Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - BREAKING NEWS in Jonelle Matthews search: 12-year-old girl goes missing after school pageant

Episode Date: October 19, 2020

Jonelle Matthews, 12, disappears from her family home in Greeley, Colorado, after a school concert. Footprints are found outside the home. Nothing is disturbed inside, but Jonelle is gone. Decades later, her body is found in 2019, but police are no closer to solving the crime. Now there's been an arrest. Who killed Jonelle Matthews?Joining Nancy Grace today: Ashley Willcott - Judge and trial attorney, Anchor on Court TV, www.ashleywillcott.com   Dr. Daniel Bober - Forensic Psychiatrist, Chief of Psychiatry Memorial Regional Healthcare Systems, Assistant Clinical Professor at Yale University School of Medicine, follow on Instagram at drdanielbober Rorbert Crispin; Private Investigator “Crispin Special Investigations”  www.crispinsinvestigations.com  Joe Scott Morgan - Professor of Forensics Jacksonville State University, Author, "Blood Beneath My Feet" featured on "Poisonous Liaisons" on True Crime Network Levi Page - Investigative reporter Crime Online  Leigh Egan - Crime Online Investigative Reporter Stewart Jacoby - former Reporter KMGH TV Denver Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

You're listening to an iHeart Podcast. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. A 12-year-old little girl sings for the choir and then goes missing, seemingly vanishing into thin air. On December 20th, 1984, Janelle Matthews attended a church, excuse me, a school choir concert about a block and a half from where we stand right now. She was driven home to her West Greeley home by her family friend, walked into her house, and that was the last time she was seen alive. By the time her father arrived home an hour later, Janelle was missing. What ensued was a 35

year long investigation into her disappearance. President Ronald Reagan mentioned Janelle by name in a speech in 1985. Her picture and her identifying information was one of the first to be on the milk cartons that were put out in all of the schools nationwide by the National Child Safety Council. Numerous searches were conducted in northern Colorado. Nothing from those searches ever led to any answers about Janelle's disappearance. Guys, I don't understand how a family friend can drive the child home. The father gets there one hour later and she's gone. Joining me, an all-star panel to break it down and put it back together

again. First of all, judge and trial lawyer and mom, anchor at Court TV, Ashley Wilcott. You can find her at ashleywilcott.com. Dr. Daniel Bober, forensic psychiatrist, chief of psychiatry, Memorial Regional Healthcare Systems, clinical professor at yale you can find them on insta at dr daniel bober robert crispin private investigator crispin special investigations dot com professor forensics jacksonville state jacksonville state university author of blood beneath my feet on amazon and now star of a new hit show, Poisonous Liaisons on True Crime Network, Joseph Scott Morgan, CrimeOnline.com investigative reporter Levi Page, and CrimeOnline.com investigative reporter and journalist Lee Egan.

But first, I want to go to former reporter KMGH-TV Denver, Stuart Jacoby. You know, Stuart, I want to thank you so much for being with us formally right there, KMGH-TV. What was the feeling in the community in those very first days? There just seemed to be this silence around the home from the first day and even in the weeks that followed because the entire community was simply shocked that this beautiful 12-year-old girl should simply vanish without a trace. And there were no signs of a struggle. So if she had been abducted, it was obvious to all of us that it would have been by somebody

that she knew and trusted. But she was simply gone. You know, to Lee Egan, CrimeOnline.com, investigative reporter and journalist, Lee, why is it, and you and I have covered this a million times, and I've tried a case like this, where when a young girl this age, 12, 13, this time Janelle's just 12 years old, goes missing, everybody says, run away, and it's kind of chalked off

that she'll eventually be heard from and she'll be found. Lee, tell me about when the dad got home, what was the scene in the home and where had she been, Lee Egan? She was a singer. She loved to sing. And she was at a middle school choir concert. Her father was at a basketball game with her older sister at a nearby high school an hour earlier than the basketball game. So she comes home, her friend Deanna and her father. Hold on, Leigh Egan, one second. Right there to Robert Crispin, PI at Crispin Special Investigations. I'm glad to hear what Leigh Egan just told me because you know, Robert, and tell me right, wrong, disagree, doesn't matter. I just

want to know what you think. The father is the one that finds her missing. The father comes home. And in most situations, we look immediately at the family, i.e. the older brother, the crazy uncle, the cousin that's living there without a job, or the father. And what Lee Egan is just telling me, the father has an alibi. He was at a ball game, I think she said basketball game, with the sister. So this time we can cross the dad out. Why do we always start with the family, Robert Crispin? Well, obviously, it's the family's worst nightmare or the parents' worst nightmare to come home and find their child missing. But why do we focus there first? We focus there first because they have the most knowledge of the child. They have

the most knowledge of the activities with inside the home. And as an investigator, we want to talk to those people right away because a trained investigator immediately is going to pick up something that's not right. They're going to pick up something that's wrong, an incorrect statement, a sense of they're trying to hide something. So immediately they go right to the family. He's got an alibi. That's great. We move on to the next one. We start talking to the neighbors.

We start talking to the brother, the sister, the mom. Exactly. Start moving out. Robert Crispin, Private Eye Crispin Special Investigations is right. Plus, Dr. Daniel Bober, forensic psychiatrist. You can't argue with stats. Yeah, absolutely, Nancy. More often than not, it's the intimates. It's what your previous guest said about them having the most knowledge of the patterns, the lifestyles and the comings and goings. So that's always who they look at. Totally.

And I mean, that aside, just statistics. If you don't start with the nuclear family, you're mishandling the investigation. Back to you, Lee. So the dad gets home from the basketball game with his sister. And then what? And then everything looks completely normal. He noticed that Janelle's shoes and her shawl were sitting next to a space heater. And he said that's usually what she does when she gets home and wants to watch TV.

She'll put her stuff by the heater, turn it on, and watch TV. So he didn't think anything out of the ordinary until she didn't show up 30 minutes, still wasn't there an hour, still wasn't there. Then he became worried. But I'm curious why he didn't notice immediately there's her shoes if it's cold outside and she's not in the house where the hey is she straight back to steward jacobi former reporter kmgh tv denver um when you first looked at the story is it true that many people thought she was a runaway? What did you think? She had just vanished. And I think that that was the mystery of the whole process.

She was this beautiful girl was just simply gone. And at the time, you know, the family had very strong faith. And so there was no discussion about her being a runaway. Nobody ever thought that she was going to be a runaway. She had a solid life in school,

solid life in church, solid family life. There was just, that just was not in the picture. She simply had vanished. It was just like, you know, oh my gosh, what has happened here? And the police were as baffled as anybody else, and they were not able to put forth a whole lot of information because they just didn't know themselves. You know, Stuart Jacoby with me, formerly KMGH-TV Denver, who covered the case from the very beginning. You heard Lee Egan mentioning about the shoes and the shawl near a heater. Did you go out in the field

to try to find Lee, Stuart? We didn't want to leave the scene. We were outside the residence, and the police had gathered us in a particular area, and we didn't really want to leave there at this point in time. When the friends and neighbors and so forth began searching in the area, then we would go out and get other pictures. But that didn't come for a while. She simply was gone. They had come home. She had been there. It was obvious. Her shoes were by the chair. There was that wrap, which I think was a shawl that was over the chair. And she simply was not there. And it was, she had just vanished. And everybody was shocked.

Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Where is a 12-year-old little girl out in this cold temperature outside? She clearly got home from the middle school choir event. Her shoes were there that she had worn that night. Her shawl was there that she had taken with her, but no Janelle. With me, an all-star panel. Let me know when we get Ashley Satellite back up. We've got her good. Back to you, Stuart Jacoby. What type of area is Greeley, and was the community involved? To have a child simply vanish the way that she had vanished was just absolutely unbelievable to everybody. And what I remember was how shocked

the entire community was. And her friends, of course, immediately began this search, and the search eventually grew into several hundred people. And so every day we were over there with our cameras and taking pictures as people were searching. And eventually, as I recall, it wasn't too long a period of time before they really stopped searching because it just seemed to be fruitless that she was going to be found. Oh, that must have broken the family's heart. And to you, Ashley Wilcott, Judge, trial lawyer, Anchor Court TV at Ashley Wilcott dot com. These are just regular civilians. I mean, if it were you or I, we might know to immediately get to the media, do our own searches, put up posters, contact all the databases, start retracing steps, look for the iPhone. Where's my iPhone?

I mean, we would know so many things to do, Ashley, but people that are not in our business of crime don't know what to do. Absolutely. And keep in mind, this was 35 years ago, so they didn't have cell phones and iPhones that you could look up the history and see where your child was. In addition to that, in a small community like this where you think, oh, wait, so did she go with a friend? Maybe she's with so-and-so. Let's just see if she went over to her house. This is really odd, but you would not think something nefarious from the get-go. Who would? I think that it would be an innocent, well, gosh, head-scratcher. Where'd she go? Let's figure out where she is versus this is a scene of a crime, potentially. Okay, to you, Levi Page, Greeley, tell me about the jurisdiction. I'm trying to figure out what the weather would be on that night.

So, Nancy, it would be really cold. I mean, it's Colorado. Levi, for Pete's sake. I know that. Come on, man. You're the investigative reporter. I'm just a lawyer. Really cold?

Uh-uh. More. More. That's what their winters are like, Nancy. What was it, snowing? Snowy. I think it had snowed. I mean, she was wearing a shawl.

She was wearing shoes. There was a fire in the home, a heater that she placed her shoes and her shawl in front of. She was known to sit in the chair where her clothes that she had left behind were found. You know, that's reminding me so much of my daughter because she's 12, like yours, Ashley. And when it's cold outside, she runs in and stands by the fire. She's a snuggle bunny. She wants to get warm and she will wear layers and layers and layers of clothes, socks, bedroom shoes, the whole shebang. Joe Scott Morgan, Levi Page has told me a critical piece of information, and that was it had been snowing. Remember when JonBenet Ramsey went missing and snow

played such an important factor in the investigation? Explain my thinking, Joe Scott. Well, if you've got snow, Nancy, there is a high likelihood that anybody that had access to the home might very well leave prints uh in the snow for instance uh shoe prints and you know that that alone is a significant piece of evidence in this case because they did in fact say that there were footprints in the snow but also you go back to the environmental factors and you begin to think about, you know, this girl is accustomed to this to this environment. She knows better than to leave the house unprotected. You're going to tell me she's going to walk out of the house barefooted. I don't think so.

So that means that there would be something that would draw her to a location where maybe she was spirited away in some way. And that is a big indicator in this case. And it kind of gives us a profile of maybe what had happened. So no tracks in this note that we know of. And back to you, Lee Egan, CrimeOnline.com, investigative journalist, investigative reporter and journalist. What else can you tell me about the scene? Because I'm wondering, was there any forced entry? Was anything a disarray?

Did she leave a note behind? Had there been an argument with her family? Did she have another little 12-year-old boyfriend or friend girl at school that they ran away together on a lark? What did we learn from the scene? Absolutely no arguments from the family. She did leave a note behind. It wasn't saying she was going anywhere anywhere but her father was a principal at an elementary school one of the teachers called the home and said he was going to be sick the next day

so she wrote down a note for her father and left it by the phone which let them know that she definitely was there you know she had time to leave the note take a phone call before she disappeared it gives me the feeling that somebody, Jackie, was watching her, watching her get out of the car, watching her come home from the school singing event, seeing her take off her shoes. As I recall, her like leotards had been left there too, that she had taken off possibly wet leotards in the snow and was trying to get warm. Can you imagine this perv watching her take the phone call or maybe even just as he was about to enter? Here's the phone ring and the pauses. I want to go back out to special guest Stuart Jacoby, former reporter, KMGH-TV, Denver.

Stuart, again, thank you for being with us. At the time, did you develop a theory about what happened to her? There were so many theories being advanced at that time because there was almost an epidemic of missing children who went missing with all of these conspiracy theories and everything that was going on. And people were trying to link them to maybe serial kidnappers or something like that. But when we developed contact with her family, she became more real to all of us. And so we were certainly brought down to earth when we began to talk to the family and they began putting out appeals for people to look for their missing girl. You know, I'm just thinking this through and it happens to me a lot. Dr. Daniel Bober, forensic psychiatrist, we cover our stories and and I investigate it and prosecute it. You can read police reports, supplemental reports, news articles.

But when you start dealing with the family that's searching for their child, not only does it become real, but you kind of start putting yourself in their position. What would I do if my daughter or my son just suddenly was gone? What went wrong? Did they do anything wrong? Was there something they could have done? Why does that happen to us? It only gets real when you put yourself in their shoes or you meet the family, Dr. Bober. I think you develop that empathy, Nancy, when it all hits home. And I think when you start speaking to the family, then it just becomes real. It's not just another file on a desk. It's a real person. And you relate to it in a way when you think about the same thing could happen to you.

So there, but by the grace of God, go on. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Guys, we're talking about a beautiful 12-year-old girl that goes to sing in a holiday special at school, junior high. She's in the seventh grade, I think. She gets home. The parent of another child singing brings her home, drops her, watches her go in. Dad gets home from a basketball game with sister. One hour later, she's gone.

Her shoes, her leotards, her shawl she wore that night because they all had a certain thing they were going to wear to the concert. They're all there. She's even taken a phone message. But no Janelle. Back to Stuart Jacoby, former KMGH-TV Denver reporter. Did you find the reporting on Janelle to be more personal than most of your cases? It was just one of those things where just, you know, nobody knew what happened. And that was the shock of all of it was that she was just simply gone. And she was a beautiful girl. She'd been on television singing Christmas carols. And

we all knew, you know, we were all parents ourselves. And so we were always putting ourselves kind of in the picture, so to speak, that, you know, this was somebody's child. And we as reporters were trying to do everything that we could to keep her name out there. And family and friends, of course, wanted to keep her name out there. And it was amazing then the following March when President Reagan was, you know, instituting the Center for Missing and Exploited Children. That was a huge, huge help to the case. And I was just wondering, Stuart Jacoby,

at the beginning, did you think the case of Janelle, her missing case, would be solved quickly? I think we thought, yeah, she's going to be found. Somebody will know and will come forward. And, of course, with any kind of story, and, of course, investigators approach it the same way, is that somebody knows what happened. All you have to do is find the person that knows what happened, and eventually the case will be solved. And I think from that standpoint, yes, we

probably were thinking, well, somebody knows what happened, and they'll step forward, and the case will be solved. But it didn't turn out that way. Straight out to Lee Egan, CrimeOnline.com investigative reporter. Lee, as the years passed, the family and others seemingly gave up hope. What was being done to try to find her? Well, the parents, they went all out trying to find their daughter a $20,000 reward, flyers to every city in the nation. They didn't give up until many years later. They kind of, they didn't give up, but they kind of put it to rest is what they said. And they took her Menudo posters off the wall.

They opened her Christmas presents because they wanted their older daughter to go on with her life. At this point to you, Joseph Scott Morgan, what should the police be doing as the months pass? Well, you know, listen, Nancy, back during that period of time, you know, we're going all the way back to 1984. There was not the network in place that that exists now. And so everything kind of starts locally and it kind of ends there many times.

You know, there is, you can push things out to the FBI and try to help, you know, and to the state level, try to get information out. But unless you stay on this case day in and day out, and we've seen this time and time again. Unfortunately, they're going to fade into the background. Well, I guess they did everything they were supposed to do, which is take fingerprints at the scene, try to go through her room. She probably didn't have anything like a laptop or an iPhone then. But to find out if there had been any communications with friends at school, ask her best friend, look at the windows. Had there been forced entry? They did all of that, and then a sudden change in the case.

Take a listen to Tori Mason, KCNC, CBS4. Oil field workers found human remains in Weld County Tuesday night, about 24 miles from the Matthews home in Greeley. Evidence at the scene helped investigators determine the remains belong to 12-year-old Janelle Matthews. According to GPD, there was red and blue clothing similar to what Janelle was wearing the night she went missing. Now the investigation remains active and Greeley police says they're chasing tips on a suspect. Trying to figure out what the red and blue fibers meant. How far away was this?

We know it was 24 miles, but what kind of area was it found in? Apparently an oil field where construction workers were laying pipe. Straight out to you, Levi Page. Tell me about the discovery of Janelle's body and how many years had passed when this was discovered. So Nancy, 35 years had passed. And in July of 2019, a construction crew had found her body at an oil construction site 20 miles from her home. And officials confirmed the remains were Janelle's and an autopsy was performed on her body and she died of a gunshot wound to the head. A 12-year-old girl dies of a gunshot wound,

I believe? That's absolutely correct. One single gunshot wound to the head. You know, to you, Dr. Daniel Bober, forensic psychiatrist, what does that tell you about the killer? That he, and no offense, gentlemen, but we know it's got to be a guy, because it always is, almost always, to use an execution-style gunshot wound to a little girl, Bober? Well, I mean, Nancy, what can you really say? I mean, it's absolutely horrific. I don't know. You're the psychiatrist. You tell me. I mean, to me, this signifies such a callous approach to this child that you could hold a gun to her head while she's alive and shoot her dead.

Yep, he executed her. Okay, I know that. But what can you tell me about the mind of a killer that would execute like mob style a little girl? Absolutely no feeling complete contempt for human life and no connection to her whatsoever.

Okay, now I see all that education and experience shining through. Maybe I should get my degree in DDS. That's pulling teeth because I had to just pull. I think it was on a knee right here. I had to pull out of Bober to get him like, tell me something, man, for Pete's sake. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace.

Right now we're going straight back to the disappearance and the ultimate discovery of the body of a 12-year-old little girl, Janelle Matthews, who disappeared from her Colorado home in 1984. The search for Janelle became a national cause. Even President Ronald Reagan discussed her on TV. Take a listen to Mark Salinger of KUSA Denver 9. Friends dropped Janelle off at her Greeley home after a choir concert. When her father got to the house later that evening, she was gone. Her shoes and a shawl were the only clues left behind. Ten years later, the Matthews family held a funeral service for their missing daughter. Still no arrests, no clues, and no closure. We realized that we haven't

haven't got complete finality here because we don't have a body or proof of something, but we would still we still want to go through and commit Janelle to the Lord and just say goodbye to her. 34 years after Janelle Matthews saw her family for the final time. I can assure you that we are going to be working tirelessly to bring justice to Janelle. A break in the case, even if it isn't yet solved. It was a big break in the case when her body is found and those red and blue fibers were found on the body. Levi Page, there was a quilt missing? Yes, from the home and the fibers that were found at the site where her body was found

matched the fibers from this quilt that was missing from the home. Robert Crispin, private investigator, Crispin Special Investigations at CrispinInvestigations.com. When you get a fiber like that, what do investigators try to do with it? Oh, forensic evidence is just priceless in a case like this. They can take that back and they can tie it into maybe something else at the home, another piece of property or quilt or blanket or something of the same type that that was bought at the same time together. It's amazing evidence to tie back to a crime scene. You know, you're so right. And that's exactly what they did. Robert Crispin to Levi Page was Janelle wearing clothes. Were there any clothes there? I'm sure she was totally skeletonized, but what about clothing? Well, she was also last seen wearing a blue ski jacket, a red blouse, a dark gray sweater,

and there were fibers from those clothings that were also found at the scene as well. Joe Scott Morgan, you're the professor of forensics at Jacksonville State University and author. Question to you, do clothing items also decompose, degenerate, because now they're just fibers left behind? Yeah, that's going to be completely dependent upon what they're made up of and what I mean by that, Nancy. If it is a man-made fiber, a synthetic, as we call it, you think about things like rayon and those sorts of things, polyester, those are going to be more resilient than, say, naturally occurring fibers like wool or, say, for instance, cotton. So that's going to be a specific tieback. And if you get that

and you can identify the fiber, you can begin to kind of put in a framework of who the manufacturer is, what type of item it a framework of who the manufacturer is, what type of item it might have been. And, of course, that goes to identity, doesn't it? You know, you have mama, you have daddy that can actually say, yes, she did, in fact, have this kind of clothing. We bought this item for her. Or, hey, I remember giving this to her for a birthday present or maybe a Christmas present. And I guarantee you that night when she went to

go do the choir event, Ashley Wilcott, and I know for a fact you have to wear a certain thing, you know her parents knew what she was wearing. Like right now, I know what John, Dave, and Lucy have on because I laid it out for them. Okay, not Lucy because now she wants to pick her own outfit. But I generally know, I still know exactly what she has on. You know the parents knew what she was wearing that night. So when they hear gray sweater, can you imagine that feeling in their gut? A body's been found and there are remnants of a gray sweater in there. No, I agree with you, Nancy. Especially like you said, when you have an event and a child has to get dressed up. No, I agree with you, Nancy, especially like you said,

when you have an event and a child has to get dressed up for it, like a choir event, you do know what they're wearing. And after the fact, imagine, which I can't even imagine, you have a missing 12 year old child, your daughter is missing. What's one of the things you're going to eventually, you know, 10 years later, still missing at some point, you will have gone through every single thing in her room, in her closet, in the house, in her life, to grieve, to go through the process, to think, what have we missed? What did we not see? What could have happened to our child? And in that process, I believe you absolutely would know exactly what was missing and what she was wearing. I know also the significance to Robert Crispin, P.I.

Robert, so now we know she's dead. She hasn't been sex trafficked and is walking the streets of New York City with some thug beating her every day. We know that this child is dead. And her body is found just 24 miles from home. And she was still wearing the clothes she had on that night give me some quick deductions i mean you know nancy this you could be all over the map on this one um i disagree i think this tells me everything i need to know except for identity this is what it tells me joe scott mor. It tells me that she was killed the night,

most likely the night she was taken, that she was therefore buried most likely that night. And also it's someone in that community because they only went 20 miles away from the home. Yeah, you're right. And this person would have specifically known about this area, Nancy. This is not, this is not some kind of local location. This is isolated, Nancy.

They have to know about this area out there. Yeah, and I mean, Ashley Wilcox, remember Robert Blake has some crazy jury said he was innocent. Well, excuse me, not guilty.

You have a killer that is not driving a vehicle because they take the murder weapon and they drop it in the dumpster a few yards away from the body. Hello, and Blake is inside at a restaurant. It tells me the killer is from there. He didn't go far. Absolutely, and that's not unusual. That's not atypical. It's unusual if you have someone from across the nation who happens to drive by. Rather, what's more typical, if it's not someone that's related to the victim,

is that it's someone who is local, who knows the area, who knows the people, who knows where to dump the weapon. And also the way that she's killed. Statistics show that women very rarely kill children by shooting them in the left side. The head wasn't left side and the angle goes through execution style and burying the body in a grave. That is a male modus operandi statistically. And then straight to you, Lee Eagle and CrimeOnline.com. So now they figure out what we're figuring out is somebody local and they start looking for overlap.

In other words, whose lives overlap with this family's lives and who do they find, Lee? Nancy, they find a man named Stephen Dana Pankey. At the time, he lived around two miles from the Matthews home. According to the indictment, at the time, he did own a firearm. And he's been accused of watching the children walk home. So he was familiar with the children. Wasn't he a governor's candidate? He ran for governor in Colorado? In Idaho. Excuse me, Idaho. And he then moved to Colorado or turned up there and started watching

children go back and forth from school. Is that rightly? That is correct. And he did attend the same church as the Matthews. He was a member of the church until 1978, and then the Matthews family joined the church that same year. So he did have knowledge of the family. He lived two miles away, went to the same church, and how many times do you think he spied on this little 12-year-old girl? So, Lee Egan, where is Panky today? He's in jail.

What's the sentence? They arrested him last week on kidnapping and murder charges in connection with Janelle Matthews. We wait as justice unfolds for former governor's candidate Steve Pankey. Nancy Grace Crime Story signing off. Goodbye, friend. You're listening to an iHeart Podcast.