Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - DEAD PERSON HOLDS KEY? ASHA DEGREE, 9, DISAPPEARS FROM HOME IN MIDDLE OF NIGHT

Episode Date: September 18, 2024

Nine-year-old Asha Degree and her brother were sent to bed around 7 p.m., an hour earlier than usual, after the family home lost power. Their father, Harold, checked on them when he returned from work at midnight. When their mother, Iquilla, went to wake the children, Asha was gone. Iquilla and Harold searched their home frantically for her. Iquilla then knocked on a neighbor’s door and called Harold’s mother and sister. No one had seen Asha. Harold called 911 at 6:30 a.m. Police arrived 10 minutes later. By 8 a.m., nearly 100 volunteers were searching door-to-door and conducting grid searches. Authorities believe the 4th grader left home just before dawn. Witnesses saw Asha walking along Highway 18 in Shelby, North Carolina, a few miles from her home. A tipster reported that she may have gotten into a car. More than a year later, Asha's backpack, which she had packed with her favorite outfits, was found at a construction site 30 miles away. That was 24 years ago. The Cleveland County Sheriff’s Office has now confirmed that a recent search at 621 Cherryville Road is connected to Asha Degree. Nearly 50 investigators from the Cleveland County Sheriff's Office, the FBI's Evidence Response Team, and North Carolina SBI agents spent two days at the site with K9s. Several items of interest were seized for testing, including a green four-door sedan with rusted wheel wells, similar to the car the FBI had been seeking. Joining Nancy Grace today:  Kathleen Murphy - Raleigh, North Carolina, Attorney at  Mark Davis  - Former Sergeant Supervisor in Patrol Division with Cleveland Co. Sheriff Office Caryn L. Stark – Psychologist, Renowned TV and Radio Trauma Expert and Consultant; Instagram: carynpsych/FB: Caryn Stark Private Practice Rick Shaffer - Retired FBI Supervisory Special Agent Donnie Peeler and Dale Champion - Hosts of "Crack House Chronicles" True Crime Podcast See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

You're listening to an iHeart Podcast. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Does a dead person hold the key? Have the answers to a little girl who goes missing in the middle of the night? I'm talking about a nine-year-old little girl just scrubbed in sunshine, Asha Degree, who disappears from her home literally in the middle of the night. I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us.

In the early hours of Valentine's Day, why does a nine-year-old girl leave her home in the middle of a dark, stormy night? Why does a nine-year-old little girl leave home in the middle of the night? Now, when we hear that happens, I immediately suspect the family. Because statistically, when a child goes missing in the middle of the night, you can look right at mommy or daddy or auntie or uncle. But I don't believe that's the case here. Where is Asha? She had never run away from home. She had great grades at school. She was a little star, a star on the basketball court, very shy everywhere, but the basketball court never gave anybody a minute's trouble. This little girl has a million dollar smile. I don't understand what happened to Asha? Joining me right now are two guys that have been on this case. It's right in their own backyard from the beginning.

It's Donnie Peeler and Dale Champion. And if you're not familiar with them, I wish that you were because they are the hosts of Crack House Chronicles. Now, having been to plenty of crack houses myself as a prosecutor, I have mixed feelings about the title of your podcast. Host of CrackHouse Chronicles True Crime Podcast. But what I do like is what they're doing. First of all, listen to this. I remember it was roughly about 2.30 in the morning. I seen her go to the bathroom. I remember I heard her go to the bathroom. She had her pajamas on and she goes to the bathroom. I waited for her to come back into the room.

She got in the bed. I cut the light off and I went to sleep. You're seeing a Bryant degree on Facebook Live. He's talking about his sister, Asha. What more do we know? The night before Valentine's Day is stormy in Shelby. Around 7 p.m., the Degrees neighborhood loses power. Aquila Degree normally bathes the children before their 8 p.m. bedtime,

but with the power out, she decides to wake them up early tomorrow for baths before school. Harold Degree gets home from work around midnight and checks to make sure the children are asleep. Asha is still overcoming her fear of the dark and storms. Harold winds down in front of the TV and checks on the children again around 2 a.m. before going to bed himself. I'm just thinking about this nine-year-old little girl that is afraid of lightning and thunder outside. And the mom making sure they have their baths and they're in their PJs early on. I can remember at this age, I would have the children bathed and in their PJs when we ate supper at night. I'm just imagining little Asha being afraid of the storm. And listen,

I want you to hear more of what her brother O O'Brien, says. So my mama used to knock on the wall to wake us up. And she was like, y'all get up, boom, boom, boom. She was getting ready for work and whatnot. She said, where your sister at? I said, she in the bed. Like, you know, playing at the bed. I'm half asleep. I ain't trying to get up.

I thought my mom just couldn't see my sister. Like, me and my sister used to sleep with the blanket pulled over our head. Can't you just imagine that? Mom in the next room, okay, get up, get up, get up. And there's always such a rush in the mornings when everybody's trying to go to work and go to school and get breakfast and make sure all the T's across the I's are dotted before they go out the door. And that's what was happening that morning. So the brother O'Brien says, yeah, yeah, she's here. They shared a room as my twins did for many, many years as I did with my sister. But there's a very subtle but critical fact. Listen, I get up out of my bed, have sleep. OK, mom, maybe she went maybe she went in there to eat breakfast or something. Maybe she woke up

early because it wasn't new for us. We woke up early. I thought she was in there eating breakfast. At that point in time, it was like, what's going on? Where's Asha? What's going on? Where's Asha? And we're still asking that tonight. Where is nine-year-old Asha? And how could a dead person hold the key to her disappearance? This, as in the last days, more search warrants have been executed and we see an older model green sedan being towed away. Now, what does an older model green sedan, there it is, have to do with Asha disappearing from her own bed in the middle of the night? Okay, I've got the cart way in front of the horse. So, let's just start at the beginning and I'm going to do that with Donnie Peeler and Dale Champion, who've been on this case, the disappearance of Asha from day one. Gentlemen, thank you for being with us. I'll start with you, Donnie. Tell me what you understand happened the morning that her family realized she's not here. Where's Asha? Let's start right there. Asha disappeared. Her mom got up to give him a bath, like O'Brien said, and she was gone.

Wasn't in the house. Quilla, the mother, was walking the neighborhood, calling for Asha. Couldn't find her anywhere. And that's when they called the authorities to come in and help find Asha. Dale Champion joining us from Crack House Chronicles. How did you guys get involved in the case to start with? Well, that morning, actually, going to work, we came down by with that area, not knowing what was going on, and got stopped in a roadblock.

I thought it was like a general license check or something, but actually they were looking for the little girl. And that was really a shock to me because it was that morning, nothing going on. But later on, we just kept wondering what was going on. And then when we started this, what was going on. And then when we started this, this was just our main thing to find out what's going on with her and do as much as we could to figure out, you know, or just keep it in the news, you know. So you were actually, Dale Champion, partnered with Donnie Peeler on the case. Dale Champion, you were actually

stopped in a roadblock? Yes, ma'am. We were headed to work. We had to be at work at seven. And so i would come through there was probably a quarter two and uh yeah the police were stopping everybody coming down the highway 18 right there you know checking the cars and asking if you had seen anything they were looking for a little girl i was missing so they told you why they pulled you over right dale yeah they were having a roadblock they stopped everybody it was coming down through there yeah what would they say what did they say to you when they pulled you over well they just wouldn't stop because i'm and i was trying to you know dig to get my license out and they go no we don't need that we've had a girl

disappear this morning and they were looking as they were talking to us you know of course they're looking in the back seats and stuff car and they just said they wanted to know if we saw anything or you know while we were coming down the road on each on each side of the road or whatnot but in addition to donnie peeler and dale Champion from Crack House Chronicles True Crime, special guest Mark Davis is with us, former Sergeant Supervisor in Patrol Division with Cleveland County Sheriffs, the third officer on the scene.

Mark Davis, thank you for making time for us tonight. Mark Davis, tell me what you recollect from the scene. You know, I got the call early that morning. The parents said the child was missing. I sent two deputies initially to respond to the house and began our investigation. They called me shortly thereafter and said, you know, they had searched the house physically and we couldn't find the child. So I immediately started getting the resources on the ground that I needed to search for the child. And within an hour, an hour and a half, I had over 100 people on the ground starting a search. Mark Davis, what was your understanding as to how, you know, the first thing we have to do, the first thing, and this is based on statistics.

This has nothing to do with the nature or character of the family. You know, doesn't matter if they're nuns and priests and virgins or if they grew up in a crack house. It doesn't matter. You look first at the family. You look at their demeanor. You look at their stories. You separate them. You doesn't matter. You look first at the family. You look at their demeanor. You look at their stories. You separate them. You get their stories. Then you look at the stories you overlay to see if they all match or if they generally match because they're going to be different in a few minor inconsequential ways. You look at the scene. You look at the home. You look at the bed.

You look at the door. Everything. You look to see if there's social media, if the child has a phone or if they have social media. All of that matters. Did they take a bag or is the window open? Is the window cracked? Has there been a forced entry? All of that plays into your deduction. So tell me what was observed. I want to hear first about the demeanor of the family. The family, the mother and father

was what you would expect having a nine-year-old child missing. The mother was, you know, highly upset, you know, making phone calls, talking to neighbors, talking to people that lived around them, family members involved, getting everything going for us. They were very cooperative with law enforcement. The father, you could tell he had his own deep concerns about his daughter being missing. The household was a lived-in household, but a clean household. I wouldn't mind sitting down in that house and having a meal. It was what you would expect for a house with two children. The parents cooperated with us fully that morning, which, you know, as you say, we always have things that we have to question.

And we began questioning those parents. And, you know, you always look at the family first. But every time that we questioned everything that we went into that morning, the parents were cooperative. The parents were compliant. They assisted us every way they could. They wanted to find their little girl. Well, it tells me a lot. Straight out to renowned psychologist, TV radio trauma expert, Karen Stark. You can find her at Karenarenstark.com. Karen with a C, by the way, if you're looking for her. Karen Stark, as you and I both know, you look at the

family first. Then you go out. You look at then the aunties, then the uncles, and the cousins, and the grown cousins, then the neighbors, then the teachers. That's how it works. If you want to find this child alive, that's where you start, whether anybody likes it or not. But in every case where I've seen a child missing, you don't see mommy running up and down the street, banging on doors herself, trying to find the child along with the dad, completely cooperative. That normally doesn't happen when we later find out the parents are responsible. So just at first blush, that tells me a lot, Karen Stark. Well, it tells you that our usual suspects, the people that would be closest to her where everyone would look, they're not going to be the people that need to be found.

They are the people that actually are concerned about what happened. They don't have answers. So it's really clear that we have to look someplace else because where is Asia? Nobody in the family has done anything, and she just disappeared in the middle of the night. This little girl seemingly disappears in the middle of the night. Let me understand something Mark Davis, former sergeant supervisor in the patrol division, third officer on the scene, has a hundred guys on the ground within I

would say an hour after this child is reported missing. He observed the parents, he observed their emotions. Near hysterical, the mom looking for her and the father's deep concern. The home was not awry. Their stories matched. Tell me something, Mark Davis, when you have all the guys looking for her. What exactly were they doing? Now, we know what time she went to bed, and what time did the guys start their foot searches? Within a half hour of me being there, I had one of our canine officers on the scene

begin a search with our canines. You know, we're doing, you know, like you heard from Donnie and them, we're stopping cars on the main highway next to it. We're doing everything that we can to find this little girl. You know, the early hours are the most precious time. So we were frantically working. You know, we have emergency services in our county that works with us closely. I had them get fire department rescue on the way with search teams, things like that, to have those people on the ground to help us.

So, you know, we as far as at least within a mile to start with, you know, the first mile of that area to, you know, start, you know, ground searches for Asia degree. You know, we still didn't know. Our canine hit on a track, it went in a direction, and after a short while, it lost the track. And, but, you know, I was trying to get all of my resources in place to search for her within that neighborhood. Joining me, Rick Schaefer, former FBI Supervisory Special Agent.

Rick Schaefer, normally when a child goes missing, you hear me screaming about, why didn't they issue an Amber Alert? Why didn't they do this, that, this, the other thing? And I'm on them, you know, like a cheap suit. But Rick Schaefer, I can't go there today. I can't rage at what was done wrong because everything Mark Davis is saying, it happened. They got the canines out. They got a 100 guys going door to door doing grid searches immediately. He had guys out there pulling over cars, as you heard Dale Champion saying, at six o'clock in the morning,

630, trying to find Asha. I can't think at this juncture in the search of anything else they could have done. They were doing it all. That's correct. They did. It was commendable. When we arrived there, the police department, the sheriff's department had literally cultivated an army of not only law enforcement, but neighbors and citizens that were searching areas, knocking on doors. It was a remarkable response in a very short period of time. When I talked to Sheriff Crawford at the time, he asked if we could provide any resources to help, and absolutely, we said we would give him whatever we needed. We sent evidence response teams down there to help look inside the home. We had agents on the scene with the Sheriff's

Department to help them conduct any interviews, searches. We provided every resource we could because it was unimaginable that this beautiful little nine-year-old girl ventured out of her house in the wee hours of the morning in a very difficult environment. It was cold and raining in February, and it was just unimaginable that she voluntarily left that house and took the risk by herself at nine years old to just venture out. A devoted father checks on his two children before going to sleep. By the morning, his daughter is gone. Joining us in All-Star Panel, straight back out to Dale Champion, Donnie Peeler, Dale Champion.

Is this real? Because I'm hearing not just one witness, but multiple witnesses, more than one witness, not connected to each other, state they see a girl matching Asha's description walking along Highway 18. Is this true, Dale Champion? As far as we know, it is true. There was a guy, his name was Jeff Root. He was a driver for Sundrop Incorporated or Choice Drinks. And he said that he did see her and actually had turned his vehicle around not once, but twice to come back and actually seen her. And there was a lawyer who's doing some stuff on this and he said he's actually talked to jeff and he the guy is 100 sure that he saw her and even there was a moment

where they locked eyes and this guy can't get it out of his head and he knows it was her okay you know what to donnie peeler when you have more than one witness say the same thing. Or Donnie Peeler, I'm sure you've learned on Crack House Chronicles, when a witness has a level of detail, a story that is rich in detail. For instance, that he actually locked eyes with the girl. That's a detail you don't usually hear from a liar. I mean, you can. But details like that, details like I've never been able to get it out of my mind, details like I turned back around and looked at her. I'm sure it was her.

Those are details that enhance the credibility of the witness. And Donnie Peeler, I'm understanding more than one witness saw her. Is that correct to your understanding? Oh, absolutely, Nancy. There was another truck driver. It was a father and son duo team, Roy Blanton and Roy Blanton Jr. They claimed that they had spotted a highway. Roy Blanton Sr. is actually a former Cleveland County deputy. I would say he's pretty credible in what he saw that morning. To Kathleen Murphy joining us now, special guest out of North Carolina, attorney triangle divorce lawyers who've seen many, many, many custody disputes,

custody kidnaps, children going missing. I don't get any sense that the parents had anything at all to do with this disappearance based on many, many different pieces of evidence specifically and most thoroughly convincing more than one eyewitness stating they saw her on Highway 18 that morning. Well, one of the indicators is, is this child been kidnapped by one parent or another? And when the parents are in separate homes, that increases the likelihood of that occurring. That was not the case with these two parents. They were in a dual family home. They had credibility when they were answering the specific questions separately. And so there's

absolutely no credible evidence. And in fact, evidence to the contrary that they were involved with her walking down the road on 18 and being seen by multiple witnesses. Now, listen to what we learn about this witness. There was a gentleman there that said that he was on his way to work that morning and he sees Asha walking down the side of the road. He's sort of in disbelief, you know, what's that small child doing on the road this time of morning? So he turned around and proceeded back up 18 at a slower pace. He came up and, you know, seen the little girl still walking south on 18

and rolled his window down and said, hey, do you need help? And when he did, she began to move down off the road. She didn't really run, but she wasn't letting grass grow under her feet either. You are hearing more elaboration by Sergeant Supervisor that morning, Mark Davis, as he's speaking on Crack House Chronicles. And, you know, Mark Davis, the way you put it right there, I find it really interesting because when you first told me the truck driver turned around, I wondered, well, what happened when he turned around? Because if I were a little girl on the side of the road, somebody I didn't know turned around and came back toward me, I'd take off running. And that sounds like what Asha did.

Pretty much. Yeah. I mean, you know, when he approached her, she became suspicious, cautious and moved down off the side of the road. OK, you know what I'm thinking about Donnie Peeler and Dale Champion? You know, she was a great little fireball on the basketball court, very shy at school and outside of the home. Not shy at home, but anywhere outside the home, extremely shy, but an incredible basketball player. I wonder if she was lured by somebody saying they could make her a basketball star, a phenom, but she couldn't tell her parents or they wouldn't let her go. I'm just looking at every angle I can imagine, Dale Champion. Yeah, that's the big question, Nancy.

Why was she outside the house to begin with for all this to happen? And that's the thing we can't get a grasp on. It's hard for us to wrap our brain around something. Why would she be outside in the first place? And we've looked at so many angles and we still can't make sense of it. So to you, Rick Schaefer, joining us, former FBI special agent. I know the FBI is now involved

and as a matter of fact, has recently executed search warrants. They made it very clear. It was made clear through a spokesperson that no human remains were found, but we've been told that there is direct evidence linking the disappearance of Asha Degree to the location at which they executed the search warrant. So I'm just trying to figure out who knew this child well enough to lure her from the home. She didn't tell her brother,

which is very surprising. She told nobody. And then when a stranger came to pick her up, came back toward her, she ran. So it's not like she was trying to hitch a ride and get away from home. She was going to meet somebody. If it were just an issue of her running away, then she would have hitched a ride. That's correct. And we looked at it from a number of different perspectives. I mean, when we first got there, obviously, we wanted to take a look at the family, as you suggested. We did a very thorough search of the house. We found no indication of anything that looked like substance abuse or problems inside the home. The parents acted accordingly. They were very upset. The mother was particularly distraught as she had run,

you know, through the neighborhood trying to locate her daughter. We interviewed the son. I think he was 10 years old at the time, but obviously in the presence of the parent to try and see if we could garner any additional information. But he indicated that he saw her as she went up to go to the bathroom and then went back to sleep. We were obviously perplexed over the fact that you have this beautiful little girl at nine years old. What would cause her to leave the house, not in the middle of the day, but in the middle of the night and take off walking down the street? A worried family frantically searches for their missing little girl, who they last saw safe and sound sleeping in her room. What does a late model green sedan have to do with Asha's disappearance

and what do candy wrappers have to do with her disappearance? Listen. It was a couple days later candy wrappers were found in a shed behind Turner Upholstery. Candy wrappers, a pencil, a marker, and even a Mickey Mouse hair bow that was hers. Students at Fosden Elementary School confirmed that those were the same type of candy that were given out as Valentine treats to the rest of the class. So those were confirmed as her items. Were they? Was it her Mickey Mouse paraphernalia? Were those her candy wrappers? Why was she in the shed eating candy? Or was that just thrown in the shed later? With me, an all-star panel, but first out to Donnie Peeler, NGL champion. What about it, Donnie Peeler? That stuff found in that shed, Nancy, it could possibly be her stuff,

the kids at the school identified it, possibly being stuff that was given to them at school. But from my understanding, too, that those sheds were right there at that upholstery shop, too, and some of that stuff could have fell out of furniture there. That was always back in my mind. You know, it's just crazy to think that it would be that far off the road. Or another thing, Donnie Peeler, it could easily have been other children playing in that shed after school. I mean, I don't know that we don't have a DNA match. We don't know how to link that back to her. And I wonder where that shed is in relation to where she was spotted on the road. Another question to you. Let me go to you, Donny Dale Champion. Is it true that, according to a report I found, Asha had money in a wallet at school before she disappeared?

I do know that shed is a couple hundred yards off the road. It's not real close. You can't even see it from the road hardly. Okay, straight out to Karen Stark joining us who has been researching and studying the case. Karen Stark, I'm almost convinced that she packed a few things in that backpack. What do we know? She packed some of her favorite outfits. And if you think about this, Nancy, it's pouring outside. This is a shy little girl, very obedient. She does not put on a raincoat, protect herself from the rain. She packs some of her favorite outfits, but nothing that will keep her warm or sustain her.

And then she walks out in the rain. A totally uncharacteristic for this nine-year-old. A complete mystery. Completely. And I've been looking for any upheaval in her life or any signs that she was upset. This is the only thing I found. Listen to her brother. Only thing that she was even upset about at the time that we knew was that she had lost her championship basketball game. Championship games was that weekend, that Saturday. She was one of the star players on her team.

Her team was in a dog fight of a game and she ended up fouling out and she felt that she let her teammates down. But by the time my game started, which was like an hour or maybe an hour or two hours later, like she had that genuine smile that she always wore. So I'm trying to figure out Kathleen Murphy joining us, a high profile lawyer

out of North Carolina, Triangle Divorce. What would that have to do, if anything, with her getting a few of her favorite outfits and leaving in the middle of the night, not telling the brother that we just saw, O'Brien, not telling her parents. What could have lured her out? Was it in connection to her basketball career? Did someone tell this nine-year-old little girl they could make her a basketball star? I don't know the identity of the person in the search warrant. And so once you know the identity of the person in the search

warrant, you may be able to tie it to some connection with Asha. It could be a connection with basketball, like you said. But I have a seven-year-old grandson. He would never go out in the rain. He would never go out in the middle of the night. That seven to nine-year-old grandson, he would never go out in the rain. He would never go out in the middle of the night. That seven to nine-year-old age, it's very concerning why she would actually put herself in the middle of nighttime rainstorms without any protection. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. They were making an access road right here. There's a log cabin up on the hill.

And they were cutting this access road, going to that cabin. And that's where they found her book bag back in there. More than a year later, Asha's backpack turned up at a construction site 30 miles away. It raised new questions, but yielded few clues about the missing girl's whereabouts. A search was done of that area. Same type of situation. People were interviewed. Evidence was collected and sent off. And until this day, Asha's still not been located. We're getting that information from the FBI. Mark Davis with us, Sergeant Supervisor, on the case at the time.

Can you tell me about the location of the book bag, and are we sure it's Asha's? Yes. I know it's been confirmed it was Asha's book bag. They released some of the items and told us some of the items. Once again, this is almost a year into the investigation before they released what was some of the items into the book bag, but it was confirmed it was hers. And it was north of where she lived on Highway 18, approximately 20 to 30 miles away. Good gravy. So somebody had to take her or her book bag by vehicle, by vehicle.

And that's where the green sedan may come in. Listen. Investigators published images of a car that may have picked up Asha. They believe it was a 1970s model Lincoln Continental Mark IV or a Ford Thunderbird with rust around the wheel wells. Investigators revealed two items found in Asha's book bag. A Dr. Seuss children's book from her school library, McGilligat's Pool,

and a New Kids on the Block concert t-shirt, which didn't belong to Asha. Okay that's a mind twister right there Mark Davis so a school book a Dr. Seuss book from her school from her school library and a t-shirt that did not belong to her. What do you make of it Mark Davis? It's one of those situations that you know we couldn't decipher it either. Why was it there? That was a lot of things. That was a lot of questions. This is far past the point

that I was in an investigation involved in the investigation, but there was speculation on all of us as far as the officers went. What did it mean? And as far as I know, that's never really been answered. I wonder if somebody gave her

the t-shirt because Rick Schaefer joining us, former FBI special agent, if someone is luring her, then I could understand somebody giving her a t-shirt that her parents don't even know about. Well, that's correct. In fact, one of the things that we looked at was through the probation and parole office is the current sexual offenders registry. It wasn't digitized in electronic format. It is now. But when we were provided it, we started a pin map and we were shocked at the number of people within a close proximity to Asha's home that had been involved in being considered an individual placed on the sexual offenders registry. And as a result of that, we conducted numerous interviews with people that had been convicted and had either relocated or were currently living

in the Cleveland County area. And back to the search. In the last days, a search has gone down directly connected to Asha's disappearance. Listen. The Cleveland County Sheriff's Office has now confirmed that a search of 621 Cherryville Road is connected to Asha Degree. Nearly 50 investigators with the Cleveland County Sheriff's, the FBI Evidence Response Team, and North Carolina SBI agents spend two days at the property with canines and multiple items of interest are seized for testing.

Investigators have not revealed what those items are, but have said the search warrants were obtained based on physical evidence directly connected to Asha's disappearance. And the green sedan. Listen. On the second day of the search at a home on Cherryville Road, four miles from Asha Degree's home, investigators moved to a second location, a home on the corner of Cherryville and Rollingwood Drive. Agents are seen going into the home and walking in and out of a fenced area behind the home. Minutes later, a flatbed tow truck arrives to the property. When it leaves, it's carrying a green four-door sedan with rust in the wheel wells, extremely similar to the car the FBI has been looking for. Dale Champion joining us from Crack House Chronicles along with partner Donnie Peeler. Dale Champion, tell me about this recent FBI search and the vehicle. Yeah, they came in, I think it was Tuesday, and they just stormed this place to come in.

And rumors were flying what was going on, and it was coming out saying was about asia so everybody just got more hyped up and then it kind of switched or the rumors were saying other things so we didn't know then they put out the press release saying it was definitely connected to asia and then they pulled this green car out and after that everything got really tight-lipped i think they uh put the gag on anybody around that had anything to do with it so it's been very quiet ever since then. But I think they're supposed to release the affidavits on these search warrants this week, possibly today. Joining us now, CrimeOnline.com investigative reporter Sydney Sutter. Sydney, we now learn that there are updates in the case. As we go to air, I'm learning about a search

warrant. What can you tell me? Nancy, yes. So we've gotten hundreds of pages of documents relating to eight search warrants tied to Asha Degree's disappearance. Investigators have released both the probable cause applications, the probable cause applications for these search warrants, and the returns. So we now know that they are searching properties tied to Roy and Connie Dedman, which seemingly have no connection to Asha's disappearance. So how they tied the Dedmans to Asha was her backpack located about six miles south of Morganton, North Carolina. This is nearly 30 miles away from Asha's home. That backpack discovered a year. Hold on, Sid, you're talking about Deadman's home. And isn't that less than four miles from where Asha was last seen? That is correct, Nancy. So their home, the properties, two properties that were searched, the Deadmans owned a nursing home facility in Vail, North Carolina, and frequently took patients up to Broughton Hospital in Morganton.

So they frequently traveled along Highway 18, passing Asha's home, passing Vail, North Carolina. Let me understand what you're saying, Sid. You're saying that the Deadmans owned a nursing home and they would take appeared to have been there for a very long time. And it was wrapped in two plastic trash bags. But what investigators have just revealed... That's not good. Why would you wrap a kid's backpack in trash bags? Two of them. Right. It seems like it was definitely a disposal of evidence. They did not want to be caught with Asha's belongings. So what investigators found in those trash bags were two hairs. One of those hairs belonged to one of the Deadman's daughters. She was 13 at the time. The other hair belonged to a patient under the Deadman's care. Okay, so these hairs connect back to the Deadman's and they're on Asha's backpack. I understand that also a neighbor said three rooms at the Deadman property were padlocked. They were full of Deadman's personal property. I understand

police have also seized cameras, journals, a trash bag, children's clothing, and a rifle from the Deadman home. Is that true? Yes, that is absolutely correct. And those journals were actually penned by the Deadman's daughters. So they had three daughters at the time. The youngest, Ann Lee, was 13, and they had two other daughters, Sarah and Lizzie, both about 16 years old at the time of Asha's disappearance. Hmm, that's where we're getting the word that a dead person may have the key to unlock the disappearance of Asha. Exactly, that is referring to Russell Underhill, that patient underneath the Deadman's care. So at the time, Underhill did not actually

reside in the Deadman's Vail, North Carolina rest home, but Connie Deadman did attend to him at the rest home he was at, and Roy Deadman was listed as his emergency contact. So it's kind of an odd connection, but the only connection between the Deadman's daughter, 13-year-old Anna Lee, and Russell Underhill is Roy and Connie Deadman, and they now are officially listed as suspects in Asha's case. They are denying any wrongdoing at all, of course, as does the lawyer for the dead patients. So, let me just consolidate this. Aisha's backpack is found double wrapped in trash bags in dense undergrowth, grown over with foliage. In it, there is the hair that links back directly by DNA comparison to the dead man's daughter and to one of the dead man's patients in their nursing home who is now dead. Do I have it? Exactly. Wow. That's a bombshell, Sydney. Absolutely, Nancy. And it's

unclear exactly where investigators are going with this. The dead men's have given multiple, numerous statements to police and they've even passed polygraph tests. So it's very unclear what the connection is, but that green 1970s-ish car that the FBI was looking for was towed from the Deadman's home. And this was a 1964... You know what's freaky, Sydney? Other items were seized, including a human tooth. Yes, in a plastic bag. And lots of explanations for that. That could have been the first lost baby tooth. They have three daughters. So there are lots of plausible explanations for that. But could it be tied to Asha? I just hate, hate what the parents have been going through, there is a $45,000 reward in connection with the location of 9-year-old Asha Degree.

Tip line 704-484-4822 Repeat 704-484-4822 We wait as justice unfolds. Goodbye, friend. You're listening to an iHeart Podcast.