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foreign [Music] [Applause] foreign [Music] garage wherever you are whatever you are
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just like Jonathan Lawrence he too once was beat up by an old man he is the captain
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button all right gather around grab a chair grab a beer let's talk some true crime
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[Music] she has not been seeing since last night however they did talk to her this morning a little after four o'clock
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am and I want to stress that what we're doing at this point in time is we're working from the apartment and then
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we're working our way out and we are at about a quarter of a mile right now we'll be extending that search probably
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to about a half a mile or so and I don't think I want to accommodate any further
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about that we'll be doing a neighborhood canvas those houses that would front streets that would be that would have
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access to the apartment complex we'll be getting a hold of those residents and asking them if they saw or heard
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anything about one quarter of a mile from the apartment complex was searched along the
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riverbank and out extending from the riverbank and there were a number of hits along
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the riverbank however we have not confirmed whether those would be something that we would follow up on or
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not we are back at the riverbank with the canines and we are going to check to see
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if there is additional hits along the river on Wednesday June 28 1995 the police in
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Mason City Iowa were still searching for a missing woman Judy husen trout age 27
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apparently was abducted early on the 27th as she left her apartment for work she is the morning and noon producer and
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television anchor at k i m t TV Jody grew up in Long Prairie Minnesota she was a flight attendant for Northwest
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Airlines for a few years before going into a career in television and one thing looking into this case right away
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you're going to see that Jody was well liked and she was a popular individual Jody is this upbeat friendly outgoing
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very lovely person this is uh according to Ray Gove now Rey was her former band director at the Long Prairie High School
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where she twice was a member of the state champion High School golf team as well you always knew when she was in the
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room he said Jody graduated from Long Prairie High School and later from Saint Cloud State University she worked at a
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TV station in Cedar Rapids Iowa from February 1991 to April of 1992 and then went to Alexandra's ksax TV to be a
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reporter and morning anchor until November of 1993 when she moved to Mason City Iowa
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her former station manager at Alexandra said it has become common for TV news women to receive unwanted attention from
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men who become obsessed but police say they are not aware that who's in true had any such problem
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now Jody who's in true is well known in Alexandra area and the ksax TV they started Fielding calls very quickly
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after The Disappearance and these calls were coming in from friends and viewers seeking information or wanting to pass
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along their concerns Mike Burgess who hired her at Alexandra said she is one of those very nice
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people who come from small towns she works hard and is always willing to Marshal a parade speak at a breakfast
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cover a news event someone you could really count on well it's kind of interesting because we met so many
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people from at crime con from Minnesota and Jody had that Minnesota accent and they actually told her at some point
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that she should try to get rid of it and I think she was looking and working towards losing that accent or at least
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was being encouraged to do so which was kind of funny though Captain because everything
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that I found from people that she worked for and worked with they would always say uh you know her charm was that she
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was this Minnesota girl from a small town that was her charm and it came like blaring through the TV and that's why
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people just loved watching her and loved listening to her yet they they made her
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wanted to kind of lose that a bit anyway regarding the television officials becoming increasingly concerned about
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unwanted attention that some of the women in TV news were getting according to her former boss Mike he stated that
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what from what he saw usually was not what he would call stalking it was typically men would get some kind of
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fixation on a reporter or anchor who was coming into their house every day through the television and he stated
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that in bigger markets it seems like every station has one of these guys but it's usually just some unwanted phone
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calls and letters and and maybe a drive-by once in a while but it's but sometimes I guess it could be more
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serious and that could be the case here now according to the Mason City Police Captain Mike harvlson he states that
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they considered this to be an abduction a possible abduction right away now he was the he was heading up this
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investigation and he admitted that from the get-go that we really don't have any
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other possible theories about what happened and we don't like what we found at the crime scene so we have a bunch of
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good information here Captain so let's start with the timeline of her disappearance and the Investigations out
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shall we on Tuesday June 27 1995. Jody who's introot does not report to work between 3 AM and 4 a.m her this is
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her regular arrival time as the morning and noon anchor and producer at kimt TV okay so let's pour through this first
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just so everyone has a good understanding Jody is on the six o'clock morning newscast so typically they would like
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for her and the other anchor and other co-workers to be there at the station at 3 A.M by most accounts it sounds like
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this may have been not such a hard and fast rule because by most accounts they refer to starting
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time as three to three Thirty a.m and it also sounds like that it may not have been terribly uncommon for her or other
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employees to be late right now Amy Coons who is also a producer at the TV station
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she does arrive for work that day at 3 A.M as scheduled now at 4 10 a.m Jody who's introot receives a phone call at
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her apartment and this is a telephone call from Amy Coons Jody picks up the phone Amy Says Jody
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are you coming into work today Jody does not know what time it is she asked Amy you know what time is it and he says
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it's 4 10 a.m Amy says nothing about the phone conversation was strange this was
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Jody asking the normal questions and normal answers no commotion in the background you know
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nothing to trigger that this is a strange phone call well this is the normal you overslept are you coming to
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work call yeah yeah she got the impression that she had woke her up that she had overslept so uh 20 minutes go by
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and there's no Jody then 30 then 40 minutes still nothing now the key apartment complex where Jody lives is
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only about a five minute drive to the TV station producer Amy Coons and others continue to call Jody when she failed to
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show up but Amy had to fill in for her on air at the six o'clock hour she has said that at the time frankly she was
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angry at Jody for not coming in and after the hour-long TV show The Station staff decided to call police who would
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perform a welfare check on Jody at her apartment which is just like we said about a mile
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or so away now when they get there the police they clearly see that something was amiss
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there was something wrong from the get-go so the welfare check takes place around 7 15 a.m officers find her red
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Mazda Miata in the parking lot of of the downtown Mason City Apartment Complex also found at the scene where a pair of
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red women's dress shoes a blow dryer a bottle of hairspray car keys and earrings now these items are found
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scattered beside her car police began a missing person's investigation immediately
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officers searched a park next to the apartment complex and along with the uh the Winnebago river that runs through
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the park about 20 officers and several trained dogs searched a half-mile area around
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her apartment Mason City police chief Jack schleeper says that his department has no concrete leads this is on the
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first day of her disappearance at her apartment they found the apartment to be in order there was no evidence of anyone
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else having been there but Jody so Jody doesn't show up to work we have a co-worker calling her to wake her up
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sounds like she woke her up seems like she got ready to go to work she went down to the parking lot
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with items to go to work she seems like she was attacked on some level we have no
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disturbance in the apartment and then we also have reports of uh female scream roughly around this same time yeah some
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of the Neighbors in the apartment complex would later tell police that they had heard a scream or screams
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around 4 30 a.m but unfortunately nobody called police when they heard that they
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they didn't report this until they were later asked did you hear anything strange see anything strange now the
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following day on Wednesday June 28th Agents from the Iowa division of criminal investigation and the Federal
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Bureau of Investigation joined local officials in the search schleeper says that he suspects Foul Play but says that
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there are few clues that have been discovered on the 29th of June this is just two days into the investigation the
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police chief says investigators have interviewed more than 100 people but no one is considered a suspect at this time
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and also on this day a prayer service is held for Jody at the mace City Church I
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I think they should just always make the statement that at this time everybody's
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a suspect yeah yeah you're right I think like keep people on their toes well and I think that on July 1st you
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know just about five or six days into this investigation I think unfortunately this is when it's really going to start
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to sink in for friends and family that that she is gone that something terrible possibly could have happened this is
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when the police chief says that her disappearance is being treated as an abduction and he says people that day
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had saw a white van in the parking lot of her apartment complex and also this is when it's first reported about the
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screams that were heard around the time that she had vanished also on this day captain and this is pretty sad but
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Jody who's in true was supposed to be a bridesmaid on this Saturday this was when her best friend Stacy Wagner uh
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from back from Long Prairie Minnesota she was getting married now on that same day as well the reward
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fund reaches eleven thousand dollars the next day which is a Sunday the who's and
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true friends and family join other worshipers for a Sunday service at a Mason City Church on July 3rd late in
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the day police call off the ground and air search for who's introot but say that they'll continue to conduct
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interviews on July 6th a maze a Mason City martial arts instructor says that who's in true
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attended a self-defense course that he had taught in March of that same year now the instructor says that who's
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intrude told him that she had an incident a few months back and that she wasn't comfortable with it and this was
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her reasoning for taking the classes on July 10th schleeper says the FBI Behavioral scientist is trying to
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determine if who's in truth's case is linked to other disappearances of young women in the region he also says that
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investigators have received more than 700 tips at this time but they have no significant leads
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on July 25th schleeper says about 800 people have been interviewed at this time but again no solid suspects so
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we're seeing a a constant pour in of tips and we see help from outside agencies however still over a month later no
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solid suspects no significant leads on September 8th the who's and true family from Minnesota they say that they've
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hired a private investigator Mason City police continue to investigate leads and
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rumors surrounding the case the who's in true reward fund at the Mason City bank
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now has reached thirty thousand dollars in November this is on the 10th police say A man was questioned about Houston
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who's in truth's disappearance he has been charged with stalking a television anchor in St Louis Park
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Minnesota but Mason City police say that the man is not considered a suspect in the who's in true case they are just
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questioning him this is Charles Allen Davidson his name hasn't ever come up again in the investigation as far as I
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could find a newspaper articles so I have to assume that they took a look at him and there was either nothing there
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or he was cleared but there's no public statement that this man was cleared on November 13th members of the who's
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and true family say that they flew to California and taped a session with three psychics for the television show
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psychic detectives the psychics said that who's intrudes kidnapper was someone who saw her on TV and had become
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obsessed with her family members say three private investigators have found nothing to identify their suspect right
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so they go to these psychics well they were probably offered to go out there and you know how it is and and we do
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take a little bit of flack on this Captain as you know that we'll get some Flack from people that go why did you
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mention psychics we also get Flack for why do you mention lie detector tests or polygraph tests the reason being is
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they're part of the story okay and we here we have a victim's family that when you're talking about almost half a year
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later they start grasping at straws right and when you get a phone call that says hey would you come out to
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California tell us your story or tell us what you know about this story we have these people here they could be total
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frauds you know that when you deal with psychics they could be total frauds you know that dealing with anybody that's
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true but you know how the family is that at this point they need anything that they can latch on I'm not gonna
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apologize for bringing up psychics because detectives use them all the time so well I care yeah so they're these but
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that we also have the interesting thought here of the statement that the the family has now hired three private
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investigators that have also produced no leads in this case well the thing that I
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was laughing about is you know their I I don't mind talking to psychics but sometimes they come back with the
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obvious answer and then you go okay well this person's probably a a bunch of malarkey yeah yeah and and to be honest
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with you that single statement there of a TV you know someone saw her on TV and became obsessed with her that was kind
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of the general Public's thought all along that it was either somebody that was stalking her or somebody that knew
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her now in June of 1996 this would be the one year anniversary of the abduction many newspapers ran stories
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featuring the case her best friend had the following to say now when I say best friend I'm talking about her best friend
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at the time remember she had moved away from friends and family to pursue this career
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she said that to think that somebody would want to hurt her I try to block it out because I can't picture that this is
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Annie Cruz who was 29 years old during the course of this interview she's a field representative for the
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American Heart Association she admit Jody in 1993 at a benefit golf tournament and ever since they were
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inseparable now they said that they enjoyed bicycling boating inline skating so they
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had a lot of shared Hobbies now Cruz says she can't bring herself to watch kimt TV uh since the abduction she
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hasn't been on her bike since Jody disappeared and she said that she would be driving
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down the road and just start wandering did this really happen like it started to feel like a movie to her did she
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really know her was the last year really real that her friend had disappeared and
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this investigation is ongoing and she said it's just a real bout with reality stating that I just can't see her being
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raped and hurt my hope is instead that someone is keeping her maybe in a basement or an attic and that they're
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are feeding her because they think that she is in love with them as well and and
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that she is their girlfriend now let's go through some details Captain because there were some strange
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details that didn't come out right away in this investigation and for whatever reason most reports only scratched the
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surface but when you dig a Little Deeper you find some interesting particulars about the abduction now I say abduction
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and you and I have had this conversation before we turned on the mics today abduction not disappearance you know
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when we've talked about Mara Murray and Brian Shafer there were things in those individuals backgrounds that point to
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things where they they may have wanted to walk away from their life there were things found at this crime
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scene and things that found in uh Jody who's in truth's life that didn't suggest that she walked away
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and the crime scene shows that she was taken away so we'll just refer to this as an abduction going forward now her
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apartment While most reports state that nothing was out of order there there was a big to do and rightfully so
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about the toilet seat so the toilet seat was found in the up position in her apartment yes now I
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cannot overstate the significance of this fact enough you know this many people have gone on to discuss this now
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police state have flat out that it led them to believe that the man had been in her apartment either the night before or
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the morning of which is possible the other possibility is that she had some drinks and got sick yeah that's
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interesting that's interesting so you have to wonder if there was a man there then is it
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likely that he killed her you know and why the why would there be the crime scene in the parking lot was
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this some kind of argument that might have spilled outside of the apartment well but we know who's who's hanging out
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with the night before well we believe so and we'll get into that but we also don't have any of her
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friends stating that she had any sleepover buddies let's call it right but she might not have been telling them
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about a sleepover buddy okay so alternatively like you said either a guy would be there or maybe she got sick she
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was known to tie one on from time to time nothing wrong with that we know that she overslept that day was she
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sleeping one off and got sick that morning or the night before was it just she was doing a little light
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cleaning and didn't put the seat down yeah or she had a guy friend that she's been hanging out with that people didn't
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know about and she got sick in the morning one thing I wonder too Captain is is there a possibility that
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and we've heard of this it's it's rare but it does happen is there a possibility that maybe one of
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the police officers used the restroom I don't want to put it past them left the seat up and failed to fess up and then
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this is Jay Cliff hold on I gotta take a leak and this is just some kind of you know red herring that there's nothing to
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do with anything here yeah but there's also some beers found in her uh apartment as well that weren't
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consistent with beers that she normally would drink yeah and I find this to be a
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little more of a valuable clue and I think it puts more weight to the toilet seat situation like you said she was
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known to drink a specific kind of beer and I I'm I don't have it in my notes but if memory serves me right it was
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either cores or Coors Light that that was her preferred Barefoot of beers beer of choice and there were some Bud Light
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16 ounce cans that were also found in her apartment that were had been consumed so there's some thought there that she
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could have went to a party or something and they had leftover beers and she just
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took those instead of taking cores I mean just because you you know I like to drink Guinness but not every time you
00:25:01
come over do you see Guinness in my refrigerator yeah I know types that drink the same beer all the time you
00:25:08
know whenever they're drinking they have the same beer you and I obviously very different than that a lot of our
00:25:12
listeners very different that than that the other thought would be how many times have even the people that
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state that they only drink a certain kind of beer well if you're at a party and that beer Runs Out
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you very quickly drink whatever's left in the refrigerator were these beers that had been brought over at a previous
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date if you just left in her refrigerator and she decided to consume them the night before yeah if you drink
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enough beers they all start tasting the same especially if you're talking about Coors
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Coors Light Bud Light those but so just to be clear that while I'm unsure of what her preferred beer was this what
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are regarded as the strange beer cans are Bud Light 16 ounce cans were found consumed in her apartment and some
00:26:00
believe that that might have been from the night before all right cheers to you Captain cheers to
00:26:20
everybody out there I want to give a cheers to all of our Stitcher listeners as well yeah for all of our old episodes
00:26:27
they're available for free on the Stitcher app and also our show off the Record which I think episode number
00:26:35
three was released yesterday and that's only on Stitcher premium so check out Stitcher
00:26:42
premium.com True Crime garage all right Captain where we left off we were about to talk about what I think
00:26:48
might be one of the more important items found at the crime scene and that is we're talking about
00:26:56
Jody's keys so one of the keys the key to her red Mazda Miata was bent it was found to be bent now but
00:27:06
it was bent and the door handle okay so I have a few different reports of that and I think you're right there I
00:27:14
that seems to be the what is reported most often that the key was found bent and still in the lock you know somebody
00:27:23
was in the process of unlocking the door or had unlocked the door open the door and the key was bent other reports state
00:27:30
that a bent key was found near her car giving the impression that maybe it had been on the ground I would like to know
00:27:39
if it was a factory key or a replacement key because a replacement key would be easier to bend but a factory key I mean
00:27:47
you're talking about some pressure that you're going to have to put on that key to bend it well so I want to give a
00:27:52
little background on the car and her apartment before we go too far into what this could mean
00:28:00
so her her Miata was in 1995. so it was a very new vehicle and in fact she had purchased it shortly before her
00:28:10
abduction now I don't have an exact date on that I believe that it was months before her abduction so that would lead
00:28:18
me to believe that it's more of a factory key that came with the vehicle itself um one thing that's been highly
00:28:24
speculated and I think it should be is that the vehicle had keyless entry so use putting the key in the car door
00:28:34
is not required where a lot of people that's where that's where the argument comes into play of well okay I read that
00:28:41
it was found near the vehicle and somebody else says well I read that it was found in the car door then the
00:28:46
people that are of the belief that it was found near the vehicle say well there was keyless entry so it's more
00:28:51
likely that it was found near the vehicle and not in the car door my argument against that thought
00:28:58
would be I think we're putting too much thought one into whether it was found in
00:29:03
the door or near the car I think the important thing is that it was in fact bent
00:29:08
um some people have suggested that the key was very thin and would have bent just by Falling to the ground I disagree
00:29:15
with that a million times over I had I had an 89 Mazda and while it was not the same
00:29:21
vehicle not the same set of keys I didn't find that those keys to be frail at all and I dropped them several
00:29:29
times and none of them were ever bent and like I said it was an older vehicle there was more opportunity for this key
00:29:35
to be bent the the other thing that I think is interesting here though captain is we are talking about a young woman
00:29:45
that was woke up by a co-worker this is an oh [ __ ] moment for her she picks up
00:29:51
the phone you are you coming to work today what time what time is it you know that's an
00:29:57
you know that's an oh [ __ ] moment when the first response is what time is it right and you find out that it's 4 10
00:30:03
that you are already more than an hour late for work and we I believe this there is some speculation could that
00:30:11
have been somebody else on the phones could somebody else at at uh Jody's apartment have answered that phone that
00:30:17
day I don't think that's likely because she says well I'll be there in 20 minutes well and she has a very distinct
00:30:27
voice as well yes thank you for pointing that out but here's the thing captain what I'm thinking about is have you ever
00:30:35
been running late for somewhere important this would be an important place for her she loved her career she
00:30:41
was work she wanted to advance her career not only with this station but to get into bigger markets have you ever
00:30:47
been running late for somewhere and you realize you're rushing and you're panicking and in the course of that
00:30:52
you're doing things that don't make sense and you're actually causing yourself to be increasingly more late
00:30:59
I've never been invited somewhere important well what I what I mean is is there a chance that this car was
00:31:07
relatively new to her it had keyless entry maybe the vehicle she had before she did not have keyless entry and in
00:31:14
the midst of being running late to this important job of hers she just hurried out to the car and
00:31:21
came what was natural and stuck the key in the car door even though that it had keyless entry well what I'd like to know
00:31:28
is was their batteries in the remote because if those batteries were taken out then maybe somebody knew this is how
00:31:36
they're going to attack or somebody that knew her closely could say okay well I know that she leaves for work around
00:31:43
this time to this time I'm going to be waiting I'm going to take the batteries out of her remote when those don't work
00:31:50
right and by you you use some more time to get her before she gets in the car we
00:31:56
should paint a picture of the parking lot in the apartment complex so people have a good idea so Bob Ross it up her
00:32:03
Miata was parked it I've heard I've read several different statements that it was parked only about seven to
00:32:11
ten or 12 to 15 Steps from the apartment complex door so regardless of who you want to uh believe there it's still a
00:32:22
very short distance from the apartment complex door now her apartment was on the second floor and it's one of those
00:32:30
apartments where you would walk in and there's a big shared hallway and everybody that lives in that building
00:32:36
would access the door to their apartment from that hallway yeah hers is on the second floor the stairs to get
00:32:44
downstairs is inside that shared hallway so she would come out of her apartment door walk down the steps and then still
00:32:52
be in the hallway and exit the door there before walking the 7 to 15 Steps to get to her car
00:33:00
so what does that mean that means that if she was attacked by somebody that was outside waiting for her yeah they have a
00:33:10
very short very brief time period to see her react attack and then successfully abduct her from that spot yeah and the
00:33:21
other thing here is that she was running late so if somebody was waiting for her
00:33:25
on a regular time they were waiting longer in anticipation of her coming out yeah
00:33:32
and that's wild too because like you said the this person would have waited considerable amount of time more
00:33:39
waiting on her and the whole time you're waiting you're adding to the risk level
00:33:44
that you are taking to perform this abduction you're talking about somebody that would be waiting an additional 70
00:33:50
to 100 minutes for Jody to come out well when they say it was a white van I always wondered could that have been a
00:34:00
news van hmm because you know one of the angles of this case is that she worked in a
00:34:07
pretty Cutthroat industry people were trying to get ahead I mean we've all seen Anchorman so we know the battles
00:34:14
that happened yeah before we get into the van though Captain I want to kind of go through some of the things that were
00:34:22
found at the crime scene as well so we have like we mentioned before there were several items that she was going to take
00:34:29
to work with her and the captain has pointed out that these were items that her friends and colleagues had said that
00:34:36
she would always carry to work these were not items you know these were found in scattered in the parking lot it's the
00:34:43
hair dryer a pair of heels hairspray earrings these were found at the crime scene these were not items that she was
00:34:50
taking because she was late that day these were items she took every day they were in a tote that she it appears she
00:34:58
was planning on placing the tote in the passenger side car seat right in the passenger seat and
00:35:05
then she would walk around get into the driver's seat and drive off to work now like you said though something
00:35:11
happened before that the for most reports that I read regarding about the the key being found in the car door
00:35:19
state that the key was found in the passenger side car door so it's just been as simple as the remote
00:35:29
didn't work on the passenger side door right it could be something else and she goes to open the door somebody comes up
00:35:35
from behind incapacitates her there's enough force on that key to bend it but leave it in the lock right now regarding
00:35:45
blood at the scene was there any blood at the scene now contrary to many many rumors that are out there the police
00:35:52
have constantly and consistently denied that any blood was found at the crime scene
00:35:59
also we have a palm print to discuss there's a partial palm print that was found on or in the car now police have
00:36:07
never said where on the vehicle that they found this palm print it's probably on the outside they
00:36:13
my initial thought here is that they must be convinced that it came from the perpetrator of this abduction
00:36:20
because it seems that at times they have relied on this palm print to rule out potential perpetrators well so we have
00:36:29
this palm print we have our items scattered everywhere but we also have these drag marks that were found in the
00:36:36
dirt close to her car yeah this leading the police to believe that Jody had been
00:36:42
incapacitated and then dragged to a waiting vehicle this must be you know we have these other items that that are
00:36:50
upsetting to find in of concern to find and I think this would be the icing on the cake when they stated immediately
00:36:56
that we are working this as a possible abduction it's because everything at the scene is pointing to exactly that now
00:37:04
one interesting piece of evidence and I don't know how much value this can have but it must have something because
00:37:13
there was a hair found at the crime scene as well and this is something that we are not told about for many many
00:37:20
years after the crime this is Frank Stearns of the ncpd I'm sorry mcpd he told this to
00:37:28
Nancy Grace on her show in 2013. so we're talking about almost 20 years later that they state that we found hair
00:37:36
at the crime scene they did not say and they're saying that they found hair at the crime scene what they wouldn't say
00:37:44
is if they had found DNA on this hair I can see her now so you wanted to get into the suspicious vehicles and I say
00:37:54
suspicious Vehicles because there's been a couple of different reports about vehicles of suspicion that morning the
00:38:00
first being the obvious one the white van and a lot of people have referred to this as a possible or likely Ford
00:38:07
economy line van that was seen by a neighbor this is Randy Linderman in the parking lot of the apartment complex
00:38:16
that morning he spotted this vehicle around it's a very early morning he he spotted
00:38:22
this vehicle around 4am he said it was parked there with either its running lights or its brake lights on now a lot
00:38:30
of effort went into finding this vamba police were never able to I want to point out a couple things here but some
00:38:37
people think well maybe Randy Linderman might be a person of interest because why would he take notice of this van if
00:38:46
he was unaware that something important was going to happen that day now he stated later that the only reason why he
00:38:53
noticed the van was from when he first spotted it he actually thought it was a police vehicle and he was of concern
00:39:01
because he might have been speeding in the parking lot at the time he took notice of it slowed down and then what
00:39:08
was he doing in the parking lot um I I don't driving home because that's really early in the morning no no I
00:39:14
should I guess I should be clear I the parking lot is very near a road obviously I don't know if he was
00:39:19
traveling on on the road or if he was traveling in the parking lot what I do know is that he states that he took
00:39:25
notice of it because he thought it was a police vehicle and he thought that he had been exceeding the speed limit at
00:39:31
that time he slowed down looked at the vehicle and we've all done this when you think that you're when you think that
00:39:38
you're speeding and you see a police vehicle you slow down and then you look to observe to see if in fact it was a
00:39:45
police vehicle and if it was are they going to pull out of that spot and follow me I speed up and turn off my
00:39:50
lights he is the one that was the eyewitness to this white van now I I want to bring something up here
00:39:58
because this is something that I've seen in a couple of different cases regarding
00:40:02
this white van this white van in reports it stated it's a white van there are other reports that stay a light colored
00:40:12
van where I think that we run some risky business here when we really specify things that might not be known at the
00:40:20
time was this a white van or was it a light colored van because under the cover of darkness and in a parking lot
00:40:27
where it's lit by street lights you could get the impression of a different color than what the actual color of that
00:40:34
van is now remember he states that he saw this vehicle around 4 a.m or so we know that she was abducted around 4 30
00:40:43
a.m that day the sun did not rise until 5 35 a.m that day so it still would have
00:40:51
been dark at this time we would have the light would have been provided for it's
00:40:54
from Street lamps there's a good chance this was not a white vehicle not a white
00:40:59
van and just a light color it could be yellow I mean how many people have seen a yellow or a gray van at night and it
00:41:05
appears to be lighter colored than what it is yeah it's also interesting to me because yes we have a lot of things now
00:41:13
um we'll have restaurants we'll have fast food chains we'll have grocery stores that are open 24 7. that wasn't
00:41:20
very common in 1995. so you're talking about a time period between 4 and 4 30 a.m where you're talking about a very
00:41:31
small percentage of people that are even going to be awake right and then as far
00:41:36
as suspicious Vehicles go we also have that incident that Jody had reported in the past you know that took place just a
00:41:43
few months before her abduction that her family said had scared her enough to to
00:41:49
the point where she even reported it to the Mason City police this took place when she was rollerblading one day she
00:41:56
says the that she believes she was closely followed by a black pickup truck with dark Windows her family says that
00:42:03
she was so upset enough to run into a house and ask to use the phone she called her mom very upset and reported
00:42:12
it to the mcpd police escorted her to work a few times to and from work a few times after the incident yeah this this
00:42:21
is where it gets weird for me because there is rumors that she talked about threats that she felt
00:42:28
threatened that she was concerned about this she was concerned that somebody would try to attack her or abduct her
00:42:34
and then there's rumors that she wasn't that concerned but if you're calling the
00:42:38
police and they're escorting you to and from work seems like you're taking that part pretty serious my guess is that
00:42:46
this is something that she often found herself into com in conversation regarding and depending on her mood one
00:42:55
might get a different thought of of her opinion of what was going on I don't know that she received any
00:43:02
threats per se but we do have this incident with the vehicle that she believed was
00:43:07
following her and like you said to the point where she gets a police escort they probably recommended the police
00:43:14
escort she receives this a couple of times the police actually even ran Mason City black pickup registrations against
00:43:23
criminal records to see if they were they could cross-reference anything but nothing
00:43:29
yeah and but again and I think I think you're more right than some of these other thoughts and opinions because
00:43:36
not only did she get that police escort but she also took a few self-defense classes according to the uh the
00:43:43
instructor there right also her colleague Amy Coons this was the the woman that called her because
00:43:50
she was late that morning and filled in for her because she didn't arrive she says that it was very obvious to her
00:43:58
that Jody was in fact wary about uh some things in particular she was worried about leaving for work alone in the
00:44:07
middle of the night you know she's supposed to be there at 3am we also have the item the thought that
00:44:14
there might have been some screams heard that that morning so well she if she's attacked get in
00:44:21
into our car I'm assuming if she took defense classes one of the things they tell you is to Make Some Noise try to
00:44:29
get people's attention so I I believe that those screams definitely were Jody's yeah and there's people that have
00:44:37
said that the screams came around 4 30 a.m it's too much of a coincidence I think captain that that time period
00:44:44
lines up with the very most likely time that she was abducted for people to hear
00:44:50
these screams that there's a couple of I mean not only is it concerning that nobody called 9-1-1 but there were a lot
00:44:58
of those windows from those apartments that looked down into the parking lot nobody nobody
00:45:06
looked outside to see if they could see anything so this while we while this really only backs up the fact that they
00:45:14
might have the time right of when she was abducted it provides us with little to no other leads there are some rumors
00:45:22
well and it's sad too because like like her co-worker said you know we she didn't show up and then we called the
00:45:29
police afterwards which maybe if they would have called the police earlier that they maybe they would have seen
00:45:35
something or seen the vehicle yeah um so there's all these little things that had to happen just right for us to
00:45:41
really not know and the thing though too is we have there's a rumor and I wanna I
00:45:47
wanna say that the reason why I'm stating that this is a rumor is because the only place that I found this was it
00:45:53
came from it came from legit news sources however I could not find it anytime an actual
00:46:03
officer on record stating this uh whether it be a detective or somebody involved in the case yeah but the rumor
00:46:09
was that during the course of hearing those screams that one or maybe more people heard a name shouted out or a
00:46:18
name screamed out now whatever that name was was never released I couldn't find anywhere where they're saying Oh it
00:46:27
sounded like a woman was yelling the name Todd or Tim or anything like that um so then the news
00:46:36
Outlets went on to speculate further that police must believe that the perpetrator was someone known to her
00:46:44
because after she's attacked or before she's grabbed she's shouting out their name you know no no Todd don't do this
00:46:51
or Tim let me go you know something to that effect the problem I have with this is I I don't know you know I'm on the
00:46:59
fence here because this seems like something that the police would either a hold back because they they need to hold
00:47:06
on to that name right but it also seems to me doesn't it seem to you Captain if if they really believed that it was
00:47:11
somebody that knew her we're not talking about a woman that had a huge circle of
00:47:16
people in the sense that of close friends and family in the area yeah but if they know what that name is
00:47:24
right so then they have a pretty good idea like if we have a couple let's call them ear witnesses that say yeah we
00:47:32
heard this scream around 4 30 and we also think that we heard a name and the police know that name but the
00:47:39
perpetrator doesn't know that the police know that name so that would be to me information that if it's a person
00:47:49
inside her Circle you would not want to release that name because you're going to try to get the upper hand on them
00:47:54
you're going to try to catch them in a lie I I mean I totally agree the only issue I take with that is that you at
00:48:01
the same time you have the newspapers and uh the media stating that a name was heard and the police are aware of that
00:48:08
okay right but then my my other argument for not keeping it close to the chest is
00:48:14
if that person is not in that Circle and that name isn't known to you within a couple days of looking into her life
00:48:21
then maybe you'd release that name just to have anybody say oh well you know this lady that went missing she was
00:48:28
screaming Timmy or whatever and I know what to me and he was acting weird for a couple days my my other thought though
00:48:36
is that maybe we only have one ear witness stating that they think they heard a name and
00:48:42
what what was reported to the police was it oh it could have been Todd it could have been Tim it could have been John it
00:48:48
could have been you know what I mean or are they the only ones saying it definitely was a Todd I heard a Todd and
00:48:55
then the police are going well wait a second we don't know how it makes sense we don't know how much weight to put
00:48:59
into this The credibility of this and do we lose the Public's help in the course of this investigation
00:49:07
which we very much need at this point do we lose their help or misguide them because now they think we're looking for
00:49:14
a Todd and only a Todd just like I said that I think that the white van description is a little irresponsible
00:49:22
does it mislead the public that we are now only looking for a white van yeah well we did a good job captain of
00:49:29
talking about the abduction what could have happened that day in the investigation that ensued afterwards but
00:49:36
I think that's important to address her life before the abduction as well now we
00:49:42
state that police suspect that she was abducted they say that the roots of that abduction May lie in the overwhelming
00:49:49
ambition her dream to be on television who's in troupe pursued her media dreams at Minnesota's Saint Cloud University
00:49:58
where she studied mass communications professors say she stood out at a time when more and more college students were
00:50:07
drawn to the television Spotlight now after college who's in truths aspirations to break into commercial
00:50:14
television led to a job as an intern at KGAN in Cedar Rapids Iowa her colleagues
00:50:21
remember her as a hard-working energetic and friendly young woman and say Jody was a fast learner after only a
00:50:31
year she left Cedar Rapids for a bigger job in a smaller television market this is Mason City Iowa a farm and family
00:50:40
oriented community of thirty thousand within months after having arrived in Mason City who's introot was a celebrity
00:50:48
a local celebrity and a growing audience for her Morning News show reflected her
00:50:54
popularity in the Autumn of 1994 husen troupe feared one viewer was taking that sense
00:51:03
of intimacy too far she was convinced that a suspicious black pickup truck was following her now a little more on this
00:51:11
was that Francis stated that I'm so I believe this was her sister I apologize stated
00:51:17
that Jody had got very very nervous and was even crying and eventually called her
00:51:23
mom on the phone and her mother was telling her you need to take more precautions
00:51:28
so she was nervous enough as we had said to file a police report the police helped her out thank God
00:51:35
during this tough time for her they say there was no further problems now on her
00:51:40
27th birthday this was on June 5th now this situation didn't take place on her 27th birthday but her 27th birthday
00:51:50
would have been about three weeks in a day before she was abducted Jody's friend and one time neighbor this
00:51:58
is John Van sice he threw a surprise birthday party for her this is at a bar and invited were Jody's friends and
00:52:07
co-workers there will be a lot of suspicions surrounding this man later but I wanted to make sure that we
00:52:14
brought up things that were going on in her life leading up to the abduction many people out there have long
00:52:20
suspected that John Van sice was having having abducted her and killing Jody now some believe John was infatuated
00:52:29
with her John in 1995 was about 20 years older than Jody now they met when he lived at the Key Apartment Complex in
00:52:38
1994. reportedly the two of them spent a lot of time together they had similar Hobbies than Goff and I and he had a
00:52:47
boat yes and John described his relationship with her as friends and as a father-daughter type relationship and
00:52:56
as you had said they shared several of the same Hobbies Jody's Family reported that there was nothing romantic about
00:53:03
the two's relationship and there is actually nothing out there to suggest that anything otherwise well and Jody
00:53:11
was a very positive person and so I think she came into his life at a time where maybe things weren't going so
00:53:17
great but she was somebody that was you know upbeat and positive about things so
00:53:23
he's it changed his outlook on his life and so I think he very very much valued their friendship well about 10 days
00:53:31
before the abduction Jody and what I would suspect to have been Jody's best friend at the time or at least someone
00:53:38
she seemed to spend a lot of well a great deal of time with this is Tammy Baker the two were Fast Friends sharing
00:53:45
the same interest uh they were roughly the same age according to Tammy Jody and her spent much of the weekend together
00:53:53
so this is the weekend 10 days before her abduction now the following weekend let's go to Friday June 23rd 1995 the
00:54:02
weekend before Jody was abducted Jody with her good friend Tammy Baker they go and they spend a day on the lake water
00:54:10
skiing with Jody's friend John Van sice who we had mentioned earlier and his son
00:54:17
Trenton van sice after a full day the ladies stayed the night in an apartment on Iowa city in Iowa City I'm sorry this
00:54:29
is Trenton's apartment so John Van sice's son this is his apartment right and as you had mentioned when they were
00:54:36
out on the water they spent that day on John's boat they they were going to stay
00:54:42
there for a full weekend but rain cut that trip a little shorter than they had planned so they returned home
00:54:51
now Monday the day before the abduction this is after work Jody goes to a charity golf tournament there she is
00:55:01
accompanied by the TV station's news director but even though they're accompanied by one another they
00:55:08
according to him they only see each other briefly during this event and anybody that's ever played in charity
00:55:14
golf tournaments know that you kind of are paired off with a group of people you spend the majority of the day with
00:55:20
them you see the rest of the people in passing now 8 P.M following the golf tournament so she left the golf
00:55:26
tournament approximately at 8 p.m that night the gray area here is what was going on with Jody between 8 P.M that
00:55:36
night and then the following morning when she takes the phone call from her co-worker at 4 10 am
00:55:42
so at 8 pm that night she leaves the golf tournament according to John Van sice Jody then
00:55:49
went to his apartment they were going to view a videotape of the birthday party from a couple of
00:55:56
weeks before he says that she left his apartment around 10 p.m that night now he told
00:56:03
news reporters that Jody you know he was very specific about her leaving he's like I watched her walk down the stairs
00:56:09
she turned around the corner and she must have gotten her car and drove home there's there's a couple of issues here
00:56:15
and does she call once she gets home because normally like if I'm hanging out with a friend guy or girl and we leave a
00:56:23
bar or they leave or if I'm at their house and I leave their house like I'll text when I get home hey made it home
00:56:30
especially if you had a couple drinks the last he saw her according to John Van sice was her walking down the stairs
00:56:37
from his apartment and turning around the corner to go to her vehicle there's a couple of conflicting reports out
00:56:43
there and we can get we'll dive more into this in tomorrow's episode because we're we're running out of time here but
00:56:51
I do want to point out that there was a phone call that there was in fact a phone call that was made that night the
00:56:57
timing of that phone call is slightly unclear and we'll get into that again tomorrow's show but there was a phone
00:57:04
call that was made from Jody to a friend and we know that this came from Jody because it was made from a landline
00:57:11
inside her apartment and this would be to her friend Kelly Torgerson now Kelly lives in Mississippi
00:57:19
when Kelly was not home when Jody called but the phone was answered and Jody spoke to
00:57:27
Kelly's husband who she knew well she knew him well the husband would later tell reporters
00:57:33
and police that on the phone Jody sounded happy she didn't sound like anything was
00:57:39
troubling her he simply told her hey look Kelly's not home take a message I'll have her call you back the two
00:57:47
didn't speak okay there was never any return call before she was abducted now as we know likely the last person to
00:57:55
speak with Jody was Amy Coons and Amy was actually Jody's assistant at the time we had said her colleague her title
00:58:04
was associate producer or assistant producer of this TV station so Jody technically was her boss whether the two
00:58:14
were actually friends were more than just co-workers is a point of debate in an interview Amy had the following to
00:58:24
say to be honest I almost dread the anniversary coming around every year it's dredging it's the dredging up of
00:58:31
all the old feelings and all the unanswered questions almost an eerie feeling you always have
00:58:40
those questions in your mind you always wonder if you could have done something more there's almost a guilt I have to
00:58:46
live with wondering if something could have been done now Coons who was the associate producer of the early morning
00:58:55
show that who's in true anchored said the two had discussed the what if possibilities in terms of having to
00:59:02
leave from work I'm sorry from home for work in the early morning Darkness each day she said that we had talked about it
00:59:11
we had conversations that went so far to ask if someone if something would happen
00:59:15
to one of us who would know saying we had a pact that if either of us was late we would call each other well that's why
00:59:25
she called her that morning and Coons worked very closely with police in the days following who's in truth's
00:59:32
disappearance she went with them to Jody's apartment the the police wanted her to see if anything looked out of
00:59:39
place now she would later say that nothing did then she had to go through Jody's clothing
00:59:46
they wanted her to figure out what possible outfit she might have been wearing at the time of her abduction
00:59:52
after five years [ __ ] said that she had finally come to grips with the idea that
00:59:57
something terrible probably had happened to Jody saying that if she's dead I hope
01:00:02
she didn't have to suffer that's the hard thing to think about I just hope she didn't have to suffer now [ __ ] said
01:00:08
that she called remember going back to that morning Kuhn said that she had called
01:00:12
who's in true around 4 10 a.m that morning and spoke with her who's in true had said that she had
01:00:19
overslept and that she would be heading to the studio shortly this has been a hotly debated issue online now we should
01:00:26
mention that Amy Coons also left a phone message and then another phone message for Jody after she had spoken with her
01:00:34
on the phone she has said in an interview that she called again around 5 a.m and left a frantic message for her
01:00:42
stating that honestly at the time at first she was really mad because Amy was going to have to edit and write the show
01:00:50
and put everything together at the last minute now we mentioned that the show went on air at 6 a.m at this time who's
01:00:57
in true it's still not shown up Amy Coons had to fill in go on air for her and when there was still no sign of
01:01:04
who's in troop by the show's end at 7 A.M this is when the police were called now Amy has been questioned by many
01:01:12
people over the years of why didn't you do something more why didn't you call and call again why did you wait so long
01:01:19
to call the police and her answer is very simple stating I don't know why I didn't call the police and so many
01:01:26
people have asked me that time and time again but I just didn't think that anything could be wrong I really didn't
01:01:35
foreign a lot more to get into tomorrow but in the meantime check out our store Page we
01:01:47
got a limited edition shirt that we made uh it's girls don't like boys girls like
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01:02:02
and don't let it [Music] [Applause] [Music]