Going West: True Crime - Mandy Stavik // 78

Episode Date: July 21, 2020

In 1989, an 18-year-old girl went back to her rural Washington hometown for Thanksgiving. But while out for a run with her dog, something terrible happened. When her dog showed up to her house without her, the family knew she was in danger. But one day, a woman would feel suspicious about her co-worker and contact police; cracking this case wide open. This is the murder of Mandy Stavik. PATREON BONUS EPISODES: https://www.patreon.com/goingwestpodcast CASE SOURCES: https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/35457264/amanda-teresa-stavik https://heavy.com/news/2019/09/mandy-stavik-family/ https://www.bellinghamherald.com/news/local/crime/article230289019.html https://www.thecinemaholic.com/mary-stavik/ https://www.chicagotribune.com/nation-world/ct-coke-can-murder-case-20181218-story.html https://www.scribd.com/document/219093900/Mandy-Stavik-Homicide-Witness-1-Statement-Redacted https://www.thatslife.com.au/coke-can-caught-killer-timothy-bass-mandy-stavik https://heavy.com/news/2019/09/timothy-forrest-bass/ https://abcnews.go.com/US/100-volunteered-bakery-worker-dna-crack-30-year/story?id=65537828 https://www.kiro7.com/news/north-sound-news/mandy-stavik-case-man-on-trial-for-whatcom-county-teen-s-1989-murder/948262549/ Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What is going on true crime fans? I'm your host Heath, and I'm your other host, Daphne. And you're listening to Going West. Hope everyone is having a great week so far. We just wanted to update you real quick on our new bonus episode on Patreon. It is the murder of Lee Lee. If you guys haven't checked out this case or you don't know about this case, I would definitely advise you guys to check it out because it is super wild. It is hands down one of the most frustrating cases I have ever heard and discussed.

So go check it out, the link is in the description below. And it also helps us get rid of some of the ads on this show by joining Patreon. I hope you guys like it and we're trying to come out with more content on there like maybe doing some live streams and some vlogs so let us know what you guys want to see. Thanks everybody for tuning in today. This is episode 78 of Going West, so let's get into it. In 1989, an 18-year-old girl went back to her rural Washington hometown for Thanksgiving. But while out for a run with her dog, something terrible happened. When her dog showed up to her house without her, the family knew she was in danger. But one day, a woman would feel suspicious about her coworker and contact police, cracking this case This is the murder of Mandy Stavick.

Amanda Stavick, who went by Mandy, was born on April 16, 1971 in Bellingham, Washington, to parents Glen and Mary Stavick. She also had three siblings, Lee, Molly, and Brent. Shortly after Mandy was born, the family of five moved to the small town of Palmer, Alaska. Palmer is a very tight-knit community, which in the 1970s had less than 3,000 residents. Palmer is an incredibly picturesque place with gorgeous mountainscapes, and it's about 42 miles or 67 kilometers from Anchorage, the largest city in Alaska. But when Mandy was just four years old, something very tragic happened in their little town. In 1975, which was about a year after Mandy's parents divorced, her much older brother Brent, who was 17, was

bow hunting in Fort Richardson, which is a US Army base in Alaska. Brent had gotten permission to do so and went out there alone one day in 1975. He was later found with 1722 caliber bullets in his back and head. And to this day, his murder is unsolved. So that means that someone shot at Brent at least 17 times if he had 17 bullets in him, obviously. And police investigated this pretty intensely and weren't able to figure out why someone killed him. You would think if someone else was there hunting and they somehow mistook him for an animal, they probably wouldn't have shot him 17 times. Yeah, that's a possibility. There's also the other possibility that because he was on a US Army base, even though he had permission, maybe somebody didn't know that and had shot at him thinking that he was possibly a threat to the base. I don't know.

That's very possible, but when I did research about this base, it looked like people did go out there hunting because it's a very wooded area on the base. So it seems like it was a common thing, so I don't know why someone on the base would mistake him for a threat or else they probably wouldn't have even given him permission in the first place, but I can't be sure on that. I would also assume that if that was the case and he was out there hunting, hunters usually don't shoot the prey that they're hunting for 17 times. So clearly this was, in my opinion, a murder. Well, exactly. And that's why I mentioned that they had shot him 17 times

or at least 17 times because you don't shoot, you're, you know, if you're hunting, you don't shoot an animal that many times. So that's why it had to have been a person who was either trying to kill him or thought he was a threat in some way, but no one ever came forward. After Brent's murder, the Stavics continued to live in Alaska and hoped to find justice for their son.

Since Glen and Mary's Stavics were divorced, Glen went on to marry another woman and have more children with her. And when Mandy was in seventh grade, so around the age of 12, she, her brother and sister, Leon Mollie, and her mother Mary moved back to whatcombe County, Washington. They settled in the tiny town of Akmi, which is located in northern Washington, and has a population of around 300 people, so they went from one small town in Alaska to a significantly smaller town in Washington's state since Mary absolutely loved rural countryside. She also loved how safe the area was and how low the crime rate was. It was so safe that people left their keys in their car and didn't worry about locking the doors to their houses.

After finishing middle school, Mandy went on to attend Mount Baker High School and the neighboring town of Deming, and she loved it. She participated in a number of extracurricular activities, including playing in the school's band, which she played clarinet flute and saxophone in, multiple academic activities, and a number of sports. One of Mandy's biggest hobbies was playing sports, and there was pretty much no sport that she didn't play. She did very well in school academically and earned her way into the honors program. Mandy was very passionate about

making something out of her life, so she put her all into everything that she did. She was also just an overall compassionate and committed person and everyone adored Mandy's Stavic. In 1988, when Mandy was 17 years old, tragedy would strike a second time in the Stavic family. As we mentioned, Mandy's father Glen remarried after his divorce with Mandy's mother Mary, and he went on to have more children. In 1988, his teenage son Spencer, who was the stepbrother of Mandy, was in a boating accident on the Canai River in Alaska, and he tragically drowned. We're not sure how close the step siblings were, but this was the second child that Glenn lost, so it was undoubtedly very hard on the family.

The following spring, Mandy graduated from high school with plans to go to university in the Washington area in hopes of becoming a commercial pilot. She was accepted into Central Washington University in Ellensburg, which was about a three-hour drive from her hometown of Akmi, and began studying there in the fall of 1989. Soon after she started school, she felt as though she would, quote, rather be looking out the window than at the instrument panel. So she began thinking of other career paths for herself as she continued getting her general studies done at the university. In the meantime, she was also learning Japanese thanks to her college roommate, Yoko. Yoko had moved to the US from Japan, so Mandy was helping her with her English at the

same time. Yoko and Mandy became great friends, and when it came time for Thanksgiving in November of 1989, Mandy asked her to come spend the holiday with her family in Northern Washington. In 1989, Thanksgiving fell on Thursday, November 23rd, and they all had a wonderful day together. The following day, which was Friday, November 24th, Mandy decided to show Yoko her favorite running trail nearby, because Mandy wasn't just passionate about sports, but she loved every kind of physical activity, and her favorite of all was running. She would take numerous different trails in her area and would often run five miles at

a time. She would often run with her family's German shepherd, whose name was Kyra, and her mom Mary would bike alongside them on these trails. But when Mandy went off with Yoko, they went just the two of them for a walk that day. After returning home, they spent some time with family. But later in the day, Mandy went back out on the trails once again, but this time just her and Kyra. Since Mandy had only walked that day with Yoko, she wanted to get a run in, and she had asked her mom Mary if she wanted to come with her, but since they had other family in town,

including Mary's sister, Mary declined. So Mandy went with their dog Kyra, but she felt fine going out alone because again, this was a very safe and tight-knit community where everyone knew everyone. Most people have houses on Tens of Acres in Akmi, including Mandy's family. So it was also a really great place to run because there was so much countryside. It's just overall a very peaceful and relaxed environment. But the afternoon went on and Mandy didn't return home. At first no one really worried about her because she

had her very protective German shepherd with her and again it was a super safe place. But eventually her older brother Lee returned home from a friend's house to find that Mandy hadn't gotten home yet. He told his mom Mary that that was strange because he had seen her running back home earlier. While at his friend's house, she jogged by the property, which was only a few minutes jog away from her house. Mandy almost always took the same route home, so they all began to wonder why she hadn't made it back yet. Especially since she hadn't gotten home before her brother Lee did.

Because Lee also mentioned that a few minutes after seeing her jog by, she ran by again, but in the opposite direction. So he just figured she wanted to get some more exercise in. But still, he assumed she would have been back by the time he was. That evening, the Stavic family would suffer a third horrible tragedy. A bit more time passed, and Mandy's family really began to worry about where she was. That evening, Mandy had plans to take Yoko into the nearby city of Bellingham, Washington, to hang out with some friends, so they didn't understand why she hadn't come home yet.

She was usually only gone for about 45 minutes, but over 2 hours after Mandy left for her run, their dog Kyra came home without her. Mary called the sheriff to report what had happened, because at that point, they assumed that it had to have been bad if Kyra came home without Mandy. Although Mandy was 18 years old at the time, the police got on it immediately. Meanwhile, Mary called neighbors and other residents of the community that she knew pretty well and just asked everybody to go out and help look for Mandy that evening. Mary was a school bus driver in the area, so she pretty much knew everyone.

Just about the whole town of Acne came together quickly to search the entire area, because they were just hoping that she was alive and injured and couldn't make it home. But as they walked the various trails she would have taken, no one saw any sign of her. When Mandy disappeared, she was listening to music on her walkman and wearing a light-colored sweatshirt with light green sweatpants and running shoes, so everyone knew exactly what they were looking for. While the town of Akmi continued to search for Mandy's stavic, the police began questioning people close to her. At the time, Mandy had an on-again, off-again boyfriend named Rick Zender.

Police wanted to question him immediately, and Rick came in right away. He and Mandy had dated in high school and into college, but the reason they were on and off wasn't because their relationship was tumultuous, they were just young. At the time of Mandy's disappearance, they were off. But police recognized immediately that Rick was incredibly helpful and wanted to answer any question they had. He was terrified to discover that something might have happened to her, and he just wanted to do whatever he could to bring her back. Police quickly realized that he didn't have anything to do with whatever happened to

Mandy, so they cleared him. The day after Mandy went missing, she was still nowhere to be found, but they did find her sweatpants that day. The sweatpants weren't originally believed to be Mandy's because they were very dirty and had some holes in them, and Mandy's family said that she would never wear old ripped pants and that they hadn't seen her wearing those. But on the sweatpants were some seamen stains that didn't match any of the people who had already been questioned.

At this time, Kodis wasn't a thing, and in fact, it wasn't invented until the following year, and then wasn't widely used until a few years after that. So there was no big system to run this seamen against convicted felons yet, so they could really only go off the DNA that they had from the people that they spoke with, and there were no matches, so they stored that away for later. At that point, they didn't feel very confident about Mandy's well-being, but they continued to search in a helicopter as well as on motorcycles and by foot with bloodhounds. They also had expert trackers come in to follow Mandy's route by foot and they were able to find her tracks.

They also saw Kyra the dogs tracks next to hers, and both tracks stopped at the same place. So the trackers felt like she had to have been abducted, or maybe she got into a car, because her tracks wouldn't have just stopped like that. But there was no signs of a struggle where the tracks ended, so they pointed more to the possibility that she had willingly gotten into a vehicle and likely with somebody that she knew. Three days after Mandy had disappeared, they expanded their search down the Nooksac River. The Nooksac River is 75 miles long running across Northern Washington, and part of the river was next to Mandy's favorite running trail. So they believed it was possible she could have ended up in that river. Some volunteer firemen took a

small boat down the river a few miles to see if they could find anything and about six miles from Acme, one of the volunteers noticed something in the distance. As they got closer, they realized it was a body laying face down in the river, and the body was being held in place by a branch in the knee-deep water. It was a young woman, and she was completely nude except for her socks and running shoes. They quickly realized that the running shoes matched the description of Mandy's. And as they looked at her face, they knew it was the body of Mandy Stavik. As investigators began to examine Mandy's body, they couldn't immediately tell how she died. And since she had been found in water that was only knee deep, they knew that she had to have been put there when she was either dead or unconscious because she could have easily

stood up in that water. Because of the water's incredibly cold temperatures, it actually preserved Mandy's body very well. In fact, the water had preserved her body so well that she didn't even look like she was dead. And the only real injuries that they could see immediately were some light scratches on her body, as if she had just run up against some thorned plants. The sheriff and detectives wanted to make sure that they informed Mandy's family immediately of what they had found, and you can only imagine how they took the news. Because remember, these were Mandy's brother and sisters' second sibling that they had

lost to foul play and third sibling total if we're counting their step brother. And same goes for Mary, this was her second teenage child who had been murdered. to foul play and third sibling total if we're counting their stepbrother. And same goes for Mary. This was her second teenage child who had been murdered. There was still a lot of things to figure out here. Since she was found nude, police didn't feel like she had died accidentally. But again, they didn't see any clear signs of foul play. But of course, they figured out a lot more once they did a full autopsy.

And the day after she was found, the medical examiner began working on just that. Mandy had a three-inch long injury on her head that had been bleeding internally, but it didn't contribute to her death and wouldn't have killed her on its own. And weirdly enough, Mandy's official cause of death was ruled a drowning, so she had asphyxiated in that river. Off the bat, this didn't make sense because, again, the river was shallow. The only thing that made sense was that Mandy was hit in the head, which caused her to knock out, and then she fell in the river or was put there. Like he said, the water was very cold enough to maybe eventually drown

you after pretty much paralyzing your body and lungs, but is that what happened? They didn't know for sure. Yeah, and I could see how if she was hidden head and she fell face down into the river, it's very possible that because she was unconscious, she got water in her lungs and she drowned that way. Yeah, absolutely. So that's what they were thinking, but then it begs the question, who hit her in the head and why? Right. Unfortunately, since Mandy had been found in the water, any DNA that was on her body was pretty much gone at this point. And really, the only thing that was left undisturbed was what was under her fingernails. As we know, fingernail scrapings can often help create a DNA profile if the victim was able to scratch their attacker.

But again, DNA was a newer thing, so it often wasn't collected in cases before the 90s, because they didn't really have the tools to do much with it. But they took DNA from her body anyway since the FBI had gotten involved. And they were really the only ones who took DNA at this time. The FBI was able to create a DNA profile for Mandy so that they knew whether or not anything found on her was her DNA, or if it was a potential suspect. The medical examiner was also able to determine that Mandy was sexually assaulted before she was killed. They also found that other than Mandy's own DNA, there was also an unknown male's DNA on her body, but again, they couldn't

find a match for it. And we've done a lot of cases that were before the 90s and before Kodis, but of course, because at this time they didn't have the modern technology to be able to really do much with course, because at this time they didn't have the modern technology to be able to really do much with DNA, in so many cases they just didn't take it because they're like, well, what the hell are we going to do with this? Not thinking that ahead in the future maybe they would be able to use it. So some people did, some people didn't, but it was mostly used in cases that the FBI were involved in.

Right. And hindsight is also 2020, so I guess kind of I understand, but at the same time, you know, throughout history, investigators have made a point of collecting every piece of evidence that they can, and at this point in time that includes DNA. So it's a good thing that they did take this DNA, because right now, back in like 1989, DNA was really kind of on the cusp of like making its big break. Exactly and recently you know in a lot of modern news cases are being solved from a long time ago thanks to DNA and doing the whole ancestry dot com thing things like that that's a huge a huge thing right now. So people who collected DNA in the past, it's really, really paying off now. Exactly. Genealogy is pretty much shutting down

a lot of these cases and solving a lot of them. So investigators felt strongly that foul play was involved in Mandy's case. And they continue to question neighbors and other residents in the area, hoping that they could get some information. On top of that, they received a lot of tips, so they were very busy following up on these as well. Other than Mandy's brother Lee, the only person who had seen Mandy running was Paul Malik, one of their neighbors.

Paul was 40 years old at the time and had seen Mandy the day she disappeared. He had come forward in the beginning and told police that while he was backing his car out of his driveway, he saw Mandy run by. After she passed his property, he then told police that he saw a dark colored pickup truck drive by in the same direction that Mandy was headed. Since there was nothing strange about this to Paul, he didn't pay much attention. So when police asked him what kind of truck it was, he didn't remember. The reason why Paul was somewhat suspicious to police was because they wondered if he

was only telling them this so he could be a part of the case in some way. Because sometimes killers do that and they try to get inside information. Also he didn't want to give them his DNA at first either. And this struck detectives as pretty suspicious. Because there he was supposedly trying to help in the investigation, but then when they asked him for a sample, he didn't want to give it up. So they started thinking maybe he was hiding something. To ensure that they could test his DNA against what they had found on Mandy's body, they got a court order and demanded that he give them a sample of his blood. But once they tested it, it didn't match with the DNA profile and sample that they had

found on Mandy's body. So they stopped pursuing him as a suspect. The most well-known potential suspect in this case was Gary Ridgeway, also known as the Green River Killer. He was active from about 1982 to 1990 and murdered people across Washington and Oregon. But he's also thought to have killed a couple women in the 90s as well. There aren't any confirmed murders by him in the year of 1989 when Mandy was killed, so it's hard to place his whereabouts then, but we do know that some of the women he murdered were in the Bellingham area. And remember, Akmi is about 40 minutes outside of Bellingham. His

M.O. was to usually strangle victims and then put them in the river or around the river in a forested area, and he would also sexually assault them, usually after death. The Green River Killer wasn't apprehended though until 2001, so in 1989, they still didn't know who he was, which obviously made this whole thing even harder because they didn't know if they had a notorious serial killer making his way into their town, or if one of their own was behind it and possibly planned to strike again. But of course, the tip lines then flooded and kind of muddied the waters a bit. They had nearly 8,000 tips to follow up on.

Which is a lot. And it's always nice when cases get a lot of attention, but it can also be a little bit detrimental because of how busy it makes the police, because they're constantly following up on tips that almost always lead nowhere, not always, but mostly. And then this also makes it harder to follow up on the potentially legit ones because they're just so slammed with tips. So it can be an amazing thing, but also a really difficult thing. And not only are police getting tips that may not be relevant, but we also talked in our last episode about how people would give police

phony information on cases as a joke. Exactly. So when a case gets a lot of attention, hoaxes do follow. Right. And that's really unfortunate when police are looking for suspects. On December 4, 1989, so 10 days after Mandy was murdered, a memorial service was held in her honor in her old high school's auditorium, and over 900 people showed up. Her high school had under 400 students at the time, so this really just goes to show you how much her murder affected everyone in the community and the surrounding towns. One of Mandy's biggest influences during

her high school years was her basketball coach Jim Freeman. She had written him a really nice letter after graduation telling him how much he inspired her. So he was the one to give her eulogy at the memorial. Mandy's family and a bunch of her friends and classmates also spoke and then everyone joined in to sing amazing grace. Years passed and still, there were no answers to the Stavik's questions. None of the tips coming in led to anything and police began to wonder if they would ever solve this case. But as the years went on, they never stopped trying.

Luckily, with time comes advanced technology, so they felt confident with modern DNA testing that it was going to be a lot easier to solve this case. As new detectives came into the county, they would all view Mandy's case with fresh eyes, and one of them actually had the idea to just go around and collect DNA samples. By this time, it was 2009, so 20 years later. The problem with that is that the predator could be long gone from that area, but they wanted to try it anyway. So they pretty much just went door to door collecting samples from different males in the area and sending them off to the lab for analysis. But after all of this, their efforts came back fruitless. But they also looked into men who lived in the area

at the time Mandy disappeared, as well as people who moved out of the area. And one person that came up in their search in 2013 was Tim Bass. Timothy Forrest Bass was known as a quiet loner in high school. He had graduated from the same high school Mandy attended, Mt Baker High, but graduated in 1986, so three years before Mandy did. At the time of her disappearance, he was 21 years old and living in the same house he grew up in, which happened to be just a few properties down from the Stavick's home. He was living with his parents and younger brother Tom, who was actually friends with Mandy, and their house was on Mandy's running route.

But for some reason, Tim was never looked into or questioned during the initial investigation. I honestly feel like I don't know how that's possible. Well, I know that detectives worked really hard on this case and jumped on it immediately, and I know they had literally thousands of tips to follow up on, but it's kinda surprising that they didn't question all the people that lived along her running route, because you would assume those people would know most out of anybody, probably. Right. Yeah. And the fact that she's friends with Tim's younger brother, Tom, is kind of like, it's like to me, any male that was in that area should have been questioned and tested.

Right. But that's another problem with all these tips coming in. It makes the police so busy that they just don't even know what to do first and things fall through the cracks. Right, mudding the waters for sure. So since Tim hadn't been questioned initially, investigators automatically felt a slight suspicion. On top of that, he had moved out of the area less than two months after Mandy was murdered. Which also makes it harder because this investigation lasted a long time, and suddenly he gets out of there, they wouldn't have, you know, of course they didn't question him because he moved. Right.

So, in January of 1990, he married a woman he met at a grocery store named Gina Malone, and they moved to Everson, Washington, which is about 20 miles or 32 kilometers away from Acme. He didn't move very far but he still got out of Acme really quick. Gina was actually local to Acme as well and was a year younger than Mandy was, but she didn't know her personally. She had seen her around school but that was pretty much it. After their move, they went on to have three kids, but their relationship wasn't very good. Gina later

stated that when they married, it was very sudden. In the end of 1989, after Mandy was killed, he asked Gina to marry him right then and there. And then that's when they moved. Of course, she didn't suspect anything was off, but she wondered what his hurry was. Tim was incredibly controlling in every aspect of her life. He told her what to wear, where to go, and who she could talk to. And looking back, she also later recalled times

when they were watching any TV show or film that had to do with murder. And he seemed to make a lot of comments about how he would never make mistakes that would get him caught if he was the suspect in the film. And this went for a lot of like cold case files and unsolved mystery type shows that they would watch, and he would just always make these comments. Yeah, a little weird to be making those types of comments to your wife. Other than being controlling, Tim was often violent with his wife, Gina.

Whenever they got into a disagreement, he would shove her against walls or come at her with a fist. He had a very violent temper. In 2010, Gina filed for a domestic abuse protection order against Tim, and this wasn't just for her, but it was also for their three children. In the details of this protection order, Gina stated why she didn't feel safe around Tim, and that included his reactions and comments to murder shows. So police were able to see these files and just felt really strange about Tim Bass.

So they went to his house and asked him what he knew about Mandy's Stavik's murder since he was living in Akmi at the time it happened. But he told police he didn't know anything about it and he hadn't even remembered her name. This was the first major red flag because as we said, Akmi was tiny. Everyone knew literally everyone and this murder was huge news. There wasn't a person in Watcombe County who didn't know every detail of this case, let alone Mandy's name. Even though 20 years had passed, he was her neighbor and his brother was friends with her. So it just didn't make sense to police at all. Then, even stranger, he refused to give them a DNA

sample. At that point, police felt really good about him as a suspect. Police didn't have enough against him to get a search warrant or a court order to collect his DNA, so they had to get smart. For years, Tim had been working as a delivery driver for Franz Bakery and Bellingham, which is a bread and pastry manufacturer here in the Pacific Northwest. And police decided to pay his work a visit. When investigators arrived, they told the Bakery manager that one of her employees was potentially under investigation for a case that they were working on.

They wanted to see if they could ask her some questions about him and possibly get something with his DNA on it. Kim Wagner, Tim's manager, told the investigators to contact the HR department which they did. But HR wanted them to obtain a search warrant. They weren't just willing to voluntarily give up information on their employee without probable cause, which they didn't have. Police were in the same position and they were once again stuck. Over the next few years, police continued to try and find out what happened to Mandy. And this included trying to find everything they could on Tim

Bass. But one evening, Kim Wagner, who again is Tim's manager at Frans Bakery, was at a bar with her husband and some of their friends when Mandy Stavick's case came up in conversation. When Mandy disappeared, Kim Wagner was also living in Akmi, and she was a year older than Mandy, and she remembers being incredibly affected by this whole thing. Someone in the group mentioned that Tim Bass lived on Mandy's street when she was murdered. And that made Kim start to wonder if that's why police came to her work years prior. At that point, she knew she needed to help. Soon after, police returned to Franz Bakery and asked Kim if they could access Tim's delivery

schedule, and she gave it to them right away. She also asked them if they were investigating him for Mandy's case, and the investigators were shocked. So now they really felt like Tim was responsible, because Kim brought that up all on her own. So they're just kind of like, oh my god, she agrees that he could be the killer. And Kim also mentioned that she thought that Tim was really odd in general, because she had known him for years and years. So she knew him pretty well and after she found out that he lived on Mandy Street, she just felt even weirder about him.

Kim really wanted to help police get Tim's DNA, but as a delivery driver, he wore gloves all day long. And he was always out on deliveries, so it's not like he had a desk he sat at where he threw things in the trash that they could collect, it just really wasn't like that. And strangely enough, if he had trash, he would actually take it home with him. Since police didn't have a warrant, they couldn't ask Kim to help them collect DNA, but she was very adamant about doing it voluntarily. Which is pretty much a loophole in this case, because police were allowed to accept evidence

that was willingly given to them. So Kim continued to watch him carefully until he eventually slipped up. One day, Tim was at the office and grabbed a plastic cup from the water cooler's dispenser and poured some Coca-Cola in it. Then, he threw the cup and can away in the trash and walked out. Kim immediately ran to the trash, grabbed both the can and the cup, and put them in her desk drawer. At this point, it was 2017, nearly 30 years after Mandy's murder.

Kim Wagner brought the coat can in the cup to police and they were over the moon excited, obviously. They sent both to the lab for testing and impatiently waited for the results. When they came back, it was a one in 11 quadrillion match to the DNA that was found on Mandy's stavix body. Police immediately found Tim Bass and arrested him for her murder. Apparently, Tim didn't show much emotion at all during this arrest, but as soon as they got down to the police station, he changed his story about Mandy. At this time, Tim was about 49 years old,

and the last thing he had told police was that he didn't know Mandy at all, let alone her name. But then, during his interrogation, he told them that, before Mandy died, they had been having a secret relationship. And the reason he hadn't told police about this is because he didn't want them to think he was guilty of something he wasn't. It's a major red flag when you change your story one, and two, you can't say you don't know anything about her, and then suddenly say that you guys were having sex on the down low. Yeah, clearly this guy is a fucking liar. He told investigators that during a mountain bike ride in his hometown of Akmi with his dad, they had come across Mandy on a jog. This was probably six months or so before her murder, and they got to talking.

He said that from then on, he continued to see her on the trail while he wrote his bike and she jogged. And from that, they started seeing each other casually, but when she went off to college, they broke things off. And as we know, Mandy had a boyfriend at this time when she was supposedly seeing Tim. So Tim then told investigators that on the day that Mandy disappeared, she randomly came to his house and they hung out for a little bit. Then she left. Tim said the only other

person home at the time was his dad, who by 2017 was dead. So unfortunately, there was no way to confirm anything he was saying. But police felt as though he dragged his dad into the story, knowing that they couldn't follow up with him. And that the reason he told police she came over on the day she disappeared was to help explain why his DNA would have been on her body. And not only did it not make sense that she would have been dating Tim at this time since she had a boyfriend, but everyone in Mandy's family had known Tim at that time,

and they know that Mandy would never date Tim, or have any kind of relationship with him because he was way out of her league. Like Mandy was gorgeous and motivated and headstrong and Tim was completely the opposite of all these things. And although she was an incredibly nice person, she really wouldn't even have given Tim the time of day. Like, yeah, seriously nice try to him, but no. In your dreams.

Which is unfortunately probably the reality is that he just really admired her or liked her and she maybe rejected him or didn't want him and he had to force himself on her. Yeah, that's probably the most likely in this case. At this time, in 2017, Gina Malone was still married to Tim. So I'm not sure how that works if she had a protection order against him, but they hadn't gotten divorced. So police asked her to come in and hopefully answer some other questions that they had regarding Tim.

But she told them that the day Mandy disappeared, she was with Tim at his house all day, and she had even seen Mandy running by the house, too. The prosecution pretty much tried to paint this whole picture, which, as we believe believe is the reality is that Mandy and Tim didn't have any relationship or history at all and that they simply just grew up on the same street and that's where their connection ended. Meanwhile, the defense wanted to try to prove that they had a relationship so that they could explain why Tim's DNA would have ended up on her body. Right. Instead of it being there because he had sexually assaulted her and killed her. so that they could explain why Tim's DNA would have ended up on her body.

Right, instead of it being there because he had sexually assaulted her and killed her. Exactly, but the prosecution was like they didn't even know each other and had a bunch of witnesses come and say the same thing. Gina filed for divorce after Tim was arrested, and when she testified in trial, she told the court that she has no recollection of ever being at Tim's house on the day that Mandy disappeared. Despite her previous alibi to police. And she would have remembered this since it was the day after Thanksgiving, because as we know, our memories are a little bit better when we can connect the day to something significant, but police were completely understanding of why she lied, because she didn't feel safe going against Tim knowing that he could still potentially hurt her, because they were at that point still married. But once the trial was underway, she felt like she could finally speak the truth, as well as finally get a divorce from Tim, and get out

of an abusive relationship with a killer. Gina also stated that Tim told her that she had to lie and say that they were together that day to help verify his own alibi. And she wasn't the only one who was asked to lie for Tim. One of the witnesses that also took the stand was Tom Bass, who is again Tim's younger brother. He told the court that after investigators wanted Tim's DNA

back in 2013, Tim acted incredibly anxious and nervous. Tom wondered why he was so worried and Tim told him that it was because he slept with Mandy, and he wanted Tom to tell police that he had also slept with her. And this was likely to make his own story more believable, to make people think that maybe Mandy slept around with everyone kind of thing, but Tom didn't want to lie, so he didn't say anything to police about it. After a couple weeks on trial, the jury found 51-year-old Tim Bass guilty of the first-degree murder of Mandy Stavick. He was sentenced to just 27 years in prison for his crimes, with the eligibility of parole

after 24 years served. Meaning that, if he lives that long, Tim Bass will get out of prison between the ages of 75 and 78. Tim also never took responsibility for what he did to Mandy. In fact, his statement to the court after his sentencing was, I would first like to stay that I'm 100% innocent of this crime. I wish no ill will towards anyone here, not even today, but I'm having a hard time with this. I hate when killers say they're innocent, I mean everyone does, but especially when

there's so much evidence against them, because then the family never really gets the answers to their questions. And with Tim, there's so much here that points to him being a killer. He lied countless times, he asked other people to lie for him, and his DNA was found on her body. Also, he lived right there at the time

and fled the area right after she was killed. He pretended like he didn't know her, but then said they had an affair, like he was backpedaling, and to find out that he's an abusive and controlling husband, it just points to him being guilty. Well, yeah, that in the fact that his DNA was one in what 11 quadrillion or something.

Exactly, that's like not a mistake. Yeah, that there's no, that's the funny thing is when people like this try to claim that a mistake was made. Oh, it wasn't me. It's like science doesn't lie, buddy. Forensics, forensics isn't going to lie. Your DNA tells the story. It's there.

Exactly. And what the police think happened to her is that she was on her run. And then, you know, how Lee had seen her running in the opposite direction after, he thought maybe she was trying to run away from Tim, who maybe had driven up to her. And then the reason that her track stopped in that place was because he pulled her into his car and then he sexually assaulted her and then maybe hit her in the head with something and just through her body in the river when she was unconscious. Yeah, that would definitely explain why those footprints had stopped.

Right, but that's what's so frustrating is they can just say, well, we think this is what happened. And Tim is in prison for this crime, yet he't just say all right here's what really happened whether or not our inkling is true. So just just give us the answer right. exactly what happened to Mandy and he's a selfish asshole for not giving up that information to her family. Like, buddy, you're already caught. You're in prison for this crime. You're going to be there for a long time.

You might as well tell the truth. Exactly. I feel that way about every killer. It's just like, just tell us. And of course, Mandy's family was relieved to finally have found out kind of what happened to Mandy despite the lack of confession. But they did say how hard that trial was because it was like reliving her murder 30 years later. Thank you so much everybody for listening to this episode of Going West.

Yes, thank you guys so much for listening to this episode and next week we'll have an all-new case for you guys to dive into. So now it's time to get some shout-outs to you guys. Thank you so much to everybody who wrote us a five-star review on Apple Podcasts this week. Thank you so much to Jaden and Debbie in Big Spring, Texas. Thank you to Samantha in Springfield, Oregon, Howdy Fellow, Oregonian, and thank you so much to Micah and Huntsville, Texas. And then we have a big thanks going to Angie and Litchfield, Illinois, Alyssa, also in Eugene Oregon, Hello Fellow Oregonian, and Kenzie in New York. Thank you so much to Kristen and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, thank you to Ryan and Wilmington, Massachusetts, and thank you to Tiffany and Connecticut.

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