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Hi, crime junkies. I'm Ashley Flowers. And I'm Brit. Today, I am as baffled as I am consumed by this case. Two teens,
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seemingly excelling in every way, go out for a night of fun and then are brutally
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shot dead in what could almost seem a targeted ambush. Some believe answers may have been right under police's noses
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throughout their nearly 40year quest for justice. This is the story of the Westside Park
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[Music] murders. It's around midnight on September 28th, 1985 when Officer Terry
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Winters of the Muny Police Department is on patrol in Westside Park, which literally, as its name suggests, is on
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the west side of the town, and it runs along the White River. It's a Saturday night just before midnight and according
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to a book by Keith Royden and Douglas Walker, a source we'll rely on very heavily here for this episode, Terry
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also has his K-9 partner Max with him. Now, at some point, this real life Turner and Hooch hop in their squad car
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to leave. And as they pull out, the headlights catch on some tire tracks that lead to a Volkswagen hatchback
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idling in a little gravel area of the park. Now, one of Terry's responsibilities is to scope out any
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cars left in the park past clothing, which was about an hour earlier. So, this is literally the gig, and Terry
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gets out to investigate. There doesn't appear to be any movement coming from inside the car. But as he approaches and
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puts his flashlight through the open driver side window, he gets the shock of his life. There are two teenagers, a boy
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and a girl, shot dead in the front seats. In the book, The Westside Park Murders,
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Muny's most notorious cold case, it says that both the front seats were reclined
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with like sleeping bags draped over them and the passenger side window was shattered. The guy who's in the driver's
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seat has been shot in the torso and the girl who's in the passenger seat was shot in the head. It's not long before
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the entire place is crawling with police and investigators take note of the fact
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that there are no signs of a struggle and no signs that point to this being motivated by a robbery. Nothing appears
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to have been taken from the car as far as they can tell. I mean, like there's even literally a portable stereo still
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in the back. And they see an open pocket knife just sitting on the dashboard. But
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the murder weapon, the gun, that's nowhere to be found. They just find a small empty gun holster under the young
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man's body. Like he was sitting on it. Well, some accounts say sitting on it, others just say under the body. Some say
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it was found in the car more broadly. I think the important thing is that it seems unlikely that it would belong to
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one of the kids, which could mean that the killer left this thing behind, right? And it seems they may have left
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behind something else, too. Prince on or in the car. Now, some of those obviously
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though might belong to their victims, who they learn are 16-year-old Ethan Dixon and 15-year-old Kimberly Dao. Now,
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they were able to ID them so quickly because while they were still on the scene processing, this guy named Dawn
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showed up and Dawn tells police that he'd been out driving looking for his stepdaughter, Kimberly, who just never
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came home that night. I guess she had gone out with a guy that she just started dating, Ethan. He picked her up
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between 9:00 and 9:30. And the plan was for them to go get some pizza, take it over to Westside Park, eat, hang out,
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but they just never came back. And while they were concerned when the teenagers didn't return home, I mean, they hadn't
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called police or anything yet, which like I understand like teenagers missing curfew or whatever is like kind of par
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for the course, but it becomes clear that this isn't par for the course that night when police let Don go with them
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to the car. And according to the Star Press, it's him who confirms the thing that he was most terrified of. It is
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Kimberly and Ethan in the car. The events of the night don't just shock Dawn and Nancy, who is Kimberly's
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mom. News of the shooting is spreading like wildfire. And while publicly the victims aren't being named, it didn't
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take long for local parents and teenagers to put two and two together. Both teenagers were students at
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Northside High School and by all accounts like really standout kids. According to the Star Press, Ethan was
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on the debate team. He was the junior class president. Kimberly was a cheerleader recently named as part of
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the homecoming queen court. And a story in the Sun at the time quotes their principal describing them as very very
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fine people. Basically saying that like they never caused any problems. They were never difficult. So, for them to
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end up like this, it's hard for anyone to fathom. But that didn't mean that they were teenagers like who weren't
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dealing with teenager problems cuz police discover that Ethan had been the victim of bullying. Now, I don't know
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the full extent of it. It doesn't seem like this is something police ever really fully explore or or find the need
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to explore, but Ethan's parents do say that at one point they had taken a knife away from him that he was keeping on him
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because of bullying. So, when I think about that, I mean, that could be one of the reasons there was that pocketk knife
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in the car. Yeah. But then why would it be on the dash and not in Ethan's hand? Like thinking he was maybe trying to
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protect himself or something. if that's what it was. And again, like I'm making all the assumptions, but if that's what
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it was, part of me wonders if he had the knife on him for like all the reasons we
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just talked about, but then maybe him and Kimberly were like, you know, doing things teenagers do sometimes when
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they're in the park and like maybe he like pulled that out of his pocket or something, like put it on the dash to be
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more comfortable. So, I don't know. Like, this is a weird fact that like I can't quite like put it in a box, but
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it's worth it's worth people knowing like it's something you'll read if you look into this story. Now, there's
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nothing in the source material about police at the time finding anything in the way of evidence like blood or prints
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on the knife or even the holster for that matter. And going back to the knife though, like it is important to say that
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I don't think like that was ever actually used. So like nothing like blood or whatever on that. But speaking
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of the holster, police never find any evidence that Ethan owned a gun. So, it's definitely seeming like the murder
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weapon belonged to the perp and then maybe this holster also belonged to the perp. And the autopsy confirms that
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Kimberly was killed by a gunshot wound to the left side of her head, which most likely killed her within seconds. Ethan
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died from massive blood loss caused by a gunshot wound to the left side of his chest. And both of them were shot with a
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38 caliber, which they for sure did not fire. I mean, like obviously no gun at the scene. And I think that's, you know,
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speaks for itself. But they do check for gunshot residue on their hands. Anyways,
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and even though the results that came back later were positive, that still didn't really change anything for police
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like because there could be explanations for that. I again, I think not finding the weapon there made it clear, right?
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And a homicide. The gunshot residue, they're in a car that's a pretty small enclosed place. They were both shot.
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Like that's explainable, right? Oh, and the other thing I wanted to note about their autopsies, neither of them showed
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any signs of drugs or alcohol in their systems. While even in Kimberly's exact time of death is unknown, the Emmy
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estimates that it could be about 11:00 p.m. So roughly an hour and a half to 2 hours after they left Kimberly's place
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and about 50 minutes before officer Terry discovered their bodies, which was around 11:50 p.m. Which speaking of
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Terry, how did he not hear the gunshots? Like he was in the park. He was It's possible that he was just out of earshot
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though when the shooting happened. Like I've never seen anything about his exact
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location at the time, like at 11:00 if it's known. But I know he's supposed to be on duty at the time. According to the
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Star Press, the park is like a little over 20 acres. So if you look at it on Google Maps, it's like a very long
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skinny like strip. So my thinking is if he's like patrolling all of it, maybe he's could be on the opposite side or at
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least a ways away. But even though he doesn't appear to have heard anything, there are others who did hear the shots.
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Investigators talked to people who say that they were in the park when gunfire rang out. I don't know who these people
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are who were at the park at 11:00 p.m. or how police even found them, but good job. Some of those witnesses say that
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they just booked it when they heard the bangs. But others claimed to have been close enough to the parking lot to see
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three people around Kimberly and Ethan's car after the gunshots. And through these witness accounts, cops determined
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that there were between 10 and 12 other cars in the park that night, not including Ethan and Kimberly's car. And
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investigators zero in specifically on two cars that were parked the closest to Kimberly and Ethan around the time of
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the shooting. But these cars weren't there when Terry showed up. So there is a red one and then there is a black or
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some kind of dark colored one often described as a Monte Carlo and it was this black one I think that they're most
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interested in because it was specifically said to have left right after the shots rang
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out. So these are either really good witnesses they have to find or suspects or suspects. And according to Royen and
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Walker's book, within two days of the murders, they actually might have found one of
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[Music] them. In the early hours of September 30th, so just 2 days after the murders,
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two my police officers notice a car parked in Westside Park. Now, nothing in the book about what this car looked
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like, so I don't know if it fits the description of the cars that they were previously looking for, but considering
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what has recently gone down in this park, they're like checking out everything. As they head towards the
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car, it starts up and drives at them. Now, police are able to block the vehicle somehow. And when they finally
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talk to the driver, they can tell that I mean, he's definitely had too much to drink. And when they ask him about like
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all of this, he says that he's grieving. Grieving what, sir? They ask him exactly
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that. Like, what are you grieving for? And he replies, you know what for? Oh my god. My daughter answers like random
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questions like this all the time. And it's frustrating. Then it's infuriatingly frustrating here. Prepare
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to stay frustrated because that's about all the info that this guy gives. And this information about this guy is
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actually only in the book. So, it is super limited. The authors don't even use his real name. But we do know that
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this guy gets arrested for driving under the influence. And he later tells police
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that he was just upset about the murders. Yeah, we all are. But most of us aren't melting down in the spot where
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they were found. So like, what's your story, dude? Who is this guy? I don't know much. I like truly like I just know
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that he had a criminal record. He had even served some time, but it sounds like primarily for a minor burglary
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charge like in another state, California actually. Nothing violent like murder. So maybe for that reason, maybe because
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they didn't find anything to link him to the killings, maybe something else, this
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guy kind of just falls off the radar, at least from the reporting perspective. I
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don't know what category police put this guy in. Suspect, person of interest, or
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just some bizarre encounter. some weird thing. Yeah. That they don't know what to make of. Either way, we don't hear
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much more about him. Instead, police around this time seem far more interested in someone close to Kimberly,
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her stepfather, Dawn. Because not only was it pretty convenient that he showed up at the park that night while they
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were still processing the scene, but the Star Press reports that police also discover that two witness accounts might
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lead back to Dawn and the car that he was driving that night. possibly putting him at the park before the shooting. So
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on October 4th, they bring Don in for a formal interview and they talked to him for about 6 hours. And in that time,
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Don's story is unchanging. He said that when Kimberly wasn't home by 11:00 p.m.,
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her mother Nancy got worried. And when she still wasn't home an hour and a half later, Don went out looking for her.
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He's like driving around, checking out local McDonald's, whatever. And then he was heading to the park where Nancy had
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thought that they might have gone. And that's when he came across all the police activity and he was told what
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happened. So the Star Press reports that police asked Don if he will take a polygraph which he agrees to. Braver
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than me, Don, but it actually plays out in his favor. Don passes it. But that's not enough to close the book on him.
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Because while the answers he was giving were deemed to be truthful by a machine and some guy reading the machine, other
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answers that he was giving to Deputy Chief Marvin Campbell in follow-up questions were like kind of freaking
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weird. Like for example, when asked if he was in the park, Don replies, quote, "Within my body, I wasn't
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there." Okay. Is that a no? Then I think it's trying to be. And I like you, like
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deputy chief, like we all find this kind of sus. Yeah. And in another statement during the interview, Don said, quote,
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"If I did this, you're going to have to tell me I did it." And listen, Deputy Chief Campbell isn't going to put words
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in his mouth, but he doesn't believe him in like what he's saying, and he doesn't
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believe the polygraph results either. The hang-up is Dawn's alibi. I mean, it's rock solid. Kimberly's mother,
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Nancy, said that Dawn went to a football game earlier in the night, but was home
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before the shootings even took place, and that he only went back out around 12:30 a.m. to look for Kimberly. That's
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great. I guess my biggest hangup about him as a possible suspect is why? Like, what would his motive even be for
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killing Kimberly and Ethan? That's the other problem. There isn't one. So, it's not quite adding up. And listen, we've
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contacted Muny PD to ask like why they were so hot on Dawn early on. Like, there could be things on police's radar
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that they didn't make public. Maybe a motive we're unaware of, but as of this recording, we haven't heard back from
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them. Now, it's no surprise that after this initial interview, Dawn lawyers up. The Star Press reports that his lawyer
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tells police he will not let Don be interviewed again without a lawyer in the room. So essentially, Dawn stops
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cooperating, which then Deputy Chief Campbell like seems to suggest that Dawn is now somehow hindering the
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investigation, but the police have nothing that they can really make stick to Dawn as their guy. And I mean, the
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thing is, they can't make anything stick to anyone. For a brief moment, they looked at one of their own, actually,
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officer Terry Winters, the police officer who discovered the bodies, which was like honestly my first crime junkie
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guess when I got into this case. Maybe your first Nancy Drew guest. Well, the amount of times that I've looked into
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real cases and it turned out to be the person patrolling who finds the bodies, but not here. This guy was asked to turn
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over his guns for analysis. It's determined they were not used in the killings. And as far as I can tell, no
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one seems to place his police vehicle anywhere near the shooting at the time of the shooting. So by early October,
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police are in a long way like circling back to the Monte Carlo tip because you see they had gotten a tip from someone
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pointing at their neighbor, this guy named James or he goes by Jimmy Swingly. And just an FYI, the book is the only
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place that he is officially named and we couldn't corroborate this anywhere else.
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But according to Royce Den Walker's book, someone who lives down the street from Jimmy reports to police that his
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house was robbed and he is convinced that Jimmy did it. He is also confident that Jimmy knows about the murders of
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Ethan and Kimberly or was maybe involved in them, which are all like pretty bold
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allegations. Did this tipster happen to mention why he felt Jimmy was involved? Like he felt this pretty strongly. I
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know. I I if he did, I don't know. like all I know is that we get to him somehow
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or like that they make this suggestion and I do know that police look into this afterwards and maybe give it some weight
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because on October 7th they release a description and a sketch of someone that they're looking for who they also
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associate with the black or dark colored Monte Carlos. This is why I said it kind
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of all comes full circle. And while there's no mention of this publicly at the time, Deputy Chief Campbell later
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indicates that this sketch looked a lot like our guy Jimmy. White male, about 24
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years old, 150 to 160 lb, slender build, brown hair, parted down the middle, acne
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scarred face, and this guy apparently wears gold wire glasses. But on the other flip side of this, this guy
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apparently looked a lot like other people, too. Yeah. Like you just described a guy in Indiana. it. Yeah,
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because when they like put this sketch out to the papers or whatever, they get a lot of calls, like somewhere between
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aundred and 200 calls about it. Police take all these calls and they kind of narrow them down to get a list about of
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like a dozen people and they do this by like seeing who was named the most. But none of those actually lead to a huge
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breakthrough. Not even the Jimmy stuff, I guess, because I don't see him come back up yet. So, they're starting to hit
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a wall early on, which is maybe why police decide to cast a wider net, looking beyond just their crime, even to
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other crimes that feel kind of similar or happen not too far away. Like maybe if this is part of some larger pattern,
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that will tell them something about their killer and where to find them. And I know specifically they looked at two
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cases. There was one that was local, one that wasn't. The first was an assault of
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a woman that took place in the summer at another park in a nearby county. And in
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that attack, the suspect might have had or been in a Monte Carlo. Then in the second case, that one happened 5 years
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earlier a few states away in Kansas where two young people were shot while sitting in their car. And on the
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surface, both of those, like that crime and this one have similar elements, but ultimately police can't connect them in
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any way like to one another. Same with the other one. So, they're kind of at another dead end and investigators turn
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their focus to some more like experimental investigative tactics like hypnosis. Hypnosis that means they have
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someone to hypnotize like who? It's mostly those witnesses that were at the park that night to see if they can
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remember any more details about like the car. I'm assuming car, license plate, whatever. Here's the problem though.
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Like the way they were doing this hypnosis veers like pretty far into unethical territory if you ask me
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because according to the Star Press before being hypnotized, one of the witnesses who was actually an offduty
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officer who was in the park that night, listen, I know, I hear it like I had the
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same questions. Um, but it sounds like this guy, they vetted him because I have the same like, oh, like Terry things
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like we've seen this before. He's vetted. He has an alibi, whatever. I mean, alibi, he's always in the park,
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but I think he was with someone else that night. But anyways, this guy was shown some pictures of cars, including
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the one that Dawn was driving that night, which was NY's car. And then he's shown a photo of Dawn before the
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hypnosis. So, he's kind of been fed info, which is what it feels like. It feels like they're being like, "Here are
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some here's the guy that the chief is like very interested in jog your memory." Yeah. But even them doing this,
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again, I said it's unethical, but even when they did it, like nothing tying Don to the killings even comes from this.
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So, whatever they were trying didn't even work. But I do think it gives a glimpse to where investigators heads
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were. For Deputy Chief Campbell, all roads were still leading back to Dawn. and he at that point is tired of Dawn's
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perceived unwillingness to cooperate. So he decides to try and put pressure on publicly. And in September 1986, Deputy
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Chief Campbell says publicly that a person related to the case refuses to come in for a second interview. And
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though he didn't explicitly say Dawn's name, everyone pretty much knows that's who he's talking about. And when asked
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about a motive, the chief says all they have are rumors and no real motive in this case. Listen, I don't know what the
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rumors are that he's referring to, like if they're even real. Like, but again, nothing really happens in the case. And
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a full year goes by and really even then nothing happens in the case itself. that
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like full year. That's just when Kimberly's family is hit with yet another tragedy because on Christmas Eve
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1987, Kimberly's mother, this is Dawn's wife, Nancy, unexpectedly dies of a heart attack. The police at the time
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decide to have an autopsy done on Nancy to rule out any kind of foul play, which
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Don even agrees to, like presumably to get these guys off his back, and ultimately nothing is found. It was a
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heart attack. So over the next few years, Kimberly and Ethan's case just kind of stalls out.
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There are rumors that swirl through Muny about what could have happened to them,
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but there doesn't seem to be anything like tangible police latch on to like what? Yeah. So, I don't have examples
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about like if if the rumors that the chief was talking about were in relation to Dawn. I don't know any rumors in
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relation to him, but I have heard like other little things. They ran the gamut really. Like I mean there was one that
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centered around the son of a politically connected family. Then there was one about someone who showed up at a party
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dressed as Rambo on the night of the murders. And then in one of the wilder accusations, a guy was convinced that a
00:22:21
woman he knew might have committed the murders. Like and he thinks this woman who I assume is like his girlfriend or
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some something like someone he knows intimately. Basically, he assumes that she mistook Ethan for him in the car and
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like thought she caught him cheating and then committed the murders. Again, there's no real meat to any of those
00:22:42
stories. So, police continue to look high and low and wide and far. And they do get at least one decent lead that
00:22:51
they do follow in the early '9s. Two investigators go to interview a man named Steve who's in prison on an armed
00:22:59
robbery charge. Unclear if Steve reached out to them or how his name might have come up, but he tells investigators that
00:23:06
the murders stemmed from a marijuana deal that had gone bad in the park. He said the three men involved in the deal
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decided to mess with or take it out on a couple parked in a car, which feels like
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a promising tip knowing there was at least that one sighting early on of three people outside of the kid's car.
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But it feels a little less promising when they're told the couple was killed with a shotgun, which like we know isn't
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true. But still, detectives are like, "Okay, listen. We got we got to at least like continue following this through.
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Like the this line of investigation might lead somewhere." And the victim's family wants that also. So much so that
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Ethan's family pays for a trip to Virginia where a woman supposedly can corroborate Steve's story. But
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unfortunately, when the detectives get down there and interview her, she ends up admitting that the whole thing is a
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hoax. And another inmate tells police that the whole thing was Steve's effort to try and get some kind of deal or get
00:24:04
like early release. You know, we see this all the time and it's so incredibly heartless, right? Like, yeah, you're
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messing around with the police, wasting their time, but the most devastating part is giving Kimberly and Ethan's
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families this like little tiny glimmering bit of hope, and then it just gets ripped away just like that. Yeah. I
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don't I just don't I don't think criminals have the same code of ethics, right, that you and I do. Like like
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they're just operating like a completely different field. Like in their minds, everyone is fair game. Like I don't
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think they see a difference between like someone they know or someone they're in jail with or a victim's
00:24:41
family. Anything to save their own skin, right? So I mean, you get how it goes. Same as in so many cold cases. Random
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tips and pointing fingers and a case file that gets dusted off just every so often for a fresh set of eyes to take a
00:24:54
crack at it. And that's where it was in 2012 when Detective Nathan Sloan first starts working Kimberly and Ethan's
00:25:02
case. Now, he spends about 2 weeks locked away with this case file. And when Detective Sloan emerges, there is a
00:25:10
familiar name on investigators radar again. Swear to God, Ashley, if you say it's Dawn, it's not
00:25:16
Dawn. It's someone else. [Music] Two branches of the same tree, two pieces of a soul. Where one sister
00:25:38
goes, the other will be. For she is but half of the whole. The missing half. Pre-order your copy at
00:25:49
ashleyflowers.com. You see, while the deputy chief all those years ago was paying so much
00:25:56
attention to Dawn, more and more tips about Jimmy Swingley kept coming in. Remember, he's the one who'd been
00:26:04
accused of robbing that guy's place, and then the guy accused him of also maybe being involved in the murders. Well,
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here's what's interesting. So, the first tip about him came in like a week into the investigation. And then a couple of
00:26:17
months into the investigation, they got another tip, a more specific tip from someone said to have been close to
00:26:24
Jimmy. And this guy said that Jimmy had come to his house on the night of the murders. And he told this guy that a
00:26:30
drug deal went bad and the teenagers ended up dead. And there were two other men with Jimmy. So, three guys again.
00:26:40
And he said that one of them pulled the gun out and the holster came out with it
00:26:44
and that's how it ended up in the car. But is there any evidence that Ethan or Kimberly were involved in drugs or would
00:26:51
be in the park to buy drugs? No. So it doesn't sound like it. And like more than just like from their parents,
00:26:57
right, who like most of the time are like I don't think so. According to the book, police also talked to other kids
00:27:01
that knew them too and none of them said that either of these two were involved in drugs. So, if this was some kind of
00:27:07
drug deal gone bad, it seems more likely that they were in the wrong place, wrong
00:27:12
time. Like, if you remember that like other rumor we heard, it was like there was a drug deal gone bad and they took
00:27:18
it out on two kids. And maybe that's that's that what really happened. Yeah. Maybe someone approached them about
00:27:24
drugs and an argument ensued. Like, oh yeah, that could there could be a lot of situations. Yeah. Well, whatever
00:27:30
happened, Jimmy's name wouldn't go away. Detective Sloan sees several more instances where people point to Jimmy
00:27:38
over the years. Some say that Jimmy admitted to the killings or to knowing something about what happened that
00:27:44
night. And he also sees that at some point in ' 87, police had given Jimmy a lie detector test which he failed. But
00:27:53
they didn't have anything to hold. You can't, you know, arrest someone on a polygraph. So like they end up letting
00:27:58
him go. I mean, they were probably still so focused on Dunn that I mean, in ' 87.
00:28:04
True. Maybe. And listen, by 2012, Jimmy had been free to live a lot of life. Lots that Detective Sloan had to dig
00:28:13
through. And he finds that he apparently hightailed it out of town shortly after
00:28:18
the murders, which is interesting. Like within a couple of months, there are records of him being arrested all the
00:28:24
way down in Florida. and he continues carrying out a lengthy criminal history over the next decade. And there's this
00:28:32
one blip in his record that stands out, at least to me amongst others. It's it didn't involve like a violent offense,
00:28:39
but the circumstances were a little chilling. So, the Westside Park murders book notes that at one point Jimmy was
00:28:46
pulled over for blowing a stop sign, and apparently he didn't have his license or
00:28:51
he refused to give it. And when police ask him for his name, the name that he gives to me is like a huge red flag. So
00:28:58
he tells police that his name is Kevin Dixon. As in like Ethan's last name, Dixon. I mean, it's Ethan's last name. I
00:29:09
can't speak for Jimmy and why he picked that last name. And there's nothing in the book about police like putting two
00:29:15
and two together at the time, but like it's just so odd that I felt like I had to mention it. I don't It's weird. Is
00:29:22
Jimmy still alive in 2012? Oh, alive and kicking. And Detective Sloan knows right
00:29:27
where to find him. Prison. Of course. I told you he had a real run in Florida, but his decade of criminal activity
00:29:33
stopped in 1999 when he was convicted of murdering a man named Brian Inco. Like violently. Brian was found in his own
00:29:42
apartment with his throat cut. Like nearly decapitated is how it's described. And so Jimmy ends up getting
00:29:49
sentenced to 65 years in prison for that where he's still hanging out in 2012. Now, Detective Sloan wants to be totally
00:29:57
solid before he goes talking to him. So, he continues to try and run down old leads about Jimmy, tries to run down new
00:30:03
leads about Jimmy, and the long and the short of it is a clearer and clearer picture starts to form around what could
00:30:10
have happened. It seems like there really were multiple people in the park and there was some kind of argument
00:30:18
about something and at some point Ethan pulled a knife which lines up with the pocketk knife in the car on the dash.
00:30:26
Mhm. And then the theory went on that someone in this group of people that included Jimmy fired the shots. The
00:30:34
group took off in the car and whatever account he's pulling this from, he has the car not being a Monte Carlo, but one
00:30:41
that maybe looked a lot like it or had some similarities. It was a Chrysler Cordoba. But how can they prove any of
00:30:48
this? Well, that's the thing. They can't. I mean, they have nothing physical tying Jimmy or anyone else to
00:30:54
the crime, right? But now that he like has heard enough that he feels solid on what happened, Detective Slo is finally
00:31:01
feeling that it's time that he can go straight to Jimmy now. Like maybe they can get something from him. So he heads
00:31:08
to the state prison where Jimmy is being held and let's just say it doesn't go well. Jimmy basically tells him to like
00:31:14
f off. There's going to be no conversation. Okay, then that's kind of the end of the line for Jimmy. But
00:31:20
listen, Detective Sloan like isn't just going to rest on this like being the one
00:31:24
and only answer. I don't know Sloan, but I like the way this man works. Like, if
00:31:28
you can't prove one theory, go try and prove others. Like, best case scenario, you find out you were wrong and you do
00:31:34
get an arrest. Worst case like scenario, you're like buttoning up your case even
00:31:39
more. Like, close all those doors that a future defense team might try to use when you finally do get your guy. So,
00:31:45
the next door he wants to explore and hopefully close or prove or whatever was that whole grieving man in the parking
00:31:52
lot thing. Oh, I like Detective Sloan, too. Let's do this. So, he tracks that guy's ex-wife down. She tells him that
00:32:02
her husband was prone to drinking too much, often blacking out, and he would even get out of bed in the middle of the
00:32:09
night and leave the house, which he had done the night police found him in that park. She also admits that she wondered
00:32:16
if her husband could have had something to do with the murders, but it sounds like ultimately she doesn't think like
00:32:23
that he actually did. I don't know if this guy is dead by this point or what, but from what I can tell, Sloan doesn't
00:32:30
get a chance to talk to him directly. It might also be because he gets redirected
00:32:35
with a new tip. And those are few and far between in cold cases. So like strike while the iron is hot, right? In
00:32:43
2013, the name Raphael Rescendez is suggested to Detective Sloan as a possible suspect. Oh, he's the railroad
00:32:50
killer. Yeah, I was just about to say like we've talked about him before. He is someone that gets brought up in a
00:32:56
decent amount of cold cases from all over because of how mobile this guy was throughout the '90s. He is suspected of
00:33:02
killing like 23 people. and his MMO was to hop on and off railway cars committing murders along the way in
00:33:10
numerous states, Florida, Texas, even as far away as California. And while Indiana is not on the list, Illinois is.
00:33:19
So, he's like within shouting distance. And were there train tracks near the park? There were. Now, according to the
00:33:25
book, it sounds like the earliest of Rendez's known crimes happened in 1986. He murdered a couple in Texas and at
00:33:32
least one of those victims were shot to death with a 38. So, the murder weapon lines up. The majority of his known
00:33:39
crimes though took place in the '9s and often involved him strangling or beating
00:33:43
his victims to death. And unfortunately, Detective Sloan isn't able to speak to himself because he was executed by the
00:33:50
state of Texas in 2006. And maybe it doesn't matter because ultimately it sounds like Detective Sloan doesn't
00:33:56
think Rendez is his guy. he's able to like close that door. So whether it's a local criminal like Jimmy or a serial
00:34:04
killer like Rendez, nothing is sticking for Sloan. And in light of closing all the doors, there is one more that
00:34:11
Detective Sloan needs to look at probably more than anything else. Like to rule in or out once and for all. And
00:34:19
we're back to Dawn. We're back to Dawn. You got it. In April 2013, Detective Sloan interviews Kimberly's stepfather,
00:34:25
Dawn, to see what he has to say after all these years. Don's story is the same, and Sloan presses him on some of
00:34:33
the odd things that he said to police back in the 85 interviews. But according to the book, Don tells Detective Sloan
00:34:40
that he was just tired then and the statements didn't actually mean anything. And in this, does Detective
00:34:47
Sloan have the same hunch about Don that police had back in ' 85? No. So, according to the book, he comes away
00:34:54
from the interview ruling Dawn out as a suspect. He closes the door. He also even returns two guns that police had
00:35:02
seized from Dawn at one point that turned out to have nothing to do with the murder that they had like all those
00:35:06
years. And while he's, you know, talking to Don and like talking to her family, he circles back to Ethan's family, too.
00:35:13
and he talks to Ethan's dad, but he doesn't learn anything new or anything earthshattering all these years later.
00:35:20
So much like back in 1986, nothing is really there to be gained from their families. However, in light of talking
00:35:30
to families, Jimmy's family members offer investigators some new information that is very interesting. Again, I'm
00:35:38
going to give you the TLDDR because spoiler alert, everything they learn about Jimmy feels super incriminating,
00:35:44
but it's all just hearsay that they can't actually use against him. Like, he might have had a Monte Carlo. He might
00:35:52
have stolen a gun from a family member, and maybe that gun was used in the murders. Oh, and he might have killed
00:36:00
two other people, one of which was his brother Jackie, whose death was ruled undetermined.
00:36:06
But in early 2014, Detective Sloan interviews Jimmy's mother. And I think the the whole brother story is really
00:36:13
interesting. So in early 2014, Detective Sloan interviews Jimmy's mother, and she
00:36:18
tells him that Jackie's wife had Jimmy's baby, some 9 months after Jackie died. Oh, that's an a motive. Mhm. She also
00:36:28
claims that Jimmy was in the room when Jackie died back in 1981. And according to the book, she tells Sloan that she
00:36:35
thought he was capable of committing the Westside Park murders and she had heard
00:36:40
a rumor that he was arrested in connection to it, which obviously we know wasn't true. But this is just to
00:36:46
say like what everyone in the area is talking about at the time. And it's like no matter where police look or what
00:36:52
roads they go down, it always keeps coming back to Jimmy who has made it clear that he is not going to cooperate
00:36:59
willingly. But in what seems like the first lucky break they get, the courts rule that his willingness is neither
00:37:07
here nor there. According to Royden and Walker's book, on November 14th, 2018, a
00:37:13
judge approves a warrant to get his DNA. So, a few days later on the 20th, Detective Sloan and another colleague go
00:37:20
to see Jimmy. And surprisingly, this time he is cooperative. He like lets them do the swab, which again like they
00:37:26
had to do. And according to the book, he sits for a 40-minute interview, which he
00:37:31
didn't have to do. But in his interview, Jimmy denies any involvement in the murders. In fact, he points to the rumor
00:37:38
a lot of people had heard over the years that it was Kimberly's stepfather, Dawn. You said DNA. What were they
00:37:46
trying to match Jimmy's DNA to? So, according to the book, potential DNA evidence on the holster got left behind
00:37:54
that like I can't tell when, but sometime between 85 and like when he's all these years later like looking into
00:37:59
this cold case. Obviously, they were able to like test old evidence. But here's the thing, whatever they have, it
00:38:06
doesn't match Jimmy. Now, despite this, Detective Sloan still seems to think that he has his guy.
00:38:15
Remember, I mean, right? Like there's potentially multiple people, but others like former deputy chief Marvin
00:38:21
Campbell, who's one of the OGs in this case, like not so sure. But without more evidence, they'll never know. I mean,
00:38:29
does he still think it's Don then? Like, was Don's DNA tested? Well, here's the problem. Unfortunately, Marvin Campbell
00:38:36
recently passed away, so I can't ask him if he still thinks it's Dawn or what he
00:38:41
thinks about Dawn. And if others like Don were compared to the DNA or like that grieving guy or whatever, like
00:38:49
that's never been reported on. In the book, the DNA evidence is described as being damaged and muddied. So, I assume
00:38:57
that like any advanced testing like IGG is out of the question. I don't know that for a fact though. And as far as
00:39:04
things like remember they found like prints in the car, like some sources claim like one was found in the car, on
00:39:09
the car, whatever. Like I just know none of those helped in the case either. Chances are like the killer never even
00:39:15
touched the car. Right. Mhm. Oh, and by the way, like we did attempt to reach out to Jimmy in prison but haven't
00:39:22
gotten connected. And same again, I said this earlier, but goes for the Muny police. Now, in January of 2020,
00:39:28
Detective Sloan became chief of police in Muny. And according to the Star Press, as late as 2022, he continues
00:39:34
following up on leads in this case when he can. Chief Sloan admits in that article that he hadn't assigned a new
00:39:40
investigator to the case. Like the time commitment and other investigators case loads just hasn't allowed it. But I did
00:39:46
see like so that's the last official update from police in 2022. But I did see like something interesting on here's
00:39:52
my disclaimer Reddit. Cool. But this was from 2023 and someone posted on a Reddit
00:39:58
forum that their neighbor confessed about a murder that sounds like what happened in Westside Park. Now, this
00:40:07
person doesn't name names or even a name where this happened. Again, it sounds like Westside Park, but they don't say
00:40:12
that. But the story that this neighbor told them goes a little something like this. The neighbor had claimed to be
00:40:18
involved with a girl at his high school that he very much liked. One day he and his friend happened to be at the park
00:40:25
where he saw this girl with another boy that he hated. So he went over to the car and shot the girl in the head and
00:40:32
then shot the boy in the chest. And he shot the boy in the chest because he wanted to watch him suffer.
00:40:40
Okay, that's all public information about like the crime scene. Even if he's talking about Westside Park, like this
00:40:49
could just be a troll. It is. And it's what some of the users in the forum wondered. But like some other people
00:40:55
felt strongly about this confession, like so strongly that they contacted the police with this information, although
00:41:01
like they never heard back from them. And like there were other people who were like, you know, could this have
00:41:06
been some kind of deathbed type confession from someone? Now, one big flag for me on this, besides the whole
00:41:12
like Reddit of it all, is that the poster said the neighbor said he used a 22 caliber in the shooting, while we
00:41:18
know it was a 38 used to kill Kimberly and Ethan. The poster also said that he brought out a piece of evidence that he
00:41:26
took from the car, but he doesn't say what the evidence is. And unless police are holding something back, the only
00:41:30
thing that we know that they were looking for was the murder weapon, which they never found. No one like talks
00:41:37
about anything ever being stolen or taken from them. Yeah. So like it makes this whole confession a little and you
00:41:44
can write whatever you want on the internet. And eventually they did take this down from Reddit. So like it's, you
00:41:50
know, if we got to talk to Chief Sloan, this is what I would have loved to ask him if we ever get the chance. It's what
00:41:55
I would love to ask him about if this ever got looked into. I mean, I think it's interesting, especially when you
00:42:00
think about when the confession says like they hated the guy, knowing that Ethan was being bullied. Like, I don't
00:42:06
know. It feels like there could be something there. Yeah. Well, and what I keep coming back to is like Jimmy's DNA
00:42:12
didn't match the holster. Like, that's huge, right? And again, like was he there or knew something? Maybe. But like
00:42:22
there's someone else that we should we should be still looking for, right? And I think it's at this point it's
00:42:27
important to point out that no one, not Jimmy, who is due to be released from prison in 2030, by the way, and despite
00:42:35
all the rumors, not Kimberly stepfather Dawn, or any of the other possible people police looked into, none of them
00:42:41
have ever been charged in this case. It remains unsolved, which means Ethan Dixon and Kimberly Dow's families have
00:42:49
never been given the closure they deserve. So, if you know anything about the murders of Ethan Dixon and Kimberly
00:42:56
Dowel on the night of September 28th, 1985 in Westside Park located in Muny, Indiana, please contact the Muny Police
00:43:04
Department at 765747-4867. You can also contact them anonymously through Crimestoppers at
00:43:16
765-286450. We'll also have a link to send a tip online in our show notes. You can find all the source material for our
00:43:22
episode on crimejunkiepodcast.com and you can follow us on Instagram at crimejunkypodcast.
00:43:30
[Music]