Going West: True Crime - Michele Harris // 427

Episode Date: August 3, 2024

On September 11, 2001, amongst the unforgettable terrorist attacks, a 35-year-old mother went missing under suspicious circumstances across the state of New York. When her car was found at the bottom of her winding driveway, the keys still in the ignition, she was reported missing. With an important meeting she missed the following day, police recognized motive for why someone could want her dead. But is that what happened? Or would a last-minute witness account be the key to solving her case? This is the story of Michele Harris. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What is going on true crime fans? I'm your host T and I'm your host Daphne and you're listening to going West. Hello everybody. Thank you so much to Kirsten for recommending today's case. This one takes place in New York on 9-11 but hours away from the city but as you can imagine there is so much going on as this case unfolded and there's there's really so much to this story and we really tried to pack it in. I mean we could have done probably so many parts on this but I think we summed it up pretty well for the trials. There's so many trials, like there's so much going on. Yeah, there's a lot going on. And it's crazy to think about the fact

that crimes actually did occur on such a tragic day, because those crimes kind of went underneath the radar. Yeah, we talk about that a little bit in today's episode, but yeah, this is a wild story so thank you again so much to Kirsten for recommending it and thank you guys everybody for tuning in. Alright guys, this is episode 427 of Going West, so let's get into it. I'm gonna be the one to blame I'm gonna be the one to blame I'm gonna be the one to blame I'm gonna be the one to blame I'm gonna be the one to blame

I'm gonna be the one to blame On September 11, 2001, amongst the unforgettable terrorist attacks, a 35-year-old mother went missing under suspicious circumstances across the state of New York. When her car was found at the bottom of her winding driveway, the keys still in the ignition, she was reported missing. With an important meeting she missed the following day, police recognized potential motive for why someone could want her dead. But is that what happened? Or would a last-minute witness account be the key

to solving her case? This is the story of Michelle Harris. Chris. Michelle Ann Taylor was born on September 29, 1965 in New York, growing up in a small village of Spencer in Tioga County, New York, which is also where today's story takes place. Now, the available information on her upbringing and her young life is very minimal, but we know that she received her associate's degree from the State University of New York, or SUNY, at Morrisville. And then that around this same time in the early 1980s, Michelle met a man named Cal Harris. Cal was a businessman who grew up near Michelle in Owego, New York to a very successful family. The Harris family owned car dealerships, which is actually where Cal worked. And then Michelle worked at the dealership as well, making it a fully fledged family business after they got together.

In 1990, Michelle Taylor and Cal Harris married and Michelle then became Michelle Harris and they moved to a 252 acre estate outside of Spencer, New York. So they both stayed very close to home. Now during their marriage, Michelle and Cal had four children, so two girls and two boys. Their first child was born in 1994, and by 1999, the marriage was already starting to deteriorate, with Michelle and Cal struggling to make it work. In late 1999, when Michelle discovered she was pregnant with their fourth child,

she also found out that Cal was having an affair with a woman who worked on the car lot with them. When she told him she knew of the affair, he admitted to it and promised her that the affair would end, but sadly it did not. So by October of 2000 after their fourth child was born, Michelle and Cal were sleeping separately. So at this point it's clear that Michelle was done with the marriage and shortly after October of 2000 Michelle was at a bar where she met a man named Brian Early.

Michelle was at a bar where she met a man named Brian Early. Now, Brian was visiting Tioga County for work, where he had a job as a surveyor, but he was living about 200 miles away in Philadelphia at the time. Brian was 23 and Michelle was 35 when they started seeing each other. And even though Michelle and Cal were separated and kinda beginning to move towards this divorce, she and Brian vowed to keep their relationship a secret from Cal and the kids, at least for now. But to stay close to Michelle, Brian actually moved to Tioga County from Pennsylvania, even leaving behind a girlfriend that he had back home.

He relocated to an apartment not far from the massive Harris property, and Michelle even had a set of keys to his apartment. She would sometimes let herself in if Brian was working late to let the dogs out, and she reportedly kept some personal items in his apartment. Now, while Michelle did seem to care a lot about Brian, it's important to mention that Brian was not the only man that Michelle was seeing after her separation from Cal. While Cal and Michelle were no longer sleeping in the same room, they remained living together for the sake of the kids. And while there's nothing, you know, really wrong with her dating around at this point in their separation,

it's kind of unclear how serious Michelle was about moving in with Brian. But, on the flip side, Brian allegedly had hopes to marry Michelle once she divorced from Cal. But friends of Michelle claimed that this wasn't necessarily what she wanted. It's reported that Michelle also had a relationship with her manager at Lefty's, which is the restaurant that she started working at, who was a man named Michael Casper. While that relationship was kind of short-lived, it was also reported that Michelle had been seen out with other men during this time, and this, you know, of course can be important for later. So as we know, Cal and Michelle were going through some major marital issues.

So in order to fully put ourselves in Michelle's shoes, let's talk a bit about the ins and outs of their marriage in its final years. So Barb Thayer, who was the family nanny, claimed to witness many loud and explosive arguments while she worked there. While she didn't necessarily claim to hear any threats, this was not the case for others close to Michelle. Michelle's two sisters had been on the phone with her when they say that they overheard Cal threaten her life, claiming that he could kill her even without his guns, which he owned many of, and he said that he could make sure police never found her body. And her sisters are hearing him say this. This isn't just Michelle relaying this information, they can hear him

talking. That's kind of insane because of the fact that he probably knows that she's on the phone with her sisters and he's still saying this. Kind of crazy. Well that's not the end of that because there was even a claim where Michelle was on the phone with her sister again when she was hiding in a closet in their home because Cal became angry and was holding his shotgun outside which Understandably made Michelle fear for her life Now this hiding in the closet claim from her sister was apparently from 1996 but in July of 2001 Michelle was getting her hair done and more terrifying behavior on Cal's end was witnessed,

because she was on the phone with Cal, who again threatened to kill her, which her hairdresser overheard. She heard Cal say, I will fucking kill you. I will make you disappear. Now to give you an idea of why Cal was so angry, even though these remarks are completely unjust. Absolutely. You should just never say that to anybody, even if you, you know, don't mean it. He initially didn't want a divorce because he had a ton of money and Michelle was kind of keen on taking some of it, which Heath will mention and go over in a moment. And then neither of them wanted to lose custody of their kids originally. So he is very angry. But like these are also such specific threats to say you'll make her

disappear, make sure nobody can find her body like whoa. Yeah. And you know, it's obviously never justifiable to ever threaten somebody's life. But the fact that you're what you're saying, he's being so specific saying like it's one thing if you're like oh my god like I'm gonna kill you or whatever I mean obviously that's not acceptable either but the fact that it's like I'm in yeah it's more common he's like I'm gonna kill you and literally bury your body somewhere where they can never find you yeah it's like it feels a lot more real absolutely so clearly there were many people in Michelle's life who witnessed these threats and these would later come

into play. So to backtrack to early 2001, Michelle had decided that she was done with Cal's antics and threats once and for all and she finally decided to file for divorce from Cal and this was shortly after she had met Brian and began dating around a little bit. Well, during this time, Cal had allegedly refused to let her divorce him. Whether it was for the sake of the family or because of a large settlement that he would

likely have to pay her, we don't really know, but we can assume that it was probably the latter. So at this point in early 2001, Michelle started working at Lefty's restaurant, like Daphne mentioned, to make her own money as she proceeded with this divorce. And interestingly, remember those guns that Cal claimed that he didn't need to kill Michelle? Well, the court ordered all firearms in the house to be relocated away from the home until this divorce was finalized, and obviously this is for safety reasons. Back to the summer now, in June of 2001, Cal was ordered to begin paying Michelle $400 a month

along with payments related to the house, which is around what she made at Lefty's restaurant. Cal had even offered Michelle full custody of their four kids, and although Cal was worth over $5 million, he offered a settlement of $740,000 to Michelle paid out over the next ten years But Michelle rejected this offer and a few months later in August of 2001 Cal offered Michelle

$80,000 a year in alimony and child support since remember he offered her full custody of the kids and she would need to support and House them herself Well likely knowing how much money he had and how much it would take to raise four very young children by herself Michelle again denied this offer and she even ordered an appraisal to be done of the car dealership business that he owned Assuming she knew that she could get much more money. However, a short time later, Michelle decided to accept the $80,000 annual offer and she had even made Barb, the nanny, aware of her decision to settle. But it doesn't seem like Cal was aware of this decision, so just keep that in mind.

Now, Michelle was planning on telling her divorce lawyer this very thing that she's ready to It doesn't seem like Cal was aware of this decision, so just keep that in mind. Now Michelle was planning on telling her divorce lawyer this very thing, that she's ready to accept this 80k annual alimony during a meeting that was scheduled for September 12, 2001. But sadly, this meeting never happened. Of course, September 11, 2001 will stick in the minds of Americans and people from all over the world for a lifetime because it was a day of massive loss and complete tragedy across the United States. As we all know, four commercial airplanes went down that day.

Of course, two planes hit the Twin Towers in New York City, one hit the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, and the final plane crashed into a field near Indian Lake in Shanksville, Pennsylvania. But a lesser-known tragedy also occurred on this infamous day, about 200 miles away from Manhattan in Owego, New York, where one family was changed forever. On the morning of Tuesday, September 11th, 2001, almost 36-year-old Michelle was home at her and Cal's largest state in Owego, New York, glued to the TV, watching the events unfold

in horror like much of the world. Michelle had even planned to go to New York City on September 14th and 15th, so just a few days later, to visit some old college friends, which by the way, is about a four hour drive away from where she lived. She was also planning on selling some old jewelry while she was there, and apparently, this even included her wedding ring. Now of course, in the wake of the terrorist attacks, she had realized that morning that this trip to New York City later in the week would not be happening. Jump to the next morning, the morning of Wednesday, September 12th, 2001, when Cal noticed that his estranged wife hadn't come home the previous evening after work." It really wouldn't have been that weird that he didn't notice until the morning since of course they were sleeping separately due to their separation and obviously divorce arrangements. But at about 7 a.m. on the

morning of September 12, 2001, Cal called the family's nanny Barb to let her know that Michelle had not come home the night before and asked Barb to help get their young kids ready for the day. When Barb arrived at the property, she immediately noticed Michelle's gold 2000 Ford Winstar minivan at the end of the Harris family's long driveway. The keys were still in the ignition, but Michelle wasn't there. Well, in order to fully grasp what may have happened to Michelle, we need to really dissect the last day that she was seen alive, which again, was September 11th, 2001. Now, as Daphne mentioned just a minute ago, Michelle woke up and she was watching the

news along with the rest of the world. Since she had friends in the city and lived in the state of New York, this event understandably hit very close to home. In the afternoon of September 11th, Barb got to the Harris home to watch the kids, and it's pretty unclear whether or not they went to school that day because many schools, especially in the New York area, were put on lockdown because people were absolutely terrified and they had no idea what was happening in the country and why. You were at school that day right? I was yeah. Okay me too. I actually had to write

a uh like a two-page essay when I was in seventh grade. I had to write an essay basically describing how I was feeling about the events. Wow that's a great project and by the way we were on the west coast so we weren't on lockdown but yeah in New York it was a totally different story. Yeah well either way Barb arrived at the house and chatted with Michelle who claimed that she had a headache that day but was still going to fulfill her shift at Lefty's restaurant. So Michelle started getting ready for work but she was waiting for her blue uniform to finish drying. Since the laundry was taking too long, she ended up being a little bit late to her work shift.

She worked at Lefty's until 9pm, and then when she clocked out, she headed to the parking lot with Michael Casper. And remember, that is the manager of Lefty's restaurant who she had previously dated, and she also walked out with Michael's friend. The three of them apparently had a couple drinks and just mulled over the horrific events of the day and discussed the state of the world, which I'm sure a lot of people were doing that night.

But after about an hour, around 10 p.m., Michelle made the drive to Brian Early's apartment. Remember, this is the guy that she is dating. According to Brian, Michelle stayed at his place for about an hour where they also discussed the attacks and allegedly, she told Brian that these terrible events made her life problems seem so small. Michelle left Brian's apartment between 11pm and 11.30pm and made the short drive back

to her house. At this point, Brian was the last known person to see Michelle. So now that we have a little bit of an understanding of Michelle's whereabouts on September 11th, we can jump back to the morning of September 12th. Cal called their nanny, Barb Thayer, at about 7am, asking her to come to the house and help out since he claimed Michelle hadn't come home the night before. So Barb headed to the family home, and as she pulled into the driveway, noticed Michelle's car, with the keys, in the ignition. Barb walked up the driveway, which is about a quarter mile long road surrounded by woods, and when she got into the house, she assumed

that Michelle had come home in that short window of time between Cal's phone call and her arriving, since she had just seen Michelle's minivan moments ago at the bottom of the driveway. Barb even called out Michelle's Dell wasn't there. Shop with Rakuten and you'll get it. What's it? It's the best deal. The highest cash back, the most savings on your shopping. So join Rakuten and start getting cash back at Sephora, Old Navy, Expedia and other stores you love. You can even stack sales on top of cash back. Just start your shopping with Rakuten to save money at over 750 stores. Join for free at rakuten.ca or get the Rakuten app.

That's R-A-K-U-T-E-N. So, Michelle wasn't home, even though her minivan was suspiciously at the bottom of their large driveway. But, Cal was home, and he was dressed and getting ready to head to work. Cal and Barb chatted for a moment, and Barb mentioned to Cal that she had just seen Michelle's car down the driveway. But Cal claimed that he didn't even know that her minivan was down there. But we gotta remember that this property is huge. It's 252 acres and the driveway twisted down a quarter mile, making it pretty understandable to Barb that Cal hadn't seen the car. Yeah, you cannot see the street from their house. Exactly.

So at this point, Barb drove back down the snaking driveway with Cal in tow to investigate. But the really strange thing here is that Cal suggested that maybe Michelle hitchhiked, or that she was with one of her boyfriends. Why would she hitchhike and to where? Yeah, like she's just gonna get out of her car that she could clearly drive and then stick her thumb out to hitchhike, like no. Yeah, like her keys are in the ignition, they're there. It's not like she lost her keys somehow.

Her car's at the bottom of the driveway, which is already weird. Why is it down there? And why would your first thing be to say, oh, she probably just hitched a ride out of here? Why would she do that? Yeah, that would not be my first thought. So Barb claimed that Michelle was in good spirits in the summer of 2001, even noting that she seemed happier than ever. Michelle expressed to Barb that she was thrilled to finally have her life back post-divorce. Clearly not a woman on the run.

So, anyway, when Barb and Cal were at Michelle's car, Sans Michelle, they looked in the vehicle and again noted the keys were still in the ignition. But Barb also saw some items kinda strewn around the car, like mail, toys, and food wrappers, which surely any busy mom can relate to. Cal's next comment is really odd, though, because he claimed to Barb that the car should be professionally cleaned. He had also later claimed that the car needed an oil change, so it would be a good idea

to take it in. I look at this two ways. One, he knows cars well, so maybe he cares about this car for whatever reason, even though it's not his. Maybe because his kids ride in it, so he cares that it's in full working condition and is up to date and all that stuff. Sure. But on the other hand too, she's not really your wife anymore. So why do you care if her car is

cleaned? Why are you pushing for that? Yeah it seems kind of out of place and a little a little bit suspicious. Well instead for now, Barb drove the car up the long driveway and parked it in the garage while Cal headed to work at the dealership. Barb felt that it was very unlikely that Michelle hadn't come home to her kids the night before because she didn't do that. She wasn't one to just stay out and leave her kids. It's the middle of the week. They have to go to school. This especially with what just happened the day before. She probably wants to be close to her kids after reeling from this horrific event.

Absolutely and you know she does have a couple boyfriends or people that she's seeing and stuff like that. But that is not to say that she would completely disregard her children. Yeah, that just wasn't like her. And Barb knew this because Barb is always around her. So she decided to call one of Michelle's friends. When the friend answered, they remembered that on that day, September 12th, Michelle was due to have a meeting with her divorce lawyer, which was a very important meeting

to Michelle. She would never have missed this on purpose. So the friend decided to call the divorce lawyer to see if he had heard from Michelle. But he claimed that he hadn't. And this is when he himself, not Cal, not Barb, not any of her friends, this is when he decided to call the state police to report Michelle Harris missing. Because he himself knew that this was very suspicious.

She wouldn't have just missed this appointment. Nobody can find her. Something is clearly wrong here. Now, understandably, due to the events from New York City the day prior, many officials in Tioga County had made their way down in New York City to assist in search and rescue and to provide extra security to the city limits, including a majority of the search and rescue dogs and aviation teams. This is what Heath was hinting at earlier.

All these resources, of course, for good reason, are being poured into the city to help find people. There were so many missing people on 9-11. Yeah, absolutely. It was just, I mean, people were searching for weeks and months. Yeah, this is like beyond a national emergency. But luckily, the local investigators who were still in the area

took Michelle's missing person call seriously right away. And they made their way to Cal's dealership to talk to him around 9 40 a.m. on September 12. Like that's early. They got there right away. They're looking into this immediately. Cal told the police that he didn't know where his estranged wife was and that she never came home after her shift at Lefty's. Kind of surprisingly, he granted permission for the police to search her gold minivan, but then asked that the car be returned after the search because it was due for an oil change.

Again, super weird. Why do you care about this oil change, man? I don't know why he cares so much, but it's just so weird, you know? Like, your wife, obviously, she's... you guys are getting a divorce, but this is still a person that you spent a lot of time with, and she is now missing, and you're like, hey, can you just make sure that, like, you get that car back to me by noon so I can make sure it gets an oil change like dude Shut the fuck up. Yeah, it's it's very suspicious and that he is he's kind of harping on this and Yeah, I think it's also kind of interesting that he is saying she never came home from her shift But he doesn't necessarily know that her car is at the bottom of the driveway for all he knows

She did come home to pick something up or whatever, but he keeps saying, oh, she never came home last night. Well, official searches were able to commence in the area with limited resources, and the police began a search using helicopters and dogs on the Harris property. On the property, near the winding driveway, there was a small pond. There was also a 29-acre lake called

Empire Lake which bordered this sprawling property. Both bodies of water were searched with divers and sonar, but Michelle proved to be absent from both. Once these searches were underway, police decided to look into who had been the last person to see Michelle, which was, of course, Michael Casper and his friend after her September 11th shift at Lefty's. Or at least as far as they know right now. Yeah, they didn't know quite yet that she had gone to Brian's before apparently going home. So police performed background checks on Michael and his friend, and they found some very unsavory

information here. Michael Casper had a reported history of heavy cocaine use, along with a conviction on assaulting an ex-girlfriend. And when they did a background check on Michael's friend, they discovered that he had served a 10-year sentence for a sexual assault. So clearly, not a good look for either of these guys. Then, police finally found out that Michelle had gone to her boyfriend, Brian Early's, apartment

after leaving Lefty's. And they went there to question him as well. And he was absolutely cooperative, allowing them to search his apartment along with his family's property back in Pennsylvania, where they owned a hunting lodge. But both properties were cleared and no damning evidence was ever discovered. The police conducted a polygraph test with Michael Casper, his friend, and Brian Early,

and all three men complied and they all passed. So police took these three men off of their radar. This of course made Cal look more suspicious since he was the only known person to have motive to kill Michelle. You know we have all those threats that multiple other people are hearing and he they were in the middle of a divorce where she was trying to get a bunch of money out of him and take their kids. And clearly he did not want her to divorce him.

And yeah, now you're saying, you know, there's alimony money here. Yeah. So there's quite a bit of motive. Absolutely. So on September 15th, a few days after Michelle had last been seen, a state police forensics investigator arrived at the Harris property. While they didn't have a warrant to investigate inside yet, they were just searching the outside, which actually included the outside of the garage.

And guess what they found? This forensics investigator noticed blood spatter on the garage walls and the outside of the house on a doorway. So this wild discovery was used to secure a search warrant inside the home where the investigator reportedly found hundreds of blood stains. Some of them even appeared diluted as if someone attempted to clean it up. And I know this is kind of hard to imagine but we read in various articles that these hundreds of blood stains, quote hundreds of of blood stains appeared recent, which is debatable, of course,

and that they seem to be from spatter. So you might be wondering how are there hundreds of blood stains? They're very small and there are so many of them because it appears to be spatter. So it's not like this was a blood bath. There were numerous areas with detectable blood, but collectively it wasn't even enough to prove that someone had died. You know, like it wasn't, it wasn't like there was blood all over the place. I mean there was, but there were very small traces of blood.

So it's still super suspicious, but it's not enough on its own to prove that Michelle was murdered there. Well, hours after the investigator made these discoveries again on September 15th, Cal met up with Michelle's sisters, where they confronted him about the threats that he had made to their sister in the past. It was clear that they did not like their estranged brother-in-law. And while he originally denied the claims that he made to Michelle about wanting her dead, he then admitted to saying it but insisted that he was not serious. Yeah okay buddy that's still pretty a very

fucked up thing to say. I'm glad that he at least admitted it even though we don't necessarily need him to because you know we have multiple people stating that they heard him say it but it's just again like we mentioned earlier you can say oh well I was just being dramatic and I didn't actually mean it literally but those threats were kind of specific. Yeah well I'm glad that these Michelle's sisters are at least doing their due diligence and confronting him face to face. Yeah because they know that something is up and that she wouldn't just leave. So after this intense confrontation, Cal returned home. And this is when the forensics investigator questioned Cal regarding those

suspicious blood stains. And he claimed that he didn't know what they were from. Samples were tested and they all confirmed to be human blood. But the blood samples were saved for later testing to determine whose blood it was, which we will talk about in the trial. Cal then says that he remembers that about a month prior to Michelle's disappearance,

she had cut herself while doing something in the garage. Like, oh yeah, wait, She cut her finger about a month ago Oh, yeah, you just somehow remembered a month ago But also like hold up this claim doesn't make any sense because it was reported that it appeared that these spatters were consistent or were Consistent sorry with blunt trauma again. It was spatter not a few drops of blood that a finger may produce Yeah Again, it was spatter not a few drops of blood that a finger may produce Yeah If you're thinking about it when you cut your finger and it was if it was dripping on the floor It would just be like little droplets doesn't spray blood. Yeah, it's not gonna spray unless you cut it like real fucking deep

Yeah, I guess I mean it could but yeah, but I don't know about that, but there were also it was in multiple locations It's not like oh on the workbench There's a few drops of blood and, okay, that makes sense, cause she was working on this. No, this doesn't make sense. Yeah, you would imagine that if she cut her finger and she was walking through the garage,

into the house or something, there would be a trail of blood drops. Maybe. Not spatter. Even if that, you know, a lot of people will suck on their finger or they'll hold it, you know? You're not just gonna necessarily let blood fly all over the room sure yeah, that's that's true, too But this is his explanation

Well the forensic investigator also noted that although the stains didn't look fresh They were still red in color Where they would have been more brown if the blood had been there for like a month or so. And I want to mention this because I forget if we're going to bring it up later, but I don't think we do. Um, this, like I said earlier, this is not, um, it's not necessarily an exact science, especially you can't tell through photographs, right? So how red it is, if there was an edit made, whatever.

So they did appear to be more recent due to the color but they weren't able to determine concretely when This blood got in the house. So definitely possible that they were new definitely possible that they weren't but again What else would cause a blood spatter in multiple areas of the house? Yeah. Yeah Yeah, that's a lot of great questions there Well, the investigator also said it looked like somewhat fresh blood stains appeared to have been cleaned, as we mentioned. This is when an official search of the inside of the home was done and the home was officially a crime scene, but unfortunately they found nothing.

No proof of a body and no proof of a murder weapon. However, the police were very, very suspicious of Cal, and decided to secretly investigate him for the time being. I mean, they even put a GPS tracker on his vehicle in the hopes that if Cal had killed Michelle and dumped her body somewhere, maybe he would return to the site at some point, like maybe if he thought that the police were onto him and needed to move the body. Exactly. But after six months of surveillance, they were unsuccessful, and this began a four-year-long halt in the investigation.

So now it's 2005. Remember earlier when we mentioned all those threats that Cal made to Michelle? The ones from her sisters, the one from Michelle's hairdresser? Well, in 2005, investigators re-interviewed the hairdresser, who had not previously stated to police that he heard that threatening phone call all those years ago. Until now. And the hairdresser later claimed that he hadn't initially told police about overhearing this call because he didn't trust them. But regardless, these two witness accounts of verbal threats were enough to secure a conviction,

even without a body. And on September 30th, 2005, police arrived at Cal's dealership and arrested him where they not only handcuffed him But put his ankles in shackles and four years later, you know, this must have been a huge surprise Yeah, massive breaking the case here. So a heads up this case includes I kind of mentioned this earlier But it includes many trials with lots of twists and turns So sorry if this is a lot kind of condensed into a smallish period of time. We could go on and on about trials.

They're not super interesting to Heath and I. I feel like sometimes with trials, there's a lot of legal jargon and they drag on and on. And we just wanted to have kind of the highlights of all the trials because there's four. So anyway, the first trial was pending but was delayed and then dismissed because allegedly the Harris family knew the original judge

which of course would be a conflict of interest. This brought the trial to a rocky start but in May of 2006, a trial with a new judge commenced against Cal Harris. Despite no body or murder weapon, it was noted that when Michelle was last known to be seen at around 1130 PM on September 11th, to when Barb arrived to find Michelle's vehicle

around 8 AM on the 12th, this timeline could have given Cal all night to kill Michelle and get rid of her body. The prosecution also brought in the tests from those blood spatter stains which were consistent with blood belonging to Michelle or someone in her family. So I mean it could have technically belonged to her kids, her mom, her sisters, but why would I mean I could understand that kids bleed but why would there be blood spatter in multiple parts of the house from the kids? You know, that's a bit confusing. It's just weird. And there was no other stories or explanations of, oh, well, you know, one of our children crashed into something and there's blood everywhere.

You know, there was nothing to explain how somebody else could have gotten injured to cause those blood stains. Right. And Cal, you know, the only explanation that Cal had was that, oh yeah, Michelle cut her finger like a month ago. So he didn't mention anything else. Exactly. So with, you know, witnesses testifying about the threats, a mysterious eight hour time gap, and the blood spatter analysis in June of 2007 the jury presented a guilty verdict for Cal Harris and the date was so much later by the way because Cal's attorney did want to push the trial he asked for more time so that's why this was happening a little bit later but the day after the verdict was read a new character came into play.

Like perfect timing, right? Or horrible timing, really. The day after the verdict was read. But basically, a local man named Kevin Tubbs, who was a farm man who lived nearby the Harris property, made a claim that would rip this case wide open. Kevin Tubbs said that he wasn't totally aware of the case that was ongoing, but when he saw a newspaper of Michelle's picture the day after Cal was given the guilty verdict,

he recognized her. So he's saying, you know, it's not like he waited to say this. He wasn't keeping up to date with what was going on. And the day that the verdict was read, he saw her in the paper. And that's when he remembered something from years earlier. On September 12th, 2001, Kevin Tubbs claims that he was up early and heading to work. He was driving slow.

And he said that it was around 5.45 AM when he noticed some commotion at the end of the Harris driveway. He claims to have seen a woman who he says was Michelle, not just like it kind of looked like her. He said this was definitely her, along with an unidentified man having an argument. He also said that he saw a gold minivan, along with a dark colored pickup truck, which we can assume belonged to this mystery man.

And I kind of have issue with this because again, this is four years later, you're saying this is the first time you ever saw this woman. You're driving by in the early morning hours when it's still dark. How is this an alleged argument that you're witnessing? how is this significant enough to stick in your brain years later? Like, think about it guys, if you saw somebody on your street having an argument, would you remember their face four years later? I mean, it's possible, especially if he lived nearby and he was familiar with their cars and their house and whatever, even though you can't see the house from the street anyway. It's possible I guess but it's just a little weird to me. Yeah, I mean I find it pretty hard to believe but he's taking this claim very seriously. He is. He is moving forward with it.

Well, this would mean that if Michelle was in her driveway at about 5 45 a.m. on the 12th, there was no way that Cal killed her in the hours prior. on the 12th, there was no way that Cal killed her in the hours prior. So this claim would be pretty damning if true, and the court ordered a second trial for 2009. Trial number two started hot and heavy when Kevin Tubbs took the stand. I mean yeah, if he's taking the stand two years later, he's not, it's not just some flippant comment. He is really believing this, or at least has reason to push this narrative sure He's adamant enough to go to trial with this so Kevin had his parents who he lived with in

2001 back his statements about what time he had left the house to go to work which they say was at about 540 a.m.. On the 12th Since the Tubbs family lived near the Harris property which they say was at about 5.40am on the 12th. Since the Tubbs family lived near the Harris property, it made sense that this timeline would be accurate, since he said that he saw Michelle and this mystery man outside at about 5.45am. However, the prosecution deeply questioned Kevin Tubbs' claim,

and they argued that at 5.45am in mid-September, it would have been too dark outside for Kevin Tubbs' claim, and they argued that at 5.45am in mid-September, it would have been too dark outside for Kevin Tubbs to be able to see anyone, let alone remember any details like faces and car types. But Kevin said that while it was still dark enough to warrant car headlights being on, the sky was becoming blue in color before the sun rose, and he starkly stuck to his story. While Kevin's testimony was strong if true, the jury once again passed a verdict of guilty, and in October of 2009, over eight years after Michelle disappeared, Cal Harris was sentenced to 25 years to life.

So Cal began his prison sentence, and naturally, his lawyers began their appeal processes. Now we are doing our best to kind of avoid too much confusing legal jargon, but during the appeal of the conviction, due to unfair claims made in the previous trial against Cal, like the verbal claims from the sisters and hairdresser which the defense claimed to be hearsay, after much back and forth a third trial was set into motion. Insane. So crazy.

Cal was of course still in prison during these few years that the appeal was commencing for a third trial, but when the third trial was pending, Cal Harris was released from prison on half a million dollars bail. So he's out for a bit and Trial 3 began in 2015 and miraculously a new person came into play all thanks to the defense. Enter Stacy Stewart. Stacy Stewart was a Texas man who was living in the Tioga County, New York area in September of 2001.

It was reported that Stacy Stewart was a frequenter of Lefty's Restaurant and that Michelle had been cordial with him there, even once giving Stacy Stewart a ride home from Lefty's. So we can assume at the very least that the two were acquaintances if she is allowing this man in her vehicle. Right. And this is where the Stacy Stewart story about the Stacy Stewart story really starts to hold some backing in the case. Quick mention, by the way, Stacy Stewart was not able to be located at this time, which is weird. And it was assumed that he moved back to Texas since 2001. So even though Stacey was not present at this trial,

Kevin Tubbs, the local man who claimed to see Michelle and a mystery man in the driveway, was presented with a photo of Stacey Stewart. And he claimed that he, Stacey, was the man he saw on that early September morning having an argument with Michelle. And it turned out that at the time of this alleged sighting, Stacy Stewart owned a dark-colored Chevy truck, which matched the truck that Kevin Tubbs claimed to have seen.

So once again, the prosecution questioned how he could have seen and remembered those details so clearly due to lack of sunlight. But Kevin Tubbs did not budge. And thus, in May of 2015, the jury were unable to determine a verdict, even with this new twist in the case, meaning trial 3 resulted in a mistrial. As you can imagine, this is where a fourth and final trial was set for the following year, which would bring us to 2016. When the fourth trial kicked off, the Stacey Stewart story was heavily backed by Cal Harris' defense team.

And as if things couldn't get even crazier, they started to question Stacy Stewart and his character. It was made known that Stacy Stewart had fled New York after Michelle's disappearance. Weird. Yeah, pretty weird. And for that dark colored Chevy truck that he owned? Well, it was sold to a new owner and it was also tracked down. Thanks to the new owner allowing a search, it was discovered that there were blood stains in the back seat of the car. Like what? And even a pair of women's earrings were found, which once presented to Kel, he claimed were very similar to a pair that he had once gifted Michelle.

But that's not all. There had also been reports that Stacy Stewart was seen burning clothes after Michelle's disappearance. So, the defense team had an excavation of a burn pit near the New York home where Stacy Stewart lived, and the discovery was shocking. While they didn't find any of Michelle's physical remains, they did uncover a piece of a bra strap, swatches of blue and beige clothing, and a button, which the defense said were consistent of Michelle's work uniform that she had been wearing the night that she went missing. And this is so suspicious because why would there be burn remnants of a woman's clothing?

Like, people don't, in a, sorry, in a burn pit, people don't just do that. People don't just burn clothes. I'm sure somebody has burned a shirt and didn't have any weird, nefarious intentions, but... Yeah, it- people don't do that. It doesn't seem very normal, and the fact that these remnants are pretty close to what Michelle was wearing the day that she

disappeared. Yeah. That makes you, that makes it even more suspicious. Yeah and friends back this up that he had requested to burn clothes. You know there were people to say that this took place that that Stacey did this and you know then you couple that with the fact that there's blood stains in the back of his old car that he got rid of and that he left New York like it's kind of a lot of things not to Not to look at it sideways. Yeah, a lot of things are kind of pointing at Stacey So despite much back and forth between the defense and the prosecution

including many other claims from other witnesses in 2016 15 years after Michelle Harris went missing. After many trials, including two guilty verdicts and one mistrial, Cal Harris was acquitted and the verdict read, not guilty. Which is wild, considering like you just reminded us, he was found guilty twice and now today he is a free man.

I mean, yeah, I mean, it's just crazy when there's not enough physical evidence to really tie to any one person. It's hard for me to really know what I think about this story. I just jumped back and forth between Stacy and Cal because again, I can't get over the blood spatter that was found in the house, even though it wasn't very much

and we haven't found any other evidence that a murder happened in the home or when it would have happened or how it would have happened. But I think about the Stacey Stewart angle and how a big question of this case is why was Michelle's car sitting at the bottom of the driveway? And this whole Stacey Stewart alleged argument

really kind of answers that in a way that did something happen between them and he hauled her away in his vehicle and that's why there are those blood stains in the back of the car. And he left her car there at the bottom of her driveway with the keys in the ignition to never be found. Yeah, is it possible that he was a stalker?

That he showed up that morning, knew what time she was going to be heading out for her shift at lefties and was able to kind of coax her into his truck or, you know, there's so many different scenarios that run through our brains here. Right. But the two main people of this story are Cal Harris and Stacey Stewart. but the two main people of this story are Cal Harris and Stacey Stewart and I can see kind of it leaning either way because Cal has a lot of motive Stacey Stewart seems kind of weird and suspicious So yeah, I don't know I could go either way here Well, it's tough because also with that fourth trial resulting in a not guilty verdict on Cal's part

fourth trial resulting in a not guilty verdict on Cal's part basically because of this whole Stacey Stewart angle but then he is not found and accused and arrested you know that's so weird that essentially that is why Cal got off and then it just kind of stopped there. I think there's just too much missing evidence here of course, we don't have Michelle's body. We don't really know what happened here. So my hope is that in the future some new information will come to light. Maybe they will find Michelle's body. Maybe they'll find more evidence. But that is why I don't think that they should stop pushing. I think that they should continue to push into Stacey Stewart, into Cal Harris, and try and really figure this out because something happened to Michelle and somebody was behind it.

Well now, Cal cannot be tried again for her murder. So hopefully he didn't actually do it and the person responsible, like you're saying, will be found. If it is Stacey, they will persevere and her family can get answers. But right now, we really don't know what happened to the beautiful and bright Michelle Harris who went missing when her four children were all under the age of seven.

We can only hope that her children and the rest of her family can continue to honor Michelle, a sister, a mother, a daughter, a friend, and all in all, a woman who unwillingly left this world far too soon. ["Spring Day"] Thank you so much, everybody, for listening to this episode of Going West. Yes, thank you guys so much for listening to this episode.

Please make sure that you share this story because there is still no justice in Michelle Harris' case. Yes, we need more people to know about this story. So thank you so much again to Kirsten for recommending it to us. Otherwise, we wouldn't have known about it. And thank you all so much for listening and for tuning in. We appreciate each and every

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I'm just a little bit of a I'm just a little bit of a I'm just a little bit of a I'm just a little bit of a I'm just a little bit of a I'm just a little bit of a I'm just a little bit of a I'm just a little bit of a I'm just a little bit of a Thanks for watching!