True Crime All The Time - Matthew Breck

Episode Date: August 15, 2022

In September 1998, 10-year-old Anna Palmer was murdered outside her home in Salt Lake City after walking home from a friend’s house. There were reports of a strange man harassing young girls in her neighborhood, but no arrests were made. Over a decade later, advancements in DNA testing finally identified Anna’s killer, a dangerous criminal who was already in prison for another crime against a child. Join Mike and Gibby as they discuss killer Matthew Breck. Breck was 19 years old when he murdered Anna Palmer in 1998, but he got away with it for over a decade. Skins cells under Anna's fingernails were finally matched to Breck, who was in prison on a 10-year-old sentence for a crime against a child under 16. As it turned out, Breck lived only a block from Anna back when she was killed, but police never even talked to him.You can help support the show at patreon.com/truecrimeallthetimeVisit the show's website at truecrimeallthetime.com for contact, merchandise, and donation informationAn Emash Digital productionSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hello everyone and welcome to episode 296 of the True Crime All the Time podcast. I'm Mike Ferguson and with me as always is my partner in True Crime. Mike Gibson, how are you? Hey man, I'm doing good. How about yourself? I'm doing well. I am very busy.

I am in the middle of kind of a studio slash basement remodel. You are. Not remodel so much as trying to create some extra space for maybe you and I to do some other types of things with the podcast or with videos on Patreon and things like that. So I got that going on until things are happening down here. There's definitely things happening. And I was talking about it on on Patreon this week, but going through some of our old DVDs and especially the Disney ones, man, just brought back so many memories. Yeah. Like I can, I could picture my daughters at a certain age watching Lilo and Stitch or this or that beauty and the beast. And even though some of those

came out before they were even born. Let's go ahead and give our Patreon shoutouts. We had Samuel Jennifer Mendez Fisher jumped out at our highest level. What's happening, Jennifer? Becky Neiman. Hey, Becky. April D's. Hey, appreciate that. April D's. We had Amy. Hey, good old Amy. And then we had Amy Davis. There's Amy Davis. Bianca Pol. Hey, Bianca. Ashley Stratton. Appreciate that, Ashley. Paul Van Rinsberg.

Hey, Van Rensberg. Summer Nash. Hey, what's up, Summer? Ashley McKinney. Appreciate that, Ashley. Katie Skibby. What's up, Skibby? Shetter Leslie.

Shetter. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. It is possible that I have those names transposed. I'm hoping I don't. Alicia Lavelle. What's up, LaVelle?

What's up, Ramsey? Hey, Ramsey. Andrew Ramsey. There's Andrew. Heather Taylor. What's up, Heather? Heather. Debbie Tabb. How you doing, Debbie? Nikia Trulier. That's what I'm going with. Mary Moore.

Okay, Mary. Tish Malette. Hey, Tish. And last but not least, Lanchow Clements. Well, appreciate that, Lanciao. And then we go back into the vault. This week, we selected Fallon. Good old Fallon. Yeah, yeah. We also had some great PayPal donations from Torin Rasmussen. Hey, Torin. Lauren Porter. Oh, there's Lauren. And Patty. Fortner. Thank you, Fortner. So we appreciate all the support, Patreon, new and old, and PayPal. Yeah. It's amazing. Gibbs, right now, we have an episode out on true crime all the time unsolved where we're talking about the mysterious death of Frank Olson. Yeah, this is a interesting case involving the CIA. It's got some Jason Bourne type elements to it. There's some

Good conspiracy pieces in this too, so it's worth checking out. Yeah, yeah, I found it fascinating. All right, buddy, are you ready to get into this episode of true crime all the time? I'm ready. We're headed to Salt Lake City, Utah to talk about Matthew Breck and the murder of 10-year-old Anna Palmer. And when I first started, you know, researching this case, well, really, before I even started, the name threw me off because it was really just like five or six months ago. we did Matthew Beck. Yeah.

And I thought, okay, that seems very familiar, but this is a different person, a different case altogether. In September 1998, 10-year-old Anna Palmer was murdered outside her home in Salt Lake City after walking home from a friend's house. There were reports of a strange man who was harassing young girls in her neighborhood, but no arrests were made. over a decade later, advancements in DNA testing finally identified Anna's killer, a dangerous criminal who was already in prison for another crime against a child.

So we know what we're in for here. Obviously, we have the murder of a 10-year-old. But we also know that we're going to be talking about some advancements in DNA, things like that that, you know, led to the eventual, identification of this person and then ultimately justice. Anna Palmer was born on August 8th, 1988. She lived with her mother, Nancy, her brother, and her sister in Salt Lake City, Utah. And you know, we have a lot of really good listeners in Salt Lake City, Utah. Yeah, no doubt. Some of our biggest fans are there. Nancy Palmer described Anna as a little socialite.

She had lots of friends. She was active in her church. She was known as a kind girl who cared for others. On September 8th, two days before she was murdered, she went to sing at local nursing homes with a friend. And what amazing young woman. Yeah. You know, socialite, I get that. Some kids are.

Some kids are not. I would say my daughters were probably more towards the end of not being. what you consider a socialite. They always had friends, but I wouldn't say either of them, you know, went out of their way to, to be the life of the party

or make tons of friends. They're a little more introverted, a little more reserved. Yeah. Than some. But I think we've all known that type of kid who doesn't matter. Yeah.

Where they are, who they're with. They're happy. They're, gregarious and they want to be everybody's friend. That sounds like Anna. Yeah. No, it definitely does. And you just touched on it, right?

To make the decision. And again, I don't know if she was forced or not, but either way, just to go to local nursing homes and sing and try to bring joy to people, that is so admirable. It is. And that's something her and I both have in common, going to local nursing homes to entertain. And I know you've done that a lot. And I have always thought very highly of you for that, whether it's calling bingo, whether it's putting on, you know, skits or things like that, just to bring joy.

That's why we're the chaps. Now, Anna lived in a safe neighborhood called Liberty Wells. And the Salt Lake Tribune wrote about Liberty Wells. They said, former drug houses have been bought out and refurbished by young professionals, hoping to raise children, flower beds, sycamore trees and fresh cut wands line the curbs. Neighborhood watch patrols roam the streets at night. So it's picturesque. It does.

It also, to me, is a great thing when you can kind of revive some neighborhoods. And you see that happen in different, you know, cities where certain parts of a city maybe older or people just start to move out. Right. And, okay, some group makes the decision that this would be a cool place to live. We're going to revitalize it. Yeah. That's a good thing.

It is a good thing. But we just got done talking about what a safe neighborhood this was. So it was shocking when on September 10th, 10-year-old Anna Palmer was attacked and murdered outside her home in Salt Lake City. Anna was murdered on a Thursday. And it started off as a very normal day. she went to her local elementary school, which was right across the street from her house. After school, she went home. Anna called her mother around 5 p.m. and asked if she could play with some of her friends.

Nancy said yes, and Anna left home to walk to a friend's house. She was last seen alive at 6.50 p.m. when she walked away from her friend to head back home. And one thing is no. Anna's murder happened very quickly. news outlet KSL wrote it was like one minute she was alive and the next she wasn't. Anna was running home from her friend's house, but she never made it inside. And Anna was found within 30 minutes of her death. It was really quick, though, that they found her 30 minutes after her death.

Well, yeah, you and I cover a lot of cases and many times people are found quickly, but many times it's days, weeks, months, even years in some instances. And, you know, you have to think about that in the context of a police investigation. Okay. What are the differences? Well, the sooner you find the body, obviously the better your investigation should go because the amount of potential evidence they're going to find. Yeah, no doubt.

I mean, obviously, police departments don't want to have to go invest. a murder? They don't want murders to occur in their jurisdiction, but if you had to choose after the fact, a murder's already occurred, would you rather find the body 30 minutes after it occurred or find it two years later? Well, it's a no-brainer from a forensic evidence standpoint, it's night and day. Nancy Palmer arrived home around 7.30 p.m., which reportedly was a bit later than normal, and she found Anna laying on their front porch. Nancy later testified that she touched Anna's hand, and it felt cold. Nancy immediately called 911.

Dispatchers instructed her to perform CPR. But Nancy said it wasn't working because Anna had a hole in her throat. So then they instructed her to put her hand over the hole and continue attempting CPR. Paramedics arrived a few minutes later, and Anna was pronounced dead at the hospital. How heartwrenching would that be to be on the phone with emergency services as you're trying to save your daughter and knowing that it's not looking good? What you're doing is not working. Yeah. And they're trying to help you.

They're trying to help you. But at a certain point, do you know? I think you would in a lot of cases. this is not working. Anna was stabbed five times in the throat and she had been badly beaten. One of the stab wounds severed her spinal cord. Now, her neck wounds were initially thought to have come from a dog attack. But after an initial exam, investigators believed she was intentionally attacked and stabbed by a person. Anna's autopsy confirmed that the wounds came from a sharp weapon. So you can have all kinds of theories in the beginning.

Sure. And that often happens. But, you know, once that autopsy is done, big difference between a sharp weapon, blade, you know, like a blade or a knife, you know, something like that. And a dog's teeth. Yes. Pretty easy to figure that out. The Salt Lake Tribune reported that Anna had bruises on her upper chest, face and genitals. She had leaves and grass tangled in her hair.

the police declined to comment until a more thorough exam was completed by juvenile assault experts from primary children's medical center. What they did say was that there was no trail of blood on the porch, none inside the house or outside leading up to the porch. Nothing was stolen from the Palmer House. The murder weapon was not found at the crime scene, but detectives did find a tennis shoe print. that they believed may have belonged to the killer. There was DNA evidence under Anna's fingernails, indicating that she attempted to fight off her killer. But at the time, the technology just wasn't there, right?

It wasn't advanced enough at that point to get a match. What's a lot of information? It's a lot of information, but it's also, you know, some pretty strange information. Okay, you look at nothing stolen from the house. I get that. May have never entered the house. She was found on the porch, but no blood leading up to it.

And from what we have described were some pretty serious wounds. Okay, what does that mean? What are you making from that if you're a detective or an investigator? And to know that, you know, she ran away from her friend's house around 650. her mom comes home at 730 to discover her body. It's not a huge window. No. And knowing that they're saying that she died 30 minutes prior to being found,

it's a really short time period for this horrific crime that take place. Well, the way you just narrowed it down, it really makes the window about 10 minutes, give her take for her to be attacked and killed. Anna's family didn't know of anyone who would want to hurt her there were no witnesses to the attack and no known suspects. But there were reports of a strange man prowling the neighborhood in the hours before Anna was killed. Now, the family not knowing of anybody who would want to hurt her, what family would?

Could you come up with a list of somebody that would want to hurt your little 10-year-old girl who's been described as this, you know, really outgoing person? everybody loves her. No, you wouldn't be able to put anyone on that list most likely. Now, could there be a neighbor who said, hey, I'm tired of your daughter doing X on my yard? Okay, then maybe you might mention that to police, but I think by and large, most people would have a hard time coming up with a list of anyone who would want to hurt a 10 year old child. 10 year old children don't make a lot of enemies. I mean, you know it. There's how many 10 year olds are going to make enemies?

I'm sure there are. People are going to write in and give me an example. And that's true with everything I say. Nothing's absolute. But, you know, I'm talking in general terms, what's more likely than not? And I think it's more likely that most 10 year olds don't have an enemy list. Or you could look at it as though even if they did have somebody who did like them, maybe their parents wouldn't even know about it.

The police and volunteers handed out flyers, I think a lot of people, including the authorities, had a very tough time believing that no one on this busy street had witnessed the attack or any unusual activity afterwards. The police department offered a $5,000 reward in the days after the murder. And this was a busy street. We'll talk about it more in a little. little bit the location and the type of traffic patterns. The Salt Lake Tribune reported that police sergeant Kyle Jones said, obviously it's a homicide, but currently there are no

identifiable suspects. Our detectives have not come up with anybody who saw her with anyone. But four girls reported that they were followed by a man driving a dark blue two-door hatchback about two hours before Anna was murdered. One of the girls reported that the man exposed and touched himself in front of her. Yeah, that's a real concern. That's a really sick SOB. To expose yourself, to touch yourself in front of very small children, it's nasty. Yeah.

I mean, obviously, it's criminal. We know that. And no doubt, you know, as police, you hear about that. you want to find this person. You want to get them off the street for what you know they're doing. Right. But also you have to believe. If they're willing to do that, what else are they willing to do?

Could they be willing to murder? Possibly. I don't know. Yeah. It's somebody they would want to talk to. Katie Rufflin's daughter ran away from this man and saw him following her to a friend's house a few moments later. Rufflin told the Salt Lake Tribune.

He asked them, do you guys know where the Hansons live? And I guess a friend of this lady's daughter stepped forward and said, yeah, they lived down there. And then she looked and saw that this guy was exposed and touching himself. So they started to walk away very quickly. They saw him coming down the street after them. Then they started to run. The girls went into a friend's home and called the police. The police came.

they talked to these girls, but left the neighborhood an hour before Anna was murdered. So the timing of this is very, you know, interesting as well. Now, Hanson family did live in the area, but the police noted that it was most likely a coincidence that the man mentioned their name. I'm assuming they thought he had just made up a name because he wasn't looking for a house. He was trying to get these girls' attention so that, you know, he could do this nasty thing that he wanted to do, the police chose to investigate the homicide and the indecent exposure separately. And I get that. You don't have any indications that they're linked yet. And I think until

you do, I could see where you might investigate them separately. Sergeant Don Bell, head of the sex crime unit, told the Salt Lake Tribune, yeah, we're looking for this guy in a car. And there is no connection with the death that we know for what he did here on the exposure. There was another report of indecent exposure from September 8th, just two days before Anna was murdered. A teenager masturbated in front of an older woman, a block away from Brian Avenue, where Anna lived. Now, police never came out and mentioned that this incident may be connected to Anna's case. Again, I just think they didn't know.

Right. It's a little concerning that you got people exposing themselves and masturbating all over the, you know. Neighborhood. The neighborhood, this place that is said to have been a very safe place. And then you have a murder that follows it. Definitely concerning if you lived in that neighborhood. As you hear all this news about exposure and, I mean, obviously the murder. I mean, you have to be second.

guessing, what are we doing here? Well, and it sounds to me like police knew these were two different individuals. So you don't have just one person running around showing off their naughty bitch. You got two people. Yeah, that we know of. I think, you know, if you're in National Lampoon's vacation, that's the point where you say, roll them up and you get the heck out of die. Exactly.

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And this I get, I think I've talked about it on a number of episodes. I think it's part of the reason why you have so many people, especially in cases that involve children who come out and show support, you know, join searches, pass out flyers. They just want to help in whatever way they can because I think in the back of their mind, they're thinking, you know, this could have been my child. Absolutely. What if this was my child? I would want everyone to rally around me and my family.

Yeah. So we're going to do that for them. And it's really touching. It is. It's heartwarming to know that, you know, people are willing to give up themselves. they don't have to do that. They could just sit on their couch and watch Jeopardy and see all of that on the news and not lift a finger.

But in so many cases we do, it's not what we see. We see communities, sometimes whole communities come together to really rally around a family. For me, it's amazing to see what people are willing to do in these type of situations. But the effects of Anna's murder were long-lasting. In 2011, Salt Lake Deals, Samgill told KSL, it shocked the conscience of our community. It made everybody feel that if you couldn't feel safe, literally in your front yard, then where could you be safe?

You know, something you and I have touched on many times, whether, you know, it's a, it's an attack in a home. Okay, the home is your castle. Right. Okay, extend that out to your yard. That's yours. Yeah. That's your kind of domain.

Your kids should, should be safe there. You really shouldn't have to worry about if your child decides to walk from your house to their friend's house. You would hope. I mean, that's the way you would think, right? And I think that's the way a lot of people do think until what? Something really bad like this happens in a community. And then it becomes, okay, we can't do things the way that we've always done it. Our sense of security or some of our sense of our sense of freedom.

is gone. Yeah. Because of this terrible act. Sheriff's deputy, Jody Samson, established a program at Anna's elementary school called Operation Safe Passage. Basically, it was where parents entrusted adults volunteered to watch children walk to and from school. And I think this is great. You know, volunteers were required to submit background checks and they wore special vests to identify themselves.

So again, this is a great program. but I also think it shows you how shocking this was to the commute. Yeah. People were willing to pitch in now to watch other people's kids. Yeah. Because they didn't want another child to go missing and or be murdered. On September 22nd, the police announced the unofficial findings from the exam. The Salt Lake Tribune reported that police lieutenant Phil Kirk said,

even though the injuries were not indicative of sexual assault, that doesn't mean we have ruled out any sexual predators and those type of individuals as suspects. I don't know what to say of the bruises. We don't have any explanation except that it was not consistent with her being sexually assaulted. Anna's case became one of the highest profile cold cases in Salt Lake City. Police were under a tremendous amount of public pressure to solve the case, to find her killer, but it would take 11 years to identify him. The police investigated over a thousand leads. But like I said, Anna's case went cold. An $11,000 reward was offered, but no information ever led to an arrest. The police believed that Anna's killer either knew her or stalked her because he knew she would be

home alone. And that does make some sense to me, actually quite a bit of sense because, you know, if you're going to attack this girl, right, whoever this monster is, but we know who it is, but we haven't gotten to that part in the story yet, but if you're this monster and you're going to attack a 10 year old girl and she's going to end up on the porch of her own home, are you not pretty confident that mom, dad, whoever is not at home? Because if not, somebody's coming out that front door and you're getting an ass whipping. Exactly. And probably more than that.

Yeah, probably more than that, right? But it had to be somebody that knew her routine, most likely. Or was watching and knew that nobody else was home and or a combination of the two. Right. We'll find out. But, I mean, I see where police developed that thought. From September 10th to October 2nd, 1998, detectives interviewed. 200 persons of interest. They received over a thousand tips. They questioned family, neighbors,

ex-convicts, registered sex offenders, and juvenile offenders who lived in and around Anna's neighborhood. A composite photo of a man seen near Anna's house was also released to the papers on October 2nd. The man was described as thin and young with wavy reddish brown hair. On October 2nd, Sergeant Jerry Mendez handed out thousands of flyers with the reward information and promising anonymity for anyone who came forward with

any type of information. So I already said this becomes a cold case. It's going to take 11 years. Right. But we're still in 1998. They're working the case very hard. You know, interviewing 200 individuals. Flyers out there. Yeah. They're doing, it's

what it sounds like, everything they can do. And then a patient at the University Hospital psychiatric unit confessed to the murder. On October 5th, 1998, detectives filed for a warrant to seize a knife and a machete from 46-year-old Jeffrey T. Hayes, the psychiatric patient who had confessed to the crime. The problem became that Hayes confession was followed by a number of other confessions that were easily proven false. We've heard that many times so fast. We've seen that in a number of cases.

Now, Jeffrey Hayes murdered his brother in 1980, and he had been arrested in the past for crime such as public intoxication, public nuisance, theft, illegal drugs, and negligent homicide. He had once confessed to killing two police officers in Washington, D.C., even though the crime had already been sold. on September 10th of 1998, Hayes went to Valley Mental Health and asked to talk to a doctor about voices in his head. And it was said in all the research Gibbs that he went there fairly often. He was a patient there quite a bit. Valley Mental Health is just a few blocks from in his house.

A nurse gave him an appointment for September 15th. The nurse later reported that Hayes was upset because because he couldn't speak to someone immediately. And it was said that he returned a few times on September 10th and exhibited what staff called abnormal behavior. So there's some suspicion there. Well, obviously Anna was murdered on the 10th. So we know he was in the vicinity on the day that she was murdered. And according to staff exhibiting abnormal behavior.

then he showed up for his appointment on September 15th. According to doctors, he was agitated, very psychotic, and talking about murder. Doctors took him to an office for an interview. According to the Salt Lake Tribune, Hayes told them, the police will be investigating me for the murder of that girl down the street. This is just five days after the murder. He also said that he had knives and that instead of going to the hospital, he wanted to hurt someone.

So doctors had him admitted to the University of Utah Neuropsychiatric Institute, and they called the police. And police did recover a knife, a machete, camouflage, clothing, and some other types of clothing from this guy's van. Knowing what Anna's injuries were, the police had to be optimistic about the items they found in the van. Yeah, knives, anything sharp. you got a question, why does this guy have a bunch of camouflage?

Sure. Okay. We go a machete. Is he out doing stuff he shouldn't be doing? Police sought a court order to interrogate Hayes because he wasn't outpatient at the time of the murder. But his confession was questionable because I already mentioned it, right? He had confessed to a number of crimes that he didn't commit in the past. It turned out that Hayes did not murder Anna Palmer.

He simply made a false. confession. So it was five days later. I'm sure he saw it on the news or, you know, read it in the paper. And for whatever reason, decided that he would implicate himself. A man named Brandon Wilson was arrested on November 16th, 1998 in Los Angeles for stabbing a woman and stealing her purse. After being arrested, Wilson confessed to stabbing a nine-year-old boy who died on November 15th in a public. restroom. But Wilson also told detectives he had recently been through Utah. So the Salt Lake City Police received news of this and they wanted to see if Wilson was involved in Anna's murder because of his use of knives as a weapon and him being in Utah, the police thought, well,

maybe there could be a connection. On November 15th, 1998, Brandon Wilson stocked two women at the beach in Oceanside, California, he was looking for victims who he felt would be easy targets. He picked 9-year-old Matthew Chetchy. Matthew was at a family reunion. He went into the restroom alone and Wilson attacked him. Matthew's aunt later reported seeing a thin teenage male

running out of the restroom and she eventually identified Brandon Wilson in a police lineup. Wilson told the police that he would keep killing people unless they stopped him. Okay. You've been caught. Right. And then you're going to make a statement about the fact that you would have never stopped killing unless you were caught or the police stopped you or, you know, something along those lines.

Okay. Pretty scary that you would murder a nine-year-old boy. Right. That's terrible. It's also scary to think that. you would have kept on doing it and doing it and doing it until you were stopped. So no doubt, investigators from all over, if they hear something like that and they find out that this person at one point was in their state, they're going to try to connect some dots here.

Well, for sure, right? If you could put him in the area at the time, you might have your killer. Potentially, yeah, yeah, absolutely. So investigators from Alaska, Oregon, Colorado, Texas, and Utah. called the police in California to ask for information about unsolved murders in their states. Salt Lake City detectives wanted to examine two knives taken from Wilson to see if either was a match for the murder weapon in the Anna Palmer case. So already at this point, they've got a couple of good suspects.

One turned out to be a person who confessed to a lot of crimes that he didn't commit. I think that that individual had some. some serious mental health issues. This person just came out and said that he was going to murder as long as he could until he was stopped. So again, if he was in Utah, let's check him out. For sure. Then on May 6th, 1999, an eight-year-old girl was kidnapped from her home in an apartment building in Salt Lake City by an 18-year-old former maintenance worker. The girl's mother heard her daughter crying in her room and saw the man running away, carrying her daughter. A neighbor heard the girl crying.

Two police officers quickly responded to the call. While they were investigating the apartment complex, an officer found the girl under a bush. And then the kidnapper was found hiding under another bush. He had a previous criminal record as both a juvenile and an adult. Police wanted to look into his past and see if he was. was possibly connected with the murder of Anna Palmer. But on May 7th of that year, the Salt Lake City police announced that the suspect was not connected to Anna Palmer's case.

So it didn't take them long. No. It was the very next day that they figured it out. But they still have a lot of bad things happening in Salt Lake, in California, too. And does that surprise you at all? Because every case we do, you know, we find these tentacles. We find these kind of offshoots of people doing really horrible things that police believe might be connected to their case. A lot of times they end up not being.

It just shows you that a lot of people roaming around this country currently doing really bad things, have done really bad things in the past. It's kind of really scary. It really is. Let's just be honest. It's alarming for sure. 10 years past with no significant leads or arrest. in Anna's case. So this is where I said it became a cold case,

as DNA technology became more advanced. Investigators had a lot of hope that testing forensic evidence from the crime scene would identify Anna's killer. In 2009, Detective sent in clothing and body swabs to a company called Sorensen forensics. What is now a very common practice in homicide cases, but wasn't so

much back in 1998 was detectives having anna's fingernail clippings swabbed for DNA from all the reporting i saw that was not standard procedure back at that time and it would make sense right DNA still pretty much in its infancy right still not able to do a ton now i don't know if that was you know every jurisdiction across the country or if that was specific to you know salt lake city but either way, police did it. And they saved Anna's fingernail clippings in case further testing was needed. Very smart. That's very smart.

And it's also something that you and I applaud, really good police work that ultimately is going to lead to someone getting caught may take a while. Yeah. But going above and beyond, you know, in the beginning, early on, really on, really. can help out down the road. Sometimes in ways that, you know, police probably had no idea. We've seen cases from the 60s, 70s where I didn't know what DNA was or how it could be used to solve a crime, but they collected something with the thought that, all right, this might be beneficial, if not now, down the road. Yeah, just maybe. And it turned out that it was.

Dan Hellwig from Sorensen forensics told KSL, we determined that fingernails from the victim would be something that might yield probative results and we took them into the lab and tested them. Foreign skin cells were found under Anna's fingernails. The DNA was determined to belong to Matthew John Breck, a man who lived just a block away from Anna back in 1998. at that time Matthew Breck was 19 years old. By the time he was ultimately charged with her murder, he was 31.

And what really got me was Breck was never questioned in 1998. Yeah, we kind of made a big deal about, you know, they questioned a lot of people. They talked to family. They talked to a lot of people in the neighborhood. This guy lived a block away and apparently was never talked to, never questioned. Nothing. Somehow he got underneath the radar. Or he fell through the cracks.

Or fell through the cracks. And maybe those are one in the same or an offshoot of each other. In 2009, Breck was in prison in Idaho. In 1999, he was convicted of burglary and sentenced to two to four years. He was released in 2001, but convicted of another crime just later that year. He was convicted of sodomy, lewdness of a child under the age of 16. and he was sentenced to 10 years. He had been incarcerated at the Idaho Correctional Institution or Afino since 2001 in his first interview

with police. Breck denied knowing Anna or having any type of contact with her. But I want to go back to this guy living a block away. Okay. Did he fall through the cracks? Did he fall, you know, kind of fall under the radar at that time?

It sounds like he did. for whatever reason. Sure. Is there not a mechanism, though, to figure out that this guy was convicted of some really, you know, nasty crimes against children and that he lived a block away from Anna back in 1998. You know what I'm saying? Like later on.

Like there's some type of scrub in the system. Yeah. Okay. With all the things that computers can do, even in. 2009. That part is kind of shocking. And maybe those kind of scrubs aren't done all the time. Maybe it would take, you know, a really aggressive cold case investigator to, to initiate something like that. But I would think if I was an investigator and I saw something that said, this guy was convicted of sodomy and lewdness of a child under 16 and looked at his prior addresses, you know,

There's some light bulb action that's going off inside my head. Again, maybe I'm just thinking that that's too easy. It's probably much, much more difficult than what I'm imagining it is. But if we don't have it in place, let's get it there. Absolutely. Because I know for a fact, it could be done. Sure. Whether it's being done today in 2022, I don't know.

If not, let's figure it out. I'm hoping that it is. I'm hoping it is too. but you and I hope for a lot of things or we sometimes assume that things are being done and then we later find out that no no they don't do that type of stuff on january 4th 2010 salt lake county prosecutors filed a capital murder charge against matthew john breck he was also charged with aggravated murder aggravated sexual abuse of a child and intentionally inflicting serious physical harm on a child He was extradited to Salt Lake City, Utah on July 8, 2010.

Matthew Brake's preliminary hearing began on June 14th, 2011. Judge Judith Atherton oversaw the hearing. The purpose of the three-day hearing was to decide if Breck would go to trial for his charges. Nancy Palmer testified about finding Anna's body on the evening of September 10th, 1998. She said, I looked at her. her and I knew she was probably gone. Her face was waxy, pale, yellowy color, like there was no blood flow. So heart wrenching, right, hearing that from a mother. Sure. But going back to what we said when she found Anna's body, right, she's trying to do CPR. And I think this even gives us more clarity on the

fact that she knew that her daughter was, was gone. Yeah. But you're not going to. to not try. No. You're not going to give up until somebody tells you definitively that you have to that nothing you can do or they can do, you know, is going to change things. Nancy confirmed that she didn't know Matthew Breck. Witnesses who knew Breck testified that he liked to party. KSL reported that one individual said he walked around the neighborhood with an aura of of arrogance talking to people as if he wanted to pick a fight. Boy, that sounds like somebody I know.

Yeah. Walking around looking for fights. Random. Jack, re-chering it up all over the place. Oh, man. Well, I can do that because you have my six. Sometimes.

Sometimes I'm not even behind you, but you think I am. But, you know, think about this person testifying. Obviously, this is not a character witness on the behalf of the defense. offense. This person is not saying great things about Matthew Breck. It was also said that Breck often carried knives and he showed them off to his friends. Now, you and I talk about knives quite a bit.

We both kind of collect knives. The one thing that I don't do is put a big K bar on my hip and walk around town, walk through the mall, pull it out, show it to people. Say, hey, look at my knife. What's wrong with that? It's not something I do. No. Now, you could say, okay, some people might do that. They're eccentric or this and that. What happens, though, is when you're suspected of murder, all of these eccentric things, and I'm using that word in my air quotes, they're going to come back and be used against you in court, right? This person liked to do this. He liked to sharpen his knife on a grinding wheel in the front yard. and then he would make slashing motions.

You know, somebody's going to say, I used to see him do that all the time. Does it mean that he did this, this or this? No, but does it make you look great? Absolutely not. Witness Todd Clark testified that he met Matthew Brack and his brother, Tom, while living in California. Clark was offered a job in Utah,

and he invited Tom Brack to come with him. Matthew Brack followed him later. According to Clark, Matthew carried himself like he was six foot six, three hundred pounds. If he was walking down the sidewalk, he wanted everyone to know he was there. This guy had some kind of complex. I don't know which of the complexes that it was. I'm assuming he was not six, six, three hundred pounds. I didn't actually see his heightened weight.

You know, remember, there was a description of kind of a skinny teenager. Right. So was this a smaller guy who? who had that type of complex. So really at all times wanted to come off bigger, badder than what he really was. We all know people like that. We do know people like that.

Clark partied with the Breck brothers, but his wife disliked Matthew. He testified, my wife felt weirded out from Matthew. She didn't want him around the kids. She was afraid of him. Okay, Matthew Brack doesn't so far have a lot of people saying very nice things about him.

Well, when this woman's on the stand and she talks about she doesn't want him around her kids and that she's afraid of him, that speaks volumes. Yeah, it says a lot. She testified that she was the one who urged a police officer. She worked with at a local grocery store to look into Matthew regarding Anna Palmer's murder. She mentioned this all the way back in 2006. Two witnesses testified about seeing a man walking near. or Anna when she was going home from a friend's house on September 10th,

Laxan Konasama, who at that point was in her 20s, testified that she and Anna were pretty good friends. Anna played with her after school while her mom was at work. She has few memories of that day and testified, these aren't the memories I want to recall. It was a very emotional time, so I probably tried to suppress them. But prosecutors played a recorded interview. from when she was 10 years old. She said that she and Anna used the swings in her backyard.

Around 7 p.m., they walked to the corner of 300 East and Brian Avenue, gave each other a hug, and then walked away separately. But they both noticed something unusual. Laxanne said, when we're at 3rd East, there was this guy behind us. I thought he might kidnap us or grab us from behind. he looked kind of strange or something. She said she called out to Anna to let the man walk past them. As he walked by them, he looked down at Anna.

Anna told Laxanne to run home. Laxan said in her interview, I started running and looked back and he was gone. I kept looking back to see if Anna was getting home safely. I didn't think anything would happen to her. She also testified that she had no reason to lie back in 19. And why would she have a reason to lie? She was 10 years old. Exactly.

She was a friend. She was friends, right, with Anna. But I think you can see, you know, why she said, these are not the types of memories that she wanted to recall. And she tried to suppress them. Yeah. What does it do to a 10 year old to one minute be playing with your friend and the next find out that that friend who you were just with was.

brutally murdered. Years of therapy, man. It's going to be very rough emotionally. Yeah. You know, a lot of times we talk about life-altering events. Well, that would be a life-altering event for that girl. There's no way around it. No. Doesn't mean that she can't lead a great life, but it's going to make some changes. Yes. It's going to be impactful. Very impactful. Witness Amy Johnson was 14 years old in 1998. Anna and Laxanne were friends with Amy's little sister. Amy was showing her new kitten to her neighbors on the evening of September 10th. She saw the two girls walking by. She also said that she saw a man wearing a baseball jersey bouncing from one side of the street

to the other. He was attempting to hitch a ride, but she said that she saw him following Anna. She testified, he creeped me out personally. I looked back and Anna was walking home and he was still walking behind her, like a crazy person. I looked again about a minute later and no one was there. According to the desert news, Laxanne said that the man appeared to be in his late teens. He was bald and wearing a white tank top. Amy said he was wearing an unbuttoned baseball jersey and had two tattoos on his chest. She also said that he had dark stringy hair. But there were reports that Matthew Brack often wore

both baseball jerseys and white tank tops. There you go. Now personally, I don't rock the white tank top. First of all, I don't have the physique for it anymore. But even when I did, it just wasn't a fashion choice that I was willing to make. Not your style. No, because, you know, I used to watch a lot of cops. And I'm not putting down anybody that likes a good white tank top.

But I always remembered seeing the guys running from the cops or being a rusted. It seemed like half of them were wearing white tank tops. So it kind of just always associated that with people who got in trouble. Yeah. That's because you can run faster in those shirts. You're more aerodynamic. Yeah. Now, I've just alienated a whole section, subsection of people who are really into white tank tops. You did. And it was not my intent. No. The Fort Fiesta owners was. Yeah, that was deliberate. Yeah. That was deliberate. And I actually got, I don't know if it's a voicemail or I got an email or I got an email about us talking about a hugo. Oh yeah. And it was a joke. And the person said, I don't know

if you know it, but they later made a four-door sedan. And it was called the we go. And I don't remember that. So I'm assuming it was a joke, but it actually could be real. It could be. I don't know. Either way, I thought it was fun. Yeah. Breck's neighbor, Rudy Velasquez reported that on the night of September 10th, Breck was ducking and hiding in an alley near Anna's house. Okay. Can they get any more people to make this guy look bad, look shady? Now, there's a reason for it because we know the guy ultimately did something very horrible. Deputy Chief Medical Examiner Edward Lees described Anna's injuries. She had several stab wounds. One severed her jugular vein, which caused Anna to bleed to death. Another wound pierced her spinal cord, which would have

paralyzed her if she had survived. He couldn't tell which injuries Anna received first and said they could have been inflicted in a very short period of time. And that makes sense because we talked about the window already. The belief is that all of this went down in a very short period of time. Dan Hellwig, a DNA analyst, testified about the DNA evidence. He said one in 11 million was the probability. ability that the DNA found under Anna's fingernails was not Matthew Brex.

The first test done before 2007 showed that there were two DNA profiles under Anna's fingernails. One belonged to her. The other was unidentified until 2009 when Brex DNA was found as a match. He matched on two different tests. When asked by prosecutor Vincent Meister, if you were to take known DNA from Anna Palmer and known DNA from Matthew Brack and put them in a test tube. You'd get the same results. And Hellwig said, yes. Now, when I read one in 11 million, that sounds like a huge number. It does.

But really, a lot of times in the world of DNA, you know, you see numbers in the, the trillions, I thought. So I don't know. Maybe it's because this DNA was older. not sure. As you think about it, there's 330 million people in the United States. Now, you'd have to narrow that down to males and, and all that. But still, one in 11 million is not a slam dunk. It's not as conclusive as you would think it would be. At least that's what I thought. Right. The final day of Brex hearing was delayed because a witness got sick. The hearing continued on July 8th, 2011. Detective Corden Parks testified that he had never heard of Matthew

Breck until he saw his name in the National DNA Database in 2009. He talked about speaking to Breck the first time in prison and Breck denying knowing Anna Palmer at all. According to the Salt Lake Tribune, Breck wrote a letter to his family after the visit and said, The bad thing is I don't remember if I did this or not. In 98, I was so fucked up on so many different drugs at the same time. I didn't know what I was doing most of the time. You know, this guy had to be doing a lot of drugs. Back then, if you can't remember whether or not you killed a 10-year-old girl,

you had to be effed up. Yeah, yeah, that was my thought as well. We talk about memory quite a bit. and there are a lot of things that I don't remember, even that happened yesterday or the week before, but they're all little things. You know what I do remember? Very, very big moments in my life.

Yeah. The birth of my children. The day I got married. I remember all of those types of things pretty vividly. I would think that if you murdered someone, unless you were a stone cold psychopath, that would be tough to forget. Yeah, it would be.

Now, if you were hopped up on every drug imaginable, maybe. I don't know. Brex attorneys announced that they would argue against the aggravating factors in his case. Judge Atherton announced that she would make her decision about Brex trial on August 12. Now, obviously, we don't have everything that went on in that hearing, but from what we did lay out, it seems kind of like a no-brainer that the judge would send this guy on to trial, right? Yeah, it's definitely a no-brainer. Seems like it.

But on August 12th, 2011, Matthew Breck pleaded guilty to aggravated murder. The state agreed to strike the aggravating circumstance of aggravated sexual abuse of a child. So the state dismissed the charges of aggravated sexual abuse of a child and child abuse. Breck was immediately sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. And it was reported that he didn't say a word at his sentencing hearing, but his attorneys did give Nancy Palmer an apology letter he had written. So everything's moving pretty fast now. Well, yeah, I would say it moved very quickly.

You know, the judge was supposed to rule about whether he would go to trial on the 12th. And on the 12th, he pleaded guilty. So my thought is he and his attorneys heard enough during the hearings to know that number one, he was going to go to trial. And number two, he was going to be convicted. And so it seems to me as though the goal then became, okay, how do we get out of some of the charges so that, you know, maybe his sentences a little bit lesser. but he still ends up with life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Well, good. No, it's great. But, you know, it goes back to a question that I've asked a number of times. At that point, why not roll the dice? Could he have, you know, received the death penalty? I don't know. I'm assuming Utah has the death penalty, but I don't know that for sure. And maybe that was the deciding factor.

Because if not, if you're just going to get life with no parole, why not take your chance? Yeah, I mean, I do know they did at one point, so maybe that was probably why he wanted to avoid the death penalty, but really. Other than that, what else could it be, right? I wouldn't want to be in prison for the rest of my life, so I would probably roll the dice anyway. Nancy Palmer was pleased with the sentence and told KSL, it's been a long time coming. Hopefully now we can get past her death to the good thing. She also told a number of news outlets. the most important thing was that justice was done.

And I think the fact that the person responsible is being held accountable. That's a big deal. You've got to come to terms with the grief and the loss. That's going to happen either way. But I think doing it without any form of justice is probably even harder. You know, once that person is held responsible, doesn't change the fact that your little one's gone, but it has to make a huge difference. Right. In some way. Now, it might be different for each and every person. There's no cookie cutter answer, but I think to a lot of parents, it makes a big difference.

They want to see somebody held responsible for what they did. You know, one of the things I found interesting about this case as we wrap up is the timing. The timing of events. was very close. You know, Breck would have been released in Idaho in two years and could have heard another child. He could have killed someone if he were released and not arrested soon after. Luckily, they matched his DNA while he was still in prison. And now he'll remain in prison for the rest of his life. And he'll never be out to harm anyone else again.

Now, he might hurt somebody in prison. There's always that chance, but he'll never be free to, you know, be a predator of children. Yeah. And those are the people that you really do not want on the street. No, ever. And it's one of the things that has upset me about the legal system since you and I have been doing this podcast. You know, people getting 25 years for selling.

some small amount of weed, but yet we've had people, you know, commit very vicious sexual assaults against women, against children, and not spend as much time inside as somebody's dealing popped. There's no way that you can make sense of that to me. I get it at the time, they were both illegal. But when you look at the two side by side, how can you make any comparison? You can't. I can't. I can never figure out how we got to a point where people were spending more time in prison for dealing a little bit of pot than some people were for committing vicious sexual assaults. You'll never get me to understand that. But there's no doubt that Anna Palmer's murder was a horrible tragedy. It shook her entire community. Not only Anna's family, but you know, that entire community was trauma. We mentioned it right up front. You know, they thought they lived in a very safe, family-friendly area. But once you have something like this happened, there's no way for it to not shatter

that kind of idyllic thing that you have in your mind. Oh, I think it ruins that picture not only for people living there, but people in the surrounding areas. When you start hearing what happened, I don't know how you could. feel safe about just letting your kids be kids play yeah and they didn't right parents were so terrified because they knew what happened to anna could have easily happened to any of their children but i do look at anna's case as you know another extremely important case when it comes to you know a cold case being solved by DNA evidence.

Now, this was not forensic genetic genealogy that we talk about a lot of times. This is one of those cases where, you know, police did a good job of collecting and preserving what would later turn out to be very crucial evidence. And as we keep saying, right, with these advancements in DNA, and we're just going to continue to see more and more of them, more killers are going to be sent to prison. And some of these older cases are more and more likely to be solved. Now, what I don't like is these people, again, spending so much time free. This guy was out for what, 10, 12 years. Yeah. And even when he was inside, it wasn't, you know, for anything having to do with the,

with the murder of Anna. But in the end, he got what he deserved. He'll never see the light of day. most likely he'll spend the rest of his life and then he'll die in prison and he should he really should no doubt about it you you'll never change my mind about that if this guy was willing to do what he did to 10 year old anna palmer right there's no telling what he was capable of doing and okay now let's talk about what did he do yeah during maybe that 10 12 year period where he was out at certain points, what did he do that police just never connected him with? And before I give the police too much credit, I got to go back to why did they not talk to this guy?

Yeah. Who lived a block away from Anna when they had some descriptions. They had some that were what, skinny teen. Okay. Can you not find a skinny teen a block away? So I'd be a little bit harder than we think. Why? Because there's a lot of skinny teens. Skinny teens. Maybe. Yeah.

But no doubt you have to look back at that and say, oh, man, that was a real missed opportunity to solve this case, you know, potentially early on. Right. They still may not have been able to put it together without the DNA evidence unless they talked to him and he confessed. It may not have had the evidence to convict him. Yeah. But that's it for our episode on Matthew Breck and the murder of Anna Palmer.

We got some voice. those Gibbs. You want to check those out? I want to hear them. Good day, Mike. Good day, Gibby. It's Ashley from Australia in case you were wondering. I live in a beautiful part of the world, a place called Glasshouse Mountains. More than welcome to pop in if you ever down this way. I just wanted to let you know that I've been listening to the show for a few years now and I love it. I can't wait for the next episode to hit. I've got a suggestion for him. I'm not sure whether you've heard of Ivan Millett. He's fairly infamous down here. He was also known as the backpacker murderer. He just recently passed away,

but I'd love to hear your take on that evil man. Also, I've been a Patreon member for six months and I still haven't received my mouse pad. Just thought I'll let you know. No, no biggie. Just whenever you're ready. All right, I'll say goodbye. Thanks very much for all you do. Keep your head on a swivel and keep your own time ticking. See you guys. Love you. I love you too, man. Appreciate the voicemail. Not sure what happened with the mouse pad, but I will, I am on it. I think the, postal service or wherever you send that out, I think they got a lot of mouse pads floating around. I think they do. Because a lot of times I will look back and it'll say, yeah, it was delivered. Yeah. But people never got it. So no problem. I'll send another one out.

But, you know, we have enough trouble here in the States with the postal service. But once you try to, you know, start sending out to other countries, especially in the last few years. I've noticed that, you know, it's been a struggle. Well, for sure. COVID and all that, right? Yes, with COVID and all that. Well, maybe we're just hand deliver it. Yeah. Because I told my family the other day, Australia is on my bucket list. That's right. And my youngest said, I heard they got a lot of things over there that'll eat you. I was like, yeah, we, it's not like we're, I'm not looking to walk out into the bush. Yeah. I mean, I just want to go to like Sydney. or, you know, someplace a little more urban.

Yeah. I don't want to mess with, like, things that will hurt me. I wouldn't want to go out in the bushes for, you know. You're going by yourself, dude. I'm not, I watch some of that stuff on YouTube and the guy's talking about, yeah, that'll kill you. That'll kill you. As he's pointing to, like, four different things that'll kill you.

Within the first minute. Yeah, exactly. No, I'll stay here. Or I'll stay in a hotel in Sydney, yeah. Hi, Mike and Jimmy. This is Emily. I'm from Southern California. I've been a listener for a good few years now. You guys are my first podcast and still my all-time favorite. I recommend you guys anytime I get the chance. I've really been enjoying listening to the voice smells every week. So I decided it was my turn. And I have to give a shout out to my co-worker, Aaron, as we will probably listen to this podcast together. So hey, Erin, I'm not sure if you guys have any big plans for episode 300, but I'm really looking forward to it if you do. and I'm not team Mike or hippie because you guys are simply not one without the other. Anyways, thanks for all you do.

Stay safe and keep your own time ticking. Awesome. That is so cool. It is. Very neat when you got somebody that you listen to the podcast with. We have a lot of husbands and wives that will listen, sisters, friends, and then either separately or together, if they do it separately, then they'll get back together and then talk about the episode.

Yeah. I always find that very interesting. My daughter was telling me the other day that she's working with somebody that listens and that their whole class at Wright State listens to the podcast. Yeah, I've had a number of professors reach out to me to see if they could use episodes in their class and even high school teachers. And I was like, pour it on. That's awesome.

Yeah. Oh, I forgot to tell you that one of the younger guys that came to move the stuff out of my basement. Yeah. He asked me, he's like, do you do a podcast because your voice sounds very familiar. And that never happens. You and I have talked about that a bunch. Nobody really ever recognizes us, knows who we are. I just thought it was very interesting.

He was standing here in my basement. I was talking to him. Is that when he looked over and saw the podcast? He might have saw the studio, too. That might have been a little bit of a give way. Yeah. Hey, guys. I'm a new listener.

I've only been listening for about four months now. And I love your show. It is so intriguing. Everything is so great. So much detail and everything. Really haven't got to know you guys all that well, but I love your show. I love what you do. And I'm Brandon Rott from North Carolina.

And I love what you guys do. Just keep doing what you're doing. Love it. And spend all your time on here and give me what I need. I love going to sleep to you guys. I really do you. You give me a good night's sleep. Everything you do, it helps me go to bed and just have a really good night.

And just do what you do. Love you guys. Appreciate what you do. I love you, too. Brandon. Appreciate the voicemail, man. So just keep listening and you will probably learn more about us than you actually want to know. Yeah. And you know what we do when we do it. If that makes any sense. Because that's what we do. Because it didn't to me. But hopefully it does to Brandon. It will. Okay. We had two things in the mailbag. And they were both from the same person.

Carrie Bynley sent each of us a fanny pack. Oh, really? Yeah, probably because she said she heard me talking about, I would never wear a fanny pack. Yeah. But she just didn't go kind of normal black tan. She sent one that was glittered aqua. Okay. And one was glittered purple. So I guess you and I have to choose which one fits each of our styles.

Right. I kind of imagined you may be wearing both of them at the same time, one on each hip, crossed over. As a roller blade? As you rollerblade in one of your shows. Okay. I think that would be a cool look, actually. I can do that. It's anywhere I can put those singles that come up on the stage.

Put those dollar bills. Dollar, dollar bills, yeah. Oh, that's not a good sign. Because my money don't jingle, it folds. That is not a good takeaway. Brandon might have some trouble going to sleep after that one. That vision's not going away. All right, that is it for another episode of true crime all the time.

So for Mike, stay safe and keep your own time ticking.