Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - Anthony Weiner gets hard time & Corpse mystery: Who took Julie Mott?

Episode Date: September 27, 2017

Anthony Weiner wept after a judge ordered the disgraced politician to serve 21 months in prison for obscene messages sent to a teen girl. Criminal profiler Pat Brown, victim advocate Mark Klaas, and reporter Scott Kimbler join Nancy Grace in this episode to discuss Weiner's sordid online history and what happens next. Death care legal expert Wendy Russell Wiener joins Nancy to look at the mystery surrounding Julie Mott, a young Texas woman who died 2 years ago. Mott's remains vanished from her casket inside a funeral home hours after her funeral and before it could be transported for cremation. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

You're listening to an iHeart Podcast. February 2004, Maura Murray empties her bank account, drives four hours from school, crashes her car, and vanishes. Join the search as an investigative reporter uncovers new evidence, interrogates new witnesses, traces down new leads in this riveting new investigative series. The Disappearance of Maura Murray, Saturdays, 7, 6 Central and 9, 8 Central on Oxygen, the new network for crime. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace on Sirius XM Triumph, Channel 132. It was January 2016, and the former New York Congressman's once promising political career was over.

Former New York Congressman has now been sentenced to 21 months for sending inappropriate text messages to an underage girl. Some of his messages are so obscene, they can't be shown on television. Today I'm announcing my resignation from Congress. The victim isn't pulling any punches. How would you describe his behavior? Sick. Wiener's estranged wife, Uma Abedin, did not attend the sentencing. The investigation into the scandal threw the Clinton campaign into a tailspin.

It may have helped Donald Trump win the election. We never thought we were going to say thank you to Anthony Weiner. Political honcho with one toe in the Oval Office, one toe in the White House, sentenced for lewd acts upon a minor. I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us. Of course, I'm talking about Anthony Weiner. Anthony Weiner gets hard time in court. This is what we know. I'll break it down before we analyze what the judge did. The judge sentencing Weiner to just 21 months. I mean, all the legal pundits are saying, oh, that's fair. That's not

fair. This is what we know about Weiner. He lost a spot in Congress as a so-called shining star for accidentally, I guess, accidentally on purpose, sending out a picture of his crotch to his full-on Twitter account. It was apparently meant for just one special lucky lady, but everybody got it. It's associated with his Twitter. You don't want to wake up to that first thing in the morning, Anthony Weiner in his undies with, well, okay,

I'll let you look it up on the Internet. So there was that. Then he tries to make a comeback by running for mayor. And in the middle of that, he gets busted sexting naughtiness to several different ladies. Okay, that ruins the mayoral candidacy. And you'd think he'd learn his lesson, but now no. And this is the worst of it all. I'm going to go to Mark Klass. Joining me right now, Mark Klass, who founded Klass Kids Foundation. As long as I have been in the business of seeking justice, Mark Klass has been an example for me.

So, Mark Klass, don't go mess it up now, because I've been counting on you now for many, many years, as do people all over the world, Mark Klass. No pressure. With me, high-profile criminal profiler, you know her well, Pat Brown, and crack reporter for Crime Stories, Scott Kimbler. Mark Klass, I'm going to let you explain what Anthony Weiner was found guilty of. Well, I'm going to avoid all of the obvious puns that exist here. But what Anthony Weiner did is he descended into a very deep, dark place where he was sexting and texting a 15-year-old girl. This was a man in his 50s.

This is a man in his 50s who has been busted time and time again in this exact same kind of behavior. And as you mentioned, it's ruined his congressional career. It ruined his fledgling campaign to be mayor of New York. And it very well may have impacted ultimately the presidential election. But this is a guy that was going after a 15-year-old girl, a girl that he knew very well was 15 because his sexting and his texting was occurring on Skype, and it was occurring on FaceTime. He knew what this child looked like, and it didn't stop him.

He was headed. Just turned. Just turned 15. Mark Glass, you're never going to believe this because you have been with me and friends for so long. You probably feel like my twins, John, Dave, and Lucy, were just born yesterday. They're almost 10, Mark. So this is just four years, just a little beyond four years.

She had just turned 15 when this started, of my daughter, my little girl, who still believes in Santa Claus and still hides her teeth for the tooth fairy, okay? And sexting my rear end, he had her on, as you pointed out, Snapchat and Skype, stripping naked and fondling herself at his request. What do you think he was doing on the other end, Mark Glass? Well, I think it's obvious what he was doing on the other end, Nancy, but he's descending into an incredibly dark place, and it's an escalating pattern of behavior, and who knows what the next step is. So at this point, for him to be slapped on the wrist yet again for this kind of behavior, even if he is spending a minimal time in prison, is a dangerous precedent because he's going to go down farther

and farther and farther to the point where there's human contact, to the point where somebody might really physically get hurt in a very real way, and to the point where his behavior cannot be extricated, cannot be brought back. Okay, let's talk about, I got into a big fight with Dan Abrams, the ABC chief legal correspondent, about this. And he thought the sentence was fair. I think it's way too light. Weiner faced up to 10 years on one count. He has done this many, many, many innumerable, countless times. He pled guilty to one count. He has done this many, many, many innumerable countless times.

He pled guilty to one count, which was the possibility of 10 years. The prosecutor said, okay, 21 to 27 months. He got 21 months on what could be a 10-year sentence on one of literally innumerable offenses. So I think it's totally off the chart. This sentence is totally wrong. But another thing that you're saying, Mark, and I want to be clear about this, this is child molestation. I was reading, you and I were emailing and you sent me some information.

When you get a child to perform an obscene act over the internet, that is child molestation. If someone got my daughter or son to perform a lewd act as they

watched on FaceTime, that is child molestation. He sent her adult pornography to this girl that had just turned 15. Okay. That, whoa, uh-uh. That is child molestation. Why is that child molestation, Mark? Well, listen, this is also something that can be shared. It's child molestation because, first of all, she is not of the age of consent. In a sexual connotation, in the sexual situation that we're in here, she cannot consent. She is a victim. She is under 16 years old. He is using his powers of persuasion, and his powers of persuasion are obviously pretty formidable given his history, to get this young girl to perform and do terrible things.

And this is information that he can, this is behavior that he can capture. He can capture, he can relive it and he can share it. So this is not only molestation, but it's pornography as well. And again, Nancy, this is so deep, so dark, so evil that this slap on the hand that this man has received is not justice. It's not fair, and it's going to ultimately probably lead to many more victims. With me, as I mentioned, high-profile criminal profiler Pat Brown. Okay, Pat, another thing that some information that Mark Klass sent me, he knew it off the top of his head, was the fact that this guy is going to re-offend. I believe the stat you sent me, Mark, was 90% of child predators, of pedophiles, molesters,

repeat, offend, after, repeat, after release from jail. Okay? They do it again when they get out. And, Pat, I'm sure you've got all sorts of scientific information, but this is what I know. Don't groan, Alan Duke, because I say this a lot. When you don't know a horse, look at his track record, people. over FaceTime with a girl, a little girl. So, Pat, what's the likelihood this guy's going to reoffend? And give me your profile of Anthony Weiner.

Okay. First of all, I'm going to say he's a sex predator. Absolutely a sex predator. Absolutely a sex predator. Like we saw on the To Catch a Predator, you know, remember the series? He behaves exactly the same way as any of those men. And I have posed online before as young girls, 14, 15 years old. And the behavior from sex predators toward me was exactly what Wiener did. They start out with just, hello, how are you doing? But they quickly descend into sex acts. Then they go from describing sex acts to them saying, I want you to do this to yourself. And he went right to that. He got on Skype, do this to yourself. He started

talking about penetration. He also talked about rape fantasies with us. So we're not even just talking about molestation. We're talking about online rape. So he's willing to go to that level. The next thing he's going to say is, when can we meet? And he's not going to say it to just that one girl, because when I was online posing, I would have 20 guys coming up and they would be not only talking to me, but they'd be talking to 10 other girls at the same time, looking for the one who would fall for it as quickly as possible. Because they don't want to waste time with actually just having a conversation. They want the sex part of it. So they will, they will be online with how many girls, you know, and then they're going to look for the one who's going to say yes. And he got this girl already to that point. He's going to go back. He's going to

try to meet up with a girl because that's what he wants. He's a sex predator and he will rape. So, I mean, the fact that he got such a slap on the wrist and put him right back out in society he put a child sex predator back out there and and that's a fact scott kimbler investigative reporter joining us scott kimbler as a matter of fact uh what pat brown is saying is resounding in my mind because didn't they argue in court at one point, Scott, that, well, wait, he's not just targeting a girl, a minor girl. He was texting, sexting 19 different women at the same time. I mean, didn't they argue that? And how does that help anything?

Yes, he has quite a history of this sexting with young girls. And not only that, he took on personas when he was online doing this, the personas of Carlos Danger and T-Dog. Okay, whoa, wait, wait, wait, wait. Carlos Danger is his handle online? Carlos Danger and T-Dog. T-Dog. Okay, Mark, Mark, I know this is not a laughing matter. I have dealt with so many child molestation victims.

Right now, can I just hone in on him calling himself Carlos Danger, Mark Klass? Can I just look at that for just 30 seconds? Carlos Danger. Well, is this subliminal? Because certainly there's danger involved, isn't there? I mean, there's danger involved to any future victims. There's danger involved to the individuals that he's texting, not to mention the harm and danger that he's creating within his own family unit.

It's just horrible, this man. You know, when you said family unit, I'm just thinking about the little boy who is now his dad is going to jail. I'm sorry, Scott Kimball, go back to what you were saying. Scott Kimball with me, investigative reporter, T-Dog and Carlos Danger. Okay, what were you saying? He does have just a long history of doing this. It would appear he is online doing this all the time, or at least he was in this period.

And this is just a tremendous amount of time that is dedicated to this. So you don't have this singular event or even the two events, the one that kept him, the one that removed removed him from congress the one that cost him the mayor's race and and and this one you have just a long history of him doing a tremendous amount of this and it surprises me nancy when you look at the history of how much he has done this and these personas that he has online with the carlos danger and the t-dog that the judge at the time of sentencing almost seemed very sympathetic to him after lawyers argued that he is not a sexual deviant and not a criminal and is getting help, which is a little surprising that they would have referred to him not a sexual deviant when you look at what he did and the amount of doing it that he did. Well, not a sexual deviant. Thank you,

Scott Kimbler. You're right. They did keep saying that. Well, not a sexual deviant. Thank you, Scott Kimbler. You're right. They did keep saying that. He's not a sexual deviant. Well, I don't know what else is deviant. If FaceTiming, Snapchatting, Skyping a girl and asking her to strip down completely naked and fondle herself, I don't know what would be deviant if that's not deviant.

How can they call a sex predator not deviant? I don't want to be thrown in the pot with all the nut jobs, Alan Duke. But I was researching this judge. She was appointed to the federal bench 15 years ago by Bill Clinton. And Weiner's wife, Huma Abedin, is Hillary Clinton's best friend. So you've got a judge on the bench appointed by Bill Clinton who is sentencing Clinton's wife's best friend's husband. Now, that is, you know, something to mull. But I don't want to bring politics in it because this is not about

politics. But I do find it very interesting, Alan Duke, that they kept saying he's not a sex deviant. Yes, he is. Yeah, I think it's kind of clear that this is an addiction. He just can't stop it. I mean, he's got a beautiful wife. He's got a child, he's got a career, and he ruins it all by this continued behavior despite alleged therapy and pleas that he's going to change. Listen to this. I'm deeply sorry for the pain this has caused my wife, Huma, and our family, and my constituents, my friends, supporters, and staff. In addition, over the past few years, I have engaged in several inappropriate conversations conducted over Twitter, Facebook, email, and occasionally on the phone with women I have met online. I have exchanged messages and photos of an explicit nature with about six women over the last three years.

For the most part, these communications took place before my marriage, though some have sadly took place after. To be clear, I have never met any of these women or had physical relationships at any time. I haven't told the truth, and I've done things I deeply regret. I brought pain to people I care about the most, the people who believed in me, and for that I'm deeply sorry. I apologize to my wife and our families, as well as to our friends and supporters. I'm deeply ashamed of my terrible judgment and actions.

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heading to St. Louis, Missouri, October 7 to keep up the good fight to save children. And Pat Brown, author of 10 Missing and Murdered Child Cases that have nothing to do with Madeline McCann. 10 Missing and Murdered Child Cases that have nothing to do with Madeline McCann on Amazon. Pat, still writing, still working, still criminal profiling. And where would we be without investigative reporter Scott Kimbler?

Let's get back to it. Anthony Weiner, his wife, Huma Abedin, long-suffering, just absolutely beautiful woman, accomplished. She's the one working. I don't know what he's doing with all of his spare time. Well, wait a minute I don't know what he's doing with all of his spare time. Well, wait a minute. I do know what he's doing with all of his spare time. He's online sexting and getting a little girl in North Carolina to strip down naked and fondle herself. And what he said, I mean, Mark Klass, everyone is talking about this so clinically.

Nobody's getting down and dirty and addressing the facts. He said to this little girl, I would bust your, well, I'm not going to say that. I would bust your slang term for female genitalia so hard and so often you would leak and limp for a month or a week. Leak and limp. That's what he's saying to a minor girl as she's stripping down on video and fondling herself. And he gets 21 months behind bars. And not only that, with good time, you get about a 15% reduction. That's two to three months.

So that's 18 months behind bars. Mark Klass? Nancy, he's not even going in for well over a month from now. So goodness knows what he's going to be doing with his time. This guy has ignored red flag after red flag after red flag. It's torn his career asunder. It's torn his family apart. Yet he continues to behave in this manner. This man, as Pat said, is a very dangerous predator

and he needs to be dealt with in no uncertain terms. And that still is not happening. This is going to get worse and worse and worse. So Pat Brown, I take it that you didn't fall for all the crying and the snotting in court? His whining, yes. So poor Brown, I take it that you didn't fall for all the crying and the snotting in court? His whining, yes. So poor me, poor me, poor me. I'm really bothered by the term, by the way, sex addiction, because do we call rapists, oh, they have an addiction to sex. Do we call serial killers, somebody has an addiction to sex? No, we call them criminals and sex predators, because they are not just doing something that they like too many times. What they're doing is breaking the law. And that's what this man was doing. He's a criminal.

He's a child sex predator. And what he was doing to that girl, you see the violence in his conversation that you just pointed out, extremely violent. And let me tell you what comes after that. So this is unpleasant for people to hear. Fondling is a nice way to say what's going to come next. What's going to come next what's going to come next is object insertion it's going to be hurting herself with like clothes pins it's going to be doing things to herself which are going to be invasive and violent that is what he enjoys he's got rape fantasy so she's not being not touched you know he's actually forcing her to do things to injure and harm herself. So, you know,

he wants violent rape. And then that goes from there into the real world. So all I can say over and over again is criminal sex predator. That's what he is. He's nothing else but that. So all the other little labels we want to give him, we need to throw him away. Criminal child sex predator. You know, Mark Klass, a lot of attention has been focused on the girl victim. And Weiner is there in Upper West Side, New York society. And this girl is from a small town in North Carolina. And I can absolutely see why all the so-called intellectuals are poo-pooing this girl. And yes, she and her father did later appear on Inside Edition to tell their story. Take a listen to the victim on Inside Edition. How did you first come into contact with Anthony Weiner? It was through a direct message on the application Twitter. I just

sent him a nice message, just, hello, I'm a huge fan. Why Anthony Weiner? I knew that Hillary Clinton would be running for president in the year 2016, and I wanted to see if Anthony was still up to the same antics. How soon did it go from these niceties to him taking it to a different level? I knew that it was going downhill and really fast. I was disgusted. That doesn't bother me in the least. Does not bother me in the least, Mark Glass. Why is that always thrown up like she's done something bad?

Because I'm glad she went on the inside edition and told her story. I want other parents to know what can happen. It's called victim blaming, blaming Nancy. It's pure and simple. For some way or another, this 15-year-old girl is responsible for the crimes that were committed against her. And it's something that people have to be very careful about. It's insidious, and it's diabolical to blame victims of crime. We have to remember, this is a man in his 50s who has ignored red flag after red flag after red flag, going straight at a girl who has just turned 15 years old. There is criminal intent, there is criminal involvement, and it's all on

his part. You know, Pat Brown, criminal profiler, Jackie here in the studio is holding up a note that says, how could his wife not see what's happening? You know, we asked that question about a lot of wives of criminals, wives that, mafia wives, for example, you know, cartel wives. Well, they get something out of that relationship that they like, like a lot of money, for example, or political power or whatever. And in my opinion, they're enablers. And I don't have a lot of respect for that. I'm sorry. You can support a guy who's a sex predator in any way, shape or form. You got an issue, you know. And so, yeah, I can't be really nice about that because it's appalling to me that anyone would support a sex predator perhaps you know she wants what she wants out of life uh so she's down playing

what he's doing with this quote quote sex addiction addiction type of thing or perhaps you know she does have a young son so she doesn't want her her husband to be a child sex predator so down playing that does make her feel better that her son's father isn't such a dirt bag i suppose but all in all you're supporting a sex predator. So that's all I can say for her. I mean, sorry. I can't be nice about it. Well, I think you're right.

But I will say this. You know how when you love somebody, you are blind to their faults? Right. To that fault? Child sex predator? No. I'm sorry. Hold on.

Hold on. I don't think he was doing it right in front of her I'm done gone There's a limit to I can't see what's sitting in front of me What's sitting in front of me is a criminal I'm out the door immediately We'll not give him any kind of support

You're right, Pepper. You're right. I hate, I don't like blaming her. I don't like dragging her into it. But your point is very well taken. Take a listen to Huma Abedin in 2013, claiming in the famous words of Tammy Wynette, she's standing by her man. Listen. It was not an easy choice in any way, but I made the decision that it was worth staying in this marriage. That was a decision I made for me, for our son, and for our family. I didn't know how it would work out, but I did know that I wanted to give it a try. Anthony's made some horrible mistakes,

both before he resigned from Congress and after. But I do very strongly believe that that is between us and our marriage. We discussed all of this before Anthony decided to run for mayor. So really what I want to say is I love him. I have forgiven him. I believe in him. And as we have said from the beginning, we are moving forward. That has all changed because wisely, Huma Abedin, who was filed for divorce, was not in court for the sentencing. Mark Klaas, are you sitting down? Of course I'm sitting down. Okay, maybe you should lay down for this one. You know, they want Weiner to go to the Schuylkill CI, Correctional Institute. That is the one that monikered club fed. In fact, Forbes magazine called it one of the best prisons to go to,

one of the best places to go to prison. I mean, okay, go ahead and lay down when you hear this because I don't want you to pass out. You can play bocce ball, plant veggies in a veggie patch. There are no fences. You can actually walk out because there's no fences. Gyms, pool tables, libraries, TV room, a garden, treadmills, stairmasters, exercise bikes. Again, pool tables, basketball courts, baseball field, racquetball courts, a greenhouse, the veggie patch. Again, Forbes magazine calls it one of the best places to go to prison. That's what they want, Mark Klass. Well, that's not prison. That's a vacation, Nancy.

I'm sorry. I mean, it's about a double standard of justice in our country, and it's about privilege. Nothing more and nothing less. Upper West Side goes to the best prisons and probably will have the best psychiatrists, but it's still capable of committing the worst possible crime. Did I mention they have continental breakfast starting at 6 a.m.? Did I mention that? Nope.

Okay. This all goes down. November 6th will be his prison designation. I go back to him crying and snotting in court. He actually fixed his mouth to say, through his lawyers, that his son is the reason he should not do jail time. So he is using his minor child, a minor, to evade punishment for abusing a minor. Does that bass-ackwards to anybody but me, Pat Brown? Is it just me that finds that crazy? Oh, that's been used over and over in court.

In other words, don't punish my child by punishing its parent. But let's talk about how much he cares about this child. Remember that picture of him lying next to his son, which he sent out, the porn picture? I mean, who takes a picture of their private part next to your own baby? I mean, how disgusting is that? I mean, he didn't even care

that his own baby was in the porn picture. You know, that's how much he cares about his son. So I'm sorry. I think people don't recognize that perhaps this guy has a psychopathology that's way worse than people want to admit. Because if he cared about his son, if he cared about his wife, if he cared about human beings, if he cared about this young girl, he wouldn't be a child sex predator. I mean, that's just a fact. I mean, just because he isn't a serial killer, that people can say, oh, a serial killer, he's a psychopath. Well, what about this guy? Really?

He's a child sex predator. What would you want to call him? You know, I'm going to put him in the same category. Well, one thing I don't get, Mark Klaas, is the feds are usually pretty harsh on anything to do with like child porn or providing obscene materials to minors. This was the offense he pled guilty to, transferring obscene material to a minor he pled to. So there's no doubt he did it. He pled guilty to one count, even though we know there are likely dozens at least of the same counts. The statutory max on this one crime is 10 years. This kind of leniency on the part of U.S. attorneys is really unheard of.

What do you make of it, Mark Klass? Well, I don't think it's unheard of at all. Again, this is the benefits of privilege, Nancy. Remember Mark Foley, the congressman from West Palm Beach, Florida, who was busted enticing congressional pages? He was trying to do the same thing the congressional pages at Wiener was doing, and he was able to go back to his home community and face no justice at all. So if you're positioned in such a situation that you can benefit from these types of privileges, you're going to be

able to benefit from them and you will get a slap on the wrist. And again, it's a very dark road this man is going down. And unless somebody starts taking this seriously, it's going to get worse and worse and worse. You know, Mark Klass, founder of Klass Kids, tireless victims advocate, a crime victim himself. Mark, I want the last word to go to you on this story. Well, Nancy, we have to take these kinds of crimes against children very seriously. In many ways, we are taking them more seriously now than we have in the past. But I'm beginning to see a crack in the dam. I'm beginning to see people ease back on the idea of punishing criminals and not being so concerned about the needs of victims and about the protection

of children. And if we allow that to continue, then this guy is going to be just the tip of the iceberg. He needs to be punished. He needs to be treated, but he certainly has to be kept away from other children. Or again, and I've said this three or four times, it's going to get worse and worse and worse. And somebody might end up dead. Certainly people are going to end up in situations that they might not be able to extricate themselves from. Pat Brown, Mark Klass, Scott Kimler. We await justice in the prison designation on November 6.

A gorgeous 25-year-old girl, Julie Mott, succumbs to cystic fibrosis. Her family is devastated. They have basically fought for her life, their entire lives. The mom, the dad, the family, trying to make her live with cystic fibrosis. And this beautiful, she actually looks like a cover girl. She's long. I'm looking at her right now. Long blonde hair, big brown eyes.

She's so stylish and everything she has. She passes away and the family is devastated. But that's not the end of the story. Then, out of the blue, at the funeral home, Julie's body disappears. Yes, her body disappears from the funeral home. And let me add a few little facts to that just to throw a monkey wrench in the work. The hinges on her coffin are busted, are broken. The hinges are broken. The coffin is still there in the funeral home in a hallway. Her body's gone. Someone actually goes into her coffin, breaks it open and takes out her lifeless body. And as of right now,

no clue as to where is Julie. I mean, on top of everything to have her body taken. Scott Kimbler is joining me, Crime Stories investigative reporter. Scott, what happened? When I see everything about this story, it would fall under the category of completely strange. At the funeral home, you have the family, of course, grieving, but you also have this obsessive ex-boyfriend that was there. Sort of just messed up the entire mood of the funeral. And then after the funeral, they realize that the body is gone. And not only is it gone, the cart that it rides on is leaned over. You know, that's a fact. I didn't know, Scott Kimber, that the cart was all bent up. That adds another fact to this scenario. There's so many wrinkles in it. Pat Brown, criminal profiler, you know, to say criminal profiler to Pat Brown really doesn't do her justice. Let me

just introduce these with me. Wendy Russell Weiner, death care industry expert. Scott Kimbler, investigative reporter. Mark Klass, need I say more, crime victim advocate. And Pat Brown, criminal profiler. To Pat Brown, Pat, I don't understand how this happened. Well, you know, there only seems to have been one real suspect, and that is the ex-boyfriend who's the stalker. I mean, this guy stalked her in real life. Then she dies. He stalks her to the funeral. Then he stays after the funeral.

And then you're going to wonder who else would want to take her body. I mean, really, at that moment in time, it seems a little strange that anybody else in the funeral home would suddenly decide, I've just got to have this beautiful woman's body. I mean, it's just a little... I agree. So you have to think that he came back and paid somebody to let him in there. And I'm sure that's what the police have been looking at. Who did he pay off? There's no video. So did he pay off somebody to let him come back and steal her body? I can't think of anything else that could have happened. You know, to Wendy Russell Wiener, death care industry expert, you know, I was just telling the story. When I met Wendy, she practically had

nothing on. I mean, okay, I'll tell the rest of the story. We were in a swimming pool. We did not meet at a highbrow legal function. I had the twins on vacation at the beach and struck up a conversation with a lady that had girls of her own. And it turned out to be she is one of the top experts in her field. Wendy Russell, Wiener Death Care Industry expert. Wendy, I don't get how this whole thing happened. I mean, we've got two alternatives. One, we've got the idea that Pat Brown is floating

and the way she analyzes it makes a lot of sense. This guy stalked her in life. He called her obsessively. In fact, he called the funeral home 200 times in one day. Okay, just so you know, that's what I'm talking about. Obsessive. And she broke up with him and he came to the funeral. The family told him to leave. And there, while Pat's right, there's not video of the moment of what happened. He is caught on video later in the days following the funeral, coming back to the funeral home.

And he is being prosecuted for criminal trespass. But, Wendy, I mean, it just makes sense to me. If he had the body, why would he be coming back to the funeral home days later, as if he's looking for clues to find her? What do you think, Wendy? Was there some sort of a mix-up? You know, Nancy, it doesn't seem as though the remains were confused with another set of remains, as some have suggested. It doesn't appear that this is what you would call a mix-up

with regard to the body. But why do you say that? Why do you say that, Wendy? Because I'd rather think it was a mix-up, although I don't like that idea either, as opposed to someone taking the body for obviously odd purposes. failure of communication or some sort of mishap that occurred at the funeral home relates to the fact that the remains were taken apparently before the business hours of the funeral home even concluded. So between the time that the funeral ended and the close of business that day, that's the time period in which the police think that the remains were taken. And of course, if the employees of the funeral establishment had something to do with the removal of the remains from the casket, you wouldn't expect to see broken hinges. You know what? You're right. That's the one fact, Wendy, that I keep coming back to, the broken hinges.

And so you would have expected that if employees were involved, they would have known how to open a casket, which can be opened. But in this circumstance, we've got broken hinges. We don't have any evidence that after the funeral home closed, that there was any re-entry to the funeral establishment after hours or anything of that nature, what we end up with is a casket with broken hinges still in place where it was awaiting transport to the other facility, other death care facility that was involved. And ultimately, you know, the remains, the remains are simply gone. Take a listen. Julie's mother says she's absolutely devastated and begging for help.

This selfish person who took her could not have loved her any more than I do. I need her back, please. We ask that you please, please return our Julie to us. Her final wishes are very important to her family to complete them. It is the last thing we can do for her. And now to our special guest, Mark Klass, founder of Klass Kids, a tireless advocate for victims' rights, who has been on a mission since the kidnap and murder of his beautiful daughter, Polly. Mark, as I always say, and I use you in so many arguments, you are the gold standard. Whenever I have a victim's family behaving strangely, I'm like, look at Mark Klass. Look at how he behaved from the word go

when he found out Polly was missing. That is what I would expect of a victim's family. Mark Klass is the gold standard and has led the fight for victim's justice for so many years. Mark, you gotta keep going, because I don't know what we would ever do without you. You just gotta keep going. I know you've got the weight of the world on your shoulders, man, but you gotta keep climbing uphill.

Right now, you just heard Julie Mott's mother begging, begging. What does this mean to a victim's family? Oh, Nancy, thank you for the kind words. You know, this mother transports me back to those dark days when Polly was in a funeral home and she was in a little tiny casket and we were preparing to cremate Polly. And some of the deepest emotions I've ever felt in my life were sitting alone with my daughter's remains in the funeral home. It didn't last long, maybe 15 minutes, maybe half an hour, but I had never felt so close yet so distant at the same time in my entire life.

It's devastating what's happened here. But I take a little exception to a few of the things that I've heard so far. I find it really difficult to believe, Nancy, that during operating hours, while there are still people in the funeral home, and most funeral homes aren't gigantic establishments, they tend to be rather small, that somebody would somehow get into her coffin, break open her coffin, tip over the cart that the coffin was sitting on, sling her over their shoulder, and run out without being detected. That makes absolutely no sense to me at all. Furthermore, it really makes no sense to me that the boyfriend would continually call the funeral home, continually call the family, continually do

everything he seemingly is able to do to find out what happened to her remains. I suspect that there might be something even more nefarious going on. I suspect that there might be not collusion, but that there might be something going on with either one of the employees at the funeral home itself or the subcontractor whose job it was to collect her remains and cremate them after business hours, after the establishment had closed down because nobody broke in. No alarms were sounded whatsoever. This is a mystery. This is a mystery that goes, I think, beyond the boyfriend himself. Yeah. And why, I mean, Mark,

you and I and Pat have analyzed literally hundreds, if not more, probably over the years, thousands of cases together. I mean, why would he keep going back if he had the body? This is after her body disappears, he's caught on video coming back. And they finally had to issue a warrant to keep him away from the funeral home. That doesn't make sense to me. If he had the body, he would keep coming back. This is what we know. After the memorial service, but before her body was transferred to the crematorium, the funeral home, quote, lost possession of Julie's body. To this day, it's unable to explain how the body goes missing. There were searches, mission park

officials, volunteers searched parks, wooded areas for any clue to find her, completely unsuccessful. You know, Mark, class with me, the way you described that moment, I couldn't help but in my mind go back to two very stark and different moments. First, when my fiancé's funeral occurred after he was murdered, I walked in to the overwhelming smell of carnations, which to this day, I can't, they make me physically sick to smell to this day. And at a distance, I saw his profile in a casket and I passed out. That was as a girl.

All right. Fast forward years later, my dad, as you know, Mark, recently passed away. And I felt those moments that you described with Polly just sitting there with him. I didn't want them to close the casket. I didn't want it to be over. When they took him to bury him, I tried to walk away and kept going back. I didn't. I couldn't stand to see him buried. But those moments in that funeral home, I will never forget it.

And then to have this happen, I just don't know which way to turn from here. But Pat Brown, criminal profiler, you've heard what Mark Klass just said. Who would take her body? What person would take her body? in the proper way, there should be no damage done to anything. It doesn't make any sense. I can understand if they moved it and something went wrong and somebody lost it or whatever. They shouldn't have that damage to the casket. And as far as the boyfriend goes, hey, look, he's a stalker. You cannot predict how he's going to behave. He may have taken that body, and he still may be hounding them because it amuses him or maybe because he wants it to look like

he doesn't know what happened. So he's, look, I don't he wants it to look like he doesn't know what happened. So he's look, I don't know what happened to her. I don't know what happened to her. So he calls and calls and calls that that doesn't prove he wasn't involved. So I have a problem with the fact there was her particular body that disappeared and there was damage done. That to me shows somebody came in who wasn't didn't have the ability to move her in the right way. And I don't understand why anybody who specifically worked for the funeral home and put their hands on it would have done that incorrectly. So I still say they got to look back at who was involved. There's a whole criminal profiling of the person that would take a dead body.

Staff members at the funeral home didn't discover her body missing until the day after the service as they prepared to transfer it to the crematorium. Police insist it was taken within a three-hour window at the end of the service, between that and the end of the business day. Tip line 210-225-8477. Wendy Russell Weiner, death care industry expert. What can be done now? Just allow the police to continue their investigation. There's really nothing from a death care regulatory perspective that can be done at this point. It seems as though the police have initiated an investigation. I know this is not as fresh an investigation as others, but as new facts come to light and as information becomes known,

there's always a bit of an increased interest, and that can reignite the investigation. In terms of the funeral establishment and the other death care licensee that were involved, the state will continue to oversee the regulation of both of those licensees and will take appropriate action if it later turns out that they were involved. Last question. You know the funeral home contracted with another company to actually move the body? What about

the fact that that company had mixed up another two bodies just recently? This isn't their first offense. I understand that that is the situation. There doesn't appear to be any evidence of a mix up in this particular scenario. Remember, when remains are mixed up, if there is a confusion about the records related to human remains, there is typically, not typically, there is always more than one set of remains involved. You think you have one set of remains, but really you have another. In this situation, we don't have a second set of remains that would have been tied into a mix-up in this situation. That we know of. True, that we know of.

But the evidence so far has not revealed that there is any kind of a mix-up. And you would have expected to have seen records that would have indicated that there was some kind of a miscommunication or a mix-up. Right. If, in fact, that had happened. Well, that leads me to the reality. If it's not a mix-up and there was an intentional theft of this young girl's body, and what is somebody doing with her remains? Nancy Grace, Crime Stories, signing off.

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