00:10:28
foreign [Music] thank you [Applause] foreign [Applause] foreign [Music] garage wherever you are whatever you are
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doing thanks for listening I'm your host Nick and with me as always is a man that
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likes his reuben sandwich just like Matthew McConaughey on Ryan here is the captain thank you thank you
00:11:26
thank you it's good to be seen and it's good to see you thanks for listening thanks for telling a friend
00:11:35
this evening we are drinking Mo guava By the Fantastic people at Paradise Brewing
00:11:41
Company in Clearwater Florida garage grade four and a half bottle caps out of five and how could it not get four and a
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half bottle caps I love ipas I love guava so a win-win Mo guava is an IPA perfect for summertime brewed with
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mosaic hops it's hoppy it's tropical it's sweet you know what they say captain Mo Money moguana
00:12:02
I don't think that's what they say ammo guava is brought To Us by Yvonne from Fort Atkinson Wisconsin that's Badger
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country oh and here's another Badger we have Cynthia from jansville Wisconsin do
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you feel that Captain that's the Wisconsin love well I guess they're big tens so uh Go Big Ten and go Bucks next
00:12:22
up we have a shout out from Mark and Aberdeen UK and a big shout out from Lance from Texas I wonder if that's
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Lance Harbor the old Coyote football team next up we have a note here that says keep up the drinking and
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storytelling from Heather in sunny California and last but not least we give a shout out to Justin down in
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Marietta Georgia so thanks to everybody for buying us around for this week's show and if you want to pitch in for
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five-star review it really does help the show alright that's enough of the business everybody gather round grab a
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chair grab a beer let's talk some true crime thank you [Music] in November of 2006 19 year old
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University of Missouri Kansas City student Jesse Ross was participating in a university field trip he along with 13
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other University students in a faculty sponsor drove over 500 miles to Chicago Illinois this is for a Model United
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Nations conference this event Drew over a thousand college students from all over the country now around 2 30 a.m
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this would be early Tuesday morning on November 21st this is about 12 hours after Jesse last called his mother he
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got up from his chair he was at this emergency meeting that they were doing for this un conference and he got up
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from his chair and he walked out of the meeting room for about a 30 minute break
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the surveillance camera in the hotel lobby caught His image of of Jesse in the area of the exits of the building
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and this was the last Trace ever of 19 year old Jesse Ross last part we talked about did he commit suicide or possibly
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did he try to walk away from his life and start a new life yeah and we both agreed we didn't like
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either of these as being high probability uh for what could have happened to Jesse so continuing on the
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path here let's get into what others have considered more likely scenarios the first one we want to get into is the
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possibility that Jesse could have fallen into the river well this would have been
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the Chicago River um and this as the captain had said yesterday the river empties into Lake
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Michigan and this is this is late November it's icy it's cold you know the police say that this is what they find
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to be the most likely scenario we have his parents saying we disagree with that we think he would have head
00:15:09
back to his own hotel which would have actually taken him in the opposite direction of this River well there's a
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scenic route but behind the hotel where this U.N conference was taking place they're scheduled for this 30-minute
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break he's seen heading towards the exits what do you what are your feelings here Captain regarding falling into the
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river well I think we have to take a look at this surveillance footage and I can't find
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it online as as far as that goes I mean I can I have a picture and then we have the description now there's two
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description and and I think this is coming from fine uh help find jessie.com uh do you know what that website is off
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the top of your head um it's the one that parents uh is it fine that's what it is so what they claim is
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that the surveillance picked up the fact that he had a white T-shirt on jeans had
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a green warm-up jacket uh and he was walking towards the main door the thing that I thought was interesting here was
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that he they also claimed that he had a gatorade bottle now so gatorade bottle not so weird
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right and you're going to a meeting but this is also after we know that we have eyewitnesses that saw him drinking so my
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question would be what is in that gatorade bottle and if that was let's say a mixed drink
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I mean especially when you're 18 19 years old uh you drink some kind of silly stuff
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here I'm gonna laugh captain and I don't mean to get you off track we'll go right
00:16:46
back to you here drinking some silly stuff you know one drink that I like this is going to be considered one of
00:16:53
those 18 19 year old drinks I like to I get some vodka you turned me onto the Tito's vodka yeah Tito's is good very
00:17:00
good vodka I get some of that and I do about a half and half job with that very light the diet Gatorade you know I like
00:17:07
the purple the purple kind I drink some of that it's very funny looking people usually make fun of me when they see me
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having a little glass of that but I like drinking it because I get I get that vodka feeling that I love without the
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hangover in the morning because I'm hydrating with the Gatorade at the same time but what you're saying here he
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likes to call that drink purple drink he could have come up with he could have made some kind of concoction and put it
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in this Gatorade bottle and carried it around with him for the remainder of the evening like you said he's in these
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parties but this quote unquote emergency meeting was actually a scheduled emergency meeting
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um so he knew he was going to be attending this did he did he create some kind of drink for himself some purple
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drink like the Nick likes and and bring it to the emergency meeting with him to to sip on uh as the night grew longer
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and longer yeah and I'd I would also claim that I probably puked more from a 16 to 20 then I have 20 to 30.
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yeah yeah I mean so oh well maybe maybe not 20 to 30. but definitely from uh 30 to where I'm at now but so that would be
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my question was he continuing drinking and if he was you know why would he leave now I've heard some speculation
00:18:24
you know some people uh smoke when they drink I I don't think there was any evidence of him being a smoker so I'm
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just going to kind of rule that out so then why would you want to go outside uh that that's the big question here why is
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he leaving this area now was it to go back to his room or was he looking for a bathroom or
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because look that's a big thing with guys more so than with females is I mean we we pee anywhere
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no so sometimes you know you're at a party and you're going man there's people in the bathroom and then you just
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take off and go around the side of the house right write your name uh I normally like to write Nick's name
00:19:08
because then if I'm if they if they see the P you know it's plus it's a lot easier to write than than the captain
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but uh was he going out to pee you know to take a pee or was he gonna get sick and sometimes when you go to get sick
00:19:23
you're looking for a bathroom but if you can't find one if you can get outside that's better than puking in the hotel
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lobby and you touched upon something that we have talked about before on the show because we covered some other
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disappearance drinking we've yeah we've covered the Joey Le Butte disappearance uh he was ultimately found in the river
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we cut we covered Brian Shaffer and that always brings up the thought of this uh
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what is it the happy face or smiley face killer that's going all over the country
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and and killing these young college men and their bodies are are ultimately found in the river eventually and and we
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mentioned on those shows when we've brought when we brought that up that we find it more likely that the person that
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had fallen into the river was probably an intoxicated young male that had hit his limit way earlier in the night and
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decided to urinate alongside the river or in the river and inadvertently fell in and met their demise that way well
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but yeah the tough thing about the smiley face killer theory is I'm probably one of the only uh True Crime
00:20:30
dorks out there that is you know kind of likes this Theory not in this case but the the theory overall and what I've
00:20:39
I've stated and the funny thing was I brought up at crime con when I was talking to Devin from uh thinking
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sideways you know I brought it up and she said smiley face killer and she started laughing because a lot of people
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find this Theory to be laughable now I I feel like they they made stake in their
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Theory these and for people that don't know the theory it's this simple these retire these retired detectives were
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studying some cases they found that there was some graffiti by the bridges or alongside the riversides that these
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bodies were found and it was a smiley face now smiley face is probably the most common graffiti and all of mankind
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right along with some words that you say right but you're a prune on the show so but
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the thing is is uh so if you if you ixnay the graffiti right from the smiley face killer I don't think it's it's that
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far-fetched to think that there is a killer or possible a ring of killers that are that are rounding up these
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individuals and not necessarily to just be found in in a body of water there's a
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lot um you know Jesse Ross is one of them uh College age student that went missing
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and has never been seen again and has been seen you know last seen drinking or partying with people now now Jesse
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wasn't last seen drinking with people he was at an emergency meeting but if there
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was an emergency meeting Jesse would have been last seen drinking with people right and the thing is this is the
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Chicago police's Theory and that what they say is that you know it's you know people don't fall into this River every
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day but they're stating that it does it's more common than one would think yeah and but if you want to Google it uh
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the what was interesting to me is a lot of times when one person fall Falls in that multiple people that they're with
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Fallen because they're trying to save them or yeah I mean there's this case where I I believe one individual died
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but three people fell into the river and they were trying to retrieve a cell phone so one of the beliefs that the
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police you know the thing is is why he's going down to that River one maybe maybe
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drink too much he's gonna get sick maybe he needs to empty out his bladder right
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maybe he wanted to take a picture right well who knows so maybe his cell phone drops in or maybe he's peeing and and
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falls in um maybe he just goes out to catch a breath of fresh air decides to stand by
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the scenic side of of this hotel and take a look at the river something catches his eye and draws him near he
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starts walking close to the river the thing here is it's extremely it would be cold out that night and I think you had
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some of those numbers for us uh but but there's a potential of ice of an ice situation maybe he didn't simply fall
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maybe he slipped and fell into the river yeah so the the police this is their Theory it seems
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I hate to say this Captain it seems likely to me um but it's also yeah it's it's the A to
00:23:53
B Theory just because this is the nearest point that would present a danger to this
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person that has gone missing you know we see him what has been reported as moving
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in the direction of the exits referring to What was seen on the surveillance and
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just like the captain said I was unable to find the actual footage of him walking in the direction of the exits
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but there is a there is a still photo of him in that area now I'll try to find that and put that on Instagram they did
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state in those reports though that they never actually see him exit the building
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but they they anticipate that that's what he was intending to do um so yeah this is the nearest point
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that creates a danger for Jesse and maybe a good a good explanation for what happened to him you had mentioned that
00:24:45
the Chicago River empties into Lake Michigan right but the the problem with this Theory there too is it's also the
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lazy Theory and I really question you know we're talking about an area you know um you know as far as tourists go we
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really need to have a good reputation or Chicago needs a really good reputation of this area being safe and so whether
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they do they have a bunch of surveillance and to to claim that you don't find him on any other tape is just
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so unlikely to me even you know if he heads back if he heads back to his hotel room that we're talking about a path
00:25:20
that is heavily lit heavily traveled and also heavily surveillance and if he goes
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to the left there's still some surveillance why isn't he caught on any of these other tapes right and you would
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think that if he fell into the river that he was either a chose to go that route for some reason uh what his
00:25:39
destination would be I don't know or B what I think would be more likely is that if he were over by the river that
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he was just simply Milling about just kind of hanging out waiting out this break catching some fresh air maybe
00:25:53
having a smoke I like you said no evidence um but maybe out there just Milling about having some fresh air and waiting
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to go back in after the 30 minute break my thought is if he if he did um fall in as to me it'd be more likely
00:26:09
that he would be you know vomiting and the reason why is because this whole theory that you know guys go and they
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pee off a bridge and then they just fall in I look I've peed pretty drunk before
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right where you know uh you're just kind of swaying but to fall in uh to a river
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that would be you know I don't know less likely but if you're heathen uh I could totally see that being more
00:26:38
likely of a scenario oh yeah because your whole body is convulsing your whole body is out of control and so sometimes
00:26:45
your sight is blurred your you know your vision is definitely impaired when you're in that situation now you and I
00:26:51
talked about um talked about the the situation of he didn't appear to be intoxicated nobody
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in that that group of 30 people in that meeting thought that he was intoxicated his friend that Ralph Parker didn't
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believe that that he was that Jesse was drunk um but we're talking about first of all
00:27:11
we're talking about 2 30 a.m right who knows how long he was drinking who knows what was in that can that gatorade
00:27:18
bottle well first of all how many of those people were drinking because you know I was just at this
00:27:24
alumni event for my town um and I had like maybe two beers so everybody else around me is super wasted
00:27:32
right right I can tell this because I only had two two beers um how many of these people you know
00:27:39
because I'm sure some of the people if I said oh so and so was wasted they'd say
00:27:44
oh they weren't that bad but that's all you know normally depending on how bad off you are right
00:27:51
so I I wonder how many of these people in this emergency meeting were drinking themselves and yes so yeah maybe not
00:27:58
intoxicated during the meeting but he he was also for all we know as far as eyewitnesses go he was sitting down
00:28:06
during this meeting well yeah and you had it you were telling me an interesting story on the phone the other
00:28:11
day about a bar we used to play yeah so there's this story has a bit of a double
00:28:16
whammy effect on it okay it might have some insight to the state of Jesse Ross I had this situation many many years ago
00:28:25
I probably was a year or two older than Jesse but as you had mentioned earlier your your tolerance is a lot lower at
00:28:33
that age for most people I would believe uh as far as how much alcohol you consume and how much you can handle over
00:28:39
the course of an evening or an entire night and we I was at this bar that we had played at our band had played at
00:28:47
several times but I don't believe we were playing that night I think I went there to see some a friend's band and I
00:28:52
belly up to the bar as soon as I get there this is like January it's very cold out that night and it's late at
00:28:59
night it's already have you know it's probably 10 o'clock at night by the time I got to the bar when I decided to leave
00:29:05
there it's around midnight I sat there there I drank draft beer all night no shots nothing crazy you know had had a
00:29:12
decent time but I get up to leave I felt fine I felt like a million bucks as a matter of fact I walked out I walked out
00:29:20
onto that felt like a million bucks but I looked like a 10. I walked out onto that downtown Street
00:29:26
captain that cold air hit me and I don't know if it was the combination of walking you know sometimes when you when
00:29:32
you were sitting and you're drinking you don't realize how drunk you are until you get up to go and I got up to go and
00:29:40
I walked outside and the combination of that and the cold air hitting me I went from sober as a judge to to drunk as
00:29:49
hell and he had scarecrow legs that's that's right it was like a ton of bricks that hit me and I had to boot man I had
00:29:58
to run to the to the nearest trash can and I I booted and then I went back inside he raft and I sat at the bar and
00:30:05
I drank a whole bunch of water because I was in no shape to drive home it made me
00:30:10
that experience made me curious about Jesse you know why would he go outside if he's not a smoker and he's not going
00:30:19
out with any other people you know he obviously he went out by himself uh what what is his purpose of going
00:30:27
outside it's either to just hang out wait out the break or he has a destination he I think what
00:30:35
more so points to is that he was probably attempting to leave the meeting and leave that hotel because he didn't
00:30:41
go outside with anybody with him you know if if I were just taking a break I would mention to somebody in the group
00:30:47
hey what are you going to do for the 30-minute break oh you're gonna go sit over there oh is there still a hotel
00:30:52
party going on or or you want to come outside and hang out with me for a few minutes
00:30:56
um I think him going by himself points to a situation where he may had a destination in mind and for whatever
00:31:03
reason if he did not appear to be intoxicated he could have been very intoxicated like my situation right so
00:31:11
that he got outside right and the eyewitnesses at the emergency meeting claimed that he was no sign of him being
00:31:17
intoxicated then Chicago PD comes out and they say well there's no sign of him being intoxicated as far as their
00:31:24
surveillance either but we're talking about a very small room that they would have footage of him in and for him to
00:31:31
walk a straight line or to not look intoxicated I mean look also if he was a man on the on a mission again
00:31:39
you know when you're getting to the point where you might get sick sometimes you start getting the
00:31:45
sweats right you know and so you're going I'm going to get outside get some cool air you know and then if I do get
00:31:51
sick I'm at least outside I'm not puking in the hotel till Lobby like I said before well your adrenaline can take
00:31:58
over and can carry you a certain amount of distance um the thing here is that the river was
00:32:04
as we said it was it empties into Lake Michigan which can be hundreds of miles long you know it's a great lake it's
00:32:11
huge it's not like some Lake that you go visit somewhere it's it's a huge body of
00:32:15
water it is a lake that you go visit somewhere no it's not a man-made lake is probably what you're trying to get at
00:32:21
divers they didn't find divers and search groups did search the river itself on several occasions and despite
00:32:29
several searches they did not find uh any of Jesse's remains or evidence that would lead you to think that he had
00:32:37
fallen into the river right but there's several bodies that end up you know watching this Shore or are coming to the
00:32:43
surface once they get to Lake Michigan and over the years these bodies have appeared and unfortunately you know
00:32:51
every time this happens we have Jesse's parents who are there wondering if that's Jesse that has surfaced well and
00:32:59
I think initially when the first part of the investigation came out that his parents didn't want to believe it was
00:33:05
something as simple as an accident right so then it became or or possibly that he
00:33:10
was also somewhat responsible for that Ox uh accident if he was very intoxicated so you know
00:33:18
um I don't think they wanted to believe it at first but now that we're 11 years out
00:33:23
every time a body comes up and or is found in Lake Michigan they're somewhat hopeful that they at least will find his
00:33:32
remains so therefore they would get some closure yeah and that sounds crazy to say that they're somewhat hopeful but
00:33:38
you're exactly right Captain they've already reserved themselves to the thought that so much time has passed
00:33:45
that he he must have passed on himself yeah and this idea too A lot of people talk about that oh well he probably went
00:33:53
downtown right uh there was a speculation that he wanted to pass out these records to
00:33:59
different record companies um and that he would do this at 2 30 in the morning it doesn't make a lot of
00:34:06
logical sense to me yeah yeah there's two stories and these were presented by people in the group within the group
00:34:13
that he traveled with uh one being that he wanted to get these CDs to different radio stations of course the radio
00:34:19
stations can be you know most of them are open 24 7. you know they're operating 24 7.
00:34:27
um I don't know that anybody's going to answer the door if you come knocking at 2 33 in the morning it seems like an odd
00:34:33
time to be dropping them off um you would think he he may have some connections that he may have he knows
00:34:40
the business a little bit he may know the appropriate time and people to drop these things off to without doing it at
00:34:46
three in the morning um the other thing uh the thought was that the band remember we mentioned the
00:34:52
band he was still at this time in his life he was still promoting a band now I don't know if it's the same band that we
00:34:58
mentioned the dead giveaway um but he he had brought Flyers with him that he wanted to pass out at a bar if
00:35:06
there was an opportunity now this was just something that he mentioned to somebody that he was traveling with
00:35:11
there's nobody has any proof that that he ever did this at any point on this trip right it seems again seems strange
00:35:19
to me that he would choose 2 30 or 3 o'clock in the morning to do this this was his last night there so maybe he
00:35:25
felt this was his last opportunity I heard that some of the bars in Chicago will stay open till about 4 a.m right um
00:35:33
so this there was an opportunity to to do this but again I think the timing seems unlikely 30 eyewitnesses that
00:35:40
never said that he had anything a flyer or anything you'd think if he had a stack of flyer that 30 eyewitnesses
00:35:47
would at least one of them would said hey we saw him with this stack of flyers and from the still photo that we saw
00:35:53
from the surveillance camera the only thing that appears to be in his hands is that gatorade bottle let's get
00:36:00
back to this and more theories right after this quick purple Drink Break [Music]
00:36:22
all right we're back all right Captain I'll tell you what I think the the fall in the river scenario
00:36:29
I think we gotta put that more towards the higher possibility end of the spectrum would you agree yeah I mean I
00:36:37
think it's most logical that leads us right next to right into the next Theory um that he was attempting to return to
00:36:46
the hotel or as you had stated and I had stated was that he was attempting to go
00:36:51
to a bar or someplace downtown and he was met with foul play along the way right
00:36:59
so I mean again where's the evidence right um and and the thing here is we have you
00:37:06
know we have Jesse's mother um you know his father's name is Donald and her name is Donna
00:37:12
um so we have Donna and Dawn uh Ross but Donna says you know the police cannot prove to us that he even left that hotel
00:37:21
building right you know so and then like you said with with the river thing possibly being a lazy Theory
00:37:30
um by the police my my argument if I'm the parents and maybe they've done this would be okay if you can't prove to me
00:37:39
that that he even left the hotel room prove to me that or the hotel building proved to me that he did not leave the
00:37:46
hotel building because hey no what I'm what are you saying what I'm saying is when they say to when they say to us we
00:37:54
don't know what happened to your son because we can't prove that he even left that hotel building I'm saying back will
00:38:00
prove to me that he did not leave that Hotel building meaning their surveillance cameras yeah start there
00:38:05
along along his route back to his hotel I think it's easy for all of us to agree
00:38:11
that that would be that seems like the most likely destination at 2 30 in the morning for a guy that has a 10 minute
00:38:18
walk to get back to where his bed is and his belongings are where he needs to be
00:38:24
in the morning time for when they leave I think this seems like the most likely scenario that he might have attempted to
00:38:32
leave but if I'm the parents I want proof that he was not on that route you know and if you tell me that you've seen
00:38:37
surveillance and he's not on any of those pictures let me see it with my eyes let me look at the at the time
00:38:44
that'll last from 2 30 until about 3 30 or 4 in the morning so that I can say you know what that person right there is
00:38:51
not my son that person you see walking is not my son that person is not my son well that's my big question in this
00:38:59
whole case itself is the collection of these different surveillance tapes and and was he actually seen in the hotel
00:39:07
lobby or somewhere else in that hotel again that's what makes it so confusing one like I said from the beginning I
00:39:13
think it's irresponsible yeah they're 18 19 maybe even 20 year old students but to have a emergency meeting so late at
00:39:21
night it doesn't matter if it was 2 A.M or if it was 1am that's still too late especially when the when the two um
00:39:29
buildings are not connected and when we're at crime con for example a lot of the podcasters let's say uh Bob Ruff
00:39:36
from truth and Justice and then Generation Y uh crawl space guys a bunch of people white wine
00:39:43
we're all just looking for a place to meet up and drinking sideways and everybody all the names that we just
00:39:50
mentioned all those famous you know Wonderful podcasts out there of names we just dropped you owe us around for next
00:39:57
year's crime Cod okay yeah you guys know what how about two rounds they are two rounds no but one of the things that we
00:40:05
talked about when I was like how well let's meet up for a drink and let's have a meet up with uh listeners and and
00:40:10
friends and at first the the kind of conversation was okay well what's good in Indianapolis
00:40:16
well my question then was well how are these individuals going to get there and if it's in walking distance then are we
00:40:24
putting people at risk by getting drunk and then having to walk you know even if
00:40:28
it's 10 minutes away I love the captain thinking like a man that's talked about too many horrible crimes and accidents
00:40:35
that have happened to people yeah well I think some of these people were just looking for uh you know more
00:40:41
um content for their show I I wasn't really I actually really didn't give a [ __ ] about anybody's um safety it was
00:40:48
more my safety like if I'm going to drink uh I want to get hammered I want to get it to the point where you know I
00:40:55
become this small you know a little Alice in Wonderland and I'm and all I have to do is crawl my way back up to my
00:41:01
room so again I like I said with this case I think it's irresponsible um that that they had this uh emergency
00:41:11
meeting so late 10 minutes walking away and and you know it's dark in a city that people these students are not
00:41:21
familiar with and that you know that there's a dance but you probably knew that there was drinking going on as well
00:41:27
well and you know that on the flip side people were going to argue with you and they're going to say you know what
00:41:33
Captain well these are adults and they are they're kids you know we're having this emergency meeting so we want to
00:41:41
give them the feel and the taste of a real emergency meeting so we're going to hold it at An Inconvenient time I'm with
00:41:48
you I'm with you I think it's irresponsible on behalf of the people in charge of organizing the event to hold
00:41:54
something so late at night kind of a fictitious emergency meeting for a fictitious U.N you know right you could
00:42:02
hold an emergency meeting at any time right right but the thing is they hold all these fictitious uh you know
00:42:08
horseshit when when the but the uh but the threat is still real right you know the danger is still real so I just think
00:42:18
it's irresponsible yeah I mean if you want to hold it at An Inconvenient time you can interrupt their breakfast you
00:42:23
can interrupt their lunch or another scheduled event um so I get it that you're trying to
00:42:29
create an atmosphere amongst that group I just think it's irresponsible like you
00:42:35
said it's 2 30 in the morning some of these people are staying at a hotel that's a 10 minute walk and we all know
00:42:41
you know you don't have to be in an Einstein or a Sherlock Holmes to understand that the Chicago crime rate
00:42:47
and murder rate are significantly higher than many other cities and the rest of this country well again like I said okay
00:42:54
so I have an issue with was there enough um work put in to get the surveillance tapes
00:43:02
um because I think look I think again like we said this is a couple days before Thanksgiving I think some of
00:43:08
these cops thought you know what this guy's a kid seems like a smart kid seems like a good kid he's going to turn up
00:43:14
I don't think initially they're just like well he fell into the river and that's what happened no but it's like
00:43:19
they I don't think they did their work and then with the eyewitness accounts you can't tell me what if the meeting
00:43:25
started at 1am or 2 A.M right it's like there's so many contradictory stories there and then it then it becomes well
00:43:32
how much surveillance footage do you need do you need the time where he walked in and then the time that he
00:43:37
walked out and maybe there's another time or how did you put here here's my other question for the Chicago PD do
00:43:45
they have the video footage of him walking from his hotel to this emergency meeting because I'd like to see that and
00:43:52
then from that point to the until 3 A.M 4 a.m I want to see all that footage and
00:43:58
I don't think they pulled that and I think they got lazy and like I said I think you know
00:44:03
I think they just assumed that this kid is going to come up it's you know it's this big trip 1200 students he's just
00:44:10
gonna show up and I think this was the frustration that the Ross family had from the get-go you know and then once
00:44:18
they didn't collect this evidence and once they didn't talk to all the people that they should have talked to
00:44:23
yeah I think it haunts this guy but I think it haunts them because they they know they didn't try hard enough and so
00:44:29
then we would go okay well what is the logical thing well the logical thing is he fell into the river
00:44:34
yeah yeah and you're right that wasn't their initial thought that was not like they they showed up to the hotel they
00:44:40
took a quick look around and they were like oh guy fell into the river seen it a hundred thousand times no it was like
00:44:46
you said it was after a couple days that they kind of come to that conclusion um I think they were looking for leads
00:44:53
obviously I think they were trying to track down some leads but I'm with you it's like my understanding was that they
00:44:59
that he would have been in this specific Hotel building for a decent amount of time you know that this was there was
00:45:06
the scheduled dance there was some events there there were people hosting hotel room parties and then there's this
00:45:13
emergency meeting he would have been there for a considerable amount of time before he left or fell into the river at
00:45:21
2 30 in the morning um so regarding the surveillance footage of him arriving to the hotel
00:45:31
could be difficult depending on the group The the amount of people walking in and out but but I'm with you I where
00:45:37
is all this footage I again I go back to the parents right so you're going to tell me that these 30 students walked
00:45:43
hand in hand together uh and so it makes it hard to have the footage going in but
00:45:48
then this one Lone Wolf just walked out by himself again this also kind of you know hints to me a little bit like of
00:45:55
Lisa lamb right we have all this video footage but then all of a sudden we have nothing like you know the big thing
00:46:01
about her and the and um the elevator is that we don't have the lobby footage and if we had the
00:46:08
lobby footage that would change some things but remember there was some you know technical difficulties with them
00:46:12
and so that's why we don't have them so was there technical difficulties with these these trail cams or other
00:46:19
surveillance footage from that area you know well and the thought here too is regarding the hotel that Jessie's
00:46:27
staying at um Ralph Parker went back there at some point he went went back there after he
00:46:32
thought Jesse had returned to that hotel now can you show me law enforcement can
00:46:38
you show me that you were able to decipher who Ralph Parker was according to the surveillance footage at that
00:46:45
hotel when he walked into the building because we've seen these security cameras we've seen some of the footage
00:46:52
that they that they record sometimes you can't decipher you can tell it's a person you can you might be
00:46:59
able to you might be able to just it's a person right you might be able to judge
00:47:02
if they're three foot tall or six foot tall you might be able to judge if they're light-skinned or dark-skinned
00:47:07
but you might not be able to know anything other than the guy had on a a purple ball cap or he had on a uh green
00:47:15
ball cap you know you might not be able to to tell me that that's not Jesse Ross
00:47:20
walking there you might not be able to tell me that it's Ralph Parker walking into the hotel unless you have written
00:47:26
down from his account of that evening exactly what time that he walked into that hotel yeah I'd like to know where
00:47:33
his whereabouts were I mean I don't I don't find his story to be that fishy though man it's it's very logical to
00:47:39
think that somebody opens up their hotel room uh it's dark you see a pile on the
00:47:44
bed you know you you just assume that it's Jesse and then you fall asleep some people are not going to turn on that
00:47:50
light he might have been intoxicated himself and just again like like I said earlier uh just pulling this you know I
00:47:58
gotta crawl to my bed you know that's all maybe that's all he was worried about this is you know that's the thing
00:48:04
when you're drinking you get you become a survivalist I just need to get to my bed at some point
00:48:10
um especially when I'm drinking some liquor but um so I think his story is logical then he
00:48:17
wakes up in the morning and Jesse's not there well is it that far-fetched to think oh this guy got up and got going
00:48:24
maybe he had something to do maybe he was hungry you know so I I don't find his story illogical but at the same
00:48:32
point show me him on surveillance footage right show him walking back to his hotel
00:48:38
show him walking into the lobby of his hotel well right and I've seen Parks and Rec so I'm no dummy right I've seen
00:48:46
Parks and Rec and what do you what do you what is the line of dummy people that people that have not seen Parks and
00:48:52
Rec you're you're a dummy people that literally you are literally no but I've seen it in the and
00:49:00
the funny thing is you know I you know I don't want to make a big joke about this
00:49:03
but the idea that there are these heated debates and these even though it's a fictitious you know it's this Mock You
00:49:09
in thing um there are some heated debates and some people take this stuff very seriously
00:49:15
so again that would um some crazy loon student uh I think uh Jesse was in charge of uh Zaire
00:49:25
so did was Zaire stepping on somebody's toes and was some nefarious act taking place because of a debate
00:49:34
um so we have video footage of him Jesse possibly leaving I want the video footage of all the other students right
00:49:43
words their whereabouts because those 30 students in that in that room they're suspects High suspects
00:49:52
you know because they would have more contact with them than the other 1200 and they would have been you know
00:50:00
um we can assume some of the last people to see Jesse live right and and why aren't these people questioned more and
00:50:07
did all of them return to the meeting after the break or remain seated during the break right or who went back to the
00:50:14
hotel who left who went for a smoke break you know who went to get some more booze
00:50:21
and that's what I keep going back to Captain if if he did in fact leave the hotel building to me it points more that
00:50:28
he had a destination in mind because he left by himself uh right but to me that to me look if you're at a party you
00:50:39
normally don't make an announcement or want somebody to come hold your hand while you go Yak right so to me that
00:50:46
would be the motivation there now the thing here is you've walked us well into the other theories
00:50:52
um and I think that you can kind of lump these together in a way so I'll kind of
00:50:57
just mention them both and we'll talk about them as they pertain to his story and maybe possibly one another but so
00:51:04
the other thought is um and this was presented you know by other people but I heard his mother
00:51:10
State this in an interview Donna said you know how do we know that the he didn't go back to a hotel room within
00:51:18
that hotel building that he never left that hotel building during the break that he went to a hotel room either to
00:51:24
continue to party to talk to somebody that he had spoken to earlier that night or simply just to go somewhere to hang
00:51:31
out for the 30-minute break you know she says you can't prove to me that he left
00:51:35
that building and she says how do we know there wasn't some kind of accident in one of these hotel rooms and somebody
00:51:41
decided to cover it up this would be pointing toward that situation but also pointing towards somebody in the group
00:51:48
in that group of 1200 students well I've always thought the idea of a student or
00:51:54
a person oding and then people dumping the body somewhere or covering up was complete just Malarkey
00:52:02
until I've been reading about it non-stop like it's been happening a lot I think there was three girl or four
00:52:09
girls charged from Ohio State because they they literally dump the body at the hospital they just the girl OD'd
00:52:20
wait so they pull up in a car and just roll the body out of the car and dump it at the footstep of the of the uh
00:52:27
Hospital yeah and they're going to be charged and there's multiple cases if you're gonna do that why not just call
00:52:32
the ambulance I don't because for whatever reason again you know they're not adults you know it's not the 40s 50s
00:52:41
60s maybe even 70s anymore I would argue that those people might not have been adults back then as well but yeah but
00:52:48
you're right different time though and I think people expected people to be more
00:52:52
mature at a younger age and I think people expected people to grow up a lot faster than we do today and I think we
00:53:01
kind of coddle people and put people into these little safe spaces so it's not out of the realm of possibility that
00:53:08
he was partying with some people and and something bad happened again like the mother says prove to me that he left you
00:53:17
know and I think it's a real possibility but again it's questioning those 30-some
00:53:21
people so I'm interested to see because supposedly there's a documentary coming out about this uh the the little trailer
00:53:30
I saw of it was absolutely horrible uh as far as a a film standpoint but I'm interested on what they were able to
00:53:39
uncover because the other problem too about this is there's a lot of podcasts that then go in and investigate just one
00:53:46
case spend their whole time on that you know I think we met uh paying from up and vanish and very cool thing this is a
00:53:54
case that would be almost impossible to do because you got 1200 students at this
00:53:59
event I mean you can start with the 30 but this this would be a a monster undertaking yeah yeah there is a
00:54:07
documentary coming out at some point um and it's done by a guy that's from his hometown or from his area from Jessie
00:54:14
Ross's area I don't know the date of when that's to be released other than the article I read was stating that it
00:54:21
was due to be outlay later this year Captain says it looks terrible i've not seen just the trailer looks terrible but
00:54:28
what I'm hoping is that this individual was able to um uncover some things that that we
00:54:35
can't find I've not seen the trailer myself um Captain the thing here is though you
00:54:41
know fall in the river I put that at a high probability um a hotel accident a hotel room
00:54:47
accident the only thing that there there's one thing that points me to that and again that's they cannot prove that
00:54:53
he actually walked outside the four walls of that hotel right um the other problem with that though is
00:55:01
you you again you know it's like with the suicide thing well where's Jesse where's the body where's
00:55:08
um you'd think that you might see depending on what type of accident it could have been you would think there
00:55:14
would have been some kind of evidence of such that took place in some kind of hotel room and obviously he would have
00:55:21
had to have been his body would have had to been removed from that hotel at some
00:55:25
point um but again you're up against this situation like the police said where you
00:55:31
get to an area you get to you there's a a report filed we go out to investigate there's no crime scene there's no crime
00:55:39
scene for us to go something happened here and furthermore you you're hearing about something who knows he could have
00:55:46
actually disappeared at 2 30 in the morning there could there could have been nobody that seen him after 2 30 in
00:55:52
the morning until it's reported at approximately 4 P.M the next day and many people have left this hotel rooms
00:56:00
have been cleaned people you know people have been in and out of these rooms yeah
00:56:04
and I know I I sound like I'm throwing the police on under the bus and saying that they didn't do their due diligence
00:56:10
and one first of all they're understaffed down under man they're they're underfunded uh under resources
00:56:16
this is also weirdly happening it's it's an adult so I think it becomes less of a
00:56:22
urgent situation um and again it's a bunch of people at this you know he seems like a good kid
00:56:28
he's probably going to show up and then you got Thanksgiving a couple days beforehand I think that factors into
00:56:34
things a little bit um so I I don't want to make it seem like I'm completely faulting them like if
00:56:41
they would have done everything they're supposed to do we would have we'd have a
00:56:45
closure for his family I I don't believe that I think you know I think they ran into some brick walls
00:56:52
here yeah there are certainly incidences when we have seen plenty of times before
00:56:57
where there just appears to be no answers there there doesn't there's no arrows pointing the police and
00:57:03
investigators in any type of direction to come to any conclusions at all um now one thing the the parents have as
00:57:11
you said you know they don't they're they seem to be unhappy with the police they unhappy with the investigative
00:57:18
efforts as far as when it comes to Jesse now he you it's understandable I mean they're not getting the results that
00:57:27
they want so you're going to be you're going to be upset you're going to be unhappy that doesn't mean that they
00:57:33
didn't do everything they could do now one thing that uh don Ross has brought up there was a strange incident uh
00:57:41
regarding the Chicago Police Department where his so Jesse Ross is on the National Database for missing persons
00:57:50
this is on the ncic and for whatever reason I don't know if it was a glitch in the system but he his name was
00:57:59
removed and his father was discovered this I don't know if somebody told him about it or whatever but he called
00:58:07
the Chicago Police Department and he told the investigators involved he said look my son's name is no longer on this
00:58:15
database for missing persons did you find him of course is the first thing he wants to know and then second of all he
00:58:21
wants to know well why would his name be removed I don't know the specifics of why it was taken off but the problem
00:58:28
that Don Ross has with the investigation and that I would have with this investigation as well is that he alerted
00:58:36
them of this and they seem to drag their feet about putting him back onto that database so the way the database works
00:58:44
is that information has to be uploaded uploaded and inputted by somebody by one of the investigators involved in the
00:58:52
case so that database didn't do anything wrong they sit around waiting for somebody to give them the information
00:58:58
unless it was a glitch right um regardless though Captain yeah but here's how it works you file a missing
00:59:05
person report right then you go looking for the person if the police find the person they have
00:59:11
no legal responsibility to tell the family that we found this person and that he is okay to have no legal
00:59:19
responsibility to do so right and and that's that's on them now they might let's say Jesse went missing on his own
00:59:27
uh chord and they go Jesse do you want us to tell your family no they don't have any responsibility to
00:59:35
tell the family oh we found him he's okay they have a responsibility to the city and the taxpayers to close the case
00:59:44
so I wonder if on some level it was one of these things where they closed the case
00:59:50
and then they said uh somebody found out about it and then they end up putting them back on the thing so they don't
00:59:56
have to have the odd conversation with the family that all we found him he just doesn't want anything to do with you
01:00:02
that's certainly a possible which would lead to the odd speculation of you know if there's something you know look look
01:00:09
for all we know his family was super religious and he had some different way of life he wanted to live and that was
01:00:15
not kosher to them so I don't know yeah we don't know the Dynamics of of his family one thing I
01:00:24
will say though that kind of to to keep their son's case alive um and to keep it in the minds of the
01:00:31
Chicago Police Department and their investigators um they have asked friends and loved
01:00:36
ones and anybody that visits find Jesse ross.com to on Jesse's birthday send a birthday card to the Chicago Police
01:00:44
Department um well I commend them and I I feel sorry for them but also they you know
01:00:51
they haven't really uncovered much else I mean that's the problem with this case
01:00:55
and probably at this point you know we gotta start moving on from this case because there is so many holes there's
01:01:02
so many what-ifs you know but I mean we could speculate on it for 10 hours if we
01:01:07
wanted to well and the other thing though I do want to throw this in because some people find it extremely
01:01:12
defiant that the Ross family would would send birthday card regards to the Chicago Police Department I I think
01:01:21
they're just trying to keep their son's case alive and well um and and keep hope that they will get
01:01:28
some answers at some point so I I don't think that it's defiant and I also do want to include that according to Donald
01:01:35
Ross's bio I don't know how long he this was a career choice for him but according to his bio he did work as a
01:01:43
police officer at one time he did hold many jobs over the course of his his years so um it could have just been a
01:01:51
short-lived career but so he does have some ties and some knowledge of police work yeah I I think with all these cases
01:01:59
when there's a missing child we all tend to judge their their families and their
01:02:05
parents on what they're doing but at the end of the day none of us know how we would react to this situation if you
01:02:12
want to dive more into this case check out that website that we've mentioned the other thing too is one thing that
01:02:17
was glaring to me as I watched interviews with his parents I do believe the parents when they state that you
01:02:25
know he was close to us that he was close to he he called us he checked in with us we always had a close
01:02:30
relationship and the other thing that I saw too you know it's it's it's quite common that you see a son you know his
01:02:40
hero may be his father that that's a common thing to see now I see this situation the way that Don Ross speaks
01:02:47
about Jesse Ross his son it almost comes off to me that that his son was his hero
01:02:53
you know he talks about Jesse being very outgoing being Fearless being somebody that liked to play jokes on people that
01:03:01
he loved and cared about and it seemed that he admired his son for these traits so uh truly a heartbreaking story we're
01:03:09
not going to give up on you Jesse uh we think that there's some hope out there and hopefully one day the parents and
01:03:15
his brother will get the answers that they need and deserve I have a handful of cases that I have on the list and
01:03:22
I'll just random do a random Google search and this is one that I'll head back to and hopefully there's more
01:03:28
information that comes out soon [Music] this week's recommended reading is where's Opie vanished in Chicago by
01:03:43
Donald Ross Jesse's father where's Opie allows the reader to ride along with the
01:03:49
family of Jesse Opie Ross and learn details of his disappearance in Chicago learn what it's like day to day living
01:03:56
with the reality of a missing son and brother and finding the courage to go on learn how such an event affects a family
01:04:03
friends and law enforcement remember this could happen to any of us Donald Ross has two books on the subject the
01:04:10
first to come out was published in 2011 so please check out where's Opie and you
01:04:16
can do that by going to our website truecrime garage.com check out the recommended page and use our Amazon
01:04:22
Banner for all of your purchases alright thank you Colonel thank you Captain and
01:04:26
we'll see everybody back here next week same garage Time same garage Channel until then be good be kind and don't
01:04:33
live foreign [Music] [Applause]