Crime Weekly - S3 Ep125: Jacob Landin: A Brother's Fight for Justice (Part 1)

Episode Date: May 19, 2023

In April of 1987, 9-month-old Jacob Jeremiah Landin died suddenly from a subdural hematoma which had put pressure on his brain and caused irreversible damage. The medical examiner determined that Jacob had died from a blow to the head, and the autopsy revealed evidence of older wounds that were in the process of healing. A partially healed fracture of one of his ribs, another subdural hematoma that was in the process of healing, and a partially healed skull fracture; the medical examiner believed that these injuries were approximately three to four weeks old, and the overall picture suggested a pattern of abuse that the baby had suffered from for an extended period of time. Reportedly, Jacob’s mothers boyfriend confessed to hurting the baby, and he was arrested, but when investigators returned to the case in 2005 they found a labyrinth  of missing information, missing files, and more questions than answers. There was no report of what this man had confessed to, and even though he was arrested for child abuse, it appears he was just let go. Now, Jacob’s brother Eric is on a mission to find out why.  Link to Eric's Podcast, 'True Consequences': https://www.trueconsequences.com/ Try our coffee!! - www.CriminalCoffeeCo.com Become a Patreon member -- > https://www.patreon.com/CrimeWeekly Shop for your Crime Weekly gear here --> https://crimeweeklypodcast.com/shop Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/CrimeWeeklyPodcast Website: CrimeWeeklyPodcast.com Instagram: @CrimeWeeklyPod Twitter: @CrimeWeeklyPod Facebook: @CrimeWeeklyPod ADS: 1. Daily Harvest Go to DAILYHARVEST.com/crimeweekly to get up to sixty-five dollars off your first box. 2. Helix Helix is offering 20% off all mattress orders AND two free pillows for our listeners! Go to HelixSleep.com/CrimeWeekly. 3. ZocDoc Go to Zocdoc.com/CRIMEWEEKLY and download the Zocdoc app for FREE. Then find and book a top-rated doctor today. Many are available within 24 hours. 4. ZipRecruiter Let ZipRecruiter fill all your roles with the right candidates! Go to this exclusive web address to try ZipRecruiter FOR FREE: ZipRecruiter.com/crimeweekly. 5. PDS Debt PDS DEBT is offering free debt analysis to our listeners just for completing the quick and easy debt assessment at www.PDSDebt.com/crime.

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which had put pressure on his brain and caused irreversible damage. The medical examiner determined that Jacob had died from a blow to the head, and the autopsy revealed evidence of older wounds that were in the process of healing, a partially healed fracture of one of his ribs, another subdural hematoma that was in the process of healing, and a partially healed skull fracture. The medical examiner believed that these injuries were approximately three to four weeks old, and the overall picture suggested a pattern of abuse that the baby had suffered from for an extended period of time. Reportedly, Jacob's mother's boyfriend had confessed to hurting the baby, and he was arrested. But when the investigators returned to the case

in 2005, they found only a labyrinth of missing information, missing files, and more questions than answers. There was no report of what this man had confessed to, and even though he was arrested for child abuse, it appears that he was just let go. Now Jacob's brother Eric is on a mission to find out why. Hello everybody, welcome back to Crime Weekly. I'm Stephanie Harlow. And I'm Derek LeBasser. So today we are covering the case of Jacob Landin. And Eric Carter Landin was just six years old when his little brother Jacob died. And today, most of you probably know that Eric is the host of True Consequences, a true crime podcast, which he started to raise awareness about Jacob's case,

but he continued the podcast to bring attention to other unsolved and unresolved New Mexico cases. New Mexico has never done a great job of protecting children from child abuse. This is an issue we as a community cannot seem to figure out. According to statistics released by the Child, Youth, and Families Division in New Mexico, in 2018, 15 out of every 1,000 kids in New Mexico were victims of abuse and neglect. In 2017, that number was 25 out of 1,000 cases. And in a 2019 Albuquerque Journal article, Dan McKay states, only three states had a higher rate of child maltreatment than New Mexico in 2017, the most recent year for which data is available. I have said over and over again on this show that the problem of child abuse and child murder in New Mexico is not new. These challenges and issues continue to plague New Mexico to this

day, and they will continue to be an issue unless we are willing to face it and address it. So I had the pleasure of not only getting to meet Eric last year when we were in London for CrimeCon UK, but on our first night there, we got to sit outside, we shared a couple bottles of wine, we talked, and Eric is a really fun and astute person. I was able to quickly determine that he's incredibly passionate about the cases he covers, as well as the people involved in these cases. And true crime is not for everyone. You have to be very empathetic. You have to also be able to distance yourself sometimes. But certain cases you can't distance yourself from. And true crime cases involving children are always tough to talk about,

tough to listen to. They are also very close to our hearts. And Derek and I decided it was time to do a deep dive into the case of Eric's little brother, Jacob, to continue keeping his name in the true crime space and to keep pushing for Jacob to hopefully one day get the justice that he deserves. And I think we're on the right track with that. It looks like the justice system is sort of gearing towards possibly having this reopened and having it settled once and for all, hopefully. But what do you think about this? No, I'm glad we're doing it. I'd said in Crime Weekly News, I believe, that I had seen a tweet from Eric a while ago, maybe a month or so ago.

And he was just basically saying, you know, he was looking for some more people to cover it. And, uh, there, it wasn't only me. There was a bunch of people who have podcasts. Kendall Ray was one of them were like, Hey, we'll help out any way we can. And I said, Hey, DM me. I remember I reached out to you and said, you know, do you want to do this? And you were like, absolutely. So I concur with everything you said, you know, there's a few people in our space who have unfortunately experienced tragedy personally. And there's really a couple options you have when you experience something like that. I'm fortunate where I haven't had someone that close to me with someone that happened like that. But I mean, from my experience with others,

you can let it consume you and eat away at you and kind of go into a corner and just wish you weren't here anymore. Or you can take that negative and turn it into something that can potentially help others as well as yourself. And Eric is one of those people, Sarah Turney's another one where they've used their, what they've gone through to create something that can help others in similar situations, which is extremely powerful. And what true crime is at the core really about. So when we have a platform that can highlight a case of, I guess I'll call it one of our own, right? That has gone through something and has a platform, but is looking for some exposure from some platforms that may have a different group of people listening and watching.

That's what we're all here for. It's a community. We're all connected in one way or another. So yeah, I'm glad we're covering it. And hopefully, like you said, there's been some movement, maybe, maybe the combination of different platforms covering it, it creates a new level of pressure and it maybe gets that ball rolling even a little faster than it would have on its own organically. I agree. And yeah, it's great. And that's really why I love CrimeCon. One of the main reasons, I mean, we love meeting you guys. So there's like two reasons that we love CrimeCon. We love getting to meet the listeners and the watchers in person, you know, and then we get to meet you guys every year. So a lot of you come back and then it's kind of like

this family reunion of sorts. But then we also get to interact with these family members of these victims, Sarah Turney, Kelsey German, Eric Landin. We get to meet all of these people. We get to talk to them. And then they do become part of our family. They do become one of our own. And it's a great place, CrimeCon, for these kinds of people to come and bring their loved one's story with them. Kind of similar how we were talking about in our last case, where somebody who knew Carla Walker brought her story to CrimeCon and was able to get it in front of people like Paul Holes and Nancy Grace and different podcasters and things. So that's kind of a great benefit that CrimeCon has. And we really love and appreciate it for that. Exactly. subscribers this week. And it's a blessing because it's not guaranteed. I know a lot of

people who try to make YouTube channels or do podcasts and you cannot take it for granted. It's not an easy thing to do. So we thank you guys for that. We thank you guys for coming back each and every week. Are we two years in at this point? No, not completely, right? We're over a year, but I don't think we hit our two year anniversary yet. That would be December, right? I think it's December. So, I mean, not even two years in and we're at 200,000 subscribers. So, obviously, it's a blessing. We're really appreciative and grateful that you guys are sticking with us and helping this channel grow because it allows us to do what we love to do, but also do these types of things where we're not just covering it and talking into the air.

There's actually people listening and watching this where. And taking action. And taking action. And we're a big enough community where we can have an impact, right? We can move the needle. It's a lot of people. So we thank you for that because this is what we can do together. And the scary thing is we collectively are just getting started.

We really are. I mean, with the coffee company, with the Crime Weekly, like we have so many ideas about where we would like to take this channel, which includes like actually traveling and doing cases. And it's just, you have to walk before you run.

And we're building up that community so that when we do decide to make those types of moves, we really have the backing to pull it off. So this is just the start of it. Again, he's one of us and we want to help him

as well as help you guys. But those are the cases we've covered where the people who are listeners or watchers of the show and we've talked about their cases as well. So all we can do is say thank you. Appreciate the support. And with your help, we'll continue to do things like this. Yeah. And the podcast, True Consequences is really good.

A lot of great episodes on there. I love, love Eric's voice. I was actually chatting with him on the phone today and i felt like i kept the conversation going for a little longer because he has this incredibly like calming chill voice uh you'll hear it because i'm gonna play clips from his podcast in in this episode but you say stuff like that about me as well okay i have a hesitancy never mind okay i still fuck myself all right your voice is more like get up like a drill sergeant you know motivated like i'm sorry i'm sorry do something

lazy stephanie okay yeah all right but we're gonna start from the beginning with this case as we usually do it's important to have that context but But what you need to know is Eric's parents, first of all, he had complicated family dynamics. Who doesn't? But Eric definitely grew up in a different sort of family dynamic that was challenging and wasn't the most wholesome. It didn't give him the most support in life. So Eric's parents were both very young when they got married. His mother, Brenda, was 17. His father, Gene, was 20. And Brenda always really wanted to be a mother. But when her first son, Randy, was born in 1978, he sadly passed away shortly after his birth. But then Eric was born in 1980.

And from his first memories, he knew that he wanted his mom to have another baby, a little brother for him to play with, but also someone to make him feel less lonely because things were not great at home. Gene Landine was a Pentecostal preacher who would travel the country for work, which not only meant that he would be away from his wife and son for long stretches of time, but also that he would move his family to many different places. Eric remembered that before Jacob was born, they'd already lived in at least four different cities, mostly in Texas. And even though his mother, Brenda, wasn't technically a single mother, she operated as one. Because even when Gene wasn't traveling for work, he was barely around. Gene would leave the house in the morning. I don't know what the hell he was doing, hanging out with his friends, getting into trouble. And then he would usually return

very late at night when everybody was already in bed. And for the most part, most of the time, it was just Brenda and Eric. And because they moved so much and because Brenda was Eric's main and often only caregiver, she was unable to work and money was always tight to the point where sometimes they wouldn't eat for days at a time when Gene was on the road or missing in action. I remember how difficult it was for you because it would just be you and me a lot. Yeah, it was hard because he was never around really. He would go with his friends before we woke up and come back after we were asleep. So we really wouldn't see him or anything. He really didn't like think, you know,

have a family I need to feed. He just thought about himself basically. Well, I remember there were times where you were worried about beating me and taking care of me. Yeah, it was hard. There was a little lady that lived in the apartment. I don't know if you remember, but we would take a walk every day,

and we would pray for God to help us, to feed us. And we'd take a walk around the apartment complex. By the time we got back, there was food on the doorstep. Every time she would bless us, I would bless her. It was her who blessed us.

We got everything. Everything you wanted was in the bag. Stupid Chef Boyardee. All the way down to the beef aromas. Kool-Aid. Everything we needed was in that bag and God put her there she was our angel she really helped us a lot I don't know if she heard a prayer or like Adam she just came out of nowhere I know it was that

one lady they put food on our door almost every day. It's really, I mean, I can't imagine how difficult it was for you as a mom and just knowing that your husband was out doing whatever, you know. It didn't matter. The only thing that mattered is that you had food and you were okay and we had a place to go. Nothing else mattered. I feel like it's important to set the picture of what was going on in our family you know when we left my dad important he essentially would abandon us for days

and days at a time and then call and be like bragging about eating lobster and steak and stuff. Do you remember that? Yeah, he was ridiculous. He just wasn't grown and he wouldn't think about anybody, like I said. I guess he's naive. Selfish. Selfish. That's how they raised him.

I don't know what happened. I remember when I was like maybe three or four. I don't even know why I remember this. And if I'm like making this up, tell me. But I remember one time you were like washing the dishes and you were just crying. And I remember I went up to you and I said, Mom, when I'm grown up, I'm going to be better than my dad. I'm going to take care of my family. Yeah, you did.

You're smart beyond your years. You got the whole picture, not just part of it. You were more grown than we were, I think, in your mind and in your thoughts. And you had it all together. Well, I think I've always had a sense for what's just and what's not. And I knew that wasn't right. I knew that wasn't fair and it wasn't okay what a great clip i'm not going to sit here and say that my life was anything like eric's but i

did have some similarities to it and i and the reason why i'm so close with my mother now is because of experiences like that where uh in spite of my father i wanted to be a good person. And I learned a lot from him, even though he wasn't doing the right things, because I learned what not to do. Right. But hearing that's a touching moment. So this is something I'm assuming this is from the episode, the true consequences episode, where when he was covering his brother's case, I'm assuming he had his mom on to interview her, right? Yeah, that's great. Yeah, that's great. That's great. It's great. Yeah. I think I knew that this would strike a chord in you as it struck a chord in me because

we both grew up in single mother households. I mean, my stepdad came into the picture when I was seven. He's been around since. But yeah, to some degree. I remember struggling in this way, food wise, not the not in the same way. But you know, we had like this, my mom would make this thing rice with milk and sugar and cinnamon. And we'd have that like three times a week for dinner, because there just wasn't a lot of money for food. So and I remember like looking at her, and she always looked tired. And she was always sad. And I remember hearing her cry at night and

things like that. And thinking, you know, this isn't fair. She's such an amazing person. She's so strong and like somebody should be helping her. And it is very impactful for a small child. And I think that it's very touching to hear Brenda talk about this one neighbor they had, this one woman who they didn't talk to her. They didn't tell her the circumstances that they were going through or their situation, but she seemed to innately know. And she would leave food on their doorstep for them. They would go out. Brenda and Eric would go out for a walk around the apartment complex.

And this woman would leave a bag of food on the doorstep for them to come home to because somehow she just knew that that's what they needed. But, yeah, it's just it's very sad. And, you know, it's hard to hear that. And then Eric says, like, oh, their father, his father was calling and saying he was eating steak and lobster and stuff. And it's just how did this dude not realize, you know, what a deadbeat dad he was because his family starving and he's not even asking if they have enough food. He's just telling them all the fun times that he's having and he's trying to be home as little as possible. So very tough clip to listen to. But you can also see how Eric and his mother would become very close and how what would happen later, something that would potentially and temporarily divide them would be so traumatic

for them. And we're going to get to that in a minute. But before we do, let's have a quick break. All right, we're back. So yes, not an easy life, not an easy childhood. And so Eric prayed every day for a little brother to keep him company. And he prayed every day that his mother would get pregnant until one day, in a rare moment when his father was home and present, his parents took him out to ride his bike at a park, and together they told him that he was going to be a big brother. And it was one of the happiest days of his life. Jacob, his little brother, was born on July 1st, 1986 in Edinburgh, Texas, and Eric was over the moon about it. But

things between his mother and father did not improve. And having another child didn't cause Gene to spend more time at home than he had before. Life for Brenda got even worse because she still had the same amount of emotional and financial support, which is pretty much non-existent. But now she had two young children to take care of. And then Brenda found out that her husband had been having an affair with another woman. And this was a sharp blow. Even though Jean said the affair had been only emotional and had never gotten physical, Brenda finally realized she just couldn't depend on her husband to be consistent and

present and she needed more help. Now, personally to me, I think an emotional affair is probably worse than a physical one when you're married. You know, like probably if I had to choose for my husband to have an affair, probably would not be an emotional one. So like Jean coming to her and being like, don't worry. It's not about sex. It's just about love. That would not make me feel better.

I don't know. What do you think? I was hoping it was like an option C. Neither. Yeah. None of them. I don't think I think I feel. Yeah. I mean, it doesn't really matter really matter but probably i'd probably be the opposite i feel like it was just some emotional i could probably

be like well maybe that's my fault but if there's other shit going on i'm not gonna get into it here but it's like you know there's certain things where it's like i can't get that out of my head you know so that's that's done just emotional if it's just emotional i feel like i can combat that like it might that's my fault that you felt like you needed to get that from someone else. But if you go and actually get something from somebody else, I can't take that back now. It's already been given. Do you not think it's your fault that she would have a physical affair and she had to go and get that from someone else? I'm feeling attacked right now. Maybe it's not. It's kind of both of your fault, right? Maybe it's

the best of my ability, Stephanie. Maybe none of the above is your fault. And this person that you're partnered with is just an asshole. No, yeah, but either is bad. And I understand why someone would say, hey, listen, I can't, on top of everything else, the absence of not being there, this was kind of like the icing on the cake.

Yeah, because now it's like, okay, you're not here to emotionally support me and your two sons, but you can be there emotionally for another woman? group of people, but it's because they're out there really just trying to provide for their family and they're making a choice to sacrifice that time to provide a better life for them. Then there's others who are just actively choosing their work or whatever else there is they're doing over their family. And there's a big difference. There is. And like you said, I feel like one of those things can be rectified and the other can't. Like if somebody just doesn't want to be with you and doesn't choose to be with you, then you can't really fix that.

And that's kind of where Brenda was at. And she was like, OK, I understand. This is not he's not going to change. He's not going to become more present. He's not going to one day be like, OK, my work is done and now I'm here, a full time father and husband like this just isn't going to ever be what I wanted. So Brenda, Eric and Jacob left Texas and moved back to her hometown of Socorro, New Mexico, where she and the kids, they lived with her parents for a while. And this was actually a good move because it allowed Brenda to start working. While she was at work, her parents could watch the boys, and she ended up getting a job as a cashier at a local supermarket. She started making her own money so that she could provide for her children and, you know, eventually they could get a place of their own. But shortly after returning to New Mexico, Brenda became the focus of a man that we're going to refer to as John. And John's not

his real name, but it's best at this point if this person remains anonymous for the sake of any future legal action, since this case is still unsolved and unprosecuted. And Eric would prefer to use this fake name to refer to this person, you know, for multiple reasons, I'm sure. But either way, we know him as John. There was already an existing connection between Brenda and John, a lot of existing connections, actually. So first of all, he had been her husband, Gene's best friend. His father, John's father, was the pastor of a church that her family attended. John's sister had married Brenda's brother, and John's aunt was Eric's godmother. So John was more than a friend. He was basically family. And the ties that bound John and the Landeans together were strong,

and they were local to Socorro and they went far back. Now, John was also married at that time and he had two kids of his own. But as soon as Brenda was back in town, he started spending a lot of time with her. He would drop by to check on her and he started planting even more seeds of doubt in her mind about her marriage with Jean, who, like I said, was supposedly John's best friend. But unlike Jean, John was always there, right? He was always around. He seemed to want to spend time with Brenda. He even seemed to like her two kids, and he seemed to want to spend time with them. In a way, someone like John was exactly what Brenda needed after years of marital neglect. But looking back,

Brenda can recognize that she was being manipulated. And here's Brenda talking to Eric on his podcast about the presence of John in her life. He weaseled his way into my life, basically, because he was a con. He'd tell me lies about what they weren't lies, but he would tell me, you know, stuff to make me question your dad, you know, like, he's calling so-and-so behind your back and this and that and I look at the phone bill and sure enough you know it's on there but I didn't know he was using it to try to get me away from him like conniving kind of way you know he just like was playing and plotting

and thinking how he could get us to break up yeah and he meant pretty much did it because he left his wife and I left your dad and then you know I don't know how it happened but he weaseled his way into my life I started talking to him and I don't even know what happened I never really liked him but he was just there. He like manipulated his way in. It sounds like he knew what to say and how to say it. And I think it's important to know that he was my dad's best friend. Yeah. That's the whole thing is, you know, he was using your dad to try to hurt me and he was your dad's best

friend so I wanted to get back at him and the what best way I could think of is you know his best friend that would hurt him the best I don't know I guess I kind of liked him and kind of believed him after a while yeah because he was a good con artist and he lied to me I told me everything I wanted to hear I guess I don't know how to even explain it he told me everything i wanted to hear i guess i don't know how to even explain it he was like some animal waiting to pounce basically i i see what you mean it's like he was waiting he saw an opportunity in the trouble that you were having with my dad and and took advantage of it basically yeah that's the whole story is he took advantage of me when i thought

you know he really cared when you were your most vulnerable too yeah and he didn't care he never cared wow there's so much there's so much to to break down here right like what a scumbag just said from this sense not knowing anything else about him because the dynamic he had the the advantage john had being the best friend, one, he's witnessing a lot of it firsthand. He's probably present for a lot of this situation. Then on top of that, Gene's probably confiding in him, talking about her, letting him know what Brenda likes, what she doesn't like, what she's complaining about, what the troubles they're having. And John's sitting there taking notes. So he knows all the right things to say and do because he knows at the core

what Brenda is concerned about and what she's not happy with. So he's going in there with all the cards. And as Brenda said, he was providing her with what she was looking for. And it wasn't by coincidence. He knew what it was. So yeah, he was absolutely manipulating her from day one. He saw an opportunity where there was some dissension. There was some problems between her and Jean and he absolutely pounced on it. Yeah, scumbag all the way for sure without knowing another thing about him. Yeah. And I mean, I don't know what John's situation is. Shitty friend too, by the way, huh? I mean, pointing out the obvious, but shit.

I mean, listen, is he a shitty friend? If none of this other stuff existed, is he a shitty friend? Gene seemed like a shitty husband. But still, you don't do that. Would you? Would you do that? I mean, listen, if your girl, role reversal. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Oh, damn. If my friend was married to a good man who was like a good father and a good husband and I knew she was like cheating on him and left him for like months at a time and didn't help or provide and was just a scumbag. Hell yeah. I'd be like, yeah, dude, let me come over here and show you what a real woman's like. Absolutely. So like I don't think there's anything wrong with a man seeing a woman and being like, she's not being treated right, friend or not.

And I know the extent of it because I am this dude's friend and it's disgusting and she deserves better. There's nothing wrong with that. That's like the plot of every romantic comedy. What's wrong is what's the motive for getting close to her, right? What's the motive? Because did he always love her? Like, her right what's the motive because did he always love her like i don't know the the history did he always love her um did he always have a crush on

her before gene and her got married why is he moving in now when he's already married and has two kids what's going on what was the motive was it always nefarious and i'm gonna go ahead and say yes it was always nefarious there's definitely'm going to go ahead and say, yes, it was always nefarious. Yeah, there's definitely something going on there. I mean, but glad we know where you stand. But yeah, I said what I had to say about him. Not a fan. Not a fan. I mean, knowing a little bit, very little bit about this case, I can kind of, I know

where this is going because obviously I know about Jacob, but it's one of those things where just off the rip, if I'm going with the audience here, already some flags, some big time flags as far as John's concerned. Yeah. And I mean, she even says like he was telling me things about Gene, right? Yeah, he was stoking the fire. They were true, but I didn't know why he was telling me. I thought he just genuinely wanted me to know.

I thought he just genuinely cared and he thought it was in my best interest to know when really he was using it to his advantage to get close. And the fact that he's always around, right? It's love bombing to a point where, okay, I know your main issue is that your husband isn't here, I'm here. And I'm gonna show you that I'm here every day and I'm gonna come in and check on you

and I'll bring you little things and I'll be really sweet and I'll make you feel good about yourself and tell you you look pretty in that dress and I'm going to do all the things that you're missing so that you overlook the fact that I'm married. You overlook the fact that I'm your husband's best friend. You overlook the fact that you don't really like me. Right. She says that in the clip.

She's like, I don't really know what happened. I don't really like him that much. I didn't even like him, she says. And this is a telltale sign of somebody who's being like emotionally and mentally manipulated when you end up dating somebody and you don't know why you are not attracted to them. You don't even really like who they are, but all of a sudden you're in a relationship with them and you're like, how the hell did this happen? Because you've been manipulated because you were in a vulnerable position and somebody swooped in and took advantage of that. And before you knew it,

now you're like dating this guy and you're like, why? I don't even like him. Yeah, this is not a good start for this story. And I can obviously, common sense tells you we're using a different name for John for a reason. It's not because he's a scumbag. Well, it could be that, but there's obviously more to it.

So I'm going into this with a skewed judgment of John already because it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out we're using a different name. There's a reason for it, a bigger reason than just this. And Brenda wasn't the only one who was initially taken in and manipulated by John, right? Eric was also charmed by this new man in their lives. John was cool and he was fun. He liked to watch movies and eat candy and he would let Eric stay up until all hours of the night watching movies and eating candy with him. He listened

to cool music on his stereo at high volumes. He drove a fast sports car and he would bring Eric for rides in his sports car and Eric would say, drive faster. And John would drive as fast as Eric wanted. But most importantly, John seemed genuinely interested in Eric and Jacob, and he gave them all the attention that their own father never had. When Eric was on Kendall Ray's YouTube channel, he said, quote, I remember that he was almost like a breath of fresh air for us because my dad had been a very neglectful as a father because he was so busy with his career that we were often left alone. We really wanted that attention and affection and that male figure in our lives. We just felt maybe he was a nice guy and that he cares about us and he was coming to save the day.

End quote. So sad. Oh my God, so sad. And I mean, it's a tale as old as time. He wanted that father figure. He was yearning for it, right? Of course. Who wouldn't?

Of course. Who wouldn't? Who wouldn't? What kid wouldn't, right? Especially like a little boy. What kind of little boy doesn't want like a father figure around to drive around in sports cars

and watch scary movies with and stuff? Like they long for that and and it is so common to see this happen with a step parent and then sometimes the step parent just isn't a good person and this is very traumatic for the child and we've got eric here who's already dealing with the trauma of having you know gene for a father and then we got the stepfather coming in and like he said we thought he was he was a nice guy he was gonna come in and save the day you're waiting for a hero to come in and make things better for you and then this person turns out to be a scumbag too that's a shitty situation no i wish it was the first time i've ever heard that narrative before yeah exactly it happens all the time and john was really nice to brenda and her sons at first

you know he filled a hole in their lives so even So even though Brenda wasn't head over heels in love with him, she didn't even really seem to like him. She allowed the relationship to move forward very quickly because it almost like he was like assumed the sale. You know, I don't know if you've ever been in sales. I've been in sales. And when they do sales training, they tell you a very toxic thing. They say, assume the sale. Talk to the person as if you've already sold them and your confidence will sort of like make them feel like they've already been sold. And it kind of felt like that's what John did. Like he moved in and he assumed the sale. And Brenda's like, OK, I guess we're I guess we're together. I guess you're my man now. You know, like that's that's what it is. And she was in her 20s. She was young. She didn't really know which way was up at that point. But by the end of December 1986, John, Brenda, Eric, and Jacob were all living together in a mobile home in Socorro. John worked as a maintenance man for Socorro County, and because he had a steady job that brought in a decent income, things were okay for a while. They were more stable and consistent than Brenda and her children had ever known, at least. The boys had something of a father figure now who could throw the ball around with them, teach them about man stuff.

And Brenda had a partner, someone who was in this life with her, not abandoning her every five minutes. However, shortly after John moved in, things began to happen to six-month-old Jacob. His mother and grandparents started noticing bruises, bumps, marks, and strange injuries that were unexplainable. And every time John was asked if he knew where these bumps and bruises had come from, he would blame five-year-old Eric. Things started happening to Jacob. It was like stuff, weird stuff would happen. There was sunflower seed shells in his bed, in his crib. He was getting hurt all of a sudden for unexplainable

reasons. And basically, what he told me was lies. He would tell me that my son, you, kicked Jacob in the head when he was walking by, that he happened to see it and this and that. But that wasn't true. He was actually, I believe, he was hitting him every time he got a chance. Every time we turned our back, he was hurting my child, your brother. I remember being blamed. I remember being very confused. And, you know, I think you know me better than most people. And I, especially at that age, really wanted to make everybody around me happy. And so I think I said what people wanted me to say or what was being said to agree with them. Because I didn't want to cause problems.

He made you say that because he said for you not to lie and stuff like that. So I think he coerced you to say stuff that wasn't really happening to cover his own butt. And I knew you weren't doing anything to your brother because you loved him. You loved that little boy. And I kept hearing, you know, he dropped him. He picked him up out the crib. He dropped him. I walked by.

He kicked him. You know, everything was like Eric did this, Eric did that. And Eric's so jealous. And, you know, it wasn't true. did that. And Eric's so jealous. And, you know, it wasn't true. Okay, we are back from the clip. But we're going to take a quick break and then we're going to discuss the clip when we come back. All right, we're back.

That was a really tough clip. I'm actually glad we took a break right there because it does make you a little little emotional to hear, to hear Eric explain it because we were all little at one point. And it's so sad that he was like willing to take the blame for something he didn't do because he really just wanted, he didn't, he didn't want John to be the bad guy, even though he knew probably in his heart, even at that age, like if it ain't me, then it's probably him. Right. You know? So you talk about the sunflower seeds and then obviously the abuse to jacob i gotta tell this story is gonna really piss me off so like really bad but um yeah it's a tough clip and it's so emotional to listen to like these two people who lived it and experienced it rehash it as they're older right so many years later like like to hear eric kind of you could tell he went

back to that day or those those moments where it's like yeah damn like he obviously understandably severely impacted by this so much and so man it's a tough one it's a tough one and i mean that's that's what's that's what's horrible right about like one of the things that's horrible eric would admit to being the one who had hurt his little brother this little brother that he prayed for and loved so much. Yeah, because he was five, because John was telling him and everyone else that he'd physically been like seen with his own eyes, Eric doing this because children are highly suggestible. And usually they're going to say or do anything to make a problem go away so that the grownups aren't upset with them. Right. And I look this up. It kind of reminded me of like Jesse Miskelly Jr. You know, it's kind of like that.

Like a child's mind is going to hear an adult telling them something and they're gonna be like, well, it's an adult. They know more than I do. According to research studies, the accuracy of a child's memory can be altered easily. They're very vulnerable to the power of suggestion. Children lack confidence and they look to adults for cues on how to interpret social behavior and

those around them. And when exposed to highly suggestive incriminating post-event information by adults, so post-event is like the event happened, the child witnessed it, experienced it, but now after the event, the adult's saying, well, are you sure this didn't happen? Are you sure this didn't happen? So that's post-event information. When they're hearing that post-information by adults, children can be definitely affected. Young children tend to assume that adults have all the answers, and they defer to pressure by adults to modify their perceptions. For instance, in the situation of a police interview, a forceful adult interviewer who keeps suggesting misinformation to a child can lead a child to believe that they perhaps have not remembered accurately, even though they were the ones who were there, not the adult interviewer. Now, in Eric's case, it was far more extreme because

he was being told on a regular basis that he was doing these things to the point where to this day, he cannot say for sure whether or not he did. And that is the power that a toxic adult acting without good faith can have on a young child. They can literally warp their brain, change their memories. And John would do this thing where he would be like, you know, they would ask, oh, what happened to Jacob? And Eric would be like, I didn't do it. I don't know. And John would be like, now don't lie. Don't lie. It's going to get worse for you if you lie. You know better. You better tell the truth. Right. And he would do that enough to the point where Eric would be like, well, I mean, he's mad enough. It must be true. And even adults in abusive

relationships go through this. Like if you've been beaten down in a relationship long enough, you can know for 100 percent certain that you're right. But the person you're with is so righteously indignant about what they're upset with you about that you're like, maybe they're right. Why would they be this mad if I wasn't doing this? Like, there has to be something to this. Maybe I am doing this. And you start to question what you know. So with a child, and I mean, Eric was five. It's incredibly easy to just rewrite history for them. And it's so sad and disgusting. Yep. Terrible. Nothing to add. It's an intimidation factor. You know, like he has that power over him where even if he does know for certain, he's not going to say it at that point. You've instilled so much fear in him. He's like, hey, I just want this to stop.

So whatever I got to say to make that happen, because I'm sure right after he said like, yeah, I did it. John was probably like, well, it's all right. It's all right. Yeah. They backed off. Yeah. You know, don't do it again because he got what he wanted right now. He can end it and no more questions. Exactly. And you also have to remember like John was this cool guy at first. John was a buddy. John was a father figure. And now all of a sudden John's become like this, you know, kind of unstable person that you don't know what they're going to do. And you are sort of hoping to get him back to that like nice guy who would watch movies with

you. And you'll say whatever you have to do to do that, which is the same in any like toxic relationship or marriage between adults. Whatever you have to say to get that partner back in a good mood, you'll do so that your life remains or your life goes back to being consistent and calm and peaceful. And it's just so, so sad. Yeah, I don't like it. Well, the first major incident with Jacob happened in early March of 1987. Brenda was at work that day and John had been left with Eric and Jacob, but he also had his other two kids with him that day. And reportedly, Brenda didn't get home from work in time for John to bring his kids home in time. So he made the decision to leave a then eight-month-old Jacob in the care of his five-year-old brother, Eric. And the next day, Brenda noticed that Jacob had an injury, a skinned ear.

So she brought him to their pediatrician, Dr. Blodgett. And the doctor told Brenda, you know, don't worry, the injury to Jacob's ear wasn't serious. But John would tell her later that he'd seen worry, the injury to Jacob's ear wasn't serious. But John would tell her later that he'd seen Eric cause this injury to Jacob's ear. He said he had seen Eric take Jacob out of his crib and drop him on the floor purposely before returning Jacob to his crib. Now, once again, Eric says he has no memory of doing this. And he said, quote, is it possible that I picked Jacob out of his crib and dropped him trying to comfort him while he was crying if we were left alone? Maybe.

But the thing you need to consider is that Jacob was a big baby. He was probably 20 pounds at this point, and I was lucky if I was 40 pounds. The other thing is that that crib was very tall. The bars were probably close to 5 foot in height, maybe 4 foot. It still would have been too tall for me to reach in there and grab him and take him out. Maybe I could have grabbed a chair, stepped on the chair, picked him up and dropped him. It's possible. I don't remember any of that happening. I don't think I would have had the strength at that angle to be able to lift him out of the crib, end quote. And I agree with all of that.

I'm 5'4", and, you know, adult woman strength. But I remember when Bella was in her crib not so long ago that there was times of the night where I was so tired, I would struggle to get her out of her crib because when they're that little, I don't know if you remember, but the crib mattress is super low so that the baby can't, when the baby starts standing up, you're not worried about the baby all of a sudden one morning realizing they can pull themselves up and then topple out of the crib. So they put the crib mattress very, very low so that the crib rails are super high and it prevents the baby from being able to, you know, get out. And you have to sort of like almost put your entire upper body into the crib and pull the baby out. And Eric was five. So I definitely don't think that

happened. But you can see he's even questioning it himself because his memory was so screwed up. He's like, could it have happened? Like, I guess it's possible, you know, but like, I don't think I did it. And it's just so sad to see. So just to recap that one more time to this day, although Eric doesn't think it's possible, he's not even sitting up there saying that. Yeah, it's there. There's maybe a scenario that I did it. Or is he like with it that he didn't do it at this point where he's like, hey, I know I didn't. Or is he just is he

just five? I think I mean, I think he genuinely doesn't remember. So he's not going to know what we think. I'm not saying what I think. I'm with you. You know, I'm thinking it was John. Pretty impossible. But the reason I ask is because it's still pretty impressive to think after all these years, even knowing what he knows now, Eric is still at this point willing to acknowledge the fact that he can't 100% say he didn't, which says a lot. Of course not. Because he could easily say, I know for a fact, I remember I didn't do it. And we would believe him. But he's not trying to do that. He was five, so he couldn't.

I mean, I guess, but I'm saying he could, even if he doesn't know, he could say it just for the impact of the story. I know I didn't do it and we would believe him. So, but he's like, he's even saying, Hey, listen, I just want you guys to hear all the facts, regardless of how they may look. And I may not always be able to definitively tell you something, even though I have a strong suspicion, but I'm just going to lay it out. It just builds a level of credibility because at the end of the day, yes, we're rooting for the, for a good ending to the story. And we obviously want to support Eric, but the fact that he's still willing to try to stay objective, even though this incident impacted him personally says a lot about him when other people like ourselves are trying to evaluate the

case. It's a, it's a, it like ourselves are trying to evaluate the case. It's a good sign as far as believing everything that you're hearing and seeing. I think it's also like, I'm unbiased, you know? I'm unbiased in this. Yeah. It says a lot about him as a person. He's giving you, like you said, laying out all the facts, but also showing you the scientific impossibility of it. Right.

Very unlikely. Yeah. Right. Because, you know, Jacob was a big baby. He was 10 pounds when he was born. And so he's 20 pounds before he's even one years old. And Eric was a much smaller child. Right. So there would really be no reason for him to do that. But here's the thing that always gets me. John apparently left them alone. Right. To bring his kids home. And I don't even know if this is a true story, by the way. Like, I'm pretty sure he probably did. But then later, John's like, oh, by the way, I know that Eric took Jacob out of his crib and dropped him because I saw it. But

like, how did you see it if you left them alone and you weren't there you know how did you see it like it can't go both ways and i don't know if that's ever been explained or if anybody ever asked him to clarify that yeah no i mean the whole thing is and you can obviously we know how the story ends to some degree and to think that this was going on before it just it pulls at your heart because not that there was anything they could do to really prevent it because it was so well orchestrated. And John really focused on Eric because that was someone at his age who couldn't really defend himself appropriately. You know, there was a plan in place, right? There was a plan in place.

And it was after this incident where John allegedly left Eric and Jacob alone together to bring his other kids home that John's ex-wife got in touch with Brenda's husband, Gene, and the ex-wife told Gene, listen, I heard that your son Jacob had been injured after being left home alone by John, and she suggested that Gene should call and file a child abuse claim on John, but Gene had talked to Brenda, and he'd heard that Jacob was fine and that he had sustained a non-serious injury. And I guess he was like, oh, it was an accident.

And he didn't feel he needed to take any further action. So it doesn't even look like Gene really cared that Brenda and John were together. It looked like he was just because, you know, somebody who was bitter about that may have taken the opportunity to call and try to get like his wife's new boyfriend in trouble. But he was like, whatever, man, I'm over here. He was living in California. He was good. Well, based on what we know about him, he didn't really seem to care much. And I will say this, this isn't a defense, by the way, whether he put two and two together at that point, we weren't there. But if he didn't for the sake of this conversation, he's looking at it like, okay, this is my best friend. I trust him. I know

he wouldn't do something like that. And it's not completely out of the question that maybe my five-year-old made a mistake. And apparently from what I'm hearing, maybe, maybe he already admitted to it. So it sounds like boys being, you know, boys, this was an accident, rough housing, not happy about it, but the police aren't going to do shit about this if I call. So whatever you want to think about Jean that's on, you know, that's your prerogative. But he may not be putting two together yet that maybe my best friend is abusing my son. He's not there yet.

So that could have been part of it. He's not thinking something nefarious is going on. It's easy in hindsight for us to put it together, right? But depending on how that story is relayed and depending on what information he was given, he may have been fed the same bullshit that everyone else was, which is, oh, this was Eric. This was Eric. You know, it sucks, but nothing you can really do about it.

Yeah. I mean, I don't feel like Gene was ever super invested in the raising of his sons anyway. So he was just going to take Brenda's word for it anyways. And if Brenda was like, it's all good. We cleared it up. He's going to be like, okay, why am I going to worry? Eric admitted to it. What are you going to do?

Call the police on Eric? You know, so you can't really, what can you do? Yeah. What am I, what am I going to worry about this for? I'm glad I don't have to worry about this. Oh yeah. He's like, whew. I don't have to do anything.

You don't need me. Perfect. That's all I want to hear. So two or three weeks after this, it was a Saturday night. Jacob was acting fussy and he was hard to settle. So after being put down for bed that night, he continued to wake up crying. So Brenda ended up giving him some medicine, put him back in his crib.

But the next day, Brenda's mother, Merlinda, she had Jacob and she noticed a soft, large lump on the side of Jacob's head. And once again, Jacob was brought to see Dr. Blodgett who informed them that this was a more serious injury and Jacob had sustained this bump from a blow to the head. Jacob actually had to be admitted to the hospital. He was diagnosed with a hematoma, and he had to undergo surgery to have the fluid around his brain drained.

He was in the hospital from May 15th to May 17th, and when he was released, he had to wear a helmet. His head was all bandaged up, and reportedly this caused his brother, to have a very adverse and fearful reaction. Seeing Jacob with the bandage and the helmet and knowing that he had to have surgery, you know, Eric was feeling very guilty. And once again, John had claimed that Eric had done this to Jacob. He had seen Eric kick Jacob in the head. And when questioned about it, Eric initially said, no, he had not kicked Jacob in the head. But eventually he admitted to having done so after, you know, once again, John yelled at him to tell the truth. Eric said that his father had always told him, if someone hurts you, you hurt them back. And Jacob had pulled his hair, so he'd kicked him.

But Eric also said, you know, I did kind of like playfully kick him, but I didn't feel like I kicked him hard enough to hurt him. Now, at that point, Brenda was very concerned that Eric was jealous of Jacob and that Jacob wouldn't be safe around his older brother. So she contacted her husband, Gene, who at that time was in Indio, California, and she asked him to take Eric for a while. And so Eric was pulled away from his life, his family, his home, his school, his kindergarten teacher who was so nice to him and who he loved. And he was sent to a different state to live with a man he barely knew, all because he'd been accused of hurting his baby brother, something he denied every time it was brought to him until he was basically coerced and harassed into admitting to it. Let's take a quick break and we'll be right back. Let's unpack that a little bit more now that you kind of gave us this, because this is starting to get serious now. And so I want to really make sure I understand it. So they go to the hospital, Jacob has this hematoma, he has this more serious injury. And if I was following you correctly, what you're stating is Eric admitted

that there was something between the two of them where he pulled his, Jacob had pulled his hair. So he had kicked him, but he had kicked him lightly, nothing to cause this type of injury. So are we to believe Eric was admitting to something he did, but in reality, it really had nothing to do with the injury that was in question. That was a separate incident that we don't know about, but Eric being a good kid was trying to be transparent and be honest. So he admitted to kicking him, even though from Eric's perspective, he doesn't believe that that was what caused that hematoma. It's something different. Is that, am I following that correctly? So I don't think personally, I don't think that Eric did kick Jacob. Oh, you don't think he kicked him at all?

I don't. I think that at this point he's being accused of you don't think he kicked him at all i don't i think that at this point he's being accused of this and he's dredging his memory trying to think of a time that he did this and he can't but the adults once again seem so sure of it john said he saw it with his own eyes and eric's like well if i would have kicked him i guess what situation what scenario would i have done that in you know that's what his little kid's mind is trying to, and I think he made it up. Like, yeah, he pulled my hair and I kicked him, you know, like, but I didn't think I kicked him that hard because still in his head, he's like, I love my brother. I'm not going to kick him in the head hard enough to like cause him to have to get surgery. So I personally don't think that Eric

ever did kick Jacob. I think he just had to sort of come up with a plausible scenario where he would have done that. Because I'm thinking like Bella's six, right? I've seen Bella actively make stuff up on the spot, not to be nefarious, not purposely, but because she's asked something she doesn't know. And when she's asked something she doesn't know, and she's expected to have an answer, and she doesn't have an answer, she will make something up on the spot. And let me tell you, she'll be dead ass about it. I'll believe her. And if I didn't know she was not telling the truth, I would absolutely buy it. Because sometimes she says things that are, there's no possible way that they could be true. Like she's so fantastic, like fantastical and all of these things happen.

But she says it like she believes it and like it's true. So kids have a great imagination and they also have this ability to sort of like roll with the punches and make things up on the spot. So that's kind of why I'm thinking of my own daughter who's at that same age. And I've seen her just like straight lie to my face without even like blinking. Possible. And maybe Eric would weigh in on this after he hears it and feel differently about what I'm about to say. But my, just my thought, my guess is that I had a little brother. We were closer in age.

I was going over it again. You know, Jacob was only eight months at this time. Eric's five years old. So bigger age gap there, right? Like a five-year-old can do a lot to an eight-month-old, but putting myself in that big brother role, even though, like I said, not as big of an age gap, there were times where my brother would try to steal something from me or grab me and I'd slap him quick or whatever, like get him off me. So very innocent, not causing any serious injury whatsoever. So my.

How much younger than you is your brother? 13 months. Like no difference. Like very little difference. But do you think if your brother was like a literal baby, you would have like kicked him? I don't think I would have kicked him. But to the point that Eric, he could have been making this up, but if we were to believe it, there could have been a situation where our instinctual thing is his little brother,

baby brother pulls his hair. It hurts. And as a natural defense, you like whack them to like get them off you, not necessarily to like retaliate, but just like, Hey, let me go. You know, like you would do with a dog. If it bit bit you or something you're not trying to hurt him you're just trying to stop whatever's occurring so do i think that in the moment when questioned or interrogated about it eric could have pulled up any memory where he had ever touched his brother in any way and been like whoa i don't remember that but i there was a day where i could it might not even have been in

the same week of this incident we agree yeah but he's was a day where I could it might not even have been in the same week of this Incident we agree. Yeah, but he just pulling something where it's like, okay I just want to be honest and tell you everything. Yeah, and because he hadn't hit his brother often This was one time he remembered and as soon as he said it That's what john harped on where it's like. Yep, that that must have been it told you like I said Not referencing any time frame or whatever just just anything that Eric could remember to be helpful. Like, again, as a five-year-old, he might even been thinking like, shit, did I cause that when I did it?

Like, he doesn't even know he's five years old. So he's thinking like, he's trying to help. Like, was it something I did? Yeah. When in reality, John was banking on Eric remembering some incident. And as soon as he got something, it was like, yep, that was it. Bingo. Yep.

That must've been what caused the injury. Because at that point, if it's John who was causing these injuries, he needs an alibi. He needs an out. And Eric gave it to him just by being an innocent young kid. So that's, that's what I think Eric was doing, but he would know better than me, obviously, you know, that's just my thought on it. And that's kind of the same thing, right? Like you didn't kick him in the head, but maybe a couple of weeks ago he pulled your hair and you like kicked out at him to push him away from you. Exactly. And you're thinking, I mean, I didn't kick him in the head and I didn't kick him hard, but like maybe that is you're a kid. You don't know about medicine and like biology. You're thinking maybe I kicked him in the butt and it affected his head. You don't know. So he's like you said, fishing for some sort of similar comparative situation and to just make it go away so that they will all move on again and everything will be happy and everybody's getting along again.

He's trying to help in figuring out how it happened. Hey guys, I'm sorry about this. And then he doesn't know that he's being used as a scapegoat. Because again, John knowing Eric, he probably knows he's going to say something like this because he already did once, right? He admitted to dropping him on his head in the crib. You don't think that could have contributed to him thinking he can get away with this type of behavior? John, I'm talking about here, where he knows he's got a young little boy. He's a little fall guy. He's got a little fall guy.

Exactly. Yeah. Unfortunate, man. So after this head injury, little Jacob was a completely different baby. Even at such a young age, they said Jacob had such a huge personality. He didn't take a year or two to develop this personality. He was just kind of a character right off the bat. He was always laughing. Eric says he never heard a laugh like that in a baby or an adult or anyone, kind of like a bullfrog, but just full of so much joy and unadulterated happiness. And Jacob was fearless. He was always on the move, always into something. He would get in the baby swing and try to swing so high and so hard that he would almost topple the entire thing every time. But now Jacob was withdrawn. He was fussy, almost like depressed and anxious. He cried a lot and he was afraid of the fun things that he had once loved. I want to talk about the time that grandma tried to put him on her shoulders. Do you remember that? Yeah, kind of. She just like didn't put him on her shoulders. She just lifted him like above her

head. Like you do with babies. Yeah. Put him, pick him up. He didn't want no part of that at all. He was terrified. When I got home, I asked him, Why is Jacob so scared? Are you playing rough with him or what's going on? He's like, what do you mean? I don't know what you're talking about. So I put him up a little bit, and he started screaming and holding on to me and just freaking out.

I said, this is what I mean. No baby should act like that. Why is he doing that? And he's just like, oh, he always does that whenever I play with him like that. And he got him and he took him away from me and tried to do that, and Jacob was just screaming. He wouldn't stop. I had to just take him away from me and tried to do that and Jacob was just screaming he wouldn't stop I had to just take him away from him I told him don't you ever ever play with my son rough like that if I ever catch

you I swear to god I'll hurt you and you know he said oh I won't and I won't and I don't know everything came out of his mouth as a lie Jacob like you talked about a little bit before but Jacob was not afraid of you cat he was not a scared kid he was crazy he was he liked it he enjoyed like crazy stuff yeah being thrown around and stuff like that before this idiot came into the picture like I even talked about how you should pick up the whole swing with him he you said he pulled the silverware drawer open and all this I remember all the knives and forks and everything makes so much noise nothing scared him so for him to act that way was out of the ordinary for him

because he wasn't afraid no fear exactly that should bring red flags to anybody that if their kid acts like scared of anything like that they're holding on to you so tight pay attention to that that's a sign a real big sign you know I was 26 and stupid I'll admit it but pay attention to how they're reacting and you know what they react to because that'll tell you a lot that is very astute she said pay attention to the things that they react to and how they react that'll tell you a lot and That is very astute. She said, pay attention to the things that they react to and how they react. That'll tell you a lot.

And she she said, like, have you been playing rough with him? And John was like, no. And then she's like, are you sure? Because he doesn't act like this. This is not how my kid acts. What the hell's going on? And by this time, Eric's out of the picture, right? He's not even there.

He's in California. So who's left to blame? Which tells you something that this john dickhead will kept blaming eric eric gets sent away but john can't stop the abuse allegedly don't come for me he can't stop the abuse even though he no longer has his little fall guy there he still thinks he's not going to get caught and it's's just, it's, it lets you know that this baby was basically John's punching bag. Yeah. You know, there's a, we've talked about it before and it's relatable here. You've said this before where you've made fun of me, but I like electronics.

I like building things, clocks, all these, these soldering wires together. And there are times where there's a lot of little components to it and you have to kind of weld them all together and then you get to the end and it doesn't work and the only way to figure it out is to go through each component each each soldering point and check it to see what the very what variable is off and it's kind of what you're describing here where initially you think you've identified the issue the problem which was Eric. But when you remove that from the equation and the problem is still occurring, well, on a radio board or a circuit board. Well, there's only two variables. She removed one of them, only left with another. And you can hear it in that part of the interview where this is the point where now she's starting to question some things because she was probably pretty confident

at the time, especially no disrespect to her. I mean, how would she know? Eric's admitting to certain things where she's looking at it on the surface and go, okay, well, that probably it. Well now he's gone like you said, so how do you explain this? How do you explain these new things now? I wonder And we didn't talk about it here, but I wonder if any point John had used his own children as a scapegoat as well Maybe it wasn't covered but when eric wasn't around could he have said because I don't know if you mentioned it. I might have missed it. Were John's children boys, girls? I don't know anything about John's children besides the fact that after he got divorced,

he had visitation with them, but they didn't seem to be around that much. Okay. They weren't around much. So maybe that might've been part of the equation where, hey, listen. And I think they were older too. So they could say like, no, I didn't do that. I think they were old enough, maybe like an eight, nine, 10, maybe even older where they could say like, no, I didn't do that. You know, I think they were old enough, maybe like an eight, nine, 10, maybe even older where they'd be like, nope, I didn't do that. You know, like, what are you talking about old man? And then move on. So that seems to be. I've had situations that I've investigated cases where child molestation cases, where you have

like older children that are not necessarily related, where they're put with younger children, things like this can happen. And same thing with like physical abuse, right? Where you have someone taking advantage of a situation. So I won't go off the path here because it could probably be solved in one question to Eric where he was like, yeah, no, those kids were never around. So, or even Brenda could answer it where it's like, no, that was never a thought in my mind because they were there maybe two or three times. And these injuries to Jacob were occurring at moments and times when they weren't around. So it would have been physically impossible for them because before they were there, that injury wasn't there. And after they weren't there, it still wasn't there. And then John's around and sure enough, Jacob wakes up

and he has this or that. So this is compelling and this is a turning point, but you're right. John, at this point, he had a scapegoat for a while, lost that, but couldn't control himself, couldn't stop abusing this little boy. And this is where the tables started to turn. But as we're probably going to learn as we go throughout this, again, this is no spoiler here. We're being transparent as we're covering it. This doesn't end well. And this is how it got there. Yeah. And hindsight's 20-20, right? Of course. I'm not blaming anyone, the way no absolutely i know you're i know you're definitely not don't worry about that but brenda kind of makes it seem in the interview like she always knew it wasn't eric she didn't

really believe that he would hurt his little brother and there was always a part of her that kind of felt like there's something not right about john there's something she knows her son by the way right yeah she knows her son she knows he loves, right? Yeah, she knows her son. She knows he loves his brother. But, you know, she kind of said I wanted to she says she says to Eric in the podcast episode, I wanted to get you out of there. I didn't want you to keep getting blamed for it. And I wanted to see if it continued, because then if it did, there was no way that he could blame it on you and you wouldn't be continually traumatized. Now, is that 100 percent true? Did she a million percent feel that way in the moment? Probably not. And I don't blame her for that because I wouldn't be continually traumatized. Now, is that 100% true? Did she a million percent feel that way in the moment? Probably not.

And I don't blame her for that because I wouldn't. I love all my kids with all my heart. Everybody who knows me knows that. But if Bella was, you know, getting like hurt constantly and, you know, someone was blaming Aiden and he admitted to it, there'd be a part of me that would be like, okay, this is possible. Stranger things have happened. Sometimes older siblings get jealous of younger siblings. And because they don't have the emotional regulation of an adult, they take it out physically on somebody weaker than them, the little sibling. So this isn't crazy. It's not the first time it happened. It's possible. I do think that there was a big part of her though, who believed like,

no, I don't think Eric did this. And let me remove him from the equation. Let me use process of elimination to see what's actually happening. Absolutely. I couldn't agree more. And at this point, Eric's gone. Jacob is still not doing well because he has this head injury. He just never recovered from it. He was always sick all the time. And on April 6th, his grandmother, Merlinda, brought him to the doctor once again to see why he had a fever, why he was crying so much. And Dr. Blodgett diagnosed Jacob with an ear infection and tonsillitis and gave him some medication, which unfortunately, Jacob had an allergic reaction to. This caused him to break out in hives. I don't

know what the medication was, but I assume it was like an antibiotic or an amoxicillin of some kind. I am very allergic to amoxicillin and penicillin and sulfa. And I remember when I was a kid and I would have like an ear infection because I got them all the time. At the first couple of times, I would get like that pink amoxicillin and then I'd always get worse. I'd have hives all over me. My throat would close up. It was a mess. So I assume it was something like that.

But basically, this kid cannot get a break. And on top of that, hospital staff, from when Jacob had been admitted for the hematoma in mid-March, they'd contacted the authorities. And a CPS caseworker, Sue Holland, had been assigned to the Landin family. And when she started looking into them, she realized there was already a complaint on file from a neighbor who had claimed that the man in the house was beating the baby in the house. So the man in the house would be John and the baby in the house would be Jacob. So Sue Holland actually went to the Landin home. She spoke to Brenda and John and they told her that basically the problem had been addressed. Problem solved. Eric had been jealous of his baby brother.

He'd been hurting him, but he'd been sent away. And they expected no further issue. And Sue Holland said that John appeared to care about Jacob and he seemed concerned about him. And she had spoken to people who knew John and they all thought he was a good person who wouldn't hurt a baby. So she left the mobile home satisfied and closed the case. Now, this is something important to know. John works for the county. He's got a lot of connections.

We kind of talked earlier about how his father was a pastor and he's got all these connections in the community. He works for the county. So he has a key to every public building in the county, including the police station. And he's friends with the police officers. They play basketball together every weekend. So he's got some connections in the community of Socorro, which is a small town to begin with. I think that Eric told me earlier, it's like 6,000 people, very small town, very small New Mexico town. Everybody knows everyone. Everybody knows everybody's business. And John's got some friends in high places who are probably going to talk highly of him if a caseworker from CPS would approach them. And I mean, even Gene, his best friend, probably didn't have anything bad to say about him,

didn't know he was abusive to children, or he wouldn't have let him date his wife and be like a stepfather figure to his children. So it seemed that John was very good at hiding his true self. But I will also say it's not in the initial report, but Eric sent us over like almost 200 pages of police reports, supplemental reports, and I read through all of them twice. And towards the end in the handwritten report from Sue Holland, it says that first Sue Holland was in the house talking to Brenda. And then John came in after and he didn't know who she was and he was belligerent. And he was like, what are you doing here? Who are you? Why are you even here? Because he didn't know she was a CPS caseworker. And then

when he found out that she was, he kind of changed his tune and shifted gears. So I think that's very important that this guy can put on a show and put on a mask when he thinks you're somebody who breaks and then we're going to wrap up this episode. But I want to talk about this because there's another angle here that we've addressed in a previous case. But we'll take the break. We'll be right back. So we're back. It was interesting what you had to say about John and his connections to the city because, again, or the town. The county. The county, right? Like everyone knows everyone. So could that be an element to it for sure. But as we've seen with law enforcement in some cases, and we've been critical of it, you can also have, I don't know,

Sue Holland, she may be top notch, right? But we've also, I've personally experienced cases where once we get involved, because as crimes now that need to be investigated, I learned very quickly that CPS has been to that house 15, 20 times. And every time they go, unfounded, case closed, unfounded, case closed. Because as I don't think it's going to be a surprise to anyone out there in the public service world, you can have some complacency, some individuals who are there to just collect the paycheck. And by the way, I'm going to disclaimer one more time. I don't know Sue Holland. I don't know if it's the case here. I'm just pointing it out. During the break,

I actually looked back up. Stephanie was right. The case was Liliana Carrillo. We covered it very early on with the Crime Weekly series. And it was also a case where you and I, I think, got in a pretty interesting debate about CPS and about their involvement because they had been called multiple times. And really, the husband, if I remember correctly, or the father had said, listen, I'm in fear of my kids. And they didn't do anything. And she ended up drowning the children. Could that be the case here? Maybe. I just wanted to point it out because you could have a situation where it's not even as deep as you laid it out. It could be that. it could be that intertwined where it's like, hey, it's who you know. Hey, that's John. We don't, you know, John's a good guy. ineptness where they're not fully vetting it because one person told them, oh, it's all set. We already fixed it. You don't have to worry about

it. They're just looking at it like one less case I have to look into. So does it really matter at this point? Probably not. But I always come to it from the perspective of was this preventable, right? Was there something or someone who could have intervened to prevent this from being the situation and having us cover it right and i don't know i don't think we have enough information to know if sue holland had all the facts and was able to investigate this properly or was she stopped because of uh you know outside influences as you mentioned. So I don't I didn't bring up the fact that he had connections as far as like this CPS kind of investigation. I think that just in general, he had people who would vouch for him.

In general, he had people who would say he's a stand up guy because he was good at wearing a mask. And I'd like to think with CPS that more often than not, they are letting things fall between the cracks because they have way too much on their plate, that they have way too many cases at once. And it's not really a matter of like, I don't care. It's a matter of, I don't have time to care as deeply about every single one of these cases as I would like to, because they're understaffed and they're underpaid. You could also say, did somebody not do their job in this case? And it could be police officers who didn't do their job. And what you'll find later is I don't, I wouldn't even necessarily say that. Well, yeah, I mean, there's going to be a question that we're

going to come into where this dude gets arrested, but then nothing happens. Like he gets arrested for child abuse, but he doesn't go to jail or go to trial. So yeah, in that case, you have to look at the police department and say, what the hell happened? And then you have an issue where there's police reports missing. There's, you know, he confessed allegedly to a police officer. That confession is gone. Where's the confession? We don't even know what he said in the confession. It's not in the files. Now, is it that somebody he knew in the police department got rid of the files for him? Or is it because he was the maintenance guy for the county and had a key to every building in the county, including the police station? And this was like the 80s, so they don't have surveillance cameras and computer systems. They just got the files and dude can go in and be like, well, we don't need that confession in there and we don't need that in there. And maybe just take some stuff. Were his connections directly with the police department where the police were going to cover it up? Or was it just giving him access to certain things that he wouldn't have had as a layperson. Now, in my opinion, if this dude is a suspect in a child abuse case and he's arrested in a child abuse case, maybe don't let him have a key to the police station.

But that's neither here nor there. I definitely got hit the rest of the case, but I love how you did that there. I don't know if anybody else picked up on it. I brought up the whole, well, CPS might have not done their job. Well, listen, sometimes they're overworked and sometimes they got too much cases. But the police, they might be the problem. Because I didn't like how you immediately wrote it off like, well, maybe not the police, maybe a CP. I didn't like that.

So I had to balance you out. You're always trying to balance me out. I was pretty sure at this point police weren't involved up to this point in the case, correct? Yo, they weren't. So why even bring them up? I was just saying he had connections. There's chronological order. There's chronological order, right? There's chronological order. He had connections in the community,

including the police department. And everybody seemed to think he was like a standup guy. Just wanted to note that how you did that. And you just had to come and defend your boys in blue right off the bat. They haven't even been part of the equation yet. I know, so why'd you talk about them? I didn't mention the police. I talked about CPS, which you just mentioned being involved. So there was a report filed by a neighbor. And that report basically, from what you told us, was essentially, hey, I believe the guy in that house is beating that little boy. Yeah. So on the surface, I don't know why law enforcement wouldn't have been involved at that point. But from what you told me, because I only know the version you're telling me, instead of it going to law enforcement, it went to CPS, correct? Yeah, because the initial report from the neighbor went to CPS. And then when Jacob went to the hospital, the hospital called CPS.

Said, hey, there's a hematoma here. Yeah. So initially, when we start to really get outside entities involved, other than Brenda, who's trying to figure this out on her own, the first government agency to be involved was CPS. And you're in the conclusion from them, from speaking to Brenda, was that this issue had already been rectified. It was the older brother. He's been sent away. Don't worry about it. And all I was saying is, listen, it could be that. It could be just, hey, listen, there wasn't anything there. And in fairness to Sue Holland, the mom say, you know, as an outside party saying, yeah, I'm dating this new guy, but we have identified the issue. It was the older brother.

Shouldn't be any issues going forward. And I wasn't trying to criticize her, even though I get, you know, you felt the need to defend her, but, and I, by the way, spoiler alert, cause I've done it before. When you, when you add law enforcement into this wrinkle, I will beat you to the punch to point out what they did wrong. Like I've done it before, when you add law enforcement into this wrinkle, I will beat you to the punch to point out what they did wrong, like I've done before. But up to this point in the story, CPS, maybe this could have stopped it. Maybe this could have been something if she had spotted something that could have prevented this from happening, because CPS does have the power to remove children from a situation without law enforcement.

If they feel- Not in every state. Absolutely not. They don't. They have to contact the police first. That's what I was just going to say. They can go there. Oh, you said they had the power to remove kids without the police. They absolutely have the power to remove a child without, they have to have law enforcement

there, but they can do it under their own recommendation. They can go to a judge and get it done. They can absolutely remove children from a home without law enforcement having to act personally. You want law enforcement there. I've done that a million times too, unfortunately, where you're present for the removal of children, but CPS can absolutely make that decision on their own. And even if we disagree with them, we can, we can't stop them, but to not get off the path here, again, identifying the different layers to this case where outside entities were brought in and made aware of it. I think this is pretty impactful because you have to ask yourself, right? How did this neighbor come to this conclusion? They must've heard something

pretty significant. Repeatedly, I would say, right? Repeatedly to say, listen, no dispute here. There's a guy in that home and he's abusing that little boy. So you can only imagine what he was hearing. Probably a lot of screaming, a lot of yelling, the little boy screaming, Jacob screaming. Crying. And I mean, they live in a trailer park, so they're very close together. Yeah. And probably, yeah, you can hear everything. So I wonder, I wish I was a fly in the wall. I wonder, I'm sure it just didn't say neighbor reports, man beating child. I would love to know what the interview consisted of with Sue Holland, with this neighbor to

say, Hey, why do you think? Because I'm talking, the information I'm getting is a little different. I've talked to the family members over there. They're, you know, I'm not going to get into specifics of what they're saying is the reason for it, but what makes you think it's the gentleman in the home and not someone else? What makes you think that this older gentleman is the one abusing this child? How'd you come to that conclusion? I feel like a lot of times people call these into CPS and they are like anonymous. Like I'm a neighbor, but I don't want to say my name. And I know from experience, like half the time, I don't want to say half the time, but in a lot

of instances, the CPS caseworker won't even like meet the person in person. Like they'll sometimes just take the call or maybe they won't even take the call. Somebody else takes the call and gets the report and then they follow up with the family. They never speak to the person who called in and made the report. Yeah, I guess that's possible. Bad business model, but I can't disagree that it does happen. So it's not going to help you much. But it doesn't change what we're covering.

I just wanted to, we're dissecting this. There's probably, if I had to guess, as it is with many cases, there's multiple points of crossroads where it could have gone different ways. A hundred percent. And I definitely, without putting blame on anyone, by the way, this is, this is one of those junctures where it could have, it could have maybe gone differently. You wish it would have, right? I think we all do. But it didn't here. And there might be justifiable reasons why it didn't, but you know, I always hate to go back

and think about the what ifs, but it's, it's kind of hard for me not to. Yeah. And I mean, even at this point, Brenda wasn't so sure about the story that she had told the caseworker, you know, that her boyfriend had not hurt Jacob and that it was all Eric. She was a little uneasy, even at this point with John being alone with Jacob. So she made an active decision to try and avoid that from happening at all costs, meaning she would make sure that her parents could babysit for Jacob while she was at work, and John would only be around Jacob when she was there so that she could watch him

and make sure everything was good. But some situations are unavoidable. And on April 10th, 1987, Brenda dropped Jacob off to her mother's house at around 10 a.m. She normally worked the 3 to 9 p.m. shift at the supermarket, but that day she'd been scheduled

from 11 a.m. to 7.30 p.m. shift at the supermarket, but that day she'd been scheduled from 11 a.m. to 7.30 p.m. And her mother, Merlinda, called Brenda at work later that day, and she was basically like, listen, I want to go to church. What should I do with Jacob while I'm at church? And Brenda said, okay, it's only an hour before I finish my shift and I'm off of work. And so she told her mother to drop Jacob off at home where John was, like drop Jacob off with John. Brenda thought at the time, what's the worst that could happen? It's only an hour. However, for the remainder of her shift, she was anxious. She felt like something was wrong. She begged her manager to let her leave early and go home because they weren't busy, but he said no.

And around 7 p.m., she was checking out a customer, and Brenda suddenly heard the sound of an ambulance speeding by. And moments later, her boyfriend, John, ran in and told her that Jacob was being rushed to the hospital because he'd fallen off the couch and he wasn't breathing. John claimed that after Merlinda had dropped Jacob off, he'd put the baby into his walker in the living room. And then John had sat on the floor where he was using his stereo to dub tapes for his brother. He said that one of the wheels of Jacob's walker kept getting stuck on the box that John was storing the tapes in, and John kept moving Jacob in the walker away from the box. But the baby continued to return because he wanted to play with the tapes. So eventually, John removed Jacob from the baby walker and placed him on the living room floor behind him.

He gave Jacob his bottle, a teething cookie, and two old tapes to play with, and then he continued dubbing the tapes. Now, John claimed that at one point he noticed Jacob was getting drowsy, so he picked the baby up and started walking him towards his bedroom to put him down in his crib. But as he walked away, John said he heard that the tape he'd been working on was clicking, signifying that it had reached its end. So he put Jacob on the couch for a moment so he could change the tapes quickly, turned his back just for a second, and he heard a noise. John said he turned to see Jacob on the floor between the couch and the coffee table. He didn't know if Jacob had hit the coffee table, but John saw a yellowish fluid coming out of Jacob's mouth and nose. He picked the baby up and turned him over. He tapped his back to try and clear the fluid, but when he turned Jacob back

over to face him, John noticed that the little boy's eyes were rolling back in his head, and so he panicked. With Jacob in his arms, John ran over to the neighbor's trailer, and they called the police while attempting CPR on the baby to try and revive him. Jacob was unresponsive. He was vomiting, And when the ambulance arrived, the paramedics noticed that one of his pupils was dilated, which indicated brain swelling. The paramedics hyperventilated Jacob, which was a common treatment to decrease cranial pressure in the 70s and 80s. And Jacob became responsive again. But just to be responsible here and like clear things up, although hyperventilation used to be a common treatment, newer research suggests that hyperventilation during the first 24 hours

after a brain injury should be avoided because it can compromise cerebral perfusion during a time when blood flow is already reduced to the brain. So I just wanted to say that because in the 70s and 80s, it used to be what they did, hyperventilation, making you breathe quicker than you normally would. But now they say, like, maybe don't do that. It was decided at the hospital, the local hospital, that Jacob's condition was too compromised to be treated there. So he was airlifted to the University of New Mexico Hospital in Albuquerque, about 75 miles away from Socorro. When Dr. Benny McWilliams arrived to the ER at approximately 9.45 p.m., Jacob was in a coma with a significant brain injury. And although the doctor didn't see any other signs of injury, such as bruises, he did feel a fresh skull fracture at the back of Jacob's head.

The baby was stabilized in the ER, and then he was brought to get a CT scan, at which point the attending neurosurgeon, Dr. Eric Marchand, made the decision to transfer Jacob to the ICU and schedule an emergency surgery. Sadly, Jacob was unable to be stabilized, and he passed away at around 3.30 a.m. on April 10, 1987. And he had this head injury, but he died from fluid in his lungs, basically, because apparently that's common when a baby has a head injury to have the fluid in the lungs. And that is what he ended up dying for. And Brenda, her parents and her boyfriend, John, had all taken the long drive to the hospital in Albuquerque together. And on the way there, Brenda remembered that her boyfriend, John, kept saying, I didn't touch him. I swear I never touched him, even though she hadn't asked or accused him of doing anything. And the doctors at the hospital

had a similar impression of John, like he was doing too much, he was being a little extra, to the point where they made notes about his odd behavior. When Brenda and John were notified in the waiting room that Jacob had not made it, Brenda obviously became hysterical. She ran out of the room screaming and crying, leaving John behind to speak to Dr. McWilliams. And John told the doctor that when he had gotten Jacob that night, the baby was very irritable. And this is how he would get sometimes when he was tired and ready for bed. John said he placed Jacob on the couch, which is about two to three feet off the floor. And there was a coffee table also, which is about six to eight inches away from the couch. John had been listening to music on his stereo very loudly when he heard gasping noises. And he turned to see Jacob on

the floor, lying sideways between the couch and the coffee table. John said he gave Jacob CPR and then he went to the neighbor's house to call for an ambulance. And Dr. McWilliams told John, you know, something else must have happened. Try to think, because in my opinion, Jacob would not have sustained an injury like the one he had died from after a simple fall off the couch. Off the floor. Yeah. I mean, if that's a high couch, maybe 18 inches. This doesn't add up. You know, this is what the doctor was saying.

And John insisted, no, no, I never hit Jacob. I would never hit a child. The doctor asked, well, did anyone hit Jacob? And John responded, no, Jacob had not been hit that day. And this confused Dr. McWilliams. And he was like, well, what do you mean by. McWilliams. And he was like, well, what do you mean by that? And John clarified. And he was like, listen, Jacob's older brother used to hit him. He had hit and kicked him before, but not that day. Jacob wasn't hit that day.

And John again stated he would never hit a child. But then he said, I feel like this looks really bad for me. Like, I'm going to be blamed for what happened to Jacob. And in Dr. McWilliams' notes, he stated that he didn't have a good feeling about John. He said the man was showing far more concern for himself than for Jacob. And Dr. McWilliams felt that John was more worried about being blamed than the average person the doctor had dealt with in the past in similar situations. Dr. Pat Lentz, the medical examiner who performed Jacob's autopsy, stated that the baby had a subdural hematoma, but he also had an older, partially healed hematoma, a partially healed skull fracture, and a healing fracture of his fifth rib. The doctor believed that the skull had been fractured along an existing suture, and the injury had most likely been caused by a hard

blow to the head with an open hand of an adult. Dr. Lentz also felt that the time between the injury and the onset of the symptoms would have been about 30 minutes, which means Jacob was injured shortly after being placed in John's care, and the doctor also found trauma to Jacob's backside, writing in the autopsy report, quote, the skin on the buttocks exhibits no contusion. However, upon incising the underlying soft tissue, recent red maroon hemorrhage involves predominantly the left buttocks with the hemorrhage measuring three by two centimeters, end quote. So basically, you couldn't see with the naked eye that there was trauma there, but once he had removed the skin, he could see older healing trauma, which I think suggests that Jacob had been

hit quite hard on his butt. Yeah. Yep. I mean, don't take a doctor to interpret that one, right? Pretty simple. What are you saying there? And I mean, by this time, it's April 9th, April 10th. Eric's not present to blame for this injury that ended Jacob's life. In fact, if the timing of the old wounds was accurate, being dated as happening roughly three weeks prior, Eric wouldn't have been there either. He'd already been sent to California. The only person who'd number one in this case. But for some reason, although he's given a polygraph that he failed, although he was arrested for child abuse, he would never be charged with anything and he wouldn't spend any time behind bars. So that is where we're going to pick up next time. Definitely want to dive into that because I don't like that. I don't like that at all. I mean, we don't have hard to believe really. I know sometimes I have

a tendency to just regurgitate what you just said. Yeah. I don't think anybody needs me to explain what you're describing there and the, and the issues with it. Right. My perspective, it sounds on the surface, Jacob was beaten or abused very quickly after he got home. And he might've been left alone after being struck one, two, three times. And then as time passed, these incidents occurred, which explains the 30 minute duration. And when that happened, that's when John realized like, oh, this is different than the other times I might've went too far. And then he panicked, but that was well after. Is it impossible? I guess I have to say, no, it's not impossible, but you and I both have kids. I've seen other cases, a fall from a couch when they're not jumping off

the couch or whatever from that height. I guess it can happen, but very unlikely. Kids are pretty resilient. And unless the floor is made of concrete and they hit their head first, you can have freak accidents. But I think when you couple it with the preponderance of history that we have here, both verbally, right, and then visibly from other incidences, and then also this report that shows even injuries we didn't know about. When you combine all of that, it paints a pretty clear picture that this child was abused on multiple occasions. And it appears that this most recent injury was just a little too far. It just went a little bit past that line. And unfortunately, before the offender realized what they had done, it was already too late to get Jacob the help he needed. I really want to hear part two because I don't know how John, unless there's someone else we don't know about i would love to hear their defense but it sounds like without going into it it's not necessarily about the defense that john put on it was just the lack of whatever was done by law enforcement like the fact

that they didn't go all the way with this and i would love to find out what their rationale would be behind not pursuing something criminally. So I'm going to be honest, like it seems like they did go all the way. Okay. But when they got all the way there, they changed their mind. Could they have changed their mind? Could there have been a grand jury thing? There's so many files missing because when they reopened this in 2005, like I'm getting a little ahead of myself, but when they reopened in 2005, the detectives who are like looking at it,

they're like, we don't understand why this happened. Like why was this guy arrested? But there's no evidence that he ever was charged. Why was nothing ever done about this? Right. And then the detectives at that point in 2005 would go to the D.A. and they'd be like, we suggest you press charges. We you have feel should have led to charges in my own department. And those people are walking free because of conversations that were had behind closed doors because the state says, ah, you know, but do you have this? Oh, but did he confess? Oh, but do you have DNA? No, dude, if we had that, I wouldn't need to come to you. We would already be done, right? Like it'd be done. But they did have a confession. The only problem is you only see that he confessed in a supplemental report. So basically there's a cop in Albuquerque. Oh, you're giving it all away right now.

There's a cop in Albuquerque because this is crazy to me. There's a cop in Albuquerque and she does the initial investigation because he's at the hospital in Albuquerque. And then a cop from Socorro contacts her and he's like, like okay i'm doing an investigation over here too and we'll come together and then like i think it was april 11th or 12th or something the cop from sakura contacts the cop in albuquerque and he's like i want to give this dude a lie detector test a polygraph test because i've interviewed him and he said the same shit but something's up here i want to give to give him a lie detector test. A couple of days later, this cop from Socorro contacts the cop in Albuquerque and says, nevermind, we're not going to give him a lie detector test because he's confessed. So in her, in Agent DeWalt, so that's the Albuquerque cop. Yeah, it's a slam

dunk. It's done. She's got this note, these notes in her reports that he confessed. So they're not going to do a polygraph. But where's the confession? Where's the confession? It's missing from the files. So there's no record of this confession. So I spoke to Eric today and I'm like, well, did you talk to Socorro cop to find out if he made a video or recording

or if he made the report and it's just missing? And Eric said, not yet. They're hiring a P.I. to track these people down, these cops and stuff that were involved so they can ask these questions. But the fact of the matter is, whatever confession was made is gone. It's not there in the files anymore. And that's the problem. I know a pretty good P.I. firm.

Just saying. Happened to no one. Okay. Maybe I would help with that. That's actually not hard at all. But we'll get there. We'll get there. I want to hear the rest of the story.

I think everybody else does. And I think, honestly, if we were prepared for it, we'd probably just say, fuck it and do it all tonight. But I think it's better that we'll digest this. We'll get back at it. Terrible case. I don't want to say fascinating, just a terrible case. And it sounds like there was a lot of things that could have been done better here to maybe prevent this. And then also after the fact, make sure that whoever was responsible for it was held accountable. That doesn't appear to be the case. So any final words from you before we take it out? No, because if I keep talking,

I'm just going to give everything away. Yeah. No, I appreciate Eric allowing us to tell this story. I think it's always, I mean, I'm only guessing here, but I think it's probably always a little nerve wracking to give up that control of that narrative that he knows the case better than we ever will. Dude, I completely agree. It would be so difficult for me. And he's trusting us with it and he's not, he's not being like weird or controlling about it. Nope. He's saying, here's here you go. Here's the police report. Here's all the information. And let me know if you have questions. And I really appreciate that shows a great deal of trust in us. And obviously, Eric, if you're listening, and I'm sure you will, there's something that we got wrong and you want to set the record straight. We will do that next week.

I'm sure he'll be listening. But as always, guys, we appreciate you being here for this exact reason, to try to help give justice to these families, try to help solve some cases. If you want to support the channel, if you want to support what we're doing, make sure you like, comment, subscribe, turn your notifications on. If you're listening on audio, you can always go over and leave a review It really again helps the channel helps us get this get more exposure to people who may not be Following us as of yet and and most importantly if you want to share this social media is used for all this Stupid shit and you probably put a lot of dumb post up We all do I know I do Spend seven seconds and put up a post about this to make people aware of it because Because maybe there's someone that's following you that doesn't know about Jacob's case yet.

And you might be the person that gets it to them. So there's a petition that you can sign. We will link it. We could probably put a link to Eric's podcast. 100%. It'll be in the description on YouTube. And it'll be in the description on audio as well, where if you want to go listen to Eric's podcast, because yes, obviously this is where he started.

This is why he's doing what he's doing, but he has a lot of other cases out there as well for other families out there who have similar stories that are looking for justice as well. So there's never a bad opportunity to go out. There's plenty of content out there to consume. And again, maybe one of those cases you can actually make a difference on. So appreciate it. Stay safe. And we will see you next week. Bye, guys.