Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - Who killed Lindsey Baum? Missing girl's remains found hidden in Washington woods

Episode Date: May 14, 2018

Lindsey Baum was 11 days away from her 11th birthday when she disappeared from her Washington state hometown. Melissa Baum has searched for answers for nearly 9 years, holding out hope that she would someday be found alive. The discovery of human remains 200 miles away brought an answer, but not the one her mother wanted. Nancy Grace, who has followed the missing child case from the beginning, looks at what is now a kidnapping and murder probe. She is joined by forensic psychiatrist Dr. Daniel Bober, Seattle lawyer Anne Bremner, Cold Case Institute Research director Sheryl McCollum, and Crime Stories contributing reporter Chuck Roberts. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. Truthfinder. Truthfinder may reveal court records, bankruptcies, contact information, social, dating profiles, assets, and a lot more. You get it all in one easy-to-read report. Why fork out thousands of dollars to a private eye when you can do the job yourself? Go to truthfinder.com slash Nancy and enter any name to get started. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace on Sirius XM Triumph, Channel 132. A monster is walking among us. And he looks just like us. A monster is walking among us.

And we don't know who he is. And we don't know what he looks like. And we have no idea how to identify him. But he is a predator. In the last hours, the remains of a little girl, Lindsay Baum, have been discovered in a remote area. I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us.

Let me first go straight out to the Grays Harbor Sheriff, Rick Scott, right now. I'm here today to share with you that we brought Lindsay home. We've recovered her. Sadly, she was not recovered as we and her family had hoped and prayed these last nine years. Her remains were recovered in September of 2017, unknowingly by some hunters in a remote portion of eastern Washington. Those remains were turned over to local authorities, who in turn released them to the FBI, where they were confirmed to be human and sent to the FBI lab in Quantico Virginia for analysis for DNA because the remains

were not associated with a specific criminal investigation they were not analyzed for DNA until just recently so just in the recent week where we notified that the DNA collected from the remains matched the DNA submitted to the lab in 2009. Today we will not be releasing a lot of specific information. To protect the integrity of what's now a kidnapping and homicide investigation we're going to keep our remarks rather general I'll not be releasing the specific location or the nature of the remains as the case progresses that information will become available when we feel it's appropriate. For now, suffice to say that myself, my fellow sheriffs, the FBI, and all of the law enforcement agencies who have been involved in this investigation

will remain involved as needed until we bring the monster that's responsible for this and hold them accountable. As I listen to the sheriff, that is, Grays Harbor Sheriff Rick Scott, talking, I feel such a flood of emotions having spent so much time with Lindsay's mother trying to find Lindsay. Guys, a 10-year-old little girl

is walking in her own neighborhood a couple of blocks she's walking back to her house in a small town of mccleary washington and just disappears not a trace not a ransom call not a ransom note no signs of who took her nothing at all all. And in a town of about 3,000 or 4,000 people, I believe, where the mom moved specifically to feel safe. This sad day has come upon us, and it is so hard for people dedicated to crime fighting and justice to accept that Lindsay is not coming home the way we envisioned it we envisioned Lindsay coming home having been maybe kidnapped by a family that wanted a child and then we find her far

far away and she's reunited with her mother. But it didn't turn out that way. Lindsay goes missing in 2009. She was going to a little friend's house, a little friend girl's house for a spend the night, and it didn't work out, and the mom sent her home, and she was never seen again. Joining me Cheryl McCollum Cold Case Institute Research Director. Cheryl if you listen carefully to what the sheriff is saying they found these remains in a very remote wooded area and they did not know that they were connected to little lindsey and therefore the remains had been sent to quantico at the lab but they did not know to compare them to lindsey bomb so that was never mentioned when the remains were sent so lindsey's dna had been sent there

immediately when she went missing in 2009 but they didn't know to match them up. How do you think, Cheryl, they finally matched them up to Lindsay's DNA? Well, when they finally got around to extracting the DNA from the remains, Lindsay's DNA was already in the system, and it was a hit. It was a match. But where she was found, Nancy, I think is also going to be critical because it gives you insight to this killer. He picked that place to leave her. That was not happenstance. So you're going to reduce your

suspect pool greatly here. You know hunters he's probably from that area. He lives or works near there. He had a vehicle so from where the path path is, where he would have a car, to where she was found, all of these things are going to be key. It was early summer in 2009 when Melissa Baum and her two children, Joshua and Lindsey, were living in this very small Washington state town of McCleary, trying to make a fresh start after Melissa had gotten a divorce from the dad and moved to the Pacific Northwest. They came from Tennessee and the mom, as Melissa has told me, said, McCleary felt like a nice, quiet, safe town. The children were making friends. Everything was smoothing out for us. Listen to what Melissa tells us. McCleary is a little town on the way to the beaches.

So if you want to go to Ocean Shores or Pacific Beach or Westport or any of those, that's pretty much the only way you have to go by McCleary. There is also quite a few campgrounds in that area. And there's a big off-road vehicle park where they at the time they had Jeep races. Well, they still do. It was a small town and they were going there hoping things would smooth out that day it was uh super hot lindsey had spent the afternoon at a little friend's pool swimming and anticipating what middle school would be like in the fall i mean cheryl you remember those days this is the same exact age as my twins. They're going to be going to fifth grade in the fall, and their 11th birthday is coming. Believe it or not, I still remember that baby

shower that you threw for me, Cheryl McCollum, over 10 years ago. And I'm just thinking about my little girl and my son, as I say big horse John David and this day they were all talking about going to middle school now Lindsay and her brother Joshua they stopped at home really quickly and then they walked with a group of other children to a friend's home remember it's summer and Lindsay asked a friend to sleep over but the girl's mother said no they could do it the next night so Lindsay left for a 10 minute walk home okay the brother was already at home and it wasn't long before the mom Melissa knew something was very wrong Melissa called the home of the little friend and the mom said she hadn't seen Lindsay in over an hour.

Lindsay had just gotten a cell phone, so she tried to call it and only found out it was accidentally left at home on its charger. She says, I just knew something was wrong. She immediately called 911. Listen to what Melissa tells me. She came in, took a shower. I was in there in the living room doing something on the computer. I don't remember. Josh was there and her friend Michaela and all the other kids waited outside while Lindsay ran in and took a quick shower and changed. And when she came out, I was laughing at her. I'm like, Lindsay, it's 90 degrees out. Why are you wearing jeans and a, and a, and a long sleeve shirt? And she's like, because this is my passion. You know, she wouldn't wear shorts. She wore jeans with the

holes cut out of the knees. And I'm like, okay, whatever. It was evening time anyway. So it wasn't that big of a deal. And she went outside and then she came back in and she's like mom there's a man outside his dog's missing and i said lindsey you know never to go near anybody you know that that tells you that she was dumb mom i'm not i'm not i'm not stupid and she said but his dog is missing which the law enforcement did verify because the guy had hung flyers all over town and he'd been asking all over town for his dog but it's just weird you know a few days before that she had thought that somebody was following her but we were never able to get a description enough of them to know you know so that night after she comes home and takes a shower

from after the pool party she comes out in her jeans and then what happens um we talked for a little bit and then she said she wanted to go with Michaela to see if she could spend the night again because she had spent the previous night with us and I said well it's going to be dark soon so if you guys are going to do that you go straight there and come straight back I want you home and she's like okay and then before she left I said Lindsay I mean it if you see that man again don't go near his car as if you don't and she's like mom duh I told you I'm not stupid and she walked out the door about a half an hour went by and she still wasn't back so I called Kara and by the time I reached her she's like no Lindsay was here for like just a couple of minutes and then she left like she she's's gone. And that was it.

She she didn't make it home. She didn't. Of course, before I called law enforcement, because, you know, Lindsay, she was almost 11. It was 11 days before her 11th birthday. She had been really trying to establish independence and prove that she was mature. So I thought, OK, well, maybe maybe she went to Christina's on her way home to see if Christina could spend the night. I wasn't sure at that point, because that's just not something, especially in a town like McCleary, your first thought is not, oh my God, somebody took my child. So I get on the phone and I, you know, I call Christina's house and I'm, I'm, you know, calling around and no, they hadn't seen her. And I keep calling her phone. And

at some point, I don't know if it was just where I was in the house I finally I heard her phone ringing in the bedroom so I went into her bedroom and see her phone plugged in so I take her phone and I go through it and I call all of her friends asking have you seen Lindsay have you seen Lindsay well meanwhile I'm walking around looking and Michaela's parents got in their car and started driving around town looking for her. This went on a good, it wasn't until dark, when it actually got dark, that I finally, I called 911. And I didn't even call 911. I called the police dispatch number because at that point I couldn't help but think, you know, she's she went some, you know, she she stopped somewhere.

She's going to show up. I don't want to cause this big ruckus and then her show up. But by the time it got dark and she wasn't home, I knew there was a problem because she wouldn't be out after dark. It wasn't even just that it was my rule that she had to be in or in the in the house before dark. She didn't like to be outside in the dark. So that's when I knew something wasn't right. And it took about a half an hour for the police officer to get there to my house. And, you know, he knew my kids and he agreed. He's like, well, Josh and Lindsay fighting. Were you and Lindsay fighting? Do you think she's just hiding out at somewhere trying to punish you? I'm like, no, we weren't. Everything was fine. I mean, her and Josh got into an

argument over his bike. But I mean, what else is new? You know, they always argue. And he's like, well, you don't think she ran away? No, she didn't run away. And where would she go? There was no bus. The buses had already stopped running. It was a small town. So the bus only came through a few times a day. She didn't have any money with her. She didn't even have her phone with her. I mean, it was just, she didn't take cadence. Everything fell. It was like the perfect storm. Like everything just came together to go wrong that night. You know, Chuck Roberts is with me,

Crime Stories investigative reporter, along with the director of the Cold Case Research Institute, Cheryl McCollum, and Bremner, high-profile Seattle lawyer who has been advising Lindsay's mom, Melissa, and forensic psychiatrist, Dr. Daniel Bober. Dr. Bober, I hear the mom just trying to make sense of Lindsay not coming home, that maybe she had argued with her brother over a bike and she was hiding out. Oh, well, she couldn't run away because the buses weren't running. And was she at a friend's home?

I mean, I guess that is normal for you to think of every alternative other than the fact that someone had taken her. Yes, Nancy, you know, this is unimaginable loss. And I think your imagination runs wild and it goes off in every direction trying to figure out what's going on. But I think the lesson here is, you know, as someone said at the beginning of the show, that there just really is no safe place anymore and that you really have to be mindful about where your kids are because, you know, there are predators out there and they're everywhere, not just in big cities but in small towns as well. I guess what I'm asking is why you don't know immediately and act immediately on the obvious, the glaring fact that your child has been taken.

Why does your mind go in every other direction than the obvious answer, somebody took your child. Why is that, Dr. Bober? I think it's denial. I think you don't want to accept the fact that that's what's happened. So you try to find a more benign, innocuous explanation for it rather than thinking that the unimaginable has happened. You know, Ann Bremner, high profile Seattle lawyer joining lawyer, joining us today, and it just breaks my heart. You're very close with Melissa.

I feel close to her because I've talked to her for so long about Lindsay's disappearance. But they had, to add irony to it, they had come to McCleary for a better life. They had come there because it was a small town atmosphere. They felt safe there. And the mom, Melissa, has told me she felt that everything was, quote, smoothing out for them after a bad divorce back home in Tennessee. It's just amazing. I'm looking back at some of the texts that I had from Melissa, and she has always believed in her soul,

she said, that Lindsay was still alive. And that she also said that she was waiting breathless and lost, you know, until there was word of where she was. And it was devastating, I'm sure, yesterday to learn that she was no longer with us. She's also worked with the family of Susan Cox Powell and the family of Kyron Horman, two other terrible missing children cases, and one adult was Susan, and been so supportive of others. And it's just a tragedy for this. Basically, they have a period at the end of the sentence that she's gone.

Melissa tells me the same thing. Yes, I do. And I know that people may think that i'm naive or wishful thinking and that very well may be true i know the statistics believe me i know the statistics but i also am her mother and i just believe in my soul that she's still alive. I always have. I've never felt otherwise. I just, I don't know. I think, honestly, it could be anything, but I can't help but think of it as something like a J.C. Dugard or Elizabeth Smart scenario. I don't know. I don't wish one way or the other. Human trafficking horrifies me. What is your working theory right now as to what happened to Lindsay?

My own personal one? Well, I believe it was either somebody she knew or believed she could trust because she would not have gotten in it. Lindsay was a very intelligent 10-year-old, like above average intelligence, and anybody that knew her will tell you that. She was very sharp, very quick- year old, like above average intelligence. And anybody that knew her will tell you that she was very sharp, very quick witted, very smart. She would not have gotten into a vehicle with somebody she didn't know. The only way she would have gotten into a vehicle is if it was somebody she knew or thought she could trust. Like, you know, say the local policeman

was saying, Hey, Lindsay, it's going to be dark. Let me give you a ride home or one of her friend's fathers, you know, but they've all been looked at. I have no idea. I I'm, I'm just clueless because I just, I have no idea. You know, they've never found any hint of her. There's been a, a rumor circulating for the last few years. And now it's just the Westport myth, and it's always the same story. It changes only in people and vehicles that a group of people were driving through town and they were high or they were drunk and they hit her. And then they cut her up and put her in a crab pot out at Westport off one of the fishing boats. That story has come around multiple times, like more times than I could count. Every time it was a different group of men, a different kind of vehicle, different this,

different that. The FBI assured me that they had traced that story back to a drug dealer who had been arrested and who had made those claims trying to get his competition in trouble. I was assured by the FBI that they sat down face-to-face. He admitted to them making up the story and that they informed him of, did you not think of what it would do to her family hearing this? And, but again, the story keeps coming up what it would do to her family hearing this?

But again, the story keeps coming up. There's always some different version of the story. Ten-year-old Lindsey Baum goes missing in her own neighborhood just 10 minutes away from her mom's home. In the last hours, remains found in a remote wooded area have been identified as being Lindsay Baum, the 10-year-old little girl who went missing in 2009. Now to Chuck Roberts, Crime Stories investigative reporter. Chuck, I want to follow up on something Cheryl McCollum said earlier. Describe to me how 10-year-old Lindsay Baum's remains were found. How were they found? Where were they found? They were found in a remote area of eastern Washington, perhaps 150 to 200 miles from her home in McCleary. McCleary is in the Puget Sound area, western Washington.

The remains were found in eastern Washington. We don't know exactly when and where, but it was in September of last year. Some hunters found the remains. We don't know who processed that crime scene, but the remains were sent to the FBI lab in Quantico, Virginia. And obviously it took eight months to match the DNA from samples they already had on file of Lindsey Baum. Why that happened is kind of a mystery, although the remains just, you know, weren't prioritized over other materials at the lab. They weren't associated with a criminal investigation, as the sheriff said. So I guess a lot depends on how old the remains were at the site and who has access to that really remote stretch of land. To Cheryl McCollum, director of the Cold Case Research Institute.

Cheryl, I want to go back, circle back to something you said, and I agree. Whoever put these remains there knew of this place. Right. They went about 200 miles from McCleary to put her there now think of it in the reverse what if they're from that area and they travel to other places to get their victims now see that would suggest to me that there may be more remains in that area if they're from that area. Now, just go with me. So the person is either from that area or they're from or familiar with the McCleary area.

Now, I know this is like looking for a needle in a haystack, but that's really all we have right now is that this person, the killer, is connected to those two areas because her remains are clearly skeletonized by now. So no sperm, saliva or any DNA, touch DNA. None of that's going to be there. That's gone. Well, let me tell you what we do now there's one possibility though if her clothing was still there if there is any dna on her clothing that's a possibility we have a little more than that though you're absolutely right about the location but we also are going to have a manner of death possibly you're going to know whether

or not she was bound whether or not her clothes were on or off whether or not they're the same clothes you're going to know whether or not possibly she was stabbed or shot these things are going to matter in putting together a profile of this killer and again it's going to be imperative that law enforcement now go back. If this was my case, I'll tell you one thing I would start doing today. I would pull all the cell phone pings that I could on the anniversary date. He quite possibly has revisited this scene. And furthermore, if you go back where she was found, are there any cans or bottles? Did he camp there? Did he visit there um they're gonna

they're gonna have to really excavate pretty well but they'll be able to put together a pretty decent picture of this guy in my well we know it's a man number one we know that and i'll i'll bet you if i were a betting person which i'm not everything I've got that it is a white male, at least in his late 20s, but likely in his, I would guess, late 30s to 40s. I would say 30s to 40s. That is familiar with McCleary and is familiar with this burial ground where he put her. And you know what? You're right, Cheryl. I've seen it over and over and over.

I've experienced firsthand. The perp almost always goes back to the scene of the crime. It may not be on the anniversary, although it is very likely on the anniversary. When you're thinking about the crime again and that person let me go to dr daniel bober forensic psychiatrist would be reliving the crime because that is where they get an adrenaline high even either sexual or some other high from the murder and likely torture of this child. So you can't murder a different child every day. So you have to relive the experience to get that high. So this person, I guarantee you Cheryl is right,

has gone back to that spot or back to McCleary to kind of relive the experience, Dr. Bober. I agree with you, Nancy. You see this a lot in, you know, serial predators, sexual psychopaths. They get deviant sexual gratification from returning to the scene or, in some instances, having an article of clothing of the victim. That's the way they sort of get off, if you will. That's interesting.

You're right um ann bremner high profile seattle lawyer joining me who is a very dear friend of melissa bomb lindsey's mom and how many cases have you and i analyzed where the perp keeps souvenirs for instance you know like um you know and i'm a scrapbooker, and I put photos in there. I put tickets in there. I mean, we just this past couple of weeks went to the CrimeCon in Nashville. And you have to come next year, period, all you guys. So we were at CrimeCon, and one night I took two hours away from CrimeCon and took everybody to the Grand Ole Opry. And let me just say that I got to go up on the stage and I got to introduce an act.

And who would come on the stage but the Grand Ole Opry square dancers and insisted that I dance with them. Can you even imagine? I was mortified, but of course I couldn't say no. So I got up there and anyway, I just hope it wasn't on video. My point is I've saved every scrap from the Grand Ole Opry and I'm going to put it in a photo album for the twins. Serial killers are just like that. They'll keep the victim's driver's license or their underwear or their hair clip or something, their ID bracelet, whatever. I'm just curious. Remember, the mom gave us a detailed description about what she was wearing, those jeans with the knees fashionably ripped out of them.

That's what she had on that night, remember, Ann? What memento did this killer keep? It had to be something. And Nancy, you and I have been talking about these cases for a long time, back since you were on Court TV. And the perpetrator always leaves something behind and takes something away. I think that's a rule we've always known. So what souvenir, you know, what monster would keep a souvenir? We know they probably did. We know exactly what she was wearing. And the fact is, what did that person leave behind at the scene? What have we not heard about? Was this a dumping ground? Was this a crime scene over in eastern Washington? We don't know

yet. We just don't know those kinds of details. But the fact is, there's going to be some piece of evidence. And I know that they've had so many polygraphs, so many search warrants issued and executed. They've looked at so many people, including recently those creepy Emery twins, the older gentleman that had videos of murders of girls. Oh, yeah. And let's talk about those two pervs. When I heard that there were brothers that they were looking at, I assumed they were like teen brothers in the neighborhood. Oh, no. How old are those brothers, Ann?

In their 80s? And one of them was in the restaurant. They're now in their 80s. And Ann Bremner, please describe what was found when the two old brothers were in. First of all, you got two old brothers living together, I think. Neither of them out living with their family. And I'm not saying there's any particular way that I think is right or wrong to live. Because, frankly, I'm just trying to keep my own car in the middle of the road.

Everybody else can live however they want to. Just don't commit a felony. But it does raise an alarm when you see two male brothers living together, not out on their own, not with their own family. And in a nutshell, how and why were they connected to Lindsay? They were, I think, cleared. And what was found? They found a poster, a fine Lindsay Baum poster or flyer in their house. And the two lived alone.

I can't remember if they were late 70s or 80s, but at any rate, one actually had Alzheimer's and was in a home by the time the case was processed. But they had all kinds of videos of, you know, snuff films of children and pedophilia with children and porn, child porn, just a house of horrors. They lived by the two of them. They called them bachelors up in Green Lake in Seattle. Interestingly, one of them had a home, an old home that they owned, by McCleary, and that really piqued the interest, along with all the other information about them, about their being involved in her disappearance. But at this point, there's nothing connecting them

other than the fact that they had that poster in their home or that flyer. Cheryl McCollum, I would absolutely be investigating them although i i believe the cops had them in their hand and i don't think they would have let them go they had this poster in their home after all this time they had reams of child porn and child snuff films, and they have a home near McCleary. That's what we got. Right. And you also have Lindsay's mother telling you she felt like somebody was following her.

So again, perhaps she can go back and tell them a description and again start connecting these dots. Go back to people's cell phones. Because you're talking about somebody that took a child at 9.15 at night. They had to know quickly that child was going to be recognized as missing. You expect the child home by 9.30, so that only gives you a 15-minute window. So this person, again, drove and drove very quickly. But who could be gone after midnight so even if they

returned to lindsey's town they wouldn't have gotten home till after 2 a.m so it needs to be somebody that nobody was expecting and nobody was looking for either you know earlier you mentioned that they should ping do a dragnet ping of the area of her remains absolutely around in it on and around how far back can pings be reconstructed can it go all the way back to 2009 i'm not sure how they you know did everything in 2009 but again it would be worth it to pull everything they can and even if they have to do things by hand look at numbers that repeat. Look at numbers that are anywhere near, you know, Lindsay's town and then the remote area. You know, you can do it by hand.

We've done it here. It's painstaking and it takes time, but daggum it, it's worth it. Well, we saw that employed in the Midlothian murder of Missy Beavers, is called a stingray device used by the NYPD. And we were told it was brought to Midlothian to do exactly that, to harness all the pings within a certain time period in that area. So if the perp's cell phone was with him in the car when he got Lindsay, that ping would register. Now, that's a recent development in law enforcement. I don't think they had that in 2009. Back to Chuck Roberts, Crime Stories investigative reporter.

You said that police are keeping a lot of the investigation secret. What do you know about that, and why are they doing that? Well, they don't want to tip off whoever did this, that they're on their trail, obviously. They need to know who had access to that area, which was used basically for hunting. It was a completely unpopulated area. I don't know whether there were trails going in or out. I don't know how rigorously they talked to the hunters that found the remains.

And I still say it's important to know how old the remains were. In other words, are these the remains of a 10-year-old or the remains of a 15-year-old or a 17-year-old? I mean, Lindsey Baum would turn 20 next month. So they've already eliminated the father. He has a pretty rock-solid alibi. He has a pretty rock solid alibi. He's Tennessee National Guardsman. They lived in eastern Tennessee when they divorced, although he was briefly stationed at McCord Air Force Base for training in Washington. So perhaps that's the connection why Melissa brought her two kids to that area. Joshua, the older brother, is back home with his father in Tennessee.

You know, that's another big piece of the puzzle right there, Cheryl McCollum. What Chuck Roberts just told us, it was used primarily by hunters. Does that mean the killer was a hunter or knew hunters? I would say was a hunter if he knew about this hunting area. Of course. I mean again Nancy this was not something he chose by happenstance he felt comfortable there he knew the area he knew where to park he knew where to take her and again he's absolutely right you don't have to look much further than her shoes to know whether she was killed quickly in the same clothes or not.

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to make Truthfinder the ultimate tool in identity protection. If your personal info appears for sale on the dark web, you'll be the first to know. Visit truthfinder.com slash Nancy. Enter your own name. Get started. We are talking about a beautiful 10-year-old girl, Lindsay Baum. In the last hours, remains found in a remote wooded area have been identified as being Lindsey Baum.

You know, another issue, guys, regarding how we're going to piece this all together is by the crime scene. This is clearly a secondary or tertiary crime scene because she was kidnapped near her mom's home. At some point, either dead or alive, she was taken to this remote area. Now is there a stop in between where she was tortured or raped or actually murdered there? Very interesting what Chuck Roberts said about the age of the skeletonized remains.

Had she been kept for a period of time. Dr. Daniel Bober, forensic psychiatrist, just from what I know about kidnapped children, they're usually killed within the first 72 hours. That is correct, Nancy. You're usually killed within the first 72 hours. I agree with you on that. I mean, it's very rare that you see a J.C. Duggar scenario where the person is kept for years or own being. Elizabeth Smart. Yeah,

yeah, yeah. That's a very rare scenario and we always hear about that. Let's go right back to Grays Harbor Sheriff Rick Scott at his news conference. So I know everybody has tons of questions. The vast majority of them, unfortunately, today, will probably not be answerable. On behalf of the Baum family, they thank you for your continued support in helping to get the information out concerning this investigation in the hopes that that will bring forward additional information now in identifying the person or persons responsible for the death of Lindsey Baum. The Baum family has asked for some privacy as you can understand they are devastated by this and want some time to themselves in

order to get their head wrapped around what's happened. I anticipate in a future press release when we're able to release more details that a representative of the Baum family will want to speak to you personally, but for now they're asking for some privacy and I ask that you respect that. There's really no additional information that I have at this point. I will take questions. I can't promise you that I'll give you answers. Sure.

We've talked to you for nine years about this case. You've always said this one will always haunt you. Now that we know that it's a homicide and kidnapping, does that change anything? How, from your side of the... Well, now we have a location that we can search forensically, and that's what's being planned for the immediate future in the hopes of finding additional evidence that will, you know, in a perfect world, point towards a suspect. That being said, our focus now is to solve a kidnapping homicide. For the last nine years, we've not been able to say definitively what this was beyond it was a missing child. And certainly the prayers and hopes of the family

was that we would someday find her alive and bring her home now the reality is we need to find a homicide suspect sheriff can you characterize what not to talk about evidence but what evidence will investigators or can investigators look for now that you have remains now that you have a site what is it you can look for for now that you have remains, now that you have a site, what is it you can look for in there that might help? Well, it could be anything, quite frankly, from forensic evidence to something that will speak to cause and manner of death. I mean, the gamut is wide open with regard to that. So we'll be looking for any and everything from

minor forensic evidence to evidence that would point to a suspect. Can you say this is an area where people might have frequented, somebody could have possibly seen something? It's a remote area that is primarily visited by hunters during the appropriate seasons, but it's not an area that has any population base of any sort. Why did it take so long for a connection to be broken? Did the hunters not realize it was human remains? The fact that it was human remains became evident quite quickly when the remains were found in 2017.

They were sent to the FBI lab for DNA analysis that's what took so long because the priority with the lab is to identify those artifacts that are submitted for examination that are tied to a specific criminal investigation homicide kidnapping what-have-you when DNA is sent there when remains remains and artifacts are sent there for DNA analysis that have just been randomly located in an effort to determine identity and information about that, that gets done when the opportunity presents itself. And in this case, that wasn't done until just a few weeks ago.

Can you specify, can you specify which county this was located? No, at this point, because of the location and working with the local jurisdiction, we really need to keep the area under wraps so that we can adequately search it and not impede that effort by having well-intended people interfere with that. SEARCH IT AND NOT IMPEED THAT EFFORT BY HAVING WELL INTENDED PEOPLE INTERFERE WITH THAT. SHERIFF, WERE THE REMAINS BURIED OR WAS THERE ANY ATTEMPT TO... I CAN'T DISCUSS THAT TODAY. DOESN'T THIS GIVE YOU SOME HOPE THOUGH OF MORE THINGS TO SEARCH, MORE POSSIBILITIES OF TRAVELING OF PEOPLE? of people who are in the area? Certainly, this is a major, major development in this investigation, and we hope that it will be one that creates the information we need to make an arrest.

Are you close to a possible arrest? I'm not in a position to talk about that, Keith. Sheriff, how did you first learn about the fact that Lindsay's remains have been found? We were contacted by the lab, yes. And what was your personal reaction to that news? I was sad that it was ending like this, but I was glad that we were able to bring some element of closure to what had happened to her. When were you able to tell Melissa what had happened and what was, you said devastated, what was her reason? They were understandably devastated. They had prayed that we would find her alive and bring them home, bring her home. That was not the outcome that the family wanted to hear.

Sheriff, your office just put out a new flyer talking about the homicide and the kidnapping. What can the public do? You asked for help. As. As I've said, Drew, for years and years and years now, there's someone out there that knows who did this and how this happened. And there's people out there that have information that would be the nugget that we need to explode this investigation and culminate in an arrest. We need those people to have the courage to come forward and share that information. Anonymously, through a text message, however it is they wish to convey that. That's why we've got an email dedicated to this.

We've got a tip line dedicated to this. Somebody out there has that nugget of information that we need to bring this case to complete closure and culminate in an arrest. We urge those people to have the courage to come forward. Take a listen to what Lindsay's mother tells me about the night Lindsay disappears. The night she disappeared, I was standing in my driveway. Law enforcement was out. And at that point, they were having me stay close. And I had my cell phone and I had Lindsay's cell phone and my house phone. And I'm standing at the end of my driveway, looking down the street, thinking, oh, my God, somebody really took my child. And I just heard this voice somewhere

inside me say, Elizabeth Smart came home, Lindsay will too. And I can't explain it. I can't explain. I'm not saying that was God speaking to me. I don't know who it was. It was just I heard this, whether it be in my mind or wherever. I heard this voice saying, Elizabeth Smart came home, Lindsay will too. And from that moment, I've never believed that she wouldn't come home. Do you remember the feeling?

I mean, I believe that I would feel as if it weren't real, that it really couldn't possibly be true that my child was really missing. What were you thinking when all of this was happening? Honestly, that night I kept thinking that she was just going to show back up and that I was going to get mad. Like, I was going to be so mad at her. I'm like, what am I going to do? Am I going to ground her? Am I going to whip her?

I was at first. But then when it really hit me standing there at the end of my driveway that somebody took her, I don't know. I can't describe how I felt. I felt like I couldn't breathe. It felt like all of the air was being sucked out of my lungs. And I still feel that. If you've ever lost your child or lost sight of your child in a grocery store or a shopping mall, that panic feeling you get, that's become a normal occurrence. You forget how to breathe. If you could speak to Lindsay now, if she could hear your voice, what would you tell her? That I love her and I want her home. I will never give up on her. I will always be waiting for her. There's nothing that should ever make her fear coming home or nothing that she should be afraid of. If whoever has her is telling her they will hurt her or her family, she just needs to get home. She needs to get away and come home. We love her and we're waiting for her and

just hang on. The tip line 1-360-964-1799 or BAUM tips at co.graysharbor.wa.us. Tip line 1360-964-1799. Right now, Lindsay's mother, completely inconsolable. Our prayers to Lindsay's family. Nancy Grace, Crime Stories, signing off. Goodbye, friend. If you are a dedicated crime fighter like myself, or you're a crime junkie,

go to CrimeOnline.com for all of the latest in crime and justice, Amber Alerts, Missing People Alerts, news on unsolved homicides and cold cases. I'll see you there, CrimeOnline.com. This is an iHeart Podcast.