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[Music] [Applause] [Music] welcome to true crammed garage wherever you are whatever you are doing thanks
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business everybody gather round grab a chair grab a beer let's talk some true crime
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[Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] tonight new information on the death of a local cyclist who went missing last
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Thursday in the Palmer Lake area Paso County sheriff's investigators have upgraded the death of Tim Watkins to a
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homicide and they just told News 5 he was shot to death his body found Sunday in the very place where he loved to ride
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a lot of questions unanswered tonight so we turn to News 5s Lena Holland live in
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Palmer Lake what have you learned Lena in the heart of Palmer Lake this news has everyone on edge here tonight with a
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strong warning from the Sheriff's Office to remain vigilant it's a small town it's you know you feel
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safe in a town like this that's why people move here that feeling of safety in the for distance for neighbors like
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David Tenace who has lived here in the Palmer Lake area for four years now a little bit scary just to think about if
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somebody would ambush you or you know who knows what could happen and the kids you know just playing in the
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neighborhood in general with that's that's scary to know the body of his friendly and well known neighbor 60 year
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old Tim Watkins was found by a civilian in the Mount Hermon area on Sunday morning search and rescue crews had
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found his shoe and bike nearby the day before but the search was called off when the Sun went down today though this
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death investigation upgraded to a homicide it was very surprising especially for an area like this where
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everybody walks around and kids bike around all the time and we've never really had to worry about something like
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this before now 12 year old Amelia - niece has taken a break from her bike and a break from being outside now me
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and my friends are too afraid to go on bike rides anymore because since nobody was found yet it's really scary I just
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think it's really sad and heartbreaking to hear that because that doesn't happen
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up here often at all Watkins body was found in a popular recreation area used by a lot of
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people our family goes up there with our dog and we take hikes and it's a beautiful area and our our school does
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cross-country runs up there so the kids are up there it's a it's a great trail but sad to know that that could be a
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possibility of what happened up there with no suspects right now the sheriff's office is asking the community to remain
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on higher alert if they see anything out of the ordinary to please give the sheriff's office a call no tip is too
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small even if you think it is irrelevant please let us decide that again the sheriff's office says vigilance is key
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here if you see anything suspicious or out of the ordinary in your neighborhood you are asked to contact them right away
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again there is no suspect information at this time for now watching out for you in palmer lake lena howland news 5
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Lena thanks and Friends of his turn down at the Red Rocks open-space tonight for
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a final ride for Tim as they called it a mechanic by trade but described by his friends the great guy vibrant
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personality someone who would do anything for you and one of his closest friends recalled for us the last
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conversation he had with Tim we were planning to do a ride one of his favorite rides it's called the airplane
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ride and actually rides up Limbaugh Canyon towards a old wrecked airplane and unfortunately we never made that
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happen and just kind of reminded me when make plans with someone that's important
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do it while you can our thoughts with Tim's family and friends tonight during this difficult time we will continue to
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track the investigation bring you updates on air and online at koat.com this week we are discussing an unsolved
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case and we will be talking about a man named Tim Watkins now each week we take on a new case and in doing so
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essentially we are taking a glimpse into someone's life their family's lives as well as friends in the community this
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week when looking into Tim Watkins life and learning about him I learned had I lived in that area in Palmer Lake
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Colorado I feel like Tim would have been a guy that I would have liked and found
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quite interesting I'm always intrigued by people that are pretty hardcore into their hobbies yeah and Tim was 60 but he
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did not look 60 at all he looked easily in his 40s yes and extremely physically fit mm-hmm now the day in question
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it was a warm Thursday morning in September when Tim Watkins as you said aged 60 he sets out on his regular ride
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in Palmer Lake Colorado Palmer Lake and its nearby town of monument are about 20
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miles outside of Colorado Springs it's a conservative military oriented city that
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is home to a US Air Force Academy to say that Tim was a experienced mountain biker is like saying Tom Brady played a
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little football yeah yeah Tim's life was mountain biking at one time Tim owned and operated a well-known bike shop in
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the area and he actually helped to create and maintain the bike trail network that carved through the rugged
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hilly terrain of Mount Hermon connecting monument Palmer Lake and the surrounding
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woodlands and canyons Tim and his buddies even felled trees to create makeshift bike bridges over monument
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Creek Tim was the person responsible for drawing the most popular map of the bike
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trail network and some trails bore his name Tim and his wife lived just a few blocks from the trail network that
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crisscross Pike and San Isabel national force on this day Tim set out up the steady ascending mount hermon Road which
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is not a paved highway but an unpaved two-lane track now we know which way he went because at some point on
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Herman rode in the hills above monument Tim's phone but dialed a friend and Tim had to stop his ride and say hello this
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is the last known conversation anyone had with Tim Watkins so who is Tim Watkins well Tim was born on November
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17th 1956 and Fort Collins Colorado and moved to Palmer Lake when he was very young
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as a kid he raced around his hometown on his dad's black relay three-speed at college he earned a degree in education
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afterward he worked in the ski patrol Tim loved adventure he loved everything outdoors he spent a lot of time learning
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survival skills hunting and fishing most of these skills he learned from his father Virgil Tim and his first wife had
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two kids together and they they had their kids when they were quite young Arielle and Isaac were very close to
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their father even though Tim and his first wife divorced back in 1993 Tim started his bike shop balanced rock bike
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and ski in Monument around the year 2000 with his second wife and he ran it for several years but he was a bike guy not
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a businessman so the shop eventually closed in Tim and his wife divorce Tim's income from that point on was comprised
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of money he made working and other bike shops in the area and he worked for a time for the school district with
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special-needs children Tim knew his third wife ginger who was 10 years younger than him since they were kids
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growing up in Palmer Lake but Tim didn't pay any attention to her until much later when as an adult
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ginger walked into a bike shop he was working in with a Colorado Bilt performance bike called a Yeti yeah Tim
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and ginger are gonna get married in 2015 together they loved a camp bike and ski
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Tim was a tall lanky curly-haired redhead he was known for being a great caring friendly guy he had a naughty
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sense of humor and he loved to have fun now Tim was in a very bad accident in 1987 that left his feet and ankle
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mangled this meant he no longer could run or hike so biking became an outlet for his
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energy and turned into his passion tim was very involved in his church and had an affinity for Native American
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traditions and rituals and he loved to work with leather and beads and make jewelry and other art work for his
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friends Tim lived outside as much as possible he would often sleep in tents I mean this guy really did as much as he
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could in the great outdoors yeah if you have any outdoorsy friend of yours this is kinda how they they operate I had a
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buddy one time that stayed in a teepee for a whole week because he thought it would be a little more fun than staying
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in the cabin in September of 2017 Tim and ginger were having some problems they loved each other but Tim's lack of
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steady income caused tension in the marriage so we have Tim who seems to always be chin deep in something that he
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loves mountain biking but then you have his wife ginger who is working six days a week and putting in long hours each
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day as a medical imaging technician rail in recent weeks she told Tim that she needed a break and
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she actually asked him to move out for a while Tim took to sleeping in his car various trail heads and living in a tent
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Tim at some point told his son Isaac that he was very depressed and that if it weren't for his kids he might
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contemplate suicide Tim was also suffering from memory loss that was getting worse and worse and this was
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very frustrating for him for those of you who've watched season three of True detective you know what we're talking
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about here on the day before he disappeared Tim asked ginger if he could come home see the next day was her
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birthday and he wanted to spend that day with her ginger said yes and he spent the night at the couple's house the two
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made plans to celebrate their upcoming anniversary which I believe was just a few days after her birthday the next
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morning Thursday September 14th ginger left for work and Tim set out we believe around
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10:30 a.m. on a bike ride he had the single phone conversation around 11 a.m. with the friend that he accidentally
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called and after that no one heard from him now ginger returned from work around
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8:30 p.m. expecting a small birthday celebration with her husband she noticed that Tim and his bike were gone but his
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car was in the driveway now knowing that Tim would not be he still wouldn't be riding at this time because he had a
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notoriously bad night vision right so she texts him but she gets no response assuming he was with his either his
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parents or his son ginger fell asleep you know mind you she's just put in a very long day at
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work right she woke up at 6:00 a.m. the next morning to find that Tim was still unheard from after sending yet another
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unanswered text she left for work around 10:00 a.m. she called the old town bike
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shop in Colorado Springs to see if Tim had showed up for work he had not ginger knew that this was extremely unlike Tim
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a few hours later Isaac Watkins called asking if she knew where his dad was now ginger began to be very worried at this
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point mm-hmm she called the Palmer Lake Police Department but was told by Chief Jason
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Vanderpol that Tim's disappearance didn't rise to the criteria for a missing-persons report until Saturday
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after 48 hours had elapsed right oh grown man goes off on his own and he's riding his bike we don't know where he's
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gone maybe he wanted it to be missing yeah and you know what if if the police chief is getting the full story when she
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calls in panicking saying hey I haven't seen my husband in quite some time right
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if he knows that the marriage was having some issues mm-hmm and also if he knows
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that Tim is an outdoor guy who has been known especially in the past few weeks to sleep in his car or sleep in a tent
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this is not really going to I have to agree with the chief here this doesn't really rise to the criteria of
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we should panic and this is a missing person but the red flag for me would be the memory loss yes and and very trend
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but if that is not played heavily on to the chief then was he supposed to do right well ginger and Isaac they were
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not going to stop looking for their you know gingers husband and Isaac's father and actually Isaac began searching the
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hills above Palmer Lake this is where he thought his father had likely gone by himself
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Isaac worried that his father may have actually carried through on his thoughts of suicide remember they had this
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conversation at some point on Saturday ginger made a public plea on Facebook to help find Tim pretty much everyone in
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the area and certainly everyone even remotely connected to the biking community they knew and they liked him
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so 60 people gathered at the palmer lake town hall and organized grid searches among the network of trails from there
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11 private search party set out fanning out over several square miles of forest and around 2:00 p.m. one of the
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searchers is going to find this shoe yeah this is near the entrance to the popular limbaugh trail which leads into
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Limbaugh Canyon one of Tim's favorite places to ride in a trail that he helped construct the shoe was found on the side
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of Mount Hermon Road near a beer can and it was Tim's size the shoe found was a size 42 pearl Azumi bike shoe and I
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apologize to the bike enthusiast if I mispronounced that that brand name it's the kind of shoe that clips into the
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bike pedals yeah so for those who don't know these are special shoes designed to
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help the rider rotate the pedals more efficiently while the shoes fastened to the pedals they aren't designed for
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actual walking no these would be very difficult to walk in but what I could find definitively was that for Tim its
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belief for Tim who had disfigured feet because of the accident and walking in the shoe would have been
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preferable to attempting to walk or run in his bare feet okay so finding this shoe is is not a great sign later other
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volunteers spotted some items scattered up near Mount Hermon Road about a half mile northwest from the shoe these were
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some of the contents of Tim's wallet specifically his Safeway card some of his other cards and his cell phone case
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these were found past Lamballe trailhead heading away from palmer lake then another team spotted Tim's bike off a
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trail this titanium bike was specifically designed for Tim by his longtime friend Jeff Tessier right but a
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lot of people that are really deep into this hobby will have a custom bike just for themselves yes and this one was
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unique as it was custom-built for Tim Watkins it was immediately recognizable to those who knew Tim so I mean the
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people that knew him immediately they spot the bike and they're like that's Tim's bike there's no question and this
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would have raised alarms big-time if anyone else would have been spotted riding this bike or attempting to sell
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it at any point the bike was located it was about a quarter mile north of where the Lamballe Canyon Trail breaks off
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from mount hermon Road 50 feet uphill from the Forest Service trail this is not an area that is accessible to cars
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the bike didn't provide any answers though it was laid down on its side next to a tree now it could have been placed
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there or it could have fallen there but the bike did have a flat tire and the gearing suggested that Tim was going
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downhill when he stopped riding the bike after the bike was located law enforcement began searching for Tim the
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assumption was that Tim was injured somewhere possibly due to a bike accident or even an animal attack in
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fact Tim once had a very close run-in with a mountain lion and there are bears in this area
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El Paso County Search and Rescue used bloodhounds to comb the area for Tim sent a local group of drone operators
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pitched in providing aerial footage through Saturday night searchers and volunteers found nothing else so well
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over 48 hours since anyone his last seen or spoke to Tim well I mean you're actually over the 60 hour mark by this
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point lame and now we have found tim's bike and a lot of his belongings but still no Tim yeah not good the next day
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on Sunday around 11:45 a.m. Tim was found dead they found the body not 50 feet from where his bike was found and
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40 yards west of the mouth of the Limbaugh Canyon Trail initially searchers missed finding him they were
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in that area Tim's body was found lying in a shallow four foot by three foot old
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mineral prospectors hole and his body was kind of covered up with branches and leaves Tim's body was deliberately
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obscured one of the searchers said quote on so what you're saying is 50 yards from his bike where they're searching
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mm-hmm they find Tim basically in a hole hmm a nature-made hole but covered up well a prospectors hole okay so a
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mineral prospectors hole this is a shallow hole that that somebody would have used to try to find something you
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know some type of mineral maybe be it gold or any other type of mineral right so he's he's in this hole but it looks
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like somebody covered him up he wasn't covered up just by the elements no cuz the way that this is stated is he's
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covered with branches and leaves and the people that were there at the scene they
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state that he was deliberately obscured that it wasn't like these branches and leaves just happened to fall on top of
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him it looked like somebody had placed them there and one of the searchers said in regards to where Tim was found he
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said quote literally we could have walked on top of Tim yes today that's how close we were to where
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his body was so when they say deliberately obscured these people I mean they're outside looking for some of
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them are friends with Tim they're outside looking for their friend he must have been covered up pretty well know is
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what I'm guessing so we talked about Tim's items and belongings that were found by searchers now let's talk about
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what items of Tim's that were not found and this was Tim's hydration pack his jacket his helmet his phone and his
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socks in one of his shoes remember only one shoe was found we don't know about the cycling gloves and I threw this in
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here because based off of photos that I could find it seems like Tim usually wore gloves and that seems to be a
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pretty common thing right but none of the articles ever mentioned whether the gloves were found or not found right
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Tim's backpack was still on him containing a single banana it's actually believed that that would lead to some
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kind of indication of leading you to to a better timeframe of whatever happened when it happened
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because he would he would have stopped for a snack at some point on this trip but he did not as it was found still in
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his backpack now the area where his body lay was wooded hard to get to and had no
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cell service so how did Tim die at first police did not publicly reveal the cause
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of death leaving the townspeople to speculate and leading to rumours and gossips spreading stories circulated
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about animal attacks and car versus bike collisions in fact Tim's autopsy results
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have never been released despite a lawsuit brought by the Colorado Springs Gazette seeking their
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unsealing so we don't know any details as to specific injuries Tim might have sustained but we do know something very
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important Tim Watkins was shot police on the scene discovered that tim's beloved mountain-bike had a
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flat tire it had been shot through by a bullet now CBS's Denver station reported on
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September 19th that Tim had been shot quote several times other news sources stated it was quote multiple times
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outside online magazine reported the following in November of 2018 according to sources familiar with the
00:25:03
investigation Watkins had been shot in three places and buried beneath logs and branches in a shallow depression 40
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yards west of the limb ball cannon trail bullets had grazed his ear and injured his hand the likely fatal shot from a 22
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caliber entered near his ribs and never exited closer examination of his front tire later revealed that it had also
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been shot Watkins is the first mountain biker known to have been murdered during
00:25:35
a ride and again that's from outside online magazine yeah which raises even more questions
00:25:41
additionally there was a long story in The Gazette about the case where they interviewed a friend of Tim's who
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observed his body and describes it as quote pockmarked with bullet holes but the El Paso County Sheriff has never
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confirmed the number of bullet holes or that a 22 was used by the bullet that went into Tim's torso was removed and
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examined for potential ballistics matches but it was determined that the bullet was too mangled to be usable for
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these type of tests and of course since the shooting occurred in the great outdoors it's it was difficult if not
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impossible for investigators to find any shell casings now if they did find any casings they aren't telling us but what
00:26:27
investigators saw the shot out bike tire the bullet-ridden body hidden in a depression and covered with foliage was
00:26:35
enough for Tim Watkins death to be declared a homicide the hiking biking camping and generally outdoorsy
00:26:42
community around Mount Hermon was shocked and terrified by the news that one of their own had been mowed down
00:26:48
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during checkout for $20 off a suitcase all right we're back cheers mate Cheers captain it's very important in this case
00:31:22
to discuss the location of where Tim's body was found and the the setting in general so Mount Hermon is on the
00:31:31
outskirts of Colorado Springs it's a very big hunting and gun community most people in the area own guns an open-air
00:31:40
sport shooting at makeshift ranges was rampant and completely unregulated as a result bullets were whizzing around in
00:31:48
the air and public recreation spaces locals voiced concern that accidental shootings were inevitable in this kind
00:31:56
of situation Tim and his son like many in the area had first-hand experiences with this for example
00:32:05
about 10 years before Tim was killed Tim and Isaac were backpacking and suddenly
00:32:10
bullets whistled by Isaac's head and ricocheted off of a boulder near misses like this were fairly common other
00:32:19
mountain bikers told stories of bullets hitting the trail in front of them as they navigated a narrow mountain bike
00:32:25
trail right so then you start wandering in this case is he accidentally hit by a
00:32:32
bullet and then do they try to cover it up or or is he hit where he's injured badly and then they you don't come up
00:32:43
upon him and his life and then try to move him out of the way so he's not found yes pretty interesting well this
00:32:53
is all going to lead to them trying to put an end to some of this just you know people shooting their guns off out in
00:33:01
these these recreation spaces and there's another story that I came across this one's from 2014 when a couple
00:33:09
reported that while they were out picnicking their Jeep was hit with gunfire so stories like this about close
00:33:16
calls with unregulated gunfire they did cause the Forest Service to finally ban recreational shooting in the mount
00:33:23
hermon area this took place later in 2014 the band cited weekly complaints of bullets barely missing people and 911
00:33:34
reports of trail users being pinned down by gunfire according to outside online magazine
00:33:41
within days of the band's implementation signs announcing it was announcing the ban were peppered by gunfire likely from
00:33:51
protesting shooters right within weeks Forest Service personnel issued about 80 warnings to people found
00:33:58
shooting in defiance of the band yeah this isn't this is strange to me because anybody that I know that owns a gun
00:34:06
they're very responsible with their guns mm-hmm and there would not be shooting in areas that somebody could
00:34:13
accidentally hit well while some in the area say that the band did cut down on random shooting others say it largely
00:34:21
went unheeded and unenforced one state senator who was a friend of Tim's describes a biking with his sons and
00:34:29
seeing a dad and his kids shooting right at a no shooting sign and menacing him and his sons when he reminded them of
00:34:39
the ban and in 2015 a 60 year old grandfather named Glenn Martin was killed by an errant bullet while camping
00:34:48
with his family roughly 20 miles from where Watkins was shot Martin's killer has never been found Tim's friends and
00:34:57
family say that while he was not confrontational and was always friendly he often stopped and asked people firing
00:35:03
their guns to be more cautious warning them that they that you know they're biking and their hiking trails in their
00:35:11
bullets range one riding partner a friend of Tim's said quote I witnessed him with a shooter multiple times he was
00:35:19
very friendly he wrote up and said hey guys I'm not against shooting or anything but I just want to let you know
00:35:25
that there's a trail right down below where your bullets are going usually according to this person that say oh
00:35:34
okay I didn't realize there's a trail down there and we'll make sure that we're shooting into a backstop
00:35:40
right one of Tim's favorite spots who biked to on his mountain biking excursions is called shooters alley
00:35:48
which is a popular popular shooting site dotted with shot up tattered stuffed animals
00:35:54
shredded trees and what's left of paper targets from shooters alley a mountain bike trail leads downhill into a 4-way
00:36:04
trail intersection with trails 7:15 this is near where Tim's body was found so while Tim had no known enemies his
00:36:12
family believed it is possible that Tim had approached the wrong person with his
00:36:17
simple request to stop shooting and then had been shot the fact that Tim was shot
00:36:22
at least three times according to media reports anyway and his bike tire also shot this ruled out an accidental
00:36:31
shooting in the minds of most people right like you said it could have been accidental in the beginning but that's
00:36:37
not how it ended right there were other dangers in the woods of mount hermon other than haphazard shooting Colorado
00:36:44
legalized marijuana in 2012 and I mean whether it's a direct result or coincidentally the number of homeless
00:36:52
transient and drifters who descended on the unsettled areas of the state skyrocketed news articles started to
00:37:00
crop up about the homeless and transient drifter problem doubling to quadrupling
00:37:06
as the outside online magazine described the setting mount hermon had long been known for its backcountry conflicts
00:37:13
bullets whizzed over makeshift shooting ranges reports of drinking and drug use were common creating a sense of menace
00:37:20
as drivers whipped around blind curves even if the sound of gunshots have quieted the sight of homeless camps have
00:37:28
created their own tension mountain bikers complain of abandoned camps resembling landfills and of eroding
00:37:36
sense of safety as the area's homeless population grows some say enforcement of the Forest Service's ban on living in
00:37:44
national forest land is lacking as is ticketing for campers who remain in one place longer than two weeks
00:37:51
so Tim was all - aware of the destruction caused by these illegal activities he was one of
00:37:59
the people who took it upon themselves to clean up the broken TVs old couches and other trash left behind by the
00:38:06
homeless who lived in the campsites illegally and human waste was a problem as well as these camps were not often
00:38:15
near sanitary facilities and often these homeless encampments would be littered with used needles Tim's family said that
00:38:24
Tim was not one to take violations of the law dangerous behavior and destroying of he's his beloved natural
00:38:31
environment lightly yeah if he saw cars driving recklessly close to cyclist on mount hermon Road he'd be likely to flip
00:38:40
them the bird or shout something he probably would have said something to campers or homeless who were littering
00:38:46
right so now we have the idea that possibly you get an accidental shooting that then becomes not accidental or the
00:38:55
idea that that somebody is shooting onto a trail and Tim stops and says hey guys
00:39:00
don't shoot on this trail and then it turns bad we have this other layer of somebody squatting in that area doing
00:39:08
something strange and he stops to tell them not to do that yeah yeah well and there's this very strange twist to the
00:39:18
Tim Watkins case several searchers volunteering in the hunt for Tim Watkins noticed a beat-up red car with Indiana
00:39:26
plates slowly and repeatedly driving past various search areas along mount hermon Road as if the driver was there
00:39:34
to take a closer look or to see what's going on right one of the searchers snapped a photo of the red sedan driving
00:39:41
past the tournelle at Lynn ball Canyon near where Tim's body was ultimately found the searcher said he became
00:39:50
suspicious when the car drove by more than once one also a little more suspicious because like you said as
00:39:56
Indiana license plates and they're in Colorado well they quickly forgot about the
00:40:02
incident this being in the wake of finding and discovering Tim's body within days reports circulated that a
00:40:10
man was threatening people with a hatchet on the trails near where Tim was found on September 25th police and
00:40:18
Woodland Park which is 20 miles down Mount Hermon Road from monument announced an arrest of a transient
00:40:26
police spotted a vehicle the vehicle that we just discussed which matched the description of the one driven by the
00:40:34
hatchet man they saw this vehicle in an Arby's parking lot they waited to see who got into the car and then pulled the
00:40:42
car over for expired Indiana plates and a broken taillight driving the red Chevy
00:40:48
Prizm was a 31 year old man named Daniel Nations they arrested him for quote unrelated weapons charges but Mount
00:40:58
Hermon residents took notice when the sheriff's office also charged nations with felony menacing according to the
00:41:05
arrest affidavit nations accosted and threatened a passing dirt biker with a hatchet at his campsite on mount hermon
00:41:13
road after placing logs in the road that forced the rider to stop nations blocked
00:41:19
off the road with logs seized to hatch it and brandished it at the dirt bike rider saying his bike was too loud
00:41:26
the rider turned around and sped away and reported the incident officers searched Nations car and found a hatchet
00:41:34
and a 22 caliber rifle possibly the same caliber bullet that killed Tim Watkins although this has never been confirmed
00:41:41
by law enforcement right in addition to these formal charges it seems that there
00:41:47
were several other reports of threatened violence and menacing against Daniel nations for example
00:41:53
detective Jason Derbyshire of El Paso County Sheriff's Office told outside online magazine the nation's acted
00:42:02
aggressively during a road rage incident in Monument around the same time nations
00:42:08
got out of his vehicle confronted another driver and ended up kicking and breaking their windshield they added
00:42:14
that the incident escalated very quickly in addition the media reported that several complaints had been filed about
00:42:21
man menacing mountain bikers with a hatchet one friend of Tim's posted on a mountain biking forum that his son and
00:42:30
some of his mountain biking buddies encountered a beat-up red four-door sedan in the road that drove off the
00:42:37
road into the bushes and when they stopped to see if the driver was ok he came out at them with a hatchet they
00:42:46
reported the incident to the sheriff now nation's wife and two young children were with him at the time of his arrest
00:42:54
and a background check on nations revealed that he had a criminal background including felony convictions
00:43:00
for domestic battery in front of a child and a sexual offense both in Morgan County Indiana nation's also has
00:43:10
convictions for indecent exposure and had habitual drunk driving in South Carolina
00:43:16
no the report also notes that Nations was charged multiple times with domestic violence because of his felony history
00:43:24
nations cannot legally own a firearm but he seems to be in possession of one I mean this is there's so many red flags
00:43:32
here not to mention that he's waving a hatchet around two bikers on a bike path mm-hmm
00:43:38
so police also charged him with felony possession of a firearm and since the threats against hikers and bikers took
00:43:44
place in El Paso County police they are charged him with felony menacing reckless endangerment assault and
00:43:51
trespassing finally on October 10th final charges on suspicion of failing to register as a sex offender were filed
00:43:59
against Daniel nations well I mean he's checking a lot of boxes so one we have this guy that obviously something's
00:44:07
wrong with him mentally we have something happening with him as far as being a sex offender he's from Indiana
00:44:16
he is attacking people on these hiking trails in the nature or threatening to attack people right but I mean look if
00:44:25
you set up logs so somebody has to stop so you can't confront them that's we're getting dangerous here mm-hmm he has a
00:44:33
gun on him this guy has a history and we have a case that's happening back in Indiana
00:44:41
with two dead girls and he kind of looks like the composite drawing hmm yeah that's what's weird about this
00:44:51
portion of the Watkins case because initially when Nations has picked up he's actually picked up on possible
00:44:59
suspicions of some kind of involvement in the Tim Watkins murder case and then that quickly leads to the suspicion that
00:45:08
he could be could have been involved in another much more prominent case as you know his mugshot is circulated from
00:45:15
being picked up in Colorado and then in the minds of many who see his mug shot say that he resembled a wanted suspect
00:45:22
and resembled the composite sketch from the unsolved double homicide case known as the Delphi murders case in Indiana
00:45:31
now nations recently lived in India and of course we covered the February 2017 Delphi murders case back in May of 2017
00:45:43
and episodes 110 and 111 it seems so far ago it does seem a very long time ago so
00:45:51
what do we know that could possibly tie Daniel nations to that of the Delphi murders right the murders of two young
00:46:00
girls Libby and Abby so for one thing it's his last known address in Indiana it is not far from where the girls were
00:46:08
found about 60 miles the girls were taken on a trail used for hiking and biking similar to the case with Tim
00:46:16
Watkins and the people nations threatened with his hatchet Libby and Abby and Tim were all found in
00:46:23
relatively inaccessible areas located off trails the creek ravine for the girls and the canyon for Tim now the
00:46:31
cause of death in Liberty Jermaine's and Abigail Williams's case has never been officially released we don't know if
00:46:39
they were shot or whether a hatchet might have been involved but whatever it is or whatever it was in combination
00:46:48
with the mug shot composite similarities of Daniel Nations former residents in Indiana and
00:46:54
a criminal history it was enough to make investigators in the Delphi murders fly
00:46:59
to Colorado to interview Daniel Nations it emerged in the media that Indiana State Police had actually been looking
00:47:07
for nations in connection possibly in connection with the Delphi case starting around July of 2017 when it was noted
00:47:16
that nations had failed to check in as a sex offender in Carroll County for more
00:47:21
than two months so he left for Colorado in May and failed to notify anyone that he was leaving the state of Indiana in
00:47:30
response to all the tips that the Indiana State Police received about Daniel nations based on his mug shot
00:47:36
they released the following statement we are aware of the arrest of the person in
00:47:42
Colorado and are investigating to see if he could be a suspect in the Delphi double murder investigation please keep
00:47:50
in mind the Indiana State Police has received more than a thousand photos of persons alleged to be similar in
00:47:58
appearance to the composite sketch of the Delphi person of interest right each and every one of these tips are
00:48:05
investigated for any potential connection to our case we will give the same attention to the person arrested in
00:48:12
Colorado but right now there is nothing that definitively connects this person to our investigation all right so just
00:48:20
looking at the picture of Daniels I think apposite drawing what's your initial thoughts you know I think the
00:48:30
way that I said this before when we've discussed it on off-the-record is I feel like the close-up mugshot of Daniel
00:48:37
nations does look to me like the composite sketch there are some similarities there however I don't know
00:48:45
that he went in comparison to the the picture of the bridge guy which is ultimately what they're going to use to
00:48:53
form their composite sketch of I think he resembles the sketch but I don't think he resembles the picture of the
00:49:00
bridge guy does that make sense yeah yeah and I would agree I mean it seems like
00:49:04
his build says Daniel wasn't as big of a guy but again it's a picture from snapchat that we don't really know like
00:49:14
it's on a bridge so it's really hard to tell it is this person tall are they short it's really hard to determine but
00:49:22
you know I agree I think the bill doesn't match Daniels yeah and you know what I did come across his physical
00:49:30
description somewhere of Daniel Nations and I'll continue to look through my notes I'm looking to see if I can find
00:49:37
that but right but his mug shot if I remember correctly his mug shot is a little deceiving I actually think he
00:49:45
might be he was a little heavier than I expected right in the weight department but the
00:49:52
the bridge guy now mind you the bridge guy could be wearing multiple layers of clothing and jackets yeah and that's one
00:50:01
thing that's very difficult to discern about the bridge guy is his weight is his build I think it's easier to pick
00:50:09
out his height because you have the you know you have him walking on the bridge you have those rails and that he's
00:50:16
walking on the most difficult thing about this case as far as Delphi case goes is there's so much speculation on
00:50:22
what they have that they have a picture of him that they have more pictures of the suspect that they have audio that
00:50:30
they have maybe video that there's possible DNA and we keep having these guys become suspects and then being
00:50:38
rolled out and you don't know what it's happening with that and we were just talking earlier they had a press
00:50:45
conference where they basically were saying like we don't have much new to share but we want to keep this in the
00:50:52
spotlight and people talking about this and they've had I think over 35 or 38,000 tips yeah that's a lot of tips
00:51:03
yeah that I mean the country really came together I mean not just Indiana super big-time in Indiana but you know you and
00:51:10
I remember when this was going on and as the news was breaking it seemed to go national very quickly after the Delphi
00:51:17
case right and it seemed like everywhere people were were flooding police with these tips
00:51:25
well I'm like you said there was a thousand side-by-side photos that were probably given to law enforcement where
00:51:31
it's hey my neighbor kind of looks like this guy hey there's this registered sex
00:51:35
offender that kind of looks like this guy hey here's a guy that I found on Facebook that kind of looks like this
00:51:40
guy hmm and other than that it was just this guy kind of looks like the drawing but you
00:51:46
have to have more than that what's the criminal history right and it's it's so much that but also the
00:51:53
suspicion here would be you know so many times when we talk about profiles being
00:51:59
released of the suspected offender in a case be it a serial killer be it the one-off murder be it something as
00:52:08
horrible and polarizing as the Delphi murders case they often state that they would believe that there would be a huge
00:52:17
change in behavior by this person and they tell the public keep an eye out for that well in this scenario we have a guy
00:52:28
that fled the whole state of Indiana yeah I mean that wouldn't be outside of the box of what they're what they might
00:52:35
be looking for you know they they reference so many times you might want to question somebody who had recently
00:52:41
sold a vehicle or recently changed certain habits or changed their facial you know their appearance but this guy
00:52:50
he doesn't not look like the composite and he it's known that he fled the state of Indiana just within months after the
00:53:01
murders but and he didn't flee the state and just went into hiding he is now having these acts of violence unto other
00:53:09
people the spokesperson Jackie Kirby with the El Paso County Sheriff's Office admitted
00:53:16
quote many similarities in the Watkins case and the Delphi murders and was not denying a possible connection
00:53:24
she said police in Indiana have requested no further information can be released to the public quote they
00:53:31
have asked us not to speak on their case so I am not at liberty to elaborate on anything that's related to what happened
00:53:39
in Indiana said Kirby the Indiana State Police investigators left Colorado without charging Daniel nations in the
00:53:48
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