The Deck - Manuel Mozqueda Ruiz (5 of Clubs, Florida)

Episode Date: January 10, 2024

Our card this week is Manuel Mozqueda Ruiz, the 5 of Clubs from Florida. What began as a pursuit of the American dream ended in tragedy on August 16th, 2004. Manuel was working construction jobs in Atlanta, GA, and Freeport, FL – until he was murdered and dumped along a dirt road in Freeport. After 20 years of only questions and no answers… detectives finally got the tip they’d been waiting on. Add that to the latest advancements in DNA technology, and detectives feel confident they’re close to finally solving this case and giving Manuel’s wife and children the justice they’ve been seeking.  If you know anything about the murder of Manuel Mozqueda Ruiz in 2004, please call the Walton County Sheriff’s Office at 850-896-8111 or the Emerald Coast Crime Stoppers at 850-863-8477.To apply for the Cold Case Playing Cards grant through Season of Justice, visit www.seasonofjustice.org.Let us deal you in… follow The Deck on social media.Instagram: @thedeckpodcast | @audiochuckTwitter: @thedeckpodcast_ | @audiochuckFacebook: /TheDeckPodcast | /audiochuckllc The Deck is hosted by Ashley Flowers. Instagram: @ashleyflowersTikTok: @ashleyflowerscrimejunkieTwitter: @Ash_FlowersFacebook: /AshleyFlowers.AFFollow The Deck on social media and join Ashley’s community by texting [phone] to stay up to date on what's new!

Our card this week is Manuel Mosqueda Ruiz, the five of clubs from Florida. In 2003, Manuel had come to the United States determined to provide a better life for his family and his expecting wife back home. But in August 2004, his shot at the American Dream was ripped away from him, and he was ripped away from his family in the American dream was ripped away from him, and he was ripped away from his family in the most brutal of ways. It's been almost 20 years since Manuel is murdered, but detectives feel closer than ever

to giving his family the justice they deserve. And we want to help them get there. So as you may have noticed, today we've released two versions of this episode, one in English and one in Spanish. You'll soon learn a language barrier, maybe what's holding back law enforcement from receiving the information they need to crack this case. And we want to make sure that Manuel's story gets shared and heard with English and Spanish-speaking communities all over in hopes that someone will

be able to help shed light on what happened to him all those years ago. So please, share this version or the Spanish speaking version with people you know to help us gain justice for Manuel and his family. I'm Ashley Flowers. And this is the deck. . The morning of August 16, 2004 started as a typical one for Billy Evans. The 59-year-old man was braving the heat and humidity of the Florida panhandle to go about his normal routine, which included driving his golf cart around his property to check things out before making his way to his usual fishing spot on a river that cut through his land.

But he would never make it to the river because as he was driving around, something caught his eye. Here's Retire Detective Steve Sunday. Mr. Evans has about probably three or four trailers that he rents and his son stays in one. He also goes down and he just check on the property and that's how he came about seeing the buzzards. So he goes and takes a little golf cart up there and he gets out and he looks and then he can see there's something.

At first, Billy thought a dead animal might be what was attracting the birds. But when he approached the wooded area where the buzzards were circling, he realized this was no animal. He actually walked up there. He could look through the woods just a little bit and he could see the victim's boots sticking out.

And he knew something and the smell. He knew there was something. Billy didn't have a cell phone, so he hopped back in his golf cart and raced to his trailer to call the Walton County Sheriff's Office. Debidys arrived sometime before 11 a.m. and confirmed what Billy had found was, in fact,

the body of a young man wearing a red shirt, blue jeans, and work boots. Now, one important thing to note about Billy's property, and just the area in general, was that it was known around town as kind of this common dumping ground for things like drug paraphernalia and garbage, even dead animals sometimes. Drug use was also rampant, so they weren't exactly sure what they were dealing with. But the more they looked at the scene, the more it became obvious that this was a homicide.

For one, they could tell that the man had been shot, although Detective Sunday didn't want to disclose exactly where. There were also what looked like drag marks on the ground, leading from where the man was laying just a few feet into the woodline back out to the dirt road. It was clear from the get-go that this man had likely been lying out there for several days. The heat, the humidity, it all contributed to drastically speeding up decomposition. So much so that they couldn't officially identify him off of looks alone. Even when a wallet with ID were discovered on his body, though there was no cash in the wallet.

He had his wallet. And in that wallet was some Mexican voter identification card. It had a photograph on it. That's what we had to operate off of for quite a while. In fact, that was the only picture we had of him. And it really didn't give him much justice. The card belonged to 25-year-old Manuel Mosqueda Ruiz. And although they couldn't officially confirm that the man in the woods was Manuel,

the ID luckily had a fingerprint on the back of it, so they would eventually use that to confirm the man in front of them was, in fact, Manuel. Now, the scene where they found him didn't give them much to work with. Well, nothing super obvious anyway. Just those drag marks and some nearby tire tracks on the road, which they took plaster casts of. And there was some random debris, maybe connected, maybe not.

I mean, again, this area was often used as a dumping ground. And while there wasn't a ton of garbage around, investigators did want to be thorough, so they collected everything in the immediate area. Detective Sunday wasn't super specific about what exactly that was that they collected. The only item he spoke of specifically was a can, but they were hopeful that something that they had would point them towards this man's killer. So they sent everything off for testing. But spoiler alert, that led nowhere.

What was more interesting was what they didn't find. There were no bullets left behind, and there wasn't much blood on the ground around Manuel's body. So that, combined with the tire tracks and the drag marks, led investigators to the conclusion that he'd likely been killed somewhere else, then driven down this empty dirt road, dragged into the woodline, and left there. Billy's statement backed up this theory. He told investigators that he hadn't heard any gunshot or noticed anything suspicious

on his land from over the last couple of days, and he really hadn't gone out to inspect every inch every day. So because Manuel was dragged into the woodline just enough to not really be visible from the dirt road, it wasn't surprising that it had taken a couple of days for him to be found. When they talked to Billy's son and his wife and his son's friends renting the trailers, no one had heard or seen a thing either. No gunshot, no weird activity. By the next day, August 17th, an autopsy confirmed that Manuel's cause of death was a gunshot wound. And although he had some THC in his system, he tested negative for any hard drugs or alcohol. The coroner was also able to narrow down his time of death to some time on the 11th or

12th of August, which explained why his body was so decomposed. Since his voter ID card alerted them to the fact that Manuel was a Mexican citizen, investigators' first step outside of the scene was to get in touch with the Mexican authorities. Their ultimate goal was to hopefully be connected with Manuel's family in Mexico to learn more about him and how he ended up in free-port, Florida. But that ended up being a little more complicated than they expected. Through the consulate of Atlanta, they contacted the Mexican authorities in the location of where he was from in Mexico.

From there, Mexican authorities located Manuel's hometown of Tupataro, a very rural small town just about five hours from Mexico City. This helped narrow their search, but the Mexican consulates still had more to do to track down Manuel's family. In the meantime, investigators over in the States surmised that Manuel was likely working in construction. He was wearing the right type of work boots for it when he was found, and being from the area, they knew that there were a lot of people

who were non-citizens finding work in that field. So over the following weeks, they tried talking to other construction workers there in Freeport, particularly those in the Spanish-speaking community. They were hoping that someone at least knew Manuel, but it was slow-going and they were mostly met with skepticism and sealed lips, likely because most of the people they were speaking with lacked permanent legal status like Manuel. So be it the language barrier or the fear of deportation, no one was all that willing

to talk to the cops. However, what was also common knowledge was that many of the construction companies like to pay their workers who were undocumented in cash at nearby convenience stores, one of those being a shell gas station nearby where Manuel was found. And that is where they got their first real lead. Investigators learned Manuel had purchased prepaid phone cards on the 11th, five days before his body was discovered. And if you're not super familiar with what phone cards are, they look kind of like credit cards and you could load them up with minutes.

I don't know if you remember buying minutes. But anyways, that card also kept track of which numbers you called and how long the calls were. You'd swipe it in a pay phone and you could make international or local calls. So detective Sapina, the prepaid phone card numbers that Manuel had purchased, and they learned that the last calls Manuel made were on the evening of the 11th. Now, only one of those calls actually went through, as in the person he called picked up and they had a conversation. But knowing he talked to someone on the night of the 11th helped detect it

yet closer to nailing down his time of death, which was likely either super late on the 11th or some time on the 12th. And, they could see that the call that went through was to Mexico, so they hoped that would aid in tracking down his family. And it did, about a month after Manuel's body was discovered. That's when detectives heard back from the consulate. Manuel's family had been found, and it turned out that it was actually the call to his wife's number that went through on the night of the 11th. When they reached out to her and asked her about that call, she said everything seemed

normal to her. It was just a regular conversation with his family. He was just calling to check in, see how things were going, and he would typically share where he was and what he was doing. But he never gave any names of who he was with. Finally, the pieces of who Manuel was was starting to fall into place. His family told investigators that Manuel had come to the US in 2003. He and his wife were expecting their second kid and he wanted to provide more for them.

His brother-in-law had been living and working in Texas, and he was the one who set Manuel up with a job in the States. He joined up with a group of other immigrants lacking permanent legal status, who essentially worked odd jobs in construction in both Atlanta, Georgia, and Freport, Florida. So Manuel was often traveling almost 600 miles back and forth between Georgia and Florida for work. They said, you know, he was a good person. He'd had a history of some drug use, but mainly just marijuana. There was some meth usage, but he apparently had trying to get his life straight because

he had a family now, and he saw the advantage of coming over here and working and trying to build a home for his wife, and the two children that he's got. He was just a typical young man trying to find his way in life, and so he winds his way down here to work, because he had a lot of construction going on during that time here. And so he was working with one of the companies, we don't know really to this day what company he was with,

but he was never reported by anybody. It had all been going as planned. He was making money to send back to his family and he would call home often. After the 11th, though, his calls stopped coming and his family got worried. But they were stuck, not knowing what to do or what happened, and for over a month, they were in the impossible position of just waiting, holding their breath, hoping for the best, but preparing for the worst, feeling like they couldn't even set investigative wheels into motion themselves because of Manuel's status in the United States.

So when Manuel's family got the news that he'd been killed, they were devastated, but not necessarily surprised. When detectives asked them why, they said that they had gotten concerned when they hadn't heard from him for so long. And they had been hearing some rumors, presumably through Manuel's brother-in-law, that something bad had happened. But no one had anything useful to tell the family about what that something was. There was just some buzz around his radio silence.

Now, they couldn't do anything with that from another country, so they were grateful that something was, there was just some buzz around his radio silence. Now, they couldn't do anything with that from another country, so they were grateful that law enforcement was actually investigating what happened, rather than just sweeping it under the rug, as can happen with individuals who are undocumented. The hope was that these investigators would be able to track the source of all of these rumors the family was hearing and get to the truth of what happened to Manuel. But whatever was getting shared with the family, whoever was talking within the community, they didn't want to talk to police.

In fact, when detectives tried to speak with other workers in the freeport area, everyone acted as if they had no idea who Manuel was. But Manuel's family told detectives that he would travel with a group and that led them to believe that he probably lived in a home with about 10 or so other workers. So he had to have been connected to the community in some way.

Detectives wanted to know where exactly he was living, which company he was working for, and who was in the group that he traveled with. But that was easier said than done. By far, for all the reasons I mentioned earlier. The language barrier, the lack of cooperation. But again, whether that lack of cooperation was because people were hiding something about the crime, or just not wanting to be on law enforcement's radar in general, is anyone's guess.

According to a report from the Department of Justice, immigrants lacking permanent legal statuses are less likely to call police for fear of making their immigration status known to law enforcement. So since no one would come forward to cooperate, detectives kept coming up empty handed. And eventually, they had no option but to turn their attention to other cases.

And as their case loads got bigger, Manuel's case got colder, and his family back in Mexico was left wondering what had happened to the man who risked so much to give them a better life. It wasn't until 13 years later, in 2017, that retired Detective Sunday came back on part time to work cold cases for the Walton County Sheriff's Office, and one of the first files in his stack was Manuel's. Now, he wasn't the original detective assigned to the case, but he was around back in 2004. He actually had visited the scene a few months after Manuel's body was discovered with the

original detective, just to see if he could find anything pertinent. And while he hadn't back then, he was determined to make headway now that the case was his. just to see if he could find anything pertinent. And while he hadn't back then, he was determined to make headway now that the case was his. After going over every piece of evidence, every potential lead, it was clear that they needed to get past the language barrier that had been such a challenge before. And thankfully, another person on the squad

happened to prove extra helpful in their investigation. One of the deputies is bilingual, and he knows a lot about the case, and he's actually my ears. We can't see these people, and I can't sit there and gauge how they talk, are they concealing something, are they hiding something?

So I told him, you are my ears, because you talk, you speak their language, and you know a lot of their culture. So he's been really helpful in that, and telling me, yeah, I think they're telling the truth. And if you're there with them, you see the body language, they're talking, how they're responding to you.

Here I'm listening and he's speaking and I do not know Spanish, so I use him a lot to gauge. And I've tried to stick with just him because I've spoken to him so much about the case. He knows it and he can pick up on things that he remembers something I might have said or told him about the investigation. So he kind of helps me in that aspect of the investigation. That deputy was and continues to be an instrumental part of the investigation, but the wall of silence remained as strong

as ever. So Detective Sunday tried a different tactic. I started making flyers of him, and since he was found in Freeport, I really concentrated on putting those flyers out around Freport. And we did some TV spots on it. When the first flyer push didn't bring in any new leads, Detective Sunday did another one at the beginning of last year, 2023.

And this time, it paid off. In January of 2023, detectives got a hot tip regarding Manuel's cold case. Now, the tip wasn't something Detective Sunday could divulge to us, but he did say that the tips spurred them into re-examining everything they found at the scene, hoping for DNA results this time. And even though it's been over 20 years, he's hopeful they'll find something using updated technology that can extract super small amounts of DNA from items.

If you're a crime jenky fan, you may remember this from the Lena Rea's Getty's episode back in June. But if you haven't listened to that one yet, here's Detective Sunday explaining how this new technology works. I'm not an expert in it, so I can only tell you just layman's terms, it's called an M-VAC, and basically from what I understand, it's kind of like a vacuum cleaner, and it will suck up every bit of DNA that's on an item and somehow it separates the DNA

and in some cases it can be better than what our lab might be able to do. Our agency is going to try to let them look at this, and we're waiting for it to be sent off, and then hopefully we'll know whatever the timeframe is. Hopefully we'll be able to enhance that profile enough that we can get it entered into CODIS. Hopefully, the DNA will be the breakthrough in the case that they've been looking for. But even though it might answer the WHO, the question of why is still out there.

And Detective Sunday is still wanting to speak with anyone he can about what happened that led to Manuel being left in the woods. Despite running into roadblock after roadblock, he's optimistic that someone who worked with or knew Manuel back then will come forward with information. Twenty years is a long time to hang on to a secret, and now that enough time has passed, someone might feel comfortable telling their story. But until then, and until the DNA results come back, it's a waiting game. It'll be worth the wait though, back, it's a waiting game.

It'll be worth the wait though, because Detective Sunday's confident that this case is very, very close to being solved. I think we're going to solve this case, and I'm anxious about it, but we just have to sit back and wait. That waiting game isn't easy though, especially for Manuel's family. But Detective Sunday wants to make it clear to Manuel's family that he won't be forgotten. The last time we spoke with him, we kind of told him that. We're getting close, but don't get your hopes up or anything like that.

And they're appreciative. They are glad somebody is really looking into it, because otherwise they just counted him off as, you know, just another statistic is important, just like every single one of those people up there on that wall, he is important, and that's why I do what I do. That's why I'm hoping that we get this solved. Manuel was a human being. He man-hub been perfect, but he was out here trying to provide for his family. And unfortunately, he met somebody that

you know took his life. And again, maybe they didn't mean to do it, but the thing is they did. He did not get to see his one-year-old grow up. He didn't get to see his daughter, his wife, his family, his mother, who she passed away about a few years ago. He was a person and he had hopes and dreams like everybody else did. And that's why I've stayed on this, especially the last good six months or so, maybe longer,

of really learning this case and really following up because he's important. If you were in the freeport area in August of 2004 and you think you might know something about what happened to Manuel, detectives would like to speak with you in the hope that you can answer some of their questions. For instance, if you were around the Shulgastation on August 11th, do you notice something weird? Did you see Manuel speaking to someone or getting in a fight with anyone? Did he get into a vehicle if so, what kind and with who? Is there a chance that he went out onto Magnolia Lodge road willingly? That's the area where he was dumped?

Or was he just dumped there after the fact? Additionally, they want to know who Manuel spent most of his time with, especially when he wasn't working. So if you can answer any of those questions or of any additional information, please call the Walton County Sheriff's Office at-1-1-1. Or you can remain anonymous by calling the Emerald Coast Prime Stoppers at 850-863-TIPS. Before I end this episode, I want to leave you with Detective Sunday's powerful message to Manuel's killer, wherever they may be. I would tell them that your sins are going to find you out and I feel that we're getting

closer. I'm always the first one that gets up to the base and bats first. I try to help the most. So they might want to think about that. Whatever their involvement was, now's the time. Come forward. Let's get this to rest. The Deck is an audio-chuck production with theme music by Ryan Lewis to learn more about the Deck and our advocacy work.

Visit the DeckPodcast.com. So what do you think, Chuck? Do you approve? AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH