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Chelsea Small /// Part 1 /// 495

November 07, 2022 / 57:01

This episode covers the unsolved murder of Chelsea Small, a clerk at Advance America in Taylor, Michigan, who was shot during a robbery on November 12, 2013. The hosts discuss the crime scene, the suspect's description, and the lack of witnesses.

Nick and the Captain detail the events leading up to the murder, including Chelsea's routine and the circumstances of the crime. They highlight the suspect's calm demeanor and the unusual choice of timing for the attack, suggesting a possible connection between the victim and the perpetrator.

They also examine the victimology of Chelsea Small, a mother of two who was working and attending school. The hosts reflect on the impact of her death on her family and the ongoing efforts to solve the case.

Listeners are encouraged to look at the surveillance footage and report any information that could help identify the suspect. The episode emphasizes the importance of community involvement in solving such crimes.

The hosts express frustration over the lack of leads and the mixed opinions among detectives regarding the motive behind the murder, questioning whether it was a targeted attack or a robbery gone wrong.

TLDR

Chelsea Small was murdered during a robbery at Advance America in Taylor, Michigan, in 2013, and the case remains unsolved.

Episode

57:01
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foreign [Music] [Applause] [Music] welcome to True Crime garage wherever you are whatever you're doing thanks for
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listening I'm your host Nick and with me as always is a man that would like for everyone to know that the attendant did
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the mailing list and that is enough of the business all right everybody gather around grab a chair grab a beer let's
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talk some true crime foreign [Music] [Music] most crimes are solved fairly quickly
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this includes the worst and most heartbreaking of crimes murder law enforcement used information
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collected at the crime scene and eyewitnesses to lead them to the perpetrator or perpetrators of the
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crimes they are investigating and then an arrest is made after that it's left to the courts and often a jury
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of one's peers to sort it out and it's another bad guy or killer off the streets but then
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there are those crime scenes that yield little in the way of Clues and after talking with persons in the
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area you discover they too are able to provide only a tiny amount of helpful and useful information
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it doesn't happen often but when it does law enforcement rely on their greatest of allies
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the General Public because the public together is powerful and generally despises criminals
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especially the violent ones as much as the women and men with badges working so hard to track them down
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and that is what we have on tap here in the garage this week it's a unique crime of the worst kind
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a killer with a brief interaction with the victim and then just seconds later he vanishes
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leaving police with little to work with one of the first articles regarding this
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murder is from the Detroit Free Press from November 13 2013 and reads Taylor Michigan
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clerk at cash advance store killed police are investigating the fatal shooting of a 30-year-old female clerk
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at an Advance America cash advance store 8229 Telegraph one question facing detectives is
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whether Chelsea and small a mother of two from Gibraltar knew her attacker an alarm was pressed just before noon
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Tuesday police say officers found small dead the killer had fled security tapes show a male suspect
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call 1-800 speak up if you have information but garage regulars will know that we have a much larger story to
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tell join us as we tell this horrific True Crime Story and ask the Public's help to track down
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a killer this is true crime garage before we get ear balls deep into this week's case I think it is most fitting
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to paint a picture of the area of where this horrific crime took place this week's unsolved homicide does not belong
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in any town or city but it's incredibly out of character for where it did take place so today we are going to go to
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Taylor Michigan which is located in Wayne County Michigan and Taylor is southwest of Detroit the population is a
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little more than 60 thousand good hard-working people the crime rate in Taylor is not what I would call
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particularly high for a city of that size but we should know in the last 20 years on a scale of 1 to 100 the U.S
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violent crime rate is 22.7 and Taylor Michigan's violent crime rate comes in at 27.1 so a little above
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the national average but 60 000 people is a considerable population and due to the city's
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location it's near Detroit and the other nearby cities are pretty well populated
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too Taylor sees its fair share of traffic and passers through now I've never been to Taylor only drove
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through myself but from what I can tell this is your typical nice Michigan City Taylor is named for Zachary Taylor a
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one-time national hero and our 12th president and Taylor we have a well-traveled road where the unsolved
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homicide that we are discussing this week this is where this went down this is on Telegraph Road Telegraph is part
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of U.S Highway 24. the highway runs through three counties in Southeastern Michigan this is Monroe Wayne and
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Oakland counties so obviously this is a well-traveled road this is Telegraph Road now back in 2013 on Telegraph Road
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we had the Advance America check cashing store this is one of those High interest
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rate loan joints every city has one in larger cities you'll certainly see several of these types of businesses if
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Advance America specializes in lines of credit payday loans which is a short-term loan typically paid
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typically due on your next payday installment loans and title loans where you get money by offering up the title
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to your vehicle but you still get to drive your vehicle as you pay that back and I don't know about today but back in
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2013 some of these locations offered Tax Services as well I'm unsure captain of the business hours
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eight years ago but I wouldn't imagine that the business hours would vary Too Much from the current hours which are as
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follows closed on Sunday important especially in this case now we are going to take you back to
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Tuesday November 12 2013. we have 30 year old Chelsea Small she is working solo at the Advance
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America located at 8229 Telegraph Road in Taylor the business opened up at 10 A.M that
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day so I would imagine this means she is arriving shortly before 10 a.m depending
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on the opening duties Chelsea is working in a manager capacity which would be expected if she is opening and operating
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the business by herself which is the case on this day according to Chelsea's mother Debbie Cayman around 10 30 a.m
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the two of them talked briefly on the phone Debbie says Chelsea told her that she had just finished up some of her
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early morning tasks and really everything sounded like business as usual Chelsea's only complaint was that it
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seemed like they were dumping a lot of work on her at this current time we all experienced this at work right just
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another day especially middle of the week when you just want to get all of your work done get the work day over
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with and go home so this is very likely the way that Chelsea felt on this Tuesday so
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everything was plain and simple normal this is until 1204 PM so this is lunch hour on a very busy road
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a man knocks on the door of the Advance America now we say Knox we don't know for certain
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but in the dramatization that they show the man knocked or tapped on the door but what we do know for certain is that
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there would be some type of notification that the man wanted to enter the business
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be it simply visual or otherwise because the store Front is glass including the front door but the door is always locked
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it's typical for these businesses to always be locked even during business hours and you even see this at some
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banks and jewelry stores and such so think of a jewelry store or a bank where you have to be buzzed in this is the
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same thing you can't enter until a staff member hits the button which unlocks the
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door and then you are free to proceed inside now some robberies are obvious right you see a mask you see a weapon or
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someone you know to be bad news and you don't hit the button you don't unlock the door some robberies are obvious this
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one was not what Chelsea would have seen when looking at the man standing at the
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door waiting to be buzzed in is a pretty average looking stocky middle-aged man she buzzes him in he opens the door and
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walks inside now the layout of the business is very basic you have the storefront where the customers enter
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Then There is probably about eight feet deep maybe a little more but all the way
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across the entire width of the store this is standing room only space where lines can form
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this standing space leads up to counters where staff can assist the clients the counter goes all the way across so
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picture a line that goes from one wall all the way to the other this completely separates the staff from
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the customers on the other side there is a little door in the middle of the counter and the counter is like chest
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High and the little door looks to be just slightly shorter than the counter Now Chelsea is sitting at the counter
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space furthest to the left of the man so he walks in and approaches Chelsea at this counter space to the left it
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looks to me like she starts to get up and this could be for any number of reasons simply just to greet the
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customer or she could have noticed something because this man has a gun now the gun is not obvious to me before
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he is standing right in front of her in fact he brought with him a dark bag so I
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have seen and heard this bag described two different ways one like a banker type bag this could be
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with a zipper or some of them even have maybe a lock but the way that it's most commonly
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described and described by detectives as well is that the bag is more like one of
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those flimsy drawstring type bags and again I've seen and watched the security camera footage repeatedly and
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it absolutely looks like a cheap drawstring bag to me and I gotta tell you Captain it looks way too much like a
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drawstring type bag that I'm awfully shocked that there's even that bank bag description I think
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that that just kind of muddies the waters a bit let's go a little more in depth of what we see we have a white
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male wearing a black baseball cap dark blue I can't tell if it's a shirt or if it's a jacket but it looks like it's
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either tucked into his pants or maybe it's a elastic waist if it's a jacket he's wearing black pants and it looks
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like um they look like tennis shoes to me but I can't tell if they're just like dirty
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white tennis shoes or if they're supposed to be like tan they're described by law enforcement as
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light-colored boots or shoes and then also you notice on the baseball cap there's a little white marking on one
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side so there's an emblem on the front of the ball cap and an emblem on one side of
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the cap and there's also some kind of white tag or some kind of white emblem somewhere on his pants it might be it's
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near the belt area uh if for those that have not seen pictures of this perpetrator but from what I can tell the
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perp arrived at the Advance America store with the bag so then he will take this with him
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when he leaves so other than what can be seen on the security footage of course no one knows for certain exactly what
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kind of bag it is we can only look at it from the footage and describe it it's dark in color and if I had to guess it's
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black but again we can't say for sure and I'd agree with you most of the pictures that you see
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of this bag I would agree with you it looks like a cheap drawstring type bag but there is one image where it looks
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like maybe there's a zipper across the whole top or maybe it's an envelope or something
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sticking out there's one picture that maybe looks more like a bank bag yeah it definitely appears to open on the top or
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on one side okay so the man walks in and goes to the counter at the far left Chelsea is sitting and appears to start
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to stand up either to greet him or because she is alarmed by seeing the gun my guest Captain is that the gun was in
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this bag as he gets to the counter and then he pulls the gun from the bag and he immediately shoots Chelsea Small
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shoots her once he then appears to place the bag on the counter and then he walks
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and I want to strongly emphasize this for those who have not seen this footage he walks he does not run
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in fact he walks very calmly to his right to that little door the door that separates the counters
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he reaches over the door again the door is just a little shorter than the counters to the left and he
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hits some kind of latch or lever on the staff side of the door this frees the door for him to push it
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open and he walks still very calmly behind the counter to the left up to the victim and then fires the gun again
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he then can be seen looking around like on some of the counters behind the counters and then he walks towards the
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back wall still in the same room appears to check some kind of cabinet and calmly walks
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back to the front of the store now he's in the customer area again and then I believe he puts the gun back
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inside of this bag I can't tell for certain but right the gun goes away and then he walks out of the store
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when officers arrive on the scene they arrive within minutes and they find Chelsea Small Dead behind the counter
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now a few things happened during the course of these events and we'll go through each item after I list them here
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one the killer did make off with some money two Chelsea activated the silent alarm this is how law enforcement knew
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to arrive on the scene indicating that a robbery was in progress and three at some point during this
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whole situation the Killer's gun jammed or malfunctioned at some point so the killer entered the Advance America store
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at 1204 PM this is a very specific time and detectives would know this obviously
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based off of the security camera footage but likely from the electronic magnet door lock as well
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now the building I worked in years ago it would make an electronic record every time the door was unlocked and opened so
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while he would need to be buzzed in one could simply trigger the infrared proximity sensor and click the door
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unlocked so he could leave the story it needs to be buzzed in but does not need to be buzzed out
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now before we get into those three pieces of information Captain I want to talk about the timing of all of this
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along with the door to the business so we know thanks to the security measures and technology that the perpetrator
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entered at 1204 PM this again is the lunch hour on a very busy road and then as far as we're being told
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nobody sees a thing what we are being told is simply that the security camera is our only eyewitness so the timing
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seems weird but notice when we went through the business hours on Tuesdays Advance America is open only from 10 a.m
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to 2 P.M so it's the shortest hours of operation for the entire week remind me where they
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open on Mondays the business is closed on Sunday open from 10 a.m to 6 P.M Monday
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Wednesday Thursday Friday 10 a.m to 2 p.m on Tuesday and 9 A.M to 1 p.m on Saturdays so maybe the
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perpetrator knows that there could be less customers on Tuesday or possibly he knows that there's less employees on
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Tuesday because of the shorter schedule right and so where my head goes is I believe
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this tells us one of two things possibly both for the business itself either the
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structure of this day is significant to the business due to some kind of operational procedure required by the
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business right or and maybe it's an Andor this is most often the day when the business receives
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the least amount of traffic the least amount of opportunity to generate more business less traffic means less staff
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so you got to wonder is this kind of random did he just pick this day at random because it was good
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for his schedule or did he want to do this on this day because of the Limited hours right so did the killer know this
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and was this Cho his choice of hitting the business on a Tuesday part of some kind of bigger plan right if I'm robbing
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the place or targeting someone that works there well this is a good day for me to carry
00:21:00
this out as I should in most likelihood encounter less tellers or staff also less customers less people in the
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parking lot but then my other question though too is if this is the day that the business is going to see the least
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amount of customers is it possible this is the day that they carry the least amount of cash with inside the building
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that's a good question and again I I also point out the possibility that it has something to do
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with the the behind the scenes operation of the business right and that might just be the case we don't know for
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certain but regardless these are hours that are posted that people could easily find I personally believe that it's it's
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not so random that he picked this day and it happens to be their shortest day I kind
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of feel like we're working with a sophisticated criminal someone that takes a lot of time and
00:21:57
and planning goes into crimes as well as a man that a criminal that's patient I agree because like you
00:22:06
said when he come when he gets into the building he shoots her right away it's almost
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like he he had a plan and he really stuck to his plan and that's what's so damn tricky about this case because you
00:22:19
go all right well he shoots her right away so was he was he there just to commit the murder and then take some
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cash to make it a little confusing right to appear as the mode of being robbery and not murder or did he decide in
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advance you know I'm making this robbery I'm not leaving any Witnesses right or did he
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did he somehow figure out that she hit the panic button that she triggered the silent alarm so I spoke with one of the
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detectives that's worked this case and he told me it was in fact you know a very traditional silent alarm the the
00:22:57
robber would not have heard anything it's not a you know like most people's home security systems there's a loud
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siren that's going off this would have been a button that she would have pushed that that he may have seen her push it
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he may not have we can't tell from the security footage I'm on this idea right now of the parking lot Captain because
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if he did choose this day I think he chose this day for the purpose of there being less staff there probably number
00:23:26
one good chance of less customers less people in the parking lot you don't want people seeing you in and out of this
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business on this day So speaking of the parking lot we've already mentioned that this is a
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major road there are a lot of businesses obviously on this street in 2013 the Advance America was located at 8229
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Telegraph now it's no longer there there is a tax place there now I believe from my understanding is that once this
00:23:59
homicide took place I'm not certain that the business ever opened back up or if they did
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people stop going there there's a tax there the tax place there now so this was on the east side of the
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street in a shared building there's room for four businesses in this building with their own storefronts so
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you would have the addresses of 8225 8229 8233 and 8237 8229 is Advance America it's the second
00:24:36
from the left when you're facing the building there were two other businesses in operation at that time
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so I imagine the parking lot in 2013 would have been configured about the same as it is today and it looks to be
00:24:52
that there are just six parking spaces in front of the businesses that's a total of six not six each
00:25:00
the building is bookended by additional parking the problem with our case is we don't
00:25:09
have any Witnesses to the crime other than this single security camera inside the Advance
00:25:15
America we don't have security footage from outside Advance which could provide some answers right like what I'm
00:25:22
guessing the other workers and the other building never even heard gunshots you'd
00:25:27
love to know what kind of vehicle this guy was driving yeah you know make model year maybe even
00:25:32
a plate number you'd you'd love to know where this guy parked because here's the
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other troubling thing we don't have any eyewitnesses saying they saw this guy outside
00:25:43
of the Advance America we don't have anybody telling us what kind of vehicle he was driving where he came from and of
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course where did he go makes you wonder if somebody dropped him off and I mean this is such a quick attack
00:25:57
quick plan executed that did somebody drop him off stroke her back around and pick him up and head out of town wonder
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if he didn't park there or didn't get dropped off and I'm basing that off of fact that we don't have anybody telling
00:26:13
us that they saw him coming or going from the store and this is bizarre because it really
00:26:20
reminds me a lot of the I-70 killer case where we had a suspect description and a
00:26:25
gun description but out of all of those attacks no one seemed to know what the guy was driving where he came from and
00:26:33
where he went now one suspicion in that case in the I-70 case was that the perpetrator was parking in the
00:26:40
neighborhoods that the businesses backed up to and that could very well be the case
00:26:46
here as that is a possibility if you look it up on the map there are houses behind the Advance America building West
00:26:54
Point Street runs behind the businesses and in fact West Point dead ends twice so the road stops it's not complete so
00:27:02
there are houses on West Point it dead ends there's like one lot size of space that is grass
00:27:10
and then the road starts again and there are some more houses so someone could park their vehicle
00:27:16
along West Point Road or at either of the dead end spots cut through a yard again there's
00:27:23
that space that is just grass so you don't even really have to you don't even need to cut through someone's actual
00:27:29
property you walk calmly no one notices you if you look like you should be there it's a
00:27:35
busy road lots of people moving about you walk calmly to the parking lot walk past the pizza place up to the door of
00:27:42
the Advance America and earlier we said knocked on the door to notify Chelsea that he wanted in
00:27:49
because that's the way it went down in the dramatization but from the news footage
00:27:56
I looked at the news footage from that November 2013. now mind you the cameras that are trying
00:28:04
to film this this is After Crime Scene tape is set up and everybody already knows what went down
00:28:10
but the cameras are back by the street so they're a little distance away so it's a little hard to tell but it looks
00:28:17
to me Captain like there's a button to the left of the door this is probably a bell or a buzzer that
00:28:23
the customers push that trigger some kind of noise notification to the staffer so they can make a quick visual
00:28:30
check of the person unlock the door and let the customer in in this case the man
00:28:36
in now your thought goes to well then this buzzer or Bell would be the one thing
00:28:44
for certain that we know the killer touched so let's try to pull some prints off of
00:28:51
this thing now again I've watched the security footage that was released to the news outlets
00:28:56
over and over again and I am 100 convinced that the man is wearing gloves in fact I believe he's wearing white or
00:29:06
off-white latex gloves and if so fingerprints won't be a factor and the only thing you really see him
00:29:13
touch on the camera footage once he's inside is that latch on the back of the door to go behind the counter
00:29:20
on the footage I believe that I'm seeing a much different color let's pretend he's not wearing gloves it would look to
00:29:27
me like his his face color in hand skin color are completely different and that's what I'm kind of basing that off
00:29:34
of that it looks to me that he could be wearing gloves foreign [Music] [Music] [Music]
00:30:13
all right we're back cheers me mateys cheers to you crispy of the crispiest kernels cheers captain and I will be
00:30:22
posting this surveillance footage on our Instagram Facebook and also our website
00:30:29
at True Crime garage so check it out because I'd be interested to see if people will see anything different than
00:30:36
we are picking up on the other thing too is think of this week's episodes as more
00:30:42
of a commercial right it's a commercial asking everyone for their help put your eyes on this footage let us know what
00:30:50
you see let the police know if you know something or recognize this man and the captain every week thanks you for
00:30:57
listening thanks you for telling a friend this week we would like to thank you for
00:31:02
telling a friend about this case not necessarily about our show but about the Chelsea Small case her sister has said
00:31:10
that she believes that the reason why this case has not yet been solved is that the right set of eyes have not seen
00:31:18
this case the local police department the detectives say that they put the probability rate of solving this case
00:31:24
very high we just need a lot of people to take a break and take a quick look at this footage somebody out there will
00:31:34
recognize something now the general autopsy information in this case Captain is that our victim was shot twice once
00:31:42
in the chest and then once in the head the killer did make off with some money the reports I have seen states that the
00:31:48
killer made off with two hundred dollars cash so very simple the shooter comes in
00:31:54
walks right up to Chelsea now there is no audio on the security footage but it does appear that very briefly that there
00:32:03
are some words exchanged between the shooter and victim and at some point Chelsea activates the silent alarm
00:32:10
indicating a robbery in progress the killer shoots her once walks around the back of the counter and shoots her again
00:32:16
and then he looks around very quickly this is interesting to me because he could be looking for more money
00:32:23
obviously but when he goes to the back part of me wonders if he's looking to see if there was anyone else in the
00:32:31
business you know making sure that there's no that's very good point no other eyewitnesses or or maybe he's
00:32:38
looking for somebody else he he makes a move to go to the back but as calm as he
00:32:44
is he does seem to want to get in rather get in and out rather quickly but again
00:32:49
could just be looking for money their their business is money I just don't understand why they only have one
00:32:55
employee I I almost I'd almost assumed that they would have two employees even on a half day like on their half day on
00:33:03
Tuesdays and maybe just one of them didn't show up that day and from every report that's
00:33:09
out there the he's only inside of this business depending on which report you look at 60
00:33:16
to 70 seconds 60 to 70 seconds so everything was happening very fast and unfortunately
00:33:23
this man was very efficient at whatever it was that he was doing now we said two shots fired but at some
00:33:31
point in the commission of these crimes the Killer's gun jammed or malfunctioned
00:33:35
at some point so this left a live round this is on the side of the store that is
00:33:42
nearest the door so a silent alarm at that business on a major road is a very high priority call for police my guess
00:33:51
on a Tuesday around noon you're dispatching multiple cars to that scene when police arrived the Killer is gone
00:33:59
the door is locked and now given the current situation there is no one to buzz open the door for the police to
00:34:07
come in and take a look around but that live round that bullet is on the floor and police see this
00:34:16
and that changes everything right because then they very quickly break the glass door they go in and unfortunately
00:34:22
they find this young woman Chelsea Small then on arrival well this case is so frustrating because like you said I
00:34:30
don't know if I see that he's wearing gloves but we have no fingerprints as far as what he was setting out to do
00:34:38
did a good job of that other than the gun being jammed and possibly this uh shell casing
00:34:47
I don't see what mistake he made it's but I can't definitively tell you what the motive
00:34:55
was was the motive to kill Chelsea and then to get a little money to then confuse cops
00:35:03
or make people think that it was just a robbery or was it just a simple robbery and she
00:35:10
was a innocent bystander dude your feelings are spot on because the detectives that have worked this case
00:35:18
there it's a mixed bag between their opinions on the motive of what went down there are some detectives that say
00:35:26
absolutely this was a robbery he didn't want to leave any eyewitnesses there are other detectives that say the
00:35:33
robbery makes no sense he walks right in shoots her he makes sure that she's dead too with the second
00:35:40
shot right and that makes me lean towards the motive being murder correct and he the
00:35:47
other thing too is he doesn't attempt to access a safe or some of the detectives
00:35:54
and again these are just this is just speculation in people's opinions nobody really truly knows for sure
00:36:02
but some detectives say look him looking around seems like he's not really looking for anything in particular or
00:36:11
looking for money and that's why I wonder with the idea when he went to the back if he was
00:36:17
looking for another person to see to make sure that there was nobody else in that building
00:36:22
because like you said regular dude myself included we would expect there to be more than one person
00:36:29
inside that building at that time so one of the best things that I've heard a detective say in this case
00:36:37
as as for what the motive may be is that if he was simply going in there to rob the place and make sure that he
00:36:47
didn't leave any Witnesses this man would be smart enough to know most people would be smart enough to
00:36:55
know that the best witness the best eyewitness in this case is the camera not necessarily our victim unless the
00:37:03
victim knows this man so you can take out the human element the human eyewitness
00:37:13
but he doesn't take out the computer I witnessed so that's it's very interesting it's a it's a mixed bag
00:37:19
amongst the Taylor Police Department as to what the motive may be and that carries on to the public as well
00:37:25
now her family Chelsea's family seemed to think that there has got to be some kind of connection between
00:37:33
the Killer and their loved one they say that it could be something as simple as she may have known him but only knew him
00:37:41
through that business right this is a type of business so there's a lot of paperwork a lot of paper trail here I
00:37:48
almost feel like if it was somebody that's related to the business to her her from work
00:37:53
that they would have been able to come up with something but therein lies again a whole nother
00:37:59
set of possible motives that do not have to include robbery do not have to include Chelsea as the actual Target
00:38:06
well like you said it could be a customer and yes there would be a paper trail but
00:38:12
how many customers are we talking about you know at a bank maybe you see a thousand some different customers within
00:38:19
a month that that just brings a very large suspect pull and yes you can start breaking it down by age weight and
00:38:27
height but I don't know It's Tricky one and this guy is so common looking I mean to me he
00:38:35
looks like uh somebody that would be out on the delivery or maybe a maintenance worker or maybe something that works in
00:38:43
a garage you're spot on again the detectives have all said that it they believe that he might be wearing some
00:38:49
work type clothing you know that that is more of a uniform rather than a casual outfit yeah I agree and the same thing
00:38:57
that I said you know Chelsea's family has said that they think she probably buzzed him in because
00:39:05
maybe she recognized him and I don't I'm not trying to take anything away from them they know this case better than I
00:39:10
do obviously and but I what I see here captain is what you just said such an average
00:39:17
looking Regular Joe he's gotta look like there's got to be a thousand other guys that look like this
00:39:25
guy in that area there's 60 000 people plus living in this area he looks just like a regular
00:39:32
guy that you would oh he hits the buzzer you hear the notification you look up regular dude at the door buzz him in
00:39:38
he's just a customer regular old customer but like you said when we were talking about
00:39:44
um uniform this also looks like a uniform that maybe a delivery driver would wear like somebody that was like
00:39:51
delivering like let's say appliances or it could be like a semi truck driver so like it still looks like a work uniform
00:40:01
to me almost head to toe uniform to me yeah right like from from the Hat all the way down to the possible work boots
00:40:09
I can't say 100 certain that those are boots that's what it appears to me other people say they see tennis shoes
00:40:16
but yeah to me top to bottom work type outfit now if we're going to go into this and
00:40:24
say well was Chelsea a Target is that what was going on here I think we should briefly discuss victimology who was
00:40:32
Chelsea Small she grew up in Gibraltar Michigan that's pretty close to Taylor just about a 20
00:40:38
minute drive right maybe about a 28 minute drive north from Gibraltar to the crime scene but in 2013 Chelsea was 30
00:40:47
years old with two small children she obviously was working at Advance America but was also attending school at
00:40:55
Wayne County Community College where she very proudly and appropriately so to be
00:41:01
proud Chelsea was on the Dean's List these cases are all sad and heartbreaking but especially so when we
00:41:08
are talking about a mother a young woman from a close family I I want to emphasize that this seems like a very
00:41:15
close family to me she's also a person who was doing all of the right things working and going to school
00:41:21
and this really this job is just that it's just a job this is not a career for her Advance America this was just a
00:41:31
stepping stool something to build her resume make a decent wage to pay her bills provide for her kids until she
00:41:39
graduated collagen and would be moving on to bigger and better things and unfortunately in 70 seconds that's
00:41:46
all gone for what 200 bucks yeah what's her relationship with her ex it seems to me and I only have
00:41:57
to base this off of his words but he's the father of both of the children they were never married
00:42:06
and at some point they they separated but they according to him remained very much a team in regards to taking care of
00:42:14
the kids I wonder if he ever fought for custody because that would be a motive he says that he considers Debbie Cayman
00:42:21
who is Chelsea's mother to be like a second mother to him so I don't know if he stayed close with her family since
00:42:31
2013 but according to him and his name's Rick Fairley according to Rick they were in
00:42:40
the process he and Chelsea were in the process of of discussing building they're rebuilding their lives together
00:42:46
their family together now we were just talking about money 200 bucks I want to make sure we are very
00:42:54
clear on something before we move on I've said 200 bucks a couple of times that is the amount cited in a couple of
00:43:03
different sources news coverage sources I don't have proof of this but I believe that that is just
00:43:12
a generic number again I don't have proof but I think somewhere along the line someone said
00:43:17
200 and it's been repeated ever since then but I believe that the Taylor Police Department stance on this information
00:43:25
has never been in a an exact dollar amount their statement has always been a small
00:43:32
amount of cash less than 250 dollars so therein lies really another big piece of this mystery what was the gunman's
00:43:42
motive for going into the store as you pointed out earlier captain in any of these cases we've seen this with yogurt
00:43:49
shop with the Lane Bryant shooting Las Cruces bowling alley I mean the list just goes on and on
00:43:57
when when the dollar amount look no dollar amount is equal to Taking Lives but when the dollar amount is so small
00:44:05
and the loss of life is so significant there's it's unbalanced right that doesn't seem to be
00:44:14
it doesn't seem to be right or make any sense and then you go we're sure that the
00:44:20
motive was even robbery here's my other issue with the way that this um dickweed looks like the
00:44:32
we were talking about his outfit and we go well it looks like uh a worker's outfit
00:44:38
but it wouldn't be that uh crazy if I was going to become a hitman and it was my my first hit I could see
00:44:49
wearing an outfit like this yeah you see what I'm saying and so like even if it was your second or third hit
00:44:57
right but yeah I mean like it's like it it's very plain Jane let me there's not a lot of identifiers on any of the
00:45:04
articles of clothing yeah unfortunately we can't make out the emblem on the pants nor could we on the hat and I did
00:45:13
say earlier that there's an emblem on the front of the hat and the side there's 100 an emblem on the side of the
00:45:19
Hat yeah the the front is a little we should leave that open-ended a little in question there because I don't think I
00:45:25
can say 100 that I see an emblem on the front of the Hat well again there's so many pictures and
00:45:33
earlier when we were talking I kept on going I don't really see the gloves now I can not not see gloves so yeah once
00:45:43
you see them there there seem to be there every time one it's like like you said they're not that it's not like he's
00:45:49
wearing bright uh white gloves they're it's almost like there's something just kind of distorting his skin like like
00:45:58
maybe he's like clear I think it's like latex gloves yeah but clear latex gloves
00:46:03
or something um but it just it doesn't make a lot of sense you know because you go well
00:46:09
so the so you're saying that and I'm not saying it's a Hitman but it's very Hitman like when you watch there's been
00:46:16
other people to say that even police have speculated that and the thing is he he walks in he's in
00:46:24
and out and he's again the clothing you said the same thing it would be nondescript clothing and
00:46:30
everything's tucked in nice and neat right there's not like he's very buttoned up in a way to not to show
00:46:38
reveal too much of him or to possibly leave strands of hair there's very little interaction with the victim herself
00:46:47
there's no indication that he even physically touched her right which is strange because he
00:46:54
openly has his hair flowing uh underneath his baseball cap but he's got to look normal enough for her to buzz
00:47:03
him in but he has to look normal enough to get into the building right like not not
00:47:09
just for her to buzz in but for other people walking by to just walking to and from the building right to not raise any
00:47:15
alarms but but what's weird hearing her mother talk about well there were customers that maybe had crushes on her
00:47:24
that maybe she wasn't interested in but you can't roll those guys out no just because this looks like a hit
00:47:32
because some people there is no emotion even though people would go well well they killed
00:47:39
this person because they weren't receiving their advances right but some people are just that cold oh
00:47:48
well she doesn't care about me well I want her dead but I can do it in such a way where I I
00:47:55
can leave my emotions out of this to make sure I don't get caught because it seems like very cold
00:48:03
come into the building shoot the victim go look around for some money shoot her again take off well think about when we
00:48:13
covered the Superbikes case out in South Carolina Superbike was the name of the business
00:48:20
someone went in and shot several shot and killed several of the workers it went unsolved for many years they
00:48:27
eventually solved it ended up being Todd kohlhepp who committed those crimes but it went unsolved because they
00:48:35
couldn't they were looking for a connection between one of the victims and the killer a personal connection
00:48:40
yeah there was no personal connection there was a business connection but he didn't care who it was that he
00:48:50
killed he wanted revenge against the business itself he went in there one day and he thought
00:48:57
they were laughing at him and poking fun at him and he went in there he waited until he
00:49:03
didn't think he would encounter anybody else so the place would be empty and almost very hitman-like even though he's
00:49:09
acting on his own behalf goes in there and shoots everybody up well it could be the same thing here
00:49:17
where it has nothing to do with Chelsea has nothing to do with really the money it's just I mean like you said people
00:49:24
stop coming there so they shut down the business and could in a way he be an indirect customer right like let's say
00:49:33
because he's we can agree on his age he he's a middle-aged man or appears to be could he be somebody that
00:49:44
I don't know purchased a vehicle for their son or daughter and then they went and
00:49:50
took out a loan against the title you don't pay that loan back they come and take your car
00:49:56
could he could he have wanted some kind of Revenge that he's not directly a customer not directly
00:50:04
affected by something the business was doing it it all gets a little it gets very tricky but I think we're
00:50:12
gonna start to see some leads here now kind of wrapping up on the victimology here a little bit in regards to Chelsea
00:50:19
herself uh you brought up the the ex-boyfriend it's my understanding that since 2013 he has had custody of both of
00:50:28
the children and her mother and her sister so she has uh her parents were separated at some
00:50:37
point and her mother remarried so unfortunately she left behind a sister mother step father father and
00:50:46
um some stepsisters but her sister and more so her mother Debbie Cayman have been the loudest voices to keep this
00:50:54
case alive and the most visible of the family to keep this case alive again the ex-boyfriend Rick fairly the father of
00:51:05
the children has answered questions and done interviews publicly so he's not hiding or ducking from anyone I've been
00:51:12
told by detectives that he was looked at you know you're going to look at anybody
00:51:16
that's close to the victim and he was looked at and it sounds like he's not our guy they don't have
00:51:22
anything to connect him to the case but one thing that's really tricky and so there have been three detectives who
00:51:36
have been up front and center working this case over the last eight years that seems like a lot the case lead has
00:51:42
changed due to retirement but the retired detectives keep a close eye on this case this is a case that's
00:51:50
being worked as a team by the Taylor detective Bureau when I asked the current lead this is
00:51:57
detective Alex delini about the case he said he would put the probability rate of solving this case at
00:52:05
very high so while we're talking about possible motives here because that's the weirdest part of this
00:52:13
case I mean let's say Chelsea knew her killer this guy thought he had some kind of
00:52:19
reason to kill her but why do it there right you would expect anyone with half a brain knows that there's going to be a
00:52:27
camera there yeah but if I do it there and I take a little bit of money I can fuse the whole situation right if I if I
00:52:36
kill her and her car even outside the place and I don't steal her purse or something then
00:52:43
we just know this was about murder and that's it but again for me I understand wanting to kind of confuse
00:52:52
the situation make it look like one crime when really it was all along a whole nother crime right but I don't
00:53:01
know that I love the risk of being caught on camera doing anything or the potential of encountering another
00:53:12
customer or another staff member yeah but if also if it was a hit that's and I don't know why
00:53:22
this mother or two would want somebody would put a hit out on her but it's better to do it there
00:53:31
because you're you're not gonna have the kids around I agree of course but again not wanting
00:53:39
people around we know there's going to be a camera it just seems to me like you could have
00:53:43
found a space a place a time where you could have you could have caught her alone
00:53:51
and done it then and there and not had to worry about any type of camera at all now one very tricky
00:53:58
variable in this case is that if somebody was planning this out well Chelsea was covering for
00:54:06
another staff member that Tuesday and some of the reports state that it may have been a little bit of a last
00:54:13
minute not a very last minute but a little bit of a last minute change the most detailed report of this I could
00:54:19
find says that it was a few days before the day of the homicide that she signed up for this shift
00:54:28
so what is not in question is she's 100 covering that shift for another team member on that day that she's killed so
00:54:36
this is not Chelsea's regularly scheduled work day this is out of her routine the change it sounds like came at
00:54:44
Chelsea's request you know you trade shifts with someone when you need a day off
00:54:50
Chelsea took a day off to celebrate her son's fifth birthday this was just a few
00:54:55
days prior to the incident again how many people did she tell how many people would have known that
00:55:02
then you have to wonder Captain does that mean if this person working that day was the intended target of a
00:55:12
homicide was this man who acted so calm and callous so he's every he's every part of the definition of a
00:55:22
cold-blooded killer was he targeting somebody else when he walked into the Advance America that day
00:55:31
[Music] thank you all right thanks for joining us here in the garage if you need more True Crime
00:55:46
garage for your ear balls then check out off the Record if you're nasty what is off the Record it's true crime garage's
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Record join us back here in the garage tomorrow until then be good be kind and don't litter foreign
00:56:32
[Music] [Applause] [Music]

Badges

This episode stands out for the following:

  • 80
    Most heartbreaking
  • 70
    Most shocking
  • 70
    Most unpredictable
  • 60
    Most emotional

Episode Highlights

  • Call for Help
    The podcast encourages listeners to review surveillance footage for clues.
    “Put your eyes on this footage, let us know what you see.”
    @ 30m 45s
    November 07, 2022
  • The Mysterious Motive
    Detectives debate whether the motive was robbery or murder in Chelsea's case.
    “Was the motive to kill Chelsea and then confuse cops?”
    @ 34m 59s
    November 07, 2022
  • A Life Cut Short
    Chelsea Small, a dedicated mother and student, was tragically killed during a robbery.
    “These cases are all sad and heartbreaking, especially when we talk about a mother.”
    @ 41m 06s
    November 07, 2022
  • Team Effort in Investigation
    The case is being pursued by a dedicated team of detectives, ensuring thorough investigation.
    “This is a case that's being worked as a team.”
    @ 51m 54s
    November 07, 2022
  • The Cold-Blooded Killer
    A chilling description of the suspect reveals a calculated and emotionless approach to murder.
    “He’s every part of the definition of a cold-blooded killer.”
    @ 55m 22s
    November 07, 2022

Episode Quotes

  • The best eyewitness is the camera, not the victim.
    Chelsea Small /// Part 1 /// 495
  • This job is just a stepping stool.
    Chelsea Small /// Part 1 /// 495
  • In 70 seconds, that's all gone for what? 200 bucks?
    Chelsea Small /// Part 1 /// 495
  • He wanted revenge against the business itself.
    Chelsea Small /// Part 1 /// 495
  • This is a case that's being worked as a team.
    Chelsea Small /// Part 1 /// 495
  • He’s every part of the definition of a cold-blooded killer.
    Chelsea Small /// Part 1 /// 495

Key Moments

  • Crime Scene Details24:21
  • Witnesses Needed25:05
  • Surveillance Footage30:22
  • Family Connections37:31
  • Chelsea's Background40:32
  • Revenge Motive48:53
  • Investigation Team51:54
  • Cold-Blooded Killer55:22

Words per Minute Over Time

Vibes Breakdown