Going West: True Crime - Lacy Miller // 273

Episode Date: January 25, 2023

In January of 2003, a 20-year-old college student in Colorado didn’t return home after a night out with friends. One week later, her body was found in a canyon outside of the city, clearly having been abducted and murdered. As police investigated the case, they uncovered that her killer had posed as a police officer, and pulled her over for a routine traffic stop before she disappeared, and that Lacy’s phony traffic stop wasn’t the first time it had occurred. This is the murder of Lacy Miller. BONUS EPISODES patreon.com/goingwestpodcast CASE SOURCES 1. Find A Grave: https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/46149832/lacy-jo-miller 2. My Plainview: https://www.myplainview.com/news/article/Police-Investigate-Colo-Murder-8836806.php 3. True Crime Recaps: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uWH0GNdTYw0 4. Fort Collins Coloradoan: https://www.newspapers.com/image/227093695/?terms=james%20clausen 5. Windsor Beacon: https://www.newspapers.com/image/671225441/?terms=james%20clausen&match=1 6. Fort Collins Coloradoan: https://www.newspapers.com/image/227046460/?terms=james%20clausen&match=1 7. Coloradoan: https://www.coloradoan.com/story/announcements/2014/07/22/fort-collins-infamous-moments/12980659/ 8. 9 News: https://www.9news.com/article/news/local/teaching-in-memory-of-a-daughter/73-343263301 9. True Crime Recaps: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uWH0GNdTYw0 10. Explorer Training: https://crgov.com/1780/Explorer-Post 11. Coloradoan: http://content-static.coloradoan.com/news/coloradoanpublishing/Miller/020403_suspiciousstop.html 12. Greeley Tribune: https://www.greeleytribune.com/2003/01/23/family-friends-grieve-for-woman-who-gave-so-much-to-others/ 13. Fort Collins Coloradoan: https://www.newspapers.com/image/227046464/?terms=%22lacy%20jo%20miller%22&match=1 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What is going on True Crime fans? I'm your host Tee. And I'm your host Daphne. And you're listening to Going West. Hello everybody, big shout out to Lollie for recommending today's case. Thank you Lollie. We have a Colorado case for you guys today. Takes place in Fort Collins where we went a couple years ago, didn't we? Yeah, we went and visited Colorado a couple years ago. Actually went to Fort Collins. It was beautiful. Such a gorgeous place. Got to go to Red Rocks, Ampitheater. That was amazing.

Which is not in Fort Collins. Which is not in Fort Collins, but it's in Colorado. Yeah, that was a fun trip. Alright, well then let's get right into the story. Alright guys, well this is episode 273 of Going West, so let's get into it. 1.5% 1.5% 1.5% 1.5% 1.5% 1.5% 1.5%

1.5% 1.5% 1.5% 1.5% 1.5% 1.5% 1.5% In January of 2003, a 20-year-old college student in Colorado didn't return home after a night out with friends. One week later, her body was found in a canyon outside of the city, clearly having been

abducted and murdered. As police investigated the case, they discovered a similar incident that happened only weeks prior and received an important tip from the killer's roommate. This is The Story of Lacey Joe Miller was born on August 10, 1982 to Wendy and David Miller in Billings, Montana. But when Lacey was six years old, she and her parents relocated to, you guessed it, Fort Collins, Colorado, which is a very idyllic college town known for hosting Colorado State University. Fort Collins boasts close to 170,000 residents and sits about an hour north of the capital city of Denver.

Lacey was joined by two younger brothers whom her parents said she doated on. I mean, she was naturally kind and she was a very nurturing person and caretaking came easy to her. And because of that, she dreamed of becoming an elementary school teacher and also really yearned to be a mother someday. Her dad David remembers fondly, quote, she was all things good and wholesome. Lacey had a group of four tight-knit best friends from middle school with whom she did everything, and their names were Amanda, Angela, and Andrea. Amanda remembered, quote, since the 10th grade, it's just been the four of us. We've been inseparable.

Another in the group, Angela, remembers her as funny and compassionate saying quote, every day was an example of that. She's just one of those people, one of those pillars in your life. When your life starts to crumble, she helps you stand up tall. The Miller family were very spiritual and they enjoyed being involved in their local church.

It really brought them together as a family, but Lacey's parents did eventually divorce and they both remarried. David, Lacey's dad, moved to Greeley, Colorado, which is another college town about 45 minutes away from Fort Collins. So luckily he didn't go too far. But after graduating from high school in 2000, Lacey actually began attending the University of Northern Colorado in Greeley, so although she was living with her mom Wendy and her stepfather Mark, she was able to see her dad very frequently.

Both of her parents were alumni of the University, so that was also very special to Lacey. So while attending the university, Lacey continued to chase her lifelong dream of being a teacher. Her advisor called her peppy and extremely focused, saying, quote, I think she was going to be a really good teacher. She would have been one of those teachers that the little boys would have fallen in love with, and the little girls wanted to grow up to be just like. So Lacey lived in the Quail Hollow neighborhood of Fort Collins, southwest of downtown, near

a park and a reservoir. When she wasn't in school, she worked at a restaurant near her home called Jim's Wings and also maintained a very active social life, and she had a very large social circle. Before she disappeared, Lacey's dad expressed concern at the amount of driving that she was doing on her daily commute. She was driving between her school in Greeley and where she lived with her mom and stepped at in Fort Collins, which took nearly an hour one way. David said later, quote, it was something I worried about.

She'd be coming home from work or from the library late at night and she'd be all alone. But Lacey, responsible and hardworking, assured him that she would be okay. On the evening of Friday, January 17, 2003, 20-year-old Lacey and some friends went out to a local pizza restaurant in Fort Collins. Around 1.30 a.m. on Saturday morning, Lacey dropped a friend off at her apartment just three miles or about 5 km from Lacey's home. And that was the last time that anyone who knew and loved Lacey ever saw her alive. The next morning, Wendy and Mark woke up to find that Lacey hadn't made it home. So hoping that she just stayed the night with a friend, they didn't report her missing

right away. But as the day went on, and more people reached out looking for her, her family began to fear the worst. She missed another planned outing with friends during the day on Saturday, and then she failed to show up to a shift at Jim's wings that night. She wasn't answering her cell phone for anyone who called either, but her mom and her stepdad did not have to go far to find a sign that something was wrong. Lacey's black 2002 Mitsubishi Mirage was parked on the street two houses away from hers.

Lacey always parked in either the garage or the driveway. So there's no reason why, especially in the winter, that she would have parked farther from the house than she needed to, which indicated to the family that someone else may have been driving her car. It is weird though, that's only two houses down. That's not like it was found across town and in a abandoned road, it's like two houses down.

Yeah, it's not like somebody planted it, like five blocks away or miles away. Yeah, that's just seems strange. Very close. So Andrea remembered quote, I freaked out right away. For me, running away wasn't an option. I knew that she wouldn't do that.

That was the low point. I was so scared. By the following day, Sunday, January 19th, missing flyers, papered Greeley, Fort Collins, the restaurant where Lacey worked and the campus of her school. While it wouldn't be the answers that they were looking for, Lacey's friends and family would get answers soon.

A strange crime spree and a suspicious roommate would lead them back to her, and to the person who took her away. So not to get ahead of myself, let's go back a little bit. On January 5th, 2003, in West Fort Collins, near where Lacey lived, a young woman was pulled over for speeding.

This woman's name was Teresa Clancy, and on that early morning, she was just heading home from work at about 3.15am when she saw lights flashing behind her. But when someone that she described as a young looking male emerged from this unmarked car because she had pulled over thinking that it was a police officer, she began to feel that something just was not right here. Why are there so many shithead police officer impersonators out there in the world?

Oh, you just wait. I mean, this is insane. I mean, we talk about that. That is a thing. Right. We talk about this all the time. Yeah. We have covered a few cases like this.

It's always weird to see things come up again, but, you know, we cover two cases a week. It's bound to happen. Yeah. But yeah, really, really weird. So this man who approached Teresa's car did not have a badge. He came up and he said that she was speeding, but he didn't have a badge and he had been flashing red and blue lights on the dashboard of his white suburban.

But this made her really uncomfortable because this wasn't your typical police car. Right. Again, he didn't have a badge, sorry, I have to say that for the third time. So she just, it made her super uncomfortable. So she asked for his credentials. And when she did, this man promptly returned to his vehicle, pulled a very dramatic U-turn and disappeared into the night behind her.

Yeah. Which is like red flag city. Right. And what's really scary is that, at that moment, Theresa knew that she was being tricked. She knew because there's no reason why an officer would pull you over and then you asked for his credentials

and then he just leaves. No, that would not happen. So in that moment, I can't imagine how terrified she was thinking, oh my God, this was not a real police officer at all. Right, especially because he sped away. She's like, what the hell was that? What was about to happen? So obviously, Teresa was very rattled

by this experience, but she was happy that she hadn't gotten out of the vehicle or done anything that this guy basically told her to do. So she reported what she had seen to the police. And actually, what this guy trying to pull her over didn't realize is that Teresa herself Worked for the police she was a police dispatcher and she was the wife of a police officer So she was mad at him. Oh, yeah, so she already knows what's going on She probably knows that I mean she may have even known that he was not in the first place.

And that's probably why she had that instinct to ask for the credentials, whereas maybe somebody else wouldn't do that, and they would just believe it. Right. So, you know, that worked out for her. So because of her connections, Teresa had a friend look up the stop in the database and see if her license plate or license numbers had been run that morning by an officer, but nothing came up. Now, police chose not to announce

what happened to the public. They did not want this incident getting out. And in the words of one detective, they said, quote, you don't want to create paranoia. So the county sheriff decided that they would only announce the incident if it happened more than once or if one of the Encounters escalated to more than a conversation between the driver and the phony officer. See this is where you know I just Disagree with that decision because I feel like that's negligence like it is. It's super dangerous

Yeah, if it leads to somebody else getting hurt and you didn't announce this to the to the public and they can't be aware that somebody's out there impersonating an officer then it's like that kind of falls on you well yeah because if if this man is a dangerous individual and he's trying to abduct people or harm them in any way and not just play some silly prank that can lead to something terrible happening to somebody in your own community and that's not cool. So I understand that you might have a bunch of people thinking, oh I'm getting pulled over what if it's not really an officer, I'm gonna drive away and it is an office. Right and I'm sure that that was probably the thought process is, hey, you know,

we don't want people running from police thinking that they're not actually police. Right. Which must have been it, but still I think that is super risky. Exactly, but get this. So earlier that same night, which again was January 5th, a man named Jason Klassen, who happened to match the description of the fake officer, was questioned by police at a nearby hotel. Around 1 a.m. at the Mulberry Inn in East Fort Collins, employees of the Inn called to report a man in a ski mask,

circling the building in his white Ford expedition. When police arrived at the scene, Jason was circling the grounds of the inn on foot with a flashlight. He had a bail bondsman identification badge on his person, claiming to work for a bail bond agency, and explained that he was simply looking for someone who would skip out on their bond. But, when the police asked to search his vehicle, they found handcuffs and three guns, including an assault rifle. Jason was in legal possession of the guns, but his behavior was extremely suspicious here. He told them that he was looking for a man named Daniel Meredith,

and his wife, who owned Jason's company Bond Payments, but the police had no record of this. So after police ran the names and they found no criminal record, Jason changed his story and explained that he was actually looking for an unidentified man who would stolen a gun and a thousand dollars from the bonds company. What a dummy. Yeah, what an idiot.

And there were red and blue flashing lights on the dashboard of his suburban, which he explained was because he was in the process of becoming a firefighter. I mean, that doesn't even make any sense. I don't think it does, either. And another thing here was that his plates were expired and he didn't have his registration with him. But despite all of this, police felt that they had nothing concrete to arrest him for.

So they released him. The officers described his demeanor as pretty calm and said that he acted as if he was one of them. They questioned him for nearly a half an hour, but he was released by about 2.30 a.m. And that is 45 minutes before Theresa was pulled over by this fake cop. So what does this all have to do with Lacey Miller's disappearance? Well, on the evening that she disappeared, a local Fort Collins man claimed that his

roommate was acting strangely, and more disturbingly reported seeing a feat in the trunk of his roommate's car. On January 21, 2003, two days after Lacey's disappearance. Eric Jensen called police to report what he thought that he saw, what looked like human feet wrapped in a tarp and bound by duct tape. When Eric questioned his roommate about this, he claimed that it was a mannequin. Yeah, I just have like a mannequin casually bound and wrapped in a tarp in my trunk. Sure thing. Yeah, sure.

But once Eric heard about the disappearance of Lacey Miller, he started to suspect his roommate, whose name, by the way, is Jason Clausen, and he started thinking that he may have something to do with it. 22-year-old Jason, while not yet a suspect in Lacey's disappearance, had already had multiple run-ins with police and not just the recent interview at the inn. Jason dreamed of being a police officer, which I'm sure is no shocker to any of you, and had completed his explorer training, which is a program for teenagers with an interest

in law enforcement. In his training, they assist the police force with events and community service outreach, and according to their website it says, quote, this is a paramilitary program with strict discipline that is run similarly to a police department. This led to a job as a security guard, but according to his employer, Jason abused his power and was erratic and unreliable. When he was caught on the job with a police baton, he was fired. And he actually received a ticket for drag racing in his car as well, which kept him from the police academy.

He applied then to work at a prison, but didn't get the job, so his last resort was the military. According to his parents, he was flying out to begin training in late January of 2003. And he was also known to have struggled with a methodiction. Very interesting here, because this guy wants to be a police officer, but he's trying to abduct people and he's doing meth. And it's like, that's a mess. Yeah, he's a mess. Like, no one in their right mind is going to hire you to be a police officer. You're an asshole. So anyway, on December 13th, Jason was stopped for a traffic violation.

And then on January 3rd, a woman who was living with Jason and Eric on North Hillcrest Drive requested that an officer accompany her as she moved her belongings out of the home because she was afraid of Jason. Jason and Eric on North Hillcrest Drive requested that an officer accompany her as she moved her belongings out of the home because she was afraid of Jason. The next day, which was January 4th, another ex-Rumate of Jason's claim that he had broken into his car and stolen items from him. The ex-Rumate was Daniel Meredith, the man that Jason told police he was hunting for on the night that he was questioned at the Mulberry Inn.

On January 13th, he was arrested for the burglary of Daniel's car, but was released on a $3,500 bond. So with the infractions mounting against him and Eric's account of the feat in the back of his car, police were extremely suspicious of Jason's connection to Lacey's disappearance. So with the help of the police, Eric called Jason on a recorded line, but Jason remained calm and again claimed that it had been a mannequin and that he had been quote fooling around to freak Eric out and test his loyalty.

Which I don't have what does that even mean? I mean he's lying, you know, all like it doesn't make any sense. Well, and further into that, Jason then reached out to a different friend and asked for help hauling some of his old things to the dump, explaining that he was shipping off to the military training soon

and that he needed to get rid of some things. Included in the items that Jason was either putting into his storage unit or taking to the dump, was a woman's purse and ID and credit cards that bore Lacey's name. And that was enough to confirm his involvement. So his friend reported what he saw, and Jason Claussen was arrested that same day,

which was January 22nd, 2003. But Lacy was still missing. Because of the chain of events that led to Jason's arrest, you know, his increasingly reckless activity and the suspicion that he was the young officer who stopped Theresa Clancy on the night of January 5th, Law enforcement began to suspect that Jason may have prayed on Lacey impersonating one of their own. Lacey's parents speculate that she was responsible and law-biting and that if confronted with somebody she thought was an officer, she would have stopped like many other people would have.

Her mom Wendy said, quote, she would only have gotten out of the car if he was tricking her or if he was in a position of authority. Lacey's friend Angela echoed this, saying, quote, we couldn't imagine her pulling over for any other reason and getting out of her car. Police retraced Jason's steps and whereabouts from the four days between when Lacey disappeared and when he was arrested, including the landfill

and his house, his car, and his storage unit. Friends of his, tip them off to an area about 20 miles or 32 kilometers outside of Fort Collins in a ravine in Puder Canyon, which is where Jason liked to practice shooting his guns. Well, it was there that they found Lacey Miller's body 10 days after she had disappeared without a trace. Her remains were in such bad shape that investigators initially struggled to even determine a cause of death, but ultimately it was ruled to be blunt force trauma to the head.

Her body had been partially burned and she was still wearing the t-shirt, bra, and underwear from the night that she went missing. Like Eric had observed on the night of her murder, she was wrapped in a tarp and duct tape. I just gotta say that these friends of Jason's are actually real ones. For being able to, I mean, they were not going to try and cover this up for Jason at all. They were like, no, this is suspicious. This is the right thing to do. This guy needs to be caught.

I don't care if he's, if I've been friends with him for however long. Bad friends, great people. Yeah. Well, bad friends to him, you know what I mean? Exactly. I mean, amazing that they did this because if it wasn't for them, he might not have gotten caught. Exactly. So many who knew Jason and Jason's family in the community were shocked at this news.

A neighbor of his said, quote, he's a good kid. A friend of Jason's from middle school lived down the street from Lacey and her mom and stepdad and said Jason visited frequently, remembering, quote, he's pretty much a mostly outgoing, sociable person. He was the kind of guy that girls kind of gravitated toward. He was caring. The charges against Jason horrified his devoutly Christian parents, who are regular churchgoers,

and had sent Jason to Christian school. His mother, Lelani, even worked as an administrator in a local Roman Catholic school. His mother, Lailani, even worked as an administrator in a local Roman Catholic school. Others, however, were less surprised. Two of Jason's ex-girlfriends were among those interviewed by police in order to build their case against him, which amounted to a court document containing over 2,700 pages in total. One girlfriend, or sorry, ex-girlfriend Erica, claimed that he had a fetish for guns and said, quote, I think he gets a sick kick out of being in charge. Yeah, no shit if he's trying to impersonate an officer.

Exactly. So she also mentioned that he had trouble sleeping and that sometimes, in addition to his methamphetamine use, he would drink as many as two bottles of nightkwill to fall asleep after staying up for days at a time. Another ex-girlfriend, Carlene, remembered that Jason told her once that if he had to dispose of a body, he would cut it up and mix it with an animal's body because the DNA would be harder to trace. In his own journal, he wrote a passage that red quote, My life has changed quite a bit in the last few months. No, let me think. It has changed

a lot. My mind has exploded. I lost it. It ran away and has come back to me completely different. I am a different person. Now, my journal is the best reference of insight into my own mind that I have. I started writing it once when I was high and just kept on going. It's getting to be quite long, and I'm not even close to being done yet. On the day that police found Lacy's body, her three best friends, again Amanda, Angela and Andrea, gathered in Lacy's bedroom to look at pictures and yearbooks and share memories of their beloved friend.

Family and friends came by the house to sing church songs and comfort Lacey's parents. Jim's wings, where Lacey worked, closed early that day to allow their employees time to grieve. Lacey's community commented that they were thankful that Jason was behind bars and no longer able to do this to another young woman. Andrea said, quote, if putting him in jail means he's never going to hurt anyone again, it's alright, but it doesn't change anything. Amanda added, quote, I'm glad he admitted to it. We're not going to remember him. We're going to remember her. On April 3rd, 2003, so a few months later, Jason Kloss and pleaded guilty to the abduction

and murder of Lacey Miller. The community was shocked but so relieved that he didn't try to deny what he was being accused of, like so many people do. Wendy said sadly, quote, there isn't justice for a lost life. Justice means fairness, and there's no fairness in this because she's dead, she's gone. Jason's own lawyer echoed this sentiment, stating, quote, nothing we can say to the Miller and Cohen families can lessen the heartache,

which they feel over the loss of Lacey. Nor do we pretend that there is not a large void in the lives of Lacy's family and friends. Her parents wrote her obituary in the first person, sharing Lacy's kind spirit and zest for life. It said, quote, To those of you who know me, and those of you who have only gotten to know me recently,

I'd like to tell you a little about myself. I hope you will focus more on who I was in life, not how my life ended. My name is Lacey Joe Miller. I was born in Billings, Montana on August 10, 1982. I came to Fort Collins, Colorado when I was 6 years old. I was a brownie. I loved school, playing barbies, tea parties, coloring, dress up, my best friend Katie, horses, sleepovers, art classes and singing.

When I was in junior high school, I ran track, played softball, and learned to play the piano in the flute. I loved watching my little brother Kenyan and making things for him. I was quiet and shy for the most part, but once you got to know me, I was funny and would say what was on my mind. In high school, I was in student council and the yearbook committee. I loved my friends hanging out during lunch, doing things that I thought my mom didn't know about, driving my car, listening to Dave Matthews band, dancing, dreaming about being

a designer or teacher, talking on the phone, instant messaging with my friends, watching friends, being a couch potato, sleeping, going to the movies, thanksgivings with my aunt Stacey and lots more. I loved seeing my dad and my brother Jesse, and every year spending time with my grandparents in Texas. I loved my family, I loved Jesus, and I loved life. I was tragically taken from this planet in January 2003. Regretfully, I leave behind my mother, Wendy Cohen, my father, David Miller, two little brothers, step parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and

many, many friends. Thank you for loving me, laughing with me, teaching me what I needed to know, and for looking and praying so hard to find me, so my parents wouldn't have to worry anymore. You are welcome to come to my funeral, and join my family, and celebrating my life. Through her grief, Wendy remained unflinchingly strong. Upon seeing Jason for the first time in court, she said, quote, my heart was pounding.

He might be the last person to see my daughter. That's hard. But she maintained her composure, and to honor her daughter, she said, quote, I'm here to honor Lacey, and I'm here to support the people who worked very hard to find her and bring this case to justice. I know where Lacey is, so I'm okay. I'll just wait. I'm sure it's not going to be good.

I've asked all my friends to pray." Wendy herself even requested that Jason be spared the death penalty. Saving the family from a drawn-out trial, a judge sentenced Jason to life in prison without the possibility of parole immediately after he pleaded guilty. But the court, including Lacey's family, were forced to hear shocking and disturbing details surrounding Lacey's abduction and murder. So after Jason did pull Lacey over pretending to be an officer. He took her back to his house, force fed her sleeping pills, photographed her tied up on his bed and assaulted her.

The assumption is that he killed her in his home and then wrapped her in a tarp and loaded her into the back of his car, which is when his roommate Eric saw her feet in the trunk. Jason then transported her body to a storage unit and left it for about a day before taking Lacey to the woods and partially burning her body. And we can assume also that when her car was found, two houses down that maybe he saw her address on her ID, on her license, and put it there there like planted her car there close by right

I just wonder why he would do that. I'm I'm guessing because he thought that it might throw off the police or kind of confuse them like Why is her why is her car two houses down true? You know and then he wouldn't have been having to risk being spotted by her family getting out of her car In front of the house if he did park in front so parking close by is a little Less risky, but still you're right. It's like it's it's close enough by to where it might seem like she did make it home when she didn't Right exactly even though that didn't really work because they still thought this was really weird that her car was parked there In a heartbreaking statement made by Lacey's father to the court, and mostly Jason, David Miller read quote, Lacey's life and the life of this evil person that murdered her were following distinct

but very different paths. Lacey's path is one of light and goodness with bright hopes and unlimited potential. This evil person's path is one of darkness and evil with no hope or potential. Unfortunately, their paths crossed. When I view a picture of my beloved Lacey, I see bright eyes, love, strength of character, strength of mind, clarity of purpose, courage, devotion to family and God. I see a strong person with much to offer. When I see a picture of the guilty, there's nothing but dull eyes, hatred, weakness of character, a weak, polluted mind, no purpose, a gutless coward who disrespects God and family, and who has nothing to offer society. Above

all, I see an evil bully who is only strong enough to have prayed upon the goodness of an innocent girl. While Lacey was taking classes, preparing to be an elementary school teacher and nurture children, this worthless punk was taking drugs with his loser friends and preparing to impersonate a police officer. While Lacey was reading her Bible and dreaming of being a mother someday, he was looking at pornography and fantasizing about abducting defenseless girls for his perverted purposes. Lacey wanted to be a mother, a giver of life.

He, like Satan, is a destroyer of life and all goodness. Even though Lacey came from a broken home, she overcame that obstacle. She was an example of what we hope our society will produce. Wendy, her mother, added quote, There's no honor greater than being the parent of a wonderful, precious human being who made good choices and loved everyone with all of her heart every day. There's no better feeling to a mom than when all her babies are home and safely tucked into their beds. There's no greater ache than never knowing any of this again,

because someone decided to destroy her for his own self-gain. This horrific ordeal ended with Wendy embracing Jason's mother, Laylawni Clausen, in court, from one mother who would just lost a daughter to a mother whose son was being put away for life. In the aftermath of losing Lacey, her parents set out to make sure Lacey's legacy was not forgotten. They established a scholarship in her name at the University of Northern Colorado, the Lacey Memorial Scholarship in Elementary Education, specifically for women in education,

which is still active today. Wendy then founded an organization in Lacey's honor called Two Hearts, the Lacey Jill Miller Foundation. Wendy had worked as a teacher for over 25 years and she really wanted to make a difference in the lives of at-risk students in the area. So the program would take in applicants who had dropped out of high school and help them get their GEDs and even college credits. Lacey also left a legacy of safety for women in Colorado, and it's called Lacey's Law, and that was enacted after her murder,

which made it a felony to impersonate a police officer. It also criminalizes unlawful possession of red and blue dashboard lights. In addition to two hearts, Wendy began hosting conferences on women's safety, which she called the amazing women's safety awareness conference. And the conference hosted classes and lectures on self-defense, sexual assault, and identity theft, which is amazing that she did this because this is so important to actively teach people about these things. She took her own tragedy and made it somehow made it into a positive thing.

I mean, she's just an amazing woman. Yeah, and she actually joined forces with the mother of a local teenager as well who had died in a drunk driving accident, as well as the brother of her daughter's murderer, Jason Klossin, to give speeches on their experiences, navigating grief and loss. Like, the fact that she is working with her daughter's killer's brother on this,

it kind of like, you know, teaming up to spread awareness, I mean, truly amazing. It's incredible. So after Lacey's murder, police released a list of safety tips for women when pulled over by police, especially when they suspect it may not be a legitimate officer. And included on that list is, don't automatically pull over if you don't feel safe. Drive the speed limit to a well lit and public place such as a gas station. Don't roll down your window or open your car doors. Tell the officer you are afraid and ask to see his or her identification. Do this through the closed window but speak up so the officer you are afraid and ask to see his or her identification. Do this through the closed window, but speak up so the officer can hear you.

If you have a cell phone, you can call the following agencies and ask for a dispatcher to verify that a police officer has stopped you. Colorado State Patrol Trooper Rust Zeller said, quote, If it's a row of flashing lights permanently mounted on the roof of a car, it's likely a legitimate stop, but if it's just one light mounted on a hood or roof of the car, be cautious. Thank you so much everybody for listening to this episode of Going West. Yes, thank you guys so much for listening to this episode of Going West. Yes, thank you guys so much for listening to this episode and on Friday we'll have an

all-new case for you guys to dive into. It's so sad that this happened to Lacey because of course when she did pull over for Jason thinking that it was an officer she was doing what we're all taught to do when we see that behind us, when we see these flashing lights. So it's just terrible that she didn't know that he wasn't legitimate and that he took advantage of that situation. But I'm so glad that we can share this story and share these tips like we just did and just talk about the importance of being aware that this happens so that it doesn't happen

to any of us out here. Yeah, so if you ever are pulled over by a police officer, make sure that you verify that they are an actual police officer that they're legitimate, especially if you do not feel safe. Which is hard because it can be scary when you get pulled over just knowing how much authority the police have, there's a lot of factors that go into that as well of how safe you feel while being pulled over. Absolutely. So that is, I think, the most unfortunate thing about being pulled over is just feeling like you're not in the right when you are, and knowing that you can be taken advantage of. Absolutely.

Well, I'm really glad that you guys listen to this episode, and please stay safe out there, and for everybody out there in the world. Don't be a stranger. Thank you. you