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foreign [Music] [Applause] [Applause] welcome to True Crime garage wherever you are whatever you are doing thanks
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for listening I'm your host Nick and with me as always is the man running for mayor of Parts Unknown reminding you to
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get out and Rock the vote he is the captain I will be kissing wives and smacking babies it's good to be seen and
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it's good to see you thanks for listening thanks for telling a friend tonight we are drinking Tuckerman
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tanks for maximum taste and quality and this great pale ale was brought to us by
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these great guys and girls first up we have Ken from Waterloo Ontario Canada and we got Jessica with her Terrible
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filling up the fridge for this week if you want to buy us a around for next week's show go to True Crime garage.com
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and click on the Donate button and like Nick said I'm running for mayor and governor and Senator and president El
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Presidente El Capitan a part of known and if you'd like to be a resident of parts so known go to our website go to
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right now so go to the website and get that done today all right let's get in the garage we're back talking with true
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crime author James Renner and Maggie the beautiful Maggie and the Beautiful art uh the host of Oxygen's The
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Disappearance of Mara Murray all right Captain that's enough of your propaganda and enough of the business everybody
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gather around grab a chair grab a beer let's talk some true crime vote for the captain
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[Music] [Music] one of the things I love about this documentary The Disappearance of Mara
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Murray is the host Maggie and are asking the tough questions they're asking tough
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questions to law enforcement to the family asking tough questions to podcasters to author James Renner and
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one of the things is James from the beginning you've always been kind of suspicious of the family but we don't
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really know how we would act if this happened to us or one of our loved ones now we see that but like I've got two
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kids and if if my daughter went missing um I won a hell of a book oh God no she's a morbid joke yeah right I mean
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not a book I would ever want to write but like I would I 100 I would open the door come in here
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you know look through our family look through our internet search history you know everything you know that you need
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to in order to find this this person this kid right no yeah I I mean we say we don't know how we would act but there
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would be nothing I wouldn't do right well the other question too is um do you know if her bank was open that
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night or that day on that Monday uh well I all I know is she went up to the ATM and she was able to she had like 200
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close to 300 in her account and she took out 280 and people get all like up in a
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tizzy about that detail they're like oh she didn't withdraw all of her money right and you shouldn't say she withdraw
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Drew all of her money because that's untrue well yeah she kept uh 16 in there you're right one I still question
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whether or not Fred gave her the four thousand dollars I mean he claims he didn't but that's a big question you
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know what happened to that four thousand dollars because you know she disappears
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and how much money does it take to disappear and set up a new life well if she only had 280 dollars that's one
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thing but maybe she had 280 plus the four thousand plus her student loan money that
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um that Monday or the the week before that it might have even been that day that Monday she disappeared might have
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been the day that they released the hold on student loan funds um so she could have taken an extra four
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to five thousand dollars on top so now instead of 280 we're dealing with maybe she disappeared with more like ten
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thousand dollars no but where's she getting this money from the student loan money
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um well you get once you get student loans you can apply for a certain amount of money
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um that's over and above your uh you know room and board and I did that in school I lived off of student loans for
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I think you know two years typical author I'm still paying back um so you know I think it's possible
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that that's what she did uh is wait until she could withdraw those funds and they they keep a hold on it until like a
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couple weeks into the semester but do we have a record of her withdrawing those nothings not I mean maybe the police do
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I I've never seen any sort of record it's just speculation um we do know that she had student loans
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so um just thinking out loud why would the why would the father give his daughter four grand
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because maybe like we all believe that he's holding back something right maybe it is oh by the way I did give her this
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money and it wasn't for her to run away and then she's in trouble for credit card fraud is it to pay back somebody
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that she was somebody else somebody else yeah that she had she stolen another credit
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card um and and she run up more than just seventy dollars worth of pizza and I was
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she paying that person off um so that's just speculation you know it was it was it money to seed uh uh her
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to get away from college and set up someplace else I don't know I don't know it's just weird so I the other question
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I have is this is not an Andy Kaufman story you know there's no I think Andy Kaufman's still alive too but that's
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another story [Laughter] that's a whole nother episode yeah that's your next book right
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um but there's no evidence of her I mean she didn't try to fake her death right right it wasn't like uh yeah I see
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what you're saying um well think about this if she hadn't have gotten into the accident on Route
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112 and I I do think that that was an accident like I don't think it was some people well did she stage it for this no
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I don't think so um so let's say she hadn't gone into that accident and she just left her car
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in a parking lot somewhere up there maybe even with a a note or something um nobody outside of the Murray family
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would have ever heard about this story um and you know they she maybe you know could have left a note and said
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you know I took off I'm sorry you know goodbye but I think the accident changed everything you know let's say she's
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going up there to start a new life or to disappear or do something she gets in that accident
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she doesn't want the police to show up right you know because that's now she's in a lot of trouble what is she doing
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they're catching her halfway through whatever her plan was so you know let me get in this car that's being driven by
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this acquaintance and um we're gonna take off and maybe the police will leave the car there and we
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can come back for it nope the police took it oh crap now we got to leave the car now it looks like now it looks like
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a possible crime um so we got to be hush-hush about everything from from now on you know no
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no letters to you know friends or family explaining what I was doing up here yeah it's just
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her and one maybe two other people that have to be quiet right and that's kind of your theory out on our friends maybe
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that they're I don't know for sure I just I just the only thing I feel 100 on is that there was a tandem driver and
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that tandem driver was somebody that she knew you know friend or family uh I tend
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to you know maybe lean 60 40 60 towards it being friend or friends well I like that you actually said that though
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because one of my I'm not constantly defending you uh but what I and I was telling you this
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earlier the the one of my favorite things about uh being able to you know call you a true crime
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friend is that you put out this amazing book that I bet once a week somebody tells me oh thanks this is the best book
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that I maybe have ever read uh which I think is a great compliment that's awesome um because I hate when somebody
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would say it's the best True Crime book oh come on um but but I like that you said that the
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only only thing that you're super solid on or 100 on is that there was a tandem driver yeah and I think
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what where a lot of people uh kind of the funny thing is a lot of people say that your tunnel vision
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but then I think that they become Tunnel Vision on you they do they do and I think to some extent there's this
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um need on the internet and social media to to choose sides and in society in general just to choose a side right and
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I and you get you delve into the more Murray case and you end up on you know specific Facebook pages and Reddit Pages
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where for whatever reason they've decided to turn me into you know kind of the bad guy the bad journalist thing and
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and then that's one of the first things they read and they want to be a part of that community so they have to like not
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like James either but if you if you spend some time with me you know I know there were some people from Reddit that
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came up to Crime con last year and they hung out and got a book and you know uh had a drink or you know some snacks at
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the bar or whatever you know within five minutes of you know hanging out right you know and
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it almost makes me cringe but you know they'll lean forward and they'll say you know what you're not
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you're not an you're not as much of an [ __ ] as I thought you were a little bit of an [ __ ] yeah yeah we all are
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but um not as much as Nick but see that's the weird thing that I've never understood with and it's not with
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everybody in the True Crime Community but with the mara case well there's other cases out there that are similar
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to this where there where there are people that they they take aside like you said they believe in a theory and if
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they dis if they disagree with your theory for some reason they've decided they don't like you as a person I don't
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know how that leap is made right um you know we've had it happen on our show where people comment and they're like
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Nick you said that it probably went down like this are you some kind of idiot you
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know it's like well well I normally get that direction towards me and yes I am some kind of an idiot
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um but I like that you said that you know that's the only thing that you feel 100 because I think a lot a lot of times
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when you bring up the pregnancy or the the belief that you think that she's alive I've never heard you say uh I 100
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believe that she's alive no and no of course not and um you know with the tandem driver thing
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I you know look it what happened after that is is a mystery did she go on to another life a lot of people think I'm
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sold on this idea that she's in Canada and and you know hanging out and chilling and eating Crepes and right and
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you know having babies and that would be nice I want to believe that uh but there's also the possibility that
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whoever this tandem driver was killed her right yeah I'm very open to that possibility but if you're
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theory that she left on purpose to start a new life if that theory is wrong let's
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just say in this hypothetical World sure I'm telling you 100 that that theory is
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wrong what's the next theory that you lean towards is it just that the tandem driver yeah it's that the tan driver was
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responsible for her death you know did she hit her head harder than we than we know and did she did she pass out and
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they freaked out and she became comatose or something silly like that or did you
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know was she traveling up there with a boyfriend right not the boyfriend but ah boyfriend a boyfriend and that person
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was the one that after that accident you know killed her or you know uh you know
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so so yes I'm I'm very much open to that you know when I started looking into the
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case the first thing I after you know Wikipedia and a couple other things I'm going to your blog and so then to get so
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much of my information about the case from your blog sure and then to call you an idiot or a [ __ ] just makes zero
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sense oh I know and you know and these people that set up websites or uh or other podcasts not Tim and Lance's but
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other podcasts on this Mister because there are a couple more right and uh um you know they they that's what they
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do they're like I hate this James earner you're such an a-hole he's such a jerk I
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hear here are 10 documents that James Renner posted on this uh his website that might help us figure out what
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happened to Maura Murray um yeah you're welcome thank you yeah I think yeah I think people should just
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give you a little more credit for that I mean you know I don't know I'm obsessed
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I was obsessed with this case there are other cases that that I get very personally involved in
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um but I've got a life I think no I've got I've got you're here with us on a Sunday there's no way you have a life uh
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so this isn't my life as and people seem to think this is you know and uh I don't
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know it's frustrating you know social media and you know I don't know how you guys are but yeah to at a point you just
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have to walk away and not like because eighty percent of the comments will be positive but you fixate on those 20 so
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one thing I liked when you set up your blog was you it wasn't just you forming an opinion and telling your
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version of what you think went down with Mara but you set up a place for people to check out new information and for
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people to come back to you with information yeah and say hey James I found this you should consider putting
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it on your blog yeah it was this Grand idea I had to open the internet and turn it into
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essentially The Writer's room of a newspaper you know when I worked at a Scene Magazine up in Cleveland we'd had
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this writer's room and I'd write these true crime stories when we'd Gather in the writer's room and I'd pitch out
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ideas I'm like what about this guy as a suspect and you know the other writers would come back well have you looked at
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this and this and it was a new way to gather information but also um to find new avenues of investigation and
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to use crowdsourcing to try to solve these cases now the way I picture it going down was you
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know if you've ever seen Mickey Mouse and the The Sorcerer's Apprentice you know where he's learning from this Grand
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Wizard and you know he's you know he goes up and tries to use some of the magic well
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I had this Grand idea to turn it into a crowdsourcing platform and everybody would be sociable and and fight for the
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greater good and and help each other out but it got out of control and people were not nice to each other and people
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were not nice to me and people when names were considered as Suspects people would go out and try to shame
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them instead of realizing that just because their name is mentioned as a possible suspect and
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they are a possible suspect doesn't mean they're guilty and they shouldn't be held
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um as get we still have a court of law for that reason you know let's not consider somebody guilty until they've
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had their day in court but that went out the window and I realized that this Grand experiment that I had
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um it just won't work in the way our culture and Society set up and that was very upsetting and very sad and now the
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the blog you know I've turned off the comments because people are just people are just
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mean to each other right now um and I I think that doesn't get us any closer to the truth it doesn't and and I
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want to hope that it's a phase and that uh we'll look back at this in 20 years and we're like oh my God that was the
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deep dark days of the you know people being mean to each other and Twitter and Facebook but I don't see an end to it no
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and you know I I was involved in a community online community years ago regarding a specific case and people
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would log on there and give their opinions on different pieces of evidence or theories that they had
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and it it got very messy very quickly it it it spun out of control into this thing where
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posters are now accusing one of one another of being the actual murder oh yeah yeah and it just it got so weird
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and strange in there yeah uh yeah I think the only way to fix it is to get rid of anonymity right and but nobody's
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gonna be for that because they they you know they want to be anonymous because they you know they they have their daily
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routine of being an accountant somewhere and yeah they have to follow everybody's
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rules but then they can log on as Poop Shoot 69 you know and she's a good friend of mine Best Buds and tell you
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everything you're doing wrong and and you know that you're that maybe the police should look into you and you know
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stupid stuff like that or I think people also forget on these a lot of these shows that you're they edit you
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yeah so it's just like that you you were saying before like you talked to Maggie
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for a really long time and then what they put on the show is the edited version of that and they might
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eventually go back to that interview yes but one of the things that you talked about in the show was the eyewitness
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accounts and I wondered that when you when you guys have gone to these places and
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looked for how many people don't recognize it the picture that you're showing them is it a bunch of
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Maury Murray yeah oh 99.9 okay so it's uh it's always just a very small how many people would you say have said oh I
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know her two or three okay so a very small and the people that that believe they saw
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her are adamant like this uh and I think I hope eventually in the doc series we'll get to see her but there's this
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employee that worked at the record store up in um Montreal I think and she was a
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hundred percent she's like no doubt about it that was her so you know people say there are these
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unsubstantiated sightings um but they're very good unsubstantiated sightings it might not be her now
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there's a lesser-known story within the mara Murray case and I want you to tell it for us because I pulled this straight
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from your book and it was one of the more you know there was a lot of interesting points in there but this one
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stood out for me a little bit it's the and forgive me if I'm setting this up wrong but when you
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were looking into the case there was a hit on her social security number or or a hit on
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something involving like a shopping uh card yeah there are two I mean you're hitting on two different stories okay so
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real quick um and then I'll get because I think I know the one you're going for is a little more dramatic but
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there was uh the um when I ran her social security number I got a hit that led me to Saco Maine and that turned out
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to be one of the Searchers that was working with with Fred Murray after Moore disappeared and and he said hey
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can I put a flag on more Social Security number so that linked his address in Saco Maine to Maurice soch so when I ran
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it it popped up so that was kind of easy to explain although it's still a little
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weird right um the shopping cart is interesting and I think I get the feeling the
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documentary series might go there because they they showed it last night okay um inside the the car they're like
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oh hey look a little shopping card now um one of the people that go to the the website these these you know when I was
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crowdsourcing it somebody read it and they they were able to get the exact number off the back of that shopping
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card find the grocery store and run it through their loyalty program system and it popped up Moore's information and
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also an email address but that email address wasn't linked to Mora it was linked to a guy named
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Richard thousand who lives in Cleveland Ohio and works as a nurse so I reach out to Richard and I say hey
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man you're hey dude yeah your email pops up on more Murray's shopping card and more Maurice's woman who disappeared in
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in UMass Amherst and he tells me the story about how he visited the the University
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and met this young woman who he thinks was Maura and they had a lunch together and then she she must have stolen his
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card his loyalty card to get like cheap gas or something and I'm like well more is known for stealing cards yeah that
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makes a little sense so I put that information up online and people right away poked holes in it and he got back
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to me and he said hey look I made that story up um the the real truth is that yes I was
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at UMass Amherst just for a couple days for a conference and I when I heard about the Maura
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Murray case I became a little obsessed with it and found her shopping cart information and put my email in it so I
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would get some more information from about that card um so man talk about red flags right you
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know here's wait so so he just repeat that yeah it's weird so he puts in his information well this is the
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last story he told me you know he lied about the first story he says so I don't know what the truth is and what's not
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but the story he settled on was that he was studying to be a nurse at the same time as Maura but not going to school at
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UMass but visited UMass for a couple days for what was the reason a conference or something was happening
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down there and uh he said they might have crossed paths but he's not sure so he came back to Cleveland and then
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when Morgan's missing he's like oh I remember UMass I was there at the same time and he starts getting obsessed with
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the case finds her shopping cart info puts in his email address in order to open up the other information because it
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says in order to access you have to put in an email address right so he gets his
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to link with her shopping cart and so it's weird right like everything about it and this guy's and the fact
00:24:05
that he lied before exactly makes it even weirder and he's living up in um Cleveland
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uh for and I've visited the house I haven't caught him there but we've talked on the phone
00:24:17
um lives by himself and I I talk to the neighbors nobody has seen a young woman up there
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but um he it's really hard these days to to have social media right and not not be able
00:24:33
to find a picture of somebody there are no pictures of this guy anywhere um on social media on the internet uh
00:24:41
that was some information that the Cold Case unit was really interested in and I
00:24:47
I have a feeling they probably have talked to him or tried to talk to him but they certainly wanted all the
00:24:52
information I had about that guy uh yeah well next on social media much it's kind of hard to find you
00:25:00
I can find pictures though yeah it's because I have posts because I post them umbrella that is yours her well our
00:25:08
listeners love to uh Photoshop us now so that's a lot of fun oh right right the coordinates sent to Tim and Lance Let's
00:25:16
just throw that out there talk about it what's the deal hold on the coordinates were sent to me
00:25:21
originally they were sent to you okay that's why that's why we're here to talk they they love to take credit for it I
00:25:27
don't know that they did I I was drinking after watching several football games and watching the documentary at
00:25:33
the same time to me those guys are we had so much fun at crime con and this this conventions get crazy though I did
00:25:41
so much blow with Tim and Lance it's I'm just joking I'm joking so what about these coordinates oh yeah yes
00:25:49
we're sending uh and it was just this email that said stop looking and the subject or or more Murray was in
00:25:59
there somehow and it was just these coordinates and it leads you to part of the White Mountains uh this desolation
00:26:06
Trail you have to go to to get up there and it's like a five hour hike both ways
00:26:11
uh I was never able to make it work um but it does look if you look at the trailer for The more Murray yeah series
00:26:21
they're hiking and so I'm I'm guessing they do track down those coordinates but I have no idea what they found up there
00:26:28
because they got a little scared and um we've definitely had our share of odd emails as you have with this this case
00:26:36
as well but um I air more on the side that whatever is going to happen is going to happen
00:26:43
anyway so whether I go on that trail or not right I don't really have a lot of like with the fact that they're like
00:26:51
well we're just too scared to go I'm like ah come on you got to do it you wouldn't yeah you got to follow through
00:26:56
with that and I think they finally do my hunch is that it's nothing but an internet troll that that wanted to like
00:27:02
for shits and giggles just wanted them to waste their time yeah waste their time wasted waste 10 hours and and
00:27:09
possibly you know indeed well that's why they send it to you oh yeah yeah I know
00:27:13
how to get this [ __ ] to waste this time no thanks what was the was the did the person use a handle that that sent
00:27:21
that to you it was the email was redirected through the Netherlands through some sort of remailing email
00:27:27
thing which is weird though because that email is connected to Mara Murray's [Laughter]
00:27:38
okay James so the book has been out for a while now and you've had a chance to participate in this docu-series where
00:27:45
are you at currently with your theory um I I right as of this moment as of today uh in 2017 October 2nd right uh or
00:27:57
is it the first yeah today's the first anyways um I would put my probability at 60 percent she's out
00:28:06
there alive somewhere trying to stay off the grid maybe Canada um and 40 percent that she was murdered by
00:28:13
whoever the tandem driver was do you have a list of suspects you like more of the tandem driver yeah it's one of
00:28:22
four or five people yeah and I'm not going to go into it specifically but how many are men how many are women
00:28:29
two of them are men okay three of them are women [Music] foreign [Music] [Music]
00:28:56
we are back cheers mates we are back with art and Maggie from the oxygen docu-series The Disappearance of Mara
00:29:06
Murray now do you guys have a hunch on where you think Mara was heading to that night we you know she was taking a break
00:29:14
for some reason but where do you think she was heading to I think that Renner is accurate in that
00:29:23
there was somebody else involved probably um whether she's going to meet a friend
00:29:30
or somebody I personally don't think that she was going alone there could have been a tandem
00:29:40
driver like a friend or somebody I don't think it was a tandem driver and somebody helping her Escape I think they
00:29:45
were just going to clear her head bought enough booze for two people um I I think that there was possibly
00:29:54
somebody going with her to just spend the weekend hang out take a break she had all intentions on coming back
00:30:02
I I agree I think you know you've got five or six theories and you see us map them out in one of the episodes yeah
00:30:10
episode five yeah none of those none of those are completely off the table until
00:30:15
we can actually find her or her remains so but we looked at the probability of which is what is more than likely that
00:30:23
happened to her and more than likely you know something there was Foul Play involved in what happened to her now
00:30:30
whether it was somebody she knows or somebody that picked her up on the highway that's the big that's the big
00:30:37
question you know what happened in that seven to ten minute time period which we've probably even narrowed down to
00:30:44
like shorter than that but you know what happened in that time frame why do you think in certain cases especially in
00:30:51
this case that we have evidence that you uncover and then people look at it objectively and they say well no that's
00:30:58
that's not true even though you've backed up that evidence I have no idea why people choose not to
00:31:04
believe that absolutely insanity it is but but even with this though we did know yeah even with this we did know
00:31:13
that um if someone told us and didn't have evidence we wouldn't believe them you
00:31:19
know I understand why people say Okay Cecil Smith is saying that but how do we believe him
00:31:25
um I get that I get that people want the evidence but I it's hard we did know this would happen
00:31:35
we didn't know that the extent of how um really intense people are about believing this this yeah conspiracy
00:31:44
theory yeah people love conspiracies but you talk to anybody in law enforcement and it's almost impossible to keep a
00:31:53
conspiracy together sooner or later somebody's going to talk and in this particular case I mean when we did the
00:32:00
timing when we looked at witness a when we drove the same route she did when we interviewed Cecil Smith it's
00:32:08
pretty clear that even without you know other type absolutely it was him just the timing of it it had to be
00:32:17
him and you know he said he was in the car you know it for us that whole conspiracy
00:32:25
theory right now you know people are wasting their time spinning their wheels on that that it was some other Cruiser
00:32:32
there that's just not the case I mean it's really going to be embarrassing when it does come out and the
00:32:39
information is able to be out there that this these people have really exhausted
00:32:44
themselves on this bunk Theory we are trying to tell you that this is this is not the case like
00:32:53
if you don't want to believe that's fine but you're going to look silly and you know even people even if we had a video
00:33:00
of the whole thing they probably still wouldn't believe it no no so you're going to have that you know that portion
00:33:06
of people that aren't going to believe it regardless of what we say but I'll tell you why in a way I think Renner is
00:33:12
even more respectable than some of these people that think they're more respectable than Renner because Renner
00:33:17
is is looking at the evidence and the facts and saying okay maybe maybe I don't think my theory is Right anymore
00:33:25
he has enough you know dignity to say okay I might have been wrong like I've wrote a book about this and it could be
00:33:35
wrong and that's like way more respectable than uh man it is nothing and I'll tell you
00:33:43
what obviously I'm coming from the law enforcement side the frustration that law enforcement has I mean and and it
00:33:50
goes through a lot of stuff I mean you talk to law enforcement is a tough job right now uh especially uniform law
00:33:56
enforcement um and unfortunately we kind of go through these Cycles every 20 25 years
00:34:02
we're in one of those Cycles right now and people for some reason want to believe that law enforcement is is bad
00:34:11
for whatever reason I mean it feeds something in their their ego or in their minds and I mean when you sit and spend
00:34:19
an hour and a half with each one of these police officers as we did um listen I've done internal
00:34:25
investigations internal actually reported to me when I was a U.S Marshal and I can tell you that you can tell
00:34:32
when somebody's not telling you the truth and or or something doesn't pass the smell test and I can tell you that
00:34:39
every thing that we uncovered here from the law enforcement side there wasn't anything where you know the hair on the
00:34:45
back of my neck stood up it was just like the simplest explanation is generally the explanation and that's
00:34:52
what we found one of my favorite parts of the documentary was that you guys did the drive that Mara had made that night
00:34:57
before the accident is there any observations or things that occurred to you that didn't make it on camera I
00:35:06
think I think the the condition of Maura's car right Maggie I mean we did that whole experiment with a rag in the
00:35:13
tailpipe and I we actually drove the car around you know we bought a a Saturn that was the same year and and knocked
00:35:22
out one of the cylinders on it and and did the experiment in the garage with the rag and the tailpipe and then they
00:35:28
actually drove that vehicle around um and more than likely even though we did what we did to it this car was
00:35:36
probably in a lot better shape than Morris was and Maggie you drove one of those same Vehicles when you were at
00:35:42
UMass right I did I had an o4 she had a 96. yeah it you know we I think the hour
00:35:50
time discrepancy always kind of puzzled us um you know did she leave right away after she went to the liquor store did
00:35:59
she stop somewhere did somebody see her you know I have always thought that um yeah when you when you go to the liquor
00:36:06
store and the ATM they're pretty much right next to each other when you go to the liquor store there's
00:36:12
Diner directly across the street and we always used to go there at UMass and the liquor store go to the diner that
00:36:19
ATM I went to the ATM so many times but I always thought that she had left the liquor store and then met somebody at
00:36:25
the diner and got lunch and that person knows where she was going and the opening to one of the shows Maggie you
00:36:31
state that the locals seem to think that Mara was abducted how do you feel about that after meeting
00:36:36
with the local people and does that tell us anything about the area well net um review but um are you were there for
00:36:49
that interview John Smith said you know I've been up here all this time and there was some really bad people up here
00:36:56
and he you know uh that that came from John Smith that the people up there are often not that savory
00:37:05
um and do I think that it was a local yeah probably I do um I think like art said
00:37:12
at the beginning people go up there to be away from everybody and whether that's
00:37:16
just you know the lifestyle you like the lead or you have had a really bad past and
00:37:23
you can't be in a place where you know you're in the city bumping into people all the time people know who you are you
00:37:28
you're going up there to hide out and live a really private life now in episode five you literally put all five
00:37:36
uh theories on the table and you end up Crossing them all out except for one well I mean I mean I think we we both
00:37:44
believe that Foul Play that there's Foul Play involved that she was she was killed
00:37:50
either by accident or by on purpose or you know somebody had an intention to kill her or some some something occurred
00:37:58
by accident either by an unknown person and and you know when you look at these cases
00:38:05
and and you do a lot of Investigations generally that if it's somebody uh that the victim knows you're going to come to
00:38:14
a conclusion fairly quickly in other words the case is easier to solve than if it's somebody that has no connection
00:38:21
at all to the victim and you know obviously this case has been going on for 13 years it's a cold
00:38:27
case and I always kind of look at it that cheese I mean this the state police the local police have spent thousands of
00:38:36
hours investigating this case they've conducted grand juries investigative grand juries
00:38:43
it put a lot of time effort and energy I mean even when we came up with a couple
00:38:47
of leads the next day they were on it so it just seems to me that they've investigated this to the best of their
00:38:55
ability you know even they'll admit you know we should we wish we had done this different or that different but the re
00:39:01
but but you know none of it was done intentionally there was no malice in anything they did they did the best job
00:39:07
they tried to do and and that leads me to believe that it's very possibly somebody that she doesn't know
00:39:15
um because those are the hardest crimes to solve so if she were abducted or if she got into a vehicle willingly this is
00:39:23
just minutes after she turned down the ride from Butch Atwood why why would it go down like that
00:39:31
I think that it's it's possible she said no to art thinks that fix it for the government
00:39:41
um the county I believe and she saw him as like an employee and didn't want to be involved with the police
00:39:49
that kind of thing I honestly think it could be as simple as Butch didn't look like you know if
00:39:57
you're just judging based on appearances he even said I mean he's this old overweight man with a mustache he could
00:40:04
have scared her I mean he's just some guy up there like I don't know if I would get in the bus with him
00:40:10
um but I think it could have just been some young guy in the area there's a lot of them that we have found that have
00:40:17
been in jail for rape sexual assault like horrible horrible things that just said hey I'm going to this party are you
00:40:24
okay you want to get in and she might have trusted him more and we have heard from family members that
00:40:30
Maura had hitchhiked in the past who did we hear that from art yeah we heard it from her high school friends right yeah
00:40:35
that she had hitchhiked um that didn't make it in the show but that to us says okay maybe this young
00:40:41
guy pulls up hambono a party you want to come sure yeah one of the things I looked at too was that she was under
00:40:48
probation at the time for the for the pizza incident at UMass and I think that that
00:40:57
um you know if she got arrested for for operating Under the Influence if she was drinking in the car I know this is
00:41:05
all speculation but to me it kind of makes sense that that she would want you know Butch pulls
00:41:11
up and says I'll call 9-1-1 she says no you know I've called AAA he knows that's
00:41:16
a lie he goes to his house and calls 9-1-1 and of course the westmins across the street are calling 9-1-1 at the time
00:41:23
so you know did she want to avoid avoid law enforcement I would say yes because she
00:41:30
probably probably would have um either been in trouble uh you know obviously for operating
00:41:39
under but it could have put in Jeopardy her nursing school too that she was going through at UMass yeah yeah
00:41:45
somebody that I believe that should be a person of interest was the track coach Haas supposedly or allegedly uh she was
00:41:53
having an affair with but this doesn't come up in the show that was one of the things that our
00:41:58
um you know where I was saying how Reiner had a lot of good information that he came up with and we would say
00:42:03
where'd this information come and it was rendered the other day we were talking um someone had sent me an email talking
00:42:11
about Haas and we have tried calling him he he wouldn't talk to us um you know so we we couldn't really
00:42:18
talk about it in the show but um you know afterwards someone sent me an email and I called Art and said hey what was
00:42:24
up with Haas like did this really get looked at like did the police interview him where did all this come from and
00:42:30
ahas wasn't even known about until Renner uncovered that whole thing so once again that was Runner um doing that
00:42:38
but I don't know I don't know we don't really know what his Alibi was do we no we don't know what his Alibi was but
00:42:47
you know it and these are these are questions that law enforcement when you ask them are going to hold back on yeah
00:42:55
[Music] because I think we might have asked and it can't we can't answer yeah yeah we
00:43:01
did and um uh you know we didn't get it we didn't get an answer from them so this is
00:43:08
obviously something they're looking at um we can say they're re-looking at everything one thing that I've got to
00:43:15
know can you tell us if Butch Atwood had a CB radio in the school bus we asked that we asked that question
00:43:25
um and I don't know um we we tried to actually find out more about that particular bus we actually
00:43:36
tried to get a photograph of it yeah and we couldn't come up I think we tried to
00:43:40
track it down at some point someone tried to track it down but my understanding is when he called 9-1-1 he
00:43:49
did it from his house he left went to his house called 9-1-1 it somehow got kind of screwed up
00:43:56
uh it went to a different dispatch it didn't go to Grafton County I think it went to Hanover dispatch
00:44:03
and then Hanover dispatch kind of relayed it to Grafton County in Grafton County actually ended up calling back
00:44:10
the residents and you know you bring up a very good point because you gotta you you sort of have to put
00:44:17
all this together now you've got Westman on 9-1-1 you've got Butch Atwood stopping his boss talking to her and
00:44:24
calling 9-1-1 you have the murats around the corner who also have some visual contact with this accident
00:44:32
and then you've got witness a all this is occurring sort of in a 10 and 15 minute time frame uh and then you've got
00:44:40
obviously Cecil Smith showing up so when you put all that together and look at that timeline which we did
00:44:48
um it kind of all makes sense the big enduring question here is how How could somebody turn their head
00:44:57
and she's gone in like seven to ten minutes that's that's always been the big question you have all these things going
00:45:06
on and I mean a lot of them are like real real important data points because we have logs
00:45:13
you know we've got Grafton County logs and we found out some information about that that that came out I don't know if
00:45:19
it made it in the interview or not um but we also have that whole jurisdictional fight that so some that
00:45:27
somebody reported that thought it was law enforcement it wasn't law enforcement it was the two tow truck
00:45:31
drivers arguing about who had the money for the tow you know so we really have put a lot of this stuff to rest and when
00:45:42
you sit down and look at it it's like it makes sense holy [ __ ] it just makes sense it's the simplest explanation
00:45:53
yeah and we've even like sat around again over a bottle of ketos being like okay what which is lying what if she's
00:46:01
got in the bus with him and then when he went and did that search for Cecil he you know dropped her body somewhere or
00:46:09
something happens like we have sat there and said is that possible but then we look back at the logs
00:46:14
the weapons saw her after the bus left um right am I correct in saying that word I think it was it because that was
00:46:22
the flurry of the activity at the rear right and the marath saw her so so even the thought of her getting in his bus
00:46:30
just didn't happen she would have had to have walked back over to the house and you and you
00:46:35
mentioned the two people and the man with a cigarette and and that's that kind of like has
00:46:42
been sort of an argument between the two westmins as to what each one of them saw
00:46:48
um Mr Westman thinks he saw the light from a cell phone trying to be activated um and Mrs Westman I think wasn't really
00:46:57
sure exactly what they actually saw so I mean that's been question two um one of the crazy things about this
00:47:03
case is that cell phone service there was no cell phone service up in these White Mountains and I think it's hard
00:47:11
for some of us to believe um is that factual like when you were up there investigating there is no so cell
00:47:18
phone service at all to this day it's it's crazy because I think you lose cell phone service the minute you kind of get
00:47:26
out of Woodsville right Maggie yeah yeah and then you pick it back up at Beaver Pond which is at the it's kind of
00:47:34
another 10 11 miles from the crash site heading towards Lincoln now there's one particular item that the police have
00:47:40
received a lot of criticism about and this is regarding the ATM footage where Mara had stopped to make a withdrawal
00:47:49
now one thought that I've had on this why they've not released this footage and that's a criticism that they've got
00:47:55
they've not released it is it either that this footage does not exist or that they had it in their possession at one
00:48:02
time but but it may have been lost well the reason they haven't released it is because
00:48:17
if there was this is me why I think they haven't really fit um if there was anybody in that video with her that was
00:48:25
not at all related to her a license plate number of somebody's car they didn't want all of these people who
00:48:32
latched onto insane theories to you know think this person was the killer or tracked down this license plate number
00:48:39
and you know these people that are just happened to be in this video um to go after them
00:48:46
so yeah that's exactly I think that yeah I think that had it needs to be protected and I think that's
00:48:54
really a good move um to protect the innocent people who would be in that video um and other than that you'll have to
00:49:01
wait till episode six I mean one of the problems with this case is um anybody that has any information or
00:49:10
any connection is being I mean we had a lot of problems talking to people people had to get
00:49:17
familiar with us because a lot of people's wrong information has been put out with a you know put out about them
00:49:24
so law enforcement I know and they reiterated with that to me today that they're just they don't want people
00:49:31
innocent people harassed that have already been talked to by by law enforcement and really that's not the
00:49:38
way to handle a criminal investigation put innocent people out there that don't have any association at all it might
00:49:45
have just been standing in the background but you both feel confident in saying that a yes the ATM footage
00:49:50
exists and B the police are in possession of it yes yes you have to wait till episode six one
00:49:58
last question uh do you believe that this case is solvable I do when when I mean I I will tell you this that when
00:50:11
we were first Maggie and I first talked to the state police and the AG's office they believe this case is solvable
00:50:18
and they have all the information so if they believe it's solvable I believe it's solvable Maggie believes it's
00:50:24
solvable so and and yeah and I think that a lot of it again I know I sound like I'm coming hard at
00:50:31
the police concerns these people and it's not that I don't think people should be talking I just think they
00:50:35
should focus their energy you know somewhere else but it I don't even think it would have been this far if it
00:50:41
weren't for people who really really care and are contacting the police with tangible
00:50:47
real information and people who have come to me with real information um some of these leads that people have
00:50:54
come forward with lately are really good really good they're really good and I even said to Tim and Lance today I
00:51:01
said hey guys you know you've been working on this a lot longer than me in art have you guys been this excited for
00:51:07
you know this case to be solved and they said nothing like this not at all so you know I think we're all really
00:51:14
really excited and we do think it will be solved [Music] a big thank you to James Renner if you
00:51:30
haven't already go and check out his book True Crime addict and a big thank you to Art and Maggie they were so kind
00:51:36
to sit down and talk with us also you keep hearing about Tim and Lance they are two great guys that did a wonderful
00:51:43
podcast that was all about the mara Murray disappearance so a big thank you to those guys as well yeah so check out
00:51:49
their podcast missing Mara Murray and the question from a lot of listeners is hey you guys covered this case yes we've
00:51:56
covered this case before we talked to Brenner uh when True Crime addict came out and we actually covered this case
00:52:03
and you can find those on our website store or the iTunes Store all right thanks for listening thanks for telling
00:52:10
a friend thank you so much for sharing on social media it means the world to us we gotta get out of here because we got
00:52:16
a a big case for next week all right until next time everybody out there be good please be kind and please don't
00:52:22
litter [Music] thank you [Music]