Welcome back to the Path one, Chile for part two of our series about
the unexplained death of Steve Sandlin. Robin, do you want to catch everyone
up on what we talked about in our previous episode. Well, Steve Sandlin
was a twenty one year old rookie police officer with an infant son, who
was also engaged to be married and was following in his father's footsteps. All
he'd ever wanted to be was a police officer. He was assigned to a
small town called Mountaineer, New Mexico, which only had a total of four
officers on the force, including Steve. But then eight weeks into his tenure
there, Steve wound up debt inside his own police station under suspicious circumstances,
after he was shot to death with his own gun. The police chief,
David Carson, tried to say that Steve's death may have been a suicide because
they had an argument earlier that day, or possibly an accident because Steve was
playing with his gun, but of course his friends and family did not believe
that. It saw a lot of suspicious discrepancies going on. There were hints
that Steve was very disillusioned about stuff that was going on on the job,
and he had even had a meeting with the New Mexico Attorney General's office.
He had also been involved in a drug bust with a marijuana dealer in which
fifty four pounds of marijuana suddenly went missing from a police evidence trailer, and
after Steve's death, a bag of what might have one bag of what might
have been this marijuana was found inside a drawer inside Steve's home, and it
seemed likely that it had been planted in an attempt to assassinate his character.
There was some suspicion on Chief Carson himself because numerous witnesses said they saw his
patrol car parked outside the police station during the approximate time period of Steve's death.
And he also really didn't have an alibi for that time period and just
said that he could not remember where he was. I know that there was
a man named James Garantino who was the Assistant Attorney General in New Mexico.
He wound up getting fired from his superiors for pushing too hard into this case
and not leaving it alone. So he became a parent that there was a
major cover up and conspiracy going on. It was not until nineteen ninety five
when Steve's death was finally reclassified as a homicide, and they have paid tribute
to him in the last few years, but unfortunately there are still no answers
about his death and if whoever killed him has gotten away with it for over
thirty five years, well, I think it's safe to say that this story
is sketchy as hell. I really can't think of too many unsolved cases where
a police officer was killed inside their own police station. Steve Sandlan sounded like
an incredibly ambitious, enthusiastic young man who only wanted to do good and could
have potentially had a great career in law enforcement. But unfortunately it sounds like
you wound up getting hired by a rather dysfunctional police department. Now, you
do have to cut the Mountaineer PD a little bit of slack, because a
Mountain Air is a pretty isolated small town, and these types of police departments
obviously do not get the same amount of manpower, resources and training that a
police force in a larger city would receive. After all, they only had
a total of four officers when Steve joined up. But when a force this
small suddenly winds up dealing with a crime that's much bigger than what they're used
to dealing with. You can see how things might go wrong. In other
words, if they seize fifty four pounds of marijuana in a drug bust and
have to leave it lying around on the floor inside the station because they don't
have any secure facilities to properly store it, then they're probably in way over
their heads. Now it's up for debate Webther the Mountaineer PD was actually complicit
in Steve's death or just watch the investigation. But either way, it's still
a pretty infuriating situation because Steve deserved much better. He just sounded like the
type of person you'd want to have as a police officer in your community because
he was finally getting to do the one thing he'd always wanted to do since
he was a child, and was treating it with the seriousness it deserved.
But it sounds like working for the Mountaineer PD did a lot to destroy Steve's
passion for his job in a fairly short amount of time. Before we start
analyzing this case, I should discuss Chief David Carson, who seems like a
pretty sketchy character for starters, his real name was actually David Joseph Shanklin,
but he apparently decided to change it after his father got married to his ex
wife, which sounds like a pretty awkward situation to say the least. This
decision may have also been motivated by the fact that Carson had an extensive criminal
record for misdemeanors under his former name. Believe it or not. While Carson
was police chief, David Joseph Shanklin still had an active warrant on him in
Hamilton County, Ohio, which stemmed from a nineteen seventy five arrest for passing
bad checks. Since the war was only applicable in Ohio, Shanklin slash Carson
did not have to worry about it, so he was able to be certified
as a law enforcement officer in New Mexico and became police chief of Mountainair in
September of nineteen eighty seven. Oooh okay, I'm shaking my head, going,
wait, what if you have an active warrant in another state? I
feel like you should still not be qualified to serve and protect when you're passing
bad checks and doing many misdemeanors, whether your name's the same or not,
and whether you've moved or not, very interesting. It is to me concerning
that he does have Yes they're misdemeanors, but he has his history of being
willing to break the law if he's passing bad checks, is he in financial
distress? Is he one of those people who just doesn't care and believes he's
above the law. Either way, I don't think it puts him in a
very good position to be police chief of a even a small little town,
because to me, it shows questionable judgment and a lack of ethics and responsibility.
Yes, people can change, Yes people go through phases, but this
wasn't like it was, you know, thirty five years ago. It was
at the time of Steve's death. It was just thirteen years before he had
that warrant signed for the bad checks. So he had to start a law
enforcement career pretty quickly after these misdemeanors had been on his record. And so
I'm wondering how quickly this someone changed should become this perfect law abiding citizen when
they've had a history of multiple run ins with law enforcement themselves. And correct
me if I'm wrong. Maybe one of you two know, But with law
enforcement officers, don't they have to provide their financial information to their employer because
they need to be beyond reproach in the sense that if there are major financial
issues or deep into debt, say they've got a gambling addiction, even if
gambling is legal there, then that could potentially open them up to making really
rash or poor decisions, like say they do a drug bust and they decide
to keep the drugs or keep money that they find because they need to pay
off you know, Peter or Paul over there. I think there are departments
like that, or especially federal government, when you get into like you know,
FBI and things like that. I know that they ask, you know,
for everything but your first child. But when you look at a small
town where there's only four officers operating there, I doubt the hiring procedures are
strict. We're in a tiny little town. I guarantee you it's not as
difficult to get through the hoops here in a tiny little town of two thousand
people as it is in let's say Dallas, Texas or San Francisco or something
like that. I just don't think there's a big pool to pull from and
so and there's, like you said, not as many resources are personnel able
to do the background checks and things like that, so I think it's just
more lax in a small town police department. That's what I'm thinking as well.
Because it was the nineteen eighties, it's not clear to me if they
found out about his previous criminal history, or if they just missed it in
the background check, or if they did know about it but just didn't care
because they figured, Well, the arrest warrant is only applicable in Ohio,
so it's not really our problem here. But like you said, people can
change after they make mistakes to commit crimes. But the problem is that he
still had an act of warrants, so he never showed up in course court
to face his charge or take full responsibility. And that definitely paints a picture
of someone who has no remorse about his past mistakes and has not really changed
his spots. But here's the craziest antidote about Carson. He actually has a
connection to an entirely different case which was featured on Unsolved Mysteries and took place
in another state. On February eleventh, nineteen ninety one, a young married
couple named Eric and Pam Ellender were murdered inside their home in Sulfur, Louisiana.
They both had received fatal shotgun blast to the head while they were in
their bed, and their infant daughter was in the house of the time,
though thankfully she was left unharmed. The following day, eighteen year old Chris
Prudeholm and three accomplices were arrested for driving eric stolen car after a sought off
shotgun was found in Prudholm's apartment. He quickly confessed to killing the Ellanders and
was indicted on two counts of first degree murder. Over two weeks later,
his body would be found hanging from torn bed sheets inside the shower room of
the Calcasoux Correctional Center, and this left Prudeholm in a coma for nine days
before he died. A suicide note was found in pru Udoam cell which he
took sole responsibility for the murders and claimed that he enjoyed them. While the
Calcashu Paris Sheriff's department believed Prudholm was the lone perpetrator and officially closed the case,
but the reason it got featured on Unsolved Mysteries was because Pam's father believed
other people were involved in the murders and that they were part of a satanic
called the Skaters, an acronym for Satan's kids against the establishment. Yeah,
what can I say? It was the early nineties and people loved their satanic
panic Anyway, Prudholm's three accomplices who were busted in the stolen car alongside him
did get charged with being accessories after the fact, and that's pretty much where
the investigation ended. But here's how this connects to Steve Sandlin's case. David
Carson lost his job as Mountainair police chief in March of nineteen ninety, and
there was a lot of conflicting stories about whether he resigned or was fired.
Afterward, Carson moved to Louisiana and became an intake officer at the Calcashue Parish
Jail. According to another employee, the shower room where Prudholm was found hanging
could only be accessed by deputies who possessed special rovers keys. One of these
deputies was Carson, and he reportedly left prudholme into the shower room before he
hung himself. Another inmate would also claim that Carson had forced him to sign
a false witness statement classifying Prudholm's death as a suicide. Rumors circulated that Carson
had Prudhom killed in order to prevent him from implicating other people in the Ellender
murders, including the Calcashoe Parish sheriff's son. Now, if you've heard Robin's
views on the case, you'll know that he does not believe there was a
major conspiracy or a satanic called the Skaters. And it's very unlikely that Carson
murdered Chris Prudeholme the Carson murdered Chris Prudholm to protect anyone. But even though
Carson's name was never mentioned in the Unsolved True segment about the Islanders, it's
pretty crazy that you would be involved in two separate cases from the show which
otherwise had nothing to do with each other. This is very, very crazy,
And like you said, is there a link to actually his responsibility in
one or either of them? Not necessarily, but it's just odd. It's
very bizarre, and it's eerie that you have a Carson holding keys to a
place where this inmate hangs himself, and then you have where we're pretty sure
he at least would be aware of more information than he let on around his
own department and Steve's death. So, oh, man, the story about
Carson from the time you told me his dad married Carson's ex wife and he
has this criminal record. It's just so out there and out of this world.
I don't know what to say, but it's really pitiful that you have
this another murder case and Carson's tied to it, and up on on some
mysteries as well. Very very interesting. Yeah, it certainly seems like trouble
seems to follow this guy around wherever he goes, and you start to wonder
that this just cannot be a coincidence. So now let's get back to the
Steve Sandland case. I'll state right from the outset that I do not believe
Steve's death was a suicide or accident. Yes, in so many of these
cases where a victim is suspected of completing suicide, their loved ones will always
say it couldn't have happened that way because they were not the sort of person
who would kill themselves. But that doesn't necessarily mean that people who looked fine
in the outside might not have had some inner demons which compelled them to take
their own life. These types of things do happen, but I really don't
think it's likely in this particular case. I have my doubts that a young
man with a Beyonce and an infant son, who was making plans for Mother's
Day right before he was killed, would suddenly decide to shoot himself over a
disagreement with his boss. It's true that Steve was becoming a bit disillusioned with
his job, but he still had a whole lot going on for him,
so suicide is a very implausible scenario here. The autopsy also concluded that the
god might have been as much as two feet away from Steve's head when it
was fired. And I have my doubts that someone planning to kill themselves would
do this, since that increases the possibility that a suicide attempt won't be successful.
Yeah, everything here is too new for someone to be suicidal at this
point. I think, like you said, he has a fiance, he
has an infant son, and they're making plans for Mother's Day. Mother's Day
is clearly a big deal when you have an eighteen month old little one,
moms worked hard. This is the first Mother's Day. He can actually help
you make a little craft and fun things like that you know, And so
I don't know. I just think he has this new job, he's got
this sweet little family that he's growing, and he has a job that he's
passionate about. Remember, he wanted to follow in dad's footsteps, and he's
only eight weeks on the job. Getting confronted about being too ambitious at week
eight is not a reason to melt down and to feel distressed. He's frustrated
because I'm doing my job the way I'm supposed to the way my dad taught
me to do it, and this man isn't respecting that, and he calls
his wife to vent. That's all that was. He wasn't so distraught about
his career that he was thinking of ending his life. I just don't buy
it. And when the autopsy says that the gun could have been as far
as two feet away from his head, you're absolutely right. Anyone who says
I'm gonna, you know, inflict a life ending wound is not going to
hold the gun away from their head. If you did survive, you wouldn't
have any brain function and things like that. So it's just it's just not
possible. I have to be with the family sentiment that says, just no
way in this case. Even if he was frustrated enough that he was disillusioned
and he was wondering like, Okay, maybe there this isn't the town for
me. I mean, I don't like my boss. There could be some
other things going on here. He has the possibility to transfer somewhere else.
He's young, he's only eight weeks into the job. His father has that
in with the Albuquerque Police. There's so many different potential situations where he could
find employment elsewhere to think that he got into a minor argument about parking tickets,
like who cares in the grand scheme of things, Like Ash said,
it's just venting to his wife. If he was going to end his own
life over this, why would he do it in the police station. Most
people who typically tend to end their own lives don't do it as a statement
making thing in a public place. It just none of it makes sense.
The playing with the gun doesn't make sense. It's so obvious that this is
murder. It's just atrocious police work. That the scene wasn't properly sealed off,
the evidence wasn't collected in a way that the police department should have done
so. By some kind of forensic standards, and that they just were so
quick to say, oh, was likely a suicide or or an accident because
he liked to play with his gun. It makes me even more suspicious of
them, the fact that they suggested that explanation that he could have been playing
with his gun. Because I was the son of a police officer, I
just find it so unlikely the gun safety wasn't ingrained in him from a very
young age, and that now as a police officer, it's been like he's
been hit over the head with it because he's had to go through all that
training. Like actually brought up in Part one that he would have learned how
to handle a gun, how to store a gun, how to use a
gun, so that you're so comfortable with it. It's like an extra appendage.
It's not something where he's just gonna like pull out this dangerous thing when
he has no intention of using it. It just none of this makes sense.
And then there's Chief Carson's theory that Steve's death was an accident because he
was playing with his gun, like I just mentioned, and it accidentally went
off. Well, I guess the theory might make sense was if Steve was
eight years old. Otherwise, I think it's pretty insulting. In fact,
I have a few feeling that any police officer who has had weapons training would
find the idea insulting. Yes, there are documented cases in which cops were
killed or injured because they mishandled their gun and it went off accidentally. But
by all accounts, Steve was a very responsible police officer who took his job
very seriously. And it's hard for me to believe that a twenty one year
old man would feel compelled to pull out a loaded gun and play with it
like some kid until it discharged and killed him. It's interesting how Chief Carson
kind of contradicted himself in interviews where he expressed his reasons why he didn't believe
that Steve was murdered. During his Unsolved Mysteries interview, Carson stated that Steve
was just too good of an officer for someone to get the drop on him,
grab his gun and shoot him with it. But wait, if you
think he was such a good officer, why would you also believe that he
would be irresponsible enough to play with a loaded gun. As far as I'm
concerned, the fact that there was insignificant an ammounsive gunpowder residue on Steve's hands
seems to cancel the possibility that he could have fired the gun himself, intentionally
or otherwise. Since his death was eventually reclassified as a homicide, i'day's pretty
clear cut that he was a victim of foul play. But the big unanswered
question here is how did it happen and who was involved? I think about
it like this too. Remember he's telling his wife that he's alone at the
station. He is basically just a security guard, and he's kind of smart
smart alec about the fact that if that's what they want me to do,
that's what I'll be. And he's frustrated. Is it possible that, since
it's so slow there, that he's alone, that he takes his gun off
of his hole, like out of his holster or off of his belt like
in the holster and sets it on the table or something like that to get
comfortable because he's sitting for a long period of time, and someone comes in
and takes it off the or grabs it over his shoulder or something like that.
Is it possible that someone had another weapon or threatened him and said give
me your gun, right and he's going, uh, and it happened that
way, or it is possible that they stun him and overpower him and take
his gun. But you don't see like much bodily injury or any sign of
a struggle supposedly at the scene. I think there's multiple ways someone could have
gotten their hands on his gun. And we know for a fact that the
shell casings are the striations on the bullets that they all match his weapon specifically,
not just his type of weapon. Yeah, that's correct, Okay,
So it's not like it could have been another issued weapon that's the same making
and model. I think he could have been I think he could have been
overpowered. I think he could have been lackadaisical and stuck his holster up on
the table. And I think he could have been threatened and handed over his
gun. That seems least likely because as a law enforcement agent, you going
to have to kill me to get it. But there's a lot of scenarios
that could have occurred in that situation. If it was someone that he knew
or trusted, he wouldn't have had his guard up too, and they would
have been able to approach him, get close enough and just go for the
gun because he would never assume that he would be under threat or that somebody
would be taking his weapon. What if someone even said something to the effect
of, hey man, I need to see your service weapon. I'm I
might I got to trade it out, or we're going to take it and
do something with it. I mean, theoretically, if you think Chief Carson
was the trigger man, it could have been a thing Steve, I need
you to hand over your gun for a second, and then he just takes
the gun and shoots him. That's true, And the gun was never tested
correct for fingerprints or anything like that because they thought it was a quote suicide.
I think they probably would have checked it at some point. But it's
also possible that whoever fired the gun could have wiped it clean a fingerprints.
I mean, I don't trust him for an air PD. But since this
was investigated by the Attorney General's office, I'd liked that they that they did
eventually look into that. But I mean they did fire their assistant Attorneys General
who was looking really hard into this case. So like, I just don't
know how much faith I haven't anybody that's true. Yes, well, I'd
say there's a good chance that Steve's death was somehow connected to the arrest of
Melvin King and the Big Drug Bus, which netted around one hundred thousand dollars
worth of marijuana from his home. Since King was released on bond, he
was definitely a free man at the time Steve was killed. He told investigators
he was not an Ountain air on that particular evening. But I have no
idea if this was ever verified. Now for years. One aspect of this
story, which was downplayed during the Unsaw Mystery segment, was a woman being
heard in the background during Steve's final conversation with Michelle Sturdevant, as they never
really addressed who this woman could have been. Michelle said she thought it sounded
like she heard yelling, but Steve apparently told her that the woman was looking
for the town hall. The building which housed the police station was too flo
with town hall making up the first floor and the station making up the second.
At first, I wondered if this woman might have had no relation to
the case and was just a random citizen who wandered in asking for directions,
but left before Steve was killed. However, there's one major problem. This
woman never came forward and has never been identified. Mountain Era is a very
small town and Steve's death was a pretty big deal there, so if the
woman was a local resident, it's hard to believe she wouldn't have heard about
what happened. If she had no involvement, why not clarify that with the
authorities. While I have a theory about who this woman probably was, Melvin
King had a girlfriend named Susan Sprague, who also ran into trouble with the
law. Three days after the drug bust at King's house, Sprague's house was
searched and she was arrested after a small quantity of marijuana, along with some
drug paraphernalia, was found there. It was suspected that the couple was in
the business of distributing marijuana together. But of course, once all those drugs
went missing from the Torrance County Sheriff's office, the charges against both King and
Sprague were dropped. We know King died in two thousand and four, but
I have no idea what happened to Sprague. If King was involved in Steve's
death, there would not surprise me if he sent Sprague into the police station
to keep Steve distracted until someone else got the drop on him and used his
own gun to shoot him. Obviously, Steve would have recognized King if he
walked into the station, but since Sprague was arrested by the state Police,
not the Mountaineer PD, I'm not sure if Steve would have known her.
Of course, if King was the trigger man, he could never be prosecuted
for the murder since he's dead. But it seems unlikely that he would have
acted alone and someone in law enforcement had to be complicit in what happened.
Yeah, I think there's this feeling that the lack of concern for the fifty
four pounds of marijuana that were supposedly just scattered in the corner and eventually moved
to a trailer that was broken into. How would anyone know where those drugs
were unless someone said, oh, yeah, we just moved those over to
the trailer, or hey, guys, heads up, it's in this trailer
over there and there's not good security on it. Hey, heads up,
we have a single officer alone at the station right now. It's just very
bizarre how convenient almost everything seems. If you did have a drug ring going
on, where the evidence was stolen, where one of the arresting officers was
murdered. Are the police. Is there someone of those four individuals who works
there that's getting a kickback from King and Sprague, or is it completely unrelated
to law enforcement and it just happens to be this drug ring that's operating and
wants to eliminate one of the arresting officers. Either way, it is very
difficult to look away from King and his girlfriend as potential suspects in this case.
Another important detail is that Steve ordinarily did patrol when he was on duty,
and he was specific complaining to Michelle on the phone that if they want
me to be a security guard, I'll be a security guard. So it
sounds like it wasn't a common practice for him to work shifts inside the police
station. So it makes you wonder if someone from law enforcement told King or
whoever the killer was, that Steve would be there on that particular night.
Ooh, like he got in trouble that night and he said, you're just
going to sit your rear in at this destiny and take it easy, man.
You don't need to be on the streets. And then he's actually getting
set up to be murdered. So if the mountaineer Peedi was involved. There's
a good reason to be suspicious of Chief Carson. We know that Stephen Carson
had a conversation earlier that day about Steve writing too many traffic tickets, though
it sounded like they each had differing opinions about how he did. This conversation
was but since Steve had recently expressed concern to his father that there was something
going on in the town which he did not like, I have to think
that there was more to this disagreement than traffic tickets. The biggest issue with
Carson is that he really doesn't have a credible alibi for the twenty five minute
window between seven oh five and seven thirty, which is the approximate time period
when Steve was killed. When questioned about his whereabouts, Carson reportedly said he
quote blocked out, which is not a very satisfactory answer. There were also
multiple witnesses who were certain they saw Carson's patrol car parked outside the police station
between seven fifteen and seven twenty five. If it was just one or two
eye witnesses, I could chalk them up to being mistaken. But there were
apparently several witnesses who remembered seeing the vehicle there, and when you couple into
Edmundo Diaz's account of Carson appearing to be very upset when he picked him up
at seven point thirty, there are some disturbing implications here. And then there
are strange circumstances of how Steve's body was discovered in the first place, as
Eugene Wright claimed he walked into the station, saw Steve's body and radioed Carson.
Yet when Wright was questioned by Army investigators, they seemed to think that
he was withholding information and knew more than he was telling. There just seemed
to be an awful lot of discrepancies during the forty five minute window between when
Steve finished his phone conversation with his fiance and when Chief Carson radioed for medical
assistance. What's also scary is remember Wright said that if he told the truth
of what happened, that he was going to go to jail. And yet
he's buddy buddy with Carson because he directly calls him right like he makes a
personal call to the chief of police after he finds the body. Oh yeah,
Like he was friends with Carson's son. So I could definitely see him
a lying about what happened. If he was asked to, now, tell
me, why was he in the police department in the first place, Why
did he even stumble upon Steve's body, That's a good question. I'm not
sure that was ever specified. I mean, he could easily say, well,
I'm friends with Carson's son. Maybe he thought that the chief would be
working there and he decided to go in to see him. But maybe.
I mean, the Army hasn't released many details about the discrepancies in right story
and what they think he's withholding, So maybe he did not provide a convincing
story about why he was in the police station in the first place, and
that's why they became suspicious. It's also incredibly strange that no one from the
Mountaineer Police Department bothered to show up for Steve's funeral. I know Carson claimed
the experience would have been quote unquote too emotional for himself and his men,
but my god, I think the vast majority of police officers will tell you
that if one of your own is killed in the line of duty, then
you show up at their funeral, regardless of what your personal feelings about the
victim might be. If Steve's father could convince several members of the Albuquerque Police
Department to make the nearly eighty mile trip to Mountaineer to pay their respects,
then it's ridiculous that Steve's fellow officers could do the same thing. I mean,
even Frank Peeler, who was roommates with Steve for a brief period time,
didn't even attend, and then one week later he suddenly resigns from the
police force. There are just nothing but red flags here. All that being
said, I'm not sure that anyone from the Mountaineer PD actually pulled the trigger
and shot Steve. Remember, one year later, we had a statement from
a witness who claimed that a law enforcement officer from another agency had confessed to
murdering Steve. Though it sounds like this part of the investigation was never followed
up on because James Scarantino got fired from the Attorney General's office. But if
this story is true, then it would not surprise me if the law enforcement
officer who made this alleged confession belonged to the Torrance County Sheriff's office. That
place sounded like an even bigger mess than the Mountaineer PD. They somehow managed
to lose fifty four pounds of marijuana, and Sheriff Gary Watts and three of
his deputies would later be indicted on charges of larceny and conspiracy. So you
can pretty much connect the dots here. Stealing fifty four pounds of drugs from
a trailer outside a police station is pretty brazen, so would not surprise me
if this so called theft never actually happened. I could chalk it up to
police incompetence. Where not for the discrepancies about when this theft occurred. Sheriff
Watts claimed the marijuana was stolen one week after Steve was killed, but five
bags of marijuana were found inside Steve's kitchen drawer only three days after his death.
Since there appeared to be a police evidence tape on the bags, I
have to believe this was some of the same marijuana which was seized from Melvin
King's house and booked into evidence at the Torrance County Sheriff's office. Otherwise where
else could it have come from. When you couple in the fact that Steve's
tape recordings of his traffic stops also went missing from his house. With that
explanation, then you can't come to any other conclusion than there being a cover
up here. And you've got to remember both of these departments are in on
this single drug deal, right like one's arresting Melvin and one's arresting the girlfriend.
Is that correct? Yeah, that is true. They were both arrested
in different places. And even though the Mountaineer PD sees the marijuana, they
obviously trusted the Torrance County Sheriff's Office enough to allow them to store it inside
their police station because there wasn't any places inside the Mountaineer station. So it's
possible that the anger, like you said, is coming from the Torrance County
Sheriff's office. And they all know each other. It's one big circle,
and so it's possible there is a loyalty of those four officers who serve in
the police department to help protect guys that are in the sheriff's office. And
if Steve's a problem for the sheriff's office, their attague could be like,
well, you're kind of a problem for us too, and therefore, maybe
the police department's not responsible for his death. But they didn't care enough to
investigate because there was an assumption that they're friends and individuals who are part of
the sheriff's department were the ones involved and they were just going to look the
other way and correct me if I'm wrong, But say like they somehow are
all involved together in, you know, doing illegal things, and Steve is
a problem. Typically doesn't a sheriff's department. They aren't accountable in the same
way that a police department is to the mayor. Isn't that correct? Uh?
That would make sense because the Mountain Air PD is part of the city,
whereas the sheriff's office is part of the entire county. So I never
really thought about that, but that would make sense that a sheriff's office would
not have to be accountable towards the town mayor. So there if it's like
the fish rotting from the head and the entire department is corrupt. If you
had somebody who was problematic, and you know you had somebody there who was
willing to take that person out, you might go, oh, we can't
physically do it ourselves, but maybe these guys will help us out. And
that would make sense because if Carson, Diaz, and Peeler, even if
they were not personally involved in Steve's death, they still could be feeling like
underlying guilt over the fact that they let it happened, and that could explain
why they never bothered to attend his funeral, even if they were not the
ones who killed him. The discovery of the marijuana in Steve's house is pretty
bizarre, and I'm not quite sure what purpose it was supposed to serve.
It was possibly an attempt to discredit Steve in order to make it look like
he was stealing drugs, But if that was a case, how come it
wasn't discovered during the initial searches by law enforcement and was only found by Steve's
fiance and mother days later. The house was searched by numerous agencies, including
the new Mexico Attorney General's office, and I have a hard time believing they
all could have missed it, especially since it was hiding in plain sight.
No, the marijuana had to have been planted there. Perhaps they wanted to
make Steve look like an unstable drug addict who was stealing evidence to Pete's habit,
but there were no traces of drugs found in his system, or this
was done to give off the impression that Steve had been murdered by drug dealers.
Because he was stealing marijuana from them. Do people typically steal marijuana from
drug dealers? Guys? Is that a thing? And if they do it
doesn't lead to murder? No? Yeah, but that doesn't make much sense
either, since Chief Carson had strongly pushed forward the theory that there was no
foul play and Steve's death was a suicide or an accident. Surprisingly, during
his interview on Unsolved Mysteries, Carson did not discount the idea that someone could
have planted the marijuana in Steve's house, so it might have actually been done
without his knowledge. Given that the drugs were supposedly in the possession of the
Torrans County Sheriff's Office at the time, they were probably the ones who set
this in motion. It also could not be a coincidence that Steve was killed
the very day after he spoke to investigators from the New Mexico Attorney General's Office.
They never publicly released any information on what they spoke about, but Steve
had previously expressed concern to his father that there were things going on in Mountain
Air which he did not approve of. It's unclear just how much Steve knew
or what he revealed to investigators. But even if he didn't know or reveal
that much, someone might have become paranoid that Steve was a liability and could
expose something very incriminating. When Chief Carson spoke with Steve on the afternoon of
May seventh and advised him to slow things down and take it easy, this
may have been a last ditch attempt to rein him in. But once it
became a parent that Steve wasn't going to play ball, the final decision might
have been made to get rid of him that night absolutely, Or it could
be that Chief Carson truly was like, oh my gosh, I'm hearing rumors
that this kid's a problem, and I'm worried for him. So he's like,
listen, man, you gotta knock it off, right. He's maybe
trying to warn him and protect him, and it comes off in a confrontational
way, but it's it's insane when you think about the fact that they're assuming
this is a suicide, and so if they're doing an investigation is home what
were they What were they looking for? In my opinion, it would be
something like, was there a suicide note left? Was there evidence of him
being harassed or stocked at the time, or distress in his home or things
like that. You would look in the drawers, wouldn't you if you're looking
for any kind of evidence that like, why investigate if it's a suicide at
the police department? Why were they at his house in the first place?
And if they were there to try to get a bigger picture, why wouldn't
they thoroughly actually investigate. Yeah, it just seems like the marijuana was probably
not there during the original searches, and that for reasons on zone someone decided
to plan it there before Steve's family paid a visit. But once again,
that just seems pretty pointless because if you're not going to allow law enforcement to
find it, then what's the point And why why do an investigation anyway,
If you think it's a suicide because you're looking for those missing cassette tapes,
you want to find those because they might have incriminating information. Yeah, they
probably he defind those. That's why they've never been seen ever since. It's
tough to know who exactly would have been involved in this conspiracy, but my
guess is that it all started with Melvin King. King seemed to have a
major marijuana distribution operation going on in the area at that time, and it's
my guess that some members of local law enforcement were complicit or at the very
least paid off by King to look the other way. However, when Steve
pulled King over for drunk driving, busted him from possession, and obtained a
warrant to search King's house in order to uncover over fifty pounds of marijuana,
he stirred up a major hornet's nest. This would definitely explain why the tape
recordings of his traffic stops mysteriously disappeared. Now, I'm willing to believe that
at the outset, at least Chief Carson in the Mountaineer PD had no knowledge
or involvement with King's drug operation. They actually worked with Steve to obtain the
search warrant for King's house and confiscated all his drugs, and I have a
feeling that they would not have gone along with this if they were on King's
payroll. But I do think that other law enforcement agencies, most likely the
Torrance County Sheriff's Office, were involved with King's operation, which is why all
the marijuana evidence went missing and the charges against King wound up being dropped.
Since King was released on bond shortly after he was arrested, I'm sure he
believed this young, ambitious, straight ro cop who busted him could pose a
potential problem, so he ultimately made the call to have Steve eliminated. Remember,
King's girlfriend, Susan Sprague, was also facing her own drug charges,
which is why I think she was the woman heard in the background during Steve's
final phone call. She was probably sent in his bait to keep Steve distracted
until someone got the drop on him and had him killed. This was probably
necessary so that they could get their hands on Steve's gun and shoot him with
it, making it easier to craft a cover story that he either completed suicide
or was killed accidentally when his weapon discharged. Now, it's hard to know
who exactly was involved in this and who actually pulled the trigger. It's tempting
to saying that it was Melvin King, but we do have an alleged confession
by a law enforcement officer from another agency who claimed he shot Steve. I
can actually believe King might not have been present at the scene when the murder
took place, because Steve would have recognized him and been on his guard if
he saw King entering the station. But if the perpetrator was another police officer,
then it probably would have been much easier to catch Steve by surprise,
and like we talked about, it'd be easier to get that service weapon away
from him. I don't think if you were confronted by somebody and they said
give me your service weapon, I don't see someone just handing it over.
I see them getting a scuffle fussed with them. If you don't have a
weapon and you want mine, we're going to have to fight over it,
you know what I mean. And I just don't see that being the case.
I could see him being more relaxed and maybe having removed his holster from
his belt. I could see another officer asking, like to check a service
weapon or ask him to show him a service weapon or something like that,
and him falling for that. I do think it has to be involved in
this drug bust. There's too many bizarre elements and mishandling of an entirely too
big of an ordeal right to not follow a protocol for the Sheriff's Department to
maybe not be caught up in the drug deals with Melvin and that girlfriend would
be the perfect cover because Steve had never seen her, the Sheriff's department had
seen her, and so I totally bide this an area. You just described
that Melvin King is somehow working with the Sheriff's department and they use the girlfriend
as bait to help kind of distract Steve from being on his game in that
moment. Just who was it that assisted in that moment? Was it another
law enforcement agent? Was it King? Was it somebody that wasn't known yet
to Steve. It's no, it's so difficult to figure out who and what
was accountable here now, regardless of who pulled the trigger, I think there
were at least three people who did not tell the truth about what happened and
are involved, Chief Carson, Edmundo Diaz, and Eugene Wright, the soldier
who supposedly discovered Steve's body. I can't say that any of these people were
actually present and actively participated in Steve's murder, but at the very least they
helped cover something up and lied to the authorities. It all depends on the
timeline. The only reported gunshot that came from a witness who thought they heard
one at seven sixteen, and there are witnesses who were called seeing Carson's patrol
car parked outside the station between seven fifteen and seven twenty five. If these
accounts are accurate, then at the very least, Carson was present when Steve
was shot, and whoever was involved probably spent the next twenty to thirty minutes
fabricating a cover story before they called for medical assistance. It's possible that DEAs
and Wright were not present for the murder, but Carson enlisted their help to
back up his cover story, as Wright was a friend of Carson's son.
But as far as the actual trigger man who shot Steve, it may have
been someone we don't even know about. If the confession is accurate and it
was really a law enforcement officer from another agency, then perhaps it was someone
from the Torrance County Sheriff's office who was involved in me who was involved in
Melvin King's drug operation. Is there any chance that Carson's son had something to
do with it? Where right is there and happens to show up like,
is there a way bay link him in because Carson's son helps carry something off?
I actually don't have any information about Carson's son because They've never mentioned him
in any articles. I have no idea if he was even in Mountain Air
during that time period, so yeah, if he was involved, they've never
publicly named him regardless. This is just a very sad tale of an honest
young man who was finally living his dream of becoming a police officer and only
wanted to do the right thing, but ended up getting swallowed up in a
web of corruption. When he pulled over Melvin King for what seemed like a
routine dui, he inadvertently wound up getting embroiled in something which was a lot
bigger than he expected and led to him ultimately being killed. Sadly, after
all this time, I'm not sure if any of the people who were involved
could still be indicted for their roles in Steve's murder. Melvin King is now
dead, and while David Carson was still alive at the time I released my
original Trail and Cold episode, he passed away in January of twenty twenty three.
But even if Steve's killers are never brought to justice, at the very
least, his death was reclassified as a homicide, and the same police station
where he was killed is now named after him. That's how he deserves to
be remembered, rather than as someone who completed suicide on the job or was
killed because he was playing around with his gun. However, since multiple people
were likely involved in what happened, someone out there probably still knows something and
could come forward with the full truth and provide closure for Steve's loved ones.
So if you happen to have any information on the unsolved death of Steve Sandlin,
please contact the appropriate authorities. Jules Ashley any final thoughts in this case,
My heart really just goes out to Steve's family and the idea that he
had this young fiance and an eighteen month old baby, planning Mother's Day with
his love, right and getting to celebrate with his little one, and he's
murdered on the job, a job that he really had dedicated his life to
pursuing. Right, I'm going to be like my dad, I'm going to
serve and protect my community. And when he took that oath and he put
that badge on, he meant it. He was going to do his job.
He was going to protect the streets, he was going to get drugs
off the streets. And then he calls his wife and he says, if
they want me to be a security guard, I guess I'll just be a
security guard. He's getting in trouble for doing his job, which is enraging
to him, and that's the last time his wife's gonna hear his voice.
He's killed in his place of employment. And what do they do. Everybody
turns their back on Steve. They don't just turn their back on Steve by
not attending the funeral and doing the right thing. They turned their back on
the widow and the eighteen month old baby who he left behind. And so
at the end of the day, the only beauty in this case is that
you see, twenty five years after his murder, you see the very police
department that he served step up and say to his fiance and his son,
we cared about Steve, we care about his legacy. In fact, we're
going to name a building after him in erect a statue because he deserved better
and you deserved better. And so I love that Steve's son is growing up
knowing who his father was and that he was a hero and someone who was
pursuing this beautiful career. But what a tragedy to think at the very least
nobody cared enough to investigate this thoroughly, and at the very worst, the
men he had taken that oath with might be responsible for it. I feel
so terribly for the family. It must have felt like this abandonment, dealing
with the death of her fiance and the father having a child there, and
knowing that the police department they didn't have the constitution to show up. They
were too distraught by this. This is such a no no law enforcement departments
don't necessarily go, oh, you're too sad, you don't go to the
funeral. No, everybody goes. Everybody goes. It's so telling, especially
since Peeler, who had once lived with Steve that he resigns a week later.
I think if law enforcement at this point in time wanted to crack this
cold case, if Peeler is still alive, that would be the one that
I personally would lean on, because I think that although I don't believe he
was directly involved, I think that he would have information that could likely lead
to who was the perpetrator. But I am definitely inclined to think that the
Torrence County Sheriff's Department had something to do with it. But it seems to
be a conspiracy of many all linking back to King's one hundred thousand dollars marijuana
load that was confiscated and then stolen back, and part of it seems to
have been planted in Steve's home. To what end, we have no idea.
It's just such a confusing and convoluted case where it seems pretty clear that
multiple law enforcement agencies, given the fact that we had scandal In that was
at assistant district attorney, right that we had Scarantino who was fired while while
being assistant district attorney when he was digging deeply into this case and the investigators
were reassigned. It seems like he might have been getting too close to some
kind of answers that maybe would have put people in legal peril or like their
whole entire investigative unit or department could have been put in the hot seat.
And for whatever reason, multiple agencies seemed to potentially allegedly conspired together for this
strange type of silence. But things would have moved on by now, like
it's so many years later. We're looking at nearly forty years later, and
yet this isn't solved. When the landscape has entirely changed, so I'm just
curious as to why nobody has come forward with more information after all of these
years. Yeah. I remember being introduced to this case when I saw it
on Unsolved Mysteries over thirty years ago, and at the time, his death
was still classified as undetermined, and to me, this seemed like one of
the most obvious examples of a death being misclassified as a suicide or accident,
because it seemed pretty obvious that it was murdered, and unlike a lot of
these these other cases, they did finally reclassify it as a homicide, so
at least that kind of honored cees memory. They knew that he was a
victim on the line of duty who was not responsible for his own death,
and it is good to know that as time has gone on that the current
people in power have been trying to right this wrong and hopefully find justice for
him. But I think the problem is that so much time has passed,
a lot of the potential players on this are now dead, and a lot
of evidence was not preserved or it was lost, and there's probably still a
code of silence going on out there where there might be people who know the
truth but do not want to come forward. But yeah, this is just
so frustrating when you hear about a police officer who's actually passionate about his job,
wants to do the right thing, and then as a span of only
about eight weeks, he becomes completely disillusioned and says that this is not for
me, this job is not what I've expected. And I can only imagine
what he might have uncovered during that time period to make him feel that way.
And this is what beats a lot of good police officers down, where
if the system is so corrupt and broke in and a lot of bad people
are protecting each other, it can be very hard for like a good cop
to break through and do the right thing. And it sounds like Steve was
trying to do something but then wound up being killed before it could happen.
But like we said, at the very least, his wife and his former
fiance and his son who is now an adult, have finally got to experience
ceremonies which have honored his memory. He has a monument of him, and
he has an entire police station named after him, so they have done him
right. But until this case is conclusively solved, it's going to remain a
major travesty Robin. Do you want to tell us a little bit about the
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