Crime Junkie - WANTED: Justice for MMIP

Episode Date: May 7, 2024

May is Missing and Murdered Indigenous Persons Awareness Month, and we want to highlight some of the many cases involving members of Native American communities that so often go underreported and underserved, and thus unsolved. Today, we’re bringing you five stories that can be solved… if the right people come forward.If you have any information about:Terri McCauley: You can submit a tip to the Sioux City Crime Stoppers at 712-258-8477, or online at www.siouxcitypolice.com/crimestoppers. Alyssa McLemore: Please contact Kent police at 253-856-5808, or email them at [e-mail] Nicole Battelo or Colby Sheppard: Please call the Enid police department at 580-242-7000.Kit Mora: Please contact the Omak Police Department at 509-826-0383. You can also contact the Washington State Patrol’s Missing Persons Unit at 1-800-543-5678, or the National Center of Missing and Exploited Children at 1-800-843-5678.Abigail Andrews: Please reach out to the Fort St. John RCMP Serious Crime Unit at 1-778-290-3900, or Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-8477Head over to our blog post for this episode for a list of incredible resources regarding Missing and Murdered Ingenious People. If you’re a law enforcement agency or family member of one of the people we mentioned in this episode, or if you’re looking for more coverage on an MMIP case, please reach out! We’d love to speak with you and see how we can support. You can email us at [e-mail]. Source materials for this episode cannot be listed here due to character limitations. For a full list of sources, please visit: https://crimejunkiepodcast.com/wanted-justice-for-mmip  Did you know you can listen to this episode ad-free? Join the Fan Club! Visit https://crimejunkie.app/library/ to view the current membership options and policies.Don’t miss out on all things Crime Junkie!Instagram: @crimejunkiepodcast | @audiochuckTwitter: @CrimeJunkiePod | @audiochuckTikTok: @crimejunkiepodcastFacebook: /CrimeJunkiePodcast | /audiochuckllc Crime Junkie is hosted by Ashley Flowers and Brit Prawat. Instagram: @ashleyflowers | @britprawatTwitter: @Ash_Flowers | @britprawatTikTok: @ashleyflowerscrimejunkieFacebook: /AshleyFlowers.AF Text Ashley at 317-733-7485 to talk all things true crime, get behind the scenes updates, and more!

Hi, Crime Junkies. I'm your host, Ashley Flowers. And today we're doing something a bit different. May is Missing and Murdered Indigenous Persons Awareness Month, and we wanted to highlight several under-reported cases that we think could really use the coverage. By now, I think we're all aware of the lack of attention members of Native communities receive when crime takes place. And as we all know, a lot of the time,

it just takes the right person hearing a story communities receive when crime takes place. And as we all know, a lot of the time, it just takes the right person hearing a story to be able to find justice and bring closure to families and loved ones. So for this episode, Britt and I are going to take turns bringing you five stories that can be solved if the right people come forward. Music The first story I have for you today is about a young woman just on the threshold of adulthood who had her life taken by someone who tossed her aside as though she were trash. And she still has family today that want to see justice served.

This is the story of Terry McCauley. On the morning of October 6, 1983, a hiker was out with his dog in Sioux City, Iowa. He was walking along the perimeter of a soybean field in this relatively remote area. And even though the road that he was on had been closed, that didn't stop locals from using it as sort of a quote dumping ground for trash and abandoned vehicles. So though he was used to seeing things there, I think the last thing he was expecting to find was the body of a young woman. He spotted her in this woody, brushy area of an embankment right by the road. She was naked except for a single white sock and her underwear were pulled down

either to or below her knees, depending on which source material you read. And the thing about her is she was badly decomposed. She'd clearly been out there for a while and it had been really warm, so I'm sure that was accelerated. This hiker contacted police and investigators arrived on the scene soon after.

When they began examining the young woman's body, they realized two things. One, this clearly wasn't an accidental death. And two, identifying her was going to be difficult. Decomposition wasn't the only thing that had taken its toll. Animals had also contributed to disturbing the crime scene. I'm not sure if they could even take a guess as to her cause of death at this point. in its toll. Animals had also contributed to disturbing the crime scene. I'm not sure if they could even take a guess as to her cause of death at this point.

Now there wasn't a lot at the scene that could tell them much either. For instance, they couldn't tell if the woman was killed there or if she was killed somewhere else and then just dumped there. And remember, this was known to be a dumping ground. I mean, there's trash, discarded tires, you name it, all there. But as they searched the immediate area, there were a few things that they found

that they believed belonged to the woman, including pieces of a blouse and brown suede shoes. So as investigators tried to interview nearby residents, the woman's body was examined by the county medical examiner. According to Bob Davis' reporting for the Sioux City Journal, he estimates that she had died two to three weeks before, and he determines that she had been shot in the face and neck with a shotgun. Some of the pellets were actually still in her body. But that's about all he could tell. Based on how she was found, everyone sort of was assuming that she had been sexually assaulted, but decomposition and the damage to her body was just so bad that they couldn't even tell how old she was,

much less fully determined that that had happened to her. So according to more of Bob Davis's reporting, her body was transported almost three hours away to Des Moines, Iowa to be examined by the state medical examiner. Although I'm not sure if anyone could actually find anything new. The state pathologist was only able to back up the county Emmy's determination that her cause of death was the gunshot to her face. Now that being said, if they were worried about this young woman remaining unidentified, they didn't have to wait long. News of a body being found began to spread across town, and within a

day or two, a woman named Eva came forward and said that she thought the young woman was her 18-year-old daughter, Terry McCully, who was a member of the Omaha tribe. The real clencher for Eva was that the last time she saw her daughter, she was wearing a pink blouse with blue and lavender sleeves that matched the pieces found at the scene. In speaking to Eva, investigators learned that Terry was last seen by her family on September 26, which would have been 10 days before her body was discovered.

She'd been dropped off close to a friend's house by her mom and stepdad. They learned that she had a lot of friends and it wasn't unusual for her to go out, only this time she never came home. And Terry always came home, either to her mom's house or her brother's. Despite being young,

Terry had two kids, both under the age of two. And even though her mom had temporary custody of them at the moment, the plan was for Terry to eventually get custody of them back. From what I can tell, it doesn't seem like the father of the children was in the picture. But she wasn't alone in raising these kids, and she loved her kids, her whole family,

really, so she wouldn't just leave them without warning. After a few days of her being gone, her whole family had gotten worried, and on October 1st, Eva decided to contact the Sioux City police. She filed this thing that's called an attempt to locate, which from what I can tell is very similar to Ebola beyond the lookout, but for missing people. Though it's worth noting, it's not actually a missing persons report.

But then four days later, when Terry still hadn't shown up, that's when she went and filed a real missing persons report. So despite this looking more and more like the young woman was Terry, investigators sent for her dental records, just so they could be 100% sure. And in the meantime, they sent all the evidence that they had collected from the scene,

including the shotgun pellets, to the state lab. Even though this was the early days of DNA, they were hoping they could get something back that could point to who killed this young woman, who, on October 10th, was officially determined to be 18-year-old Terry through dental records. Once she was officially identified, investigators immediately went to the friends that she was hanging out with the night of the 26th, and they were able to put together a pretty detailed timeline. Her friends told investigators that they all went to numerous bars that night, which, just

a side note, at this point, the drinking age in Iowa was 19. So I don't know if they went to bars that just didn't card or if she had a fake or who knows, but the point is they were out and about at a few bars as well as a park late into the night. Then around 2.15 in the morning on the 27, Terry told her friends that she was gonna go on a date with someone.

They watched her get into a white vehicle, a Chevy Nova to be precise, and after that, no one heard from her. Now this Chevy Nova was actually known to Terry and one of her friends. The two had gotten a ride from this driver of the car a few nights before. Though if that friend actually got a description

of the driver to police or a name of this person, that's never been reported on. But I do know that she told police she remembered seeing a few things in the car that stuck out, including a Bible, fishing tackle, and romance novels. All of Terry's friends were interviewed and eventually cleared. So you'd think, find the car, find the driver, maybe find the killer. Or at least, the driver would be able to tell them where Terry went next. But it seems investigators hit a dead end there. Either that, or there's just a huge gap in the reporting, because one minute it seems like they're on a roll, and then the next there's just nothing. At some point, I know they're able to identify that the pellets found from the shotgun came from a 20 gauge,

but nothing else they sent to the lab gave them anything they could work with. And it feels like there was just radio silence for about three months, until around January of 1984. That's when Sergeant Anthony Sunklaides, who by this point seems to be the lead investigator on Terry's homicide, was working another case. In that case, this guy had been arrested because he'd shot at his ex-girlfriend's house with

a shotgun. And one day, Sergeant Sunklaides was looking at all of this information that he'd gathered on this man while reviewing Terry's case when suddenly he stopped and he realized it just so happened that the perp in this new case drove the exact same car that Terry's friend saw her getting into the night she vanished. And sure, it could have just been a coincidence, but what were the odds, right?

I mean, it was at least worth looking into a little bit more. So Sergeant Sunklaides started to dig. And it turned out this man's apartment faced the exact spot where Terry's body had been found. Now, I'm not sure how far we're talking. The closest residents were like a quarter mile away, but I mean, still, he lived in the area close enough to definitely raise some eyebrows. Now, this guy has never been named and information around him is sparse.

But the next thing I can confirm is that police searched his apartment and seized his car. And if anyone thought that the car and the shotgun and the apartment were just coincidences, just you wait because according to Timothy Allen's reporting for the Sioux City Journal, in his car investigators gathered a bunch of evidence, like romance novels and a Bible and fishing tackle,

and 20 gauge shotgun shells that just so happened to be the same brand Terry was shot with. And those were found in this guy's apartment. Oh, and the analysis of those shells proved that they were from the same batch as the pellets found in Terry. Now, I'm pretty sure they didn't find the actual gun, because I can't find any reporting on that. But a deeper look into this man's character was just another nail in the coffin. In talking to his friends, investigators learned that he'd been

gloating about killing someone. And when they spoke to his supervisor at work, the supervisor remembered that the day after Terry's homicide, this guy had apparently shown up for work, but about three hours into his shift, he started acting really panicky, like something was obviously really, really wrong. And then he told his boss that there had been a death

in his family and that he couldn't be There at work anymore. It was just too much for him. So he just left Investigators obviously went and checked with his family about this and sure enough there was no death in the family But still to them this wasn't Physical proof that he had killed Terry it just added to the growing mound of circumstantial evidence. So then the question became, why? If he really was responsible for Terry's death, why did he kill her?

The answer to that might be something that we've heard on this show time and time again. This man was known to hang around this part of downtown that was frequented by sex workers. And Terry would go there regularly as well. Now her mom, Eva, stated in an article by Jodie Ewing for the Sioux City Weekender that Terry wasn't a sex worker, although she, quote, did have ways of getting money off her dates, end quote.

And one of the friends she was with the night she was killed, the one who was actually in that white car with her too, that friend was a sex worker. Even if she wasn't involved in sex work, whoever killed her might have thought she was. And there had been a recent threat made to the sex workers in that particular area. Someone had called the Woodbury County Communication Center

and threatened violence if the police didn't arrest the known sex workers in the area. And although the caller couldn't be identified, whatever information they had made them believe that he sounded a heck of a lot like the man they were looking into. So the theory at this point was that this man may have killed Terry because he thought that she was a sex worker and he was following through on his threats of violence against sex workers. But even with, again, all of this circumstantial evidence, the stuff in the car, his weird behavior, his frequenting the area that Terry frequented, there were a few wrenches thrown into the mix. For one, the

analysis of his car didn't turn up any evidence that Terry had ever been inside. And two, that friend who rode in the car with Terry couldn't ID this man as the driver. So investigators decided to conduct another search of the area where Terry was found, looking for anything that they might have missed the first time around. And during this go, they actually did find more of her clothing, including her jeans, the rest of her blouse, her bra, and coat. That same article by Jody Ewing reports that the items were partially buried, roughly 15 feet from where they had found her shoes. Based on how thorough the initial search seemed, it sounds like these items might have been fully buried when investigators

searched the first time, and then either the weather or some other kind of natural causes unburied them. But that's just speculation on my part. But with this discovery, they had everything that she was wearing the night she vanished, except for one thing, a single feather earring. Police weren't sure if that earring was just lost or purposefully taken by the person who killed her as some sort

of trophy or souvenir. In 1984, Sergeant Sunklaides went to the county attorney. He basically wanted to see what their options were at this point, but the county attorney didn't think they had enough to go forward. So they decided to wait and wait and wait some more. Years began to go by, and investigators were just hoping that they could find something to conclusively link this guy, who by now was considered a suspect. Maybe he'd slip up and tell someone, or someone would come forward with new information, but it seems like that never happened. I don't know what happened with the other case that he was originally arrested for, but I know that around 1990, he moved out of town.

The case continued to eat away at Sergeant Sunklaides, and in 1992, he went public with a lot of detail, saying that he believed the suspect got away with murder. By then, there was a new county attorney who said that he'd take a look at Terry's case, but it seems like he came to the same conclusion as the former county attorney. There just wasn't enough there. So Terry's case remained cold.

But fast forward to 2021, Sergeant Jeremy McClure was on the case, and he, too, believed Terry's case could be solved. Maybe with modern technology that they just didn't have back in the early 80s. By the next year, they sent several items to the lab looking for DNA that could conclusively link the suspect to Terry. Also that same year in 2022, Terry's son Nathaniel, who goes by Nate, met with the county attorney, hoping to get the ball rolling on,

at least pulling together a grand jury. But it doesn't seem like he was successful. And if anything came back from the state lab, that's never been reported on. Despite being so young when his mom died, Terry's son struggled deeply with the loss. In an article for KWIT, he says his biological father was in prison for most of his life, so it was up to his grandmother, Eva, to raise him and his sister. And while she did the best she could, there was always a hole where Terry should have been.

Over the years, he tried to fill that hole with whatever he could, using alcohol and drugs to try and numb that pain, but nothing can bring back his mom, who is remembered for doing the best she could to raise her kids, despite being so stinking young. The pain of that loss still exists today. Terry's case remains unsolved, and while investigators strongly believe that the case could still be solved,

they just need something that they can use to conclusively tie the suspect to Terry. Maybe it's physical evidence, maybe it's a witness, or maybe even a confession from the suspect himself. Both police and Terry's family believe that this man has felt a tremendous amount of guilt over the years, and you can only live with that heavy of a burden for so long.

So if you know anything about the murder of Terry McCully, you can submit a tip to the Sioux City Crimestoppers at 712-258-8477 or online at SiouxCityPolice.com slash Crime Stoppers. But this isn't all for today. We've got four more cases to share with you. And up next, Britt will tell you about the disappearance of Alyssa McLemore. Hi Crime Junkies, I'm Britt, and this is the story of Alyssa McLemore. Around 9.15pm on Friday, April 10th, 2009, a phone call comes in to the 911 dispatch

center in Kent, Washington. 911 dispatchers are trained for emergencies of varying degrees, everything from fires to the cute little kids who accidentally call 911 to ask for help with their math. But this call, it's one of those calls that would send chills down your spine. The dispatcher hears the frantic voice of a woman on the other end, pleading for help. Then a male voice in the background interrupts, saying, I'll hurt you. Now, this call has never been released, so we don't know exactly what is heard next,

if anything, but we do know the call only lasted about 10 seconds, leaving the dispatcher trying to track down who made the call and where it came from. Pretty quickly, they're able to see that the call was made from a cell phone owned by a 21-year-old woman named Alyssa McLemore. But there's no GPS on Alyssa's phone, so they can't really dial in on exactly where she is in that moment. Thinking quickly, though, the dispatcher goes to the next best thing. They can see where she lives, so they dispatch police to her home, which is also in Kent.

When police arrive to the house and knock on the door, they quickly find out she's not there. They learn she lives with her grandmother Barbara, her mother Gracie, and her three-year-old daughter, and none of whom know where she is. As you can imagine, when police come asking for Alyssa and then explain why, her family is immediately concerned and they're ready to get the ball rolling for police to start trying to find Alyssa and they're ready right then and there to file a missing persons report.

But according to Alyssa's aunt Tina in an article in The Guardian, the police are like, hold your horses. They tell the family, quote, you have to wait to report her missing. She's grown, she can leave when she'd like. She hasn't committed any crimes. Which to me sort of feels like whiplash, right?

Like they went to her house trying to find her because they thought she was in danger. And now even though she's not here, they're like, just kidding, she's probably fine. I guess I had this whole image in my mind that they were like rushing to save the day, but the more I read about it, it really feels like they're kind of just following up on this 911 call because it's protocol, just a box to check, not because there's actually any urgency to find Alyssa.

But in Grandma Barbara's mind, there should be urgency, because she tells police that Alyssa should be home. They were expecting her there. You see, the night before, April 9th, around 6.30, Barbara called Alyssa to tell her that her mother, Gracie, wasn't doing well, and she needed to get home. Gracie has scleroderma, which causes the hardening of the body's connective tissue. And from what I can gather, this wasn't like a, hey, we need some help at home with stuff around the house because your

mom's not well. I think this was like a, hey, your mom could die at any moment. You need to get home type of call. And Alyssa, who helped take care of her mother, is basically like, I'm getting on a bus. I'm heading back. So what Barbara is telling police is that it was already weird that she wasn't there yet and then to have them show up? This is like every red flag that something is wrong. And it's not like Alyssa was hours and hours away when her grandma called her the night before. According to an article for The Guardian, she was about six miles away.

Now I'm not sure if her family knew that or if that's what police later learned from cell phone pings, but Barbara said the family became concerned after an hour had passed without Alyssa showing up. And then after that when they called, she didn't answer her cell phone. So there's really a whole day missing between when Barbara talked to her and when she called 911. But none of this changes police's minds, leaving the family pretty much on their own right now.

And it's not like they have the ability to go all out, fully searching themselves. I mean, Alyssa's mom is in terrible condition, so Barbara is tending to her, plus Alyssa's three-year-old. They're basically just left to wait, hoping Alyssa will make it home before her mom passes. But two days later, on April 12th, it's too late. Gracie passes away, and there's still no sign of Alyssa. Alyssa's aunt Tina talks about how she thinks Alyssa's disappearance is what ultimately pushed Gracie over the edge. Like, she couldn't handle it anymore, which it truly just breaks my heart to think about.

And things aren't getting easier for this family because about a week later, they have to have Gracie's funeral. But despite all of this grief, there's also a sense of hope. Because if Alyssa is out there like police believe and somehow has heard about her mother's passing, I mean, there's no way she's missing this funeral. An article in The Count Reporter by Steve Hunter mentions how Alyssa's close friend, who was at this funeral, was convinced she would walk through the door,

that she would have never missed this. But Alyssa does miss it. She's a total no-show. And the family realizes there's got to be a good, or I guess in this case, a horrible reason that Alyssa is not there. Which leaves two options. Either whoever the other voice was on the 911 call is not letting her leave, or the other, more alarming possibility, she's no longer alive. But for the family to find out which, they need some help. So back they turn to the police, hoping this time they can get a missing persons report filed. And they do. The police formally open an investigation into Alyssa's disappearance. Now, it's the 14th, so this is roughly four days

after Alyssa had called 911. And investigators start with that 911 call. But again, there's no GPS on Alyssa's phone, so they can't track its exact location. And by this point, the phone is no longer even in service or taking messages. So with Alyssa's phone being a dead end, the police turned their attention to finding anyone who might have seen Alyssa the day she disappeared. And they were able to track down a witness who claimed to have seen her. And apparently, Alyssa wasn't alone. According to what investigators are told, the witness saw Alyssa in this busy intersection, known to be frequented by sex workers.

And it's possible she was working, because investigators discover that Alyssa had been arrested multiple times between 2008 and 2009 for sex work. But when you dig deeper into where this area is, it's pretty alarming. According to an article in the Seattle Times by Sarah Jean Green, this is where serial killer Gary Ridgway, aka the Green River Killer, found some of his victims. But before anyone thinks we cracked this thing, know that Gary Ridgway was arrested in 2001, and this is 2009, so we are years after the fact.

But even without Gary, it's still possible she was with a client who did something. Though, unfortunately, that might make it even harder to figure out what happened to her. Either way, they try to collect all the details they can from the people who last saw her. The witness tells investigators that they saw a green pickup truck approach Alyssa. It's described as a 90s model with possible organ plates. And a second witness they find describes the driver as a white guy between the ages of 50 and 60 who was seen with her at an unspecified date.

So unclear if it was even the same day Alyssa went missing. What's also not clear is if anyone saw her get in the truck. It's not in the research and there's nothing about cameras in the area either, so we don't know if she just talks to him and then he goes on his way or if something else happens. And trying to find this guy feels like a needle in a haystack. In that Kent Reporter article by Steve Hunter, one of the investigators talks about the lack of specifics in these witness accounts. And what's more troubling is that this intersection that investigators can now place her in offers direct access to a highway connecting California, Oregon, and Washington. So she really could be anywhere along the West Coast in a matter

of hours. And it's not long before investigators realize that all they have is a 10-second 911 call and a vague description of a possible suspect in the pickup truck. And when no new evidence comes to light, the case goes cold for almost two years. Until April 7th, 2011, when a woman's body was found just outside Morton, Washington, about an hour and a half south of Kent. And the authorities know this is suspicious just by where the body is found. This is out in the woods, off some remote road. We're talking logging country. The impression is that whoever this is

wouldn't have just ended up out here on their own. And when investigators in Kent get wind of some of the details, it just screams a list to them. The victim has the Kent get wind of some of the details, it just screams Alyssa to them. The victim has the right body type, the right age range, and it's put out that this Jane Doe is of some mixed ethnicity, and Alyssa is Native American. She's a member of the Unaghan tribe. And when you look at the map of where Morton is, it aligns with what we discussed. If someone had gotten Alyssa into their car and hopped on a highway near where Alyssa was last seen,

they could get to Morton pretty quickly. So this seems like a viable lead to investigators. Maybe after two years of waiting, Alyssa's family can finally have some answers. But it turns out it's not Alyssa. There's zero information on how this was determined, DNA, dental records, I don't know. And it would take another 11 years But Alissa. There's zero information on how this was determined. DNA? Dental records? I don't know.

And it would take another 11 years before this Jane Doe was finally identified. Now, there's no public information on who this was. Sometimes families don't like publicly putting that out there. All we know is that the Doe Network has listed her as being identified in 2022. But within those 11 years, a lot has happened in Alyssa's case. It's a roller coaster. The whole time her family tried to stay as active as possible. They're doing all the things.

They set up a Facebook page, they hold fundraisers, they conduct their own searches for Alyssa. And this goes on for year after year after year. And year after year, more Jane Doe's are found. And time after time, there Doe's are found and time after time there are the feelings that come with that brief moment of hope and grief and pain. In an article for the world by Alison Herrera, Alyssa's aunt says quote, every single time there's a body found on the news there's a pause. It's literally like you're dead for a moment because you have to wonder,

is it Alyssa? I think I've called the corner more than anybody should in a lifetime." Alyssa's family assumes through all these years that the investigators on this case feel the same way, that they're doing everything in their power to find Alyssa the same way they are. But that comes into question around 2016, when something shocking is discovered. Now I don't have the exact date of this discovery, it's not in my research, but one of the investigators discovers that Alyssa's profile in the FBI's National Crime Information Center database has been misidentified as Asian, not Native American, since 2009.

Which is baffling, but also points to something else. If they got this detail wrong, how much were they paying attention to this case? And what if Alyssa really was one of the Jane Doe's they ruled out? Thankfully, I think for later cases they were using DNA. Alyssa's aunt remembers police taking DNA samples from her items shortly after she disappeared, but it took them two years to gather and submit the family's DNA to the National Missing and Unidentified Person System. Washington state law requires that to be done after 30 days or even sooner if there's a suspected crime.

So who knows how many Jane Doe's were ruled out in that time and even before just by like checking boxes on a piece of paper? I don't know. And when mistakes like this happen, it just makes the victims' families feel even more alone. But so many Indigenous families were having similar experiences. According to an article from King Five published in 2022, Washington State, where Alyssa disappeared, quote, has the second most missing Indigenous people in the U.S. And that article from The Guardian mentioned earlier says, quote, according to the FBI's figures,

Native Americans disappear at twice the per capita rate of white Americans, end quote. And a lot of these are women, but think about it, those are just the ones reported. Imagine how many go unreported or in Alyssa's case, misidentified. Some legislatures and several groups, like the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women movement, are trying to change this. There's also a goal of forming an Indigenous Cold Case Unit

in the state of Washington strictly for solving the cold cases involving Indigenous victims. But we are far from where we need to be. And by 2019, Alyssa's family is still searching for the answers they need. They try partnering with the Homeward Bound program, a program run by the Washington State Patrol Missing and Unidentified Persons Unit. It put Alyssa's photo and information on the side of a truck traveling major highways across the country. Basically, an updated version of the 80s milk carton kits. But despite the program having some success in the past for other missing people, it doesn't seem to push Alyssa's case forward.

Or maybe it does, because in that year, there is a credible tip that comes in. It's just not clear where it comes in, or how, or if the truck had anything to do with this person coming forward. But according to a King Five article by PJ Rontawa, it sounds like it comes directly to the family. And the information given is that Alyssa's remains could be in this local park. So the family themselves goes to this park, and during a search at the park's edge, the family discovers an open, abandoned well on the property.

And at the bottom of this well, they notice a tarp. They notify the police because, hi, they don't have the resources to go get something from the bottom of a well. But for some reason, police don't even search it. They claim it was an issue of resources, but my gut tells me that they didn't feel it was credible. Either way, the family was unable to find anyone willing to search it.

In February, 2023, a reporter pressed the police about this and they said they would investigate. The city said they would fill the hole in, but who knows if this got done. And if it had, I sure hope someone was able to take a look at things down there beforehand. And a real quick jump back, sometime in 2019, investigators shared the call information obtained from Alyssa's phone with the FBI, hoping the latest technological advancements

would help them gather new clues. However, no significant progress was made. According to Sarah Jean-Green's article in the Seattle Times, one of the cold case investigators even keeps a CD containing the 911 recording, which he listens to repeatedly, hoping to discover any new information. And although releasing the call publicly could help them identify the man's voice, they don't. They're afraid somehow it could jeopardize the investigation.

And it sounds like the family has never even heard this call. They just have a transcript of it. Now it does sound like recently that 911 call has been submitted again to the FBI for more analysis. But still, at some point, you gotta think, what do you have to lose by releasing it? It's similar to the Amber Tecaro case we covered way back in 2018. The police released a recording of the last call she'd made with a man's voice on it. And while her murder still remains unsolved, someone may recognize that voice one day.

It could lead to the arrest of her killer. And who knows, maybe that's what could happen here. When Alyssa's family gathered to mark the 10th anniversary of her disappearance, there were balloons and photos of Alyssa and other missing indigenous women. There was also a sign that read, We need closure. The pain is torture. And that seems to sum up everything about this case.

The family knows they might not get a happy ending. But an ending they need? It's long past due. It's time to bring Alyssa home one way or the other. And someone out there knows where she is. If you have any information on the disappearance of Alyssa McLemore, please contact the Kent Police at 253-856-5808 or email them at the KPD tip line at kentwa.gov. Now back to Ashley who's going to tell you all about the disappearance of Kendra Nicole

Batello next. Now, I'll be honest, there's not much I have to work with in terms of reporting to tell Kendra's story. But I think that's exactly why her story is so important to tell. Because even though there are far more questions than answers, someone out there does have to have those answers. But here's what I do know. On Tuesday, July 12th, 2022, 24-year-old Kendra Batello was reported missing

to the Enid, Oklahoma, police department. The report was made by her mom, who told police that the last time she spoke to Kendra was around midnight, five days before, on the 7th. Her grandmother, Lillian, actually saw Kendra the day before that, on July 6th. And she said at the time she didn't notice any red flags. But, you know, now that they're in this situation, there is one thing that kept nagging at her. Normally, when she and Kendra saw each other,

Kendra would check in, you know, ask her how things are going. But when Lillian came to visit her on the sixth, she didn't. And Lillian can't help but wonder if that was just a subtle sign that there was something going on, maybe something distracting her granddaughter. And that's not the only thing that Lillian

is looking back on with more skepticism. After she left, she got a text from Kendra saying that her landlord, this woman named Tanya, was accusing Lillian of stealing her dog. And because of that, Tanya was kicking Kendra out of the room that she rented. Now, I couldn't find much about the whole dog drama, but getting kicked out of her home seems like it was just one more thing piling on Kendra recently.

According to her family, she'd been in a rocky relationship with her boyfriend, 25-year-old Colby Shepherd, and this dude had a history of violence. Back in 2020, assault and domestic battery charges were filed against him, and although the plaintiff is listed as the state of Oklahoma, the victim in the case isn't quite clear. That case was dismissed and purged, as was the protective order that Colby filed against Kendra in 2021. And now in 2022, Colby's been charged

with one count of domestic assault and battery by strangulation and one count of domestic abuse, assault and battery. And just abuse, assault, and battery. And just a side note, I'm using the term boyfriend because that is what is used in all of the reporting, so it seems like they were still together as these charges were being brought against him. Anyway, before anyone last heard from her, Kendra had attended a bond hearing for Colby's case.

Initially, his bond was on the condition that he have no contact with Kendra, but at her request, that no contact order was removed. So at this point in the story, he is out and they actually lived in that room Kendra rented together and presumably he was kicked out too. And we know that he was also with Kendra the last time her grandmother saw her. So Kendra had all this going on.

And then after the 7th, she just never contacted her family again. Now I don't know if there were alarm bells ringing right away. I mean, Kendra's loved ones have said that she sometimes struggles with her mental health and experiences substance use disorder. So it might not have been out of the ordinary for her to do her own thing for a day or two. But her phone has been going straight to voicemail and she hadn't even posted on social media,

which was super out of the ordinary for her. I don't know if they tried to reach out to Colby, but that's one of the first things that investigators do. They interview him as well as Tanya the landlord, but the results of those interviews have never been made public, though it's worth noting that neither have been named persons of interest. After Kendra's reported missing, days pass with seemingly no leads, until July 21st when a woman comes forward to police

and says that she thinks she saw Kendra at her house. This woman lives in Pawnee, Oklahoma, which is about an hour east of Enid. And according to an article in the Enid News and Eagle by Kelsey McKendrick, the day before, which would have been the 20th, a woman matching Kendra's description knocked on this woman's door and asked for a glass of water.

Now, I haven't seen many details about their interaction in the source material. So I don't know if they chatted, if this mystery woman introduced herself, or even if she was alone. But the woman filing this report says that she didn't realize anything was wrong until the next day,

this day that she's actually coming in and making the report. Because that's when she saw a post about Kendra and she realized that the woman who asked for a glass of water might be the missing woman, Kendra. Now to my knowledge, it's still unclear if the woman actually was Kendra, like if they're able to determine that for sure. But this sighting gives everyone hope that she might still be out there. On July 24th, the missing and murdered

indigenous people of South Central Kansas organized a search for Kendra in conjunction with her family. But it doesn't seem like they can find anything. Over the following days and weeks, Kendra is entered into NCIC and NamUs. Investigators even receive numerous tips. They even get one saying she was sighted in Wichita, Kansas. But according to Haley Weger's reporting for News 9, that lead comes up dry. And the same article reveals that they also serve a few search warrants,

and later they even collect potential evidence, but exactly what this evidence was or where it's from hasn't been reported on. The biggest question I have is what happened to her cell phone? And although I know investigators try to ping it, I don't know if they find where it was or where it traveled to or when it turned off.

Weeks and then months go by, all with no sign of Kendra. And to my knowledge, Colby's just chilling this whole time. And that's how it stays. Even when there is a twist that I don't think anyone saw coming, Colby himself ends up going missing. The details around his disappearance are even more sparse than the details surrounding Kendra's. He was last seen on December 27th, 2023, at a Pizza Hut in Enid around 8 PM. Now, police have never publicly stated if Colby's disappearance is related to Kendra's, but without him, I don't know what other leads they have to follow

to find Kendra herself. And that is about all I know. There is a Facebook group called Where is Kendra Botello that's updated periodically. As of this recording, the two most recent posts are about skeletal remains of a woman that were found in Shawnee, Oklahoma in 2023. There was some speculation that the remains could have been Kendra, but according to a post on April 1st,

they weren't determined to be hers. Though as far as I can tell, those remains haven't been identified as anyone yet. Kendra is a member of the Muskogee Nation, and according to that same article by Kelsey McKendrick, she has short black hair but is known to wear a variety of wigs of different colors. She has brown eyes, dimples and is 5'8". They know that she sometimes hangs out in Bristow, Oklahoma, which is about an hour and 45-ish minutes away. Colby is six feet tall and has hazel eyes. At the time of his disappearance, his hair had been dyed blonde,

but Namus indicates it's naturally brown. When he was last seen, he was wearing blue jeans, a dark hoodie, a blue shirt, and a gray baseball cap. Both cases are still open, so if you know anything about either of their whereabouts, you can call the Enid Police Department at 580-242-7000. And for additional resources, you can check out the Minnesota Indian Women's Resource Center. We'll have them linked in our show notes. Coming up, Britt is going to tell you about the disappearance of Kit Mora. As the summer of 2022 turns into fall in Yakima, Washington, a high school senior named Amethyst

can't ignore the panic burning in her belly any longer. Her best friend, Kit Mora, had moved the previous summer from Yakima to a city called Omac, which is about 200 miles away. When they left, the plan was for this move to be short-term, just some time for Kit to bond with their bio mom, Lori Sue, and Kit's much younger half-siblings. After a substantial number of incidents involving CPS when they were a kid, Kit had been removed from her care, so Lori Sue hadn't been a big part of their upbringing.

So this was supposed to be just this great little trip, a time to reconnect, and then Kit was supposed to be back before the school year started. But what started out as a couple of weeks turned into a trip that just kept getting extended and extended again until they finally said they were going to stay in OMAC for their junior year, which like, fine, whatever, Kit and Amethyst stayed in touch for a while. But Kit had gotten harder and harder to get a hold of. And the last time they'd communicated was almost a year before, in November of 2021. And that was on social media. Amethyst hadn't actually heard Kit's voice since two months before that. So the pit in Amethyst's

stomach is just growing and growing. It's only made worse when she finds out that Kit's adopted sister Charlotte hasn't heard from Kit since November of 2021 either. In fact, no one has. For a long time, Amethyst had tried to rationalize Kit's silence. She tells Tammy Erra with the Yakima Herald public, I figured maybe they wanted to distance themselves from Yakima, but the more time passed,

the more she started to worry. So in late September of 2022, when it's been a full 10 months since anyone in Yakima has heard from Kit, Amethyst, her grandma, and her cousin hit the road for OMAC. If Kit wants to cut ties with their loved ones in Yakima, that's fine, and Amethyst will respect that. But first, she needs to see for herself that Kit is okay. Their first stop in OMAC is a thrift shop called the Storehouse Mercantile, which is

owned and run by Lori Sue. Amethyst knows Kit worked there when she first got to OMAC, but when they pull in, the store looks abandoned. Amethyst asks a neighboring store owner what the deal with the thrift shop is, and he says it's been closed for months. So not exactly the most encouraging start to their little investigation, but they're not backing down. Next, the trio decides to head to the OMAC police department, where they ask some officers hanging around outside if they know anything about Kit. They personally don't, but they take down Amethyst's phone number and say they'll see what they can figure out. And before long, her phone starts to ring.

It's one of the cops. And he says he's talked to Laurie Sue, and she told him that Kit ran away way back in April, which was a full five months ago. As for where Kit was supposedly headed, the reporting isn't consistent. Some say Laurie Sue claimed that perhaps they'd gone back to Yakima, which Amethyst obviously knows isn't true. Other reporting says Laurie Sue claimed that they'd run off with an internet boyfriend, or maybe it was an internet girlfriend.

Laurie Sue couldn't seem to decide. The thing is, that feels off-base to Amethyst, too. She explains in that same reporting by Tammy Erra for the Yakima Herald public that, quote, they were aromantic and asexual. They had no attraction to anyone, which as far as Amethyst is concerned, makes the whole idea of them running off with a love interest questionable at best.

Now, this isn't the first time the OMAC Police Department has been asked to look into Kitt's well-being. As Kelsey Turner reports for Investigate West, by early December of 2021, Kitt's adopted sister Charlotte had been hit with this overwhelming doubt about Kitt's wellbeing. She says, quote, I had this gut feeling. I don't even know how to explain it. I just felt like something was wrong. As any good crime junkie knows, when your gut is telling you something's off, you should listen. And Charlotte did. She called the OMAC police department and asked them to do

a wellness check on Kit. And I'm sure she took comfort in knowing that law enforcement was on it. And given everything that had been going on at Laurie Sue's apartment around that time, you'd think the OMAC PD would have taken extra care to cross their T's and dot their eyes. Because when an officer visited Laurie Sue's apartment for the wellness check, it was actually the third time that OMAC PD had been there in the past five days. They'd already been out on November 28th when neighbors called to report what sounded like a domestic dispute, and then again on November 29th to take Laurie Sue's boyfriend into custody on suspicion of alleged intimate

partner violence. But when the officer had knocked on the door that day, it didn't take much for him to be satisfied that everything was A-OK, at least as far as Kit was concerned. According to reporting by Hero Windsor for the Cooper Point Journal, a quote-unquote dark-haired woman with a baby, now thought to be Lori Sue, answered the door and told him, Kit was just fine. Thanks for asking. Have a nice day. Frustratingly, none of this interaction was recorded because the officer's body cam wasn't

on. But after he left, he wrote up a quick six-sentence report saying he'd confirmed that Kit was just fine, and he closed out the request without taking any further action. It's not clear what was communicated back to Charlotte at that point, but I assume she was told something along the lines of what's in the officer's report. And why would she question that, right? Like, they're the pros. If the police department confirmed that Kit's okay, Kit must be okay. But what Charlotte couldn't have known was that the OMAC PD almost certainly didn't confirm that Kit was okay. And they weren't the only institution to fail Kit that fall. Because though they'd been enrolled as a junior at OMAC High School, their attendance

throughout the fall semester was spotty at best, and then stopped entirely, likely at some point in November, when they stopped communicating with friends and family in Yakima. In January of 2022, the district dropped them from the school roster entirely for having too many unexcused absences. But that's not supposed to happen, or at least it's not supposed to happen without specific steps being taken first. Those steps are outlined in a state law known as the Becca Bill, which is aimed at encouraging student compliance and well-being. According to the website on attendance and truancy for the Washington State Governor's Office of the Education Ombuds, the school is supposed to notify the family of the child's

excessive absences and work with them to determine what the problem is and develop strategies to correct the situation. If the school takes those steps and the child's attendance doesn't improve, it's supposed to refer the student and their family to something called a community engagement board or to the juvenile courts. But none of this happened. So for the entire spring semester, no one was looking for Kit. And by June of 2022, the OMAC PD was once again visiting Laurie Sue's apartment, this

time with workers from the Washington State Department of Children, Youth and Families in tow. They were responding to a report from a neighbor who was concerned that Lori Sue's children, kids' half-siblings, four kids under the age of five, were being neglected. What they found there was the stuff of nightmares. YourSource1 reports that the children, quote, had caked-on filth, matted hair, soiled diapers, burns, and adult human bite marks that were in various stages of healing. And though the kids were removed and taken to a hospital for medical care, before long, they were returned to Laurie Sue. And what's mind-blowing about this whole thing is that no one bothered to ask about Kit. The OMAC PD had been there only seven months earlier checking on them.

So they knew that Kit, still a minor, should be there. But their name wasn't mentioned once in any of the records about the visit. Now you might assume that Amethyst's visit in September of 2022 is when the OMAC PD finally starts to investigate Kit's disappearance. But you would be wrong, because they list Kit as a runaway based on nothing other than Laurie Sue's word. And as Kelsey Turner reports for Investigate West, according to Detective Brian Bowling

with the OMAC PD, quote, a runaway juvenile is not a crime, end quote. Laurie Sue, meanwhile, packs up and gets the heck out of Dodge just a few weeks later, moving almost two hours south near Wenatchee. At this point, it's pretty much an all-hands-on-deck situation for kids' loved ones. Charlotte creates a Facebook page titled Find Kit, and she and Amethyst start organizing vigils and posting missing persons' fires. But it's not totally clear who community members are supposed to contact with tips.

Some of the flyers instruct people to contact the OMAC PD, but others list the Okanagan County Sheriff's Office, the Colville Tribal Police, or the Washington State Patrol. And this is a quintessential challenge loved ones of missing indigenous persons face all too often? Kelsey Turner explains in that reporting for Investigate West that, quote, "...overlap between federal, state, local, and tribal law enforcement jurisdictions is

a major barrier in addressing the missing and murdered Indigenous people crisis, often causing confusion over the responsibility for investigations," end quote, citing a 2022 report from the Congressional Research Service. The confusion is only compounded when the responsibility for finding a missing person falls entirely on the shoulders of their loved ones without help or guidance from law enforcement. By late November 2022, there's a petition circulating online asking the FBI to step in and investigate Kitt's disappearance.

But it's not until January of 2023 that the OMAC PD finally starts treating Kitt's disappearance as a missing persons case, coordinating its investigative efforts with the Colville Tribal Police and the FBI. Which means, by the time law enforcement picks up the case, Kitt had likely been missing for over a year. And I don't think anyone can fully calculate or comprehend just how much this set the investigation back. By February of 2024, Kitt's disappearance remains as much of a mystery as it was in January of 2023.

Detective Bowling says he's still actively working the case, running down any leads he gets, but he acknowledges that a lack of resources is a real hindrance. According to Kelsey Turner's reporting, he's the only detective on the entire OMAC police force. And you know what that means, crime junkies. It's critical that members of the community come forward with any tips or information they have, no matter how small or irrelevant they may seem. So if you know anything about the disappearance of Kit Mora from OMAC, Washington, please contact the OMAC Police Department

at 509-826-0383. You can also reach out to the Washington State Patrol Missing Persons Unit at 1-800-543-5678, or the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children at 1-800-843-5678. Coming up is the fifth and final story that we're highlighting on Crime Junkie today, and that is the disappearance of Abigail Andrews. Ash is going to tell you her story next. It's early April 2010 in Fort St. John, British Columbia, and Doug and Debbie Andrews are doing their best not to panic.

Their 28-year-old daughter Abigail was supposed to call Debbie when she was on her way home the night before, which would have been April 7. But Debbie's phone never rang. She didn't get any texts from her daughter either, and the silence just continues on and on from there, which is super unlike her daughter. Normally, Abigail stays in close contact with her parents and her brother Ben, and to make the whole situation even more concerning, Abigail's a few months pregnant. Now, the whole family has been super excited about welcoming the baby into the world. In fact, on April 6th, her parents had taken her shopping downtown for baby supplies.

Sam Cooper quotes her dad in the province saying, quote, Abigail was so happy and looking forward to having this child. She wanted to be her best and do her best for this child." End quote. But it seems like there was one person who hadn't been as excited about Abigail's pregnancy as she and her family had been. And that's the baby's biological father.

Spencer Hall reports for energeticcity.ca that Abigail's aunt, Beth Cobbett, says, quote, "'She was hoping that through time and talking that he would come on board as far as being a part of the child's life. They weren't cohabitating or living together or even going to look at having a relationship in the future, but she was hoping for a father of her child, end quote. And it was his house Abigail was headed to when she left her apartment on the evening of the seventh on foot. She told both her mom and her landlord's father-in-law exactly where she was going.

The family was already worried about Abigail's silence by Friday the 9th, but their efforts to stay calm just dissolved that night when they received strange texts from Abigail's phone. What exactly these texts say hasn't been reported, but that same piece in the province describes them as quote, bizarre and crazy, end quote. More than anything, they just don't sound like Abigail. So her brother Ben responds to the texts with questions only his sister would know the answers to.

But Abigail or whoever has her phone doesn't end up responding. So that's the day that her family officially reports her missing. Although it's not clear if this happens before or after those weird texts come in. Almost immediately both the family and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police seem to be assuming the worst. On April 14th, just a week into Abigail's disappearance,

the RCMP starts a search of a local landfill. They say mum on what led them there. But CTV News quotes RCMP Corporal Annie Lento as saying, Over the course of our investigation, we yielded some information that pointed us in that direction." And although they publicly claim that they're just looking for clues about her disappearance, Christine Rumleski reports for energeticcity.ca that both the coroner's service and a forensic anthropologist are on-site assisting in the search, and Abigail's family is under no illusions about what they might find.

Her dad Doug is quoted again in Sam Cooper's reporting, this time saying, "...we are hoping the police will find her body. I want some miracle to happen, but I'm a logical man. We're at the point of dealing with the reality we will never see Abigail again." That's not to say that the family has given up hope entirely. Both Doug and Ben make public pleas directed at Abigail, begging her to let them know, to let anyone know if she just is out there but needs some space maybe or if she's dealing with some problems that she hasn't felt comfortable talking about. Though Ben is quick to clarify that they need to hear from her in her own voice. But that call that they're desperately hoping for,

the call where Abigail tells them that she's sorry, she't mean to worry them everything's okay she's gonna be back soon. That call doesn't come. When the RCMP finishes its search of the landfill on April 20th they're no closer to finding Abigail. And while the official party line is that they haven't identified any persons of interest, the Andrews family indicates that that might not be quite accurate. More reporting by Sam Cooper in the province says that Doug thinks investigators know exactly who's behind Abigail's disappearance, and Doug believes that quote-unquote, all the evidence points in one direction.

Meanwhile, days turn into weeks, and those turn into months. Abigail's Aunt Beth raises money from local businesses hoping to put a couple of billboards on the Alaska Highway leading into Fort St. John. And those go up in June. A report by Yolanda Cole that's published in the Global News says they, quote, feature two large photos, a description of the young woman, and phone numbers to call with tips. But whatever tips the billboards bring in, if any, don't seem to lead to any arrests. By October of 2013, the RCMP confirms that they believe Abigail was killed, and that they have narrowed in on a specific suspect.

But whoever that one suspect is, they won't name him publicly, though they say they think people know who they're talking about. In a video the RCMP posts to YouTube, Corporal Bill Robinson says, quote, we believe that this person has spoken to people about what they did. And we're asking those people to contact us no matter how small or how unimportant they may feel their information is." But it doesn't seem that there have been enough people who have come forward. And that's why this case needs you. That's why we're sharing this story.

In 2022, Beth sat for an interview with Spencer Hall, and she suggests that what the family needs more than anything, more than vengeance or even justice, our answers. She wishes that they could absolve Abigail's killer of any responsibility just to know what happened to her. She goes on to say, quote, to have closure, just to know and to be able to have a grave. If that were in our power, that would be what we would grant. But obviously, that's not within our power." They're still waiting for those answers to this day, over 14 years later.

As with all of the cases we're highlighting today, Abigail is indigenous of Métis descent. And I want to take this opportunity to briefly fill you in on the history of the Métis, because it's fascinating. They're one of the three recognized Aboriginal groups in Canada, the other two being First Nations and Inuit. According to a publication put out by Métis Nation British Columbia, quote, prior to Canada's crystallization as a nation in West Central North America, the Métis people emerged out of the relations of First Nations

women and European men. While the initial offspring of unions were individuals who possessed mixed ancestry, the gradual establishment of distinct Métis communities outside of First Nation and European cultures and settlements, as well as the subsequent intermarriages between Métis women and Métis men, resulted in the genesis of a new Aboriginal people, the Métis." In a video produced by the Rupert Land Center for Teaching and Learning, Audrey Pacha, the president of the Métis Nation, Alberta, says, What it takes is our people who are in those key positions today and in schools really teaching our kids the proper history of this country.

I think it's going to make an amazing change to how the Maytee will feel no longer forgotten, no longer ignored." That's exactly what we can't do. We can't forget Abigail or her story. If you know anything about the disappearance of Abigail Andrews in Fort St. John, British Columbia on April 7, 2010. Please reach out to the Fort St. John RCMP Serious Crimes Unit at 1-778-290-3900. Or you can reach out to Crimestoppers at 1-800-222-8477. And crime junkies, this brings us to the end of today's bonus episode.

The cases we shared with you today are only five of thousands of open and unresolved MMIP cases that could benefit from more awareness. Again, all it takes is the right person hearing the story to bring justice forward. Maybe that's you, or maybe it's someone that you know. So please continue to share these stories and help us in spreading the word. If you're a law enforcement agency or family member of one of the people we mentioned in this episode or if you're looking for more coverage on an MMIP case, please reach out. We would love to speak with you and see how we can support.

You can email us at crimejunkie at audiochuck.com. And be sure to check the show notes for this episode. We're gonna be linking out to a ton of MMIP resources, as well as different ways that you can help get involved in the fight for justice for these communities. ["Fight for Justice"] You can find all the source material for this episode on our website, CrimeJunkiePodcast.com. And be sure to follow us on Instagram, at Crime Junkie Podcast. And Britt and I will be back next Monday with our regularly scheduled episode. Crime Junkie is an AudioChuck production.

So, what do you think, Chuck? Do you approve?