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[Music] % [Music] welcome to True Crime garage wherever you are whatever you doing thanks for
00:01:47
listening I'm your host Nick and with me as always is a man whose fantasy football team will squash your little
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fantasy football team like a grape here is the captain thank you thank you thank
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you it's good to be seen and good to see you thanks for listening thanks for telling a
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[Music] friend ladies and gentlemen this week we are very excited to be featuring True
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cheers to Patrick in Fort Benning Georgia next up we have Jen from Stratford Connecticut and last but
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certainly not least we have Curtis in lyen Hurst New York everyone we just mentioned went to True Crim garage.com
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our old episodes check us out on the Stitcher app they are free also we have a bonus show called off the Record and
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that is only on Stitcher premium you can find all those Links at true Crim garage.com and that is enough of the
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business all right everybody gather around grab a chair grab a beer let's talk some true
00:03:46
[Music] crime [Music] a young woman leaves work late at night and arrives home her car makes it into
00:04:16
her usual spot in the garage but somehow she never makes it inside the house with very few Clues Left Behind
00:04:26
police are left scratching their heads the number one suspect the boyfriend acts suspicious but nothing ties him to
00:04:35
The Disappearance the case grows cold and languishes for 30 years in so many of these missing
00:04:46
person's cases decades pass there is no movement on the case and we are left with no
00:04:55
resolution but in this case all is not as it seems after nearly three decades there
00:05:04
is new information that is not really knew it all but it was left out of the case
00:05:13
files some suggest this information was conveniently lost or covered up intentionally this is true crime garage
00:05:25
and this is the case of Veronica Jill Bloom Hurst [Music] Veronica Jill Bloom Hurst was born on
00:05:55
September 4th 1969 nothing is known about her birth parents this is actually a major speed
00:06:03
bump for the investigation it's complicated but we will get into that the why that is important after we get
00:06:11
to know a little more about Veronica her family and the day that she went missing
00:06:16
Veronica was adopted by Paul and Betty Bloomer when she was only 7 months old she had an older sister named Carolyn
00:06:25
also adopted but from a different family and a younger brother named Todd who was
00:06:31
the bloom Hurst biological son reports are that Veronica had some early physical disabilities that impeded her
00:06:39
ability to walk but with the help of leg braces and hard work she eventually overcame this she had magic shoes she
00:06:47
was also diagnosed with a learning disability and took special education classes in school Veronica was somewhat
00:06:54
quiet and shy but was friendly and everyone liked her she was a bit of a homebody her family likes to say that
00:07:02
she often was tucked into bed by 8:00 p.m. unless she was working or with her boyfriend in 1990 Veronica Bloomer was
00:07:11
21 years old and living at home with her family in menot Illinois Veronica lived with her parents
00:07:19
and her brother Todd on Monroe Street Mota is a very safe small city of about 7,000 residents in Northern lale County
00:07:29
and on top of that they moved there because the father became a firefighter and he was well connected not just in
00:07:37
the fire department but also with the police department as well yeah her father Paul was a firefighter her uncle
00:07:44
was a police officer and her mother worked at a nursing home her older sister Carolyn in 1990 was in her mids
00:07:55
and lived about 20 minutes away with her husband Veronica was working as a sales
00:08:00
associate at a local retailer about a half a mile from her home this is at Dempsey's Super Value she had multiple
00:08:10
job duties this included cashier Manning the movie rental counter and selling lottery tickets many people in town knew
00:08:18
her as the friendly movie Clerk and although she was not a gregarious person she was described as
00:08:25
bubbly when she wasn't working Veronica spent a lot of of her time with her boyfriend Jeff Vera a 22-year-old
00:08:34
computer science junior college student whom she met about 6 months earlier the two were serious and had discussed
00:08:42
marriage although they were not officially engaged at this time now we relied heavily on the terrific series of
00:08:50
articles in this case by Jim Hagerty that was released earlier in 2020 on the Rockford Advocate website we spoke with
00:09:00
Jim as well and we'll be sharing some information that he gave to us now let's get into the events captain of September
00:09:08
19th and 20th of 1990 this weekend ahead of us marks 30 years that this young woman has been
00:09:18
missing and Foul Play is absolutely suspected in this case now the day in question will be Wednesday September
00:09:27
19th 1990 Veronica went to work at 5:00 p.m. for her evening shift as usual this is the
00:09:35
cashier gig at Dempsey's Super Value she has worked there for several years Veronica recently had a bad case of mono
00:09:44
and she wasn't feeling very well have you ever had Mono I have not it's awful it just you feel completely drained like
00:09:54
you don't even feel sick so much or at least I didn't I just felt complet completely exhausted and it ruined the
00:10:01
New York Jets football season last year mhm so you know it's serious so she's not feeling well she's still taking
00:10:09
medication for mono at this time around 9:30 Veronica's sister Carolin came into
00:10:16
the store and talked to her sister about a doctor's appointment that Veronica had
00:10:20
the next day this of course to address the mono that she's still fighting off mhm then Veronica called Jeff her
00:10:29
boyfriend she rented a movie for herself from the store's catalog of VHS films this was the B Midler movie Stella old
00:10:39
school VHS Be Kind Rewind mhm when her shift ended at closing time she walked out of
00:10:47
the store in the company of another sales associate this was her friend Sharon vaner what time was this at it
00:10:55
was late this was at 1:07 a.m. so Veronica told Sharon that she was very tired and she was going to go home and
00:11:04
go to bed she intended to watch the movie the following day MH the two walked to their cars parked on the west
00:11:12
side of the parking lot they warmed up their vehicles defrosted the windshields and then Veronica got into her blue
00:11:19
Chevy Corsica and drove North out of the parking lot onto Meridan Street and headed East toward her home on Monroe
00:11:28
Street which again is just half a mile away the next morning Veronica's brother Todd
00:11:36
woke up for school Todd was having some car troubles so Veronica was supposed to
00:11:42
drive him to school that day right she wasn't downstairs yet but he saw her car in the garage so he just simply waited
00:11:51
but she never came down when he went and looked in her room he realized that she
00:11:56
was not there so now he's like she's not home at all he called his father at work
00:12:03
at the firehouse and his father told him you know just drive your own car to school and I'll come and pick up this
00:12:11
vehicle later and I'll do some work on it so Todd leaves the house he goes off to school Paul father arrived home from
00:12:20
his overnight shift around 8:00 a.m. that morning he assumed that Veronica was out to breakfast with her boyfriend
00:12:27
Jeff and simply forgot about driving her brother to school that day again it's not a regular activity for her to drive
00:12:34
him maybe it just slipped her mind well and like you said Jeff is this is a serious relationship so the family knows
00:12:42
who Jeff is and and everybody is aware of of who he is so Paul leaves the house again some Reports say that he went off
00:12:51
to his part-time job some say that he went to run some errands regardless of why he leaves the house when he returned
00:12:59
to the house the phone rang and it was the doctor's office they're calling to say that Veronica didn't show up for her
00:13:08
follow-up appointment that was scheduled for that day then the phone rang again now this
00:13:14
time it's Jeff the boyfriend he's asking for Veronica is Veronica there they were
00:13:21
supposed to go out to lunch he said Paul told him that Veronica was not home and
00:13:26
actually asked Jeff had he seen her anytime since she left for work the previous day he said no I had not
00:13:35
starting to worry Paul calls his wife who's at work he ask her if she had seen Veronica that morning and she says of
00:13:44
course she had not as well all right so we are in a weird spot here Captain everything appears to be as it should
00:13:54
with the exception that no one knows where Veronica is mhm her car is parked in its usual spot in the bloom Hurst
00:14:04
garage it also appears that the vehicle arrived at or about the expected time but anywhere that Veronica should
00:14:14
be she is not she wasn't home to drive her little brother to school that day she missed the doctor's appointment and
00:14:22
she was not out with her boyfriend I heard it reported multiple times some people say that was a false followup
00:14:29
doctor's appointment and some people were saying that because she didn't feel like the Mona was getting better or she
00:14:36
wasn't feeling better that it was a extra appointment and so that makes it even more important sometimes you don't
00:14:43
follow up on an appointment cuz you're feeling better the other thing too here is the garage setting right there's
00:14:53
multiple different kinds of garages your house now has a attached garage your house before had a detached
00:15:02
garage but this this is a detached garage and it's I believe roughly about 30 ft away from the house so it's it's
00:15:11
quite a distance between the garage and the house well and it looks to me too that you would actually if you were
00:15:18
driving and wanted to park in the garage that you would enter the garage from an
00:15:23
alley that is behind the house and behind the garage right that makes sense that you wouldn't pull that that there
00:15:30
may not even be a driveway to get you from Monroe Street to the garage so with Veronica's car in the
00:15:38
garage this means that she or at least the vehicle arrived home after her shift at the Super Value the night before her
00:15:47
mom woke up around 2 a.m. and from the kitchen window she could see Veronica's car was in the garage the garage door
00:15:56
was shut and the lights were off this was the family's kind of signal you know that everyone was home and safe at the
00:16:06
house for the night the last person in would close down the garage and Betty it was routine for her to get up in the
00:16:14
night to check that the garage was closed out B again like we said it's a very small
00:16:20
community her father works for the fire department within the area I think one of their neighbors was a police officer
00:16:29
it's a very safe area so since there's no sign of Veronica Paul he gets in his vehicle he drives out to the sister's
00:16:36
house out to Carolyn's house again about 20 minutes away and this was just to see
00:16:42
if Veronica was there she was very close with Carolyn and there was some reason to believe that she intended to go to
00:16:49
her sister's house that day to talk about maybe wedding arrangements or wedding dresses but Veronica was not out
00:16:58
there as well when Paul showed up at the house Carolyn was immediately alarmed she says you know her father was
00:17:09
normally a calm and practical dude but on this day he was quite panicked and this set her off so Carolyn had no idea
00:17:19
where her sister was and she followed her dad back to the Bloomer home when they
00:17:26
arrived they were surprised to see Veronica's boyfriend Jeff as well as their neighbor John John lives across
00:17:35
the alley behind the Bloomer home he is as the captain was saying a mandota police
00:17:43
officer Jeff called 911 around noon to report Veronica missing with the arrival of the police
00:17:54
people started to gather at the Bloomer home and Searchers fan out to scour the neighborhood we aren't going to get into
00:18:02
the whole scope of the search but the PJ star summed it up nicely by saying quote
00:18:09
police quickly began searching the town and questioning people 2 hours after the
00:18:14
first report planes began to crisscross the sky for a glimpse of a missing woman
00:18:20
that day and several after just about every Fire and Police Department within 30 Mi of Mendota assisted in the search
00:18:28
hundreds of civilians scoured the area hour after hour day after day not stopping even in the rain dive teams
00:18:36
jumped into lakes and ponds to seek Clues end quote now remember Paul was a firefighter so you can
00:18:44
imagine that we're going to have an all handson deck type of response right and that her neighbor was a police officer
00:18:52
yeah the police chief stated that he could not even begin to guess how many man hours were were expended on the
00:19:00
search MH which extended to a 15 to 20 mile radius of Mendota and yet there was no sign
00:19:08
anywhere of this young woman no sign anywhere of Veronica it seems that she has just
00:19:15
simply vanished now at the house it was Veronica's sister Carolyn that thought someone should check the trunk of
00:19:24
Veronica's car we got the car in the garage no one's thought to check the trunk and this is really we've talked
00:19:33
about this with many cases that we've covered when a person goes missing the vehicle is
00:19:40
located this is always a very traumatic experience for whomever is the one that is in charge of opening up the trunk and
00:19:49
a lot of times we tell these stories and it's a family member that's opening up the trunk of the vehicle and it's
00:19:56
something that they never ever never forget right now Carolyn was very careful to open the trunk very very
00:20:05
slowly all that was in there thankfully was Veronica's overnight bag which I guess was packed and still in there from
00:20:14
the weekend before MH now of course police looked at whether Veronica had actually made it home that
00:20:22
night as we said her car was found in the usual spot in the unattached garage about 30t from the house right Betty
00:20:32
usually left the garage lights on for her so Veronica would not come home to a dark garage again their routine was that
00:20:40
Veronica would shut off the light close down the garage before entering the house sure enough the garage door was
00:20:48
shut the garage light was off there was no sign whatsoever that anything was a Miss no sign of a struggle nothing was
00:20:57
dropped near you know there's not items laying on the ground that right we don't
00:21:00
have blood on the garage floor yeah or any personal items that would be lying on on the ground out there but so we we
00:21:09
have evidence that the car made it into the garage the light got turned off the door got shut we have evidence of that
00:21:17
we don't have evidence that it was her other than her co-workers saying that I walked her out to her car probably
00:21:26
actually saw her drive off for a second yeah and I say that that it appears that everything was
00:21:35
as it should be because we don't have a whole lot of time between when the coworker said that they left from their
00:21:43
shift to the time where her mother would routinely wake up to make sure that the
00:21:48
garage you know that Veronica's vehicle was in the garage and the garage was shut down it was 107 according to the
00:21:55
coworker and according to her mother mother Betty Betty would usually get up around 2: a.m. to look out the kitchen
00:22:03
window to check and see if the garage was shut down yeah so nothing seems a Miss except for we have a missing woman
00:22:11
correct correct so police did begin to suspect that Veronica did drive home did in fact drive home and then immediately
00:22:21
left with somebody else this of course is because not only was she missing but some of her personal items were missing
00:22:29
that seemed to indicate that she had taken them with her mhm these items were her purse and car keys the items that
00:22:37
she was wearing of course were were gone as well and this included her boyfriend's class ring her earrings a
00:22:45
watch her glasses and her red work smok also missing was the VHS movie that she had rented at work and brought with her
00:22:56
when she left that night so Captain you're starting to see a picture here of if in fact she did drive
00:23:03
home she gets out of her vehicle shuts off the light closes the garage door she's going to walk from the garage to
00:23:10
her her house yeah roughly 30 ft away and it's almost like everything you would expect for her to be carrying into
00:23:18
the home with her that night is also the things that are missing along with her yeah so then the question becomes
00:23:28
is she abducted does somebody pull up that she knows and says hey come with me real quick and she gets in their car
00:23:37
what happened right and I've not been able to find anything in regards to if the vehicle
00:23:43
was locked or not or if the garage was locked or if it was common for either to be locked it it's likely not important
00:23:53
but I was looking for those details yeah but to be very clear yes yes there was a
00:23:58
search that happened we have planes flying overhead we have people searching countless manh hours 15 mile radius they
00:24:07
didn't do a lot of searching of the actual property of of the House of the garage
00:24:15
of her car the idea to even search her trunk was not the police officer's idea came
00:24:23
from the family well and I think the problem here is very similar to what we were talking about yesterday on off the
00:24:32
Record it's what do you think that you're searching for can often dictate the way that a search is is that you go
00:24:40
about the search and it feels to me like in in these very crucial hours you know
00:24:48
we can sit here 30 years later and go well why didn't they do this why didn't they do that but in these very crucial
00:24:54
hours they think that they're just looking for a person who who is missing for any number of reasons they're not
00:25:03
fully aware maybe they're not equipped I don't know the answer to that Captain but for whatever reason they don't think
00:25:10
that they should be looking for Clues uh or evidence for for foul play at the time they're simply looking for
00:25:18
Veronica right the Bloomer family also believed that Veronica must have left with somebody she
00:25:26
knew Paul told the register star that if his daughter was taken against her will it was by somebody she knew
00:25:37
otherwise there would have been some noise or some sign of a struggle in the garage she's always been he says very
00:25:45
naive and overly trusting I think what it's kind of a weird statement that he gives there but I think what he saying
00:25:52
is even if she was taken against her will she may not have realized that at the time and very likely willingly got
00:25:59
into someone's vehicle or walked away with somebody that night a dogs were brought in to track Veronica scent from
00:26:07
the garage this is a good move after sniffing an item of of her clothing the dogs left the garage and went into the
00:26:16
alley behind the garage and after about 200 ft the dogs seemed to become confused and simply lost the trail or
00:26:25
whatever Trail they were following the obvious conclusion was that Veronica may have gotten into a vehicle that was
00:26:33
waiting for her in the alley when she disappeared Veronica was 5T tall 100 lb with braces and hazel
00:26:42
eyes she was wearing a mint green sweater with a white tank top cream colored pants and wire rimmed
00:26:51
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[Music] 2023 all right we are back Cheers Cheers Cheers Cheers police labeled Veronica a
00:29:29
missing person early reports state that police did not believe that there was Foul Play but it was clear to everyone
00:29:37
who knew her that something bad happened to Veronica well we see this a lot with
00:29:42
police where they go L she's an adult she probably took off maybe she's with another guy doesn't want to tell her
00:29:50
boyfriend about it maybe she took off with some friends maybe she took off to start a new life yeah they did the
00:29:56
typical thing they thought that she left on her own you know she is 21 in their defense there is no sign of a struggle
00:30:05
so they awaited they waited about 24 hours to take an official report but again her friends and family are saying
00:30:14
she didn't run away that this is totally out of character for her and there is some evidence of this right she did not
00:30:21
take any additional clothing or any sentimental items right it's just the things that she would have carried from
00:30:29
the vehicle to her home her and those items are the only things that are gone she run at a movie just the night before
00:30:38
that seems like a strange thing to do if you're planning on taking off the next day mhm she had a doctor's appointment
00:30:46
later that day and remember she wasn't feeling very well the morning before in fact she considered calling in sick to
00:30:55
her shift at Super Value plus her family they're on record they said that she only had $10 cash on her at the time and
00:31:05
that she left her paycheck at work uncashed well she lived kind of a simple life she struggled through school so
00:31:14
going to college was not really an option that she put into her own mind and so really her plans were I like my
00:31:23
job yes it's kind of strange hours but it gives me a bunch of time during the day to do my own thing and really the
00:31:30
plan for her or her plan for herself was I'm going to get married and become a mom and and that's what I'm going to do
00:31:39
and I'm pretty sure that in regards to her job with th those weird hours I'm kind of guessing here Captain because I
00:31:46
don't know for certain but I'm thinking that she probably shut down the store that that store must close maybe at the
00:31:54
1:00 hour and that's why her co-workers pretty firm on that 107 a.m. time of having last seen her mhm again $10 cash
00:32:04
on her at the time she had a paycheck at work that was left uncashed if she intended to run away she
00:32:12
would have very likely needed some money some resources you would wait to get that check and cash it well let's stay
00:32:19
on that check for a second because it's reported multiple ways some people make it seem as if there was a check left in
00:32:26
the car like she had a work check in the car that was what I believe is not the case
00:32:32
that she had actually a check that she was going to be receiving that the next Friday in a couple days and that's the
00:32:40
check that people are talking about her not having correct the the information I
00:32:45
have says that the check her paycheck was at her work she also never used any credit card or accessed her bank account
00:32:53
after the night that she went missing finally Veronica's mom Betty was battling cancer at the time of course
00:33:00
Veronica was very concerned about her mother and made sure to check in with her all of the time so the idea that
00:33:08
Veronica would just leave was really Unthinkable to her family and friends a coworker of hers says at the Super Value
00:33:20
who says she was the closest of the employees to Veronica said that she would have told someone if she was
00:33:27
planning to leave or to go somewhere as she often spoke and told everybody at work about her upcoming plans I'm
00:33:36
reading a little between the lines here Captain I don't know that I believe that
00:33:40
this statement from the coworker means so much that she would have told us if she was planning on running away and
00:33:46
starting a new life somewhere I think it also hints to the idea of if she had something going on that day to meet with
00:33:55
a specific person or go to a a specific place she probably would have blabbed about it to her co-workers at some point
00:34:01
leading up to that event right and what we have pretty much on record is her telling her co-workers hey I'm going to
00:34:08
go home I'm not even going to watch this movie I'm just going straight to bed so
00:34:13
no talks about meeting up with her boyfriend afterwards or meeting up with a friend after work she's seems like an
00:34:21
open book doesn't she where we have both co-workers and her family that seems to
00:34:27
say that they were very aware of what her plans would have been for the following day well and I think a lot of
00:34:34
people make something out of the fact that she was adopted and maybe now that she's a
00:34:40
little bit older maybe she' want to know where she came from but all indications
00:34:46
point to she was kind of curious but not that curious and felt that it would be almost like an insult to her family that
00:34:55
that gave her this life that she enjoyed yeah her adopted family is her family and I believe that was her own words you
00:35:03
know this this is my family whether it means now or whatever or however she felt about it she didn't feel the need
00:35:10
to seek out the people that gave her up she was living with who she wanted to live with she was very proud that her
00:35:18
parents adoptive parents were the ones that raised her she's in a unique situation too Captain where her sister
00:35:26
her older sister was adopted as well from another family so if she had any weird or mixed feelings about being
00:35:34
adopted she had someone sharing the exact same experience as her to go to and bounce things off of yeah police
00:35:42
eventually came around to the belief of Foul Play in connection with Veronica's disappearance and their thoughts this is
00:35:50
not that it was not a random abduction so per the register star that we quoted earlier Chief Ken Han said police quote
00:36:01
doubt that it's a random abduction in a in part because the Super Value Store where she worked and her home are off
00:36:07
the beaten path Mendota is also small enough that everybody knows everybody and any strange face or vehicle would
00:36:15
likely be noticed end quote now I know this is back in what 1990 yeah but answer me this question if
00:36:24
you could as many cases as we've gone through especially missing person cases if you're in law enforcement how are you
00:36:31
handling this because to me it's almost like they use this well we think that she just took off on her own and she'll
00:36:38
turn back up it's almost like they're which I know that happens a lot of times I know that there's thousands of missing
00:36:45
person cases and within 24 hours 48 hours that person's found and they're okay no big
00:36:53
deal but it seems to me that it's not the responsible thing to do that it's just it's it would be better
00:37:05
to you know let's wait and see and and not put out any information at all mhm I think it's a tricky
00:37:15
situation because she is an adult I think had this been a younger person that we wouldn't be in the same boat
00:37:23
that we are now right I do also o believe that there's likely in many of these cases things behind the scenes
00:37:30
that we are unaware of simple things of okay well we have our our shift roll call for
00:37:39
police uh for first shift second shift third shift of of this day oh one of the notes is we have a missing young woman
00:37:46
she's 21 years old here's a description of her and a picture even though we've not gone official with it at this point
00:37:54
yeah it's it's weird because when you look at these small towns especially the ones that are safe and have very low
00:38:00
crime rates you go well what else could they be working on just make this priority number one yeah but it's also
00:38:06
strange too because it's like maybe their their words and their actions don't necessarily match up where they go
00:38:13
well look we think that she went missing on her own or she went went to go hang out with
00:38:19
somebody but we're also all hands on deck and a bunch of people searching and we have a 15 to 20 mile radius of a
00:38:28
search that seems a little take that's that's a little more taking it serious than the words of oh
00:38:36
we think she'll turn up yeah I I think we're probably putting those in the wrong chronological
00:38:42
order it's obvious to me that it would be oh she might turn up and then it's all Hands-On deck for a search right
00:38:50
okay so who took Veronica now that the police have come around to the idea that she's not just gone that she's not just
00:38:57
where she shouldn't be or was expected to be that someone took her and their words are we believe there's Foul Play
00:39:05
in connection with her disappearance and we also do not believe that this is a random abduction I think they're
00:39:10
probably pretty spot-on with both of those thoughts and theories now as we've seen in so many cases the investigation
00:39:18
is going to start with those closest to her so 2 days after Veronica was last seen police sat down with Veronica's
00:39:27
boyfriend Jeff as we saw Jeff showed up at the bloom Hurst home very quickly after learning from Paul that she was
00:39:37
missing right he hears from Paul and then Paul goes off on some errands out to the sister's house comes back to the
00:39:45
home with the sister and now Jeff the boyfriend's at their house with the police officer and now it's kind of
00:39:53
becoming a thing that Veronica is missing right so him being there I guess is understandable right he would go over
00:40:00
there to look for well if they're supposed to have lunch that day well he goes over there cuz he now believes
00:40:06
she's missing not just to pick her up for lunch he's already from the father what I'm saying is he was had plans with
00:40:13
her and she didn't show up and now he's worried where she's at he and Veronica were serious at this time he loved her
00:40:22
by all accounts he was concerned when she didn't turn up but then he called 911 rather than leaving it to her
00:40:33
parents I think some people might think that this is weird I'm totally fine with
00:40:37
this right because we sat here before in these same chairs and said why isn't anyone taking action so we're not going
00:40:45
to uh punish somebody for being the first to take action yeah I I don't fault him at all for that you wonder was
00:40:54
that a discussion that that Jeff and Veronica's father had right like you wonder because there there was a
00:41:02
conversation before Jeff shows up at the house did Jeff tell the father hey I think we should call 911 or I think we
00:41:10
should report this to the police and the father says being the firefighter being
00:41:15
the guy that is said by his own family to be always calm levelheaded did the father say no
00:41:23
it's it's early give it a give it an hour give it a couple hours let me go to her sister's house you know was Jeff was
00:41:31
he panicked from from the get-go well like I said I mean it just throws another wrench in the whole case
00:41:38
because like we said she had some learning disabilities she struggled just to get through school I mean they had to
00:41:47
get her special help just to get her through school so you would assume that Jeff would know her almost better than
00:41:57
anybody at this time you know especially when you're 21 you're not sharing everything with your parents so I just
00:42:05
wonder if he really understood her capabilities with inside the world when we talk about how her father says that
00:42:14
she had this um sense of naive how much does Jeff understand this but he would have a better sense of who she was what
00:42:23
she was capable of doing and like I said this this the the house being 30 ft from
00:42:29
the garage it leans to the idea that you could abduct somebody but it seems like the idea that somebody would have
00:42:44
to know her and on some capacity to get her into that car agreed and I think you could look at
00:42:53
this thing with Jeff of calling 911 one of two ways with him arriving at the house and
00:43:01
calling 911 and and throwing himself into the investigation it's either one of two things either he is responsible
00:43:08
for why Veronica is missing right and he's manipulating things to make it look like he's concerned or to me I I think
00:43:18
you could go either way with it but you could also lean that this is further confirmation by somebody else outside of
00:43:25
the house that she would not have just went off somewhere but this Jeff guy is a unique character he seems to have
00:43:34
some social immaturity I guess would be the way I'd put it well he's not the best
00:43:41
Communicator with people kind of a nerdy guy smart guy everybody says he's pretty
00:43:48
bright well there's there's what we have is we have several people that say Jeff
00:43:53
started to act inappropriate early on in this case so first of all they said that he would not leave the
00:44:03
bloom Hurst home so he showed up there he stayed there for 3 days sleeping on the
00:44:10
couch and the Father Paul said quote he was constantly asking how the investigation was going yeah almost like
00:44:17
he was a little too concerned yeah Paul says that he Jeff began answering the phone as if he was a
00:44:26
person that lived there right trying to control the situation okay and Paul told
00:44:32
the media that he would not meaning Jeff would not leave our house we didn't think much of it at first but then we
00:44:38
would just he would just lay on our couch in the fetal position Paul says I think he went home to shower but other
00:44:46
than that he was at our house all of the time M every time the phone rang he would try to answer it we thought that
00:44:53
was very strange again it's it's one of two things the same thing we just talked
00:44:59
about it's either him trying to control the investigation knowing what the police know knowing what the family
00:45:05
knows or he's just really freaking concerned well not only is he concerned but he just doesn't think other people
00:45:12
are capable so you don't need to answer the phone I'll answer the phone you know
00:45:16
what I mean I I don't know that I we would I would take it that far um to to worry that people aren't capable Paul's
00:45:24
a firefighter I I don't want to try to think of what what Jeff was thinking just judging his actions it it shows me
00:45:32
it's either one of those two things he's trying to know be the first to know about the investigation to cover his own
00:45:41
ass right or he wants to be the first to know that everything's okay and that the
00:45:46
woman that he loves is alive and well right but that's what I'm saying about the maybe he there was a sense of him
00:45:54
not thinking other people were going to do as much as he could do for the investigation that's why he has to plant
00:46:00
himself in their house that's why he has to answer every phone call that's why he
00:46:05
has to talk to the police about every detail that's why he's getting arguments with people about details and and
00:46:12
conversations about her going missing according to the Rockford Advocate series on the case Again by Jim Hagerty
00:46:22
Jeff the boyfriend approached the producers of the radio broadcast of the Mendota High School football game that
00:46:29
took place on Friday September 21st this is the day after Veronica came up missing Jeff asked them to play
00:46:41
something for him during the halftime show it was a recording that Jeff gave them to play that had Jeff reading some
00:46:50
words and he says on this recording quote I am making this recording for you you because me and all your friends and
00:46:58
family miss you we want you back I don't care what the problem is I don't care where you are or whoever you're with I
00:47:08
won't be happy until you're back with me I hope I haven't pushed you or anything
00:47:15
I don't think I have I want you to know I love you everybody else loves you and we're waiting to hear from you cuz we
00:47:23
got some sad people and wherever you are and whatever you are doing call the mandota police department at and he
00:47:32
gives their number cuz I love you I know you love me so I brought this tape for you to hear cuz it's going to be strange
00:47:41
to a lot of people out there but you know this song and it's for you and you know I always think of you when I hear
00:47:49
it Veronica I love you this was followed by a paa song I unfortunately I do not have the the name
00:47:58
of the the song it's followed by a PA song well PA's big in that portion of the country
00:48:06
it makes me think of you every time I hear it well so a lot of people thought that
00:48:13
this was totally strange right maybe this guy is one of those just a dramatic person who is gushing publicly about his
00:48:22
feelings and it might be overreacting the eyes of some but airing this public statement
00:48:31
basically very very shortly after Veronica went missing I do think it's a little odd yeah a little
00:48:41
odd and a quick background investigation on Jeff revealed some concerning information um according to people who
00:48:48
knew him at work he had a temper and was the type to quickly fly off the handle over very small things like a machine
00:48:59
malfunctioning or something not working properly didn't he have an accident at some point he did further A co-worker of
00:49:07
his who was a longtime friend of Veronica's told police that Jeff had become possessive and controlling of
00:49:14
Veronica and would get mad at her if she was late for something or busy when he wanted to talk to her Veronica told this
00:49:23
friend on several occasions quote he mad at me and I don't know why this friend believed Veronica was afraid of Jeff's
00:49:31
angry Outburst another cooworker of Jeff's this is a woman told police that he had
00:49:38
called her down to their workplace one night after Veronica vanished but didn't want to talk about work stuff creeped
00:49:47
out she left but Jeff followed her home and demanded to know whether she thought
00:49:53
that he had done something to Veronica he even said to her quote this is according to this woman I don't know why
00:50:02
anyone would think I would have anything to do with her disappearance or murder the whole incident left her feeling very
00:50:11
unsettled because Jeff and I have a problem with this too Jeff was the first person to mention the word
00:50:20
murder in regards to Veronica to everyone else she was just missing now Jeff her boyfriend he is saying the word
00:50:32
murder kind of I want to argue with you on that a little bit because isn't that kind of similar to the 911 call
00:50:40
everybody's looking for her and you go well I don't think that's enough going to call
00:50:46
911 hey I think she's just missing right that's a level of concern and he then ramps up that level with of
00:50:56
concern by saying I don't I'm not so for sure that it's just a missing that she's just
00:51:03
missing I think there's something more nefarious here yeah I I don't know to me it's similar in where one may talk about
00:51:12
somebody in the past tense and be the only one to know that they're no longer with us true true after his daughter
00:51:20
went missing Paul Bloom Hurst recalled that one weekend when Veronica had gone to a paa festival with Jeff she had come
00:51:30
home with bruises on her face she told her parents that she walked into a speaker so now there's a question to
00:51:42
Veronica's parents was Veronica covering up for something that actually happened
00:51:48
something bad that happened on that trip and maybe Jeff was to blame maybe was she covering for Jeff it's worth
00:51:56
mentioning that this character assassination of Jeff was not it doesn't seem to be
00:52:03
Universal Veronica's parents Paul and Betty Bloom Hurst and sister Carolyn and her husband they all liked Jeff they
00:52:13
have said that he was I think you use this word a little odd a little quirky but he he was a horse of a different
00:52:21
color well they all said that it was clear that the two of them were in love that that he very much loved Veronica
00:52:29
and she loved him and things seemed great between the two of them of course people pointed fingers at him because he
00:52:37
was the boyfriend but there wasn't much to go on right even after years passed Jeff moved away and started his own
00:52:47
family but in 2004 14 years after Veronica vanished the mandota police department officially re examined her
00:52:56
case and in the course of doing so they did some re-interviewing of people and reviewing of the evidence this
00:53:05
examination also included some new interviews for example Veronica's closest friend Tracy was interviewed for
00:53:13
the first time 14 years later for the first time and then they gave the case File to the Bloomer family and what it
00:53:23
contained about Jeff the boy friend was enough to convince some family members particularly Todd Veronica's little
00:53:31
brother that Jeff had killed Veronica and when the case File was leaked to the public it had the effect
00:53:39
of trying Jeff veverka in the court of public opinion so what do we have as evidence that points the finger in a
00:53:48
negative light towards Jeff well it's the case File so let's go through what this case File
00:53:57
said on September 23rd 1990 this is 2 days after Veronica went missing police sat down with Jeff who was at the time a
00:54:07
composing room worker at the local paper the Sterling Daily Gazette as well as a
00:54:13
community college student the investigator who interviewed him supposedly over a long period of time
00:54:22
there are varying reports on this and you're going to have that when you you have a case that's 30 years old most
00:54:28
Reports say that it was about 6 hours maybe a little longer the officer the investigator who interviewed Jeff then
00:54:37
wrote up a summary of what he says Jeff said in this interview and what has been
00:54:43
purported to have been said by him is very suspicious now this investigator who wrote up this report was Mota Police
00:54:54
Department in investigator John P I'm going to go with P for his last name that's p period who was in charge of the
00:55:02
investigation yes this is the same John who was neighbors with the bloom Hurst his house was directly across the alley
00:55:12
that was in the back of their home here is what the report says Jeff told police
00:55:18
keep in mind that this is all as described by the interviewer John not verbatim and not taken from any
00:55:26
transcript or recording either of those things apparently do not exist in this case
00:55:35
this is all as described in Jim Hagerty series about the case he has personally reviewed the police report containing
00:55:43
this information about Jeff so in this interview it said that Jeff said that on September 19th the last day that
00:55:50
Veronica was seen he drove his father's van to Veronica house and then used Veronica's car to run some errands he
00:56:00
later returned to the car to the Bloomers home that's a confusing story in it in
00:56:08
itself I don't know why he wouldn't just use the van to go about his errands but
00:56:13
this is what police are saying he said then around 4:40 he was in his van and he saw Veronica leaving for work so he
00:56:22
drove to Super Value waited for her to Park when Veronica pulled into the lot he said he inched the vehicle his van up
00:56:31
next to her vehicle and then the two kind of you know gave an I I love you type signal to one another he then drove
00:56:39
home to his house in sublet Illinois and didn't talk to Veronica until 9:30 p.m.
00:56:49
she called him from work he said and they discussed having lunch after the doctor appointment the next day he said
00:56:57
he then watched a movie and fell asleep at 1:30 a.m. then according to mandota police
00:57:05
investigator John his report says Jeff gave reasons why he might be involved in Veronica being missing and he also gave
00:57:13
us ways he thinks it might have happened per the report Jeff blurted out that maybe someone she knew in a van no a
00:57:23
truck drove up by by her garage and she got into the vehicle with them maybe they got to fooling around and maybe she
00:57:32
said no and she was pushed or shoved and got hurt real bad and then he dumped her
00:57:38
somewhere where no one would find her also it's possible that when she got off work she took her red smok and placed it
00:57:46
over the passenger's front seat and someone may have taken it and put it around her head and did something and
00:57:53
the Smock was not found correct he went on with another hypothetical saying maybe I thought when
00:58:00
she told me on the phone that night her sister was taking her to a doctor's appointment that she was pregnant and I
00:58:08
drove down there pulled up in the alley and she got into a van no a truck and we
00:58:15
argued and maybe I was afraid of what our parents would say and I did something I don't remember maybe I was
00:58:23
the person who picked her up and I thought she was pregnant and I thought she was pregnant and I lost my mind yeah
00:58:30
but this is after how many hours of questioning the least amount of time that I found in the reports say 6 hours
00:58:38
yeah so it's anywhere from six to I think I've seen up to 24 hours of them questioning this guy yes which that
00:58:46
would be a long time I don't know how the you think the officer would need to take some kind of work the officer
00:58:51
started confessing uh hey I worked I several times I worked over a 30 hour shift if you want somebody to talk put
00:58:57
me in a room with them we'll go at it for two or three days yeah I'm ready nonstop the other big problem and issue
00:59:06
I have with this with this information is how it comes to us this is not a audio tape of Jeff
00:59:18
being interviewed by police this is not a videotape of Jeff being interviewed by
00:59:24
police this is not a transcript of that interview with questions and answers questions and answers well it is a
00:59:31
transcript no it's not it's what it is is it's the officers he is telling he's reporting
00:59:40
later yeah it's a transcription of his him remembering well right but we can get into semantics if you
00:59:50
like but it's it's not the proper use of the word transcript what what I'm saying
00:59:55
is this is not even the officer didn't sit down and write down this stuff in the interview itself this is a couple
01:00:04
days go by and he's told his superiors that Jeff said some incriminating stuff when I interviewed him for hours the
01:00:11
other day oh what did he say oh he said this and this and this well could you write that down for us in some kind of
01:00:18
report right and what I mean by that is you could you could take that any way that you want there's a lot of new
01:00:24
nuances that are missed and left to speculation in this situation this officer is reporting this Days Later did
01:00:33
Jeff say that he did this or did Jeff say that someone could have done this well that's two very different things M
01:00:40
and we have this officer writing it down days later also we just we're just we have only this officer to report this we
01:00:49
don't have anybody else backing this up we have no again no recording of any of this nobody else sitting in the room
01:00:56
writing down the same notes right but this reminds me again Shaker Heights a little bit right West Memphis
01:01:04
3 Shaker Heights they recorded the interviews and they had multiple officers in the interview room at the
01:01:10
same time right but again with this case we don't know but I I don't like the question of well how do you think it
01:01:18
would have been done you know or like when in West Memphis 3 when Daman goes well the killer must have enjoyed it or
01:01:28
and must have felt some power or something right he speculating on something and then people turn that into
01:01:35
well he must have done this because why would he say that well cuz you're asking
01:01:40
him to speculate those are pretty common questions that are that are that are in
01:01:46
these interviews again I believe to me it's the nuances that are missed because you
01:01:52
didn't bother to you didn't transcribed the interview you didn't record the interview then now 48 hours
01:02:01
later where the officer says to Jeff well what was she going to the doctor for well she had Mono could she have
01:02:09
been pregnant Jeff says I don't know and then later the report says Jeff said she
01:02:14
might have gone to the doctor because she was pregnant those are two completely different things using about
01:02:20
the same words right it's it's way too messy I think to look at this and go well
01:02:27
Jeff's statements are very incriminating no the practice in which that you obtained that information seems to be
01:02:34
extremely [Music] flawed if you have thoughts on this case go to True Crim garage.com check out our
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blog we're interested in hearing your thoughts and until tomorrow be good be kind and don't
01:03:00
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