Anatomy of Murder - Annie (Anne Kasperzak)

Episode Date: October 31, 2023

A 15 year old disappears and her shoe is the first clue that she was murdered. Her earliest years coupled with the angst of youth, make what happened, and who killed her, all the more cruel. For episode information and photos, please visit https://anatomyofmurder.com/ Can’t get enough AoM? Find us on social media!Instagram: @aom_podcast | @audiochuckTwitter: @AOM_podcast | @audiochuckFacebook: /listenAOMpod | /audiochuckllc

9-1-1, what is the address of the emergency? I'm at the river bottom at 126 South, where the river bottom trail is, and there's some pools of blood. There's like one, two big piles of blood, and there's splattered blood all over the bridge. I wanted to give Annie's family peace. I wanted to give Annie's family peace. I wanted to give Annie's name peace. I knew that I could solve it, so investigative journalist and former deputy sheriff. I'm Anastasia Nicolazzi, former New York City homicide prosecutor and host of Investigation Discovery's True Conviction.

And this is Anatomy of Murder. The definition of the word anatomy, as in anatomy of murder, is separating or dividing into parts for detailed examination. And that examination is one of the foundations of our show. Each episode, we break down a homicide, the life of a victim, the what's of the crime, and how and if it was solved. And as you know, the journey is different in each and every case. In some, investigators head in one direction only to realize it's the wrong way,

or an unexpected event throws everything off and a case goes cold, or a new piece of evidence changes everything. And sometimes, all those things occur in the very same case. That's what happened in today's story, which took place in Draper, Utah, a bit south of Salt Lake City. It used to be a horse country type community, and then it gradually grew until it became a community of about 40,000, 45,000 people when I was working there. So while the community grew, it was also a town that still wanted to retain its history. They do have a street with like a shopping center, but they still had codes that enforced where you could take your horse. They still wanted to pride themselves in being small-town horse-friendly.

That's Draper native Jacqueline Moore, a former detective for the City of Draper Police Department. But Jacqueline actually began her career as a hairdresser. I could tell that it wasn't going to be like a long-term career. It was fun, but only part-time. So my mom had actually just gone through the academy. So she told me how much fun it was and suggested I go on a ride-along.

And the rest, as they say, is history. Going from hairstyling to police work sounds like quite a leap, but the two jobs do share some similarities. Both involve interfacing with a big variety of people and often listening as they share the intimate details of their lives. So when you hear hairdresser, Scott, do you equate like hairdresser law enforcement? Do you see how one naturally leads to the other? Coming from someone who doesn't have much hair left, I will tell you that both jobs seem very intense. A lot of focus and concentration is necessary to be good at your job. The one thing that I was thinking too is like the devil's in the details, right? Is that you need to know what you're doing, but it is really looking between

the cracks, if you will, or knowing how to part the hair or braid it in a specific way. If we're talking hairdressing, that both of those, it's the detail-oriented work that often makes the difference in both. You know, for me, my law enforcement career began with a ride-along with the very agency I ended up joining. And the opportunity to serve is an honor and for many, a calling. I remember one of my training officers describing it as a daily dose of confronting the unknown. No two days are ever the same. And for Jacqueline, that was something she really enjoyed. Every shift is something new, lots of growth throughout the career. So you could specialize in something and really hone in on

specialized skills. And then if you got bored with that, you could go do something else. So Jacqueline put herself through academy training. And in 2007, she began working for her hometown police department in the investigations unit. I really wanted to be an investigator because I like putting together puzzles. I like putting together information and seeing what kind of story comes out of it. Just five years into her career, Jacqueline was faced with a puzzle that would impact not just her professional life, but her personal life as well. The case began in an area referred to as the River Bottoms. It's a scenic spot along the Jordan River that's popular with runners and hikers. But in the early morning hours of March 11th of 2012, a jogger noticed something that concerned them enough that they called the police.

I'm at the river bottom at 126 South, where the river bottom trail is. There's like one, two big piles of blood, and there's splattered blood all over the bridge. And then right along the edge of the water, there's splattered blood all over the bridge, and then right along the edge of the water, there's like a red hit shoe in there. Small animals like raccoons and foxes had been spotted along the riverbanks, so it was plausible that the blood was from an animal. But the jogger's description of piles of blood sounded strange, and then there was the lone red shoe in the water. Police decided to investigate further.

CSI went down there and tested the blood and found that it was human. So they started a search of the area to see if they could find a body or anyone injured. A police helicopter circled the area. It wasn't long before they spotted an object along the bank. And about a mile, mile and a half downstream, they found a woman's body or a female's body. And her face was so swollen, they thought she was like a mid-30-year-old Asian woman.

With an unidentified body, police had to consider all of the scenarios. Was it a woman jogger who perhaps injured herself on the trail and then fell into the water? Or was it something more sinister? After examination of the female's body more closely, the answer was definitely the latter. She had blunt force trauma to her head, multiple gaping wounds, one to her forehead, two or three more to the back of her head, large contusions, swelling to her cheeks, the side of her head, the top of her head, one large gaping wound to her mouth. All signs pointed to this being a homicide, and the obvious first step was to identify

the victim. Officer Derek Johnson was assigned to lead the case. He and Jacqueline had become fast friends and friendly rivals after starting at Draper PD around the same time. He and I, we were so competitive with each other, like who was going to get detected first? Who was going to solve this major case first? But when it came to his cases, Derek was all business.

He got to work right away. He asked around neighboring police departments, had any suspicious activity been reported around the river bottoms? Were there any missing persons recently reported? They actually got information that the neighboring agency had a reported runaway the night before a juvenile who ran away. The night before the body was found, Draper's neighboring police department got a phone call

from a woman named Veronica Kasperczak. Her 15-year-old daughter Annie Annie, had run away from home. Veronica told police that Annie wasn't just a rebellious teen acting out against her parents. There was more that police should know about her. She came from an abusive childhood or an abusive, very young childhood. She was diagnosed with failure to thrive.

Her mom was addicted to drugs. She was being abused physically and potentially sexually. Around age seven, Annie was removed from her birth mother and entered the foster care system. She was assigned to a caseworker from the Utah Department of Child and Family Services. The caseworker was Veronica. She had worked to place Annie in a stable and loving Services. The caseworker was Veronica. She had worked to place Annie in a stable and loving home, but years later that still hadn't happened, so Veronica decided Annie's stable and loving home would be her own. She and her husband officially adopted Annie in 2007. That year,

with Veronica herself just a few months away from giving birth, Annie moved into their home. Five years later, the family had grown to include Annie and two younger brothers. She loved hanging out with her younger brothers, and she would babysit them a lot. Although Annie was doing fine in school and socially, her difficult start in life did still show up in different ways. Veronica was working with her in therapy every week to make her more functioning in society. They wanted her to have healthy relationships with people. She had a lot of anxiety and she had a lot of boundary issues. Throughout it all, the bond between Annie and her new parents remained strong. On March 11, 2012, Veronica and her husband went out to dinner, leaving Annie to care for her younger brothers.

Nothing seemed out of the ordinary when they returned. They saw Annie before she went to her room. But when they checked on her later in the night, she was gone. Annie had left a note under her blanket saying she was running away to California and not to come looking for her. And that is when Veronica called police. Derek heard about Annie's disappearance the following day. And he asked the question that was in the back of everyone's mind. Could the unidentified body, which was thought to be a middle-aged Asian woman, actually be that of a Caucasian teenage girl? Derek Johnson reached out to Annie's mom immediately and asked for a photo. They sent a photo. He asked for what she was

wearing. Veronica, Annie's mom, described what Annie was last seen wearing. She was wearing a red plaid shirt. They said she had braces. They described her hair as being long and dark. They also mentioned a pair of tennis shoes Annie was last seen wearing. Her father had bought them for her on Valentine's Day just a few weeks earlier. They were red. And it matched. It matched this person in the water. It had taken less than 24 hours for investigators to identify the body of 15-year-old Annie Kasperczak,

but it would take much, much longer to understand what and who caused Annie to meet this awful end? When Annie first went missing, her mother had turned to Annie's then-boyfriend, 14-year-old Chris Bagshaw. Chris didn't know where Annie was, but had a her boyfriend Chris that she was running away with a guy named LJ, and this name was confirmed by another of Annie and Chris's friends. Annie's parents were taken aback. They had not heard of LJ before. They didn't know who that was. Her mother, Veronica, passed the name on to investigators

who wanted to learn more from Chris. Lead investigator Derek Johnson approached Chris and got some basic information from him. But when it came to LJ, he didn't have much to share. Here is audio from that conversation with Chris. When you talked with LJ, did you actually physically talk to him on the phone,

or was it like through a message, or how did you talk to him? I talked to him once. Okay. Chris had never actually met LJ, which was going to make identifying this person all the more challenging. And when you talked to him on the phone, did he speak with an accent or did he notice anything distinctive about his voice? No. No. Okay. Just normal. Okay. Just a normal voice. And was there a phone number for that? No, it was with you. It restricted.

You know, Anastasia, it's interesting the tact that he took in this initial discussion with him. I mean, he's trying to get Chris to open up, and the officer there is giving the impression that he already has information. And with that, giving Chris an opportunity to tell the truth. But it doesn't seem like it's getting anywhere. So, you know, I think a question that people might say is, well, not knowing this guy's full name, does that make anything suspect about it? But, you know, Scott, all I could think about is we have these conversations all the time about,

you know, through the years as technology changes, and young people today, they form relationships on Snapchat, social media, and living in this digital age, how often is it that people don't know the specifics of a person that they've met and are even communicating regularly with online? You're right. You're right. But, you know, as an investigator, I'll take two initials opposed to nothing.

Is it going to be a really strong lead? Who knows? But it's something at least to start with. So police were left to try and figure out who LJ was and if he was the one responsible for Annie's murder. Only one week later, they were well on their way to finding out. A neighboring police station reached out to Derek with news that they had a woman in their custody who'd said that she had witnessed a crime the same night Annie went missing. She had been at the house of a man named Daniel Ferry,

someone who police were already familiar with. He was known to be around drugs, selling drugs, using drugs. He was known to hang out with violent criminals in the Salt Lake County area. The night Annie went missing, Daniel had a gathering at his home. The eyewitness in custody said she saw a girl show up at the party. The witness told investigators that at some point during the party, Daniel propositioned her. When the girl who the witness believed to be Annie rejected his advances, he assaulted her. She said other men were also involved. She overheard people talking about putting her in a rug or a tarp, wrapping her up, and then dumping her body. She watched Daniel and two other guys leave the house. She believed it was with the body. And then they

came back later and they were talking about how crazy it was. And she assumed that it was Annie's body. When the woman asked where the girl had gone, Daniel said that she, quote unquote, went swimming. The woman's testimony was explosive and damning. But investigators can't just take a statement at face value, even when it comes from a purported eyewitness. So Derek set out to dig deeper into what she claimed to have seen. As it turns out, Derek had actually served Daniel a search warrant at his home a few months earlier for unrelated charges. But with a new warrant in hand, this time for the investigation into Annie's murder,

Derek headed back to Daniel's home. I actually joined them on the search warrant and we found blood in the bathroom. We found blood and evidence of violence in the basement. It looked like there was blood on a dirt board and otherwise the house was empty. The blood was sent to a lab for testing. Pieces of the puzzle seemed to be adding up, so they decided to bring their case to the district attorney. They screened it with the district attorney,

who said, we're feeling good about this, go ahead and arrest him. Daniel Ferry, along with another man who had been at the party that night, were arrested. When questioned by police, Daniel denied knowing Annie. He said he had no clue what he was being picked up for and said he had never heard the name LJ before. But investigators pressed on. This wouldn't be the first time someone in their custody denied everything when it came to facing potential murder charges.

Yet the case only grew stronger when they discovered that Daniel had a nickname, Little Joe. And the initials for Little Joe, of course, would be LJ. You know, Anastasia, there is a very good reason why Daniel Ferry would be your prime suspect of interest at this point. You know, there's also an equally good reason of why he is yet to be charged, because clearly more work needed to be done, and two initials is just part of a puzzle, adding some solid investigative pieces, but you really need to do more groundwork here. A hundred percent, but when you start to like look at it, just purely on a coincidence

level, they know from the boyfriend of Annie that she had said she was leaving with someone named LJ. They pick up this guy, Daniel, who again, the name doesn't match at all, but some of the circumstances are similar based on what this woman says. And now he has a nickname that has the exact same initials. It could completely be just coincidence, but what amazing coincidence if that's where it lands. Yeah, and I could always imagine the word coincidence doesn't make it through the door to your office. I like them, but you can't go into court based on just those. So our thoughts were obviously the same thoughts that investigators had at the moment, because they really weren't convinced that they just had the killer in their grasps. So the general feeling

among the team was the evidence was squarely lining up against Daniel, but they really needed to wait for something very, very important, which is the lab results to really be sure. I knew at the time that Derek had a suspect. He told me that he had someone that evidence was pointing towards this guy and this guy was a very bad guy. And so I believed they were going to wrap up the case quickly. When the lab results came through, they were not exactly what investigators had expected.

All of the blood starts coming back, not related to anyone, no one at the party. In fact, much of what the lab tested turned out not to be blood at all. I mean, that's when you almost hear just that wah, wah, wah. I mean, just complete feeling of deflation, I would imagine, right? Because everything is lining up until the blood doesn't match. And a lot of it

wasn't even blood at all, which, by the way, for those of you out there, that is not so uncommon, whether it's presumptive or things that look like blood. I don't even know how many times, and I'm sure you've experienced this too, Scott, that it ends up being something as simple as ketchup or something else staining that really does appear to the naked eye to be something different than it actually is. And that's exactly right. I mean, it does happen all the time. But think of it this way. His home was being investigated as if it was a crime scene. A warrant was issued based on statements from one eyewitness. No other information was putting her there except for that statement. No digital trail, no cell phone pinging from that location,

which would be a great clue. So with everything riding on one person's statement, while it's completely disappointing, it's not completely surprising. Now, even with these new forensic results, investigators still did believe that Daniel was the one who had murdered Annie. Maybe at a different location, maybe some other different circumstance they weren't yet aware of, but they did all agree that it was becoming much harder to prove. Regardless, Daniel would remain in jail for a different case.

In a neighboring city, the same department which was West Jordan where the eyewitness walked into, they were investigating him for a crime completely unrelated to Annie that had occurred around the same time of Annie's murder. Information comes in at some point, and I'm not sure how, that a woman was actually taken to that house by Daniel, and he shaved her head and threw darts at her because she owed him money.

The violent assault allegedly took place at the party during the same time frame that Annie had been killed. So was it possible that the eyewitness's testimony had never been about Annie at all? That's what police in West Jordan believed. So they charged Daniel for the assault of the other woman. West Jordan investigates the kidnapping and assault of the woman at the abandoned house. So they charged Daniel with that.

More evidence leads to a violent home invasion robbery where the other male was involved. So they end up charging him with that. So both of them stay in jail for the time being. It seemed pretty clear that a crime had occurred, but it was looking more and more likely that the victim was not Annie Kasperczak. That realization was extremely disheartening. All of this time has been used on something else while evidence of Annie's murder is going away. Months went by with little movement on Annie's case. Within the police department, however, things were changing.

Jacqueline was promoted to a detective position. Derek brought her on to Annie's investigation, and they worked together closely to figure out next moves. Then Derek got promoted to sergeant and received a new assignment, which meant he would be taken off the investigation into Annie's murder. Jacqueline would now be the only detective working to find who killed Annie. And this was only the second homicide investigation she had ever done. Not hard to imagine how overwhelmed and underprepared she must have felt. Thankfully, Derek remained supportive. He worked graves, so we did not work together a lot. But when I did have questions, he would

always answer my call. He would always meet with me if he was around. So he was my sounding board for a little bit. After those blood results had come in, Derek told Jacqueline that he wanted to clear Daniel Ferry's name. Now that Jacqueline was conducting her own interviews related to Annie, she definitely understood why. I also started to see why Daniel not being cleared was hindering the case because everyone was just retelling me what they had watched on the news. So Anna Seega, I think this is a really good opportunity to also talk about what law enforcement must be doing within their investigative mode, is not only trying to find a killer here, but to make sure that if evidence is presented clearing Daniel, that every effort needs to be made to do that. And when the evidence was reexamined, it was clear that Daniel Ferry was not involved in Annie's murder.

After being sent to jail, he had pled guilty to that unrelated kidnapping charge, a crime that was proved to have been committed on the very same night Annie was murdered. And the witness who initially implicated Daniel admitted her story had not been the truth. I don't remember exactly what she said, but she did admit that she tried to connect the two stories so she could get out of charges. Jacqueline knew the investigation needed a fresh start. And one year after Annie was killed, it got exactly that. Police announced to the public that Daniel Ferry had been cleared in the murder of Annie Kasperczak. It was official, and that meant it was also official that Annie's killer was still on the loose. Then, tragedy struck again.

But this time, it was within the police department itself. On an early September morning, about a year and a half after Annie's murder, Jacqueline was getting ready to go for a run. I got a phone call from dispatch saying there was an officer involved shooting. They needed me at the scene. So I called my boss, the detective sergeant, and asked him who it was and what happened. He told me it was Derek. Derek Johnson had been killed. So I raced down there, found out that they called his time of death at the hospital. And now we were just tasked with holding the scene until another investigating agency could come in and investigate his murder.

Sergeant Derek Johnson had been finishing a patrol shift. He was a few blocks away from the Draper Police Station when he saw what looked to be a broken down car. And Derek pulled up next to it. There was a male and female in the car. The male pulled a gun and started shooting at Derek. Derek drove away. As he was driving away, one of the bullets went through his shoulder or arm,

so it wasn't protected by his vest. And it went through his body and killed him within seconds. The 32-year-old sergeant left behind a wife and a six-year-old son. It was the first officer death that the Draper Police Department had experienced. When investigators were looking into the murder of Sergeant Derek Johnson, they determined that the two occupants in the vehicle that shot at him were involved in some type of domestic argument. The male driver turned, fired at Derek,

then turned the weapon on his domestic partner, and then shot himself. You know, Anastasia, this profession's risks are evident. You know, when a routine task, like addressing a disabled vehicle, can escalate to an officer's murder. You know, as you know, I've personally felt this pain when my training officer, a member of my district, was killed in the line of duty.

And the impact on fellow deputies, the community, and most profoundly, his family is indescribable and just so tragic. And I know, Anastasia, you've done prosecutions against people who have killed police officers in the line of duty. You understand that. And we see firsthand when we work in this field how it impacts officers personally and professionally to the core. And you just look at this one here.

Yes, the profession is inherently dangerous, but it's not even like he's, you know, showing up at a domestic violence or an abduction, nothing. I mean, he is literally going to help someone who looks like they have a disabled car. So it is clear that it is solely because of the uniform that he was wearing that the person inside that car opened fire. Personally, Jacqueline had lost her friend and ally. And on a professional level, the person most knowledgeable about Annie's case was now gone. He knew the family very well.

He knew who Annie was from his investigation. So if I ever had any theories on could this have happened, I would run it by him. And he'd tell me, no, that couldn't have happened because blank. And maybe I'd never considered that before. Derek's death raised the stakes of Annie's investigation. The job of finding Annie's killer was now entirely in Jacqueline's hands, and she was feeling the pressure on every level. It became real that I could be hurt, even if it was just driving to work and getting in a car accident. And I recognized that this case would never be solved if I was hurt.

Jacqueline jumped in with a new sense of urgency. Before Derek was killed, she had gone back to the basics, trying to learn what she could about Annie and her life. One thing that stood out was the note Annie left when she ran away. In it, she told her parents she felt out of place, but she also mentioned something more troubling. Annie wrote, quote, I lied to my friends. I told them I was P, but I only wanted their sympathy. Her mother Veronica had explained the cryptic note that the P was for pregnant. A few months before she was killed, Annie told her parents she had had a sexual relationship for the first time.

The parents eventually found out that she told the boy that she was pregnant with his baby. Veronica went and had her tested and it showed that she was pregnant with his baby. Veronica Wynne had her tested, and it showed that she was not pregnant. That boy was her boyfriend, Chris Bagshaw. Chris and Annie had been friends for a while, but their romantic relationship was new. The two had only dated for a few weeks. I don't think it was really official that they were boyfriend-girlfriend, but they were dating-ish,

and then I think Chris tried to separate from her and be more friends with her. And then he wanted to go date other people or at least be single. But Annie had a different idea. We talked to her therapist, got her therapist notes. Annie was struggling with, if someone is broken, she believed that she could fix them at all costs. So she didn't care if they didn't want her around. She wanted to be there to support them, love them. And then she also didn't want to get rejected.

So Chris trying to leave her, she absolutely refused to let him. Was this two teenagers trying to navigate their first intimate relationship, or was something darker at play? Jacqueline learned that Chris, like Annie, had a rough childhood. He was born to very young parents who had separated. There were reports of substance abuse and physical abuse in the home. Chris, at age 14, was almost the same age his dad had been when he was born. So his dad and his mom had him when they were 15 and 16. They told him his whole life,

don't make the same mistake we did. Don't get pregnant when you're a teenager. Jacqueline believed that Annie told Chris she was pregnant to try to stop him from leaving. And as far as she can tell, Chris never knew that was a lie. But even if that is what happened, was it motive enough to kill her? And Scott, I really thought that that was somewhat heartbreaking. You know, it really goes to the angst of the early teen years, the trepidation of those first intimate relationships. Now here's a boy that maybe wants to leave this girl who doesn't want him to leave for all sorts of reasons. And remember, she'd had a very difficult start in life. But again, when we come down to motive,

you know, hearing that maybe he was about to repeat the pattern that his parents had with him, you do wonder how that was working on his mind. The fact that Annie had told Chris she was pregnant and he did not know as far as we knew that she was lying about that. I know statistically a very high rate of killing for women who are pregnant is the father of the child. And again, I think that's a relevant fact here, because although we do know here that Annie was not, in fact, pregnant, you know, the reason that it is the leading cause of death when women are pregnant is likely because the other partner has some issue with becoming a parent. And so while she may not have been pregnant, that is what her then-boyfriend

thought. So it could play into motive if it's going to ultimately be Chris that ultimately is the person who did this to Annie. And what they found next may actually lead to the motive on a SIGA. When they were searching his room after Annie was found, investigators collected something interesting in his trash can, which was a torn up note. Our CSI tech put it together and it was him listing off everything he had told Derek in the first interview and then questioning what other evidence we had. The note was oddly specific. It seemed strange for him to try and keep such close track of what he had told

investigators. And then there was Annie's cell phone records from the night she was killed. She did not call anyone else. She was calling friends, but no one else that we didn't know. Everyone's number we knew, and Chris was the number one person she was calling that night. Even so, all this evidence was largely circumstantial, and Jacqueline was meeting resistance. Others in her department thought Chris, a scrawny teen with no prior record, could not have carried out this violent crime. If she was going to prove them wrong, she would need to have more evidence. And that meant digging deeper. But there were points that she felt limited by her own lack of experience.

Remember, this was only Jacqueline's second homicide investigation, so she went back to school. And Scott, I love this part. I started putting myself through basic and intermediate homicide investigation classes. And I started presenting the case to anyone and everyone that would listen, including the instructors who are from out of state who had decades worth of experience investigating homicides. And when a colleague raved about a training with a cell phone data investigator, Jacqueline immediately signed up.

You know, Anastasia, I think it is worth repeating here that I love digital forensics, you know, especially cell phone data. Definitely one of my favorite investigative tools. So much, I mean, so much can be learned if you just know where to look. And as I was sitting in the training, I thought, oh my gosh, because Chris's cell phone and Annie's cell phone, the records were so odd, the way they were pinging off of the cell phone towers that night, it was showing them several miles away within minutes. So it wasn't even possible to drive those distances.

The cell phone records from the night of Annie's murder appeared to show Chris far from the Jordan River. But in her training, Jacqueline learned that if a cell phone has a weaker signal, it's going to ping towers that may be further away. And this was Jacqueline's lightbulb moment. Just because Chris's cell phone had pinged or hit off towers far from the river, it didn't mean he was actually at the location of those towers. Jacqueline shared her case with the investigator leading the training, who was intrigued.

He offered to come to Draper with a special machine that could replicate Chris's phone. I just love that. He's going to just show up with this machine. She's going to learn. She's going to do it. And they're going to get some answers. He and I drove around all over the valley near all the cell phone towers we could find, trying to imitate what Chris's phone was doing.

They got to the bridge on the Jordan River where the jogger had spotted pools of blood almost two years before. And when we got down to where Annie was killed, that is the only place that we could imitate what Chris's phone was doing on the night she was killed. He would move 10 feet away from where she was killed and it showed different numbers. So it was showing that Chris was within 10 feet of where Annie was killed on the night that she was killed. And there was more. After this cell phone expert started working the information and creating a report that the attorneys could understand, he called me and he said, you'll never believe this.

When Annie first went missing, Veronica had called her daughter's friends to see if they knew where she was. She also called Chris Bagshaw. That call, where Veronica called Chris and said, do you know where Annie is? And he said, no. That is the ping that is showing Chris was at the site.

It looked like Veronica, who had fought so hard for her daughter every step of the way, may have also helped catch Annie's killer. Jacqueline now felt ready to present her findings to the district attorney. In addition to the cell phone report, she wanted to highlight other evidence against Bagshaw. After Annie's body was found, Bagshaw had handed over his shoes to police. But before he did, he mentioned that the last time he hung out with Annie, she had a bloody nose. Here is that audio. We were hanging out and then she just got a bloody nose, and we were sitting, like, right here, and she drifted on my shoe.

But I'm not sure which shoe it is. Okay. All right. And then did you try to wash it off or anything? Yeah, I wiped it off. Wiped it off. But when the shoes were tested, they found more than just a few drops of blood. There were multiple angles of blood on his shoes, meaning it wasn't just drops from straight down onto the top. It would have been on the sides, on the front, on the bottom. So it

didn't match the story that she had a bloody nose and was dripping blood on top of his shoe. And when they tested that blood further, as expected, it came back as Annie's blood. Jacqueline's evidence was strong, but tensions were high when she presented it to the DA. One of the attorneys said, I don't know if this is enough. And I was full of rage. I'm like, not another setback. Once she finished, the district attorney made the call. An arrest warrant would be issued for Chris Bagshaw. And so I was elated. Went back, told everyone in my investigative unit what had happened. And we set up a time to go out and meet Colorado police and arrest Chris.

And that was because shortly after Annie's murder, Bagshaw had moved to Colorado where his mother lived. Jacqueline and her sergeant went there to verify his identity for Colorado police. One of their officers watched him get into the vehicle with his mom at his mom's house, followed them to the school. And then when Chris got out of her vehicle and she drove away, they pointed to him. We verified that it's him.

And they walked up to him and arrested him. Jacqueline was finally able to make the phone call that she and Derek had been working towards since Annie's body was found two and a half years earlier. I called Veronica right then. I was shaking. I was so happy. Finally, this case is going to be closed. Finally, we're going to have answers. I called Veronica and I said, it's done. While Veronica was shocked by news of the arrest, she wasn't surprised about who they arrested. She believed the night that she called him that he was lying to her.

But now that theory would be tested in a court of law, and it would be up to a jury to decide if Chris Bagshaw had killed Annie or if the investigation had taken another wrong turn. Bagshaw waited behind bars for his trial date, but a few months before it was set to begin, investigators got a phone call. Someone housed in jail with Bagshaw wanted to speak to them about Annie's case.

This kid apparently was known in the detention center for being very religious, and he said a lot of other kids would come to him asking for forgiveness, and he kids would come to him asking for forgiveness. And he said Chris came to him asking if he could be forgiven for doing something like this. And Chris explained how he killed Annie. Bagshaw explained in detail what had happened on the night Annie ran away.

He said that he told Annie to write a letter that she was going to California and for her parents not to look for her. He told Annie to meet him at the river. And that night, it was in March, so it was cold. He brought a shovel and he told her to start digging a hole that they could sleep in to stay warm. But the ground was frozen. And at that point, Bagshaw turned on Annie. And we want to warn you that what he said is graphic,

but we're including it because it's unfortunately very much part of this horrific crime. Then he just started hitting Annie in the head with a shovel. He said it took forever for her to die. And once she was down on the ground, she was making all these noises and pleading and saying that she loved him. He put the tip of the shovel in her forehead and stomped down on it. And he said that's the only thing that stopped her

from making noises. The shovel, while never found, helped explain the brutal nature of Annie's injuries. A week before the trial was set to begin, investigators got another surprising phone call. We expected that he was going to enter a plea of not guilty. And then his attorney called us before and said, Chris is going to enter a guilty plea. Jacqueline was there to watch Bagshaw plead guilty to the first-degree murder of Annie Kasperczak. Annie's mother, Veronica, was there as well.

Bagshaw was sentenced to 15 years to life in prison. He'll be first eligible for parole when he is 37 years old. Jacqueline felt vindicated. This investigation had faced so many roadblocks, including some from her own department. It was validation because from the beginning, I felt like the statistics that we know about intimate partner violence and violence against pregnant people all pointed to him. And I didn't feel like he was getting the proper attention. I saw bias with my other detectives who didn't believe that a 14-year-old scrawny kid could do this. So it was very validating that all the work showed that he actually did this.

It was also important to her that Annie's story was reflected in the evidence. Being able to see all these different aspects of evidence coming together to show Annie's story, other than Veronica, it was different than everyone else heard. They all thought she was into drugs, she was a problem child, and she really wasn't. She was just this kid who had a rough go and had a supportive and loving mom trying to give her a chance. After the sentencing, Jacqueline grieved. For Annie, who never got a chance to live the life

her mother had fought so hard to give her. For Veronica, who lost her cherished daughter, and even for Chris Bagshaw. It was also very sad because he's a 14-year-old, he's a kid. How did he end up here? And now what's going to happen to him? And Jacqueline, the one-time rookie who put herself through all of those detective trainings, began to teach.

I teach the cadets now, and I used to teach investigations classes, and I would bring this up. Like, don't let your biases get in the way. It could be a small child harming another small child. It could be something that you don't think it is. The unfortunate truth when it comes to murder is that almost anything is in the realm of possibilities. After overcoming countless challenges and emerging stronger with each hurdle, Annie's life was unjustly cut short by a misguided act of violence, a senseless act rooted in fear and misconception. Without question, Jacqueline's unwavering dedication and tenacity were instrumental in cracking this case.

She'll be the first person to say that it was a path that began with another dedicated and determined member of law enforcement, Sergeant Derek Johnson. He harbored a profound commitment to Annie, incessantly pursuing justice on her behalf. Heartbreakingly, his untimely death on the line of duty epitomizes the ultimate act of selflessness and sacrifice for the community he served. At sentencing, Annie's mom, Veronica, read directly from her daughter's diary about the first time Annie and Chris Bagshaw met. And she wrote, I quote, there's a kid in my math class I really like. At sentencing, Veronica went on to say that her daughter's only mistake was falling in love and hoping to have a future with him.

But those words have just stuck with me because they really speak to the age. These two met in math class. Annie's quote really brings home the points of innocence and youth and just how brutally tragic it is losing someone Annie's age to violence. Annie started life in a very tough way and was given the ability to heal and grow emotionally strong when Veronica and her husband showed Annie the true meaning of family love. Annie lost her life to violence, but we will remember her for her strength, how hard she worked to heal the emotional scars her early days left her with, and all the joys she gave to her family. Tune in next week for another new episode of Anatomy of Murder.

Anatomy of Murder is an Audiochuck original. Produced and created by Weinberger Media and Frasetti Media. Ashley Flowers is the executive producer. So, what do you think, Chuck? Do you approve?