. a small fraction of the tens of
00:43:10
thousands of teens who have participated since 1959 when a California sheriff's department started the very first post.
00:43:17
And listen, for sure, when operated properly, explore programs can offer real value.
00:43:23
>> Participants, usually 14 to 20, get early exposure to police work while building leadership, discipline,
00:43:29
confidence, a sense of belonging. Agencies get a recruitment pipeline, a way to connect with the community. It
00:43:36
should be a win-win, right? So, how do we get the good without putting children at risk? The answer is oversight. For
00:43:44
post underlearning for life, the organization is supposed to set and enforce protection rules with a
00:43:50
five-point safety plan. Screen out abusers, educate youth, parents, and volunteers about warning signs, set
00:43:57
boundaries, encourage reporting, remove offenders. In practice, every safeguard lives or
00:44:05
dies at the local level. And as then freelance journalist Jonathan Kaminsky found, historically, Learning for Life
00:44:11
has mostly left agencies to police themselves. And inside that shaky setup is a glaring vulnerability, ridealongs,
00:44:20
the program's most popular feature and its riskiest. California based attorney Anthony DeMarco, who has spent years
00:44:27
litigating explore abuse cases, told us that ridealongs are a perfect setup for exploitation. hours alone with a
00:44:35
powerful adult with no one else able to see or hear what's happening and almost no real oversight from the department.
00:44:43
But doesn't that too deep leadership rule apply? Everywhere except ride alongs, at least they were the exception
00:44:51
until just this past June when Learning for Life finally started requiring two adults in the car if the Explorer is
00:44:58
under 18. Before that, the loophole was wide open. And the Marshall Project concluded that ridealongs factored into
00:45:05
about a quarter of abuse cases. But ride-alongs are only part of it. These programs are a perfect storm because
00:45:12
they stack all these risk factors together. Officers get access to teens. Oversight is often thin. And the kids
00:45:19
want to be there. They're ambitious. They want to impress. A lot of them see this as their future. And the structure
00:45:25
can make it hard to tell where normal training ends and something sketchy begins. So when an officer singles them
00:45:33
out with extra attention, >> it can feel important. >> It's their big break instead of feeling
00:45:37
like a red flag. That's how grooming usually starts here. Not with threats, but with connection.
00:45:44
An officer becomes a confidant, builds trust, maybe gets close to the family. And that's just as true when the teen is
00:45:51
legally an adult like Heidi. A birthday does not erase the power imbalance. >> And from there, things can escalate,
00:45:59
right? It's a ride home, a private hangout, late night messages. By the time that it's clearly sexual or
00:46:05
coercive, the team might actually feel like they went along with it or that speaking up would ruin everything, their
00:46:11
reputation, their shot at the job, their future. Anthony says that there is often
00:46:15
this unspoken deal. Stay quiet and the doors stay open. speak up and it slams shut. And victims might also be afraid.
00:46:25
By the way, >> they're cops. >> These are cops. Yes, they carry weapons. They can arrest you. A lot of victims
00:46:31
worry that they'll be targeted or that no one is going to believe them. So many of them never even tell. Some of them
00:46:40
come forward years later, and even when they do, there's no guarantee that they're going to get justice. And this
00:46:46
isn't just a stat. So, I did a bit of a call out about the explore program, if you remember, in our episode on Peggy
00:46:52
Hetress. And not too long ago, I posted a Tik Tok asking people to share their stories with me if they were in the
00:46:58
program. Didn't say what kind of stories, just left it open. And the number of messages I got from people was
00:47:04
wild. So many of them had stories from their past where either they had friends that were in intimate relationships with
00:47:11
officers or they themselves were groomed. and tons of them still didn't want to come forward even now.
00:47:19
>> So, the problem is so much bigger than we think it is. But there were some people who decided to share their story
00:47:26
in hopes that it could save even one more young person from abuse. And one of those people was a 43-year-old woman who
00:47:34
I'll call Kate. In 1998, then 15-year-old Kate joined the Bosowin Police Explorer program in
00:47:43
New Hampshire. She'd grown up admiring a DARE officer and knew that she wanted to
00:47:48
be a cop. The post seemed like the perfect first step. A small group of teens led by Officer John Laros, who was
00:47:55
in his late 20s. And John's mom had been a teacher of Kate, so he like already felt safe and he knew how badly she
00:48:03
wanted this career. and he knew that she was vulnerable. As a pre-teen, she'd questioned her sexuality. Her parents
00:48:10
eventually came around, but for a while, they restricted what she could do. She felt really cut off, and Jon acted like
00:48:16
the one adult who accepted her no matter what. As the Explore adviser, he controlled everything. The program
00:48:24
included regular ride alongs, sometimes overnight shifts, and Kate was often paired with him. And her parents were
00:48:31
fine with it. They trusted him and supported her goals. But it didn't take long for him to start just like pushing
00:48:38
boundaries. Within months, she said that he was steering conversations toward sex, making crude jokes, asking her
00:48:46
about her experiences, and oversharing his own, including that he cheated on his wife. Now, at first, Kate didn't see
00:48:53
it as wrong. It felt like he was treating her like an equal. She actually felt special. But sometime around early
00:49:00
2000, Kate says that he assaulted her. It happened in this dark secluded lot near the county jail. This like boat
00:49:08
launch that he routinely checked while on patrol. And she tells us that one night he drove there, made a comment
00:49:14
about people having sex there, and then told her to get out of the car and perform oral sex on him. And she said
00:49:20
she didn't feel like she had a choice. She was a teenage girl alone with an armed officer, afraid of his reaction,
00:49:27
afraid of ruining her future, so she complied. Kate told us that there were more assaults in the months that
00:49:33
followed, all while he was on duty. At one point, she says that John even showed her a news article about another
00:49:39
cop getting arrested for assaulting an explorer. He then pulled out the New Hampshire criminal code and read her the
00:49:45
exact statute, the one that described what he was doing as felonious sexual assault. Like Kate didn't want to anger
00:49:51
him, so she like tried to reassure him like she was over 16, the age of consent in New Hampshire. But he corrected her
00:49:58
if the adult is in a position of authority, the law is actually 18. So he absolutely knew what he was doing and he
00:50:06
made sure Kate knew too. And after that, she changed. She became this shadow of the fun-loving kid that her friends
00:50:13
knew. She tried to tell another explorer what was happening, but instead of support, she got shamed. So, she stayed
00:50:19
in the post for a couple more years. It did open doors for her, like she graduated high school early. She got
00:50:25
into a criminal justice program, even landed a civilian job with another police department. But the trauma
00:50:32
followed her. She was convinced that she led him on, that she didn't deserve happiness, and eventually she gave up
00:50:38
her dream of becoming a cop. Now, years passed. Kate got married, and in 2013, she had a daughter. And there was
00:50:46
something about becoming a [music] parent that made her finally see things differently. And she knew that she'd
00:50:52
want someone to be held accountable if they did this to her child. So in September of 2014, after a lot of
00:50:58
soulsearching, she actually reported John. He was long gone from Bosowin by then. He was actually chief of police in
00:51:06
nearby Canterbury at that time. >> Right. But since he and the Bosowin chief had worked together, the case was
00:51:12
handed over to the New Hampshire Attorney General's office. Investigators asked Kate to wear a wire and confront
00:51:18
him. And listen, she hadn't seen him in ages. And the prospect of this was like overwhelming. But she agreed and she
00:51:24
goes to meet him at the Canterbury station. And on tape, they have this guy admitting to the sexual activity, even
00:51:32
apologizing, though he was like insisting it was consensual. And later when investigators confronted him again,
00:51:39
he repeated the confession. And according to WUR's Heather Hamill, he even said that he thought it was quote
00:51:46
fun to flirt with a 16-year-old under his control. What? In August 2015, John was arrested for aggravated felonious
00:51:55
sexual assault and placed on unpaid leave. And news coverage shows that he was indicted on a slew of felony and
00:52:02
misdemeanor sexual assault charges a couple of months later. Then he resigned the following January. By summer of
00:52:08
2016, the case went to trial. He actually took the stand where again he admits to the sexual encounters with
00:52:15
Kate, but is still claiming they were consensual. How can he call it consensual when the law literally says
00:52:23
it [music] wasn't? And also, he pointed out that law. >> Literally, that's what prosecutors
00:52:28
argued that like the whole thing was grooming and coercion. They brought in an expert on trauma and pressed him on
00:52:34
his changing stories. But Jon's defense painted him as like this like bumbling and harmless guy and suggested that Kate
00:52:42
had financial motive to go after him. Two former explorers testified that she had quote bragged about the
00:52:48
relationship. And so after 7 days of testimony, [music] the jury deliberated for just 2 hours and they found him not
00:52:56
guilty on all charges. >> [laughter] >> I know. >> In In what world was he not in a position of authority? It's
00:53:07
baffling. >> I This is unreal. >> According to Kate, prosecutors later asked jurors what shaped their decision.
00:53:13
And you know, they said they just couldn't picture Jon being a violent guy, and they questioned why she would
00:53:18
stay in the program. Some people thought she cried too much. Some people thought
00:53:22
she didn't cry enough or that she seemed just too strong. So it it didn't matter
00:53:25
what she did or was going to do, it was the wrong reaction. She was never going to make herself the perfect victim for
00:53:31
them, >> which is like what we see all the time, right? Like survivors are held to
00:53:35
impossible standards. >> They're expected to fit this narrow script, like be composed, but not too
00:53:41
composed. Remember every detail, even though trauma distorts memory, and if they don't match what people think a
00:53:46
real victim quote unquote looks like, they're not believed. Kate was crushed. Mhm.
00:53:51
>> The attorney general's office encouraged her to file a civil suit. Like some survivors pursue that even when criminal
00:53:57
charges don't stick, but she just couldn't stomach another courtroom. Like the public backlash was already intense
00:54:02
and she worried that suing would make people dismiss her story, like think it was just about money, so she decided
00:54:09
against it. The upside is that John Lash is no longer a cop. And after he was suspended, locals raised broader
00:54:17
concerns about Canterbury PD. So, the sheriff's office reviewed the department and they actually found over a decade of
00:54:23
mismanagement and dysfunction under his leadership. Now, we reached out to John via text. He told us that there was
00:54:29
nothing to discuss since he was found not guilty. And when we noted that he still admitted to sexual contact with a
00:54:35
minor explorer and asked if he had anything to say now, nearly a decade later, he said that he'd already
00:54:40
answered for it at trial and told us to lose his number. No one at Bosow PD today was around during Jon's [music]
00:54:48
time or the Explorer era, but the chief told us that the program was shut down long before Jon's arrest and that no
00:54:56
other complaints were ever reported. Speaking out even now still feels risky to Kate emotionally and legally. Like,
00:55:03
we're using a pseudonym, but that's not going to hide her identity from him or the community. But she decided it was
00:55:09
worth it. Silence hadn't protected her. it only protected him. And she wants people to know what happened. And she
00:55:17
hopes that her story helps someone else get justice even though she didn't. And Kate's not alone in that hope or [music]
00:55:23
even that outcome. For many survivors, justice stays just out of reach. The Marshall Project found that only about
00:55:30
half of the Explorer related cases that they tracked led to any time behind bars. Big reason is because of plea
00:55:37
deals. charges just get like reduced to misdemeanors or to nonsex offenses. Beyond Explorer Post, a Washington Post
00:55:44
investigation found that nearly 40% of officers convicted of sex crimes involving children from 2005 to 2022
00:55:53
never served a day [music] in prison. >> And when there is punishment, there is no real standard of what that is.
00:55:59
Charges fall under this like mix of state and federal laws, statutory rape, abuse of power, civil rights violations.
00:56:06
Prosecutors don't always use the same playbook, even when the behavior looks similar. And so, sentencing is all over
00:56:12
the place. >> Inside agencies, discipline is just as inconsistent. Some officers are fired,
00:56:18
some resign, others stay on the job with reprimand or short suspension, or sometimes nothing at all. And that's
00:56:26
what happened in Jennifer's case. In the late 80s, Jennifer joined the Contraosta
00:56:31
County Sheriff's Explorer program in California after hearing about it at school. She was 15 and already set on a
00:56:38
career in law enforcement. And this post was smaller, like fewer than 10 teens and run entirely by one deputy who we're
00:56:45
going to call Bill. Bill, who was in his mid to late30s, started inviting Jennifer on overnight ride alongs a
00:56:52
couple of times a week. Her parents are fine with it. She was with a cop. Like, what could be safer? And over the next
00:56:58
couple of years, he slowly introduced her to inappropriate behavior. things like telling her how beautiful that she
00:57:05
was going to be when she grew up. She trusted him, believed what he said, and valued his opinion. She idolized this
00:57:11
man. So, when one night he turned around in the patrol car and kissed her, she was stunned, but also flattered. A month
00:57:20
later, he took her to his house while his wife was away and pressured her to have sex. Now, she said no, and he
00:57:26
stopped that time. Now, soon after her family moved to Florida and before leaving, she confided in another
00:57:33
explorer. Not as like a cry for help like Kate, more like she was mourning the end of something that she thought
00:57:39
was real. >> Like in her mind, what they had had been a relationship. That explorer told the
00:57:44
sheriff's office, and to their credit, they opened an investigation, but by then, Jennifer was across the country.
00:57:50
So, everything was happening over the phone with her, but only with her. What do you mean only her? They didn't talk
00:58:00
to her parents. >> Mm-m. They had no idea that that >> even though she was still a minor.
00:58:06
>> Yeah. It's wild. And like in that moment, since Jennifer was like so embarrassed, she minimized it, but she
00:58:12
did at least confirm that they kissed and that the relationship was inappropriate. The sheriff's office
00:58:17
didn't respond to our interview request. But as far as we know, the investigation
00:58:22
went nowhere. Bill didn't lose his badge. Records show that he did step down as explorer adviser in 1991, but he
00:58:30
stayed on the job for nearly two more decades. [music] Jennifer joined another explorer post in Florida. This one
00:58:37
larger and more structured, but the same problems persisted. She remembers the comments like the lingering attention
00:58:45
from male cops of all ages. At the time, when she's young, it didn't feel predatory. It felt like being noticed.
00:58:53
She went through the academy, worked as a dispatcher, and became a reserve officer. But the steady boundary pushing
00:59:00
wore her down. And eventually she realized these are not superheroes. They are just human men in uniforms. Some
00:59:09
good, some not. So when she got pregnant, she left the field. Last year, while flipping through an old photo
00:59:16
album, Jennifer decided that she actually wanted to confront Bill. But that's when she found out that he died.
00:59:21
So there would be no reckoning, no chance to look him in the eye and tell him what he'd done to her. And she
00:59:28
carried shame for years, blaming herself. And only later did she understand how vulnerable teens are and
00:59:34
how men like Bill take advantage of that. Heidi, Kate, Jennifer, and so many others, they did what adults told them
00:59:42
to do. They trusted the people in charge, and so did their parents. I mean, go back to Heidi. Take Mike and
00:59:49
Janice Gatliff. They were so involved. It's not like they just dropped Heidi off and hoped for the best. Mike went to
00:59:54
her first meeting. They showed up to events, but they were also trusting the system and thought that Heidi was
01:00:00
surrounded by honorable cops worthy of their powerful positions. You know, they still believe the law enforcement
01:00:06
explorer programs can work if there's real oversight and accountability. But they don't think Heidi got that. And
01:00:13
they have to live with the ache of knowing that they'll never see her huge smile or hear her contagious laugh
01:00:18
again. She'll never wear the badge that she worked so hard for, pouring nearly 2,000 hours into the explorers. So, what
01:00:26
they hold on to now is their faith and their memories. The way that Heidi could turn everything into a joke. The moment
01:00:32
that she made a quiet child in Haiti smile during a missions trip just by refusing to give up. They know that
01:00:38
Heidi changed lives simply by being who she was. [music] and her compassion and her drive and her goofy sense of humor
01:00:45
all came from one place, a heart that was wired to show up for others. So, in all of this, I I have to ask, does IMPD
01:00:53
still have its program? When detective Christine Manina took over after Daniel Bowman, she told us that it was
01:01:02
basically a free-for-all. Like, teens tried to outrank her and like boss her around. So,
01:01:08
>> so back then she came in, she set new rules, tightened boundaries. Some of the
01:01:12
kids left, most of them stayed and she ran the program for like 5 years before she retired. [music] And to answer your
01:01:19
question, no, they don't have an explore program now. They have something called
01:01:22
junior cadetses, but as of late October, IMPD told us no one was enrolled in that. So whether that's a fresh start or
01:01:30
just a rebrand remains to be seen because a new name doesn't mean new safeguards. And those safeguards are
01:01:37
what's necessary because this isn't just about a few bad apples. This is, I keep
01:01:41
saying it, about a system that allowed them to operate, policies that left massive gaps, higher-ups that looked the
01:01:47
other way or downplayed allegations, and a culture that protected [music] the institution first and the kids last. And
01:01:54
girl, this isn't even a new problem. Like, f the stats. This has been a systemic issue for decades. Like, I
01:02:01
don't know if you knew this, but in the 70s, the Los Angeles Police Department found itself under investigation after
01:02:06
some officers were discovered taking overnight camping trips with teenage girls from the department's all female
01:02:12
explorer post. And one of the girls described these camping trips as quote, "Little more than orgies." According to
01:02:18
reporting, it had been happening for like a couple of years before an explorer finally sounded the alarm. In
01:02:24
that case, some officers were charged, but news coverage shows that most of the cases just collapsed. Prosecutors cited
01:02:31
a lack of evidence and victim cooperation. In some cases, they say they couldn't prove that the officers
01:02:36
knew that the girls were underage. I guess it was too much detective work for them to like figure out that the girls
01:02:41
in a youth program were youths. Yeah. >> And department discipline was also weak.
01:02:47
like a few resigned, a few were suspended, one was fired, one got a disability pension for injuries and
01:02:52
emotional stress, others were cleared, and then like by the late 70s, the whole thing just like fizzled out in the
01:02:59
media. According to Jonathan Kaminsky's reporting, it had been happening for a couple of years before the Explorer
01:03:04
sounded the alarm. It doesn't have to be this way. Some groups are doing it right, like the Duchess County Sheriff's
01:03:11
Office Law Enforcement Youth Cadet Program in New York. Their adviser, Sergeant Alonzo Montana, has built
01:03:16
guardrails into every part of it. Communication runs through tracked group platforms. Parents are looped in early
01:03:22
and often, and historically, they haven't even allowed ridealongs at all. When Nina spoke with Sergeant Montana
01:03:27
earlier this year, they were just starting to phase them in with [music] very strict rules. And we spoke to a
01:03:32
woman named Don Bolley in Wisconsin. She says that she joined her local Explorer
01:03:36
Post in the early 1980s when she was a freshman in high school. She learned skills like conflict resolution,
01:03:42
emergency response, even firearms training. She loved her program leaders and says that they changed her life and
01:03:48
the lives of others in the program. For Dawn, it wasn't just a resume builder. It was formative. It showed her how to
01:03:54
stay calm under pressure and that being a cop wasn't the path for her at all. >> So, it's not the explorers that need to
01:04:02
stop. >> Yes. >> As usual, it's just the abuse. Yes, but any meaningful change has to start with
01:04:09
the agencies running these programs. >> They're the ones with the power and the obligation to enforce the rules,
01:04:16
>> the responsibility. >> Yeah. And my god, be thoughtful about who you put in charge. Don't just grab
01:04:22
whoever's free and hand them a group of teenagers. I mean, like, right now, the qualifications are pretty minimal.
01:04:28
Adviserss have to be at least 21, pass a background check, and get agency approval, and then be signed off by the
01:04:35
local exploring council. >> And do they go through any like serious safety training? Not really. So beyond
01:04:42
the background check, the like training they have to do is pretty much just online webinars. And actually, Nina,
01:04:47
when she was doing all the reporting on this, she took them and earned the same safety certification that advisers get
01:04:53
while sitting on her couch in one night. >> Salute to Nina. Salute to Nina. Now, the
01:04:58
recent ride along policy change by Learning for Life, which by the way never responded to our interview
01:05:02
requests, is a step in the right direction, but rules on paper are the easy part.
01:05:08
>> We still don't know how or how often that policy is enforced or what actually
01:05:12
happens to agencies that ignore it. That attorney I mentioned, Anthony DeMarco, sees the problem as systemic. Officers
01:05:19
are given unsupervised access to minors, then protected by a culture and union contracts that often shield them from
01:05:27
serious consequences, even when there is misconduct. His view is don't just slap
01:05:32
a band-aid on the problem. Make it as transparent and accountable from the ground up starting with ride alongs. So,
01:05:39
what can we do? >> Right here you go. I love to leave you with a good takeaway. So, if you're a
01:05:43
parent, an agency, or a teenager in the program, I got you covered. So, agencies
01:05:49
define inappropriate conduct clearly, things like shoulder rubs or oversharing, and act early with serious
01:05:56
discipline or termination before it escalates. Make ride along assignments random so officers can't quietly
01:06:02
handpick the same teens over and over. Use tech like interior audio and video in patrol cars, GPS tracking, maybe even
01:06:10
like an Uber style recording that kicks in for every ride. The thing is like Anthony thinks that there would be a lot
01:06:16
of push back on that idea from cops and explorers. >> Okay, >> but like who cares? Like in my mind if
01:06:22
it protects even one kid, it's worth the discomfort. Now parents, if your child wants to join an explorer cadet program,
01:06:30
>> do not assume uniforms mean it's safe. Treat it the way you would a new school
01:06:35
or a daycare when your kids were little. Ask who runs the post, what are the rules, how are ride alongs tracked,
01:06:41
what's the policy on texting and social media? How are complaints handled? Stay involved. Show up. Talk to adviserss.
01:06:48
Connect with other parents. The more visible you are, the easier it is for your kid to speak up if something feels
01:06:54
off. And keep the conversation going at home. Talk about boundaries. Make sure your kid knows that they can come to
01:07:00
you. If an adult, even if it's someone in uniform, >> especially someone in uniform,
01:07:05
>> if they make them uncomfortable, remind them that abuse is never their fault.
01:07:09
And if they disclose it, go straight to the authorities. If local law enforcement shrugs it off or you're
01:07:14
concerned about a conflict of interest, go above them to state or federal agencies. And for my youths listening,
01:07:22
explorers or no explorers, you guys are faced with crazy [snorts] all the time. I wanted to be 20 when I
01:07:29
was eight and I was like dying for someone to look at me like I was older and mature. And some people will do that
01:07:36
with respect. They're going to give you responsibility and the room to come into
01:07:40
your own. But others are going to try and take advantage. I didn't know what the signs were when I was young. So, let
01:07:46
me talk to you like the grown-up you are. You are not an idiot. So if you feel like a line is being crossed, you
01:07:53
get that like tingling in your spine or that jelly in your belly, you know something is off, you do not have to
01:08:00
justify it. You don't have to excuse it away. It's not your responsibility to make adults feel comfortable. And you do
01:08:07
not have to protect them from their own actions. And if you realize it too late,
01:08:13
no, you didn't. It is never too late to draw the line and stop unwanted behavior. And it is never your fault.
01:08:22
Doesn't matter if it's a cop or your pastor or a teacher or a coach. Whether it's an Explorer program or somewhere
01:08:28
else, you don't owe anyone your time, attention, or access. If an officer asks to meet alone or sends flirty, secretive
01:08:36
messages or just gives you a bad feeling, tell someone you trust. And if something already happened, you are not
01:08:43
to blame. Even if you didn't or couldn't say no in the moment, even if it felt like something you agreed to, power
01:08:52
dynamics can twist what feels like a choice. And you deserve support no matter what. So, crime junkies, if any
01:09:00
part of this episode hit home. If you know someone who's been affected by abuse in any youth setting or you just
01:09:06
want those spaces to be safer, talk about this. Share this episode. We can do better. We have to for Heidi and Kate
01:09:16
and Jennifer and for the next teenager who walks into an Explorer post with the dreams of one day wearing a badge. If
01:09:23
you or someone you know is struggling or has experienced abuse, help is available. We're going to link resources
01:09:29
in our show notes, including hotlines for sexual assault, child abuse, domestic violence, and suicide
01:09:34
prevention. Please reach out if you need to or share them with someone who might.
01:09:39
As always, you can find all the source material for this episode on our website, crimejunkie.com.
01:09:44
And if you want to listen to more episodes like this and all of our episodes, completely adfree, be sure to
01:09:50
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01:09:57
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