Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - Mom gets traffic stop, cops find dead tot boy in trunk! Uber driver danger!? And did missing teen witness murder?

Episode Date: January 29, 2018

A 14-year-old Sarasota, Florida, boy has been missing since last September, not long after he apparently witnessed murder. Nancy Grace searches for answers about what happened to Jabez Spann with Cold Case Research Institute director Sheryl McCollum, private investigator Vincent Hill, and forensic psychiatrist Dr. Carole Lieberman. Reporter Larry Meagher joins Nancy to discuss the case of an Alabama woman who is facing criminal charges after police allegedly found her newborn son’s body in her trunk during a traffic stop. Co-host Alan Duke reports on the case against a man who allegedly posed as an Uber driver to lure college coeds into his car where he then raped and robbed them. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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plus indicator strips to see how Super Beets works for you. And free shipping! 800-516-0683 or go to nancysbeats.com today. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace on Sirius XM Triumph, Channel 132. He witnessed a crime and a week later he disappeared. Somebody came to me and told me that my grandson was a witness to that murder and that's when he went missing. He gave me a kiss on the jaw and a hug and said, Granny, I'll see you later. I didn't have no idea that I wouldn't see him no

more after that. I'm asking you if you want me to beg, that's fine. But I know that there has to be somebody out there with the heart that can say something, say something. Just tell somebody where he at. Well, you know, you just could. We want some closure. Help me. Help me help a mother who is desperate at this hour. For all of you mothers, all of you fathers, grandparents out there listening now, a teen boy is gone and he is beautiful, loving, good student, everything. His mom is heartbroken. Please help us. I'm Nancy Grace.

This is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us. I'm going to go straight out to Cheryl McCollum with the Cold Case Research Institute, the director and crime scene investigator. Cheryl McCollum. Tell me. The best fan. 14 years old.

Funny, fabulous, standout football star. Tons of friends, supportive family. No police records. No problem to anybody. Grandmama was raising him. He loved her, Nancy. He just was a standout kid everybody knew him real easy smile a little mischievous uh loved video games and girls and his cell phone that's what every single person told me cheryl you are actually bringing me to tears because you have just described my son, John David, to a team.

Absolutely. You know, we have secret signs that mean I love you. Mm-hmm. And that's what I look forward to every morning is seeing John David and Lucy. And that's what I look forward to every night is putting them to sleep. And all the time in between. This mother is desperate and we need your help so much. Joining me in addition to the director of the Cold Case Institute, Dr. Carol Lieberman, forensic psychiatrist.

Also with me, private eye Vincent Hill and straight back to Cheryl McCollum. Cheryl, how did he go missing? Nancy, he was last seen at a Labor Day barbecue where tons of family and friends were at. He went to his grandmama and said, hey, I'll see you later. Kiss her on the cheek. She said, I love you. And that was it. Nobody has seen him since. We are talking about a missing teen boy. And so often when we hear teen boy missing, everybody thinks the worst. They think, ah, he's involved in something nefarious. He did this.

He did that. He was running with the wrong crowd. Blah, blah, blah. What was he mixed up in? That is so not the case with this young boy. This boy had never been in a bit of trouble. Great student. Football star.

Just gorgeous boy. His mom, heartbroken. If you could see this kid's smile. I'm looking at some of their posts, Cheryl. They're desperate. They're posting, we need this baby home. We are not okay. Begging people for help.

I don't understand how he went missing. Let's go back to the facts. That's where I start when I don't know how he went missing. Let's go back to the facts. That's where I start when I don't know what to do. It's like trying over and over and over to put together a Rubik's Cube that just doesn't seem to fit. And you play with it and you play with it and you start over and you start over and you fit one piece together. And then suddenly another piece doesn't fit. That's how this is working. Right now, we are digging into the case of a missing Sarasota teen boy with one of the biggest

smiles I've ever seen. We're talking about Jabez Spann. Now, you say he goes missing, but where, when, why, how? He literally is on his street in Newtown and walks away. His grandmother doesn't see exactly where he goes. No friend has come forward. No neighbor has come forward. There's no surveillance tape where he's at a convenience store or a library or anything. He's simply vanished. But there's a twist, Nancy. On August 28th, a man by the name of Travis Combs was murdered in Newtown, 453 feet from Jabez's

grandmama's front door. Someone came forward and told the family and then separately their private investigator that Jabez witnessed the murder of Travis Combs and said, you know, y'all shot him? Y'all killed him? And so there is great fear that he was once a witness to a murder and now is a missing person. is that this young boy witnessed a crime and now he is missing. I mean, I wonder sometimes what our world has come to when a young boy is kidnapped or murdered because of what he saw. It's what they write about in movies and TV shows, but this is real, and the pain of his family is real. Is there a street code of silence? If so, it is so misguided. What do we know about this boy? We are talking about a 14-year-old kid,

Jabez Spann, has never been in trouble, doesn't have a rap sheet, went to school every day, played on the football team, loved his mother. Joining me, Dr. Carol Lieberman, forensic psychiatrist, author of a brand new book you can find it on Amazon, Lions and Tigers and Terrorists. Oh, my. How to protect your child in a time of terror. Dr. Carol Lieberman, nothing could be more on point right now. How can we protect our children and what went wrong? I mean, Carol, when I was growing up, I would come home, do my homework. I was a latchkey kid.

I would get on my bicycle and pedal, pedal, pedal, pedal, play in the woods and streams, spot birds, chase whatever I heard in the woods, if it was a kitty cat or a squirrel or whatever there was. And it was only until 5 or 6 o'clock when it was beginning to get dark, I'd pedal that bike back home. And that was okay. That's not true now, Dr. Carol. Yes. People are, kids, it's even dangerous for kids to be in their front

yard these days. To Cheryl McCollum, director of the Cold Case Research Institute. Cheryl, let me understand, who is Mr. Parker? Is he a neighbor? What, if anything, did he see or hear? He saw Jabez in the neighborhood, witnessed the crime, and heard him say, allegedly, y'all killed him? So again, Nancy, for me, you know, his statement was, y'all killed him, not they killed him, which says to me, Jabez knew the people involved with the murder of Travis Combs. To Dr. Carol Lieberman, forensic psychiatrist and author of a brand-new book, Dr. Lieberman, how did a good kid like Jabez somehow get mixed up in a murder that he had nothing to do with, and now he's paying the price?

Yes. He was in the wrong place at the wrong time. That's all it amounts to. It's a really, you know, one of the things that's for me most frustrating about this story is that the police didn't take this report about his having witnessed a murder or and said that, you know, you all killed a man or words to that effect. They didn't take that seriously. They thought it was just a rumor. So a lot of precious time was lost.

You know, it's possible that he left on his own because he was afraid that the people were going to come after him, the murderers, or they might have threatened him and said, if you tell, we're going to hurt your family. Well, you know, Dr. Carol Lieberman, I'm typically on the same page as you, but Cheryl McCollum, for a kid to leave home, the only thing he knew and loved, leave his mother, which is all he had in this world, and not a message, not a a text not a phone call nothing i i don't believe he left home that's the stuff that novels and movies are made up nancy he had no money no clothes

no food and his cell phone stopped pinging now this is another twist in the story his cell phone continued to ping until september the 4th, and that's when Hurricane Irma hit. And that's when law enforcement absolutely knew they had something very serious on their hands. Right now, the reward has been doubled, that reward climbing now up to $50,000. The FBI originally contributed $19,000, now offering $44,000, and then another $6,000 being kicked in by local police and law enforcement. Jabez Spann, last seen around 22nd Street in Sarasota. He was wearing a turquoise shirt. He is 5'9". He weighs 120 pounds. Sarasota Police Department has received many tips. Detectives remain in daily contact with the Spann family, but there's no new information in the case. To Vincent Hill, private investigator, people don't just vanish

off the face of the earth. Vincent, there is a clue. Yeah, Nancy, people don't vanish, especially 14-year-old boys. I have a 16-year-old. He would have called. He would have texted. I can track his phone. I can do all of that. So he's definitely not going to leave the house where he gets food, comfort, and things of that nature. And there's that old street code, Nancy, that snitches get stitches. And I think, unfortunately, we probably already know the outcome of this case. I don't know the outcome of this case. What I do know is a mother is crying at this moment, right now, for her son. And we need to pull together and help her. The family has hired a private investigator. What should he or she be doing?

This is your specialty, Vincent Hill. Yeah, right now, Nancy, follow any lead. I mean, I would be looking for any surveillance footage in the area. I would be tracking down where the last location or his phone pinged. Anything technology-based that could help me find out where he could be right now. There's somebody that saw something. Those people need to be talked to. They need to be questioned and follow up every

possible lead. His birthday has come and gone. And you know, Cheryl McCollum, director of the Cold Case Institute, there is no way this kid would not have been home for his birthday with his mom. No way. He wouldn't have missed his birthday. He wouldn't have missed his grandmother. And he wouldn't have missed getting a learner's permit. Not going to happen. Jabez's mom, Mrs. Spann, has not seen her son since he went missing on the family's front yard. He was in his own front yard. How does that happen?

How can there be no clue as to where this young boy has gone? She and others believe her son unintentionally witnessed a murder, the murder of Travis Combs, and they believe firmly someone connected to that murder took her boy. She is now doing her best to stay optimistic. She says, I don't even try and draw a conclusion. All I want is for us to have the first step in finding him. I have hope and I have faith. The Sarasota police on the case. According to authorities, quote, no child has ever gone missing from Sarasota. Well, they have now.

As the search intensifies for this boy who disappears from his own front yard, the reward now up to $50,000. Cheryl McCollum joining me on the case from the get-go, director of the Cold Case Research Institute. Cheryl, what more can you tell us? How can you help us crack the case? Because now I understand original witnesses refusing to talk.

Absolutely. He said he never said that about Javad saying that y'all kill him. He's saying that he never said, y'all aren't going to like the way his face looks and y'all aren't going to like where he ends up. So he has, you know, totally changed his story and is not wanting to cooperate anymore. I don't believe that there is not a clue out there.

I don't believe that this case cannot be cracked. I believe we can find answers for his mother. If you can help us in the disappearance of this bright, sparkly wonderful young boy with a million dollar smile please call 941-366-TIPS 941-366-8477 941-366-8000 there is a fifty thousand dollar reward us. If there's anybody that know anything like, don't just let him, if something happens, don't just let him just be out there like that. If a crime is being covered over a life, there's something hugely wrong here. And I'm begging, please bring him back home. And the house is so empty without him in it. Please go to CrimeOnline.com, read about his disappearance, and look at his photo. God willing, we will find a clue.

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And now, we are heading across the country, live to a story in Jackson, Alabama. I wish you could see this mom. She is really a Kim Kardashian lookalike. Have you seen her photo, Jackie? I mean, she's got the straight dark hair parted in the middle, the big brown eyes, and she's actually got that pout going on where you kind of suck on her cheeks a little bit. Lucy Lynch did that the other day. Oh, yes, she did. When I was taking a picture of her, she actually sucked in her cheeks and did it like a little kiss thing with her lips. I wanted to say a child, where have you learned that? Have you been on the internet? So I secretly ran and grabbed

her iPad and did a history search. No, she's just been watching more and more and more gymnastic videos thank god thank you lord because i thought she'd never get off of watching guinea pig videos hence the two guinea pigs that are in a cage in her bedroom so gymnastic videos is a nice relief but i don't know where she learned that little pout but this lady has definitely got one in her photo. This gorgeous young Alabama mom seemingly did no wrongdoing except, whoopsie, an expired license tag, right? Wait till I tell you what happened. Actually, let's go now to Larry Mayher, Crime Stories investigative reporter. Larry, so this young mom, Jaleesa Gaines, gets pulled over for what? She was pulled over for having an expired license tag as she was driving in Jackson, Alabama,

which is in the southwestern part of the state near Mobile. Now, hold on. So she gets pulled over for a very simple traffic stop. You mean the whole plate was bad or was it just the little sticker had expired? It was an expired license plate. Okay, keep going. When police first talked to her, she gave them a different name. Let me just stop you right there, Larry Mayher. Okay. She gave a different name. Okay, Vincent Hill, private investigator. This is what I used to tell juries.

Okay, when I see a trooper coming up behind me with the lights on, I don't hit the gas and try to outrun them and maybe jump a roadblock. I stop and I pull over. Okay? That's what I used to say when defendants would take off. It's flight. It's evidence of guilt. The last thing I would do is when they ask me to roll my window down and show license and registration,

I don't say something like, what's your name? Angelina Jolie. Reese Witherspoon. No, you tell them your name. Yeah. Because they know. All they have to do is a 30-second computer search that they've got at their fingertips, like an iPhone, really, in their car.

They put your tag in, and they know who's supposed to be driving that car vincent yeah nancy and some of the biggest arrests i ever got was from a simple traffic stop which resulted in someone giving me a fake name i've caught people i've caught people wanted for murders rapes you name it based on a simple traffic stop and and a fake name. So that always gets the cops' spidey senses up. I love traffic stops. You know, let me just tell one quick little story. So we were driving to take the twins to something. Oh, it was something like Disney on Ice.

What is it? Let It Go? Let It Go? What movie was that? Frozen, yes, Frozen, of course. Of course, John David was just like screaming on the inside, but he had to go see Frozen on Ice. So we were leaving this big arena and I said, turn left, turn left.

And David goes, I'm not supposed to. I said, just do it. He turns left and immediately, whoop, whoop. I'm like, oh, dear Lord in heaven. So anyway, poor David. He's about to get a ticket when I decide to inject myself into this scenario. I get out of the car. I walk around back.

The officer says, get down. I'm like, oh, dear Lord in heaven. I held my hands up. I'm like, sir, I'm totally I held my hands up. I'm like, sir, I'm totally unarmed. Please don't shoot me. So anyway, you never know what's going to happen in a simple

traffic stop, Vincent Hill. So are you saying you've actually caught killers at a traffic stop? Yes, absolutely, Nancy. I've caught three people that were wanted for murder based on a simple, quote-unquote, simple traffic stop. Wow. Okay.

Larry Mayher, you know, I don't know why you got off the topic the way you did, dragging it frozen and Disney on ice. But can I please get you back in the middle of the road, Larry? Yes, ma'am. The police pull her over for a tag violation, which in that jurisdiction is just a little, you keep your same metal plate. You just get a yearly renewal sticker, and it's a bright color. Like in 2017, it might be bright orange. In 2018, it's blue. So cops can look at a distance, and they know immediately your tag is expired. So they pull her over.

Okay. What happened then? When the officers on the scene discovered that she had lied about her name, they asked her consent to search the car. So hold on just a moment. Vincent Hill, private investigator, they asked, it's like a vampire, they can't come in until you invite them.

Yeah, that's right, Nancy. You either need probable cause or verbal consent. That's right. There's only two ways they can get in that trunk. Now, under an old U.S. Supreme Court case, U.S. v. Carroll, RRR, the government was allowed to search cars more easily than homes and structures because of, quote, exigent circumstances. Which means if there's dope or a dead body or stolen merchandise in that car, the car can leave. That is an emergency, an exigent circumstance.

So, therefore, officers need less PC probable cause to search your car. So, if a cop searches your car, you might as well not cry about it because of U.S. v. Carroll. Oh, just an aside. You know where that came from, Vincent Hill? Exigent circumstances? might as well not cry about it because of U.S. v. Carroll. Oh, just an aside. You know where that came from, Vincent Hill? Exigent circumstances? Do you know? Where's that, Nancy?

Moonshine, honey bun, moonshine. Because when this case happened in the U.S. Supreme Court, it was during prohibition, and everybody was dragging moonshine around in their trunk. And cops, as I recall it, see a car weighing heavy, dragging its tail, and they go, mm-hmm, it's got moonshine. They pull it over, and they searched it and got the moonshine. And the defense was they had no right to search the trunk because they didn't have a warrant, and they didn't have probable cause.

Hence the ruling exigent circumstances. So you can thank some moonshine. Oh, my grandfather on my father's side. Okay. He was known to cook up some scuppernong wine in the bathtub, not judging. Okay. Larry Mayer, so you're telling me that she was asked, can we search your trunk? Right, Larry?

That's the story that the police tell, the version of the story that the police are offering. I don't like your attitude. What do you mean that's the story? Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Wait. Larry, I don't like your attitude, young man. Yeah.

That's the story that the police. I was trying not to cast any aspersions on the police. You said that's the story the police gave. Like, they're lying? Uh-uh. Now, hold on. In just a moment, we're going to do a little credibility contest in this case. So they say, Larry Mayher, that they said, can we search your trunk?

And they say, she said, why, yes, I'd love you to search my trunk. Okay, then what happened? Inside the trunk was a shoebox that had been of an infant baby boy which an autopsy has determined was Jalissa Gaines's son whoa whoa whoa wait just stop right there you know Larry Mayher you said that like um yeah they got her for throwing a beer can out the window you Larry you're telling me that they search her trunk, they find a shoebox, which tells you the size of this child,

wrapped in a sweater and a blanket. In the shoebox is the tiny baby boy's body. Did you just say that, Larry? That's correct. That's where the body of the baby boy was found. And you want to tell me

that you believe the mom as opposed to the police as to who said, yes, you can search my trunk? Oh, no, dear. She's lost this credibility contest. As soon as I find out there's a dead baby in a shoebox in her trunk. Okay, what happened then, Larry? Well, according to the family of this woman, the baby had been born about a week before, five to seven days before she was stopped in the car. The total autopsy results have not been made public. However, a medical examiner has said that the child was born alive, was not still born, and had lived four or five to seven days before he was killed. How he was killed is not yet known. Wait, wait, wait, wait. Dr. Carol Lieberman joining me, forensic psychiatrist and author of a brand new book,

Lions and Tigers and Terrorists, Oh My! How to Protect Your Child in a Time of Terror, which is now available on Amazon.com. Dr. Carol Lieberman, let me just get my mind around this. I remember, you know, when the twins were born, I went into intensive care with blood clots, lots of them, and it stuck in my lungs. The twins went to the other end of the hospital, to the NICU, neonatal intensive care unit, and we all stayed there. In fact, i set the alarm off in the hospital once trying to get to the twins and i think about dr carol how helpless they were at five to seven days old i remember the first time i held them in the hospital to give them a bath. And I had to hold their neck up. I was so afraid water would get in their mouth or their nose.

And they were just so fragile. And when I think about this little baby in a shoebox, in a car trunk. Dr. Carol Laberman, you gotta talk me off the ledge on this one. Well, yes, you have to wonder about the kind of heartlessness that a mother could have, did have, apparently,

to be able to presumably kill the baby, although we don't know exactly the cause of death yet. I mean, it's hard to believe it, to carry it around in the trunk of your car. You know, also, of course, there is the possibility, not likelihood, but possibility that she's protecting, you know, someone who killed the baby, like the father or something. But it's most likely her doing. And obviously,

she was trying to hide that from the get-go when she gave the false name. She knew that she didn't want them to find that. She's sociopathic. I mean, she has no conscience. She has no humanity to do that to a tiny, helpless child, no less her own child. Dr. Carol Lieberman, the police say she exhibited, she did not exhibit a degree of remorse that they had hoped for or expected. I've heard about, although I did not experience it it maybe it was because I nearly died and I you know I was just trying to keep three of us alive any disassociation from the twins at all when they were born all I could think about was would they live how could I make them live were

the doctors doing everything where the nurses doing everything was I and my parents and my in-laws was everybody doing everything they could to save the twins that's all I could think about I mean but I've heard that some moms disassociate or can't connect to the baby what is that dr. Carol Lieberman yes that is that is true. There are, you know, postpartum, there can be some psychiatric problems, some diagnoses from postpartum depression to starting off a psychosis, what her mental state is, in addition to them saying that she didn't exhibit enough remorse, the expected amount of remorse. There might be some kind of psychiatric condition. And if there is, I'm sure that she's going to be using that. Her attorney will be using that in her defense.

But, you know, the more likely stories when these kinds of things happen are that she didn't want the baby to begin with or she had gotten pregnant to get a man. Dr. Carol, Dr. Carol, I'm just a trial lawyer here. I'm just a JD. I know you're the psychiatrist, but let me just cut through all the psycho talk. She was on her way to Walmart. Okay? That speaks volumes to me, Vincent Hill. She no more cares about this baby than the man in the moon.

She's on her way for a shopping spree at Walmart. Yeah, I don't think she cared one bit, Nancy. And I think it's evident in the fact that she's like, sure, you can search my trunk. Like, I don't care if you find my baby in there. Who cares? Or she, Vincent Hill, private investigator, may have felt that if she said no, that would make them even more suspicious. Then they would definitely search her trunk. And if she said yes, if they looked in the trunk and just saw a shoebox, they probably wouldn't look in it.

So she was really between a rock and a hard spot. But I want to direct everybody to CrimeOnline.com and see this mugshot of this young mom. She's absolutely beautiful. But she's definitely got the Kim Kardashian, what do you call that? The selfie look where you're sucking your cheeks going on oh yeah she looks like and you are that's the look she's giving right to the mugshot so to larry mayher crime stories investigative reporter where is jaleesa gaines right now she was initially investigated on a lesser charge which was abuse of a corpse.

And she has been indicted. Police say she has been taken into custody and processed for manslaughter. Manslaughter. I think the jury ought to get at least a choice of murder one, murder two, manslaughter, involuntary, involuntary manslaughter. I mean, give them a choice for Pete's sake. That baby, that infant child, did not end up dead in a shoebox all on its own. And we don't know the cause of death yet. The COD is as of yet undetermined. But I know this.

We do know the child was born alive and allegedly lived from five to seven days. The Jackson Police Department now investigating the baby's death and according to the chief, Chief Jerry Taylor, officers find the baby's body in the trunk of that car during a simple traffic stop on Highway 43. Natural parts are just broken and a lot of folks trying to figure out how something like this could happen. Were there any signs of any physical trauma to the baby? Well there again we would have to wait for the autopsy report for that. She hasn't said a whole lot as far as what may have happened to the baby. We have a baby who never had the chance to speak for themselves so we're having to speak for him and we take that very seriously and we want to

cover all our bases in this case. Cops say the mom quote hasn't said a whole lot about what happened to the baby and that she is showing much much less remorse than they had expected. To Larry Mayher what more can you tell us? Investigators say there may be other people involved in this case. They are not elaborating on what they mean by that, and they are still conducting interviews even though the mother has been indicted. Well, expired tags got her pulled over, and then police find a five-day-old baby dead in a shoebox in the trunk.

I can only wonder what would have happened if when asked if they could search her trunk, she said no. How many times have I called Uber, even taken Uber with my children on many, many occasions. But now, is an Uber driver suspected of a sex attack on a customer? Straight out to Alan Duke joining me on the story. Alan, what happened? Well, this is a scary story. I mean, I use Uber a lot. My young daughter, well, she's 26. This is her main form of transportation around Los Angeles

is calling Uber or Lyft. Well, it seems allegedly that there was this man who had been an Uber driver in the Santa Barbara County area. That's not too far from Los Angeles. And he decided that he wanted to do more than driving. And so what he did was he pretended to be someone's Uber driver. He would see someone apparently waiting for an Uber ride. He would zoom in and pick up the passenger. The passenger, typically, according to investigators, were young women between the ages of 19 and 22 coming out of parties or clubs near their college campus. They wouldn't bother to look and make sure that that was the right car they were getting into. They get into the back. He would drive them home and then allegedly rob and sex assault them in various ways.

An Uber driver now accused of raping women who used the car service. To top it all off, the Uber driver is in the U.S. illegally. A man living in the U.S. illegally, we believe, who crossed the border from Mexico, uses his job as an Uber driver to target young women now accused of sex attacks and robbing them. Right now, police say there are more victims out there, victims who have not come forward. This guy, Alfonso Nunez, drives women to their homes, assaults them, steals their stuff, including computers, jewelry, cell phones, money.

Then he even collects his fare payment by using the smartphone app Vimo. He even disguises his identity and his Uber records, according to police. Now, tell me, Alan Duke, what about DNA evidence? Has that played a role in this? Yes. Yes, they're checking. They've got his DNA now, and they're checking it against other sex assault cases in the Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo area to try to match up other victims. And let me emphasize, this guy wasn't an, he had driven for Uber before, but at the time, he wasn't driving for Uber. He was pretending to be the proper Uber driver, and these drunken, allegedly drunk...

Okay, now let me make this clear. He was faking them. Was he currently Uber driving? No. No. It's something you turn on and you turn off, but he wasn't working as an Uber driver at the moment. He was pretending to be an Uber driver. And this is the dangerous thing.

These Uber stickers out in California, you're required to put on the windshield. Anybody can print those out from the internet and you can tape them on. So the real lesson that I give my daughter and anyone else is make sure you're getting into the right car. Detectives now on the lookout for potential witnesses and more alleged victims throughout San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara counties where this guy had been driving for Uber for months. Now, he's also gone by the name Bruno Diaz and Brushbat is a username. Now, that was his Venmo name. What he would do, he was raping and getting a fare from them.

But when you ride an Uber, the money's automatically transferred through the Uber app. Well, he didn't have an Uber app that was turned on. So he'd say, hey, could you send me this $10 through Venmo, which the millennials, as we call them, the young people, these college students, that's how they pay each other off. They send $10 on Venmo, and that's how he made his money, by being a fake Uber driver. Well, it's like the new era of PayPal. Cops now saying he was not always driving for Uber, as Alan has told us, not driving for Uber when he would pick up the women.

Now, sometimes drivers in cars parked outside restaurants or bars actually jump in front of the real Uber driver, and they'll take someone unsuspecting to their location. And that is a way that these young ladies are at risk, And that's what police are alleging happened here. The crimes to me indicate that Uber and others could devise a new way to screen their potential drivers. I mean, how do they select drivers now? Alan, just I mean, there are 10s of of thousands of them in the Los Angeles area. It's a huge thing, and many of them are recent immigrants, if you will, but many of the passengers are as well.

But they do a criminal background check, but they only do it one time. This guy's an illegal immigrant. Yeah, but in California, you can get a driver's license. Being an undocumented alien can get a driver's license here. And he had one. Had one since 2015. Did you know he was actually deported out of New Mexico over a decade ago? Deported.

But that has nothing to do with this. I mean, it will change the charges. He shouldn't have even been there to start with. Well, the thing is that Uber, Lyft, and the others can do anything they want to do, background checks. But if someone wants to pretend to be an Uber driver, they can do it. It's very easy to do. And unfortunately, when you're 19 years old and you're out at a party drinking or at the club, you're not paying attention to what car you're getting into.

And as a result, you get into the wrong car, you're going to the wrong place car you're getting into and as a result you get into the wrong car you're going to the wrong place and bad things could happen did you know alan that there are actually seven different investigations allegedly being worked on right now where this guy alfonso nunez is a suspect for women between the ages of 19 and 22 all of them were college co-eds. Cal Poly Institute, that's the big one that's there in St. Louis Obispo. That's the other one. Then there was a county college that the fourth one was a student at.

So that's what he targeted. He saw these young, drunk college girls coming out of parties. I don't like the way you say young, drunk. I mean, so you have a few beers at a bar or a restaurant. What, it's your fault you get into the wrong car? I don't like the way you said that, Alan. It just makes them dangerous. And you keep talking about how you have a daughter 27 years old. Shame, shame, shame.

You don't get this kind of penalty for having a couple of beers. I mean, can you say in good conscience you haven't ever thrown back a few? I think these were more than a couple of beers for these ladies. Their judgment was impaired. I mean, good thing that they weren't driving, right? I disagree with you on that. I disagree with you on that. I'm not saying that they asked for it. Because I have come out of many a building, and I ask for an Uber. I look on my iPhone. I see where it is. I see a car come up. It's got an Uber sticker. And they wave and I wave. And I'm like, great.

And I jump in. Bam. People fake it. What? I'm stone cold sober. All right? I'm a teetotaler. And I mean, I would have done the same thing they did.

So don't be talk, talk, talk. Don't jump up and say they were all drunk. You don't know that, Alan. What did you smell their breath and take a blood alcohol? The cops are making that part of it. No. He's charged. No don't know that, Alan. Did you smell their breath and take a blood alcohol? No, but the cops are making that part up. No, I think, no, this is a cross-exam. You don't get to explain. That was a yes, no.

Did you smell their breath? Yes, I did, Nancy. No. Did you take their blood alcohol? The cops. No. Bam. You don't know.

This man is charged with rape of an intoxicated person. That is part of the charge. In one of the cases. Actually. That is part of the charge. In one of the cases. Actually, I think two of the cases. He is being, he's under suspicion. Seven cases are being investigated right now. And until you can tell me, you smell their breath and took their blood alcohol,

Alan Duke, I don't want to hear a word about the alleged victims. That's part of the facts that they're charging that they were intoxicated. One of them. I don't like your attitude i don't like your attitude that was you should go you should go have a drink i'm gonna warn your daughters people maybe your sons too that you gotta be careful about getting into if you're out drinking that's great call an uber but will you careful you get into the right car making this about the women having a drink okay just stop that this is about getting into the wrong uber car wait a minute that's still putting blame on them this is about this guy who was deported from new mexico and now authorities are saying oh we don't have any idea how the heck he got back. According to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Nunes was deported from New Mexico in 2005.

And they say it is, quote, unclear exactly where he was living or what he was doing in New Mexico at the time. But I know this. He's a suspect in seven different cases. And DNA, according to Alan Duke, did you not say DNA was used in this case? That is direct. Now he gives me a yes, no. Now I get the yes, no from Alan Duke. You know what?

Let's take a listen to what the district attorney has to say. Mr. Alar Condunez is an undocumented immigrant here in the United States, a citizen of Mexico who was deported voluntarily in 2005 when the Department of Homeland Security made contact with him in the state of New Mexico. Let me mention here, though, with that particular fact, like anyone charged with a crime here in the state of New Mexico. Let me mention here, though, with that particular fact, like anyone charged with a crime here in the United States, he is entitled to the same protections of our Constitution as anyone else charged with a crime.

So he is indeed considered to be innocent until a court of law is deemed that he is convicted and guilty of the crimes that he's now charged with. Yes? So are you committed to prosecuting this case, or will the suspect be turned over to ICE for a deportation? No, that's a great question. We will absolutely prosecute this case here in our county.

In fact, his immigration status is not relevant for the purpose of this prosecution. We will treat this case as we would any other case that we come across. It's important to know that in my mind the relevance of his immigration status really points more to the safety of services like Uber. If those companies are not conducting adequate background checks to make sure that they know the true identity of the people that are driving, then those consumers, those of us that use those services, we don't know for sure whether or not we're at risk. And so I think that's something that essentially is a factor that, in my mind,

makes using one of those services a little bit more risky because we don't truly have adequate background checks to know that those drivers are safe. So you feel confident that there are other victims out there? We have evidence that leads us to believe there are other victims. In fact, we're going through all the forensic data that we have now that we've collected to ensure that we can identify them. But that's why we're putting out a plea. Anyone that believes that they may have been a victim or if they have any other information or have used Mr. Alarcon Nunez as an Uber driver in the past, they can be urged to contact our San Luis Obispo Crime Stoppers. So we're asking anyone with any

helpful information to reach out and contact us. The risk to users, consumers that are using the for hire driver services that are available today. There are many good folks that are Uber drivers and Lyft drivers and doing that sort of work. But there are some things that individuals can and should be doing to protect themselves. One is when you hire an Uber driver and you see who the driver is on your phone and you get a description of the vehicle as well as a picture of the driver and a license plate. Any consumer needs to verify that information before they get in that vehicle. We're finding that those that are predators may go because they know that there's someone waiting for a Uber driver,

and they'll jump in front of the actual Uber driver, and they will take someone unsuspecting to their home, and that's a way of putting somebody at risk. In this case, that's exactly what is alleged to have happened. And so young people in, who are out and about and they want to get home safely, it used to be that people would have a designated driver before these services were there. Those are probably still the most safe ways to get home

if you've been drinking, is to have a sober driver that you know and that you trust. But if you're going to use one of these services, just make sure that you're doing all of your due diligence to verify that the driver is the person that you trust. If you're going to use one of these services, just make sure that you're doing all of your due diligence to verify that the driver is the person that you contracted with when you sent your request for that driver to come to you. Alan, do you have a tip line for me? Yes, I do. The district attorney is asking anyone who might know of another victim to call Crime Stoppers in the San Luis Obispo area at 805-549-7867. 805-549-7867.

Or just call the District Attorney's Office. You know, I want to direct everyone to CrimeOnline.com where we have this guy's photo up, his mugshot, and all the information relating to these offenses on ladies. Help us find other victims if they exist and bring this guy to justice. Nancy Grace, Crime Stories, signing off. Goodbye, friend. You're listening to an iHeart Podcast.