Crime Weekly - S1 Ep16: The Murder of Krystal Beslanowitch (Part II)

Episode Date: March 26, 2021

Subscribe to our new YouTube Channel!: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_NhRiyowalHnbKjveNQxxA On December 16th, 1995, the body of 17 year old Krystal Beslanowitch was found along the Provo River near Midway, a mountain town 38 miles southeast of Salt Lake City Utah. She was found lying face down and completely naked, surrounded by large river rocks which were covered in blood. She had been beaten savagely to the point where she was unrecognizable, and police knew that whoever had murdered Krystal had done so with a lot of rage, utilizing one of the river rocks lying nearby to hit Krystal in her head and face at least a dozen times. Today on Crime Weekly we are going to discuss this case, and how it went cold for over two decades before improved technology and a dedicated police force were able to finally uncover who killed Krystal Beslanowitch. Website: CrimeWeeklyPodcast.com Instagram: @CrimeWeeklyPod Twitter: @CrimeWeeklyPod Facebook: @CrimeWeeklyPod

History's masterpieces wouldn't be the same without their most notable accents. Neither would the Kia Sportage without its multiple drive modes. The Kia Sorento without its expansive 12.3-inch panoramic display. Or the Kia Telluride without its three rows of spacious seating. The 2025 Kia SUVs. Kia. Movement that inspires. Call 800-333-4KIA for details. Always drive safely. Limited inventory available. Hello everybody and welcome back to Crime Weekly.

How are you doing today, Derek? I'm good. I'm good. I'm ready to cover part two. This is a really fascinating case. You picked this one, and I'm glad you did. I had never heard about this case prior to you discussing it with me. And, man, a lot of layers to it. Yeah, it's really tough because she was so young. Crystal Beslanowich, whose case we're covering in this part, as well as the part before. So if you guys haven't heard part one of this case, you should probably

listen to that first or none of this is going to make sense. But it's just very sad because she was so young. She'd had a troubled life. She'd gone through a lot. I wouldn't say that she was on the right path as we speak, where she was in her life at that moment. But I think that because she was so young, there was a good chance that she could have found her right path again. And she never got that chance. And it makes me sad. Yeah. I mean, and you're right, because you hear a lot of stories about individuals who had made some personal choices in their childhood that weren't the best. And then they turn out to be very successful individuals with a big family and a happy life. And you would never know that about them unless they told you. So you're right. Anybody out there

who's, you know, and I don't think there's a lot of people, especially not our listeners, but anybody who's out there saying like, oh, well, she was a sex worker. Why do we, why do we really care? Because she was a kid. She was a child and she, she had a very tough upbringing, losing her father at four years old. And we don't know what would have happened. And regardless of what she was in, nobody deserves to go through what she went through. And so that's why we're covering it. Which is pretty much what Todd Banner said, because he said, I don't know if you saw a couple of interviews with him, but he said that there would be people sometimes who would ask him, like, why are you working on this case so hard? She was just a sex worker. And he was like,

I don't care what she did. She's a person. She's 17 years old. She's an innocent person. Why wouldn't I pursue this just like I would with anybody else? Absolutely. It happened all the time as a police officer, as a detective, where we'd have a lot of situations where a sex worker would be sexually assaulted. Listen, that can happen, right? It happens all the time. Just because they do that for a living, there's a lot of times where they say no, and because of their profession, the guy doesn't accept that. And so we had a lot of sexual assault cases, a lot of just felony assault cases where we've had women severely beaten

because of them saying no to certain individuals. And I treated those cases like any other case. It didn't matter to me what they did for to make money, even though, you know, it was illegal. It is illegal. At the end of the know, it was illegal. It is illegal. At the end of the day, I was only concerned about one thing, and that was getting the person who did that to them. So didn't matter. Should we give them a little? Obviously, again, like you said, anybody who's watching this, you definitely should go listen or watch part one before doing that before listening to this one.

Should we just give a little recap? Yeah, we can. We can give a little recap. We're talking today about 17-year-old Crystal Beslanowicz. She was originally from Washington State. Her and her boyfriend slash pimp Chris, they moved from Washington State to Utah where Chris had family.

And they settled there in a motel in the Salt Lake City area. And the area that they were living in in this motel happened to be an area well known for prostitution. And Crystal herself was working as a sex worker at this point. And according to people who knew her, Crystal had been working as a sex worker for quite some time, even before a time where I would feel comfortable calling her a sex worker, as we discussed in part one, because at that point, I believe it was just exploitation on behalf of whoever was sending her out into those streets, because I don't think that she came up with this idea on her own at that young age. But so she moves to Utah with her boyfriend one evening after she finished up with

a customer. She told him she was going to go to the store. The store was in walking distance. She was going to grab some food, but she never made it to the store. The next morning, her body was found on the banks of Lake Provo by a rancher and his son. And she had been beaten severely. I believe that you said 16 times she was hit with one of these large granite rocks that was found around her body. And at first, no one knew what her true identity was because she was found nude. She didn't have any identification on her. They had to use her tattoos in order to identify her. Her boyfriend, Chris, saw the news. He saw the tattoos. He called the police. But he gave her name as Tracy Beslanowich, who was Crystal's older stepsister, and she was using her identity.

So when the police called Jeff Beslanowich, who was Crystal's stepfather and Tracy's father, he said, no, this is not my daughter, Tracy. This is my stepdaughter, Crystal. So now we have Crystal Beslanowich's identity. The police have figured out who their Jane Doe is. And the number one suspect that they had at this point, the only suspect they had was her boyfriend slash pimp, Chris. Yeah. And the deal with Chris is, yes, he lied to the police. However, as you just established, where her body was found was approximately 40 miles away from where she was last seen alive. And they put the

time of death based on her state of rigor mortis at between 11 p.m. on the 15th and 1 a.m. So only four or five hours after she disappeared. So it's reasonable to assume that whoever her offender was, they were in a vehicle as they drove out to this location. And we do know that Chris didn't have a car. So it does weaken the means for him to carry out this assault. Additionally, as we said in last episode, Crystal was the breadwinner. She was the one bringing home the money. Chris was not working. So from an investigatory perspective, when you're looking at it, when you think about motive for, for Chris to have killed her, he'd be cutting off his only source of income if to put it bluntly. So that's another thing that would be against him as far as being the guy. And if I were looking at this case, those are two big things where I would say, Hmm, it might not be him.

Yes. He lied to us about her name, but there's a numerous reasons he could have done that. The obvious thing is he doesn't have a vehicle. How would he have gotten her out there? So you're right where we left off last episode. We now know who she is. The police now know who she is and they and they have basically one suspect at this point, Chris. Yeah. But in what you just said, the police pretty much came to that as well. You know, I don't for me personally, the fact that she was making money for him wouldn't have been as much of a deterrent, especially considering the crime itself. Right. So she was beaten very savagely. So it looks like this could have been something that happened a spur of the moment,

not planned and out of a great deal of emotion. So if you're having a lover's quarrel, if there's something going on, I expect because of the line of work she was in, there may have been some sort of jealousy and possessiveness at times. So you could imagine that he might do that. But the fact that he did not have a vehicle was probably the biggest reason that police questioned whether he had done it. And I think that they probably could gauge when they initially talked to him his level of deception. Right.

And this was also in 1995. I believe the gas station she was heading towards was a gas station by the name of Circle K. And according to Chris, he went to that location around 11 PM to see if she was there. I don't know if they had cameras or not, but there might've been something there that, you know, based on the time of death, again, just more reason why it couldn't have been him. So yes, a lot there, absolutely based on the assault itself does appear to be some type of emotion involved with it. Whoever killed her, there was definitely, it was personal to them. And I don't know if you mentioned it or not,

but the murder weapon is believed to be these granite rocks that you talked about that were along that bed. Did you mention that? Yes. Yeah. So with the granite rocks, it appears that there were six with blood on them. So detectives did a great job of collecting all six rocks. And we'll be talking more about the granite rocks tonight. So at this point, the detectives only have one suspect, Chris, and

they have very little to go on. But then on December 19th, 1995, a new suspect presented himself. Herb Fry was a local taxi driver who had befriended Crystal. He would sometimes pick her up and bring her where she needed to go. He would bring her coffee. And as they got closer, Herb claimed that he fell in love with Crystal and he wanted to marry her, but he obviously didn't approve of what she did for a living, or at least he didn't approve of what she did for a living if she was going to be his wife. Now, Herb actually voluntarily went to the police. I believe he found out what happened to Crystal, that she'd been murdered, and he presented himself to the police, and he told them that he'd seen Crystal the day she

disappeared. He said it was earlier in the day and that he was just driving by the motel and he saw her standing outside. So he stopped and they talked for a little bit. And after the police did some digging, they were talking to people who Herb knew. They discovered that he'd actually told one of his friends that if he couldn't have Crystal, no one would. Yeah. And when I first heard about Herb, and Sheriff Bonner said this as well, he was pretty certain this guy was involved somehow. And I'm starting my wheels are turning as I'm hearing about him for the first time. And I'm thinking to myself, what if he was in that motel parking lot at some point and saw crystal with chris right like you know more i'm more of like a physical level where they were interacting with each other sexually whatever it may be even if it's just kissing and that would that could have set him off and now we

talked about a vehicle a couple minutes ago this guy had a vehicle and he had a taxi so it's not something that would stand out too much not Not something that's really identifiable. It's pretty ubiquitous. You can find them. They're everywhere. So I was like, oh, this has potential. And I have a strong suspicion the detectives involved felt the same way. Oh, absolutely. He had the vehicle. He was obsessed with her. That's what it made it sound like. It was unhealthy. Yeah. And when he said he was just driving by the motel and he saw her outside i was like bullshit dude like you were not just happened to be driving by the motel you probably drove by that motel several times a day hoping to see her standing outside so that you could you know strike up a conversation and i definitely get the feeling that Crystal was definitely not as into Herb

as he was into her. No, no. And she probably was playing the game too. Listen, we know what line of work she was in, doing the flirt thing, doing whatever she has to do to get these guys to go the extra mile to pay the money. So she might've been giving him some false hope because that's what her job was to do. And like you said, he took that literally. Wait, so you think Herb was a customer? Oh, 1000%. You don't? I didn't get that impression.

No? No. Oh, I would love to hear. Guys, if you're watching this or you're listening to this, definitely comment on that one because I took away from it 100% that he was a customer, probably one of her most frequent customers. Frequent flyer. And he felt special.

He felt special because he was probably someone who was throwing a lot of money at her. And so she was spending a lot of time with him. And yet she was doing it as a business transaction. And he was forgetting the fact that he was paying her to spend time with him. That's was doing it as a business transaction and he was forgetting the fact that he was paying her to spend time with him you know that's how i took it because why else would she be spending time with him he said they were friends he brought her coffee gave her rides like yeah i'd love to hear crystal's version of that because i bet she felt differently but yeah

that's interesting that you didn't pick up on that wow interesting well i mean i don't know i don't think every time a man and a woman are you know hanging out they have to be having sex i think based on description of herb and what he was talking about and how he basically said he was in love with her and he was going to marry her and and she was you know it was it was she was a sex worker. So it was her job to make them feel special. And I think she did that with him. And for him to take that to the level of, I want to marry her and to tell other people if I can't have her, nobody can, that's unhealthy. And so that's a, but that'd be interesting.

I mean, it doesn't really matter now, but that's interesting that you didn't pick up. I wonder how everyone else feels hearing about him i i want you all to go to our instagram and comment under the post about this case and let us know if you think that herb was a customer of crystals or was he just this hopeless romantic who wanted to marry her and sweep her off her feet and take her away from all of this? I think they're siding with me on that one. But either way, he's creepy. Yeah, 1000%. Yes.

Okay. So like you said, Herb kind of checked all the boxes. He was a taxi driver. So he had the means to drive Crystal to Lake Provo. He was obsessed with her. He considered himself to be in love with her. He probably kind of stalked her. Like I said, he was just probably driving past the motel. But at this time, there was no evidence that they could compare to Herb to prove that he had been responsible. They had the rocks, of course, which were the murder weapons,

but they didn't have the technology to get anything off of these rocks. They had a bloody fingerprint on Crystal's wrist, but it was in blood. And we have talked about this before, how difficult it can be to successfully get a fingerprint off of something that has blood on it. We talked about it with Faith Hedgepeth's case. So if we have a fingerprint in blood on human flesh, how difficult do you think that would be to actually get a good indication of whose fingerprint that is? I think it's impossible, honestly, because yeah, I mean, pretty much I, you know, correct me if I'm wrong, but you know, a fingerprint

essentially is on any object. It's the way you have a fingerprint is because of the oils in your skin. And that fingerprint is so delicate. It's basically transmitting, you know, transferring the fingerprint oils onto the object and creating the ridges that would be displayed on your finger. So think about how delicate that is. There's something called the low card exchange theory, where basically you have an item and it has attributes. So you can have like a mug and it has attributes. And when your fingerprint comes in contact with it, your fingerprint now becomes part of that mug's attributes. Well, the fingerprint is very,

it's very fragile in that state. And that's why you have to use a certain type of oxide powder to kind of enhance it so you can see it. So when you're talking about the bloody fingerprint you're seeing on her wrist, what you're really referring to is the shape of a fingerprint because it is in fact a finger. But when we're talking about a latent fingerprint that can be used for identification, it's not detailed enough. The ridges aren't there because of the blood. So to make that a print identifiable to someone else, it's impossible. But yes, it does tell you that someone was grabbing her on the

wrist because their hand was covered in blood and therefore it transferred onto her skin. Yeah. And blood's a liquid, right? Even if you had blood on your fingerprint and you placed it on someone's hand, it's going to be bleeding. The blood's going to be bleeding. But you know what I mean? Like wet ink. It's not going to stay static. It's going to move and change.

So you might even be able to tell it's a fingerprint. You might be able to see those familiar swirls and see the ridges. But I don't think at a court of law it would hold up because of the fact that this is just not the best way to get a fingerprint. The best thing I can say to everyone out there, if you ever want to try this, and you should because it's fascinating stuff, grab a mug, grab something that's not porous, right? And wipe your nose or wipe your cheek and lightly touch the mug and then hold that mug under a light and just a certain angle. And you're going to see the fingerprint. You're going to see it because basically what you're seeing is the oils from your fingerprint on the mug itself. And you can enhance that by touching the, your nose. Cause obviously you have a lot

of oil on your face and think about how, when you look at it, think about how delicate that really is. And if all you have to do is have your finger swipe across it or have it rub up against something and that little delicate print that you're just able to slightly see in that light, do you think it would remain intact if you did that? And the answer is no, it wouldn't. And that's how sensitive and how difficult it is to pull prints off of things. And that's why it's such a very specific process when they lift prints, because even the lifting of the print itself can disturb the print. And so a lot of it comes down to how good of a fingerprint examiner you have and their ability to remove that print without disturbing the ridges. Well, first of all, I don't endorse anybody touching their face. You should not do that. Okay. Cause you're going to deposit a whole lot of garbage into your pores while you're

touching your face. So don't, don't do that. Find another oily part of your body. But yeah, that, that's actually very interesting. And that fingerprint is going to come back in and it's kind of a, once again, interesting how this whole fingerprint thing pans out. Because for a while, they were looking at this fingerprint and they legitimately said this. They were like, this is our key. This is the most important piece of evidence. We're collecting the rocks because we hope that DNA progresses and we're able to test these. But the fingerprint is going to be what catches this person. And then it's kind of funny what that fingerprint ends up being at the end of the day. So in 2008, the Wasatch County Sheriff's Office began working with Sorenson Forensics.

And Sorenson Forensics is a lab located in Draper, Utah. So they were hoping to recover skin cells or touch DNA. Sorenson swabbed four of the six rocks that had been collected. So these rocks had stained portions, places obviously where blood was present, and then they had unstained portions that were free of blood. So they swabbed the unstained portions, figuring that if the rocks had been used as weapons, this would have been the place where Crystal's assailant would have been gripping the rock and holding it. And sure enough, they did recover a small amount of male DNA, but it was just a partial profile. It couldn't be used to identify someone fully, but it could be used to eliminate current suspects to compare against their DNA.

So they did compare the partial profile to Crystal's boyfriend, Chris. He willingly gave them a sample, but he was not a match, which Todd Bonner and the rest of the police force had already sort of figured out. The person that Bonner was really interested in comparing the partial DNA profile to was the taxi driver, Herb Fry, because Todd Bonner was sure that Herb was their guy. So they followed Herb one day from his home to where he worked, and they parked outside and they waited for him to go out for a cigarette break. When he did, a police officer who was dressed in plain clothes, he went out also and walked up to Herb to join him to have a cigarette together.

And then he watched. He watched Herb smoke a cigarette so that he could see where Herb put the cigarette in the ashtray. So he knew which one to grab. And this was the way that they were going to get Herb's DNA. And I always kind of wondered, like, why didn't they just ask him? You know, Crystal's boyfriend, Chris, gave it up willingly. Herb, I mean, they probably didn't ask him, you know, Chris, Crystal's boyfriend, Chris gave it up willingly. Herb, I mean, they probably didn't ask him because they thought he was guilty, right? I think it was that. And I also think it was like, right now he is completely, his guard is down. And if we ask him and he says, no, we might decrease the possibility of getting a cigarette

butt or a coffee cup or something like that, because he may be conscientious of where he puts things in public, you know told them some things, but then he probably felt like they, you know, you can sometimes pick up on it where maybe the detectives were questioning him a certain way. And he was like, Hey, I think they think I did this. And so he might've like stopped coming in and he might've sensed that and been, you know, again, I didn't see anything to prove this, but he might not have been as cooperative and they might have picked up on that. Before we continue, let's have a quick break. OK, we're back. I was also thinking while we were talking about the sponsor that they may have been afraid that Herb Fry would run.

Right. Because he's a taxi driver. It doesn't appear like he had a wife or kids, right? Because he was trying to marry Crystal. So maybe if they'd asked him for DNA, he would have, and if he'd been the one who done it, he would have just ran, left the state and then they wouldn't have been able to catch up to him. Yeah. You're right. I think that's an excellent point. I didn't even think about it. But yeah, you hint that you think it's him. He picks up on that. He is, in fact, the guy. He has nothing holding him to where he is and he takes off and you never hear from him

again. So yeah, excellent point. And I think it's another interesting point because a lot of people might not know that legally, like if I'm smoking a cigarette in public, right, or if I'm drinking, you know, a bottle of water in public and I discard that cigarette or that bottle of water, the police can just come and take that. It's not an issue. Anything that's sort of like what abandoned or thrown out in public, they can take. And so, you know, be careful, I guess, what you're leaving your DNN.

We've talked about this. And it is specific, and I'm not giving anybody hints here, but abandoned property would be in a public area or common area that everyone has access to. So if you have a cigarette and you throw it into an ashtray in your driveway of your property, the police technically, well, they can't. Legally, they can't walk on you, even if it's in public, you know, plain view. If the ashtray is six feet into the driveway, they can't walk on your driveway and take that cigarette butt because they're taking it from a private area that they don't have the right to be at. So legally, the only time they would be able to grab that cigarette is once you took it

and put it on the sidewalk. So in this particular case, it looks like he was at a public building. I believe it was, what was it? Like his actual place where he worked or something? Where he worked, yeah. Where he worked. And so this ashtray, this little, you see him outside of these buildings a lot, not so much anymore, but all the time. And definitely in 2008, you'd see him there outside the building. It's a common area where everyone can go smoke. And so apparently this detective was like right out there with him and was able to, I'm sure he had to write this in a search warrant. He had to actually physically see him take the cigarette from his mouth, put it in a specific

area of the ashtray and identify that specific cigarette as the cigarette that he left there, because I'm sure there were multiple cigarettes. So very, very specific, I'm sure, in the search warrant, as far as how, or I should say in the arrest warrant, or not the arrest warrant. What am I looking for here? Affidavit. The affidavit. But they wouldn't even need an affidavit because it's an abandoned area. So they wouldn't even need a warrant for it because they're not seizing it from him. But when they're writing up the report for why they're testing it,

they would have to be able to say definitively that cigarette came from that person. So what if I threw something out and put it in my garbage cans at the end of the driveway? Can the police go through that? I feel like we have had this conversation before. We have. Abandoned property. Yep. The minute it steps onto a public area, like a sidewalk, it's free game. Yep. It's free game.

Or even like a public area like this. But again, I got to be careful I put this out because this was a case we actually did and it wasn't my case. It was a federal case. But we were trying to get DNA from an individual and he was speaking with one of our confidential informants. So they were at a diner and we wanted his DNA. So we made sure that they ordered coffee. He ordered a coffee for him before he even got there. And we ran into an issue because the diners is a public area, but it's privately owned.

So it's really no different than going into someone's home. There's an expectation of privacy. Like anything in that diner, including the mugs, belonged to the diner. And so in that case, just to be safe, we got a search warrant. And obviously the diner was more than willing to turn over the mug. They didn't care. Yeah, but what if you just asked the diner without got a search warrant. And obviously the diner was more than willing to turn over the mug. They didn't care. Yeah. But what if you just asked the diner without getting a search warrant and you were like, hey, can we have that mug? This is your property. Consent. Yeah. You have to sign something consent. But we drew up an affidavit because we wanted them to know we

were legitimate because we're all in plain clothes. It's kind of unnerving for us to come up to you because we waited until the person left the target left and then before anybody touched the mug including the waitress we said well don't touch it uh you know detective little vassar you know we're here we want to we're doing something is your owner here could we call him we did he came down no problems he was more than willing to do it so the whole time while you're waiting for the owner to get there you've got this like table with the cup like just guarded like a chain of people just standing multiple agents multiple agents guarding this mug yeah that's kind of funny yeah turned out it wasn't him by the way that happens a lot listen it's not all wins there's a lot of l's along the way i'm sure he's glad it wasn't him oh i'm sure he

was yeah a lot of l's he and to this day that person doesn't know. Oh, I'm sure he was. Yeah. A lot of L's. And to this day, that person doesn't know that all transpired. Because after we realized it wasn't him, we went on to the next situation. I am never drinking in public again. Yeah. This guy's at home watching TV. It was TV dinner. Maybe he's listening to this podcast and he's like, I love diner coffee. Yeah. Yeah. So there was obviously going to be a lot of high hopes, just like you're saying in this case. You know, you wanted you wanted this guy to be the one because you wanted to further the investigation. He wasn't the one. But in Wasatch County with Herb, they really thought it was him.

But once they compared Herb's DNA to the partial profile of Crystal's attacker, they found out that he wasn't a match. And this kind of brought them back to square one. And it shook Sheriff Bonner a little bit. And he says this in one of the documentaries I watched. He said he was so sure that Herb Fry was responsible for Crystal's murder. And I think he said like this above all else in the case shook me to my core. And I started thinking about it and I was like, oh, that's kind of weird. Why would you say this of all things shook you to your core? You know, you saw this poor murdered girl laying there. And then I was like, well, it probably almost surprised him how confident he

was that this was the person. And then to find out it wasn't and maybe he'd been hanging his hopes on this and he maybe he almost was like, wow, I can't believe, you know, how wrong I was like that. That can be really problematic. And I think as a good police officer, he recognized his his bias almost a little bit or his not his bias, but his his almost like insistence that he go down this path because it was like once Chris, the boyfriend was eliminated, Herb was all they had. So I think that Sheriff Bonner kind of held on to Herb because if they didn't have Herb, they didn't have anybody. Yeah. Well, I think it was good because it's okay. It's kind of like the case I just told you about with me with the mug, right? It's okay to have an opinion because we're humans, right?

So there's been, I can guarantee you almost every single case I've ever worked, I have a hunch on who I think it is, right? And there's been some cases where I was like, absolutely positive that this individual was the one who did it. Where you separate a good cop from a bad cop is what Bonner did, which is not only including the evidence that supports your narrative. So here, a bad cop would take that negative match and go, oh, it was probably just not a good sample. Let's just throw that out. I still think Herb's the guy, right?

That's a bad cop. A good cop is saying, I believe it's this guy. But as soon as the evidence, even though it didn't support his theory, was presented, well, guess what? Herb's off the list. That's a good cop. And so, and that's what he did. You know, he, he, he, and he said it in the documentary. I was sure he did it. I was sure he did it, which I thought was pretty impressive for him to say that, you know, considering what's happened since. But, um, but yeah, that's the difference between a good cop and a bad cop. It's letting

the evidence dictate the case and not trying to find evidence that supports your theory of the case. What do they call it? Confirmation bias? Confirmation bias. Yeah. Basic. And again, that's a bias that can really skew a case because again, there's 15 facts that

you've uncovered, but only eight of them fit your theory. So those are the ones you're going to focus on. That's not good. I feel like my husband does that a lot in arguments. I think a lot of people do it. And you know, it's okay to support your argument with the things that fit your agenda, but it's not okay when you're deciding between someone's freedom. You know, you have to be unbiased and you have to be objective and you have to take all the information regardless of where it fits into your theory. Yeah, I don't think it's okay when he does it to me, Derek.

I'm team hubby. You're on Adam's side. Yeah, yeah. Well, as we're talking about Sheriff or Todd Bonner at the time, he was a deputy sheriff. He was a good cop. And this was rewarded because in 2009, he became the sheriff of Wasatch County. And although this case, his first homicide investigation had gone cold and he hadn't solved it, he would still come back to it often over the years. He would see if there was new information, new leads, you know, like we talked about in part

one, every time he got together with like police friends this is the case that they would talk about and little did he know there was a tool that could be used to help crack this case and uh he was even available i believe in 2009 yes it was invented in 2002 so this this thing, this tool, this forensic tool, it's this little vacuum. Invented in 2002, and it wasn't meant for crime scenes or forensic work or police work. It was meant to suck bacteria off of food. And they called it the MVAC. Now, this is one of those cool situations where something's created to fill a need, but it's a separate need than what it ends up being used for. It's discovered to have practical

applications in other fields as well. And the FBI were actually the ones who started using the MVAC in investigations for DNA collection. And I went on the MVAC's website and it claims that the MVAC can collect DNA from rough, porous surfaces, such as a heavy granite rock, for instance. So usually, in most cases, if you're not using the MVAC, DNA is going to be collected using a swab. Like, I think it's just a cotton swab. But this swab can obviously only do so much. And it's going to be much more effective on flat surfaces. Now, these granite rocks, they were hard. They had all these

little nooks and crannies, these little pores in the surface that could hold touch DNA, and the swab can't reach into those areas. Now, we actually talked about this last week, and you told me you've worked with this system before. So can you tell us a little bit more about it from the horse's mouth? Yeah, absolutely. So I actually called a friend of mine as well, Detective Sue Cormier. She's still on the job. I think she's been 27 years. She's in the process of actually trying to get one for her department. So the first thing about the MBAC system you need to know is they're between $42,000 and $44,000 per unit. Yeah. So that's why there's not a lot of them out there. And then you have to think about

the maintenance and the materials you need, like the products you need to keep using it, because obviously every time you use it, you have to replace those items for chain of custody issues and for obviously sterile environments for doing the next lab. So what the MVAC is to really kind of just make this simple is it's, it's a vacuum, right? But the difference with the MVAC system is there's a sterile fluid that's run through the system as well while you're shop, while you're doing this vacuuming of the product, whatever, or the object, whatever it is. And so that's, that fluid is, is mixed with whatever you're sucking up through the vacuum and all of that debris and material, that microscopic matter,

whether it's skin cells, hairs, saliva, semen, whatever it may be, it's caught in a filter of the MVAC. And then that filter is taken out and examined and a DNA profile can be developed from the contents, you know, derived and taken from that filter. A couple other interesting things about it. And then I was talking, so like you said, Stephanie, this was developed during the E. coli breakout. That's what it was really designed for. And I don't know that the inventor's name, but the son's name is Jared Bradley. And Jared runs the company now. He's good friends with Sue Cormier. And that's how I kind of learned about it. And that website you probably went on the MBAC website is the company that he runs. And he spends a lot of his time now

working with police departments, trying to find ways through grants to get them the MBAC system, because the MBAC system is amazing, especially in a case like this, where, like you said, this granite rock, it's a flat service and it has all these little nooks and crannies. And that's where the MBAC shines. It's where the swab can't get into. So all these little crevices, microscopic crevices that the swab is just going to kind of brush over, the MVAC is sucking those items out of those cracks. And if you think about it, we talked about a fingerprint earlier and how easy it is to disturb a fingerprint because it's on the surface. Well, what better DNA than the DNA that's preserved and protected by the crack itself, right? So you can wash that rock. The elements outside can disturb the DNA on

the exterior of that rock. But all those little crevices that you can't even get into with a swab, it's going to protect that biological matter, which can then be used later after it's pulled out by the vac to develop a DNA profile. So it's really, really an incredible tool and it's used a lot when it can be, but it's very expensive to have one. And it's also expensive to have it used if you're not going through a state lab. So that's what I was going to ask. You said 43 to 44,000. 42 to 44,000. She told me more. Yep. Is that what they were costing when it was being used to suck bacteria off of food? I have no clue, but I would venture to say not. I'd venture to say not. I think it's gone up in

price. And, and you know, this is a story We could do a whole podcast just on this because this is the barrier to entry for law enforcement. And a lot of people don't realize it. But Sorenson Forensics, I don't know. I don't know if they're a private lab. It sounds like they are. It doesn't sound like it's the state lab. They're private. So guess what?

Sorenson, great job. I guarantee you they charged a big bill. And I'll also guarantee you this. That's why initially they only swabbed four of the six rocks. Oh, yeah. Because guess what? It was too expensive and they were just trying to do as much as they could. And I think I mentioned this before. This is why we got to get more grants going, because even the grant I was trying to help Detective Cormier get for an MVAC system, it didn't actually apply to it. So guess what? Her department didn't get one. So we're still working on it, but it's unfortunate that such a valuable tool that can be used in so many cases, the reason why it's not is because it's

expensive. There's a dollar amount attached to why some of these cases haven't been fully examined the way they could be. Yeah, that kind of pisses me. That kind of pisses me off because, listen, I'm all for capitalism, but this is where capitalism kind of fails us, right? Because that's exactly what it is. I'm sure they've made improvements to it, but it wasn't costing that much when it was being used for E. coli.

So now that there's a demand, right? Obviously, there's a demand for this now for law enforcement. So the people who are making it are going to say, well, let's make a good profit on this. And that's fine. But you're right. There should be grants of some sort or just some companies who maybe donate. I don't know.

It's a mess. There are some, but not enough. This is something, and I'm 100 i'm bored with you and as pissed as off as you are i can tell you from our side of it we're pissed off too i told you about like one hair is like three grand to have it it's it's crazy and so it's like hey detective choose which hairs you want analyzed i want them all analyzed well we can't afford that so pick some it's like you want me to pick which hairs like what if I pick the six hairs out of the 12? The wrong ones. Yeah Exactly. And so it's a super frustrating thing

and you know, i'm probably living in a dream world here, but You would like to think that if something like this is created. I don't expect Jared or his company to take i'm not i'm not I'm not villainizing them at all because I'd do the same thing if I'm being honest. I would. And he does do a lot to help departments try to get him. Like he's great. From what I've – I've never spoken to him personally, but he's great.

But there should be government grants out there that say, hey, listen, specifically for this NVAC, we want every department, at least we want every jurisdiction to have one. We don't want there to be a jurisdiction in this entire country that doesn't have access to these if they need it. Because if it can help solve one case, then it's worth it to us. Or even there's one in like every state. And then you can send your samples to the lab that has them. But at least there's one nearby. Here's the thing. The vacuum would have to be, because some of it's cars that they got a vacuum, it's a manpower and a money thing.

I'm looking at the picture though. It doesn't, it looks pretty small. It doesn't look super complicated. It is. It's small. And it's one of those things that I'm sure for the YouTube version of this, by the way, we're on YouTube now in case you guys didn't have noticed yet. The vacuum doesn't look that crazy. Like it's not like, oh, it's a super scientific thing.

However, it does. A lab tech has to do it because again, it's being used in a court of law. So it's something that has a process to it where it has to be done a specific way in order for it to be admissible in court. You know, like there has to be some level of like sterleness to it where it's like hey listen they can confirm that whatever biological matter was obtained from that car or that rock did in fact come from that rock and it wasn't a form of cross-contamination i bet you we can reverse engineer the technology and then sell it at a discounted price we'll go we'll go buy some vacuums at lowe's or something and throw a little filter and some fluid on it. Call Dyson and be like, hey, can you guys do this? Yeah. Yeah. You let me know how that works out. I think Jared would be coming after us.

I know he would. Sorry, Jared. Yeah. He's got that thing patting into the hill. Well, it just so happened that in 2013, Sorenson Forensic Labs acquired an MVAC system, and they used it to retest just one of the rocks that the partial DNA profile had come from, as well as the other two rocks that had not already been tested. And they were able to recover a full DNA profile that was then entered into CODIS, where it found a match to a man who had already been convicted of a felony in Utah many years before. And I didn't know this before this case, but if

you're convicted of a felony in Utah, it's mandatory for you to give your DNA. And they put that in the system. And I think that should definitely be the case in every state. And I don't think it is yet. I don't know if, I don't believe it is, but I don't, I don't know if I don't believe it is, but I know in many states it is, I believe it is in Rhode Island, which is where I'm located, but it's yeah, it's a buccal swab. So basically what they do is they take a, like a Q-tip type thing and they swab your cheeks or the inside of your mouth, the cheeks of your mouth. Um, and then they submit it into CODIS. So they have it on file. Yep. Great idea. So this man is named Joseph Michael Simpson, and he had been living in Utah at the time of Crystal's murder, and he'd been working as an

airport shuttle driver. So it was reported that he would often drive people from the airport to this place called Homestead. It's kind of like this boozy, like hot springs resort outside of Heber City. Now driving this route, which he did often, would have brought him directly past the area where Crystal's body was found. So in 1987, Joseph Michael Simpson was living in Clearfield, Utah, where he worked at a restaurant. And apparently he pulled a herb and he developed some feelings for a woman who also worked at this restaurant. He seemed to be just really into her and he asked her out on a date, but then he found out that somebody else they worked with at the restaurant, another man also was feeling romantical towards the same woman and he got jealous. So he got this knife and he went over to this man's

house and they got into an argument outside. And this argument was witnessed by a neighbor. And then right after this, this man was found dead and he still had a knife in his back. Now Simpson later claimed that he had not gone there to kill this guy. He said he'd only brought the knife because he wanted to intimidate him and scare him. But let me tell you that this man that Simpson killed, he was messed up. He was stabbed 13 times, and nine of these stab wounds were in his back. So this is overkill.

And what does this remind you of? Crystal Bislonowicz. Yes, the overkill in Crystal Bislonowicz's case, the overkill in this new victim's case or old victim because it happened before Crystal's death in 1987. But Simpson's first murder that we know of, it was also overkill. It was angry. This is somebody who clearly does not have control of his temper. And the fact that he was stabbed nine times in the back, like this guy was trying to get away. And the fact that you pursue somebody to continue stabbing them, to continue hurting them, it shows that he kind of, and I've seen people like this. They'll be fine. They'll be fine.

They'll be fine. they'll be fine, they'll be fine, and then they'll snap. And once they snap, it's very difficult to bring them back down. And that kind of person is dangerous. He doesn't have control over his anger. And he's the one that went there with the knife, right? So what's this guy going to do that he's arguing with? Simpson went there to tell the guy not to go out with his girl at the restaurant, who

wasn't even his girlfriend. So he's kind of creepy. but he went there with a knife. He said he didn't go there to kill him. But why do you bring a knife if you're going to go talk to somebody? I agree. I definitely agree. And again, we talk about Crystal and we say that whoever killed her, there was some emotion in it. There was rage in it. The M.O. for this killing aligns quite well. So, yes, the puzzle starting to fit. And when we say emotion, especially when we're looking at the death of Crystal, you might think emotion means love or jealousy, you know, or something like that. But he didn't even really know this guy that he killed that well. His emotion was anger, rage, jealousy, and absolutely blinding white hot rage is what happened there. And he was caught and he was

charged with this murder. He was sentenced to life in prison, but then he was paroled seven and a half years later, just five months before Crystal's death. So in 2003, Joseph Michael Simpson left Utah with permission from his parole officer, and he went to go live with his parents in Sarasota, Florida. So when the DNA that was found on Crystal matched to Joseph Michael Simpson, Salt Lake City police tracked him to Florida because obviously at this point now they're sure they have their guy. They have a DNA match, but they didn't need another sample of his DNA to compare since obviously I think that they have to do this, right? They have to double check. Yeah, absolutely. Well, here's the thing, right? So the DNA

on that rock belonged to Joseph Michael Simpson. However, you could make the argument that, hey, did the DNA actually come from that rock? Did it come from something else? Could it have gotten there through contamination, right? Is it actually the same profile of the person we have on file from the buccal swab? So what I'm saying is, yes, the DNA on the rock belongs to the killer, but how do we know that the buccal swab for Joseph Michael Simpson didn't get mixed up in CODIS, right? So now what we want is a direct comparison to the guy we've identified as Joseph Michael Simpson and see if his DNA matches the DNA that was found on the rock. Why don't we take a quick break and then we'll dive into what happened because there's still a lot more to the story and I think we're heading to

Florida. So before the break, we were talking about Joseph Michael Simpson and essentially how, yes, they have a match of his buccal swab that was entered in CODIS, but now they need a direct match. They need to know that whatever DNA sample they get from him directly matches the DNA profile found from the rock. And so that's why they have to go down to Florida. But again, they don't want to alarm him because Simpson thinks he's gotten away with this, right? It's been, it's years later. He's walking around thinking, hey, that's one I got away with. And they, you know, they haven't identified me yet. And I didn't get into it before the break, but just to kind of piggyback on what you said as far as his time served, again, we could talk about it for an hour and I don't

want to get upset, but it's a situation where this previous murder that he was involved in seems pretty cut and dry. And to only have him do, what'd you say? Seven years, seven and a half, seven and a half years for killing someone else over a girl. I got to tell you, there's way too many stories where we hear about convicted killers getting out and then killing again.

Now someone's going to come on here or comment and say, oh, well, you know, rehabilitation, people can change. You're entitled to your opinion, but it well, you know, rehabilitation, people can change. You're entitled to your opinion. But in my opinion, if you kill someone, regardless of whether you can be rehabilitated or not,

it's not going to bring that other person back. So I don't think you should get a redo when that person doesn't. That's just where I'm coming from. Yeah. And we're not talking like a vehicular manslaughter, like you accidentally killed. Exactly. This is an intentional. Bingo. You stabbed this person a dozen times, nine times in the back. You are a killer. You're a cold-blooded killer. This wasn't accidental. This wasn't manslaughter. This wasn't you were trying to protect yourself. This is, yeah, like you said, cut and dry. I don't understand why this man was

ever allowed out. Once you know someone is capable of killing somebody over the tiniest thing in yourself. This is, yeah, like you said, cut and dry. I don't understand why this man was ever allowed out. Once you know someone is capable of killing somebody over the tiniest thing in cold blood and not feeling bad about it, they need to go away forever. And yes, people can be rehabilitated, but I don't think that somebody who murders somebody knowingly to this extent can be rehabilitated. And clearly, clearly we're right. Right. And we saw this with Michaela Garrett as well with her attacker who had murdered three other people and went away to just, you know, and even before that he had been in a number of instant, you know, incidences and been sent to prison a number of times, and he never served his full

sentence. So not only is it letting murderers back out on the street, but it's also sending these people a message that, yeah, you killed somebody, but there's not really going to be repercussions. We told you you were going to get life, but we lied. Psych. Rehabilitation, it's a real thing and i believe in it but my opinion is if regardless of whether you can be rehabilitated or not if you've done it once you can do it again and if doing it again results in a death i don't know if we should be taking that chance we're on the same page it's unfortunate because this was preventable absolutely this was preventable five months later yeah he wasn't gonna wait long and you know we don't even know if if

the the guy he killed and crystal are his only victims there could be yeah you know a couple other unidentified a couple jane does or a couple unsolved mysteries that this guy has checked off on his bedpost. Yeah, well, I'll hit it again at the end. But the reality is the justice system failed Crystal here. No doubt about it. I mean, the justice system failed her. They released this man. He shouldn't have been released.

Parole, whatever it is, they failed her. And because they failed her, she's dead. There's no ifs, ands, or buts about it. They can try to justify it any way they want. That's the reality. And it's usually due to like what? Prison overcrowding? Is that the excuse that they always give?

They always give prison overcrowding. Stop putting people in prison for smoking a joint and save the prisons for the murderers and the rapists. And then work on rehabilitating everybody else. You've got white collar crimes people who are embezzled, didn't pay their taxes. Work with those people on rehabilitation and put the murderers behind bars and keep them there. Keep the people, yeah. Keep the child molesters, the rapists, current killers let them let them take up the cells we can i don't care about a guy trying to avoid his taxes yes he's got to do the crime he does the crime do the time

but he's not a danger to society or more specifically our children so that's why that's who i can deal with i'm thinking thinking Derek and Stephanie on the presidential candidate ticket for 2024. Yeah, right. God. Don't want that job. Well, no. Like you said, the Salt Lake City police, they've got to go to Florida. They need a DNA sample from Joseph Michael Simpson, but they're not going to ask him,

right? Because he's going to get spooked and he's going to run. He's gone. And at this point, they're pretty sure they've got their guy because like you said, there could be a chance that the samples were mixed up in CODIS, but this chance is very, very small. And they're just doing this, getting the new DNA thing to just make it like go over in court, you know? Yeah. Concrete. This is a no, you know, this is a no brainer for the judge and the jury. So they, they basically just start following him around, like camp outside

of his house. When he leaves the house, they follow him. He was working at that time at a smoke shop. So they follow him to the smoke shop where he works. And then they, you know, did what they did to Herb Fry. They waited till he came outside, smoked a cigarette. They went and grabbed the cigarette. And they actually had to send it back to Sorenson Labs to get tested. So they remained in Florida while that DNA sample was being tested. And then 10 days later, it came back as a positive match to Joseph Michael Simpson. Yeah, no, it's great

police work. And yeah, they stayed down there because again, as you said, they were pretty confident they had the right guy. This was just a dot in the eye crossing the T type thing where they're like, hey, we're going to make sure this is a home run because we're locking him up and he's never getting out again we don't want to have a mistake here so let's take the time we have time on our side because he's has no idea that we know and so let's do it the right way you know and and by the way i don't know if you mentioned this but but when we talk about detectives going down there uh sheriff bonner himself went down there did you mention that no i didn't but he he did he did go down yes yeah he was going down there which you know you said it in episode one about a guy first homicide going through the ranks becoming the sheriff

the top dog he's going down there he they got it they believe they got the guy. He wants to be there. Just kudos to him for going all the way through with this case. Well, it was going to go full circle for him. And at this point, when the match came back, there was no doubt for him that the person who'd held that river rock, which had brutally ended Crystal's life, had been Joseph Michael Simpson. And on September 17th, Sheriff Todd Bonner, who'd been chasing Crystal's killer for so many years, he was finally able to have the opportunity to get a pair of handcuffs and put them on the man who was responsible. And the police in Florida gave him that courtesy.

You know, they were like, yeah, this is our jurisdiction, but this is your case. This is your guy and you do the honors. Yeah, I wish I could have been there. It's great. Hey, Cinza chilled on my spine thinking about it. Me too, I got is your case. This is your guy and you do the honors. Yeah. I wish I could have been there. It's great. It sends a chill down my spine. Me too. I get goosebumps. Look. Can you see? Yeah. And you saw it in the murder decoded, right? I mean, you could tell it's something that he needed because it had probably haunted him his entire career. And to have that opportunity to look that man in the face and say, hey, guess what? It took us a while, but we got you. You didn't get away with it.

And Crystal's going to have her justice now. So it was really, it doesn't always work out that way, as we know, unfortunately, from doing these cases. But this is one of the, I hate to say good stories, but, you know, as far as the investigation is concerned, it is. This is as good as you can hope for. And I do attribute this being finished and kind of concluded to Sheriff Bonner, because he would just keep coming back to that case. He'd always come back to it. And as soon as that technology was available, and they needed to, like you said, they got charged for this.

So the police department, the Wasatch County Sheriff's Department, they had to come up with this money. And that was important enough for him to take that money and budget it for Crystal. And I'm so glad that he did. Yeah, great job. So Simpson's trial didn't happen until 2016. And although the prosecutors didn't know for sure what exactly had happened since Simpson claimed to be innocent of the crime. They were able to guess and piece together what they felt likely had happened to Crystal. So what they theorized is that instead of going to the Circle K, Crystal had gone back out on the streets looking for a John. Joseph Michael Simpson admitted to police that he had frequented the areas of Salt Lake City where prostitutes work. He said he procured their services many times before.

Actually, during questioning in Florida, Simpson had told the detectives that he engaged in sex with prostitutes once or twice a week. I don't know how this guy could afford that. He was clearly spending all his money on just that. He was probably living in a really dilapidated place. Seems like a super expensive habit. Yeah. So he picks Crystal up, and once in Simpson's car, Crystal had no choice but to go where he was taking her.

And it was believed that he drove her to the river road outside of Heber City. Crystal removed her clothing. They had sex. But then Simpson must have said or done something that scared her or made her feel unsafe. Because wearing only her socks, which she never took off, remember, Crystal jumped out of his car and ran. Simpson pursued her. And at one point, Crystal must have stepped on something sharp. This ripped her sock. It wounded her foot. It slowed her down. So the police believe, or the prosecution believes, that Simpson caught up to her. And Crystal most likely tried to reason with him, talk him down,

you know, maybe even yelled at him. Maybe she was like, hold on a second, give me a second, I hurt my foot. And as she was doing this, she removed her socks, one which had a corresponding hole that matched the wound in her heel. And she folded them neatly, as she always did, and she placed them on a nearby rock. And then Simpson picked up a rock, a big rock nearby, one of those granite rocks that had her blood on it, and he attacked her with it, most likely catching her by surprise. And even though it would have only taken one or two blows to end her life, Simpson continued to bring that rock down on this 17-year-old girl over and over again, just as he had done to the man that he killed in 1987. And I'm not sure, we don't know because he hasn't confessed. He hasn't admitted. He hasn't given a statement on what happened. He says that he's innocent of this. I don't know what could have happened

or transpired to make him so angry to do that. So I was looking up some different things and I watched, again, watched the documentary and we'll never know unless he comes out and says it. But I, again, I have no inside information, but for me, just the folded up socks suggests a non, it wasn't a sense of urgency for her. She had time to fold up her socks and take them off, like, you know, sit down, take them off. And my theory is that they went up to this area. They got out of the van. Maybe he tried to make it romantic, you know, put down her clothes on the ground and they had sex outside. And while she, when she stood up before things went South, she stepped on this, you know, this piece of fencing or whatever it was, this something sharp. And she was like, Oh, and he was, Oh, what happened? And, and she took off the socks, folded them to look at her injury on her foot.

Maybe they looked at it together. And at that point, I think maybe he might've said something like, Hey, listen, I'm in love with you. I want to be with you. Will you leave with me? Will you come, you know, come with me? And she might've been like, you're crazy. You're out of your mind. Like, listen, this is not going anywhere. This is not serious. And he, he realized very quickly that he wasn't going to be able to have her. She was going to continue to do what she wanted to do. And then maybe that's when it went South. That's what I think, because it just seems hard to believe that if something took off in the van after they had sex and she got out and ran, whether she stepped on something or not, I personally,

if I had stepped on something and cut my foot, I wouldn't have stopped running. I would have kept running, dove into the river whatever i can do to get away from this person i'm not going to stop and go oh time out you know what i give up let me just check my foot real quick i'm gonna fold my socks yeah there's a difference here because hit me with it hit me with it you're a man so yeah you're not gonna you're not gonna do that would you stop if you were running away from me if i'm your offender and you know that this is bad, would you stop to check your foot? Well, it depends. It all depends on what was the precursor to that, right?

Did he attempt to kill her? No. If somebody tried to kill me and then I ran away and got away from them, no, I wouldn't stop running. Maybe he just said something scary to her. Maybe he was like, oh, why don't you just stay with me and I'm going to drive you all the way to Florida and we're never coming back. And she was like, screw this. And she got out of the car and started running. Who knows?

Maybe he said, I killed a man in Utah in 1987. Who knows? He could have said something. And in that situation, if I didn't feel like he was actively trying to kill me and I was just running away from him, I might have felt, you know, I'm injured right now. This man is going to run faster than me. He's stronger than me. If he catches up to me as I'm running, it's over. So let me stop and, you know, just take my breath and try to talk him down. Like, hey, you know, we don't have to do this. Calm down. Because as a woman, sometimes you don't have this option. Like we, you know, I can't run, I can't run that fast. Okay. I'm not diving into the river. I'm not a strong swimmer. You know, I'm not going to

drown myself in the river. I don't know what the current's like. I don't know what the hell's in there. You know, am I going to take my chances with, with the nature, the river that I don't know if I can control, or am I going to try to talk to this man, especially if I'm a sex worker and I'm used to dealing with men and I'm used to kind of like rationalizing with them. And I'm sure she's run into angry, violent men in her career before. True. And she's probably known how to negotiate, how to bring them down, how to compliment them. It just didn't work with Joseph Michael Simpson. Again, it doesn't matter now, but I would love for him to eventually confess and kind of shed light on what transpired.

Just because you always want to know. I don't know what it is. You just always want to know. Like, yeah, we know what happened. We know who did it. But like, what actually, why did it go that way? Could it have gone a different way? Like, what was said that triggered, you know?

Yeah. I hate to give light to these guys like i hate you know it's such a double-edged sword because you hate to give any type of limelight to these guys where you do like these tv interviews with them to get inside their mind and all that stuff but at the same time it's it really is fascinating because there's a lot you can learn from it right and there's a lot you can apply in the future to if you're ever in a situation like this, God willing, you wouldn't be. But if you are, what you could do differently to maybe learn from what he said and get yourself out of it. Because, you know, he's not the only person who thinks like this. There's a lot of sick people out there. So that's the double edged sword. But I would love to know. Exactly. You said it's fascinating and it is fascinating, but it's also valuable information, valuable statistics. Yes.

How are these people thinking? What's their motives? And then you can use that information to apply to other crimes, to other assailants and be, you know, that's it. For ourselves too. If you find yourself in a situation with a robber, like a gun, you know, you're a gun point, you know, what, what, from what you've seen before, what should you do, you know, and you can learn from these things. So yeah, we may never know, but it's, it does, it does keep me up thinking about it. Cause I'm like the socks,

the socks, the folded socks, you know? Yeah. When you talk about means, motive and opportunity, I really do enjoy that. And what the most important one out of all of those to me, though, is the motive. Like, if I don't know the motive, it bugs me. It just because, you know, it's senseless. It's always going to be senseless. But at least if I know what the motive was, I can follow the thought process. Without having that, it just seems like, what? You just, what did you pick up a prostitute so you could kill her?

That could be an option, too. That could very well be the case. I mean, this is. He might've drove her out there for, why drive her 40 minutes away? He might've known all, like that's, that, that could, he was going to have sex with her and kill her. Maybe he tried to strangle her or something in the, in the van. And that's why she got out.

And you know, you're right. I mean, 40 minutes to go have sex with a sex worker seems a little. It was a remote area. Far from it. It was a remote area. It was a remote area. Yeah. You can go to a parking lot. They could have had sex before, closer to where he picked her up. And he had her clothes. Maybe he had them so she didn't have them. And then he started driving. And that's when she started freaking out. We've been driving for a long time. We're not going back to my motel. What's happening? What's happening? And as soon as he stopped, she ran out of the car. He ran after her. That's a possibility. Well, according to him,

he's innocent. So he would probably never tell us. That's the interesting thing. By the way, side note, loving YouTube for that reason, because I've been doing air quotes now for nine, 10 episodes, whatever it is, and you guys never saw it. So now I don't have to say I'm doing air quotes anymore. I can just do them, which is that in and of itself is enough of a reason to do YouTube, honestly. Invaluable. Right, right. So Joseph Michael Simpson, he has this trial and I found it very, I found it very entertaining, his defense attorney, Richard Gale. So Richard Gale did not deny that his client had been with Crystal that night sexually. But he did point out that Simpson's DNA was not the only DNA found in Crystal's vagina.

There was also another unknown male profile. And Richard Gale said, quote, There is a mixture of DNA. It's not just Joe. It's from other people. DNA is not the gold standard. When there's a mixture of DNA, it points in two directions. End quote.

What do you make of this claim from Richard Gale, defense attorney to Joseph Michael Simpson? A for effort. Stupid. Because for me, it's not about the DNA in her vaginal canal. It's about the DNA on the murder weapon. And I think we had a... Oh, we'll get to that. Yeah. I mean, so yeah. No, I'll just say, hey, listen, he's doing his job. But again, these are the things that frustrate me because I'm going to generalize this. I'm not saying it about this attorney. I've seen this with my own eyes and ears. Lawyers, many of them are extremely intelligent. not as a cop, as a person, that there are intelligent people who go to law school and get their degrees and look at the facts and circumstances and know what happened and still

try to find loopholes in the case, not because they care about this person or defending whatever, but that's just their job. And that to me is unacceptable. That's just my opinion on it. I know there's a lot of great defense attorneys out there. If you genuinely believe that the person is innocent based on the evidence presented, I'm all for it. Do what you have to. Everyone deserves to have a defense in a trial. But with a case like this, and again, I'm not calling out this lawyer, it does frustrate me because a reasonable person, I think everyone listening to this right now or watching can see the facts. And yet you're trying to find a crack in the case that may potentially get this monster off and back on the street. It doesn't make sense to me, but I am biased, right? I wore the badge. I get it. So I'll

just shut up. But that's how I feel. Yeah. Criminal defense attorneys are a rare breed. And I do think many of them defend clients knowing that they're guilty. I mean, look at Jose Baez with Casey Anthony. That dude knew that she had done what she did, allegedly. And not only did he defend her, but he also had some sort of relationship with her, according to one of his allegedly, according to one of his employees. So there's just a lack of professionalism there, I think sometimes. But, you know, imagine like, how do you sleep? You know, knowing that you got these people off.

If you have kids, if you have a family, if you have daughters who are 17 and you're arguing to get this man back out on the streets. I don't know. I couldn't, I couldn't do it, but. I don't get it. I don't get it. But, you know, I do know there are lawyers. I read something when I was doing the research in the OJ Simpson case where like Johnny Cochran, who was an amazing lawyer, basically, again, this was never confirmed, but basically said, hey, listen, you know, did you do it? No. Okay. That's all I want to know. And like, that was it. You know what I mean? Like, then I'll protect you. I'll defend you. We got this. Yeah. But like you said, they're smart. So, you know, they are there. You know, it's not easy to get a law degree. And then again, some of these lawyers, you see them in court. Amazing.

And honestly, there's been cases that I've been the detective on and i'm sitting in the room and i'm listening to this person defend them and even i knowing all the facts knowing what i know i'm like damn it's got me questioning myself now maybe i gotta go look at my notes again you know because they're that good that's called gas light so yeah yeah no they're they're good's just charismatic. And the best ones are like Johnny. You know, they're performers, too. You know, they're very they're good. Jose Baez. He's good, man. You may not like him, but that guy's the guy's good. I'm sorry. He is. He's good. I don't agree with some of the things he's done, but he's good. You know, If we're looking at it in a vacuum at what he does. If we're looking at it in a vacuum in Casey Anthony's case, he did okay. But the prosecution also overshot their coverage by going for a murder charge without a body or substantial evidence. You could say the same thing in OJ. OJ, prosecution made some huge mistakes that led to Johnny Cochran and Al Shapiro looking like

geniuses you know what I mean so yeah you're right there's if the prosecution does their job in most cases you can the facts will ultimately be the deciding factor but when you have the elements of a defense attorney prosecutor and their abilities playing into it yeah it can sway it can sway the judge the jury because you know Jose Baez got like disbarred a bunch of times or something, you know. Did he? I didn't know that. I didn't know that. Anyways, we went off on a tangent there.

Sorry. So now we're talking about defense lawyers. We're talking about prosecutors. Well, the prosecutor in this case, his name was Case Wade. And it's a very hard name for me to say because I feel like it should be Wade Case, but it's Case Wade. He pointed out that although there was trace evidence from another male found on Crystal or in Crystal, Simpson's was the only DNA found in a sufficient amount to identify an individual profile. So these two DNA profiles, Simpson's and the other unidentified males, they were both also found on the rock that had been used to kill Crystal. Because of this,

Richard Gale, the defense attorney, he theorized that the other man could have been the actual killer and that this man may have, quote, reached into the vaginal vault of the victim and then touched the rocks at the scene, depositing Simpson's DNA on the rocks, end quote. So like he's trying, man. This is all to bring up reasonable doubt. This is the only thing. Like this dude does not believe a word of what he's saying, but he hopes that the jury does. He hopes that he can just plant the tiniest little seed of reasonable doubt in the jury's mind for them to be like, oh, well, well, if he reached into the vaginal vault, that's completely possible. What even is a vaginal vault? Never in my life have I heard that term, but moving on.

Yeah. I mean, I'm not going to touch that one, but yeah, I mean, it's a stretch, but I will say it does. It does make you wonder how the second individual's DNA got on the rock. Right. We know how either. But listen, listen to this. There was another theory that defense attorney Richard Gale had. He also theorized that Crystal's assailant may have gotten Simpson's DNA on his penis. And then he wiped his penis on the rock, depositing Simpson's DNA on the murder weapon. Yeah, that's a, yeah, we'll, we'll just, we'll, you know, to bring it back about this, we'll wait. Cause I mean, that's just too much there that I can go. There's too much that can get me in trouble there. So I just don't understand why you would, why you would do that to your penis. Like it's a hard granite rock, like granite rock. It wouldn't be pleasant thing about this. That sounds, there's no sexual gratification coming from that. No, um, that'd be a first sex

with a rock. I, that'd be first for me. Um, but what, just to bring this back, what we're talking about here, there is this unidentified DNA. So what they're trying to do is say, Hey guys, look over here, look over here. Don't focus on the fact that my client's DNA is on the rock that killed the victim because there's this DNA over here that they're trying to present as proof beyond a reasonable doubt, reasonable doubt that maybe my guy didn't do it. And maybe this unidentified DNA, this is the person who did it. But every single explanation or theory that he's given, it doesn't, he's trying to explain how his guy's DNA got on the rock, but he hasn't given a good explanation. Is it possible, I guess, in a world that maybe there was someone else there with

Simpson? Absolutely. But it still wouldn't explain how he was there. Simpson was there. So yeah, there's a possibility that there were two people there, that maybe two people killed Crystal, but we do know that Simpson was there. So I thought about that. I considered that. For a good portion of me researching this case, I was like, what if there was a second guy there? But then I thought about it some more.

And what we're dealing with here is touch DNA. So Crystal was a sex worker. She had had sex with another man, at least one other man that same evening. So it makes sense that she would have DNA from another man inside her vaginal vault, whatever the hell that is. So it also makes sense that she could have the DNA of this man on her skin, on her body. It's touch DNA. She hasn't showered yet. So she went right home after being with the John. Then she told her boyfriend, Chris, she's going out for food.

She goes to the Circle K. She never makes it there. She's with Joseph Michael Simpson. He could have touched her and gotten this man's DNA on him. And, you know, even though these theories are insane, if there was a substantial amount of this other unidentified male's DNA on the rock, I think that he may have even had a chance of making that work. But for the record, I don't I don't believe there was a second person there. I think it's more in line with her hands. I think it's more in line with her hands. I think that's where we tie in the hands. As you just said, everything, she had sex with this other male earlier in the evening.

She was probably touching him with her hands. I believe that during the initial blows, Crystal was protecting herself. And maybe even like you would do if you're being struck with a weapon, you'd grab for the weapon. You'd grab for the weapon to try to prevent it from striking you. And that's how her fingers got all screwed up and her hands got scraped up, I'm sure, along the ground as well. But while she was defending herself and blocking the rock, she probably transferred this male DNA from her hands to the rock. And that's why it was such a small amount. That's my theory on it.

I'm not a forensic scientist, but that's my theory. I know it's possible based on trace DNA that can happen. But again, all these things we're talking about here, none of it negates the fact that there was a positive match on the rock itself. And I apologize for not knowing this. Maybe you do. Wasn't his DNA found, was it found on just one rock or was it multiple rocks they didn't say they just said that the the rocks they tested with the hvac had his dna on it but i'm sure it was multiple rocks

because they only tested the one rock that they'd already gotten the partial match from and they tested the other two rocks that they hadn't tested the first time you're right and and again with the elements and stuff you might have only gotten one rock but the reality is one of the rocks covered in blood from that area was found to have his dna on it he didn't have any other reason to be there he could have said hey listen i had been out to that location multiple times i fish out there i touched those rocks all the time he could have tried that he didn't go that route it would have been didn't go that route. That would have been way better. It would have been way better, but they didn't go that route. They went this route. And he was trying to explain away how his DNA, his client's DNA got on the rock and he didn't have, clearly he didn't have any good explanation for it.

During the trial, there was actually a DNA expert. And I believe that this expert was actually hired by Simpson's legal team. And the expert was asked, you know, if these theories were possible. And he was like, yeah, you know, it's possible, but it's not likely because 21 nanograms of DNA were found on the rock. And this is much higher than you would see in a secondary transfer.

So 21 nanograms of Simpson's DNA was found on the rock, the murder weapon. And that's way higher than you would see in a secondary transfer situation. You know, this isn't really as the lawyer tried to make it seem like somebody got their DNA on them and they touched the rock. That's a secondary transfer as opposed to like an actual transfer where Simpson's clutching the rock with his hand. That's a primary transfer. Right. So additionally, on top of all of this, you got two jailhouse informants who testified at Simpson's trial and they claimed that Simpson had confessed to the murder. The first informant testified that Simpson said, quote, I got away with it this long. What would make them open the case now? Why now after all this time? End quote. He's so pissed. Smooth. Smooth. Well, this informant also testified that Simpson had said he'd taken a

ring off of Crystal and given it to his girlfriend or wife. And then the second informant testified that Simpson would often complain about his DNA being found on that rack. So the informant was like, you know, why don't you just shut up about it? Like, on that rock. So the informant was like, why don't you just shut up about it? Stop telling people. Because the second informant knew that Simpson had told the first informant. And he was like, you're telling everybody you did this, right? So shut up. And Simpson replied affirmatively. He was like, yeah, I did this. And I haven't told anybody but you. And I don't really buy the word of jailhouse informants, by the way. This is not the piece of evidence that I'm going to hang my hat on and go home.

It's certainly not because I know that they're often offered things in exchange for their testimony, reduced sentences or better conditions in prison. So whenever somebody basically having their testimony bought for them, and if you're giving me something in exchange for my testimony, as far as I'm concerned, you're buying it. So I don't really trust that too much. And remember, I said we would come back to that bloody fingerprint. So this was still an issue, obviously. The fingerprint, what they could see of it, it did not match Joseph Michael Simpson. Apparently, the best match that could be found was the print of Sheriff Todd Bonner. And it was theorized that he'd left the

print accidentally when he'd checked Crystal's pulse on her wrist. So Simpson's lawyer, Richard Gale, was not having this, right? He was like he was like oh hell no he believed the print belonged to the actual killer and he said quote even an inexperienced sheriff knows when you have a dead body you have blood on your hands you don't touch the body the print was left there by the murderer not by sheriff bonner end quote this dude's trying richard gale man richard gale is the hardest working criminal defense lawyer ever. He's just trying to get that that reasonable doubt. Right. Yeah. He's trying to put doubt in the minds of the jury members. I mean, I do agree with him on this a little bit. That bloody fingerprint,

it's kind of an outlier. And I think it's it's pretty standard for a police officer to be taught right that, you know, common crime scene procedures like you don't touch the murder victim without gloves. But we also do have to remember, this is a small town. It's Wasatch County. They hadn't had a murder there in something like, I think it was seven years. There happened to be a couple murders that year, but this was Todd Bonner's first homicide case that he'd ever worked. So he may have made a mistake. He may have touched her without gloves on, especially since this was his, you know, he was there first. He called for backup. He's standing there listening to the river, you know, being overwhelmed by this. And he's waiting for backup to come. He's waiting for like,

you know, the Emmy and all of this to come. And he may have been like, well, you know, she's face down. How do I even know that she's dead? Let me check. And he may not have been prepared with gloves. You know, at this point, he admitted he didn't know that she's dead? Let me check. And he may not have been prepared with gloves. You know, at this point, he admitted he didn't know that he was responding to a murder call. So it possibly could have been Sheriff Bonner's fingerprint. But like you were saying, with the blood and the fingerprint, it would be really difficult to pin that to anybody in general. So they were just saying, like, this is the closest match that we can think of. And Richard Gale is like, oh, that's the murderous fingerprint. You guys need to get out there and keep looking. Yeah. No, I've said it before. I'll say it again. We're not perfect as police

officers. We make mistakes. We're human beings. All we can hope is that if we make a mistake, it's not critical enough where it affects the outcome of the investigation. And sometimes it does. And it seems very likely that that could be the case where, you know, I was just painting this room and I think I do a good job of covering up and I got my sneakers on and tarps down and I accidentally touch a spot where I didn't know there was paint. And then all of a sudden I put my hand on the wall to take a break and I got a fingerprint on the wall and i'm like i thought i i thought i checked everything or like i'm stepping through a spot and then i have paint on my rug he could there was blood everywhere there was cast off everywhere it wouldn't take a lot of blood to transfer onto his skin where maybe he put his

hand down to brace himself to get near her body and he got a drop of blood on his finger and then he's he's got tunnel vision on the body and he goes to check her pulse because he can't see how bad she's how bad she's been beaten in her face area so he checks her pulse and he had a little you know he had finger we haven't seen a photo of the fingerprint so it might have been a very subtle amount of blood we don't know i'm thinking it was a small amount of blood yeah small amount of blood and he you know transferred that onto her skin when he was checking for a pulse. It's an honest mistake.

Yeah. You'd like it not to happen, but I can promise you it happens. And I mean, I think that he's done so much for this case that that little mistake can probably be like overlooked, you know, just chalk it up. But I will say there are, there are a different jury that could be the thing that, you know, that's how scary it is. That's how scary it is. Because remember you were talking, we were talking about the Faith Hedgepath case, right? And you were like, we think that they, that the police know who did it, but

they cannot bring this person to trial until they've identified who that DNA belongs to that was found on Faith because the lawyer would use it to raise reasonable doubt, which is what, you know, this dude's doing here. Good for him. That's all they're trying to do is trying to get a number of jury members to say, I can't, I can't, I can't, I can't say he's guilty or she's guilty. But that did not happen here because Joseph Michael Simpson was found guilty and sentenced to life in prison, this time without parole. Now, during his statement to the jury, Simpson, he talked about his childhood. He talked about playing high school football, living in Florida, driving trucks. He talked about a time

when the economy tanked, when he became depressed, his health was failing. He was in a good place in his life. He thought his life was over. But then he was bit by his pet cat, who had never been aggressive before. And from this cat bite, Simpson developed an infection, which sent him to the hospital. And he realized when all this was going on, he was in the hospital, he needed to make a change or he was going to die. So the cat, strangely enough, was dead. He died the day after Simpson was released from the hospital. But Simpson felt that the cat had given him a second reason to live, and he hoped the jury would now do the same. So my question for you is, do you think that Joseph Michael Simpson killed his cat for biting him?

Probably. It feels like real. I didn't think that's where you're going to go with this question yeah but i mean you got me there but nothing would surprise me no i mean very odd timing and again when you're a desperate man and you know you're running out of options i guess we go to the cat i don't know it was and i mean it's kind of sad honestly that like you're you're being sentenced you're asking the jury for for lenience and the the best thing you can come up with the closest thing to your heart is this cat who bit you and sent you to the hospital like this is your closest friend that's kind of sad but i mean at the same

time he probably not the nicest dude probably had a really bad anger problem probably why he couldn't keep any friends because he just stabbed them in the back or killed them with a rock so that's i mean that's the best kind of ending to to a case that you know we could possibly have i guess the person eventually got caught crystal got her her justice um whatever little good that does for her i'm sure probably not much yeah people get offended sometimes when you say the word closure because there's never closure, but it does close a chapter of this story because there's nothing else to do. The person who's responsible for her death has been caught. And at least at this point, the family has at least that piece of information where they know the individual responsible for her death

is no longer walking around no longer free yeah no longer free just enjoying life and for for crystal you know depending on what you believe you know as far as your religious beliefs or whatever if there is a second life or anything like that she can look at it and go the that man who took my life away from me now has had his life taken away from him, you know, essentially. But again, the big takeaway for me with this case, it's not that hard to figure out. For one positive note, I wish we had more. You know, we do have a lot of them, but I wish I wish every cop was like Sheriff Bonner because, you know, he took it personal, but he never, he never took it too personal. He followed the evidence regardless of where it took him.

And it took a lot longer than I think you or a lot of people want it to take because this man was out on the street for a long time after, you know, her death. But the big takeaway for me that we can look at this as the justice system failed crystal and may have failed other people. We don't know if this man was responsible for other deaths. May have failed other people. I mean, maybe not with Joseph Michael Simpson, but we definitely know the justice system has failed many, many other people. Yeah. And the system is not perfect. There's a lot of inequality things. There's so many things wrong with it, but this is a big one as well because I do believe in

second chances, but I do believe that those second chances should be given to people who have committed lesser offenses. I think murder for me is like a deal breaker as far as the second chances is concerned only because the victim in the case doesn't get that same second chance. And for me, if that person that you affected

doesn't get that second chance, if their family doesn't get that second chance, then neither should you. but we're thinking of them. And hopefully someday the justice system gets it right. And we have a better system in place where people like this don't have an opportunity to do something like this twice. Well, thank you guys for being here with us. Remember to follow us on social media, Instagram, Twitter, go to our website, Crime Weekly. Is it Crime Weekly pod.com or is it Crime Weekly? CrimeWeeklyPodcast.com. CrimeWeeklyPodcast.com. You can leave us a voice message. You might even hear yourself on the podcast.

You can request a case. We love hearing from you all on social media. Send us an email. Send the case requests in because now we're on our own. We can do whatever we want. True. And listen, we listen to every single voicemail. I'm usually the one that checks them.

And then I forward every single speak pipe to Stephanie. So we talk about them. I love hearing from you guys. I love hearing your voices. And the messages are great, but it's so cool to put a name with a voice because you hear your accents and it's just really, really cool. I really enjoy every time I get one. I like, I'm like, Oh, here's another voicemail from someone who's on this journey with us. So it's really, really cool. We appreciate

them. And yeah, we get a lot of case submissions. So don't think if we don't respond on Instagram or something like that, we're not hearing it. We're writing them down. But as you can imagine, especially with, with Stephanie over here, she's a cyclopedia. We have so many cases we want to cover. And as long as y'all have us, we're going to keep doing that. I'm always afraid that there's going to be a mean speak pipe. It's just going to be somebody swearing at me and calling me names. A lot of them are anonymous. They don't put their in and i'm like this is it this is the one this is the one and i'm like usually like in my office it's dark it's late and it's like i'm waiting for it i know it's going to come eventually at some point um but yeah if you if i i'd rather

wait and not have that but yeah thank you guys for that we really appreciate it all right we will see you guys next friday and remember if you haven't subscribed to the youtube channel yet hopefully it's up by the time i'm saying this but if you haven't subscribed yet head over there and subscribe and make sure you leave us a review on the podcast too thank you guys so much and we will see you next week bye later