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00:01:42
welcome to True Crime garage wherever you are whatever you were doing thanks for listening I'm your host Nick and
00:01:47
with me I have my partner in crime and together we would like to welcome you to the husband friendly True Crime podcast
00:01:54
ladies and gentlemen here is the captain yeah hide your kids hide your wife hide
00:02:00
your husbands too it's good to be seen and good to see you thanks for listening thanks for telling my
00:02:07
[Music] friend this week we are very excited to be featuring 14 karat by the bright
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for a happy and hoppy character ABV 6.3% garage grade 4 out of five bottle caps and let's give some cheers to those
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listeners who made today a bright spot on the garage calendar first up a big cheers to Jana listening in from Chicago
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Illinois and a big we like your JY goes out to Macy and Conway Arkansas and last
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but certainly not least we have Melissa and Sanger California everyone we mentioned they went to our website true
00:02:51
Crim garage.com clicked on the Pint class that helped us out with this week's beer fund and for that we thank
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sure you subscribe to us through the Apple podcast app or through patreon and Colonel that's enough of the business
00:03:19
all right everybody gather around grab a chair grab a beer let's talk some true crime
00:03:31
[Music] months ago we received the following letter hi Nick in cap I've been listening for Years love
00:04:04
the work you do I was recently listening and you guys suggested if a first responder had a
00:04:11
local case that we'd like you to look at to email in well here I am I live in Chicago Illinois and there is a case
00:04:21
that is near and dear to my heart that needs your help Kiera Kohl's is a USPS worker
00:04:30
who has been missing for 5 years she was 3 months pregnant when she went missing in October of
00:04:37
2018 at the age of 26 years old she up and vanished her vehicle with her person side were found parked on her
00:04:48
block she was due to work that day but called in sick when you call in sick for USPS it
00:04:56
is not as simple as a quick phone call I know someone who works for USPS and have heard them calling sick
00:05:05
before it's about a 5 minute long process typing in special codes and employee numbers rumor here is we know who is
00:05:16
responsible she is still missing and I feel like this case resurfacing could help thank you a loyal
00:05:25
listener so as promised we looked into this missing young woman case and we certainly did not like what we found
00:05:33
sure Chicago like many of our country's larger cities can be a dangerous place we've all heard the stories of gang
00:05:41
style shootings drugs and murders of sex workers plaguing the city but Chicago also has millions of law-abiding
00:05:49
upstanding residents everyday folks who are just working hard to achieve the life they want for themselves and for
00:05:56
their families one of them was 26-year-old Kiera Kohl's Kiera had it all going for her
00:06:05
she was gorgeous she had a successful job she loved she had a new apartment in a car and she was having a baby but then
00:06:15
suddenly someone took all of that away Kiera Kohl's vanished from the face of the Earth and October of
00:06:25
2018 where is Kiera Kohl's this is true crime [Music] [Music] garage Kiera Michelle Kohls was a
00:06:57
26-year-old woman whose life was all coming together Cara was the fourth of five children born to Mom Karen Phillips
00:07:06
her father was Joseph Kohl's all of Karen's kids names begin with the letter k it was a very close family and Kiera
00:07:16
had a lot of people who cared about her Kier was a go-getter and her family says
00:07:22
she was very outgoing and driven her mom said one word to describe her would be ambitious her dad Joseph said her family
00:07:31
nickname was boss lady Kohl's because she was very bossy and told everyone in the family what to do now even as a
00:07:40
child Kier was loud and in charge her mom Karen said Kier was always a chatterbox someone who was very outgoing
00:07:49
from an early age she wanted to be in the media TV or radio she just enjoyed being out there Kiera was a super girly
00:07:59
person person as well and would do professional level makeup jobs for her friends and family members whether it be
00:08:05
for a prom weddings or so on she was also known for her appearance she was a hair done nails done and dressed very
00:08:15
nicely kind of person her only issue was that she had asthma but she had an inhaler and was able to keep her
00:08:22
symptoms in check with that in her 20s Kiera lived in the Chicago area like the rest of her family she worked two
00:08:32
part-time jobs to pay her bills she lived on the 8100 Block of South Vernon Avenue in the middle class chadam
00:08:40
neighborhood this is a Treeline street with rows of red brick three story apartment buildings with small Lawns and
00:08:48
curated Hedges Kiera also bought a car and drove for Lift but it was her job as a seasonal mail sorter for the US Postal
00:08:58
Service that she loved she did that job on a part-time basis for 3 years she was
00:09:04
determined to get the USPS to hire her on full-time as a letter carrier and she did she got the job that she wanted and
00:09:14
it was the job that she loved she loved putting on the uniform and using her cart to tote the mail through
00:09:21
residential Chicago neighborhoods she started that position in 2015 and everything for Kiara was going great
00:09:29
she also had a long-term boyfriend Josh Simmons Karen her mother said that Josh treated Kiera well Josh worked for the
00:09:37
Postal Service as well as far as kier's family knew all was good between Josh and Kiera in October of
00:09:46
2018 Kira was 26 years old and 3 months pregnant Josh Simmons her long-term boyfriend was the father Kiera was
00:09:56
thrilled and her whole family was thrilled Kara was the last one of Karen's kids to Bear a child and her
00:10:03
family was they were over the moon about the situation now it's unclear if Josh was over the moon as well but kier's
00:10:11
family hadn't noticed anything a Miss with the young couple now let's move to Tuesday October 2nd
00:10:21
2018 Kiera went to an appointment with her aunt and a friend the nature of this appointment has never been released but
00:10:29
it's believed to have been some kind of prenatal appointment it's unclear why but Kier had taken off Monday the 1st of
00:10:38
October and Tuesday the 2nd of October from her job apparently letter carriers are expected to work long hours and it's
00:10:49
possible that Kier was tired and not feeling great we know she was pregnant at the time but she seemed like she was
00:10:58
in a great mood when her mom talked to her that night so this October 2nd appointment this is and we need to all
00:11:05
make special mental note of this right here this is very important to our timeline this October 2nd appointment
00:11:12
was the last known inperson sighting of Kiara by her family Kiera talked to her mom every day
00:11:23
and so Tuesday October 2nd was no different they spoke on the phone around 7 P.M that night Kiera was at a local
00:11:31
Wick grocery store and talked to her mom about the healthy foods that she should
00:11:35
be eating during her pregnancy and about the baby things that she wanted to buy all seemed well all seemed normal Karen
00:11:44
later said quote she was already excited about becoming a mother that's all my child ever wanted to be a mom and to
00:11:51
accomplish all the things she's set out to accomplish to have a nice paying job which she had to get a new car car which
00:11:59
she bought to move into her own apartment which she did and to become a mother which she was about to do the
00:12:06
next day Wednesday mom calls Kiara again it's 88 degre that day and she wanted to
00:12:14
remind her daughter to drink plenty of fluids for the sake of the baby the call however goes to voicemail well Karen the
00:12:23
mom very diligent keeps trying keeps trying to get a hold of Kiara calling several more times but all getting the
00:12:31
same result this was odd and concerning she called Kim this is Kiara's sister but Kim hadn't heard from kiar either so
00:12:42
they went to Snapchat and I guess Kiera Captain was a chronic Snapper she had not posted a story that
00:12:51
day so this was very unusual by all considered mom and sister family members are saying look this is
00:13:00
our loved one who always answers our calls sure maybe the phone's dead maybe she's charging her phone maybe she
00:13:06
forgot her phone and she's out but she always answers the phone and she's always Snapchatting and none of this is
00:13:14
happening at this time well just to be clear she didn't call off October 2nd and 3rd in
00:13:22
advance there she called off in the morning of the 2 and then again on the third correct and the the call off is
00:13:30
very important to our timeline as well right we know that she called off on the first we know she called off on the
00:13:35
second and then we're going to learn that she called off on the third as well again we understand she has this
00:13:43
appointment so that makes sense right you can't be at work and at your appointment all at the same time but
00:13:49
she's also pregnant and so maybe she woke up not feeling great decided to take the day off that's one of the
00:13:54
benefits of a great job like being a letter carrier or a working for USPS right they it takes a while to get hired
00:14:03
on but once you get hired on they have great benefits and so this is a great job and again we don't know the exact
00:14:10
details of why the call-offs took place but now this is going to lead us to Thursday October 4th so now we still
00:14:19
have no response from Kiara Karen her mother decided you know what I'm going to go over to her apartment enough is
00:14:27
enough she gets there she's alarmed because her daughter's car is parked outside but it's parked down the block
00:14:35
right so the apartment was locked and there's no answer Karen could hear that the TV was on inside of the apartment so
00:14:45
now she's she's worried enough to go over there Captain she sees the car in a strange spot which makes her even more
00:14:52
worried and doors locked no answer TV on inside she is very worried at this point
00:15:00
so she calls the boyfriend Josh Simmons and ask him if he could come over because he has a key to the
00:15:08
apartment he says in this phone call that he does not have a key to the apartment and this is going to be very
00:15:16
problematic to our story here Captain because Karen says and has said many times very distinctly recalling that
00:15:24
Kiera said that she gave Josh a key to her apartment yeah well this is liar liar pants on fire she's not lived there
00:15:31
this is not a situation where she's lived there for 2 years or 3 years or five years and
00:15:37
and she gave somebody a key and maybe she's mistaken or he lost the key she had only been there a few months so if
00:15:45
she tells mom I gave my boyfriend a key there's no reason to doubt that so she's
00:15:53
a little suspicious now that uh Josh suddenly doesn't have a key and remember they've been dating for 6 years and he
00:16:01
tells Karen that he hadn't seen or talked to Kier all day remember this is the fourth and he doesn't seem too
00:16:08
worried correct so what we have now is Mom is going to jump into action she calls Chicago PD and says I have a
00:16:18
pregnant daughter I can't get a hold of her I'm worried that she's like passed out on the floor in her
00:16:24
apartment shortly after the call to police we now have the boyfriend Josh Simmons on scene he's there with Mom
00:16:34
yeah law enforcement's going to do a welfare check we have Karen's husband who is there as well his name is Dan
00:16:41
Perkins so both of them have arrived on the scene shortly before the cops show up now after the cops show up and
00:16:49
getting no answer to pounding on the door and announcing a police presence they took the hinges off of the door and
00:16:55
entered the apartment Karen says that she was so terrified that there would be something
00:17:00
in the apartment that she didn't want to see so she stayed outside taking deep breaths trying to remain
00:17:08
calm Josh and Kiera's stepdad Dan they went along with the officers into the apartment then they come back outside a
00:17:18
short time later announcing that the coast was clear there's they found nothing inside right the TV was on the
00:17:25
place was neat and tidy as usual the groceries remember she was on the phone with Mom when she was at the store so
00:17:33
the groceries that Kiara had bought the evening before were all put away where they
00:17:39
belonged as far as Mom stepdad and boyfriend were all concerned they're telling police look yeah there's no one
00:17:46
here that's strange but also there's nothing out of order and there's no sign of a struggle everything is as we would
00:17:54
expect it to be minus that we don't have Kiera here yeah no sign of a struggle no
00:18:02
sign of robbery kier's car is there but it's not in her normal parking spot but that happens sometimes in these
00:18:12
apartment complexes where you get back home and somebody has a couple people over so you have to park down the street
00:18:18
a little bit but what they do find in her house is her keys and her wallet so where is she at did did she take off
00:18:31
on foot somewhere yeah so let's stay on this vehicle situation for a minute here
00:18:36
so as we said Karen finds her daughter's car there and this is alarming to her because usually kiar would park the
00:18:46
vehicle directly in front of the apartment on the street they find the vehicle parked on the street but it's
00:18:54
down the block and Mom is saying look this is not somewhere that Kier would have parked especially knowing that she
00:19:02
spoke to her on the phone at the grocery store and she would be hauling in groceries from the vehicle and we found
00:19:10
those groceries put away inside the apartment so I'm guessing here captain that that Mom and stepdad are probably
00:19:20
thinking well she she must have moved her vehicle or went some another place at some point for the vehicle to be
00:19:27
parked on the street at this location so Mom calls a locksmith because they want
00:19:33
to get into the locked vehicle and once they were able to access this vehicle she found Kiera's
00:19:41
lunch bag all packed for her her day at work the contents I have listed here are
00:19:47
an apple and orange water her prenatal vitamins in the trunk of the vehicle they found Kiera's mail cart that she
00:19:56
used daily at work and and her work coat but also inside the car were Kiera's purse and her cell phone which was
00:20:05
sitting on a seat underneath of a jacket one of Kiara's jackets so they're wondering where the hell is
00:20:12
Kiera Karen starts calling K's friends no luck she called all the local hospitals her daughter's not there
00:20:20
either Cara had never been to jail so that didn't seem likely we're reaching out to everybody we cannot find this
00:20:28
individual but what we do have is the cell phone but what I couldn't find anywhere was it was there any suspicious
00:20:35
activity on the cell phone the family was not able to access the cell phone due to password
00:20:43
protection mom files an official missing persons report with the Chicago Police Department on that very day October 4th
00:20:52
CPD and the US Postal inspection service begin a joint investigation into kar's disappear
00:20:59
her Father Joseph Kohl's her biological father he comes into town from Racine Wisconsin where he lived and he's now
00:21:08
actively helping in on the search for his daughter right Joseph in his search he goes door too in the neighborhood
00:21:17
asking people questions handing out flyers he even was stopping passing cars to talk to the drivers the passengers
00:21:25
and to hand them a missing person flyer Karen began Plastering Flyers about kiar
00:21:32
all around the city praying that kiar had just been maybe having some kind of mood swing from pregnancy hormones and
00:21:39
would turn up that didn't seem likely but you can you really get the feeling here captain that they are just grasping
00:21:46
onto any inch of hope that you know this is all just a misunderstanding and she's
00:21:52
going to turn up sooner rather than later and it seems at this point between the interaction between the family and
00:21:59
the boyfriend Josh seem to be where Josh is trying to help but it's also seems like he's
00:22:05
not uh like his stories aren't straight correct that's that's exactly right and the the thing here though
00:22:16
that's going to make it difficult for the family to keep grasping to any ounce of
00:22:22
Hope is that they're seeing one thing right when they review her vehicle and the items
00:22:30
found in her vehicle they're seeing one thing when they look at her apartment everything is as it should be but then
00:22:37
they learn when talking to her place of work that she called in sick on that Wednesday October 3rd USPS would not go
00:22:47
into any details citing privacy interest right but stated that Kier had not vanished while on duty so they wanted to
00:22:54
be they wanted to be clear like she called in six she didn't show up for work and then she went missing from here
00:23:01
whatever happened to kiar happened before she ever got to work that day and again it's weird yeah or happened the
00:23:08
night before yeah because here the situation appears that she packed a lunch packed up her vehicle to go to
00:23:16
work like any other day but then called in sick now it's not out of the realm of
00:23:22
possibility that maybe she packed up her lunch took her purse and her cell phone puts it in the
00:23:30
vehicle and then suddenly gets ill and decides to go back into her apartment that's even though it doesn't make a
00:23:36
whole lot of sense what they're seeing that's not out of the realm of possibility here but again if she's if
00:23:44
she's sick and at home she should be sick and at home and we're not finding her at all and like you said that we're
00:23:51
trying to figure out the cell phone can the cell phone tell us any information about her whereabouts or who she spoke
00:23:57
to or her movements after we talk to her at the grocery store and they're not able to get into
00:24:04
the cell phone because of the password protection and did she call off Fork through her cell phone cuz the thing
00:24:10
that the Postal Service can't tell us can't confirm is what we what they can say is yes somebody called off but they
00:24:21
can't confirm that it was her see it gets very difficult because they're going to say the postal service is going
00:24:28
to say we believe it was her and here's why right and it goes back to the method
00:24:33
and and the the protocol for calling off in that situation and it sounds to me from everything I've been told is that
00:24:41
you got to punch in like employee numbers and codes and all kinds of things like it's a it's a lengthy
00:24:48
process and so USPS is saying look somebody provided us all the information that would tell us that this is Kiera
00:24:56
that actually call in in and phoning off from work right but but as you said if if somebody knows that information and
00:25:06
knows that protocol and you is used to that then one could perform that task and it doesn't have to be Kiara no and
00:25:16
the person that is being a little suspicious is her boyfriend of six years her baby
00:25:25
daddy right and he would know those protocols and he would probably know the information on how to have her call off
00:25:34
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select ESPN plus content via Hulu learn more hu.com [Music] all right we are back onwards and
00:29:45
upwards cheers to you Colonel cheers to you Captain often we say tall cans in the air and this week very fittingly so
00:29:54
because the 14 karat comes in the pint can so it is tall cans in the air and oh little special announcement here too we
00:30:04
did put some signed books the deli murders back up on the website this will be the last batch going out before
00:30:12
Christmas so if you want to gift the best book ever written to somebody uh feel free to pick one up at true Crim
00:30:19
garage.com or if you want to gift one to yourself um that's a great idea too so last batch Before Christmas tell your
00:30:26
friends also want to welcome the colonel to the Instagram so if you're not following him
00:30:33
at tcgn do so so you can be part of the cool kids now let's get back to this case one thing that is very different
00:30:43
about the more recent cases that we cover compared to the older and colder cases is the technology and one thing
00:30:52
that we're seeing time and time again with these more recent cases the way that we're solving these crimes
00:30:57
and solving these Mysteries is with things like cell phones and surveillance cameras you know in the old days every
00:31:07
business had a surveillance camera that they never replaced the tape for or actually didn't work or the time stamp
00:31:14
was completely wrong but today many people have the doorbell cameras whether it be from the great
00:31:21
folks over it simply safe for any number of outfits but these surveillance cameras in these neighborhoods coming
00:31:28
from residential places are really helping police and now we we know how important a timeline is police are going
00:31:37
to go around this neighborhood they're looking for surveillance video footage to help them fill in the timeline of
00:31:45
their missing person so they collect all this video footage and they start reviewing it but then a reporter brought
00:31:53
them some footage that she had uncovered right this was from a couple living two
00:31:58
buildings down from Kiara who reviewed their camera footage and found footage of the missing young woman they rushed
00:32:06
out and they brought the footage to the attention of an NBC Chicago reporter one
00:32:12
who had went door too trying to drum up leads in the case the video was timestamped Wednesday October 3rd
00:32:20
2018 at 11:54 a.m. so this is daytime and on this video they believe that it showed Kiera she's dressed in USPS
00:32:32
uniform carrying a backpack and walking down the block but the thing is she walked past her own car and kept
00:32:41
going walking away from her apartment she walked down the block and then changed
00:32:48
Direction Karen's husband Dan Perkins told wgn9 Chicago that quote she seen something
00:32:57
something that made her turn around that fast and cross the street and her car was on the other side of the street end
00:33:04
quote she then walked out of the frame so they could not see where she went from there the last image of her was
00:33:10
captured at 82nd Street in Kohl's Avenue so Kiera our missing person who had not answered her mom's calls all
00:33:20
morning on October 3rd from what the video is showing them she's dressed and she's heading to work that morning and
00:33:27
she had put all of her stuff in her car we know that from reviewing her vehicle but also she called in sick and then
00:33:33
vanished so none of this is really making any sense to everyone who's looking for Kiera but there's some
00:33:40
problems initially I mean You' think that we'd see this video footage and go oh well there she is but not everybody's
00:33:49
convinced that that is Kier right we have mom who mom knows best watch the footage over and over and over again
00:33:57
once it was released to the public and she's watching it over and over again one looking for Clues anything to help
00:34:04
her find her daughter but then she's also watching it repeatedly thinking something's off about what she's seeing
00:34:12
and this makes me go back to the idea of we can't confirm that she's the one that
00:34:18
called off on the third now we have this image of her in uniform walking to her car like she's going to go to work but
00:34:27
we can't even confirm that that's her well what happens is she goes to police and she says look she's talking to the
00:34:37
detectives and says I've been watching this video footage and the video footage that you
00:34:45
have of a young black woman in a USPS uniform walking down Kiara's block the day after she was last heard
00:34:54
from I'm mom and I'm here to tell you you that's not my daughter Kiera in that video and she says quote it's a mother
00:35:01
thing you just know your child that's not her walk she was a little bit smaller and a little bit shorter than
00:35:08
the person that she was seeing in the video so police they get this information and you think that they
00:35:14
would be floored but actually they're not surprised at all in fact they tell Karen that they knew that the video was
00:35:23
not that of Kiara this was prior knowledge to them they said that look it's another female
00:35:29
postal worker who happens to live on the same block and we've identified who the
00:35:35
person is in the video we've just not updated the public right and they're saying the the person in the video
00:35:43
that's seen while it does look a lot like Kier given the uniform and all the the actual person abruptly
00:35:51
turned around because she had forgotten something from her residence she went back to get it and then she walked to
00:35:57
the bus stop and so that's why she's walking past Kiera's car it's not her car it's not
00:36:03
Kiera the cops tell Karen though even though we know this information don't say anything keep this to yourself well
00:36:10
be because this video footage is probably drawing up some leads drawing up leads and it's also leading people to
00:36:18
police right right because people are viewing this video they're sharing this video they're watching it they're
00:36:24
they're looking for Clues too some of these people are reaching out to police and so when you have this tool this is a
00:36:30
very important tool for law enforcement because you are looking at Kiera's Circle her family and her friends why is
00:36:40
she missing and now you don't always know everybody that she knew you may not know
00:36:46
everybody that she talked to or had interactions with during the time in question which it seems like is about a
00:36:52
2 and 1 half 3 day period And so you have now have this tool that you've put out to the people
00:36:59
that is snaring individuals coming into you and saying oh I knew this young woman right I and here's how I know her
00:37:08
so but also when you first hear that they released this video footage and then you find out that the
00:37:16
mother isn't convinced it's her daughter uh what what was the first thing that popped into your
00:37:23
head cuz cuz mine was not mistaken ENT and actually a postal worker my thought was is it possible this is some kind of
00:37:31
decoy yeah no the I I was thinking the exact same thing because it goes back to the question of who actually called in
00:37:39
sick on the thir exactly and if if you can make that leap already that maybe that wasn't Kiara then you start going
00:37:47
okay well then maybe it's not her in the video and somebody somebody manipulated the system
00:37:54
calling in calling off sick for her to make it look like everything is as it should be and oh by the way here's
00:38:02
somebody dressed up like Kier walking down the side of the street now if you really want to try to throw police off
00:38:09
and really want to Stage a scene the best thing to do would have been to get in that vehicle and drive it away and
00:38:15
park it in some random neighborhood somewhere exactly but and uh the other thing here too though with this case
00:38:23
that I think it's so frustrating frustrating for for the family and for the parents and is you have this
00:38:29
boyfriend of 6 years his girlfriend is 3 months pregnant she's super excited and this guy's stories just
00:38:40
don't make a lot of sense I mean even just hey come over you have a key let's check the apartment no I'm sorry I don't
00:38:48
have a key what I know you have a key well and it gets difficult too because you have extenuating circumstances right
00:38:56
you have have situation where where women in general are more likely to be prey than than a
00:39:07
male victim would be and then on top of that you we we've reviewed a case at least one case if not a couple here in
00:39:15
the garage where a pregnant woman is taken because she's pregnant right now our Person of Interest or the person
00:39:25
that we're talking about here today is pretty early in the pregnancy so that doesn't seem incredibly likely but
00:39:33
you're trying to factor all this in and and you go back to the video real quick my belief is that police probably
00:39:41
released this to the public again it was given to a reporter so maybe the reporter released it to the
00:39:48
public I don't know exactly who was in charge of releasing it we know that they the police were in charge of telling
00:39:54
Karen to be Hush Hush about it not being your daughter in the video right but my
00:39:58
belief is that when it was released to the public and whoever released it to the public at that time believed that it
00:40:04
was Kiara and then later police were able to confirm no it's not kiar and it's also not somebody posing attempting
00:40:14
to make anybody believe that it is Kier it's just a happen stance that another woman works for the Post Office and
00:40:22
lives on her same street and was captured on video that same day yeah I was reading something and tell me if
00:40:29
this is if this is true I mean it sounds unbelievable but I I believe it's true the number one
00:40:39
cause of death towards a pregnant woman is homicide I think that that depends on
00:40:47
where you are getting your information because I've seen that reported as well but I've also seen homicide as the third
00:40:55
yeah but even if it's in the top 10 we we live in a pretty messed up Society well I mean look at it if if we lived in
00:41:05
a perfect Society we would have no show so well I'd rather live in a perfect society and not have a show no I'm not
00:41:12
saying that we that that thank you world for being cruel to other people I'm not
00:41:17
saying that one bit but if we want to go down that road that's that's the truth of the matter right
00:41:23
so this situation we're going to go we're going to Leap Forward in time and then we're going to go back in time as
00:41:30
well here so bear with me for a second here Captain so remember Karen is told to be Hush Hush about this information
00:41:37
she holds on to this information keeping it to herself for two years two full years after that she said look I'm done
00:41:45
keeping this to myself it hadn't done any good to keep it quiet the case is cold by this point so she tells
00:41:52
everybody look that's not my daughter in the video police told told me to be quiet about it and she's she's not
00:41:58
blaming police it was a strategy that they attempted to use to hopefully find her daughter do you know who I love in
00:42:05
this case who Karen that's who I love of course every interview I like the fact that when she is telling you and she's
00:42:16
telling the media I'm not going to give up there's no doubt that she's not going
00:42:22
to give give up and I I'm glad that this case is getting a little more attention so keep in mind Karen is
00:42:32
saying that I last spoke to my daughter she's at the grocery store this is at 700 p.m. approximately on Tuesday
00:42:40
October 2nd and so now with this information going public Karen is telling the public I really believe that
00:42:49
something happened to my daughter between the hours of 700 p.m. when I last spoke to her on Tuesday October 2nd
00:42:56
and 8:00 a.m. Wednesday morning October 3rd this is when Karen is calling her daughter and it's going to
00:43:05
voicemail so the first time that she is aware that something could be wrong so we're dealing with about a 13-hour
00:43:13
window here that Karen is saying this is the time that I'm concerned with this is
00:43:17
when whatever went wrong went wrong but also isn't law enforcement also stating that they believe she went Miss on the
00:43:26
second well so that's part of the problem with this case so what's crazy look it's it's incredibly crazy
00:43:34
that the video footage is not Kara yeah the the foot the video that was out there for two years and then then we the
00:43:41
public find out that's not Kar and I I don't agree with that call I agree with hey we put out the
00:43:48
video we started getting some calls we got some leads don't wait two years see the the
00:43:56
problem with that becomes this like first off that's the only video footage that was public until
00:44:03
2022 right we're going to get more video footage that's going to be more important to this case than that of the
00:44:09
video not featuring our victim that was out there for two years so that that video that's out there for two years
00:44:16
it's deceptive but the strategy is it's resulting in tips and leads for detectives which is great but here's the
00:44:24
problem with that you got to figure that a that a high percentage if not all of the tips and leads that it's providing
00:44:31
to you are just doomed to lead to nowhere because it's not you know what I mean help me to help you I'm giving you
00:44:39
false information yeah and and saying that this this is this is going to lead to good leads no it might lead to leads
00:44:47
like I said the the the powerful thing the important thing for police it's going to lead you to people that you may
00:44:52
have not considered or were unaware of to talk to so that's a positive the negative is my belief that most of the
00:45:00
leads you're going to get will result in a dead end because they're not they're not going to go anywhere right because
00:45:06
you're also saying hey have you seen this person well if somebody saw that person
00:45:11
they didn't see the right person that you're looking for well and the thing too that you have to wonder about if the
00:45:18
person responsible for making our victim disappear is also the same person that called in sick for her
00:45:27
right we have listeners telling us that only someone who works for USPS could call in sick that's not something that
00:45:36
that I could do I couldn't call in let's give a shout out to our friend Williams
00:45:41
who's probably delivering mail or running from a a nasty dog in a neighborhood right now listening to this
00:45:48
show well let's just make this clear hello Williams shout out to Williams so it's your buddies it's your buddies
00:45:56
captain and Colonel hello he's we we've learned that that I could not call in sick for Williams and pull it off right
00:46:05
because you have to have codes and all kinds of stuff and like we said it's not a short process it takes several minutes
00:46:12
I've had more than one person tell me that it takes about four or five minutes and you got to jump through some hoops
00:46:17
to to get that day off so that's really interesting because that tells me that if you have suspect pool that likely
00:46:28
your person you can limit that pool of suspects to somebody that would have knowledge of that system meaning either
00:46:36
they're a postal worker themselves or they had witnessed a postal worker do this multiple times to the point where
00:46:45
they were comfortable and able to pull it off well like we you know like I said earlier Josh old old red flag Josh
00:46:56
that's why I'm going to start calling him old red flag Josh works for the Postal Service he would know the ins and
00:47:03
outs he'd probably also know her employee number or it might be on a badge or something that she has to wear
00:47:13
yeah and again we have this situation where the family and police are the only ones that know for about two years that
00:47:21
Kier was not in that video and that their that opens up their time line considerably so all things on that front
00:47:28
are looking bad what we do know is that she left everything behind her car her purse her
00:47:36
inhaler which most people that have asthma they are they usually don't forget their inhaler if if they're
00:47:43
without their inhaler it's it's simply because it slipped their mind the captain and I have different information
00:47:49
here that is you know we we go to different sources and there's a lot of different Source material on this case
00:47:55
one bit of information that I have that varies from the captains is my information says her car keys were
00:48:02
missing and so if that is in fact true then really the only thing's missing in action at this point for the police's
00:48:11
investigation is Kiara who's with child and possibly her keys as well everything
00:48:18
else is where it should be uh the car just parked a little bit further away from the apartment than one
00:48:24
would expect yeah but I'd also say her purse most people would not Park their car on the street and leave their purse
00:48:33
in the car most people would wouldn't leave their cell phone in their car exactly exactly but it's also you know
00:48:40
but but it's there it's the situ it is the situation now this is not our first time talking about the Chicago Police
00:48:47
Department and it won't be our first time talking about their unwillingness to release information about Active
00:48:53
cases we saw the same thing in the case that we covered in our episodes about missing children this is missing kids
00:49:00
Tiana and Diamond Bradley now here in kier's case the police have never disclosed much about their investigation
00:49:08
we do know that kier's case was very quickly treated as an endangered missing person's case so police acknowledging
00:49:16
quickly that something bad had happened to Kier right but it's unclear what evidence they have of this if any at all
00:49:24
they did interview her family friends and co-workers they looked at all of her social media as well her sister Kimberly
00:49:32
remarked that it was extremely odd and unsettling to see kier's Snapchat dormant normally she snapped and posted
00:49:40
on Instagram daily yeah but off also if you're law enforcement you know that women that are pregnant have a higher
00:49:50
percentage chance to be met with Foul Play so I think you can go well she left her car here left her purse here it
00:50:00
doesn't look like she ran away so I think it's uh makes sense why they would come to that conclusion that it's more
00:50:08
likely she was met with Foul Play well and we do know that they retrieved her phone and they went through her phone
00:50:15
they went through the computer analyzing them they used chemicals to search for forensic evidence in her apartment and
00:50:22
basically dismantled her car looking for evidence what they found is unknown as said they've not released much in this
00:50:30
case they also reviewed thousands of hours of video surveillance footage and didn't reveal what they found in that
00:50:37
regard until 2022 now in the mean time rumors were flying about this case the public
00:50:45
thought maybe Kiera had been abducted while on her postal route right there were even rumors that her her stepfather
00:50:53
Dan Perkins was somehow involved I don't understand why it's a little unclear to
00:50:57
me why that was even a rumor Karen denied had to publicly deny that her husband wasn't involved in any way well
00:51:05
see I wondered because he was going door too and he was stopping people and maybe
00:51:10
that ruffled some people's feathers that was her biological father oh well that makes sense I'm what they call sometimes
00:51:16
stupid so what we do know is that Mom who we all love here she's she's the angel
00:51:25
she's the the fighting Angel for her daughter she's worked this Last 5 Years to keep this case alive and just so I'm
00:51:34
clear you're I mean you're not throwing Chicago Police under the bus I mean yes it's this case has been going on for 5
00:51:42
years but it's not like it's we're in year 10 or year 15 and they're still not releasing more information to try to
00:51:49
drum drum up leads I'm not happy with their handling of this case um and and and I won't really dance around that and
00:51:57
we can get into more of that in part two I just think it's difficult for law enforcement if you're in that position
00:52:05
of what do you release to the public and what do you hold back because you you're
00:52:09
eventually going to have to build a case against somebody well here's one thing that we do know and talking about
00:52:15
building cases so let's talk a little bit about suspects right Captain so of course police interviewed Josh Simmons
00:52:21
Kiera's boyfriend old red flag and some interesting things came out about Josh he and Kiera had been together for six
00:52:30
years at this point and now they are having a baby together everybody knew that K seemed very happy with Josh
00:52:36
everybody knew that and Josh was happy too or at least they thought because later everyone will find out that he had
00:52:44
a whole other long-term relationship with another woman that he was involved with I I get conflicting reports here
00:52:51
some Reports say that they were married some Reports say say that they are boyfriend and girlfriend for a long term
00:52:57
but what we do know that's not conflicting is that they did have kids together so they're living a life
00:53:05
together and so what police learn is that Kiera our missing person was his girlfriend on the side yeah it's
00:53:17
very tough here because you hear that they dated for 6 years and then you go oh Josh is a
00:53:24
cheater cheater pumpkin eater but was he cheating on uh Kiara or was he cheating with Kier the the cheating part
00:53:36
is weird because and normally it's pretty pretty obvious what's going on here not so much so the other woman's
00:53:45
name get this is Kiara so Kier and Kiera yeah now to be clear what we learn is this Kiera
00:53:56
long-term girlfriend six years Kiara who he may have even been married to or is married to right they know about each
00:54:05
other so they both know that Josh is in a long-term relationship with the other so I mean we could you could call
00:54:14
it cheating for a lack of a better term but it's not really cheating if everybody knows what's going on
00:54:20
everybody knows what's going on so now we what we don't know is whether this was something that one or both were just
00:54:26
simply putting up with or if one or both were totally cool with it we could also
00:54:32
have a situation with with one being cool with it and the other not we don't know but this guy is a complete [ __ ] he
00:54:41
this guy is's a complete you're right when you meet when you're with Kier or Kiara whichever one you're with First
00:54:49
Once you meet the other girl and you go oh I fancy you too what's your name oh those names are too similar I'm sorry
00:54:58
I'm going a hard pass on this one can you imagine trying to get that right well wait which one did I wake up next
00:55:05
to Kiara or Kiara well and we also see reports that Kiara the the other girl that we just
00:55:13
introduced also worked at USPS so this is a really unique situation all three of these persons
00:55:23
working for the United States Postal service and all in this weird messy triangle difficult to understand Postal
00:55:31
Service love triangle he was he was he was known at work as Josh red flag Dirty dick police of course they're
00:55:44
very interested in talking to Josh once they learn this new information now they
00:55:48
want to talk to him again and again and again they've never named him as a suspect but all the investigators have
00:55:54
said about Josh is that when they have interviewed him in the past he's given quote varying accounts end quote of the
00:56:03
last time he saw Kiara Chicago PD detectives said quot he gave us some conflicting accounts wasn't
00:56:11
consistent on some of the statements and then didn't want to talk to us so after
00:56:17
his initial interview Josh at some point lawyers up and reportedly has never talked to police since he G
00:56:25
counil Karen turned against Josh pretty quickly rightfully so after he told her right away she says when he said he
00:56:34
didn't have a key to the apartment she was suspicious of him right then and there this lady is brilliant but also am
00:56:44
I is this information correct not only has he not really been Cooperative not only has his stories kind of varied not
00:56:52
made sense but he has moved out of state well and so this this is the other problem too with with Josh and adds to
00:57:04
the level of concern here coming from Karen let's pretend for a minute that he doesn't have a key and he's telling the
00:57:12
truth okay let's pretend that that's real I don't believe it I believe he had a key and now he conveniently doesn't
00:57:18
have one but let's pretend that that's that he's telling the truth there what we also know another statement coming
00:57:25
from Karen here is that when she had her last conversation on the phone with her
00:57:31
daughter Kiara Kiera not only said she's at the grocery store and this that and the other thing but she also says that
00:57:37
night on October 2nd that Josh was coming over that night and and if I was Karen when he got there to check the
00:57:44
apartment and he says yeah I don't have a key well I'm pretty for sure that you have a key no I don't have a key I would
00:57:51
have said can we check your pockets well but the other problem too so let's let's
00:57:56
continue on this road for a moment he says when he meets up with Karen and others he says I didn't see
00:58:03
her the night of the second which is weird because daughter tells mom he's coming over liar liar pants on fire he
00:58:11
also says look I didn't see her I've not seen her at all but I've been talking to
00:58:17
her which seems to be highly unlikely probably untrue as well because remember kier's cell phone was found in her car
00:58:27
so when did it get to her car and once it was there he clearly wasn't talking to her after that time period well again
00:58:36
how are you communicating with her and why is she communicating with you and not her mother doesn't make any sense
00:58:43
mom also says that Josh did not help to disseminate Flyers about the missing young woman he didn't participate in
00:58:52
searches for her as as well well you don't have to search for somebody that you know is dead and Karen says quote I
00:58:59
can't understand you dated my daughter for 6 years I took you to be a decent guy you work and go to church and now my
00:59:06
daughter is pregnant and missing and you do nothing end quote friends of Kiara like her friend Kiara Johnson this is
00:59:15
another this is a whole different person I don't know why everybody has practically the same name in this case
00:59:20
but this is a third person now a friend of Karas post on social media begging everyone to help out in a search for
00:59:28
Kiara so as you heard we're we're talking about Kiara's Father Joseph biological father Joseph pulling out all
00:59:37
the stops looking for his daughter this man lives in another state lives in Wisconsin travels to Chicago and stays
00:59:46
there permanently looking for his daughter knocking on doors stopping cars passing out flyers and yet postal
00:59:54
employee boyfriend and baby daddy Josh Simmons did none of the [Music] above if you are a member of law
01:00:12
enforcement or a first responder and you have a case from your jurisdiction that
01:00:15
you would like for us to take a look at here in the garage please go to our website truecrime garage.com and find
01:00:21
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