Clues with Morgan Absher and Kaelyn Moore - Egypt Covington: The Wrong House Killing

Episode Date: May 20, 2026

On the night of June 22nd, 2017, 27-year-old Egypt Covington went to yoga, texted her boyfriend goodnight, and went to bed. The next evening, he found her on the floor of her living room... tied up with Christmas lights... killed by a single gunshot wound to the head. It was the middle of June. No forced entry. No robbery. No obvious motive. For three years, local police chased the wrong leads and publicly named an innocent man as a person of interest. All while sitting on a geofence warrant that had the answer from the start. It took Egypt's family, a 14,000-signature petition, and a transfer to the Michigan State Police to finally get the truth. Morgan and Kaelyn trace every clue... from the Christmas lights, to the bright blue truck caught on a gas station camera, to the DNA match that finally put names to a senseless crime. Head over to our Clues YouTube channel to WATCH this episode: https://www.youtube.com/@CluesPod If you’re new here, don’t forget to follow Clues to never miss a case! For Ad-free listening and early access to episodes, subscribe to Crime House+ on Apple Podcasts. Clues is a Crime House Original Podcast, powered by PAVE Studios.  🎧 Need More to Binge?  Listen to other Crime House Originals including Crime House 24/7, Crimes Of…, Serial Killers & Murderous Minds, Murder True Crime Stories and more wherever you get your podcasts! Follow us on Social YouTube: @CluesPod | @crimehousestudios Instagram: @cluespodcast | @Crimehouse TikTok: @Crimehouse Facebook: @crimehousestudios X: @crimehousemedia Clues is hosted by Morgan Absher & Kaelyn Moore  Instagram: @morgsyabsher | @itskaelynmoore TikTok: @twohottakes | @heartstartspounding Episode Sponsors: A year from today isn’t that far away. Get started now at ⁠https://www.HelloAlma.com/clues⁠ If your glasses are overdue for a refresh, now is the time. Go to https://www.Zenni.com/PODCAST and use code PODCAST15 for fifteen percent off your first order. Go to https://www.SolaceHealth.com to see if you qualify. It takes about two minutes, and it’s covered by insurance. Must be 18 or older. Advocates do not provide medical or legal advice. Treat yourself to the most advanced bras and shapewear on the market. For a limited time, Honeylove is offering up to 50% off sitewide during their Memorial Day sale. Use our exclusive link to shop at https://www.Honeylove.com/CLUES To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hi listeners, it's Carter Roy, host of Murder True Crime Stories. I want to let you know that Crime House Plus and Murder True Crime Stories are celebrating America's 250th by dropping a four-part limited series on the crimes that built America. These are the crimes and cases that gave us Miranda rights, sparked criminal profiling, and a murder that built America's Missing Children Movement. Follow Murder True Crime Stories for. a new episode every Monday leading up to July 4th, or you can binge all of them right now add free with Crimehouse Plus. To join, go to CrimehousePlus.com or if you're listening on Apple podcasts, tap try free at the top of this show's page. This is Crime House. A young up-and-coming singer is found dead in her home, tied up with Christmas lights in the middle of June. There was no

sign a forced entry, robbery, or assault, just a single gunshot wound, and a crime scene that made it look really personal. Until one overlooked clue changed everything and revealed a truth that no one saw coming. Hi, welcome back to Clues, where we sneak past the crime scene tape to explore the key evidence behind some of the most gripping true crime cases. I'm Kaelin Moore, and I'll be the one digging deeper into the timelines, the backstories, and the court files released on these cases. And I'm your internet sleuth, Morgan Absher. I'm the one who's diving into anything I can find online to talk about the lesser known details and pull out those threads that just don't add up. Don't forget to share your thoughts on social. Want ad-free listening

and early access? Subscribe to Crimehouse Plus on Apple Podcasts. And make sure to go back and listen to all of our previous episodes wherever you get your podcast. Now let's get into Egypt Covington's case and the clues that defined it. The 2026 Chevrolet Tracks is the stylish SUV for those on the move. And with the standard Chevy safety assist package, you have the backup to handle every turn with confidence. The 2026 tracks. Start your build at Chevrolet.ca. Risa's knows a thing or two about great combinations. Chocolate and peanut butter, obviously, but there's more than one way to Reese's. From indulgent Reese's big cups with caramel to crunchy Reese's pieces and Reese's miniatures, there's a delicious Reese's for every mood. It's the same

combo you love, just with more ways to enjoy it. So whether you're snacking, sharing, or just treating yourself, nothing else is Reese's. I remember coming across this case back when it was unsolved. Yeah, wow. And family was still really trying to advocate and get the word out. And what has transpired and unraveled since is mind-blowing. Yeah, this is one of those cases that kind of keeps me up at night because when it was solved, what the result was was very freaky, which, I mean, obviously we're going to get into all of that. But it's a, it's a freaky one. Completely out of left field. How did they connect the dots? If this was 30 years ago, would it have been solved? No. No. No. So let's dive in and get into all of these clues, the modern technology that really

cracked this and everything. And just a quick reminder, if you're watching this episode on YouTube, you're going to see some videos, photos that will help you visualize the case. And if not, you can check us out on our socials. That's at Clues podcast on Instagram, because we're going to have all the same stuff there. And you should just follow us there anyways. And just a warning before we begin, this episode does contain graphic descriptions of murder and violence. So please listen with care. All right, this case starts on the night of June 22, 2017.

That night, 27-year-old Egypt Covington and her friend, Lindsay, went to a yoga class, and they were thinking about hanging out afterwards. But after it ended, Lindsay said she was tired. So Egypt also went home and she planned on settling in for a low-key night. She was texting with her siblings a bit and then she sent a message to her boyfriend, Curtis, before she went to bed at around 10 p.m. They exchanged a couple of goodnight texts and that was it. The next morning, on June 23rd, Curtis started his day like he always did with a good morning text to his girlfriend, Egypt.

And she always replied back within 30 minutes max. So when she didn't answer him that more, morning, he found that a little strange. And things only got more concerning as the day went on. He called and he texted Egypt a bunch more times throughout the day, but she never picked up. He hoped that maybe she had gone to work and maybe just didn't bring her phone with her, left it at home. Maybe it got lost or it was broken. So Curtis was a little concerned, but alarm bells weren't going off just yet. He had Father's Day dinner planned with his daughter, so he didn't want to cancel on her. but after dinner, with still no word from Egypt, he went to her place just to check up on her.

It was about 7.15 p.m. when he got over there, and he saw Egypt's car sitting in her driveway. And that is when he knew that something was wrong. When he opened the Duplex door, there was a shared hallway between her and her neighbor. And the door on the left, which was Egypt's door, was open. Curtis stepped inside and he yelled for Egypt, but she didn't answer. Instead, her dog Ruby came running up to him, and she wasn't acting like her usual self. She was normally really excited to see Curtis, but today there were no kisses, no wagging tail. Ruby instead led Curtis further into the house almost like she wanted to show him something. And it was there in the living room that Curtis found an absolutely heartbreaking sight. Egypt was lying on the floor in the fetal position. Her hands had been tied up with

Christmas lights and there was blood on her head and pooled all around her. Curtis immediately ran out of the house and dialed 911. Before we get into how this investigation unfolded, let's rewind a little bit. Because in order to understand the complicated nature of Egypt's case, you have to understand Egypt and her relationships. One of the first things that people say about Egypt was that she was a very talented musician. Ever since she was a kid, Egypt knew it was a path that she wanted to pursue. And the only thing that made her happier than music was her family, and Egypt had a very big family. She was born on July 19, 1989, to Chuck Covington and Tina Covington. The couple ended up divorcing when Egypt was just a kid, but that just ended up expanding her family. She had

six siblings, a mix of full, half, and step, all whom she loved, and they all got along so well. Her dad, Chuck and her stepmom Kristen, raised Egypt in Belleville, which was a small town of Michigan between Detroit and Ann Arbor. As Egypt and her siblings grew up, some of them moved across the country, but not Egypt. She stayed put. She wanted to stay close to her parents. And eventually, she rented a duplex in Belleville. And maybe because Egypt had spent her entire life in Belleville, she kind of became the unofficial mayor. That's what people said about her. She was this huge extrovert. She had a really big circle of friends. And her sister Beth said it was impossible to go anywhere in town without Egypt running into someone she knew. But it made sense. Egypt was one of those

people that was just so instantly likable. She had this really infectious laugh. It made everyone else around her laugh too. Plus her stepmom Kristen said that she was kind and she was authentic. She never gossiped. She never really had anything bad to say about anyone. And her father, Chuck, said that she was a calming presence. If there was ever a disagreement or an argument near Egypt, she would figure out a way to solve the issue. And these were all qualities that came in handy when Egypt eventually found work as a bartender. Her brother, Duane, worked at a local pub and he got Egypt a job there. Duane said that they had tons of regulars, but claims that they came, quote, mostly to see her because she was like a shining light. But bartending was just a temporary

way for Egypt to make money. She never stopped pursuing her passion for music and really wanted to make a career out of it one day. In 2014, when she was 24 years old, she won a local singing contest called Country Idol. And that actually inspired her to audition for The Voice. And from there, she started recording and posting more of her songs online. But Egypt also had realistic expectations about this career that she wanted for herself. She knew how hard it was to break through. And so because of that, she developed sort of a backup plan. In 2016, 26-year-old Egypt got a job as an account manager for a beer and wine distribution company. And it was around this time that she got serious with Curtis Meadows.

The two had been on and off for years. They had opposite work schedules and lifestyles that kind of kept them apart, especially because Curtis had a daughter from another relationship. But with her new job, they would be finally spending a lot more time together. So by 2017, it seemed like everything was falling into place. Curtis was planning on moving in with Egypt when his lease ended in July. She had had roommates at her duplex before, but at that time she was living solo. Her only current roommate was her pug chihuahua mix named Ruby, who she was obsessed with.

And plus, Egypt was moving up in her career. She was thriving in her account manager job, so she could finally afford to live alone, at least for this moment. And somehow, amongst her jobs, her passions, her relationships, Egypt still made time for other hobbies too. She hunted and played golf. She sang at local bars and restaurants, and she had recently gotten into yoga. She had everything ahead of her. that is, until her life was tragically cut short. So June 23rd, 2017, police from the Van Buren Township were on the scene in minutes,

and they immediately started analyzing our first clue, the crime scene. It seemed clear that Egypt had been killed by a gunshot wound to her head. There was a pillow next to her that they thought was used as a makeshift silencer, but there was no gun anywhere nearby. And then there were the Christmas lights that had been used to tie her up, this was especially strange to investigators because it wasn't anywhere near the holidays. I mean, this is the middle of June.

So they were hoping that this could be a big deal. They could get some kind of evidence from these lights, maybe some DNA pulled from them. So they sent them off immediately for testing. Meanwhile, other detectives were speaking to Curtis, who was understandably distraught. And we're going to play a clip of his 911 call for you guys here. We showed up at my girlfriend's house.

We're at 4-5-7-6. I think it's his Bemis. And I walk inside. She's there. Tied up. She's dead. There's blood on the head. There's five.

She's dead. You said 4-5-5-7-6. Yes. Yes. By the car, say, go gas station. And you're sure she's dead? Yes, yes. Yeah.

She's tied up. Right. Okay. Don't. Okay. Hold on. No, the dog. The door would let track open.

I mean, he is just beside him. himself. And when you watch interviews of Curtis talking about this, he's like, I don't even remember this. Like, I blacked it out. But he does tell investigators that he had found Egypt's door open when he arrived. They didn't find any signs of robbery to the police. This kind of meant that Egypt must have known her attacker enough to let them in. And because of this, they thought that her murder was personal. A few days later, the results of Egypt's autopsy confirmed that her cause of death was in fact that gunshot wound. But there were no other reports of pre or post-mortem trauma. There were no signs of SA. Unfortunately, the tests on those Christmas lights were also kind of a

bust. Police were able to get three different profiles from the lights. One was from Egypt, while the other two were unknown. But there wasn't actually enough material to run those unknown profiles through any of the databases. And we've talked about this quite a bit with CODIS, where you need to have a pretty substantial amount of material to even submit to CODIS. Yeah. So police have kind of nothing else to go on except looking at those closest to Egypt. And first up was her boyfriend.

I mean, he was the one that had a key to her place. He found her. So they start looking at Curtis Meadows. And they quickly learn that their relationship had its own share of problems. One of this week's partners is Honey Love. Honey Love is all about bras and shapewear that support, but never squeeze. Honey Love is an independent female founded brand, and all Honey Love products are intelligently designed by women who actually wear them, including founder Betsy, who is highly involved in the development

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slash clues. After you check out, they'll ask you where you heard about them. Please support our show and tell them we sent you. Experience the new standard in comfort and support with Honeylove. Hi, listeners, it's Carter Roy, host of Murder True Crime Stories. I want to let you know that Crime House Plus and Murder True Crime Stories are celebrating America's Two 250th by dropping a four-part limited series on the crimes that built America. These are the crimes and cases that gave us Miranda rights, sparked criminal profiling, and a murder that built America's missing children movement. Follow murder, true crime stories for a new episode every Monday leading up to July 4th,

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That's z-en-n-I.com slash podcast. promo code, podcast 15. As of an in-depth 2021 study, 34% of female murder victims were killed by their intimate partners compared to just 6% of male victims. And so with no immediate leads, in Egypt's case, the police decided to look at the most likely suspect. her significant other. Just three days after Egypt was killed, police brought Curtis in for questioning

and a polygraph. He himself said that he wanted to get the suspicion off him as soon as possible so that the police could keep moving with their investigation. Like, hey, it's not me. Let's get this over with. And then you can actually help figure out what happened to Egypt. He happily sat down with them while they grilled him about their relationship. Curtis later told the press, quote, the only thing I'm guilty of is loving her. He did pass the polygraph, but police still had to interview friends and family to really get a clear picture of their dynamic.

They wanted to see if anyone thought Curtis might be capable of something like murder, which leads us to clue number two, the tension in Egypt's current relationship. Here's what they learned, the more they talked to family and friends and other witnesses. Curtis in Egypt had been on and off for almost a decade at this point.

They had met in 2008 when she had just turned 20 and he was 28. She was working near his house. And they basically just say that like when he saw her, he was smitten. He asked her out immediately. She said yes. And so the first time they dated, it was about a stretch of two years. But as we mentioned, it was tough for them. They were working opposite schedules.

You know, Egypt's working late nights at a bar. He's working during the day. So it's hard to connect. And so Curtis basically says he ended things. It was too difficult to maintain a relationship when you are so disconnected. Egypt's parents said she was absolutely heartbroken over this, but over the years, they just kind of kept coming back to each other and really trying to make it work. But in the midst of these breakups and makeups, Egypt and Curtis had their fair share of fights too. So the Van Buren police looked into whether or not Curtis might have been abusive.

They found zero evidence of that. There were no restraining orders, no police reports, no calls out to their homes. Plus, a lot of these alleged fights were years ago, long before they had gotten more serious. It seemed like Curtis and Egypt's relationship this time around was going really smoothly. I mean, again, he was about to move in with her in July. And from some of the sources I saw, like, she also went home after yoga that night to, like, keep cleaning and organizing her house to get ready for his move in. So they were really actively planning this future together. So with Curtis, having passed his polygraph and really no other reason to suspect him further, police started looking elsewhere.

Meanwhile, Egypt's family and friends started processing their grief. Egypt's father, Chuck, did a lot of the heavy lifting for the family in those early days when it came to speaking to the press. He talked about how much they all missed Egypt and he pleaded with the public for any information they had. He said, quote, there's grief, but that's what brings up the anger. And that's again where I call out for anyone that knows anything to talk to the police. Because this entity, this animal, this pathetic son of a bitch, whoever could have done that, death isn't good enough for them. That doesn't bring her back.

It's really, really heartbreaking. I know, it gives you the chills. And you just, you feel his pain, his anger. I mean, his daughter is gone. And when it came time for her funeral, Egypt's family came to a pretty small and private event. But they wanted to do something that would let the whole town, the town that loved her, her pay their respects too. So they planned a public memorial service for about a week later on July 1st. They played some clips of her music and they told stories late into the night. We actually

have a clip of her singing here. But there was one awkward moment at the service. Egypt's ex-boyfriend, Kenny Mahalek, walked in and the place immediately went silent. A lot of people had their suspicions about Kenny. So, Five days before her murder, Egypt actually ran into 37-year-old Kenny at a local strawberry festival. Kenny's a family friend who she dated during one of the off periods between her and Curtis. It seems like their relationship didn't really end well. It also seemed like he hadn't moved on, but Egypt was over it. And in fact, at that strawberry festival, they got in a pretty big public argument.

And by the end of it, Egypt told him that he needed to back off and give her space. Yeah, by all accounts, this was a pretty aggressive, kind of like screaming match. Yes, a lot of people saw this happen, too. It was like out in public. And some of the people who were at the service had seen them argue at the Strawberry Festival. And they described it like the two were yelling at each other. At one point, she ran over to Curtis for support. And, you know, a couple of people also said that it looked like it was about to get physical.

That's how much they were screaming at each other. Yeah, it got scary. And because of this very public fight, a lot of people started feeling like Kenny was guilty. But one person didn't think he had anything to do with it, and that was actually Egypt's mother, Tina. She had a gut feeling that Kenny was innocent. Kenny had apparently broken down crying when she asked him point blank if he killed her. He told her no. So she invited him at the service to come down and sit next to her.

And that only caused more whispers later on. The police, however, were trying to work out exactly what they believed, because they were still trying to parse through all of this. And that's because Kenny was the next person of interest on their list. And from what they had heard, some of the arguments that he and Egypt had were downright scary. From the start, detectives thought Egypt likely knew her killer. I mean, again, there's no sign of force entry. They assumed she had let them in. And a jealous ex who had a huge public argument with her right before she died, well, of course, this is going to be someone that they really hone in on and look at.

Which brings us to clue number three, Kenny's apparent obsession with Egypt. Police had a lot of reasons to suspect 37-year-old Kenny Mahalic. One of the biggest was that he really didn't have a solid alibi on the night that Egypt died. Detectives had actually brought Kenny in earlier during the investigation, and he had told them that he had been out with friends the night Egypt was found. He said that he was bar hopping, but got home around 10 p.m. That was around the time Egypt and Curtis had sent those good night texts to each other. So the police knew she was killed sometime after that.

And from 10 p.m. until the early morning hours of June 23rd, Kenny said he was home alone watching TV on his phone. He told police they could look at his phone if they wanted to verify that he'd been streaming shows. And since he had location services enabled, they could easily check that too. They could verify his alibi. Now, Van Buren Police Department did take his phone. Kenny even volunteered his password. He also urged the police to check the GPS data on his truck. like, hey, didn't move. I was home, guys.

Yeah, it's right there. Except the police still had some serious suspicions about Kenny. They did have him take a polygraph. He supposedly failed every question, except for his name and the date of the test. Which, I mean, we've talked about polygraphs not being very accurate. Exactly. But after that, Kenny lawyered up and stopped cooperating with police.

But I will say, like, everything he gave them, like, here's my phone, here's the password, check my truck GPS. Like, very cooperative. Yeah, yeah, definitely not trying to like pull a fast one. It doesn't seem like that. Seemingly, investigators didn't have any good evidence tying Kenny to the crime at that point. They did have some circumstantial evidence, though, like many stories about Kenny from Egypt's friends and family. And like you said, I mean, there was family history there.

Their families were friends. So they had known each other for a long time. Kind of, you know, I don't know, a lot of you out there can probably think about that crush you had on your family friend, whatever. That was kind of these two. Yeah. And so they were young. A lot of people could speak to really rocky times in their relationship.

And many people came forward and said that they witnessed Egypt and Kenny arguing a lot. One time they even fought so loudly that the police were called. But friends also said that these fights were by no means one-sided. Egypt would start some of the arguments and she could yell just as loud as Kenny did, they would say. But they did also point to Kenny's behavior being a lot more unnerving. They said that Kenny was controlling and would reach out to Egypt's friends if she didn't answer her phone. Egypt told her sister Beth that Kenny would put his hands on her and shove her, including

once at a friend's wedding. She also said that he allegedly punched a hole in the wall near her head, which does count as domestic violence. And I just want to give us all kind of a clear understanding of like what is domestic violence? because I think that can get lost a lot in these cases. Yeah. And essentially, it's a pattern of abusive behavior in any relationship that is used by one partner to gain or maintain power and control over another intimate partner. It can be physical, sexual, emotional, economic, psychological, technological, it can be threats of actions or other patterns of coercive behavior that influence another person in this intimate partner relationship.

It can really encompass a lot of things. definitely. And that's coming from the Justice Department, by the way. And so there was a lot going on here. I mean, I saw in one interview, someone said that he would even go through her phone. So clearly a lot of jealousy, insecurity, whatever. And so their relationship was very turbulent. And when it finally ended after three years, their friends and family were all intertwined. So even if they wanted space, it was kind of hard to avoid each other, especially kind of in this small town too. And lines were kind of blurred. You know, again, she's on and off with Curtis. and during those off times, they wouldn't necessarily get back together, but would still cross-pass, hook up, according to some people. But when she and Curtis got back together, they knew they wanted to take things very seriously this go-around. And so Egypt was officially done with Kenny.

But Kenny wasn't really over her. And Egypt said that she would run into him all over town all the time. According to some, she almost felt like Kenny was following her around. And Curtis also noticed this too. There was one Sunday morning in the spring of 2017, shortly before Egypt was killed, that she had spent the night at Curtis's house. Early in the morning, Curtis is looking outside, and he actually saw Kenny parked behind Egypt's car. Now, I don't think Kenny knew Curtis saw him at the window, and so he's kind of, you know, tucked in the house, and he says he watched Kenny peer into her car windows before leaving. Egypt didn't really seem surprised when Curtis woke her up and told her what had happened,

but she did end up confronting Kenny about this. Kenny claimed he was just in the area for work, had spotted her car, saw that the sunroof was open, and he wanted to close it for her. But Curtis, on the other hand, like, saw this and he's like, he's lying. So there's little details like this, along with, again, that very public fight at the Strawberry Festival five days before she died, that was enough to make Kenny look super suspicious. And all of this definitely shifted Beth's view of Kenny, which Beth is Egypt's sister, along with a lot of other members of their family. But again, Egypt's mother, Tina, didn't feel that way.

She had confronted Kenny. She had got a very genuine, vulnerable answer. And so she was kind of on his side. And at this point, there's not enough concrete evidence to charge him. So all investigators can do is keep their eye on him and continue to do their job and investigate. Meanwhile, they had to consider other suspects that were close in proximity to Egypt, including a few new ones that no one had really anticipated. At the time of her death, Egypt was living in a duplex. The neighbor in that duplex was a man named Stephen Edwards, and his business is our fourth clue.

Egypt and Stephen were pretty good friends for a while. They would even leave their interior doors unlocked to go to each other's units. Remember, there was like that front door and a lot. hallway to get into the duplexes and then Egypt was on the left, he was on the right. Yeah. So they were so tight. They wouldn't even lock their doors. It's just the two of them in this duplex and like, they'd communicate. They'd go back and forth. They were friendly. Yeah. But that spring, something had changed between them. Egypt told her mother, Tina, that she was actually thinking of moving. She didn't really feel safe in her duplex anymore. And that was mainly because of what

was happening at Stevens. You see, Stephen actually worked as a licensed medical marijuana dealer So there were a lot of people always coming and going. Again, this is not unusual. This is his job. But the people who started visiting that spring started to give Egypt a really bad feeling. Now, it wasn't Stephen himself the police were worried about. They were actually able to roll him out as a suspect pretty quickly because he had been out of town the whole weekend at an EDM festival called Electric Forest, which was about 200 miles away,

in a totally different part of Michigan. But despite kind of looking into Stephen and his business, they couldn't really gather anything else from this. Besides a few sketchy customers, police couldn't really find any connection at the time to move on with this lead. There's nothing to go on. So after all of this, Egypt's case really starts to stall.

And at that point, Egypt's family was doing everything they could to keep her story alive. With the help from the community, they put billboards up around town pleading with the public for answers about her case. Curtis spoke to the press saying, quote, she's irreplaceable. This world is less without her in it. And that's what hurts the most. And with no real leads left to pursue, police tried to apply more pressure onto Kenny, Egypt's X.

On March 23rd, 2018, nine months after Egypt's death, they formally announced that Kenny was a person of interest in the investigation. Which is so interesting to me, like, again, not a police officer. clearly. I'm sitting in a podcast chair. But this man offered his GPS data, his cell phone data. You think they would have been able to very quickly rule him out. Yeah. And they didn't say he was a person of interest even when they looked at all of that. But now they're deciding to say he is. Yeah. In hopes, I guess that he'll crack. The vampier and police told the local press that they didn't have any new evidence when they made this declaration. They just had a feeling that Kenny was guilty and they were trying to get him to come forward. Does this feel a little botched anyone?

Yeah. Does this feel a little borderline? I know it's a tough one. It feels a little borderline, though. It's like detective tricks, right, where it's like not botched when it works out and you actually get the perpetrator, but it is botched when you ruin an innocent person's life, unfortunately. So let us know in the comments if you're giving your botched board at home a mark here. What's interesting is in this time, though, the one person who never gave up on Kenny was Egypt's mom, Tina. In April of 2018, she hired a private investigator named Dave Pomeroy to take another look at this case. And when asked why she stood by Kenny, Tina said, quote, I was raised to believe that you don't ruin somebody's life without proof. Literally what you just said. And she just felt like there wasn't proof. Tina thought that the murder had something to do with that next door neighbor, but she never went into more details. She didn't want to be hypocritical, but she did say that she felt like it had something to do with that medical marijuana salesman next door.

And she was determined to get to the bottom of things. When Dave Pomeroy started helping her, she got increasingly frustrated by, the way Van Buren police were handling the case. Supposedly, they were keeping important details from the family. Like the fact that a strand of hair had been found in or near Egypt's hand, Tina wanted to know if that had been analyzed, but the police would not tell her. Pramore thought the Van Buren police were maybe in over their heads, that maybe a more experienced department could help solve the case.

If they let the state police assist, there was a chance that they could actually crack it. but the Van Buren police insisted that they could handle it on their own, which to me that feels like botched. Like other people can tell that you're in over your heads and they're like, no, we got it, we got it. Bringing a little help. Clearly they don't have the resources for this. Also, what's interesting, you know, if they did have a hair at this point in time, seemingly

there would have been enough DNA evidence for CODIS with a complete profile from a strand of hair. But they just wouldn't say anything to the family. And at that point, it had been almost a year since Egypt's death and there were no arrests. It's trending towards cold. Yeah. We need to keep forward momentum here. So Tina really keeps speaking out about this. She really doesn't want it to like lose traction in the press.

And her son, Dwayne and his new girlfriend also start really speaking out about this. So Dwayne's girlfriend was named Lindsay Brink. They were getting serious about their relationship, but they were also getting serious about trying to find justice for Egypt. And that was despite the fact that Lindsay had never actually met Egypt. She was introduced to Dwayne after Egypt to have. had passed that was later in 2017. And there was like this cute story of she mentioned Duane turned his phone on and his background was Egypt. And Lindsay asked him, why is there a beautiful woman as your phone background? And he explained, that's my sister. She's been murdered and no one

knows what happened. And after that, Lindsay was fully on board with helping in any way she could with this investigation. She wanted her new boyfriend and his family to have closure and to be able to help them in any way she could. And ultimately, it was Duane and Lindsay that were the ones who convinced Kenny to sit down with Tina's private investigator, Dave Pomeroy, and give his side of the story. Kenny talked with Pomeroy about his frustrations, particularly about how the police hadn't tried to confirm his alibi that night. And after that discussion, Duane and Lindsay started to believe Kenny that he was innocent. This caused a really big rift in the family because Egypt's dad, Chuck, his wife, Kristen, and a lot of Egypt's other siblings, still believed that Kenny was the killer.

But Duane and Lindsay were convinced that someone else had done it. Lindsay even asked to meet with the Vamburin police to discuss the progress on Egypt's case, and she secretly recorded that meeting. And in that recording, the police really refused to tell her anything. It's a policy not to discuss ongoing investigations, even if it's with the family members. And that makes sense, too, right? Where it's like, we don't know who did this yet. to Egypt. And again, it looks like it's someone that knew her and was close to her given the

circumstances. So I got not wanting to share. But at the same time, not a lot is being done seemingly. No, I know. And Dwayne and Lindsay just feel like what they're doing is not enough because nothing is moving forward. They really wanted the Van Buren police to turn the case over to the Michigan State police because they thought that they just had more resources and more knowledge working in cases like this. Yeah, more eyes on it. So they created a petition for it and they got over 14,000. thousand signatures. Lindsay also made a Justice for Egypt Covington Facebook page that gained thousands of members. And Lindsay and Duane then hounded the Van Buren Police Department with emails asking for the status of the investigation, hoping that it would just exhaust them enough to

turn over the case. Yeah. Which love that. Like just pest her until they finally help. Be annoying. Then one day, the township clerk who was fielding a lot of these emails sent a reply all by accident. Yeah, you can box this. I was waiting for this one. This part always gets me. Reply all, sir. So, yeah, the town clerk is basically getting all these emails. Lindsay is ceasing everyone that needs to be on these emails.

And hits reply all. And he calls their emails about Egypt's case stupid. And he asked to be taken off the email chain about it. I forget exactly what he said, but he was like, can you take me off of this? I don't want to be associated with this stupidness. And it's literally DeWain asking about his sister's murder. Can I get an update on my sister's case? And he calls it stupidness.

Pretty heartless. And that was... Unprofessional, for sure. That was the straw that broke the camel's back. And when Lindsay got that email, she literally sent it to everyone. She posted it on the Facebook. I'm pretty sure she printed it out and was like posting it around. She wanted everyone in the community to know this is what this person thinks about her case.

And this is how they're treating it. They're calling us stupid. And it just started this huge public protest. Yeah. On June 22nd of 2020, which was the three-year anniversary of Egypt's murder, her friends and family took to the streets. They marched out in front of the Van Buren Township Police Station and they demanded that the case be turned over to the state. Which at this time is a huge deal too. This is early on in like COVID.

Yeah. To get a group of people together and protest in this way. I mean, that's sending a very loud message. Yeah. And, you know, that clerk tried to walk it back and said something like, I was just asking to be taken off the chain. Sorry it came off bad, but it didn't matter. Because it finally worked. All their protesting worked. Just days later, it was in the hands of the Michigan State Police. And just as Egypt's family had been hoping for, they started making progress immediately.

Immediately. Yeah, these detectives started combing through the Van Buren files, looking for anything that they could have missed. And then they kind of started using their own more sophisticated approach. one of the first things they examined was something called a geofense warrant. And what that warrant uncovered is clue number five for us. First, I'm going to explain how geofencing works because it's kind of crazy, actually. Yeah, and you're going to see this word in the news a lot more, a lot more cases are using geofencing. I love this. So basically, geofencing allows someone to draw a barrier.

Like, think about when you go on Zillow and you like want to search houses within a certain area, you can basically draw a barrier around an area and see what cell phones were in that area during a certain time. If someone has their location history turned on, which most people do to use their apps, then their device will likely show up. You don't even need to be looking for any phone number in particular. It will show all cell phones that came and went from that area during the time in question,

as long as their location data's turned on. But we've talked about this, with other cases. Like, even Google is recording your location pretty often down to, like, the foot. Yeah, like the room and the house that you're in. Yeah. And these warrants are actually super versatile. They can cover anywhere from a few square feet to a several block radius. They can also show data from just a few minutes to multiple days, depending on what law enforcement needs. So the state police take a deeper look at that geoffence report. The information came from Google, who had the location data from a massive internal database called Censor Vault.

Now, local police had asked them to draw this geofence around Egypt's house and the surrounding area outside of her duplex. This actually included two gas stations, a bank, a strip mall. All of these things were like really close to her house. What state investigators saw was a phone that was not hers inside Egypt. house on the night she died. Bouched. I mean, state police have this. And they find that pretty fast. Pretty quickly. And it's like they look and it's like state police have this, of course,

because they're going through this geo-fans warrant. But the local police had this. And yet they're still putting pressure on Kenny. As Kenny was like, here, check my GPS data. I wasn't there. What? Right. Batched. So it turns out the Van Buren police did not. even follow up on that cell phone that was inside of her house. State police, however, track this number down. They figure out who it belongs to. And it turns out it belongs to a 28-year-old man

from Toledo, Ohio, named Shandon Groom. But when asking Egypt's friends and family, if, you know, they knew a Shandon Groom, any connection to Egypt, they did not know this name. Shandon seemed to have no connection to Egypt at all, which was why detectives, wanted a clearer picture of things before they made any moves on Chandon and gave a way that they knew about him. Thankfully, something the Van Buren police did do was save security footage from the businesses

near Egypt's duplex. So the state PD detectives started looking for anyone with Ohio plates on all of that surveillance footage, which feeling a little Sherlock-y for me. Yeah, yeah, I can write it down as Sherlock. And the surveillance from one of the nearby gas stations gave them another critical piece of the puzzle,

which is clue number six for us, a Dodge Ram pickup truck getting gas right around the time that Egypt was killed. The truck had a front license plate that looked to be from Ohio, but it was too blurry to read, but this truck had such a bright blue color. It was kind of a rare, more unique color.

So when detectives went to cars registered in Ohio and searched Dodge Rams with that color, they got a hit. And it turns out it was the same guy who came up in the geofence warrant, Shandon Groom. Now, they don't stop there. They keep digging, keep expanding their scope. And if you remember, detectives did initially test those Christmas lights that were used to tie Egypt up. And they looked at DNA. They didn't have enough of a profile to send it to any databases.

But by 2020, DNA technology had progressed a lot even in just that short time. So when running it this time, they did get a match. It was to a 34-year-old named Timothy Moore. And guess who Timothy happened to know and be in contact with? Shandon Groom. They were actually cousins. Timothy was also from Toledo. He had a pretty serious criminal record,

a history of breaking and entering, drug dealing, various gun charges. But Timothy also, like Shandon, did not have a connection to Egypt. So the detectives used cell phone data to see where the men were earlier in the night to see if they could gather anything to really connect them to this. And it showed that both Timothy Moore and Shandon Groom had stopped at a friend's house close to Egypt before they went to hers. And that friend was 31-year-old Shane Evans. Timothy Moore is Shane's half-brother, so all three men were related.

And Shane finally helped all of these pieces come together. Because he did have a connection to Egypt. They had actually gone to school together, high school. Police initially thought that this was a clue, but it turns out that Egypt and Shane hadn't really known each other at all back then. However, Shane did work for the landscaping business that took care of her duplex. So now, understanding the connection, the state police decided to make their move. They arrested Timothy Moore in early November 2020, just a few months after they took over the investigation.

That's all it took. And then Shane Evans and Shandon Groom in December. With all three men in custody, police made a pretty strategic move. They singled out Shane and, you know, they did something that's kind of like a dirty investigator trick. But they kind of exaggerated the evidence that they had on it. him just to see if he would freak out and give them more. They claimed that they had him on video driving near Egypt's house. But they also claimed that all of the other men had already confessed to everything. And that wasn't true. The other men hadn't spoken at all, really.

Yeah. That's something that always blows my mind. And obviously, I'm glad it's happening in this case. But it is legal for them to lie. Yeah. It's just, it's crazy. I mean, I guess they didn't ask for lawyers because they were just sitting there by themselves. answering these questions. And it turns out those lies worked because before long, Shane was giving them the answers to questions that people had been asking for years. So it turns out that Egypt's neighbor, Stephen Edwards, had been important to this case after all, just not directly. That's kind of what Egypt's mom had thought this whole time. So Steve was open and he was vocal about this marijuana business he ran. And he actually had someone break into his home to steal from him before. And Stephen had

told his landscaper, Shane Evans, about it. Shane knew that Stephen kept his product in his home. And he also knew that Stephen was going out of town to Electric Forest. So when Shane, Shandon Groom, and Timothy Moore were hanging out one day, complaining that they wanted some weed, but they were too broke to buy some, Shane pitched them this idea. He said maybe they should rob Stephen's house. Now, Shane didn't exactly want to be involved directly in this robbery, but he was happy to show Shandon and Timothy where the house was. So he drove ahead of the other two men in his car and he pointed out the duplex from his car window. And he specifically told them which door they should go through. And that was the one on the right. But when the men went back

to rob the house later that night, they walked through the wrong door, the left door instead. They went into Egypt's home where Timothy was already pointing his gun. Egypt was in the kitchen, so they told her to sit down while they tried to find the weed, thinking that the house was the one that was doing the business, and they were only there for about four or five minutes before things just went sideways. Shandon and Timothy got nervous because at one point Egypt grabbed her phone, it was kind of using her phone. So they forced her to the ground and they pulled down some string lights

that she had been decorating her nearby door with. They had her lie there and they tied her up. And then when they were leaving, Timothy put a pillowcase over her head, and he shot her. He was the one that pulled the trigger that night. And what was kind of wild about this was he definitely didn't need to murder anyone that night. Like, he probably could have left.

Absolutely fucking not. He did not need to kill Egypt at all. But it turns out that he had gone to prison before. He was basically violating his parole and he was out of prison and a female eyewitness caught him, called the police and had him turned back in. Police believed that in his mind, any, like, specifically female, witness is bad and shouldn't be left alive because they'll turn you in. He's like, I'm not letting this happen again to me twice. Yeah.

So he pulled the trigger. Absolute fucking losers. Yeah. Also left, right? Not that hard. But they couldn't have just held up their hands. L. left. Okay.

I'm going, it was just a mistake. And after. To get weed. To literally get weed. Literally. You're going to steal someone's life from them. Yeah. In this horrific way.

Yeah. And after Shandon and Timothy left, they texted Shane saying just one thing. Oops, wrong house. So callous. And Shane responded to that text saying, quote, I don't ever want to know what happened. But it wasn't long before Egypt's murder was all over the news. And this whole thing seemed to be a case of mistaken identity. I mean, the minute you go inside, you see, it's a woman.

Hey, is there marijuana anywhere? Nope. Bye. Sorry. Bye. Bye. Like, literally you were going to get weed or maybe you thought this weed salesman had a lot of money in his house. Whatever the reason.

Like, really? Yeah. And they killed her for it. And it wasn't even her. Yeah, it wasn't her business. It wasn't the right house. It's just so disgusting. So with Shane's confession, now all three were facing first degree murder charges.

It turns out Timothy's DNA was on the Christmas lights. Still, it was just that there wasn't enough of it to test back in the day. But there was enough leaps made in DNA testing that they were able to get just the little amount of it. Yeah, we can definitely confirm that this was you. Yeah. Still, it took about two more years until they could actually get a trial date. But in April of 2023, Shane took a deal and pled guilty to second-degree murder. In exchange, she agreed to testify against his co-defendants.

And on May 4th, Shane apologized to Egypt's family at his sentencing hearing saying, quote, I hurt you all, and I'm so sorry for what happened. I don't know what to say. I pray for your forgiveness, but I understand if you don't forgive me, but I'm truly sorry. Egypt's sister Jessica said, quote, although the boy at issue today was not the one inside her home and was not the one who pulled the trigger, he was the one who initiated the act that led to her death.

He is as culpable as the person who pulled the trigger. Shane was sentenced to 15 to 25 years, and he got 2.5 years of time served for how long it took for his trial to go. And meanwhile, both Shandon and Timothy were preparing to face a trial by jury. Timothy Moore seemed to think for some reason that he had a pretty promising case. His attorney tried to argue that he had been in a car crash 10 days prior to the murder and had broken ribs and was in a neck brace.

Therefore, he couldn't have subdued Egypt, tied her up and killed her in the time frame that was given. But as the evidence mounted, all of that basically fell apart. And inevitably, both Timothy Moore and Shandon Groom decided against going to trial and they'd just negotiated plea deals instead. Timothy pleaded guilty on July 13, 2023, and Shandon pleaded guilty the next day. Their sentencing hearing was a few months later on October 5th, and Shandon took the stand and apologized to the family and he asked for their forgiveness. Timothy took the stand to apologize as well, but he also added some cryptic statement about how the family was never going to get really like the full story on what happened. It was pretty confusing. Fuck you.

In the end, Shannon Groom was sentenced to 17 to 26 years in prison and he got credit for time served. Not enough. And Timothy Moore was sentenced to serve between 20 and 55 years with credit for time served as well. Which to get out in 20 for doing this. I know. Egypt's dad did want the death penalty, but it was not a death penalty state. So it wasn't on the table. But he did in his closing statements basically say, like, you deserve the death penalty. Yeah. Sentencing is always so interesting to me. And I don't know, it just leaves such a sour taste in my mouth when you have these people also like begging the family for forgiveness. Like, you know what you did. You didn't have to do it at all. Get out of my face.

Especially Shane. I mean, if Shane would have actually gone in there with him instead of cowardly just pointed out at the house, they would have gone in the right duplex. I know. I know. And so that is where we're left. This case was solved. There's not a lot of loose ends left. There's a lot of different Reddit threads on this case.

There's an Ann Arbor subreddit where a few people talk about Egypt and just how many lives she touched. They write about how special she was, how glad they were, the family finally got justice. And of course, they talk about the Van Buren PD. There's a quote from someone here, Can't believe local police sat on it for three years and state police solved it in three months, incompetence at its best. And the poor ex who had to live with everyone thinking he did it all that time. Yeah.

Which is, again, something we kind of mentioned and why we have one of the botched marks. Yeah. And we do like to end these episodes on advocacy. So I wanted to add here that Dwayne and Lindsay did eventually get married, which is very sweet. Tina gave Dwayne a ring to propose with. It was the one that she had been saving for Egypt. And now that they're married, they've actually gone on to advocate for loved ones of other victims of violent crime. And Lindsay founded the advocacy group, Can't Stop, Won't Stop.

It helps people understand what they can do to get justice for their loved ones. And there's also a lot of charity work that's been done. in Egypt's memory. A memorial fund was created by Egypt's family after her death and it raised nearly $20,000. Egypt's family donated part of the money to a women shelter, part to an animal rescue, and part to an annual scholarship fund in Egypt's name for future graduates from Belleville High School. They also put up a memorial for Egypt in a place called Quirk Park. The memorial is modest. It's a small plaque with a few flowering trees planted alongside it. And on the plaque, Egypt's family put a quote from her social media that reads like this, quote,

So grateful for spring, although nothing is permanent, we still must not forget to have faith the flowers will bloom again. They always do. A girl named Egypt. And with that, we're going to go on to our missing person that we're going to highlight this week. This week, we're going to highlight the case of Rosa Marie Camacho. The FBI is offering a reward of up to $50,000 for information leading to the recovery of Rosa Marie Camacho and or the arrest and prosecution of the individuals responsible for her disappearance. The FBI's New Haven field office and the Hartford Police Department in Connecticut are seeking the public's assistance and locating Rosa Marie. She was last seen with her mother as the two were leaving a grocery store in Hartford, Connecticut on the afternoon of October 24, 1997. The body of Rosa's mother was later found in a lake in New Jersey in November of 1997, but Rosa remains missing. Rosa was four years old at the time of her disappearance and spoke mostly Spanish at the time. She was last seen wearing a black jacket and blue pants.

She's also described as having brown eyes, brown hair. She was three feet at the time of her disappearance in 38 pounds. If you have any information regarding this case, you can contact your local FBI office, the nearest American embassy or consulate, or you can submit a tip online at tips.fbi.gov. We will also be sharing an age-progressed picture. She would be 33 this upcoming June 7th. That's all we have for this episode of Clues. Now we turn it over to you guys, your thoughts, your feedback, your theories, your comments, things that you related to, other cases you want us to highlight. All of that stuff is what makes this really so special. Absolutely. You guys have been putting a lot of new cases we've never heard of on our radar and we really appreciate it. We want to get the word out. If you are keeping a botched tally at home, we've got three on the board with one Sherlock mark for the state police that came in. And again, at Crime House, we really value your support. So share that.

those thoughts on socials. Remember to rate, review, subscribe to blues to help others discover our show. Thanks guys. Thanks guys. Bye.