20/20 - The Hand in the Window: 'Be On the Lookout'

Episode Date: November 19, 2025

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This is Deborah Roberts. I'm here with another weekly episode of our latest series from 2020 and ABC Audio, The Hand in the Window. Remember, you can get new episodes early if you follow The Hand in the Window for free on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or your favorite podcast app. Now, here's the episode. At 43, Stacey Stanley was a grandma with a punk rock look. She wore her hair short and spiky, and she often donned a studded leather choker necklace or a black and white bandana. Stacey had the music taste to match her look. Classic rock was her favorite, and she was not shy about performing it at karaoke. Her sister Gina Stanley says her go-to songs were Leonard Skinner's Freebird and Sweet Child of Mine by Guns and Roses.

Sweet child of mine. I actually had a video of her singing it. When we were kids, I was videotaping her singing that. Gina shared the video with ABC News. In this home video, a teenage Stacy with dark, very high volume hair, holds a microphone and belts with confidence in her living room. It seems to me reminds me of childhood, families where everything was. Stacey and her sister, Gina, were just 11 months apart in age.

We grew up to be very close. What was Stacy like? She was one of the most kindest people you would ever meet, do anything for anybody. It was like the major part of our family that brought everybody together, had made big dinners and stuff for holidays and stuff like that. Gina told me Stacey was the glue that held the family together. She was very close with her two sons, Corey and Curtis. Corey, how would you describe her?

Very loving and caring, you know, give her a shirt off her back if she needed to. Very good mother. Couldn't ask for a better one. Curtis? Always there for her kids calling you consistently. You know, if you didn't pick up, she'd call you like a thousand times. Like, you put it on mute, and then your wife would get the calls. And you're like, your mom's calling, for what, to talk to you?

Stacey lived in Greenwich, Ohio, about 20 minutes from Ashland. She didn't seem to have anything in common with Jane Doe, who was kidnapped in the town, or with Elizabeth Griffith, who had recently gone missing from Ashland. But on September 8th, 2016, Stacey Stanley drove into Ashland to run some errands, and she never returned home. From ABC Audio in 2020, I'm John Quigny onus, and this is The Hand in the Window. Episode 3, Beyond the Lookout. Stacey Stanley headed to the Walmart in Ashland for top soil and gardening supplies. While she was in town, she also got her nails done.

When she stopped for gas on the way home, she realized she'd been driving on a flat tire. She called her sons for help. Curtis says she was frantic and annoyed. After all, she had just gotten. a new tire. She called us a thousand times, so I picked up, and I'm like, what's up, Mom? She said, oh, I got a flat tie and say, OK, well,

let me call you back. And me and Corey will figure something out. Curtis and Corey got in touch with a family friend who was in Ashland that evening. And they arranged for him to swing by the gas station to help with Stacy's tire. And I called her back. I said, hey, we got somebody who's going to come down,

help you change the tire. He'll be there shortly. And her whole demeanor change. She was, like, all happy, giggly, like her normal self, you know. She was laughing on the phone, and I said, well, she's like, some nice guy stopped to help, but he don't have no tools. And I had then told her to tell him, you know, kick rocks. We got somebody coming to help you.

Kick rocks, meaning get lost. Curtis says his mom had a tendency to trust people. She'd give strangers rides all the time. I'm like you got to quit doing that because some people can't trust everybody everybody's not the right person to trust but in this case everything seemed to turn out fine

at first the stranger used the tools the family friend had brought to change the tire and that was that I had talked to my mom about it must have been about 20 minutes later or so that she was in the gas station getting a couple

coffees, a cup of chinos to be exact and that she was going to go home and she'll call me in the morning. And she's like, all right, Wayne, I love you. It's the nickname she always called me. And I said, all right, Mom, I love you. I'll talk to you tomorrow. And that was the last we ever heard from her.

The next day, Corey went to work, as usual. But later that evening, he realized he hadn't heard from his mom. I tried calling her. I was ringing like a busy tone. so at that time I called my brother I said hey have you heard from mom today and he said no

I said try to call her I can't get a hold of her he tried calling her I worked the rest of that evening and then I called my aunt I'm like hey we haven't heard from mom do you know what's going on and she's like no we should go down there so we end up going to my mom's trailer no one answered when they knocked and the door was locked

so Stacy's sons and her sister ended up forcing the door open. And she had two little dogs, Chaco and Maya. She loved them little dog, little chihuahuas. The two chihuahuas were still in their kennels. It was clear that Stacey had not been home to let them out. We just knew that she wouldn't just leave those dogs home by their self like that. There's no way.

She loved them dogs so much. And at that point, we kind of knew something was wrong. Mm-hmm. Stacey's family began looking for her and her car. What had happened on her way home from the gas station? Me and Corey was going to go drive the routes from Ashland to Greenwich to check to see if there was any accidents or maybe she was down in a ravine or something like that. Maybe she fell asleep and wrecked her car and nobody just hadn't noticed it.

They didn't find her car or any other. or any signs of car accidents along the route. So they reported Stacey missing to the police. The Huron County sheriffs had put out a bolo beyond the lookout. Stacey's family kept doing their own digging too. Corey Stanley went back to the gas station to see if any of the employees had seen anything. They remembered Stacey but didn't know if she left with anyone. After that, we went down to the police station to try to see if they got any kind of news or anything.

And while we were speaking to them, it came across the radio that they had somebody had reported her car on East 9th Street in Ashland. The caller said Stacey's car was parked on the side of the road, just a few streets over from the abandoned houses on Colvert Court. By this point, Stacey had been missing for three days. We beat the cops over to the car. The cops ended up showing up there, and my brother opened the door up and got in the car and was looking for, you know, in the car for something. Curtis realized the driver's seat was all the way back.

My mom was short, so it didn't make sense why the seat was back. So then I started digging around a little bit more, and I seen that here, driver's license was not in her purse. I'm like, okay, that's the odd, you know, like, why's that out? When Corey looked inside the car, he noticed something else was off. He picked up her ashtray. My mom smoked roly cigarettes. She rolled her own, and it was cheaper that away. And I just opened it up, and I happened to see a camel filtered cigarettes in there. And I was like, these aren't my

moms my mom don't smoke these I know my mom will not spend money on cigarettes it's alarming because now we're figuring this was my mom driving a car and these aren't her cigarette but so somebody else was in this car stacey's family kept searching for her after crisscrossing ashland and the roads leading to greenwich they got a group of volunteers together he had a good 78 of us walking the streets hanging out flyers. Like I had printed off like almost 2,000 or 3,000 flyers. We're searching dumpsters and anything just to try to, you know, because something, obviously we knew something had happened, but we didn't know what.

One evening, some of the volunteers even went up to the abandoned houses on Covert Court. Being on the door, realizing it was an empty house, I was going to go in there, but it was so late at night that we all had kids and had to go get up the next morning and take kids to school, then we went right back out there to do it again. Stacey's family didn't know that one of these run-down houses near the laundromat was not actually empty. And they didn't know that the disappearance of their beloved mom, grandmother, and sister was just one event in a new disturbing trend in Ashland, Ohio. About three weeks earlier, 29-year-old Elizabeth Griffith had gone missing. And on September 11th, three days after Stacey was last seen at the gas station,

Jane Doe was held captive and assaulted inside one of those abandoned houses by the laundromat. In a matter of weeks, Ashland had become the site of a kidnapping and two disappearances. At the Ashland Police Station, Detective Kim Major was trying to figure out what was going on, in Ashland. She'd started by speaking with Jane Doe. Her next task? Interviewing Jane Doe's kidnapper. What did he have to say for himself?

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now streaming on Hulu and Hulu on Disney Plus for bundle subscribers. Terms apply. During Detective Kim Major's interview with Jane Doe, she got a detailed account. of how Sean Great had lured Jane into the abandoned house, held her captive, and raped her. When the interview with Jane ended, Detective Major thought her work was done. But when she stepped out of her office,

the police captain told her that Sean Great was not offering much information so far. The captain wanted Detective Major, an expert interviewer, to see if she could get great, to open up. And he wanted Major to ask great about more than just his alleged crimes against Jane Doe. While you're in there, see if he knows anything about The Missing Girls. The Missing Girls, 29-year-old Elizabeth Griffith, who we told you about in the last episode,

and 43-year-old Stacey Stanley, whose sons had been searching for her for days. Detective Major was surprised to hear Stacy's name. She knew that Jane Doe, Elizabeth Griffith, and Sean Great all spent time at the Crock Center in town. But Detective Major was not aware of any possible link between Stacey Stanley and Sean Great. The investigation unfolding in front of Detective Major kept getting bigger and bigger, but it seemed like one person, Sean Great, might hold the answers. Detective Major typically like to prepare before interviews, especially ones as high stakes as this one. I might do a little bit of history to try to get a baseline. Maybe I'll try to type somebody's personality or find out what matters to them. It can help you with maybe changing

gears in an interview because they're so dynamic. In his case, I knew nothing. So my goal was to walk. And you didn't have a lot of time to study. I had no time. I had a couple minutes to walk down the hall because you always run that risk of somebody shutting down. So there is no time. There's no time to go in a room and do history. There's no time to make 10 phone calls. You're figuring him out as you go. Yeah. The room Sean Great was being held in was not at all like Detective Major's office, with its plants and soothing colors. Sean Great was instead seated in a standard interrogation room with bare walls and stark lighting. Date September 13, 2016, time 10.53 a.m. Detective Major preparing to interview Sean.

Your initial impression of his appearance? He was shirtless, so his physique, he's muscular. His eyes, just as people describe them later, they're blue and piercing. Angry, upset? Almost neutral. Initially, he had been angry. I knew prior to me coming in. But when I saw him, when we made eye contact and I came in the room,

He was sort of neutral. I could see him looking at me, just wondering how to take me. Detective Major had a strategy for putting people accused of crimes at ease. She was deliberate about everything she did in an interview. I'm hyper aware of how the room is set up. I don't interview with the table in between someone. I might be at the corner of the table, but I'm face-to-face with someone. So in his case, he was handcuffed.

and I can't get a confession with somebody in handcuffs so those came off why well I talk with my hands so do a lot of people so those nuances in an interview

or how you pick up on something that's different than somebody's constant and then when you see something that varies from that you know there's something going on there but out of his handcuffs he could attack you he could they could. You weren't thinking about that.

I have a flaw, so I'm going to just air it right here. I have a flaw where I am focused on what I need to get, and my safety sometimes doesn't even come to mind. Hey, Sean, I'm good, Major. Nice to meet you. We're going to bring these cuffs off you. After she took his handcuffs off, Detective Major asked great if he'd like anything to drink. He said he wanted coffee, and she asked an officer to bring some in.

Major had learned that building rapport with a suspect and showing them empathy could get them to open up. So she chose to speak with great in a gentle tone. All right, bud. All right, you want to throw a lot, okay? A whole lot. There was a camera in the room so that other officers could watch and listen. But that camera went down during the interview. So the audio you're hearing is from Detective Major's backup recorder. I had dropped it down my top, and it's not something I even tell generally would tell people, but it's just my backup.

And in this case, it became the primary recording so you can hear my heartbeat on there. Once Detective Major and Sean Great settled in, she told Grate she had just talked to Jane Doe about what happened to her in that abandoned house on covert court. I want to kind of go through what she said and see what we're missing, okay? It looks like, you know, you have a conscience, you have some feelings, I can see that.

I saw you tear up when I came in, so... Yeah, it's rough. When you asked me, you know, going through things, like, Yeah, I am going through things. Great explained that by going through things, he meant not having anywhere to live. He said Ashland's homeless shelter was shut down, and that's why he was staying in the abandoned house.

So really it's all Ashland's fault for everything that I've done. That's frustrating. I think sometimes it's like the perfect storm. You're here in Ashland. You don't have a place. to go, you end up being in an abandoned house, which is, you know, you're always looking off your shoulder, when you're going to show up here and you're in someplace you're not supposed to be.

So when you say it's Ashland's fault, well, we can't blame that. But do you know what? Sometimes we are where we are because of all these little things that are going wrong around us. Detective Major told Sean Great that investigators already knew what he had done. to Jane Doe. Now, they wanted to understand why he abducted and assaulted her. Great, trace things back to his mom. It may have started when my mom left me when I was a child. I come off from school and she's gone,

but I don't blame her. I used to, but... Why did she leave? She'd go find herself. I'm sorry. That's hard. I don't really matter when you used to it. Well, I don't know that you are. You're going through everything. You're still a human.

You know what I mean? It doesn't matter. Sean Great started crying. Detective Major tried to comfort him. She said that being honest about what he'd done to Jane Doe was the right thing to do. She started asking him questions about. about her. Great said Jane Doe

was very Christian, knew the Bible well, and did not believe in sex outside of marriage. But he also told Detective Major that he believed Jane Doe needed to have sex to push past her

lustful desires. She's just battling all the time. She's battling with the lustful desires and it's a roadblock did you think by you doing what you did to her that it would push her past that?

I mean, I'm not... I know. I had overboard. I think overboard. Overboard, yeah. Overboard. It did get overboard. Detective Major pointed out that he had held Jane Doe captive for days. Time was just going too fast. Meaning you wanted to keep her there and do it

another time, meaning have sex with her again? I don't know. Just spending time with her that I wouldn't be able to spend time with her for a long time. Major also pointed out that Jane Doe was injured all over her body. Great, try to justify that by saying he gave her a few little taps. It's like a few little taps. But you do understand with your strength that a little tap to you on somebody like that is going to cause some words. But this was actually

when she just started going crazy first and I didn't know what to do. So you thought if I hit her, she'll snap out of it and submit? She didn't still submit. You got more and more out of him. That's right. It just kept coming out

in layers a little bit more and a little bit more. Detective Major and Sean Great had been talking for almost 40 minutes. She knew she had to tread carefully. She needed a full, clear confession. Time is always of the essence. I'm against the clock to get him to say something before I say the wrong thing and cause them to stop talking at all.

So far, Great had spent a lot of the interview downplaying what he had done to Jane Doe or trying to justify it. Do you think this will impact her for a long time? She'll hear her muscle thoughts. She'll be able to move on, stay focused now. Detective Major tried to get Sean Gray to move beyond, attempting to justify what he had done. Her tone remained calm, even as she began asking more pointed questions. Do you think that that that?

is good for her to have somebody forced themselves to have sex with you? Is that good or not good? It's not good. Okay. So you think she needed to have sex with somebody, but do you think she needed to be forced into sex? Be honest.

She needed it because she wasn't going to do it herself because it's so wrong. She needed to be free from that. Tying her up and forcing her into sex is not free. Tire her up and have sex with her, no, but I didn't tire her up. You tire up when you leave's to keep her from leaving? Yeah. Okay.

But you're five times as strong as her, am I right? Is that right or wrong? Yeah. That's kind of a given, right? So she doesn't have the option of not. She tried to fight you off. I mean, looking at this whole thing, you forced her to have sex she didn't want to

Sean Great did not have a defense this time Detective Major's questions seemed to have worn him down he became very quiet and said I abducted her and I'll read her Finally Great had confessed I abducted her. I raped her. He also admitted to strangling her, threatening to kill her,

giving her drugs to sedate her, and using his phone to record the assault. It had taken 47 minutes of disciplined interrogation, but Detective Major had gotten what she needed. Earlier in my career, I probably would have stopped right at Jane Doe. I would have walked out of the room and maybe did some high-fives with people that I got a confession. But police suspected this case was bigger than Jane Doe. Detective Major needed to find out if Great knew anything about the two other women, both still missing, Elizabeth Griffith and Stacey Stanley. So you have a conscience, do you agree?

Yeah. You think your life's over. You think you say you died a long time ago, meaning probably your soul. we were emotionally, you feel like you're dead. Yeah, that on the cross with Jesus. Detective Major started by mentioning Elizabeth Griffith, the 29-year-old Great had met at the Crock Center. We can't find Elizabeth.

Can you help me? I don't know if I can help you. I don't know if I can help you. Why? This might be one of those moments. This might be your moment. To do the right thing. To do the right thing, Sean.

It's the right thing. The right thing is to tell us where she is. Great stayed quiet. Detective Major kept pushing gently. And that goes on for just so long, long enough that he's acting like he has no idea what I'm talking about. And I'm trying to put value in what he's saying, and I'm thinking he may not know where she is.

You almost feel like you're on the outside of yourself looking in. So I have to, like, check my ego and say, okay, I'm going to go for it. She kept asking Sean Gray to tell her where Elizabeth could be. Can you take me to her? Why have you found her? I haven't found her. Detective Major, kept assuring great that they really had not found Elizabeth Griffith, that they needed his help.

I'm looking for Elizabeth's body. Can you take me to it? She's dead? I believe she is. Hey, listen to me. This is your moment. Is it my moment? I believe it is. My moment is when I die. Once I'm put in a cell, the key lock is my moment. Detective Major had spent an hour with Sean Great, and he kept dangling information in front of her,

as if they were playing a game of cat and mouse. I might not be able to take you to her, maybe someone else or others. How many are there? Great Mumble depends on how much you say many. Great Mumble depends on how much you say is many. Why? I don't know.

There might not be none. There might not be none. Great was being cryptic. So he's playing with you? I think so. Possibly he's wanting to tell me something. so he's saying things to see my reaction. I feel played with, but maybe he's struggling with,

should I say it or not. You had been with the department almost two or three decades, right? Yeah. Done how many of these interviews? A thousand? Over a thousand. This one was different.

In a lot of ways, yes. Great seemed to be getting closer to admitting something, but did he have answers about what had happened to the two missing women in the area, Elizabeth Griffith and Stacey Stanley? Detective Major was not going to leave the room until she got Sean Great to spill his secrets.

The Hand in the Window is a production of ABC Audio and 2020. Hosted by me, John Quignores, produced by Madeline Wood, Camille Peterson, Kiara Powell, edited by Gianna Palmer. Our supervising producer is Susie Lou. Music and mixing by Evan Viola. Special thanks to Katie Dendos,

Janice Johnston, Michelle Margulis, Caitlin Schiffer, Rachel Walker, Annalisa Linder, Joseph Diaz, Jonathan Balthasier, Gail Deutsch, Gary Wynne, Stephanie MacBee, Natalie Cardenas, and Samantha Wanderer. Josh Cohen is our director of podcast programming.