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[Applause] 2023 welcome to True crab garage wherever you are whatever you are doing thanks for
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listening I'm your host Nick and with me as always is the man that will be joining me for lunch after the show so
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grab a beer let's talk some true [Music] [Music] crime [Music] [Applause] [Music]
00:04:20
[Music] [Music] missing per jelik rainwalker on Friday November 2nd 2007 12-year-old jelik rainwalker was
00:05:10
reported missing from his grandparents residence in green witch Washington County New
00:05:17
York jelik is biracial with light brown hair and green eyes at the time of his disappearance jelik was 5' 6 in tall 105
00:05:31
lb he is believed to have been wearing blue jeans and black high top sneakers Foul Play is
00:05:40
suspected anyone with any information is asked to contact the New York State Major Crimes unit at
00:05:50
518783 3211 or email NYS vicap troopers.ny.gov y.gov that's nysv IAP at troopers.ny.gov
00:06:10
[Music] [Music] [Music] J Rain Walker was born on August 2nd 1995 in Albany New York to a mother
00:06:36
addicted to crack and alcohol jelik was diagnosed with fetal alcohol syndrome meaning he was exposed to addictive
00:06:43
toxic substances in utero that impacted his development despite all of our digging we have never located jal's
00:06:51
parents' names jelik was a goodl looking kid with green eyes and a big smile there are a few photos of jelik
00:06:59
available online and if you look him up you'll see a face beaming with personality but unfortunately due to
00:07:05
jal's parental situation he was put up for adoption shortly after entering this world from there he was shuttled around
00:07:14
from foster home to foster home six and all before Steven Kerr and Joselyn McDonald adopted him in 2003 per the
00:07:23
Albany Times Union jelik lived with the couple and their children for 5 years including three years as their adopted
00:07:32
son Steven and Joselyn had four other children three biological sons and one adopted daughter the kids ranged in age
00:07:42
from 8 years old up to 14 jelik also had two biological half brothers who lived in Albany New York about 35 miles from
00:07:52
the town of green witch where jelik lived with his adoptive family in Royal upstate newor New York as described by
00:08:01
our friends over at the Charlie project on J's case profile page his adoptive family lived a non-traditional lifestyle
00:08:11
when they first took in jelik the family lived about 15 minutes from the village
00:08:18
of greenwitch in Washington County now this house was really the current house was really a
00:08:27
Back to Nature type structure there's no indoor plumbing and the electricity the
00:08:33
only electricity that the house has comes from a generator and oh it's just a one-bedroom house so the family that
00:08:42
sleeps together weeps together I guess it's easy to say that J's parents were the hippie types they sold eggs at local
00:08:50
farmers markets and preferred to leave little to no environmental impact jelik was homeschooled by his adoptive parents
00:08:59
and and some other local kids were schooled at jal's home as well now jelik had some behavioral problems according
00:09:07
to the Cambridge green witch police chief the boy was diagnosed with a number of emotional and psychiatric
00:09:14
problems because of his fetal alcohol syndrome and being shuffled around from seven different families in his only 12
00:09:22
years of life his life was not easy of course misbehavior and lack of understanding of approp inter
00:09:30
interaction was to be expected but his issues resulted in emotional Outburst that could be violent his adoptive
00:09:38
parents stated later that he had rage filled temper tantrums and that his siblings were afraid of him his Outburst
00:09:46
could last up to an hour jelik was very intelligent he was an Avid Reader before
00:09:52
jelik was adopted he lived with the showen family and they did plan to adopt him but after after he attacked their
00:10:00
daughters when he was 7 years old they decided he could no longer stay in their home this is when he went to live with
00:10:08
Steven and Joselyn several of the other Foster families who had taken in jelik temporarily over the years said that he
00:10:17
was a loving child but his outbursts were too disruptive for them to feel comfortable offering him a permanent
00:10:24
home this is just a difficult situation and it's a sad reality that we have this kid who is brought into this
00:10:33
world and he's brought into this world a victim immediately yeah and he's given up for adoption and and to be honest
00:10:41
with you Captain I thank God that those parents the woman was at least smart enough to give him up for adoption as
00:10:49
rough as that sounds it doesn't sound like she had the skill set or resources to raise a child well like you said I
00:10:57
mean you have trauma happening to you since birth right and then you're being shuffled around and
00:11:04
then you have this situation where people good people are attempting to do a good thing bring this child into their
00:11:11
home try to raise them as their own but because of his issues it becomes an unbearable
00:11:21
situation where now your children might be afraid of of this kid who who seems to be a great kid smart kid loving child
00:11:31
but at times he's got these outbursts that are violent and at times scary yeah you want to help the kid but you don't
00:11:37
want to put your kid in danger as well so that's a little background on the events that were leading up to The
00:11:44
Disappearance of jelik well let's go over this house really quick cuz I mean that's a very odd situation to oh I
00:11:51
didn't get into it cuz I just assumed everybody lived that way it's almost like they lived in like a hunting cabin
00:11:57
like something that would be okay for the weekend you're we're going to go up there yeah there's no electricity but we
00:12:03
have a generator we're going to spend some time Outdoors that doesn't seem that bad it seems like a far
00:12:12
removed reality compared to how people are living currently seven people sleeping in one
00:12:19
room too I don't know how ethical that is especially when you have kid you're trying to adopt it it just seems a
00:12:25
little funny to me that's the thing it's it's difficult to talk about it here imagine living in that situation yeah
00:12:35
and the younger kids probably don't know much different now at the end of October
00:12:40
2007 12-year-old jelik had a few rough days according to stepen and Joselyn jelik threatened another young boy who
00:12:51
was in his homeschool class at their house it's reported the boy was only about 5 years old
00:13:00
according to Joselyn and Steven jelik said some pretty horrible things to this kid along the lines of a violent sexual
00:13:08
assault he intended to perpetrate on him now it's important to bear in mind that
00:13:15
we are hearing all of this information about this incident secondhand he's just a kid himself so where is he hearing
00:13:23
this stuff in order to be able to make those type of threats to somebody else if in fact this went down the way they
00:13:30
said it went down correct because jelik was homeschooled and the family was somewhat isolated from society there is
00:13:37
not really any way to verify whether their depiction of this incident is accurate at all yeah and sometimes it's
00:13:44
just a like you said A Simple Choice this is a a family that wants to live this way and sometimes it's a choice to
00:13:52
be isolated because you don't want people to know what's going on behind closed doors regardless of what went
00:13:58
down they're going to say this is what went down and according to them this incident
00:14:04
was the last straw Joselyn had become afraid of the boy she says according to the Charlie project on October 23rd
00:14:13
stepen called a crisis hotline and reported jalik to be unmanageable around the same time
00:14:20
Joselyn and Steven began inquiring of child services Personnel how to reverse the adoption they were were informed
00:14:29
that a legal adoption is binding and cannot be undone jelik was theirs to keep they were recommended respit care
00:14:38
services respit care services is temporary institutional care of a sick elderly or disabled person providing
00:14:47
relief for their usual caregiver in other words shortterm relief with a little separation time between in this
00:14:57
situation parents and jelik they decided to make use of this resource this was not the first time that they did though
00:15:06
right the plan was for Elaine and Tom person to keep jelik at their home for a few days after that he would be sent to
00:15:14
another respit home the persons who had housed jelik in the past kept him at their home until November 1st on the
00:15:23
evening of Thursday November 1st Steven picked jelik up from the person home near Albany Father and Son went to a Red
00:15:32
Robin restaurant to get some dinner then instead of returning to the family home
00:15:38
in green witch Steven and jelik headed to Steven's parents house at 11 Hill Street in a different part of Greenwich
00:15:48
this house was unoccupied at the time as Steven's father was a state department Diplomat stationed in Romania and
00:15:56
Steven's mother was there with him as well at the house Steven later told police the two spent the night but in
00:16:04
the morning he went into the room jelik slept in and found that the bed was stuffed with pillows the way that kids
00:16:13
do when they want it to look like someone was sleeping in that bed jelik was not there at 7:30 a.m. Steven found
00:16:23
a note and then he called the Cambridge green witch police at 8:57 a.m. all right just side note here make sure
00:16:35
you're paying attention at 7:30 a.m. Steven found a note he calls the police at 8:57
00:16:43
a.m. this note was handed over to the police it was in jal's handwriting and it said dear everybody I am sorry for
00:16:54
everything I won't bother you anymore goodbye Del leque now not on the same note but on a separate sheet of paper
00:17:05
there was a word Albany later people suspect that this could be important now the story of the
00:17:13
parents of Joselyn and stepen they were saying hey jelik clearly ran away he had gotten in big
00:17:22
trouble with them and clearly felt horrible about it the adopted family sat down with police to discuss their child
00:17:29
well and when this family is supposed to be your forever home and now they're trying to give you back after seven
00:17:37
houses you've already lived in this could be cause of well they they don't even want me they don't want to try to
00:17:44
work with me on any of the issues that I have and now they're bouncing me back around I I don't want to keep keep doing
00:17:51
this so gives a very plausible reason of why he would want to just leave the situation stepen and Joselyn told Chief
00:18:00
Bell and his officers that their son was very troubled and he was both suicidal and homicidal at the time of his
00:18:09
disappearance but they said they had not attempted to provide him with any counseling or medications for this it's
00:18:17
unclear whether they just did not believe in medical intervention or if they were exaggerating jal's condition
00:18:25
Steven and Joselyn tried to come up with some possible destinations where jelik might have run off to they informed the
00:18:33
Cambridge green witch PD about gel's brothers his half Brothers in Albany that makes sense he's been there
00:18:42
before maybe he wanted to seek them out or take up residence with them if possible right he's 12 years old you
00:18:51
know it's it when you're 12 especially when you've been bounced around from a few different houses you might feel that
00:18:58
it's not that difficult to just pick up roots and start elsewhere Joselyn said perhaps jelik
00:19:05
hitch a ride somewhere maybe like New York City because that was somewhere that jelik had always wanted to go now
00:19:13
according to Stephen jelik had befriended some older teen boys while at the Parson home and he said well maybe
00:19:23
they he ran off with them or they suggested that jelik was interested in his Heritage and maybe he wanted to live
00:19:31
with an africanamerican family well we have a missing 12-year-old boy and thus the search Begins the police took this
00:19:41
case very seriously from the beginning and that is obvious police chief Bell sent out officers to Canvas the area
00:19:49
quote if he got out onto a main road somebody would have seen something Chief Bell said and working on the assumption
00:19:57
that the child had gotten lost or God forbid harmed himself they pulled out all of the stops police and other
00:20:06
agencies searched a fem radius of the kurr's home where jelik was last seen by his adopted father they used infrared
00:20:15
cameras helicopters canines divers and even drained a pawn in their aial land and water searches for the missing boy
00:20:26
forest rangers joined in to help scour the dense wooded areas tips were called in from around
00:20:34
the Nation about supposed sightings these were checked and run down police investigated more than 200
00:20:42
leads in the first few days because this was not Chief Bell's first rodeo both the family's house and the
00:20:51
where they actually lived and Steven's Father's House were both searched immediately when they didn't find jelik
00:20:59
in the first couple of days things began to look worrisome November and Upstate New York has very cold nights Joselyn
00:21:08
and Steven were able to describe what they believed jelik to be wearing at the time that he went missing a yellow
00:21:16
fleece jacket a t-shirt with a dragon on it jeans and black high tops police could not totally rule out suicide or
00:21:26
running away but since not a trace of jelik turned up in any of the searches things were looking dire Chief Bell told
00:21:34
reporters on November 12th if he ran away he would have turned up by now and we just don't have a runaway kid here
00:21:42
yeah I mean he's 12 years old so it's not like he has the resources to just go start a new life even though maybe he
00:21:50
wanted to because of all the problems I think he was having but he's also 12 years old so we
00:21:57
can assume he's a little as far as Street smarts go a little naive and becomes a likely
00:22:07
victim yeah I mean he could have taken off he's he's a child the children are impulsive and he is making irrational
00:22:16
decisions or choices or or or the ability to not make good choices when he is throwing fits so he may just be
00:22:25
reacting to stuff going on and may have made some bad choices now the adoptive parents in the family they tried to pull
00:22:34
the community together as one would expect immediately after the kid went missing they spent weeks putting up
00:22:40
flyers and Joselyn implored residents to post gel's missing flyer and keep an eye
00:22:47
out for the boy they held prayer vigils they hired psychic they offered a cash reward but pretty quickly it became
00:22:56
apparent that their public facade was not the same as their private Behavior mhm something's wrong here police chief
00:23:06
George Bell said to the newspapers he said in 30 years of experience a kid of 12 years old and he says I don't care
00:23:14
what his mindset is he doesn't fall off the face of the world and chief Bell came right out and stated that Steven
00:23:23
and Joselyn were not acting the way other concerned distraught parents acted in his
00:23:30
experience they didn't set up shop at the police station demanding action and answers now stepen claims to have called
00:23:39
the police station 78 times but Chief Bell disputes this right he pointed out that step and his wife agreed to be
00:23:48
interviewed only with an attorney and Steven did not agree to be polygraphed on the advice of his attorney yeah which
00:23:56
we we see that happen often but you'd think they'd do a thorough search of the the house yeah
00:24:03
there's some debate on how thorough the search of the houses were because what's
00:24:08
going to happen is that's really you're doing like a cursor search at that point
00:24:13
in your investigation you're really just going in there and looking for the boy himself right A lot of times kids are
00:24:21
just hiding somewhere there's there's an amazing amount of calls where it's a missing person's case little kid
00:24:28
especially the younger they are they're often found in the home right so you're just looking through these houses for
00:24:36
this young boy himself and that makes you move from room to room rather quickly you're not really there looking
00:24:42
for evidence of what could have happened to the boy unless things are obvious any
00:24:47
obvious signs so later you're going to have the parents say hey we submitted to these searches on both of these
00:24:54
properties very early on later the police are going to have a different version of that saying these were just
00:25:00
ciary searches we didn't really get into any detailed searches of the home and when we tried to go back they said no no
00:25:08
no we don't want you here now Joselyn on the other hand did agree to be polygraphed and I couldn't find the
00:25:16
results of that but my guess is what there's just a lot of things with these individuals that don't make a
00:25:25
lot of sense like the one the lawyer told the husband not to take a polygraph test but it's okay for the wife to take
00:25:34
one it's just seems very strange I don't know could not find the results of that
00:25:41
test but uh I'm thinking that they didn't gain anything to further fuel their suspicions from that polygraph
00:25:51
test right the husband's refusal to cooperate and it goes beyond for you know there
00:25:58
are people out there going right now well who cares he didn't agree to the polygraph test it wasn't just that it
00:26:03
was other forms of not cooperating not answering basic questions not being willing to sit down without an attorney
00:26:10
present and not setting up uh information center at the police department setting up shop I mean some
00:26:18
people will hunker down at the police station to keep an eye on what's going on and and be fully aware and be the
00:26:25
first to know what's going on with their child that didn't happen here so these things
00:26:30
are setting off some alarm bells to to some people out there and as there were hints there were also hints that Steph
00:26:40
Kerr had a problem with his own temper and had flown off the handle at jelik in the past one story Chief Bell learned
00:26:50
from joselyn's mother J's grandmother Barbara reallyy who heard it straight from her
00:26:58
daughter was of a situation when jelik was 9 years old and he was continually making some noise by like drumming his
00:27:07
fingers or hands on the table even though Steven repeatedly asked him to stop as some point as The Story Goes
00:27:15
Steven lost it and grabbed the boy dragged him down to a creek to the creek near the home and was holding his head
00:27:24
underwater this until the wife intervene right that's that's called attempted murder step and Joselyn hired an
00:27:34
attorney right from Jump Street they got a bulldog at a big local firm named Jeffrey McMorris this lawyer said
00:27:42
publicly that the Cambridge green witch police and state police were treating Steven as a suspect and clearly embraced
00:27:50
the idea that he had done something to jelik rather than investigating if the boy ran away MCM Morris requested that
00:27:59
the FBI take over the investigation articles show that the FBI became involved in the case of missing
00:28:07
jelik rainwalker by the end of November and while Stephen and Joselyn stopped cooperating with police and
00:28:14
refused to participate in searches for their son in early December they appeared in an exclusive interview with
00:28:23
Ana Tucker of tv10 Albany in which they refused to answer most of the questions instead declaring how much they were
00:28:32
doing to find jelik and were preparing for when he returns to their home and then there was this on December 20th an
00:28:42
article in the Albany Times Union states Steven Kerr the last person to see jelik
00:28:48
rainwalker his adopted son before the boy disappeared November 1st has been seen around green witch in Cambridge
00:28:57
tearing in down Flyers advertising a vigil for the missing boy police chief Bell says he receives several calls a
00:29:05
day from people who are angered and perplexed by Kerr's Behavior police sources and multiple eyewitnesses told
00:29:14
the newspaper they saw Steven removing the signs apparently Steven said that he wanted the Flyers gone because the event
00:29:22
they were promoting was organized by people who were slandering [Music] [Music] this show is sponsored by better help do
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00:32:01
all right we're back cheers to you Captain cheers to all the people out there especially the
00:32:07
people in the back I want to make sure that I point out that we the cheap seats we hey those are the best seats those
00:32:14
are the people that fought to get in what did John London used to say he'd say that people in the cheap seats clap
00:32:20
your hands and the people up front just jiggle your jewelry well I want to point out captain
00:32:28
that we relied on the excellent coverage of this case for our coverage of this case by The Post Star newspaper articles
00:32:37
by Don Leman as well as the excellent coverage by the Albany Times Union wanted to put that in there before we
00:32:45
got too far right let's try to make sense of this so it's it's the adopted father so Stephen yeah yeah but to go
00:32:53
around and to pull down Flyers it makes zero sense to me I don't care what they're saying about you by having that
00:33:01
flyer up there it's bringing attention to the fact that your adopted son is missing the whole point of anything is
00:33:10
to find him safe or find out what happened to them and by ripping down these flyers and not talking to police and not
00:33:18
doing certain things it's almost like you're stepping away and and we know with a lot of these missing person cases
00:33:25
you you need the story to be as loud as possible so you can get as much of a spotlight on the case right and there
00:33:32
are people out there that will argue hey this was not technically missing person's Flyers these were Flyers
00:33:38
advertising the the prayer vigil or the candlelight vigil for this missing boy but you're spot on Captain any any
00:33:46
publicity is good publicity at at this point right and you would also think that your head space would be so far
00:33:54
gone from worrying about anything other than finding the boy right like wouldn't
00:33:59
that just be consuming you at the time like you don't need that sweet taste of vindication of ripping down Flyers to
00:34:07
get even with these people that you think are bad mouthing you you'd be too concerned about finding your son but if
00:34:15
this is true then maybe this is a check mark that is verification of this dude not being able to control his behavior
00:34:25
and reaction to things yeah I mean this guy's a [ __ ] stain but I also like we go
00:34:31
back to that house you have a an adopted son and you were saying an adopted daughter correct correct and then
00:34:41
biological kids and they're all sharing one room they're all sleeping in one room I just and this has happened
00:34:51
several times where we have these sick individuals that will adopt children and they Abus them and I
00:35:01
think there's some kind of law against some of these things I know in certain states that if you let's say you get
00:35:10
remarried your step daughter can't share a room with your biological son certain
00:35:17
things like that that they have to if they're not blood relative that they can't share a room I know that's a law
00:35:24
in several States you'd think that would apply also to um people that are going through adoptions but it seems like they
00:35:32
got these adoptions to go through and then they just said well we'll do whatever we want we'll live however we
00:35:37
want um this just seems like a very dark situation that should have been investigated before the kid even
00:35:45
went missing if anybody knew to investigate it so I I mean I don't to me it's really pretty cut and dry right
00:35:55
it's either a situation of this is a family making do the best they can I mean look some people are forced to live
00:36:02
in their cars for months at a time right but either this is a situation where a family's just trying to make do and
00:36:10
squeak by or you're right maybe maybe there's something something weird going on here or or it's just somebody milking
00:36:18
the system yeah or a little bit of both I mean but I think the thing is is most people that can't help themselves or
00:36:26
can't help their family they don't look into the idea of adopting more children that's more mouth
00:36:33
to feed that's more bodies to house what's the advantage I get what you're saying but we got to keep in mind he was
00:36:41
with them for five years so their situation could have changed when he was 12 could be much different than when he
00:36:46
was seven yeah okay so what we have here now is the boy still missing jalik still
00:36:53
missing and now we got this added threat of the cold weather and possibly snowy winter weather is on the way volunteers
00:37:03
continue to go out looking and looking for jelik but nothing was found and then Stephen
00:37:10
Kerr looks like he was feeling the heat a little bit he told the Times Union claiming to be completely Cooperative by
00:37:18
the way he said he opened his bank and phone records to police and let them search the two homes that he had access
00:37:26
to we touched on this a little bit before he said quote I've done everything all they want to do is string
00:37:33
me up and hang me but they don't have any evidence but Chief Bell said Stephen wouldn't even put his fingerprints on
00:37:43
the door of the police station he said he used his elbows to open the door at the police station and Cambridge when he
00:37:52
came in to bring in some information Belle is on record stating I mean this whole thing is weird end quote
00:38:03
Yeah they I mean look you just get that feeling and especially as police officers or law law enforcement officers
00:38:11
they're they're around this stuff often I mean to me it feels a lot um pedo like
00:38:18
and and child abuse that's that's my gut feeling so what did the investigators uncover about
00:38:26
Sten Kerr that clearly convinced them that he knew more than what he was saying well on the morning that he
00:38:33
reported jelik missing he told them that he found the goodbye note as I'm calling
00:38:38
it from his son at 7:30 a.m. when he woke up but as we pointed out earlier he didn't call the police until 8:57 a.m.
00:38:48
what did he do during the hour and a half between finding the note and calling the police he took a shower and
00:38:54
he returned some rented movies Be Kind Rewind he did admit this to Chief Bell in all fairness he wasn't
00:39:03
like hiding this information well in all fairness you get charged for the late fee that's important yeah but I think I
00:39:11
think I do think it's important to point out he wasn't hiding they didn't have to
00:39:14
dig this up right right you know but it does seem weird an hour and a half goes by before you report him missing and
00:39:21
there's more well no the reporting the kid missing like an hour and a half later not not a big deal to me if you're
00:39:30
looking for the kid if you're calling around if you're doing some work you know there not necessarily you got a
00:39:37
12-year-old boy right this is of age where you could go to the store and let him stay behind and maybe babysit some
00:39:45
of the kids so when you see this note that your 12-year-old adopted son is missing you go well let me look around
00:39:53
real quick let me go to some spot that I know he hangs out at let me take a shower and return some movies right but
00:40:00
let me let me call some of his friends if if you told me he did all those things and then he called the cops I'd
00:40:08
go okay that makes sense but taking a shower and returning some movies it's ridiculous I in full
00:40:16
disclosure Captain I'm with you the note by itself doesn't doesn't alarm me to the point of immediate panic but when
00:40:23
you compound that with oh I found his bed stuffed with pillows to make it look like somebody was sleeping in it and I'm
00:40:31
trying to reverse you know I'm a week away from trying to have reverse this adoption yeah that's weird you know what
00:40:37
I mean there's a lot there's a lot of stuff going on so the other thing too is that the police did they did have to
00:40:44
uncover this they uncovered video surveillance camera footage of a Chrysler Town and Country van that Chief
00:40:52
Bell stated on the record was exactly like the gold one own by Steven's father remember the night that jelik went
00:41:00
missing or the morning however you want to look at it that he went missing he and Stephen were at Steven's parents'
00:41:08
home just the two of them and this van that they found on the surveillance camera
00:41:14
footage it was seen driving by the Glenn's Falls National Bank branch on Main Street in green witch at 12:16 a.m.
00:41:26
on November 2nd that's the night that jalik vanished Steven told investigators that he was asleep at his father's house
00:41:35
at that time of night liar well I mean they've never been able to confirm that it was in fact the same van but it looks
00:41:44
identical according to the police chief right investigators stated that Steven refused to allow them to inspect the
00:41:51
minivan to compare it to the one seen on the video of course he did of course he
00:41:57
did further Chief Bell subpoena Steven's cell phone records and they showed some
00:42:03
inconsistencies with what step Kerr told police about that night his cell phone history showed that on the night of
00:42:11
November 1st after he and jelik left the Red Robin Steven took a different route
00:42:17
to the Hill Street house then he had claimed Chief Bell said we know for a fact he has lied to us about that route
00:42:27
because the cell phone records State he was nowhere near the route he told us he
00:42:32
took home there was also very little cell phone activity that has been reported for Stephen for that night in
00:42:41
question he had one call at 8:15 the night before and then there was no other call until he called the police at 8:57
00:42:52
a.m. the morning when Steven said he found the note I like to know if his phone was even on or in service because
00:43:01
with cell phone pink technology maybe we would know where he went so what we have
00:43:06
here Captain is about roughly 12 hours you know what was Stephen doing either he was doing exactly what he told the
00:43:15
police he was doing but it doesn't seem that way you know he's had his parents home with jalik and they went to bed and
00:43:21
Stephen slept for the night or or was it more of what we have evidence of that's just not true the story might
00:43:30
just not be true if that's the case then we have hours oh we know he's when he could have been covering something up or
00:43:37
getting rid of something well but right but we're pretty clear on the fact that this guy's a liar and if we think he's a
00:43:44
liar then law enforcement thinks he's a liar and it's like what else is he lying
00:43:49
about well let's get into that 8:15 p.m. call this was very shortly after Steven
00:43:54
and jelik finished eating eating dinner at the Red Robin according to The Post Star this call was from a friend of
00:44:02
Stevens who later spoke to police this is some weird stuff he told them that on the phone Stephen was agitated and angry
00:44:12
and Steph made several rude comments about jelik the caller's impression was that jelik was in the
00:44:20
vehicle and could hear the insulting and derogatory things that Steven was saying
00:44:27
about the child in January of 2008 it came out in the media that step and Joselyn were continuing to receive
00:44:38
monthly stien checks for $1,500 of course they were these were funds paid to adopted families of
00:44:46
challenged children by the Department of Social Services to help pay for their care of course jelik had been gone for
00:44:55
months by this point all of this was enough to tip the scales let's say in a news conference on
00:45:04
January 14th 2008 police named Steven Kerr as a person of interest in jelik disappearance this was based all on the
00:45:15
information we just went through and the fact that he was the last person to see
00:45:20
the child before jelik vanished meanwhile at the the other end of January 2008 there was a big
00:45:30
development in this case an anonymous letter sent to Media around the region that claimed missing 12-year-old jelik
00:45:40
rainwalker was alive and was picked up on Route 40 this was being investigated by police
00:45:48
the postar says they received the typewritten letter on Wednesday as did at least two Albany television
00:45:59
stations but the contents of the letter are a lot more indepth than that the letter which contained no return address
00:46:10
and was postmarked and was postmarked Westchester New York reads jelik still alive needed a foot soldier for this War
00:46:21
on Drugs picked him up Route 40 post 30 he's okay no fake he says ask his mama and papa who are the macaroni
00:46:35
family my cat name Diamond yes why does frany yell fire and then it says rapper question mark I don't know what that
00:46:46
means don't try to look we are not there clearly this letter was designed to make it look like jelik was alive and
00:46:55
maybe even weet and living somewhere else with a crazy person yeah I don't know I mean or who
00:47:02
knows or was it supposed to be some code for something there's no indication of who wrote it I mean your guess is as
00:47:09
good as mine or anybody else's I mean did jelik write it did somebody write it on his behalf is somebody holding him
00:47:16
somewhere against his will is he living there happily it it's a confusing letter well
00:47:24
this I would really like to know if if the initial letter that was supposedly written by jelik was actually written by
00:47:32
jelik and if this and if that wasn't then I would guess that this one isn't as well and this is just to throw law
00:47:40
enforcement off the this was a typed letter so it again it's it's the person no return address it's kind of cryptic
00:47:49
it's typed there's whoever whoever gave this to the media they're clearly constructing the
00:47:57
thing with without the intention of you determining who authored this letter right now Stephen and joselyn's lawyer
00:48:05
Jeffrey McMorris jumped on this opportunity to say hey I Told You So Right their lawyer said that the letter
00:48:13
contained information that only jelik would have known so that's got to be proof that he's still alive somewhere
00:48:19
right and his clients Steven Kerr and Joselyn McDonald were excited and they said that it was a sign that Rain Walker
00:48:27
was still alive and again they're just they're doing everything they can this is what they're saying right and not
00:48:34
only are we doing everything we can but we're also preparing for the boy to return now this letter arrived yeah wait
00:48:41
we were're preparing for the boy to return when we're going to try to get rid of him anyways and we we keep taking
00:48:47
the money we keep taking money for him even though he's not around even though we're probably the cause of him not
00:48:55
being around but we're going to keep taking money so what shows you what kind of people these are well this letter
00:49:01
arrived it came about as the Kerr McDonald Clan was in the process of packing everything up to move to Vermont
00:49:10
because stepen felt that he was being persecuted by the police in the meantime as they prepared to leave the family was
00:49:19
staying at the Hill Street home of Steven's parents where Steven and jelik spent the night that last night that
00:49:27
jelik was seeing yeah well you got to stay there so you can monitor it so you can monitor if the police are search in
00:49:34
that area but but then you're also leaving the other place abandoned to not keep an eye on it so yeah but you but if
00:49:43
if you're the one responsible for him going missing you know which property is important and which one's not on
00:49:50
February 7th the Cambridge green witch police visited the family there it seems as though this impromptu visit was
00:49:59
deliberately intended to allow the police you know to look around scout out what was going on in the house they saw
00:50:07
a computer when they were there and this this is when they're like uhoh they freezed the scene and they sent someone
00:50:15
out immediately to get a search warrant so they could confiscate the computer yeah Chief Bell would not comment on
00:50:22
whether they planned on searching the computer to see whether it had produced the anonymous letters about jelik being
00:50:29
alive but they want to search it for something so we can assume that's probably what they're looking at amongst
00:50:35
other things but according to the postar newspaper the letters were typed in a font in style that bore a quote strong
00:50:43
resemblance to those used by Joselyn and other corresponden to the media unfortunately forensic examination of
00:50:52
the letters themselves did not provide really any any indication as to the source of the letter as a result of this
00:51:00
search though Jeffrey McMorris filed a notice of claim against the police department naming Chief Bell
00:51:07
specifically alleging trespassing and false imprisonment no lawsuit was ever filed and nothing was ever settled it
00:51:16
really looks like this Captain was kind of a warning shot you know from the attorney to the police department
00:51:22
telling them to back off right don't bully my clients don't bully don't do your job
00:51:30
that's what he was trying to say don't do your job MCM Morris was dramatically indignant about all of these unwarranted
00:51:37
infringements on his client's rights he was constantly making statements like the police conduct was outrageous and
00:51:46
calling Chief Bell the ring leader of the Witch Hunt against his clients he continued to declare that the police
00:51:53
were focusing on the wrong person that jelik was out there somewhere and that investigators were suffering from tunnel
00:52:02
vision I do want to get into a couple of people that well they seem to really truly care
00:52:10
about jik let's talk about two women involved in this case who have principles and stood up for this
00:52:18
unwanted child despite the personal cost of doing so one is Elaine person she's the respit caregiver she was an advocate
00:52:29
for jelik from the beginning she was of course aware of his behavioral issues but as a respit caregiver she was
00:52:38
trained to deal with them and look past them to the person that the child truly was she says quote jelik was a beautiful
00:52:48
sweet intelligent generous and loving child with some behavior issues according to Elaine she and her husband
00:52:59
and jelik had a nice five days together and when jelik left her home with stepen
00:53:05
on that day November 1st she said he seemed happy it certainly did not seem to her that jelik was planning to run
00:53:14
away or harm himself and remember she said she did not believe that the boy knew that his adoptive parents were
00:53:22
trying to give him back right besides just offering insight into jelik Elaine had some important information
00:53:31
for the investigators she told them that during jelik stay with them she and her
00:53:37
husband Tom observed jelik doing some homework assigned to him by his father remember the home the kids were
00:53:45
homeschooled right and this homework assignment was to write a letter of apology to the other kids in his
00:53:52
homeschool classroom who he had hurt by this recent Outburst Elaine said that she did not
00:54:01
read the note written by jalik out of respect for his privacy but she knew what it was and what purpose it was
00:54:09
intended for when she saw the news that Stephen Kerr was you know she sees this on the news cerr is holding up this same
00:54:19
note as evidence saying that jelik had left on his own volition she's shocked you know she yelled at the
00:54:28
TV that's not a goodbye note that is a homework assignment now we could give Stephen the benefit of the doubt and
00:54:36
assume that he simply mistook this letter of apology for a departure note but remember Stephen was the one who
00:54:43
assigned jelik to write the note in the first place and really Suspicious Mind might even make the leap that Stephen
00:54:52
had done so deliberately planning to possibly later use the note to explain why jelik had vanished but it's almost
00:55:01
like he put him in a situation go here for a couple days one write this note for me I'm going to use
00:55:09
that against you but I'm also going to use this time to figure out how I'm going to get rid of
00:55:14
you I find the whole thing a little weird and I question a lot of it I understand Elaine's suspicions but the
00:55:23
way that the letters written the the way it's constructed does seem a little more
00:55:30
goodbye is to me than apology right it says goodbye it says I won't bother you anymore um I guess you could take that
00:55:39
really one of two ways or or maybe even both mhm Now Elaine made it her mission to find jelik she took a leave of
00:55:49
absence from her job and started a task force comprising of her herself her husband
00:55:55
Barbara reallyy who's gel's grandmother and some of gel's other Foster families they were calling themselves the fine
00:56:03
jelik task force they started a website publicizing jal's disappearance it became a bulletin board of sorts listing
00:56:12
all sorts of suspect Behavior and past transgressions on the part of Joselyn and
00:56:20
Steven the website has been taken down since then but we were able to find some excerpts from it the website did not
00:56:28
pull any punches for example Elaine wrote she believed Steven harmed jelik and caused his
00:56:37
disappearance from a section titled what the police know it's alleged that the family
00:56:43
applied to adopt jelik and another child basically in a bid to have access to the
00:56:52
state provided funds that accompanied such adoptions and then after these adoptions went through they moved to
00:57:01
that inadequate housing situation with no Plumbing or electricity right it was said that Steven and Joselyn sent their
00:57:10
own children to private school but made jelik and the others uh make do with hand-me-downs and they were homeschooled
00:57:19
other posts on the website provided Snippets showing what life was like there for
00:57:25
jelik one says one time after a series of ignored reminders jal's mother banned him from using the out houses for
00:57:35
several days chik's only option was to either use the woods this around the house or try to
00:57:43
wait it out until the family went on some errands so he could use you know restrooms at these different
00:57:51
businesses both jelik and Joselyn told jal's former foster parent that jelik was locked in his room at night they saw
00:58:02
the locks on the doors when they visited jelik gel's grandmother also confirmed that the locks were there and used J's
00:58:11
room also had no heat according to this post so the small portable heater was I guess they put a small portable heater
00:58:20
in the room at times but would remove it this to believe believe to be a form of
00:58:25
punishment now of course we should make sure that we don't believe everything that we see on websites especially
00:58:31
websites like this others on social media have posted that Joselyn had the kids best interest at heart and she was
00:58:40
trying to protect jelik from her husband Barbara really is Joselyn McDonald's mother and jal's adoptive
00:58:50
grandmother Barbara told the media that in the 5 years jelik lived with her daughter's family he exhibited instances
00:58:59
of uncontrollable rages that were frightening to other family members she also said that very quickly very early
00:59:08
on she began to question the story that jelik ran away because she did not like the answers she was getting from the
00:59:17
parents to her questions this comes to light and gets into some good detail from a 20 2016 post by Barbara on the
00:59:27
Facebook page she started for jelik and chime in at any time here Captain if you need clarification on
00:59:35
anything because there are some names in this post that we have not yet introduced to the audience M she posted
00:59:42
n years ago today jelik was last seen by the waitress and manager at Red Robin restaurant in laam New York just after
00:59:51
8:00 p.m. jelik and stepen left Red Robin and Steven's parents gold van 12 hours later my daughter Joselyn McDonald
01:00:02
called me saying jelik had run away in the night and she wanted me to drive to Greenwich she says this was a hurried 45
01:00:12
miles to Steven's parents house where she found step Joselyn and Robin Robin's one of the uh is her grandson in the
01:00:22
family room of the house Robin had just showered Joselyn was heading into the shower and Steven was talking rapidly
01:00:31
about finding a note and that he had gotten up early and looked in and seen what he thought was jelik in bed and
01:00:40
then he had gone to shower and have breakfast Steven was rambling and talking faster and faster about the
01:00:47
respit home and the other foster children and then returned to talk about his meal that he had the night before
01:00:55
mhm she says I asked questions about whether they'd reported jelik missing to the police and whether they'd gone to
01:01:04
the neighborhood houses searched the streets whether the house in the garage and the van had been thoroughly searched
01:01:12
how jalie could have left the house through which door you know she's asking all the normal questions whether there
01:01:19
was any clothing or a jacket that might be missing the answers were that there was only one way jalie could have left
01:01:28
the house through the back door into the garage and then out the automatic door of the garage she says I asked about the
01:01:38
noise of the garage opening and that there were extremely close neighbors that may have heard something but the
01:01:46
response was they didn't want to bother the neighbors with any questions yeah the front door was locked from the
01:01:53
inside with a key that was still in the hall cupboard there was no missing jacket or clothing that they remembered
01:02:02
being in the house they hadn't gone to any neighbors or searched the streets they hadn't searched the house except
01:02:10
the bedroom jelik had supposedly slept in the previous night there was no overwhelming sense of urgency or danger
01:02:20
for jelik she says indeed she says John was concerned because Bon and cayana these are the the
01:02:29
other children were in the home school and she needed to get them and take robin to his doctor's appointment she
01:02:37
said that Stephen said he had an office birthday party to go to after a half an hour step and Joselyn decided we all
01:02:46
needed to go to their house on Raven way and then she would get the kids together
01:02:53
and then go to the son's doctor's appointment she says that they all drove but they took separate vehicles to the
01:03:01
home she said when she got into their house Joselyn was on the phone on her cell phone calling The Homeschool family
01:03:10
and Steven started circling around her asking if she wanted breakfast and listing all of the things that he could
01:03:17
cook for her he was speaking rapidly she says and walking in circles now once Joselyn finished her phone call she got
01:03:26
Robin into his coat and was going to go pick up the other children then go on to
01:03:31
the doctor's appointment Stephen said he was going to his work to his boss's birthday party she says she was
01:03:40
stunned and said that she would drive around and look for jelik which is how she spent November 2nd 2017 9 years ago
01:03:49
today was the last time anyone other than Steven Kerr saw jelik 9 years of searching and investigating still no
01:03:57
definitive answer jelik was a wonderful and loving child and deserves to be cared for and kept safe she says I feel
01:04:06
we are in a holding pattern but one day the final piece will be found and we'll know what happened to jelik and there
01:04:14
will be Justice our search for jelik Will Go On until there are answers we love you jelik we miss
01:04:21
you look I wanted to go through that whole post there because it's important to note that she's pointing out that as
01:04:30
soon as she was alerted to this missing child as soon as she got involved as soon as she's face to face with both
01:04:37
mother and father neither of them seemed to be concerned that the boy was missing
01:04:43
neither of them seemed to be looking for how the boy would have left the home checking with the neighbors looking on
01:04:49
the streets they didn't want to bother the neighbors mhm she's the one saying hey this is what we should be doing this
01:04:55
is what we should be investigating we should be calling this in we should be doing that meanwhile adopted mom is
01:05:01
worried about getting the other kid to the doctor's appointment getting kids to school the dad is worried about oh hey
01:05:09
sit down I can cook you some some breakfast this is what I had for dinner last night I have to go to my boss's
01:05:15
birthday party so a whole lot of I mean there's no sense of urgency there's no there's no effort being made at that
01:05:25
time when she walks into the situation on behalf of the parents of jelik [Music]
01:05:42
rainow all right thanks for joining us so much more to get into tomorrow and we're going to be back
01:05:49
here so we want to see you in the garage tomorrow until then be good be kind and
01:05:54
don't L [Music] it Angie's List is now Angie and we've heard a lot of theories about why I
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