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welcome to True Crime garage wherever you are whatever you are doing thanks for listening I'm your host Nick and
00:01:47
with me as always is a man that knows that four out of five doctors recommend True Crime garage here is the captain
00:01:55
and the fifth doctor is locked in our basement it's good to be seen and good to see you thanks for listening thanks
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for telling a [Music] friend this week we are very excited to be featuring Eternal Autumn brewed by
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conversations make sure you follow us there at True Crime garage Colonel that's enough of the business all right
00:03:37
everybody gather around grab a chair grab a beer let's talk some true [Music] [Music]
00:03:58
crime [Music] I 30 years have passed since the murder of 24-year-old Tracy Renee Harkness
00:04:23
Tracy was found having been attacked and beaten to death inside her apartment that she shared with her 18 month old
00:04:30
daughter Tracy and her ex-husband shared custody of the little girl the apartment
00:04:36
was located in an otherwise safe neighborhood in one of Columbus Ohio's many suburbs Friday November 6th
00:04:45
1992 was a horrifying day that forever changed the lives of everyone who knew and loved
00:04:54
Tracy there were no signs of forced entry into the apartment and police ruled out burglary as a motive
00:05:02
investigators said the attack on Tracy was a crime of passion detective Cindy aason with Grove City police is quoted
00:05:10
as saying it was a very brutal crime a very personal crime she had over 36 wounds over half of those were fatal
00:05:21
wounds Tammy bowling Tracy's mother said I remember just lying on the couch and saying to God
00:05:30
I have no reason to live anymore the bowling family wants the killer to be caught for the sake of
00:05:39
Tracy's now grown daughter Tracy's family and the Grove City Police Department are hoping that new
00:05:46
technology and DNA testing will lead to an arrest in the meantime Tracy's family
00:05:54
has something to say to the killer if you did this get it off your conscience and go tell Tracy's family wants this
00:06:04
killer brought to Justice if you know who killed Tracy Renee Harkness call The Grove City police department at 614
00:06:15
277 1710 or to submit a tip and remain anonymous you can call it in at 614 645 tips that's 614 645
00:06:31
8477 or you can email our show by going to our website True Crime garage.com this is the still unsolved
00:06:42
homicide case of Tracy Harkness 30 years later and this is true crime [Music] garage I
00:06:58
prise Grove City Ohio today the population is about 42,000 people 30 years ago when this
00:07:11
case took place it was about half of that 20,000 people Grove City is a suburb of Columbus Ohio and back then it
00:07:20
was very much your standard blue and white collar area a lot of hardworking folks many who worked in the Greater
00:07:27
Columbus area and after after work they would retire to their three and four bedroom homes in the not quite what you
00:07:34
would call a sleepy town as Grove City was kind of hustle and bustle especially during the daylight hours but after the
00:07:41
sun goes down if we are talking about 9 or 10:00 at night it turns to a ghost town rather quickly pretty standard
00:07:49
Midwestern Town late at night you're going to get a few people out really hardly any cars out on the street and as
00:07:57
you said Captain Grove City was very much your typical middle class suburb with some of its citizens living on the
00:08:04
fringes of both ends of that middle class Spectrum now as we said in the trailer our victim Tracy Harkness was
00:08:12
found deceased in her apartment she lived in the Regency Arms apartment complex Tracy had only lived in the
00:08:19
apartment that she was killed in for about 2 and a half months before the attack the apartment complex occupied
00:08:26
Three Square city blocks and was made up of several buildings most of them like Tracy's building which was a four family
00:08:35
brick unit Tracy's unit was a twostory unit the apartments were moderately priced and occupied by a wide range of
00:08:43
tenants her two-bedroom place had a front door and a back door with parking for her vehicle by the rear entrance to
00:08:53
the apartment Tracy still had unpacked boxes of various personal items around the place when she was killed one of the
00:09:01
things that made these apartments unique was they had a main floor you had your bedrooms on the second floor and you
00:09:09
also had a basement neighbors told the media that Tracy was quiet friendly and respectable she kept to herself and
00:09:16
didn't make any waves on November 6th 1992 at 237 p.m. police officers were dispatched to the Regency Arms apartment
00:09:27
complex at 30 474 Richard Avenue in Grove City on an unknown emergency call some people called 911 and reported that
00:09:37
a woman was badly injured we have Steve hutter and Lori short they were the ones
00:09:44
to sound the alarm Lori was Tracy's cousin she and Steve stayed with Tracy a few weeks earlier but they had left
00:09:54
behind some keys on Friday November 6th they stopped by Tracy's to pick them up Steve told investigators that Lori
00:10:03
knocked on the back door of the apartment but got no answer they went to the back door because that was the door
00:10:09
Tracy and pretty much everyone else used this portion of the apartment complex was built in a u shape around a rear
00:10:17
parking lot where the residents had spaces to park their cars as a result most residents didn't use their front
00:10:25
doors other than to get their mail or the newsp paper Tracy was no exception and Lori and Steve noted that her car
00:10:35
was indeed in the parking lot right behind her unit when they pulled up Tracy was known to keep the back door
00:10:43
unlocked when she was at home when they got no answer at the rear door Steve walked around to the front door and
00:10:50
noted with surprise that the door was open about 6 to 8 in so he went inside and yelled for Tracy when he got got no
00:10:59
response he looked in the dining area and he saw some socked feet there he found Tracy harness lying on the
00:11:08
floor he hastily went outside and knocked on doors to get help he yelled to Lori telling her to get back in the
00:11:17
car and stay there no one answered his knocks so when he saw a pickup truck pulling up across the street he ran
00:11:26
across the street and told the occupants to call 9 11 the driver called police and the other guy went with Steve back
00:11:35
into the residence to check the victim Unfortunately they were unable to find any vital signs the Regency Arms
00:11:43
Apartments located in Grove City are probably less than five miles from the police department Grove City police
00:11:50
detective Steven robinet was in the area and responded to the scene when he arrived the detective found the
00:11:57
apartment resident identified as Tracy Harkness lying face up in the dining area of the apartment
00:12:05
she was pronounced dead by Medics at 2:44 p.m. detective Robinette secured the scene and commenced what would then
00:12:14
become a three decades long investigation neighbors started to gather outside the Regency Arms
00:12:22
apartment additional detectives arrived on scene and started interviewing some of the
00:12:27
witnesses detectives quickly noted the following Tracy's car was found parked in her usual spot located near the rear
00:12:36
entrance to the apartment the rear door deadbolt was locked but the front door deadbolt was unlocked and remember when
00:12:44
Steve Tracy's friend saw the front door it was already open about 6 to 8 Ines so
00:12:51
according to detectives notes there was no sign of force entry and quickly it was learned that there was a duplic at
00:12:59
key to the apartment but that key was missing Steve and the man who assisted Steve relay to detectives that he
00:13:09
noticed that Tracy suffered severe head wounds and cuts to her forehead and cheeks Steve said she was hard to the
00:13:16
touch they both said she was blue detectives already knew this The woman Inside the apartment was quickly
00:13:23
identified as Tracy Harkness and had clearly been dead for quite some time there was no emergency as far as the
00:13:31
victim was concerned she was beyond help unfortunately at this point but there was an emergency when detectives learned
00:13:39
that the victim had an almost 2-year-old daughter Megan who lived with her in the
00:13:43
apartment other than clothing and some kid related toys and items in the residence there was no sign of little
00:13:52
Megan so detectives fanned out through the neighborhood and scoured it for Megan meanwhile Tracy's mother mother
00:13:59
Tammy bowling arrived on the scene and was quickly taken to Police Headquarters to be interviewed she was able to tell
00:14:07
detectives that Megan was likely with her father Mike harkes Tracy's ex a visit to Mike's home address located his
00:14:16
fiance Sherry who related that Megan was with her paternal grandmother and Mike was out of town for the day on a hunting
00:14:24
trip a phone call to Megan's grandmother confirmed that the little girl was there
00:14:31
safe and sound the investigation shifted from a potential kidnapping in progress
00:14:36
to a homicide investigation but it's strange cuz we see this in so many cases where the victim's partner or ex partner
00:14:46
is out of town that day I could see how that would lead law enforcement to be suspicious of that individual let's
00:14:55
learn more about Tracy Harkness Tracy Renee Harkness was born on September 23rd 1968 her mother was Tammy bowling who
00:15:05
used to be married to Tracy's father Rick both were now remarried Tracy had two brothers she graduated from Heritage
00:15:13
Christian in Columbus in 1987 she attended the Columbus par professional Institute from 1987 to
00:15:22
1988 in November of 1992 Tracy was a 24-year-old single mother it's fair to say that Tracy's life was in flux at
00:15:32
this time she had been having a hard time holding down a job and maintaining a residence as of late her recent
00:15:39
employer said she was friendly and easy to work with but she spent a lot of time
00:15:44
on the phone on personal calls when she died she was working at a new job as a secretary she also had a part-time job a
00:15:54
few nights a week helping out at a friend's jewelry business so she definitely had the full plate Tracy was
00:16:00
a longtime member of the grace Memorial Church on Christ and Christian union she
00:16:06
attended church sporadically she tended to go to church for a while when things weren't going so well in her life or she
00:16:13
was feeling guilty but that would last short term she had been attending church at the time of her death and had
00:16:22
recently spent an hour at the altar vowing to stay out of bars spend more time with Megan and be a better mother
00:16:31
her pastor told police that he thought that Tracy seemed unhappy Tracy also attended jazzer siiz classes on Tuesdays
00:16:39
and Thursdays Tracy's friends and family said she drank socially but not to access and she wasn't known to do drugs
00:16:48
well like we said before Tracy's ex partner or ex-husband was on a hunting trip that day what's fascinating about
00:16:56
their relationship was there were actually married to each other twice his name as we said earlier Captain is
00:17:03
Michael harkes the first time around the marriage was dissolved in April of 1990 but shortly after the breakup Tracy
00:17:12
discovered that she was pregnant and she and Mike remarried for the sake of the child Megan was born in January of
00:17:19
1991 and Mike and Tracy divorc again in April of 1992 Mike would later say that they were
00:17:27
really only married for one month the second time around from August to September in
00:17:33
1991 so the divorce the second time around ended in April of 1992 but we all know that paperwork and things like that
00:17:43
take place so it can take some time he's just stating look we were really only together and trying to be together for a
00:17:53
much shorter period of time than what it looks like on paper according to Tracy's
00:17:58
friend she and her ex-husband got along very well and spoke almost daily this because they shared custody of little
00:18:06
Megan well in a perfect world all people that shared kids together would have a healthy relationship for their kids
00:18:14
detective Robinette who would be the lead on this case noted that many people describe Tracy as a very outgoing yet
00:18:21
lonely person who always seem to be searching for happiness well there's probably many of us out there that can
00:18:28
relate to Tracy detectives noted that Tracy went to local bars in the evening when she was not at home with her child
00:18:36
when she didn't have to watch her care for Megan a few people said that she would sometimes pick up men and she
00:18:43
tended to fall for men much faster than they were comfortable with and sometimes
00:18:48
she had become confrontational there was at least one report that she would show up at the
00:18:55
place of these guys employment or were at their home unexpectedly now in more than one case a
00:19:03
man she was seeing was already in a relationship yeah that's what we Define as a stage five Clinger detectives
00:19:10
learned very quickly from talking to Tracy's friends that Tracy recently had a boyfriend and that they had broken up
00:19:17
just two weeks earlier this boyfriend per her friends was a young man named David seock seock would quickly become a
00:19:26
very interesting person to detectives when it was learned that David seock may have been in possession of the missing
00:19:34
duplicate key to Tracy's apartment remember we have no signs of forced entry into the home now that doesn't
00:19:41
mean that a key was used to gain access to the apartment we could have a situation where Tracy let her killer or
00:19:50
Killers into the apartment yeah or just didn't lock the door behind her when she
00:19:55
entered her apartment let's get into this investigation a little bit further here Captain the Franklin County
00:20:02
coroner's office sent forensic pathologist Keith Norton out to the crime scene he took note of multiple
00:20:09
lacerations of the scalp an abrasion on the left chest and a compound fracture of the left little finger on Tracy
00:20:20
Harkness Tracy when she was found she was fully clothed she was found wearing jeans a shirt and a green black and
00:20:28
white sweater an autopsy was performed the following day after she was found Tracy had defensive wounds on both hands
00:20:37
and her little finger was fractured abrasions were noted on the right side of her neck the left chest and back a
00:20:46
laceration was on her right forehead a linear cut was seen on her right cheek examination of the victim's head led to
00:20:56
the discovery of third 30 plus 30 plus injuries to the scalp and numerous skull fractures that's a vicious attack some
00:21:05
injuries were completely through the skull and into the brain on the left side and back of the
00:21:11
head the wounds tended to be long linear single wounds that were 1.1 to 1.2 cm long and half a centimeter wide this is
00:21:22
a lot of injuries this is a pretty severe attack where it looks to me Captain the the le guy here that we got
00:21:34
somebody that's probably has attacked her and then we're seeing rapid fire blows once the attack commences and
00:21:43
normally when a victim has that many wounds it's it's more likely that they knew the killer the lacerations to the
00:21:51
right side of the scalp and the top of the head tended to be two short wounds side by side that's per the
00:21:59
documentation here two short wounds side by side the distance between the twin marks in each of these wounds was 38 of
00:22:08
an inch so it's one of these situations where you look at this is and and say okay what kind of weapon would have been
00:22:18
used to leave these marks right on our victim or do we have a situation where Cy was attacked by two different people
00:22:31
on different sides of of her right that would make some sense a lot of wounds to
00:22:38
the victim is there any evidence that she put up a fight that maybe she left wounds on her attacker it's hard to say
00:22:46
if she would have left any wounds on her attacker but she definitely put up a fight there was significant defensive
00:22:54
wounds and even some other indications that she put up a fight beyond the defensive wounds that were found so the
00:23:01
autopsy concluded that the cause of death was blunt force trauma to the Head Right
00:23:07
basically she was bludgeon to death Tracy had what is recorded as 36 different wounds with the majority of
00:23:14
the trauma to the back of the head note that she had defensive wounds to both hands and people told detectives
00:23:24
look Tracy could take care of herself if if she was attacked she would have fought like a banshee and everything in
00:23:32
the autopsy indicates that that was exactly the situation I'm going to ask you a question and don't don't look at
00:23:39
me like I'm a [ __ ] so she has a bunch of defensive wounds to her hands that would make me think that the attacker
00:23:47
was in front of her but like you just stated most of her head injuries seem like it was coming from behind her
00:23:58
that's correct so my speculation would be one of two possibilities and both seem likely unfortunately so we we can't
00:24:06
really deduce much from from this speculation or from the wounds I believe because I think I I think what we're
00:24:13
seeing here based off of these wounds and the autopsy is that yes there is some argument that she could have been
00:24:21
attacked by two people one on each side of her however think about how it would play
00:24:28
out if it was just a one-on-one attack and her defensive wounds being to her hands both of her hands right if
00:24:35
somebody were to raise a weapon and come at you your natural reaction is going to
00:24:41
be to put up your hands to defend your face or your body well that's where you're wrong Colonel cuz my natural
00:24:48
reaction would be to kick him in the nards and she Pro she likely did this and at some point started to lose the
00:24:56
fight and if she Struck from the front and Falls forward now we could have a situation
00:25:04
where she is on all fours or she's on the floor attempting to get up to continue to defend herself and now the
00:25:13
attacker is striking what is right in front of him or her which would be the back of her head what's difficult for us
00:25:20
to sit here and try to decipher is without being able to see the wounds or or a diagram of the wounds
00:25:33
themselves just reading the report as it is on paper does not give us any indication of what direction this weapon
00:25:42
would have been coming from now we have to compound that problem with we don't know 100% what weapon was used to attack
00:25:51
Tracy Harkness right and also just to be clear she was found face up which could
00:25:57
mean that after the attack that she actually moved herself into that position to possibly
00:26:04
get help correct she could have been moved by the attacker she could have moved herself she could have actually
00:26:10
successfully got up at some point during this attack it's we're not saying this is how it went down exactly we're just
00:26:18
saying when you try to play this thing out the scenario out based off of the information that is available you could
00:26:25
see it kind of working out that way if it was in fact a one-on-one attack I wouldn't be so quick to lock myself into
00:26:33
it being a one-on-one attack or a two onone or three-on-one attack yeah it's just we live in a sad cold world
00:26:41
evidence collected at the autopsy included but was not limited to the following fingernail clippings and
00:26:48
scrapings finger and palm prints blood samples Tracy's clothing was collected and examined for trace evidence no
00:26:56
sexual assault occurred during the attack a ring missing a stone was removed from her left finger a mark on
00:27:05
her right finger indicated that a ring was typically worn there and it was the approximate size of a ring found on the
00:27:12
floor near her foot so what I had talked about earlier there Captain goes along with this portion of the autopsy report
00:27:22
right not only do we have the wounds to her hands the defensive wounds to her hands but what you're is the items that
00:27:28
she was wearing these Rings right suffered damage as well because they were probably blocking some of the
00:27:38
attack detective robinet wrote in his report that the weapon used to commit the murder had not been recovered but it
00:27:45
was believed to be some type of clawed instrument as most of the wounds were in pairs and spaced the same distance apart
00:27:54
the weapon is believed to be some type of small possible flat pry tool blunt instrument marks were found on the
00:28:01
surface of the north wall in the dining area and then rumors flew around town the Tracy had been attacked with a
00:28:12
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[Music] garage all right we are back and we like your jib cheers cheers to you Captain tall
00:31:54
cans in the air now before we get too far into the weeds of this investigation I want to point out something that I
00:32:02
noticed time and time again in this investigation and you The Listener will notice this throughout as well this
00:32:11
whole investigation was incredibly Complicated by the fact that most of the people in Tracy's Social Circles they
00:32:18
all seem to know each other and a lot of them seem to have been in some type of relationship with each other at one time
00:32:27
or to be related to each other this can help an investigation this also can hinder an investigation and the
00:32:35
interview process for detectives must have been a major headache because on one hand some of these people that we
00:32:43
are going to discuss did not tell the whole truth to police some of them were covering for each other then on the
00:32:52
other hand rumors and speculation were rampant at the time everyone knew everyone else's business in this case or
00:32:59
at least they thought they did this is because a lot of the people that we will discuss were in their early to mid 20s
00:33:07
and they were in bars a lot together and there was a lot of gum flapping and chewing the fat going on at these bars
00:33:14
in these Social Circles well it also makes it difficult for law enforcement you have we've seen over and over with
00:33:22
cases the husband did it or the ex-husband so if I'm law enforc the first thing I'm doing is you get this
00:33:29
vicious scene this vicious murder scene I'm looking at the ex to see if he has any wounds on him I'm looking at the
00:33:38
current boyfriend another thing that makes it difficult for law enforcement is when her friends say look she's she
00:33:45
was quick to fall in love with people showing up at their work now the amount of people of Interest it gets multiplied
00:33:54
that's exactly right there Captain oh Ohio BCI along with Grove City police were assigned to the crime scene the
00:34:02
scene was photographed and videotaped now here are a few things of note as the captain pointed out Tracy
00:34:10
was found lying on her back on the carpet with a pool of blood under her head her legs were straight her left arm
00:34:17
bent and her hand on her chest her right arm was extended out Tracy was fully clothed with the exception of shoes
00:34:26
there was a lot of dried blood stains near the body location there was dried blood found on a rug the plastic baby
00:34:36
gate leaning on the wall the kitchen floor various items like stuffed animals and shoes lying near the body and on the
00:34:45
countertop south of the body so a lot of blood in this dining room area is found
00:34:52
near our body but when you have these pools of blood were there any foot prints left behind there was one partial
00:35:01
footprint found at the scene that was determined not to belong to Tracy I believe it was determined not to belong
00:35:09
to Tracy because it it's not stated as fact in the reports that it was not Tracy's footprint but keep in
00:35:19
mind this was a shoe print a partial Sho print that was found every indication that we have is that once the attack
00:35:26
took place our victims not wearing any shoes at that time well then on top of that
00:35:32
you have to rule out her friends that found her or anybody else that was at that scene yeah by the time that she was
00:35:39
found by these you know these friends and then the random person that the friend pulled in with him to to go into
00:35:48
the apartment the second time the blood had already dried at the scene so we we'll get into her timeline and and I
00:35:57
think without 100% certainty we're not going to be able to narrow down the time of death to 1 hour but it looks like
00:36:06
investigators strongly believe that they know about what time she was killed and
00:36:12
we can base that off of a lot of other evidence that we will get into also found at the scene Captain we and near
00:36:20
the body we had a dish towel and pieces of paper towel that were left near her feet type notes say that a 3 in and 1/2
00:36:30
in patch of blood was smeared on the Walls by the towels a kitchen chair was on its side and blood spatter was nearby
00:36:39
indicating perhaps that Tracy was initially struck closer to the table the remaining three chairs and dining table
00:36:47
were not Disturbed clumps and cut sections of hair were noted in various places on the dining room floor what you
00:36:55
can gather very quick is that this is a was a vicious attack and there's obvious signs of a struggle here
00:37:08
especially near the the body location what's interesting to me though and and I think the listeners will note this as
00:37:15
well when we go through our our brief description of what else is found in the apartment or the state of the apartment
00:37:23
it looks to me like this attack started and ended in this dining room area it also makes sense too because let's say
00:37:30
the attacker attacks her from behind so then you'd have these wounds on the back
00:37:36
of her head she turns around to defend herself and then that's how she gets the other defensive wounds detective Robin
00:37:44
net said that nothing obvious was missing from the apartment and Tracy's purse and jewelry were in plain sight so
00:37:54
a robbery seemed unlikely here here Tracy's purse and car keys were on a large foot stol in the living room area
00:38:03
a pair of women's black shoes were on the floor next to the stool the TV in the apartment in the living room area
00:38:11
was on flowers on the TV stand appeared to be a few days old a toilet seat was up and urine samples were taken from the
00:38:21
bowl some moving boxes as we said were still packed up and still found by detectives in the apartment detectives
00:38:29
notes indicate that the attack was believed to have solely gone down in that dining area could you imagine
00:38:36
though if it was that simple that Tracy was attacked the person used the bathroom beforehand or they use the
00:38:44
bathroom afterwards and just didn't flush and that's how we end up catching this person and to rewind back to what
00:38:51
the friends were saying about how easily she was to fall in love with somebody this opens up so many more possibilities
00:38:58
cuz like you said one of the the guys that she was seeing for a time period was married so now you got this larger
00:39:05
pole of people that you have to pull from not just a partner or ex partner but possibly a partner of a partner
00:39:13
right and what we will see once we get into these Persons of Interest is that unfortunately you could easily see a
00:39:23
motive for a handful of people here in this case and as we pointed out earlier some of these Persons of
00:39:32
Interest are in a relationship with another person of interest well on top of that there was no sexual assault so
00:39:39
if there was sexual assault at least we would know if there was Seaman then at least one of the
00:39:46
attackers would have been male the toilet seat being up we've seen this in multiple cases and the first suspicion
00:39:54
then goes to Well there must have been a man in that apartment or in that home shortly before the attack or or maybe
00:40:01
even after the attack right look I I don't I'm not going to sit here and pretend to know everybody's bathroom
00:40:07
habits and don't really want to know them either but well if you did I'd have to quit the show I will say this like I
00:40:14
don't my mind does not jump to a male perpetrator immediately because a toilet seat was left up it's I've I in my
00:40:24
lifetime I believe that for every one woman that insisted that the toilet seat be down or the the lid be down
00:40:31
constantly there's been another woman that insist that it be up all the time so I've never really looked at that and
00:40:37
said oh that 100% locks me in on a male perpetrator very fascinating set of circumstances so far in this case CSI
00:40:46
Tex collected some items that appeared to be of evidentiary value we had latent prints blood samples from the spray and
00:40:56
SM and unspecified trace evidence a bed spread from Tracy's bed with Muddy shoe prints on it was collected as well as an
00:41:05
empty Marboro cigarette pack yeah it seems like somebody pulled a f your couch Rick James move on her bed the
00:41:12
thing that's interesting about the cigarette pack is note that we had said earlier that Tracy was known to drink
00:41:20
socially I've seen it reported that she would she may smoke on occasion when drinking but it seems like most people
00:41:28
are in agreeance that Tracy was not a smoker she was not a regular smoker and then we have this maror cigarette pack
00:41:36
that is found in the apartment but there's no other smoking materials found in the home there's no ashtrays or a
00:41:46
lighter that is noted as well so could this have been left by the killer or is this a situation that it was left by
00:41:54
somebody else prior to the the attack and for whatever reason had just not been discarded of yet law enforcement is
00:42:00
going to do a neighborhood canvas of the area went till November 8th that would have been that Sunday and no eyewitness
00:42:10
claims to have seen anything yeah no one seemed to see anything unusual or hear anything of Interest or of added value
00:42:19
to our investigation here this is really interesting to me based off of how violent the attack appears to have been
00:42:27
and you and I know that area fairly well even right 30 years ago we knew it fairly well and I would think that the
00:42:36
belief is that that the attack went down late at night probably on November 5th sometime nearing the 11:00 hour on a
00:42:46
Thursday late at night in that area 30 years ago for an attack to be this violent it would be
00:42:56
I think it's strange that nobody heard anything now it's not impossible but I find that it that it to be strange and
00:43:03
backing up that idea is detective deskins who went on record and said based on the overturned furniture and
00:43:12
the scattered items near the body it appeared there was a struggle adding quote it's difficult to believe based on
00:43:20
the struggle that no one heard anything end quote well like you said this is a a
00:43:25
part complex these are apartments that share walls so you would think in some of the cases we've covered when somebody
00:43:35
is attacked in a single family home we have maybe not eyewitnesses but ear Witnesses so it's very very strange to
00:43:43
me that we have nobody that thinks they heard anything but also I wonder because
00:43:50
they didn't initially have a great idea of when the attack happened that maybe when they were questioning these people
00:43:59
if you're questioning somebody on Sunday about something that happened Thursday they might just not remember a
00:44:08
little bang against the wall or oh maybe I did hear a somebody's scream or a muffled scream right and there's plenty
00:44:16
of evidence to suggest that Tracy was killed late on Thursday evening and now we know that the body's not found until
00:44:28
Friday afternoon so you already have some delay there I want to paint a little bit of a better picture though
00:44:35
because one thing that I think is interesting in this case first let me address one thing that you you just
00:44:40
brought up sharing walls exactly right in these apartments I'm always fascinated when we have these types of
00:44:49
attacks and struggles when somebody hears something or didn't hear anything because you are sharing walls with your
00:44:55
your neighbors now in Tracy's case that four family unit building that she lived
00:45:02
in I mapped it out it looks to me like she was on the end so she would have only shared a wall with one
00:45:11
neighbor again we're we're I'm basing that off of the idea that the apartment next to her was occupied uh it may not
00:45:19
have been her apartment the building she was in if you picture a U there's three
00:45:27
buildings that make this U shape and in the center of that U of those three apartment buildings you have a parking
00:45:36
lot that is shared by all of the occupants of those three buildings so what's interesting to me here is you
00:45:44
have a situation where my car is in in the line with your car your car is in the same area as our other neighbors
00:45:55
cars so as far as the parking lot goes I think that that's where you're going to
00:46:00
have the the space where the most eyes are on the comings and goings of everybody be it the occupants or
00:46:08
visitors of the of your neighbors in that parking lot so I think people are going to have a good idea of the
00:46:16
activity there just because you're frequently in and out of your car and you have the rear entrance to your home
00:46:23
your apartment as said almost all of the people in that apartment the that apartment area or at least this space of
00:46:31
Regency arms because it's not laid out the exact same everywhere throughout Regency arms but in this space these
00:46:38
people are using their back door as their main in and out to their home simply because of where their vehicle
00:46:46
would be located so one thing that was of note I I want to make sure that I underline this and and really Echo this
00:46:53
and and be clear here on on not to read too much into this but one thing of note
00:46:59
is that neighbors did point out when asked if they saw anything strange or unusual or if there's anything of note
00:47:05
that should be reported to detectives about who may be coming and going from Tracy's apartment the neighbors told
00:47:13
several neighbors told the police about a white man with a white vehicle that had a large Dragon decal on the vehicle
00:47:23
who had been seen at the apartment several times but that is key to hone in on but we should also point out the fact
00:47:32
that they followed that up with had not been seen in a couple of weeks so it could be connected to our murder but it
00:47:41
doesn't have to be because we have a night in question that we really need to focus in on now you might not know this
00:47:49
answer I'm sure law enforcement does but like you said she has an ex husband and
00:47:54
she had a current boyfriend at the time that boyfriend had the extra set of keys
00:48:00
she was only in that apartment for a few months when was he gifted those set of keys well I actually I think we need to
00:48:09
kind of clean that up a little bit because there's a couple things going on it's she has an
00:48:14
ex-husband she has an ex-boyfriend and the ex-boyfriend from my understanding only stayed there for
00:48:23
between about 10 days to possibly two weeks that relationship was over with before she was killed so no current
00:48:31
boyfriend there's no current boyfriend that we have listed here and it sounds like she was pretty vocal and talking
00:48:39
with a lot of family and friends about her life so nobody reported a current boyfriend everybody reported this
00:48:46
ex-boyfriend and we'll get into him we talked about him briefly uh David seelo that was the ex-boyfriend but I'm
00:48:53
guessing he doesn't own that no he does match the description that very vague description he's he's Caucasian male he
00:49:02
owns a white car with a large Dragon decal on the vehicle now it makes sense though that
00:49:08
you would see his vehicle right at that apartment several times a few weeks ago a couple of weeks ago as stated by
00:49:16
neighbors because he was staying there briefly now as far as the duplicate key goes he tells police he gave the key
00:49:25
back they don't find it at the scene but that doesn't mean that he didn't give it back
00:49:31
he claims that he gave the key back Tracy harness's ex-husband Michael harkes said that he was
00:49:40
told that David seock had a duplicate key to the apartment which again makes sense because David seo's not denying
00:49:48
that he ever had the key he wasay there we don't know the the thing that we we really want to find out
00:49:56
is one why didn't they find the duplicate key and since they did not find the duplicate key who the hell had
00:50:03
it well and what makes this case even more difficult for law enforcement is you have eyewitnesses that saw this
00:50:11
ex-boyfriend at the apartment at some point but because everybody's using their back
00:50:18
entrance because that's where the parking lot is well the parking lot is not small it's and so if you said to me oh D
00:50:28
have you seen this white vehicle that had this Dragon decal on it yeah when's the last time you saw it I don't know I
00:50:36
wouldn't you wouldn't be it'd be very hard for eyewitnesses to pinpoint the last time they saw that vehicle at that
00:50:44
apartment well and the other thing that's difficult too is remember the back door the the door that was used as
00:50:51
the main in andout for Tracy and her friends and visitors was found locked it was the front door that nobody used
00:51:00
regularly that was found unlocked and open when her body was discovered right the other thing that makes this
00:51:08
difficult and like you said we know this area is not only are there several parking lots around those apartment
00:51:19
complexes but there are side roads that are not that far from the apartment so if this was premeditated it wouldn't be
00:51:29
that hard to park down the street it's also not it's also not that far of a distance for somebody to park um there's
00:51:42
a I'd say within a half of a mile was a large Shopping Center or a strip mall and it wouldn't be that hard to park in
00:51:52
that parking lot and then walk over to the apartment complex yeah no again this is a rather safe
00:52:00
area and police went out of their way to inform the public that the they believe
00:52:08
the attack on Tracy was personal this is based off of the fact given the low rate of violent crime in
00:52:14
the area that fact is going to further bolster that idea and what eventually would be the
00:52:23
detectives Theory is that this was a crime of passion now before Tracy was killed there were had
00:52:30
been no homicides in Grove City in the year of 1992 Tracy was killed in early November
00:52:37
so that tells you that points out just how low the rate of violent crime would be in that
00:52:45
area she's not murdered until November and she's the first murder victim of that year now let's see if we can fill
00:52:52
out a thorough timeline for for Tracy as that's going to be key to this case as it always is so detectives spoke with a
00:53:03
lot of people during the first days of the investigation and then we pieced together a timeline for Tracy based off
00:53:10
of these interviews and notes made by the actual investigators so Tracy harkus was last seen alive at a lingerie sales
00:53:19
party in the Stone Ridge Subdivision this around 10:30 p.m. on November 5th this was at the home of a woman who
00:53:28
Tracy was friends with detectives interviewed everybody at this party Tracy's daughter was in daycare on
00:53:37
the day of the 5th and then was picked up by Sherry remember Sherry is Tracy's ex-husband
00:53:45
Mike Harkness that's Mike's fiance I'm assuming that Tracy had a a good relationship with Sherry because
00:53:54
Sherry's helping them raised their daughter but she also has a good relationship or reportedly good
00:54:00
relationship with her ex-husband yeah I I didn't see any reports about the relationship between Sher and Tracy but
00:54:06
you can make some inferences right I mean Michael Harkness it's reported by everybody that that I could find that
00:54:14
they had a good relationship Michael's words and everybody else's words where that he and Tracy spoke almost
00:54:23
daily and it wasn't just about hey can you pick up Megan in 10 minutes or hey can you can you cover for me this day
00:54:31
they they spoke about what was going on in their lives too and so it sounds to me like they remained friendly and then
00:54:38
based off of the fact that we know that Sherry is picking up Megan from daycare and that there's a good relationship
00:54:45
between Mike and Tracy I think the inference that we can make here is that yes the the relationship between Sherry
00:54:52
and Tracy was probably a good one on our timeline here we should note that Megan
00:54:57
was at home with Sherry and her father Mike the rest of the evening this is according
00:55:06
to Michael and Sher so this is the evening of Thursday the 5ifth now remember we're going to fast forward to
00:55:16
after that lingerie sales party Tracy left that party around 10:30 it would be a 10-minute
00:55:23
drive for her to get from The Party location to her apartment when she was found when Tracy was found remember she
00:55:32
was wearing clothing she was fully clothed she was wearing the same clothes that she wore to the
00:55:39
party but she's not wearing shoes when she's found and remember that we found shoes her purse
00:55:48
and her keys in the living room near that foot stol so her friends reported that Tracy
00:55:57
usually changed into sweatpants and a sweatshirt almost as soon as she would get home again her purse keys and shoes
00:56:05
were found on the stool or near the stool and the TV was on so to me Captain I'm looking at this situation I'm going
00:56:13
okay she leaves at 10:30 everybody at the party is saying that Tracy said that she was going home after the party and
00:56:23
there's indication at her apartment she probably came home kicked off her shoes sit down her purse and keys flipped on
00:56:30
the TV and before she could change into the sweatpants as reported by all of her
00:56:37
friends that she would usually change into sweats as soon as she got home either somebody knocks on the door she
00:56:43
invites somebody in or whatever happens and then she's attacked well this makes it difficult
00:56:49
too for law enforcement because did somebody follow her home from the party or did somebody lay and wait and once
00:56:59
you see movement and you see lights turn on that that's when you make your move and you go knocking on that front door
00:57:07
so the detective notes are as follows they say that either a Tracy let her as salent in the front door or I guess the
00:57:17
back door and and he or she or they locked the back door and then left through the front door B the as salent
00:57:25
was already in the house when she walked in this would make sense if either she left a door unlocked somebody had a key
00:57:31
or somebody had access or gained access in some form or fashion to the apartment or see her and her attacker or
00:57:41
attackers came in together when Tracy arrived back at her home that night the other thing too that's interesting to me
00:57:49
here Captain is that the note of friends saying that Tracy sometimes would leave
00:57:55
the back door unlocked when she was home could it be possible like you pointed out that she arrives home goes through
00:58:03
the back door and just didn't lock it behind her when she [Music] arrived want to thank you guys guys so
00:58:25
much for joining us here in the garage make sure you tell a friend make sure you tell your mother to Listen to True
00:58:32
Crime garage join us back here in the garage same Back Time same back Channel and until then be good be kind and don't
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