Crime Weekly - S3 Ep194: Riley Strain: A Nashville Tragedy

Episode Date: March 29, 2024

22-year-old Riley Strain was a college student at the University of Missouri where he majored in business and finance while holding an internship at Northern Mutual where he planned to work after college. In March of 2024, Riley and his Delta Chi fraternity brothers took a trip to Nashville, Tennessee for their annual Spring trip. The group arrived on a bus from Columbia on Friday, and that evening they all went out, enjoying Nashville’s colorful entertainment district. The night started with all the friends together, but at around 9:45 PM, Riley was kicked out of the bar they had been drinking at, and he left the establishment alone, telling his friends he was headed back to the hotel. Riley’s fraternity brothers never saw him again, and his disappearance sparked a very publicized search that would end in tragedy. Use code CRIMEWEEKLY at www.CrimeCon.com for a discount on your CrimeCon 2024 Nashville tickets! 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. Thorne.fit/Crime - Use code CRIME for 10% off your first order! 2. EatIQBAR.com - Text WEEKLY to 64000 for 20% off ALL IQBAR products! 3. TryFum.com/CrimeWeekly - Use code CRIMEWEEKLY for 10% off your order! 4. Prose.com/CrimeWeekly - Get your FREE consultation and 50% off your first subscription order! 5. EarthBreeze.com/CrimeWeekly - Get 40% off your subscription!

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keep you coming back for more. For a limited time, go to tonal.com to get $500 off your Tonal purchase plus a free four-year warranty. That's tonal.com for $500 off, plus a free 4-year warranty. Tonal.com. In March of 2024, Riley and his Delta Chi fraternity brothers took a trip to Nashville, Tennessee for their annual spring trip. The group arrived on a bus from Columbia on Friday, and that evening they all went out together, but at around 9.40 p.m., Riley was kicked out of the bar they had been drinking at, and he left the establishment alone, telling his friends he was headed back to the hotel. Riley's fraternity brothers never saw him again, and his disappearance sparked a very publicized search that would end in tragedy. Hello, everybody. Welcome back to Crime Weekly. I'm Stephanie Harlow. And I'm Derek Levasseur. So today we're talking about Riley Strain, which has been deep in the news for the past, I mean, month, basically, all throughout March.

Every time I open up, you know, Google and I have my Google alerts set, there's new information about Riley Strain and a lot of misinformation, by the way. But, yeah. No, it's something where I was obviously seeing it on social media. There were certain clips coming out of very limited footage of Riley. And it wasn't until recently when the, and I know we're going to get in all of it tonight, some body cam footage was released. And that's when I decided to weigh in just on my preliminary kind of observations from it, from my experience and what I, as a, both a patrolman and

a detective, and also as a human being and as someone who was a college kid at one point, all of those things, just, and obviously the, the geography that I, I'd put up some Google maps and stuff to kind of just put out what it looked like, although it's not always how it appears to be, but I wanted to weigh in on it because a lot of people were, and I did see some misinformation, as you were saying. And before we get into all of it, this is a little different for us, for Crime Weekly, because we normally do deep dives on these cases and there's not going to be a deep dive here. It's going to be one episode just tonight. We're changing it up. So we're going to go through everything, but I'd really appreciate it. I think we both would. If at the end of all this, tell us what you think about it. This is a different situation for us because it's more than Crime

Weekly News would get into. It's got more meat on the bone, but it's also not what we normally do for Crime Weekly. So this is kind of a hybrid. it's in between, but if this is something and just be, you know, be brutally honest, but if this is something that you guys want to change up here and there on cases like this, where there is enough to kind of break it down where it's not necessarily two, three, four, eight parts. It would be like my coffee and crime time, basically. Basically like the, the, the OG, the coffee and crime time. And I really wanted to cover it because we were talking about it a few nights ago and you kind of just like you went off and you were saying all this stuff and i was like i wanted to tell you to stop and save it

because i wanted to cover it and you had so much good insight and and opinions so uh i hope you can replicate that tonight i'll do my best i'll do my best. I'll do my best. But yeah, that's why we're covering it. Definitely a change of pace. Some of you may like it. Some of you may not. I'm assuming that will be the situation, but overall, give us the constructive criticism. We'd like to be able to cover cases like this. It will be different than what we normally do. Definitely not the norm. We like the long form podcast. We like, that's what we embrace. And that's, I think makes us different. But every once in a while, something that I became invested in, not only for Riley and his family, but also for my own kids. Because I do think in tragedy, there's always

lessons that can be learned and applied to that specific situation, but also to your own life, which may prevent something like this from happening. So that's my investment in it at this point. And we obviously want to share that with you guys. And hopefully some of the tips or recommendations that we come out of this with will prevent this from happening to someone that you love or care about. Yeah, hopefully. But I think, you know, when your kids get older, they go to college, they start drinking, they start having like their own autonomy, their own lives. It's just a very stressful situation. It's kind of similar to what we were discussing with Crime Weekly News and Laila Santanello, where her mother said, I suppressed her a lot because I was afraid of just letting

her go out willy-nilly into a world she wasn't prepared for, into a world where people aren't very nice all the time and where there's dangers, the night is dark and winter is coming and all that stuff. So it is, it's very stressful. And I, I already do have a child that went through college and, uh, I can tell you that for three years, I was stressed out about something exactly like this happening or something similar to it, you know, because she's, she's a woman and, you know, you worry about sexual assault on college campuses and things like that. And, you know, I've already been planting the seed with Tenley, you know, because she's, she's a woman and, you know, you worry about sexual assault on college campuses and things like that. And, you know, I've already been planting the seed with Tenley, you know, she's 11, but I've already been planting the seed. Like, oh, schools around here are so great. These state schools, they're just amazing. And think about all the money you would save. And I would just give that money to you to just do whatever you want with, if you stayed here and

I don't know, live with me forever. I just always tell the kids, like, just go to like a trade school and then work for me or something, you know, like just stay here with me forever where you're safe. You know, what did you know? I went to a trade school. Yeah. I think it, I think trade school is amazing by the way. Not for college, but for high school. Yeah. Oh, you had like a, what was it like BOCES? A vocational school. So like a, so Davies Tech, shout out to Davies Tech. What did you learn to do? Did you like learn to rebuild engines? I took auto body for four years. I figured.

Auto body for four years. I almost went that route. I almost worked for DuPont. So can you change the oil in a car? Can definitely change the oil in the car. I didn't necessarily learn that at school, but I learned how to repair body panels and paint vehicles. I probably couldn't do it now.

Oh, very cool. But back in the day, I could paint a fender, man. Paint the hell out of a car. I could paint a fender. Well, let's talk about Riley Strand because he wasn't your typical frat boy. Standing at six foot five with a thin build, the 22-year-old was a gentle giant with the soul of a child, according to his cousin, Jake Bradley, who said, quote, Yeah, he likes to have fun with his buddies and all that. If you saw him outside of that, his love and his care and his kindness were of a five-year-old boy that loved every toy he ever had, end quote. And according to Riley's cousin, Jake, Riley was best friends with Jake's two-year-old son. You know, he was just very innocent, and he had a fun-loving personality, a childlike energy.

And Riley was very close to his mother, Michelle Whited. He talked to her every single day. Even when he went away to college, he kept in touch with her. He always let her know what he was doing, told her he loved her. Very good relationship. And on the evening of March 8th, when he was in Nashville, Riley was in constant communication with Michelle as he and his friends bar hopped. He FaceTimed his mother from the Friends in Low Places bar and honky-tonk owned by Garth Brooks. That was a great song. You remember that song? really no i've got friends in low places how do you

yeah hello just got that copyright good job uh i don't think i sound like earthbrook but i couldn't tell the difference i know it was pretty i will say i mean we've been to nashville so i mean like hearing about these places we didn't leave the hotel though but hopefully when we go to nashville this year maybe Nashville this year, maybe we can get out. Maybe we can get out of jail for a night, you know, because we did not leave the hotel when we were there for Podcast Movement. It was a great hotel.

I mean, the pizza was good. Remember the pizza? Pizza was great. So he's at Friends in Low Places Bar and Honky Tonk owned by Garth Brooks. And before Michelle went to bed at 7.30, her son Riley wanted to talk to her, let her know that he was having fun. He had his friends with him, his buddies, his frat brothers. They were kind of teasing Michelle for already being in bed at 7.30. And apparently

during that conversation, Riley also revealed that he'd also been to Miranda Lambert's Casa Rosa bar earlier in the night. So they went to Casa Rosa first, then Friends in Low Places, and their next stop is where stuff's going to go down. Yeah, and just to give a little context, because you are right, it wasn't with you that I went to Nashville, but I did go back for a bachelor party with Cody, for any of the Big Brother fans out there. Yeah, you did. I'm surprised you remember anything from that time.

I remember it. And we did go to Miranda Labrador's. And I will tell you, I've been a lot of places. I've been to Louisiana. And I've been on, what's the name of that street? I'm drawing a blank right now. Bourbon Street. I've been on Bourbon Street.

And I've experienced that. And honestly, it was more overwhelming on Broadway because it's just this wide street. All these bars are right on top of each other. Music just pouring out of them. People stumbling around. The entire road. It's a wide road is just filled with people. There's no cars allowed and it's just a massive amount of people. So the reason I bring it up is not to talk about how great Nashville is because it is great. Shout out CrimeCon coming up soon.

Yeah, we do love, I love Nashville, yeah. Love Nashville. But my point behind it is when you're down in these areas, you're going there with good intentions. You may be going with friends, but with the amount of people, if you just stand at the top of Broadway and you look down before you get in there and you look at the wave of people that just stretches all the way down this road and it's a long road. You have to assume that in that amount of people, there's probably some people in there that don't have the best intentions that aren't

there for a good time. And so it's, it's something where it's like, oh, Derek, why are you being a Debbie Downer? But these are the things you have to think about when you walk into that situation, just because you have good intentions with that vast amount of people, you have to approach it with the level of skepticism that, hey, most of these people are here for the same reason. But just from a statistical standpoint, there's probably a few people in here who are looking for that person to take advantage of. Could be a man, could be a woman, could be a group of people, could be someone who's by themselves. So knowing that when you go to situations like this, the more people that are there,

the more likely it is that there's someone amongst the crowd who's looking for someone to prey on. And that's one thing that when I was there, I was with a group of people, it was something that I was considering thinking, I don't know who's around for someone to prey on. And that's one thing that when I was there, I was with a group of people. It was something that I was considering thinking, I don't know who's around me right now. I can't make it one way or the other. I look around to my left, I look to my right, you're shoulder to shoulder with these people. And you just never know. You never know what you're going to encounter. And that's coming from a guy who's, I'm a decent size. I know how to defend myself, former police officer, but I was still very cautious of my surroundings.

But you always are, man. It doesn't matter where we are. It's you. But I'm glad you just said that. Cause that's how you have to be. Yeah. But I don't have to be like that when I'm with you. Cause that you're doing it for me and I can just relax and drink.

Yeah. Okay. But I will say, I will say it's hard to go into a place like, you know, Broadway on Nashville or what was it? Sixth Street in Austin. Yeah. And be like, oh, I have to keep my wits about me right now. When you're going to an area that's specifically designed to get blackout drunk, basically. Right. You know. Right. So it's hard because you go out and you think it's this party atmosphere and it's a lot of fun, but those are the areas where, you know. You got to be most aware. Yeah, absolutely. That's exactly. That's what I'm trying to say here. It's like, yeah, you want to let your hair down. You want to have a good time.

And we want you to do that. But there is another side to that coin. But you also have to be careful. And not only for yourself, but your friends. Just make sure Kevin Costner, the bodyguard, a.k.a. Derek, is with you. Bring a bodyguard. He was like, when we were in Nashville, we were in the hotel bar and you had your back to the wall and your arms folded and you were like scanning the room. And I'm like, there's two

people in here, man. What do you think is going to happen? That's how I roll. All right. So let's take a quick break. We'll be right back. So according to Riley's stepfather, Christopher Whited, Riley didn't sound as if he'd been drinking a lot when he was on FaceTime with his mother. And after getting off the phone with his mother, Riley continued to text her coherently for the next hour. Michelle Whited said, quote, he was sending me texts after we FaceTimed saying, Mama, I love you. Have a good night. And sending me pictures from the different bars they were going to show me. They were having a good time, end quote. So a few buildings down from Friends in Low Places was Luke Bryan's bar.

Well, is Luke Bryan's bar. It's still there. It's called Luke's 32 Bridge Food and Drink. And this is where Riley and his friends ended up on that Friday night. Around 9.40 p.m., Riley was removed from the establishment and separated from his friends, who would later claim that they were trying to pay the bill and the bouncers would not allow them to leave with Riley. Now, the restaurant and the bar has since countered this claim, saying there was no bill left to settle and Riley's friends were not prevented from leaving with him. But either way, Riley got separated from his group. And when they called him on his cell phone, he told them that he was headed back to their hotel, the Tempo, which was about six blocks away. Now, there was also

reports saying that after he left Luke Bryan's bar, he tried to enter the bar across the street and he was denied entrance. And then he sort of, you know, started stumbling to his hotel, but also not in the right direction that he would be going if he wanted to go to the bar. I mean, to the hotel. Yeah. There's a couple of things we can take from this. First off, I'm not making this direct at Luke Bryan's. I've been to Luke Bryan's. I had a great time. Seems like a great bar. This is something they deal with every single weekend. But I will say it's not in their best interest to get behind this and say, oh yeah, we separated them. This happened. So you have to take what they're saying with a grain of salt. It may be true. It may not be. I'm going to talk about a case. I think it's true. I would honestly like to think it was as well.

Allegedly, there's surveillance video of one of Riley's friends, because Riley was asked to leave. One of his friends, because you know it's a rooftop bar, right? Right, yeah. Most of them have different levels. Yeah, one of Riley's friends walked downstairs with him, walked him out the front door, but then the friend returned to the bar and Riley left alone. Yeah. So it could, it could be a situation where they wanted to keep having fun and partying. The bar is like, Hey, listen, they didn't have a bar. And that could be the other side to it, right? Like one, it could be the bar covering their ass. The other side

could be the friends who now feel guilty about what happened. We're trying to justify the fact that basically they let their buddy leave on his own because they weren't done partying yet. And I want to qualify all this because these people are out there. We have a big social media presence that's following this case. I'm not saying it's their fault. I'm not saying they did anything wrong. I'm not even saying that what I'm putting out there is what the case may be. There may have been a bill they had to pay, or they may have thought there was a bill they had to pay. They maybe thought they left their credit card at the bar when they had an open tab. There's a lot of reasons that this could have happened, but this goes back to what we always say, which regardless

of the circumstances, if there's two people there and your person, the person you're with gets booted out, you should be going with them. If there's five people there and someone gets booted out, one person has to go with them at least. Buddy system. Yeah, buddy system. And that's not gender specific. No, no, no. I don't care who you are. This is a perfect example of that.

I don't care if you're an eight foot dude, you know, who's trained in mixed martial arts. If you're under that condition where you're not operating on all cylinders, you can't really make conscious decisions if you're that under, you know, under the weather, which we're going to get into that as well. How intoxicated was he? Was he under something that he wasn't aware of? Was he drugged while he was there? We're going to get into all that.

But just on the surface, if you're looking at your friend and you can tell that they're not in the right state of mind and they're having trouble walking through the bar, you don't want to let them go off on their own. Regardless of the situation, there's always going to be another night to party and to go out again. And I will go out on a limb and say, regardless of the reasoning behind not leaving the bar, I feel safe in saying that more than likely the friends now are sitting here in hindsight saying, damn, I wish I would have went with him. I'm a hundred percent sure that his friends weren't like, oh, we're going to send Riley out there and something bad's going to happen to him. It's 945. It's still early. It's

a Friday night. They're like, damn boy, why'd you get so drunk already? Like go on back to the hotel and sleep it off. The hotel's not too far. Six blocks. And like we said, a lot of people there. What's going to happen on that main road? There's cops everywhere. Every corner, there's a police officer. I mean, I would have called them an Uber, but you know, whatever. Now here's the thing about that. That's a great point because I have seen some people say that, and I had to get an Uber from there. When you're down in Broadway where like all the bars are. They don't go up there.

There is no access. You're either going off one of the side streets, which is a little bit of a troop, a little bit of a walk away. And also dangerous. Dangerous in its own right. Because you've got like side streets, alleys. It's dark. That's where, alleys. It's dark. That's where shit goes down, yeah.

It's definitely dark over there. So the main thing you can do is walk all the way back up Broad Street and catch an Uber at one of the open streets. But most of it's shut down. There are cross streets, like intersections that are open that are monitored by police. But I will tell you, it was very difficult to get an Uber every night, even when, you know, we, there's five of us working together. Some Ubers were able to get to us, some were not. So it just seems like it might've been a situation where they got, they got Riley outside and he, he started making his walk before the, the, the buddies even had a chance to figure out what they were doing. And that's probably why they called him to say hey dude where'd you go we're coming out right now where are you and he's yes because they said

but by the time they came out he he was gone so they probably told him like stay put well we'll just grab our stuff and be out and then he he took off but i will say like and i'm not trying to offend anybody or like say the wrong thing even though i always do. But I think women are more cognizant of this stuff, like putting their friends into cabs or Ubers. Because I remember being a little inebriated in the French Quarter in New Orleans. And it was a true crime thing. And we were there with all people we knew. And one of us had a little too much to drink. And it wasn't me this time. No, it was never me. I never have too much drink. But one of us had a little too much to drink. And it wasn't me this time. No, it was never me. I never have too much drink. But one of us had a little too much to drink. And I remember we were at the Cat's Meow doing karaoke.

I missed my song to walk this girl out and order an Uber on my phone, pay for it, and put her in there and put her hotel in. And basically, I took a picture of the Uber driver. And I was like, get her there safely, you know, and like her hotel in. And basically, I took a picture of the Uber driver and I was like, get her there safely, you know, and like threatening and stuff. But I think just women are more cognizant of this because in general, society thinks men can take care of themselves. And I mean, objectively, most people can, most adults can take care of themselves. But it's when you're in an unfamiliar place and you don't have your wits about you that we basically become little babies at that point. We need somebody to take care of us,

and there's no shame in that. No, I agree with everything you're saying. And just to even add on to that, what we can take from this is even when you do everything right, like you were saying, you take a photo of the Uber driver, you threaten them, you do all this stuff. And we always mention this phrase, victim of opportunity. There may be a situation where the offender at the time doesn't even have an intent to do anything that night. But when a victim is found to be alone, that's when this person decides to act. So you may create a situation just by the lack of, of other people being there. So when in doubt, regardless of the area in, no matter how safe it is, no matter what protocols you take to protect that person and ensure that they get home,

it's a really simple rule, buddy system. If somebody else is with you, you're absolutely, I don't know what the statistical probability is, but I can guarantee you it's a lot less likely that you're going to find yourself in a situation where someone's going to attempt to take advantage of you because if they do try that, they now have to compete with two people as opposed to one. We've talked about this in cases of abducted children, that it is far less likely for an abductor to snatch a child if that child is in the company of other children or even just one other friend. It's when they're alone and they are that victim of opportunity that there's a there, but that night might not be the night. And it may not even be by their choice. It may just be the situation they're in where an opportunity doesn't present itself. So yes, there are offenders in the crowd that you have to compete with and you have to be aware of. The question that you have to ask yourself is, are you going to give them an opportunity

to take advantage of you or someone that you're with? And you can do things that can decrease that likelihood. There's nothing ever that's 100%, but there's definitely precautions we can take to make sure that the group we're with, everyone gets home safe. So later, after they were finished doing whatever they were doing, Riley's friends returned to the Temple Hotel. And although they did see Riley's room key in the room, there was no sign of him anywhere. So they attempted to call him, but the calls went right to voicemail. So the fraternity brothers began searching for Riley. They checked his Snapchat location. They knocked on the doors of other friends staying at the hotel, other frat brothers, to see if Riley was in one of their rooms.

When they didn't find Riley anywhere, they called his mother and she and her husband got right in the car and headed to Nashville. Once there, Riley's parents took over, talking to the police and filling out a missing persons report. And then they started checking emergency rooms and morgues. But no one there at either of these places matched Riley's description. We are going to take a quick break. We'll be right back. OK, we're back.

And just to talk about timeline, we have a situation where the last time that someone speaks to Riley, we're going to talk about the other sightings, but the last time his friends speak to him is around 945, probably after that, because he gets kicked out of the bar at 945. And then he's kind of floating in that area. And when his friends eventually talked to him, he says that he's heading back to their hotel. It could have been five minutes later. It could have been 15 minutes later. But either way. I don't think it was a super long time, right? Because he's still walking. Conservatively, let's say 945 to 10 o'clock, somewhere in there. They speak to him. And then as you were saying, before the break, they later returned to the Tempo Hotel. He's not there. So we don't have this extensive window where Riley was alone by himself for a

long time. It's a very short distance, six blocks away. Maybe we don't know what time, uh, that he, they arrived back at the hotel, but let's just call it a couple hours and Riley's nowhere to be found. So we have to assume that that window is when whatever happened to Riley happened to him. And just, just to put this out there, by the way, a lot of you know this case. We're telling it in present form and current form. And we know the outcome. We're going to get there. But we're telling it this way for the people who aren't familiar with this.

So you're going along with the story. But we know that there's been an outcome to this to a certain degree. We're going to tell that portion as well. But we are telling the story in present tense. Yeah, I think I said that at the top of the episode. Tragic end. You know what? I wasn't paying attention then.

Thanks. No problem. All right. So listen, the Metropolitan Nashville Police Department headed the search using boats on the Cumberland River, searching the banks of the river on foot and searching the area by helicopter. And then on Tuesday, police released surveillance footage of Riley Strain leaving the bar. But instead of turning right, which would have led him in the direction of his hotel, he turned left.

Most likely, he just took a wrong turn. He didn't intentionally try to go away from the hotel. Now, the video follows Riley's movements as he stumbled unsteadily through downtown Nashville. Apparently he had started up Third Street. He told his friends he was heading back to their hotel, but instead a surveillance camera from an escape room on Third Avenue North caught this video of him walking by. That's when he cut across the parking lot. When you can see him in the video go down, it's pretty disturbing.

Other nearby cameras caught these. You see Riley turning onto Church Street and then stumble onto Gay Street. He made it, as far as we know, basically to the James Robertson Bridge. And that's at the critical time where what I call it, when things went dark. What we don't know or have video of is where he went after this last Life 360 ping near the James Robertson Parkway Bridge at 9 53 p.m. We would like to see a little bit right before the parking lot to kind of know what was happening before the parking lot and then we'd also like to know what happened after he crossed down onto Gay Street, because there's such a void that we haven't seen. There's something there that's going to fill some gaps.

Our whole heart is out there somewhere, and we need to find him. Riley's path took him up 3rd Avenue North. That surveillance from the escape room captured him passing by at 9.44 p.m., so minutes after leaving the bar. Then he stumbled through the crosswalk at Church Street. He crashed into a pole pretty hard. Then he turned onto Gay Street, where he disappeared from surveillance video.

Minutes later, a Life 360 tracker thing, it's an app that you have for like family location. Yep, that pinged Riley's last known location at the corner of James Robertson Parkway and First Avenue North. And this is where he had a brief interaction with a police officer. Yes. And I know we have a clip for that, right? Yes. Before we get to that, just so yeah, that's where we're at. I think the one thing you can take from this video is that he was clearly under the influence

of either alcohol or was he drugged at the bar? I don't know. But it doesn't take a detective or a rocket scientist to figure out. We've all been there. He was not in the right state of mind, which is part of the reason he went the wrong way. There are some questions. I get where the family's coming from, like what happened before it. But it doesn't look like from that video, anyone was chasing him.

Anyone was interacting with him. Anyone was following him. It doesn't appear that he's running away from anybody. So that doesn't mean that does not foul play. What I'm saying is that this portion of the video up to that point, there's nothing that suggests he was under the right state of mind and just encountered the wrong people, it clearly, to me, says, hey, listen, he was kicked out of the bar because he was highly intoxicated.

He wasn't even given access to another bar because he was highly intoxicated. He went the wrong way from the hotel. Or he appeared to be heavily intoxicated. Appeared to be intoxicated or under some type of influence. Some influence, yeah. Some influence. Some influence, yeah. Some influence. And then he went the wrong way home because, again, he's not operating under the right state of mind from whatever he's under. I'm going to assume it's alcohol.

We know in Nashville and many other parts of the country, especially in Nashville, there has been an uptick in people who are being drugged at these locations. So is it possible? Of course it is, but I'm only looking at what I can see and I'm trying to be pragmatic about it and not speculate. That's what I take away from this video. We have up to that point at the bridge and that brings us to the police officer video, which is by the way, what got me to react to this case and what had me put something out on Twitter. But do you want to play that now and then we can weigh in? Yeah, let's play that now. Okay, let's play it.

How are you doing, sir? I'm good. How are you? Good. So this Nashville police officer was actually in that area at that time investigating reports of a broken in car. And this is when Riley approaches him from the opposite direction. Now, Derek said there's a longer clip where you can see Riley come into frame earlier on and he was doing what you said, stamping his feet. Yeah. So if you go on my Twitter or you can just Google it, it's everywhere. It's only maybe like 30 seconds, 40 seconds longer. But initially when the officer's walking, you see Riley kind of

off in the distance and he looks slouched over. He's got like a hard stomp to him, something you would see with someone who's inebriated or under some type of influence. Like a heavy shuffle. Like a heavy shuffle. He's like kind of leaning forward, almost like you see in the video that we just played before that. It's a similar manner, similar stature. And he's, he's walking very heavy footed as he's approaching the officer. Then we got the clip that we just played there. And in my opinion, again, from personal experience, I don't mind admitting it. And as a police officer, it's amazing what someone can do when they're intoxicated and don't see me

initially, but then when they see me in uniform, they suddenly sober up for a second, right? Yeah. How are you, sir? How are you doing? That'll do it, man. We've all been there, or most of us have been there. I shouldn't say all. And to me, if you see that full clip, you see that in the distance. Riley clearly doesn't see the officer, like he doesn't have his lights and sirens on the cruiser going. So he's just walking down the road in his uniform.

And that can be pretty discreet. So especially at night when it's dark at night and he's under the influence of something. So he's looking down. Then to me, what that video shows that we just saw is Riley looks up, realizes he's not in the best shape right now and sobers up for just a second to at least give the impression to the officer that he's perfectly fine. He even acknowledges the officer, hey, how's it going? And he's got a good stature, his shoulders are back, cool as a cucumber at that point. He looks very well put together. But the other part of that clip

that we don't see, which is extremely important, and I slowed this down frame by frame because there were so many people speculating about it online. But that officer continues to go in the direction as he's passing Riley. But then about 27 seconds, don't quote me on that, but that was how I timed it. Let's say 27 to 30 seconds later, the officer spins back around and starts waking, making his way back down the sidewalk in the direction that Riley was going. And in my opinion, after slowing it down frame by frame, I don't see Riley anywhere in that clip. He's already gone. And based on the pace that he was moving, we should have still seen him.

The bridge is really off in the distance. There is some shadowy things that you see. The video isn't that clear. I zoomed in on it. I looked at what other people were posting. I thought it was just fixtures from the street, parking meters, whatever it might be. It did not look like a human figure to me. In my opinion, when that officer turns back around, Riley's already gone. And I don't know if you want to go down this path yet, Stephanie, but there is the surrounding

area, which I put up a Google map on my Twitter, and we could do it here as well, that could lead us to where we're going and what I speculated or talked about in my little synopsis of it, because to me, it's extremely important that when that officer turns around, Riley's nowhere to be found because you can see into the road. And if he's not crossing the street, there's only one other way he could go. I mean, he may have ducked off to the side of the road, concerned that the police officer would turn back around and be like, hey, you, you know, because you're paranoid when you're drunk like that.

This is what we talked about. Yeah. We think everybody can tell that you're, you're hammered, you know, and you're just super nervous about it and paranoid. So he might've been like, let me just go off to the side right quick. Take a second, take a breather. Yeah. That way I'm not, you know, it's the same way you would, if you were driving and maybe you had a little alcohol, you, you see a cop pass you and then you're like, Hey, maybe I'll pull over maybe off a side street for now, you know, like just for a little bit. Exactly right. Completely agree with you. And I won't go too far down. I think we're going to get there on this. But that was my observations from it. I feel like he just went off the path and it was really only one or one other way to go. And I put that on Twitter. I didn't I didn't go too far with it to say anything because you didn't know at that point and there could be other things. But that was my initial observations after

seeing that video, which was really critical. And I think you're going to get into it, but the whereabouts or the tracking of Riley ended moments after that. So that's why that video is so important. Yes, because this is the last person technically to see Riley alive. However, he did speak to somebody else, not his friends, not that police officer. He spoke to somebody else shortly before he vanished. And we're going to talk about that after this next break. So Riley's last known location was near Public Square along the Cumberland River off of the James Robertson Parkway. The last person Riley spoke to that night was via text. And according to family friend Chris Dingman, Riley was, quote, seeing a young lady that was a recently new relationship.

And she is literally the last person that we know that had any communication with Riley from the family. She said she even had to Google it. She didn't understand what that slang was. That just goes to show what kind of state of mind he was in at the time. This is all within a 10-minute window when he was seen to when he went missing, end quote. So some people were speculating, you know, instead of just saying this kid, you know, is under the influence of something and he can't text properly, some people were saying it was a code or it was slang and maybe L-O-P-S or LOPS was an acronym for low on power. Sorry. I don't know why you

would say good low on power. Sorry. But he was probably just trying to say good, good luck or maybe like I'm having a good time. I don't know. But it didn't come out. However, it doesn't appear to be the case that Riley's phone was low on battery when it shut off. It was a cryptic message. He was responding to a girlfriend who texted him and asking if he was having fun. He responds, good L-O-P-S. You said it was unclear what that meant, but some have said it could have stood for low on power, sorry, referring to his phone battery, which was near death and died a few minutes later.

Riley did have battery power at the time his phone went dark. So that's been helpful. We have found out that information. It wasn't, you know, like, you know, he was at 5%, which most kids run around on and it frustrates us as parents and we text them, plug your phone in, you know. But no, at this moment, what we have been told is that the phone did not die due to battery capacity. Now, at that time, police were reporting that they did not believe Riley had become a victim of foul play and that he did not appear distressed in the body cam footage was just taken minutes before his phone stopped transmitting his location. Police spokesperson Don Aaron said, quote, to those who are saying that they believe he could have been in distress,

that somebody could have been after him as he walked onto Gay Street. Well, as you can see in the video, he's walking by himself on the riverside and speaks to a police officer as the officer is looking at a vehicle that's been broken into, end quote. And I think that's pretty much what you're talking about, that people were looking at this body cam footage, sort of slowing it down, zooming in, trying to prove or speculate upon the fact that Riley was being followed, chased even, that he was in distress, that he was going in the wrong direction because he was trying to get away from somebody. But, you know, according to this police spokesperson, in this footage, you don't see anybody following him. So that couldn't have been the case.

I agree. And so I don't have to reiterate that. That's clearly what it looked like to me. Now, there is always that room, that spot there where we were talking about the 27 to 30 seconds where the officer turns back around and Riley's gone. Could he have encountered someone that was off the side of the road at that point that he then engaged with in a confrontational manner who this person saw Riley and took advantage of him? Yes. At this point, that's still something that I'm considering because yes, I can say in one breath, it doesn't look like he was distressed up to the video that we have that doesn't automatically rule out the factressed up to the video that we have, that doesn't automatically

rule out the fact that whatever happened to him was still at the hands of another. And we just didn't capture it on video after the officer sees him. So yes, up to that point, not in distress, not being chased. I agree with that assessment, but there is a small window there where we don't know. A very small window though. Yes. Very small window. And you would think that if there was a confrontation't know. A very small window though. Yes. Very small window. And you would think that if there was a confrontation, maybe the officer would have

heard it if two guys were fighting. Yeah. He was right there. Yeah. He was right there, but still I have nothing at this point to, to concretely rule that out. So in my opinion, as I'm looking at this, that small window, although very small, like you said, still a possibility that there's someone over there. Again, like we say, victim of opportunity who sees Riley as he's staying off to the side to kind of stay out of the, you know, the sights of the officer and they go, Hey, look at this college kid. He's drunk. He's probably got some money on him. I heard, I heard there's a pretty big homeless population that sometimes stays over there. There's still some possibilities there when we're trying to figure out, at this point, what happened to Riley. Well, on March 17th, Riley's debit card was found on the banks of the Cumberland River, near a pair of homeless encampments.

Breaking news, 22-year-old missing college student Riley Strain's credit card has just been discovered. It was found right near the embankment of the Cumberland River in Nashville. Nashville Search and Rescue is scouring the banks for the remains of Riley as we speak. Riley's family is also here on the scene as they are making this discovery. As we know, Riley went missing after being kicked out of Luke Bryan's bar on Broadway. As we speak, the two girls who actually found Riley's credit card are being interviewed by Fox News. These are the two girls right here that actually made the discovery of Riley's missing credit card after going down into this embankment.

As you can see, it's very treacherous and it's kind of a drop off straight to the Cumberland River. Reports indicate that Riley's phone last pinged right underneath this bridge. So I like this video a lot for those who are watching on YouTube, because if you're not from the Nashville area or you're not familiar with the Nashville area, it shows you the kind of terrain that you're dealing with. It's not like there was a road and then the river was right there level with the road. It's like a guardrail sort of, and then a very steep embankment, and then the river is there. So for those of you who are listening on audio and you're not able to watch, that's kind of the terrain that we're dealing with. Yeah, strongly recommend going and looking up a map.

And for YouTube, I'm going to put that map up right here. Or you can watch our YouTube video. Yeah, you can watch our YouTube video. But the first map I'm going to have Shannon throw up is right here. And this is going to show the different sightings from Luke's that we talked about tonight. And then it's going to also show you in relation to where the last sighting was, where the bank card was found. And obviously that's extremely important because as I said, initially you have Riley, you see him, and then he kind of disappears. In my opinion, the only way he could have went was off to the right. And you can see how rough

that terrain is, is kind of like a drop off there there right into the Cumberland River. And if you look at the video, although it's tough because it is a body cam, it's very dark to the right, very dark. And I could see a world where even a sober person who is not familiar with the area goes down there to maybe grab something, trips, falls, rolls right into the river. Nevermind a person that we've seen on video for multiple moments here who is having trouble even walking down a sidewalk. So it's just a recipe for disaster. And that was my initial impressions even before the bank card. The bank card is extremely concerning for two reasons. The motive behind someone interacting with him would more than likely to be to rob him and steal his wallet.

Yes, you could make an argument that they would throw the credit card in the water to not tie it to them. Maybe they just stuck to cash. But the fact that you only find the credit card leads me to believe that maybe it was in his possession. It was in his pocket. And when he took a tumble, it slipped out. Exactly. He takes a tumble and it falls out before he goes into the water. And again, it all lines up with where he is last seen. And then the

credit card is found right there. So at this point with that bank card, as an investigator, we may not be saying it publicly, but all the signs are pointing to a, to a tragic outcome. And this is very hard to like go through because I have a son, right? And I think about Riley's mother. And as these little tidbits are coming out, like just the hope that she had that he was sleeping it off somewhere or, you know, someone was taking care of him is just like slipping away every single day and new information is coming out. And it's so difficult to put yourself in the shoes of a mother whose son is missing. And every time more news comes out about his case, it's just disheartening. And I mean, this had to have been and still has to be just the absolute worst, the worst experience that has ever happened to these people, Riley's family, especially him being so close to his mother. So it's very difficult to, you know, we're talking about it a little clinically because it's what we do. We talk about the facts and things.

But just thinking of if this was my son, Aiden, and I was hearing this stuff and seeing these TikToks and stuff and then, you know, having true crime podcasts talk about it. It's a nightmare, honestly. And our hearts go out to Riley's family and especially his mother who, you know, loved him very, very much. Yeah. And at this point,

as we're talking about this, it doesn't look good, but I'm sure that the family is still holding out hope at this point when they find the card thinking, okay, we have something where there may have been an issue at this point. Could he have been involved in an altercation where he was taken against his will and he's still somewhere?

I know that's probably running through the parent's mind. Like, hey, is he somewhere right now waiting for us to find him? Yes, it doesn't look good. But until you know for certain that is something that I'm sure is a scenario that I mean, as terrible as it sounds, I'm sure that the family is holding on to hoping that's the case. And they're like you said, there's these homeless encampments right around right around this area. So the family was honestly speculating from a place of hope. You know, maybe these homeless people saw Riley Riley drunk and one of them took him in, gave him some water, let him sleep, and he's going to stumble home in the morning or he's

still with somebody. Who knows? But just his debit card being there doesn't necessarily mean anything. And it might actually bring hope because it's like, okay, he wasn't robbed. He wasn't targeted. He could still be out there. And it's just I just can't imagine the anxiety and the not knowing. And then when you finally do know, it's not what you hoped for. There's one final thing I want to mention, and I'm not 100 percent on this. So if I'm wrong, correct me in the comments. But I believe there was a witness potentially after this incident, after the officer's footage

that may have seen Riley again. And I don't think there were 100 percent that it was Riley, but they described this person as being extremely intoxicated and taking, quote, one of the worst falls into a bush that they've ever seen. Yeah. So there was more than one person in these homeless encampments. Several people reportedly saw Riley in this area on the evening of March 8th. One resident of this homeless camp saw Riley fall into some bushes, and then Riley got back up and disappeared into the night. And another resident who saw the same thing said, quote, we heard a commotion. We looked up. He almost fell over. The last bush right there caught him. He was very, very, very intoxicated.

I have never seen anybody stumble that hard before. I yelled, get up. They said, he's just drunk. He's okay. End quote. I think when he's saying they said that, it just means like the other people in that camp were like, ah, he's fine. You know, he's just drunk. Don't worry about him. Yeah. Yeah. That's, this is all not looking good, but that's why we're bringing it up to give the context to describe to accurately the condition that Riley was under. And then you base that, you, you add that to the layout of the, of the land of where he is. And it's, it's not good. And we're going to continue on with it. There's more to talk about. There's definitely stuff to take from this story that I think we can all learn from, but before we do, let's take our last break for the episode. We'll be right back.

So given Riley's clear inebriated condition combined with the location he was last known to be, there was obviously speculation that he'd fallen in the river and drowned. The Cumberland River spans 688 miles, cutting a path through southern Kentucky and middle Tennessee before connecting with the Ohio River. It runs through two major cities, Clarkson and Nashville, and there's eight dams along the river. The river is usually used by large barges transporting goods. Tennessee Wildlife Resource Agency Captain Josh Landrum stated that the river presents several dangers to people, especially at night and especially in cold temperatures. Landrum stated that the river presents several dangers to people, especially at night and especially in cold temperatures. Landrum said, quote, undertoes can be present anytime there is wind and strong currents in river systems. However, typically through the downtown area,

the river is narrow and the river current is the greatest danger. A strong river current alone could cause even a good swimmer difficulty in getting back to the shoreline if they were to fall in, end quote. On March 8th, the water velocity of the Cumberland River was measured at 3.81 feet per second, according to the United States Geological Survey data. Additionally, temperatures on March 8th were in the 50 degree range, making hypothermia a real threat to anyone who might find themselves in the water. However, Riley's stepfather, Christopher Whited, wasn't 100% sold on this theory, stating, quote, I've done a fair amount of drinking in my life and I still

question whether it was alcohol or something else, end quote. Whited also claims that since Riley's disappearance, he has received messages from up to 10 people who claim they were drugged or roofied at Nashville bars. And I myself have seen TikToks of people making the same claim and not even in connection with Riley's case, just making claims something was put into their drink while they were at the bar. And one girl, I couldn't find the TikTok again, but she said, I have no idea how anything got in my drink because the bartender made it. The bartender handed it to me. I held it in my hand. I drank it pretty quickly.

There was never an opportunity for anybody to slip anything in as far as I know. But yet within 15 minutes, I was stumbling, could barely walk. My vision was blurry. I didn't know what was happening to me and I'd only had one drink. So I'm going to play a clip of somebody who lives in Nashville explaining that this does seem to happen. If you've been following the case of missing 22 year old Riley Strain is from before you think, oh, he's so drunk. It's downtown Nashville. One of the things that you need to know is that we have a serious roofing problem on Broadway in Nashville and I don't think a lot of people outside of this area know how seriously

bad it is. It's unfortunate that it's a common known thing here and that women that are Nashville locals that live here don't go to that area because it's so unsafe because it's something's happened to them or somebody they know. And I just feel terrible for all of the out-of-towners that are coming here that don't know that it's a problem and that we're allowing it. I mean, that's the worst part of all of this. And I just hope they find him. And I hope that this brings attention to the bigger issue we have. So yeah, I think that video is extremely important. As far as this case is concerned,

it looks like he's intoxicated. He could be under the influence of a drug that he wasn't aware of. He could have been roofied. I'm not disputing that claim. I have no evidence to say one way or the other. So I'm not going to go down that road. All I've been saying this entire episode, I think we've been saying is he was intoxicated. He was under the influence of something. He wasn't in the right state of mind. What I will say for all our listeners and viewers out there who are concerned about this, you absolutely should be.

It doesn't only happen in Nashville. It happens throughout the entire country. A couple small things that you can do that may help this is number one, be with someone else. Don't be out drinking by yourself. That's number one. But whether you're with someone or not, there are devices, there are things that you can purchase that are relatively inexpensive to prevent this from happening. But also if you feel like you have been roofied, there's ways of finding out almost immediately. So first off,

when you don't have anything else on you, never leave your drink unattended. There's even like socks you can buy or scrunchies that you can purchase. Nail polish, I heard. Well, yeah. Well, the scrunchies can go over the cup so that only the straw will be sticking out. That's one option. That's an easy thing. But if you don't want that look, the other thing that you mentioned, I think I've mentioned

this to you. There's two other alternatives. You can buy a nail polish that you dip into the drink and it will immediately turn the nail a specific color. If there's something found in that drink, specifically a date rape drug. There's also, if you don't want to do that, like if you don't wear nail polish. Or you don't want to dip your finger into your drink because you've been touching everything. Listen, that's the least of your concerns at a bar. But I mean, yeah, I'm with you.

The other thing you can do is there's, uh, and I apologize for not having, uh, the actual name brand of it. You can look it up, but there's something you can put on the back of your phone. It like adheres to it. It's like an adhesive and you basically take a small amount of your drink, dip it onto that little spot and it'll change color. Again, if there's something in your drink that you need to be aware of. So they have strips too. You just dip them into your drink, dip it onto that little spot and it'll change color. Again, if there's something in your drink that you need to be aware of. They have strips too. You just dip them into your

drink. You can buy them on Amazon. Right. There's a lot of options. I don't care if you're male or female, you should have them on you just in case. If you spend it in any amount of time at bars drinking regularly, that's just going to up the odds that something like that's going to happen to you. So if you're doing that, then maybe just have those things in your purse or your pocket or your wallet when you go out just to be safe, you know, better safe than sorry. And there are things that are odorless. I'm not going to or don't have a taste to them. I'm not going to say what those things are here because I don't want to give anybody ideas. Yeah, because nobody can do an internet search.

Of course, of course. I don't want to contribute to it. But there are many victims have come forward and said that there are many instances where when they are drugged, immediately after taking that drink, they taste some type of metallic taste. So if you ever find yourself feeling like the drink tastes like metal, immediately stop drinking that drink and find someone that you trust to stay near you. Because at that point, you've already taken some of it. You've already digested some of it, but I would take that drink. I would maybe contact the police or at minimum, pour it out, give it to the bartender. You don't want someone else drinking it and get yourself around people you can trust

immediately. Because if you did taste something metallic, more than likely the person responsible for it may not be directly next to you, but maybe in the surrounding area monitoring you to see how you react to it. Yep, absolutely. Now, this is the issue though with places, like you said, it happens everywhere and it does. Happens everywhere. But places like Nashville, Austin, New Orleans, it's going to happen far more because these are big tourist areas. These are, you know, people go to Nashville. They're not usually, like young people go to Nashville. They're not usually going for like the scenery or CrimeCon.

You know, they're going because they're like, hey, this is a party town. There's lots of great honky tonks. There's great music, drinks. Everyone's having a good time. So in places like this, you do need to be more careful. And check out this clip. Because these bars in Nashville are so used to people just getting blackout drunk. Apparently, this is how some of them handle their over-served patrons. In researching Broadway and all the people that get roofied on Broadway,

I came across this. A security guard dumping a girl that's clearly intoxicated out on the sidewalk. Who is held liable? Who is held liable for these kind of things? For example, how Riley was thrown out of the bar. This girl is clearly passed out. And they just sit her outside on the street as a puppet. And people take pictures of her. Clearly passed out. Somebody could clearly put her in their car. This is Broadway in Nashville. Terrible.

Quick way to have a lawsuit on your hands, that's for sure. I'm disgusted. I'm disgusted by it. I'm disgusted by the way he wheels her out like she's trash. This is a girl who can't even keep her eyes open or stand up straight. And you're wheeling her out to the road and leaving her there like she's garbage. And then these random men are walking up to her, touching her. They don't know her. They don't know her. They're putting their hands all over her, laughing, taking pictures. It's disgusting. Now, obviously, there's personal responsibility. You shouldn't drink too much. I mean, it was daytime, too, man. I've never seen anything. Even in Vegas, I've never seen anything like it.

Really? Oh, yeah. Well, yeah, that was that was a bad position to be in. But that's when you really need to count on people like that's a bouncer. You know, that's like a security guard, technically. And you are just leaving this girl out there and anybody could have grabbed her. They two guys could have grabbed her, pulled her into an alley and raped her. Who knows? And nothing would have ever happened because she's not going to remember. It's really bad. And the fact is, like, this drinking culture

seems to have gotten out of control to the point where it's like become so large that even local law enforcement and the security of these clubs and bars can't keep it in check. And they're just like throwing people out on their ass. Like, I think she was sitting on a toilet, which is like, where did they get that from? You know, what? She can't be more than 110 pounds. Like, bring her in a back room. Give her some water.

Let her rest. Keep her safe. She's your customer. And I know you don't like that she's drunk, but who gave her the alcohol to get that drunk? Like take some responsibility for your fellow human. It's gross, dude. It's gross. I have investigated with my firm a few wrongful death lawsuits.

Oh, I remember, yeah. Yeah, I can't say the names of them, but around bars and the civil responsibility there. And they'll bring us in to kind of look at the case objectively and decide whether or not the bar has some culpability. And a lot of that requires my team and I to go out and track the steps of the whereabouts of the victim prior to that to see where they were drinking and how much they were drinking prior to the incident. And there is some civil responsibility there where if it can be proven, the bars can be held responsible, especially if a death results from it. So I don't know for sure what's going to happen here, but I wouldn't be surprised if there is some type of legal action taken on behalf of the family, Riley's family, against Luke's. I don't know if it would stick, but obviously they're very upset right now.

And they're going to want their pound of flesh and they're going to want someone held responsible. I think when we were talking on the phone the other day, I was like, you know, who's nervous right now? Luke Bryan, man. It could be an angle here, you know, where they end up going after the bar for this. But there's a lot that they would have to prove because there's a lot that happened after the fact. And there's a lot that happened before he showed up at Luke Bryan's, right? He was already at two other bars. So who do you hold responsible? Yeah, it's going to be tough. It's going to be tough. As someone who's worked these cases, it's not as easy as it sounds. Well, while the search for Riley was going on, the Tennessee Alcoholic Beverage Commission began an investigation into whether showed that Riley had purchased and was served only one alcoholic drink and two waters before he was removed from the bar.

An official statement from the company said, quote, At 9.35 p.m., our security team made a decision based on our conduct standards to escort him from the venue through our Broadway exit at the front of the building. He was followed down the stairs with one member of his party. The individual with Riley did not exit and returned upstairs. End quote. But Riley would not safely return, even though that's what everyone hoped for. Following an extensive search that stretched on for nearly two weeks, the body of Riley Strain was found Friday in the Cumberland River, about eight miles from where he was last seen. This brief interaction with a Nashville police officer responding to a car burglary near the bar shows Strain walking away from his hotel and toward the river. Two days later, volunteers searching the banks of

the Cumberland found a bank card with his name on the back. Police say they alerted businesses along the river and that it was a dock worker who first spotted strange body in the water. Police identified the 22 year old through multiple means including his watch and shirt. They have the blue the blue stretcher right there um this could be it this could be it. This could be where we have found, they have found Riley. A person was just recovered by the riverbank right where Riley was last seen on surveillance camera crossing the street. The person was loaded onto a stretcher and taken away by ambulance with the sirens on. Yeah, not the outcome that we hoped for, but definitely something that you could see as a very plausible outcome. I want to throw up a map real quick here for everyone who's watching on YouTube. And like

Stephanie said, if you're on audio, come on over real quick, check it out. But there's a map here where you can see the last known location for Riley when he was alive and where he was eventually found. As Stephanie said, it was eight miles down river. That's a pretty far distance. And there's a lot we could talk about there. We covered Robin Pope on this podcast years ago, and we talked about currents. And it wasn't until, I think, if my memory serves me correctly, it wasn't until months later that Robin was found. And it was a very short distance. It was only maybe five or six houses down. And a lot of what I learned by talking to experts in water currents and all these different things that are way above my head is that when the body goes into the water

initially, it can sink, but as it starts to decompose, it fills up with gas. We can make it more buoyant and allow it to come back to the surface. But the other things that you're dealing with and may take some time for the body to show up is all the things that are in the water, trees, tires, trash, rocks, gravel. There's a million things that the clothing of the victim can get caught on before they're discovered. And with the current going at 3.8 feet per second, that's pretty fast. But with all those hurdles to climb, it could take a little bit of time and obviously the processing of the body, the decomposing of the body before they're found. Another case that I covered on Breaking Homicide was Christopher Jenkins,

very similar story, college kid, strong, last seen walking by himself. He was ended up found in the river because he was last seen near a bridge. And it wasn't again until a much later time. People actually thought that he had been killed somewhere else and then thrown in the river to throw people off. So this happens more than we care to admit. It's not the outcome we're looking for. I mean, remember we talked about this happening in Austin to like three or four men that they were at bars drinking and then they left and then they showed up dead in the river. That's right. The Lady Bird or something. It was like Lady Bird Lake or something like that. I can't remember exactly, but it's very similar. And there's still not any certainty on whether there was foul play

involved in those cases. 100%. Good to point out. But if you're drinking and you're at a bar and it's nighttime and you're not familiar with the surroundings, you could find yourself in a place that you're not familiar with, and then you're going to lose your footing or something like that. I would hope, you know, Riley's gone either way. I would hope that it was an accident as opposed to somebody did this to him. I don't know if that's better. It just feels better, you know, to think that he wasn't targeted, that he wasn't alone and vulnerable, and somebody took advantage of, you know, this very sweet kid and ended his life for no reason.

I think that it being an accident is the least terrible scenario, I guess. You know, I will say this. I hear where you're coming from. But to me, it almost makes it worse. And the reason I say that is because it's the whole theme of why we're covering this case. Like it was avoidable, you mean? It was preventable. This was easily preventable and never should have happened. There's times where you're doing the right thing. And unfortunately, you know, you could be out for a jog and there's just a bad person there. You did nothing wrong. You did everything right. And unfortunately you become

a victim of a crime. This was preventable. This should not have happened. Regardless of how much you drank, regardless of what happened, there were multiple things by multiple individuals, not just one person where this could have been prevented from the friends to the bar itself. If Riley had been drinking, if Riley had been drinking and he wasn't drugged, drinking a little less, drinking in more moderation, although you did point out and they did point out that he had switched over to Waters, which I'm obviously happy to hear that. He's 20. He's 22, man.

He's been drinking for what, a year legally? You know you go ham when you're first like 21, 22's 22, man. He's been drinking for what, a year legally? You know, you know, you go ham when you're first like 21, 22. Oh yeah, I'm not judging. I'm not judging. I'm 40 years old and I still have those times. So not judging. But I'm just pointing out that as a parent, if something just happened to him that was out of his control or out of the control of others, then it's still terrible. But at least you can hold someone responsible for it if you find it. To think that it is just a tragic accident that could have been prevented, to me, that's even harder to come to graphs with. I don't know, because if it was someone, there's no surveillance.

It could have been, they could be anywhere. Maybe you never find out who they are or what happened. And then you never find out who they are or what happened. And then you never have closure where in this scenario, it's like, all right, I can see how that happened. And it was unavoidable and it is tragic, but at least he wasn't like targeted and attacked by somebody nefarious, I guess. I don't know. Or hurt, you know, by somebody else. I don't know. I gotcha. Well, officials say that no foul play related trauma was observed on Riley's body.

And although toxicology results are still pending, Riley's death appears to have been accidental. And obviously, the toxicology results are going to show what was his blood alcohol level? Yeah, what was the ethanol level? Did he have some substance in his system that may have caused him to appear to be more inebriated than he was. That's going to tell us a lot. And obviously, if his BAC comes back very, very high and there's no sign of any drugs that would cause him to behave that way, we kind of know what happened. Well, and listen, too, by the way, the cops have been speaking to his friends. It's going to be very quick to say, how much was he drinking? Yeah, we went to three different spots and he was drinking.

Well, they probably already gone to these shots and pulled the credit card receipts and saw how much. That's what I'm saying. They're going to pull all that. They're going to see the video camera footage. So, yeah, the toxicology report is going to tell you if there's anything else in his system, which I think is extremely important. But as far as how much he had consumed that night, really easy to figure that one out. Well, shortly after Riley's body was found, Nashville Mayor Freddie O'Connell told reporters that the city was coming up with ways to prevent tragedies like this from happening again, saying, quote, most of that initiative is focused primarily on women being safe.

But I think we're always exploring ways to make the entertainment district in particular safe, end quote. I think that ship has sailed. According to locals and all the people I was watching on Twitter, people who live in Nashville, they don't even go to Broadway anymore. They don't. It's not safe. Not only are there issues with roofies, but pickpockets and getting robbed, getting mugged constantly. They just don't find it to be a safe place. So you could make it safer, but I don't know if you're ever going to make it safe. But Nashville's also considering installing barriers to prevent pedestrians from accessing the uneven terrain at the edge of the West Bank of the Cumberland River, which is also like, duh, why haven't you done that yet? You know, you got drunk

people stumbling all over. You can't have it both ways. You can't be this tourist destination for bachelor parties and bachelorette parties and college kids to come in and get blackout drunk and not like, you know, it's like having a toddler. If you put a toddler in a room and they're not in a playpen, you put pillows on the sharp edges and stuff so that he's not knocking his head into things. If you want your city to be this drinking destination, then you better make sure you baby proofed your, you know, the surroundings around it. Like, I don't understand how he was even able to get down there. But apparently there there wasn't a lot securing him or preventing him from getting to that location. He could have even

sort of fallen over that guardrail because it's a low guardrail. Maybe he didn't even go down there intentionally. Maybe he was just leaning against the guardrail unsteady, tumbled down. That's what I think, 100%. I mean, I don't think he walked down there. I think he kind of veered off a little bit. Some people were saying that they think he walked down there to try to hide from the police. Like, oh, let me just hide out here. You know, sit down really quick, be out of sight, out of mind, sober up a little before I keep my walking up. I don't think so. I think he just was probably like, let me hide out here, leaned against the barrier and then and toppled over. Or even took one step. But I think you rolled down that hill and that's probably why the card flew out.

If he had just rolled one time and then fell into the river or stepped wrong way, the bank card would be in the river. Now, I don't know exactly where the bank card was found, how far up the bank it was located. If it's like six feet higher than the water, then I think it's even more suggested that he rolled down the hill. If the bank card was found right along the river, then it's possible it washed back on the bank after going in the water. Those are the details we would need to know. But I think based on how he was walking prior to that, even just stepping over one time, not seeing his footing, tripping over a rock. There's no way under that condition he

was going to be able to stop the roll once he starts. He's going right in the water. Yeah. I mean, they were showing, so I'm trying to find the picture again. They were showing that there is quite a substantial bank between the drop-off and the river. So a lot of people were like, how did he roll down here and then end up in the river? He would have fallen and ended up on the banks, if anything. I don't know. I don't know. Perfect set of tragic circumstances. It's an accident. They call it an accident for a reason. It shouldn't happen most of the time, but it just lined up in the wrong way. Yeah, it's very sad. But we'll wait. And if we, you know, if the toxicology report

comes back and there's something suspicious in there, we'll update you on Crime Weekly News and we'll keep an eye out. But as of now, our prayers and our thoughts are with Riley's family and his friends. What a tragic loss of life. What a tragic loss of a young, bright, kind life. And it's just very unfortunate. And please be careful out there, whether you're 22 or 62, be careful out there. Agreed. And I definitely feel in my professional opinion, based on what we know, it was a tragic accident, as tough as that may be to hear for some people, it just all lines up. And the fact that when he was found, there's no signs of an altercation prior to that is even gives more credence to the idea that this was a tragic accident. I do want to leave the episode with a question because I was thinking about this case as I knew we were about to cover it. And it's a controversial take. And I'm not even saying that I necessarily agree with it. But I want to leave the, I want to pose the question. Why are you always doing controversial takes, man? Yeah. You know, well, I like, I like hearing other people's opinions, especially in the comments,

because, you know, a lot of them have this anonymity where they, you know, they can speak their mind freely, whether it's there, they have a controversial take or not. So you kind of get a true opinion on what people really feel a true temperature. You get the full gambit, man. The full gambit. You definitely do. So I'll pose this question to you, but also to all of you listening and watching out there. When we think about preventative measures, obviously I'm not gonna beat a dead horse here.

The number one thing, traveling groups. This was preventable if you're sticking together and someone was with Riley. In my opinion, this does not happen. Yeah, even if he did fall, somebody would have been there to pull him out. Someone would have been right there for him. And by the way, he wouldn't have went the wrong way in the first place. Right. Well, I mean, unless his friends were

drunk too. Unless they're drunk as well, I guess that's true. But yeah, you're right. There would have been two people together. It's probably not happening. So I want to pose this question. I know generally when there's a crime being committed, you don't have an obligation to step in and stop said crime. But there are cases where people, victims, sue passerbys who are just standing there and don't intervene. I wonder if there's going to be a precedent or there could be a precedent down the road, and this is where I want your opinions on it, where- I thought you were supposed to intervene. I thought it was a good Samaritan law. There are situations where it can happen. I'm not caught up on the laws. I'm sure people will

weigh down below as far as it, I know people have been sued before and it gets thrown out. Normally from what I understand, unless you started it or you were somehow involved with it, you don't necessarily have to put yourself in harm's way. But I'm sure there is case law as well where it has happened based on the circumstances. If you're standing over them, recording the entire thing, and I don't know, I won't go down that path. But the question I want to pose to everyone out there, including you, Stephanie, is you're a parent, you have a child. They leave the hotel or the Airbnb with a select group of friends. Said friends are with your son or your daughter all night. They make a conscious decision to leave your son or daughter behind when they know they're not under the right state of mind, right?

They know that leaving, that they just got kicked out. They're not in a good place. Should there be an ability for you as the parents to civilly go after the friends for not making sure that your son or daughter got home okay? I can see where your head's going. Like I said, controversial take. Let me hear your opinion on it. No, there shouldn't be.

At the end of the day, I mean, there's a moral obligation, I think, right? For instance, when we were in Austin, I saw one lone girl, drunk man, carrying her shoes. She kept dropping one shoe and she'd pick it up and drop the other one. And I'm like, oh my God, this is making me nervous for this girl. So I go over to her and she's like trying to go down some alley. And I'm like, hey, you know, go this way. And then she's like, I'm looking for my friend. And then I helped her find her friend. And then once they were together, I felt better about it. Right. So there's a moral obligation. But Riley, at the end of the day, was an adult, which means that he is responsible for himself and his actions.

So legally, I don't think there should be a precedent set. But what if he was drugged? What if he was? Did his friends drug him? No, but they can see the condition he's in. I mean, once again, it's a moral thing of like, but but but can you legally can you legally go after them? I don't think you should be able to know. But I mean, I guess you could file a civil lawsuit against anyone for anything. Yeah.

Can I ask a follow up question, even though you just said that? And again, this is for you and everybody out there. We know how Stephanie feels about it. Separating how you feel. We know how you feel about it. Do you think as a preventative measure, if there was precedent that showed in past case law that friends who left their other friends alone and something happened to them, a tragic accident, and it wasn't foul play and it was preventable, if people were being held legally responsible, do you think it would cause younger people or

adults or whatever to think twice about leaving their friends by themselves, putting them in an Uber by themselves or letting them walk home alone? Do you think people would say, hey, we got to go with them. We're responsible for this person now. We can't leave them alone. I don't know. I don't like that precedent. I don't like that the legal system tries to make it like, I wouldn't even want to go out with my friends at that point. Because then what if, what if one of my friends was drunk and snuck away and I didn't even see her leave because I'm with six other people. And now all of a sudden I'm being pulled into a courtroom for letting her walk away when she's drunk. But I didn't even do

that. Like now I have to prove this and put evidence and I'm caught in some like legal. No, I would be like, my friends would be like, let's go out. I'd be like, nah, man. All right. Cause I know you drink too much and I'm not trying to have your parents sue me. If you end up, you know, like going out and doing something crazy. I guarantee you Riley's friends never make this mistake again though. Well, that's that.

I mean, it's, it's sad that it took that to learn that, but I want to hear from you guys. We want to hear from you guys. We want to hear from you guys. Let us know what you think. Let us know what you think about this case, because it does speak to a bigger issue that I do think we can all address as a society. Do you think that one, this was preventable to not only the bar, but maybe the friends should, should be held responsible in some way. And whether you think that or not, do you think that there are preventative measures like holding people with these victims accountable that could

help this from happening in the future? And if you don't agree with any of those, let us know down below some preventative measures that you do think that would help and would be fair to everyone involved. And then finally, let us know what you think about this format of Crime Weekly. It's completely different than what we normally do again this is a case that most of you were aware of we told it in present tense so it still had that you know storytelling element to it as we were going through it and we weighed in as far as what we can do as parents as friends as family members to help better protect everyone involved give Give us your honest opinion. Let us know what you think about it. We're going to be back next week with a new case. This was a one-off episode.

We are not going to tell you what that is yet. Any final words from you, Stephanie? No, I don't even know what it is yet. So those are my final words. Okay. That's your final word. If you've got some recommendations, why don't you go ahead and throw them in the comments right now. You can pick Crime Weekly's next case. I like that. And maybe the Crime Weekly discussion on Facebook, they had some opinions on it. So make sure you weigh down below. Let us know what you think. I always say this every episode, but it means even more tonight. Everyone stay safe out there because there are things that we can do to make sure that we all get home okay.

We will see you next week. Have a good night. Bye.