Cold Case Files - In the Care of a Killer / Deadly Lies

Episode Date: July 21, 2026

The suspicious death of 2-year-old Billy Blankenship is solved when police force his babysitter to re-enact the circumstances of his death. Then, a murder case is solved when the dead man's body is found by divers searching underwater for a car.Apartments.com - To find whatever you’re searching for and more visit apartments.com the place to find a place.Figs: Check out Wearfigs.com for 15% off your first order with the code FIGSRXShopify - Sign up for a one-dollar-per-month trial period at Shopify.com/coldcase and take your retail business to the next level today!Rosetta Stone - Cold Case Files listeners can get Rosetta Stone’s lifetime membership for 50% off when you go to RosettaStone.com/coldcaseZenni -  Give those glasses a refresh! Go to Zenni.com/PODCAST and use code PODCAST15 for 15% off your first order!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This episode contains stories involving violence against children. Listener discretion is advised. There are over 100,000 cold cases in America. Only 1% are ever solved. This is one of those rare stories. It's November 15th, 1990 in Concordia, Missouri, and Sandy Blankenship heads into town for work. Along the way, she drops her two young children at the home of their babysitter,

28-year-old Tani Gunter. Sandy's youngest, 2-year-old Billy, doesn't want his mother to leave. I remember him looking at me that morning with, he was about ready to start crying, and Tani was holding him so I could get out the door. And I wanted to turn around and go back, and I didn't. At work, Sandy's day unfolds like any other, until lunchtime, when she receives a call. The secretary there was a good friend of mine, and she told me that there had been an accident, that Billy had fallen down some stairs, and they were taking him to Warnsburg Hospital.

Sandy and her husband arrive at the hospital as doctors are preparing to airlift Billy to the Children's Hospital in Kansas City. Billy is unconscious and critical. I pulled his eyes up just to look at his eyes because he was just laying there like he was sleeping. and his eyes were real gray. And the lady told me, go ahead and talk to him because he can hear you. So I was talking to Billy on the way to the helicopter, told him we'd be right behind him, you know, we would be there. At children's mercy, doctors give Billy a cat scan

and tell the Blankenships his skull is fractured. 24 hours later, he is pronounced brain dead. The Blankenships are urged to donate their son's organs and say goodbye. I got to hold him for just a little bit, and we talked to the doctor again and discussed organ donations, signed the papers and stuff, and then they told us they would let us know when it was all over, and that's pretty much the way it went. Sandy Blankenship looks to her babysitter to make sense of the tragedy.

Tani Gunter explains she had taken Billy into the basement and told him to stay there. Gunter then walked upstairs to make lunch, and Billy apparently tried to follow, making it partway up the flight of stairs, before falling back down and hitting his head. Five days after the fall, two-year-old Billy Blankenship is laid to rest. His death believed to be a tragic accident. It will be eight years before anyone has reason to believe otherwise. Eight years later, in Concordia, Missouri, Amy Yance is a working mom in need of a woman. a babysitter for her three-month-old daughter Mariah Sisko. Amy, however, has a bad feeling about the only available choice, a sitter named Tani Gunter. As far as anybody that I knew, she was the only person left that I could send her to to watch her. And I wasn't really scared

if someone happened. I just knew that there was an accident. I just really didn't want to take her there. On the morning of August 3rd, Amy drops Mariah off at Gunter's daycare. A few hours later, she gets a phone call. My secretary come and told me that, you know, they brought the baby to the hospital. And so my sister took me to Wingsburg. And then, you know, nobody really told us anything other they couldn't get her to breathe on her own. Doctors at Western Missouri Medical Center decide to airlift Mariah to Children's Mercy in Kansas City. Mariah survives the life flight, but dies that night.

I touched her and she was real cold. And, you know, all the nurses and everybody was crying. And I just told her to wake up and she wouldn't. Kansas City's medical examiner conducts an autopsy, but is unable to determine an official cause of death. He declines to classify it as an accident, noting that the babysitter in this case has had at least one other child die in her care. Eight years after Billy Blankenship is buried, Mariah Sisko is laid to rest. The memory of her death, however, does not fade. 10 days later, along the streets of Concordia, Missouri, news of Mariah Sisko's death travels fast.

On August 13th, Billy Blakenship's aunt, Terry Holtkamp, arrives for a scheduled visit with her local doctor. Holtkamp, however, gets more than just a checkup. He just nonchalantly made the comment something along the lines of, well, that's really terrible that that baby died with that same babysitter as Billy. And I just about fell over. I was literally sick. For eight years, Holt Camp has suspected her nephew's fall down the stairs was more than an accident, but kept her suspicions to herself. Now she wonders if it's time to say something.

It was August the 17th, 1998. I had made my decision. I had to be a voice for him. I had to stop her from babysitting. I had to stop her from babysitting. Under a new Missouri law, a fatality review panel is convened to inquire into the circumstances surrounding Mariah Sisko's unexplained death. Holt Camp reaches out to Page Bellamy, a panel member as well as prosecutor for Lafayette County. I remember thinking that lightning was striking just too many times at one household.

And as we discussed the case amongst ourselves, everybody was suspicious that too many kids are getting hurt and too much is going on in one babysitter's home. On September 10, 1998, one month after Mariah Sisko's death, a team of investigators pays a visit to Tani Gunter's home. Gus Colillis leads the team. His job is to record a reenactment of Mariah Sisko's death. What we're trying to do is to get a commitment from the person involved to lock them in to their version of how the event occurred. like this. I had another receiving blanket that I kind of threw over. I stepped

right outside the door. Tani leads investigators through Mariah's last day alive. She puts the infant down to sleep on the bedroom floor and leaves the room. When she returns, Gunter sees something is wrong. They're just having to look

down on her feet. And they were real white. And I thought there was something wrong with the baby. So I ran out. over here, picked up like this, turned her over real fast. I could see her lips were blue. Her feet were really, really white. She was kind of a light, white color. I picked her up real quick, and I'm Ryan. I started trying to get her, she was kind of lamped that I couldn't tell she was out unconscious or asleep. Gunter's reenactment is consistent with the medical

examiner's report and points to a possible SIDS-related death. With no other evidence to consider, Investigators turned their attention to the second case involving Gunter. Billy Blankenships fall down a flight of stairs eight years earlier. To me, it was shockingly clear that this was not the mechanism of injury. Dr. Lori Frazier is an expert in the study of child abuse. Investigators ask her to review ER notes as well as a CAT scan, taken of Blakenship's skull eight years earlier. When Frazier reviews the X-rays, she finds a massive fracture.

You could see it in a kid who fell from a building two or three stories and landed with their head on concrete. You could see fractures of children who were hit by cars and thrown. You'd see it maybe in a child who was an unrestrained passenger in a motor vehicle accident, something that has some force or velocity to it where the child's impacted forcefully. Fraser believes Blankenship's death to be suspicious, suggesting that his injuries resulted not from an accidental fall, as Gunter described, but more likely from a direct blow to the head, a classic case of child abuse. With Frazier's findings in hand, investigators returned to Tawny Gunter's house a second time, this time to recreate the accident that claimed two-year-old

Billy's life. On December 17th, investigators record toward Tani Gunter walking them through the death of Billy Blankenship. I remember walking over to the refrigerator. I took something out of it. Once the microwave. Gunter tells investigators she was making lunch in the kitchen and Billy was in the cellar. When Gunter heard two thumps. Shortly after I turned the microwave on, I heard like a thump and then none of the thumps.

Gunter rushes to the top of the stairs to find Billy. to find Billy lying at the bottom. Down the steps. I looked over with the other kids who were still playing. Had their attention over here. Billy was whimpering just for a little, just a couple minutes. I thought it just knocked the air out of him. I picked him up like this and I asked

that, Billy, what are you doing? Something in that back. And he was quite, he was a little bigger than this doll. So I'm going to bring him upstairs. stairs, I'm probably about this point. He kind of started going limp on me. I thought maybe he was trying to go to sleep on me. As Billy begins to lose consciousness, Gunter calls for help. I remember kind of Billy, wake up, wake up today, wake Billy. My telephone was on the wall here at the time. I picked it up. I had the emergency numbers up here I called for the ambulance. I told him I had a two-year-old that had just

falling down the steps. At that point, I kept them wake up, Billy, Billy said wake, so I kept trying to get him to stay awake. Investigators are suspicious of Gunter's story, but like the previous reenactment, they can find no obvious holes. Prosecutor Paige Bellamy decides to bring in state investigator Jim Ripley as a fresh set of eyes to review the case. They wanted someone from the outside to come in and kind of try to take a look at the case as much as you could from a distance before you got in the middle of it. Ripley and Lieutenant Kyle Marquart review the taped reenactment of Blankenship's death, paying particularly close attention to Tawny Gunter's language, searching for any inconsistencies in her story.

Sergeant Kyle Markwart was right next to me, and I said, you know, why don't you look at this tape? and he looked at the tape and he said, did you see this? I noticed that when she said that she heard the child fall down the steps, and then she said, I thought I'd just knocked the wind out of him. Billy was whimpering just for a little, just a couple minutes. I thought it'd just knocked the air out of him. I picked him up like this. I thought I had just knocked the air out of him.

Ripley and Marquart believe these words might provide, the inconsistency that reveals the lie. Earlier in the reenactment, Gunter had claimed she never saw Billy fall down the stairs, but just heard two thumps. Now, however, she puts herself at the scene when Billy fell. She goes to the bottom of the stairs and says, I thought I'd just knocked the air out of him, which is not at all consistent with what she's telling you is an unwitness fall. And now suddenly, as she's recreating it, she's put herself in the position of being the person responsible. Lieutenant Ripley calls Paige Bellamy with the inconsistent statement, which in his mind

solidifies his case. For her to make an admission, placing her there with Billy at the time he's basically been injured, was an admission of guilt as far as I was concerned. Then Paige Bellamy makes one of the most difficult decisions of his career to exhume the body of two-year-old Billy Blankenship. Our listeners know health care professionals play a huge role in closing out the cases we look at on this show, whether they're medical examiners, forensic pathologists, nurses, morgue technicians, or crime lab specialists. No matter their field or specialty, these experts deserve a uniform that works as hard as they do.

That's where figs comes in. They make scrubs that are lightweight, breathable, durable, and designed to help health care professionals take on every challenge of their day. They feature four-way stretch technology, moisture-wicking fabric that keeps you comfortable through long hours, and thoughtful details like secure pockets exactly where you need them. If you work in health care or know someone who does, they definitely need to upgrade their scrubs to Figs. And right now, you can take 15% off your first order at wearfigs.com with the code FigsRX. That's wherefigs.com code FigsRX. I have way too much free time, said no one ever.

work, appointments, family and friends, life is nonstop. And trying to find a new place on top of all that, completely overwhelming. That's where Apartments.com comes in. If you want to make time for the things you love, but you still need to find your next home, Apartments.com has tools to make your home search so much easier. And it's all on one site. With 3D virtual tours to get a sneak peek at a rental listing, online tour scheduling, plus the ability to see the exact unit you're interested in and apply for a place with one click,

renters can handle it all on Apartments.com, make your move from the comfort of anywhere and make more time for you. Join the millions of happy renters and visit Apartments.com, the place to find a place. Okay, my husband has been putting off for replacing his glasses for way too long. We're talking scratches right in the center of the lens, constantly adjusting them, squinting at his phone. It's been a whole situation. but he never seems to have time to take care of it. Every time I bring it up, it's always, I know, I'll get to it. And I get it because even now, replacing glasses somehow still feels like a whole production.

You've got to book the appointment, sit through the exam, pay way more than you've expected, then wait around for them to come in. It's enough to make you just deal with the old pair. That's why Zeni Optical is such a relief. It's all online. Prescription glasses, sunglasses, blue light lenses, starting under $30. You just pick a frame, upload your prescription, and they ship them straight to you. No appointment, no store, no awkward upsell moment.

And honestly, the affordable price changes how you think about it. Instead of overthinking one pair, you could just get what you actually want, like a pair that would have easily been a couple hundred dollars elsewhere. For me, it was around 200. But then on Zeni, it was under $40. So that got our attention. And once you're actually wearing them, it's just better. Clear vision, lightweight, they look great,

and you're not constantly thinking about when they'll need replacing it again. If your glasses are overdue for a refresh, now is the time. Go to Zennie.com slash podcast and use code Podcast 15 for 15% off your first order. The style sell out, so don't sit on it. That's ZE-N-N-I.com slash podcast promo code, Podcast 15. On March 11, 1999, cold case detectives prepare to exhumed Billy Blankenship's body, hoping to unearth a cold case of murder. Even for a seasoned investigator, the exhumation is difficult.

I've been in law enforcement for 25 years. And when we opened up that casket and that little boy's body was there with his little blanket and Ninja Turtle and it just took the air out of that room. Over the course of eight years, the child's body has decomposed, making the job of medical examiner, Jay Dix, that much more difficult. Well, the body was intact, however, the skin and the tissues had degenerated considerably. One saving grace is that Billy's skull. is pristine. It's here that Dr. Dix finds a telling fracture.

Well, as soon as I saw the fracture, I thought this child didn't receive the injury from falling down the stairs. This was at least a four-inch break in this child's skull. The skull is kind of divided up by suture lines and it had this significant fracture to the back of his head that went across the suture lines, which would be, I guess, comparing it to if you cracked a window and then you put a second crack in the window, it would jump across the first crack, which is significant. You know, it would take a lot of impact to do that. The medical examiner's findings are unequivocal.

Billy Blankenship did not die from an accidental fall. He said, go back and tell the lady the facts don't fit the story. She has to come up with a different story because these facts don't fit her story. It didn't happen that way. At that point, you know, we had no doubt that this was more than what Tawney Gunther was telling us. And then we had to take that information and confront Mrs. Gunter,

see where that would go for us. Two weeks after the exhumation, cold case detectives Jim Ripley and Kyle Marquart travel to Concordia, Missouri. Their goal is to get a confession from Tony Gunter. They meet Gunter at the local days in and begin to lay out the evidence against her. The inconsistencies in her taped statements,

the significant injuries shown on Billy Blankenship's CAT scan, and finally, the exhumation and the medical examiner's examination of the skull itself. All are inconsistent with Tani Gunter's story of an accidental fall down the stairs. Tani, however, sticks to her version of events. Lack of a better term, she was very stubborn. She's very difficult. I mean, we interviewed her for a long time, and the truth is, she got up to use the restroom, I think, maybe to wipe her eyes or something. And Sergeant Markworth says she's not going to tell us. Tani Gunter returns from the bathroom and sits down.

In a moment and without warning, the babysitter changes her story entirely. I went to the basement steps to sit and tell the kids to pick up the toys that much was in the microwave. He did. As I got around the corner of the steps, Billy was at the top of the steps. I think we both scared each other when I saw him. And he saw me. And she sat out and said, I saw him go down the stairs.

And then that was a revelation, because after that point, her story was, she's at the microwave, and she hears thumb thumb. I kind of took him, and I turned them around. I told me to go back downstairs and pick up the toys before lunch. At which point, he fell down the steps. And I see him falling down the steps.

I went down the steps after him. He made him face up at the bottom of my steps. And I went to pick him up. I didn't think he'd be hurt. Gunter's story has gone from a fall she didn't see, to an accident she saw but did not cause. With one more question, Toney Gunter takes the final step. When Billy got to the top of the stairs,

you were directing him to go back downstairs to help pick up the toys. Is that what you told him? And during the interview, you said you kind of spun him around, and that's when he went down to the stairs. Is that right? Yeah, I'd kind of take it. him by the top of the soldiers to turn him around. And I didn't realize that I'd turn him around faster than what I thought I did.

Gunter admits to spinning Blankenship around and causing his fall down the stairs. With police cameras turned off, she goes even further. She's crying and I just looked at her and I said, Tawny, you pushed him, didn't you? And she just nodded her head. Yes, I did. She didn't say I did, but she nodded her head. Cold case detectives deliver Gunter's taped statement to Page Bellamy, who begins preparation for a trial that never happens.

Gunter is charged with murder in the second degree. Eleven years to the day of Billy Blankenship's death, however, she pleads guilty to voluntary manslaughter. As for Mariah Sisko, who died in her care, Cold case detectives are unable to develop evidence proving that Gunter was responsible for her death. To this day, her death remains a mystery. On January 10, 2002, in a crowded courtroom in Missouri, Tani Gunter awaits sentencing. Billy Blankenship's mother, Sandy, reads a statement to the court about the woman who stole her son. Tony Gunner took from us something that can never be replaced or forgotten. The grief we have endured has been a parent's worst nightmare and impossible for us to come to terms with.

It has been the most horrifying experience of our lives. We trusted her with the care and safety of our most precious son, and now we deal with the constant pain of his death. The courtroom also watches a video of Billy as he was 12 years earlier. When the tape is finished, the judge passes sentence on Tani Gunter. With respect to count one, the court sentences and commits the defendant to the custody the Missouri Department of Corrections for a period of 15 years. Gunter receives the maximum sentence of 15 years.

The courtroom empties and nothing is left but the echoes of a cell door slamming and the life never fully lived. In July of 1986, Frank Ross says goodbye to his relatives after a weekend visit in Claremore, Oklahoma. Ross takes off on Route 66, headed home to nearby Stillwell, Oklahoma. Two days later, Ross's sister, Pam Charles, gets a phone call. My brother in Stillwell, Teddy, he had called and asked, you know, where's Frank? And I said, well, isn't he there? And he said, no, that he never showed up. The next day, Frank Ross is still missing.

Then his sister spots Frank's car, apparently abandoned in a Claremont parking lot. And then that's when we really started getting, we knew that something was wrong. Detective John Cummings of the Claremore Police Department picks up the missing persons case. Cummings learns that the night Frank Ross disappeared, he spent time at Claremore's tack room lounge. Some of the witnesses were able to place him back in the area of the bar where they were playing pool with a gentleman named Kent Hill, James Kent Hill. Apparently Mr. Ross had some cash on him and was buying a lot of drinks and apparently

he had bragged that he had a large sum of money on him. Pretty typical, you know, two guys at a bar playing pool and bragging about who's the best. The man Frank Ross was last seen with, James Kent Hill, is a familiar face to Claremour Police, with a record of several run-ins with the law. Witnesses tell police that the two men left the pool hall together around 2.20 a.m. and drove off in Hill's Plymouth Duster. Detective Cummings drops by Hill's house to check out his story. Mr. Hill at first basically denied knowing who Mr. Ross was.

Then he remembered, oh, yeah, I did play pool with a guy. It's that description. Oh, yeah, I did give him a ride. But I gave him a ride straight to a convenience store to buy a six-pack of beer. Then I dropped him back off at his car. And that's the last I saw of him. After just a few interviews, investigators begin to find holes in Kent Hill's story. A local woman tells them, Ross and Hill came by her.

house together around 310 in the morning, almost 40 minutes after Hill claims he last saw Frank Ross. Bob Powell works the case for the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation. So we knew he was lying to us about that. Kent was certainly a strong suspect. There wasn't any indication that there was anybody else involved in this. During their first interview with Hill, investigators noticed that his Plymouth Duster was banged up. The back bumper dented and the side mirror fallen off. He told us that about two weeks previous to that night, that he had been in rural Rogers County somewhere playing what he described as Dukes of Hazard

and lost control of his car and hit a tree and caused that damage. Witnesses from the Tack Room Lounge offer a different story, telling police that Hill's car was in perfect condition when he left the Tack Room Lounge with Frank Ross. It's a very insignificant thing taken by itself, but when you combine it with the other facts of the case, it becomes a point that we want to clarify. It also becomes a point that we're going to use later on in an interview. Police believe they know who killed Frank Ross.

Two lies, however, do not make a case for murder. Detectives need something more substantial, something like a body. Claremore's biggest lake is known for its fishing, but this is no ordinary day on the lake. Four months later, in a twist of fate unrelated to the search for Frank Ross, a local woman, Linnell Collins, has hired a professional diving crew to search for an antique car. Before going off to war, her older brother and a friend had taken their beloved Model T Ford, nicknamed the Red Robin, and pushed it into Claremore Lake.

You have to understand that Claremore Lake is a place where teenagers, for probably decades, have partied around Claremore. And so I'm sure that this plot was hatched over some alcohol. But at any rate, they decided they were going to shove their car off into the lake, and that way no one would ever get the Red Robin. On a cold November morning, John Belding suits up and dives beneath the surface in search of the Red Robin. After just five minutes underwater, Belding makes a discovery. I was kind of walking along and stumbled into the bones,

and I pulled the command station up here. I believe I found some bones. Up on shore, the command station reminds Belding that they were hired to find a car. The bones are probably nothing more than a cow carcass. I finally asked them, does cows around this part of the country wear blue jeans? Because these bones are in blue jeans and cowboy boots.

Suddenly, the search for the Red Robin has become a crime scene. In a second stroke of luck, Detective John Cummings is there to take charge. He has come to the lake knowing that divers often finds something useful to police, like a stolen car. When he sees the body, Cummings immediately, thanks of Frank Ross. As soon as we got it up on shore, I went back to my car and pulled Mr. Ross's file out of my back seat, and I had a photograph the family had given me, and the photograph the family

had given me had the exact picture of the shirt that was on the body, identical. An autopsy shows that the body dredged from the lake was about the same height, weight, and age as Frank Ross. In 1986, however, DNA is unavailable to confirm the identity. It's frustrating as an investigator because I really thought that was our guy, and I was positive at this point that Mr. Hill had some involvement in his homicide and his disappearance. Without a positive ID, investigators must bury the remains in a John Doe grave. And the Frank Ross investigation falls into the cold files once again, where it stays for six more years until a broken heart helps to unseal a coffin and identify a killer.

A few years ago, I almost didn't start my podcast because I kept telling myself, I'll do it when things calm down. But life never really slows down, right? There's always something, work deadlines, trips, family stuff. And what I eventually realized is, if you wait for the perfect moment, you usually end up waiting forever and losing momentum in the process. That's why I've been thinking about Shopify lately. If you've ever had even a small idea for a business, this is one of those tools that makes starting feel a lot more realistic. You can build a clean professional storefront really quickly using their templates and built-in AI tools. No coding, no design experience. You can literally just point, click, and shape it into something that

actually reflects your brand. And then there's Shopify checkout, which makes things incredibly smooth for customers. And because all their information is stored in one place, returning buyers can check out in a single click. That means fewer abandoned cards and more of those moments where you hear, and Noah's sale just came through. Plus, if you ever get stuck, Shopify's AI assistant sidekick is right there to help in real time, so you're not spinning your wheels or losing progress. If you've been putting something off, this might be the nudge to just start and see where it goes. All you need is the idea. Shopify handles the rest. If you're serious about hearing your first, start your free trial at Shopify.com slash cold case today. You heard that right,

start your free trial today at Shopify.com slash cold case. That's shopperies. That's shopperies. I've always loved the idea of being able to drop into a new place and actually connect, like not just getting by, but really understanding people. I remember being in Italy trying to order food and ask a couple questions and realizing how limited I felt sticking to just a few phrases, I wanted more than that. That's why Rosetta Stone's new app, Rosetta Stone Sapphire, caught my attention. It's their biggest update in over a decade, and it builds on their research-backed method with some really smart new features.

Instead of memorizing vocab lists, you're learning through visuals and audio fully in the language. So it starts to feel natural, more like how you learned growing up. One feature I especially like is chat missions. It turns practice into these interactive real-world scenarios, like checking into your hotel or dealing with lost luggage and gives you little objectives to complete along the way. You get feedback in real time so you can adjust and sound more natural as you go. It's a really comfortable way to build confidence before you're out there doing it for real. When I was traveling, I remember the look of pleasant surprise from a waiter when my friend spoke Italian to him as she ordered lunch.

I wanted to be able to do the same, and now I can finally work toward that. If you want to take your language skills to the next level, don't wait to try Rosetta Stone Sapphire. Coldcase Fowles listeners can get 20% off their Rosetta Stone Sapphire subscription when they sign up today. Visit rosettastone.com slash coldcase. This gets you access to Rosettastone Sapphire in 25 languages. That's Rosettastone.com slash coldcase. In February of 1992, a woman in Claremore, Oklahoma, named Liz Humphrey, has just broken up with her live-in boyfriend, Kent Hill. For six years, Hill has been the number one suspect in the disappearance of Frank Ross, a man who, police believe, was killed and dumped in Claremore Lake.

Now, Kent Hill's ex-girlfriend says she knows the truth about Frank Ross and is prepared to tell it all. She walked right in the front door and asked to see me and came in my office and said she wanted to tell me about Kent killing the man from the tack room. When he gets home, he starts telling me that he met this guy, Frank Ross at the bar. They went and bought beer, went out driving around out in the boonies out where Joey, his brother lives. This man put his hand on Kent's leg like, you know, I guess he was Humphrey says Kent Hill was shocked by the move. He slammed on the brakes and pulled over.

He had that red duster at the time. And he always kept one of those long knives in between his seat. He grabbed that, ran around the car, stabbed him twice because he was scared that he was going to hurt him. But, you know, I mean, you don't have to kill somebody to keep him from hurt. Humphrey says that after stabbing Ross, Kent Hill dragged his body. into the nearby woods. Several weeks later, feeling the pressure from police questioning, Hill decided the woods may not be the best hiding place.

He felt like he needed to move that body where it was. Well, he got real messed up on some... I don't know what he took, just to get up enough nerve to go do this. According to his ex-girlfriend, Kent Hill took the corpse, rotting in the heat, to Claremore Lake and sent it to the body. him. Detective Cummings believes Hill killed Ross as Humphrey describes, but not because Frank Ross had

made a pass at him. The real motive, Cummings believes, was the wad of cash Ross was flashing around the tack room pool hall. Cummings takes his case to Ray Hasselman, a Rogers County assistant district attorney. As he reviews the case, Hasselman sees one problem. He believes Kent Hill and Liz Humphrey, are common law, husband, and wife. Well, you have a problem with, as is common in most states, that if you are married to an individual and that person tells you something in the privacy of the marriage, that that information is usually not allowable in criminal proceedings or even in civil proceedings. Without Humphrey's statement, the state declines to file the case, and the investigation once again goes cold.

Detectives, however, might have one more angle. The body pulled out of Claremore Lake four months after the murder, and now resting in a John Doe grave. Cold case detectives hope that science can someday give their John Doe a name, and that the name turns out to be Frank Ross. On December 1, 1993, two men with shovels begin to unearth what Cold Case detectives hope, will be the clue to solving a murder. A few yards of dirt later, a shovel hits the edge of John Doe's coffin. The body is removed from the coffin and a DNA sample is extracted from its bones.

Scientists use mitochondrial DNA testing to compare John Doe's DNA to samples taken from Frank Ross's surviving family members. The result confirms what most have suspected all along. The body pulled from Claremore Lake seven years earlier was Pam Charles's brother, Frank Ross. In our hearts we knew it was Frank, but just to finally say for sure, yes, it was a better feeling, you know, a more comforting feeling, I guess. At the Claremore Cemetery, the John Doe marker is replaced by one reading Frank Leslie Ross. With a death certificate in hand, Detective Cummings once again takes the case to the Rogers County District Attorney.

Ray Hasselman agrees this time that all the pieces add up to murder. If you can put it together by, this person was here, this person was here, this person said this little bit of information, the body was found where they said it would be. And you put all that together, a lot of times jurors, I think, will find the case. It's a much stronger case. The assistant DA issues a warrant for Kent Hill's arrest on the charge of first-degree murder. On December 18, 1995, Kent Hill is driving through Claremore when a squad car lights up his rearview mirror. It's John Cummings, Claremore PD.

Ken had been questioned several times over the years about this case, never deviated from a story as far as he didn't have anything to do with it. This time, Hill takes a different tack. After just 15 minutes of questioning, he drops the story he's been holding on to for nine years. that he took Frank Ross to get a six-pack, then dropped him off at his car, alive and well. Now, Hill echoes his ex-girlfriend's testimony that he and Frank Ross went for a drive in Hill's Duster.

I pulled up out in the country to go with nothing. And the next thing I know is just a big girl like, man. He's got all the needs for the night. And he's trying to get my name of pain. Hill claims he grabbed Ross by the throat and strangled him in self-defense. Across the table, Cummings listens and considers all he's learned in nine years about Kent Hill's character. His history tells me he's a pretty violent, aggressive individual. Mr. Ross's background, the best we can tell, is a very passive, no criminal history.

Wouldn't be the type of guy you would think would pull a knife on somebody and try to assault him. Cummings wants to test Hill's new story, so he tells him. takes him for a drive in the country and asks him to find the spot where Hill fought for his life. According to Hill, he pulled over at a specific hairpin curve to go to the bathroom and was attacked. As detective and suspect walk the scene, Cummings notices something that effectively guts Hill's claim of self-defense. Hill's brother's house is no more than a half mile from where Hill claims he was attacked. If Hill needed to use the bathroom, why not head there. If he was afraid of him, why would you stop a half a mile from your brother's house

to use a restroom on the side of a county road when you can see the house? You can see his brother's house from that location. Didn't make any sense to me. Hill is brought back to the station where Cold Case detectives tell him his story doesn't add up. Under pressure, Hill's account changes once again, but only in the way he killed Ross. Instead of using his hands, Hill now claims he used a knife. He just kept moving toward me, and that's when I pulled the knife out, and I stuck him right in the reef cage. And he just gasped and went down, and that was it. It was open. Cummings does not believe either version offered by Hill, and bets that a jury won't either.

He books Hill for murder in the first degree. Standing before a judge at his first hearing, Hill decides to make a deal. He pleads guilty. to a charge of manslaughter. And on April 26th, Kent Hill is sentenced to 20 years. In 2001, Kent Hill is living in the Hamilton Correctional Center in Hodgin, Oklahoma. In July of that year, he sits down with cold case files. Hill sticks to his story of self-defense. Now, however, Ross wasn't killed by a knife or by strangulation.

Now, according to Kent Hill, it was a one-punch knockout. He meets me at the back of the car and grabs me by the shoulders. If I didn't have my cuffs on, I can show you. Grabbs me by the shoulders and I look up and he says, I'm going to kill you. And I said, bam, that was all she wrote. And he's laying on the ground and I'm screaming to get up you queer pieces. I'm going to kick your ass. Because I did, I wanted to whip him bad.

Underpinning Hill's story is the assumption that Frank Ross is gay, an idea that, according to police, isn't supported by facts. We have at least three barmaids that said he asked him out on dates. I think that was just a poor attempt by Mr. Hill to come up with some kind of a story to cover what he did, which is all the evidence we think points to nothing but a robbery. I had no idea if he had any money at all. I know he was buying everybody to drinks talking about how much money he had. Wasn't what I was thinking. Far from it.

The Model T, known as the Red Robin, is probably still in Claremour Lake. but the search for it yielded something much more valuable, the answer to a murder, and a small measure of justice for Frank Ross's family. We were just ready for him to be behind bars and whether it was, no matter how long it was, it did make us feel better that they did finally catch him and he did admit to it.

Pluto foe, if you know the name of the movie you'd like to see, just stream it for free on Pluto TV, where all your blockbuster favorites are landing all sorts. Summer long. Catch Anchorman, the legend of Ron Burgundy. Fantastic. The Matrix trilogy. Welcome to the real world. Mean girls. Shut up. Titanic. I'm the key in the world. And so much more. For showtimes, press nothing. They're free 24-7. That is so fetch.

On Pluto TV. Stream now. Pay Never.