00:00:00
Hey, weirdos. I'm Ash. I'm Elena. She's back. I'm back. And this [clears throat]
00:00:05
is Morbid. This is Morbid. >> [music] >> Oh, I'm >> Are you alive? I'm alive. I'm alive. We
00:00:23
made it through. [music] We just had one of those things that, you know, the stomach bug. It just rolls
00:00:29
right through. And then it paused and came back, [music] which is really [ __ ] It paused before it hit the last
00:00:34
of us and then it hit the last of us. Then we cleared it on out. >> That's [ __ ]
00:00:39
>> goodbye. Glad you cleared it out though. I appreciate that. >> We made it through, but man, everybody
00:00:44
wash your hands. >> Wash your hands. Make sure your kids are washing their hands as much as possible.
00:00:49
I know sometimes that doesn't do it, but trust me cuz we're a hand-washing house.
00:00:54
At least it's getting hot out again. Like does I feel like when it's hot viruses they don't do as well. Don't
00:00:59
thrive. Well, not some of them do, but I don't know if this one does. >> like tummy bugs don't necessarily
00:01:04
>> one thrives in like cold weather I think the best. >> Yeah, which of course it's literally
00:01:08
about to get cold again. Of course. Like hotter than Satan's butt hole outside. >> It's true.
00:01:14
I got to announce this solo and it didn't quite feel so right. So we just want to remind you one more time that we
00:01:19
have a game. We have a [ __ ] game with Hunt A Killer. >> This feels so much better that you're
00:01:26
here and we can talk about it together. >> I'm really excited. It's nuts cuz I was
00:01:30
saying when I announced it, that was our first sponsor that we ever had on the pod.
00:01:35
>> They were the first ones that reached out. >> Hunt A Killer. I was always a big Hunt A
00:01:40
Killer girly and I'm being so for real. I need I should find the boxes somewhere
00:01:45
like the early boxes and it was when they came in those like black plain boxes. >> Yep. In the early days me and John used
00:01:51
to love them especially like before we had kids. >> Oh, yeah. We loved that kind of thing.
00:01:55
>> That's really cute. You played games together? >> Yeah, we loved games. >> Me and Drew are really good
00:01:59
>> games. The only games that me and Drew play are like Mario Kart. Yeah, we love
00:02:02
Mario Kart, too. >> Mario Kart. We're we're an equal opportunity game family. >> board game house, but I would like to
00:02:07
become a board game house. >> are really fun with kids. >> just playing a board game with your kid.
00:02:12
Yeah. Yeah, I got that like reading board game. >> Yeah, it was helping me. I was learning
00:02:15
how to read. There you go. Good. I'm glad. >> [laughter] >> But yeah, um we're [ __ ] stoked about
00:02:22
the Salem Slicer. Salem Slicer. It's very 80s themed. It's very New England. >> It's Salem, obviously.
00:02:30
>> It's very like a fake true crimey. Mhm. Uh you're going to There's a special exclusive podcast episode in the game
00:02:39
from us. >> cool is that? Uh which is really fun and it was really fun to do. They've been great to work with. We had
00:02:45
a blast. We were part of the whole thing from beginning to end. I know it's crazy
00:02:49
that it's actually like hitting stores now. Cuz it's been It's been a while. >> It's been a while. And it's just like if
00:02:55
you ever wanted to be a detective, now you get to do so. >> It is, honestly. Hunt A Killer is so fun
00:03:00
that way. It had There's like real evidence in there. There's things you can touch, things you have to
00:03:06
unlock, things like it you really have to get into it. It's fun as hell, I'm telling you.
00:03:11
>> through all the evidence. So, right now it's available for pre-order at Walmart.
00:03:16
So, definitely go pre-order it, please. Do it. And do we have any other biz nasty, Big Red?
00:03:24
>> Um biz nasty, I would say uh hey, if you're looking for a signed copy of The Butcher Legacy, speaking of
00:03:30
pre-orders, speaking of pre-orders, >> Hey. uh go to Premier Collectibles. I have the the link is on my Instagram.
00:03:38
Um go click it. Premier Collectibles. I'm sure if you type in The Butcher Legacy on there, it'll come up. Um I'm
00:03:45
signing things for them, signing copies, and I will continue until you guys say,
00:03:51
"Hey, you dumb [ __ ] we don't want any more signed copies." I doubt people will
00:03:56
say that. I I doubt [laughter] I doubt the true blues will say that. I doubt the good people will say that.
00:04:03
>> I have been reading your book all afternoon and like all I I read like a little bit last week. I was reading it
00:04:10
at a pedicure and I was like I'm probably scaring everybody around me. >> like >> [laughter]
00:04:15
>> There's just blood dripping off the off the cover and people are like, "What are
00:04:18
you reading?" >> What's going on there? Is that okay? It's not okay. But I love it.
00:04:22
>> Yay! >> I Alaina always has me read like when she's writing. So with the first two I
00:04:27
read a lot of chapters before the final product, but I obviously then still read
00:04:33
the books and that was fun and I still loved them. But with this one you didn't have me read as much as you were
00:04:38
writing, so it's like a completely different reading experience. >> I love that. That's so fun.
00:04:43
Cuz I forget the twist. Yeah, that's it. I know you were like, "I know there's a
00:04:46
twist, but I don't know." I'm like, "Ha ha ha." I know. I was like [clears throat] I'm not going to tell
00:04:50
you. >> I know. I was I'm very excited about it. I'm getting very close to the end. I'm
00:04:53
like more than halfway through. I'm very excited. It's I If you guys I'm telling
00:04:58
you get into it, man. Get into it, yeah. >> Get into it. >> Please. It's fun. I swear. I [laughter]
00:05:04
swear. And I'll love you forever. That's nice. >> So make sure you go pre-order The
00:05:08
Butcher's Legacy. And if you search for some reason you're like, "Fuck that, I don't want a signed copy, but I would
00:05:13
like a copy of the book." I get it. For sure. Why not? >> Okay. >> If If you want to do that, go to
00:05:20
butcherslegacy.com and buy it anywhere you want to, really. >> anywhere the [ __ ] you want. You can You
00:05:25
can pre-order it anywhere you want. >> The world is really your oyster. >> It is and I'll and I'll keep making sure
00:05:30
it's your oyster. >> You can't We should be specific. You can't buy it at like an IHOP. No. Or
00:05:34
like a Denny's. >> that's an idea. Okay. Yeah, [laughter] there you go. See if you can talk to
00:05:39
your literary agent about that one. >> to try to get it in anywhere. So International House of Pancakes, here
00:05:44
she comes. >> Here I come. >> [laughter] >> We are slap-happy because this is later.
00:05:50
>> And I feel like we never record this late. >> No, we don't. >> But life happened. Life sure happens.
00:05:56
>> Life has continued to happen. >> Yeah, it keeps on happening. >> I like that life keeps happening.
00:06:00
>> Yeah, that's great. We love that. >> it gets a little crazy. But sometimes it's just hard to fit everything in the
00:06:04
day. All right, everybody. So, look at your stopwatch. The episode's about to start. Okay.
00:06:10
All right, you can say that it's about to start now. >> Okay, there you go. There's your minute
00:06:13
mark. Thanks so much, whoever you are. >> [laughter] >> So, we are going to be talking today.
00:06:18
This is going to be a two-part uh >> A two-part uh >> Two-part uh It is true crime. It's true
00:06:22
crime. >> It's true crime. Yes. >> So, this this is a very tragic case. Very interesting, though, I will say.
00:06:27
>> know this case. I didn't know this case before Dave found this and was telling
00:06:31
me all about it, and I said, "Please do that one." And we started looking into it, and I said, "Whoa, a lot is going on
00:06:37
here." So, we're going to go over a lot in part one. We're going to be talking about Mark Kilroy and who he was and how
00:06:44
he found himself to be missing, and we'll get into right when they're getting hot on the case, but not quite
00:06:52
there yet. And then we'll pick up again in part two. Oh, I love that. So, let's talk about Mark Kilroy first. He was
00:06:57
born on March 5th, 1968 in Chicago, Illinois. >> Chicago. He was the oldest of two
00:07:03
children born to Jim and Helen. And not long after he was born, his parents decided they wanted to leave the
00:07:10
city for a slower pace of life, and they ended up moving to Texas, Santa Fe to be
00:07:14
specific. For his entire life, Mark Kilroy was the kind of kid that parents can only dream
00:07:19
of. Aw. He went to church regularly with his parents. He was an active member of
00:07:23
the community, especially the church community. His father said, "When he was around, he always lifted people up. He
00:07:30
went in the right direction all the time. He was a real good guy to be around." >> Aw. He also was always a good student.
00:07:37
He avoided drinking. He didn't do drugs. When he was in high school, he joined the uh, Santa Fe High School baseball
00:07:43
and the basketball team. And he was involved in student government, he was involved in Boy Scouts, but he always
00:07:50
made sure to spend enough time on his studies at the same time. So, he's like involved in all these different
00:07:55
extracurriculars, but also managing to be a good student at the same time. >> easy. No, it's not. Now, when he
00:08:01
graduated from high school in 1986, he was accepted at Southwest Texas State University, and he had a brief stint
00:08:08
there before he ended up transferring to Tarleton State University, and that was
00:08:12
on a basketball scholarship. Okay. Sports had always played a really big part in his life, but after a few years,
00:08:18
it became clear to him that this wasn't going to be his whole life. Like, he wasn't going to be in the NBA. Yeah. So,
00:08:24
he transferred to a third school, this time the University of Texas, and he ended up deciding to study medicine
00:08:29
there. Oh, wow. That's a big deal. It is. Now, even though their lives had led them separate directions, Mark and his
00:08:36
core group of friends from high school still managed to stay in touch through their college years. And whenever they
00:08:41
were home on school break or anything like that, they always got together. Mhm. Now, in, uh, late winter of 1989,
00:08:47
Mark and his friends Bradley Moore, Bill Huddleston, and Brent Morton started planning details for their spring break
00:08:54
vacation. Okay. They were stoked about this. Yeah, of course. >> As soon as the semester ended, they were
00:08:59
going to be back in or they were going to meet back in Santa Fe and take off together for a few days on South Padre
00:09:05
Island, which is a resort town not too far from the Mexican border. For Mark, that year was more exciting
00:09:12
than the usual spring break trip because it also coincided with his 21st birthday.
00:09:16
>> Oh, what a what a lucky thing. And remember, he didn't really drink or do drugs or anything like that. So, he's 21
00:09:23
now. He can drink for it to be legal. >> can have a little drinky-poo if he wants
00:09:26
to. And what better time to have a drink than spring break? >> Of course. They had all attended spring
00:09:30
break break festivities in South Padre before, but this was the first time that also that Mark and his four high school
00:09:36
best friends were going to be visiting together. So, that was also like an exciting thing.
00:09:40
As soon as Bradley finished up his exams around noon on March 10th, he jumped he
00:09:44
he jumped in his car and jumped in his Itzu. And he drove to Austin to pick up Mark.
00:09:49
And they headed to Santa Fe to meet up with Bill and Brent. Okay. It's also very funny to me that there's Bradley,
00:09:56
Bill. >> Bill, Brent, and Mark. >> Yeah, it's so so >> [laughter] >> Now, along the way they caught up on the
00:10:01
things that they'd missed in each other's lives, about their plans for the future. Just boy talk, just vibing. Just
00:10:07
hanging. Just hanging. Uh Bradley said, "We talked about how it would probably be our last summer at home together."
00:10:12
Aw. Which is like that's really sad. It's sad, but it's also like okay, so like let's make the most of this trip.
00:10:18
Like Yeah. There's a there's like a tension there almost where you know this is like kind of the end of a chapter.
00:10:24
>> Well, it does it feels like one of those like you know those shows or movies you
00:10:28
see where it's like the group of friends and it's their last summer at home before they all head off in different
00:10:33
directions. >> Yeah. And you want it to end well. Like this is supposed to be like, you know, a
00:10:38
summer where you get like you have fun and you you let loose. >> Yeah, it's like supposed to end with
00:10:43
this like happy ending. >> It's supposed to end all together. And I now that you're beginning to talk, I do
00:10:49
know this. >> Okay. Um I do know this. I think we talked about it on Crime Countdown.
00:10:55
You know what? That actually makes sense cuz the name >> I think you're right. The name sounded
00:10:59
really familiar to me. >> Yeah. And all of a sudden I was like, "Wait a minute." We talked about so much
00:11:04
on Crime Countdown and there was like such little bursts of information, like snippets exactly. So, every now and
00:11:10
again I'm like, "Did we talk about Bob?" >> Yeah, I'm like, "Did we do a whole episode on that?" And then I'm like,
00:11:14
"No, we didn't." >> I know, exactly. >> Yeah. So, it was late by the time they reached
00:11:18
Santa Fe, but the four boys decided they didn't want to waste any time. So, they
00:11:22
started making their way to South Padre around midnight. In total it took about 9 hours for them to get there, including
00:11:28
two stops along the way. But, there There no time to rest. As soon as they checked into the hotel, they showered,
00:11:34
they ate, and they hit the beach. Yeah. This is their last trip. They got to make the most of it.
00:11:38
Now, with roughly a quarter of a million students expected at South Padre that spring break, the entire area had been
00:11:45
transformed in anticipation of all these kids' arrivals. According to journalist
00:11:50
Gary Cartwright, the weekend attractions and offerings included beer companies sponsoring an unprecedented variety of
00:11:57
entertainment, including free movies, free concerts, free calls home, Which like please just think about that. Yeah,
00:12:03
which is wild. and surf simulator rides. Religious organizations from as far away
00:12:08
as Madison, Wisconsin, were handing out pamphlets and free suntan lotion urging students to pray rather than to party. A
00:12:15
beer company offered the free use of a swimming pool to students who didn't mind being filmed for part of a
00:12:20
commercial, and the boys took advantage of it. >> Yeah. So, it's just like all kinds of
00:12:24
things going on. >> Yeah, again, it's just like let loose. It reminds me of like [clears throat]
00:12:28
like just that little like snippet reminds me of Saved by the Bell when they go on that
00:12:34
like beach vacation. >> yes. >> Right? >> Yeah. I I for some reason that that episode sticks out of my head. It might
00:12:40
have been a series of episodes. >> It's like Saved by the Bell, and then it made me think of Gilmore Girls when they
00:12:44
go on spring break. I don't even remember that when they go on you It's like You can count on a girl. You can
00:12:49
count on Elena to pinpoint a specific Gilmore Girls reference. >> absolutely. >> Wild.
00:12:54
>> Yeah. So, Mark and Brad took advantage of the free phone calls home, and they let
00:12:58
their parents know that they all had got there safely, and they were just hanging
00:13:01
out on the beach. Later that night, they met up with a group of girls who traveled from Purdue University, and
00:13:07
they just spent the night drinking and hanging out in their joining hotel rooms until dawn, getting to know each other,
00:13:12
just having a good time. Yeah. Within a couple days of their arrival, the four guys had kind of settled into a
00:13:17
routine of waking up early, hitting the beach, going back to their hotel rooms for a little nap before ending or before
00:13:24
starting the evening's round of drinking, like typical vacation. Yeah. Occasionally the routine was interrupted
00:13:30
by an event like the daily Miss Tan Line contest. Miss Tan Line. >> I love it. But for the most part, it was
00:13:35
just a lot of sun, a lot of drinking, a lot of fun. So this was pretty much what
00:13:39
they expected, but none of them had expected it to get old quite so fast. And by Sunday, March 12th, they decided
00:13:46
they wanted to change it up a little bit. Like they were like, "Okay, why don't we go like sightsee? Why don't we
00:13:51
go to Matamoros, Mexico, just over the border? We're so close to Mexico, it would be so fun to travel."
00:13:56
>> Yeah. So that night, Mark and his friends stopped at the Sonic Drive-In in Port Isabel for dinner. There they met a
00:14:02
group of girls from the University of Kansas who were also on their way to Matamoros. So they all decided, "Okay,
00:14:07
let's go together." And the girls followed behind as Brett drove to the border. After parking their cars on the
00:14:13
Brownsville side of the bridge, they all walked across the border into Matamoros,
00:14:16
and they just spent the night kind of bar hopping, and they specifically landed at one bar called Sergeant
00:14:22
Pepper's. Okay. Once they got back to their cars early the next morning, the two groups said their goodbyes, and they
00:14:27
went their separate ways. Now they all had so much fun in Matamoros that night. So after a day at
00:14:33
the beach the next day, they all decided, "Why don't we go back into Mexico again? Like that was so much
00:14:38
fun." Yeah. So they did, and they arrived a little after 10:00 p.m. It turned out that Mark and his friends
00:14:43
were not the only one with that plan though. By the time they arrived in the small border town, the sidewalks were
00:14:48
crammed with nearly 15,000 students. >> Holy [ __ ] All of whom had come to party
00:14:54
and celebrate spring break. So looking for the bar with the shortest line, they ended up at a place called
00:14:59
Los Sombreros, described as a spot with a lot of neon and music loud enough to shatter brick. Woah. Yeah, sounds like
00:15:06
my worst nightmare. >> just going to say I hate everything about that. >> I will say though, if I was 21, dream.
00:15:12
Like let's go. >> Yeah, would have loved it. Now, couldn't pay me. >> Couldn't, no. Music loud enough to
00:15:17
shatter brick is actually so scary to me. Yeah, it actually is. >> [laughter] >> We went to dinner together one time. I
00:15:24
forget where we went, but I just remember sitting down at the table with you and the music was really loud and I
00:15:29
you looked like you were going to crawl inside of yourself. >> was [laughter and gasps]
00:15:34
so I remember that vividly and I know exactly where it was. >> Cuz I think you literally looked at me
00:15:40
and said, "How are we going to get through this?" >> I said I was like, "I can't hear
00:15:43
anything. Like I don't know what's going on." >> And what if I agree to something crazy?
00:15:47
>> Yeah, I could not. Yeah, loud music [clears throat] is a lot, especially if it can split brick. Yeah. So after a few
00:15:53
hours with music splitting brick at Loston Bros, they traveled deeper into the city ending up at the London Pub,
00:15:59
which I feel like you wouldn't expect to see. No. It had just rebranded itself actually as the Hard Rock Cafe, which
00:16:05
has no relation to the American chain. Really? >> Yeah. Wow. Uh the group apparently we
00:16:09
all just have good ideas. All right. >> The group stayed there until about 2:00 in the morning and then Bill decided it
00:16:13
was probably time to head back across the bridge back into the US technically. So by that point the four boys had
00:16:19
separated when they walked in when they walked out of the bar, Mark's friend saw
00:16:23
him leaning against a car outside talking to a girl who he had met earlier that day at the Miss Tanline contest.
00:16:29
But [snorts] seeing him and getting to him were two very different things entirely at this point because remember
00:16:34
I just said there's 15,000 people littering the streets like I'm stressed out. >> All I can picture now like just to
00:16:41
relate this to us and maybe anybody else in Boston is like the um St. Patty's parade or like pride or something like
00:16:48
similar. >> or when it's like um 4th of July on the Esplanade. Yes, like millions.
00:16:54
That's what I'm thinking of. >> Just like shoulder to shoulder. >> Yeah. So getting to him was going to be
00:16:57
tough. So rather than try to fight the movement of the crowd, Brad and Brent figured it would be easier to just go in
00:17:03
the direction of the bridge that led back to Texas and then they could all just meet there cuz they they figured
00:17:08
why wouldn't we all just do that? >> Yeah, why not? By that time Mark had caught up with Bill and so they assumed
00:17:13
that they would find their friends. But as they neared the border, Mark told Bill to go ahead of him because he had
00:17:18
to relieve himself, so he ducked behind a tree to do that. A short time later, Bill met up with Brad and Brent, and the
00:17:24
three of them were sitting around waiting for Mark, who they figured would emerge at any second, but minutes passed
00:17:29
and he still wasn't showing up. And eventually, they started to get concerned. By then, nearly all of the
00:17:35
bars had closed, and all of the tourists had flowed back over the border, and there were still no signs of Mark.
00:17:42
So, they spent hours roaming the town looking for him. They went back over the border, but it was like he vanished
00:17:48
without a trace. Damn. >> He was just gone. And honestly, you don't think, and I know like
00:17:55
you don't think about this happening with like a man. No. You know what I mean? Like when it like
00:17:59
>> your first thought. >> Like when it's like a group of men together, [clears throat]
00:18:03
you would assume Nothing can touch them. >> Like they're invincible, essentially.
00:18:09
You know what I mean? I know that's not true. I'm just saying that's the initial
00:18:12
thought. >> way we're kind of like conditioned to think with these kinds of stories.
00:18:15
>> a group of young men, one of them suddenly going missing is like, what? >> You're like, how did that happen?
00:18:22
>> safe? Yeah. It's It's just like very shocking. >> It is. It's And it's chilling. Yeah, it is chilling.
00:18:28
That's the perfect way to describe it. So, they spent all night searching the increasingly empty streets of Matamoros
00:18:34
for Mark, growing more and more concerned with every single hour that passed. Finally, when the sun came up
00:18:39
and they still hadn't found any sign of Mark, the three decided maybe he had just gotten a ride back to South Padre
00:18:45
with someone that he met at the bar, maybe that girl that they saw him talking to earlier. They're like,
00:18:50
hopefully we're overreacting here. Yeah. Because the alternative that their friend had now disappeared in a foreign
00:18:56
country was way too frightening to accept at the time. And like, who takes a grown man? Well, and you don't I mean
00:19:03
I I don't think you initially go to that. Like obviously, when you're looking for your friend for hours and
00:19:07
hours and you can't find them, like panic starts to set in. But then, after a little bit, you're like, "Okay, let's
00:19:13
be a little logical here. Maybe he did just get a ride home." >> Yeah, like your your brain doesn't want
00:19:18
to believe that the alternative. >> Right. Unfortunately though, when they got back
00:19:23
to the Sheraton later that morning back in Texas, they discovered Mark's bed was
00:19:27
empty. It didn't look like it had been slept in, and there was nothing in the room to
00:19:31
indicate that he returned. Exhausted though from their night of partying and search and searching, they went to bed
00:19:37
hoping that when they woke back up, he would be back. Remember, this is the '80s. Like, we're
00:19:42
not all super well-informed in how to respond to a situation like this. And honestly, I think what you
00:19:49
were just saying as men, They just weren't thinking of it. >> They're not thinking like that.
00:19:53
>> Yeah, cuz they're not conditioned to think like this. And again, remember, like back then, it's not like they were
00:19:58
listening to true crime podcasts or watching documentaries and Dateline and seeing this kind of [ __ ] happening all
00:20:03
the time. >> Exactly. This was not something that anybody was thinking about, you know?
00:20:08
But, here's the thing. When they woke up several hours later, Mark still wasn't back, and they decided that under the
00:20:14
circumstances, it didn't seem wise just to keep waiting for him to show back up.
00:20:18
So, that afternoon, March 15th, they all together went to the South Padre Island
00:20:22
Police Department, and they filed a missing person's report, including every relevant detail that they could remember
00:20:28
from the night before. Now, during spring break, the usually quiet South Padre community had learned to
00:20:34
brace itself for an increase in everything that comes with the increase in the number of visitors, from hotel
00:20:40
bookings to also reports of criminal activity. So, Mark wasn't necessarily the first
00:20:45
person to be reported missing during spring break. He wasn't even the first person actually reported missing that
00:20:50
week. >> That's wild. >> It's yeah. >> Spring break scares the [ __ ] out of me.
00:20:54
I never was allowed to go on spring break. >> I never was either. >> And I will not allow my children to go
00:20:58
on spring break, and I know I know that there's like all these things that you say before you have kids that you're not
00:21:04
like, "I'm not going to do this, and I'm not going to do that." That's one I know, I will be standing 10 toes down
00:21:09
on. As someone with kids, no, I'm not either. So it's just not happening. We can take a family vacation.
00:21:15
>> [laughter] >> So while the police took the report seriously, they still was they still
00:21:19
were confident that he would show back up. >> Yeah, they probably thought he was like
00:21:22
drunk and like passed out somewhere. >> Exactly. >> Yeah. But when Mark's friends mentioned
00:21:26
Mexico, the detectives did become somewhat more concerned. Author Jim Shoots, and we will link his book in the
00:21:32
show note show notes, he said, "No matter how casually the kids themselves took this business of crossing into
00:21:37
Mexico to raise hell, no one in law enforcement in South Texas took Mexico cases lightly."
00:21:43
Cuz you're in a completely different jurisdiction. Yeah, of course. You don't Yeah. A completely different area.
00:21:49
Now throughout the 1980s specifically, drug trafficking and organized crime had spiked in Mexico due mostly to a massive
00:21:56
economic crisis that put a lot of people out of work and led to few options for legitimate employment. Criminal gangs
00:22:02
that were once very poorly organized and focused mostly on petty crime had become
00:22:06
a lot more formal, and now there were lots of different networks for trafficking guns, drugs, people, you
00:22:12
name it. Gang violence was a problem all over the country, but it was particularly
00:22:18
challenging at the American border. Oh, I'm sure. Because large amounts of drugs
00:22:23
and other illicit substances were flowing into the country there. So it wasn't that uncommon for tourists or
00:22:29
unlucky American workers to get kidnapped and ransom back to their families. So this is what the investigators in
00:22:35
South Padre had been thinking when they got the report about Mark going missing in Matamoros. And if that was what
00:22:42
happened to Mark, the small police department in South Padre did lack the resources to deal with a case like this.
00:22:47
>> mean, that's a big deal. Yeah. So that afternoon the case was forwarded to Cameron County Sheriff Alex Perez in
00:22:54
Brownsville, Texas, which you do have to respect how quickly these police forces
00:22:59
moved. >> Yeah. That doesn't always happen. >> No. It's not often that a small police
00:23:04
department realizes that they don't have the resources. >> out. >> So when they do, like you got to snap on
00:23:09
that. >> Yeah. Now, if Mark had been kidnapped for ransom, the county sheriff would have
00:23:13
had the resources and the regional knowledge necessary to resolve everything, hopefully, without getting
00:23:19
on the wrong side of Mexican authorities. Mhm. So Perez assigned his uh the case to his most reliable deputy,
00:23:26
George Gavito, who immediately recruited the help of Deputy Lupe Limas, a formal
00:23:30
Brownsville police officer, who had recently started working with the sheriff's department. And he had a lot
00:23:36
of experience working on cases that crossed over into the border. So this was kind of That's who you need.
00:23:41
>> duo, right? Yeah. So Gavito and Limas were aware of the potential implications
00:23:46
of Mark having gone missing, especially over the border. He was one of 60 Americans to have been reported missing
00:23:52
in Mexico in just 3 months. >> Whoa. Yeah. However, they were also familiar, like
00:23:58
we were just saying, with the chaos and, you know, just the drunken vibes going around on spring break.
00:24:04
>> So neither of them were ready to assume the complete worst. >> Yeah, cuz this could just be debauchery.
00:24:09
Exactly. [laughter] >> And honestly, I'm sure they were hoping it was. >> that's the thing. You're hoping this is
00:24:14
just a lesson learned. >> Exactly. >> So instead of going to worst case scenario, they decided to proceed as
00:24:19
they would with any other missing person's case, operating on the assumption and the hope that Mark had
00:24:24
simply caught a ride with a girl that he met at a bar and he would turn back up soon enough.
00:24:29
That's how they planned to approach the case, but before the day was over, that plan changed dramatically.
00:24:35
After Mark's friends filed a report with the South Padre police, they returned to
00:24:39
the hotel and they called Mark's parents, obviously, to let them know that he was missing. What the the call
00:24:44
no parent wants to get. >> And the call, like it's got to be so stressful to send your
00:24:49
kids on spring break. Like And also, here's the other thing. These aren't kids. He's a 21-year-old, so they didn't
00:24:55
have a lot of say in if he went to he didn't. >> their kid and it's like >> you go you sit there and you're like it
00:25:01
won't happen to my kid. >> Right. And then when you the worst happens, I don't even know how you bring
00:25:07
you wrap your brain around it. >> just not feel like real life. >> cuz you're like no, this is literally
00:25:12
the worst case scenario. How is it actually happening? >> Right. Ugh. So, they had heard the news
00:25:17
reports of people going missing along the Mexican border as it was all happening and they immediately worried
00:25:23
that something bad had happened to their son once they realized he was one of those missing people.
00:25:27
>> So, rather than wait to hear from the police, Jim called his brother Ken who was a US Customs agent which like great
00:25:34
contact to have. >> Uh he was based in LA and he asked for his help. Now, Ken knew his nephew pretty well and
00:25:40
he knew that well Mark might have had a few beers now and again and you know, maybe partied too hard every now and
00:25:45
again, he wasn't a drug user and there wasn't anything else on that side of the border that he would have gotten caught
00:25:51
up in. >> Yeah. Plus, his car was still on the American side of the border and all of
00:25:55
his belongings were inside and they were they knew that he wouldn't have just abandoned all of that.
00:26:01
So, in just a few hours the missing person's case had escalated from a local matter to now a federal investigation.
00:26:07
Damn. Yeah, fast. By the time which is honestly a good thing I think. >> Good, yeah, that it got leveled this
00:26:13
high. Yeah, by the time Ken Kilroy and his partner Oren Nak got in touch with uh George Gavito, several calls had
00:26:19
already been made to the Cameron County Sheriff's Department and a large team of
00:26:22
law enforcement officials was assembled to search for Mark. At the same time, Mark's father Jim was
00:26:28
on his way to Brownsville to help in in the search however he could. Gavito remembered later about Mark's
00:26:35
father, uh he came into the Sheriff's office and he never left the Sheriff's office. He was there for 30 days each
00:26:42
single day, Saturdays and Sundays too. He begged me to help him look for his son. Oh my god, that just destroys my
00:26:48
heart. >> That's a parent right there. >> That's a full-blown parent. The problem was while Gavito and the
00:26:54
rest of the investigators assigned to the case obviously desperately wanted to find Mark Kilroy, they had no evidence
00:27:01
and there were no leads to work with. And even if they did have those leads and did have that evidence, none of them
00:27:07
had jurisdiction to launch an investigation in Mexico. Yeah. So that's really really complicated there.
00:27:14
And you're not thinking that as a 21-year-old on spring break crossing over the border. No.
00:27:18
>> But now that we have that information, it is something that you have to consider.
00:27:22
>> do. >> If something happens to me >> It's not that easy for people to get the
00:27:27
resources and the jurisdiction and the warrants and the this and the that and the share information. And that's why I
00:27:32
think it's so important that we share stories like this. >> Yeah, because you need to know that you
00:27:37
have to at least be aware of these things. It's It's so scary. >> Cuz this this is anywhere. Anywhere
00:27:43
that's not where you're based and where you're all your [ __ ] is. >> Mhm. Well, it's just like we were
00:27:49
talking about >> find you. >> Yeah, just like when we were talking about the Amy Bradley case like in
00:27:53
international waters. >> It just becomes more complex. The web becomes tighter and that's hard.
00:27:59
>> It's awful. And it sucks because people should be able to go on vacation, should
00:28:03
be able to let loose without monsters preying upon them. >> people just stop being [ __ ] It's
00:28:09
never happened in all of humanity, I don't think. >> sick if we could all just agree to stop
00:28:15
being [ __ ] >> It would I would love that. Everyone. >> I would love that. >> What a peace on earth is a real I'm
00:28:22
like, damn. I know. That is You just You wish somebody would get that that wish [clears throat] and
00:28:28
actually have it happen. Honestly. Cuz it would be real nice if everyone was just chilling. Yeah, it would be great.
00:28:33
Imagine if everyone was just chilling. >> I can't even picture it to be honest with [laughter] you.
00:28:37
>> That everybody was just minding their own business. No. Helping out their >> Helping their brethren when they could.
00:28:42
Yeah. I mean, that's how I try to live my life. I Obviously, everybody can be an [ __ ] sometimes, but like to this
00:28:47
degree, no. At this point in my life, I'm just trying to chill. Yeah. She just threw up the She's saying, "I'm just
00:28:52
trying to chill." [laughter] I am. I'm just trying to chill. So, but no, that's like I said, I really do think that's
00:28:57
why we should be >> Yeah, telling these stories. So, aware of the restrictions on law
00:29:02
enforcement in international in an international case, the Kilroys turned to the nearby communities for help. In
00:29:07
the early days, Jim went down to the bridge that crossed into Matamoros and handed out missing flyers from morning
00:29:13
until night, just hoping that somebody he was going to run into and hand that flyer to would know something and give
00:29:20
them some kind of lead they could work with. That truly breaks my heart. It's awful. Family friends also joined the
00:29:26
search. Uh, Mark's former basketball coach, Joe Rodriguez, spent the first week traveling back and forth to
00:29:32
Matamoros, uh, interviewing what are called veladores, and those are the men who
00:29:37
provided security for local businesses and bars, kind of like a bouncer. Jim said of the Rio Grande Valley
00:29:43
communities that helped search for Mark, "They were just absolutely wonderful how
00:29:47
they coddled us and took care of us." Which is really sweet. Like, it's uh, this case does not end up No. in a
00:29:54
in a This is not a happy ending, which I obviously hate, but at the very least, it's nice that these communities were
00:30:01
able to work together and that people were supported in the search. >> Now, while the family and the community
00:30:07
continued to search on both sides of the border for Mark, the sheriff's department took two more atypical
00:30:13
methods of investigation. A few days into the search, uh, Gavito brought Brad Moore into the
00:30:19
sheriff's office to be hypnotized, hoping that it might jog his memory and reveal some critical clue about the
00:30:25
night that Mark went missing. Now, when I first heard that, I was like, "Okay, maybe that'll work." Like, sure.
00:30:32
But, you know, sometimes these things work. Hey. We don't know everything there is to know. We really don't.
00:30:38
>> mind, about what the [ __ ] happens. So, if something could potentially help and
00:30:43
especially I would as a parent I would do [ __ ] anything. Absolutely. >> Nothing would be off the table.
00:30:48
>> Absolutely. So, Willie Cannon of the US Customs Service said, "It's kind of an
00:30:53
unusual situation because there's really nothing to go on." Yeah. So, when Brad was unable to come up with anything new,
00:30:58
they moved on to Bill Huddleston. And while he was under hypnosis, he described seeing Mark walking near a
00:31:05
quote Hispanic man with a cut on his cheek right before he disappeared. Hmm. Which is like
00:31:11
pretty to have the cut on the cheek to go on, that's a little more than just your typical
00:31:18
description of somebody, you know? >> So, Bill said he didn't recall Mark talking to the man, but when he looked
00:31:25
back he said he saw the strange man motion towards Mark. Okay. Interesting, right?
00:31:32
>> Yeah. So, when more than a week passed and there was still no sign of Mark, the
00:31:36
Kilroys were getting desperate and they turned to another outlet for help that was kind of a newer outlet. Just one
00:31:42
year earlier the TV program America's Most Wanted made its debut, which like Wow.
00:31:48
>> Isn't that crazy? >> feel like that's always been a thing even though you know it's not.
00:31:51
>> life it always has been. And pretty much your life, too. Like for most of our
00:31:55
most of your life and all of mine it has. >> Yeah. So, and the thing was it had debuted a year earlier before this case
00:32:02
and it had already led to the capture of many violent criminals. >> Yeah. So, the producers of America's
00:32:07
Most Wanted agreed to feature the story on the program and they immediately traveled out to Brownsville a recreation
00:32:13
of of the night that everything happened and Mark went missing to air on the show. Okay. While they were taking a
00:32:19
break from filming the segment, a woman staggered up to one of the cameramen, Scott Judy. She was clutching a crumpled
00:32:25
missing person's poster in her hand and she told him, "He's dead, you know. They
00:32:29
found him shot in the head." What the [ __ ] Out of completely nowhere. That's horrifying. And just like what?
00:32:38
What? It turned out that rumors had already started circulating among the spring breakers in South Padre that Mark
00:32:44
had been found dead. Moments later one of the producers angrily escorted the woman out of the
00:32:49
area and made sure she didn't come back, but it got everybody thinking. >> Yeah. Now the segment was rushed to
00:32:55
completion and it aired on the show a few nights later along with a 20-second PSA recorded both in Spanish and in
00:33:01
English telling viewers how they could help. The episode did result in more than 150 tips called in by viewers
00:33:08
claiming everything from Mark was dead to Mark was seen working in a convenience store in California, not
00:33:13
true. None of the tips really led to anything, but according to Jim Schutz it allowed investigators to see into the
00:33:19
Mexican side by tracking what the Mexicans were doing with tips from the show. So they didn't have jurisdiction
00:33:25
there, but now that community is able to kind of talk to them a little bit. >> Yeah. So there's it's giving them
00:33:31
something. >> Yeah, for sure. They really hadn't made any more progress on the case than the
00:33:35
American counterparts, but detectives in Texas could see that the Mexican investigators were taking Mark's
00:33:40
disappearance very seriously and they also were running all these tips down. So that was nice.
00:33:46
>> Yeah, so things are in motion. >> They are. But by the end of the month investigators on both sides of the
00:33:52
border weren't much closer to finding Mark Kilroy than they had on the day he went missing and it was starting to feel
00:33:57
like he was never going to be found. Mhm. In order to feel like they were doing something productive and
00:34:02
proactive, Jim and Helen withdrew Mark from school. Jim told reporters, "We're trying to
00:34:08
find out what things we can do cuz we don't really know. We're holding up well, but it's a matter of what you can
00:34:13
do, how much can you do and you start to run out of things you can do to try to find Mark."
00:34:17
>> Yeah. It's just awful. >> It is. Now just as everybody was starting to lose hope that Mark would
00:34:23
ever be found, there was a break in the case and it came in one of the most unexpected and innocuous forms.
00:34:30
On the end this is where we really take a hard left. So, bear with me, everybody. All right, I'm here. We're
00:34:35
going into a completely different area here. So, on the afternoon of April 1st, Mexican police were conducting a
00:34:41
checkpoint on Highway 2. That's the main road that connects Matamoros to Texas. Okay. The setup was a simple uh drug
00:34:49
checkpoint like countless others along the border, basically attempting to stop drugs from coming into or out of Mexico.
00:34:55
Okay. Now, they're sitting there on this on this stop and they spot police spot a red truck they recognize
00:35:02
coming down the highway. And they quickly ran the plate and discovered that it belonged to Serafin Hernandez
00:35:07
Garcia. Now, at the time, the Hernandez family was well-known to the police in Matamoros. For decades, they had been
00:35:14
one of the better organized gangs in the region, responsible for a lot of drug trafficking and smuggling.
00:35:20
In more recent years though, the organization had expanded to include several members of the family living
00:35:26
across the border in Brownsville, Texas. So, they were kind of like working dual
00:35:30
sides of the border. Okay. Now, unlike more of the hardcore gangs that had been recently established in the
00:35:36
region, the Hernandez family mostly just ran marijuana back and forth from Texas
00:35:40
to Mexico. So, >> Okay. they the police they'd run into the police a lot, but they weren't like
00:35:44
super dangerous or anything like that. Despite that, they had been successful for many years, due in large part to
00:35:50
their charismatic leader, Saul Hernandez. But, when Saul was killed by machine gun
00:35:56
fire in 1986, the family business started to fall apart. Now, Paul's bro uh Paul's brother, Serafin, tried to
00:36:03
step into his brother's role and keep everything together, but within a month, he was arrested by US officials, which
00:36:09
left their entire operation in disarray. Yeah. Now, without the charisma of their former
00:36:14
leader, the Hernandez business wasn't just in danger of losing money, but they were also in danger of being taken over
00:36:21
by one of the other organizations in the region, because that was happening, too.
00:36:24
They would just walk in and be like, "Well, you're part of us now, and you're going to be paying us everything that
00:36:29
you're making, and that's it." Yeah, deal with it. Like, otherwise, we can just shoot you. Oof. Yeah. So, in order
00:36:36
to fend off any potential takeovers, which would have inevitably ended in the murder of those higher up in the family,
00:36:41
like I just said, >> Yeah. uh what remained of the Hernandez leadership turned to Adolfo Cos-
00:36:47
Constanzo, the Cuban-American leader of the criminal organization that was dubbed Los Narcos Satanicos, the Narco
00:36:54
Satanists. >> Ooh. Yeah. As one of the more feared and dangerous gangs in the region, Adolfo Cos-
00:37:01
Constanzo's group operated less like a criminal syndicate and more like a religious cult. Okay. Yeah. And it was
00:37:09
all orien- uh oriented around Constanzo, who was the known as the Godfather, and his {quote} {unquote} high
00:37:16
priestess, Sara Maria Aldrete Villarreal. I really hope I'm saying these pronunciations correctly. I looked
00:37:23
them up. So, yeah. Okay. >> Interesting. Okay. Now, at first, the deal that was struck between Constanzo
00:37:31
and the remaining Her- Hernandez family members was just for simple protection, but before long, the remaining Hernandez
00:37:37
family members basically were absorbed into the Narco Satanists. >> Okay. So, as soon as they received the report
00:37:44
about Mark Kilroy, who had disappeared in Matamoros, it occurred to investigators that he could have been
00:37:50
kidnapped by one of the local gangs. That was one of the first things on everybody's radar.
00:37:54
>> Absolutely. Publicly, Mexican authorities, quote, tried to claim that that Kilroy must have vanished in
00:37:59
Brownsville, because they were aware that news of another kidnapped tourist was going to hurt the local economy,
00:38:04
which was already hurting. Mhm. But, behind closed doors, more than a few people brought up Adolfo Constanzo and
00:38:11
the Hernandez family. Mhm. And sadly, [clears throat] they knew that if Mark had been kidnapped by
00:38:16
the Narco Satanists, there was very little hope that they would get him back alive, if they ever even got him back at
00:38:23
all. That's worst case scenario. It really is. >> Like truly worst case scenario.
00:38:27
>> To not even get to think that you wouldn't even get his body. You'll just never get him back.
00:38:32
>> Like that's >> Like oh god. >> I can't. So now back to the afternoon of April 1st.
00:38:37
Agent Raul Morales had been stationed at the checkpoint on Highway 2. He'd been an agent in the area for many years and
00:38:44
he was familiar with the various members of all the gangs, especially the Hernandez family.
00:38:49
So when he saw the compact red pickup coming down the highway, he knew right away that he would find little Serafin
00:38:54
behind the wheel. And that was confirmed when they managed to check the plate. And since little
00:38:59
Serafin had blown through the checkpoint without stopping, they also knew that they had ample reason to stop him and
00:39:05
even arrest him if they needed to. But Morales and all the other officers had been through that before. They'd
00:39:11
stop one of the gang members as they came across the border. They'd try to get information. Inevitably the gang
00:39:16
members would stay silent and the whole thing was kind of just a pointless exercise in frustration. Yeah. So
00:39:21
instead, he had a better idea. And uh the way that this all works out, I was like
00:39:28
there's some kind of divine intervention here because the fact that he was like,
00:39:31
"You know what? I'm not going to do that today." >> Yeah. It all worked out. Not in a good
00:39:36
way but it worked. >> Mhm. So rather than hitting the sirens and forcing Hernandez to pull over, he
00:39:43
and his partner jumped in an unmarked Ford Bronco and they followed Serafin at a safe distance hoping that he would
00:39:49
lead them somewhere or give them a lead on whatever it was this family was up to.
00:39:53
>> Mhm. So they ended up following him to the Santa Elena ranch which was by the
00:39:58
way Elena. That's me. Uh it was an old farm about 20 miles outside of Matamoros. Morales and the other
00:40:04
investigators had figured Constanzo's organization had been headquartered somewhere just outside of the city
00:40:10
and later that would be confirmed by a raid um and information that they obtained
00:40:15
from US Customs officials. In the report, Customs agents estimated that there were up to 24 people
00:40:21
smuggling drugs for a drugs for Constanzo, and they were all coming and going at the ranch, but they wrote that
00:40:27
no more than 12 were involved in the kidnappings and the slayings that eventually took place at the ranch.
00:40:33
>> Oh, Jesus. So, at the time, Morales and the other investigators had no proof of
00:40:37
what they suspected was going on between this gang here. Yeah. They had only really just learned about the location
00:40:43
of the ranch when they followed Serafin. >> [sighs] >> So, rather than risk losing valuable
00:40:48
evidence, Morales chose to hang back and stake out the ranch, hoping that they could gather some kind of compelling
00:40:54
evidence to justify a search warrant for the property. This is great detective work.
00:41:00
So, the next day, he returned to the ranch pretending that he was a lost traveler looking for directions back
00:41:05
into town. Wow. >> Which is like brave. I was just going to say that's terrifying.
00:41:09
>> Yeah. So, he spoke with an elderly man who said that he was the caretaker, and
00:41:13
the man did seem to be tending to the animals that day. So, he was like, maybe you are a caretaker.
00:41:18
>> what the [ __ ] The man said his name was Domingo, but he said he didn't know who
00:41:21
owned the ranch. He just showed up every day to do his job, and he didn't ask questions. I mean, hey, I don't blame
00:41:27
him. Yeah. So, Morales could tell the man was lying to him. He was like, I definitely think
00:41:32
he knew more than he was letting on, but he also didn't want to blow his cover, so he didn't push.
00:41:37
Uh also, his job that afternoon was to keep the caretaker busy while his partner poked around the property trying
00:41:44
to stay out of sight. >> this is This is scary. It's like terrifying. >> But a lot of police work happening here.
00:41:51
>> Yeah, and really good police work. >> Yeah. So, as the other agent crept around the property, he spotted what
00:41:57
looked like a brand new Chevy Suburban, which was not exactly the type one would
00:42:01
expect to find on a farm in the middle of nowhere. Probably not. And now, peering into the back of the car, he
00:42:06
could see a layer of uh dark dust covering almost the entire back seat, which he immediately recognized as the
00:42:12
resin dust that shakes off of dried marijuana plants. So, it's like caked on in that car. Okay. And as he started to
00:42:19
turn away from the truck, though, something else caught his eye. On the floor in the back seat of the car
00:42:24
was a gray cement statue of what looked to the agent like some kind of demonic figure. Mhm. Not wanting to raise any
00:42:31
alarms, he just went back to the car and waited for his partner, Morales, who came back a short time later. Okay. Now,
00:42:38
back at the station, the two agents checked in with their supervisor, Commander Juan Benitez, and gave him an
00:42:43
update on what they had all seen at the ranch. Now, Benitez had been raised in the traditional, I hope I say this
00:42:49
correctly, uh Walahokan community. And he was more familiar with folk religions than the other agents were.
00:42:56
Oh, wow. That's good that they had somebody that actually knew [ __ ] >> It [clears throat] really worked out
00:43:00
because we're pulling on a thread here right now. >> Yeah, for sure. So, when Benitez heard
00:43:05
the description of the statue in the back of the car, he immediately recognized it as the statue of Alaguala,
00:43:11
who's a trickster god in Santa Maria. And this god is recognized as the messenger to the supreme creator,
00:43:18
Alawufi. Oh, okay. >> really hope I'm saying all that right. >> [snorts] >> So, Benitez explained that the trickster was
00:43:25
a favorite among the drug traffickers to kind of worship and like ask for protection, especially those who wanted
00:43:31
to curse their enemies. Ooh. According to author Edward Humes, among the legends was the belief that if the
00:43:37
proper offerings were made to Alaguala, he could make you bulletproof and invisible. Woah. So, that being the
00:43:44
case, the promise of those powers would have made some of the greatest criminals
00:43:48
in the world. >> Um yeah, I would say so. And for that, those criminals felt like there was
00:43:54
nothing too valuable to sacrifice. Oh. So, it was obvious that there was drug smuggling going on at the ranch, but
00:44:00
they needed something a little bit more and they because they knew something much worse was going on there.
00:44:05
>> Yeah, this is not looking good right now. So, Benitez himself had overseen the downfall of the Hernandez family in
00:44:11
the last few years. So, he knew that whatever was happening at the farm, they weren't working alone, and they probably
00:44:17
weren't running the show anymore either, which meant that another cartel was involved. And that's a big deal. Yeah.
00:44:23
So, he ordered that the ranch be monitored day and night. And in the meantime, he placed a call to his
00:44:28
contact at the DEA to find out whether they knew anything about the operation at the ranch.
00:44:33
Now, the DEA had also been monitoring the Hernandez family since before they expanded beyond the border. But that
00:44:40
focus became more intense when the family expanded into Brownsville, Texas. It was as Benitez had expected.
00:44:47
Something had changed changed in the family's fortunes since the elder leaders had died.
00:44:52
So, for decades, like I said, Hernan the Hernandez family had been trafficking small amounts of marijuana back and
00:44:57
forth, but their operation was not that impressive, especially compared to the newer cartels.
00:45:02
And after the death of Saul and the failure of his brother, it was expected that they would kind of just be on their
00:45:07
way out. But that was hardly what the DEA had seen. Edward Humes wrote, "The Hernandez boys
00:45:13
were living in a fine home, driving a fleet of brand new trucks, and walking the streets like swaggering feudal
00:45:19
lords." Woah. Yeah. What a description. Exactly. And they said, "Obviously, that
00:45:25
kind of money and confidence didn't come from selling small amounts of weed or even cocaine at that point to tourists."
00:45:31
Yeah. There was something a lot bigger going on here. So, the agent pretty much confirmed what
00:45:37
Benitez already knew. The remaining Hernandez family must have hooked up with a more powerful cartel.
00:45:43
But he mentioned one more thing that Benitez didn't know. According to the DEA agent, there had
00:45:48
been rumors circulating lately about the Hernandez boys talking about how they had all the protection they needed, and
00:45:55
that they had bought off the local cops. All of which they attributed to, quote,
00:46:00
"Some weird religion that made them invincible. Okay. Yeah. Okay. So it was the comment
00:46:07
about the religion that started to bring everything into focus for all of these agents here. The statue of the trickster
00:46:13
god that Morales's partner had found in the back of the Suburban, the fact that little Serafin had just blown through
00:46:18
the police checkpoint without the slightest hesitation, and the fact that he didn't even seem to think about being
00:46:24
followed when he led them directly to the ranch, like that wasn't on his radar. >> Yeah. It all started to make sense. Now
00:46:31
little Serafin had never been the brightest member of the family, but even he wasn't so stupid as to openly defy
00:46:37
the police that brazenly, unless he thought he was untouchable and protected. >> Oh. Yeah.
00:46:44
>> what I'm saying? >> that makes so much sense. Yeah. Damn. And that means they're making the
00:46:49
ultimate sacrifice in their mind >> Yeah. >> god. Yep. So by the morning of April
00:46:54
8th, 1989, Commander Benitez had gathered enough information from his agents and from all his other sources to
00:47:00
confirm pretty much every suspicion he had. Now fortunately for him and the other agents, whatever religious beliefs
00:47:07
that the family had and their connections had, it had made them confident to the point of carelessness.
00:47:12
Mhm. After getting a warrant for a wiretap a few days earlier, agents started listening in on the phone calls
00:47:18
that were coming and going out of the ranch, during which one of the Herrera-Hernandez boys and their
00:47:22
contacts didn't even bother to use code names or obscure the subject of their conversation at all. Wow.
00:47:30
>> they were. They're invincible. They're protected. >> Yeah. So they think. That morning,
00:47:35
little Serafin was to receive a very big amount of marijuana at the ranch, and that was exactly the kind of information
00:47:41
that Benitez needed to justify a raid on the compound. >> So before little Serafin hung up the
00:47:48
call, he also said something about El Padrino. Benitez didn't know what or to whom
00:47:54
Serafin was referring because it was the first time he'd heard heard the reference. But for the time being that
00:48:00
had to wait. But that will come back later. Okay. So later that day several agents descended on Serafin's house in
00:48:06
Matamoros where they found him with another known drug dealer, Sergio Martinez. Upon searching the house they didn't
00:48:12
actually find any drugs but they found more than enough evidence of a drug operation. Yeah, something's a foot.
00:48:18
>> Yeah, it was resin dust everywhere. There was guns, there's paraphernalia, there's a lot going on.
00:48:24
So when he was questioned about the large quantity of marijuana that they just received Serafin was silent.
00:48:29
But rather than continue to press him Benitez threw them both in the back of a police car and drove them both out to
00:48:35
the ranch, the bigger ranch. Now after breaking a lock on one of the large set sheds the agents discovered 60
00:48:42
lb of marijuana along with a significant cache of weapons and the Chevy Suburban
00:48:48
that Morales and his partner had seen earlier that week. Whoa. Now back in Matamoros agents watching Serafin's
00:48:55
house managed to grab a few more members of the gang as they arrived including one of the older members, Eleo
00:49:01
Hernandez. Like Serafin and Martinez none of the men really seemed to be too concerned
00:49:07
about having just been arrested. They all kind of presented with like cocky certainty that
00:49:13
Cuz they're divinely protected. >> Cuz they're divinely protected. Exactly. Something's going to happen here.
00:49:19
>> deeply frustrating for the investigators cuz they're >> And must have been the freaky because
00:49:23
it's like oh they genuinely believe Yeah. that this is this this trickster god is protecting them. And what
00:49:31
sacrifice must they have made to him for them to believe that they are so protected here.
00:49:37
>> honestly would be the thing that would send chills down my spine. >> Like they believe that they're
00:49:40
invisible. Not just invincible, invisible. So they had to have felt pretty confident with the sacrifice they
00:49:48
had made. >> Yeah. Their sacrifices. Yeah. Benitez said later they weren't worried at all.
00:49:53
They thought we couldn't hurt them. They thought they were protected." Damn. Now,
00:49:57
although they were pretty profoundly irritated by the confidence, they also knew that they'd eventually got a
00:50:02
confession one way or the other. >> Yeah. So, here's the thing. We've told cases We've
00:50:07
told stories before. There's been cases where officers resort to violence to get
00:50:12
answers. >> we've seen those. >> And that was especially common in this area in the 1980s.
00:50:17
>> I'm sure. There were the more common tactics like we've talked about beatings, threats, but there were also
00:50:22
more extreme tactics. And Dave found one that I said, "Excuse me, what? Hold the
00:50:28
phone." Oh, lord. One of the most effective techniques at this time involved adding large quantities of hot
00:50:34
sauce to soda water. The [ __ ] Which was then shaken up and shot up the suspect's
00:50:40
nostrils. Oh my god. Hot sauce and soda water shoved into your nostrils. All I can think of is the sensation when
00:50:52
you get the bubbles in your nose if you're like drinking it and you're like, "Ooh, that hurts."
00:50:56
>> hot and spicy. >> Add it with hot sauce and have it shot directly into your nose.
00:51:02
>> Yeah. Holy [ __ ] >> Yeah. Edward Humes wrote, as you're thinking about that, he described it. "First
00:51:08
comes a hideous sensation of drowning as the foaming liquid floods breathing passages followed by an indescribable
00:51:14
searing pain as the peppery liquid scores sensitive nasal tissue." Oh my god. Yeah. So, not too shocking, this
00:51:23
one was particularly effective. >> Oh, I yeah. That I'd tell you [ __ ] >> I'd tell you [ __ ] I didn't do, probably.
00:51:30
>> I would make up stuff that you didn't even know about. >> Yep. Oh my god, that hurts. My nose
00:51:35
hurts now. >> can you even? No. So, in this case, it turned out that the hot sauce soda
00:51:39
technique would not be necessary. The rumors of it alone would suffice when it came to Domingo Bustamante, the
00:51:45
caretaker at the ranch. >> He was like, "You know what? I heard that that's a thing and I'm not going to
00:51:49
deal with it." >> they were like, "We could do that." And he was like, "You know what? Let's just
00:51:53
chat." >> Why don't I just tell you what's going on? And remember, he was the one who had
00:51:56
already talked to one of the officers. >> "I don't know nothing about nothing. I
00:52:00
just came and did my job." Precisely. Now, he had been picked up by the feds when he got to work on the morning of
00:52:05
April 9th. And a short time later, he was sitting across from Benitez in the interrogation room. Now, from the moment
00:52:11
they met, Benitez could tell that he wasn't a drug smuggler or some hardened criminal. He was clearly just a man
00:52:17
trying to make enough money to support his family and he had gotten caught up in something much bigger than him.
00:52:23
More importantly, he didn't believe in witchcraft or the trickster gods. So, he didn't have any
00:52:29
of the confidence and the smug cockiness that kept the others from talking. >> He said, "I know I'm not invisible, so."
00:52:35
>> said, "I know you can see me right here, right now." Basically, he would be easy
00:52:39
to break. Just easy to get information out of. So, it turned out that Benitez's assessment of the caretaker was right.
00:52:45
Within just a few minutes of the interrogation, he was telling agents everything he knew.
00:52:50
He confirmed that the ranch was the headquarters of the Hernandez smuggling operation. And then he began
00:52:55
[clears throat] rattling off all the names of the smugglers at the ranch, at least all the ones he knew.
00:53:00
He told them, "People come and go all the time at the ranch. Some are friends of the bosses or workers, but there are
00:53:06
others. They're treated very badly." Oh. He began to say something about an American who he had seen at the ranch
00:53:12
recently. And then he kind of trailed off, almost seeming to realize that he said something he shouldn't have.
00:53:17
>> No, keep talking. So, the other agents and Benitez were aware of the disappearance of Mark Kilroy and several
00:53:24
of them had been involved in the case on the Mexican side, but it wasn't until that moment that they all assumed the
00:53:30
case they were working on was a separate matter entirely. >> Oh, [ __ ] >> thought that and then they were like,
00:53:36
Oh, this is them. This is not. So, it was when the caretaker brought up the American that it occurred to all of the
00:53:44
agents that this case could be related. So, Benitez pressed further. Domingo, the caretaker, hesitated, and
00:53:51
then he started talking about a day a month earlier when he saw a young man tied up in the back of the blue Chevy
00:53:56
Suburban at the ranch. The men at the ranch had left him tied up like that in the truck overnight.
00:54:02
Domingo said, "I felt very sorry for him. I made him something to eat. I brought him some eggs and water for
00:54:07
breakfast, and then the bosses came and took him away." Oh my god. This like makes my stomach
00:54:13
hurt. It's horrific. He estimated that this had occurred two or three weeks earlier, and he said the young man was
00:54:20
white with blonde hair, which matched the description of Mark Kilroy, but that was all he knew, he said.
00:54:26
So, Benitez, thinking quickly, went back to his desk and rummaged through the drawers until he found the glossy black
00:54:31
and white photo of Mark Kilroy that was being used in all the missing posters. He slapped the photo down on the table
00:54:38
in front of Domingo, and Domingo immediately recognized the man in the picture. He told the detectives, "Yes,
00:54:44
that's him, the guero." Ugh. And guero is um is like slang in Mexico talking about like a white blonde person.
00:54:52
>> Oh, man. And that is where we are going to end for part one. >> Holy [ __ ] Yeah. So, I took you what probably felt
00:55:02
like on a hard left, but then we we kind of got back to our original destination.
00:55:08
>> Oh, man. Yeah, part two really sad. >> even sadder. Yeah, I feel so [ __ ] hard for this family and this group of
00:55:17
friends. What they've had to go through. That all just started from a celebratory
00:55:22
time in their lives. >> man. Like, what? Like, Jesus, they weren't even doing anything wrong. No,
00:55:27
they were just >> like they were like getting into trouble, you know what I mean?
00:55:30
>> No, they were just they crossed over the border, they had a fun night, and >> Yeah, like they just didn't
00:55:35
I think they just didn't have the information, you know? Like they were just lacking information. Exactly.
00:55:41
>> Cuz at the time Exactly. I mean, again, remember this is the '80s. It's not now.
00:55:46
No. So, we can't judge it off of now, where you where you know certain things. >> And even judging off of now, how many
00:55:52
millions of kids go on spring break to Mexico still? Yeah, like it's not like this is
00:55:57
you should be able to. And this is like a this is one of those cases that it's like worst case scenario. It is.
00:56:03
>> It really is. It's the cases that you get warned about when you go on spring break. It's awful. Yeah. So, we will be
00:56:09
back with part two, and we will get a lot deeper into this, and it's jarring. So.
00:56:17
Fun fact. Apparently, in Japan, if you're found drunk and violent, police will physically roll you up in a giant
00:56:23
plastic sheet and carry you away like a burrito. That's iconic. >> [laughter] >> They said, "We don't have time for this.
00:56:30
Give me the burrito wrap." >> Burrito him. Like that's So, don't get drunk and violent in Japan. Okay, I
00:56:35
won't. >> I mean, don't get drunk and violent anywhere, but But definitely don't do it
00:56:38
in Japan. >> They'll wrap you up and take you away. >> Yeah, they'll just throw you over their
00:56:42
shoulder. You heard it here first. Maybe not, but you heard it here, that's for sure. Maybe. All right, weirdos. We love
00:56:49
you. We hope you keep listening. And we hope you >> keep it weird. >> But not so weird that you get crazy and
00:56:56
violent in Japan, or in Mexico, or in the US, or anywhere. >> Don't be crazy and violent.
00:57:01
>> Especially anywhere you're unfamiliar. Be [music] careful, everybody. Everywhere.
00:57:12
>> [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] [music] >> Mhm.