Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - Gorgeous New Orleans Coed Dumped 'Face Blue' by Uber Driver, LEFT TO DIE

Episode Date: August 23, 2023

University of New Orleans student Ciaya Whetstone enjoys her first Mardi Gras celebration with her friends and her boyfriend: She posts photos on Instagram captioned, "Well my first Mardi Gras parade did not disappoint." As the night progresses, Whetstone ends up at her boyfriend's house, and later in the evening decides to go home to check on her dog. She calls an Uber.   Whetstone’s roommate is home and Whetstone introduces the Uber driver as a “new friend." She announces to the roommate her plans to leave with the driver. The roommate tries to get Whetstone to stay home, but she says she wants to go find her car. That is the last time Whetstone was seen alive.   Around 6:41 a.m., a man claiming to be an Uber Driver brings a visibly ill woman to New Orleans East Hospital and drops her off. The medical staff says Whetstone is blue in the face and has dilated, fixed pupils. There are no other outward injuries. Hospital personnel try to revive Whetstone without success. The time of death is called about 7 a.m. The Coroner determines that Whetstone has lethal doses of fentanyl and ethanol in her system at the time. Whetstone's mother is still pushing for answers in her daughter's death. No one has been charged in Whetstone's death. Joining Nancy Grace Today:  Miranda Whetstone - Victim's Mother Renee Rockwell (Atlanta) - Criminal Defense Attorney; Facebook: "Renee.Rockwell"  Dr. Shari Schwartz -  Forensic Psychologist (specializing in Capital Mitigation and Victim Advocacy); Twitter: @TrialDoc; Author: "Criminal Behavior" and "Where Law and Psychology Intersect: Issues in Legal Psychology" Dan Corsentino - Former Police Chief & Former Sheriff, and Private Investigator; Served on US Homeland Security Senior Advisory Board Dr. William Morrone - Medical Examiner, Toxicologist, Pathologist, and Opioid Treatment Expert; Author: “American Narcan: Naloxone & Heroin-Fentanyl Associated Mortality”  Nicole Partin  – CrimeOnline.com Investigative Reporter; Twitter: @nicolepartin See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

You're listening to an iHeart Podcast. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. She's beautiful on the inside and the outside. She's young. She's healthy. A college student who actually wants to help children when she is through with her education. She is so alive. You know there are people that just kind of like through life and then there are those people when they walk in the room, it's electric. You want to go talk to them.

You want to be around them like a moth in the flame. That's this girl, Kaya Whetstone. Can somebody explain to me why this gorgeous young co-ed is dumped, blue in the face, dumped like a sack of potatoes outside a hospital and left to die. And yes, this beautiful young girl, Kaya, died. And as of right now, no justice. No justice. My twins are 15. They're about to start driving.

We practice every day at night in the rain on the interstate, you name it. Why? Because I want to protect them. I want them ready. I want to save their lives in any way I can. But should you be afraid every time your son or daughter gets into an Uber? Yeah, I said it. Gets in an Uber and you don't step out of that Uber. You get pushed out like a sack of potatoes. I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories.

Thank you for being with us here at Fox Nation and Sirius XM 111. I also want to tell you how I found out about Kaya. Does the name Alex Murdoch ring a bell? Well, it should. Alex Murdoch in South Carolina, the heir to a legal dynasty, just convicted of murdering his wife, Maggie, and son, Paul. What does that have to do with Kaya? Well, I was there for the duration, waiting on the verdict and the sentencing, broadcasting live from in front of the courthouse every single day, looking in the back of Alex Murdoch's head the rest of the time in court. One day I was afraid I was going to be late for court and I was running out of the Holiday Inn. We were only there one

night, one night at that particular hotel. And I saw a lady following me and I was trying so hard to get to my car thinking I'm going to be late. I'm going to be late. I can't stop. But I went, you know what? I stopped. She had tears in her eyes and she handed me pictures and a lot of typewritten papers. And I said, can I help you? And this was Kiah's aunt that worked at the Holiday Inn, begging in tears, running out into a hot parking lot, chasing me to try and get justice. Where are we living that you have to chase somebody down out in a parking lot at 730 in the morning to try and get justice for this beautiful young girl everything is completely bass-ackwards that she had to

come running to try to hand me this stack of papers to try to get somebody to listen to these facts well let's do just that. Take a listen now to our friends at WVUE. She's my best friend. I brought her here to graduate, not to come pack her up. Miranda Ferrand holds a picture of her daughter, Kaya Whetstone, a 21-year-old University of New Orleans student who mysteriously died two weeks ago after being dropped off at a hospital by an uber driver she is a precious angel and i will not rest she's mine dropped off by a neighbor that's certainly a euphemism putting perfume on the pig dropped off more like pushed out of the car. And what more do we know?

You know, that really struck me when her mother says, I brought her here to graduate, not to come pack her up. Listen to WYFF. A University of New Orleans student from Bamberg, South Carolina, was dropped off dead at an area hospital this weekend. The woman was identified as 21-year-old Siaya Jordan Whetstone. A co-worker posted on Facebook that Whetstone got into an Uber around one Friday morning and was not seen or heard from again until she was dropped off at the hospital. Police say her death remains unclassified at this time and the investigation

is ongoing. Joining me right now in all star panel to make sense of what we know right now and what I now believe to be a desperate plea for justice. Before I go to all the legal experts, medical doctors, former police chief, forensic psychologist, investigative reporter, I want to go to Miranda Whetstone this is Kaya's mother first of all miss Whetstone I am so sorry the torture that you have gone through since you learned about what happened to your daughter I am so sorry. Please know that we're not just saying that.

We really mean it. And I want you to tell me how you learned Kaya is dead. Thank you, Nancy. I really do appreciate the opportunity to be here and speak with you all today. So Kaya, the way I learned that Kaya had passed away. So I was in Florida on a travel assignment for work. What do you do? Respiratory therapist. So I drove from Florida back to South Carolina to spend the weekend with my grandmother for her birthday. And we, Alex, which is Kaya's younger brother, and I were set to go visit Kaya on Tuesday, the 27th, I believe it was in New Orleans.

And, uh, anyway, uh, we had woken up that morning and my grandmother decided that she wanted to go on the trip with us. So we were trying to get our itinerary together and I said well let me call Kaya and just make sure that we don't need to rent a car so I call her cell phone and a lady answers and she she basically I said where I said where is Kaya where's Kaya this is like nine o'clock in the morning, our time in South Carolina. So I think they're an hour behind us or so. But anyway, she immediately said, ma'am, I'm going to need you to hold on and speak with the doctor.

Oh, dear Lord in heaven. She put the emergency medicine doctor on. And obviously, I know that's not good and I said where's my daughter what what is going on and she said ma'am I hate to inform you but your daughter was dropped off this morning at the ER and she's deceased and obviously I mean at that point my world just stopped I can't even explain I can't even explain. I can't explain what happened after that.

I dropped the phone and fell to my knees. And that's how I learned that my daughter had passed away. You know, very rarely have I been left speechless. story with me, renowned attorney, no stranger to the courtroom, is Renee Rockwell on Facebook, Renee.Rockwell. Renee, this is your turf, New Orleans, Louisiana, and I believe all of this occurred around the time of Mardi Gras. And that is one of the reasons Kaya was out so late. Kaya did not do drugs. She was not a boozer. She made good grades. The works.

You know that kind of student, you know, Renee, in our line of business, when I was prosecuting cases that you were defending, we don't see that kind of a young person. The ones we see are the ones that are dealing dope, that have stolen a car, and that have shot somebody, and we're trying to, you know, piece it all together and make the best of a really bad situation. That's not Kaya. Kaya actually was studying, I think it was psychology, to then help troubled children when she got out of school. That's who Kaya is.

I mean, you and I have dealt with so many parents that get disney. Have you ever heard it told the way Miranda Whetstone just told it? No, you can't. It's unimaginable, Nancy. And Kaya, as I meet her mother today, I realized that Kaya even has a great grandmother, a mother, a little brother. Those are the kind of things that you do not see in a courtroom, Nancy. Familial support. This girl had everything. Everything taken away from her. Take a listen to our friends at WCIV.

Kiah was brought to a city hospital at 6.41 Saturday morning by a man who told security he was an Uber driver. A nurse said Kiah looked blue and her pupils were fixed and dilated, but she showed no physical signs of injury. Kaya was declared dead about 30 minutes later. Whoa, wait a minute. Wait a minute. So she gets dumped off like a sack of sugar. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Nicole Parton joining me, CrimeOnline.com investigative reporter.

She was still alive when she was dropped off at 6.41 a.m. If she had been dropped off earlier, she may have lived. Do I have the time right, Nicole Parton, that she was alive but blue when she was dumped? That's right. She was dumped off by the Uber driver at 641 a.m. And she was declared dead at 707. Now, when Miss Whetstone, who is joining us, Kaya's mom, called her daughter's cell phone. She didn't get any of that information. She just told point blank, first thing in the morning, your daughter's dead. But

listen to this information. She then learned. Take a listen to our friend Olivia Vidal, Fox 8. I am asking anyone that knows anything about what happened to my daughter to please come forward and tell the truth. The family and their attorneys are asking for more transparency and more consistent communication from investigators. They have to read about it in the news

that Kaya's pupils were dilated and that her face was blue and that she had been dropped off at the hospital by a private party. She found it out on line. Ms. Whetstone, tell me about discovering that your daughter was dumped off and that her face was blue and her pupils dilated. Again, I'm in the medical field.

I'm a respiratory therapist. I see this every day. My heart is broken. It is absolutely broken. She is worth more than that. She is worth officials reaching out to me as a mother. I'm just, I'm heartbroken i'm devastated i'll never get over this and you had to read online that she had been dropped off by someone that then sped away with her face blue like she was trash, like she American Narcan. Dr. Maroney, let me

just start with one simple question. Why would someone's face turn blue? Everything in your body has blood flowing through it and blood is red. When the oxygen no longer makes hemoglobin red you get a dusky color and that is blue that is called cyanosis it's just a word that means blue things look blue because they don't have oxygen and the blood flow is not at a healthy level. Because you're not breathing. Your blood doesn't get the oxygen it needs. And so you turn blue. Heart's still pumping, but you stop breathing.

Dr. Maroney, did you hear the timeline? She's dumped out of the Uber car at 6, I believe it was 641, 30 minutes later, she's declared dead. If someone is simply not getting oxygen, wouldn't that be fairly, I mean, nothing medical-wise is easy for me because I'm just a JD, you're the MD. But she was alive when she was dumped. For every reason and every fact that's presented, we can assume that she was dumped and she was alive. But prior to her drop-off, if she could have been brought sooner

or any kind of interventions, but bringing somebody sooner, that is the key to making sure you get a different outcome. Can I just talk about Prince for a minute? Oh, always. Prince, who I adore. Me too. Prince on a private plane. They land. They don't stay. they take off again, and he dies

because he didn't have Narcan. Would you agree with that? Yeah, because we have Narcan everywhere in America. It's with the police. It's with the fire department. It should be in vehicles. It should be on trains. It should be on airplanes. Hold on. I've got to explain why I care what Prince, the artist formerly known as Prince, has anything to do with Kai Whetstone. Take a listen to our friends at Crime Online. Around 6.41 a.m., a man claiming to be an Uber driver brings a visibly ill woman into New Orleans East Hospital and drops her off. The medical staff says Whetstone is blue and has dilated fixed pupils, but there are no other outward injuries. Hospital personnel try to revive her without success.

Time of death is called around 7 a.m. Whetstone's death is classified as accidental. The coroner determined that Whetstone had lethal doses of fentanyl and ethanol in her system at the time. Important, remember, this girl has no history of drug use. And I don't mean just never been arrested or treated. None of her friends, none of her family have ever seen her or known her to do drugs. That would be like somebody telling Jackie I had an OD. That's not gonna happen willingly. It's not. So why suddenly does this young girl have a lethal amount of fentanyl in her system? Back to Dr. William Maroney, medical examiner, renowned toxicologist,

and author of American Narcan, Naloxone, and Heroin Fentanyl Associated Mortality. He has literally written the book. Okay, so how does somebody go from never using drugs, like me, never even smoked pot, nothing, don't want anything to do with it, to a lethal amount of fentanyl? Maroney, that does not happen in my world of criminal justice. That has not happened. Okay, you have to look at it this way. Say that Kaya has not been exposed to any drugs. She's what we call naive. Her body, her liver, her blood, her brain, she is naive. And in a naive state, you are more likely to experience a toxic effect from a drug than if you were a regular drug user, you would be dependent.

She was not dependent. dependent so that if there's a drug like a fentanyl that took effect she's in worst case because she's a naive somebody very early not involved in drug use okay let me ask you a question okay i understand you're saying her body is naive. Naive typically means a lack of worldly knowledge, but the body is naive to drugs or alcohol. Got it. However, it was determined that her body naivete had nothing to do with the fact there was a lethal dosage of fentanyl. Whether she had used fentanyl in the past or not, it was still a lethal amount. And here's what I'll say. This is going to sound a little shady because of the holiday or whatever social. There is the chance that she was the target of a predator seeking to subdue her with drugs and alcohol.

And this happens to tens of millions of women a year, especially young women. Women are introduced to drugs through intimate relationships and communications. That is a fact. And the introduction of fentanyl is somebody targeting her. And I'll say this about the police investigation. They may not be releasing everything because they don't know everything that happened. But the amount of fentanyl that she was exposed to in her toxicology report is 39 nanograms per milliliter. You only need three to die. And you're saying in her toxicology report, she had 39 nanograms. And you only need three to die. She OD'd this woman like if I had to go out this studio door right now and go score fentanyl I guess I would go to

where I prosecuted for so many years where I know you can get crack cocaine pot heroin whatever you want meth I would go there and try to score some fentanyl I don't know if that would work that's where I would go there and try to score some fentanyl. I don't know if that would work, but that's where I would go first. This girl didn't even know where to get fentanyl, even if she wanted it. This girl had been with her friends. Isn't that right, Miss Whetstone? She had been out at a Mardi Gras party with her friends, her little college friends. They weren't dealing fentanyl, absolutely you're right nancy she she actually had worked that day and when she had gotten off from work at the mall at buckle she went actually with a friend that she works with one of her managers from buckle and uh they went to a

mardi gras parade yes take a listen to our friends at wciv i spoke to two of her cousins who were very close to kaya all they know is that kayaaya was Snapchatting with friends at a Mardi Gras parade on Friday night. She climbed into an Uber and then nothing. She had been at the Mardi Gras parade. And there's just a big time gap until then when he dropped her off. So we don't really know. I just pray she didn't suffer. And I just hope we get the justice she deserves.

Okay, help me out here. Renee Rockwell, I want you to put this in the back of your mind because this is what I'm going to argue. Abandoned and malignant heart. It's been also called a black heart. Abandoned and malignant heart. That would be, this is the example I would give to juries, like when you get in your car and you floor at 90 MPH and you drive through, let's say a street

festival that's been cordoned off for pedestrians only, and you mow down seven or eight people dead, crushing their skulls, blood everywhere, torn down tents, the works. Did you know those victims? No, you didn't know them you never met him in your life did you intentionally plan to kill those victims no you committed an act that was an abandoned and malignant heart complete disregard for human life and I am telling you Renee Rockwell this needs to be a murder charge based on the theory I just gave you doping up a girl naive to drugs her body couldn't take it plus it was a huge like ten times the amount over lethal

dose yes almost four times the the lethal dose is three, and she had 39 nanograms of fentanyl in her system. That's an OD. Somebody gave her an OD probably to rape her would be my guess. But regardless, I don't have to prove motive. Somebody gave her the fentanyl. She did not have it getting into that Uber car, and now she's dead. What about that, Renee? You got to wonder, Nancy, did somebody hand her a drink?

Like the doctor said, did somebody try to take advantage of her? The police are going to try to figure out what time did she get in the Uber? What time did he drop her off? Where was she in the Uber? Well, they're taking their D-A-M-N time, aren't they? And, Nancy, where have we gotten in this society where you have to hire a lawyer to get justice? Exactly. They should be all over this.

Law enforcement. Okay, what do we know? Let's follow up with Renee's theory that she just threw out there. But it's a theory you have to acknowledge and determine. Is it true? Is it possible? Is it probable? Is it improbable? Take a listen now to our friends at CrimeOnline.com. On a Friday evening in New Orleans, South Carolina native and current University of New Orleans student, Kyle Whetstone and her friend, Juliet Orr, attend some parades. After the parades, Whetstone goes out friend juliet or attend some parades after the parades whetstone

goes out on the town with some other friends and then hitches a ride from yet another friend who drives her to her boyfriend's home in the suburb of hanrahan from there juliet or tells the new orleans advocate whetstone catches an uber to her apartment in gentilly to check on her dog so here we are it is 1 a.m everybody else is is all partying. Still, it's Mardi Gras. The whole city of New Orleans is partying. And she has the wherewithal, still sober, and says, I can't go with you guys. I got to check on the dog first, and then I'll go. She goes back home to check on the dog.

What I'm saying, this is a fact that when you're out of your gourd and you're high on fentanyl and are drunk, you don't think, oh, guys, I'd like to go with you, but I've got to check on my dog and then I'll rejoin. That is factually probative. It proves something to me about her state of mind at 1 a.m. OK, right there. she's still fine. She went to boyfriend's home, and then she catches an Uber to her apartment. Now what happens? Pick it up, Jack. It's now 1 a.m., and when she arrives at her apartment, she tells her roommate, Reese White, the Uber driver is a friend, and they're going to go look for her car. Reese White tries to convince her roommate not to go, but Whetstone leaves with the Uber driver anyway.

Around 1.30, another friend reaches out to Kaya Whetstone. Roberto Torres talks briefly to Whetstone, and while they're on the phone, Torres clearly hears the Uber driver ask Kaya Whetstone, quote, do you like to party? At that, Kaya Whetstone tells Torres she will call him back. She never does. I just learned a lot. I just learned a lot. Somebody's going to hell. But you know what?

I want them to make a pit stop at a C.I. Correctional Institute before they meet the devil. Do you hear that, Renee? Did you hear that? She's fine at 1 a.m. She picks up the phone. She's fine. She's coherent. She's sober. And then she wants to go find her car. She doesn't want to leave it parked at a Mardi Gras parade overnight. So she says, oh, the Uber driver's fine.

We're friends. A friend reaches out to her 1.30 a.m. She's fine. And she hears the driver say say do you like to party i'm so mad i could chew a nail in half what does that tell you renee that's presuming there was nobody else in the car but when do you strike up a friendship with an uber driver that there's something that smells bad about that i I don't like that at all. Well, it could have just been casual in that, oh no, he's my friend. He doesn't mind going at

1.30. He'll take the ride. It's fine. I don't know the context of that. Joining me right now is Dan Corsentino out of Pueblo, Colorado, former police chief, former sheriff, and served on U.S. Homeland Security Senior Advisory Board, now private investigator at DanCorsentino.com. Dan, can we talk? I know you have investigated all around the world as part of Homeland Security, but can I just talk to you about Uber? They have to know who the driver is, the route he took. I mean, for Pete's sake, when I order Uber Eats, I can watch the driver coming to deliver the food. You can watch them walk up. So if I can do that with my food, don't they have a way to monitor or surveil their drivers? Yes. Number one, the timeline that you articulated

certainly doesn't favor the Uber driver here. Number two, the route that the Uber driver arrived from and where he went to should be tracked both on their GPS tracking system and then in the vehicle that they have, which I believe was a Toyota, they have these black boxes that are in those vehicles that record all sorts of information if they extract that. So the situation that has developed at this point in time in regards to Uber deals with the policies that were in play and the intent specifically of this Uber driver.

What was his motive in the end, assuming that this young lady was alone in the vehicle and there was no other party in the vehicle with her? Exactly. We're learning a little bit more about her route and the details surrounding her disappearance for that period of just a few hours where she ends up dumped like a sack of sugar, dead, soon to die, blue in the face, eyes, the pupils dilated. Take a listen to our friends at Crime Online. The victim's mother says Kaya Whetstone died 26 minutes after she was carelessly and recklessly dropped off and left for dead. That Uber and the unidentified driver who dropped her daughter off the morning she died showed disregard for the child's life and are ultimately responsible for her death. Kaya Whetstone called an Uber in the early morning

hours of February 19, 2022. A driver picked her up in his 2019 Toyota Camry from a parade route in the New Orleans area and drove her to her destination on the UNO campus. The Uber driver escorted Whetstone to a dorm room. Then both the driver and Whetstone returned to his car and drove to another quote undisclosed and undetermined unquote location. The lawsuit alleges the driver at some point during the ride contributed to or caused the harm that led to Whedstone's death. When the unnamed Uber driver took Whedstone to the hospital in New Orleans East, he left without leaving his name or events that led to the medical emergency. She was dropped off at 6 41 a.m. and pronounced dead at 7 0 7 a.m. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace.

To Mrs. Whetstone. This is Kaya's mother trying to piece together everything that we're hearing. Do you know, Ms. Whetstone, whether a rape kit was performed on Kaya? I was told

that there was a rape kit and it was negative. You were told that. Dr. Maroney, have you looked at the autopsy report? Yes, I have it in front of me. I'm looking at all the different sections, but I'm predominantly looking at the labs. Could you thumb through and tell me if you see any indication that a rape kit was performed on Kaya? Because what I'm zeroing in on,

and this is to Dan Corsentino and Renee Rockwell, high profile defense lawyer, is that time. So somehow she struck up a casual friendship with the Uber driver. He walks her to her roommate's room, walks her to her dorm room. They check on the dog. And then the driver and Kaya go back to the car right here to an undisclosed location. And it says undetermined. That's total BS because Uber has a record of everywhere this driver goes.

So they know where he went and right there when she goes to the dorm room, when she goes to check on her dog, she's fine. Then within about three and a half hours, she's blue in the face. What happened at the undetermined location? What happened right there? Renee, where is New Orleans East Hospital as it relates to the campus. Nancy, I can't tell you exactly how far away that is, but in New Orleans, there's nothing too terribly far away. I'd be curious if he brought her to the nearest hospital.

I want to make one point, though, Nancy. Just because there's a negative rape kit does not mean she was not raped. Let's just remember that right now. Absolutely not. Plus, Maroney, do you see anything in there about a rape kit? No. Really? The rape kit will be documentation from a staff that's called criminal sexual assault nurse, the SANE nurse. But the pathology, external exam of the genitals says grossly unremarkable. That doesn't mean there's not sperm. Well, no, but that will be found in the rape kit. But you would say, is there assault on her female parts? And according to this, it doesn't look like an assault,

but that rape kit report will be a separate document. Do you have that, Miranda? Do you have the rape kit? I do not. And it can't just be the genitals. You have to look at the mouth. You have to look at the whole body to determine is there semen there is there male dna from perspiration for example on her body you have

to look everywhere to find that and i'm not hearing that that was done what more do we know about this victim take a listen to our friend sydney sum Crime Online. Kaya Jordan Whetstone moves from her native South Carolina to Louisiana for college. Whetstone settles in New Orleans and into her routine of psychology classes and a retail job at the mall in a clothing store called Buckle. Friends say Whetstone is set to graduate in the next year with the dream of helping kids through therapy. And more. Whetstone was looking forward to her first Mardi Gras.

She started her weekend in Metairie watching carnival parade festivities with her friends and her boyfriend. Then it was on to a night out on the town. On her Instagram, Whetstone shared photos of the festivities and she captioned them, well, my first Mardi Gras parade did not disappoint. As the night progressed, Whetstone ended up at her boyfriend's house and later in the evening decided to go home. She called an Uber. To Dr. Sherry Schwartz, joining us, forensic psychologist specializing in capital mitigation and victim advocacy. She's the author of Criminal Behavior and also the book where law and psychology intersect. You can find her at Trial Doc or at PantherMitigation.com.

Dr. Sherry Schwartz, thank you for being with us. You know what's sticking in my mind like a brand on skin? Do you like to party? That is what the Uber driver said to this little girl, a novice to drugs and alcohol. Do you like to party my rear end? Apparently, he had a very different interpretation of what it means to quote party. Absolutely. And what that sounds like to me, it's chilling because what it sounds like is that this is somebody who is a predator, who has a depraved mind, and he's got an ulterior motive, and he's sizing her up.

And you know, Nancy, I read in her obituary that she never met a stranger, and she always made people feel loved and accepted. And I imagine Kaya, a young psychology student, getting into that car and seeing the Uber driver as a friend because she never met a stranger and couldn't imagine because she was so good that anybody else would be out to do her any harm. Ms. Whetstone, why haven't there been charges brought in this case? I'm not saying the Uber driver meant to kill her. I'm saying that he treated her with an abandoned and malignant heart at the very least this is a voluntary manslaughter charge at the least what's happening nancy i i agree with you 100 we have heard

absolutely nothing from the authorities uh justin actually uh subpoenaed nola police department this week um because he was told that they would have a phone conference, whether this case was actually still ongoing or whether it was closed. Because right now we have no knowledge of that. And we're in limbo. We have not, I have not heard anything from them. Can I tell you something else that we've learned? Dan Corsentino, former police chief and sheriff, we contacted the police. Gee, I wonder why they didn't want to come on today. But we also learned, they said, we went to the Uber driver's house and he wasn't home. So that's when you stake out the place.

That's when you sit there till he does come home. How do I know that? I've done it myself. I've sat in my beat up Honda, hiding hunched down behind the wheel, waiting for a school bus driver to come home. And I got her. What do you mean he wasn't home? Yeah, Nancy, the police department appears, as I took a look at this case,

to really be underperforming. And they haven't put this as a priority. They took the coroner's report as an accidental overdose and they closed the case out and they ran with it from that perspective. I mean, this young lady deserves a voice. She deserves to be heard and she can't at this point because one component in the criminal justice system is failing to do their job, and they need to really focus in on the Uber driver. There's no doubt about that.

Nicole Parton, CrimeOnline.com investigative reporter. What can you tell me? What is happening in the case? Jackie, who is the sheriff in this jurisdiction? What county is it, Miranda? Nancy, I'm not even sure. I know it's Greater New Orleans. Renee, you would know that.

Well, we don't have counties in Louisiana. We have parishes. That's right, we have parishes. And you could count on it being Orleans Parish, but if she was in Metairie, that... Nancy, the conglomeration of all the police departments, the sheriff's department, we've got these. First of all, Mardi Gras, you know everything shuts down for weeks, Nancy. No, I did not know that. Oh, yes, ma'am.

People do not go to work. Why? Because it's party central. It's carnival. I don't believe that includes the police department. Well, apparently in this case, it's included the police department, Nancy. So we're talking about Orleans Parish, Nancy. We're talking about New Orleans metro area and Mardi Gras. It is party central. It's carnival. And people take off of work for 10 days.

And obviously the police department has done the same. Ms. Whetstone, I doubt deeply that the police department took off the night that your daughter was giving a fatal, lethal dosage of fentanyl. What is your message to them today? I need communication. I need to know where they stand, what information they have. They have her belongings. They have her phone. Her phone has everything on it.

It has everything. We are in the dark. I have no clue where they are in this investigation, what they have found, who they have talked to. I am absolutely in the dark. And no matter where I turn, I'm still not getting anywhere. 18 months later, I have yet to get a phone call from these people from the department. They just say, hey, your daughters, we still care. We do care. This is still an open investigation.

We're still looking into things. I need communication. I need to know what they are doing about this situation because I'm not going to go away. I have a lifetime to sit and nothing but time. I have nothing but time to give. Nancy, you used to be a prosecutor. How important and part of your job was victim contact. They even have victim witness advocates now at every prosecutor's office and at the police

department. That is one of your main focuses in any case is victim contact. You know, Renee, you just sent a flood of memories back sitting in victims' living rooms, at their kitchen table, the victims' families, because their loved one would be typically dead by the time I met them. And it's everything, it's everything to know your victim's family, to know your victim, whether in life or in death. And I'm embarrassed, embarrassed for law enforcement, specifically the Orleans Parish Sheriff Susan Hudson, that this is how the constituents are treated. Their number is 504- eight two two eight thousand and

believe you me I will be calling again to get about three inches up their tailpipe dr. Maroney final thought the final thought is her lungs are congested with copious amounts of fluid which means the overdose that killed her developed with the Uber driver. That you can tell that by the amount of fluid, and it's one of the secondary causes of death after fentanyl toxicity, it's pulmonary congestion. And our investigators said, give her a voice. We go beyond her case. There's hundreds of thousands of women that are being exposed to predators who give them drugs for sex to abuse them in beginning relationships. We have to give them all a voice. This kind of behavior has to stop. We have to put these people in jail. To Dan Corsentino, jump in, Dan.

One of the things that I found, which I found somewhat interesting, is Uber purports to do uniform training on sexual misconduct through online videos, six online videos to be specific. But how they do that in the system they have in place is really, really questionable. So it's not going to be a mitigating factor for this Uber driver, one, if he didn't do it, and two, if he did do it and he still is the perpetrator in this case, it only adds more to the fire in the fact that their system has failed. And I think that becomes critical in the investigation, as well as the sheriff's office filling in the gaps specifically on the timeline that exists. Every sheriff's department, every criminal case, homicide investigators, suspicious death, serious bodily injury, they've got to fill in the gaps where there's timelines that are unaccounted for. And they failed to do that.

And that answer, those answers have to be complete. At this airing, no one has been charged. No one has been arrested. Nothing is happening in the case. Why? Nancy Grace signing off. Goodbye, friend. You're listening to an iHeart Podcast.