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today [Music] welcome to True Crime garage wherever you are whatever you are doing thanks
00:01:57
for listening I'm your host Nick and with me as always is a man who knows that orenthal James was a mighty bad man
00:02:05
here is the captain baddest man in this whole damn town it's good to be seing and good to see you thanks for listening
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thanks for telling a [Music] friend today we are still sipping on the Fantastic brew from Stone Brewing called
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hit subscribe and there you go Bingo Boingo and that's enough of the business all right everybody gather around grab a
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chair grab a beer let's talk some true crime for me wa for me [Music] we discussed the situation that took
00:04:14
place in the parking garage or the suspected situation that took place in the parking garage we have poor Mercedes
00:04:22
Vega here who is abducted in this parking garage we we're told by police eventually that that's where they
00:04:29
believe that this went down and they have something telling them that and we'll go through those possibilities as
00:04:35
we get to it but but we have her car that's missing that's another great mystery of this case the vehicle her
00:04:43
vehicle is eventually found she was driving a 2019 white Dodge Charger this vehicle is later found
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abandoned outside of a restaurant near First Street and Farmer Avenue this is is in Tempe Arizona so
00:05:02
Vegas car is found abandoned and parked illegally this is not far from her apartment complex so we have a couple of
00:05:09
things that are taking place here captain and we know this based off of where she's found in the vehicle
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information and vehicles being used in the commission of this murder her vehicle is moved we're told that the
00:05:22
abduction took place in the in the parking garage she's found in a vehicle that doesn't belong to her many many
00:05:29
miles away what we cannot say is how did they transport her out of the parking garage and I know that I'm already
00:05:37
saying they but when you have this kind of movement with vehicles and you have an abduction that takes place in a
00:05:44
parking garage and a in a public place all all I can keep thinking about here Captain is that it makes more sense and
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it's so much easier to do these horrible evil acts if you have two people working
00:05:57
in unison together to to carry out this hor horrific murder well cuz you have to
00:06:03
move the victim and you also have to move the car so some of the physical evidence that we're going to find at the
00:06:09
parking garage is a a statement by her her family that is saying they had to get this information from police they're
00:06:16
saying she was hit over the head because there was tissue and blood found in the parking
00:06:23
garage and based off of the surveillance footage that we have of her walking into
00:06:29
the parking gar her car being moved transported to this other location this feels to me a lot like what I suspected
00:06:37
happened in the Jennifer kessie case in Florida many years before this case right Jennifer cessy's case she lives in
00:06:47
what was supposed to be a nice apartment in a nice area parking garage I believe
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that she was attacked on her way to her vehicle intercepted before she could get
00:06:57
in that vehicle or pulled out of it at some point here we have a very similar situation
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because we are seeing and being told that there is physical evidence that says the attack took place in the garage
00:07:09
could it be police would actually go on and add clarification to this later they
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think based off of blood evidence that they found in the garage and on her vehicle that was later recovered that
00:07:23
she very likely had approached her vehicle her back was turned to the as salant or or or as salance and that
00:07:32
suggests to me that she's attempting to get into her car right and the and these
00:07:36
cowards attack her from behind well but because we know where the victim was found because we know where the victim's
00:07:44
car was found it makes you wonder how much surveillance footage law enforcement has that they're just not
00:07:50
sharing with the public you are so spoton going to that point right here in in our coverage of the case because one
00:07:58
thing that's perplexed me amongst other things in this case is that they they being law enforcement have said they've
00:08:05
never released it but they've said that we have surveillance footage of her car being parked there illegally makes me
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wonder too if we have any form of DNA evidence I know we have some gloves so if the gloves were left by the killer
00:08:25
then he wore those gloves so they'd have touch DNA evidence in inside the gloves
00:08:30
unless he dous those gloves and bleach yeah or the fire the the heat it doesn't even have to be the fire itself it could
00:08:37
be the Heat and also the the water the the water pressure coming out of those fire hoses and whatever they use to
00:08:45
extinguish those flames on the vehicle very likely disrupted and destroyed and contaminated a lot of the physical
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evidence that they probably suspected that they would find potentially in the vehicle or on the victim herself the
00:09:02
problem is with this vehicle being a salvage title it's it would be different if it were her vehicle it would be
00:09:10
different if it was the suspect's vehicle you would expect to find a lot more evidence physical evidence in those
00:09:18
situations this is a situation Captain where the perpetrator perpetrators and the victim may have only been in this
00:09:25
vehicle for a very very short period of time yeah i' I would start looking for individuals that were similar in age to
00:09:32
her yes if not if not maybe a hair older thank you and look it's so difficult to
00:09:39
try to crawl into the minds of these monsters here and figure out who they are why they did what they did or or or
00:09:46
why they They carried out the crime in the manner that they did but I I can't shake the fact I shouldn't say fact
00:09:54
because it's not a fact I cannot shake the idea the suspicion that I have that the perpetrators of this horrible crime
00:10:02
are probably younger folks and probably similar in age she was in her early 20s I would suspect that these whoever did
00:10:13
this to her probably about that same age early 20s mid 20s somewhere in that neighborhood now one thing that I think
00:10:23
it's been talked about we're not going to be the first to have to have talked about this
00:10:28
but this case is discussed and and and there's plenty of articles about the case but one thing that I don't think
00:10:36
that that that comes through and is actually not even presented in most of the articles is police have somewhere to
00:10:44
start their investigation it may have taken them a bit of time to connect these dots but if
00:10:51
you go back in time to October of 2020 Mercedes Vega was she was horribly attacked back then and so you have to
00:11:02
look at that while we cannot say that they're 100% connected that it's it would stand a reason that there is no
00:11:09
connection at all what information do you have on that attack so until you can can you clear this you you have to say
00:11:17
there's a possibility so here's what we have October 12th 2020 this is from police and court
00:11:25
records this is early morning hours it's in the 4:00 hour 4: a.m. hour Mercedes is getting home from her shift at the
00:11:35
gentleman's club that she was working at the time now I want to be perfectly clear here the apartment that she's
00:11:42
living in in 2020 is not the same apartment that she lived in when she was abducted in
00:11:48
2023 right so she's arriving at home she pulls into the parking lot she gets out
00:11:55
of her vehicle and a man wearing a mask mask and gloves points a gun at her demanding
00:12:03
her her keys her handbag and her phone threatens her life and throws the poor young lady down
00:12:14
on the ground viciously so violently that when when she reports this she still has gravel you know like we talk
00:12:24
about Road Rash or whatever but she still has the gravel from the parking lot like sticking to her back yeah when
00:12:34
reporting this and she is visibly shaken she is terrified she's scared beyond all
00:12:40
get out here and her family has talked openly about this attack as well and they say look after after this went down
00:12:50
this guy's wearing a mask the our poor victim here has no clue who did this to her but they took her her belongings her
00:12:57
personal belongings likely her identification that would have been in her handbag along with the keys to her
00:13:03
vehicle and her cell phone so they have her personal information she never goes back to that
00:13:09
apartment ever again ever not after reporting the crime she never returns to that apartment or that parking lot
00:13:18
simply out of fear and so yeah there be so much trauma there but that to me feels like a a
00:13:27
robbery this her murder case doesn't feel like a robbery gone bad no because it's it it appears that it's violent
00:13:36
right away yeah right because it's it's a it's not just violence right away to hurt and harm her but it's hurt and harm
00:13:45
her with the the intent of abducting her and moving her elsewhere which really shows me and
00:13:53
tells me that it's very likely that they had to hurt and harm her to make it easier for to abduct her and move her
00:14:00
elsewhere and like you said law enforcement shows up to our apartment we have we find some kind of evidence that
00:14:07
there's attack that happens in the garage so I'm guessing that there's blood and stuff in the garage but also
00:14:13
blood on your car it just makes you wonder why why would they move her car because you don't need to move her car
00:14:20
to abduct her and kill her you don't but maybe you're hoping that maybe you're hoping that at the very least that that
00:14:29
detectives will not be able to know that she was abducted from the parking garage
00:14:35
because try to think about it from the criminals angle if she is targeted the criminal the abductor and
00:14:44
killer are going to her parking garage because they know that there's a high probability that that's where they can
00:14:49
find her and abduct her from but if if you don't so so what that means is as the perpetrator you are now on a shorter
00:14:59
list of of people who could have conducted this crime why because that means you have to be in the know of
00:15:06
where she lived and where she parked her car you can't say that any Bob Tom and James off the
00:15:15
street would know where this person lived they might know where she dances they might know where she works but they
00:15:23
may not know they likely wouldn't know where she lived where she parked her car and so what this is suggestive to me
00:15:30
moving the vehicle again you're putting yourself at risk but you're doing that because you're trying to stag the scene
00:15:38
of the crime of the abduction and set it up in a way that maybe the detectives can't figure out that she was abducted
00:15:45
in that parking garage and that opens up a whole other list of possibilities which would then carry
00:15:52
itself to a whole other list of potential suspects so let's go back to that 202 attack what happens here
00:16:03
is Mercedes Vega she's no dummy she starts noticing look on on some of the apps that I use there's activity on some
00:16:15
of the apps that I were was using and in at least one case she can tell that someone is trying to transfer money out
00:16:25
of one of her accounts and this this guy is a dummy however because guess whose account he's
00:16:32
trying to put it into his own I mean come on come on Cracker Jack why don't you can you come up with a better plan
00:16:40
here so she goes to police and she's she she God bless her after this horrible attack happened to her in 2020 like she
00:16:50
didn't just want to get the guy busted she she moved elsewhere she had to change her whole life and her parents
00:16:56
say like she almost it was almost like she was starting over because she had to up and move abruptly she had to she had
00:17:03
to change her her routes she changed where she worked and things of that nature but she she doesn't want to just
00:17:09
get the guy busted who who who scared her who hurt her who stole her stole from her she tells the police like I'm
00:17:18
willing to work with you morning noon and night on this because I I want to help other people I don't want this this
00:17:26
guy to do this to anybody else so she's she goes to police and says look at this activity this person is
00:17:34
trying to get my money out of my account and trying to put it into his so police
00:17:38
take that information and it leads right to the doorstep of the perpetrator well we can't say that he
00:17:44
perpetrated the the the robbery on her 100% but we know that we know the result right the robber took her her personal
00:17:52
belongings along with her phone so I'm assuming here that this person somebody is using her phone to to get into these
00:18:00
accounts and attempt to move things right this leads them to a person named Kujo young and I want to spell that
00:18:09
because I'm I'm likely saying the first name wrong it's probably cudjo young it's c u DJ o e last name
00:18:19
Young last name but licker we know that this attack and robbery on her takes place mid October 2020 let's fast
00:18:27
forward one month to mid November 2020 this is when another dancer at the same club that Vega was working at was
00:18:35
targeted just one months later according to records a woman was getting home to her Scottdale apartment very nearby not
00:18:43
far around 3:45 a.m. she's approached by a man at gunpoint then a vehicle or a passer
00:18:51
by stumbles into the area and this man gets spooked and runs off we can't say for certain that it's the same crime but
00:19:00
doesn't it sound very similar we have two people that worked at the same at the same
00:19:06
establishment and both are attacked when they return to their apartments in the middle of the night a gun A gun is used
00:19:14
in both situations yeah and you would think that because of her profession she's probably carrying cash exactly and
00:19:22
here's the thing we talked earlier about these businesses most of them the good ones
00:19:27
anyway they're being escorted to their the people that work there are being escorted to their cars and often times
00:19:34
it's not just it's not just dancers it's waitresses and bartenders and everybody
00:19:39
involved they're being escorted usually by a very large and capable security guy
00:19:45
I I tell you what I got thrown out of one of these establishments one night and I was uh through no wrongdoing of my
00:19:51
own just a complete misunderstanding you know and uh but I'll tell you this Captain I was very happy that they
00:19:57
didn't result to violence to get me out of there because it it one punch is all it would have taken you should have seen
00:20:04
the size of these guys they they were mountains I tell you so that's what she said these if you're going to attempt to
00:20:11
Rob one of these young ladies or a bartender or whomever coming out of one of these joint you ain't going to do it
00:20:17
in the parking lot at one of these joints and like you said this is a is primarily a cash
00:20:24
industry and why would one would somebody work at this establishment for the same reason I used to bartend one of
00:20:31
the best parts of it was you got to leave usually with a good stack of cash at the end of a busy night people can
00:20:39
Target these type of people and and and it doesn't take a sophisticated criminal
00:20:43
to Target these these persons well like you said you could have the idea well these lers are leaving with a lot of
00:20:52
cash I'm going to rob one of them okay well I'm going to do it right after they leave work oh they're being escorted out
00:20:58
I can't can't do it here okay I need to follow them home and that's what happens twice this cudjo
00:21:06
young is picked up Mercedes Vega picks him out of a photo lineup this is in December of 2020 and let's keep in mind
00:21:16
he's also charged at the same time with another armed robbery and let's go a step further records show that young was
00:21:25
seen inside of the gentleman's club following the robberies right so he's going into this so he has a direct tie
00:21:34
to this Gentleman's Club yeah but it makes sense you go into the club you see which girl is working more you can see
00:21:41
the dollars being thrown and then you pick out your victim and you follow them home and unfortunately he he post bond
00:21:49
posted Bond on both of these cases and he he gets let out now we we should point out a few things here he's out on
00:21:57
bond at the time of Mercedes Vega's death in in April of 2023 at the time of her murder what gets a little difficult
00:22:06
here so he so he's out and and could have potentially committed this murder but what gets difficult here is there
00:22:14
there are records there are court records that show that he may have had an ankle monitor at the time right so
00:22:22
they would be able to track his movements but you would but good suspect nonetheless because one he's capable
00:22:28
capable of the crime and on top of that it probably wouldn't be too hard if he's
00:22:34
been a a customer before to figure out where she lives you know he he knows somebody that knows somebody and gives
00:22:42
them information doesn't even know that this guy robbed her in the first place but maybe the idea is well if I get rid
00:22:48
of her she can't identify me and that's all they really have so I won't be charged and I won't go to jail here to
00:22:57
back up some of this information this is from news2 or 12 news they are on record saying that they
00:23:05
have confirmed that cud Joe Young was wearing an ankle monitor in April of 2023 and that ankle monitor did provide
00:23:16
GPS information so if he's the perpetrator and they've not connected that dot he
00:23:23
either figured out a way to to get out of that monitor or or be because it would it would track
00:23:31
his movements now the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office said well when asked if they've investigated potential links
00:23:42
between the robberies and this homicide the they did say we will not comment on this or any other possible
00:23:50
connections at this at this point but let's go to April 13th of 2023 so this is days before the abduction and
00:24:03
murder court records there show that young Young's attorney filed a disclosure notice that a man named and
00:24:11
I'm going to go air quotes here George so we don't know if this is a real name fake name what have you but in this
00:24:19
filing names a air quotes George who was going to be testifying at the robbery trial
00:24:28
because cud Joe Young is saying that this George character is the person that threatened him and which then forced him
00:24:37
to commit armed robberies no last name for George is given and then as we know sadly four days later is when Mercedes
00:24:46
Vega is found dead but a couple things to consider here with these robberies I'm not talking about the abduction or
00:24:55
the murder I'm talking about the robberies here if if these persons are being escorted out to their
00:25:02
vehicles which I think it's easy to make that assumption and we should there's a
00:25:07
reason again there's a reason why these robberies are happening when the person gets out of their car not when getting
00:25:12
into their car and in both situations they've left the establishment the same establishment mind you and they're
00:25:19
attacked later so either they're being watched and Then followed to where the attack takes place and the robbery takes
00:25:27
place or or could you have a situation where you have two people in communication saying the target's
00:25:35
leaving and if you if you know where they live well you got a pretty good idea of their destination in the middle
00:25:41
of the night and you could have somebody sitting on the other end waiting to [Music]
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to upgrade your selling [Music] [Music] today all right we are back please raise
00:31:58
your hand if you've ever been kicked out of a gentleman's club tall can's in the air cheers colel
00:32:06
I will not put my tall can in the air but I will I will not I will not this case I don't want to say that it seems
00:32:15
open and shut but I think I think in most cases where there's smoke often times there's fire and here we have the
00:32:23
situation with this this armed robber a violent armed robber cudjo young this George character we don't know who he is
00:32:33
could this be retaliation for getting someone busted could it be retaliation before someone's about to be sent off to
00:32:41
prison I I think that those are suspicions that would be that that most people would have we can't say with any
00:32:49
level of certainty but it can't be overlooked now I do know the the family is disappointed with the investigation and
00:32:59
one aspect that they're disappointed with is that the the vehicle that she was found in that description you know
00:33:06
we we gave that description to you in in part one a 2018 white Chevy Malibu that's not released to the public until
00:33:15
over a year after the murder and the reason why they say they're disappointed is they think that it would have been
00:33:21
more helpful to the investigation or more helpful to the public if you are since you are in fact asking the public
00:33:27
for their help yeah to have released that information much much sooner I agree 100% with what the family's saying
00:33:35
I do want to kind of throw a little bit of a wrench in the whole situation though because we don't know what leads
00:33:43
and what police were working on and detectives were working on it prior to releasing this
00:33:49
information what I think we have here Captain is I think and I'm hoping that I'm right I don't know that I'm right
00:33:55
but I'm hoping that they were hot on something they were working that angle they were
00:34:00
chasing those leads and that they released this information when they figured out we have to move on from
00:34:07
whatever it is we're working on well they had three crime scenes yeah so I think they were hopeful
00:34:13
that they're going to get maybe some DNA maybe a fingerprint we don't know what they have what they don't have but it's
00:34:21
very tough for law enforcement and I don't want to come off as a boot licker but
00:34:28
the idea that these Law Enforcement Officers don't want this solved that they did there was some
00:34:35
malice by not releasing information it's sometimes you just make a bad decision and and you have to kind of go with go
00:34:44
with what you think is best but again I I agree with the family I think a year is too long now if you said hey we we
00:34:53
followed this we worked this hard within a couple months it doesn't go anywhere well then then release information but
00:35:00
but we have cases and this is the whole [ __ ] thing you know the True Crime world I mean how
00:35:07
many cases do we have that are 20 30 years old and law enforcement is still keeping things that could possibly solve
00:35:16
the the crime too close to the the chest that's the flip in this situation where
00:35:23
here we look if a year later was it too late very difficult for anyone to say however
00:35:30
it's a year later it's not 10 years 15 years later we've seen in cases 19 years later where they're
00:35:36
releasing like okay well good luck the person that might be able to identify that item that you're asking us to
00:35:42
identify May no longer be on the Big Blue Marble May no might be Pushing Daisies by this point yeah it gets hard
00:35:49
to say I I think when we're looking at something within a year's time I I bet you I would suspect like you said three
00:35:56
crime scenes Sur veillance footage at the at the scene that we're being told by and they back this up with evidence
00:36:03
that the abduction took place at one of the places where we have surveillance footage we have an eyewitness who can't
00:36:09
really describe the person he sees outside of the vehicle at another one of the crime scenes and then we have police
00:36:15
on record saying that we have surveillance footage of her car being parked illegally they're not saying we
00:36:21
have surveillance footage of her car being parked there they're saying we have surveillance footage of it being
00:36:25
physic somebody physically pulling and parking it and so when you have a witness at one scene and surveillance
00:36:31
footage at two other scenes it's very likely that detectives were working this for a while under the impression that we
00:36:38
are going to solve this soon and we need to keep a lot of this stuff close to the
00:36:42
vest because we are going to find ourselves sitting across the table very soon from the guy or guys that did this
00:36:51
and we need everything in our Arsenal to get them to confess or to later get them
00:36:55
convicted in the court of law this this situation of course is very troubling to
00:37:00
all I understand the frustrations and the disappointment of with the family Sorry by the family with this
00:37:08
investigation I do still feel like that there's this one could be solved very soon I think there's a chance that
00:37:16
there's a lot going on here and that they're closer to solving this than we know to stay on to this uh cut Joo young
00:37:24
ass hat yeah in November of 2020 3 he's arrested again this is in a Tempe Arizona this is the police department
00:37:34
there in Tempe they're running this narcotics operation he's picked up and arrested in this narcotics operation
00:37:41
he's accused of facilitating a large scale drug transaction involving around 40,000 pills that's a four with four
00:37:50
zeros after it 40,000 pills containing fentanyl this is according to court documents records show 11 codefendants
00:37:58
have been charged in that particular case some of them have agreed to plea deals cut Joo young has not so he's
00:38:06
facing a long list of charges including this criminal Enterprise money laundering transporting drugs for sale
00:38:15
uh conspiracy and we know that he's also facing those robbery charges armed robbery charges in July of this year of
00:38:24
2024 his robbery case it's supposed to go to trial well it gets pushed back to October unfortunately one big thing
00:38:34
that's going to be missing from the robbery trial is Mercedes Vega she picked him out of the photo lineup she's
00:38:42
no longer around to Aid in the prosecution of this guy and God bless her parents because they say you know
00:38:49
what if if this guy whenever he's in court we're going to be in court too representing our daughter honoring our
00:38:56
daughter making sure he knows there are so many people that want to see him where he deserves to be whether he
00:39:04
killed our daughter or not he deserves to be behind bars and punished for the crime these other crimes but doesn't
00:39:11
that isn't that what this crime feels like it feels like somebody that thinks they're a badass gangster and because
00:39:22
it's not just probably not just one individual but two individuals oh we're gonna move her car and then we're gonna
00:39:29
we're gonna kill her and we're gonna set set the car on fire we're probably steal
00:39:34
this other car from this lot and there's so many crimes that are taking place here plus the robberies and what
00:39:41
concerns me and what makes me believe and suspect that that he's good for this or involved in it again it's the the
00:39:50
what you and I agree is the suspected age of the perpetrator of the abduction and homicide yeah the and this is you
00:39:58
know Wann toe gangster whatever I don't know this cat and and and don't want to know him and I have no interest in even
00:40:04
talking with him but I what I can say is based off of his rap sheet and his name
00:40:10
constantly being in news articles this dude is what I would Define as a career criminal and these types rarely talk
00:40:20
they rarely rat on another and they're usually if if they're out walking around they're committing crimes real pieces of
00:40:28
[ __ ] yes and I that's who I think that this guy is does it mean that he murdered her we can't say with a great
00:40:34
level of certainty but I but if police haven't been able to move on from him it's also not it's wouldn't be out of
00:40:42
the realm of possibility that somebody he knows or is associated with was involved I I see a situation here
00:40:50
Captain where I think more than one person was involved in the abduction and murder and I see a situation where I
00:40:57
think it was likely that more than one person was involved in those robberies is that complete coincidence could be it
00:41:04
also could not be a coincidence at all now this guy you know he reminds me of uh of somebody that we spoke about
00:41:13
before and one of the criminals that that you and I loved to hate uh the one that thought he was some kind of
00:41:21
talented rapper from inside of the jail yeah but uh and so October 15th this this is where you
00:41:30
get frustrated not frustrated with law enforcement frustrated with this guy with the cudjo young in October this is
00:41:38
October 15 2024 so just a couple weeks ago we have Mercedes VGA her family her parents they're back in court because
00:41:47
they still don't know who killed their 22-year-old daughter but they're in court for a different case they're in
00:41:52
court again for robbery charges and for for charges that cut Joe Young faces he is playing the system he is playing the
00:42:03
system you know what he keeps doing he keeps firing his attorney so that his trials will keep getting pushed back and
00:42:10
pushed back and pushed back so once again in October he because he he he changed his they're saying changed his
00:42:18
attorney the trial has once again been pushed back he's currently being held without bond on several drug charges and
00:42:27
has been since November of 2023 so at least he's not out and walking the streets but he's playing the system and
00:42:36
he's he's using every card that he has up his sleeve to delay what I think will be his eventual his inevitable
00:42:45
conviction in at least one of these cases there is a statement and I want to be clear here I don't know who this is
00:42:52
coming from I don't know if this is coming from the family or from law enforcement again the Maricopa County
00:42:59
Sheriff's office has not been an open book regarding this homicide investigation or or their findings thus
00:43:07
far so I I don't I I don't suspect that this is coming from them but it came from somewhere there is a statement out
00:43:16
there in reports and in stories that say that she was attacked and taken by at least two people she was hit over the
00:43:24
head shot in the arm and eventually left in a vehicle so there's no nice way but
00:43:31
somebody took an accelerant lighter fluid and put it on her head and hands and that's where the fire started and
00:43:37
unfortunately that information seems to be true because based off of the eyewitness's statement when he's calling
00:43:43
911 he's what is he saying again he's saying that he's seeing he can see a flame or Flames coming from inside the
00:43:50
vehicle but again the statement I don't know where it comes from but what's interesting about it to me and and
00:43:57
and I believe to everybody would be the statement of taken by at least two people is that speculative or is that
00:44:04
something that they can they know from the surveillance footage or is that something they know by the the physical
00:44:11
evidence at the scene or scenes what we do know this is this that moving these vehicles much easier to do with two
00:44:18
people and in both cases we have two vehicles we have we have the Salvage tidal vehicle that was moved at least
00:44:25
twice right off of the lot and then placed at the where it was found in Flames we don't know if it was used to
00:44:35
abduct Mercedes we don't know if her vehicle was used to transport her out of the parking garage I mean we have the
00:44:43
situation with all this movement with the vehicles and with the blitz attack on our victim I don't know it just seems
00:44:53
a lot easier for two people to to have carried this out than one and you have to wonder is it retaliation right there
00:45:00
are people that have suggested that the bleach in the throat may may be more of to send a message to somebody I I don't
00:45:09
know that I agree with that 100% I don't think it's a bad assessment or specul speculation I think that I truly think
00:45:18
that the setting of the fire the purpose of that was to destroy and burn everything and that if you were trying
00:45:27
to send a message to someone else beyond the victim well what kind of message are
00:45:34
you actually sending if all of that evidence and all of that information is destroyed which the fire would imply
00:45:41
that you were attempting to do so yeah I unfortunately and I hate to say this out
00:45:47
loud because there's going to be people that know and love and care for our victim I I think that that was just a
00:45:52
way to punish her in the moment this is clearly whoever did this I think there's
00:45:58
a direct connection between the suspect between the perpetrator and the victim and I think that somebody in that moment
00:46:06
for and thankfully it was a very short period of time wanted to hurt harm and and and torture this poor young woman
00:46:14
yeah if I'm investigating this crime like you said she was attacked before but to me that
00:46:19
feels like a robbery doesn't feel but it's a difficult case and again we don't know how much they're holding
00:46:27
back this is just a little over a year old as far as the case goes and you you got three difficult crime scenes yeah
00:46:37
one crime scene that was set on fire the other one was the parking garage which hey glad that we have surveillance
00:46:46
footage and then the abandoned car but they could have a lot on this individual and well the the more crimes scenes in
00:46:57
the more known crime scenes so these these are not just unknown like we have plenty of cases that we've reviewed
00:47:03
where we know that there are additional crime scenes we just don't know the location of them and here we know the
00:47:09
locations of of the multiple crime scenes so that in itself would be would lend itself to the idea that the more
00:47:17
crime scenes the more evidence and therefore you're I think you're right I think you're spoton
00:47:23
Captain I think they have something they have stuff here they have meat on the bone and what what can they do with it
00:47:32
it's very difficult to say at this time this case is still relatively new it appears that they're working it very
00:47:39
good I hope and it it appears that they have more information than what has been
00:47:44
released to the public we should I do want to point out a couple things too before we wrap here her vehicle remember
00:47:51
her vehicle one of those crime scenes is where her vehicle was found that was the
00:47:55
parking lot of a business called The Culinary Dropout this is near Mill Avenue and Fifth Street and the report
00:48:04
is I've never been to this Culinary Dropout but the report here from the locals is her vehicle is found behind
00:48:12
one of the most popular restaurants in that area her vehicle was a white 2019 Dodge Charger with the license plate Luv
00:48:23
love 333 this is is near ASU Campus and again we have that statement I and I I hate to keep throwing that out
00:48:36
there because we don't know where it came from but a statement of she was attacked and taken by at least two
00:48:43
people and if that's the case you hope that that police can get an advantage point at some point where they can
00:48:52
leverage something to get person a to turn on person B and that might just be the only thing that
00:48:59
remains in this investigation for them hopeful hopefully they've honed in on on who's responsible or they have a a small
00:49:07
pool of people and they know that someone someone's inside of that pool of people are responsible for this murder
00:49:15
make no doubt about it make no mistake about it the these are very very dangerous people for obvious reasons in
00:49:22
the murder of Mercedes Vega but even beyond that the these armed robberies are whether they were committed by the
00:49:29
same people or not are very very dangerous people this this cartel for a lack of better word uh a conspiracy of
00:49:39
11 12 people to move 40,000 pills of fentol are very very dangerous people this this situation does not get any
00:49:49
more serious than this I do want to include this information from the family that says this is the family talking
00:49:57
here Captain we aim to keep Mercedes Vega story alive in the media and ask that all of you continue to share her
00:50:05
story share this True Crime Story repost her story on social media if you have information on her murder and you are
00:50:14
afraid because again we're talking about dangerous people dangerous Circles of people if you're afraid of these people
00:50:22
and you have information about her murder her Abduction the vehicle information any anything that could help
00:50:27
police help out this poor family there are ways for you to come forward and and not and these people
00:50:34
don't have to know that it was you there is a reward for information leading to the arrest of the person's responsible
00:50:41
you do not have to give your name if you have any information regarding this case
00:50:47
you may contact Silent Witness we've talked about them before in other cases and they've had great success great
00:50:54
successes helping solve these cases in some cases many years after they occurred yeah they should change their
00:51:01
motto silent but deadly Silent Witness you can contact them at 480 witness wi t n SS that's
00:51:13
480948 6377 or for Spanish speaking you can call 48 t s g o you can also leave an
00:51:26
anonymous tip on the Silent Witness website at [Music] H wait for me wait for [Music]
00:52:10
me want to thank everybody for joining us here in the garage thanks for telling your mother thanks for telling your
00:52:17
brother Colonel do we have any recommended reading thank you Captain this week we are recommending the Leon
00:52:23
shootings and All-American Tragedy by Robert Conlin this is available in all forms kle audiobook with Audible and of
00:52:31
course hard and paperbacks October 25th 2023 was supposed to be an ordinary day ordinary night in Lewiston Lewiston is a
00:52:41
small workingclass city of about 37,000 people in Central Maine friends and family gathered to do things that they
00:52:49
loved when Terror was Unleashed at the local bowling alley and a popular sports bar and restaurant we had a deeply
00:52:57
paranoid Army reserve soldier who walked into both locations with a high-powered
00:53:02
rifle open fire and then he fled and this all took place in the great state of Maine a state that the FBI had just
00:53:10
months before named the safest state in America and one of the tragedies within a multitude of tragedies here is that
00:53:20
there were numerous red flags raised in the months before the attacks read or listen to to the Leon shootings and
00:53:28
All-American Tragedy by Robert Conlin you can find that recommendation and many more on our website's recommended
00:53:35
page at true Crim garage.com and until next week be good be kind and don't litter
00:53:51
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