Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - Texas A&M Student Steps Out Barefoot for Uber Eats Order, VANISHES: Where is Caleb Harris?

Episode Date: March 26, 2024

Caleb Harris plans a Sunday fishing trip with his buddies.  After a day on the water, Caleb calls his dad to talk about their different types of lures. After hanging up, Caleb Harris caps off the day by joining his roommates outside their off-campus apartment in The Cottages at Corpus Christi. Harris and his roommates spend the evening outside with their new dog.  A little after 1 a.m., he heads back inside and sends a Snapchat to his sister at 2:44 a.m. A minute later, Caleb Harris orders food through Uber Eats. When the Uber Eats driver arrives at 3:20 a.m., Harris is not in front of his apartment to accept the delivery, so the food is left at the doorstep. When Caleb Harris's roommates begin their day, they open the front door to find the Uber Eats food Caleb ordered still at the door. The roommates are looking for Harris. At 11 a.m., the roommates file a missing person report with police and notify Texas A&M Corpus Christi campus security that Harris is missing. At 3 p.m., the parents Randy and Becky Harris are told their son is missing. Joining Nancy Grace Today: Randy Harris – Caleb’s dad Dr. Jeff Kieliszewski – Forensic Psychologist, Author: “Dark Sides;” YouTube: Dr. Jeff Kielisze Assistant Chief Todd Green- Corpus Christi Police; Email: [e-mail] Todd G. Shipley, CFE, CFCE– Cyber Crime Expert, and Author: “Investigating Internet Crimes: An Introduction to Solving Crimes in Cyberspace;” X: @webcase  Mandy Noell - Reporter, News4 San Antonio /WOAI  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

You're listening to an iHeart Podcast. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. 20 minutes. How can just 20 minutes change your whole life? How does a boy step outside barefoot to get his Uber Eats and he's never seen again? I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us here at Crime Stories and on Sirius XM 111. First of all, take a listen to Rachel Bonilla. When Caleb Harris's roommates begin their day, they open the front door to find the Uber Eats food Caleb had ordered still at the door. The roommates started looking for Harris. At 11 a.m., the roommates file a missing person report with police and notify Texas A&M Corpus Christi Campus Security as well that Harris is missing. At 3 p.m., parents Randy and Becky Harris are told their son is missing.

Randy Harris headed straight for Corpus Christi. And what does Randy Harris, Caleb's dad, have to say about this? Listen. This is not normal. This is not, this, this is a different situation where, you know, Caleb disappeared, vanished. Just so many things that just don't add up, especially at three in the morning, you know, but he was planning a lot of stuff. It wasn't like he, he wasn't going anywhere. I mean I mean, he was planning stuff. So that's what is odd about the whole case. This young A&M student is gone, seemingly vanished into thin

air. And we all know something is off when you order Instacart or Uber or DoorDash. Your food doesn't sit on your front porch all night long for your roommates to find it the next morning. There is a critical 20 minutes, critical 20 minutes that this boy scrubbed in sunshine disappeared. With me, an all-star panel to make sense of what we know right now. Where is Caleb? Right off the bat, I want to go straight out to Caleb's dad. But first, I want to give you a tip line, 361-886-2840. There is a reward. Repeat, 361-886-2840. And now to kill his father, Randy Harris, joining us. Mr. Harris, thank you for being with us. I can't even imagine what you are going through, you and your wife. My son went missing inside a giant Babies R Us warehouse store when he was about three.

And just those moments until I found him, I'll never forget it the rest of my life. And you have been living with this since Caleb seemingly disappeared on a foggy night. I want to start at the beginning with you. When did you find out something was wrong? Well, we text back and forth quite a bit. And so, you know, the next morning, typical Monday morning, maybe he slept in late, whatever, and getting ready for

school around 1030. And so no big deal. And then we got a call from the roommates. They called my wife and she immediately called me. I was working south of town. And so I got down here as quick as I can. And that kind of started everything off with meeting with the police again. They were there within five minutes of me arriving and took the report again and immediately raised it to a missing persons. How could he just vanish? What do we know? Tell me some more about Caleb. He's a student at A&M. What is he studying? Where does he live? What year is he in school? Two and a half years into school. He's

studying environmental science. Definitely just absolutely loves the outdoors, loves fishing, loves hunting. Really got into duck hunting the last couple of and uh you know just loves all the clothes wants to be sponsored he's gonna um get his kayak guide license uh to be able to help people that buy kayaks that really don't know what how to outfit them and what to put on them and what to do and so uh he's you know he's gonna do that uh getting ready to go to uh work in colorado this summer um just a lot of stuff He had texted me that evening, you know, some fishing lures he's going to use the next day. He's very methodical about species of fish he's going to go fish for. He doesn't just throw a shrimp on a hook. Very,

very calculated of what he's going to do. And that was the night before and he was ready to go the next day and then he vanished. To Dr. Jeff Kaliszewski, joining us, forensic psychologist, author of Dark Sides. You can find him on YouTube at Dr. Jeff Kaliszewski. Dr. Jeff, thank you for being with us. You know, when someone just seemingly walks away into the fog, we wonder why. That's not what happened here. He didn't just walk away.

Think about it, Dr. Jeff, somebody doesn't order their DoorDash or their Uber Eats and just decide, Hey, I'm going to walk out into nowhere. That didn't happen. He was excited about fishing the next morning about his plans to move to Colorado for a job over the summer. I mean, no sign ever of depression, any kind of emotional problem, great grades, just living the life, doctor. This guy did not disappear on his own. I would stake everything on it. Right. In cases like this, a lot of times, right, people wonder about suicide, but it's the idea that you rule a lot of these things out. If there aren't mental health issues, if there aren't a history of significant impulsive behavior, then you wonder about accidents. Those happen too. I've lived in college towns where

it seems like the same accidents happen at the same place around these towns. For example, kids falling in the river. So that is a potential option. And then what it would leave after that was the possibility of some type of abduction or kidnapping, unfortunately. Dr. Jeff Kaliszewski, can I just stop you right there? He did not go out on his little stoop at his apartment where he shared his off-campus apartment with his roommates. He didn't step out there to get his Uber Eats and fall in a river. That did not happen. Okay, I want you to rethink that.

Now, I'm certainly no MD, much less a psychologist, but I know that much. When I go out the front door to pick up Uber Eats, I'm not going to fall in a river. An accident, an accident. You got to rule it out. You got to rule it out. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. I can rule out suicide and I can rule out falling in a river. It's out. Okay. Let's don't talk about falling in a river again. You know, hold on. I think it's timeline, right. Joining me is Mandy Noel, investigative reporter news for San Antonio. Mandy, thank you for being with us. What's your understanding of the timeline? That's what I'm going to be focusing on right now, because that's

how you start a missing person or foul play investigation with your timeline. Did you hear me in the open say I've got a critical 20 minutes? I think that Randy Harris, who's Caleb's dad, knows the 20 minutes I'm talking about. I'm sure you do too. But I want to get all of the facts I can leading me up to those 20 minutes. Hit me. You are exactly right. And that is a critical 20 minutes. Hit me. You are exactly right. And that is a critical 20 minutes. And there's so many questions because of police zones, words vanish without a trace. It's a strange disappearance.

So 1 a.m. and it's before that 20 minutes, Caleb is on a ring doorbell camera or some surveillance camera with his roommate, a friend and their new dog. 2 a.m. The roommate goes to sleep on the couch. Caleb, like Mr. Harris mentioned, preparing his fishing reels the next day. It's the last time his roommate saw Caleb. 2.44, and this is where that critical time starts. Caleb sends a Snapchat, walking the new dog. 2.58, his phone turns off or it dies. Pings at his apartment complex. 320, that Uber Eats that he ordered. It's seen as a surveillance camera, but the footage, the information with the footage is kind of wonky.

They're saying it could be a one hour kind of time swing. As you mentioned, the food's found on the doorstep the next morning. But the other thing to point out here, he wasn't planning to go anywhere. He walked outside without his keys, without his wallet, and he walked outside without shoes on. So that time, you're right, it's critical because it's just this small window where he was communicating with friends and family and then nothing. Let's take a listen to Dave Mack, Crime Online. Harris and his roommate spend the evening outside in the parking lot with their new dog. It's a little after 1 a.m. when he heads back

inside. He sends a Snapchat to his sister at 244, and at 245, Caleb Harris orders food through Uber Eats. When the Uber Eats driver arrives at 320 a.m., Caleb Harris is not in front of his apartment to accept the delivery, so the food is left at the doorstep. Okay, back to Randy Harris. This is Caleb's father. He is begging for your help. Join us. Help in the search for his boy.

Again, the tip line, 361-886-2840. Mr. Harris, can I just run through that timeline again with you? So he's outside. They've got a new puppy. Uh, it's one AM. The puppy wants to go outside. They they're outside with the puppy to TT in the parking lot at that month. They're out there at two 44. He sends his sister a Snapchat, I guess with the dog. And there's no question it's 2.44. They're timed. Snapchats are timed. And I might add, they time out once you open them.

But I've got one more minute. And everybody may scoff, but minutes matter. Minutes matter. Even one minute. At 2.45, he orders food through Uberber eats is that correct mr harris um i really don't have the exact timeline on exactly when he ordered uber eats uh we do know that the uber eats uh was picked up from the convenience store uh two lunchables a red bull and apple pie. Typical for Caleb. We believe it was delivered around that 320 mark. It was picked up at the grocery store, you know, like 217 or something like that.

Okay. What did he get? Two Lunchables? Two Lunchables, apple pie and Red Bull. Okay. That's normal. He would go to school, be done by noon, 1 o'clock, get back to the apartment, either a friend or roommate, and grab their kayaks, and that was their lunch for the afternoon. And, you know, they'd be out until before dark. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Joining me now, Assistant Chief Todd Green with the Corpus Christi Police.

Assistant Chief Green, can I confirm with you that Uber Eats time, and I know one minute may not matter to a lot of people, but if I saw, for instance, just hypothesizing another car come into the apartment complex at 2.45, that time would matter. 2.46, that time would matter. Can you confirm with me the 245 Uber Eats order? Yes, that's correct. And it arrived. We confirmed that it was delivered at 320 in the morning. We identified the driver, a young lady. We interviewed her and she did not report seeing anything suspicious at the time. And there's nothing to make us think that she had anything to do with his disappearance.

She did not see Caleb. You just gave me a lot of information. I know it was a short statement, but that's a lot. Number one, the moment you said a female driver, I could tell you right now the driver's not responsible. Statistically, a female is much less likely to perform any violent act, period. Not happening. Okay. So she's there at 320 and she doesn't even see Caleb, correct? That is correct. She did report seeing one other vehicle leaving the parking lot.

We believe we have identified the driver of that vehicle and also have eliminated that individual as a suspect. OK, right there. Assistant Chief Green, hold on. want you to publicize the name because then, you know, thousands of angry people would be coming down on that person as if they were the kidnapper. But can you just tell me a little bit, like, why were they leaving the apartment complex at, at three o'clock in the morning? Did they live there? Were they visiting? Were they leaving for an early morning shift? Why were they leaving? It was an individual who lives actually lives in San Antonio and had come down for the weekend to visit his girlfriend at those apartments. And we're not 100 percent sure.

My match is very, very closely. So we believe that's the vehicle that she saw. That individual told us the same thing, that he had left the apartments about 3.30 in the morning. And he didn't see anything? No, he did not. He saw a vehicle coming into the apartment complex, which we believe is the Uber Eats delivery person. Gosh, this just keeps getting more and more odd. Okay, that story makes perfect sense to me. And if he's leaving his girlfriend's apartment after visiting the weekend, he's got to leave at three 30 in the morning to

get back to San Antonio on time for a job. It's highly unlikely a guy is going to leave his girlfriend asleep in bed, taking off for a job and suddenly decides oh there's a guy I don't know I think I'll kidnap him that didn't happen okay he's out let's pick back up where we are guys take a listen to this we know his phone pinged at 3 a little after 3 and we're not sure exactly where he was or if he had contacted anybody with that pink. Phone actually quit working at 2.58. Okay, let me follow up on that. We all are familiar by now with the Brian Koberger investigation.

Can I tell you what launches a timeline, the fact that one of the young ladies inside that home on King Road ordered, I believe it was a door dash. So we know she's alive and well. I think she got the door dash at that time. It's like looking at your watch. All of this is digitized by time, location, all of that. You can count on it. And here we're getting the same thing, just like this ping. Now I want to circle back to Randy Harris. This is Caleb's dad. And for everybody on the panel, let me remind you, we're not having high tea at Windsor

Castle with Charles and Camilla. If you have an idea, spit it out. Now is the time. Mr. Harris, I want to talk about what you just said about the ping. Oh gosh. So we're getting a ping at 3 a.m., but you're not sure, as you and your wife were saying, where he was at the time of the ping. The phone quit working at 2.58. Did he turn it off? Did it run out of juice? What happened? We really don't know that for sure. His phone, you know, because he's out all the time, the phone does go dead pretty quickly because he's, you know, just using it all the time, the phone does go dead pretty quickly because he's just using it all the time. The ping was at 303.

It was a Snapchat picture, I believe, to one of his friends, and it was on the bridge. But, again, the timeline doesn't quite add up. They were able to get, from what I understand, through AT&T, an additional ping around 312 down the street. So, again, the phone was off or turned off, but there was some other activity, and it may have been an IP ping or VPN ping. I really don't know. Okay, let's make sense of what we're hearing right now. And remember, Killam's dad has been sifting through all the facts. He's

throwing out some jargon. Not everybody's used to, but luckily for us, Todd Shipley is joining us, digital cyber crime expert, former detective sergeant and author of, listen to this, Investigating Internet Crimes, An Introduction to Solving solving crimes in cyberspace. And you can find him at darkintel.info. Todd Shipley, we need you now more than ever. Because I've been investigating Caleb's disappearance, I understood what Randy Harris just said. But a lot of people may not explain what he's saying because i'm not quite sure i understand how he is ordering uber and that's at 245 and then his phone is pinging down the street at 312 did the phone

have to move oh randy has the phone been No, it has not. We've done a tremendous amount of searches right off the bat. And the police were there with cadets and with search and rescue and lots of search and rescue people from San Antonio. And that was one of the biggest focuses is, you know, obviously finding Caleb and trying to find that phone. Even yesterday, we had the search and rescue team out of San Antonio, literally in sewer drains with cameras and ladders looking for the phone just to try again. Can I jump in on anything? Yes. That information that we had originally came in on an emergency request through AT&T because it was a potentially endangered missing person. That data that we're getting right now, we're sharing that with two of our federal partners, the U.S. Marshals Service and the FBI, as well as our local team, our organized crime unit,

which has the resources to go through all this digital data. And the bottom line is, at this point, we don't believe that that is an accurate ping. We are working on the theory that he never left or his phone last was located right there on the street, right in front of the apartments, right near the bridge over the drainage ditch where he sent that Snapchat photo at about 3.03 in the morning. So right now we're working off that. We don't believe that he ever traveled over to Rod Field, which is about a mile away, a little over a mile.

Okay, let me decipher what you just said. You think the 312 ping down the street is erroneous. That's our work working theory right now. That data, it was preliminary data that came in very quickly. It appeared to show him over there in that area, but at this point, we don't have a high level of confidence that that's accurate. Okay. So can you tell me this? Do you think it's wrong or you just don't know? At this point, we feel feel like it's it's not accurate. Wrong. OK, that's really important.

Thank you for telling me that before I go down a rabbit hole with a cyber expert. Is that you, Todd Shipley, jumping in? Yeah. Go. It doesn't mean it doesn't mean it's wrong. It just means that the phone found when it was looking for cell towers, a cell tower to talk to. And so it could have been a mile away. The chief is right. They're looking through a whole bunch of other data that we don't have yet, which would have been the things that, you know, we would all start to look at, which is the cell tower data and trying to figure out where things were. But, you know, trying to geolocate somebody with just one ping is not necessarily possible or accurate,

and the chief is correct. So they're looking at the larger set of data that they've got from the cell towers, trying to figure out what other cell phones were there. Who else could have been there pinging those towers at the same time? So there's a lot of data that they're trying to walk through and understand because those cell towers collect a tremendous amount of data. Okay. One thing you just said, Todd Shipley, that I just want to follow up on, when you said the cell phone was trying to find a tower, quote, to talk to. In other words, the cell phone is trying to find a tower to get a connection. And it could be 30 feet away. It could be a mile away. So it's pinging all around, pinging.

And that's the cell phone trying to get a cell from one of the towers. I hear somebody jumping in. Go ahead, please do. It was me, Mr. Harris. I want to I want to really explain something to the police has done a phenomenal job in this case. I mean, these these guys are amazing and and not questioning anything that they've done at all. You know, we're outside the bubble. We're looking at all different kinds of things. And, you know, those were areas where, you know, we went with bloodhounds. We went with the police.

And, you know, so we're, you know, interpolating and just suspecting along with everybody else. So and we certainly understand those cell tower images could be even a mile from that location. It was just kind of a hot spot. And so I really want to stress how happy we are with what the police and the other authorities are doing, because they really are. They're just killing it out there. They're doing a good job, and I want to make sure that we're backing them 100%. Absolutely, because you know what, Mr. Harris? Usually when a cop makes a headline, it's because he did something wrong, right? Nobody ever says, like, do you call your cable company and go, you know what? I watched the end of a miniseriesiseries last night and you did a great job, you know, making

my TV. No, you call and go, the cable's out, fix it. So nobody ever comments on how awesome LA law enforcement is. And I really appreciate you saying that because it's so rare that we get to hear that. Okay. So everything we know about part of the timeline is now upended. And that's a good thing because that helps me refine the timeline. I got a question.

The Snapchat that Caleb sent to his sister, I assume with the new dog. Where was he when he sent the Snapchat? Can you see in the background where he was? Yes, it appears he was walking through the parking lot of the apartment complex. It's actually a short Snapchat video. And it appears he's in the complex at 2.44 when he's walking the dog. But then at 303, he's actually just outside the apartment complex on the main street that runs right by the complex. And there's a small bridge that goes over a drainage ditch. Okay. I want to be clear about the bridge because a lot of people are like, oh, did he fall in some deep

water? That's not what that bridge is, is it? Well, it's a drainage ditch. When we have heavy rains, it certainly could be a drowning potential. But at the time of his disappearance, there was only less in that area was less than a foot of water in it and we searched it thoroughly with our dive team texas search and rescue brought in their canines we swept it again with the canines it was swept again with uh the bloodhounds from the department of uh corrections brought their canines in so it's been thoroughly searched and no sign of Caleb or the cell phone. Randy Harris, I feel very strongly, he did not go to that bridge and fall into the one foot of water. That's not what happened.

I agree. So the Snapchat to a sister, and for those of you that don't know about Snapchat, it's not like you're texting a message. It's a picture. It's a snap. And it's supposed to, I guess, in the moment, in real time, send a picture of what you're doing that expresses what you're doing at that moment. And it's the big way of communication right now amongst preteens, teens and students. So, again, where was he, Randy, when he sent the snap to his sister?

From what I understand right there at Oaf with the sister, it looked like he was just in the parking lot with taking the dog for a walk. OK, and that was just before 3 a.m. OK, guys, take a listen now to more of what we know regarding the timeline. Here's Jackie Howard. The timeline for Caleb Harris is traceable up until 2.58 a.m. Caleb Harris is on security cameras, ring doorbell cameras around his apartment, and is on his phone, which is pinging at his apartment. According to the investigators at 2.58, Harris is on his phone, which is pinging at his apartment. According to the investigators at 258, Harris is at his apartment when his cell phone battery dies or is turned off. The Uber Eats driver arrives at 3.20 a.m.,

and Caleb Harris is not there to get the food. 258 a.m. to 3.20 a.m., a 22-minute window of opportunity, and in the foggy early morning hours of Monday, March 4, 21-year-old Caleb Harris vanished. Todd Shipley joining us, digital cybercrime expert at darkintel.info. Todd, I mean, when I look at my Life360, it tells me my son's phone is at 10% or my daughter's phone is turned off. So we can't tell if his phone died or whether it was cut off. Well, I don't know who else was connected with Caleb and whether the family had something like 360, which is a great app for families. But at this point in time,

they know what they know, which is the phone went dead because AT&T has those records and the phone stopped pinging. So it's going to be, they've got a limited amount. We don't have, like we normally have in these cases, a consistent pattern of a phone contacting the towers and letting them know where they're at. In this case, it stopped. So we have to work back from that time and try to figure out what was going on the phone before that to see if there's anything that's of relevance to the case and who he contacted, who the messaging was to. You know, there's a lot of things that the phone will tell us that AT&T may have already given law enforcement,

but they're looking for all those things, trying to identify any source of what happened. So, Assistant Chief Todd Green with us, Corpus Christi Police. Again, thank you for being with us, Chief. Now, the water is getting muddy for me. And I know that you and Randy Harris and Mandy Noel can clear it up. Was he near that bridge that night? Yes, we certainly believe that based on the Snapchat photo he sent to one of his high school friends at 3.03 in the morning. So we have another entry into the timeline. He sends a Snapchat to a friend at 3.03 a.m. and he's at the bridge? Correct. We're very confident that he was there at the bridge in

front of the apartment complex. So when we're talking about the bridge, it's, we're very confident that he was there at the bridge in front of the apartment complex. So when we're talking about the bridge, it's kind of really only a bridge to fall off on one side. That didn't happen. That's where he is out walking the dog. Where is the dog, Randy Harris? At that point, the dog was back in the apartment. So let me under, he must have gone out to get the food. OK, so he's alive and well, sending a Snapchat right there at 3.03 a.m. The Uber East driver arrives at 3.20 a.m. So we're now down to a 17 minute period. Randy Harris, the bridge that we're seeing, is it adjacent or part of the parking lot? No, it's literally right at the corner of the complex. And I was going to add, when the phone went dead at 258, it went dead across the board. Snapchat, I have fine friends and I also have the fine utilities, you know, so I can look at both of those and see. And both of the timelines were identical at 258.

And then everybody else's Snapchat also located him at 258, kind of right there at the corner of the complex or on the bridge right there. Okay. I've got a question for you. If his phone goes dead at 258, how does he send a snap at 303? That is for the forensics to figure that out. That's a timeline thing. It's an anomaly because Snapchat, from what I understand, is immediate got, we've got a few minutes there. So again, is that a cell phone, a cell tower issue? Is it a AT&T issue? Is it a delay with Snapchat? We really don't know it. We feel like he may have done that, you know, before the phone went dead, but we can't confirm. Oh, okay. You mean like suddenly I get a message that somebody sent yesterday? No, I don't think it would be like that. No.

Okay, Todd Shipley, what could it be? Because the reason I'm interested is because he's on this bridge. He's at this bridge. Is that the last known communication with him at that location, not standing out in front of his apartment? So can you explain why he may have sent it at 258 and then it arrived at 303? Sure. I mean, there could have been a lot of reasons technology-wise that that could have occurred.

Snapchat is a great little tool, but it still uses a centralized server system where it's got to go to one place and be sent back to whoever the sender is sending it to. So it could have been AT&T. He could have been in a dead spot that it didn't get picked up right away and it took a minute to send. I mean, technologically, there's a lot of reasons why it could have been in a dead spot that it didn't get picked up right away and it took a minute to send. I mean, technologically, there's a lot of reasons why it could have been a delayed send. Even if the phone had died minutes before, he could have sent it and it just didn't show up till a later point in time. OK, so that's that's not unusual. All right.

Well, let's see. That doesn't totally explain it. But I mean, the point is, it could have happened or he could have sent it at that time. We just don't have enough facts and evidence right now to know. Without having the phone, we don't know for sure. Well, to Assistant Chief Todd Green, do we know if the Snapchat was sent at that time at 3.03? Did the phone die or get turned off at 2.58? Do you have any idea where the phone was turned, whether it was turned off or it just went dead? If it went dead, why didn't he go in and plug it up?

I mean, what do you think, Chief? Well, we're still looking at that and we're puzzled by the timeline as well, as Mr. Schneider said, and we're considering the options that he mentioned, that he may have sent the Snapchat before the phone went silent. We try not to say dead. We don't know if the device was turned off purposely or if it just ran out of power. I don't think we'll be able to determine that until we actually are able to look at the device itself. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. The mystery is deepening as parents of a missing

Texas A&M student, Caleb Harris, reveal he seemingly vanishes after going out to pick up his Uber Eats order. We are following every piece of digital evidence that we can. But what do we know regarding anything his roommate may have said? To Caleb's dad, Randy Harris, what does the roommate say?

Their hearts are broken. I mean, truly, these are kids that have grown up with Caleb since first grade, fourth grade. They live in the same apartment complex, live across the street, and live with him. One of the roommates is graduating with a nursing degree, will be moving out, and they've already signed a lease with actually the boy in the video there, the third boy in the red or maroon shirt. He'll be joining them this fall as an additional roommate, which, again, is another friend from New Braunfels.

The friend group out of the New Braunfels area is really tight. There's about seven or eight kids down there from the school that they graduated with. And one of his roommates he's been with since fourth grade football. You know, just, you know, all these kids are very, very tight because we went to a small Christian school there in New Braunfels. So their graduating class was, you know, 40 kids. So it was a very close knit, you know, a lot of these kids are like brothers and sisters. The apartment, I understand Chief Todd Green was carefully searched. I assume his vehicle was searched. Was it still parked there, Chief Green? Yes. That was one of the things we did early on in the search, try to determine if he left, willingly left the complex, why would he do that on such a foggy evening on foot?

And it didn't make sense to us. We checked the vehicle just to make sure that it was operational, that it had fuel. It did. So that certainly added to the question of why would he be going anywhere on foot at that time of night. In those conditions, as we mentioned, it was extremely foggy that night, which has also complicated the investigation. Surveillance video that we have recovered is not the quality that we would normally expect, but the fog certainly made it much more difficult to see things.

And I assume that all of his social media has been combed? We are in the process of doing that, yes. It's time consuming. We've issued over just our team here. Our team has issued 16 search warrants for electronic search warrants for data. The U.S. Marshals, who's working right alongside of us, have issued seven search warrants. The FBI has helped us out by accessing financial data. So we're looking at it from every possible angle. helped us out by accessing financial data.

So we're looking at it from every possible angle. And one of the things that's probably a little unique in this situation is that when the data comes in, we're not analyzing it just by ourself here within our department. We're immediately sharing it with the marshals, the FBI. We're constantly meeting with the Texas Rangers. We're sharing data with them.

So when the data comes in, everybody is looking at it, analyzing it, and providing us with any kind of leads that they believe we should follow up on. We have a really good team, a forensic cyber team here, but we're also reaching out and using our federal partners, federal and state partners. Randy Harris, was Caleb, to your knowledge, in a relationship with anyone? No. His focus was on a school, hunting, fishing, playing video games with his roommates, pretty much a homebody and very consistent. He's had a couple of girlfriends, but nothing out of the ordinary for a college student.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm trying to piece it all together, guys. Listen to this. What we do now is continue keeping Caleb in the light. I mean, keeping him, you know, he's out there. We feel like he's out there and we're going to get him back. We just got to find him. I'm curious, what is your theory, Randy?

That's a hard one to answer because, you know, because we don't have a true north in this case and we don't know really what has happened and there's no evidence and everything that they're gathering. I strongly feel like the authorities are finding true north for us. We really don't

know. His keys were there, his wallet's there, his truck's there, his shoes are there. The only's there, his truck's there, you know, his shoes are there. The only thing missing is his cell phone. He was barefooted, and he vanished. So we really don't know whether he came upon something that he shouldn't have seen or he's the kind of kid that would go out and help somebody change a tire. So, you know, we just don't know. I just don't understand.

Yes, please do. So one thing that I thought about this, if we're working on the theory that this is an abduction, a couple of things that I'm sure law enforcement is looking into. The first thing is there are random abductions of people that happens. But a lot of times when an adult is abducted, they're abducted by someone who's had contact with them or knows them. I've seen and been involved in cases like that. So I'm sure that law enforcement is combing through this young man's text to see who he was talking to, obviously through the social media. But are there people that he had contact with that other people didn't know about? I mean, all these theories, I think, are probably under

investigation and also giving this kind of a national voice. Are there people who aren't in that local area who had contact with him through social media or texting or emails or things like that, that could maybe help provide other information to look at other potential people that could have been involved in him that maybe no one knew about. You know what? You're right, Dr. Jeff. Guys, you're hearing Dr. Jeff Kaliszewski joining us, author of Dark Sides. A random kidnapping is rare.

And when you say someone that knew him, we mean that in the loose sense of the word, someone that had been in a class with him, somebody that was a checkout person at the grocery store, somebody that had connected with him online, you know, maybe in a gaming room. Most of the games that people play, they're not playing by themselves. They're playing with somebody in cyberspace, a real person out there somewhere. It could be any of these people. I don't mean their best friend or their roommate or their girlfriend that really know them. It's more that someone could know of them. You're absolutely right, Dr. Jeff.

And the scary part of that is you don't know who they are. They may not even be using their real name. Randy Harris, did he play online? You mentioned games. I mean, my son loves them. Did Caleb? Actually that night, one of his best friends that lives in uh uh colorado and i wanted to correct you he's got a job in alaska not colorado thank you that's pretty exciting you know for him uh coming up this summer and uh anyway but yeah he was on the phone for we because i immediately uh got the phone records from AT&T, you know, just like just like anybody else can do. And so I started looking at all the phone numbers and the texts and doing who do I see

on here that doesn't make sense or I don't know or I'd punch him into my phone because I do know a lot of his friends. And this particular friend's actually in Colorado Springs going to school and they had been on the phone playing video games, but, but without headsets, they normally would just call each other. So he was on the phone with him for, uh, 71 minutes earlier that, that evening, like at 10 o'clock. Caleb Harris missing. This kid is scrubbed in sunshine. There's just no other way to put it. And Mr. Harris, I just don't know how you are getting up and putting one foot in front of the other. How are you and Caleb's mom managing? You know, it's hard, but we're also a family of faith and we love the Lord Jesus Christ. And we, you know, that's where our strength comes from. I cry a lot, but my wife is

my rock. My daughter is my rock, my in-laws, my family, the church, the people in New Braunfels, the people at Corpus, just an immense amount of strength. I mean, just to have somebody donate a helicopter yesterday and today to just go search and make sure that we're covering every inch of Corpus Christi we possibly can in the hopes of really not finding him. That's what we're doing. We're just making sure that we're doing our part to aid in the investigation. And we have so many people that have offered boats. So many people offered food. We've got volunteer search people. We have friends that we've known, you know, for as long as our entire lives that are just involved heavily in supporting us. And, you know, we just feel the love.

We feel the love of Christ just radiating and, you know, giving us the adrenaline, really, just to keep going. But my wife, she's my rock, and she's just been super strong. And my daughter, she's amazing. Her birthday was Thursday, 17. You know what? So often, Mr. Harris, I've prosecuted and investigated and covered so many cases. At first, we keep saying it doesn't make sense. It doesn't make sense. Because as you've read in the Bible, we see through a glass darkly. We can't see clearly.

We can't put those pieces of the puzzle together. We're missing something. Have you guys been able to amass ring cam, any kind of cam from neighbors? Yes. The police have done a great job of that as well, and we've been assisting them. We're still doing that today, just going back and double-checking, make sure that we haven't missed any surveillance cameras or ring cameras. Those, sorry, those are critical. The one o'clock image that you've been showing, that was a ring camera from three or four houses

or apartment complexes, not complexes, but little duplex things down the road. So, yes, we highly encourage everybody get out and look at their cameras and take five minutes, that's all it takes. And I also encourage, because we're finding cameras that delete everything in three days, change your settings to 60 days for future For future surveillance, so you've got it. Guys, there is a $25,000 reward. $25,000. If you know or you think you know anything about Caleb Harris, please contact 361-826-2950. 361-826-2950.

Our prayers, our energy, and our efforts go on. Help us bring Caleb home. Goodbye, friend. You're listening to an iHeart Podcast.