00:00:00
hey Parks and Rec fans Rob Lowe here did you know that parks and recollection is
00:00:06
back and that's not all we wanted to shake things up a little bit sort of give us some new life so my buddies Jim
00:00:13
O'Hara and Greg Levine are going to be hosting the podcast that's right rob it is me Jim O'Hare and I played Larry
00:00:20
Terry Gary Jerry Berry I'm Parks and Rec and I am so excited to go on this adventure with Greg and you know me Greg
00:00:27
Levine Parks and Rec writer Jim and I are continuing in the Parks recap tradition going through every episode
00:00:33
starting with season four yes we are so make sure to subscribe to parks and recollection wherever you get your
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podcasts I am literally so excited when it comes to health and wellness good sleep is essential Ashley invites
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you to a New Era of sleep with the latest in sleep Technologies experience all night cooling with the Tempur-Pedic
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Breeze collection or rest easy with adaptive pressure relief on the all-new purple collection thanks to its gel Flex
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store today better sleep starts here thank you [Music] [Music] thank you welcome to True Crime garage wherever
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you are whatever you're doing thanks for listening I'm your host Nick and with me
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as always is my friend and yours and together we say to you if you change well we will love you anyway here is the
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captain if I can change you can change everyone can change it's good to be seen and good to see you thanks for listening
00:02:20
thanks for telling a friend [Music] foreign this week we are sipping on some red bird ale from the good Folks at
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Portsmouth Brewing Company in Portsmouth Ohio Redbird is a classic steam ale brewed with roasted caramel malts that
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are perfectly paired with three different domestic hops Redbird ale is full flavored and has a beautiful color
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so show it off and pour it into your favorite glass garage grade three and a quarter bottle caps out of five and
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let's give some thanks and praise to our friends for helping us fill up the fridge this week first up a shout out to
00:03:02
Carolyn our friend and the midday show host on 92.5 The River Boston's independent radio cheers to you Carolyn
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in a big we like your jib goes out to Tim Stratton and Timothy Stratton Jr and last but certainly not least Captain we
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have Heather from Draper Utah everyone we just mentioned they went to our website truecrimegarage.com clicked on
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the Pint glass and that helped us out with this week's beer fund and filled up our old garage fridge and for that
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we thank you yeah bwruent Beer Run follow us on Facebook Instagram or Twitter especially at Twitter at
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truecrime garage.com in Colonel that is enough of the business all right everybody gather around grab a chair
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grab a beer let's talk some true crime [Music] [Music] this week we have a strange missing persons case
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on tap for you in the garage strange may not be the best description as I think most would agree that most if
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not all missing persons cases would fall into the strange category but this one is layered with plausible
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theories some have told me that this is the story of the ghost by the water how did that ghost come to be
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some say the ghost is the ghost of a man who went missing years ago on a hot July night back in 1996
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Rob money left his home and jumped into his cherry red Firebird he pulled out of his driveway and drove
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down the road nothing was particularly out of the ordinary about that at all except
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he did not come home later friends and family decided the best thing to do was to notify the
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police and then it became official Rob was missing and police and others were looking
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what they would find is his cherry red Firebird parked all alone at a nearby body of water Hoover
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also known as Hoover Reservoir his car was parked near the dam there were no obvious signs of a
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struggle and at his house police found the same but Rob was gone the fun-loving 29 year old seemingly had
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vanished Into Thin Air in some cases some might say vanished Without a Trace but remember
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the layers when one starts to peel back the layers one will quickly find traces of Rob
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some have even said that the ghost by the water is a trace of Rob went missing in the summer of 96.
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in June of 1997 several teenagers all recent high school graduates were over by Hoover Reservoir late at night
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drinking beers and passing a joint celebrating their graduation and the start of what would possibly be the best
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summer of their lives yet it was past midnight and was starting to get chilly when one of the 18 year old
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boys spotted what he thought was a spirit walking or floating just near the shoreline yards off in the distance
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some of the boys agreed that they had seen something that they could not explain
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at least one of the boys thought that maybe it was just the joint and the beers and their minds were playing
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tricks on them in the end not all could agree if they had seen something or not and the ones that believed that they had
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in fact seen something were not quite sure what they had seen but a few of the boys who would later
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swear that they did in fact see something out of the ordinary remembered the man who went missing the year before
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they remembered that the missing man's vehicle was found not terribly far from their party spot on that late summer
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night and so it was like that Rob money the fun-loving 29 year old with a flashy
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fast car became something of folklore an urban legend about a ghost and a man who went missing from a safe middle
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class suburb late One Summer Night this is the case of Rob money and this is true crime garage
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[Music] foreign [Music] was born April 5th 1967 in Nelsonville Ohio that's in Southeast Ohio the money family was a
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family of five Mom Dad Rob's older brother and his sister at some point during Rob's childhood the
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money family moved from Nelsonville Ohio up north to Westerville Ohio Westerville was and remains a nice and
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safe suburb of the capital city of Columbus Ohio Rob his brother and several of Rob's
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buddies growing up were way into Motocross not just as Weekend Warriors but Rob his brother and some of their
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friends raced dirt bikes and competitions and possessed the ability to work on the bikes themselves
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in fact Rob would go on to take several more technical classes in high school all related to the automotive field
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Rob fell for a girl at a young age her name was Angela the two were close their families in fact were close Rob's mother
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and Angela's mother go way back and After High School the two got married Rob and Angela got married
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Rob went to work for a construction company he was a big machine heavy equipment operator for his successful
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Local Company at some point the two moved into a nice house that they rented the house was
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over 1200 square foot and was not just in the quiet part of Westerville but it was over by the water so a very
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desirable location the address was 1279 Central College Road now as we said Captain Rob was an
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equipment operator this is for the Smith excavating company operating off of sciota Darby Road
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Rob had worked for them for nine years and he was known to be a hard worker he was extremely reliable and rarely missed
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work that fact Captain will be one of several reasons that the alarm will be raised
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quickly later when he goes missing so Rob to me seems like a pretty simple guy but interesting guy he has has
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he does have hobbies he has a Need for Speed but he just seems to be a guy that you know got married and he's a hard
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worker and he's building a life for himself yeah and that's one thing that jumped off the page to me here too
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Captain I made a note that Rob was 29 when he goes missing but he was working for the same company for nine years so
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that's a very good work history for his age kind of old school now a few things of importance take
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place the year before Rob disappears so he goes missing in 1996. so let's go back to 1995 real quick so one of those
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things that I believe to be important is Rob buys a brand new cherry red Firebird
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two at some point in 1995 that Year Rob and his wife Angela split up now there are a couple of different
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reasons or stories that that maybe why or the way that the two split up I asked a few people why the two decided
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to call it quits and the thing is people closest to him and her did not seem to have any real hardcore proof or
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understanding as of why the two split up growing in different directions you're right so usually what we see is when
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when you have a messy split people were pretty well aware or there's all kinds of reasons why a couple broke up but the
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way that I think that this thing worked out is that I was told that the two of them that
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that for reasons just pretty much between the two of them that it just didn't work out the best I could sort
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out Captain is that it was pretty a pretty clean mutual and amicable separation right one of Rob's closest
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friends believes that the two split because Rob even at the age of 29 was still very much living like a 21 or 22
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year old guy a responsible 21-22 year old guy but not like a dude that is going to be
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turning 30 right right so maybe maybe a certain clock is ticking for Angela that
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wasn't ticking for Rob and the two decided to not continue to spend their lives together
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everything I could find everybody I spoke to all had the same account of Rob the same report of Rob he
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is a guy that works hard he's living for the weekend and his weekends are full of hanging out
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with his buddies who are a little rough around the edges by most reports Captain Rob is a
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happy-go-lucky hard-working work hard Party hard kind of guy but if you're into the hobby of cars whether
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it's race cars or just just regular cars that is a hobby that you could spend a lot of time on the weekends so that
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could be something where it's like if you're working really hard on the weekdays and spending your whole time on
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your hobby that might get in the way of having a healthy relationship now another thing of importance in regards
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to 1995 is Angela Robb's wife not only do they split up but she moves out of the house that they were renting
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together Rob decides to stay at the house and as we said it was a nice house in a good location so affordable rent no
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reason to move out he decides to stay and a friend of his who I believe is two years older maybe a couple years
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older than Rob's moves in with Rob so Rob's roommate his name is Ron we do need to point out though
00:14:56
that when Rob goes missing it is my understanding that no one has officially filed for divorce yet so a divorce was
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going to happen but Rob was busy and Angela was busy and by all accounts they got along so it sounds like there was no
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hurry on anyone's behalf all right so do we think we're all squared away on the life and events
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leading up to our time in question for Rob money Captain yeah I think I got a pretty good grasp of who rob is and who
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his friends are and so let's get to the events of July 1996. this is the month that Rob goes
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missing so let's go through the newspaper articles because this will set it up nicely for us to dive into most of
00:15:45
these articles will be from the big local paper here that is the Columbus Dispatch this first one is from Sunday
00:15:53
July 21st so this is to be clear five days after Rob was last seen in three days after he is reported missing two
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police the headline is police have car a few other Clues missing Westerville man and
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the article reads Westerville police have few clues in The Disappearance of a 29 year old man who was last seen
00:16:20
Tuesday at his home Rob money of 1279 Central College Road was reported missing Thursday after his roommate and
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friends said they hadn't seen him and did not know where he was this is according to Lieutenant Don Richardson
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the night the report was filed police found Moni's car less than a mile from his home near a concession stand at
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Hoover Dam just off Sunbury Road this is according to police a park ranger at the
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dam listed in a log book that the car had been parked there since Tuesday police said quote it's a situation where
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there's not a lot to go on but it's out of the ordinary because no one seems to be able to give us any information about
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where he could have gone and quote so you're saying this is a park and there was a concession stand at the
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park and his car has been parked there for now several days that's correct and that's according to police
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now Moni's wife Angela reported him missing the car was found at the dam this is again as a 1995 Firebird it was
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registered in her name so that's how they know to contact her when the vehicle is found
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and they're asking anyone with information to call Westerville police detectives so let's go exploring through
00:17:47
the information here the first things that I was interested in in this case was who and when
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was Rob reported missing by and I wanted to know about the car situation right so
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who and when was robber reported missing well we know that from the article Rob was reported missing on Thursday this
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article says Thursday night but I have other reports captain that say that it that it was Thursday daytime and it's
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not super important but I'm going to go with the daytime reports as that is what
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is most stated the most in this case in fact this is the only report that says the missing report came in at night
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now more so Captain I was interested in who reported Rob missing because we have
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a smattering of persons who one would expect could report him missing we've got Rob's wife while separated that
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seems still seems appropriate we have Rob's parents they live in town and by all reports Rob was close with
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his parents especially close with his mother in fact many of Rob's friends knew Rob's family quite well and
00:19:03
probably the person that makes the most sense to report him missing other than his work would be Rob has a roommate
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correct so I was a little confused by this because other reports state that Rob's mother was the one to filed the
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missing persons report and as you said we got the roommate that would make the most sense but remember his friends are
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close with his family his parents right and so I was able to confirm with the detective that Rob's wife his mother and
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roommate pretty much worked in concert to report him missing so they are all checking with each other
00:19:44
have you seen Rob where is Rob and then based off of the fact that none of the three had seen or heard from Rob that
00:19:52
it's time to call the police so Rob is reported missing and his car the red 1995 Pontiac Firebird is
00:20:00
reported missing as well now that's a good segue here Captain because I was fascinated by this car
00:20:07
situation as I think anyone should be whether we're talking about a missing person's case or a homicide case
00:20:16
we want to know how the car got to where it was found and by who who got it to where
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the car was found this is all going to be incredibly important to our case so what do we learn here captain from
00:20:30
the article the car was found by police this is a great start to our investigation and the topper
00:20:39
is the park ranger in their log and notes they recorded that the vehicle had been there since at
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least just after midnight or so on the 17th this is key two we have the car being found by police
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relatively quickly we know that they speak to the park ranger and they can confirm that this
00:21:02
vehicle appears they first see it in the lot shortly after Rob is last seen and what I like about this information
00:21:12
here Captain is that it's not some random person that found the vehicle and maybe moved it or said what state that
00:21:21
they found the vehicle in this is law enforcement to be very clear here the thing that makes it even better is the
00:21:28
law enforcement agency that's investigating him being missing is the same agency
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that finds the car this makes it very clean so just to put this picture in more of a clear light right so I'm
00:21:42
trying to follow what you're stating so Rob has seen at work comes home leaves home
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seen by neighbors leaving home later his car is going to be seen at this park and noted by Park Rangers
00:22:00
we have this car it's it's parked here and this is just hours after Rob was seen by his neighbors leaving his house
00:22:07
that's correct so I'm kind of working backwards here from the time that he's reported missing but
00:22:15
and based off of the the article itself now I spoke to a handful of people that are very close
00:22:22
to this case and I was hoping to talk to a few more but have not heard back from
00:22:26
them yet but from what I could find all the people I did talk to Captain in my batch of questions
00:22:34
I started off by saying I would like to know more about Rob's Car how was it found and by who so we already know and
00:22:42
we've already answered that question the other questions I had were was the car locked where are the keys in it was the
00:22:49
car neatly parked neatly in a parking spot was there any damage or concerns like a dead battery or flat tire or flat
00:22:57
tires right what we learn here and reminder one of the very cool things I can't emphasize this enough that we have
00:23:04
here in this case that we rarely have in other cases is that police found the vehicle so it's not altered or moved or
00:23:12
anything by someone else who we just have to take their word for it it's Westerville police 2 the investigating
00:23:19
agency that finds the vehicle and here's the information about the the vehicle so
00:23:25
the vehicle was found parked neatly in a parking spot there was no damage or concerns to the vehicle there was the
00:23:32
the battery was fine the the tires were fine the vehicle was operable right and it was not locked
00:23:41
and the keys were found in the vehicle do we have any sign of struggle though no no signs of struggle at the vehicle
00:23:50
and no signs of struggle at Rob's home either and the thing that that makes this even
00:23:57
more interesting to me Captain is that you know these Parks typically close at at dusk
00:24:06
you know the the they may have a time but most of them close at dusk and it's it's actually illegal to be there and
00:24:13
you can be arrested for that and I don't have an exact time but I think later we'll be able to narrow it down even
00:24:20
more we cannot all of these years later say what time that vehicle arrived to that parking lot what we can say is
00:24:30
when the park ranger first noted it in their log which would be sometime after midnight on Wednesday so Tuesday he's
00:24:39
last seen Wednesday Park Rangers note that his vehicle is found sitting parked in there in their parking
00:24:48
lot Thursday he's reported missing and around that same time in a very short period of time police find his vehicle
00:24:57
now is it happenstance that they find his vehicle very quickly it could be but the
00:25:04
other thing we need to point out is we talked about this in the trailer a little bit this is a cherry red 1995
00:25:11
Pontiac Firebird yeah it'll stick out like a sore thumb yeah in in Rob goes missing in 1996 this is a new car yeah
00:25:20
this is a of a very new car this is a a head turner and the parking lot for if anybody's ever been to Hoover Reservoir
00:25:30
there's multiple parking lots because there are several boat launches there's also the dam there there's Trails there
00:25:38
it's five square miles of water there's multiple parking lots most of them off of Sunbury Road which is the
00:25:49
road that anyone would take west of Rob's house to get to his house that's the only road that leads to the
00:25:58
road that he lives on if you are west of his home now I'm a pretty good athlete I'm not a
00:26:06
super athlete Captain as you know but I could stand on Sunbury Road and punt a football and it land on the property
00:26:14
where Rob's house once stood two out of three times or one out of ten nine out of ten baby nine out of ten so
00:26:22
his home was not terribly far from Sunbury and Central College Road now this parking lot where his car was found
00:26:36
is ex like I say extremely visible from Sunbury Road it's you can't miss it you I mean you
00:26:44
turn off of Sunbury Road and within eight yards you are in the parking lot and it's not a huge parking lot
00:26:52
so what I'm getting at Captain is it could be happenstance that they found his car that same day in a relatively
00:26:57
short period of time it could also be they were either traveling to or from Rob's house after the missing persons
00:27:04
report was placed and because that parking lot is so close to his house on the way there from Westerville Police
00:27:14
Department they likely spotted his car just because they know to be looking for his car and
00:27:20
it's right there I mean it's the reports will say the newspaper reports will say
00:27:24
that the vehicle was less than a mile from his home I drove from his lot to where the car
00:27:30
was found it's at most point three miles from his home probably under 0.3 miles I mean so many things that are strange
00:27:41
again this is a couple minute walk from his house this park is but you leave your new car there no
00:27:49
damage no sign of a struggle and the keys are in the car just doesn't make a lot of sense
00:27:57
[Music] [Music] hey Parks and Rec fans Rob Lowe here did you know that parks and recollection is
00:28:17
back and that's not all we wanted to shake things up a little bit sort of give us some new life so my buddies Jim
00:28:24
O'Hara and Greg Levine are going to be hosting the podcast that's right rob it is me Jim O'Hare and I played Larry
00:28:31
Terry Gary Jerry Berry I'm Parks and Rec and I am so excited to go on this adventure with Greg oh and you know me
00:28:37
Greg Levine Parks and Rec writer Jim and I are continuing in the Parks recap tradition going through every episode
00:28:44
starting with season four yes we are so make sure to subscribe to parks and recollection wherever you get your
00:28:51
podcasts I am literally so excited if you're looking for an easy way to ensure your children reach their full
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percent off IXL membership visit ixl.com garage today [Music] thank you [Music] all right we are back
00:30:51
cheers Captain cheers here's the next article that we have this one's titled year later family lives for missing
00:30:59
man's return this is by Adrian McGee dispatch reporter from July 16 1997. this article reads although it's
00:31:08
been a year since her son disappeared Jackie zepper of Westerville hasn't given up hope that he'll someday walk
00:31:17
through her door quote it's a terrible thing to not even know if somebody is dead or alive she said Westerville
00:31:25
police have investigated every possible lead into The Disappearance of Rob money
00:31:30
and have nothing new to go on said Detective Mike Shaheen Mony of 1279 Central College Road was in the process
00:31:38
of divorcing his wife Angie when he disappeared that's what the article said again everybody I spoke to is yes they
00:31:46
were in the process of this but nobody was really submitting paperwork or really doing
00:31:53
anything it was something that they were all going to get to eventually right this article reminds us that his car was
00:32:00
found at Hoover Dam well and also that there could have been some money involved because if I don't know if they
00:32:05
own this house together but a lot of times the judges they were renting okay so maybe they didn't have a lot to split
00:32:13
up but if they were going to get lawyers or if there's paperwork there still might have been some fees and they might
00:32:19
have just been like hey we don't hate each other no rush neither one of us are in a rush to get remarried so we'll take
00:32:27
our time on this yeah and I can't emphasize enough that everybody I spoke to basically had the same suspicions as
00:32:34
to why they split up that Rob again he he partied pretty hard on the weekends and that maybe he wasn't maturing or
00:32:42
growing up at the same Pace that Angela was and at some point where you're approaching 30. both of them are 29
00:32:49
years old at some point if somebody wants to have a family you got to start doing that
00:32:54
and it sounds like Rob was happy to be married happy to be in a relationship but he he wanted to be
00:33:02
not tied down or held down on the weekends and that she was moving on and he was
00:33:08
moving on and and nobody neither of them had any problem with that and in fact this is a weird situation
00:33:15
too Captain because these aren't two people that fell in love in their 20s and got married they knew each other
00:33:20
since they were kids so there there is a strong friendship there as well yeah and
00:33:25
I won't go through the rest of this article because it does not add a whole lot of evidence or or even
00:33:31
anything that we can chew on as far as speculation goes as to what happened to Rob but the rest of this article is
00:33:39
rather sad because what it's talking about is that they are still optimistic Rob's family that he's that maybe he's
00:33:47
suffering from Amnesia or something weird happened and that he's just gonna walk through the door again one day uh
00:33:55
and that's what they're all hoping and praying for so just kind of a an article that that really
00:34:01
circles around the family's heartbreak and sadness the following article is from the year
00:34:09
the next year 1998. so now we got two years he's missing and one thing we learn in this article
00:34:17
which is extremely tragic you know we always talk about this Captain how there's these
00:34:23
tiny little bits and Nuggets of information in these cases that make them all the more sad and
00:34:31
so Rob's mother's birthday is approximately the same date that he went missing so either the date that he
00:34:40
was last seen or the date that he was officially reported as missing right and so she's saying in this article two
00:34:48
years later we we do not celebrate my birthday anymore there's nothing to be happy about this time of year or on this
00:34:55
day my my birthday get together birthday dinner with my family forever canceled because it's it's just nothing but
00:35:05
heartache for them well that's a good question though because again the day he goes missing Rob goes to work he comes
00:35:12
home the neighbors see him leave where is he heading to is he going to a family dinner for his mom's birthday
00:35:20
that that's interesting interesting so I can fill in in the blanks a little bit as to what his day was as you said
00:35:26
Captain he went to work on that Tuesday it's a normal Tuesday right he is spotted after work so he's on his
00:35:35
way home and he stopped off at a Kroger store which is for those that don't live
00:35:40
in the area Kroger is a long-standing franchise grocery store usually they're bigger stores
00:35:48
he's seen by a friend that he went to high school with she sees him actually sees him in line
00:35:55
and we've all kind of experienced this right she sees him and goes hey Rob how you doing I haven't seen you in a while
00:36:01
and it's the old chit chatty stuff he goes I'm just trying to stay out of trouble how you doing
00:36:06
and she's good to go mind your own business I don't know you lady um but she says that he he seemed typical
00:36:16
Rob very normal looked like he had just had a a long day at work right he's standing
00:36:23
in line and he's got just a small amount of groceries with him she actually notices that he has some Stakes
00:36:32
well this this was one of the things of the story that I found to be rather strange
00:36:37
the reports with Rob the police have kept a lot of stuff close to the vest now the thing here is some of this
00:36:47
information will trickle out over the years and some of it is being chosen by police to be released to the public
00:36:54
as the years go on and one of the things that we learn after he's been missing for a couple years is
00:37:01
Not only was he seen leaving his home but we get a little more information about that so he's seen leaving his home
00:37:09
by his next door neighbors and they tell police like Rob would come and go there we didn't think anything
00:37:18
was out of the ordinary he didn't leave in a hurry he we didn't see anybody with him there
00:37:24
was nothing strange about him walking out hopping in his car and backing out of the driveway and and driving off
00:37:32
now what is strange to police and later to Rob's roommate so Rob's roommate Ron was at work
00:37:41
that night old Ron and Rob Ron and Rob again it's difficult to tell the story those are the people that that that
00:37:48
happens to me like you know if if I have a boss it's it's a Dawn and Rod but because they're
00:37:56
so close we're like is it Ron or rod and so for years you work with these people
00:38:01
and go is it Ron or Rod which one is it so Ron is at work that night and this is
00:38:08
confirmed by his employer by time cards and confirmed to me by the current detective on the case
00:38:17
his roommate Ron is not somebody that the detectives are concerned with now what is curious here though Captain is
00:38:28
we would later learn that not only did Rob our missing person leave his home that night
00:38:35
he left a half eaten steak dinner on the kitchen table that night and we I thought the steak dinner thing was
00:38:47
a little strange because I cannot for the life of me think of one time that I and I look
00:38:56
everybody's different not everything has to be relative to my world but I cannot
00:39:01
think of one time that I ever cooked a steak by myself and so when I first heard that oh
00:39:07
there's a half eaten steak dinner on the table I kept thinking there had to have
00:39:11
been somebody else at that house with him that night but well no because I've cooked steak by
00:39:18
myself a lot exactly not everything has to be relative to my world I did ask a few people the same thing and they
00:39:25
agreed with me they couldn't think of a time that they ate a steak dinner by themselves well that's because they're
00:39:29
not living life right but a couple questions here though one is the is the new car that the car the
00:39:37
car that found is that the only car that he has no so he also has a like a small
00:39:43
older work truck right and I can't say what he was driving that day all I can say is that the neighbors
00:39:52
saw him getting it the way that it's described to me is the two neighbor ladies who
00:39:58
live on the same side of the street as Rob saw him get into his vehicle his his Pontiac Firebird
00:40:04
back out of the driveway and he heads East on Central College Road and I think this is of significant
00:40:14
importance because to get to the parking lot we said how close it was to his home
00:40:19
0.3 miles or less from Rob's home to the parking lot where his car was found you would go West on Central College to
00:40:30
get to that parking lot so he appears to be heading not appears to be he is heading in the opposite direction of
00:40:38
where his vehicle would later be found another very tricky thing here Captain is
00:40:47
the steak dinner business half eaten steak dinner so that like would suggest to me that he left abruptly
00:40:56
he left unexpectedly right and so what would cause him to leave unexpectedly well
00:41:05
you could think maybe he maybe somebody had it out for him and showed up to the house and forced him to leave but again
00:41:10
we have the neighbors saying they see him by himself so we know the roommate is at work
00:41:19
this is either old time got away from me and I had somewhere that I had a a prior
00:41:24
engagement or meeting that I arranged and oh I gotta leave all of a sudden or he got a phone call
00:41:32
a phone call that inspired him to get up and leave his meal and leave the house now let's take this a few steps further
00:41:42
let's do that what we would later learn and this is something that that I don't believe has been publicly stated but
00:41:53
I've had many people tell me this is that they found a glass of Kool-Aid in the freezer
00:42:02
so picture this it's a hot July day he's sitting at the kitchen table he's got his drink
00:42:11
he's got his meal he's having dinner after working all day something causes him to get up mid-meal
00:42:20
and leave but before leaving he gets up and he puts the Kool-Aid in the freezer to me that tells me
00:42:33
that he thought that wherever he was going he would not be there very long that he would be returning to finish his
00:42:41
meal get his drink out of the freezer and go about his night and I know we can speculate on every little tiny thing but
00:42:50
you could also go with the idea that obviously we both agree that this unfinished stake
00:42:57
is more of a sign of some kind of interruption into the dinner and is it possible that somebody calls him he
00:43:05
answers the phone and then as he's putting stuff away he's putting it back away in the wrong spot because he's just
00:43:12
trying to get out of there no I I think that he he is setting things up so he can return to
00:43:19
his meal minutes later right right it's a hot summer day I don't know if they got air conditioning I don't know if the
00:43:27
windows are open or what's going on at the house right hot summer day you leave the hot meal on the table you put your
00:43:33
cold drink in the freezer so it's cold when you get back and he leaves the house takes obviously
00:43:40
takes his car keys because we know he drove the car his wallet is found at the home
00:43:45
another thing that would suggest that he he does not intend to be gone long does
00:43:51
not need his wallet wherever he's going and believes that he would be returning soon enough to sit back down and relax
00:43:58
and finish his dinner and go about his night and we're assuming that law enforcement
00:44:04
has his call log to his house that night yes 100 I would I would make that assumption
00:44:13
um I don't know the details of that call log I don't know if if a call was received that night that
00:44:20
caused him to leave I don't know that they know the number I mean we've talked about this in in the
00:44:26
past that many times calls were not being logged or information being kept unless there was
00:44:34
reason to bill for that call um that they just simply did not keep that information
00:44:42
and so what we have here Captain is trying to zero in on why this 29 year old man left his home
00:44:54
that evening and the thing here that we need to point out is that police would later say it's on
00:45:04
the two-year anniversary of when Rob goes missing that we learn some more information so police Westerville police
00:45:12
are basically saying in a news article that they've dismissed suicide and running away
00:45:20
and that they have a large number of leads that simply came to a dead end they police are saying in this article
00:45:30
we have reason to believe Foul Play is why this man is missing and in fact in this article they go on
00:45:41
to say that nobody just drops off the face of the Earth Westerville police say they have a
00:45:48
suspect but quote we have absolutely zero evidence of any criminal acts at this point
00:45:58
they go on to reiterate some of the things we've already covered in this article here Captain money had worked
00:46:03
for nine years operating heavy equipment at Smith and Associates Excavating he he
00:46:09
had a five-year marriage to his childhood friend from Nelsonville Ohio which led to a separation several months
00:46:17
before his disappearance his 1995 Pontiac Firebird was last seen by a neighbor leaving
00:46:25
Moni's home in Westerville at 9 30 PM July 16 1996. two days later the vehicles found
00:46:33
unoccupied in the lot near Hoover Dam and he's reported missing they also State here Hoover Reservoir
00:46:42
was dragged and searched by Columbus Police divers and nothing was found his mother in this article says there is
00:46:51
only one person that I know of that would have any animosity toward Rob but without any proof I can't actually
00:47:00
point a finger police agree with Rob's mom saying quote I think very likely he knows that he's
00:47:10
the suspect detective Richardson said what police need he added is someone to come forward
00:47:17
with more information read the listeners that quote you're showing me from Rob's
00:47:22
mother yeah this one is a is a a heartbreaker here quote the thing that's so hard is not to know what's happened
00:47:30
to our son this is my son and I love him and I want him back end quote and the detective in the article goes on
00:47:40
to say that had police learned sooner of the victim's disappearance the outcome might be different in this case quote we
00:47:48
immediately started out in a hole Okay so some good stuff to explore here in this
00:47:55
article right police say quote I think very likely he knows that he's the suspect well this is very telling not
00:48:01
only do we have a suspect but two key words used in the statement he and the so we know that there the police is
00:48:12
suspect is a male and the word the implies that he is the only suspect that he is the Prime
00:48:22
Suspect and why would they have a suspect when you also have police at this juncture
00:48:29
and again they're they're keeping a lot of stuff close to the vest the the steak dinner doesn't come out
00:48:36
for a couple years the Kool-Aid in the freezer placed there by Rob before he leaves the house
00:48:41
doesn't ever come out as far as I've been told that's all information that that was gathered from people that were
00:48:48
looking for Rob that were close to Rob stuff that was discussed by police with them
00:48:56
and so we know that when people go missing or let's say somebody's murder you have that question that's everybody
00:49:06
goes huh such a Cheesy question they but they have to ask it it's the the age-old question of police
00:49:13
and detectives asking everybody in Rob's Social Circle and his family and friends
00:49:18
and people that he works with do you know anyone who would want to hurt Rob course they asked that question they
00:49:26
have to and guess what in this situation the same name kept coming up over and over again again and again the same name
00:49:36
do you know anybody that want to hurt Rob and police are constantly told by many people the same name again and
00:49:46
again and again we've been looking into cases for a long time now and there's normally some similarities but
00:49:54
there's some different stuff here that that's what makes this one so fascinating one
00:50:00
cars found relatively close to his house keys are in the car very strange but normally when you have a missing
00:50:09
person you get you get a lot of is there anybody that would want to hurt this guy
00:50:14
and you get a lot of no's this one opposite uh but then police have a pretty interesting statement in this where they
00:50:22
say they're starting the investigation in a hole Yeah I think that too is a very telling statement by police right
00:50:31
detective Richardson said had police learned sooner of the victim's disappearance the outcome could have
00:50:37
been different we immediately started out in a hole this has to mean a couple of things
00:50:45
most people don't go around killing people and I have had several detectives and
00:50:52
you have two Captain over the years have told us in several cases that that end up going cold you know what we ended up
00:50:59
with a really good suspect however we didn't know that the person had been killed for a month or so after the
00:51:07
murder because the body was concealed or we didn't know that the person went missing because they weren't reported
00:51:13
for a couple of days those detectives have constantly told us the same things over the years
00:51:20
had we known right away that we had a suspect if we could have talked to our suspect that night or the next morning
00:51:28
we probably would have got a confession or at least got them to fumble and deliver some statements that could
00:51:38
have leads or information or evidence in those statements to us however the suspect in those cases was able to
00:51:49
collect themselves was able to put together a story more importantly was able to hide evidence and in this case
00:51:59
the biggest piece of evidence is Rob money's body whoever is responsible for Rob
00:52:06
disappearing had an opportunity to get rid of Rob's body [Music] join us back here in the garage same bat
00:52:25
time Sinbad Channel and until then be good be kind and don't litter foreign [Music]