Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - Missing Skelton boys' dad refuses to reveal their whereabouts, insists they're alive with 'underground sect'

Episode Date: April 3, 2018

The young brother -- Andrew, 9, Alexander, 7, and Tanner, 5 -- vanished from Morenci, Michigan, while celebrating Thanksgiving with their father John Skelton. The father has never been charged with murder in connection to the boys’ disappearance, but he is serving 10 to 15 years in prison after pleading no contest to unlawful imprisonment in Sept. 2011. Nancy Grace explores the latest in the case with Sandra Ali and Jeremy Allen, who are covering the Skelton brothers' case for Detroit's WDIV-TV, psychologist Caryn Stark, and Cold Case Research Institute director Sheryl McCollum. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace on Sirius XM Triumph, Channel 132. Three little brothers, Tanner, Alexander, Andrew, just five, seven, and nine years old, vanished from their home. What happened? Is there a new and stunning explanation? We want these boys home alive. Is that even possible now?

I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us. We, of course, are referring to the missing little skeleton brothers. Beautiful, beautiful little boys. Every time I see them, the one with the little glasses is pictured in the middle. The tender age is five, seven, and nine. How do they just disappear from their own home? As at this hour, anthropologists are studying bone fragments to determine if they belong to the three boys? Praise God in heaven. As I go to air right now, I've learned those bone fragments are not the Skelton brothers, just five, seven, and nine years old. So where are they? With me, Sandra Ali, WDIV Detroit investigative reporter,

along with Jeremy Allen, also joining us from WDIV Detroit investigative reporter, along with Jeremy Allen, also joining us from WDIV Detroit, Karen Stark, renowned New York psychologist and the director of the Cold Case Research Institute, Cheryl McCollum. First, to Sandra. Sandra, thank you so much for being with us. I have been tormented by the disappearance of these little boys about the age of my twin boy and girl. It's driving me crazy. It's like I'm going to jump out of my skin, but I don't know what to do. Sandra, what do you know? How did it all start? Well, you know what, Nancy? First of all, thank you so much for having us. And I think it's so important to not forget about these boys. Like you just mentioned, it just breaks your heart when you look at their pictures and know that investigators, FBI agents, state police, everyone has been searching for these little boys for so long.

And no one has any answers. No one is any closer to any answers. I've got to tell you something, Sandra. With me, Sandra Ali and Jeremy Allen from WDIV. When I just got the news that bones were discovered in a Missoula backyard, my stomach, I almost threw up thinking, is this them? Jeremy Allen, when did we first learn that three little boys were missing and under what circumstances? So, yeah, so back on Black Friday, 2010, John Skelton, the boy's father, he had the boys for the holiday and he was to return them the following day.

I'm sorry, he was to return them on Friday at 3 p.m., and, of course, that didn't happen. So immediate panic hit the town, a small town of Marinci, the boys' mom. Wait a minute, wait a minute, right there. Hold on, hold on. Why, Sandra, would the fact that the dad was late returning the boys, I assume, to the mom, why would that cause a panic? Just because he was late. Parents are always late. Well, they had actually been having an ongoing custody issue, Nancy, that had really started to escalate in the fall, end of summer, early fall. Their father, John Skelton, had taken them out of school before that, taken them on a trip to Florida without the mother's permission. So this had been ongoing. So immediately on that Black Friday, when their mother, Tanya, called and said she wanted to pick

the boys up a little bit earlier than they had originally planned, John Skelton told her they weren't home. And he's the one that's supposed to have them. I mean, that strikes fear. And I got to tell you something, Sandra and Jeremy, Karen, Cheryl, you know this, I have to travel. And for instance, I was just in Vegas on a bail bond issue and I was out of my skin. I call home when I can't get anybody on the phone. I go berserk. I think the worst. And you call and the husband says, well, I don't have them. I would go through the roof.

I would go berserk. What do you mean you don't have them? You have my children. So Jeremy Allen, now I get it when you say a panic ensued. So the mom calls the dad. He's got the boys. It's time for them to come back home. And he says, I don't know where they are.

I don't know where they are. So what happened then, Jeremy? Yeah, I mean, he didn't exactly say, I don't know where they are. I mean, there are so many parts to this story, right? Because he actually was in Toledo, Ohio in a hospital because he tried to kill himself. And he told the mom that the boys were with a— Oh, my stars. Right.

You find out your husband is in—or your ex is in a hospital after a suicide attempt. Well, where are the boys, ages 5, 7, and 9? I mean, Cheryl McCollum, director of the Cold Case Institute, right there. I would be berserk. The husband's in the hospital, and he doesn't know where the children are? I would lose my mind. And I agree with what everybody has said so far. This is when everybody panics. So this man has attempted to take his own life, failed, but is telling you, I don't have the children.

And what about the mother, Tanya Zubers? Take a listen to what's going on. I don't know where my kids are. I'm a mess. I don't know. Are my sons laying in this house? Did he flip out and do something? I don't know what's going on. I don't know where my kids are. I know that their dad is now telling the hospital he tried to kill himself. Where are my sons? What have you done to them? So it's hard to imagine them hurting for me. He's the one that holds the key. He is the one that can make this all be solved. Are you okay with not seeing your kids anymore?

My relevancy is... I don't know if I'll ever know in this lifetime to wdiv sandra ali when she says says are they crying are they scared are they crying for me i mean i just what have you learned in your investigation what happened happened then, Sandra? The mom calls, the dad's in the hospital and doesn't know where the boys are. What happened next, Sandra? Well, Tanya immediately called her family members. She said initially she wondered, what did you do to my boys? That was her first question.

That was the first thing that came to her mind. And are they okay? Did you hurt them? And she immediately, in a panic, talked to her family members, and then they got the Marinci police involved. Well, this is what he, the husband, says happens. He said that it was a Wednesday, and he made the boys their favorite meal, fried chicken and a cake to celebrate Andrew's birthday. They all had dinner together and watched a karate movie. And then in one of his versions, Jeremy Allen, he says, a blue van comes up and takes the children.

Hold on. Let's listen to what the dad says. A person in a van. Did you know the person? I knew the organization, but I didn't know the person, no. What organization? The organization of the company. To Sanjali, WDIV Detroit investigative reporter, a van investigators say that they wonder was it Skelton behind the wheel of a minivan the day his three sons go missing? I'm having a hard time taking in his story. Did he make a stop in Holiday City a few miles south of the Michigan-Ohio border? Was he the one behind the family's minivan?

Sandra, help me understand the way the facts unfold at this point. You know what, Nancy? There were so many versions of his initial story. And when we talked to investigators, they actually said that that was one of the things that tipped them off, that John Skelton's stories, they said, never added up. He had so many different versions. Initially, he did mention a blue van. And when I talked to him in prison just a few weeks ago, his story changed. He said it was a light colored van. Sandra Ali, WDIV, joining me along with Jeremy Allen, also WDIV Detroit reporters, Allen producer. Sandra, you actually went behind bars and spoke to the dad? I did, Nancy.

I went into the prison and I talked to John. We reached out to him. We reached out to John while we were working on a series of these stories over the last many, many months. And he wrote me. He sent me letters from prison. And he put me on the visitor's list. And I went in and we did the first interview.

In fact, aside from his mother, who's visited him twice while he was in segregation, this was his first in-person visit with anyone since he's been incarcerated. Sandra Ali with me, WDIV, who goes behind bars to speak to the man who says he's the last one to see the three little boys alive. Listen to what the dad says behind bars. I walked in with a notebook and pen, which then I was told wasn't allowed. We weren't allowed to record our visit in any way, but guards opened several doors. They escorted me to a small area that looked like a classroom full of prisoners. And out of the corner of my eye, I saw John Skelton sitting alone. We talked for more than two hours. Remember, we weren't allowed to bring any of our cameras inside prison,

so all I had to rely on was my memory. I couldn't get back to the car fast enough so I could get everything I was thinking and feeling on tape. You can tell my adrenaline was pumping. So I walked in the room. We made eye contact, he shook my hand and he started sobbing, which caught me off guard. John apologized for crying. He said he was so emotional because he couldn't believe he was having contact

with a visitor. I was the first person to visit him here. I was sitting in the chair next to him. I didn't realize we would be in such close proximity. We were side by side the entire time and to my surprise John wasn't wearing any restraints. No handcuffs, his belly chain and shackles had all been removed. I asked him about the boys right off the bat. In tears, he said, I miss their voices. John said they loved picking vegetables together, mowing the lawn and doing dishes. You could ask anyone in Morenci or any of the inmates here. They'll tell you I was a good dad. I would never hurt my boys or anyone. On their last night together, which John remembers as being the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, John says he made

the boys their favorite meal, fried chicken and a cake to celebrate Andrew's birthday. John said they all ate dinner together at the table, then watched a karate movie before going to bed. John says he had already made arrangements with a group he calls the Underground Sanctuary to give the boys away. And on Thanksgiving night at 10, John says he watched as two women and a man who looked like he was in his 60s pulled up to the house in their light colored van to take Andrew, Alexander and Tanner away. John says he told the boys they were going to have a better life with a new family, a family who lived on an Amish farm in Ohio right along the Indiana border.

He promised them their new family would buy them the farm boots they'd been asking for and let them ride on a tractor whenever they wanted. Breaking down in tears for the fourth time during our interview, John said he regrets giving his boys away. Based on cell phone tower records, police say the dad, John Skelton's drive that evening, started around 4.29 a.m. and ended 6.45 a.m. Is that when he said goodbye to his children? Possibly. For all times. Karen Stark, joining me, New York psychologist.

See, it's so difficult for people like me or Cheryl, who I know to be parents, to understand a dad not coming clean about where his children are. I mean, the fact that he keeps changing his story makes me know if I didn't suspect him at the beginning, I do now. Why would his story change, Karen? I don't understand how you can disassociate from your own children, Karen Stark. His story keeps changing because he can't come up with the right story, Nancy. He's not telling us the truth. And I think it's very telling that he tried to kill himself. Because you're always talking about when somebody, how does it always happen that they manage to kill their children, but they can't kill themselves. And I think that's a very telling incident. I think that

this is a whole bunch of malarkey. And there's a lot more going on. You certainly put it a lot more nicely than I would have Karen Stark. And another thing I'd like to ask you about with me, Karen Stark, a renowned New York psychologist. Karen, we know, let me, let me double check with Jeremy Allen, WDIV. Jeremy, obviously they're having a very contentious custody problem because you outline how he took the children out of town when he wasn't supposed to. He wouldn't return them on time. So what do we know about that? Because then I'm going to go back to Karen.

With that as a backdrop. Yeah, so the back story and the reason that they had the marital problems, I mean, one of the big reasons they did was because John decided that after going to a family, or I'm sorry, a class reunion down in Jacksonville, Florida, where he went to high school, that he wanted to move his family to Florida. Jeremy Allen, the mom, did not want to leave the state. I mean, I can only imagine coming home and my husband saying, oh yeah, we're moving to Florida. Oh, over my cold dead body. Not that there's anything wrong with Florida, but I'm not going to uproot the children from their school and their home and their relatives and just move because he wants to be close to his high school buddies.

But the taking the children away and the custody battle ensuing Karen Stark, I mean, so often we see that as a backdrop to felonies. The parents can't get along and then suddenly the children go missing. Because one of the parents is saying, if I can't have them, then nobody can have them. I want to go back to Sandra Ali, WDIV Detroit reporter. Sandra, I want to take a listen to what you obtained by going behind jailhouse walls to speak to this father. I don't know if he deserves the name father, John Skelton. Listen. Remember, we weren't allowed to bring any of our cameras inside prison. John says he told the boys they were going to have a better life with a new family who lived

on an Amish farm in Ohio along the Indiana border. John says he promised the boys their new family would buy them the farm boots they'd been asking for and let them ride on a tractor whenever they wanted. Breaking down in tears for the fourth time during our interview, John said he regrets giving his boys away. The more that I can talk about my boys and share their story, the greater chance that that one person that we are waiting to see our story that knows something, the greater chance of them seeing it. Cheryl McCollum, director of the Cold Case Institute. I mean, this business about taking them and going to Florida,

no mom is going to go along with suddenly uprooting the children just because you want to be around all your old friends. I don't believe it. But his story keeps morphing, Cheryl. It keeps morphing. It keeps changing. He keeps adding, you know, an element here and a fact there that everybody knows is

bogus. And Nancy, one thing we also need to mention about his failed suicide attempt, when that happened, he called a friend to take him to the hospital. He wanted no part of law enforcement. You know, I'm looking at these cell phone tower records, 429 AM, 646 AM. It concerns me deeply because it reminds me of the Susan Powell case, Sandra Ali, WDIV, where her husband, Josh, is out riding around in the snow after midnight claiming he's taking the boys camping. Susan Powell was never seen alive again and then later he blew up his home with the boys in it. What is he doing Sandra Ali out driving around 4 29 a.m to 6 46 a.m. What about other physical evidence? I know about the cell phone records, Sandra. What other evidence is there? Were the boys clothing there? Did the home look like there had been some sort

of a struggle? What do we know? Well, the home, we know, Nancy, was in complete disarray. And the feds said when they went in, it was unlike anything they had ever seen before. It was trashed from top to bottom. Now, John Skelton also claimed he burned a lot of what he called, quote, unquote, evidence. That's what he told me when we talked in prison. But investigators said they never really saw any evidence that he had burned anything. Cords were cut. Computers were smashed. Furniture was, you know, tossed to the ground.

We don't know if he took a baseball bat to a lot of stuff, but that's what it looked like. Oh, my stars. I'm only imagining these little boys, 5, 7, and 9, in the middle of all this. And what about the mother, Tanya Zubers? Take a listen. Things that were glass were busted. The big curio cabinet was smashed to pieces along with everything that was inside of it.

And then, in a bizarre twist, his story changes yet again. Sandra Ali, WDIV, what is his latest incarnation? He said, Nancy, that he had made prior arrangements when he knew he was no longer going to have any sort of custody whatsoever. No shared custody, no visitation, nothing. He said he made prior arrangements with another family. That's what he's calling it. Another family for the boys to go and live a better life on an Amish farm. And he said that those people picked up the boys earlier than he had planned. He said that he had made arrangements with them, but they came Thanksgiving night at 10 o'clock. Three people pulled up to his house that he had made prior arrangements. And it was two women and a man. And he said he watched as they drove off with his three sons. An Amish family. Cheryl McCollum, director of the Cold Case Institute, an Amish family? What? Nancy, he's building this thing where the Amish family's

not going to have a phone. They're not going to have cameras or internet. So they're going to be on some farm that, you know, nobody has any communication with. It's completely crap. It's bogus. It's a lie that nobody is going to believe. Nancy, Sandra Ali recently interviewed the man that Skelton told detectives had his sons. Mose Gingrich had not been initially identified, but after he was, Gingrich visited Skelton in jail to confront him about it. And this is what he now tells Sandra Ali. Moze grew up Amish. He left the community back in 2002 and became a TV personality practically overnight. I didn't realize I missed the country that much. Moze and his wife started what he describes as an underground railroad,

an escape for Amish children who wanted to leave the old world for the new. We just have a good old open house policy where new kids that leave and need help come in and we help them get up and running. A safe place. A safe place. By now you're probably wondering, how is this man linked to John Skelton or his three missing boys?

It took me a while to connect the dots because I was like, how did this guy ever get my name? John Skelton first told investigators he gave Andrew Alexander and Tanner away to live with another family where they would be safe. John later told investigators a man by the name of Moe's Gingrich would help find his boys their new home. That detail of John's story hasn't been made public until now. He mentioned my name. So what happened when investigators first tracked down Moe's Gingrich? I had two different routes I could take. I could stay secretive about it, not tell one person about it, and crawl under a rock and let this guy control my life. Or I can do what I'm doing.

I can set out to prove that I'm innocent. I have nothing to hide. Moe's is cooperating with the investigation. In fact, in early March, he went to the Bellamy Creek Correctional Facility to talk to John face to face. He was pretty shocked to see me. He was completely caught off guard. He had no idea I was coming. I think when he gave the detectives this alibi that he gave these kids to an organization out of Missouri, he thought they might just follow up on this and maybe go interview me and he'd never hear anything about it again. I don't think he ever once thought that the person he's accusing is going to come sit down and actually talk with him. Did he recognize you?

Yeah, he recognized me immediately. Moe says John Skelton looked uncomfortable, but it was obvious to Moe's, John is a quick thinker. He's head and shoulders smarter than I would have given him credit for. Instead of blurting something out that was like, oh, you did that TV show. It took him three seconds to be like, I saw you in a picture. Somebody gave me a picture. And he was just, I couldn't believe how smooth he was. But I said, I want to talk to you about your three boys.

You said your boys were given to an unlisted adoption agency. That agency sent them on down the line to me. And I said, I want you to know, Mr. Skelton, that I never received those three boys. If you did give them to an adoption agency, there was a disconnect between them and me. Not only did I never receive them, but I've never even heard of them until six months ago. And he acted just mind-blowing, sad.

Tears started coming. He said, well, that was my last hope. That's the only thing I had left. I was always told that once I get out of jail, I can find you and I can contact you and you'll be able to tell me where these kids are. We think he'd probably seen this television program and thought, what a perfect alibi

to continue this wild goose chase. John Skelton has told himself and the world so many lies and so many falsehoods over the last seven years that he's come to believe most of them. His life's on the line. Once your life is on the line, you're going to do anything, any extreme measures to the ends of the earth to try to save your own life. To Sandra Ali, WDIV, what was his demeanor as he's spinning this yarn about an Amish family? You know, Nancy, his demeanor changed a couple of times. I mean, we were there for several hours. So when we initially got there, he sobbed when we first walked in. And he broke down several times

during the interview. But I will tell you this, Nancy, as I went back and looked through my notes I had taken later, every time I asked John Skelton a very pointed, specific question about the investigation, he would stop and eat. And he would deliberately waste time, as I guess the wheels were turning in his head as he was trying to figure out how he would deliberately waste time as, I guess, the wheels were turning in his head as he was trying to figure out how he would answer my question. Sandra Ali, that is, I mean, I'm fascinated by that. Like I would be looking at a cobra in a glass box. But what type of question would you ask to elicit that behavior,

stop everything and start eating? I mean, I don't even know how many thousands of witnesses I have interviewed or interrogated, direct examined or cross-examined, and I watched them very closely. And Cheryl, I remember telling you this and you laughed when I told you. I would, at some points, try not to even blink when I would watch a person answer my question.

And I practice it over time so I wouldn't have to blink because I want to just catch every movement. If they looked away quickly at the question or they turned their head or they looked down or they looked up, I did not want to miss a single thing as I examined them and determined in my own mind their veracity, their truth. What do you make, Cheryl, of what Sandra Ali is saying that she had asked him a pointed question and he'd stop everything and start eating? Fascinating. And what he's doing there is I can't talk with a mouthful of food because that would be rude. So he's given himself time to think of an answer that he thinks she's gonna buy so if she point blank says did you harm your boys did you kill your boys do you know who your boys are he's

gonna start eating so he doesn't have to answer her sandra what were some of the questions you would ask that would make him stop everything and start eating You said they were pointed. I asked him, Nancy point blank, did you hurt your boys? Where did you take them? Were they in the van with you that morning when you drove to Holiday City? When was the last time you saw them? And he he took a lot of time in answering. Now, if if John Skelton was talking about himself and his, you know, anything personal about himself, he, you know, he had no problem spending a lot of time talking about himself. But when I specifically asked him about the boys, he would be very, very deliberate in his answer. You know, when she was asking those questions, I immediately fired off the answers in

my head, Karen Stark. When was the last time I saw the twins? What were they doing? What were they wearing? Had I hurt them? I mean, all that. I mean, there's an immediate answer firing through my brain. Karen, that is so classic. And I'll tell you something, Nancy, when I work with patients and we touch upon a subject that they find unbearable or too much, that they can't answer it, that it's painful or they haven't thought about it, they'll change the subject and they'll start talking about something else or there will be these very long pauses. So he's obviously prevaricating and trying to take time away from the question he's being asked to figure out what would be the right thing to say right now that will fit the rest of the story that I've come up with.

Take a listen to what the Skelton brothers, the three little boys, now missing five, seven, and nine years old. Mom, Tanya Zivers, says, The loving, caring sons that I raise to the ages, they don't like mom to cry and be upset. They want mom, this is who they know. This is what they want. You know, so I don't, because someday we will be back together.

I will find them. It may not be until I'm buried, but I will find them. And I don't want them to think that I was just a shell of a person in our time apart. Furious, angry. Who I am now, if I could just have a minute with him. Would you want to talk to him, Tanya? I think so. I want to remind him

of his sons and the happy times and all the things. And one answers as to why you would do this to our sons, your sons. Tomorrow would it be birthday number? 12. 12. For my baby. You wonder.

What do you wonder about? Who would he be? What does he look like? All of them. To Jeremy Allen, WDIV Detroit producer. Jeremy, you know, you and Sandra know the physical evidence better than anybody. What do you make of what happened that day? We know a lot because we've talked to investigators not so much.

And as Sandra talked about earlier, the house was just destroyed from top to bottom. And one of the big pieces of evidence that investigators had early on was looking at John's search history on his computer, which showed that he had Googled, can you break a neck with your hands? Oh, my stars. I didn't know that part. That's giving me horrible flashbacks to the top mom, Casey Anthony trial, where she had researched neck breaking and turning household items into weapons.

And something else you just said, Jeremy WDIV, you know, if I can, when I leave for the morning, I try to put everything back in place and have everything neat and organized as best as I can before the children come home. Because I want them to have stability and a sense of peace and orderliness as they live. Not like the house like a cyclone hit it, which, you know know it happens when you're a family and everybody's working and trying to get to school and just imagining it's the exact bass awkward opposite of him leaving the the home all destroyed and everything broken like he took a baseball bat to it back to the computer searches j, WDIV. What do we know about his computer searches? He's the only adult in the home. It had to be him. True. Yeah, it was him. And,

you know, the other search that they found that was very disconcerting was the fact that he searched, does rat poison kill humans? And I think Sandra can probably speak a little bit more to that because, you know, they got into that a little bit more. Sandra Ali, way in. So Nancy, I did ask John when we talked in prison about his computer searches. I said, you know, I said, John, how do you even then explain what they found on your computer? And he said, well, what did they find on my computer? I said, well, how do you explain rat poison? And he said, poison? I've never searched for poison on my computer. I've never looked that up. And I said, well, what about how to break someone's neck? And he said, he kind of chuckled a little bit. And then he went into a very long explanation about how he said he and

the boys had watched a karate movie the last night they were together and that the boys had asked him to look that up because of something they had seen in this karate movie. With me, Sandra Ali and Jeremy Allen, both from WDIV Detroit, who have never let go of this case. They're on it now as strong as ever sandra ali what do you make of his latest story that he gave the children over willingly to an amish family and as cheryl mccollum correctly points out that would be a way to explain how you can't find them they don't have a phone they you can't know where they live you know that they're out in some communal setting where they can't be uncovered. Sandra, explain to me. None of it makes sense, Nancy. None of it makes sense. And John Skelton repeated

over and over. It wasn't, he kept saying that this wasn't out of anger. I didn't do anything out of anger. I did this because I knew I could no longer be with my boys. And he has no solid explanation. And I think that's what's so frustrating for investigators. It's like the boys vanished into thin air and he's sitting there in prison and he's not talking. He's not giving anyone anything to go on. Well, what I don't understand is why he could not reveal their location now. And I asked him that. I asked him, I said, you know, give us a name, give us a phone number, give us a location. And, you know, he did say that this quote unquote group was supposed to reach out to his family in Jacksonville, Florida, and show them that the boys were safe and show

them evidence, if that's evidence in pictures, letters, videos, something to show the grandparents who are in Florida that the boys are indeed safe and sound and living on this farm. That evidence has never come to fruition. No one has ever sent his family in Florida anything. His kids are fine. I know this as a grandmother. I have a grandmother's heart and I know this. I don't know where they are. If I know this as a grandmother. I have a grandmother's heart, and I know this. I don't know where they are. If I did, they wouldn't be there. This is his Facebook page, and it says, I love my wife very much. May God and Tanya forgive me. The dad, John Skelton, claims he was trying to keep his three little boys out of harm's way. How in the world, Sandra Ali, WDIV, is this keeping them out of harm's way?

I mean, the only one causing harm to them was him, Sandra. His claim is they were being mistreated and abused by their mother. That's his claim. Now, was there any evidence to support that? Well, no. No. And, you know, and Jeremy spent a great deal of time talking to the boy's mother, Tanya. And, you know, she'll tell you, police will tell you,

they never found any claims of abuse. As a matter of fact, the mom speaks directly to that question. Listen to Tanya. That has all been investigated. I was investigated. I was interrogated as well. My house was searched. My computer was searched. All of my stuff was gone through as well. There were interviews with school teachers, school administrators, church people, friends, all kinds of people.

School administrators and teachers who are trained to see abuse in children. Who said to the police? I have never seen more children more loved and cared for by their mother. Those children were not abused. There is And anyone who truly knows me knows that my children come first, always have, always will. My dream job was to be a mom, and within the first year of getting married I was pregnant for my first child and this year marks 30 years that I've been a mom and it is the greatest job in the world and now I get to be a grandma too but to say that I abused my sons kills me. To Jeremy Allen, WDIV, you know, I have watched the mother. I have studied her carefully.

I don't believe she would touch a hair on their head. I don't think there's any way this mom would have hurt her little children. I mean, she says her dream job was to be a mom, and I believe her. Yeah, I mean, you get the impression when you're talking to Tanya, especially face-to-face, that, you know, there was nowhere in the world she'd rather be than in her home with her children. I've always felt that, yeah, she was genuine and honest when she talked about her love for her children.

So, to me, it doesn't seem like a possibility that she was abusing her children, even though obviously John and John's family would tell you otherwise. Well, I mean, he's the one, Sandra Ali, not telling us where the children are. So what's his excuse for not telling us where they are now? I mean, you'd rather sit behind bars and rot as we wait to find out where they are? I don't get it, Sandra. I don't either, Nancy. And he did say, I'm going to sit here and serve time anyway. He said a couple of times, which I found very interesting, he kept saying, you know, I'm guilty. And I said,

you're guilty. And he said, yeah, I'm guilty for I'm serving my debt to society because I did not have custody of the boys, and so I'm guilty of unlawful imprisonment. And I said, well, John, why don't you work out some sort of deal? I said, why don't you tell everyone where the boys are? Tell investigators where the boys are. Work out some sort of deal. You're saying they're safe. where the boys are. Tell investigators where the boys are. Work out some sort of deal. Everyone, you're saying they're safe. Everyone just wants to know they're safe and see them again and be with them again. And he said, why would I tell them where they are? Why would I do that? They're

just going to meet me, he said, at the prison door and get me for something else. So I might as well just continue sitting here and serving my time. To Cheryl McCollum, director of the Cold Case Institute. Where are they, Cheryl? Nancy, I agree with the sheriff. This is not going to have a good ending. It's interesting to me that he mentioned to Ms. Ali 10 p.m. Anytime a suspect gives me a time, I highlight it. So from 10 p.m. to 429 is six hours where something bad happened in that home. And then between the 430 and 645, when his phone is actually moving, that doesn't mean it wasn't moving before. He could have left it at the house and he was moving without the phone in that

van so they could literally be anywhere but I do not believe they're alive Sandra Ali with me along with Jeremy Allen just recently bone fragments were uncovered and my heart just sunk I just was so afraid it was was the skeleton boys. What became of that discovery, Sandra? Well, Nancy, you know, when we heard about that, it was, you know, sheer panic here as well in the newsroom. And everyone initially thought, well, maybe, maybe this is it. This is the day the boys' bones are discovered. And, you know, they've done DNA testing, extensive testing, and they've just ruled, in fact, that these bones, this discovery has no, no match to Andrew Alexander or Tanner

Skelton. Well, I thank God for that. But in another way, Cheryl McCollum, I mean, when I look back on how I felt when I learned that their bones had been found and I was praying it wasn't the skeleton boys. Now, I don't know if I should pray for the discovery of their bodies so we can know what happened and they can be buried. I mean, Cheryl, do you really believe they were living with some Amish family? That's crazy talk. That is insane. And Nancy, here's the thing. When the bones were found in that shed, John Skelton himself said, those aren't the boys. Well, how the hell would he know that? He doesn't know where they are. If he gave them to some family, the family could have harmed them. The only way that he knows their remains were not in that shed is if he knows where their remains are.

And he does. Sandra Ali, what are your thoughts? Where are the boys, and what can we do to bring them home? You know, Nancy, I wish I knew. And I see why investigators and everyone involved in this case and this poor family and this poor grieving mother, when you're this close to this case, you realize, you understand why everyone is so frustrated and so heartbroken. This has gone on for so long. And we're no closer to solving the mystery. It seems that as time goes on, the mystery just deepens, which is what makes this even more difficult. When you say the mystery deepens, what do you mean by that? And what was the single most disturbing thing Skelton said

behind bars? You know, there was so much he said. I will tell you, you know, we just talked about the bones. One of the first things he talked about when even before I sat down was the bones. And he he said he he rolled his eyes and he said, I said, what did you think when you saw that on the news? And he said, oh, those aren't my boys. And he even talked to family members and said, oh, I knew after I saw those reports, I knew those weren't my boys. Nancy, I've been doing a podcast on this since May of 2017. And we've gone more in depth on this story than anyone ever has. And in fact, we've talked to John's parents, which nobody's done for years, and they seem to blindly follow John's words. And that was disconcerting to me because I think when people are pointing the finger at John's family, I think it's important to remember that they all regard John as kind of this intellect, this superior mind in their

family. So when they talk and they tell the story about what John told them, I believe them that they think they're telling the truth. Now, I don't believe that John's telling the truth. So basically, you're getting John's story through the parents. But just remember that a lot of those people in John's family are victims as well. I'm looking at the pictures of the little boys. They're beautiful. Andrew, Alexander, and Tanner. They're old enough now. If they were alive, they would have found a way to let people know that they were alive. That's what I was going to say. If three little boys all of a sudden wound up next door to you or in your school or in your community, you would know it. Nobody has reported this.

There's no way a seven-year-old and a nine-year-old are not going to talk about where they used to live or their old house or their mama. There's no chance these children are alive. Yeah. They would try and get in touch with their mother. You know that, Nancy. They would do anything possible to try and reach out. I mean, in the third grade? Of course.

Nancy, John Skelton's family, his father, mother, and sister have a reply to that. Well, I've thought about that. I question that, too. Why hasn't them boys... Did anybody ever think maybe they're happy where they're at? The Marines police said, there's no way you can hide children. Well, I pulled up 186 cases of underground children that have been hidden. A few years back, down here in Jacksonville, was filling up my other truck with fuel and I was had my back there and a gentleman come up behind me and he asked me not to turn

around and said I know your plight and your sons are okay. Really? And I says thank you. And that was it? That was it. You didn't turn around? It pops in my head all the time. Why haven't they contacted somebody? Right. Maybe they're happy. Do you feel 100% that John gave the kids to somebody? Yes.

You do believe that? Yes. And you believe those kids are safe with whoever that group is? Yes. You're 100% confident that your son is telling the truth? Yes. And I think that's the important thing in all this is, I think everyone's waiting to find out if John's telling the truth, right?

Of course they are. Yeah. And then who's going to get the last laugh? So you believe that to this day? I believe those boys are fine. You believe that or do you want to believe that? No, I believe it. I believe it full are fine. You believe that or do you want to believe that? No, I believe it. I believe it full in my heart. I believe it totally, 100% that them boys are fine.

Is there a victim or is it just the boys that were victims in a kind of a messed up household for a little while? I think only the boys are the victims because they've lost, they've, they're protected, but they're missing out on two grandparents that love them and an aunt

and a daddy that loves them dearly. And I'm sure Tanya loves them too. I mean, you know, everyone's a victim, I guess. There is a $60,000 reward. The tip line, 517-458-7104. Repeat, 517-458-7104. Karen Stark, Cheryl McCullen, Jeremy Allen, Sandra Ali. Thank you. Nancy Grace, Crime Stories, signing off. Goodbye, friend. This is an iHeart Podcast.