Anatomy of Murder - The Letter (Desiree Thompson)

Episode Date: June 25, 2024

A woman’s murder went unsolved for years. An anonymous letter sent to police gave chilling details of the crime, but would it actually solve the case?  View source material and photos for this episode at: anatomyofmurder.com/the-letter/Can’t get enough AoM? Find us on social media!Instagram: @aom_podcast | @audiochuckTwitter: @AOM_podcast | @audiochuckFacebook: /listenAOMpod | /audiochuckllc

We didn't have a body yet, but we assumed after a few years she was deceased, because she wouldn't have just abandoned her kids that way. I'm Scott Weinberger, 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 pain caused by the loss of a loved one to violent crime is almost unimaginable. I can think of almost nothing that compares except maybe this, when a loved one disappears without a trace. Left with no clue if he or she is alive, dead, or suffering, the uncertainty must be agonizing, and the lack of resolution paralyzing. When someone we love suddenly disappears, it shatters our world in

an instant. But the loss of a missing person can bring on a whole new level of grief that could last for months, years, and even sometimes for decades. Statistically, there are about 6.5 missing persons for every 100,000 people in the U.S. With the help of law enforcement, dedicated families, and vigilant communities, 75% of those go missing are found alive. But that isn't always the case. Tragically, approximately 10% living in California City, California, who on one evening back in 2012 left her home to pick up some groceries and never returned. She was a mother of a kid just trying to make it.

I mean, she had had a couple little bumps in her life. She was going to school and it straightened her life out. That's the voice of retired homicide detective Larry Brandenburg, who started his nearly 40-year career in law enforcement at the L.A. County Sheriff's Office. In 2022, he would be asked to work with the California City Police Department to help put some of their cold cases to bed. They had five unsolved murders and three missing person cases. And I say, what a great way to use experience resources. I mean, manpower to clear some cold cases. My hat's really off to them.

Yeah, when I heard Larry talking about this in his interview with you, Scott, it really harkens back to, again, we've spoken to other investigators in certain departments. They do this. They bring in retired detectives. And I just think it's such a ingenious way of, as you put it, like using resources that are already proven, that have the skill set to help when the current caseload is just too much. I looked at all of them, saw what had most workable leads that might provide some proof. Desiree Thompson was not one of the first ones because looking through the case, I think any investigator would go, well, it's probably her husband because of what had happened the night

before she went missing. But despite investigators' suspicions about what probably happened, the mystery surrounding Desiree Thompson's disappearance had never been solved. And for 10 years, her four children had grown up without a mom and without a clue to where she was or what could have happened to her. So let's go back to that night of January 7, 2012 in California City, which despite its name, is actually a pretty small community of about 15,000 an hour east of Bakersfield and 100 miles north of Los Angeles. From what can be learned from the case file for Desiree, it had been more than just a trying day for the overworked mom. She'd finally made the brave step to file the restraining order against her estranged husband. But hours later, he would defy that order and the situation quickly boiled over into violence.

He beat her up. He slapped her around, punched her and broke her phone, and threatened her with a shotgun in her face. And then he left, and she called the police, and they showed up and took a domestic violence report. Later that evening, rattled and nursing a swollen eye, Desiree left her apartment, telling friends that she needed to take a walk and was going to the store to buy some cigarettes. But when she hadn't returned for several hours, the friend got worried and called the police. I think it was nine o'clock in the evening to report her missing. Members of California City's small police force immediately fanned out and started canvassing the area around Desiree's home, including the nearby market, a few local restaurants and bars looking for Desiree. But there was no sign of her. Now, of course, Desiree

was a grown woman, and law enforcement always has to consider that a person reported missing may be gone on their own volition. But considering she had so recently been the victim of an assault, it was not too premature to assume that she might be in real physical danger. And there was another reason why her sudden disappearance was being taken so seriously. Everyone who knew her, and most especially her mom, Sherry, was insistent that Desiree loved her children and would never abandon them for any reason. The family was adamant she would not take off like this. For those reasons, police searching for Desiree were immediately focused on her abusive husband,

Edward Gibson. It wasn't long after investigators started peeling back the layers of this case that they discovered the violent altercation with Desiree that preceded her disappearance was not an isolated incident. It was not his only run-in with Desiree or law enforcement. He had a prior conviction for domestic violence, felony conviction towards her. So there was a history of this. But she kept taking this gentleman back, even though the kids that she had,

he was not the father of the children. He wasn't a real nice guy. I'll put it like that. These were the known facts. Just hours after she was reported missing, Desiree had been the victim of domestic abuse. Her assailant had a history of violence and had threatened her life. Obviously, this is not a situation where you would wait 24 or 48 hours before raising the alarm. It was all hands on deck. She was considered a person in great danger because of what happened earlier.

I thought that this was a really startling statistic, that about one-fifth of female intimate partner homicide victims who had a restraining order were killed within two days of that order being issued, and about one-third were killed within a month. So it really speaks to how close in time to whether it's domestic violence or these orders being put into effect, it really can be, unfortunately, a tinderbox that has to be looked out for as well. That's so true. And in specifically this case, Anasiga, it shows a pattern of violence between a potential person of interest who also happens to be in a relationship with your victim.

I mean, that's my first big red flag. And also follows, as you say, national and international data. But not only could this person be a threat to Desiree, but also to her children and potentially other people if he was desperate enough. And there was also another big reason why Edward Gibson was now a person of interest in Desiree's disappearance. And that is because he was nowhere to be found. The estranged husband was never interviewed. He fled, and that raised even more suspicion that he did something to her. So investigators issued a be on the lookout, or as we call it, BOLO for Gibson. But unfortunately, at the time, the small California City Police Department

didn't have the funding or the manpower to conduct a statewide manhunt. In the meantime, what had now become a frantic search for Desiree continued with the hope that they still might locate her alive. Police pieced together a timeline of when she had been last seen. And Scott, we talk about this all the time, the importance of the timeline. There's several reasons why, Anasika, the timeline is so critical because that information can point you to places to begin your canvas. Someone is last seen by a witness in a neighborhood. And of course, you begin knocking on doors. Someone was last seen at a convenience store and you begin to pull surveillance tape from the entire area to potentially see if your victim, maybe a car pulled up and they got into it, or maybe they

were forced into a vehicle. Timelines are the backbone of every homicide investigation. And what it all comes down to is that it is a way to hopefully find any holes or clues to know what happened and when. And then also the tools. We always talk about this as well. The cameras that you're looking for can give you timeline stamps or timestamps of somebody in a specific area.

And also, we would look at credit card activity, right? We would want to know if the suspect may have taken her credit card and is now at an ATM where a camera is there. And we could see that the person entering those numbers at the ATM is not our victim. And here, according to witness accounts, Desiree had spent the day in her home with friends. And at around 8 p.m., she told her friends that she was stepping out. She left her apartment to go to the store to get some cigarettes, and she went to a girlfriend's house. She lived about a mile away in an apartment. She went over there and told her girlfriend about what had happened earlier that day with her husband.

Told him she was afraid that he was going to hurt her. Desiree's mom then reported that she spoke to Desiree later on that evening. She called her mother from the girlfriend's phone because her phone had been broken. And she left her girlfriend's house about 8.30 and was never seen again. So police knew that Desiree must have disappeared sometime between her call to her mother and being reported missing at 9 p.m. Now, unfortunately, there was no way to track her using her cell phone because her estranged husband had destroyed it in the altercation.

And some of the other common digital forensic tools yielded few clues as well. I think she had bank accounts or a credit card, see any activity on anything, and there was nothing. There was a growing fear that the beloved mother of four would never be seen alive again. But then California City Police received an out-of-the-blue phone call from a police department in Kansas over 1,500 miles away.

According to law enforcement in the Sunflower State, Desiree Thompson was very much alive and well and living in Kansas. Less than 24 hours after Desiree Thompson was reported missing, a flash of hope came in the form of a phone call informing California City Police that Desiree had been located in Kansas. Considering everything they knew about Desiree and witness accounts of her last turbulent days in California City, local police were surprised by the fortunate turn of events. But when investigators finally got the full download from the Kansas police,

their celebration was short-lived. Some cops conversed with each other from here and there, and then they realized someone with the same name was located by the police. And it turned out it was a male with that name. That's obviously not our missing person. The man not only had the same name as Desiree, but he also had the same date of birth. So you could see how this mis-ID may have happened. And so Desiree's mom and children suffered through one of the many tortures of having a missing loved one, false hope. Despite desperate search efforts by her family and the tight-knit community, months pass with no sign of Desiree or the person of interest in her disappearance. Things slowly got put on the back burner because no workable leads and they didn't have the resources to chase this guy all over the country. And unfortunately, things just got colder and colder as time went on.

For the next 10 years, there were no new leads in the case. Desiree's kids, now being raised by her mom, Sherry, would grow up to be teenagers and then adults. And without any knowledge of their mother's fate, they were denied the opportunity to grieve and to heal. You know, just for a moment to sidestep, there is this concept that has been coined suspended pain by some in the psychiatric world. And it's basically that due to this never ending hope that loved ones have when someone goes missing, they just hope they'll be reunited, right? And so loved ones, survivors, they almost fall into this state of a suspended animation that they can't fully function until their loved one comes back.

It's an endless cycle that is hard to extricate themselves from. The toll also manifests itself in levels of guilt, you know, that if they presume their loved one is dead, they could be jinxing their loved one to a tragic fate. But all hope was not lost. In 2022, Detective Larry Brandenburg took over the case with a fresh set of eyes and a new determination to bring and deliver both peace and justice to Desiree's kids. And his primary focus was right back on Desiree's husband, Edward, who was still at large. There was really nothing to do other than find the estranged husband. Then he received a new lead that would send the investigation into a whole new direction.

I started doing computer searches. I'm pretty sure I found him in Texas, but I never went to talk to him because some of this new information came up on the case. It was just, you couldn't ignore it. On January 10, 2022, almost 10 years to the day after Desiree Thompson went missing, the California City Cold Case Squad received what can only be termed, at the very least, an intriguing phone call. I got a call from a citizen who said he had information regarding this missing person. I wasn't there when the call came in, but he left a message and he phoned again the next day and I actually spoke with him. Most investigators are used to fielding all kinds of calls and claims about unsolved cases, most of which never yield anything of substantial value. But right away, Larry knew this call was really different. The man claimed to know the fate of Desiree Thompson. And sadly, it was what her family had always feared the most.

He identified himself and told me that this gentleman confessed to him killing a Black woman back in 2012, and that he buried her body in the backyard of his house. I was kind of taken aback by it, going, okay, you know, this sounds interesting, but is this kid a coup? Larry immediately asked the man how he came to the conclusion. And he explained to me why he thought it was Desiree, because he had remembered seeing flyers 10 years prior in the city that, you know, they had placed up all over looking for her.

The description of how the killer described the woman and what brought this to his attention. But despite his suspicions, the man had never notified police. Instead, it had taken a recent post that jarred his conscience into making the decision to finally pick up the phone and call law enforcement. Desiree's mother had put out some social media on the anniversary of her death. He saw that and he said he began to cry and he knew he had to call the police and tell them what he knew. The man agrees to come into the police department for further questioning. I did want a lot of details on the phone because I like to interview people face to

face. And I see we both know how valuable it is to try to be face to face with somebody who may have this kind of information. For me, number one is credibility. Having them there listening to a story, you could also potentially get a sworn statement and have them sign it. These are important steps to really digging in to see, is there credibility in what they're claiming? And, you know, interestingly, we have talked about this with respect to suspects or persons of interest a lot, but here we're talking about a witness. I can tell you after speaking to, honestly, countless of hundreds of witnesses over the years, I don't know how many times that you read something on paper, but it just feels very different, either all the more true or sometimes not true based on watching them, their body language,

when they are speaking to you face-to-face. And that really goes to why these type of conversations, when if at all possible, should always be face to face. So I met with him on the 21st of January, and we sat down. In that interview room, the man identified a family friend, a man by the name of Jose William Lara, who is now 60 years old, as the man he thought was responsible for Desiree's disappearance and ultimately her murder. Him and his father met this guy at a church in town and they would play soccer together. He also recounted how he and his father would go over to Lara's house to drink beer and to hang out with mutual friends after church on Sundays. It was on one of those drunken afternoons that Lara made his stunning confession.

And as Lara had begun to tell this story about a party that had taken place then recently, remember, we're talking about January of 2012. Well, it was the very same night that he was referring to that Desiree had disappeared. And he said he was at this party

where there was a bunch of people wearing black clothes and had mohawk haircuts. He he said he was at this party where there was a bunch of people wearing black clothes and had mohawk haircuts. He said while he's at the party, two or three guys pushed him to the ground, disrespected him, and threw him out of the party,

made him leave. He's very pissed off, so he goes home, he's stewing about this, and he tells the kid that he goes back and he's sitting outside waiting for some of these guys

to leave the party because he wants revenge. That's when Lara says he saw someone outside who he thought was one of his assailants. So he began to follow him. But Lara was wrong. The person he was following was not one of the guys who had beaten him. In fact, it wasn't even a guy at all. But for now, we'll just leave it at this. It was definitely a stranger to him. It's a black female, but he says he's so mad that he wants revenge. And in that moment, Lara decides to act out on a violent fantasy.

And he tells her he's got some beer at home, does she want to come and have a beer? And this is just speculation on my part, but I think this poor girl was too afraid to go home because she thought her strange husband might come back and hurt her. According to the witness, Lara told him that after the woman got in the truck, they drove straight to his house. Once inside the house, he tells her, come in my bedroom. He goes, I got a small refrigerator in there, and I told her to bend down and get a beer. And when she did, I slammed her head into the refrigerator and just started stabbing her. The man's rage seemed to have no bounds when the machete he was using broke. He continued to stab his victim about the head and the chest.

The story was shocking and brutal and so far unsubstantiated. But something in Larry's gut told him that the witness was telling him the truth. This young man seemed very believable. He got emotional during the interview, apologized that he didn't come forward sooner, that he should have, and he felt really bad about that for the family. The witness went on to sign a sworn statement, and before they parted ways, Brandenburg asked him if he was still in contact with Jose Lara, who was reportedly still living in the area.

He told me and everything. He says, I don't talk to him anymore, but I see him walking his dog every now and then, and he lives in his apartment. This new information was a stunning turn of events in a 10-year-old cold case. But the story would still need to be corroborated, so Larry Brandenburg reached out to the witness his father, who as reported by his son, had also been a witness to Lara's drunken confession. First, I talked to the father because I wanted to see if he would corroborate everything his son was telling me. And he did, and even had a little more information.

In fact, the father told the investigator that he'd actually sent an anonymous letter to the police, complete with a diagram of a backyard where the body was buried. Larry was puzzled because in going through all the evidence in the case file, he had never found a letter or any mention of one. As we all know that over the course of a lengthy cold case, sometimes evidence can get lost. Paperwork can get misfiled. But this was kind of a big one. Had California City Police dropped the ball? The reality was actually more mundane, but no less damaging to the investigation. It turns out that the letter had never been delivered to the police station at all. It had mistakenly been delivered next door. The young man's father dropped it off. He thought it

was the police station, but it was actually the post office, I believe, right next door to the police department. He just wrote the police on the envelope it was actually the post office, I believe, right next door to the police department. He just wrote the police on the envelope. No postage, no address. But lucky for investigators, the man actually had a copy of the typed letter and the handwritten diagram. And he shared both with police. And he said, here, I want you to look at this and read it. And there was a letter in there explaining this. And there was actually a drawn diagram of the house, the bedroom, and the yard where the body was buried.

We actually have a copy of the letter. And I'm just going to read you a few portions from it. So at the top, it starts with, what I'm about to say is something I have to get off my chest because I feel that it is the right thing to do. And then towards the middle, it goes on. This is what he showed and told me. And then a little later when she bent over to get a beer, he told me the most shocking thing I have ever heard. He started stabbing her so many times until he made a pool of blood on the carpet. He said he buried her in the backyard. I have included a map illustrating where she was buried.

I'm just giving you this information that he told me. And before he has gone on to say the writer, whether you want to believe me or not. That's remarkable. The letter went on to say that the author had seen the missing persons posters around town. And he believed that the victim to be Desiree Thompson based on Larry's description of his victim. When asked why the man and his son hadn't come forward sooner, the father explained that they were both Mexican nationals without citizenship or a visa, so they were afraid. He says, you know, I was deported 30 years ago from the United States.

And he says, then I came back after being deported. And now I have a family. I have children. I have a successful life. I built a life. And he goes, I didn't want to get deported. Armed with the information provided by the man and his father, Larry marched straight to the police chief. I just told him, I said, I don't know if this is true, but it's definitely something we've got to follow up on.

But this guy confessed to killing Desiree Thompson and buried her in his backyard. And I said, you know, that's something that we're going to easily be able to prove, I think, one way or another. After some digging, it turned out that Lara had made more than one drunken confession to more than one person. Investigators tracked down another man in Lara's circle that told police he stopped by Lara's house on the day after the alleged murder. He claimed that Lara was acting strange and wouldn't let the man in the door. The following day, he spotted Lara with a gaping gash on his hand, which Lara had blamed on the fight that happened at the party. When they went to the hospital to get him stitched up,

Lara suspiciously refused to make a police report. And as more and more people came forward to describe their interactions with Jose Lara, a dark and disturbing portrait was coming into focus. He would tell people, and again, this is nothing that I could prove or I really even tried to look into because it's El Salvador. He told them he was down there during the Civil War and he was part of a kidnapping squad. Either get ransom or they'd kill him. As a suspect, Lara was checking the boxes, but many things remained unproven. Not the least of which at this point was whether the woman he described killing was actually Desiree Thompson.

There was only one way to know for sure. So after that, we started doing some research on the house where this allegedly happened, talked to the owner who owned the house back in 2012, and see if he lived there. The owner was able to verify that Lara had rented the house from him between the years 2010 and about 2013. So now we know that this guy did live there at that time in the house where they're saying this happened. Then we went to the house and talked to the current resident. Nice family, man, wife, and his kids. We told them something had happened in the house long before they moved there.

And we wanted to know if they'd let us look at the bedroom in the backyard. And they were very gracious and agreed. The plan? To check the house for any signs of a bloody struggle and the backyard for any human remains. We went and enlisted the FBI's evidence recovery team out of Sacramento to help us do the dig. Because they're very good at what they do. So they came down with a whole team of folks and we had Kern County Crime Lab do the inside of the house. The first thing investigators noticed was that the layout of the home and the backyard were eerily similar to the diagram that the witnesses had sent in this anonymous letter years earlier. So while the FBI set up camp in the backyard, Detective Brandenburg

and his team zeroed in on the bedroom. Soon, investigators found exactly what they were looking for. We tore up the wood flooring and they located blood after all them years in the concrete floor. And the backyard would tell a story

all its own. The FBI started digging hours into the dig. They got down about three and a half feet, and the lady in charge said, I don't think there's anything here. I said, we got blood evidence in that bedroom. I said, please keep digging. She did.

They located a tennis shoe, I think, and then a piece of clothing, and they kept going, kept going, and then a piece of clothing. And they kept going, kept going. And then they found a hair. Then they found a skull and other bones and other clothing. They had discovered clear physical proof of a murder. It appeared that much of the identified remains had been destroyed by fire. But there was enough to corroborate the witness's statement to police.

There was things missing. There were bones missing, of course. But he did attempt to burn the remains down in the hole. There was evidence that charred wood. He had actually told the witnesses or the one witness that he had burned her clothing and his clothing in a barrel. But he may have and then dumped some of that into the hole. But that's not all investigators found in the makeshift grave. There was also a machete blade recovered amongst the remains. So from there, investigators meticulously excavated everything they could find. The clothing and the blade were sent to the crime lab and the remains were sent to the ME's office or medical examiner's office.

So even though things were lining up, as many of the witnesses said, law enforcement still needed to positively identify the remains as belonging to Desiree Thompson. Meanwhile, across town, another team had been keeping a close eye on Jose Lara while the search was going on. I did have FBI surveillance people on his apartment because this is a very small town. I said, if he finds out we're over there digging up that yard, he's going to be gone. Their suspect was now 60 years old, but given the allegations and his history, investigators were careful not to lose sight of him or back him into a corner. Once the remains were found, the search team alerted the surveillance team that it was time to bring in Lara.

They were on him, and I think it was about 9.30 at night. They got a hold of us, and the dig was pretty much over. They were starting to backfill things in. They said, hey, he's on the move. He's going westbound on California City Boulevard. We all got and jumped in our cars, went and we detained him right then and there. As the swarm of federal and local law enforcement descended on him, Jose Lara appeared unbothered. He didn't even ask us what this was about.

Lara was taken into custody. And armed with a search warrant, police took the opportunity to search Lara's apartment. There was some phones there that we confiscated, and there was a machete laying on the dressing. So we took that because we were told by the two witnesses that he carried a machete all the time. He was from El Salvador, and he used to use them down there in the sugar cane fields or whatever.

But he always had one, they said. The interview with Lara took place with the help of a Spanish interpreter. But according to Larry Brandenburg, he was in no hurry and was determined to do his best to not miss a thing. We started out like that real slow and about him playing soccer and going to church and his wife passing away of cancer, which she did in 2011. That's kind of when he started drinking more and more and getting kind of strange. And just for a moment, Scott, to sidestep, you know, here you have someone who is not a native English speaker. And again, I've watched the interview and it's not in English. It's in Spanish with an interpreter interpreting for Larry.

And that does really investigator conducting the interview. Yeah, it actually accomplishes the opposite of what you're trying to do is connect to that person to make sure that there's a back and forth between them, you know, that they're building a rapport. You know, Lara is opening up and talking to him, but there's that barrier in between, especially with the language. That's exactly what happened here. They had a Spanish speaker who was doing the interpreting and from watching it and listening to it, it took a really long time for them even to get around anything of substance, which means exactly what you're saying there, Scott, is that Larry Brandenburg, even though it was a more difficult process, he made sure to take his time and not rush.

Once you get to the point, Anastasia, that you do have a good back and forth and there's an understanding that the language is not an issue, there was a reason for Larry Brandenburg to start pushing the pedal on Lara, to try to find out and tell him the reason why he was really there. Now, I asked him if he knew why he was there, that he was under arrest, he wasn't free to leave, and he advised him of his right. And he said he didn't know why he was there. He had no idea. I said, well, we're going to explain that to you in a little bit, but I want to ask you about some things back in 2012. So at that point, Larry Brandenburg began asking about the party

that Lara had gone to the night of January 7, 2012. He corroborated word for word what the witnesses told us about this party, getting in a fight with these guys. I asked him if he had a scar on his hand because when he was killing Desiree, he cut his hand really bad, which happens frequently when you stab people to death. Lara was surprisingly cooperative and presented Brandenburg his hand. There was still a big scar there. And I said, how did you get that? He says, all these guys at the party, they cut my hand when I got into a little tussle with them. I said, oh, really? And then Larry Brandenburg confronted Lara with the gruesome evidence that

had been discovered at Lara's old home. I said, well, you know, we went over and searched your former house today, right? He goes, no. I said, you know what we found in the bedroom? He says, no, nothing. I said, yeah, we found blood in your bedroom. He goes, I don't know what you're talking about. I said, you know what we found in the backyard? And he says, you got a case, bring it.

In an instant, Lara dropped his gentle elderly man act and revealed a glimpse of the cold-hearted killer police believed him to be. You know, he was very cool and calm through the whole thing until I got confrontational about searching his house and what we were finding there. It was like night and day when I started confronting him with evidence and that he was lying. Despite ending short of a confession, the interview provided detectives with substantial corroboration that Lara was indeed Desiree's killer. The pieces were falling into place and with Jose Lara safely behind bars, investigators hoped the autopsy would provide the final proof they needed to close the case. But determining a definitive cause of death was going to prove a challenge. Obviously, multiple stab wounds, but they couldn't be specific about that because of the decomposition, of course.

The bones were not all attached. What remained of Desiree's skull provided the most telling and the most disturbing evidence of how Desiree was killed. It was consistent with at least one or more blows of a machete to the face area. It was very violent. It was devastating. So when they put it together, now based on a mountain of circumstantial evidence, Larry decided to present his case to the district attorney. You know, there's always that moment where you're, as an investigator, going to the DA or state attorney and asking them to agree with what your findings are and to move ahead in the case and take it towards prosecution. And you've done that thousands of times, Anastasia, right? How do you identify that moment?

Definitely a lot. You know, we always used to say, you know, they would call from the front and say, Detective so-and-so is here. And we, as supervisors in a homicide, we used to like to use like the group method. So it wasn't just one set of ears listening. And again, sometimes you're all on the same page and it's easy. Sometimes you disagree, but the detective almost just knows it's coming and walks out and is like, okay, I'll be back when there's more. But you also have these really tense conversations.

And I say it with people that I have incredible respect for, but it's different standards. But detectives, you know, when they believe that they have enough, they want to act to get that person off the street or to kind of get going in the justice column, hopefully for the victims and those left behind. And that was the moment in this case where Brandenburg and his team were going to prosecutors asking for just that. And this was a case full of hope and painful uncertainty. But the district attorney was about to deliver, in this case, one more setback.

I'm feeling pretty good about this case at this point. You know, I'm thinking everything went just the way the witnesses said. But when the DA got the case, they called us back and they said, well, you know, we're going to kick this back to you. And I said, what?

They said, well, we don't know who the remains are in that hole. Despite the DA's initial decision to not authorize the arrest of Jose Lara, Detective Larry Brandenburg was convinced that he had captured a killer. I was dumbfounded when they first refused. I was like, you've got to be kidding me. I said, I don't give a damn who the remains are. You've got a dead body down there that didn't put itself there. And you've got blood evidence in the bedroom and we'll find out who that is. But right now, just for filing purposes, call it Jane or John Doe and charge him because

he's the only one that lived there and knew all this information. The strong stance worked. After some deliberation, the district attorney's office agreed to finally file this case. That is a moment of victory for both sides here, for both prosecutor and homicide detectives. And again, it really comes down to the collaboration that we as homicide prosecutors band together with the homicide detectives and the local law enforcement detectives of each jurisdiction. Because, you know, these are decisions being made by human beings. And sometimes it's hopefully with that open mind and this exchange of ideas and what the evidence means that sometimes we're steadfast in our decision. But you could also sometimes be convinced that our position was not at least initially correct. And so, you know, I applaud the DA in this case for keeping an open mind and also to Larry for really pushing forward with what he believed he had, with the evidence he had accumulated at that point. You know, investigators have to pick their battles and they were steadfast in their beliefs and the DA agreed and I applaud them equally, Anasiga.

But if there was any doubt that the remains were Desiree's, that was short-lived. We got DNA from the mom, all the children, sent it up to California Department of Justice lab, and one of the femurs from the leg with the kids' reference samples, and it came back as her. It was a reality that the family had long prepared for, but never wanted to be true. That Desiree Thompson had not just disappeared, she had not run away, she had been murdered.

It marked the end of just one part of their journey as survivors, offering some closure to the mystery that had haunted them for a decade. But next would come the part that they had been waiting and hoping for if this was going to be the result. And that was the quest for justice. Leading up to the trial, Jose Lara continued to deny ever meeting, let alone killing, Desiree. But the trial would not come quickly because at that point, the defense claimed that Lara was not competent to stand trial. And that went on for a year for him to be examined and reexamined. And they concluded that he was sane and that he's competent to stand trial. So once that was no longer an issue, then at trial, the defense went back to an earlier theory. Desiree's estranged husband, Edward, who had been the first person of interest in Desiree's disappearance,

who now, even all these years later, was still on the lam. And she provided a very convenient alternative theory of the murder for the defense. They tried to tear me up on a stand while I didn't go find the husband. And I said, you know, well, there was too much evidence here. That's why. And they tried to elicit the husband hired Laura to do it. That's what they told the jury at the end in their little closing arguments, that Laura might have been guilty of hiding the body or even participated, but it was the husband. The prosecution jumped on it right away, declaring that the defense argument just didn't hold water.

So somebody hired you to get rid of a body and you got rid of it in your own backyard and cut her up in your bedroom? Not to mention all of his what we'll term oversharing to friends about his crime. Not once did he mention a murder-for-hire plot or the name Edward or anything about knowing Desiree at all. It took the jury just three hours to return their verdict. Eleven years after her violent murder, Jose Lara was convicted of the first-degree homicide of Desiree Thompson. He was sentenced on June 16, 2023, to 25 years in a California

state prison. If these people had to come forward, we would have never caught this guy because he wasn't even on the radar. He didn't even know this girl, had no attachment to her whatsoever. So if he would have kept his mouth shut, he would have got away with this. Healing from the trauma of losing a loved one to violence is a long and painful process, but the closing of Desiree's case was a necessary and long-awaited first step. And to see Desiree's children to finally give them the truth that they had sought for so long, is a stark reminder of why investigators and prosecutors do this job. They'll never get over it, like murder victims, survivors never get over it, but it helps them live with it, I think.

From my final thought, I am still amazed by the power of that letter and what it did for the investigators, Desiree's family, and for the person who wrote it, evident by the way that letter began. As Anastasia said earlier, it's quoted at the top by saying, I'm about to say something that I have to get off my chest because I feel that it is the right thing to do. Clearly, to me, that is someone who has carried a burden for a very long time. I've seen time and again how people who call in with tips could be the linchpin in solving cases that may otherwise remain mysteries. It's a truly remarkable aspect of the work we delve into here on AOM. When someone steps forward with information, no matter how small or seemingly insignificant, it could be the key that unlocks an entire puzzle. And the satisfaction

that comes from contributing to justice being served is immeasurable. Desiree Thompson went out for a walk and never came back. It's an age-old story, but this one came to a tragic and unexpected end. A woman who was already navigating an abusive relationship and now victimized by a sadistic killer who took revenge on her simply because he could. There's an adage that if you see something, say something. Here it was that they heard something. And while it took time, two men put themselves at risk due to their immigration status, but went to police to try and bring

answers to a family suffering because of the unknown. Wherever you both are today, thank you. Desiree's mother became a caregiver once again and raised Desiree's children after her daughter disappeared. What those years of not knowing must have been like is something that we don't pretend to understand, but we do feel for the immense pain they all must have felt. Our thoughts are with her family as we remember and honor Desiree. Next week, we will be off. You can get caught up on any missed episodes while we are gone, and then tune in the following 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 executive producer. So, what do you think, Chuck? Do you approve?