Going West: True Crime - Monique Baugh // 384

Starting point is 00:00:00 What is going on, True Crime Fans? I'm your host Heath, and I'm your host Daphne, and you're listening to Going West. Hello everybody, hope you're having a good end of your week. Today, sorry Ruth. She just sang that intro. Hello everybody, hope you're having a good end of your week today. Sorry. She just sang that intro. Hello everybody. I can keep going if you want. This story today was recommended by Christina. Thank you very much Christina. This story is truly devastating. It should have never happened especially because the woman that we're gonna talk about today, Monique, the woman that the story is about

Starting point is 00:00:43 fought so hard so that this didn't happen to her. So yeah, she was trying to protect herself, protect her family. It's just incredibly tragic all around. It really is. So thank you so much, Christina, for showing this story to us.

Starting point is 00:00:57 And as we always say, if anybody else has a story that they want heard on the show, the best and only real way to do that is to email it to us. That's how we will see it, but we do have hundreds and hundreds of emails and over a thousand K suggestions already, but don't let that deter you. Send it in any way.

Starting point is 00:01:13 Going West podcast at gmail.com and a big thanks to you for doing so. Yeah, and we will eventually get to your recommendation. It just might take a second. All right guys, this is episode 384 of Going West, so let's get into it. Hi, I'm Una Chaplin and I'm the host of a new podcast called Hollywood Exiles. It tells the story of how my grandfather Charlie Chaplin and many others were caught up in a campaign to root out communism in Hollywood.

Starting point is 00:02:06 It's a story of glamour and scandal and political intrigue and a battle for the soul of the nation. Hollywood Exiles from CBC Podcasts and the BBC World Service available now on Spotify. In December of 2019, a 28-year-old realtor headed to an appointment with a prospective client and vanished. When her body was found in an alleyway, police uncovered the details of her grisly kidnapping and worked hard to put her killers behind bars. With the help of surveillance footage and the knowledge of a threat being put on her family,

Starting point is 00:03:09 police narrowed in on multiple people for the crime. This is the story of Monique Bau. Monique Latrice Leanna Bau was born on October 17, 1991 in Minneapolis, Minnesota as the only child of Wanda and Frank Bow. Her parents divorced when she was young, so she did have younger half-siblings on her dad's side, but when she was with her mom Wanda, it was just the two of them and they were extremely close. Monique's uncle, so her mom's brother, later remembered, quote, that was my sister's pride and joy. That was my sister's only child. A family friend on her dad's side, echoed, quote,

Starting point is 00:04:13 she was so special to all of us. She was kind, sweet, funny. Her laugh was contagious. After graduating from high school, Monique settled into a career in real estate and began selling properties for the prestigious Chris Lindahl Real Estate Group, encompassing St. Paul Minneapolis and their suburbs. And she and her long-term boyfriend, John Mitchell MoMA, known professionally as MoMA, settled into a home in Coon Rapids, Minnesota, which is a suburb about 30 minutes

Starting point is 00:04:45 north of downtown Minneapolis. So things in life were awesome, and Monique and John also had two daughters together, who in 2019, when this story takes place, were the ages of one and three years old. And Monique's life totally revolved around them. I mean, they were her world. Friends online described her as, quote, one of the kindest moms who loved her girls fiercely.

Starting point is 00:05:11 Monique's mom, Wanda, added, quote, she was a young, kind, loving, beautiful mother and had a blossoming real estate career. Her daughters were her world. But as happy as Monique's home life was, the couple had faced some trepidation recently in the form of what Monique actually viewed as a safety threat against her and her daughters. Her boyfriend, John, was an up and coming rapper

Starting point is 00:05:39 who had found moderate success, even collaborating on songs with well-known artists like Nipsey Hussle and Rick Ross. John's friend, Lyndon Wiggins, signed John to his music label, which John then left in 2019. And although John claimed that Lyndon was simply bitter at his decision to depart his recording label for bigger things, Lyndon actually accused John of stealing music from him.

Starting point is 00:06:05 Sources say Lyndon also referred to John as a snitch after he was arrested for dealing drugs in October of 2019. So there are a lot of troubles between them, especially on Lyndon's side because he openly stated that he believed that John worked with police to assist in his arrest. So their exchange became so heated that it really scared Monique. And fearing Lyndon's retaliation, she decided to separate temporarily from John

Starting point is 00:06:35 until this feud blew over. So nothing would happen to their daughters if things were to escalate to such a degree. Feeling a responsibility to maintain a safe home life for her daughters, of course, Monique moved with them out of their home in Coon Rapids, Minnesota, and into a North Minneapolis townhouse

Starting point is 00:06:55 that was owned by her mom, Wanda. This was just a temporary agreement and the family still spent plenty of time together, but Lyndon was a pretty threatening presence in their lives, and Monique didn't want to take any chances where her young daughters were concerned. On December 29th, 2019, 28-year-old Monique received a call from a woman who identified herself as Lisa, and asked for a house showing in the area for the following day. When Monique didn't immediately respond, given that it was the holiday season, she received several more phone calls from this Lisa person.

Starting point is 00:07:36 Monique told a co-worker that she found this very odd, as this caller was particularly persistent and she had also inexplicably obtained Monique's personal phone number instead of calling her office, which was even more unusual. But despite the strange circumstances, Monique made plans to meet with this client at the house that the client requested to see in the Maple Grove neighborhood of Northwest Minneapolis. So Monique arrived at the home around 3pm and went inside this beautiful home. And we will post photos of the street because it's really a gorgeous neighborhood with a lot of trees and it's just a stone's throw from multiple lakes, but just you guys have a visual.

Starting point is 00:08:16 Yeah, and the Maple Grove area is like really nice to begin with for sure, so yeah, Monika arrives to this great neighborhood ready to sell a house to this alleged woman named Lisa and a short while after she gets there as seen in surveillance footage captured by a neighbor a U-Haul truck arrived at this home backing up closely to the garage Which is obviously really strange because this is a house showing like nobody's moving in this day So why is there a u-haul truck there? Yeah, super suspicious.

Starting point is 00:08:47 So across town around 5 30 p.m. Police received a call from a man who claimed that his home had been broken into and that he had been shot and This man who made this call was Monique's partner John Police arrived at a home on Humboldt Avenue on the city's north side to find John nursing gunshot wounds to his arm, leg and torso, one of which had narrowly missed his heart. John explained that a gunman clad in a black ski mask had entered his home using a key to unlock the front door. had entered his home using a key to unlock the front door.

Starting point is 00:09:28 Now John had been home with the couple's two young daughters and recalled that the intruder burst in and began shooting towards John over the head of his three-year-old daughter who was asleep on the living room couch. John remembered screaming, quote, you got me, I'm dead, I'm dead. And my babies are here, but luckily he and his daughters fled upstairs where he was able

Starting point is 00:09:48 to call 911. The floor was littered with silver bullet casings from a.45 caliber gun, and strangely the key used by the intruder to enter their home was determined to belong to Monique. So where was she? An hour later, police were again summoned after a report of gunshots. 911 had been called after shots rang out in an alley behind Russell Avenue North, which is like 11 minutes south of where John had been shot. When the police reported to the scene, they found Monique Bough unconscious

Starting point is 00:10:28 on the asphalt ground of the dark alleyway. She had been shot twice in the torso and once in the face, and duct tape constrained one of her wrists. She had suffered multiple scratches and bruises, she had a chipped tooth, and many of her acrylic fingernails had been ripped off. And more shell casings matching the bullets from the home invasion were scattered nearby.

Starting point is 00:10:54 Again, this was from a 45 caliber gun. She was rushed to North Memorial Medical Center, but sadly, she died shortly after her arrival, just hours before the new year of 2020. Witnesses placed an older model tan-colored Buick in the area of Monique's discovery. And tracing her whereabouts back to her last known location, police pulled the surveillance footage from area homes and were able to see the U-Haul truck with Arizona plates that

Starting point is 00:11:26 pulled up shortly after Monique's arrival to the house. Neighbors of Monique's in the vicinity of the townhouse in which John was shot also reported having seen a U-Haul truck with Arizona plates that evening, so there's clearly a connection there. And police also recovered Monique's black BMW with a single pink acrylic fingernail inside, indicating that she may have attempted to flee in her own vehicle, only to be dragged away by the men in the U-Haul truck. Based on the security camera footage from the Maple Grove house showing that afternoon, two men ushered Monique into the back of the U-Haul truck at 3.18 p.m. So an hour and a half before sunset and also like only 15

Starting point is 00:12:14 minutes after she got to the house and then the truck arrived at her home at 5.16 p.m. So 45 minutes after dark and about two hours after the truck left the house showing. So what was going on for those two hours in this truck? I mean, we could only imagine. Yeah, probably some very horrifying and terrifying things. Just so awful. So investigators believe that whoever had abducted her had been attempting to get her family all along. But that Monique was holding off

Starting point is 00:12:45 on telling them where they were located in order to keep her boyfriend and daughters safe. Terrifyingly, the U-Haul could be seen circling the block of Monique's townhouse for 30 minutes before the intruder barged in. And basically the key to the identity of the men who likely shot both John and Monique seemed to be concealed in this U-Haul truck.

Starting point is 00:13:12 But using the license plate, police were able to trace it back to a rental car company and they waited impatiently for it to be returned because they knew once, you know, I mean, it was just a rental. So whoever's bringing it back, like these are the people responsible or at least they know the people who are responsible.

Starting point is 00:13:32 Right, yeah. And it's great that they were able to get that surveillance footage so quickly because it's possible that maybe if they did return the truck, it would be a lot harder to kind of track these guys down. You know? Yeah, I mean, if they didn't have that surveillance footage, they wouldn't know that a U-Haul

Starting point is 00:13:47 was involved. Right, exactly. Yeah. This changed everything. It's amazing that they had this to utilize. Now, Minnesota state surveillance cameras also captured the U-Haul truck, which was particularly noticeable because it had a taillight out on the passenger side fleeing the Willard Hay neighborhood of North Minneapolis, which is where Monique was found. That same license plate was also captured leaving the area of Monique's home where John had been shot.

Starting point is 00:14:18 So again, the fact that they have three different area cameras to show the same truck, they now know that there is a connection to all of this. Oh, absolutely. Which you could have guessed anyway, but now we've got the evidence. So when this truck was returned, investigators seized it immediately,

Starting point is 00:14:39 fully forensically processing it in hopes of gleaning clues as to what happened in the missing hours of Monique's final day From inside the back of the truck Investigators recovered zip ties Packing tape and more of Monique's pink acrylic fingernails. I am so glad they didn't clean all that up But like why didn't they? Yeah, it just seems like these guys want to get caught at this point Yeah, it just seems like these guys want to get caught at this point. Especially because remnants of blood were also recovered.

Starting point is 00:15:08 And law enforcement noted that the truck reeked of ammonia, as if someone had tried to clean up the crime scene. But not very well. Right. So the assistant Hennepin County attorney, who later posed to the jury what he believed happened to Monique on her terrifying final evening, claimed that the forensic findings in the back of the truck were quote, not pleasant and that Monique had been quote, bleeding significantly. Now based on the rental agreement, a woman who has never been named publicly had signed and

Starting point is 00:15:41 paid for the truck. When police tracked her down for questioning, she maintained that she had no idea what its purpose had been and that she had rented it as a favor for her drug dealer, a man named Cedric Berry. And get this, Cedric had apparently been another rival of John's, aligning himself with John's former business associate, Lyndon Wiggins. As investigators zeroed in on Cedric, they spoke to John about who he believed would have been capable of such a heinous act. And John told detectives that he believed that he was being targeted by jealous individuals after flaunting his affluence and success on social media. He had also been accused of assisting the police in taking down local drug dealers,

Starting point is 00:16:27 many of whom were in the orbit of Cedric Berry and also, of course, Lyndon Wiggins, leading to Lyndon calling him a snitch. And then, of course, there was also the business deal that had gone south for Lyndon when John chose not to renew his contract with Lyndon's recording label. But on top of all of this, John also accused Lyndon of having a crush on Monique, and even added that Lyndon was quote, the only person that he could see doing this.

Starting point is 00:16:56 Cedric's DNA was run alongside DNA found on the gear shift of the U-Haul, and guess what? It was a fucking match. His cell phone data also showed that he was in the vicinity of both Monique's home and the home in Maple Grove from which she was abducted. But who was the other man with him at the time? And how did Lyndon Wiggins factor into this crime? With this information being uncovered, it's so sad that we know Monique was afraid of something like this happening and she wanted to keep her family and her daughters safe so she went to go stay in her mom's townhouse and they still found the townhouse and

Starting point is 00:17:34 attacked it anyway. Yeah I mean she was taking all these safety measures to keep herself and her family safe and unfortunately these guys were just relentless in their pursuit to find her and her family and it's just it's it's incredibly sad that they were able to do so. And even setting up this fake showing like it's just plain evil. On Monday January 6th 2020, a week after Monique's brutal slang. Police tracked Cedric Berry to a double-tree hotel in the Blackstone neighborhood of West Minneapolis, and upon his arrest there, the Hennepin County Attorney Mike Freeman announced, quote, I cannot begin to describe how vicious the behavior was

Starting point is 00:18:18 in this case. We have charged Mr. Berry with setting a trap for Miss Bough, assassinating her at close range and shooting her boyfriend while in a house with two small children. We are seeking high bail and will do all in our power to prove him guilty. After Cedric's arrest, police announced to the press that they had determined the identity of the second man involved in Monique's murder and John's shooting, but that he had not been arrested yet. What followed was an aggressive search for justice that would result in five total arrests. Cedric was determined to be the intruder who donned the mask and shot John in the couple's home. But his accomplice later announced to be a man named Barry Davis. So not to be confused with Cedric Barry.

Starting point is 00:19:13 We got a lot of fucking berries in this story today. Cedric Barry and Barry Davis. Yes, don't forget two separate people. Now, so he, Barry Davis, was nowhere to be found, still, and it took police four months before he was tracked down via a police tip in Chicago. A motive was pretty difficult to ascertain for Barry Davis because all parties maintain their innocence,

Starting point is 00:19:38 but the criminal complaint originally filed against Cedric Berry stated, quote, investigators were aware that John MoMA had recently signed a contract to record rap music and had been flaunting his cash on social media. MoMA indicated that numerous individuals knew that he was involved with Monique Bough, but did not believe that anyone who wanted to harm him

Starting point is 00:20:01 knew where they lived. Suspected of being the ringleader who masterminded this operation, Lyndon Wiggins was also arrested in Minneapolis. Thus began an intense legal battle for Monique's family to see justice against the five people responsible for her death. ["The Star-Spangled Banner"]

Starting point is 00:20:39 Hi, I'm Una Chaplin, and I'm the host of a new podcast called Hollywood Exiles. It tells the story of how my grandfather Charlie Chaplin and many others were caught up in a campaign to root out communism in Hollywood. It's a story of glamour and scandal and political intrigue and a battle for the soul of the nation. Hollywood Exiles from CBC Podcasts and the BBC World Service, available now on Spotify. In the wake of Monique's murder and John's injuries,

Starting point is 00:21:27 Monique's mom, John's injuries, Monique's mom Wanda attempted to transition her granddaughters into life without their mom as seamlessly as possible. But the family's grief was palpable. Chris Lindahl Real Estate, which again is where Monique worked as an agent, actually started to go fund me for her daughters and donated $10,000 themselves and then raised nearly $40,000 to leave behind for her girls. On June 4th, 2021, so about a year and a half after she was murdered, the first trial which would determine the sentencing of Cedric Barry

Starting point is 00:22:01 and Barry Davis began. Now Cedric's and Barry Davis began. Now Cedric's legal team argued that while he was a known drug dealer, what he was not was a murderer. In fact, they argued that because he was a drug dealer and intended to sell drugs on the day that Monique was killed, he had simply rented the U-Haul

Starting point is 00:22:20 to transport a large amount of marijuana. His lawyer, Jared Mollinkoff, maintained his client's innocence, saying, quote, "...what you will never see is evidence that suggests an actual motive for Mr. Cedric Barry to be involved in the shooting and murder." However, the state of Minnesota, on behalf of Monique Bough, claimed that his criminal history said otherwise. So aside from being a convicted drug dealer, Cedric had an extensive history of legal infractions

Starting point is 00:22:51 dating back 20 years. There were multiple narcotics convictions for the use, possession, and sale. He had served time for driving under the influence, assault, robbery, and illegal possession of a firearm. In 2002, he was even convicted of manslaughter after a shootout with a rival gang resulted in a fatality. He was described as quote,

Starting point is 00:23:16 having a long and violent gang history as well. Like Cedric's legal team, Barry Davis's defense team painted that Barry had nothing to do with John shooting or Monique's murder. Barry's attorney, Robin Gordon, claimed quote, this case against Barry Davis is the edge piece of a jigsaw puzzle with not a lot filling out the middle.

Starting point is 00:23:41 A theory is not enough to solve this terrible murder of Monique Bough, just like the edge pieces of a puzzle isn't the entire puzzle. Both defense teams stated that they believed that the police were simply bowing to the public pressure to solve the murder, and that they didn't care if they put the correct person behind bars, as long as somebody paid for the crime that had been committed. bars as long as somebody paid for the crime that had been committed. But the jury just wasn't buying it, so on Monday, July 12th, 2021, both Cedric Berry and Berry Davis were sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Starting point is 00:24:18 Judge Peter Cahill even tacked on 20 years required to be served after their life sentences, in case the law ever changed and the men stood a chance of being paroled. Judge Cahill stated flatly that he didn't want them ever getting out. Wanda was present at every turn of each of the trials, seeing that justice would be served for her slain daughter. In her victim impact statement, she said through tears that her daughter had quote, faced pure evil that night, saying sadly quote,

Starting point is 00:24:50 I can only imagine what was being said to her, how many times she begged for her life. These defendants treated my daughter as if she was less than human. But more than anything, Wanda said that she ached for her granddaughters, who would grow up never knowing the mother who loved them endlessly. Wanda stated quote, Monique loved being a mother, I tell her girls that often. So the next trial was for Elsa Segura, who was Lyndon Wiggins girlfriend of three years at the time of the murder.

Starting point is 00:25:23 Now Elsa was arrested in 2020 for aiding and abetting Monique's murder, but she was kind of a unique case because she didn't deny that the other three men, Cedric, Barry, and Lyndon, had anything to do with the murder. And to be honest, she didn't even deny her role in the murder. However, she claimed that she didn't know what she was signing up for and that her contribution would be used to take someone's life. Elsa was the one who pretended to be the woman named Lisa, calling Monique and asking her for a house tour on New Year's Eve.

Starting point is 00:25:54 According to the court proceedings, Lyndon had requested Elsa's help, asking her to call Monique directly and request a house tour for that specific day and for that exact property, even offering her a burner phone on which to do so. So Elsa obliged, but claimed that she hadn't known until later that her efforts would be used to murder Monique. However, subpoenaed cell phone records proved otherwise, because on the evening of December 31st, Elsa had reported to work for the evening and spent her time Google searching

Starting point is 00:26:27 local Hennepin County jail rosters and researching how to mitigate stress and anxiety. Wonder what that was for and the following day she looked up multiple articles detailing Monique's death. She and Lyndon exchanged multiple calls and during during one FaceTime call, Elsa saved a picture of Monique to her phone. She also Google searched quote, the sacrament of confession and quote, legal immunity. Yeah, sounds like you know what was going on to me. Yeah, I don't, you know, you're trying real hard to paint yourself as a person who didn't know what was going on, but you know, we have evidence.

Starting point is 00:27:04 So in the days leading up to her arrest, she continued to speak to her boyfriend on a daily basis, saving more pictures of Monique to her phone and reading more articles about this murder. One of the most egregious details about Elsa's involvement is that she actually worked as a probation officer, as well as part time at a juvenile supervision center for young offenders. So she should have been like a bastion of law and order, but she chose otherwise here. Her feigned ignorance and plea of innocence is maddening, given that the two couples she and Lyndon and Monique and John were very well known to each other. Lyndon and Monique and John were very well known to each other. The four had commonly mingled at both work and social events even after Lyndon and John

Starting point is 00:27:50 had their falling out. Elsa even followed John on Instagram. Elsa's defense argued that Elsa only did what she was told because she was psychologically and physically assaulted by her partner, Lyndon Wiggins, and that she made the call without knowing that it would lead to Monique's murder. She claimed in her testimony that she believed that she was just helping him with his drug business.

Starting point is 00:28:15 But Judge Cahill argued, quote, we wouldn't be here if it wasn't for Elsa Segura. This family would never know this pain, and the law recognizes that as it should. It recognizes that making a crime possible, even if they're not willing to pull the trigger, assisting others and committing that crime is equally worthy of conviction and punishment. Granted your role was lesser, but the state is correct. It is still significant because you could have stopped this from happening. And so, it is not unjust to receive the same penalty as your co-defendants.

Starting point is 00:28:57 On Tuesday, November 9th, 2021, Elsa was handed a life sentence for aiding and abetting the premeditated first degree murder of Monique Bough. Though it was an emotional sentencing for Monique's loved ones, Elsa showed no emotion in her trial. In another tearful victim impact statement, Wanda read quote, the defendant, she actually could have been a hero. She could have warned Monique. She could have warned Monique.

Starting point is 00:29:26 She could have warned her that the showing was fake. The defendant had a choice and she chose to please her boyfriend by sticking to the plan. Elsa's boyfriend, Lyndon Wiggins, was on trial next. He was well known to police already, identified as a, quote, large-scale drug dealer. He went by the street name Linden Swarn, and was also known by his rapper name, Black Bag LA. In October of 2019, just two months before he organized the murder of Monique Bough, Linden was found to be in possession of more than a thousand imitation oxycodone pills laced with fentanyl, three guns, over 400 pounds of marijuana, and over $30,000 in cash.

Starting point is 00:30:14 Multiple properties of his were raided, including a farm that he owned in Michigan, but even in the wake of Monique's murder and these discoveries, Lyndon continued his criminal endeavors until July 21, 2020, when he was apprehended for a final time on charges of aiding and abetting the murder of Monique Bough. After his final arrest, police recovered nearly 35,000 additional pills laced with fentanyl, another firearm, and over $20,000 in cash. On June 2nd, 2022, Lyndon was also found guilty of aiding and abetting a homicide, which is a charge that carries a mandatory life sentence in Minnesota.

Starting point is 00:31:01 The final member of the five to be handed charges was Chante Davis, who was Barry Davis' sister, and Cedric Barry's wife. So according to the criminal complaint filed in her case, Chante assisted her brother and husband by booking hotel rooms for them to hide out in after their crime spree, and she also drove her husband Cedric to pick up the U-Haul truck. The criminal complaint states that she had actually been present at the Double Tree Hotel when her husband, Cedric, was arrested.

Starting point is 00:31:34 Cell phone data placed her and her husband's close vicinity for much of the day on December 31, 2019. Chantet had even purchased the burner phone, from which Elsa Segura made the call to request a home tour. In October of 2022, Shantae waived her right to a jury trial and was found guilty via stipulated evidence. She received a prison sentence of 90 days with credit for 10 days served and was placed on probation for two years. But why she received such a light sentence is still somewhat of a mystery. Wanda is credited with her dog pursuit of justice and relentless quest for closure for her daughter and granddaughters. Her tearful testimony rocked the courtroom, and was even fought her for multiple local news anchors, with one reporting quote,

Starting point is 00:32:26 My goodness, so hard to watch, so emotional. At the sentencing of Cedric Barry and Barry Davis, Wanda stated in her victim impact statement quote, Monique did not have to die, and you didn't have to throw her out like she was garbage, either. My baby was so precious, so precious to me, to all of us, she was so valuable. How dare they, and I'm asking you, Your Honor, to please use your power to make sure that they spend the rest of their miserable, insignificant lives in prison.

Starting point is 00:33:00 She also reported that her oldest granddaughter, who was three at the time of Monique's murder, told Wanda that she wanted to die so that she could see her mommy, which is just incredibly heartbreaking. Monique's oldest also asked Wanda, quote, How is God going to save us if he couldn't save mommy? Wanda added, quote, That's a question a child should never have to ask. But Monique's murderers gave a tepid response to Wanda's desperate sobs, denying their obvious involvement to the very end.

Starting point is 00:33:38 When asked if he wanted to address the court, Cedric Berry stated simply, quote, I hate that you guys had to go through this, and I always pray that the truth comes out. Berry Davis gave a similarly weak final statement saying quote, justice wasn't served. They didn't prove that. Nothing to do with me with this shit. But Judge Peter Cahill who became known for speaking his mind and was not one to mince words responded quote, I do think they proved it. The jury thought they proved it. I think they did quite a good job of proving it actually. There will be no possibility of release.

Starting point is 00:34:12 Frustratingly, John Mitchell-Moma provided his own set of challenges to the court and almost got himself brought up on charges. His frequent outbursts came to a head when he exclaimed that he couldn't believe that taxpayer dollars were being used for this trial. A frustrated Judge Cahill was forced to retort, quote, You're about three inches from a jail cell right now.

Starting point is 00:34:35 But John explained in media interviews that he had been maligned as having been responsible for the death of his partner and the mother of his children and that he had become fed up with it. He lamented quote, they've got me looking like a monster. I've never seen that Cedric dude in my life. I don't know him. I really want to clear the air. It's like I murdered her.

Starting point is 00:34:59 This has really hurt my heart. They have it like I'm in a gang. I don't have a gang life background. I think it's because I really do not want to be around their crowd. I believe this is all because of jealousy and envy. There are people out there that would rather see me dead than successful, even if that means killing the mother of my children. I knew Monique since I was 16. She was in her prime. We were just getting started.

Starting point is 00:35:26 Frustratingly in January of this year, so 2024, the court overturned Elsa's conviction. The Minnesota Supreme Court announced that she was entitled to a new trial on the basis that prosecutors failed to provide sufficient evidence on two of the four charges against her. The court announced that the evidence was sufficient enough to support charges of kidnapping

Starting point is 00:35:50 and of aiding and abetting first degree felony murder while committing bodily harm. However, the court argues that evidence was not strong enough to convict her on the basis of aiding and abetting first degree premeditated attempted murder, nor premeditated first degree murder. Sadly, this means the continuation of the nightmare for Monique's friends and family over four years later. The Minnesota Supreme Court continued, quote, We realize that our opinion may result in another trial involving these difficult facts

Starting point is 00:36:24 and intensify the grief of those affected by the senseless acts of violence perpetrated on Bao and her boyfriend. Nevertheless, we are duty bound to ensure that a defendant in a criminal trial is not convicted based on insufficient evidence. Shocked and saddened by this, her cousin, Shirelle Sinkfield, spoke to the press on behalf of the family, saying, Monique's life cannot be released back to us. We cannot get her back. So why should anyone involved in such a horrific crime be eligible for any type of freedom? We don't have any freedom. Her kids don't have any freedom.

Starting point is 00:37:02 I can speak confidently on behalf of my entire family. It does not get easier. Even though the time goes by, the years go by, it does not get easier. Because every moment we think about her. She's in our living rooms, on our walls, and we think about her day in and day out. However, on a lighter note, Charelle says that the whole family takes comfort and her daughter is growing into the spitting image of Monique. Shirelle said proudly, quote, when you look at her oldest daughter and you're like, wow, like you are Monique all over again.

Starting point is 00:37:39 And it is like really hard because sometimes I just grab her and I just hug her because I'm like I picture this just you know being Monique and hugging her Thank you so much everybody for listening to this episode of going west Yes 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 on Tuesday we'll have an all new case for you guys to dive into. What a horrific story, especially again because she almost could sense, Monique could almost sense that something like this could happen.

Starting point is 00:38:20 It was in the realm of possibility for her and she made the steps to try to avoid it and it happened anyway And you know obviously nothing against John You know he was just getting away from this recording label But it also sucks that she had to be swept into this this whole crime You know nothing to do with exactly yeah She had nothing to do with any of this shit and she ended up dead to do with exactly. Yeah, she had nothing to do with any of this shit and she ended up dead. It's just such an awful story but thank you guys so much for listening. Big thanks again to Christina for recommending it and we'll see you guys next week. Alright guys, so for everybody out

Starting point is 00:38:55 there in the world, don't be a stranger. Music I'm a little bit of a loser I'm a little bit of a loser I'm a little bit of a loser I'm a little bit of a loser I'm a little bit of a loser I'm a little bit of a loser I'm a little bit of a loser I'm a little bit of a loser I'm a little bit of a loser I'm a little bit of a loser

Starting point is 00:39:40 I'm a little bit of a loser I'm a little bit of a loser I'm a little bit of a loser I'm a little bit of a loser

Going West: True Crime - Monique Baugh // 384

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