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GameChanger [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] welcome to True Crime garage wherever
00:01:44
you are whatever you are doing thanks for listening I'm your host Nick and with me as always is a man that needs no
00:01:49
introduction yet we do it every show anyway he is the infamous Captain it gets a little redundant it's good to be
00:01:57
seen and it's good to see you thanks for listening thanks for telling a [Music] friend we are drinking solar dog IPA by
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out of five this is a wonderful IPA with a blend of citrus notes and a smooth multi finish and solar dog was brought
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to us by our favorite garage goers first up we have Chris and oh who says hello from Cedar Point and check out Kindred
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University so thanks to everyone for these cies and if you'd like to pitch in for around for next week's show go to
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that's all on the store Page at true Crim garage.com all right Captain that's enough the business everybody gather
00:03:31
around grab a chair grab a beer let's talk some true [Music] crime Mia Zapata 27-year-old singer for
00:03:49
the band The GS was murdered on July 7th 1993 around 2:00 a.m. she had left uh the Capital Area Capitol Hill area of
00:04:01
Seattle she was visiting with a friend she told her friend that she was going to catch a cab and head home for the
00:04:07
night now we have about an 80 minute time period where we cannot account for her whereabouts she was found just
00:04:15
before 3:30 a.m. she had been murdered brutally murdered and the police had few leads in this case and even less
00:04:25
evidence to go on so unfortunately this this case the investigation was not very
00:04:32
optimistic from the get-go and it was apparent to everybody involved in this investigation her Inner Circle and the
00:04:39
music community of Seattle that this thing was not going to be solved anytime soon or without the help of somebody
00:04:47
pushing this investigation along well who comes to the rescue Captain well it's her friends and it's her close
00:04:54
friends her bandmates the people that she's known since 1986 who started the band that gets with her in Ohio before
00:05:02
moving out to Seattle to try to jump into that Grunge scene and become a part of something bigger and I don't know if
00:05:09
this was spearheaded by Steve moriori the drummer for the band did I say that name I probably said his name wrong and
00:05:15
I apologize but it seems like it was spearheaded by him you see him a lot there was a documentary made about the
00:05:22
gits um there actually were also featured in a little bit in a Thing Called hype it was a documentary about
00:05:29
the GR scene and I think they they featured the gets a little bit but Steve uh seems like a you know just a standup
00:05:36
dude right uh can I interject real quick not only a standup dude but like a guy that you want to have as your friend
00:05:44
right like he he comes off to me as the type of dude that if you're buddies with
00:05:48
him he's going to do whatever he can for you yeah so they have this horrible crime there's not much and look a lot of
00:05:56
these cases law enforcement is just sometimes just bum bumbling idiots you know similar to the captain but in this
00:06:03
case I think they're doing their work and but but again can't blame the band for not believing them so what does the
00:06:10
band do they go hey look let's rally around this let's get the scene rallying around this investigation and how can we
00:06:16
do this we need a private investigator so what they're going to do is set up uh benefit shows where they'll play uh
00:06:24
they'll have other bands play I believe uh Nirvana actually played one of these benefit shows I know Jam played one of
00:06:30
the benefit shows so the whole Community rallies around so they could raise money
00:06:35
uh to put forth to give a private investiga team opportunity to help solve this case and not enough Captain do you
00:06:43
hear the phrase music Community right you hear you know music scene or whatever but music Community it is a
00:06:50
community and that's what music is all about it's about band members coming together to create great music and
00:06:55
bringing people in to listen and witness that great music that you've created now
00:07:00
obviously Steve and his fellow band members the gits they don't know how to solve crimes or investigate crimes and
00:07:06
one of their best friends was brutally murdered but what they do know how to do is they know how to bring people
00:07:12
together they need and and they did just that you do what you know when you're faced with adversity and they brought
00:07:19
people together for one cause one cause to raise money to one solve their friends crime to bring Justice to her
00:07:27
and her family and themselves as well as let's take this this horrible a horrible person did this okay and this
00:07:36
person still walking amongst us and if he did this once he very well could have done it again let's get him behind bars
00:07:44
where he belongs that's the difference you can make yeah and I have in my notes Here Captain I don't you said a couple
00:07:49
of bands uh you said narvana Pearl Jam I have sound Gard as well in my notes but
00:07:55
basically the GS brought these bands together to help raise a bunch of money to hire that private investigator that
00:08:01
you spoke of they raised about $70,000 to hire a private investigator and they not only hired one but they
00:08:08
went out and they interviewed a bunch of people so they could find the best one for their case they hired Lee Heron and
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she is a private investigator and with the $70,000 they were able to hire her for a
00:08:22
threeyear time period to work on this case that's an extensive amount of time now the thing here is she starts getting
00:08:31
involved in this thing and she starts running in the circles that the band would have run mhm uh because her
00:08:37
suspicions were that maybe somebody the person that did this might have known Mia so she's talking with her friends
00:08:44
and she's going to a lot of bars she's interviewing band members of other bands and she gets a lead okay and this is
00:08:52
through one of Mia's friends and uh it's a roommate of hers actually tells the private inv investigator that there's
00:09:00
this person that was friends with Mia and friends with the roommate and it sounds like there might have been some
00:09:06
kind of relationship going on between the roommate and this quote unquote friend uh but there during some heated
00:09:13
arguments this friend tells the roommate uh saying things like you know the the [ __ ] is dead the [ __ ] is dead why did
00:09:21
I do it I don't know why I did it um just saying weird strange things when it comes to and your immediately jumps to
00:09:30
your murdered friend when you hear somebody saying that uh the private investigator tracks down this person uh
00:09:37
and is able to collect a lot of samples uh she searched the the vehicle uh searched his car uh she would eventually
00:09:45
turn him into law enforcement uh believing that she had a good suspect now law enforcement they use the
00:09:53
polygraph test to talk with this individual now and we we touched upon it a little bit but when you have this
00:10:00
situation with very little evidence the polygraph test might be your number one weapon when you're talking to the
00:10:05
suspects because you have to figure out who had the means to kill her during that 80-minute time period where were
00:10:13
they were they involved are they lying about where they are right uh now this individual even though he's saying these
00:10:19
strange things um he passes the polygraph um so unfortunately this lead doesn't seem to pan out well then you
00:10:28
start questioning why he's saying these strange things you know uh but this comes from the captain who says strange
00:10:36
things I I put it put that on a te for you every week I leave the garage and I go why does he say these strange things
00:10:43
that's what I say every week about myself now the private investigator she's going to get another lead and this
00:10:50
lead is actually generated through a fan of the gits uh this fan started some type of internet relationship with a guy
00:10:59
that lived in the Seattle area now this guy he starts saying strange things while we're on the topic right he starts
00:11:06
talking about how he is going to do to this girl what he did to Mia uh so our private investigator uh starts following
00:11:15
this guy around and what she observes is that this guy has some strange hobby okay this is what you know every episode
00:11:25
we get into some dude that's got a strange hobby this is a strange yes it's podcasting uh not that strange no no
00:11:33
this is this is horrible um and it makes your mind wander okay so while she's following this guy this is something she
00:11:40
figures out that he has he does on several occasions he parks at schools oh God and he watches girls soccer teams
00:11:50
from his car he stays in his vehicle the whole time and then after the soccer game or well they called a match I guess
00:11:58
or the practice whatever he's watching uh afterwards he would drive to a porn shop okay so this is definitely strange
00:12:07
Behavior the private investigator she collects a whole bunch of information on this guy and she ends up figuring out
00:12:15
that at let's just rewind for a second sorry so he watches girls play soccer yes and then he drives to a porn shop
00:12:24
yes that's his hobby well I'm guessing it's his Hobby because the private investigator Lee Heron she said that she
00:12:31
observed him do this on more than one occasion so it's not like it just happened on accident once right okay so
00:12:39
um and she's probably only following him for a limited amount of time who knows how often uh he spends his afternoons
00:12:45
this way regardless the private investigator she collects info on this guy and through this information and
00:12:53
after studying this guy for a while she learns that he did know Mia at some point it's questionable I'm a little
00:13:01
unclear as to what their relationship was if they were just acquaintances or if it was more than that but she
00:13:07
definitely points out that they had known one another well and this case is very difficult too because you know even
00:13:14
if you're a introvert right even if you kind of keep to yourself it's like you know of a lot of people when you're in a
00:13:22
band and a lot of people know of you and so there'd be a lot of people that I've
00:13:28
played um gigs with you know our band open for theirs or theirs open for our for my band or whatever that that I
00:13:36
probably hung out with you know 10 15 times but other than those circles of people I've never hung out with them
00:13:42
ever you might not even know their last name or where they live they're just acquaintances MH um so but get this
00:13:49
there's a little bit of icing on this bad cake here right I don't think that's icing um he's he's a cab dver driver oh
00:14:01
uh and she Mia remember said that she would probably get in a cab and head home for the night the last time that
00:14:07
she was seen yeah now when confronted by the private investigator um he says that
00:14:14
he's not in he was not in the area the night that Mia was killed that he was off he was out of town he was staying
00:14:20
with a friend in Olympia okay okay well this is a very good private investigator
00:14:26
you don't just straight up lie to a private investigator of this level because she figured out very quickly M
00:14:32
you were not staying with your friend in Olympia that night um so he's unable to
00:14:38
account for his whereabouts uh for the night that Mia uh was killed okay so so he just basically came up with a false
00:14:46
Alibi mhm and then The Alibi didn't check out right he he does eventually break down uh to to the private
00:14:55
investigator he admits that he was driving driving his Cab in the Seattle area that night right um he explains to
00:15:04
her that he has a severe drug problem and it's one it's it's hard for him to account for his whereabouts a lot of the
00:15:13
time um but he says you know I had nothing to do with her death well and possibly the reason why he was lying in
00:15:20
the first place is that he's probably heard rumors that she was catching a cab yeah right and so then he knows he was
00:15:27
driving a cab in that area that night you know there there's a part of me that feels for him I mean he is a
00:15:34
creepo that watches girl soccer and then goes to porn shops but uh yeah I I guess
00:15:40
I feel for him in the sense that he has a serious drug problem that he can't seem to get a hold of um I don't feel
00:15:47
for him because his his movements seem very strange to me and seem like maybe something he might want to talk to a
00:15:54
professional about that he's got some some things to work out even past the drug problem yeah he should try
00:16:00
talkspace.com there you go um but so this this is a very good suspect this is a very good suspect in this case yeah I
00:16:09
think so but again like I was saying like you you've heard the story so it's and you are a cab driver so we have that
00:16:16
speculation that she got into a cab but on the other side of things if you are innocent then man
00:16:22
you you know the story like I said and so you're going to go well they're going to assume it's me
00:16:29
you know if I tell him I was in the area and I was working that night they're going to assume it's me well and he's
00:16:34
got a couple of other problems here too because with that severe drug problem who knows if he you know like we said
00:16:40
he's unable to account for his whereabouts maybe he's even unable to account for what he does when his eyes
00:16:45
are open you know um he maybe he blacks out the other thing too he's probably running in certain circles and doing
00:16:52
certain activities meaning purchasing and using drugs where he's often breaking the law well and I think that's
00:16:59
one of the reasons too that the band did such a good job as far as raising money
00:17:03
and raising awareness and keeping this on the Forefront because they were afraid that law enforcement just looked
00:17:09
at you know M as just you know here's some grungy girl um you know that possibly was a drug addict as well I
00:17:17
mean there was no signs of uh drugs in her system right be we got to be should be clear about that right but but the
00:17:24
idea is like I mean think about it this way I mean it's you know I grew up you know especially with my parents you go
00:17:30
I'm in I'm in a ban and they just assume that all your buddies in the ban are drug addicts right you know um so this
00:17:39
this individual uh all the information that Lee Heron collects on him is turned over to law enforcement now law
00:17:46
enforcement agrees with the private investigator and says that you know what this is a very good suspect and you know
00:17:53
we're going to look into this um there's not they are never able to link him to the murder of Mia Zapata and like we
00:18:02
said before though I mean our biggest weapon here our biggest Ally here is lie detector and I haven't been able to find
00:18:10
any information if they if they were able to question this suspect right the statements that I saw um didn't didn't
00:18:18
include anything whether he took a polygraph or submitted himself to a polygraph or not one thing we should
00:18:24
think about though too is if somebody is unable to account for their whereabouts
00:18:28
or some that's blacking out often you might get a lot of answers that are I don't know I don't know I don't know
00:18:35
what I did I don't know and they're not lying they're not lying that so the polygraph may not help you in this
00:18:41
situation but the police's statement was basically um we had nothing to link this
00:18:46
individual to the actual murder well again with the private investigator it's the same as law enforcement law
00:18:52
enforcement was frustrated because every time they got a piece of evidence it kind of went nowhere when they got a
00:18:59
lead it went nowhere and that's the same thing happening now with the private investigator and the ban would not stop
00:19:07
right right and because there was a lot going on with the band and what they were try their efforts that they were
00:19:13
trying to pull together at the same time that this private investigator has Unleashed her investigation and she's
00:19:19
following these people around uh some of that is in 1995 uh the gits collaborated with Joan
00:19:26
Jet yeah uh they made album and they did a tour to benefit the private investigation further of Mia Zapata's
00:19:34
murder uh they they named the band evil Stig um which I'm a little unclear on this Captain you might know better than
00:19:41
me but it obviously spells gets live or gets live backwards get live yeah gets live and um Joan Jet did a um she did
00:19:51
something she she wrote a song about a woman being attacked on the streets uh which was kind of you know based off of
00:19:59
what she knew about Mia Zapata's case well I I know that a seven-year [ __ ] wrote a song called
00:20:07
Mia which was I think Loosely based on the actual uh murder of Mia Zapata and that record I believe was called
00:20:18
Viva uh zapada yes and a lot of people would you know at these benefit shows would yell Viva
00:20:26
Zapata um but we also what another thing that was super weird about this was MIA
00:20:32
wrote a song uh you know before her death and and it was talking about her being
00:20:39
attacked by a serial killer which I mean now we know like Talking Heads right you
00:20:44
know Psycho Killer kissy uh so you know and it's a dark subject but I think there's a lot of bands that have drawn
00:20:53
uh on this on the True Crime topic for for songs well I believe that song was called The Sign of the crab or something
00:21:01
like that yeah and uh you got to keep in mind you know she's in Seattle at the time of the Green River Killer
00:21:07
investigations going on um and that was something that did not stay out of the news hardly at all um you know so this
00:21:14
would have been something that anybody with their ear to the ground would have been aware of which I mean think about
00:21:20
the her bandmates though that recorded on that song and now going through what they've gone through and having to
00:21:26
listen to those lyrics and and how uh you know almost like a fortune teller um Mia was to her own life mhm now we said
00:21:35
that the band raised over $70,000 to hire this private investigator for a three-year time period um eventually the
00:21:41
funds did dry up uh there were no major breaks in the case during this time but the investigator Lee Heron uh she
00:21:49
continued to investigate on her own time afterward for many years now it was in 1998 um after five years of
00:22:00
Investigation the Seattle Police uh their detectives basically came out and said unfortunately we are no closer to
00:22:07
solving this case than we were right after the murder and so much time has passed in that in this case but the band
00:22:14
like like I said I mean I just championed them Steve and all the guys in the Gs and everybody that helped them
00:22:21
out as well but they they didn't just raise money and awareness for uh this case they also rais money for like
00:22:28
selfdefense classes yeah they called the organization it was a self-defense group
00:22:33
called home alive and you know the name obviously coming from wishing Mia would have got home alive that night and how
00:22:41
could young women and girls fend off uh these type of attacks so uh they would have taught self-defense uh they also
00:22:49
taught martial arts and uh use of pepper spray so they could defend themselves while they're out on the streets and
00:22:55
make it home alive well the band could just sat on their thumbs and did nothing but they didn't like we said they raised
00:23:02
a bunch of money they got a private investigator involved they they started this group for self-defense classes but
00:23:11
you know it's nine years into this case you know as every year goes past you got
00:23:16
to start thinking like people are losing hope at this point oh by yeah incredib incredibly I mean this it's gotten
00:23:23
colder and colder and colder as the years have gone by not only did the police invest invation go cold the
00:23:29
private investigator has run out of leads uh 9 years later and we're not looking at any type of way of solving
00:23:35
this except for one thing we remember we talked about the police and the investigators doing their due diligence
00:23:42
well they were able to collect some DNA that tiny little minuscule amount of DNA
00:23:48
that they collected and they had the foresight to save that DNA right rather than to push in the chips and risk it
00:23:56
and potentially destroy the DNA and never solve Mia's case Right But as time elapse we have new technology yes
00:24:04
there's advancements going on in DNA evidence and what they can do with that and a lot of this comes about by way of
00:24:11
a guy named Carrie Mullis uh he wins the Nobel Prize for uh chemistry uh in the 90s and he developed um something called
00:24:21
polymerase Chain Reaction uh we're just going to call it PCR so we don't have to
00:24:27
keep repeat that um why don't you tell us what PCR is Captain you see how I just bow out
00:24:34
gracefully on that one again I am a captain not a scientist you know this Advanced science stuff gives me a
00:24:40
migraine headache it well again there there's a lot of little documentaries and one of the things on this case that
00:24:46
I thought was interesting was the Forensic Files and they kind of break this down a little bit better than
00:24:52
probably I will but basically what they're able to do is it's almost a photocopier for DNA so they're able to
00:25:00
take this small sample and duplicate it now by the duplication we have enough to
00:25:05
sample but we also have enough to uh if if the test doesn't go right that we might be able to sample again or
00:25:13
photocopy it again now this um the Nobel Peace or Nobel Peace Prize the Nobel Prize Was Won in 1993 the same year as
00:25:22
her death Okay the reason why they waited so long was because PCR wasn't uh perfected yet and there was still there
00:25:30
was some trials and errors and so with such a small sample they could have tried the PCR and it could have not have
00:25:36
worked and then again damaged this DNA we'll get right back to the Breakthrough in this case after this quick beer
00:25:45
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[Music] all right cheers mates so we have a break in the case yes and just like a
00:28:08
lot of the investigators believed early in this case when all the leads dried up
00:28:13
they believe that without any DNA that this case would probably never be solved well you have to applaud law enforcement
00:28:20
for not losing this evidence yes not losing it and not risking it by testing it too soon until the tech technology
00:28:28
had fully developed thank God FY Malik was not involved in this case yeah um so here's the way that this goes down
00:28:37
Captain um it takes quite a bit of time as we had said but uh in 2001 they are able to amplify the DNA
00:28:48
that they found on Mia Zapata now this was from the saliva that was collected near the bite marks that were on her
00:28:55
chest and it's going to have two strands of DNA so so there's the DNA but what it's stating is that one strand is Mia
00:29:04
aata's Strand and the other strand is of a male yes the the the worry that that they faced when they went into this that
00:29:12
it might have just been Mia's DNA and that they wouldn't be able to extract anything else what they end up finding
00:29:18
is hers along with it single Source male DNA mhm they enter this into the system
00:29:25
um and this is in 200 one and it failed to generate any positive results matching it to uh a suspect but this uh
00:29:34
system has a name right uh yes so this would be the codus system that we've talked about several times on on the
00:29:40
show so but this to break it down simply uh codus is where if you commit a felony
00:29:47
then they collect your DNA and it goes into this system MH well what happens here is that in 2002 there is a man
00:29:55
arrested in Florida on the other side of the United States uh for burglary and domestic abuse charges uh in 2002 they
00:30:05
collect his DNA during this time uh this man is Jesus mesia and he is a man that
00:30:14
had a history of violence toward women uh including domestic abuse uh burglary as we have mentioned assault and battery
00:30:22
as well now all of his ex-girlfriends and his wife wife uh had filed reports against him at some point in their
00:30:32
relationships um here's the thing captain now we have King County investigators are going to have to go to
00:30:41
Florida and try to find Jesus mosqu he he commits his crime his DNA is in the system but they have to keep testing
00:30:50
they keep have to keep running the test to find a match within the system so somebody kept doing their job yes and so
00:30:59
now the now law enforcement is going down and they're going to try to capture this monster right and you know what
00:31:05
let's give credit where credit is due you said somebody had to keep running those tests somebody had to keep this
00:31:09
DNA evidence and store it uh the person responsible for that her name is jod sass um and she was she worked at the
00:31:17
Washington State Crime Lab well jod sass I like your G there you go now Captain you know that these things are never as
00:31:25
easy as they appear to be right you can't just you can't just go marching up to somebody's door knock three times
00:31:32
they open up the door greet you with a smile and you go guess what sir we have your DNA on this murder victim here's
00:31:38
your handcuffs put them on and let's go to jail forever right it never works that way I wish that it did but the uh
00:31:45
King County investigators have to go to Florida to try to locate uh Jesus Mia and they have to they need to apprehend
00:31:54
him but they're going to have to question him first it's not just as simple as arresting him because they
00:31:59
found his DNA they go to his home where he and his wife were living um I don't know if this Jesus guy is just really
00:32:08
lucky you know to get away with murder for this many years um and then he gets lucky again because they learned from
00:32:15
talking to his wife that he left the home just days before they arrived um and I don't think that it had anything
00:32:23
to I don't think they put it out an announcement that they were going looking for this dude right so he leaves
00:32:29
uh the wife has nothing but bad things to say about this guy and she's going to give them every bit of information that
00:32:35
she has so they can apprehend him well yeah cuz he's probably you know beat her for years so she provides them with a
00:32:43
very good description of his vehicle you know what kind of car he's driving make
00:32:47
a model year all that good stuff probably even the license plate number as well um they're going to put out this
00:32:54
information to all their Blue Blood Brothers uh throughout the State of Florida and
00:32:59
they're looking for this guy they're looking for his vehicle well his vehicle is spotted a few days later in Miami um
00:33:07
and that's when the investigators are going to go to Miami and knock on his door where he's staying they interview
00:33:15
Jesus uh there sound it sounds to me I I wasn't they didn't videotape the interview I wasn't able to witness it
00:33:23
but from the way that the investigators described the interview there might have
00:33:27
been a bit of a language barrier between uh the investigators and Jesus no yeah now he was in the country for a long
00:33:34
time but he was a illegal immigrant yes and he was from uh from Cuba mhm so they're talking with him and he's saying
00:33:43
you know I don't know what you're talking about uh I you know I didn't murder anybody I've never murdered
00:33:48
anybody um also claims that he was never in Seattle I believe as well that's exactly right now the investigators do
00:33:56
something pretty interesting here uh and they basically provide Jesus with a photo lineup well it's a photo lineup of
00:34:05
unfortunately a bunch of dead young women uh murder victims and they're pointing to each one and they're saying
00:34:11
you know do you know her have you ever seen her have you talked to her have you dated her uh all these questions about
00:34:17
every single one of these pictures of these girls and Jesus is saying I don't know any of them answers no to every
00:34:25
question that they have including all the questions that they ask him about the picture of Mia Zapata and so what
00:34:34
the detectives are able to take from his statement is he saying I've never met her I've never spoken to her I didn't
00:34:41
know her well guess what you just they just laid a trap right there because gocha gotcha because guess what if you
00:34:49
didn't know her you've never spoken to her you've never met her then why is your saliva on her and why was it placed
00:34:56
there short before she died now now do you think the cops confronted him right then when he said
00:35:02
no um I believe he was arrested very quickly after that statement right but I mean but they didn't like say hey this
00:35:10
is how we got you right because if I was the detective in the room I would have said you done messed up
00:35:18
aaon well they're going to continue to build their case against Jesus and one thing that comes about pretty quickly
00:35:25
after they arrest him is they're going to put his picture on the news and in the newspapers because they're happy
00:35:32
that they finally made an arrest in Mia Zapata's case well there's a woman that comes forward and she had actually filed
00:35:39
a police report weeks before the murder and this police report was because some man had exposed himself to her mhm okay
00:35:49
so she says you know what remember that report that I filed back in 1993 that was the guy that was free willly yeah
00:35:56
that was the guy that exposed himself to me well he's got all kinds of problems now Jesus does uh not only did he leave
00:36:03
his DNA evidence on the murder victim um but now the prosecution has a living witness to to testify against this guy
00:36:13
saying that he was in the area uh this is what he was up to um he could have done the same thing to to Mia uh but
00:36:21
they were also to able to establish that he was in the area living just like blocks away from where her body was
00:36:29
found yeah that they were able to establish that he lived about three blocks from where her body's found the
00:36:34
other interesting thing here and I don't think they were able to prove it but I always wondered if maybe he worked for a
00:36:41
taxi company yeah I think there was some rumor about that it's a little hard to trace him um to to pinpoint on a
00:36:50
day-to-day basis where this guy was he was a Drifter for most of his adult life one he was illegal yeah and and he lived
00:36:57
in uh they know that he lived in Florida Arizona and Washington and and it was a
00:37:02
bit of a brief stay uh in Washington I believe but he had some kind of small criminal history in both the State of
00:37:11
Florida and Arizona well he had a criminal history I think in Cuba and I think that's the reason why they they
00:37:18
basically sent him here yeah and let's not get into that conversation because that's a whole that's a whole another
00:37:23
conversation it's political um but the thing here this have you seen this guy on TV he's a large man it's kind of
00:37:32
scary like he he he's got like a football player type build to him where I mean like he's tall big shoulders long
00:37:40
arms uh and that was the thing that her bandmates and the private investigators said when they saw him on TV and saw
00:37:49
that he was arrested they thought you know really unfortunately Mia didn't stand much of a chance against this guy
00:37:58
right um and they believe that the way that this thing went down is that she when she left her friend apartment
00:38:05
around 2 a.m. they think that Jesus would have spotted her probably within about 15 minutes of leaving there then
00:38:12
he followed her for a bit of time uh she's wearing the headphones most likely wearing the headphones like you had said
00:38:18
and she may not have even heard him creep up behind her and grab her and attack her uh unfortunately you know not
00:38:26
only a murder victim but the last hour of her life must have been hell um and this guy is is an is a monster I know we
00:38:36
I feel like that word is overused on our show a little bit um but that's all I see when I look at this guy it seems
00:38:42
like this case obviously was sexually motivated that's his motivation here uh you know we also have the fact that he
00:38:49
is you know flashing himself I wonder too if he was like a Peeping Tom uh but there's no doubt in my mind that he has
00:38:58
done this before before Mia he did it after and I'm sure that there's other cases that this guy is connected to yeah
00:39:08
I was really hoping that his you know once he was arrested and then convicted he was convicted in
00:39:14
2004 um and he you know he convicted a first-degree murder meaning that they they fully agree and are aware that he
00:39:24
abducted her and in a assaulted her and then killed her knowing what he was doing the entire time I was hoping that
00:39:32
with his picture being in the papers and being on the news that somebody just like that lady came out from 1993 I was
00:39:39
hoping more people would come out and maybe be able to solve some cold cases cuz like you said Captain I I throw him
00:39:45
into the bin of once a monster always a monster um the unfortunate thing you know I thank God this case was solved
00:39:55
that's all you can can hope for when these horrible things happen when people I shouldn't say when horrible things
00:40:00
happen it makes it sound like it just happens no when PE when horrible people go out and do horrible things to good
00:40:05
people that's all you can hope for um but it was a little it bothered me a little bit and
00:40:13
I'm not going to lie to you that he he only received 36 years um for that's for abduction assault and murder um it
00:40:21
seemed a little light I do take I do take some um they able to charge him with u the rape as well or is that
00:40:30
included in the assault charges uh it may be included in the assault charges I'm a little unclear on that uh the only
00:40:38
thing that I the only thing that I can be somewhat happy about is I have in my notes here that he was 48 years old at
00:40:45
the time of his I don't know if that's at the time of his arrest or his conviction but regardless he would be in
00:40:50
his late 40s maybe 50 years old by the time he was convicted I'm hoping that with a 36 year uh prison sentence that
00:40:58
this guy never sees the light of day again well you know he had to go back to trial right yes so this is what drove me
00:41:05
nuts is you know 36 years doesn't seem like enough you know especially for somebody's life but so he goes back to
00:41:12
trial because they said well that that penalty is too harsh MH not have a new trial but we're going to you know
00:41:20
resentence you resentence you yeah and he waved his rights okay which made almost zero sense because that's the
00:41:28
reason why they're having the resentencing trial anyways he ra waved his rights to have a jury that force it
00:41:35
back onto the judge and guess what the judge did baller move right here just resentence them to 36 years okay very
00:41:43
good um I have that he never testified on his own behalf but he has maintained his innocence in this crime obviously we
00:41:51
have proof positive that he is not innocent of this crime and I think we all could learn something from her
00:41:58
bandmates her friends her family the band that gets we can learn something of don't give up keep talking about the
00:42:04
case keep trying to shed some light on the case and then maybe we can get some justice yeah and once again the gits
00:42:11
were made up of Mia Zapata Andrew Kessler Steve muray Ary and Matt Dresner and if you get a chance make sure you
00:42:19
check out the work of Mia Zapata in the band The gets how about a little recommended reading for you Captain yes
00:42:25
col all right so we have received and thankful we're very thankful for this we've received a lot of praise for our
00:42:32
episodes last week we did The Killing Fields Trilogy um that took a lot of research to put that baby together and I
00:42:41
wanted to mention that you know give credit where credits do and a lot of that research came from the Houston
00:42:46
Chronicle uh the newspaper down there as well as Katherine Casey's book called Deliver Us uh so if you're looking to
00:42:53
learn more about the Texas Killing Fields and more about the the cases within that case uh you need to check
00:43:00
out Katherine Casey's book Deliver Us and you can do that by going to our recommended page at truecrime garage.com
00:43:08
and you can pick up any of the books that we've recommended there or DVDs that we've recommended there simply by
00:43:13
clicking on the Amazon banner and your little Purchase cost you nothing extra helps out the show thanks to everybody
00:43:19
for joining us in the garage this week and until next week be good be kind and don't litter
00:43:37
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