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GameChanger [Music] welcome to True Crime garage wherever you are whatever you are doing thanks
00:01:43
for listening I'm your host Nick and with me as always ladies and gentlemen a finely tuned Athlete on the verge of
00:01:50
greatness he is the captain yeah finely tuned athlete that barely can tie his shoes it's good to be seen and it's good
00:01:56
to see you thanks for listening thanks for tell him a [Music] friend this week we are very happy to be
00:02:07
featuring all struck dry apple plus Oak cider fall or Autumn whatever you want to call it I call it a great time to
00:02:14
have a glass of cider taste the fresh apples the sunshine and a hint of dry Oak garage grade three and 3/4 bottle
00:02:23
caps out of five and today we are toasting some of our garage Army Members First up we have Brian h a big Buckeye
00:02:31
fan down in Cookville Tennessee and a big shout out to Amilia and Haley Idaho next up we have our friend Liz who is
00:02:40
down with the sickness in Tyson's Virginia and a big we like your jib to letia in Kansas City Missouri next up we
00:02:48
have brother Ben in Minnesota and sister Kinsey in one of the most manly cities of all time Kodiak Alaska and last but
00:02:56
certainly not least we have jock or is it jacqu in Virginia cheers to everybody who went to True Crim garage.com and
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clicked on the Donate button thank you all for filling up the fridge make sure you check us out on Instagram Facebook
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Twitter all that stuff @ True Crime garage and that is enough of the business all right everybody gather
00:03:20
around grab a chair grab a beer let's talk some true crime [Music] yeah Lauren was my neighbor um we're
00:03:45
just trying to find out where she is at this point I mean no one has seen her since Saturday I mean the last time
00:03:52
anyone heard from her was an email that she sent out and no one's heard from her
00:03:57
since did you see her hang out with anyone at the time anything like that I mean no no no one has seen her sincerity
00:04:05
I haven't seen anything I mean always hear noise outside but it's just people walking by pretty much and you she just
00:04:13
recently graduated from Mercer yeah she and I were we were both JD students um we graduated back in
00:04:21
May what kind of person was she I mean how did you what did you be I she's as nice as can be I mean very personable
00:04:28
very much people person do you know anybody that any enemies she might have had somebody that might want to hurt her
00:04:34
no I we're we all know where she is I mean the only thing we can think is that maybe she went out running and someone
00:04:41
snatched her because I mean we went we went over one of her friends had a key we went inside and tried to see if there
00:04:49
was anything a Miss but I mean she had a door jam that was sitting right by it so
00:04:56
there was no sign that anyone broke in I mean was locked when everyone got here I
00:05:03
we we just don't know where she is what about um in the like the parking lot area I know they've been doing a lot of
00:05:08
I think that's where they had recovered the body or whatever they recovered from
00:05:12
there had you heard had you seen anything there had you see anything there all I
00:05:20
mean we don't know if this is the same person you know what I mean like they took out a body there earlier we don't
00:05:24
know if it's the same person or not that's why we're trying to ask people if they know who lived there
00:05:31
are you okay sir I I think I need to sit down [Music] okay 27-year-old Lauren Giddings
00:05:54
graduated from Mercer University law school in May of 2011 11 she grew up in the suburbs Southwest of Baltimore
00:06:03
Lauren moved away from home nearly a decade earlier and lived most of that time in
00:06:09
Georgia she is away for college but while away it is said that she fell in love with the South which in my opinion
00:06:17
is very easy to do after school she wanted to do Defense work either working as a defense attorney or for a defense
00:06:26
team she was just weeks away from taking the bar exam so Captain lawren really got two major things going on right now
00:06:35
one she is done with school and now it's time to study hardcore and nail this bar
00:06:41
exam and two she's moving she's going to move out afterwards and the plan is to pack up everything and move to Atlanta
00:06:50
shout out to the ATL so she will be attempting to get a job in Atlanta after passing the bar I
00:06:58
believe she was going to move in been with a boyfriend in Atlanta but for now it's study time we've got to pass that
00:07:06
bar we have an aspiring lawyer cramming for the Georgia bar exam now at first her friends assuming she was sequestered
00:07:15
in her apartment studying thought little of her absence they thought little of her not answering the phone or not
00:07:22
returning their text messages this however would not go unnoticed and after a few days one
00:07:29
friend in particular will sound the alarm it was about 4 days before anyone went looking for her June 29th was when
00:07:37
friends started officially looking for Lauren we need to introduce Katie O'Hara and Lori
00:07:45
subick these are Lauren's best friends lifelong friends the three became a trio way back in kindergarten but now as
00:07:54
adults this Trio is spread out living in three different states but they are in constant communication with each other
00:08:02
Katie is at home in Maryland and she sounds the alarm first she had been trying to get a hold of Lauren for a
00:08:08
couple of days Lauren was not returning calls or text remember however Lauren was studying pretty hardcore for the bar
00:08:15
exam so you know how people will set up like an outof office reply thanks for your email but I will be out of the
00:08:22
office I'm skiing and Aspen that is what I put on my out of office reply however I'm just sitting on
00:08:29
the couch drinking beer and watching football for 4 days straight I normally just put I'm out of my office doing
00:08:35
something way cooler than you are well Lauren and I'm guessing this may have been a Facebook post or maybe an email
00:08:43
that she sent out but she sent out a little message saying I'm basically putting myself on lockdown and I'm
00:08:49
studying for this exam right it's been the thing she's been gearing towards for years yeah kind of a a don't be offended
00:08:57
thing if you don't hear from me regardless of what was going on luckily Katie sounded the alarm and Friends
00:09:05
joined in because as you will see this case could have went much much differently Katie called her good friend
00:09:13
Lori Lori didn't take the call she was busy and thought you know I'll call my friend back Katie didn't stop there she
00:09:21
called Lorie's sister who lives with Lori Katie is not close with the sister so now Lori is aware that something is
00:09:28
going on here Lori tells Katie she was experiencing the same issue Lauren was unresponsive now they are both trying to
00:09:37
get a hold of Lauren calling her cell and everything is going straight to voicemail by this time I should note
00:09:44
Lori is in Chicago so now the friends reach out to Lauren's family they too have not heard
00:09:51
from Lauren for a couple of days this is getting Stranger by the minute for Lauren's friends and family also becomes
00:09:58
more E when the phone calls are going straight to voicemail yeah Lauren's sister Caitlyn wheeler said she was
00:10:06
already concerned but now talking with Lauren's friends her concerns were certainly
00:10:12
validated Caitlyn was one of two younger sisters of Lawrence Caitlyn sent a Facebook message to one of her big
00:10:20
sisters law school Pals and mon this is Ashley Morehouse Ashley and Lauren met on a
00:10:28
Friday evening back in 2008 and became fast friends they were pretty close Caitlyn asked Ashley to drop by Lauren's
00:10:36
apartment Ashley did she says she walked up the stairs to the second floor apartment and knocked on the Crimson
00:10:44
door of apartment number two Lauren's apartment no one answered she says she saw Lauren's Mitsubishi Galant her
00:10:53
vehicle was parked outside out front where she would expect to see it Ashley called CA back to tell her she hadn't
00:11:00
found her sister Ashley offered to swing by again later then they got in touch with Kristen Miller a close friend of
00:11:09
her sisters who had gone to college with Lauren in Atlanta Miller thought it was
00:11:15
odd that she too hadn't heard from Lauren after sending a message a couple of days
00:11:21
earlier over the next few hours everyone was desperately trying to reach anyone who might know where Lauren could
00:11:29
right so they're kind of putting the pieces together to realize nobody's made contact with her for days yeah yeah and
00:11:37
the thing here is Caitlyn her sister knew Lauren's passwords to uh some of her online
00:11:45
activity so she logged into Lauren's Facebook and logged into Lauren's Gmail accounts this would offer her no Comfort
00:11:55
at all as she saw quickly that Lauren had not sent any emails in several days she hadn't been on Facebook at all her
00:12:03
sister started calling Mak hospitals to find out if there had been some type of accident or or if she was held up in a
00:12:10
hospital somewhere right and then Lauren's friends and family reached out to the police and an officer was being
00:12:17
sent to Lauren's apartment this was about 1100 p.m. Georgia time 20 minutes later the dispatcher said an officer
00:12:27
went to the apartment complex and didn't find any signs of forced entry the officer then called and suggested that
00:12:33
Lauren may have gone away for a few days the officer said a missing person's report could not be filed until the
00:12:41
morning that's ridiculous you have no contact with somebody for multiple days you you went in the fact that you went
00:12:49
in and you saw that there was no emails sent and there was no emails checked for
00:12:54
multiple days that's an that's another sign especially a student student that is looking to move and possibly get jobs
00:13:02
you'd think they would check these things yeah it what the officer is going to reiterate to the
00:13:09
family is you know we did go by there we saw absolutely zero signs of forced entry the apartment was Secure the door
00:13:17
was locked yeah and they're they're saying yes we understand that you can't get in touch with her but we don't see
00:13:24
anything that would point us in the direction of of we should be involved in this whole thing we also believe that
00:13:32
these apartments are primarily uh occupied by students I believe I actually believe that all of them so it
00:13:41
could be are students and that they're all law students so it could be some kind of University Housing and you think
00:13:47
that they'd be able to contact the university and get access you know hey let's just we went by there's no sign of
00:13:55
force entry but let's just let's go into her apartment yeah I'm I'm uncertain if the
00:14:01
university owns these these buildings right but they could the police could get a hold of the
00:14:07
landlord yeah so it around midnight it was decided that Ashley Morehouse who we've already talked about should go
00:14:14
ahead and go back to the apartment but this time go into the apartment she was going to use a spare key which Lauren
00:14:22
kept in a white vase on her patio table this is to get inside of the apartment yeah that's I I don't like that I don't
00:14:30
like the hidden key thing so she did go to the apartment but she was not going to go into the apartment alone she had a
00:14:37
few of Lauren's friends and or classmates friends classmates with her yeah and some neighbors as well inside
00:14:45
they found Lauren's purse and keys they found her cell phone as suspected the battery was dead to the cell phone they
00:14:53
plugged the phone into a charger turned the phone on and learned that no calls or messages had been made or sent in
00:15:01
several days someone turned on the phone and found that Lauren hadn't made any calls or sent any messages since
00:15:08
Saturday so four days ago as of now we are on Wednesday all of Lauren's study materials were at the house as well so
00:15:17
no one had any reason to believe that she was out somewhere studying you know plus her phone and right is there
00:15:27
everything that you would expect to be there with Lauren is there in the apartment except for Lauren yeah they
00:15:34
did check regarding her email there was an email that she had sent a few days before it was one of the I believe the
00:15:42
last email she sent was before Saturday correct was her her she sent an email stating that she believed somebody was
00:15:51
watching her or somebody had tried to break into her apartment it's reported different ways I've not seen the actual
00:15:57
email myself but it's reported different ways and I'm a little uncertain as to if she mentioned
00:16:03
both or if it was just one or the other but it's suspicious Behavior regardless very and we need to point out here
00:16:10
Captain if everyone hasn't already figured it out by all of her friends that we've mentioned Lauren was very
00:16:17
social by all accounts she was extremely outgoing yeah while her friends are in her apartment conducting a little
00:16:25
investigation of their own one of Lauren's neighbors this is Steph McDaniel came over at some point now
00:16:33
let's give a little background here Lauren is not new to this area as we have kind of already pointed out she has
00:16:39
lived in this apartment complex for years so has Steph McDaniel and I don't know this to be true but I'm guessing a
00:16:47
lot of these people these students that live in these apartments that it's a more of a
00:16:53
long-term situation than most college type situations M now Lauren and Steven lived in the same apartment complex
00:17:02
attended the same College taking the same classes both were recent graduates of law school and both studying for
00:17:11
their bar exams remember Lauren however is from out of town out of state even from Maryland Stephen while not from the
00:17:20
immediate area he was born and raised in Georgia Steph is from littleburn Don't make me say that too
00:17:28
many times Lil burn Georgia which is like an hour and a half to an hour and 45 minute drive north of maken Steven
00:17:37
graduated from Park View High back in 2004 Steven Mark McDaniel earned a academic scholarship to Mercer as an
00:17:48
undergraduate so stevenh and Lauren as did most of the residents in this apartment complex they knew each other
00:17:55
right the apartment complex this is not a huge or well even big apartment complex that consists of two buildings
00:18:04
each building is two floors and each building houses eight Apartments so only 16 Apartments total Lauren lives in
00:18:13
apartment number two this is on the second floor Steven lives in apartment number four he too is on the second
00:18:21
floor these two spoke several times over the years they were however a bit of Polar Opposites let's say Lauren was
00:18:32
very outgoing and Steven was not Lauren had a ton of friends and Steven was a loner step stops by he's talking with
00:18:40
Lauren's friends who's looking for her there you know everybody wants to know where she is one of Lauren's friends
00:18:47
would go on to describe Steven's presence as quote very weird yeah now I I think most people would say that this
00:18:56
guy didn't have a lot of friends was probably pretty quiet seemed pretty nice but also seemed a little
00:19:04
strange yeah yeah well that was Steven that you heard in the trailer there so that gives you a
00:19:11
little Steven flavor I guess whatever that is Steven flavor from Mak Georgia now what they are seeing at Lauren's
00:19:20
apartment Captain nothing is a miss and her friend Ashley Morehouse described the scene the best when she told cait
00:19:28
wheeler quote everything you'd take with you if you went somewhere was in the house right Caitlyn called her uncle who
00:19:38
is a cop in Washington DC he told her you better tell the group to go outside you know get out of the
00:19:47
apartment go outside lock the door and call 911 and insist that they send an officer to the scene immediately right
00:19:56
so that's exactly what they did and two Mercer University police officers were dispatched to the apartment after they
00:20:04
arrived they spoke with the group the officers then decided to call the mon city cops a mon police officer arrived
00:20:13
at the scene at 12:52 a.m. the officer in the group walked around the complex looking in the
00:20:21
bushes they searched the law school they searched the library the officer in the
00:20:26
group stayed they didn't go home until about 3:00 a.m. I do want to point out that Mak police officer while at the
00:20:35
scene he did notify the detective Bureau that they had a missing person right early in the morning on Thursday June
00:20:45
30th one of Lauren's friends her father was friends with the mayor of mon so the
00:20:54
mayor was contacted and told of this whole situation ation the mayor of course calls the chief of police and the
00:21:03
general orders here Captain are going to be one very quickly determine if this situation warrants a fullon
00:21:11
investigation and if it does let's get into that investigation right away so Lauren's friends and family wanted the
00:21:20
police to be very understanding of this situation and to treat it accordingly basically what they want wanted to be
00:21:28
understood is Lauren's been missing for days now right even though we reported her missing late last night right we did
00:21:37
our own little investigation we being the family and friends and we determin she's been missing since Saturday so we
00:21:44
are coming up on five days now Lauren's been missing for 5 days don't treat it as though it's just been one
00:21:52
day remember we said they need to determine if necessary and then then go right into a full-on investigation well
00:22:01
that is exactly what law enforcement determined and that is exactly what they did by 9:00 a.m. the mon police who are
00:22:10
now officially in charge of this investigation they are back on the scene back at the apartment complex now we
00:22:18
have detectives we have officers we have one of those large Caravans this is those large mobile command centers that
00:22:26
you see yeah and you know when you see one of these things that something major is probably
00:22:33
going on well they have to look at her apartment now with all that evidence of all of her stuff being
00:22:41
there one where is she but then two is there any evidence that somebody came in and and took her away from that right
00:22:50
and by this time they are knocking on doors and they are interviewing and asking question questions of all of the
00:22:59
residents at the apartment complex Steven McDaniel is interviewed at this time this is a informal interview
00:23:08
conducted inside a police or detective's car right now at about 9:40 a.m. two detectives noticed a terrible smell
00:23:18
coming from a trash can I like to call these wheelie bins it's this is a large trash can outside in the apartment
00:23:26
complex the the type that will hold several bags of trash rubbish and debris and the garbage truck comes around lifts
00:23:34
it up and dumps it into the truck and I'm ass big bins yeah and I'm assuming that each apartment didn't have their
00:23:43
own bin I'm assuming that they had these bigger bins for multiple apartment units
00:23:50
yeah I believe these were shared uh bins as you would say so the detectives are are worried about the
00:23:59
smell because what they would later say these are experienced detectives they have worked violent cases they have
00:24:07
worked homicide cases before unfortunately what they're smelling they're familiar with this smell and
00:24:15
it's not it's not good for their investigation whoever smelt it dealt it they open the lid to the trash can and
00:24:24
they saw that there were several trash bags that appear to be full of trash they cut open the bag that was on top
00:24:33
and inside was exactly what you would expect to find it was trash then they cut the open the bag just below the top
00:24:42
bag yeah inside this bag they found what appeared to be a decomposing torso of a
00:24:49
woman from my understanding the only clothing on the Torso was a pair of pink shorts
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00:27:23
mes cheers captain and a big cheers to all the teachers out there that's right a few hours after finding the Torso
00:27:32
Steven McDaniel granted reporters an interview along the sidewalk near the apartments let's take a
00:27:40
listen you've been studying for the bar I no one had seen her since Saturday because I we all just is not a whole lot
00:27:51
of interaction unless we're doing classes and she was doing the online version of it studies together though I
00:27:59
no we were in there there's two different people that there's two companies that provide it Captain
00:28:06
provides it and Barbie provides it I signed up with Barbie and I've been doing the lectures that they have in the
00:28:12
mornings she was doing the Kaplan online so I hardly ever saw her I I would see her like go out running but I what time
00:28:22
would she go out running I I don't even know when at night or morning I I saw like midday a couple weeks ago I mean
00:28:31
that was the last time I saw her was coming back from the bar prep on the main campus because we got moved over
00:28:38
there for a week or two but she normally would run that was her she she ran all the time I mean she
00:28:46
she had a group that she would go running with Ian I I don't know anyone that would want to
00:28:53
hurt her she was as nice person as there is was she moving soon did you know anything about her yeah yeah she she was
00:29:07
going to be moving out today she was supposed to move out today because someone else was going to
00:29:15
be moving into her apartment new law school I do you know if she was F where is she
00:29:24
from is she from Mar Maryland yeah she's from put this on you so we can hear you is
00:29:29
that all right okay I'm so sorry you can just hold on for that thank you she's from Maryland yeah I mean she
00:29:37
she was from up in Maryland I all her family was there as far as I know I mean she what's going on in your mind right
00:29:48
now like what are you thinking why would anyone do this sh didn't hear anything no didn't
00:30:00
see anybody yeah I heard something maybe I got have help okay don't worry do you want to sit down for a
00:30:12
second you got something to drink do you know if a bunch of her friends are getting together or anything
00:30:20
I that's how I found out that she was missing we a bunch of her friends came over
00:30:28
yesterday night around midnight and they they couldn't they hadn't seen her since
00:30:34
Saturday so they were trying to find out where she was so they were knocking on neighbors doors and stuff I no they they
00:30:40
went in they had a key to her apartment and they checked around didn't see anything out of place I it was locked
00:30:47
when everyone got there that was midnight yeah around midnight and then we went we went over to law school see
00:30:53
if maybe she was over in the library studying or something thing and we we looked up in the study rooms on the
00:31:00
third floor and there was no one there and we came back we looked around and just trying to find any anything to
00:31:08
figure out where she was she doesn't have any family in Georgia I I don't know I as far as I know every all of her
00:31:17
family is from in Maryland have you met her family before there there was one time that I
00:31:23
met them they came down first year she she had a little dog a little brown dog that she would exercise out in front of
00:31:32
the law school and it got hit as she was coming across the road I I heard the car
00:31:41
hit it and ran out and she was there crying and we thankfully there was someone who came along who knew a vet or
00:31:49
something and they helped that and the her family came down I think a couple weeks after that or something I met them
00:31:56
just brief but a boyfriend I we we've been trying to figure out she has a boyfriend up in
00:32:06
Atlanta but I someone called her called him and he hadn't heard from her just no no one could figure out
00:32:16
where she was so was the last question be we you said that somebody seen her on Saturday yeah she went over to uh couple
00:32:23
friends house Garen Mueller and Joe Kens they live over on Walnut and and they they said that she was over there in the
00:32:32
morning and then that was the last time that anyone we've been able to find out from had seen her she hadn't mentioned
00:32:41
what she was going to do that day or anything we uh Joe he got onto her computer last night to see if she say
00:32:49
anything she'd sent an email out to some people that afternoon talking about like
00:32:54
going out to eat or something and the last thing that anyone there was an email that she sent out after 10:
00:33:04
that night where she she sent to I think it was someone in Atlanta a friend of hers in Atlanta and he she said that she
00:33:16
she was afraid in her apartment that she thought someone had tried to break in on
00:33:19
Thursday night and she she was afraid to stay in there but where did you hear where did you hear
00:33:28
that from from Joe no he he pulled it up and we we read it off the screen she has said B to a friend in
00:33:35
Atlanta yeah I I can't remember his name but and you hadn't heard anything on Thursday night she never came to you to
00:33:42
tell you anything no I I if she had I could have done something I I could have lent her a
00:33:50
handgun i' I've got a little handgun that I have for defense and she could have SLE or something yeah I something I
00:33:58
if she was afraid in her apartment then I mean get her out of there tried to break in that's what she said in the
00:34:05
email she thought that someone had tried to break into her apartment she said like Mak hoodlum tried to break into my
00:34:11
apartment on Thursday night is that her car par there the Chevy no small car no um I think that
00:34:20
that's the detective's car detective P there no it it was here earlier and they they tow it I it had been there for days
00:34:29
and then they towed it to I guess look through see if there was yeah how did you find out that something was wrong
00:34:37
with the police here was it like when you walked up a little while ago or no I we the police were called last night and
00:34:45
they came and they looked around they didn't see anything I me they went in we looked around the place no sign of a
00:34:54
struggle no sign that anyone had broken in just nothing just she was gone I all of her stuff was there her ID was there
00:35:02
her wallet was there so what you're hearing there is it's actually we have three interviews with Stephen McDaniel
00:35:12
and in the trailer you heard the first portion of that what you just heard is what is the second portion now I
00:35:19
apologize for the audio but keep in mind this is an interview that the local news
00:35:24
is doing with this man because he's believed to be a witness they're trying to figure out what's going on why are
00:35:29
the police here we have a body that's been found a missing woman the body's not been identified yet and this is
00:35:37
right after he finds out Daniels finds out that a body has been found yeah he finds out from the the person asking him
00:35:46
the questions it's not confirmed that it's the girl that he knows is not confirmed that it's his law school
00:35:54
friend Laura Giddings but he can you you can tell that he's assuming right yeah well and I think the news people are
00:36:01
assuming as well so when we say these are three different interviews they're they're actually they're all kind of
00:36:10
happening at once you could you could make an argument that they're just one long interview but the first one that
00:36:15
you hear he's giving some general information they're asking general questions and then when they tell him
00:36:21
hey a body has been found he has to go take a break he's he's overwhelmed with emotion
00:36:27
and he goes and he takes a break where I believe he went off somewhere and sat down for about 20 minutes yeah uh and
00:36:34
then he kind of conducts himself and then comes back and answers more questions and that's what you just heard
00:36:40
there some important things in that second portion are he references the email that we
00:36:47
talked about that was sent at 10:00 on Saturday night and this is believed to be the last communication that she
00:36:55
attempted with anyone he says that it was sent to a friend in Atlanta in in reality he's right but but
00:37:03
it was actually sent to her boyfriend who lives in Atlanta right and you heard Steven's words he says he read it on the
00:37:11
screen on her computer screen the night before when he and her friends were in the apartment trying to figure out where
00:37:18
she could be he says that that Lauren wrote to her boyfriend saying some Mak hoodlums tried to break into my
00:37:26
apartment right um not really buying this email but well well I mean it it happened um right it was an email that
00:37:35
that she sent well well was an email sent from her computer yeah you bring up a good
00:37:41
question I didn't think about it that way until you just till you just brought it up in that that manner um it was an
00:37:47
email that was sent from her account let's say right yeah and believed to be from her police were suspicious of this
00:37:56
email too but not in the sense that you and I you know that you just educated me
00:38:01
to mhm um they were suspicious because they're like okay your your long-term girlfriend sends you an email saying
00:38:10
people tried to break into her apartment and it's days later and you're not contacting hey
00:38:17
boyfriend why didn't you respond to this this makes no sense I mean I've gone over this time and time again like in
00:38:24
cases like the Adon case for example well why wouldn't the boyfriend of himman Lee contact her the day that
00:38:33
supposedly she goes missing why wouldn't her ex-boyfriend contact her the day she
00:38:38
goes missing here's a scenario where you got to email now now mind you it's email
00:38:43
it's not a text message right so so that's where it becomes fishy too because if if you're calling people if
00:38:52
you're sending text why won you just send this and a text why would you send it through email unless that was
00:39:01
their uh the the protocol for their relationship because they were so far away that they would communicate more
00:39:08
through email MH but I don't think there's any evidence of that so it's just strange that that would be sent
00:39:13
through email anyways and then if if the guy didn't check his email then he gets
00:39:18
a pass that's why he didn't contact his his girlfriend that would send this email but again it it's fishy that you'd
00:39:25
send the email anyways but now mind you what is happening at the same time is they're going through the trash
00:39:33
like you were stating and now they find a torso they're I think they're all the detectives are assuming hey this is the
00:39:44
this is the missing girl this is Lauren yeah 100% but now they're going to go through all the other
00:39:50
bins but what's interesting is half the apartments trash has already been picked
00:39:55
up yeah so let's let's get into that in just a second because I kind of want to go through what you were just talking
00:40:02
about and this is interesting because just a like a week ago regarding that Adnan Sayed case and what you just
00:40:10
referenced I was having a conversation with our friend Zoe and I was explaining that my take on that
00:40:18
is you know that that Dawn was his name the boyfriend believed to be hon Lee's boyfriend he was older and I just simply
00:40:27
said to her because she found it very strange and I agree I think on some level it is strange but I also think
00:40:34
that everybody tends to kind of think everything is relative and everything is similar to their own situation and I I
00:40:45
have to remind myself sometimes that that that is not usually the case if just because I find something to be
00:40:52
strange we don't know the Dynamics of that relationship or for lawen with her boyfriend as well and so in the case of
00:41:01
dawn he's he may just not have cared he may not have thought of the relationship
00:41:05
in the same way that she thought of this relationship I understand that but when
00:41:11
have you ever made plans to meet up with somebody they didn't show up and you didn't try to make contact with them
00:41:18
I've actually that's actually happened to me multiple times so you make plans with somebody they never show up and
00:41:25
then you just don't even call or text to figure out what happened I think it's actually happened three or
00:41:32
four times but I can I can think of two times that that 100% that's exactly what
00:41:37
went down right so cuz I was I how many times was that person a significant other uh all of the times it was
00:41:45
somebody that I was dating or in that type of relationship not not a significant other I wouldn't say that
00:41:52
but somebody that I was okay now now had been on multiple dates now now answer this question how many of those times
00:41:58
did you get a call from the police stating that that person was missing and then there then afterwards you didn't
00:42:04
make contact with them um NE well never right so look I I I think it's I mean we don't want to go
00:42:12
too far into this well that's a different case but but what I'm talking about here and it kind of goes along
00:42:18
with Lauren's case as well is from what I could find and what I'm I'm making a lot of
00:42:28
assumptions here about Lauren's relationship with this boyfriend yeah it seems to me though that they're they're
00:42:35
not so connected at the hip you know what I mean they're not they're not so tied to
00:42:41
one another this is a bit of a longdistance relationship right um yes it is longterm yes it sounds like they
00:42:47
were planning on moving in together but it also sounds like they very much lived
00:42:53
Separate Lives when they weren't with each other right which would make more sense why you would contact somebody
00:43:00
through email plus this dude uh I believe he's significantly older than Lauren maybe 10 years 12 years he's he's
00:43:11
older he's more established she met him when she was working at some um Law Firm
00:43:18
uhhuh remember she wants to be a lawyer so he doesn't respond to this email because he told detectives he said look
00:43:27
I I wanted to I wanted to have a conversation with her in person about this email and I wasn't going to do so
00:43:34
until the next time I saw her he's saying yes I understand you're telling me that she's missing she sent me this
00:43:41
email I didn't reply you think that's suspicious I'm telling you I didn't even know that she was missing um yeah he's
00:43:49
he's in California on a golf trip so his he has a solid Alibi he he he's been right
00:43:56
you know he's on the other side of the country uh at the time in question he was the other thing that police were
00:44:05
suspicious about so now now we've cleared the boyfriend right now the other thing that police are suspicious
00:44:11
about is the night before remember it's believed that Saturday is the last time anybody had any contact with Lauren
00:44:19
right the night before on Friday night she and a friend stayed at the home of two males and you hear St McDaniel
00:44:28
reference that in the the interview there he said you know when when the reporter says when's the last time
00:44:35
anybody saw her he says she was with some friends at and she he mentions their names I don't I don't know their
00:44:44
names um they lived on Walnut Street yeah well in fact the the the real story is her friend was seeing one of these
00:44:54
guys they they had have a relationship and they were partying there the night before and the the two women decided to
00:45:02
just crash at that house so she was last seen coming home from that house so now
00:45:07
police are a little suspicious because they're like wait a second we thought she had a boyfriend yes she does
00:45:13
boyfriend's in California on on this golf trip oh what's she doing staying the night at these guys house the night
00:45:19
before yeah but there's a lot of people that go hey we're we're going to have a long distance relationship and
00:45:26
hey uh whatever happens in your hometown I don't need to know about it you know what I mean that that is well and that's
00:45:33
what I wasting common I I I like I said I'm making assumptions here but that's that's really what I'm assuming was
00:45:40
going on with Lauren and her boyfriend's relationships they live Separate Lives when they weren't together right and and
00:45:47
as far as law enforcement and detectives are concerned now if that is the case and you go well we have evidence that
00:45:55
she's hanging out with with these other guys is there another romantic interest that you know would have motive because
00:46:03
she's going to leave him uh for the the longtime boyfriend and that's an angle they have to look into let's hear the
00:46:10
the third portion of that interview and then this morning they knocked on my door they were looking around trying to
00:46:17
find anything and few a few of the other friends uh Burpy um Burpy and Garen and Ashley they were
00:46:30
here they were here last night and they'd come back this morning I just went out and talked with them and they
00:46:38
and then they moved us all over to the side and they bust us all down to the department and kept us there until I got
00:46:46
back just a little while ago ask question yeah they they took statements trying to find out if anyone had seen
00:46:54
anything if anyone had heard anything when the last time anyone St or what now they haven't confirmed at least
00:47:02
not with us that it it was um that they found are you holding out any hope right
00:47:09
now I I hope but if they found it on on the property somewhere not can you heard anything about a ban
00:47:25
please were talking about no no as far as any of us knew they they were still trying to just find her and we got an
00:47:33
email this morning from some people that live on the other side of Kroger on the
00:47:37
other side of the river that they had seen her in the past running in that area we thought maybe someone had
00:47:44
snatched her over there or maybe she got hurt or something all right so when we listen to those three Clips the one
00:47:50
thing that jumps out at me that is more apparent In that clip I I think than the
00:47:56
other two is this the reporter starts asking him something and he starts doing this and then when he goes to
00:48:09
answer there's no emotion it goes right back into normal speech yeah so when I was watching it I
00:48:18
watched it a few times and it's the footage look the audio is not the best and the the video is not that's the best
00:48:25
audio we've ever the video is not the best either and plus he's got we should probably describe what Steven looks like
00:48:33
so he's kind of a pasty skinny kid um he would be in his uh 26 he would be 26 at
00:48:41
the time of that interview yeah he has very puffy hair very yeah long hair but it's it's all it's all over the place
00:48:50
it's very poofy as you it's almost like a afro yeah and he he he looks like what
00:48:59
maybe he's got a little facial hair maybe hasn't shaved in a couple days or something very patchy yes so when
00:49:07
watching that one the video is not the best but then two they're outside you can hear the wind blowing and at some
00:49:12
point you can hear Vehicles driving by uh maybe somebody's cell phone is making a weird
00:49:18
noise but with the wind blowing his hair is constantly like in and out of his face right yeah and I was trying to
00:49:27
determine because we've seen this in in several other cases where what you hear is it sounds like
00:49:35
somebody who's very emotional it sounds like somebody who's crying but you will have witnesses tell you there were no
00:49:41
tears and I was trying to determine if he was in fact actually crying tears not just putting on a a noise or a
00:49:51
voice uh to to sound like he's very upset and that he's crying yeah I couldn't determine if I was seeing tears
00:49:58
or not but what I will say is the woman who gave who was asking him the questions her words later were yes he
00:50:08
was very emotional uh and yes he became very emotional as soon as I told him they found a
00:50:15
body um and he does in this third portion keep referencing she was a jogger and unfortunately we've covered too many
00:50:25
cases where a woman has been out jogging and she's not seen again so he keeps referencing that but again I couldn't
00:50:34
tell if there were tears or not I'm going to go with what the reporter says she says he was very emotional I'm just
00:50:40
going to believe that she believed his emotions to be genuine at the time but I'm with you it sounds to me like he's
00:50:50
turning it on and turning it off right when he's turning it on and then he's he's asked to give a response and he
00:50:56
gives a response and the emotion is not it's absent from from his words it's too
00:51:02
clear and I but I also don't like anytime that we have a missing person we have no you have look you can assume uh
00:51:11
your friend's missing for a few days they find a body yeah you could start assuming that's her body I I I get that
00:51:19
part but I don't like when people start offering these alternate endings oh well
00:51:24
we just thought this or we just thought she went for a run and somebody grabbed her you know it's it's alternate endings
00:51:31
and I I just never like that well I I get that but this is not the first time he's been asked what does he think
00:51:40
happened to her you know what I mean like so it's but he also I think where he's quick with an answer it's because
00:51:45
he's been asked that question probably at least two times before this interview because you heard him say he he spoke
00:51:52
with police that morning and he also spoke with them we know he did a a brief interview with them in either a
00:51:58
detective's car or a police car we also heard him say that they took some of them down to the station and talk to
00:52:05
some of her friends there as well so he's he's been he's been talking about this missing person's case all morning
00:52:15
long by by the time of this interview right but it's also he does this thing where he kind of
00:52:21
goes like well I didn't know her that well you know but then offers a lot of detail you know like well I didn't know
00:52:31
her that well did you meet any of her family yes one time and and I remember what happened the day before you know
00:52:37
what I mean like yeah that that's a lot of detail yeah so he's saying what that he believes he saw her maybe a week or
00:52:46
two before that interview that's what it sounds like to me he's not claiming that
00:52:51
he saw her on Saturday he's saying he he's heard from Friends that she was last seen on Saturday yeah I didn't get
00:52:59
that I think what he um the the reason why there's confusion on that answer is he was basically saying like yeah I
00:53:07
remember seeing her run like a week or so ago uhhuh so I think it wasn't so much that that's the last time I saw her
00:53:16
I think he's going that's the last time I remember seeing her run so after the Torso is found and as
00:53:26
we said yes it was found on the property of the apartment complex he he Steven's
00:53:31
unaware of that during that interview um the detectives are knocking on everyone's doors that live in the
00:53:39
apartment complex they again are going to ask more questions but this time they want to ask each resident if they can
00:53:48
come inside and do a quick walk through right from the paperwork that I saw captain they state that everyone granted
00:53:57
them permission to go into their Apartments this did include Stephen McDaniel however the way that it's described in
00:54:08
in the paperwork it sounds like they really had to do some talking to talk him into letting them come in and do
00:54:17
this is just supposed to be a quick Walkin walk out quick observation do you see anything super suspicious that that
00:54:26
warrants further investigation if not move on well right and you have to protect yourself against law enforcement
00:54:34
you don't want to be accused of something that that you didn't do but the reason why I find that odd and I
00:54:41
understand that he's also a law student that's going to take his bar so you know
00:54:44
you go oh well should I let you in so would be all the other residents though as well right right I agree but
00:54:53
but what I find strange is that you've you've talked to the cops several times you seem to be willing to help and then
00:55:01
all of a sudden once we want to come into your apartment you're going oh hold on I don't know if this is the right
00:55:06
thing yeah in fact like well it's one or the other to me like if if if they would
00:55:12
have started asking him questions and he just said look I don't want to answer any questions without a lawyer from the
00:55:18
get-go you know or like maybe he you know answer some initial questions but once you said hey step into the car with
00:55:26
me you go no no no no I'm a law student this is the these are the rules he's very forthcoming in that interview as
00:55:33
well with the with the uh news reporter then all of a sudden you don't want me in your apartment according to the
00:55:39
documents that I viewed and we I don't know what the actual truth is all I can state is this is what the documents the
00:55:47
state documents said happened according to the police according to the detectives they
00:55:55
are initially not granted permission by Steven to enter his apartment to which they explained to him everyone else
00:56:04
except for you has allowed us into their Apartments I don't know if that is in fact true but Steven must have believed
00:56:13
it because then he chooses to let them into his apartment right they're in there very briefly this walk through
00:56:20
through Steven's apartment took place at 1:40 p.m. now in his apartment they find
00:56:25
a large knife a large samurai sword a rifle two handguns and amongst some other items they they find some other
00:56:35
items but these are the items that they specifically note of being in question regarding that walkthrough that took
00:56:42
place at 1:40 p.m. yeah but it's like uh you could also state that every apartment you went into that had a a
00:56:50
knife set had a large knife true so yeah so I mean sword is a bit out of the norm
00:56:58
a rifle and two handguns a bit out of the norm I don't think so I mean as far as like you know he could have been a
00:57:05
hunter or he wanted to protect himself and maybe the samide sword samide sword but I bet you know a few people that
00:57:13
have swords or so you know some collectible I actually out of all the items that we just mentioned there I
00:57:21
have everything of those in my my res except for the rifle so I was going to say I was going to guess the sword but
00:57:29
what I will say is yeah out of if they did in fact walk through all the apartments this is the only apartment
00:57:35
and these are the only items that made it onto their paperwork later right so they obviously found it to be alarming
00:57:44
let's say now it didn't take long Captain but it was on the news and online news reports later saying that
00:57:51
the body a body turned up at Lauren's apartment complex they didn't know for certain if it was her but a few hours
00:57:58
later they would confirm that it was in fact Lauren she was no longer missing Lauren was dead right the but the thing
00:58:06
about that that I'm so fascinated in is that the the scheduled pickup for trash was
00:58:14
earlier and correct and for some reason there was some kind of like half the apartment's trash got
00:58:23
picked up and then there was some reason there was some interference that the other part of
00:58:30
the the complex was not the the trash was not picked up yeah so let me let me go through this and I'll tell you
00:58:37
exactly why that went down like that so the Mak Telegraph is a newspaper and and
00:58:43
this they covered this case and this story hands down better than anybody else they' they've covered it for well
00:58:51
since it happened yeah until now and well that's right um so the as the mon Telegraph put it Giddings torso had been
00:59:01
disposed of stuffed in a flip-top curbside garbage can beside her apartment building for police finding it
00:59:09
was a stroke of Fortune on what was trash pickup day at the complex it would have been hauled to a landfill without
00:59:18
the Torso Giddings might have become one of those supremely lost the Unfortunate
00:59:25
Souls who disappear into Forever Without a Trace that's from the Mak Telegraph what went down captain and
00:59:33
this like you said a stroke of luck and like the mon Telegraph put it if if that
00:59:39
trash would have been picked up that day this case would have been very very different and that's why I said earlier
00:59:45
that her friends springing into action is really what made this case completely different right it kept it got it on on
00:59:54
the right path because her friends get involved they recognize that she has been unheard from they send friends to
01:00:04
her apartment determine that she is in fact missing has been missing for days log into her email yeah log into the
01:00:10
email one of her friends says to her father you're friends with the mayor of mon can you call him and tell him what's
01:00:19
going on because she's been missing for days this is completely out of character
01:00:24
and she sent an email saying somebody was trying to break into her home we're completely freaking out here yeah
01:00:31
friend's father calls the mayor mayor calls the police chief police chief gets everything set into action now we said
01:00:38
the night before the officer on the scene did notify the detective Bureau that they have a missing person's case
01:00:45
and hey detective it's now your missing person's case the detective who they contacted I don't know if he was on call
01:00:53
but the the detective Ive that received that call received the case let's say did tell the officer he would be there
01:01:00
in the morning now I don't know what time he was going to get there I but we do know that the mayor called the police
01:01:05
chief and this set into action a chain of events right all of those officers were at the scene just before 9:00 a.m.
01:01:15
the next morning we have detectives there we have police cars there and we have that big large Caravan this mobile
01:01:22
command center let's say because of all those vehicles and because of this mobile command center
01:01:30
the guy driving the garbage truck decided I'm not going to ask the police to move their Command Center or their
01:01:38
vehicles right I'm going to go collect other trash and I'll swing back by here once they leave yeah so it was actually
01:01:46
all of those chain of events set this into motion to where they couldn't pick up that trash that day as you said
01:01:52
should have been picked up before the body was discovered yeah sometimes the universe lends us a
01:02:00
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