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Two women and a little girl have vanish on their way home from a gospel concert.
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But no one can disappear without a trace and not leave behind a complicated web.
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From family members to law enforcement, we can finally bring you the details that haven't been reported on anywhere
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else. This is the story of Sarah and Kimberly Boyd and Linda McCord. For Tiffany Ross, April 5th, 1987
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begins, like many other lazy Sundays, hanging out at her grandmother's house in Dorchester, South Carolina. Tiffany's
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family is really tight-knit, so people are always in and out of the house. And on this day, it is her uncle Philillip
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who stops by. Tiffany's only eight, so she's not part of her uncle and her grandma's conversation, but she can hear
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clear as day when Philillip says that his wife, 32-year-old Sarah Boyd, and their 2-year-old daughter Kimberly, are
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missing. Philip hasn't seen them since Friday, April 3rd, when they left to go to a gospel concert with Sarah's
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32-year-old friend, Linda McCord. Now, it was supposed to be a quick thing. I mean, like to the concert was only like
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a 30 minute drive from where they live in Dorchester. And in that moment when she hears this, this sparks a memory for
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little Tiffany. Maybe a sign that everybody missed a day earlier that something was wrong. You see, Sarah
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stopped by her mom's house every day after work. So Tiffany was standing in that same kitchen on Friday when Sarah
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asked her mom if she wanted to come with them to that gospel concert, but she said no. And so mom and daughter agreed
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that they would see one another the next day. But they didn't stop by the house the next day like they said they would.
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After Sarah and Kimberly got into Linda's 1977 Blue Lincoln and drove off, no one had gotten so much as a phone
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call from Sarah. But now that everyone is talking, they are beyond worried. Sarah's not someone who would just go
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off somewhere without telling anyone, especially with her daughter. So the family rallies together with the help of
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friends and neighbors, and they all start driving around in pickup trucks, looking everywhere they can think of,
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just trying to make sense of a situation that doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
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And this is low country South Carolina. So there are dirt roads, tons of open space, which you might think would make
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it easy to see like far and wide. But according to an officer that we spoke to, it's like looking for a needle in a
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hay stack because without any information to narrow down a search area, there is just so much remote
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ground to cover. Now, as they're looking, right around this same time, there's somebody who's sounding the
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alarm about Linda being missing as well. Police get a call from her husband, John
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McCord, and he tells them that last he knew, Linda was on her way to a gospel concert with Sarah and Kimberly. Now
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granted, Sarah and Kimberly's family, they're still doing their own search. They haven't even told police yet. So,
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this is the first police are hearing of it. So, John goes into a little more detail
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based on the police report that was filed. He tells the police that he hadn't seen Linda since she left at
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around 6:30 p.m. on Friday to pick up Sarah and Kimberly. And oh, by the way, he's extra worried because he'd found
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Linda's abandoned car already that morning. John says that a witness spotted Linda's Blue Lincoln at around
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900 a.m. It was stalled and abandoned in Orangeberg, which is just one county over from Dorchester. The spot where
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it's found is this intersection that like three of the major highways cross, one of them being Highway 15, which is
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the road that the trio would have taken to the concert. But problem is the car is found like 20 minutes in the wrong
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direction from where Linda was supposed to drop Sarah and Kimberly off on the way back. I mean, it's not even on the
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way to Linda's mom's house either where she and John are living. But doesn't even really matter because no matter
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where it was, Jon tells the police it's not even there anymore. Then where is it? John said he already
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had the car towed to an auto shop. Well, before calling police. Yes, but also no. So, this is where
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things get a little messy. So, the police were technically told about the car before it was moved. Like, the
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witness who actually found it called the police in Orangeberg County where the car was, granted, and he is now calling
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Dorchester County, right, where the Boyds and the McCords live. And that makes sense. Like, why would
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the witness call a different county? Like, they don't know, right? They're here in Orangeburg. They're
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going to call Orangeburg, right? So, when Orangeburg County police ran the car's registration, John is
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listed as the owner. And lucky for John, Lieutenant Martin with Orangeburg County
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is his buddy. So, Lieutenant Martin just called John up and like, "Hey, your car's here." And the two of them
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basically like drove out and moved it together. So, like, on one hand, what the hell people,
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right? Like, let's just hold up a minute and take stock of the situation. On the
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other, you have a police lieutenant agreeing to help move the car. Like if you're John, like so John probably
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thought it was okay to do. Yeah. And I mean I assume John told Lieutenant Martin that he hasn't seen
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his wife since she drove away in that car now that they're finding it abandoned. Right.
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I don't know how much Lieutenant Martin knows right off the bat. The officers that we talked to believe that
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Lieutenant Martin honestly just thought he was helping a friend move his car and
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that he didn't learn about Linda being missing until after they had already moved it. But anyways, they claim that
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the reason they took the car to the auto shop is because once they got into it, they discovered that a freeze plug had
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popped out of the engine, which can happen when a car is sitting out in the cold for a while and like the water
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inside the engine freezes. And if that happens, like a car might run for a little while, but eventually the engine
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is going to die. And what month did you say this happened in? This is April of 87 in South Carolina,
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so it's like it's not the summer months. I did look it up and while it was cold that night, it was like around 39
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degrees. We know water freezes at 32. So like question marks. I don't know. Here we are. And this is
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where the investigation really begins. Police go down to the auto shop and they bring the state law enforcement division
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or sled to process the car. But it looks pretty unremarkable. I mean, there's nothing broken or torn. There's no
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traces of blood or anything to suggest foul play. And even if there was evidence to find that was invisible to
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the naked eye, like fingerprints or something, by now there are a few people besides Lieutenant Martin and I'm
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assuming John or whatever, who have been in the car, like mechanics, whatever. Right. So, since that's no longer a
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viable lead, that's where their work on the car seems to stop. An officer we spoke to said that police never actually
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went under the car to see what was wrong with it. He just remembers someone, possibly Lieutenant Martin, telling him
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about the freeze plug being the issue. And then another a different officer remembered potentially seeing a photo of
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the plug, but never actually checked out the engine either or even talked directly to a mechanic, it seems. So,
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with the car being a bit of a bust, police turn back to the area that it was found in. That place where all the
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highways came together. This place is called Wells Crossroads, and it's pretty remote. Now, there is a church and a
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Department of Transportation office there, but they would have been closed by the time the trio was driving back
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from that concert, which would have been at around 10:30 p.m. So, do they know by
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this point that the women actually made it to the concert? Like, people saw them.
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I don't know if they they know that just yet because they're still like literally
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just checking out the area where the car was found, but they do confirm that the
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trio made it to the concert pretty early in the investigation. I'll actually come
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back to that, I promise. But for now, there is no sign of them in this area anywhere. Like, if they had walked to
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get help after their car broke down, you would think there would be something for
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them to see. So, police aren't sure what to make of this without knowing what actually brought Linda, Sarah, and
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Kimberly to Wells Crossroads. They first want to talk to witnesses, and they start with John. Not just because he
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found the car and reported the trio missing, but because this is a small community where everybody knows
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everybody, which means everybody knows everybody's business, even police. And according to an officer we spoke to,
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police already knew a thing or two about John. The officer we talked to remembers
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police being called to Jon and Linda's house for what he described as a domestic dispute on more than one
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occasion. And he remembers Linda filing at least one police report against Jon accusing him of domestic violence. And
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while the officer doesn't remember exactly what was in that report, and don't worry, I fully offered to look for
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them, but our foyer was denied. Wamp wamp. Linda's family filled in some of the blanks for us about her marriage to
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John. John and Linda met at a picnic and they hit it off really fast. I mean, like, they got married within a year.
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But Linda's family told us that Linda was someone who sought out friendships with who her family describes as the
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wrong people. And from the jump, to them, Jon was the wrong people. Like bad vibes right off the bat. he didn't like
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being challenged by women and implied that he liked Linda because she was kind of meek. And Linda's family felt like
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they saw Linda less and less and less over the about 10 years that the couple was married, at least until recently,
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because not long before she went missing, Linda and John actually had to move in with Linda's mom because their
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house had burned down in a mysterious fire that I would love to know more about, but like again, could not get a
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ton of information on. Okay. Yeah, I have questions, too. So, I don't know if John was on better
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behavior while they were living there. Linda's mom has passed away, so we couldn't ask her, but I doubt it because
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we heard from one of Linda's cousins that the last time she spoke to Linda on the phone, Linda sounded really scared.
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And she confided in her that Jon was abusive and had threatened to kill her multiple times. Linda's cousin also said
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that Jon allegedly put a gun to Linda's head once to make her lay her head on her pillow and then he tore her hair
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out. Oh my god. Another one of Linda's cousins remembers a time when Linda came over with a black eye. Both cousins told
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Linda to leave Jon, but she was afraid of leaving Jon. And on top of everything going on, Jon allegedly would often
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follow her when she left the house. And listen, her cousin hadn't even known that Linda ever reported the abuse
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because she barely opened up to her own family about it. So, I can't imagine how
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bad it must have gotten for her to finally go to police. So, police go into their interview with John knowing all of
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that. But he seems willing to talk, at least initially. He talks to them for almost an hour, giving them a rundown of
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everything he did the night that Linda went missing. He says that he got home from a job laying concrete at around
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7:30 p.m. and then he noticed that Linda wasn't home yet. So then after that he went Wait, how did he know that she left
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at 6:30 to pick up Sarah and Kimberly if he wasn't home then? He was still at work at 7:30.
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He was based on what I can put together. I think he was going off of what she told him her plan was. I don't think
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he's saying that he saw them leave. But anyway, so he got home after work and he sees that she isn't there. So he
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says he goes back out to a store, buys some beers, which he drinks in his truck to just kill time and relax, and then he
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apparently drove all around at night looking for Linda. Does he go home at any point or does he
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drink beers and just know she's missing his wife is missing and goes out drunk driving looking for her?
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If he goes home, he does not mention that to police. So he's that worried. But oh, by the
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way, doesn't report her missing for another full day. Right. Correct. Okay. Now, an officer remembers him claiming
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he didn't call police right away because he thought Linda would come home eventually,
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which like doesn't like drive. I I get, but then why are you driving around looking for her immediately?
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Yeah. Like both things can't be true. I know. And listen, he's like, listen, she left me before to stay with friends
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after we fought, but she always came back. And he's not saying that there was any kind of fight in this instance, but
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just that like Linda was known to stay with friends happened before, right? So I just am assuming she's gonna
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come home, which again to your point is like wait, which version is true? Yeah. And all of this is verified by
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by no one. Cool. Yeah. Because he says he is alone all night. So in his mind, nothing's really wrong
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until her car is found abandoned. Well, not even then, cuz he said that the idea
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she was at a friend's house was still something that he was considering when he came across the car, which really
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doesn't make sense to me because why would she just leave her car at this crossroads? And hi, there is still no
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sign of her or the two other people she went missing with. That That's what I was just about to say. Like, I can see
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her trying to leave him. Like, that's I understand that. like you got to take any out you can get. But it doesn't make
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any sense that Sarah and Kimberly would be missing two. I know. And here's the thing. At the
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time there was this rumor going around that maybe both women ran away from their husbands, but like there's not
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quite the same history in Sarah's marriage to really give that rumor weight. We actually talked to her family
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about her marriage to her husband Philillip and we learned that I mean the two had known each other forever. Their
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families were close. I mean, the pair had even grown up basically next door to one another. They were childhood
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sweethearts who eventually got married. And Kimberly was Sarah's pride and joy. And from what we heard, Sarah seemed to
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be really happy before she and Kimberly went missing. But one of her sisters did
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mention feeling like there was some tension in her marriage to Philillip. Not any type of abuse, but like that
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maybe something closer to emotional distancing and that Philillip, this person said, could be cold.
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Mhm. But Tiffany remembers her uncle Philillip as a firm person, like in his tone of voice, but she said that to her
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he had this like huge heart underneath it all. Now, all that being said about their relationship leading up to Sarah's
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disappearance, there was something off about the way Philip acted after one of Linda's cousins, who by the way was
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actually a distant relative of Phillips. Like I told you, small town, she told us about an incident that stood
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out to her in the days after the three went missing. She said that Philip seemed almost dismissive when another
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family member was trying to give him advice on how to help the investigation. And he basically just said that well
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sometimes women just like go off. And Linda's cousin describes everyone's jaw kind of like being on the floor when he
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said that. And he doesn't even talk to law enforcement until 3 or 4 days after Sarah and Kimberly go missing. Though to
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be fair, I don't know if they were like beating down his door trying to get to him. Cuz while it does seem like Philip
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drags his feet on working with law enforcement, he does look to them for help eventually. I mean, he stops
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authorities on the street, in the grocery store, anywhere he can find them, asking for updates on the case.
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So, even if he wasn't a super emotional person in general, it does become clear to people like he seems devastated by
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this. And in fairness to him, I can see how him saying they'll come back could be
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like wishful thinking or denial on his part. Like I don't like he has to believe that or it's just like too much
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to carry like losing your wife and your daughter. Like that's your whole family,
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right? I don't know how I would process. I can I can see myself being like well sometimes this happens some maybe I
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missed something. Maybe they're you want them to be alive and out there, right? Yeah. Okay. So I'm still trying to wrap
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my head around this. If Linda's family is distantly related to Philillip, does that mean that Jon and Philip like know
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each other? They they do. And actually more than just like through dis this distant
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family connection, both of them actually worked at the same cement plant together. And I listen, I know what
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you're thinking. I knew where this was going. Like very strangers on a train situation, but like simplified. Two guys
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work together. Both possibly having issues in their marriages. Both wives go missing. Both saying they'll probably
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turn up. Could they have been in on it together? Well, the investigators we talked to all
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told us that they were never as suspicious of Philillip as they were of John. And maybe that's partly because of
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the lack of documented physical abuse and maybe because Philip agreed to take a polygraph and passed a polygraph.
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Though, interesting tidbit we heard from Sarah's family. They say that he got a passing grade, but he did fail one
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question, which was about whether or not he was having an affair. We obviously asked law enforcement about this, but
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they wouldn't confirm that with us. So, if there was an affair, they would not talk about it. Maybe no one even talked
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about it to him. Maybe there was no affair. I don't know. But police feel like they know Philillip isn't their
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guy. And they rule him out entirely early on in the investigation after they search both the cement plant and a dump
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site that he works at. And they don't find anything incriminating. And so while Philillip is over there being Mr.
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Cooperative, Jon is clamming up and doing himself no favors. Police make it clear to him that he is a suspect and
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taking a polygraph would be in his best interest so that they can clear him and move on. But John says, "No way, not
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now, not ever, especially not after the last time he took one." John tells police there was another
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incident that he got caught up in where he agreed to take a polygraph. Now, he says in this case he was innocent. TBD
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what was poly results and what was cold hard facts but he wound up being found guilty and the officer we talked to
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remembered that it was related to some kind of vehicle theft or something of that nature in Orangeberg County but we
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couldn't get those case files and nothing like that appears in John's court records so I don't know and listen
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I know crime junkie life rule number four is never take a polygraph but this is the latest in a long list of reasons
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why John's looking really sus to police. If he's not talking and he's not taking
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the poly, they're going to need something else on him if they want to try and prove that he's their guy. So,
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they spend a lot of time really trying to nail down the trio's last movements the day they went missing. So, Linda's
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mom tells police she saw Linda earlier the day that she went missing, actually in the same parking lot of the school
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where the gospel concert would be that night. And when she saw her, Linda was talking to somebody in a beat up blue
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car and it was a car that she didn't recognize. And then we know that Tiffany confirmed she saw Linda and her car in
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the driveway when Linda came to pick Sarah and Kimberly up. So, we know she's okay after talking to whoever that was
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in the blue car. But like, sure would be good if police could find whoever was in
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that blue car. So, Linda picks up Sarah and Kimberly around 6:30 p.m. and all of
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them take off for the gospel concert. Like I told you earlier, we know they made it. Police interview witnesses who
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were there at the concert, who saw the trio, but no one seemed to report anything out of the ordinary about them.
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But somehow a rumor comes up that maybe one of the missing women possibly had a thing with someone in the gospel choir.
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But according to Linda's family, when we talked to them, that might have come from John's own jealousy. I guess he
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hated that Linda went to see gospel quartets, which were made up of two men and two women, because that meant she
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was around other men, God forbid. And it sounds bananas because that is bananas, you guys. But Linda's family
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found out just how deep Jon's jealousy ran when they discovered yearbooks of Linda's. M.
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So, I guess in pictures of her with dates to like school dances or whatever, John had fully scratched out the men's
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faces. Woof. Like, that is not cool, John. I know. And everyone we talked to was
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clear that they don't believe there's any truth to the rumors of like extrammarital romances or whatever. And
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like again, this is a John thing. This seems like a John thing. But to go back to the timeline, so after the
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concert ended, the three piled into Linda's car to head home. There is a couple who actually sees Linda's car
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later on on the highway headed back toward Dorchester County. This couple is a preacher and his wife who knew Linda.
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They knew Sarah. They went to the very same concert they were all just at. Well, guess what they notice? They see
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Linda's car and they see an old beat up blue car following Linda's car. And it all stands out because the cars weren't
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traveling at a normal speed. Both were driving really slowly, which makes sense if Linda's engine was overheating
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because of the freeze plug popping out. But here's the kicker. The couple couldn't tell who was actually driving
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the car. So, while we see Linda's car, this isn't necessarily the last sighting of the
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trio, just the last sighting of the car, the car that they were in, right? There's just one more sighting of
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Linda's car after this. This is a sighting of the car sitting empty at the Wells Crossroads the next day. So, this
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is now Saturday at 1000 p.m. So, police realize that Linda's car must have been sitting there for at least 10 hours
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before it gets found by that witness and then moved by John and the lieutenant. And then now there's this 24-hour window
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between them leaving the concert and then the car even being spotted there abandoned where we don't know where they
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are or even really where the car was. So, the theories it's like uh help gone wrong. They have car trouble and whoever
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was inside this beat up blue car who Linda apparently might kind of maybe know or at least like met before because
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her mom saw her talking to someone in the car earlier like is helping them and then something
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like takes a turn or their car broke down on the side of the road and the wrong person stumbled upon them.
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Right. I mean, to me, those theories make way more sense than them just running off, which is like without car.
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Yeah. Yeah. But there might actually be another theory. So, one officer dropped a bomb
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on us. And this is the part that has never been reported before. Even the family didn't know this when we
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interviewed them. Apparently, there were some additional witnesses from the gospel concert who reported seeing a man
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who kind of like walked in and just hung around the back of the room for a few minutes before leaving again. And the
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officer remembers that the description of this man matched John McCord. And when I found this out, a story that the
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family told us just like clicked into place for me. Like one time, I guess Linda's relatives say that she caught
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John in a parking lot under Linda's car tampering with the engine so that he could play hero by like fixing the
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problem so she could get back home. I'm sorry, what? I know. My eyes were like popping out of
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my head when I heard this. So, when you put that story together with the sighting of someone who looked like John
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and then what Linda's family told us about him following Linda places, this potential other theory of like what
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could have happened starts to emerge and starts to make sense to me. Yeah, this is like classic stalker
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behavior. I know. But without witnesses being able to confirm that John was that guy at the
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back of the concert or that he was the guy driving the beat up blue car, there still is no concrete evidence directly
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pointing to John or anyone for that matter. What kind of car does John drive? So, police and family that we spoke to
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said that it was a green pickup truck that he drove, but I don't know if he had access to other cars. I mean, I know
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he worked at a dealership at one point in his life. Also, did he have a friend or like, you know, again, did he have
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access? I don't know. And as far as I can tell, police never connect him to a beat up old blue car. Now, by now in the
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investigation, it's been almost 3 weeks since Linda, Sarah, and Kimberly have gone missing, and the investigation is
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hitting wall after wall. So, Linda's and Sarah's moms meet for the first time to try and share
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information. Linda and Sarah had gone to elementary school together, but they lost touch at like before reconnecting
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as adults. So like these two moms, while they were again small town, might know who each other are, they don't know each
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other super well before this. And so they kind of exchange what they're hearing from police, they try and stay
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in contact because all they really have to go on is what they're able to find out themselves.
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Especially because Orangeberg County isn't doing much to help with the investigation. Even though Linda's car
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was found there, like by that point, the 3 week mark, there hadn't even been an official search of the Wells Crossroads
00:25:07
area. What I know and like looking back, some family members wonder if Sarah, Kimberly, and Linda, who were black,
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they wonder if they had been white, would there have been more resources, more news coverage, more pressure to get
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something done quicker? Different skin color, different access to resources. These are like real things
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that there are very real statistics about. I know. And some of the family are clear
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that their criticism is for Orangeberg County even more than Dorchester County. But either way, like things are just not
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moving at this point. So, the family and those close to them push even harder, pressuring law enforcement every way
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they can. So, that search of Wells Crossroads finally happens on April 26th, three long weeks after they went
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missing. But after hours of searching, nothing is found except for a few marijuana fields, which police do look
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into. Like maybe they came across these fields when they got lost, then something happened. Like were they in
00:26:08
the wrong place at the wrong time? Came across the wrong person or weed farmer, whatever. But like that doesn't go
00:26:13
anywhere either. And to me, like that boils down to like it doesn't make sense for them to be in that area in the first
00:26:18
place. So once again, the investigation hits a wall. The next thing that moves it is
00:26:24
Dorchester County police get an anonymous phone call that leads to them searching a completely different area.
00:26:34
This anonymous caller urges police to check out a local racetrack where he claims the women and Kimberly were
00:26:41
murdered. Now, what he says exactly, police are keeping under wraps like still to this day. But even then, they
00:26:48
told local media that the caller had information that only someone with close knowledge of the case would have,
00:26:55
whatever that might be. So, the first weekend in May, just a week out from the last search, 75 people, police and
00:27:02
volunteers, scour 50 acres around that said racetrack. But again, they come up empty-handed. Police hold out hope that
00:27:11
maybe this tipster will call again. and like maybe they just didn't have enough information or the right information or
00:27:15
whatever, but as far as we know, that never happens. So, where is this racetrack and are
00:27:23
there any like specific ties to like suspects or other theories? I mean, this racetrack is in Dorchester
00:27:29
County like where like they live and stuff, but if there's any ties to a specific person or suspect or whatever,
00:27:35
like we weren't told about that. Now, after this, smaller searches go on for another month. Police even bring in
00:27:42
an FBI plane with radar capabilities. Like the radar can help find buried bodies in like the woods and swamps and
00:27:48
stuff, but even then nothing. Okay, so this case sounded so familiar to me and I could not put my finger on
00:27:54
it until you mentioned searching for bodies in woods and swamps. Didn't we talk about this case in another episode
00:28:01
where a mom and daughter disappeared in like the same place? This is how I found this case.
00:28:06
Okay. Karina Malinowski and Annette Sagers. that's the case that you're thinking of.
00:28:10
So, like just so people know, the short version of that case is that it's another mother and young daughter who go
00:28:16
missing in the Low Country. This is just a few months after Sarah, Kimberly, and
00:28:19
Linda. They lived about 45 minutes away. And we actually did ask officers about whether
00:28:25
they ever thought these cases were connected. They said they looked into that possibility, but they didn't find
00:28:30
anything to suggest any kind of connection. And if I remember correctly, uh the connection sounds like like awful
00:28:37
husbands show up in both cases, but like that's kind of it. That's kind of it. Yeah. So like there
00:28:41
is a strong suspect in that other case, Crime Junkies. I'll link out to the episode if you want to hear it. The one
00:28:46
that it's in is the episode Missing from a Bus Stop. But back to Sarah, Kimberly,
00:28:50
and Linda. Not connected to that case or any other case. And all roads are dead ends. As the years go on, their families
00:28:59
feel the chances of finding their loved ones alive slowly starts to slip away. But what's even worse is that there are
00:29:05
so many leads they feel have gone uninvestigated by police. Leads that police claim they haven't even heard
00:29:12
about until recently. Like Linda's family told us about something that Linda's mom remembered about the night
00:29:20
Linda went missing. something that she was too scared to share with police before she died in 1989 because she was
00:29:27
too terrified of John. So, if you remember, Linda and John were living with her that Linda's mom after that
00:29:33
mysterious housefire. So, the morning after Linda had gone missing, Linda's mom saw John and a nephew of his come
00:29:41
through her front door at around 6:30 a.m. Both of them were super sweaty with like mud all over their work boots. And
00:29:50
she was like a very like super tidy person, so she noticed it. And I bet she wasn't even happy about it, right? But
00:29:57
she also didn't think much of it at the time because they did work in construction.
00:30:02
But remember, John told police that he was alone all night, right? And so if he had nothing to hide, why
00:30:09
didn't he just tell them that he was with his nephew? Especially because having a witness to
00:30:14
back up your story, an alibi, like that just helps you. I know. Okay. When did they finally hear about
00:30:21
this? So, according to police, it wasn't until Linda's family shared it with a journalist, Mel Orleans. U Mel had done
00:30:28
some reporting on this case for ABC News 4 in 2024. Was everyone else just too scared to say
00:30:34
anything after her mom had passed? Like, that's such a long time. Well, I mean, I
00:30:39
think that they probably had some of the same fears that like Linda's mom did. Like I don't know also how much they
00:30:46
felt like police could even help because like after she was gone, right, everything's hearsay, right? And by the
00:30:54
way, the thing I haven't told you or maybe you've picked up on there might be all the reason in the world not to have
00:30:59
gone right to police with this. You see, at some point down the line when the case really starts to go cold, Linda's
00:31:06
family brings in a PI, this retired sled agent that they know. They're trying to
00:31:10
see if he can like track anything down. M and they told us that the private investigator had reasons to believe that
00:31:18
John was allegedly a police informant. And the PI believed that Jon would allegedly buy alcohol, sell it to
00:31:26
underage kids before they went out to the local clubs and bars, and then he reported their underage drinking so that
00:31:32
those kids would get arrested. Uh, didn't you just describe entrapment? Basically,
00:31:38
it definitely has that air of enttrapment. Yeah. And it's like it's messed up any way you
00:31:43
slice it if it's true. Now, that PI has since died, so beyond what the family told us, like we couldn't verify this.
00:31:50
But both families feel that John seemed to be protected by law enforcement specifically in Orangeberg or like he
00:31:57
just seemed untouchable there, which by the way, we started this episode being like his friend, Lieutenant Martin at
00:32:02
Orangeberg, who called him up was like, "Your car is here." So, while it feels to them like Jon is being protected,
00:32:08
Sarah's family told us that they continued to have their own strange encounters with Jon in the years after
00:32:15
the disappearances. One of Sarah's sisters says that she saw Jon following her home in his car one
00:32:22
day. Another day, she claimed that he walked through her backyard. And they feel like his behavior, it felt
00:32:29
threatening, like his way of intimidating them into not looking any deeper. Oh, and want one more reason
00:32:34
Sarah's family never came forward. So, get this. The day Sarah's mom went back to work as a seamstress after Sarah and
00:32:43
Kimberly disappeared, this woman in the sewing room all of a sudden like burst into tears when she saw her, telling her
00:32:51
that she knew something that she couldn't tell her or quote unquote they'd kill her. What? Now, Sarah's mom
00:32:59
like pleaded with this woman to tell her something, anything that would lead her
00:33:03
to her daughter or her granddaughter, but the woman would not say anything. And the wildest part of this story is
00:33:10
that Sarah's mom says that John was the one who picked this lady up from work that day and then she never saw this
00:33:17
woman again. Okay, I was going to ask who they are, but I think we just answered that
00:33:23
question. What? I know. For real. Is this like another missing woman? Do we know who she is?
00:33:29
I don't know that because Sarah's living family doesn't remember her name. Police
00:33:33
didn't know anything about this until the ABC 4 story came out either in 2024. I know. And the problem is Sarah's mom
00:33:40
has passed away. She died in 2016. So, I don't know. I'm still trying to dig and
00:33:44
look and like ask questions. Like again, for a small community, you would think that we should have a name of this, but
00:33:49
like I don't know if anyone out there listening knows. Would love to hear from you like if this is real.
00:33:54
Yeah. But all in all, I mean, you can see it seems like everyone in this community was just so scared of Jon that
00:34:00
they were terrified to cross him. So for Sarah's family, like this is another lead that like seems promising, but they
00:34:07
don't feel like it went anywhere. Although again, I don't know that police knew to look at it
00:34:12
right now. Things went kind of silent for a while. There's like a very small blip in
00:34:18
the case in 1990. A weird one though because in 1990 police get alerted that Sarah's credit
00:34:26
card had been used at a local mall. But when they pull the signature from the receipt, it's like indecipherable. So
00:34:33
they can't use it to find the person who actually swiped the card. Okay. But like it's the '9s. Security
00:34:40
cameras existed in stores. I know they did. And they actually had some. But like back then I mean they're
00:34:46
they were garbage. You know what I mean? They're barely not garbage now. I know.
00:34:50
So, when they did look at him, they tried to pull it. They at least did their due diligence. But Sarah's sister
00:34:54
says that police could tell that the person who used the card was a woman and she used the card to buy luggage. But
00:35:00
like that's that's it. And listen, Sarah's family can't help but I don't know, wonder or hope that the woman
00:35:08
might actually have been Sarah, right? And it to me it's kind of weird that it would be like 1990 like 3 years
00:35:19
of nothing and then this card just pops up and and gets used for like the first time in that long
00:35:25
for it to be her. I know like well her or not her like I was surprised it was even still active.
00:35:30
I was actually going to mention that or like not expired. I I think that they probably kept it
00:35:35
active just in case someone did use it, right? Like I like that I don't know if I told you this, but their purses and
00:35:41
stuff were missing from the car. So I kind of wondered if it wasn't her, maybe the purses wound up somewhere, you know,
00:35:46
maybe they were found, maybe they were donated, discarded, whatever, and then someone comes across it. So say it gets
00:35:51
donated years later someone buys it. They're like, "Oh my god, a credit card inside." Like
00:35:55
what would happen if I used it? The fact that it's a local mall, too, though makes me Would she really just be like
00:36:00
buying luggage now if she was running away 3 years later? Like for her for it to be her just seems kind of
00:36:07
unimaginable, right? And I I guess it depends on the reason she's gone. If she if if she
00:36:12
quote unquote left, but listen like whoever it was that used the card, that person never comes forward to clear this
00:36:19
up. I don't know if police went to the public with this lead. Like it wasn't in any of the reporting that we saw before
00:36:26
like around 2023. So listen, I don't know. It might be worth a call out now. I'm no legal expert, but the statute of
00:36:32
limitations on credit card fraud has to be up. So, if you are out there watching
00:36:36
and you used Sarah Boyd's car to buy luggage in 1990 at a South Carolina mall, like I don't know, you might have
00:36:43
the missing piece to this puzzle. It might seem insignificant to you, but like where you got the card could be
00:36:49
incredibly meaningful. Come forward to police. I'll have the contact information at the end of the show. But
00:36:54
until she comes forward, if she ever does, like Maul Woman is kind of a bust and it would be another decade before
00:37:00
Sarah's family gets another rush of hope. This is in like 2001 or 2002. And this is another like really weird blip.
00:37:10
A man claiming to be an FBI agent knocks on Sarah's mom's door, telling her that
00:37:17
he's gone undercover to investigate Jon, and he is going to help them find out what happened to Sarah and Kimberly once
00:37:24
and for all. Then 2 weeks later, this man comes back to Sarah's mom's house, this time with a woman he says is his
00:37:31
wife. And during that visit, he drops a bombshell. According to Tiffany, the man tells Sarah's mom
00:37:43
that one night he sat around a fire with John and a few other people. Everyone was drinking and John made a confession
00:37:52
that he quote killed two birds with one stone. Now, we don't know what that vague statement means, but this guy goes
00:37:59
on to say that John said he killed Sarah first and then he tortured Linda for a long time before finally killing her.
00:38:07
But the thing is, he never said anything about killing Kimberly. So, he drops this bomb on her, on Sarah's mom,
00:38:14
telling her that her daughter and possibly her granddaughter are gone. And then the man's like, "Okay, listen.
00:38:20
We're going to come back to you as soon as we make an arrest." Like, basically, it almost feels like a heads up.
00:38:25
Mhm. So, they leave her a business card and they take off. But here's the thing.
00:38:30
Tiffany told us that when she called the number on the card a week later because
00:38:36
she hadn't heard anything, it was just like a busy tone on the other end. And when the family checked with Doorchester
00:38:44
and Orangeberg PD, neither had any idea who those people were that showed up. I mean, okay, okay,
00:38:54
my head is spinning. Like, who were these people? What did they look like? Did they look official? Like and also
00:39:01
like obviously this feels super hoaxy, right? But like but yeah, like but what's the point? What's the end goal of
00:39:09
of doing this? And to go there twice and then come back with an additional person and leave a card. Like
00:39:16
I wish it was this was stuff that they had like kept. I mean, not that we could even do anything with it now,
00:39:20
but like but it's like so much work has to go into like making that feel official and coming back multiple times
00:39:26
and like again years later. Yeah, I don't get it. But obviously the arrest that the family had been waiting for and
00:39:35
that they were promised that never comes, right? Police indicated to us that to this day they think Jon likely had
00:39:43
something to do with the trio's disappearance, but there just was never enough evidence to charge him. Though in
00:39:49
the years since the disappearances, John has faced other charges. In 1988, he was
00:39:55
charged with pointing firearms at a person. And in 1993, he was charged with assault and battery. But the chance of
00:40:02
getting real answers in regards to John's possible involvement becomes slimmer because in 2018, he died.
00:40:11
That doesn't mean the end of the line, though. If anything, I feel like people should finally feel safer coming forward
00:40:18
with information. Yeah, they might because in June 2020, police actually get a tip. A caller tells them that
00:40:25
Sarah, Kimberly, and Linda's bodies might be buried in concrete, specifically concrete that John laid for
00:40:31
a house in Santi, which is about 8 miles from Wells Crossroads. And this isn't the first time that police have followed
00:40:38
a tip about concrete. I mean, they had searched one of Linda's cousins house early on in the investigation because
00:40:44
Jon laid concrete there, but they originally found nothing. And then this tip leads them to search a house that
00:40:50
once belonged to one of Jon's family members, but it's not clear exactly who that person was. When the new owners
00:40:57
decide to renovate, police get permission to demolish the place, tear apart the concrete that John laid. But 3
00:41:04
days of hard work passes, and sadly, once again, nothing is found. Have police tried getting to that nephew who
00:41:12
came in all muddy with John? Allegedly. allegedly. I know. So, here's the thing.
00:41:19
So, the family has a theory about which nephew this could be, but they're not 100% sure. And remember, this
00:41:27
information came out not until 2024. And Linda's mom was already gone by the time
00:41:32
it came out, and she's the one who who had the encounter. And Orangeberg County Sheriff's Office
00:41:36
didn't respond to our multiple requests for an interview. So, I couldn't even ask them. And the officers we did speak
00:41:42
to all formally with Doorchester. They're long retired now. But even though he retired earlier this year,
00:41:48
former Dorchester County Sheriff Elsie Knight told us that he still investigates this case on his own time
00:41:55
because to him, it is far from cold. But over the years, these disappearances have gone from a community tragedy to a
00:42:03
literal small town ghost story. Sarah's nephew told us these days locals speed through Wells Crossroads at night
00:42:10
because they've heard about sightings of a person standing in the road who disappears as you drive closer. A person
00:42:17
locals believe is Sarah or Linda. But for these two families, this case is more than a ghost story. I mean, it is
00:42:24
very real and it does haunt them day in and day out. Linda's family believes it's unlikely that an arrest will be
00:42:30
made in this case now. It's been too long. But they also believe that someone out there knows what happened that night
00:42:36
in 1987. And they want whoever that is to know that Linda, Sarah, and Kimberly were human beings with family who loved
00:42:44
them. Families who have never stopped looking for them. According to Tiffany, Philillip has stayed close to Sarah's
00:42:50
family over the years, making sure that they knew he never forgot them or Sarah or especially Kimberly, the daughter
00:42:56
that he never got to see grow up. Tiffany is grown up now and she's had to live almost four decades without her
00:43:01
aunt and her cousin and she finds herself thinking about how their lives would have turned out. Tiffany said she
00:43:08
is sure someone out there can give them closure and she told us that person needs to put themselves in her family's
00:43:14
shoes. How would you feel if this was your loved one? She knows that John terrified a lot of people, but he's gone
00:43:21
now. He can't hurt anyone anymore. But Sarah, Kimberly, and Linda's families have not been able to lay them to rest.
00:43:29
So, if someone out there knows something or has any information about Sarah or Kimberly or Linda's case, you can
00:43:37
contact the Doorchester County Sheriff's Office at 843832300. You can find all the source material for
00:43:48
this episode on our website, crimejunkpodcast.com. And you can follow us on Instagram,
00:43:53
CrimeJunk podcast. We'll be back next week with a brand new episode. [Music]