True Crime with Kimbyr - Small-Town Tragedy: The Heartbreaking Story of Diamond Bradley: Part 3

Episode Date: January 20, 2025

In this episode of True Crime with Kimbyr, we uncover the haunting story of Diamond Bradley, a vibrant high schooler from small-town Illinois who sought connection online. Her life was tragically cut short in 2018, but her memory continues to shed light on the dangers of digital friendships and the vulnerability of young lives in close-knit communities. Through meticulous research and a compassionate lens, Kimbyrleigha delves deep into Diamond's life, her family bonds, and the fateful events that led to her loss. Don’t miss this compelling case that deserves more attention. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sergeant Sangston drives out to the scene with Sergeant Kinken. It is a very rural area and that this time of year it's covered in snow. There are cornfields on both sides as far as the eye can see. And they estimated that the nearest house was at least a mile or more away from this location. It's in the middle of nowhere. I mean, just look at this area. Sanxton walked down the gravel road until he came upon the female. He just took one look at her and he knew that this was Diamond Bradley.

her body was partially submerged in water because it was a creek that ran through this area and she had a number of wounds to her neck and many injuries that appeared to be defensive wounds. It was clear just how violent this murder was and how hard diamond fought to survive. He didn't want this news to travel to Doris before he could tell her the heartbreaking truth himself, so he raced over to her house. He said there's no amount of training that can ever prepare you for telling a mother that her child is dead. and I cannot imagine. The officers knocked on Doris Bradley's front door that evening around 7 p.m.

And when she answered, they told her, you're going to need to come down the station with us. We're going to give you an update. Something told her that this was not going to be good. They sat her down. And before they could even say anything, Doris just knew. In her heart, she knew Diamond was dead.

And she lost it. She broke down right in there. She couldn't control it. She wanted to go home. And Dequan was back at the house. Doris came hysterically crying into the house just bawling. And the first thing to Kwan thought was, oh my God, it's Diamond. The crying sounded just like her, so for a moment he felt relieved.

Relieved that this was a bad dream that she was back, but soon he realized he was actually living in a nightmare. He came running towards the door and that's when he saw his mom and he realized it was her that was crying. He said Doris and Diamond, they had the exact same cry. He really thought Diamond would be standing there in the living room, but instead his mother, and she broke the heartbreaking news to him. She said, they found Diamond, and Dequan was like, okay, well, where is she? And Dora said she's dead. Dequan blacked out. He fell right to the floor

and disbelief. He couldn't breathe. It was the most awful feeling in his entire life, especially seeing his mom the way that she was. It made it even worse. She didn't know how to go on without Diamond. And DeQuan felt like a failure because he always told Diamond that he would be there for her, but he wasn't there for her in the moment when she needed him the most. And when Deovana heard this news, she couldn't understand why anyone would want to hurt her cousin. She couldn't believe she had just seen her a couple nights ago and never knew this would be her last day of life. Diamond didn't know. And it was just too sad for anyone to think about. The missing person's case is now a homicide investigation.

The investigators are determined to find out how Diamond ended up in that ditch. Once the news spread through the small town, they were on high alert. They were shaken to the core. They didn't understand how anyone could do something like this. Someone was out there hurting children, and this made the residents very fearful to go anywhere. By February 5th, 13 days after Diamond went missing, teams are focusing on the dark colored Jeep caught on the CCTV footage. They don't know exactly what color it is, and they're trying to sift through piles of records on dark colored jeeps, not to mention all different years, and this would take them a very long time.

So they decided we're going to call a body shop that specializes in working on jeeps, and they locate an expert who can help them identify the year and the color that the jeeps came in, the year was made, so they can narrow it down. This expert takes a good, hard look at the footage, and he narrows it down to a black Jeep wrangler between like two different years. And that was a lot easier for investigators to work with. So now they run all that information into the DMV database and they pull up all the addresses and names

for people in the surrounding areas who owned Jeeps matching that description. This part reminds me of the white Alantra. If you know, you know. Idaho College murder case. Remember how they had the still shot of the white car from the gas station and they needed to track down the owner? Same here. They went to many different houses, spoke to a bunch of different.

people everyone was cooperative they get to one of the known addresses it's about a mile north of where diamond's body was found when they knock on the door a woman comes out she explains she's not the owner of the jeep he used to live there but he has since moved away to another town called standard but she doesn't have an address to give them however this town is only about a mile and half away so kin can and sainstyn decide we're just going to drive over there and this is an even smaller town than Spring Valley. It only had 200 residents. You can tell how small it is from this picture. They figure, you know what, it's just a few blocks we're going to drive around and actually look for a black Jeep Wrangler. And it doesn't take them long to find one. It's parked in the driveway of one of the

homes on 4th Street. They walk up, they knock on the door. A man answers he comes out. They ask him, are you the owner of the black Jeep? He says yes. He introduced himself as 26-year-old Richard Henderson. They asked him if he happened to be in Spring Valley on January 24th, and he said, yes, I was. He told them he worked at a greenhouse factory called ColorPoint that was in that area, and he remembers being there that day. They asked him if he would be okay coming down to the Spring Valley Police Department to talk to them because they're working on a case that they think he might be able to help them with, and he says, sure.

He was very open, pleasant, cooperative, just hopped in this wild car, and they headed over. Now, I have this interview, and I know some of you have mixed feelings about me playing videos in my videos. And I understand the audio can be different. It's not always clear. The subtitles don't always work right. But I really want to give you a feel for these individuals and the situations that they're put in. That's why I showcase real interview footage if I have it and we do. So I'm going to play some of it. But I will also make sure to explain everything as well. So they just want to know what he knows. Perhaps this man saw Diamond hung out with her. Maybe he gave her a ride and then dropped her off and then foul play ensued.

They just needed to know. Chief Hage and Sergeant Kinkan are in the room with Richard here, and this is the interview. Before we get started, I just want to let you know that we're an audio or video saying, okay? But you do, you know. Yeah, please. You can see right away.

Richard is on board. He knows he's being recorded. He's like, I'll even offer to take off my hoodie. He's very comfortable. He's drinking a bottle of water. He has his phone out beside him, and now they're going to be asking him questions about being in Spring Valley on the 24th. Here's that portion now.

We're in Spring Valley. Yes, sir. Okay. What were you doing? I went to the gas station. And do you know about what time that was? And you know from 6.30 to 7 o'clock. Okay. Were you with anybody? Not yet. I was picking up my buddy.

You were supposed to get a few already. We did start with back home. Okay, one thing I noticed right away. Tell me if you noticed this, he's an accent, right? Not just like a country accent, but like a foreign accent. It sounds like maybe he's English or British. I cannot tell, but please, if you're able to identify it,

let me know the origin of that accent. So he explains that on that Wednesday morning, he was waiting to meet up with a friend and he stopped by the gas station. He got some cigarettes. That was around, I don't know, he said 6.37 o'clock. He doesn't hear back from his buddy, so he heads back home.

There were officers observing this interview from behind the glass. and one of them, Sergeant Pellegrini, who had been at the Marathon Gas Station. Remember, he saw the footage, and he took a good look at Richard, and then he runs out of the room to go look at that Marathon gas station footage again. Meanwhile, other officers are observing the way that Richard is responding to questions, his body language, the tone of his voice, anything out of the ordinary. He had told the investigators that he did pass through the St. Paul and Spalding intersection, and they know he did because they have footage to prove it. He also tells them he drove into Putnam County, which is towards where he lives in Standard. By now, Pellegrini matches Richard's face to the man on the footage. Let's take a look at that.

Man walks up to the door, comes into this door, he's walking up to the counter to buy something. I try to figure out what it was in his hand. I don't know. He said it was cigarettes, but it's just some yellow square. And I kept thinking if it was cigarettes, when he'd had interaction with the clerk, I don't know. He just shows the clerk something and then walks out. Nothing that out of the ordinary. However, this video footage puts him less than 100 feet away from Diamond's home on the morning that she went missing.

So Pellegrini gives us information to the investigators that are interviewing Richard. Next, they ask him where he went after he crossed over the bridge. He says he went past where he worked at the color point greenhouse and turned left. And this next part is where things get a little weird. They kind of start to unravel. Watch this. Okay. So you get across the bridge. Where do you go then?

To a minimum color point? You did? I think or you know? I think. Okay. So you think that you turned in front of color point and you were alone in the vehicle at that time? Just for sure?

I mean, you kind of hesitated there a little bit. Did you notice the hesitation when they asked him if he was alone when he crossed that bridge? That long pause. Let's watch it again. Listen to this again. So you think that you turned in front of color point and you were alone in the vehicle.

at that time. He kind of hesitated there a little bit. That hesitation was big for investigators. Sergeant Sankson, who was watching from the other room, said, that was an aha moment. He knew that the investigators were onto something. And King Ken said later that in that moment, her heart started to erase. So they pressed him about this. And you can see how the investigator is like, are you sure you were alone?

Because you hesitated there for a minute. Here's what Richard says. He says, well, I picked up a friend on because I was supposed to be getting Molly. He says, well, I was going to pick up a friend so we could buy some Molly, which most of you know, but for those who don't, it's ecstasy. Wait until you hear what he says next. Who are you who'd you pick the word of a friend then? Or who was the friend? Diamond. Diamond. Did you catch that? He literally just admitted that he was with his friend, Diamond.

He doesn't know her last name, but she's the one that went missing. Wow. You'd think. If he knew she was missing and he was with her the day that she disappeared, he would have already come forward to let them know that, wouldn't he? I mean, this is a small town. He was bound to have known his friend when missing, right? He had to think so. He just admitted he was with Diamond that morning, so they pressed him about that. He tells them the plan was to get Molly, but it fell through.

They weren't able to get it. So he just dropped Diamond off at the trailer park where they were supposed to be picking up the drugs. that's his story, that he was only with her for a short period of time, like 30 to 40 minutes. And he's so proper, always responding with, yes, sir. But there's a problem with his story, many. But the one that they're focusing on is the fact that the trailer park is in the opposite direction to where Diamond's phone traveled. So either he stole her phone and went a different way, or he's lying. And now is their chance to put a lot of pressure on him because they have evidence to the contrary to what he's telling them it's a perfect opportunity to take control of the interrogation and put fear into

Richard hoping that he will confess so they ask him how he even knows diamond and he says oh i know her because you know through molly now they tell him that they've been tracking diamond's phone and it didn't go to the trailer park richard just kept saying okay okay they're like we know exactly where her phone went we want to know what happened between you and diamond that morning. He said nothing happened. And at this point, they need to take a breather, hopefully to restrategize, see if any new information has come in, they take a bathroom break, they come back, and they talk a little more. Richard appears to be very calm. He's cooperative. He doesn't seem nervous or upset, but he is a little annoyed. I mean, they are pressing him about murdering a girl

that he was with. But they feel like they can get Richard to give them more information if they keep him talking. So that's exactly what they did. And then they ask if he's willing to get in the car and show them the exact route he took. And he's like, no, not now, because you're accusing me of murder. But the detective is pressing him saying, but you're the last person to see her alive. It would be so helpful to our investigation. He just kept repeating, you're accusing me of murder. Clearly he's unhappy about it.

But finally, he does agree to show them where he says he picked her up and where they went. So they get into a squad car and they retrace the path he said they drove that day. Now I'm not going to show you this whole video. There's no point to it, but I will show you this. I want to show you what the weather was like. I said it was snowy, it was cold. And I'm sitting there imagining Diamond alone the morning she disappeared. All alone in the bitter cold.

Richard said they started at the Marathon gas station and he pulled up into this alley right next to where Diamond's house was, and he waited. What's crazy is that if her mom would have just looked out a window, she would have been able to see Diamond getting into this car. Anyone would have. He said that once she got in the vehicle, they were on their way. So the officer took him down the route that he knew the Diamond's phone went on,

across the same intersection over that bridge, and then they're out in the middle of nowhere. This is where Diamond's phone pinged last. All that's left of Diamond is across some stuffed animals and fake flowers on a memorial next to the creek bed. Changing this landscape. These things were not supposed to be there. Diamond wasn't supposed to be there, and yet she was.

And she was left behind right at this location. That's when the detective asked Richard, if he recognized this area, they are literally right in front of where Diamond's body had been found, right next to where her family set up that memorial on the side of the road. So the officer pulls up and he stops right in front of him. but you can see it on the dash cam footage right here. When Richard got to this area, things changed.

He began to cry. And the detective was trying to play nice and play to his emotions. He said, take your time, Richard. Richard wouldn't look. He didn't want to see the memorial. He just turned his head. The detective said, We just want to know exactly how it went, Richard.

They won a confession. Richard just kept crying and crying. He said that he pulled over to the rights. They wanted to know what happened when he stopped the car and he said, we had sex. He says that when they were finished, he wanted her out of his vehicle. And I was thinking, wow, this is a really weird place to make a girl get out of your vehicle in the middle of nowhere in the snow. Nothing for miles.

That's either extremely cruel or not exactly how she ended up outside the vehicle. But we know whoever did this is a monster either way. And what he says next catches the detectives by surprise. he tells them that when he pulls over and tells her to get out, she pulled a knife on him. Why would she do that? He says he's kicking her in the arm, and that's when he says she gets herself. And what he means by that is to say that the knife went into her body. The detective asked where the stab went in at, and Richard said it was the stomach or the side of her body.

He said that he pulled the knife from her and there was blood on it, but that she kept coming after him, to his story. Wait until you hear what this man said next. Now for what he said when the detective asked, how did Diamond get into that ditch? He said she started walking and he pushed her. Wow, I was not ready for that. I wasn't expecting him to say something like that. King Ken does not think the story makes any sense and I don't either. The elements for one thing, it's so cold. It's in the middle of nowhere. It's a stranger. I don't know. Everything seems wrong. He's claiming that she was the one who attacked him. And after stabbing herself, she's still coming after him so he grabs a night from her, stabs her in self-defense, only two or three times, according to him, just to get her

away from him. The thing is, this does not add up. Because Diamond's autopsy showed she had over 20 stab wounds, 20, and a very severe wound to her neck. These were not wounds you would make in self-defense. It was overkill. That's why the detective pressed Richard. about where he stabbed her and why. If she's got wounds on the back, it means that she wasn't running towards him. She was running away. The fact that Richard was posing this as self-defense

when he's so much larger than Diamond didn't make sense either. He's 6 to 270 pounds. Diamond is 5 feet and only 115 pounds. Why would he need to stab her at all? He's brought back into the station and they questioned him even more and Sergeant King Ken grabs her laptop

and she attempts to get Richard to look at the autopsy photos and he doesn't want to, but she insists. And she's doing this for a couple of reasons. One, shock value to get Richard to break. And two, because there are clearly stab wounds to the back of Diamond's neck and her back. And so she asked him, at what point did you cause these wounds in her back? And she turns the laptop around so that he can look, right, at poor little 16-year-old

diamond and what was done to her. Richard just makes some excuse like, you know what, she was flailing around. and she was trying to get out of the car, so the knife must have ended up stabbing her there. Right. Kinken asked him, where's the knife now? And he says, he doesn't know. He thought it was with Diamond.

They asked, could it be out of your house? And he's like, I don't know, go check. He's held at the Putnam County Jail as a prime suspect. And Diamond's family is relieved that someone is in custody, but they're disgusted by the way Richard was claiming he killed Diamond in self-defense, along with the way he painted Diamond out to be, someone who was eager to buy drugs, have sex with a stranger,

and then pull out a knife on him. He was playing the victim when he's a grown-ass man and he's dealing with a child. Over 200 people attended Diamond's funeral. Many of them were fellow students and faculty members from Hall High School in Spring Valley. Interim Superintendent Jay McCracken said, it's been a difficult time for the district,

and quote, as tragic as this is, and as sadden as we are, it's still very heartwarming to see people pull together and help people who are in need, end quote. A month or so goes by since Richard was put behind bars, and they finally get another lead. Richard himself admits to getting rid of the murder weapon and tells detectives where they can find it. He says he brought it to work with him over at ColorPoint, the massive greenhouse operation. This place is huge. Look at it. There's so much to search. He says he threw it into a wooded area while they bring out bulldozers, tractors, all kinds of excavation type equipment to sift through the debris that's all over the place. And King Ken is out there watching all of this

unfold and there are people using shovels and rakes going through inch by inch. And while all this is happening, she thinks that she spotted something shiny. Sure enough, as luck would have it, it's a knife. This is an evidence photo of exactly where the knife was found. Here it is. It's a kitchen knife from like a kitchen knife block, but it's a sharp and long one. Definitely not something that it would have been easy for Diamond to have been concealing if she would have been the one bringing it with her into the Jeep with Richard. But it would be quite easy for him to hide it on the driver's side of the Jeep, waiting for the perfect moment to bounce on her. Investigators put together a timeline of events that they believe led up to Diamond's murder. They met online through

an ad or a dating site, and they decided to meet in person on January 20. with Richard coming up with the plan. They believe he was looking for an easy target and knew all along he was going to kill Diamond. That's why he brought the knife with him and drove right out to this rural area, either to cause her harm right away or engage in a sexual act and then harm her. At 6.45 a.m., Diamond is picked up in the alley near the marathon gas station. Then Richard drove her out of town. And at 654, they saw the Jeep pass a police officer on a dashboard camera, headed out to Butnam.

to think that she was dead only 10 minutes later is chilling. They knew that she was probably dead by 718 when her phone stopped working. So within 30 minutes of being picked up, she was already dead. Richard is officially charged with first-degree murder of Diamond Bradley in April of 2018. He was being held at the LaSalle County Jail awaiting trial. Before I go any further, do you remember that text that Jay got from Diamond at 640? that said, I'm dying.

The investigators, they said that, according to their timeline of events, that text was sent prior to Diamond getting in the vehicle with Richard, so they were confused about the context. And it's something I can't get past. It's very eerie to me, and I've tried to make sense of it.

She's planning to meet up with Richard, maybe go to IHOP. She accidentally texts J instead, saying, do you want to go to IHOP later? And then 40 minutes later, before being picked up, she texts, I'm dying? If this wasn't a true,

dying declaration in the form of one last chance for someone to save her life, what is she referring to? What's dying? Was her phone dying? That doesn't seem like you would text that because I'm dying is not in reference to your phone. So okay, is she hungry? Maybe she's dying of hunger. But perhaps Diamond really was dying at some point and it wasn't too long after that text. But they still determined it meant nothing and it was just a coincidence and I can't accept that. But I guess I have to, right? I just kept thinking, could the times be off somehow? Like, they said that she got into Richard's car at 645 and that the text was at 640, but that's only five minutes. Are they sure that the cameras are right? Like, all those times are correct? Because I just can't believe that. And I want your thoughts.

Of course I do. They do clear J as a suspect. He has nothing to do with Diamond's murder. It's just very odd that she would text him that. But you know how the last person you text is sometimes still up when you open your phone. I can just imagine her scrambling as she's stabbed for the first time, like grabbing her phone, making that text, and then Richard grabbing the phone and eventually killing her and turning it off right away to avoid any other activity. We'll never know. Richard waived his right to a jury trial and instead opted for a bench trial, meaning that a judge would be the one to decide his fate. However, Richard's public defender, Roger Bolin, was finishing, preparing for the trial, and Richard wanted to know if they could get a

plea deal. He never gave a reason why he wanted this plea agreement, but it is known that the prosecution was planning to seek a sentence of 20 years to life in prison if he was found guilty. Diamond's family did end up accepting the terms of a plea deal. Doris said she did not want to look at Richard during a trial. She had already had enough. All he did was smile and smirk, and she just couldn't go through it. Richard pleaded guilty in exchange for not receiving a sentence of natural life in prison with no chance of parole. He ended up being sentenced to 53 years in prison minus the 275 days he already had been in jail at that point of the sentencing. The circuit court judge did guarantee though that he would serve 100% of his 53 year sentence. So he wouldn't get paroled

until the 53 years were finished, but that does not seem long enough to me. In regards to Diamond's family agreeing to the plea deal, state attorney Christina Judd many said, Quote, they needed closure and they thought 53 years was acceptable. They knew nothing was going to bring Diamond back, unfortunately, and a few more years wouldn't make much of a difference anyway. End quote. Diamond's death took a toll on Doris. It was extremely hard, which is understandable. And Dequan said, she placed a lot of blame on herself and felt like she was a bad mom, but he knew she wasn't.

A monster did this. Doris decided to have Diamond cremated instead of buried because she wanted to old. always have diamond with her. She said she couldn't just bury her and leave her in a cemetery somewhere. That hit me. I know I'm like overly emotional today, but that hit me. I never ever thought of it like that, but it's so true. And Doris carried diamonds earn everywhere with her, even to court the day that Richard was sentenced. She would go on to say, quote, it's hard to move on, and at one point I wanted to die because she wasn't there anymore, end quote. But she said she had to think about her other kids, especially her two youngest, and she knew that she had to be strong

for them. It broke my heart to hear her say that. My heart is broken for Diamond and her whole family. It's yet another senseless death, and we may never know why Richard decided to kill her. But Diamond said it best when she posted this back on October 27, 2016. She said, quote, I'm living in a f*** up world with f***ed up people, end quote. Well, Diamond, I'll say this. We're not all bad, but you're right. You were with one fuck-up monster on the day that you took your last breath, and I'm forever sorry for that. My message to all of you is to always be prepared.

Like Doris said, not everyone is trying to be your friend. So act like they're out to get you before you ever get too close. Do background checks. Talk to people who know them. Don't meet people alone. We've heard it all before, yet we know we've all made our own mistakes. It's just sad that some people have to pay for the people. mistakes with their life. This one was hard on me, especially with like my treatments

that I'm going through right now. I'm a mess. I thank you so very much for watching and I'll see you in my next video. Bye.