True Crime All The Time - The Murder of Dru Sjodin

Episode Date: May 13, 2019

Dru Sjodin was a 22-year-old college student at the University of Dakota when she was murdered in 2003. Dru was a responsible person. She was taking a full class load, was in a sorority, worked multiple jobs and even found time to volunteer. So when she went missing the evening of Nov 22, 2003, her friends and family knew it wasn't like her and they began to search for Dru. What no one knew was that Dru encountered a vile sexual predator named Alphonso Rodriguez as she headed to her car after work.Join Mike and Gibby as they discuss the assault and murder of Dru Sjodin. This was a woman who was preparing herself for life after college and was working hard to accomplish her goals. Her killer Alphonso Rodriguez saw an easy target in Dru Sjodin. She was a pretty young woman who was talking on her cell phone and, as most of us are when we're talking on our cell phones, she was less aware of her surroundings. The act committed by Rodriguez will make you upset, but even more so will his rap sheet and how he seemed to get away with similar acts time and time again throughout the years.You can help support the show by going to patreon.com/truecrimeallthetimeVisit the show's website at truecrimeallthetime.comSee 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 130 of the True Crime All the Time podcast. I'm Mike Ferguson. And with me as always is my partner in true crime, Mike Gibby Gibson Gibbs, what is happening. Hey man, how you doing? I'm doing pretty good. When I said 130 out loud, it kind of took me back a little bit. Yeah. It seems like just yesterday you and I were doing 100 Ed Kemper. Yeah. Part one. It really was. Literally. Like just yesterday. It seems like it. It's just, it, it kind of gives you a sense, you and I, of how quickly time passes.

Yeah, it flies by, man, for sure. If true crime all the time was a TV show, we would be on season six. Man. We'd be in syndication. We would be making bank. We'd be big time, man. I'd be like, have a couple houses. I just saw something where, uh,

Kim Kardashian's getting her own show or something, you know, true, true crime show. We'll probably be, uh, advertising it at some point. I'm just thinking, she's doing a true crime show. Yeah. Well, she's, um, either, is she an attorney or just recently got her, finished her degree? Really? Or is getting her law degree one or the other. Right.

But yeah, lately she's been into criminal justice for, for whatever reason. Okay. Cool. And I assume Kim just says, hey, I'd like to do a true crime show. And they say, okay. Yeah. Well, they know whatever she touches. You and your tens of 20 million followers.

Million? Yeah. Well, she has to do is put her name on it and should generate viewership. Maybe she'll have you on it. I'll advertise for it. But, you know, Mike and Gibby, come on. We could do a true crime show. We can do it.

We can pull it off. All right, Gibbs. Let's do some Patreon shoutouts. Okay. We had Tara Ives. Hey, Tara. Lisa Brodour Browdha.

Cindy Grimmett. Hey, Cindy. Kimberly Key. Hey, Kimberly. Patty Snow. Hey, Patty. Terry Youngman. Yeah, very young.

Andrea Stoner. Hey, Stoner. April Crocker. Hey, April. Krista Cardin. Hey, Krista. Melissa. Melissa.

Julie Golubski. Julie. Julie what? Hey, Julie. Yvonne Moore. Hey, Yvonne. I think that's the Yvonne in the UK. I think so.

You said there was only one Yvon. Yvonne Moore. That's it. That's it. Susie Cross. Hey, Susie. Stephanie Swofford. Ooh, Swaffod. Kara.

Hey, Kara. Kim Weeks. Hey, Kim. Trisha. Thanks, Trisha. Amanda Monroe. Monroe, like Maryland's sister. Kimberly Stiles.

Hey, Kimberly. McKenzie Wright. Hey, McKenzie. Cleo the Crime Cat. Whoa, me, me,ow. So we got that going for us. Kristen. Hey.

Tracy Brownell. Hey, Tracy. And Carol. Carol. Who I think has. been with us before is back. She's back. If we go back into the vault, okay. This week we selected Beatriz Vasquez. It's a fun name to say. It is fun. I like it. Long time supporter, long time listener. Yeah, thank you. Very much appreciated. We appreciate all the support we get,

including PayPal. We had Mary Ashley. Hey, Mary. Candice Zugich. Melissa Buell. Hey, Melissa. And Stephen will. Hey, Stephen. So, you know, some of those folks are, actually Patreon members themselves. I like that. And so that's really cool. They're just supporting a couple of different ways. We appreciate it. If I had the money, I would support both ways too if I knew how to open my wallet.

I was going to say, you have the money. Your problem is figuring out how to open the wallet. I got to find it first. Dusted off, you know, don't want to break it when I bend it. No, it's going to crack. It is going to crack right in half. Yeah. There's nothing you can do about it.

So I just best, just leave it alone. So right now, we have an episode out on True Crime All Time Unsolved. Yeah. About the Dardine family. Yeah. And this is another one of those kind of mysterious, unsolved family murders. Certainly is. Yeah, happened in the late 1980s.

And we're in one of your favorite states of Illinois. We are. So rural. That will be interesting to see. how many people you can tick off in that state. I won't make anybody upset when I say Illinois. And the neighboring state that is Illinois. Yeah.

But there's a, there's a, kind of an infamous serial killer tie-in to this one. Um, a lot of branches, you know, kind of what we've been doing with unsolved lately. Yeah.

I think it'll be a really good one. I do too. That people will like. We got some good feedback about last week's episode on, uh, Eric Cook. Yeah. A lot of.

I can always tell what grabs people because you get, we get more messages, more emails, you know, more things on Instagram. A lot was made out of the, the woman that was interviewed back in the early 60s that said, two blacks don't make a white.

Yeah. You know, I think I said, I kind of, I didn't know if that was some Australian version of two wrongs, don't make a right. I've received a lot of conflicting information on it. Some people have said they've never heard it in their life.

It's not an Australian saying, at least not now anyway. Right. One person actually did some research and said it came from, I don't know, like the 1800s that it was said back then. And but a lot of people said it is racist and was said to be racist. And that back in the early 60s, this came. from a number of different people. That part of Australia specifically was very racist.

Perth versus, you know, we talked about how rural Western Australia was. Right. I didn't think it was just from the context, but that's why we have people, you know, email in and let us know what they think. Yeah. That's very interesting, though. All right. Are you ready to get to this episode?

I'm excited to do this one. So we are talking about the murder. of Drew Jadine. This occurred in 2003. And normally, you know, on TCAT, we put the killer's name in the title. And it's because we're going to spend a lot of time talking about them, covering them in detail. And obviously, we always try to cover as much as we can about the victims. I think this case is different.

And we've had some that, that have been like this. Um, you know, Shonda Scherer comes to mind. There's a couple of other ones like that. We don't have a ton of information on Alfonso Rodriguez, who was ultimately convicted of murdering Drew. So we're going to spend some time talking about him, but not the normal amount of time, right? We're not going to have background and childhood and all of that stuff.

He was not a serial killer. As far as we know, he was a monster. You know, not only a guy that made the decision to murder this beautiful young woman. But as we'll find out, his rap sheet shows years and years of what is basically a sexual predator. And, you know, you're going to love it, Gibbs, because shockingly, he doesn't do the amount of time that that most people think this guy should have done. Right.

Yeah. Always seems to be the case. Now, I will say this case hits very close to home. for I think probably both of us, right? You have a daughter very close in age to Drew Shadine. My oldest daughter is a little bit younger than, than Drew was, but is getting ready to go off to college. Yeah. Like Drew did and, and start that part of her life. You know, these are tough. I hear a lot from different people about some cases affect them more than others. Yeah. You know, we did a case a while back where the victim was a younger male, you know, 18, 19, 20.

I can't remember what case it was. Well, I got a lot of mothers reaching out to me and saying, this was a tough one because I have a 20-year-old son. Right. When we do younger women or, you know, teenage females, sometimes we get that as well. But I do think it goes into being one of the reasons why this case. grabbed at people the way it did. Drew Shadine was a person who could represent someone in your life, a daughter, a sister, best friend, neighbor. The East Grand Forks police chief said as much in an interview when he said, you can picture her as someone in your life. She was described by friends

and family as someone who truly loved life, someone that really cared for others. One of, Drew's friend said that she would do anything within her power to help anyone feel special. You and I talk about a lot of victims on the podcast that we do. And family and friends always describe them in glowing terms, right? These are victims. What else are you going to say? You're going to say they were wonderful. They were the best person.

You're going to say all that. And I would say for the most part, that's true. I don't think I've ever heard this one. This is a woman that would do anything in her power to help another individual feel special. That's a different type of characterization than I'm used to sing. Drew Katrina Shadine was born on September 26, 1981 to Father Allen and Mother Linda. She was named after her maternal grandfather. When she was born, Drew already had.

an older brother named Sven, who had been born less than two years before she was, they developed a very close bond over the years. And Sven definitely looked out for his baby sister. The family called her glue when she was little for the way that she stuck to her mother. We all have a kid like that, don't we? Yeah, just goes wherever the mom goes, holding on to the leg. You've seen mom's dragging kids across the room just because they don't want to let go. That's what I got about, you know, Drew.

Some kids still do it. Yeah. 18 or 19, it gets to be a little much. Yeah. Let go of your mom's leg now. Yeah. You're an 18-year-old boy weighing 240. Yeah.

Probably shouldn't be holding on to your mom's leg at that point. It's weird when I see your mom come over and you're like letting not letting go of her leg. You know, I'm like, come on now. As a 45-year-old? Yeah. which is a bit much. Well, that's the reason she had to have that hip replaced. I feel bad about it.

I kind of know she doesn't really stop by as much as she used to. She doesn't. Another of Drew's nicknames was Princess. She loved the color pink. Oh my gosh. That's two things you have in common. Princess? In the color pink.

I do love the color pink. She would dress up all the time in little pink dresses. One thing that I found fascinating was that as a child, Drew Shadine had. an addiction to butter. Isn't that funny? She would get it out of the refrigerator and run off and hide with it. And I read that there were times where she ate a whole pound of butter.

Wow. Before they could figure out where she was. I remember there was a show called My Strange Addiction. Oh, my daughter watches that all the time still. Is it on real? Well, I think she's watching on Netflix. Yeah. I never know what's still actually going on.

That's true. Because all my kids watch is Netflix and Hulu. But they had somebody on there. That's what they ate all day long was buttersticks. Yeah. Just buttersticks. That's pretty tame for that show. Yeah.

That show gets, uh, it goes to the extreme. Yeah. But there, there are people addicted to some weird things. Just gnawed on a butterstick. I've talked before on this podcast about the fact that as a child, I ate paper towels. Mm-hmm. No, I don't think I was addicted to them. I remember eating them from time to time. It wasn't like an everyday thing. Yeah. But I do remember doing it. Yeah, that's, that's weird, Mike. Yeah, it is. Luckily, I grew out of it. And Drew did as well. I mean, this was a childhood thing. She grew out of her butter addiction as she got older. Drew's parents divorced when she was three. And within a couple of years, her mother remarried to a man.

named Sid Walker. So by five, six, something like that, Drew had a new stepfather. But the one thing that that really kind of grabbed my attention was that her father, Alan, was never out of either of his kids' lives. It was said that he spent many holidays at the house of his ex-wife and her new husband just so he could be with his kids at the holiday. That's cool. That's, that's, that's sacrifice. That is. Now, I'm assuming they split not on horrible terms. Yeah.

Because that would be pretty hard to do. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Of course, they had to be cordial to pull that one off. But either way, to go over to, you know, spend the night, whatever it was at your ex-wife's house and this is now her new husband's house, that takes some chutzpah. Yeah, it's a could turn into a very tense situation. It could. So obviously they had a pretty good relationship to be able to pull that off.

When Drew was 10 or 11 years old, her mom and stepfather made the decision to sell their home in the Twin Cities of Minnesota. So St. Paul, Minneapolis, right? The Twin Cities. Yeah. And moved to Piquot, still in Minnesota, but, you know, obviously a smaller town. Sure. Aside from the divorce, which a lot of us went through as children. Drew had a very happy childhood.

She made friends in Piquot. She graduated from Piquot Lakes High School in 2000. Get the Piquot out of here. I know. She was voted Homecoming Queen her senior year. Wow. There's a third thing that's similar with you. I was homecoming queen.

Yeah. So it just tells you how popular she was in school. So this brings us up to 2003. Drew Shadine is 22 years old. She's a typical college student attending the University of North Dakota in Great Forks. Now, last episode, we had a little geography section. We're going to have to have another one here. You're on a roll with this.

Well, it just did, yeah, it's not going to be in every episode thing, but as I got into the research, I started to get confused. So I figured I'm going to have to do a geography section, but I'm going to wait a little bit. Okay. So she's at college. She was ambitious. She was a hard worker. So just to tell you what she had going on while she's at college, she's carrying a full class load.

She was in a sorority that she loved, Gamma Phi Beta. She had a boyfriend back home. And at the same time, worked multiple part-time jobs. Which is amazing. Multiple. Yeah. Meaning more than one. But it doesn't end there.

No. She's going to say, I've got a little extra time. Let me use that and help volunteer. Yeah, the one hour a week that I'm not solidly booked, I'm going to volunteer to help the less fortunate. Yeah. With my sorority sisters. It just goes to show you what type of person Drew Shadine was.

And I probably said it wrong. I don't think she was your typical college. student. That wasn't me in college. I was not working multiple part-time jobs, volunteering. It was all I could do to get to my classes on time, make sure I had some time to play Sega Genesis. Well, but you were selling your fake IDs out the back door. Allegedly. Yeah. Allegedly there was a big board. Right. Like you sell in one of the Vegas vacation. You stepped. You stepped. into the board. You got your picture taken. Maybe you did or maybe you did not have a new ID.

Yeah. Allegedly. Allegedly. Yeah. I don't know how many allegedly is I can put in there. Right. But yet, it helped you buy pizza and beer and a few other things. Maybe. Allegedly. Yeah. Now, one of the jobs that Drew had was at Victoria's Secret, which I know is a place that you like to get a lot of your things, Gibbs, when you're feeling sexy. Maybe, maybe not. Allegedly. But Drew worked there, part-time. Yeah. And this Victoria's secret store was located in the Columbia Mall in Grand Forks, North Dakota.

So not far from the college, right, in the same town. On November 22nd, 2003, Drew finished up her shift at the store. And then she headed over to a Marshall Fields located. located in the same mall. Sure. To do some shopping. Once she finished up her shopping there, she left the mall and was making her way out to her car.

Right. Very normal. This is what people do. It was around 5 p.m. On this walk, she called her boyfriend Chris Lang on her cell phone. And they talk for a bit. Maybe as long as 10 minutes I've seen.

You know, going out of the mall, heading towards her car. but then something wasn't right at the end of the call. Chris heard Drew say, okay, okay. And then something maybe like, oh my God. And then the call ended. That's the worst.

That is the absolute worst. I'm telling you, Gibbs, if this happened to me while I was talking to my wife or my daughters, I think I would flip out. Yeah. I'm figuring out the last known location because we have. have that technology now with the with the cell phones today right i'm putting on a tactical vest with all the gear i own and i'm heading out rambo style yeah you're on your way that's all there is to it and if it turns out that it was just spotty cell coverage and the call dropped so be it now i can live

with looking foolish what i can't live with is the other oh i know now i don't really have a tactical vest, but it sounded badass, so I put that in there. Yeah, just with the same thing with you calling me and asking me to take my helicopter up in the air and start tracking. Yeah, use some of the thermal imaging equipment that you have on your personal helicopter. Yeah, that's cool stuff, man. Come in handy. But this is a bad situation for a couple of different reasons.

You know, Drew's in Grand Forks. Her boyfriend is back in Pequot. as is her mother. It's about 200 miles between the two cities, right? So Chris called Drew's mother, Linda, to tell her what happened and that he was worried. Linda was worried, obviously. So she called Drew's father, who lived in the Minneapolis, St. Paul area of Minnesota. But this is even farther away from Grand Forks, North Dakota. It's about a five-hour drive. Rock. Well, that's a good haul. From the Twin Cities to Grand Forks. But Alan makes it, right? Her dad gets there. I'm sure he broke every speed limit there was. I know I would. And actually probably call you and say, we got to do a smoky bandit slash cannonball run type thing. We both get it going, man. You be the decoy and, you know, we'll get CB radios. Of course, that would take a lot of time to set all that up. We could just use our cell phone.

That's true. And just do it that way. But CB radios are cool. That would be cool, but not the time to go out and get them right now. No, you wouldn't have the time. But her dad, Alan, made it to the mall parking lot later that night to find Drew's car parked in a spot where apparently she would not have normally parked it. And I'm not sure who knew that, but it came out in the investigation. It was reported that he set there for hours that night,

waiting for her to return to her car, but she never did. Let's take a quick break. Talk about our sponsor, Bolin Branch. I think we all know how important it is to get a good night's sleep. And right now, it's even easier than ever, thanks to the world's softest sheets, brought to you by Bowling Branch. Everything that Bowling Branch makes is designed with your comfort in mind. This is what they do, from their 100% organic cotton signature soft sheets to their cozy

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Go to Bolandbranch.com today for $50 off your first set of sheets. That's B-O-L-L-L-Branch.com promo code T-Cat. BowlingBranch.com promo code T-Cat. Drew's boyfriend, Chris, received another call that night around seven. 44 p.m. from Drew's phone. But no one spoke on the other end of the line. All Chris could hear with some static. He heard what sounded like buttons on the phone being pressed. And then the call cut off. It was later determined that the call was made somewhere around Fisher, Minnesota. So it's late, Gibbs. Everyone is worried by now, right? Drew never returned to her car. And,

she didn't show up to her other job at a nightclub mentioned it this woman has two jobs right and that was not like her in all of the research it was stressed how responsible drew was she never missed work she never missed deadlines if she said she was going to do something or be somewhere she'd do it yeah or she'd make it or she'd call you punctual punctual yeah she was very responsible very punctual. Yeah. What Drew Shadine could not possibly have known was that she was being watched that evening by a sexual predator with a long list of crimes.

It was a 49-year-old man named Alfonso Rodriguez. This guy was from Crookston, Minnesota. Rodriguez came from a hardworking family. They had originally been migrant workers. workers. He was a quiet kid. He was introverted. He dropped out of high school in Crookston when he was a freshman to work at a sugar plant. I don't know. When you drop out as a freshman, you don't really get much of the high school atmosphere, right? You're not living through much of it. No, you're missing out on a lot of social skills there. Yeah. I mean, it's not like you Gibbs who soaked it all in. I mean,

a lot of that had to do with the fact that a couple of years you had to go twice in high school, but... Well, we got to bring that up. Six years in high school, it really gives you the full experience. Yeah, it wasn't six years, but yeah, you know, I... What the wrong with it, extended stay? They're all low. Unless you're in prison.

And then you don't want an extended stay. Yeah, well, unless you're running everything, you know? I assume by year six, you are running the whole school. You're the shot collar of that school. Yeah. It's good to be king. Exactly. You know?

You're sitting on the game of thrones or whatever. That's right. The sword throne. Me and the, you know, my buddy in the custodian shop, man, we're sitting back, having a beer. Because you were of legal age. It was a legal age by then. You know, hey, crack open up beer. But as for Rodriguez, he did drugs from an early age.

And we're not talking about just weed here. He did weed, but he was into acid hashish. Oh, a little hashish. A little hashish. You name it. You know, I wonder, are we going to get to a spot someday soon where, I mean, we just, we can't really say they did marijuana because it'd be like legalized everywhere. So it'd be like, it's like saying someone's smoking a cigarette. Well, and, you know, when it talks about people doing, you know, marijuana from an early age, I just really don't put much stock into it.

Yeah. I don't view it as, um, granted, it's illegal. Sure. I don't view it in the same vein that I view meth, heroin, Coke, uh, PCP. Right. It's just, special K. Special K. It's in a different category for me.

And I've known a lot of people that, you know, smoked on a regular basis. Yeah. It sure didn't make them want to go out and hurt anybody. If anything, it was quite the opposite with those people. Made them very relaxed. Yeah. It was like, let's order a large pizza and I'm just going to sit here. Yeah.

So I don't want to make light of it, right? I get it. It's illegal. I just don't see it the same way as some of these drugs that will literally make you eat another person's face off. Yeah, there's a scary. Bass salts or whatever. Yeah. The zombie.

zombie drugs. Did you say zombie three times? I did. Just in case you didn't hear it to first two. I want to make sure I landed it across the board. Now, it's not going to be long before Alfonso Rodriguez's real dark side comes out. This guy had a history of extreme violence against women. Way back in November 1974, Rodriguez approached a woman sitting in a truck in a movie theater

parking lot in Crookston. He was carrying a steak knife and he ordered the woman to drive to a secluded location where he raped her. What is incredible is that this guy was out on a $1,500 bail for a rape charge that he just picked up the month before. Wow. This makes me. That makes you sick to think about the fact that someone else got hurt.

Well, this guy's out running, you know, free. He was found guilty and sentenced to 15 years in prison for those two crimes. So sentenced in 1975. You would look at that and say, okay, 15 years. It's no joke, right? No. Haneous crime. 15 years is a pretty, to me, acceptable sentence.

You know, even the judge at sentencing said, I feel this man is a security risk. and that's why I'm sentencing him accordingly, meaning to, you know, a lengthy term. But instead of sending him to prison, he sent Rodriguez to a medical facility to be evaluated as part of a sex offender treatment program. And this is where for me, things went a little sideways. Because it's like less than four years maybe later, this guy's back on the streets. Oh, so forget the 15 years. Yes.

Just do four years. Come on out. And he didn't even really go to prison, right? He went to a secure medical facility. Yeah. He's being analyzed. You would hope, I mean, the design, I'm assuming was for him to be treated by mental health professionals or some type of professionals. He would come out a changed man.

Now, we know he didn't. No. You know, that's why I knew you were going to get a little ticked at some of this part. Yeah, it's just, I mean, I get it. I understand wanting to implement certain programs. Try to help people. I get it too. Yeah, yeah.

It's just, uh, there's going to be people that are going to play the system, you know. They're, make you think that they're well. Sure. Just to get out. Yeah. I guess the, the problem I have is you have a family of the victims. you had the victims themselves, right? They didn't die.

They were sexually assaulted. What are you saying to them when you're basically, okay, what you went through, we termed to be worth 15 years of this man's life in prison, but we let him out after four. Yeah. I mean, look at it this way too. I mean, if I'm your attorney and I come to you and say, hey, you're going to get 15 years or they have this really great program.

it's in a medical facility you're not going to be around all those really bad criminals yeah it's going to be more relaxed you got to do some you know classes during the day do some therapy sessions oh i'm with you no doubt i would take that in a heart yeah why wouldn't you you're like man i'll rather do an easy 15 or less than a hard 15 yeah and and normally in that situation right you're released when they feel your well yeah and that's where you were you come of what you were saying if all they have to do is act like they're out. I mean, so speaking of that, I did find one report that was made during his time there. And it said, Rodriguez may appear well organized and able to control his behavior in the

security hospital. But on the outside, without the type of controls that we have in here, there is a good possibility that he would resume his old behavior patterns. I mean, you have to realize if you're going to put controls in place within the facility that won't be in place when he leaves, why have him in place there? You're trying to get them set up. So when they leave the facility, you know, as normal as possible. They can control themselves.

Yeah. Yeah. And this is what I have an issue with. We run into this on episodes from time to time. where you have a report from a professional that says, you know what? I don't think this guy's ready. He's, you know, if you let him out, there's a good chance he's going to do X, Y or Z. Yet they let him out anyway. And the guy ends up doing X, Y, and Z and worse. Yeah. And that's what happened in this situation. So they let him out. And shockingly, not long after he is released,

He confronted a woman with a knife as she's getting into her car forced her to drive to a secluded spot where he raped her. This is literally within a very short period of time of Alfonso Rodriguez being let out of this security hospital. Yeah. Probably got a trophy for finishing the coursework before they let him out. Here's your trophy. Now, he was charged and he went to trial. twice on this one, the first one ended in a hung jury and the second trial he was acquitted. But I think something that's very important is to look at the way that he commits his crimes, right? Normally with a knife goes up on a woman that is either in a parked car, getting in a car,

near a car. That's very important. Yeah. As it relates to the, what we're going to talk about in the case of, uh, Drew Shadine. So he's acquitted of the crime, but he does end up going back to this security prison, mental health facility that he was in for a very short period of time. As soon as he gets back out, Gibbs, and I'm not kidding you. I'm not exaggerating this. Just a few days after getting home, Alfonso Rodriguez walked up to a woman on the street, grabbed her by her arm and told her to get in his car or he would kill her. Now, this woman fought back and she fought back hard. No way was she

getting in his car. Sure. So he stabbed her. Stabbed her in the arm, stabbed her in the stomach. She was able to run off. She lived. And she was able to describe her attacker as well as his car to police. But I just can't stress it enough. I mean, the minute that this guy gets out on the street, he attacks a woman. Forget everything he learned in his classes. Yeah. He threw his participation medal out of the car window and said, okay, I'm done with that.

I fooled them. Now, he was arrested and convicted on charges of aggravated assault and attempted kidnapping. This time he spent 13 years in prison, right? I think they had learned their lesson from, the previous forays into this treatment program, this secured, you know, mental facility. No, that's all done. You're going to big boy prison because obviously what we've tried before is not working.

Right. Changing it up. So Rodriguez does his time in prison. He's released in 2003 just months, right? before his encounter with Drew Shadine that night at the Columbia Mall. This guy spent 13 years locked up. He doesn't wait that long to strike again. So, you know, you talk about it Gibbs, right?

You hear people say, some people are just incorrigible. I mean, no matter what you do, they're never going to change. I think that's the deal with Alfonso Rodriguez. is. He has his own way and he's going to continue to do his thing. It's what he wants to do. Yeah. And I don't care how many treatment programs you put him in. I don't care how long you lock him up for. If you let him out, when you let him out, he's going to attack a woman. Because it's what he does. And it's what he wants to do. I truly believe that. He would later say that he saw Drew at the mall that night. And everything about her reminded him. of a girl who he said molested him when he was a boy.

Rodriguez said he panicked and walked away. Now, I think you have to keep in mind that these details from Rodriguez come out many years later as he's fighting for his life. So just take that knowledge into account as he gives these type of details. So he says he saw Drew. She reminded him of a girl that. allegedly molested him when he was a boy. He panicked and he walked away.

But then he saw her later outside of another store in the mall. And this time he made up his mind that he was going to follow her. And this is around 5 p.m. So we've come full circle. Right. This is the time where Drew is walking through the mall, you know, out of the mall, walking towards her car. It's also the time when she's talking on the phone with her boyfriend Chris.

Right. Exactly. Alfonso confronts her at her car, pulls a knife. Again, this is why we went through all of his previous attacks. Right. It's his MO. It's how he did things. That's what he does.

Dragged her away from the car. And at some point in the next couple of hours, he raped her, murdered her, and dumped her body. And this was huge. I mean, almost immediately the story hit the new cycle. and every article and every newscast about Drew's disappearance coming out in both North Dakota and Minnesota, they called her the girl next door. They called her everyone's daughter. Right.

These are, you know, the terms that they used to describe her. She had a ton of friends. We talked about that who sang her praises. Her mom and dad were very vocal as well. And I think all of this helped number one. for her disappearance to, you know, hit the media as hard as it did. But number two, to stay in the news cycle. It's one thing for them to talk about it, but you don't want it to dissipate, right?

In a situation like this where you're looking for your loved one. No. And this wasn't just local. It might have started out like that. But I think very early on, this got picked up nationally and became an even bigger. story. It didn't take long for the local and state agencies to come together. They organized their efforts pretty quickly. And then you had all the volunteers. There were a lot, right? Both acquaintances of Drew's and complete strangers that came out and forced to help look for her. Because I think Gibbs at

first, everyone thought, okay, we're going to find Drew pretty quickly. You know, something's happened to her, but it's not foul play. You know, she got hurt. She's stranded. Whatever. We'll find her. Exactly. Yeah.

They're not. I'm thinking they're just figuring that she's at another one of her volunteer events. She's doing something. She's helping a friend out, got in their card. She could be anywhere knowing, you know, all of the different things that she was into, but we know, right? Unfortunately, that didn't happen. But the search dragged on for five months.

But as it was going on, just about a week or so after her disappearance into this investigation, it was December 1st, 2003, police arrested Alfonso Rodriguez in connection with Drew's disappearance. In the beginning, he was charged with kidnapping. Murder would be added later. My assumption is that it wasn't too hard to figure out that they needed to. to talk with old Alfonso, you know, given his record and the fact that he liked to abduct women at gunpoint. Not to mention the fact that he was registered as a level three sex offender. So he's hitting multiple radars, you know, different alarm bells had to have been going off. His name is up in lights in the, in the police precinct.

So they went and talked to him. They questioned him. They liked him as a suspect. He admitted that he was near the Columbia Mall that day. But of course he denied having anything to do with Drew's disappearance. But his story is bogus. It doesn't check out. He said he was at the mall to watch a movie that wasn't even playing.

It wasn't playing at the mall. It wasn't playing anywhere. So I don't know. If you're going to come up with a lie as your alibi, by, I think the least you could do is fact check it a little. Do a little research. Make sure the damn movies playing at the time you said you were there watching it. That's the least you could do, right?

I would think so. But how smart is Alfonso Rodriguez? Dropped out of school at the age of 14, has spent most of his adult life in either prison and or a secure mental facility. and he's a sexual predator. So I'm not giving the guy a whole lot of credit with really pretty much anything. And or should you?

Nor should I. And then the real evidence started to come in. And it was pretty overwhelming. They found surveillance video of Rodriguez at nearby stores at night. They found receipts from stores where he had bought things that night. He bought a knife. Is this guy seriously,

dumb enough to buy the knife that he's getting ready to use to commit a crime at a store at essentially the same place where he was going to abduct his victim. Yes, he is. Yes, he is. Obviously, this man did not read your book, Gibby. I don't know why he didn't, but. I mean, now it's an e-book, so it'd be even easier to read. But back then, why didn't he?

1995 is the cost currently? Oh, I was like, is that when it came out? $19.95. $19.95. You can get it currently on Amazon. That's not even the best thing, though, that comes out in support of, you know, this guy committing the crime. They found items in his car that turned out to have Drew Shadine's DNA on them. There was a bloody shoe and a bloody knife. And the blood on both matched her DNA. So let's hear a little bit from this POS. Alfonso Rodriguez in this short interview with police. Tell us that you went to the movie theater, but that doesn't really pan out.

We're having trouble finding me on the McDonald's videotape. Do you think maybe you're actually somewhere else than the movie theater? I don't know. No, I don't know. I know I wasn't at the mall. What are this girl was in the doctor? So there he says he wasn't at the mall when she was

was abducted. You think maybe this guy had been in prison or incarcerated for so long that he just didn't realize that there was surveillance video everywhere? He's looking around. He sees his little boxes with little blinking lights and just think, I don't know what those are. Obviously, he must have told them that he was at McDonald's. So they'd go get the surveillance tape from McDonald's.

He's not on there. But yet all of these places that he says he's not, they find him on surveillance. But they still hadn't found Drew Shadine. And, you know, everybody is still searching. Drew's stepfather, Sid, handed out socks and clothing to searchers at the command center. Everyone had a role to play. Here's a clip from the news about three weeks into the search. Here's the latest on Drew Shadine.

She's the young student who has been missing for three weeks. The National Guard has been called in to help in the search. while the man accused of kidnapping her, Alfonso Rodriguez, still refuses to talk to authorities. So she's been missing for three weeks. He's been in custody for a couple of weeks. I just wanted to play that

because it's a news clip from a point in time. We talked about the search is still ongoing. I mean, Drew's mother, I don't even know, you know, what's going through her mind at that point. I would think she, jumped at every phone call, wondering if this was going to be the call saying that Drew was safe, or if it was going to be the one that she dreaded, saying that they had found her body,

the fateful call came on a day when Linda was handing out sandwiches to volunteer searchers. No information was relayed to her on the call. It just said, come to the command trailer, which was set up behind. Kroxton High School. And it was there that she found out the worst news imaginable. Drew's body was found on April 17th, 2004 in a ravine near the town of Crookston, Minnesota. It just so happens to be that Alfonso Rodriguez lived in Crookston, Minnesota. How convenient. I think he lived with his mommy there. In the basement?

Probably in the basement. But you got to figure, like I said, incarcerated for the 13 years prior, he really had just got out. Well, that's true. He probably is either, they're probably looking for a halfway house for him or he's in a transition period. I don't know if he had a PO. He just didn't wait very long. And obviously the guy's not going to have a job to go out and get his own place. So what else is he going to do, but live with his mommy?

Live with his mom. Or as you say, his mommy. I like to say it that way. Yeah. So Drew's found in this ravine. She was partially nude. Her hands were tied behind her back. And I think one of the main reasons why she was found when she was found, April, was

the snow had finally begun to melt and it uncovered her body. Authorities determined that she had been beaten, stabbed, and sexually assaulted. She had cuts to her neck. one of them Gibbs, they said, was about five and a half inches long. Yeah. That's a serious wound to the neck. And on top of that, they found a rope around her neck. And underneath that rope was a plastic bag.

I just think that's really bizarre there. What's the plastic bag? You think it was part of trying to suffocate her and it got torn? I think there's a couple of different theories that you can make. there is tried to suffocate with the plastic bag didn't work. Put the rope over, tried to strangle. But in one of the clips that I'm going to play here in a minute, I believe there is also a theory that the plastic bag was to limit the amount of blood.

So it was almost as if maybe the rope was keeping the plastic bag in place is I think what one person theorized. I don't know, we'll have to see when we get to that clip. I can't remember exactly what it says. But I think the problem was a lot of time had gone by, right? Since she was killed, she had been out in the elements for, you know, a good period of time. The medical examiner couldn't conclusively determine cause of death. You know, they came out and said it could have been from the wounds to the neck.

It could have been suffocation from either a plastic bag or the rope or, or it. it could have been from exposure. You know, being wounded so bad that you really couldn't move and, but you're left out in the cold. Could have died of hypothermia. They just didn't know. Right. Too many, too many options, sadly.

But either way, no matter what the absolute final cause of death was, it was rendered at the hands of Alfonso Rodriguez, right? even if Drew Shadine died of exposure. She only did so because of the actions of Alfonso Rodriguez. Without him, she wouldn't have been in that ravine. She wouldn't have been out in the cold. She would have got into her, I think she had a 94 Osmobile Cutlass. Yeah.

And would have driven back to school. It's a cool car. I had one. bought it off my mom. That's how cool it was. Just saying. Big V8. to have plastic on the seats?

No. Oh, you know how you go into people's houses sometimes? You have plastic on their furniture? That's not okay? It's okay with me. I just didn't know if maybe your mom did that. No, my mom never did that, but my aunt did that. The couches were covered in plastic.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. But it was weird, though, because they were covered in plastic, but she still weren't allowed to sit on them. That never made any sense to me. So why even cover them in plastic? These are the plastic showpieces. Yeah, but why?

Plastic covered show furniture. But if you're going to have couches, enjoy them. Or if you're going to show them off, don't put the plastic on there. Yeah. And not let anybody sit on them. Yeah, but my old's was cool, man. It was a great car. Good memories in that thing.

I'm sure. Let's not let those out, though. Yeah. Keep those tight. This could be damaging. Yeah. So kind of said up front, right? We need to talk a little bit about geography because it plays a huge part in this case.

Grand Forks. That's where the University of North Dakota is. That's where Drew was going. It's the third largest city in the state of North Dakota with over 50,000 people in the city, over 100,000 probably in the metro area. But that's not what's important. What's important is that it lies very close to the border of Minnesota. And it's only about 25 miles from Crookston, Minnesota, where

Drew's body was ultimately found. It's kind of like Fargo. I never realized until I was looking at the map. Yeah. How Fargo really sits almost on the line between North Dakota and Minnesota. And that makes a lot of sense because I'm watching that TV show Fargo. Right. They keep going back and forth between North Dakota and Minnesota and I couldn't figure it out.

Well, now I know. Now you know. They're very close to each other. You got to see how close it was to Canada. Canada. Canada. Yeah, it's actually not very far at all from, I think, Winnipeg. Yeah. If I remember correctly. I don't have the map in front of me, but.

Have you been to Minnesota? I've not been to Minnesota. Been to Dakota's? Nope. I've been to Canada. Really? Yeah. I've been to Minnesota. Been to South Dakota. Not North Dakota. Maybe one day. Maybe we'll have a tour there. You never know. Yeah. You know, cards, letters, flowers with condolences poured into the family.

Drew's mother, Linda Walker said later in an interview, I can't even describe the feelings of knowing I'm never going to have my daughter back, but the uplifting from the people who reached out carried us and still does to this day more than I can put into words. I thought that was telling what that family went through was horrible. but for her to say that, you know, this outpouring of support from friends and even strangers, right? A lot of people didn't know Drew at all, didn't know the family. She said it kind of carried them through, got them through just a very, very difficult time in their life. Many people attended Drew's funeral.

Now, Alfonso Rodriguez, he never admitted any involvement in Shadine's death before. for his trial, during his trial, or at his sentencing. That wouldn't happen until many years later. And we're not going to spend a lot of time talking about the trial. We've talked about some of the evidence. It was very compelling. You know, I think with that, the prosecution had enough to convince the jury that Alfonso Rodriguez murdered Drew Shadine.

He was convicted by a jury in August. 2006 and sentenced to death by the judge the following month. It was reported that he showed no emotion when the sentence was read. And the judge gave him a chance to speak, but he declined. I mean, what are you going to say, Gibbs at that point? That's going to make any difference. I don't think there is anything that you can say. I don't think so either.

I mean, can you make a heartfelt enough apology to the family? where it would mean anything to them. It's possible to some people. Some people are just like, I don't care what you say. You murdered my daughter. Yeah. I don't want to hear anything that's coming out of your mouth.

But then you have people like, gotta get that sorry. Alfonso Rodriguez is the only person to be sentenced to death in North Dakota in 100 years, in a century. Wow. There's a reason for that, right? North Dakota doesn't have the death penalty.

Minnesota doesn't have the death penalty either. Before we get into that, though, I want to talk about the jurors. You know, a lot of the jurors cried as the sentence was read aloud. I think this was an extremely tough thing for them to do. So how is it that Rodriguez got a sentence of death when neither of these two states have the death penalty? And again, the answer lies in the geography because he transported Drew Shadine's body over the state line from North Dakota to Minnesota. So that makes it a federal case, right? So prosecutors are able to use federal law, which brought the death penalty into play.

I thought that was fascinating. I mean, it's something you would never expect to come around that way. No, and I know they use that sometimes, what is it, transporting of a minor across state lines. I know there's firearms across state lines. I know there's some different things like that that are against federal law. But then you think about the jurors, right? So let's say these are jurors from North Dakota that do not have the death penalty, may even have voted the death penalty down or whatever, but they're required by law to

sit on this jury and decide whether or not this man should get the death penalty. And they gave it to him. I think that's fascinating. I just don't think people think about how that can come into play. You know, I mean, they're thinking of the state laws. Because most of the time, that's what we're talking about, right? When we're talking about murder and, I mean, those are state charges. Yeah. Normally. Is this, I mean, for me, for me, it's interesting because there's so many federal laws, even on the smaller scale, right? We live near a base, and unless you ever get pulled over, you don't know if you're on one of the roads by the base and the military police pull you over for speeding,

the fine is twice. What it would be? Yeah. And you can't argue it's you have to pay it. It's a federal offense to go over the speed limit by the base. And the fine is twice what it would typically be. Why are you speeding by the Air Force Base? Do we really need to go deep into those type of questions?

When you open up these Pandora's boxes of things, you know, you piqued my interest. National Geographic or is it or the Inquirer one of the two, one famous. Okay, you said National Geographic. I'm pretty sure you meant National Inquirer. That's exactly what I meant. I'm just trying to cover it up. Is the National Geographic givey reporting on things that you're doing? They wanted me to get pictures of Area B.

Is the National Geographic paparazzi following you around? They want pictures of the UFOs and the one hangar out there. Now, I did read this very interesting article about the pastor of the church where Drew's mother and stepfather attended. So back in 2004, this would have been after Rodriguez was arrested and probably just after they, they found Drew's body. The pastor said that he could not support the death penalty, even for a man like Alfonso Rodriguez. And in the paper, you know, he quoted some biblical things and said his faith just would not

let him, you know, think that way. I completely understood it. Sure. But by 2006, after Rodriguez was convicted, another article where the pastor had completely changed his mind. And he just said, sometimes we're given the choice between evil and evil. And we have to decide which is the lesser of the two. I thought that was, you know, incredibly fascinating because, you know, here's this man that's torn and he's weighing things and saying, I don't believe in this, but this guy, you know, both things are evil in his mind. And ultimately, he makes the decision that

Alfonso Rodriguez is more evil. So Rodriguez is on death row and he's going through his appeals. He got shot down. He got denied pretty much all the way up to the U.S. Supreme Court. He had been interviewed by medical experts while he was on death row. And recently he's been making this, what they have called a last ditch effort at a habeas corpus

appeal, but the experts have come out and said that they do not believe he was insane when he deliberately killed Drew Shadine. And apparently in these interviews, he laid out the murder in pretty gruesome detail. I guess he was hoping that by doing so, convinced the mental health experts that he was not legally sane, that no sane person would do what I've just, what I did. What I said I've done. Yeah, but they didn't buy it. A 416-page motion was filed in U.S. court in Fargo today,

and in it, two medical experts who interviewed Rodriguez back in June concluded he was sane when he killed Drew Shadine. The new documents out today reveal Rodriguez didn't kill her by accident as he has maintained for the past two years while on death row. The documents also give chilling new details about how he chose her as a victim, stating she, She was on the phone. She had placed her key in the ignition of her car. Her driver's side door was open. It goes into more detail about how he killed her and how he also placed a bag over her head when she began to bleed from the mouth to prevent blood from spilling into the car. 60-year-old Rodriguez has been on death row in Indiana appealing his conviction. Rodriguez with a new set of four attorneys, two of them here in the cities, is making a habeas corpus of the appeal, basically claiming he is being wrongfully held. Now I just spoke with Drew's mom, Linda Walker, just moments ago on the phone. She said she doesn't want to know what is all in this document here, this 416 page document,

but have this to say about Rodriguez. He's an evil person, Jessica, and evil people tend to always want to use each and every opportunity to shine spotlight on himself. and he does not want to be executed. So he's using each and every opportunity given to him to ensure that that doesn't happen. So I think some good stuff there, right? You got to hear from Drew's mom, Linda. You also got to hear some of the details that came out after the fact.

Right. From Alfonso about, you know, why he chose Drew. she was distracted, she was on her phone, she was in a compromised position. That's what I took away from what he's saying, right? He's already in the car. The doors open. She's on her phone. This is a person that I can come up on probably pretty easily. Exactly. So I think Gibbs and wrapping up the abduction, sexual assault, the murder of Drew Shadine, it changed how a lot of people in small towns, acted. A lot of people became more aware of their safety. You know, even in 2003, some of these small rural areas in North Dakota, Minnesota,

there were still places where I think people felt like they could leave their doors unlocked. A lot of that changed with Drew's murder. The University of North Dakota changed some of their campus safety protocols. Even though this didn't happen on campus, she went there. I'm sure it was a, it was a huge blow to the school and people that attended. But Drew's case also made many people more aware of sexual assault. There was a lot in the research about how experts believed that this case, and cases like it, enable more victims to come forward.

More women began taking self-defense classes. And as tragic as what happened to Drew was, it also helped change some laws. Both North Dakota and Minnesota toughened their sentencing guidelines on sex offenders, including life sentences for the most serious offenses.

They also made it so that there was stricter supervision of these people once they left prison. I mean, those are all good things, right? You and I, we get so ticked off, researching and then talking about these cases where, you know, and men, for the most part, are committing these horrible sexual assault, sexual crimes against women.

Again and again and again. Well, and they're able to do it again and again and again, not because they're not caught. Sometimes they're not. But in a lot of cases, they're caught. They just don't serve what we think should be a valid sentence. Right? It's too short. Yeah.

They're not deterred. deterred. They get out. They do it again. They go back in for a while. They get out. They do it again. It just doesn't work. Yeah. And I don't know what the right answer is. You know, I mean, strikes you're out, you know. Yeah, I don't either. But how many is too many? Well, what I do agree with is at least having it on the table, the ability to give someone a license for a sexual assault, rape that is so severe. Sure. That it warrants it.

And who makes that decision? At least you're giving the judge the ammunition. Yeah. I mean, I know you would go with castration, but I still think these are good steps. We're getting there. We're getting there. We're not to your level yet.

No. In 2006, President George W. Bush signed into law the Adam W. Walsh Child Protection and Safe. Act inside this included Drew's law, which among other things changed the name of the National Sex Offender Public Registry to the Drew Shedine National Sex Offender Public Website. So we've talked about this before, right?

This is a tragedy. Can something good come out of it? The tragedy has already occurred. There's no taking it back. Now let's work towards making something good happen in Drew's name. And that's what they did. You know, this website provides information to the public on the whereabouts of registered sex offenders, regardless of state boundaries. So go back to what we talked about, right? If you're in Grand Forks, North Dakota, in the old days, were you only getting the North Dakota registered?

Could you not get the Minnesota sex registry, even though this guy is essentially five, you know, minutes away from you? I don't know. But this national thing kind of takes all those borders away. It allows all that to happen, which is great. No, it's a great thing. It's a cooperative effort between state agencies that host, you know, public sex offender registries and the U.S. government. It's operated by the DOJ.

and basically allows people to search the website for information on a sex offender no matter what state the person is in. Hey, look, you should know who, who and whatever sex offender is near your home, where your kids are. You should know that. No, and I do. I'm signed up for a bunch of different services. They email me when somebody comes near, moves out.

But again, I don't know in the old days what would have happened. if I lived on the border of Indiana. I mean, we're not that far from Indiana, but what if you lived like right on the border? Yeah, that you only got the aisle on. Would you have received a notification from Indiana? Right. Maybe not. Attorneys for Rodriguez are still fighting for him.

There's articles from this year. They are still fighting to try to get out from under his death sentence. So who knows when or if he'll ever be. executed, but make no mistake. This is a very bad guy. This is an individual gives that, like we talked about, I don't think would ever stop. I think if he was smarter, more intelligent like a Golden State killer. Right. He would have murdered and or sexually assaulted many women. Couldn't imagine what the numbers would be. And gotten away with it. I just don't think he was that type of criminal.

No, he was not the brightest. Right. So he didn't get away with his, but again, I think of him like the Terminator. He's not going to stop. You're going to have to physically stop him. Yeah. Otherwise, he's just going to keep going. And that's all he knows.

And remove him from society. That's the only thing that's going to stop it. Where he is is where he needs to be at a minimum. I agree. But that's it for the murder of Drew Shadine. We've got some voicemails. Yeah, I see. You hear those? Hi, Mike and Gitty. This is Sarah Carpenter from Nashville, Tennessee.

I've been listening to your podcasts for a little while now. I have about an hour drive to work, an hour drive home every day. I'm a teacher also. And so I spend my time listening to these podcasts. I spent nine years working in the law enforcement arena, so I love how detailed you guys are and how much research you do. We've lived here in Tennessee for six years almost, and just before we moved up here, there was a case of Holly Bobo.

She went missing in 2011, and then partial remains were found three years later, and it was ruled a homicide. It's a big to-do up here, and I would love to just know more and hear your guys take on everything. I love you. Both can keep your own time-sicken. Yeah, this case is definitely on the list, and we've had this one requested before. I know we will cover it.

Hi, my name is Brianna. I'm from Palestine, Texas. I'm over here, I'm listening to the show. I've never listened to a podcast before. It's my first time, but I'm really into it, but I'm watching episode 81, and that's a murder of Michelle Avila. I can't say her last name. I'm so sorry.

But this one really reminds me of this movie that I watched as a kid when I grew up. It was my favorite movie, me, my cousin, we used to watch it all the time. It's called A Murder Among Friends. Everything you described is just like the movie. Like, when she put the log on her on her bag, that's exactly what happens to the group. They cut her hair. She, like, lived in the mom's house. Like, and she would wear her, like, her stuff.

And, you know, her mom never suspected it. Never suspected that she was the one that would kill her daughter. I guess it's just crazy. But I just want you all to know that I really love it. Y'all should keep doing it. Like, I enjoy listening to it. I listen to it every morning as soon as I wake up, even while I'm getting ready for work.

I listen to it on my way to work. When I leave to go to my next person and work, like, I'm obsessed with it. I just want y'all know you are doing good and thank you. So thank you so much for the voicemail. I'm not sure about a murder among friends. There was a movie called A Killer Among Friends, which is based on that case. Yeah. So I'm thinking maybe that's the one she's talking about.

It had Patty Duke in it. It had Tiffany Amber Thesson from Saved by the Bell. Your favorite show growing up. Oh my gosh. That was when I was in college. You still watched it. That was on when I was in college and I watched it. You still have the posters.

I watched it just for her. You still have the posters. I've seen them in your workout room. But that movie, and it might be what she's talking about because it came out in the early 90s. It's based on the real life murder of Michelle Avala. Hi, guys. This is Connie from Michigan. And I first have to say, I just love your podcast.

And I love how respectful you guys are of the victims. I just got one that I thought you might like to listen to. It is Francine Hughes from Danseille, Michigan. In the mid-70s, she was a victim of domestic abuse. And she, after one particular incident, burned her husband alive. And I just thought that might be an interesting one for you guys to look at. And once again, I really love how respectful you guys are. And this team thing between the two of you, team, purgy, whatever, I don't see how anybody could pick a team.

You guys are both wonderful. Thanks. Bye. Yeah, she had to say Team Fergie. Well played, Fergie. Well played. It actually said Team Gibby and I edited it out. Yeah.

No. No, we appreciate that. I mean, we do. We do try to be very respectful to the victims. I think it's important. We've tried to do that from the beginning. I'm not familiar with that case, but it sounds very intriguing. It does.

And I'm writing it down now, so we'll check into it. He actually is. Hey, Mike and Gibe. It's Nyla calling from the Great North here. I'm a new listener to this show and stumbled upon your episode on Robert Picton. And I was actually born and raised in Vancouver. So I just wanted to say that you guys did an amazing job. I consider myself kind of an expert on the case growing up around it.

And you guys absolutely nailed it. And I just wanted to leave you a recommendation for another Vancouver serial killer. It goes by the name Gilbert Paul Jordan, also known as the Boozing Barber. He was a raging alcoholic. all around pretty crappy dude. But it's an interesting case and definitely something that is talked about in the Vancouver community. Yeah.

Anyways, just wanted to say a huge thanks to you guys. I'm in my exams for my last year of university. So you've made the 13-hour days in the library a little bit more bearable. And keep doing what you're doing. Thanks so much. Bye. All right.

So Picton. I had a hot dog last week. Yeah. I thought of Robert Picton. That's just wrong. I know. It's almost like I can't help it. Yeah. There's a couple of the ones that we've done that I don't think will ever quite fully leave me.

Robert Pickton's one. Arthur Shawcross is another one and probably Tommy Lynn sells. Those three right there, I just don't think I'll ever forget the details even if I tried or if I wanted to. Stick with you forever. Exactly. All right. We had mailbag.

Let's see you're the mailbag. Sue Kelly sent us some peanuts. Okay. She sent some candy corn. All right. And she sent several Harley chips from Sturgis. Awesome. Which is very cool.

Sturgis. You've been there? I have not. You know where it's at? Is it South Dakota? So kind of close to what we just covered. Right. Yeah.

I know it was one of the Dakotas. I'm pretty sure it was South Dakota, but pretty sure it is too. You asked the question and then you don't know. the answer and make me just wave out there in the breeze. I'm just trying to remember, you know. But I've been to South Dakota. Where is Mount Rushmore? South Dakota, right? Mount Rushmore? Yes. The Badlands? Yes. That's where, whatever state that is in, I think, is where Sturges. Yeah, South Dakota. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Too much geography. What if we're wrong, though? How bad will this be? Imagine the messages we are going to get.

dude, I get so many messages a week about being wrong. It's okay. Yeah. Oh, you get mad. I'm all right being wrong. I can handle it. I can handle it. Yeah. All right. That is it, folks, for another episode of true crime all the time. So for Mike and Gibby, stay safe and keep your own time ticking.