00:00:30
How could this have happened to us? But you know, over the years I see so many people losing loved ones. But um and I
00:00:39
and the one question that keeps coming back to me is um if we had done something different, if we'd stayed in
00:00:46
Hawaii, if we'd stayed in Spain, this would have never happened, you know? Why did this this happen? what what what
00:00:56
brought us here to this place, you know, for this to happen? Um there there's so many multiple
00:01:04
universes, you know, we could have stayed here, stayed there, moved to Florida earlier. Um and and she
00:01:13
would have been alive today, but she but it it didn't happen that way. Why? Um I don't know. I don't know. But I
00:01:25
wish we would have I wish we would have done some things differently. Yeah. Uh in my lifetime now, it's been 30ome
00:01:34
years since Peggy's gone and and still nothing has been done about it. And it's like everybody just wants to turn a
00:01:41
blind eye to it and move on. What? What? Move on? I've got stage 4 colon cancer. I'm doing all right right
00:01:51
now, but I my doctor has told me and she was very blunt about it. She said, "You
00:01:57
know that this is going to kill you." And I said, "Yeah, I know that. I understand that." So that's why I agreed
00:02:05
to do this interview because I may not be around before this comes to a conclusion, you know, but I'd like to
00:02:14
see it start. I'd like to see him uh get busy and do their job and and make uh give Peggy resolution,
00:02:25
you know. Maybe me, maybe I'll still be around. I don't know, but I'll try try to be around. I'm not afraid. Uh I I'm
00:02:36
not afraid of anything anymore. I can't be. I have to be strong and and um and I
00:02:44
want if we can do something for Peg and her memory, then let's get it done now. So, what do you say, crime junkies?
00:02:55
Let's This is a lot of people. >> A lot of people. >> Hi, crime junkies. I'm Ashley Flowers.
00:03:38
And I'm Rich. >> This is weird, you guys. This is really freaking weird. We haven't been on tour
00:03:47
in six years, and it was not this. >> It was not this at all. Oh my god. >> Thank you guys for coming to our
00:03:53
hometown show. Uh in Indie is keeping me humbled. I don't know if you were out front standing in
00:04:02
line. I biffed it and like fell in the concrete. Yep, you saw it. She's fine. We checked her out, but uh
00:04:10
found a peg. >> All right, you guys. I We are here to tell a story. I'm ready. Are you guys
00:04:16
ready? >> All right. So, the person you saw speaking, that was Tom Hrik, and his
00:04:25
sister Peggy Hetric was murdered in Fort Collins, Colorado back on February 11th
00:04:31
of 1987. Now, there is still plenty that can be done to solve her case, but the people
00:04:40
in charge who have the power to do that something are doing nothing. >> But you know what changes that?
00:04:46
>> A little bit of pressure. >> A lot of noise. And so, we're here today to tell you why you should make noise
00:04:53
and why you should be straight up mad. Not just on behalf of Peggy and Tom, but so many people in our story. And it's a
00:05:03
story that starts on February 11th, 1987. Now, it's February in Colorado, but there's no snow on the ground, but it's
00:05:12
cold at 7:00 in the morning when this guy named Woody is biking his way to work. He's like head down. I imagine
00:05:18
he's just like in the zone. >> And all of a sudden, he kind of gets like snapped out of his days when he
00:05:23
sees something in this vacant field. And then all of a sudden, he sees in front of him this like splash of blood. And in
00:05:31
that moment, he realizes it's not just a splash of red. It it truly is blood. And
00:05:37
so in that moment, he's like, "Forget work." Like, he has to get police there to the scene.
00:05:42
>> And when police come, what they find is a 100 foot blood trail to the middle of
00:05:47
the field where they see the body of a woman laying face up. She's got her hands over her head, her legs are out,
00:05:55
her bra and shirt have been pulled up, her pants and underwear have been pulled down.
00:06:01
and they assume that she had been stabbed because of the blood, but they can't actually see any wound. The only
00:06:07
thing they see is like a gash on her cheek, and they see that one of her nipples has been removed.
00:06:14
>> Yeah. So they also noticed that she has again she's got her clothes on her, her
00:06:21
jacket, her purse is clung like hung over her shoulder still and like everything is still inside. All the
00:06:26
normal stuff you would expect to find. Even her checkbook which is how they end up identifying her as 37year-old Peggy
00:06:32
Hetrick. >> But along with her checkbook like she still has all of her jewelry. She
00:06:36
>> So it's not a robbery. >> It's not they're not so not that what they're thinking. And especially because
00:06:41
like there's a like something about the way that she was put out there like with
00:06:45
her arms spread like she feels posed, right? Like this feels like something more than that. So by 9:00 a.m. this
00:06:53
field is just like a frenzy with officers. And one of the sergeants that responds to the scene that day is
00:06:59
Sergeant Ray Martinez. And he says when he shows up he is surprised to see basically all of Fort Collins Police
00:07:07
Department there. Now, unfortunately, not all of the hands that are on deck are gloved.
00:07:15
So, as they're working this scene, they turn Peggy over and they realize that they were right. She had been stabbed
00:07:22
once to the upper back. They also noticed that there's a ton of like dry or dead grass like on her butt. And so
00:07:31
the like little semblance of this theory starts to begin to form about what could
00:07:36
have happened because you see they follow that blood trail back to where it was on the curb and they notice a couple
00:07:42
of really interesting things. So first there's this like really critical set of footprints near the blood spatter.
00:07:49
Footprints that do not match Peggy's shoes that she's wearing. And then they also notice that there is this cigarette
00:07:55
butt in the blood. And Peggy was known to be a smoker. So they start thinking, okay, maybe she was walking having a
00:08:03
cigarette and she was surprise attacked by someone and then she was stabbed right there and then drug out to where
00:08:12
she was found. So you'll see this like dark line that is the blood trail path. And the interesting thing is they they
00:08:19
begin to speculate that her pants were pulled down first before she was drugged because of all that grass on her butt. I
00:08:26
don't know if that's true because I kind of have all the questions about this. You'll see that there was this like what
00:08:31
they're on the top what the drag marks look like and I actually like I was trying to figure out how drag marks
00:08:37
would look like this and I was literally like dragging people these like poor people who work at audio check like
00:08:42
dragging people through the hallway of the office >> because when you get drug your legs like
00:08:46
V outpart so these drag marks have the feet together >> which which makes sense if her pants are
00:08:52
pulled down. The thing that doesn't make sense about this is everyone says that that this is the drag mark and this is
00:08:57
the blood mark, but if you see the pink line, like I I marked one pink and one blue. The blue is the drag mark. The
00:09:03
pink is the blood trail. And I'm like, in what world do they not like not line up?
00:09:08
>> They should be right on top of each other. >> Exactly. Now, I've asked like all the
00:09:12
detectives I can about this, and the best theory that they come up with is like, "Oh, well, maybe there was two
00:09:17
people, and one was dragging her coat, and one was dragging her, but like her coat's not the thing that's bleeding."
00:09:23
>> Also, her coat is on, her purse is still over her shoulder. Her coat was never
00:09:28
off. >> And I don't know if this is all like a red herring, and everyone's trying to
00:09:32
explain it, but it it maybe means nothing. The other thing I think is so interesting is that her boots, in my
00:09:37
mind, don't show any sign that she was drugged. Like I know it wasn't muddy or anything,
00:09:42
>> but there should still be like dirt and dust and grass because there is debris
00:09:46
on her body like that, >> right? But there doesn't seem to be any of that. So the question they have like
00:09:54
in this moment is like how did she get to the middle of this field? >> And potentially more importantly, who
00:10:01
wore Tom McCann dress shoes size eight and a half or nine? because that is what they determine was the shoe print, those
00:10:10
like critical shoe prints by that big splash of blood. >> And the blood is from like active
00:10:16
bleeding, like the stab wound. It's not from any of like the mutilation or anything like that.
00:10:20
>> No. So, what they end up finding is that the autopsy showed that the mutilation
00:10:27
was done postmortem. And interestingly, there was no sexual assault, but when they did the autopsy, they saw
00:10:35
additional mutilation in her genitals. So, someone like took time and it wasn't done by like animal predation or
00:10:43
anything like that. Like, it was precise. It was done with what they determined to be a small sharp
00:10:48
instrument, which is different than what they determined she was stabbed with, cuz they determined she was stabbed with
00:10:54
like a 5 in serrated blade. >> So, that gives us two weapons. We've got two weapons.
00:11:00
But the problem is they don't find any weapons there at the scene in that field. They also don't find her nipple.
00:11:10
But that would be harder to spot. They want to like have a search team look for it. And they're like, "Don't worry, we
00:11:17
know exactly who we're going to call the scouts." >> Like children. And when I heard this, like when I heard
00:11:27
this for the first time, I was like, "You mean to tell me that I was out there selling [ __ ]
00:11:34
Thin Mints?" >> No shade to Thin Mints. We love Thin Mints. >> I was selling Thin Mints and Samoas when
00:11:41
I could have been searching for body parts. LIKE, WHERE WAS THAT BADGE? On my honor, I will serve God in my country,
00:11:50
obey all the crime junkie rules, not contaminate evidence. >> That's That's the dream. Okay. So,
00:11:58
new crime junkie life rule. Always go a layer deeper because if I I dug and I dug and I turned out it wasn't
00:12:05
Girl Scouts or Boy Scouts. It was actually Explorer Scouts, >> also kids, >> which
00:12:12
>> still high school kids. And I'm going to give a quick PSA. I don't know how familiar people are with
00:12:18
Explorer Scouts. Um, they have like programs all across the country where like high schoolers who want to be in
00:12:25
like the police force one day like can go in and train, whatever. Um, I'm not saying don't do it. Ask some questions
00:12:33
though. >> But there will be a Crime Junkie episode coming soon because the Explorer Scouts
00:12:38
is like rife with abuse. So if you're a parent, >> get involved. get involved, stay
00:12:45
involved. And that's my quick PSA. So, kids are out there looking for nipples, >> naturally,
00:12:53
>> which by the way, they don't find. Police are out there looking for a per. And police decide like the best thing we
00:12:59
can do is like, we've got to retrace Peggy's last movement, and we have to build some kind of timeline. We have to
00:13:06
learn about who she was. So, they decide to start at her apartment. Now, at the time, Peggy had a temporary roommate.
00:13:13
And temporary is important because the two were sharing a set of keys. And on this night, when Peggy got off of work
00:13:21
at her job at the fashion bar, she walked home and she was pounding on the door cuz it was locked, trying to wake
00:13:27
up her temporary roommate, Sharon. Now, Sharon, depending on what report you read or Sharon's memory, she either like
00:13:34
was out still drinking and forgot she was supposed to get home to let her in or had been drinking too much and was
00:13:39
inside passed out. But either way, Peggy is banging, banging, banging, like cannot get Sharon to wake up. So, she
00:13:46
decides to make the best of like this meh situation and kind of go bounce around to a couple of bars, hang out.
00:13:54
She has some drinks. She is using the pay phone and constantly calling her apartment. She wakes Sharon's ass up. By
00:14:00
midnight, she goes back home again, banging on the door, but this time she wakes Sharon up. And she goes inside,
00:14:08
but she's not in for the evening. She goes in to change out of her work clothes and into jeans and a blouse.
00:14:14
Jeans and a going out top for my millennials. And she goes to this place called the Prime Minister. And this bar
00:14:22
was a regular haunt for Peggy. So, it's not surprising that she ran into someone
00:14:26
that she knew. It was her on-again, off-again, currently off boyfriend, Matt Zulmer. And Matt says that he was there
00:14:34
that night with another woman. It was actually someone he had like just met that night. Like they he's like her name
00:14:39
was maybe Shawn. And he said he talked to Peggy for a little bit, like everything seemed fine. He even had
00:14:45
offered her a ride home because she knew he knew that she walked and she had originally accepted. But Matt said that
00:14:51
he went to the bathroom and when he was coming out, Peggy was leaving. And so he
00:14:55
figured like me, she doesn't need the ride anymore. Matt stays till last call, stays with maybe Shawn. They end up
00:15:00
going back to his place. And the bartender at the bar confirms this. Peggy left on her on her own. Maybe
00:15:06
Shawn confirms that she went home with Matt. And so this is the last time that we have anyone seeing Peggy alive at
00:15:14
around 1:15 in the morning, leaving the prime minister. Now, you'll notice that the prime minister is like over here.
00:15:22
Her house is over here. The field where she's found in is kind of in between the
00:15:25
two. So, this is like playing into their theory >> that she was walking home. >> Exactly. That maybe she was walking home
00:15:30
and got surprised by someone. So, they really start thinking like they had done an initial canvas of the area to see if
00:15:37
anyone had like seen or heard anything. No one had, but they're like who who would be in this field in the early
00:15:44
morning hours? So, a detective, Linda, she decides that she wants to like kind of just do some more canvasing. She
00:15:52
wants to go to some of the trailers nearby. And she goes to the home of Clyde Masters, one of the first doors
00:15:58
that she knocks on. And Clyde says the same thing. Didn't hear or see anything, >> but he says, "You know, now like, you
00:16:06
know, in the hindsight, like there was something weird that morning. My son, I live in this trailer with my son Tim.
00:16:12
He's 15. He always walked through that field to go to like his school or school bus or whatever in the morning, like 7
00:16:19
o'clock in the morning. He's like on that morning, I remember seeing him like hesitate in the field. He didn't stop
00:16:25
for long. He didn't do anything. He still made it to school on time, but it's just weird. You might want to talk
00:16:31
to him. And the officers are like in their head they're like, "Okay, if he's going to
00:16:37
school at 7 o'clock in the morning, >> that's like the same time that >> Woody Woody found and like
00:16:43
>> so he doesn't make sense. >> Why wouldn't you say something if you saw someone in the middle of the field
00:16:49
like and we know she was there. Why would you just go to school like nothing happened unless you had something to do
00:16:54
with it?" So they go to Tim's school. They pull him out of class and before they can say anything, he knows exactly
00:17:02
why they're there. But he tells police then what he would tell you today. So February 11th, 1987, I woke up at a
00:17:15
normal time. I think it was somewhere around 6:00. Uh I remember I still remember my father
00:17:21
had fixed sausage and eggs for breakfast that day. So I had sausage and eggs for
00:17:25
breakfast. took a shower, got dressed. I typically wore a t-shirt, jeans, and a jean
00:17:31
jacket, and uh about 6:55, I walked out the back door to head through through the field
00:17:38
to go catch my bus. And I remember I still remember to this day when I was getting close. We had a little fence
00:17:45
halfway across the property line, like not at the edge of my property, but about halfway between the trailer and
00:17:52
the edge of the property. And I remember seeing at that time of day, it looked like there was trash out in the field. I
00:17:57
thought somebody had dumped some trash out in the field. That's what it looked like. And I remember thinking, man, this
00:18:02
kind of crap never used to happen before these roads went in. Now people are dumping trash in the fields. And I
00:18:07
walked on and uh went through the fence onto the field north of my house. And I remember
00:18:19
seeing it. It started to look more like a a body out there. And I remember seeing it looked like someone had spray
00:18:26
painted brown paint on the ground, reddish reddish brown paint, like a rust color along the field going out to it.
00:18:34
And I remember walking my normal path and then I veered veered over to go look and see what the hell was in the field.
00:18:42
And I I walked over towards it, stood there, and looked at it. And to 15-year-old me, I think I was in such a
00:18:51
state of shock that I couldn't believe that was a body. I thought it was a mannequin, specifically a recessa Annie
00:18:58
doll that someone had stolen from the school and dropped out in the field as a prank. And I remember walking away
00:19:05
kind of confused about it, thinking, "No, there's no way it's a body. It's somebody dropped a mannequin out there."
00:19:11
and I walked on, caught my spool bus, and I didn't say anything to anybody about it.
00:19:19
>> All right, it's the life rule number 10 tour for a reason. >> Say it with me.
00:19:25
>> It's never a mannequin. >> But, okay, so there are a couple of things to remember here. First of all,
00:19:32
this is happening in 1987. This is the year before we were even born. >> So, there's no crime junkie. There's no
00:19:39
crime junkie life rules, >> right? Secondly, okay, so he thought it was a mannequin,
00:19:44
but specifically he thought it was a recessa Annie doll. Does anyone know what a recessive Annie doll is? Is it
00:19:51
from my Instagram? Because I didn't know what a recessive Annie doll was. And so obviously I went and
00:19:59
bought one on eBay. This is Annie. >> She's been hanging out with us at the office.
00:20:07
>> She's Yeah, she's been tormenting everyone at the office. I'll like hide them in like on like their desks. I'll
00:20:12
put them in their chair. She's great. So, the thing about this, you guys, is that the recessive Annie doll, there is
00:20:19
this picture. I can tell you that it actually did look like Peggy all day till I'm blue in the face. But there is
00:20:25
this picture of Peggy's face when she was found in the field. Again, she is completely white. Her mouth is open.
00:20:33
Like, there's a sideby-side I have that when I would tell like people working on
00:20:37
this show, I would say they looked a lot alike. They're like, "Yeah, okay. It's like it's a doll. It's still a doll."
00:20:41
And then I show them this picture and literally >> uncanny. >> They would like lose their breath
00:20:47
because her hair color is the same. Like literally the cut is the same. Everything is exactly the same. So it is
00:20:55
not that wild if this if that was his comparison. It's not that wild that he thought he maybe saw a recesscent Annie
00:21:02
doll in the field because one of the things he says too is he never got right up on it. He was always like 5 to seven
00:21:08
feet away. And the other thing you have to remember is that like you heard a grown man tell you that story in 1987.
00:21:16
That grown man was a 15-year-old kid. And that 15-year-old kid is telling them that he didn't do anything. He thought
00:21:26
it was a mannequin, but police do not buy it. So they pull him out of class and they bring him in for questioning.
00:21:34
And the whole time he is insistent that he is innocent, but they give him a polygraph and the polygraph says
00:21:43
otherwise, >> which there's another life rule there all like never ever take a polygraph.
00:21:49
>> No. And we have another life rule. You guys know always get a lawyer. But Tim
00:21:54
said that he didn't know that he could or should get a lawyer. If he didn't do anything, why would he need a lawyer is
00:22:01
his thinking. >> And so his dad was letting these officers question this kid alone. And
00:22:08
while he's being questioned, the other thing he didn't know is that they were searching his trailer, specifically
00:22:15
paying attention to Tim's room. And >> okay, can we stop for She's really distracted.
00:22:18
>> She is. You got to go just move her. >> Yeah. Here, just take her. Put her back
00:22:22
where we found her. Bye, Annie. She's traveling with us from city to city. Like I'm honestly really Annie's
00:22:30
not going to die after this show. She's staying with me forever in the office. >> Annie is forever. Annie's Annie's
00:22:35
forever. So they're doing the search of Tim's place and they're finding stuff. They're
00:22:42
finding toy guns. They're paying specific attention to this like knife collection that he had, right? Like
00:22:47
they're still looking for a murder weapon. >> They find a pair of pants that have a
00:22:51
spot of blood on them that they collect. And then they find something that they truly believe is like super telling. The
00:23:00
thing that they think shows that Tim is this violent killer. They find his drawings.
00:23:09
Now, >> interesting response. I know it's not that because >> I saw these and I know I'm closer to
00:23:18
like having a middle schooler than being in middle school, but I feel like it was
00:23:23
5 minutes ago and I like can remember the boys in my class making this [ __ ] >> I will one up her all day. My son is in
00:23:31
high school now, but he was in middle school and like this isn't that weird. Like there's like
00:23:39
>> I don't love it. >> No, it's not great. But it's also like there's like little
00:23:44
military badges. There's also long division in the middle of it. Like that's like I was I literally like
00:23:51
pulled some >> manifesto, >> right? Like I literally pulled some of like doodles from like his old school
00:23:58
books and like literally was like on math homework. There was like a cat god. It was the whole thing. This it just
00:24:05
seems very benign for it to be like the smoking gun in this case. But they do they see this as their smoking gun in
00:24:11
this case and they're finding this stuff as Tim is sitting through a 9hour interrogation with multiple detectives.
00:24:21
>> What you think about all this? What you think about the people that tell me what's going on in here all day since I
00:24:26
haven't been here? >> Well, they're pretty much sure that I did it. >> Why are they sure you did it?
00:24:35
>> Cuz all the evidence points towards me, I guess. You have a lot of u pictures of
00:24:40
of killing women, don't you? Pictures you've drawn. >> I do. >> Not just women, >> huh?
00:24:45
>> Not just women. >> Not just women, but you do have pictures of women being killed, don't you?
00:24:51
>> Yeah, I guess I do some. >> But you know, you have all those knives and stuff. Don't you do anything with
00:24:56
your knives anymore? >> I like to collect knives. >> And what else do you do with them?
00:25:02
>> You don't do much anything. >> You just collect them. I use them in a real hiking stuff.
00:25:09
>> What are you using for >> like a cutting room stuff? >> I want to clear this up in your mind.
00:25:15
>> It's important you tell the truth. >> I have told the truth. >> Can you dig what I'm saying?
00:25:21
>> Yeah. >> She has lost her life. She has no more freedom. She can't do a thing.
00:25:29
Her life has ended. You scared a lot of people. You scared me. I didn't sleep last night. I slept about two hours. You
00:25:37
scared the hell out of me. Thank God we found you. Half the detective. Half my people lost
00:25:47
all their sleep last night. We're trying to find you. Now somehow like I have seen people
00:25:57
break in shorter times with people there. like he in 9 hours alone he never breaks.
00:26:04
>> A 15-year-old kid. >> 15-year-old kid. He never confesses. He says that he is innocent and they don't
00:26:10
have anything. All they have at this point are these drawings which they can't arrest him for. So, they have to
00:26:17
let him go. But when they do, they leave that 9-hour interrogation more convinced
00:26:23
than ever that he is their guy. Especially one detective named Jim Brick. Jim is convinced because of three
00:26:31
things really. Number one being the drawings. The drawings is everything to them. But number two, in his
00:26:37
interrogation, it somehow came up that Tim knew about Peggy's nipple being removed. Which if he thought it was a
00:26:46
mannequin, if he was 5 to seven feet away, >> how could he have known that? >> How could he have known that? The other
00:26:52
thing is that they confirm that one of the sets of prints, there were two sets of prints in the field. One of the sets
00:26:58
of prints was Tim's. Now, it was not the critical set of prints by the blood spatter on the curb.
00:27:05
>> And this field is where Tim walks to school every single day. >> And the closest it came was like 5 to 7
00:27:11
feet away, which he said, "I never got close to the body." But his prince in the field, they are convinced that he
00:27:16
did this. So, looking for something to get this kid on, Jim Rodri calls the FBI and asks them to do a profile. They send
00:27:25
him the drawings and the profiler is like, I'm sorry, I don't see it. Like, I no, you can't say that this kid, there's
00:27:34
nothing else. You can't say this kid murdered someone based on drawings. But instead of taking that and being like,
00:27:39
okay, what else have we got? Who else should we look at? >> Jim decides to phone a friend. He's
00:27:46
going to do some profiler shopping. So, he calls somebody that he knows in Washington and gets like an offthebooks
00:27:51
profile. And the guy he talks to says, "I don't know, man. Like maybe I have like seen that a lot of times killers
00:28:02
will position their victims so they can like see them afterwards." And when they
00:28:07
look at where Peggy was in the field, like there was this direct line of sight from Tim's trailer. So he's So Jim Brick
00:28:16
hears this and he's like, "Okay, this is it. >> That's all I need to know. >> It is my job. nay, my duty to get Tim
00:28:24
Masters off the street. He is a dangerous individual. So, they don't let up. They keep pulling him out of class.
00:28:31
They're telling his teachers that he's a dangerous murderer. Obviously, that's not staying with just a teachers. Like,
00:28:37
everyone in school knows what's going on. Tim walks through the hallway and like people will go to the other side of
00:28:42
the hall just not to be near him. And it's coming at him from all angles, like not just in school and through police,
00:28:49
but every day for the first month, the newspaper that's getting delivered to his house has the front page story
00:28:56
saying that police have one suspect and they're inching in on an arrest. But again, Tim does not break. His story
00:29:05
never changes. And he has answers kind of for everything they put forward. So the prince in the field again, he's
00:29:11
like, "Yeah, those are mine. I told you I was 5 to seven feet away. They're my prince. The nipple thing. He's like,
00:29:18
"No, I didn't see it. I knew her nipple was removed." >> Kids out in the field looking for
00:29:24
>> the girl in my art class told me cuz you had kids in the field looking for a nipple. So, of course, that got around.
00:29:31
They find out that the blood on his pants was not Peggy's. It was actually Tim's own blood. So, that's not even
00:29:38
like anything that proves anything. And when they processed evidence in Peggy's case, they found unknown fingerprints on
00:29:44
her purse and they found unknown hairs on her, none of which belonged to Tim. So with all of that and with him not
00:29:52
breaking, they have no choice but to cast a wider net. So they start looking at other people but quickly, very
00:30:02
quickly, ruling out everyone else. And so the case also goes cold, very quickly.
00:30:10
Now, I haven't talked a ton yet about what it was like for Peggy's family. And it's I mean, it's like I feel like it's
00:30:16
you hear this all the time to say it was devastating, but there was something like extremely awful about the timing of
00:30:22
all of this. Like Colorado was just supposed to be a stopover for Peggy. And it's so interesting like when you start
00:30:29
looking at a case like this 2D image of someone that gets left behind because when I first started and I hadn't talked
00:30:36
to Tom, I didn't know who Peggy Hetrick was. All I had were a couple of newspaper articles to like learn about
00:30:42
this woman. And I want to kind of give you a taste on like on like what you might see. So like if you could just
00:30:48
read one of the things that I gave you. >> Yeah. This was written in a newspaper
00:30:51
article about Peggy. The police identified her as Peggy Hedrickk, 37, college dropout bar hopper
00:30:59
and aspiring writer who worked at the fashion bar, a nearby clothing store. Her friends privately worried something
00:31:06
horrible would happen to her given her late night impulses, her jealousies, her appetite for adventure. Sometimes she
00:31:14
would head out into the night just to collect details for the book she was writing or to spy on her boyfriend. And
00:31:20
that's like so different from the Peggy that I've come to know through Tom because this woman was amazing.
00:31:27
she growing up. So she in college and after college had this boyfriend named Frank who she was madly in love with.
00:31:34
They were planning to get married and have kids and they were planning this big bright future which was going to be
00:31:40
incredible because she was brilliant. Peggy spoke four different languages. She traveled all over the world. Her and
00:31:47
her family had lived in different countries. She was writing this book that no matter how hard I try, like I
00:31:53
cannot even like wrap my head around it. It was about another country and money and I don't know, she was just an
00:31:58
amazing woman. But things for her took a bit of a left turn. Like life didn't turn out how she expected because Frank
00:32:08
died suddenly and unexpectedly. And then a couple of years later, her mom passed
00:32:12
away. And it's not like anything went bad for her. It's just like she had to like reimagine what her life was going
00:32:18
to look like. And I think she felt kind of a drift for a little while. And so her and her dad and Tom, they moved
00:32:23
around a bit. They ended up on in Hawaii for a little bit and got island fever. And when they moved back, Tom and his
00:32:29
dad went to Florida and Peggy went to Colorado because I think that that place felt familiar. She'd lived there before.
00:32:36
And none of this could happen at a like a good time or an expected time or or anything, but there's something about
00:32:42
the timing of this that feels extra cruel because just two days before Peggy was murdered. She called her dad and she
00:32:50
said, "You know, I had this dream that I I moved back to I moved to Florida to be
00:32:56
with you guys and I was so happy and like I think that's where I'm supposed to be. Can I leave Colorado? Can I move
00:33:02
to Florida and and be with you?" And her dad's like, "Of course." like anywhere we are, that is where your home is.
00:33:09
So that was the plan, but she couldn't just drop her stuff and go. Like that's not real life. She had a lease. She had
00:33:16
a job. And so in two days, her family instead of like planning her move or planning to help her move, they had to
00:33:26
start planning her funeral. >> You feel like you've fallen into an abyss. One day you have sure footing and things
00:33:35
are stable and she's going to be down there and and her friends down there were going to find her a job to help her
00:33:43
find a job and she was going to live with us and be a bright spot in the house and we be a family to
00:33:54
an abyss like going into the ocean. you can't breathe and you just sink a way far away
00:34:02
uh without stopping and so now your life is changed forever. What do you do? You
00:34:10
know um yeah hopes and desires are they go out the window. Now you have to start a
00:34:16
new life and then after that you know my dad started to get sick. Now I'm dealing
00:34:22
with my dad that is is dying because the doctor pulled me in. He said, "Your dad
00:34:28
maybe has six months." And I just looked at I said, "What?" >> So Tom had to take care of his dad. They
00:34:38
also wanted to be close to the people investigating Peggy's case. So they moved back to Colorado, but the only
00:34:44
updates they were getting was like the party line, like this is active and ongoing. But that became harder and
00:34:50
harder to believe as the years went by. Especially when one day out of the blue,
00:34:56
Tom gets this call from someone at the police department and they're like, "Hey, we have a bunch of your sister's
00:35:02
stuff if you want to come like get it." >> Which the only stuff of Peggy's that police would have is evidence,
00:35:10
>> fully evidence. And they were like, "Do you want it?" And he's like, "Well, yeah, anything of hers we'll come get."
00:35:15
So they go to the department. and they go to this like rickety garage across the street and the the woman like pulls
00:35:21
up the door and pulls out two bags like a plastic two plastic bags that have two
00:35:25
paper bags inside and just like hands it to him and he says they go home and they're unwrapping this and they like
00:35:31
pull out one thing and they realize I mean it has blood spatter still on it and they're like I don't think we should
00:35:38
have this >> but nobody else seems to want it so they like package it back up and put it away
00:35:43
just in case anyone ever comes looking for it, but like who? Cuz nobody comes around asking for it. And the only
00:35:52
updates that they're getting are really from the media. So, it doesn't seem like
00:35:56
a lot is happening. And behind the scenes, the only thing that's really happening is more of the same. Jim Brick
00:36:03
is still convinced that Tim Masters is the one who did this. And in all that time, Tim has just been busy growing up.
00:36:12
And when he turned 18, he moved to the into the Navy like his father. And he was excited for this transition because
00:36:19
like this was going to be his fresh start. He had spent all of high school with people thinking he was a murderer.
00:36:24
This is where he was going to go and be unknown. And being unknown sounded amazing to him. He was going to put his
00:36:30
head down and work. And that's exactly what he did day in and day out, month after month, year after year, all the
00:36:37
way up until one day in 1992. I'm told to report to the master at arms first thing in the morning the next day.
00:36:46
Like, well, this is weird. I report to the master at arms master at arms office the next day and uh the the
00:36:55
E4 that that's assigned to to escort me somewhere is like, should I put him in handcuffs? They're like, no, no, that's
00:37:01
not necessary. And I'm going, what the hell? Handcuffs? Uh he takes me over to the Navy
00:37:06
intelligence office in Philadelphia and there I'm met by three detectives from Fort Collins police
00:37:14
uh Hal Dean, Jim Brick and Linda Wheeler and I I proceeded to endure about a day
00:37:23
and a half of interrogations. I didn't recognize them, right? I didn't know Lind Linda Wheeler.
00:37:30
I didn't recognize him until so so Jim Broadick had this habit of wearing like reddish color deodorant and he had pit
00:37:39
stains and when I saw the pit stains I recognized him and so I remember my thought was what the hell I can't
00:37:48
believe five years later I'm still being harassed over this I didn't have anything to do with this
00:37:55
and then but I was still under the mindset of uh especially I'm just an E4 in the Navy. I I really
00:38:04
respect I really treated authority with respect and Lind Linda Holloway, well, she's Linda Willer at the time, Jim
00:38:10
Barrick, they were still authority. I still treated with them with respect and I kept telling myself, they're just
00:38:15
doing their job. After the interview with with uh Linda Wheeler, I had put it all behind me. I thought it was over and
00:38:23
I thought the four cones police knew I didn't do it, so I didn't even think about it.
00:38:29
I want you to know that clip could have been shorter, but I needed you to hear the deodorant thing.
00:38:35
So, when the detectives left that interview, there was three of them and they're they were kind of split. So,
00:38:42
like I don't know what Hal thought, but I know Linda Wheeler left that interview
00:38:45
being like, I think we got it wrong. Like, I do not think that he is our guy. But Jim Brick left more convinced than
00:38:54
ever. He was on the right track and he had to prove it. So he ends up, so that was in 1992. Fast forward to 1996,
00:39:03
Jim ends up reopening the investigation. And within a couple of years, he finally
00:39:10
is like, "By golly, I have it. I have what will take him down." And so one day in August of 1998, Tim is out of the
00:39:19
Navy at this point. He's sitting at home in his house in California, and he gets
00:39:23
this knock on the door, and he goes to answer. Before he even gets to the door, he sees that it's open and there is a
00:39:29
police officer standing right there in front of him. >> And he said, "Are you Tim Masters?" I
00:39:33
said, "Yeah." He said, "You're under arrest." I said, "What? What for?" And he wouldn't tell me. And uh he
00:39:42
handcuffed me and as as he's taking me out the door, Jim Brick meets me there and he goes, "You're under arrest for
00:39:48
the murder of Peggy Hedrickk." And I went, "We what the hell? You got to be kidding me." It was a complete
00:39:56
shock. >> It was a complete shock to everyone because everyone's kind of like looking
00:40:02
around at each other like, "Wait, what did we miss? What happened? What did they find?" Even Tim is asking himself
00:40:09
that. And when he talks to his lawyer in county lockup, the lawyer tells him nothing. They have nothing new. They are
00:40:18
basing all of this on your drawings. And so they're going to go to court with those drawings and a star witness to
00:40:27
talk about those drawings. >> Lieutenant Brick provided me with um approximately 2,200 pages of drawings
00:40:39
and narratives produced by this young man uh before and immediately after the sexual homicide. This is a voluminous
00:40:49
amount of material. In my uh 18 years of doing this kind of work, I have never seen uh such voluminous productions by a
00:40:58
suspect in a sexual homicide. And that tells us that he was preoccupied with sexual violence, with violence, with
00:41:08
sexually sadistic images, with images of domination and degradation of women. And
00:41:14
he was also fascinated by knives. After spending 6 months on the case, I felt I understood the motivations for this
00:41:23
homicide and that I had become convinced uh that Timothy Masters was the individual that had committed uh this
00:41:30
homicide. >> Okay. So, Dr. Reed Malloy after having never spoken with Tim decides that he
00:41:40
killed Peggy and it was a case of mattress, which >> that's if Okay. That's like killing your
00:41:46
mom. Yes. So, yes, he basically was saying like Peggy was a substitute for Tim's mom.
00:41:53
>> Did Tim even hate his mom? >> No, he loved his mom. And we haven't talked about Tim's mom because she
00:41:59
wasn't in the picture because for years, actually, almost to the day before Peggy
00:42:04
died, his mom passed away. And it was like super tragic. She got sick. They thought she had the flu. And so, one day
00:42:12
she leaves their trailer. His dad was going to just take her to the hospital. He was expecting to see her the next day
00:42:17
and she just never came home again. And it was a huge a hugely informative like like a moment for Tim. He loved his mom.
00:42:26
I mean, he missed her so much. And so the theory kind of became that like around the anniversary of his mom's
00:42:34
death, he's like mad at his mom for dying, for not being there. He's out in the field in the middle of the night and
00:42:41
he sees Peggy and he sees Peggy's red hair and it reminds him of his mom's red hair and in that moment he had to kill
00:42:49
her because he was trying to kill his mom. >> I have seen these two pictures next to
00:42:54
each other a lot. Um, his mom does not have red hair. >> British doesn't even have red hair
00:43:01
>> at all. >> At all. But nobody cares. This is what they go to trial with. this and the
00:43:08
drawings and the defense, they only have one witness come to the stand and it's someone to refute all this stuff about
00:43:15
the drawings >> cuz there's nothing else to refute, right? >> It's not like they did a bad job. It's
00:43:20
like all that's all they had there. There was no case there. He should not be like I mean it feels like everyone
00:43:26
sees like where this is going. >> As I was standing as I was standing there, I was thinking I'm going home.
00:43:34
I'll be going home after today. Uh yeah. And then the the jury came out and I kind of knew something was off. They
00:43:46
would none of the jury would make eye contact with me. I'm like, "Oh god." And then the judge asked, "Have you reached
00:43:53
reached a verdict?" And the the four person on the jury says, "We have." And they hand it to the judge and the judge
00:44:00
reads it. Tim Masters, you have been found guilty. And so the media at the time described me as being completely
00:44:08
emotionless as the verdict is read. It it it wasn't a lack of emotion. It was complete shock.
00:44:16
Like, oh my god, I can't believe this. I just got convicted of murder. And that they cuffed me. They took me to
00:44:25
the county jail. And now I know I'm going to prison. So the judge sentenced me to life in
00:44:31
prison with possibility of parole after 40 years. Oh, it was awful. It's like a world ending event. Like
00:44:41
your life is over. >> Over the past year, we have covered more potential and confirmed like wrongful
00:44:48
convictions than I think ever before. And we've been really fortunate to be a part of some amazing things like like
00:44:54
James Rayos being exonerated. We just gave a million dollars to the Indiana to for them to start their own branch of
00:45:00
the Innocence Project because this stuff is happening all Well, no, I appreciate
00:45:06
it. It's because of you guys. It's because of you guys. So, you guys did it as well and I'm so freaking grateful
00:45:11
because this stuff is happening all the freaking time. And >> like it's obvious here, but it's not
00:45:16
always as obvious. It's not always like this glaring. But we have to be paying attention and
00:45:23
we have to be the ones to fix it. And it's not just me and Brit here on the stage. Like you guys are the jury. You
00:45:29
guys are the voters and we have to do something. And I know it can feel so insurmountable. Like the world is
00:45:37
batshit crazy right now. But you have to like it. You have to take one step at a
00:45:42
time. You have to care about one thing. And what is the one thing you can do? Like I Brit and I were nobody before
00:45:49
this. you guys like it takes one step. Do the thing that you care about and take the one step.
00:45:54
>> And in this situation, like, okay, what's the thing? Like, how do you break it down?
00:45:58
>> The the real questions are, okay, it's Tim Master's wrongful conviction and then the question of who really killed
00:46:03
Peggy Hedrickk, but you got to figure out Tim's wrongful conviction first. That's the first step.
00:46:10
And in this like weird twist you don't see a lot, even Peggy's family wasn't convinced. Like they left the trial
00:46:19
being like okay like we get he's convicted. We don't see why though. Like even they were like what what they
00:46:26
presented in court >> is just drawings. >> It didn't make sense. But Tom would say
00:46:31
he told us he's like you know what we thought we had this thought that like well there must be something else. Like
00:46:36
maybe it didn't make it to trial. It like got excluded. All these weird things happened in court. But they
00:46:40
wouldn't have arrested him just based on that. They wouldn't have take like put him on trial for that. Like they
00:46:45
wouldn't have convicted him. there must be something we don't know. We've said it in episodes before like there must be
00:46:49
sometimes there's not there's nothing and it's just freaking wrong. But everyone was out there telling
00:46:54
themselves like there must just be something we don't know. So Tim gets taken away. He is put in the Buenav
00:47:04
Vista Correctional Complex known as Buenny if you know you know. >> And so he is there every day waking up
00:47:11
in a cage for something that he didn't do. He is working out. He's taking classes. He's working a job. All while
00:47:19
his defense team is filing appeal after appeal after appeal. But Tim is getting less and less optimistic. Like you have
00:47:28
to stop believing the system when you're in his position and then when the court
00:47:32
of appeals denies you and then when the Supreme Court of Colorado denies you. >> And like these appeals, we talk about
00:47:37
them all the time when when cases go this way and there are appeals being filed and appeals being filed. This is
00:47:43
not just something that happens. This is expensive. It costs so much money to fight for your life like this,
00:47:50
>> right? Which is why he ends up he ends up like not having lawyers at some point
00:47:54
and having to do a lot of the appeals himself, which makes him even less >> how to have hope at that point. If the
00:48:00
lawyers are getting denied, you're now your own lawyer, >> right? Because he's learning how to be a
00:48:05
lawyer like in prison while he's also trying to learn how to use Microsoft Word to write the appeals. like he
00:48:11
there's no way he thinks this is going to turn out good for himself. And so as his like view of the world is changing
00:48:17
and his life has completely changed, it's not just him. Like other people's outlooks and lives were changing as
00:48:23
well, including Linda Wheeler. So, she was one of the detectives on the case and she saw how he just got railroaded
00:48:32
and she couldn't believe that the system not only allowed this to happen in the first place, but then as she watched all
00:48:39
of his appeals get denied and the system that is supposed to like be these checks
00:48:43
and balances to fix mistakes, >> letting it keep happening, >> she got so discouraged that she quit the
00:48:50
force because she is like, "What am I going to do?" Like I'm just one person. I can't help. I can't do anything. What?
00:48:59
Like what is one person gonna do when the entire system is so broken? So she left. But it is just one person who
00:49:10
changes everything in this case. And it's not someone with a badge, an FBI agent, a scientist, a lawyer. It is a
00:49:19
CPA named Taylor Maris in a cut off. I love this picture. >> I love Taylor Maris. Taylor Maris was a
00:49:26
crime junkie before there was crime junkies. Taylor Maris is at home one day watching a true crime show and it is
00:49:33
about Tim's case and he's watching it. And by the way, they're not like questioning if Tim is innocent. This is
00:49:40
basically like Jim Brick's power hour, his victory lapping like high five to me.
00:49:45
>> Look what we did. And so he's watching this and he's like he's he's like I keep
00:49:49
waiting for the thing like the thing that proves he did it >> because it's got to be more than these
00:49:54
drawings. >> And and even he's like I made those drawings when I was young and like I
00:49:58
didn't kill anyone. So he waits and he waits and he waits and then the show ends
00:50:03
and he's like oh no. Someone should do something about that. I should do something about that. And so
00:50:13
he takes the first step. It's a small step. He writes to Tim in prison and he's like, "What can I do?" Like, "I see
00:50:19
it. How can I help you?" And Tim says, "I don't know, but if anyone can help, you need to get in touch with Linda
00:50:26
Wheeler. She'll know what to do." >> He said, "You know, you don't know me, but do you remember Tim Masters?" I
00:50:33
said, "Sure." He goes, "Well, do you think he's possibly innocent?" And I said, "Yeah, I really do, but what can I
00:50:37
do? You know, I'm done. I'm not even a cop anymore." And he said, "I uh well," he said, "I I talked with him. I or I
00:50:46
just communicated with him by uh a letter." And he said, "I bought all the transcripts of the trial, $900 worth."
00:50:54
But he said, "They don't mean anything to me cuz I don't read legal ease." He said, "Can I send them to you?" And for
00:51:00
the first time, I sat there and read what happened at the trial. And I was infuriated because I knew this case and
00:51:09
I knew the jury had not heard the truth. And at that point I went, "Okay." So I contacted um uh Maria Lou, who was Tim's
00:51:19
attorney, and uh I said, "You want my help?" They said, "Yeah." I said, "Okay." But I know what I had to do is I
00:51:26
had to put back on a badge cuz I knew I wouldn't have any credibility as a civilian,
00:51:33
>> as you can imagine. Wait, wait, wait, wait, I just take a moment to acknowledge that buying $900
00:51:41
worth of court transcripts, not knowing how to even read what's in there, >> some real Ashley Flower [ __ ] folks.
00:51:52
>> I I was going to say like I would have, but I'm sure I've done I've done it. >> I've done it, man. Like someone's got
00:51:57
to. So, as you can imagine, Fort Collins PD isn't like welcoming Linda back with
00:52:05
open arms. She's basically trying to upend a case that they think is over and done with and is a win for them. Do I
00:52:12
list it? I feel like I do. >> A little bit on like this one. Yeah, >> good. >> Perfect.
00:52:17
>> Thanks. You guys got to let me know. >> It's been like all night, guys. >> So, Linda decides she's going to work
00:52:23
for the DA's office. And the DA basically she has this understanding that she part-time is going to work on
00:52:30
Tim's case. And when she thinks about what's going to make a difference in Tim's case, she's thinking about, you
00:52:35
know, this is decades on now, DNA. Like this is going to be the thing. And she remembers meeting a woman at this like
00:52:41
conference a while back named Selma. And Selma and her husband Richard have this
00:52:46
independent lab out in Holland where they do all this testing. >> And independent is super key here.
00:52:52
>> Oh, they trust nobody. >> We don't trust anybody here. >> No. So she's like, "Okay." And I think they
00:52:57
end up getting back like that evidence that Tom had, like, "Thank God somebody saved it." And they're like, "Okay, we
00:53:02
need to do some testing." The problem is, and like part of what what I think is broken in our system is they can't go
00:53:10
and just test stuff >> because the prosecution owns the evidence against you. >> So you have to like ask permission from
00:53:17
the people that put you away if you can test the evidence. Now, the saving grace
00:53:23
here is that by this point, Fort Collins PD has recused themselves. Lammer County, who is like the district
00:53:28
attorney's office, has recused themselves. So, it's going to a DA that is neutral, hopefully, who they're
00:53:34
hoping doesn't have a dog in the fight other than wanting the truth to come out. So, Selma and Richard come to the
00:53:40
US and they do this like 4hour presentation for the new the DA here, Don Quick. And after 4 hours, Don's
00:53:48
like, "Yes, love you. Love your lab. Love what you're doing. Go Justice. Let's send this [ __ ] off and see what's
00:53:55
up." Well, isn't it convenient that right when they get permission to do this, a bunch of
00:54:04
evidence gets destroyed? Mhm. So, luckily they have a couple of things left that they do send off, but this
00:54:16
makes them more convinced than ever that Lamur County, that Fort Collins PD is hiding something.
00:54:23
>> And the more they dig, the more stuff they find. And they end up filing this appeal for a new trial based on the fact
00:54:30
that they believe Tim's rights were violated. And it's really based on like four points. So, one is they say that
00:54:37
crucial evidence was withheld from his defense team early on. His defense team never knew about the crucial set of
00:54:45
prints. They didn't know there was another set of prints in that field, the dress shoes, the Tom Macccan dress
00:54:50
shoes. >> They didn't know about that. >> They also didn't know about the FBI profile, the original one that was done
00:54:58
that said, "No, this is not it." Like, that got hidden and destroyed. So, they didn't have that to work with when they
00:55:03
went to to trial. The second thing, we've got that whole like DNA destruction thing that just happened.
00:55:09
The third, even before that, there was some skin cell DNA that had been mishandled by the lab. So, we can't even
00:55:15
use that. And then fourth, they say that the team, the investigative team did not look into viable suspects. Now,
00:55:25
they did not pick Tim Masters out of like a void of suspects because there was nothing else. there were actually
00:55:30
much more viable suspects which we're going to get into, but they never looked into them properly and they never told
00:55:36
the defense team about them. So, those are the main four points, but then they also found all this other really shady
00:55:44
stuff. Like, do you remember how the first like month after this happened, every day the newspaper showed up at Tim
00:55:52
Master's house and the front page was about them honing in on their one guy. So every day for a month, the Fort
00:55:58
Collins PD made a fake front page of a newspaper and delivered it to his front door, hoping that it would make him
00:56:06
crack. >> Literal fake news. >> And they were taking his mom's obituary and they were putting it in envelopes
00:56:15
and like leaving it around for him to find just to like psychologically torture this kid. And so even that
00:56:23
wasn't doing anything. So, come the one-year anniversary of Peggy's murder, they plan this like weird
00:56:31
operation, and like I I don't even want to call it an operation. It's like reminds me of something me like or my
00:56:36
husband and his friends would do like on video games at 11:00 at night where basically like the big scheme.
00:56:43
>> Yeah. The little paper trail of this that's left is basically like Colorado authorities contacted the FBI and
00:56:49
they're like, "Listen, we can't like we need to prove that this guy is dangerous. He hasn't done anything to
00:56:54
help us. So, we should like push him to do something. >> We should make him do something violent
00:56:58
cuz he is violent. >> So, we're going to keep like putting him in in scenarios to like push him to do
00:57:03
something violent. But, if he goes too far, we all have to pretend it wasn't us.
00:57:09
>> Because if he's as violent as we think he is, I mean, he's capable of killing
00:57:12
somebody. And if he kills someone again, we didn't make him do it. >> And the FBI's like, "Got it."
00:57:18
And they're also like, "But also, if he does nothing and we look like idiots, we
00:57:23
can't say anything." And the FB is like, "Got it." And of course, he did nothing. Like, and
00:57:28
so that's why nobody found out about this, but this is the stuff that they were finding out they were doing in the
00:57:32
background. So, they file all of this, they send off the DNA, and even now Tim is not optimistic.
00:57:44
Why would he be? There's very little that has gone right. and even when it's like glaring and in your face, he
00:57:51
doesn't think it's going to go his way. >> So, I'm in the unit. All of a sudden,
00:57:56
the whole facility locks down for some reason. And they lock down a lot. You just assume a fight broke out somewhere.
00:58:02
Somebody got hurt, whatever. So, I'm sitting in my cell and my case manager comes up while everybody's locked down
00:58:10
and he says, "Tim, your lawyer just called. She wants you to call her back." I'm like, "Okay, I'm locked down. What
00:58:18
am I going to do?" He says, "I'll try and get you out here in a minute." He So, he goes down. Then he comes back a
00:58:24
little bit later. They take me out or no, he goes back down to talk about it. And then the news comes on and there's
00:58:30
an announcement from the special prosecutors in my case. And they announce that uh they're going to
00:58:36
dismiss the case against me and I'll be released on a PR bond. And I'm like, and
00:58:42
everybody in the unit was cheering. Yeah, you're going home, masters. You're out of here. I'm like, wait a minute,
00:58:47
wait a minute. I'm going to talk to the lawyer later today. We'll find out for sure. Cuz at this point, I'm so
00:58:51
pessimistic. I don't even believe what I just saw on the news. And then I go to I go down to the case
00:58:57
manager's office. He calls my lawyer, Maria Lou, and she says, "You're out of there. They're letting you go."
00:59:07
So, ironically, I made it. I wasn't in prison for quite 10 years, but I was in there almost 10 years. And uh oh man, it
00:59:17
was it was weird. They they had uh my lawyers bought me a suit out of their own pocket and uh I got to wear a suit.
00:59:27
They talked the sheriff into letting letting them release me from the courthouse rather than coming back to
00:59:33
the county jail to be processed. So I went in there and they released me out of the courthouse. That never
00:59:38
happens in Colorado. if you get released, you got to go back to the county jail and wait around while they
00:59:43
process you. And they they let them release me from the courthouse. My entire family was there. My family
00:59:51
was so big that they they couldn't fit in the courtroom and the courtroom was packed anyway with people. So, they had
00:59:57
my family go back in the judges chambers. And when the hearing started to release me, all my family started
01:00:03
walking out and there was my sister. I almost broke out in tears when I saw my sister.
01:00:12
It was a good day. Yay. Justice. That day was January 22nd, 2008. So, they released him. They
01:00:25
dropped the charges, but crime junkies will know that doesn't mean he is considered an innocent man. They have
01:00:32
the option to refile if they want to, but DNA tests come back and they can't tie anything forensically. They do have
01:00:41
like partial profiles, they can't tie any of it to Tim. So eventually he ends up being exonerated, fully exonerated in
01:00:50
2011. And he ended up and he ended up suing some of the people who put him there. So
01:00:57
hell yeah. >> Much bigger cheer for that. Well, hang on. >> So, >> it's like goodish news.
01:01:07
>> So, he sues Jim Brick, uh Jolene Blair, and Terry Gilmore. Those are the two DAs
01:01:13
who, by the way, by the time he is out and filing these suits, are now judges. >> Yes,
01:01:21
>> he ends up suing them. He does end up, and there were other people like he sued
01:01:25
the city and there were a whole list of people. He ends up winning a $10 million
01:01:28
judgment, which was great for Tim. Jim Brick, I know you guys were worried about him. I could tell. He got put on
01:01:37
paid leave and then resigned. And though multiple grand juries indicted him, nothing ever stuck.
01:01:46
>> Yeah. Charges were dismissed. Jolene and Terry, this was at least happening kind of around election year.
01:01:53
They didn't win re-election for judges or what? Judge ship, whatever it's called. Um, but that's it.
01:02:00
>> No slap on the wrist. >> No slap on the wrist. No punishment whatsoever. Nobody lost their license.
01:02:06
Nobody faced any charges for what was done to Tim. And even more interesting to me, nobody was looking to say, "Okay,
01:02:15
this happened to Tim Masters." When it was so obvious it was based on drawings >> out there. No one was like, "I wonder if
01:02:22
this happened to someone else." >> To someone else. Nobody was asking those questions. Now, we reached out to Jim
01:02:30
and Jolene and Terry. Obviously, no one wanted to talk to us. And this is just a
01:02:36
fun fact that means nothing, but I had to share it. When we I like, you know, you got to like find contact info for
01:02:41
these people. So, we had look them up on Facebook. Guess who's dating and went to
01:02:44
Italy? Again, I like I don't know why >> nothing to do with anything, but it means nothing.
01:02:53
>> We know it. We want to share it with you. >> So, after Tim settles his lawsuit,
01:03:02
he asks the court that all the records be sealed because just like he did when he went to the Navy, he just wants to
01:03:08
start over and he's like, I don't want this coming up again. I like I just want I just want to live my life and I don't
01:03:15
want this to be the thing that defines me. which made it real hard for us to get the records.
01:03:20
>> Bad news for us. >> But we did find a source who got us a good number of the records. And in those
01:03:28
records, there were some really viable suspects that were not him. Starting with the on-again, off-again boyfriend,
01:03:38
Matt Zner, who in this picture is 37, but at the time of Peggy's murder, he was 29. Now, you know, everyone's got
01:03:50
their favorite person of interest. And for Linda Wheeler, Matt is hers. Now, Ray Martinez says everyone was kind
01:03:58
of quick to write Matt off in the early days. And I think it was probably because he seemed really devastated,
01:04:05
genuinely upset. His reaction seemed like what they should have been. And like they kind of were like, "Oh, he had
01:04:11
an alibi. Remember maybe Shawn from the bar? She was with him all night." >> And she left the bar with him.
01:04:16
>> Well, kind of. >> She did leave the bar with him. And she her story has always been that she was
01:04:23
at his house till like 3:00, give or take. Well, when you look at the time of death for Peggy, like on face value,
01:04:30
they say it was between 1:00 a.m. and 3:00 a.m., which that would give him an alibi. Now, if you look at the records,
01:04:38
you'll see there's this like grid where they basically use I don't know like the
01:04:42
averages to get to one to three, but really the full window is one to five, which leaves two hours that Matt does
01:04:49
not have an alibi, which I think is really interesting >> because there's something I haven't told
01:04:56
you yet. I have a little secret up my sleeve. In Peggy's purse, the one found over her
01:05:03
shoulder when she's down in that field, there was a note written to Matt. Go ahead,
01:05:12
Matt. I need your help. Sharon has got my keys and isn't home. No answer. If I have to knock on your door at 2, please
01:05:20
don't be a grump. I don't want to spend the night sleeping in the hall. Peg. But
01:05:26
this is in her purse. So the question is like why does she still have this note to Matt?
01:05:31
>> And did Matt see it? >> Right. >> Can't tell you because it seems like police never even asked him.
01:05:37
>> Now there seems to be like the best theory that people can come up with. So this is where Matt lived, he lived even
01:05:43
closer to the prime minister than Peggy did. And so you know the question is like, okay, did she when she's locked
01:05:50
out, it seems like that's when she wrote the note. Did she go leave it on his door? And then when she was able to get
01:05:55
into her place, did she go get the note and she's like, I don't need a place to stay anymore. Or did she like not even
01:06:02
make it to his place, but realize she could get back into hers and then it's just kind of like a moo point and it's
01:06:06
like living in her purse. No big deal. >> But they never ask Matt about this note.
01:06:10
>> No, they never ask him if he or at least based on the records I have, they never
01:06:13
ask him if he saw this, which to me would be kind of critical because it's like seeing her or this note is like
01:06:18
never part of his story that we have. So, we've got Matt's story, right? Like he sees her, they talked for a little
01:06:26
bit, he's with maybe Shawn, they end up leaving together. Peggy leaves alone at 1:15. He does tell police. There is this
01:06:32
like one thing that Peggy mentioned that might be significant. He said, "Oh, well, Peggy mentioned, by the way, that
01:06:38
she had a new boyfriend, which I could be like I could see in a couple ways. Like, yes, she's actually seeing someone
01:06:43
or she sees her on again off-again guy with another girl and is like, "Oh, you're with someone. I'm also newly in
01:06:51
love. He's way hotter than you. Super tall, super sweet. Don't even worry about me. And like you have fun with
01:07:00
like maybe Sean, >> right? And I think it could be maybe Sean. I think it could be like TBD. I
01:07:06
think there might have been someone she was saying, but it's important to know that Matt was the guy that she always
01:07:10
went back to. Like this this saga between them had been going on for a very long time. And I know that even
01:07:17
earlier in that very week that she was killed, like the two had dinner together. So like this is very much off,
01:07:22
but like only in the way that they were off. And also police never seemed to even ask him about this dinner or what
01:07:28
happened or were they talking about getting back together or anything? >> Did they check his alibi with maybe
01:07:34
Shawn? >> So they did. They checked that he was with maybe Shawn. We also checked and we also found out
01:07:41
maybe Shawn is actually Dawn, >> which is like kind of close. >> It was It's close, Matt.
01:07:47
>> So close. >> So, we found Dawn all these years later, and her story is really interesting, and
01:07:54
you know, and we were able to even find her statement from back in the day, too.
01:07:57
And and it it's all corroborated by what she was saying back in the day. And but
01:08:01
it adds a little bit more color. So, she said that she ran into Matt at another bar earlier in the night and he had like
01:08:07
sold her a car. He's a car salesman. And so, he had sold her a car. This I mean,
01:08:12
this guy, that's what I'm saying. Like, he I think he he was a smooth talker with police. So, he sold her a car, sees
01:08:19
her, like recognizes her like, "Hey, if when you get in with your friend, you should come over to the prime minister."
01:08:24
And she goes there, he's already there. He is at the bar talking to who she now realizes was Peggy, but she didn't know
01:08:30
at the time. And she says she waits for like five minutes just to see if he's going to like wrap it up or like what's
01:08:35
going on. And finally she walks over and as she approaches Peggy like turns and talks to some guy next to her. So she
01:08:40
kind of thought Peggy was with that guy. Matt doesn't even introduce her. He's just like go get a table. So she goes
01:08:45
and gets a table for four thinking this woman and this guy are going to join them. They never do. But she says like
01:08:50
the whole time Matt's just kind of like eyeballing. He she doesn't know the history there but he seems to like kind
01:08:55
of being like paying attention to Peggy, >> but like nothing weird, whatever. And
01:09:00
she says that he ends up like like the whole story goes the same. They end up staying till last call. Peggy leaves on
01:09:05
her own. She does go back to his place. She stays till like 3 give or take. And >> which is great if Peggy is killed
01:09:14
>> after like a three window. >> It doesn't even like wrap for any weird reason. She's like, you know, he's like
01:09:20
hinting he has to work in the morning. Like I can take the hint. He also says that he like hates kids. Not like kind
01:09:25
of, but like hates kids. And she's like, well, I have one of those. So, like I don't think this is going anywhere. So,
01:09:33
she ends up leaving. But when we talked to her today, she said there was something about his
01:09:38
apartment that she always found so weird that like still stands out to her to this day. And she's like his apartment
01:09:47
was pristine. Like not just clean, but like there there wasn't like a fork to be found in
01:09:54
the sink. There weren't clothes on the floor. There weren't like things in the bathroom. It was like model apartments.
01:10:00
>> Yeah. She's like >> unlived in clean. >> Yeah. It doesn't seem like someone lived
01:10:04
there. And she's like, I always thought that was weird. But then a few years later, someone had come back around
01:10:12
asking some questions and they were asking specific questions about Matt's apartment. And they started showing her
01:10:20
pictures of his apartment. And she said she has this moment where it's like full
01:10:26
body chills because she's like that's not the apartment I that I don't she's like yes it's the
01:10:35
same layout but she's like I don't remember any of that stuff >> like someone lives in this place and
01:10:42
that's not how Matt's apartment. And the specific questions they were asking her
01:10:47
about were they were like, "Did you see the broken table?" And did you see those
01:10:53
like spots on the floor and under the sink? >> Which when I look at these pictures, I'm
01:10:58
like, "What broken table?" But there's the leg is broken on the coffee table, >> right? The first time I heard it, I was
01:11:05
imagining this like shattered table. >> It this is like could it's like a It's like a boy fixed it and who a
01:11:11
29-year-old boy who like lives in an apartment and he was like, I'll just this will do. And so, and this they they
01:11:16
never like, as far as I can tell, get this tested. I don't know what this is that they're talking about. But she
01:11:21
obviously says, "No, I didn't remember this." But she's like, "I don't remember the apartment looking like this at all."
01:11:27
>> Of course. But like is that like the implication is like it happened after she left then?
01:11:33
>> Yes. So that I think that's what they were trying to like get to was did the table break and these spots come after
01:11:41
you were there? Was there some kind of altercation that happened in the apartment? And there's this other like
01:11:48
really interesting thing that I haven't gotten to yet because like you have to wonder with with you know
01:11:56
maybe Sean we know is Dawn. Is it is it that this isn't the same apartment? Is it that it was is it memory?
01:12:04
>> Yeah. Like I mean it was super late in the night. They've been drinking. >> Well and we know that like human memory
01:12:09
is super super flawed. Like there's a ton of statistics on it and I won't bore you with all of them, but one
01:12:16
specifically from the Innocence Project is like something like 70% of wrongful convictions are because of witness
01:12:23
misidentification, misremembering. And like like you said, it's late at night. We know they've been drinking. Um
01:12:30
there's there's a million things that could go like in a perfect circumstance, >> human memory is flawed. And this is not
01:12:37
a perfect circumstance. I don't want to discount anything. It takes me more to get on the husband boyfriend did a
01:12:43
train. Hang on. >> Okay. So the when they went and talked to Matt like early on like first like
01:12:50
day or two they searched his car and in his car they said they found sping wet clothes and shoes. Not like damp. They
01:12:59
literally say in the reports that it was like someone swam in these things. And they also find sping wet clothes in his
01:13:05
apartment. So they collect all of it. But then Matt a couple of days later is like hey would love my stuff back and
01:13:12
they say sure no problem sorry we didn't like dry and fold for you and they just
01:13:17
give it back to him without ever testing it because they have by that point Tim masters square in their sights
01:13:24
>> and he's drawing >> god forbid and the other thing that I think is so interesting that was at Matt's apartment
01:13:32
is outside they found a bunch of footprints that match the shoes Peggy was wearing along with like 11 cigarette
01:13:43
butts of the brand that she was known to smoke. >> Which when I think of the shoe prints,
01:13:47
I'm like, well, she has this note, right? Like she maybe dropped it off and then came back for it. She started
01:13:52
there. She didn't drop it off. She could have been there. >> But the cigarette butts, like
01:13:56
>> that's a lot of them. >> So they people started to wonder like was she there waiting? And when they
01:14:01
were talking to Peggy's friends, they said, you know, she could be jealous. And like, we could see a world where she
01:14:08
saw Matt with this other woman and she thought like, okay, I'm going to go to his apartment and see if they go home
01:14:15
together or I'm going to go and see if she stays the whole night or leaves or whatever.
01:14:21
But then you have to wonder, so, okay, so if that's what happened, then was there some kind of altercation in his
01:14:29
apartment? And that doesn't fit with anything we have or know at the scene. >> The theory is that the attack happens
01:14:36
next to the field. She gets drugged out of the field. The blood is in like in the field. Next to the field,
01:14:42
>> right? And nothing. And again, we've got this like weird stuff at his apartment,
01:14:45
but like why would he go then take her to the field or like if he was giving her a ride home, why stop at the field?
01:14:50
Like there's so much about this that like doesn't >> the attack can't happen in both places,
01:14:54
but they're also saying maybe it did, >> right? And there is no part of Matt's story ever that has him and Peggy even
01:15:04
seeing each other at his place. >> Well, and my question kind of goes back to it goes to like does Matt have a
01:15:09
history of violence, violence against women, violence against Peggy? They've been in relationships before.
01:15:15
>> No. So, he has like he doesn't have anything violent on his record. He has like some DUIs, but like nobody
01:15:20
described their relationship as volatile. Nobody has come forward and said that he has done anything to anyone
01:15:25
since. So like again I go back to like what would the motive be like if he did something it had to have been like a
01:15:30
heat of the moment thing but then that would happen I think at his apartment not while she's like walking home or
01:15:36
>> right >> it doesn't it does not add up completely. >> I think the biggest question is
01:15:42
does he have the Tom Macccan dress shoes? >> He does not. And he's not a guy who
01:15:49
would like wear Toman dress shoes. And I I looked up and down. I tried so hard, of course Matt didn't want to talk to us
01:15:54
either, to find out even just what size shoe he wore. There was some pictures in
01:15:59
the file of these boots. I think it was because of like how they were placed by his couch that stood out to detectives,
01:16:04
but like I get the sense that like these these were the nice shoes. >> These were his fancy shoes. So these
01:16:10
boots too were also the one that Dawn said he was wearing that night and they don't match any of the prints out in the
01:16:16
field. So maybe for all of those reasons they end up not looking at Matt even though
01:16:25
he failed a polygraph just like Tim and he failed the question do you know who killed Peggy Hetrick
01:16:34
>> kind of the big question you know >> but the poligrapher said he's quote probably telling the truth
01:16:42
so that's Matt Zolar the next person we found is Donnie Long. Now, shortly after Peggy is murdered,
01:16:53
there is another woman who is murdered named Linda Hold. She's 39 years old. She is stabbed nine times. She's bound,
01:17:04
gagged, and tied to a tree. She, like Peggy, is not sexually assaulted, but there also is no mutilation in her case.
01:17:13
And then shortly after that, 30-year-old Mona Hughes is murdered. And we tried up
01:17:19
and down and tried contacting family. We could not find a picture of her. But she
01:17:24
was stabbed 14 times. Again, no sexual assault, no mutilation. And pretty quickly, police had decided
01:17:31
that none of this was connected to Peggy because they thought the MMO was just too different. And eventually, they end
01:17:38
up connecting Linda and Mona's case to Donnie Long. And Donnie Long ends up confessing to murdering Mona and Linda.
01:17:47
And they at least do the bare minimum and they like circle back and they say like, "Hey, what about Peggy?" And he
01:17:53
says, "Nope." And they say, "Okay, thank you." >> Which this is not the first time we've
01:18:01
seen this happen. And it never fails to just be like, "What?" You guys, I'm literally working on a case right now in
01:18:08
Washington that I'm not saying it was Israel Keys, but like >> we're not saying it wasn't Israel
01:18:16
>> a lot of things. And I had a call with the FBI and I was like here are the 20
01:18:19
things I think are like I don't know. Like I just want to know if you've looked at it,
01:18:24
>> but don't worry. They said it can't be him. He told us it was only four victims
01:18:29
and this would have been five. >> That's literally what they said. They're like Keys, not a good dude. We're taking
01:18:36
his word for it. >> Yeah. So, like I don't know. It It just seems strange to me. But they say not
01:18:43
Donnie Long. So, we we don't look at him either. Which brings me to my favorite part.
01:18:51
So, Ray Martinez, his >> I'm going in and out. I'm Are you me? Right when this is getting good. You
01:18:58
guys don't do this part. Don't do this to me. >> Okay. >> Ray Martinez. This is his favorite
01:19:03
person of interest and this is someone I have become deeply obsessed with. Whether he had something to do with
01:19:10
Peggy Hedrickk or not, there is something here and I will not stop until I find it.
01:19:19
So, I'm talking about local opthalmologist Dr. Richard Hammond, who many people refer to as handsome, and I don't see
01:19:29
it. So, >> we also know a lot about him at this point. So, >> Dr. Hammond, he was uh like looked at like when they
01:19:42
did the neighborhood canvas like early on like they talked to him, him and his wife, he didn't see anything. He's not
01:19:47
raising any red flags in 1987. He's an opthalmologist, a family man, except for the one red flag that supposedly was
01:19:56
raised about Tim because he too had a direct view of where Peggy was found from his primary bedroom window. And by
01:20:07
the way, he was like didn't sleep at night, >> but he wasn't doodling. >> So So no red flags.
01:20:15
>> So no one worry about him. Yeah. So they they they came across him during the
01:20:18
initial canvas. Him and his wife are like, "Nope, didn't see anything. Didn't hear anything. Thank you very much.
01:20:23
Goodbye." Well, fast forward to March of 1995 and some really big red flags start
01:20:31
getting raised because there is this woman who Colorado State University had like a job board, which is like digital
01:20:40
now, but back then was like straight up note cards on an actual board. and she picks up this note card for housesitting
01:20:45
and it's for Dr. Richard Hammond and his family. They're going out of town. She and a friend are going to stay at their
01:20:50
place and housesit. She doesn't know the guy. They show her around. They give her
01:20:54
the basement like free reign. Here's where you sleep. There's a bathroom down here, but make yourself at home
01:20:59
throughout the whole house. So, she's in the basement and she notices that she keeps like hearing this weird
01:21:09
sound in the bathroom and she like doesn't know quite what it is. And I think that if she were by
01:21:18
herself or if I were by myself, I'd probably be like, "Weird. I'm gonna use the bathroom upstairs." But she had her
01:21:26
friend with her, >> her crime junkie BFF. and have Ashley had me with her. >> And so they're like, "We're going to get
01:21:32
to the bottom of this." Like, "What else do we have going on?" >> Full Nancy Drew.
01:21:35
>> So they're like looking around, looking around. They realize it's like every time they turn on the light, they hear
01:21:39
this weird noise. And so they get a flashlight and they realize that there are cameras
01:21:46
in the vents, >> plural, >> plural, >> cameras. And they realize that like these cameras are set up from an
01:21:54
adjoining room. And so they go to the room next door and they realize that like the knob is locked. So again, you
01:22:03
got your crime junkie BFF. >> Never picked a lock in my life, but I'm about to learn.
01:22:06
>> I'm about to find out right now. So I'm sure they're getting like again like what am I I'm going to get like all like
01:22:11
the paper clips or like the whatever. I'm going to figure this out. So they go and like God is on their side because
01:22:17
they go to like start figuring out how to pick a lock for the first time and they realize that the door hadn't
01:22:21
completely latched. So all they have to do is like push it open and it pushes open and there is this video equipment.
01:22:31
There are these filing cabinets with quote an uncountable amount of videotapes. So she well not woo you don't know
01:22:41
what's on these. Hang on. She calls a friend because she's like okay like I'm let me try to like explain
01:22:50
this for a minute. This is there's this can't be this. So they she calls this friend she has who used to work at the
01:22:56
police department who knows a lot about it like video stuff. This is like very 1995.
01:23:00
And he comes over and he looks at the room and he's like, "Nope, >> bad news. >> We got to call the real cops."
01:23:10
So the real cops come and they find hundreds of tapes and they find this like index that he has of like ages,
01:23:19
names, dates. Is it a shower shot? Is it a toilet shot? These toilet shots are not just like someone going they they
01:23:25
are close up on genitals which brings us to Peggy Hetrick because she had genital
01:23:33
mutilation >> and she had a a nipple which they said was surgically removed with surgical
01:23:38
precision and then you have this opthalmologist starting to get a little weird and
01:23:43
luckily this is all happening in the same area. And so the person who gets called to this new scene is Ray
01:23:49
Martinez. And when Ry gets this call to show up at this like house where this is
01:23:55
going on, he's like, "Hammond? Why do I know that name, Hammond?" And it hits him that he had talked to him in the
01:24:04
initial canvas for Peggy Hedrickk's case. >> So I'm tying this together. Weird cameras.
01:24:13
uh crime scene near the crime scene back then and he's a doctor and guess what we
01:24:20
find in his closet. We start looking through his closet and we find Tom McCann's shoes. Boy, does that ever ring
01:24:28
a bell. And so we called up Brick, this other detective did, and he refused to come out. He wouldn't
01:24:38
come to the scene. He said, "No, we already know who done it." But that's a moot point. Basically, when Jim Rodri
01:24:46
said that and the officer told me about it, I I was angry about it because me as
01:24:53
a past detective, you don't overlook anything. You know, you you flip over every stone that you can. You might be
01:24:59
wrong where your lead was. Maybe this is something different. Why not look at what's it going to hurt? Right? But he
01:25:07
refused to come out. So I told the officer there, I said, "Let's just seize everything. Let's seize the tapes, seize
01:25:13
the camera, seize those Tom Macccan shoes, you know." So we did. We collect our own evidence and turned everything
01:25:21
in and it never went anywhere. And I think a day or two days later, he's found dead in a hotel in in Denver. They
01:25:30
said, from what I've learned that when they found him, his whole body was shaved. He shaved all the hair off his
01:25:37
head and his body, complete body, and disposed of it. So that to me is weird other than he didn't want any trace
01:25:45
evidence linked to him. Why would you do that if you didn't think you might have
01:25:50
left something behind at a scene? >> Don't naked mole rat. >> What? >> I know. And
01:26:06
if you ask the people who are like pro- Hammonds, >> who is pro- Hammonds, >> there are pro- Hammond people, I'm going
01:26:14
to get there, they will say, and this this really came from his wife. She said that he was very into bodybuilding. And
01:26:21
like I I've heard this before, try as I might, I don't know if he was actually like doing competitions.
01:26:27
Like, so my question is like is he always like N smooth or is this like something that he did today? Because I
01:26:34
think about Peggy's case, we know at one time >> there are unknown hairs found at the
01:26:39
scene. >> Exactly. So, is that why he's doing that? Is he afraid he's tied to something else? I don't know. His wife
01:26:50
says, "No, no, no. It was just the bodybuilding. There's no way he could have done anything violent. That's not
01:26:57
like him." which like I have all the questions about because like how does she even know what he's capable of? Did
01:27:04
he did she know about the tapes and the video cameras and everything? >> She said she didn't know about any of
01:27:10
that. So I feel the same way. I'm like you can't you can't have it both ways. You can't say that you were totally
01:27:17
shocked by this. You had no idea. And >> you definitely can't do that. >> But I actually know him and that for
01:27:21
sure know like it doesn't work that way. So I don't know. She did end up getting
01:27:26
an immunity deal >> from what is my question. >> Probably because like all the tapes and
01:27:31
stuff was like in her house too. I don't know. >> But she got an immunity deal and she
01:27:37
told the police like she didn't know about this but they had this like very vanilla life. She said, you know, she
01:27:43
would make dinner from scratch and he would come home at 7 and they would have dinner with their two teenage kids and
01:27:47
then their kids would do their homework and they like didn't even watch TV because they didn't really like it. Just
01:27:52
like a sweet family life. wasn't showing what Hammond was into. >> No. So, he is arrested.
01:28:01
He is released on a $5,000 bond. And that's when he went to that hotel and he took his own life. He had like a cyanide
01:28:09
cyanide drip to his leg. And it's so interesting the way that he and the people who support him like spun this
01:28:19
thing after his death. And it kind of starts with the note he left behind that Britt, I'm going to have you read.
01:28:28
The media frenzy surrounding my arrest has caused immeasurable harm to many people, especially my family. I have
01:28:36
lost everything, but I cannot survive the loss of my wife and son and daughter. My death should satisfy the
01:28:43
media's thirst for blood so that hopefully everyone else who has been affected by the case can truly begin the
01:28:50
process of healing. I love redacted family names very much. I am truly sorry for having hurt you so deeply, Rich
01:29:01
Hammond. >> So he really makes it about the media like >> what I didn't wasn't so bad.
01:29:08
>> But the the way that the media they're bloodthirsty really bad. >> And the way that the community like
01:29:14
latches on to this is wild. There is basically this like brawl that takes place within the newspaper where people
01:29:22
are writing like these letters to the editor and these op-eds where they are defending this man and saying that like
01:29:30
the media and reporting on what he did is the problem. And it's almost unbelievable. But I want to like share a
01:29:39
little bit with you. I gave you some of this. There was this woman named Pam Hurley Nagel.
01:29:44
>> I literally could not read all of it. >> It's horrific. >> Yeah. >> But you you need to understand like the
01:29:49
tone at the time because >> so this is published like in the news. >> It saddens me that the Colorado and
01:29:57
other media flits chose to feast on Richard Hammond's tragic plight. I don't condone his alleged behavior
01:30:07
which was limited to the privacy of his own home. >> What? Like filming other people without
01:30:17
their consent in his home? >> Minors, by the way. There's like a lot of minors like get [ __ ]
01:30:26
Bam. But the media exploited this man and his family, their vulnerability. Okay, Rich Hammond was a man and doctor
01:30:41
who took time to replenish his society with quality medical care. What he allegedly did was wrong, but in the
01:30:49
scheme of things, the hurt was exaggerated after the media got its predatory clause in it.
01:30:57
So this is like the tone in Colorado at the time and as they are finding even more. Richard Hammond had a secret
01:31:09
storage locker no one knew about with Rubbermaid tub after rubber made tub of more videotapes, pornographic material,
01:31:18
sex toys. He had a secret bank account nobody knew about. a phone that like was registered to like his practicing
01:31:27
partner who's like not my phone. >> Tell them about the belt. >> Oh my god. And then they then they found
01:31:31
this like waist contraption that like hooks onto a belt that has all these tiny sharp instruments that would just
01:31:39
like >> little knives, >> but they never thin knives. >> They never tested that. They never did
01:31:46
anything with that. And all this time, like it's important to know that when the media is talking about him there, no
01:31:54
one is talking about him in connection to Peggy. >> It's just these tapes. >> It's just about these tapes. And a lot
01:32:01
of people, Ray Martinez, they're like, "Okay, is it possible Peggy was on one of these tapes? Is it possible he was
01:32:07
connected to Peggy in some way?" We don't know because something weird happened a couple of months after he
01:32:17
died. There was a motion that got granted very quickly and all of the evidence in the
01:32:25
case of Richard Hammond, all the videotapes, everything they collected, those Toman shoes, it all gets burned
01:32:33
against every protocol, every procedure, against everything that they were supposed to do with this evidence. It
01:32:41
was deemed burnable. And Jim Brick, some people thought it was weird, but Jim Brick shows up to
01:32:49
talk to the Denver Post and he says, quote, "Should we revictimize all these women
01:32:56
by telling them they're victims?" So really, it's an effort to protect them, to preserve these victims rights, which,
01:33:06
okay, hear me out. There is a world in which I can imagine finding out you are on one of these horrific tapes and never
01:33:16
wanting it to exist. >> For sure. >> Get rid of it. I don't want to even know that it's locked in an evidence locker
01:33:22
somewhere. It needs to be destroyed. But I think what we need to focus on here is
01:33:28
the phrasing in that statement from Jim Broadick. >> Yeah. Because by destroying everything,
01:33:34
they took away their like ability to sue his estate, to do anything legal with it.
01:33:39
>> Well, and on top of that, by telling them they're victims. >> Yeah. So many people didn't even know.
01:33:47
They did talk to some people and confirm that they were on the tapes, but the real kicker is they didn't actually look
01:33:55
at most if not all of them before they could even assess what was on them. They destroyed them,
01:34:04
which again is against all policy and procedure. And I know somewhere out there there are
01:34:12
noble people who do noble things for noble reasons. would love to meet more of them.
01:34:17
>> They are probably not within this department that railroaded a 15-year-old for drawing things. I
01:34:25
always go a layer deeper. have a feeling it has to do with the fact that there was going to be a special prosecutor on
01:34:34
Hammond's case if they were going to take this tape thing to trial because Laramar County had to recuse themselves
01:34:41
because members of the DA's office quote had been guests of Hammond's home and may have been videotaped.
01:34:50
>> I think we just found out why all the tapes were destroyed. So, they were so ready to just like write this off, make
01:34:59
this go away. I mean, they were like accepting these like bogus excuses of why he couldn't be connected to Peggy.
01:35:06
Like, someone was like, "Oh, well, he didn't even like use scalpels. He couldn't have like cut off her nipple.
01:35:11
He didn't use scalpels." And his the guy he like owned the practice with was like, "Yeah, we do surgery with
01:35:17
scalpels. What the [ __ ] are you talking about?" They have an affidavit from a woman who's like, "He used a scalpel on
01:35:23
my very eyes." Like, that's not true. But they just wanted this to go away. And just to show you like how far under
01:35:30
the rug this was pushed at the time, which by the way, it is not lost on me that this happens in 1995 and Jim Rodri
01:35:37
reopens his case on Tim in 1996. But it is so far pushed under the rug that Peggy's family, Tom, had never
01:35:47
heard about Richard Hammond. I remember a few years ago they talked about a doctor. I was coming out of the
01:35:56
village in with my friend and he looked at the news box, Rocky Mountain News, and had p Peggy's picture on the front
01:36:03
cover of the newspaper and he said, "Hey Tom, that's your sister." And I so he got the newspaper. We went back into the
01:36:10
village and I read it. I skimmed over it. I went, "What? Who is this doctor?" Yeah, nobody's ever told me about this
01:36:19
guy. >> So Tim's defense team never knew about any of those three guys I just talked
01:36:26
about. And there were so many people in the case file that I think warranted a deeper look. I mean, there was a guy
01:36:32
named Greg Casease, who I think was the person Peggy was actually dating at the time. Derek Cordova was somebody she had
01:36:38
seen before. A guy named Tim Matthews was someone who supposedly liked Peggy and was jealous of Matt. And I'm not
01:36:44
saying any of these guys had anything to do with it, but clearly these guys were
01:36:47
like part of her life and they didn't even do so much as talk to them. >> So there's a lot of other suspects, but
01:36:55
the thing that got the thing that like solidified the exoneration to begin with was the
01:37:02
DNA. So like >> So we have Yes. So this >> what happened with it? >> We do have DNA. That's what ruled Tim
01:37:08
out. The DNA that we have, there was a part of a profile on the waistband of her underwear. Now, mind you, everything
01:37:18
we have is touch DNA, and they tested that part because they figured if her pants were pulled down, maybe her killer
01:37:23
was the one to pull them down. So, we have a waistband of her underwear. Then, they found some mixtures on her clothes,
01:37:30
like her under her arms, her coat, her boots, her pants. They find a full DNA profile on her sleeve. It turns out that
01:37:38
was just a cop because nobody's wearing gloves back then. You guys saw it. And we do know that there was a match to
01:37:48
the DNA found on her waistband of her underwear. And do you guys want to guess who it was?
01:37:59
It was Matt Zner. So, we have this match to the partial >> Mhm. >> profile. Why isn't that enough to
01:38:16
confirm to say to convict Matt? >> Well, Linda Wheeler thinks it should be. >> I want Matt Zoler to know that I'm still
01:38:24
after him. I want him to know to make up some little hiccup or something that in
01:38:29
his life that he'll make a mistake that we can catch him on. But it's like I just when I when I I I know who did it
01:38:38
and he's not held accountable and he's been free for 30ome years that uh the attorney general did all they could and
01:38:45
I really felt that they did. But it's like but I'm not done and I I don't I don't want to be silenced. There's still
01:38:52
a wrong that was done and I still feel like something might good might come out of of this case getting reopened and and
01:39:00
refocused on that there somebody might come up with something that's said or done that we didn't know about that
01:39:06
allows us to take this case further and keep it opened. >> Now the problem is there could be
01:39:14
explanations for the DNA like touch DNA. You don't know when it's put there. It can be transferred. We know that her and
01:39:21
Matt had a relationship. We know that they interacted the night she died. We know they went to dinner like within the
01:39:27
last week and nobody asked them about that. Like >> it's not 100%. We also have the Missy Woods of it all.
01:39:36
If anyone listened to our John Ramsey episode, you'll remember that Colorado is having a DNA reckoning right now
01:39:42
because a woman who worked in their lab from like the '9s to 2023 was found to be like falsifying a bunch of stuff.
01:39:49
like wasn't following policy and procedure. All of the cases she worked on are under investigation.
01:39:54
>> There's a lot in question when it comes to DNA that's being handled, stored, >> right,
01:40:00
>> processed through Colorado for decades now. >> And even though a lot of it, like, you
01:40:05
know, some of that stuff was done in that independent lab in Holland. Again, >> stored in Colorado.
01:40:09
>> It all was there. And so, is that going to be something that a defense team uses? It's totally possible. I also
01:40:18
think that like a defense team basically like has all these open ends because of
01:40:24
Richard Hammond as well. Like you without that door being closed, some very powerful people made sure we'd
01:40:29
never know what was on those tapes. We made sure that we could never like fully close that door or cross them off the
01:40:34
list. And so I think it's going to potentially make a prosecution very difficult. But I also think that they
01:40:40
should be we have multiple other partial profiles that didn't match Matt. And I think we should be testing these other
01:40:47
people, too. >> And just to show you how much I think can still be done, because I think DNA
01:40:53
testing is going to help. I think it's going to potentially take this case forward, but there is just so much leg
01:40:58
work that can still be done. Right now, no one is working this case. And as we were literally coming like getting ready
01:41:04
to do this show for you guys, we came across another person who we had never heard before. this guy named Randy
01:41:10
England who is in prison right now but who had a streak of crimes from 1977 to 87 and his crimes it shows that he was
01:41:20
clearly escalating in northern Colorado and he was super active in 87 when Peggy
01:41:27
was murdered and we found this note in one of Tim's lawyers like papers that said quote England cut off nipples too
01:41:36
and I don't we haven't been able to track that down we're still trying to request records. But there's also this
01:41:41
tip in Peggy's case that someone saw a car with Wyoming license plates at around the time that she's thought to
01:41:47
have been murdered. He had a car with Wyoming license plates. So again, I don't know if this means anything, but I
01:41:53
know that it means there's more that needs to be done, more people to talk to, more to track down, more leg work
01:41:59
that the state of Colorado is just not doing. Now, after Tim was released, he went on
01:42:09
to write a book about his case, about the prosecution, about his wrongful conviction. We relied on it heavily for
01:42:17
this. We relied on talking to him and talking to Tom. And he said since since his wrongful conviction, he's just been
01:42:24
like trying to live his life. He likes working on cars. He likes working with horses. He likes spending time with
01:42:29
people he loves. And he actually has a really surprising confidant these days. I think it is really ironic that the the
01:42:39
former lead investigator in the case who came to arrest me in 1992 is actually one of my dearest friends now, Linda
01:42:46
Holloway. Turns out she's a really good person. She put herself out there so much. Linda
01:42:53
Holloway put herself out there so much to do the right thing. It just for one, she it greatly endear me to
01:43:02
her. I'm I'm not good with good at words, but it's very endearing that she did that. She put herself out there for
01:43:09
me, and it just speaks volumes to her integrity. She's she's just one of those people that will do she'll do the right
01:43:17
thing regardless. She just has she does the right thing. That's a rare person in
01:43:22
this world. I mean, a lot of people wouldn't go out on a limb like she did. They would just
01:43:30
go with the grain. life would have been a lot easier for her if she had just gone with the grain and not not gone
01:43:36
gone against everybody else. >> Tom Hedrickk was diagnosed with stage 4 colon cancer two and a half years ago.
01:43:46
So you heard at the top of the show he has limited time and he's the last person talking about Peggy before now.
01:43:53
this is why we are talking about Peggy and it's what has made him like feel this sense of urgency to get her name
01:44:00
out there and for you to know her story. >> I said you guys have had 30ome years to
01:44:06
do your job and I said obviously at this point you're telling me the case is closed
01:44:13
and I said but the fella upstairs is going to they're not getting by him. he already knows who it is and he'll take
01:44:21
care of this problem. And they just all they're all all their faces just turned white. And I said, "He'll he will get
01:44:29
the final say. You've had your chance." And uh and I said, "What's it going to take to reopen this?" Because they told
01:44:38
me it was closed. And they said, "Short of a full confession, nothing." I said, "You what?" and they said unless
01:44:48
somebody actually comes forward and admits to it completely and and fully uh we can't reopen this
01:44:57
case. And I just I was as far as I was concerned with that meeting I was done. I wanted to get out of there because for
01:45:08
over 30ome years we I've waited around for something to to take place for this and then they take somebody and they put
01:45:18
him in prison for 9 years and he's innocent as the driven white snow and they ruin his life to a certain extent
01:45:28
and then he gets out and and rightfully so. And and here we are. Here we are today, right now, doing this interview,
01:45:39
and still nothing has been done about it. And it's like everybody just wants to turn a blind eye to it and move on.
01:45:48
What? What? Move on? Well, you're I don't have much longer to go because I have a disease that'll take
01:45:57
my life soon and I want something done about I want the people that have the ability to do their job to get busy and
01:46:05
do their job. That's what they need to do instead of just turning a blind eye. Well, you know, it is what it is. Case
01:46:12
closed. There have been a lot of mistakes in this case that I've learned through
01:46:17
media, through the newspaper, from Linda, quite a bit from Linda. And uh I'm not happy, very upset about this.
01:46:27
So, I don't have longer to go, so I want something done about it immediately. So, this is where you guys come in. I
01:46:38
need you to get out your phones. This is the time to do it. Everyone take out your phones. This QR code will take you
01:46:43
to a place where you can just put in your information and we made it super easy.
01:46:46
>> Ashley, do you see all these phones? >> Beautiful, >> but it will email the attorney general
01:46:51
and say that we're requesting that you guys reopen Peggy's case. We're now the people who have to pick up this for Tom
01:46:59
and speak on behalf of Tom and Peggy. So, I'm going to give you a minute. I'm going to put it up afterwards, too. We
01:47:05
are so grateful that you guys are here. It is. I cannot express to you how weird
01:47:10
this is. >> It's wild. Six years ago, we did a show in a basement in Philly where it was
01:47:17
pouring rain and it was leaking and there was 100 people there and it was and I don't know how we got here and we
01:47:23
got but we got here because of you and you guys are wonderful and our team. I want to say a huge thank you. There's
01:47:29
amazing audio check people here you guys who helped put this together. >> We can't do a show like this by
01:47:35
ourselves. They're absolutely incredible. >> We can't do an episode without them.
01:47:41
>> Thank you guys. >> Thank you guys. You are amazing. >> We'll see you on Monday.