Hidden True Crime - Ashlee Buzzard Imprisonment Victim Speaks Out as Melodee Buzzard Remains Missing
Episode Date: November 11, 2025Ashlee Buzzard was arrested on Friday, November 7th on a felony charge of false imprisonment and the victim has now publicly come forward. Plus, Lauren is joined by Anne Emerson of the Criminally Obse...ssed Network to discuss her experience in covering this case and a bit about what she uncovered on Ashlee's childhood. Subscribe to @CriminallyObsessed Subscribe to @KUTV2News here for Utah News: https://youtube.com/@kutv2news?si=PlckTEP4hM5vo4ZB About Hidden True Crime What started as a simple conversation at their dinner table became a captivating podcast. Join the dynamic duo of Dr. John Matthias, a criminal psychologist, and Lauren Matthias, an investigative journalist, as they delve into the psychological facets of unthinkable crimes every week. Their unique perspectives and in-depth analysis offer a fresh take on true crime storytelling. Thank you for your support through sponsorships, subscribing, listening, and becoming a Patreon member at Patreon.com/HiddenTrueCrime Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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Hello, gems. We have some major breaking news tonight in the Melody Buzzard case.
missing nine-year-old. Melody Buzzard is still missing and we have some major
breaking news when it comes to her mother Ashley and the charges that Ashley is
facing. For those that have been following the case of missing little melody, she's
been missing for weeks now on a road trip early in October, October 7th through
10th with her mother, they left from Lompoc, California, Santa Barbara County, drove all the way
allegedly to Nebraska, turned around. Melody was last seen on the Utah, Colorado border.
We don't know much after that. We're going to get to that. But here's the breaking news.
The breaking news is that we know more about Ashley Buzzard. That's Melody's mother, her charges
against her.
She was charged Friday with false imprisonment.
We have been speculated.
We have been wondering.
It happened right after a search warrant of the house.
Was it Melody?
Was it another person?
Was it a woman in a purple wig on the road trip?
We now know where those charges are stemming from.
The victim has come forward.
It is a male.
His name is Tyler.
In search of Melody, Tyler Brewer,
Paralegal. Due to widespread public speculation surrounding an active missing child investigation,
I am issuing a limited statement to ensure accuracy and to protect the integrity of the case.
When Melody was reported missing, I contacted Ashley, buzzered solely to offer assistance in locating a missing child.
I am a legal document assistant process server mandated reporter and officer of the court in that capacity.
I immediately reported all concerning communication and inconsistencies directly to law enforcement.
On November 6th, during an interaction at her residence, Ashley's residence, the situation escalated.
Ms. Buzzard became visibly distressed after sharing information that she appeared to regret disclosing.
Now we wonder what that information is.
A box cutter was produced by her.
Oh my gosh.
showing some violence here.
And despite multiple requests to be allowed to exit the home,
I was not immediately permitted to leave.
The door was secured by several locks,
which delayed my ability to exit.
This incident was reported to law enforcement.
Makes sense?
He's a mandated reporter.
I am also in communication with Melody's father's family
who share the same objective,
locating her and ensuring her safety.
I will not provide further details at this time
as this remains an active investigation and search effort.
My position has never changed.
Find Melody.
Protect the investigation.
Bring her home safely.
This is by Tyler Brewer.
All right.
So let's talk.
I am with a guest today that I'm so excited to introduce.
And it's so good to see you.
This is Anne Emerson.
She is a the senior investigative reporter and journalist and host
of the criminally obsessed YouTube show,
but it is an entire platform owned by Sinclair across,
tell us a little bit about criminally obsessed.
It's so good to see you again.
You too, Anne.
Thank you so much for having me.
This is criminally obsessed.
So criminally obsessed is a true crime digital platform.
We've only been up for less than a year,
just a year, and we have over a million followers now,
but you can find our work across all the social media platform,
but we also now have a daily show,
criminally obsessed,
where we're able to really do deep dives on stories like
what we're talking about today,
which is one of the craziest ones I've heard recently.
Yes.
You know, and Anne and I have met at trials.
We've hung out at trials.
You guys are boots on the ground.
What you do, what you do is incredible.
You are a veteran investigative journalist,
and you have been covering the Melody Buzzard case,
along with local reporters in Utah that are boots on the ground,
because this is really sort of narrate.
into this sort of Utah area right now. And KUTV, two news in Salt Lake City, a place where I used to also be a local reporter, not that station, but in the area, they are following closely. You are in touch with them. And so I wanted to bring you on because I wanted to know what you are seeing. Some of the info that criminally obsessed is dropping is it's fresh, it's new.
it's breaking.
And so I reached out directly to you, Ann, I was like, Anne,
you come on and share what you know and what criminally obsessed is uncovering along
with your local reporters.
You know, I mean, you and I have been doing this for a long time.
And honestly, like, these are exactly the kind of stories we've been covering for years.
I've been doing it for like 30 years.
And these kind of stories really demand that we get on the ground and start looking.
to see what's going on, right? Because there are so many small local law enforcement agencies
that now have to be involved. We're talking about a 3,000 mile bizarre trip that Ashley Buzzard
took with her nine-year-old daughter, Melody, all the way up, you know, through possibly Nebraska,
Kansas. And now we're on this return trip. There's no way that we're going to get the
information we need as investigative journalists to figure out what's going on unless we have
people literally that we can get to the ground. That's what's going on with criminally obsessed as
far as being able to work with our partners and our resources within Sinclair. We have 185 stations.
Thank goodness we got one in Salt Lake, which is fantastic, KUTV, and we were able to bring them in
on the investigation and say, hey, we're hearing that there could be something in these
five stops that, you know, Lauren, that you and I got.
We got these five stops from the law enforcement, so we were able to work off that information of Green River, Utah, last spotted at, you know, the Colorado, Utah border. Going down into Utah, let's go investigate and see who is hearing what on the ground and who's talking to the FBI. So that's really, that's kind of where we kind of got involved and jumped in. And Samantha Hoffman is a reporter out of KUTV, and she was able to actually go to some of the,
gas stations that might have been a stop along the way that may it be why they had surveillance in
these areas and that's when she actually talked to an employee who says she thought she met Ashley
and she told the FBI about it and then she said that she kind of leaned out of the
out of the door of her gas station that she worked at and kind of leans out and looks and sees
what she thought was like a woman who was in her 20s or 30s.
with purple hair is the way she described it. So it's just fascinating details and raises, of course,
a million questions like, well, if she's 20 or 30, like, where's melody? Or is that melody? And it was
just hard for her to be able to see how old she was. So those are questions that really needed more
investigation and people are getting on the ground and doing it. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, this woman,
or as you point out, maybe it's melody and she didn't get, you know, an exact view.
She, of course, didn't know that she needed to be looking in detail at these people, right, that she would be speaking to the FBI about them. But this person really has brought new questions to this possible siding of another person has brought new questions to this case. I have wondered how it was possible for Ashley to drive so many miles so quickly, right? As well as putting her daughter somewhere, we don't know where and making that drive so fast, I've wondered, you know, could there have been.
another person that was helping her drive. Could there actually be a woman in a purple wig or another
adult? Or as you point out, was it Melody? We simply don't know. But it's certainly another
clue in this investigation. And I feel like this type of investigation and crime that we're
following here, it hit into crime and criminally obsessed, all of those little details matter.
Those are the details like when looking for Gabby Petito, for example, someone had dash cam,
or a video camera that spotted Brian Laundry's van,
and that led them to, unfortunately, Gabby's remains.
But these little clues can have so much information and insight
while we need the public's help looking,
especially in this region of the country,
to be looking at dash cam videos,
to be looking at surveillance.
Exactly.
I mean, and it really is like helping us figure out what this,
what this timeline looks like, right? Because one of the things that that's driving me crazy about it,
and I'd love to hear what you think about it, is, you know, that she went all the way up to wherever
she went to. And this was on the return trip. Right. Kansas, Nebraska, take a pick. Yeah. Yeah.
And this is the return. Right. They went, they left. Did they pick somebody up? Why did they go there? We don't
even know the motive behind the trip. Unless you do, I'm looking, you know, maybe you know more and you can share more.
with us today. Well, no, what I think is, you know, whatever happened, and you know, we can
speculate about this. We don't have, we don't have that information yet, but, but one, one, you know,
thread that I would pull is that whatever happened up there was not what the way she expected
it to go or that it didn't pan out the way she thought it would, because I can't imagine her
driving that far for no reason. So to be coming back down towards the Colorado, Utah,
child border, whatever happened put her off of the main road to some degree, which is one of the
reasons why we were in contact with a PI who is working with Melody's father's family,
pro bono. He's been doing it for years. He's been doing it for as long as we've been, you know,
journalists, you know, 30 years. He's been out there boots on the ground, finding people. His
specialty is finding people. And I was, you know, he told me that the work that Samantha and I were doing
as far as locating this information out of Utah kind of led him into that area. So he's also been able
to do a little bit of digging in that area to try and figure out who knows what and get,
get up more flyers, just to have more people on the ground. Because it's obviously something is going
on in this area to have her spotted it.
For, you know, we know, I mean, they're not going to, the law enforcement is thinking all of us
as journalists are watching every single move that they're making right now.
And for them to make an announcement to say, the last time we spotted them was right
here at the Colorado, Utah border, you know, all of our antennas go up and we immediately
start doing a very, very close look at what is right after that border.
And I think that's where we're going to see some things.
coming out soon. Yeah. Well, and that is where Samantha,
a KUTV reporter, Samantha Hoffman, went. It was to
Junction, Utah, which is about 230 miles from that border. And
that is where she sort of said, hey, by the way, and it was fascinating to find
out, yeah, she had already spoken to the FBI. The FBI had already been there.
They are looking in this area. So not only did we discover a possible
sighting of a possible other adult, we learned that
this is exactly where the FBI is looking. And they're talking to everyone along the route,
trying to figure out the next step. And you're right. Law enforcement knows. Journalists are on this
case. And so for them to announce anything publicly is to say, hey, here's a tip. This is what we know.
You know, search. That's fascinating, though. I don't want to bury the lead of what you just said.
You guys have a, you guys have someone investigating then. Pro bono. And we're able to contact him
and let them know if there's stuff that we're saying or he's saying, you know, it's, he is,
working pro bono and he's working with Melody's father's family is from what we understand.
And we also, you know, from what we've been able to gather, that is in a strange situation
between Ashley and the father's family to some degree. There hasn't been, according to the
father's family, at least, that we've been seeing in media reports that there has been
some level of an estrangement. And that brings me to another part of this, which is an
incredibly important part, which is understanding what state of mind Ashley has been in during
this. You brought it up earlier, and it's something that I've spoken with Bill about Bill Garcia,
the private investigator, who I've got more information coming out today and will be on crimly
obsessed, more information that we're getting from Bill and from other people that have been in
contact or have been able to watch what's been going on at the at ashley's home and melody's
home but you know when we have talked to to him about what's going on right now you know there is
there is just this deep concern about the state of mind because as you said nobody drives three days
three thousand miles and feels good at the end of it i mean we've all taken big road trips we know
what that feels like. And to be in that, that state of mind, that sort of what I would describe as like
a manic state of mind to be driving that hard, that fast, and then be turning around for whatever
reason back into this area is very concerning. So there's a lot of-
Switching plates, while switching plates, while switching wigs, you know? Yes. I mean, who does that?
Yes, exactly. You're pointing out the very, I, I'm-
I agree, either manic or she had help or both.
Yeah.
Well, and that leads me to something else that I discovered as I was kind of doing some research at the same time that I was sort of learning, you know, as we were sending or Samantha was getting into the Utah area in Joggi, Utah from Salt Lake, going down there and just doing these pit stops.
And honestly, I think we're still, we're still doing it.
So we'll keep you in the loop as far as what we hear is, you know, in this whole area.
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slash remove. But the other part of it to speak to the state of mind is that Ashley, we learned,
because it was on the front page of a newspaper in 1995, 30 years ago, that she and her mom
had actually been what the mom said, Lori Miranda, victims of an abusive situation at home with
domestic violence and that they had left the home and and Lori Miranda Ashley's mom had taken Ashley
at nine years old to hide and had taken her to hide. Had you heard about this before?
No. Keep going. I need to give you the article. Okay. So. Yeah, and send me the article after. Please.
I will. So I found this article and it is.
had been on a thread somewhere that I found out there in, you know, in the world. And so I had it
verified with newspapers.com to make sure that it was all accurate. But the Santa Maria Times did
an interview with Lori Miranda, the grandmother, and Ashley Buzzard when she was nine years old.
They were taken out of, well, they ran away from this abusive father who also had what
Lori described as an alcohol problem, had run away, had to hide, had to go to relatives,
all of these secretive, deceptive, you know, not deceptive, but like, you know, having to hide
is my main point. And as they, and Ashley's even quoted in the article on the front page of
this article called School of Hard Knocks about how uncomfortable she was and how difficult this was
and how scary this was.
And for her to now not be cooperating
and have her nine-year-old daughter, Melody,
in a situation where she's keeping her disguised,
switching plates, going on this bizarre road trip,
the parallels are just overwhelming.
It's almost like this trauma resurfacing
that she's acting out.
Bingo.
Wow.
Wow. Yes. And the fact that this was in a paper, the fact, and this is, you know, and this is interesting from a state of mind. Psychologically, does that mean if it was on the front page of a paper? I know when I was little, my mom used to hold everything that I was in, right? Like every clipping of everything. Is this something that Ashley was able to hold on to throughout her life and look back on this article and be able to remember how she felt and what was going on? And how would this?
affect her state of mind right now in a vulnerable situation and concerned about the welfare
possibly of her daughter? We know that she kept her out of school, that she was being homeschooled.
What was she afraid of? And what mental health issues are we dealing with? What level of PTSD or
trauma or issues? I mean, these are all like, I have no right to describe like how Ashley's
feeling right now compared to how she felt at nine years old.
But at that point, she was scared and uncomfortable.
Right.
Yeah, absolutely.
No, and this is just sort of speculating on these behavioral patterns.
People have all mentioned her mental health.
So it's fair to discuss what could possibly be going through her mind.
If we can understand what's going through her mind, perhaps we can find her daughter,
which is what we're all trying to do right now.
So it's fair to sort of say, what do you think happened?
We also know that she had a lot of stress after Melody's father passed away unexpectedly,
at six months old, there's this trauma sort of repeating itself. That's a fascinating find.
I had no idea, Ann, and yeah, send me that article. My goodness. It's definitely something.
Yeah, something my co-host, Dr. John Matthias, he's a criminal psychologist, can certainly delve
into. Oh, fabulous. I would love to hear what he has to say. I had, I immediately called in one of
my favorite counselors, mental health counselors to talk about it as well, because I was like,
I just need to understand what this means.
And he gave me some wonderful sort of background on, you know, how this could really trigger
major mental health issues, of course, especially that feeling of being vulnerable,
uncomfortable, unsafe.
Those were words that were used.
So, yeah, I would love to hear anything that John has to say about it.
But, you know, as far as how we're going to get through this right now, you know, they were
able to, this is my hope.
If this is a mental health issue, I'm hoping that whatever happened on this road trip left Melody in a safe place that we can find her, but also that Ashley, now that she's being held for an unrelated charge, which is completely bizarre as well.
We'll talk about that a minute.
Yeah.
So that she's being held, that if she's being held, can they help her with her mental health journey to get to?
a place where she can either remember where melody is or help us find out where melody is.
You know, these are the kind of things I'm hoping that that is, that they're using that time,
which I can only imagine after speaking with the law enforcement in Santa Barbara, I found
them incredibly sympathetic and careful as far as trying to work their way, navigate this
very, very strange situation.
That's good.
you brought up a lot of things we're going to touch on them but but I hope to do you believe there's hope
I want to ask that do you feel like there's hope for find her absolutely I mean I get chills thinking
about it I do I'm one of those people that will always go through these things like especially
when I'm like diving this hard down a rabbit hole I think it's because I believe that there's an
urgency that we have to get the information out that we've got to find her and that they're
they're getting close that
is my feeling. I feel like that Ashley's getting close to wherever she needs to be to share
information. And I think that if we can kind of safeguard, like, accurate information as we go forward
to, that's going to be really critical as well, like, as far as whatever's going on in Utah.
And you know, Utah a lot better than I do. But, you know, it's vast rural.
Right.
And this area, from what I understand, is full of, you know, parks and open lands.
I mean, yeah, we need to find her.
We need to find her.
And hopefully she's with people.
It's hard.
You know, I spent years working on the Murdoch case, and it's hard for me to fathom, you know, family violence that would include anything that would endanger melody.
So it's so hard for me to send, you know, right now I don't want to.
I want to be glasses half full.
We're on the right track.
And that there is still a message to get out there.
Yeah.
There is hope.
There is hope.
Speaking of Ashley's behavior and the charge that she's been charged with, the fault
imprisonment, that victim came forward.
He shared some interesting things.
Tyler Brewer, he's a paralegal who went over.
He says he has one goal, and that is,
to find Melody.
And he says,
and he seems to have some hope, too, in his statement.
And that he suggested he went over there to help that she,
Ashley might have said some things she regretted in that she pulled out a box cutter
and did not immediately let him leave and that there were multiple locks on the door
that he had to unlock to get out.
I want to talk about that too,
because if we were referring to her paranoia, you know,
she's not talking to law enforcement.
I have questions about this article you found.
about this case, but if she's not talking to law enforcement, she has multiple locks on her door,
perhaps in a manic state. I'm sensing some paranoia to some severe paranoia, not to mention
concern of violence because there is a weapon here. But, you know, it's concerning and bizarre.
So a question I have for you is, is law enforcement or anything from the article that you
mentioned, does it suggest that Ashley's mother, like when this situation,
happened when she was nine did they trust police did police help them because she is not cooperating
with police right now and seems afraid of them totally and i yeah that was one thing that i kept on
kind of pouring over this over and over again and i get the impression that she was looking for help
the the the the mom of ashley 30 years ago when when they got into trouble they were looking to help
they were looking at their family for help um they were unhoused they went to a home
homeless shelter, they were trusting to some degree that they would get help. Although, as we all
know with domestic violence situations, sometimes the help comes too late or it's hard to get that
message out because unfortunately it is so prevalent. System isn't perfect. It's not perfect and it's
overwhelmed. And I think it was overwhelmed 30 years ago. So we don't know, honestly, why she is so
worried about law enforcement, I would say that what we know about Melody's situation with
school as well kind of feeds our information on what's going on right now. Because we understand
that it was indeed the school district that, that, you know, alerted police that they had to go in
and actually try and do some kind of welfare check. And from what I understand, when search
warrants were put because I've been speaking with law enforcement as well, but when they
tried to go out, tried to go in there the first place, it did not go well. And they had to go
back with search warrants. So if she felt threatened right off the bat, I don't think it matters
who it was that was coming to the door. If she felt like there was something that was going to
threaten her safety or possibly in her mind threatened the safety of her daughter for even
wherever she is, then if you turn it all the way on its crazy head in a bizarre sense,
is she trying to protect Melody?
Right.
No, I know.
Right.
Correct.
And so I don't know if anyone is going to be a good guy when the idea is that everyone's out there
to get me.
So that is like the big concern.
And it, it, I don't know how you feel about this.
There's been a lot of signs out front saying, where is Melo?
what have you done with melody or you know however it's said and I wonder how she's reacting to
that if that's created more tension in her mind or you know that she thinks she's doing one thing
the community is seeing it as a is a totally different situation whether or not that's
creating even more danger in her head it was chilling it was yeah it was chilling to see
video of her taking some of those signs down and you're
You know, I think your first thought or the public's first thought.
My first thought is, oh, wow, she doesn't want to find her daughter.
She doesn't like this.
She doesn't care that we care.
We all just care.
We're just here, you know, trying to find a little girl that we think is in danger.
We believe it's in danger.
And to see her taking those signs down was chilling.
But I agree with your analysis of like, let's think about what is in her mind.
What is going on in her mind?
And so if she believes, if Melody is okay somewhere and she believes that she is protecting
Melody, then these signs are not helping keep her hidden from the public. So I appreciate sort of
this other, you know, nuanced side of what could Ashley possibly be thinking? Is it completely
nefarious and horrible that she's taking these signs down? Or is there something else inside
her brain? Exactly. And we just need more information right now. And I'm hoping that when there's a
hearing tomorrow on this unrelated charge where she was holding the
this man allegedly hostage?
Yeah.
Fault imprisonment.
We'll just go with the chart says.
False imprisonment.
So however that was going down, like hopefully they'll be able to share enough information
with the judge to either hold her for a mental health evaluation for another day in order to like,
you know, because we know that, you know, the community needs to stay safe as well.
Yes.
So is that a possibility that they can, they can do something like that?
or are we already at our time limit?
Those are things that I'd really like an answer to.
And you know, what keeps on coming to mind, Lauren,
is like when we first met was at the Lori Vallo stuff,
you know, as we were going through the Lori Valladaybell.
And did you not go there immediately in your head when you were hearing
moms not cooperating again?
Yes.
Oh, I thought of the time Chad Daybell took down missing children signs.
Where are the children?
And Chad Daybell had been ripping it down off of a sign.
in Rexburg, Idaho. So that was my first thought. But yeah, it's hard to, it's hard not to compare
new crimes to past crimes, right? You have this, this idea of what you reported on and how it ended.
It's very chilling. But yes, that's where my mind went to, Lori Vallow, you know, and her children.
Yeah. So that to me, too, I mean, just because we were fresh off of that from this past,
you know, sort of late spring. And, you know, that's where I was thinking, too. So it's, it, I think,
think that now that we understand now that we can put a 30 year mark on this story as far as how
Ashley feels about what you know what's happened during her lifetime and then to have this
this very traumatic sort of death with the with the father of melody that these are such interesting
psychological points for us to be able to start putting it into context that I don't think I had
with Lori.
You know, I didn't have that kind of timeline.
It's extraordinary that we would end up with a newspaper article that showed us how deep and severe
this actually was.
Right.
This trauma.
Right.
I know.
That's fascinating.
Thank you for sharing that little bit.
I'm so grateful for criminally obsessed and how you are covering this, the boots on the ground
work that you're doing, the working with other local reporters in Utah at KUTV.
Tell us a little bit about where we can follow criminally obsessed and keep up on this story.
You guys are doing an excellent job.
And like I said, our goal here at Hidden True Crime is to help find Melody.
That's why we're doing these interviews.
We're trying to share where people can get information because this is one of those cases that is just so important to get out there, this urgency, right?
Of just find this little girl before it's too late.
If it's not too late, you have hope.
I have hope.
So tell us where we can follow criminally obsessed and keep updated on this case and others.
Well, thank you so much.
I mean, I think the best way is to go straight to criminally obsessed, subscribe to our YouTube channel.
That is where I'm reporting on this with the latest breaking news.
I'm going to have at least, I think I'm planning on two updates today to this story because it's fast and furious right now.
And tomorrow we're going to have a hearing.
But we're doing deep dives.
You'll see a lot of the depth of the reporting at Crimley Obsessed.
Our strength is that we are able to go across all social media platforms, Instagram, TikTok,
Facebook.
We have all of these stories up and more, plus the YouTube, which is really giving us an opportunity
to give you a daily show on the stories that you're the most obsessed with.
I mean, they're the stories that we've got to follow.
and everybody needs new information.
I personally, as someone who also worked in local news for 10 years,
and it has worked at ABC News for another 20-year show,
you know, in my past,
I love bringing a network together, a parent company,
together with all of the local news stations across the country,
and really utilizing that power,
because you and I know from the work that we've done on the ground,
there's nothing better than a good local news reporter
to get out there.
And they know the street, they know the street sign,
they know the cop that lives down the street,
they know the mayor, those are the people that we need.
And it really brings back, like, using local news to its really,
really strong vantage points.
So I'm thrilled to be able to use our partners like KUTV and
Samantha to get out there and help us figure these things out.
And I hope we can do it with a lot more, Lauren,
in the future.
I hope we really can make some.
some progress on these stories. Wonderful. Thank you so much, Ann. We so appreciate you bringing the
information you did. We're looking forward here at Hidden 2, Crime, to continue following criminally
obsessed, and we're going to be doing our own. We took a drive yesterday, Hidden 2 Crime,
through the gorge where Ashley allegedly drove back to California. And, yeah, we will continue
to try to follow this as well along with you. Oh, I can't wait to hear what you're hearing.
and seeing and doing.
So yeah, it's great.
Thank you so much.
Thank you for having me.
And we'll stay in touch.
Thank you.
Thanks so much.
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