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Welcome back to the Pathway Chili.
I'm Robin, I'm Jules, and I'm

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Ashley. Let's dive right into this
week's case. November eighth, nineteen eighty

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five, Harris County, Texas,
the charred body of fifty two year old

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Ed Baker, the millionaire chairman of
an oil investment business, is discovered inside

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his burned oak car in a remote
field. Since Baker was suffering from serious

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financial problems and claimed he was receiving
death threats, there is suspicion that he

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was murdered by people he owed money
to. However, others suspect the Baker

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staged an elaborate suicide in order to
ensure that his family could collect on his

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life insurance policies. It's also theorized
that Baker may have faked his own death

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and fled the country, but the
actual circumstances of what happened to him remain

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unknown. After that, the path
went Chiley. So today we're going to

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be exploring another bizarre case which was
featured on Unsolved Mysteries, the nineteen eighty

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five death of Ed Baker. Or
was it actually a death after all?

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This is a pretty unique story about
a man who built up a multimillion dollar

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oil investment business before it all came
crashing down and he wound up debt.

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The charred remains a Baker's body would
be discovered inside his burnt out car in

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a remote field, and on the
surface, this seemed like a clear cut

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case of foul play, since Baker
had been experiencing severe financial problems and his

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playing paranoid behavior prior to his death, which suggested that his life was in

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danger. But it turned out that
opinions about this case would be sharply divided,

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as there was other evidence to suggest
that Baker could have staged an elaborate

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suicide and made it look like a
murder so that his family could collect his

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life insurance benefits. And there was
also a third possibility. Even though investigators

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were pretty certain that the victim inside
the vehicle was Baker, his body was

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burned so badly that some people suspected
he faked his own death in order to

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escape his troubles. So could the
victim have actually been an unidentified John Doe.

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If Baker really did die that day, was it suicide or was someone

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else responsible for his death? Well, after thirty eight years, there are

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still no conclusive answers about what actually
happened, but the possibilities are endless.

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So we're going to be exploring a
number of different theories about the case on

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today's episode. I have so many
questions, like is it possible that the

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decline in wealth came from something more
complicated than just a failed business endeavor?

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Like could it have been that,
Yes, he's a very successful billionaire or

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multi millionaire doing these oil investments,
but he's also contributing money or funneling money

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to something that's darker. Or is
he gambling or is he part of some

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other kind of elite group who's doing
illegal behavior, and therefore when the finances

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crash, maybe it's not just his
business that's crashing those finances. Oh yes,

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this definitely gets brought up a lot
later in this case, there is

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speculation that he was involved in the
legal activity, and he was involved in

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gambling. He was spending more money
than he earned, so I think that

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definitely contributed to his problems. And
then you've got to think about the mental

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health that comes with that, right, So, Like I mean, I

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feel like right now, in twenty
twenty three, we're all doing the thing

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where it says, Okay, how
do we take our family finances and cover

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groceries and mortgages and car payments and
children's childcare and clothes and everything that we're

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looking at. Financial stress can cause
significant mental and emotional health problems. It

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can cause significant relational and family problems. I'm wondering when you started describing him,

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I almost felt like you were describing
Rivera to a point. I'm not

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sure there's a similarity because there really
isn't like any outward indications that he was

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suffering from a mental health problem.
But it's possible that he reached the point

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where he realized either I'm going to
be go to jail or I'm going to

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wind up bankrupt, and that suicide
might be the better option to almost protect

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his family instead of just being a
mental health crisis. Yeah, that's a

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lot of people theorize is that he
knew it was the end, but he

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wanted to ensure his family was being
taken care of before he killed himself.

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Our story begins in Texas in nineteen
eighty five. Our central figure is fifty

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two year old Edward Gerald Baker,
who goes by the name Ed and currently

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lives in Houston. Ed spent the
early part of his life working such jobs

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as a shoe salesman and an insurance
agent, and had two daughters and a

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son with his first wife, but
after twenty years of marriage, tragedy would

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strike on Thanksgiving weekend in nineteen seventy
three when Ed's wife was killed in a

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car wreck. He would soon get
remarried to a woman named Mary Ella and

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eventually decided to start his own company
called Vanguard Groups International. At the outset,

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Ed only had three employees working under
him, including Mary, and the

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company initially specialized in such ventures as
building inexpensive housing and selling partnerships in commercial

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real estate development. However, by
the time the nineteen eighties rolled around,

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the oil industry was hitting a major
boom period in Texas, so Baker decided

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to start using Vanguard to sell limited
partnerships in speculative oil wells. After achieving

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some early success with promoting oil well
exploration, it wasn't long before Baker developed

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a reputation for being a brilliant strategist
who was able to develop clever tax shelter

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programs and sell them to wealthy investors
that were happy to trust him with their

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money. As a result, Vanguard
would be featured in Ink magazine for three

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consecutive years on their annual INK five
hundred list of the fastest growing privately held

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companies in the United States. By
nineteen eighty four, the company was housed

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in a newly constructed office building and
its sales had reached to nineteen million.

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However, as Ed's wealth grew,
it seemed like he wanted to change his

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lifestyle, and in March of that
year, he decided to divorce Mary after

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ten years of marriage. In September, Ed married his third wife, Karen

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Wallbridge, but the marriage would prove
to be short lived, and Ed would

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file for divorced from her only five
months later. Only four days after the

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divorce was finalized, Ed got married
for a fourth time to Sandy Hawk,

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one of his employees at Vanguard.
Okay, if anyone's listening, if you

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were going to be his fifth wife, it's time to start looking at the

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trail right and there, and is
probably not someone you're going to rope down

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and have as a long term partner. So surprising, very surprising. You

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have this successful man. He sounds
like he's almost a narcissist who says Okay,

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I've been successful. I don't need
her, even though she stood beside

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me and help me start this company. And this one's not so fun either,

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And I can get whatever I want
because I'm a wealthy man. And

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he just kind of seems to pick
and choose what he wants when he wants

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it. Don't you feel like he's
probably already engaged in an affair, like

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the idea that four days later he
goes on and he marries that employee of

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Vanguard, And it's like, clearly
you were obviously engaged in some kind of

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extramarital affair prior to this divorce,
because just your timeline seemed to be like,

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whatever's convenient if she starts to have
too many opinions, or if I

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find somebody who I think is better
looking or more fits the idea of the

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successful guy that I've become. It's
exactly what Actley said. It just falls

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under this really narcissistic behavior. And
it's pretty cringe when you look at this

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long list of women. But ugh, get like Ash said, if there

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was a fifth wife, you would
definitely be looking at all of these other

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wives that came before you, and
these short marriages and I mean, the

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one ended in tragedy. We can't
count that, but it seems like a

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man who wanted to be on the
rise and wanted to project a certain image,

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and his wife was like merely an
extension of him, exactly. And

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as he gets more and more successful, or as he thinks he gets bigger

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and more grandigoes, he's like,
oh that one not so much. Not

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you either, No, thanks,
thanks for helping me, but I'm going

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to continue to keep going. Doesn't
sound like the person i'd want to have

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chasing me for a short term.
But I will say, even though he

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did get married four days after the
divorce was finalized, we all know,

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especially if money is involved, a
divorce would have taken a really long time.

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And you do have people who say, I've been filed for divorce for

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two years, you know, and
because of the court systems were waiting on

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stuff. But Ed's gross so far
in his his grandiose behavior. I think

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that's an extension of of that.
Oh yeah, we're going to talk more

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about this on our next episode.
But I have the feeling that Ed was

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suffering from a serious midlife crisis as
he got into his fifties and got more

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rich because he did a number of
weird things around this time period, and

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the fact that he went through so
many wives in such a short amount of

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time. It was just kind of
par for the course for him during this

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time period. Doesn't the name Vanguard
remind you, do either of you?

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Watch Seinfeld? Yes, vandal Ay
Industries exactly. Yeah. And it also

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reminds me of them, didn't the
leader cult leaders? Yeah? I'm like,

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yeah, I think he did keep
going there or whatever. Yes.

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And if another man, if you
just look at him, I'm I question,

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what was it. I don't see
it either about good old Vanguard.

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So Ed's going to hire George Constanza
to be his LATEX sales yes, and

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start his own colt. It was
also around this time period when Ed began

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to spend money excessively and became heavily
involved in high stakes gambling. However,

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this would eventually come back to bite
him because, without his investor's knowledge,

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Baker had been borrowing their money to
support and maintain his lavish lifestyle. He

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likely assumed that he would be able
to repay that money once he attracted another

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round of investors, But as nineteen
eighty five rolled around, the price of

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crude oil started dropping in a huge
way. This would lead to an oil

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glut, which drastically worsened over the
next two years and had a major negative

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impact on Houston's economy. As a
result, Vanguard started experiencing serious financial hardship

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as Baker found himself unable to attract
many people to invest in his oil well

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deals. As the years went on, Vanguard's investors, most of whom had

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invested a minimum of two hundred thousand
dollars each, were clamoring for their money,

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but Baker was unable to repay them. Three lawsuits were filed against Vanguard,

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including one from Window Energy, who
complained about having invested in an oil

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drilling operation which was never completed.
Okay, so basically he's running a Ponzi

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scheme where he just continues to make
these false promises, collect money, and

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use them for his own benefit,
is what he's doing here exactly. And

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like Ponzi schemes weren't as well known
in the nineteen eighties, but these would

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definitely come into the spotlight a lot
during like the late nineties and early two

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thousands, with people like Bernie Madoff
and with like the two thousand and eight

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financial crisis. But whenever you do
something like this, it's always going to

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fall apart, where eventually you just
do not have enough money to maintain your

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lifestyle and pay back your investors in
the house of cards comes crashing down.

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Who do they say, borrowing from
Peter to pay Pal? Is that is

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not the phrase? Yeah, that's
the phrase. Yeah, exactly. I

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Also you got to think, too, he's got kids, right, that

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are they're probably adult kids at this
point, but he's he's got kids too

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that are you know, I'm sure
part of this lifestyle or you know,

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their dad's an important figure in their
life. And so this would be incredibly

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stressful to say. Not only do
I have the investors that are coming after

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me, I have legal repercussions coming
after me. Eventually this could turn into

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criminal charges. And I don't know
how much he's worried about his temporary wives,

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but I do assume he would be
very concerned about the fact that he

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does have children and possibly you know, other little kiddos that are counting on

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him, and not only is his
lifestyle falling apart, but theirs could be

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too. By October of that year, Vanguard was on the verge of bankruptcy,

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and Baker's issues with his investors,
as well as some tax problems,

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meant that he was not only in
danger of losing his company, but he

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could also be facing potential jail time. Baker told his private investigator, Bob

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Gail, that in order to escape
financial ruin, he was arranging a baileut

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with two men from Miami who were
going to loan him a million dollars.

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According to Gail, Baker was very
concerned because he'd heard these men might have

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some sort of connection to the mafia
in organized crime, so he wanted Gaile

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to run a background check on them. While at around seven thirty pm on

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the evening of November sixth, Ed
suddenly showed up at the home of his

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ex wife, Mary, and he
appeared to be very paranoid and anxious.

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Mary said that she had never seen
Ed look this bright and before, as

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he started rambling on about how he
was being followed and that over the past

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two weeks he'd received some letters at
work containing death threats. Ed also told

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Mary that earlier that day he received
two threatening telephone calls at his home number,

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even though it was unlisted, and
the caller said quote today is your

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day to die. I feel so
bad for Mary in this moment. I

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mean, this is the woman,
remember who started the company with him when

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it was a legitimate business. It's
something that you know, she was part

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of the action, and when it
starts to skyrocket, he divorces her like

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it's almost as if she really was
his right hand man. She really was

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his best friend, saying, not
only am I helping you grieve the death

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of your late wife, I'm the
wife to step in after that role.

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I know from experience that's not an
easy position to be in. She also

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is encouraging him to chase this stream
of a new endeavor and they do it

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together, and then he leaves her, and then she watches him start to

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kind of have this grandiose lifestyle from
wife to wife to wife, and then

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all of a sudden, he's back
on my doorstep. And as much as

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you would kind of be frustrated with
him, this is the man who was

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your best friend and husband for many
years. You guys did a lot of

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things together, including your family,
and he's scared and he's overwhelmed, and

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I'm not so sure that there wasn't
some kind of complication if he received money

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from someone other than a financial institute
who was going to quote help him.

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Trust me, there were heavy strings
attached to that money. So it's like

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blood money. In my opinion,
no one is going to just help you.

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I've learned that the hard way right
financially, with business, no one's

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out to just help you. There's
always something at the back end that they're

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going to get tenfold for whatever they're
offering to give you. So could he

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have been right? Could he have
been scared that these people wanted more than

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he could repay and now he's indebted
to them and he might have to pay

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with his life possibly, Or like
we talked about it earlier, he could

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be setting an elaborate plan in motion. But at this point I almost feel

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like he actually is legitimately overwhelmed and
scared. He has real names to give

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to his private investigator. If he
was just super vague with everything and he

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didn't have names of the actual people
to run background checks, I would say

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what you just said, Ash.
He was setting up this whole idea of

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there being this imminent threat to his
life in order to be able to have

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this elaborate stage suicide so that the
insurance companies would pay out and you know,

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his debt would be forgiven or whatever
the situation. But the fact that

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these people have names, I don't
know. It does sound like he could

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have been in danger. And I
will say about Mary is that she seemed

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like a very decent person that even
though Ed had divorced her years earlier,

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it sounds like she still legitimately cared
about him and was fearful about his life.

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And we'll talk more about this later
on, but I find it interesting

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that as the years went on,
it would be Mary, his ex wife,

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who seemed to be more anxious to
find answers about what happened to Ed,

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rather than his current wife Sandy.
So Mary was would pretty much be

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the torch bearer at trying to find
answers and being an advocate for him over

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the next several years. I assume
that was her love. I mean,

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I assume that they truly did life
together, whereas it sounds like these second

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are the third and fourth wife might
have been luxury items who were arm candy

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for a man who had more money
than he knew what to do with and

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started to want to have somebody who
was young and attractive and fun at a

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party, these kinds of things.
Whereas Mary was that person, she was

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his rock. I'm sure through many
griefful moments mourning his wife, I'm sure

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that she was there when days weren't
good in a small business startup, and

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she was there when the days were
good until he decided to leave. So

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I very much believe she not only
loved him, but she loved his family.

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And in this moment, she's going
like, as much as I think

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sometimes you are the dumbest man I've
ever met, I don't want anything to

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happen to you. I feel like, aside from his late wife, it

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has to be the most meaningful relationship
that he's ever cultivated. And unfortunately,

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probably due to his midlife crisis,
he used her bit like a stepping stone

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and then went through wives really fast, and at that point he wasn't married

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to them for very long. And
it doesn't seem like he seemed all that

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interested in the day after the relationship. It was more like the external,

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how it made him appear and how
others perceived him, and how his wife

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00:18:06.359 --> 00:18:08.759
was an extension of him. But
it feels like from the information that we

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have, his relationship with Mary was
different, especially since she was the one

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that he trusted to go to with
this information. It speaks to the depth

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00:18:18.119 --> 00:18:22.160
of their prior relationship for sure.
So before he left Mary's house, Ed

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mentioned that he had sent his current
wife, Sandy, to her daughter's home

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in Austin for her own protection.
Hours later, at approximately one am on

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the morning of November the seventh,
Sandy said that she spoke to Ed over

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the phone from Austin and he told
her that he was holed up in his

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bedroom because he had just received another
threatening phone call. He said there was

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a good possibility he might die and
asked Sandy to remain strong before he ended

250
00:18:45.880 --> 00:18:49.319
the call. Later that morning,
at nine to fifteen am, Ed's gardner

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showed up at his residence and discovered
that the house had a broken window and

252
00:18:52.920 --> 00:18:57.519
appeared to have been burglarized. When
the gardener went inside and entered Ed's bedroom,

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he noticed that the telephone have been
knocked off a table and an ashtray

254
00:19:02.319 --> 00:19:04.480
was overturned on the floor. Though
the rest of the house did not appear

255
00:19:04.519 --> 00:19:08.119
to be ransacked, there was no
sign of Ed anywhere, and while a

256
00:19:08.160 --> 00:19:12.319
shotgun he owned appeared to be missing, most of Ed's personal items, including

257
00:19:12.319 --> 00:19:17.640
his jacket and a wallet containing credit
cards and nine hundred dollars in cash have

258
00:19:17.720 --> 00:19:22.559
been left behind. Okay, I
mean knowing that we have two theories murder

259
00:19:22.640 --> 00:19:27.960
or suicide, or potentially a murder
he committed, put the body in the

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00:19:29.000 --> 00:19:33.359
car, and fled. You could
see this from both sides, right,

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00:19:33.400 --> 00:19:37.039
But I'm almost inclined at this moment
to think he had sent Sandy to her

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00:19:37.119 --> 00:19:44.279
daughter's house for her own production.
I genuinely think he was scared, whether

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it's legitimate or not perceived or not
imagined, I think he was scared.

264
00:19:49.960 --> 00:19:55.400
And he also makes a phone call
over to say that he had just received

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00:19:55.400 --> 00:19:59.359
another threatening call. So he is
confiding in Sandy, and he is confiding

266
00:19:59.440 --> 00:20:07.440
in Mary's and then that night he
disappears and he doesn't take important things.

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Now, if you're going to complete
suicide, I don't think you need your

268
00:20:08.920 --> 00:20:15.039
wallet, although keep in mind you
have your car and the registration for that

269
00:20:15.119 --> 00:20:18.839
and stuff. But to make it
easier on people, wouldn't you want your

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00:20:18.880 --> 00:20:23.240
wallet at the scene to make an
identification super easy? You'd think if you

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were planning it. Now, if
you weren't planning this and you were apprehended

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00:20:26.640 --> 00:20:32.839
or something happened to you. Leaving
your wallet behind becomes a very serious issue.

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00:20:33.720 --> 00:20:36.359
And there's also the fact that the
only item that appears to be missing

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00:20:36.480 --> 00:20:40.079
is his shotgun. And you keep
wondering yourself if he was kidnapped, why

275
00:20:40.119 --> 00:20:42.759
would his shotgun be missing, Like, why wouldn't they use their own guns

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to get him out of the house. So it makes you wonder is there

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00:20:45.359 --> 00:20:49.400
a reason that he took that when
he disappeared. Maybe he fell for fear,

278
00:20:49.680 --> 00:20:53.160
in fear of his own life,
and that was the quickest weapon for

279
00:20:53.279 --> 00:20:59.359
him to grab, but somehow he
was apprehended in the process. But I

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00:20:59.400 --> 00:21:03.799
agree these people are they're as mobbed
up as they seem like they are,

281
00:21:03.119 --> 00:21:07.759
or is threatening so much so that
he is so paranoid. He's confiding in

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00:21:08.279 --> 00:21:12.240
both his ex wife Mary and his
current wife Sandy, and he's telling his

283
00:21:12.279 --> 00:21:17.240
private investigator that he's scared. These
guys have their own guns, so they

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00:21:17.240 --> 00:21:19.480
didn't take his gun to do this. But I do agree with you ash

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In that if he was going to
stage an elaborate suicide, I would think

286
00:21:25.240 --> 00:21:29.559
identification of the body would be a
really important thing, So you would want

287
00:21:29.640 --> 00:21:33.839
to make it as easy as possible
for the investigators at the scene to be

288
00:21:33.839 --> 00:21:37.920
able to draw the conclusion that it
is indeed your body. Ed remained a

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00:21:37.960 --> 00:21:42.880
missing person for the next twenty four
hours, but shortly after nine am on

290
00:21:42.920 --> 00:21:48.039
the morning of November eighth, the
Harris County Sheriff's Department was contacted by some

291
00:21:48.160 --> 00:21:53.839
farmers who reported finding a burned out
vehicle in a remote rice field located next

292
00:21:53.920 --> 00:22:00.279
to a dirt road about twenty miles
outside of Houston. When the Sheriff's and

293
00:22:00.359 --> 00:22:03.599
arrived at the scene, they discovered
that the burned out vehicle was a Jaguar

294
00:22:03.680 --> 00:22:08.720
Sedan and the charred remains of a
person were in the passenger seat. The

295
00:22:08.799 --> 00:22:12.880
body was burned so badly that they
could not even tell if the victim was

296
00:22:12.920 --> 00:22:17.960
a man or a woman, and
its weight had been reduced to thirty two

297
00:22:18.200 --> 00:22:22.359
pounds. A check of the Jaguar
revealed that it was registered to Ed Baker,

298
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but due to the condition of the
remains, the authorities could not say

299
00:22:26.720 --> 00:22:32.559
with absolute one hundred percent certainty that
the victim was him. However, the

300
00:22:32.599 --> 00:22:37.200
medical examiner's report noted that there were
at least sixty points of similarity between Ed's

301
00:22:37.240 --> 00:22:41.440
dental records and what was left of
the victim's teeth and jaw, so the

302
00:22:41.480 --> 00:22:47.680
official consensus was that it was him. In addition, a ring was found

303
00:22:47.759 --> 00:22:52.000
with the victim, and Sandy would
positively identify it as a ring that she

304
00:22:52.039 --> 00:22:56.720
had given to her husband. A
burnt thirty two caliber revolver was on the

305
00:22:56.799 --> 00:23:00.559
vehicle's passenger side floorboard beneath the victim's
feet, and there did appear to be

306
00:23:00.599 --> 00:23:06.559
a gunshot wound in his head.
The cartridge under the revolver's firing pin had

307
00:23:06.559 --> 00:23:11.480
an indentation which seemed to indicate it
had been fired, while the other five

308
00:23:11.519 --> 00:23:15.480
shells inside the gun looked like they
had exploded from the severe heat of the

309
00:23:15.519 --> 00:23:19.759
fire. There also appeared to be
remains of a shotgun inside the vehicle,

310
00:23:21.119 --> 00:23:25.640
which may have been the missing shotgun
from Ed's residence. A total of three

311
00:23:25.799 --> 00:23:30.720
empty one gallon cans of gasoline were
found inside and around the vehicle, so

312
00:23:30.759 --> 00:23:34.680
it seemed pretty obvious that someone had
intentionally set the Jaguar on fire and this

313
00:23:34.839 --> 00:23:38.599
was a case of arson. Okay, so many questions here. If this

314
00:23:38.759 --> 00:23:45.359
is some mafia related or planned attack
on this man and they have the plan

315
00:23:45.480 --> 00:23:49.400
to go in. We're going to
kidnap him. We're going to put him

316
00:23:49.440 --> 00:23:55.880
in his own car and drive him
somewhere, shoot him, set the car

317
00:23:55.960 --> 00:23:59.720
on fire, and tried to burn
all the evidence. If they have the

318
00:23:59.759 --> 00:24:03.839
wear withal to buy gas cans and
gasoline plot when they're going to attack this

319
00:24:03.920 --> 00:24:10.079
man, make threatening phone calls.
I'm going back to the shotgun we just

320
00:24:10.160 --> 00:24:14.920
mentioned. Why would his shotgun be
part of the plan. You came prepared

321
00:24:14.920 --> 00:24:18.400
with a murder weapon. If you
went to this extent to attack him right

322
00:24:18.440 --> 00:24:22.079
and to kill him and to get
rid of him, why not just kill

323
00:24:22.160 --> 00:24:25.240
him in his home right there and
set that on fire. That's very bizarre

324
00:24:25.319 --> 00:24:30.039
too. Why risk taking him from
his home to the car and driving with

325
00:24:30.160 --> 00:24:34.960
someone who is likely panicked. Why
would you do all that? No one

326
00:24:36.000 --> 00:24:37.799
else was in the home. It's
not like they had to isolate him away

327
00:24:37.839 --> 00:24:44.440
from anybody else. That's odd to
me. I'd also like to ask,

328
00:24:44.720 --> 00:24:48.559
do we know you said? The
medical examiner reported there's at least sixty points

329
00:24:48.599 --> 00:24:52.640
of similarity between Ed's dental records and
what was left of the teeth and draw

330
00:24:52.759 --> 00:25:00.680
area. I'm curious how rare would
that be for other people to match that,

331
00:25:00.880 --> 00:25:03.519
like, is that something that one
in ten thousand would have, one

332
00:25:03.519 --> 00:25:07.799
in one hundred would have, one
in a trillion would have What are we

333
00:25:07.880 --> 00:25:11.079
looking at there? That's a good
question, because I don't really know how

334
00:25:11.119 --> 00:25:15.680
they conducted dental records investigations back then, Because this was nineteen eighty five,

335
00:25:15.759 --> 00:25:19.039
it was still a much different time. DNA testing was still a couple of

336
00:25:19.079 --> 00:25:25.319
years away, So today they would
just use DNA to positively identify beyond a

337
00:25:25.359 --> 00:25:27.039
shadow of a doubt if it was
him. But here, you're trying to

338
00:25:27.039 --> 00:25:32.119
do dental records for a very burnt
out body, and I can't imagine what

339
00:25:32.160 --> 00:25:34.599
the teeth looked like at this point. So he said there were at least

340
00:25:34.599 --> 00:25:38.960
sixty points of similarity. But if
it's sixty out of say eighty or ninety,

341
00:25:40.000 --> 00:25:42.000
then that sounds like a pretty convincing
match. But if it's sixty out

342
00:25:42.039 --> 00:25:47.200
of a couple hundred, then maybe
that isn't so convincing. But he did

343
00:25:47.279 --> 00:25:49.440
think that there was enough similarities that
he felt that the victim was ed.

344
00:25:51.759 --> 00:25:55.599
So witnesses reported having seen smoke in
the rice field early on the morning of

345
00:25:55.680 --> 00:26:00.000
November the seventh, which meant that
Ed's death likely took place only hours after

346
00:26:00.160 --> 00:26:03.640
his final phone call with Sandy.
Around that same time period, an eyewitness

347
00:26:03.640 --> 00:26:07.799
had been driving through the area and
noticed a blue Chevy pickup truck with chrome

348
00:26:07.880 --> 00:26:12.319
rails and mag wheels rapidly speeding away
from the field, but the truck was

349
00:26:12.319 --> 00:26:15.759
never found and it was unclear if
he had had any connection to what happened.

350
00:26:17.400 --> 00:26:21.160
In a bizarre turn of events,
hours after the discovery of the burnt

351
00:26:21.160 --> 00:26:23.480
out jaguar, the body of a
young man who appeared to be in his

352
00:26:23.519 --> 00:26:27.880
early twenties and dressed in nothing more
than a camouflaged shirt, was found about

353
00:26:27.880 --> 00:26:33.039
a quarter mile away from the scene. The victim had been handcuffed and killed

354
00:26:33.079 --> 00:26:37.200
by several blows to the head,
which crushed his skull. Initially, there

355
00:26:37.200 --> 00:26:41.640
was speculation that this man might have
been hired to kill Baker before someone else

356
00:26:41.759 --> 00:26:45.079
killed him, but the investigation later
determined that he was murdered in a dope

357
00:26:45.119 --> 00:26:49.359
deal, which was completely unrelated to
the Baker case. As far as I

358
00:26:49.359 --> 00:26:52.920
can tell, this young man's name
has never been released publicly, and there

359
00:26:53.039 --> 00:26:57.359
virtually no details available about what happened
to him, but he was likely killed

360
00:26:57.359 --> 00:27:02.799
around twenty four hours after the first
eyewitness sightings of the smoke from the burning

361
00:27:02.880 --> 00:27:07.200
Jaguar. So it was nothing more
than an odd coincidence that these two events

362
00:27:07.240 --> 00:27:11.720
happened to take place in the same
area. That is so sad I could

363
00:27:11.759 --> 00:27:14.759
see where Initially you'd go, Okay, wait a minute, is something connected

364
00:27:14.799 --> 00:27:18.680
here, But it's pretty clear that
they're not. It's just two tragedies occurred

365
00:27:18.720 --> 00:27:22.960
on the same evening. But okay, what about back to this eyewitness and

366
00:27:22.079 --> 00:27:29.359
the blue Chevy pickup truck with chrome
wheels that are flying away, right,

367
00:27:29.440 --> 00:27:33.599
it really kind of looks chaotic to
someone enough for them to remember and mention

368
00:27:33.720 --> 00:27:37.680
it. We know the problems with
eyewitnesses. I won't get started with it.

369
00:27:37.799 --> 00:27:41.559
But was anything ever able to be
done? I know a blue Chevy

370
00:27:41.720 --> 00:27:47.559
doesn't really give you a whole lot
of details, but was anything found from

371
00:27:47.559 --> 00:27:51.839
that truck? It doesn't sound like
it. I haven't read anything. If

372
00:27:51.839 --> 00:27:55.839
they looked for tire tracks to like
indicate if the pickup truck might have been

373
00:27:55.880 --> 00:27:59.599
near the scene where Ed's car was
found. They obviously thought it was an

374
00:27:59.599 --> 00:28:03.319
important because they did reveal it on
Unsolved Mystery several years later, and they

375
00:28:03.319 --> 00:28:07.359
thought it might be a vital clue. So maybe the witness shared some information

376
00:28:07.480 --> 00:28:11.160
to make them think that this truck
had some connection to what happened. But

377
00:28:11.200 --> 00:28:15.240
then again, like at that point, the motorist is not going to know

378
00:28:15.519 --> 00:28:18.720
that someone has just been murdered in
that field, So are you really going

379
00:28:18.799 --> 00:28:22.880
to distinctly remember a truck speeding away
before you know the significance of what happened.

380
00:28:22.880 --> 00:28:26.759
It could be something where once he
learned about Ed's death, he just

381
00:28:26.759 --> 00:28:29.839
thought back and says, oh,
I remember seeing the speeding truck, So

382
00:28:29.920 --> 00:28:33.039
maybe it's significant to the case and
that's why he came forward. Do we

383
00:28:33.119 --> 00:28:41.440
know anything about the trajectory of the
gunshot? I know it doesn't look like

384
00:28:41.480 --> 00:28:45.200
they have that information. They never
released it publicly. That's too bad,

385
00:28:45.279 --> 00:28:48.920
because I think you could see if
somebody else was going to put a gun

386
00:28:48.960 --> 00:28:52.200
to his head and kill him,
you're going to be looking at a certain

387
00:28:52.240 --> 00:28:56.720
trajectory, Whereas if somebody is going
to end their own life, say with

388
00:28:56.839 --> 00:29:02.599
a rifle, you're going to get
a very specific trajectory, don't you guys

389
00:29:02.640 --> 00:29:06.680
think? I think so, yeah, because I'm currently working on another case

390
00:29:06.680 --> 00:29:10.839
where the trajectory of the bullet and
the victim could make a big difference in

391
00:29:10.920 --> 00:29:15.119
determining whether their death was murder or
suicide. But it's also possible because things

392
00:29:15.119 --> 00:29:19.720
were spurt so badly with his body
that maybe they just couldn't tell clearly in

393
00:29:19.759 --> 00:29:26.079
this particular case. Shortly after the
discovery of Baker's body, his attorney,

394
00:29:26.119 --> 00:29:30.880
Wardbucy, received a letter from him
which read, quote, mister Wardbucy,

395
00:29:32.400 --> 00:29:34.839
there have been threats on my life
in the past month that I don't know

396
00:29:34.880 --> 00:29:38.799
how real they are. Just in
case, I've written Sandy a letter that

397
00:29:38.880 --> 00:29:42.279
I want you to keep to give
to her in case something should happen to

398
00:29:42.319 --> 00:29:47.240
me. I hope this isn't silly, but in these days and times,

399
00:29:47.480 --> 00:29:52.160
crazy things happen every day. Maybe
I'm just reacting, but I've never had

400
00:29:52.160 --> 00:29:55.200
a threat before, and it just
kind of gets to me. I guess

401
00:29:55.279 --> 00:30:00.240
you've had experience with clients before,
so you understand if anything should happen.

402
00:30:00.440 --> 00:30:03.519
Please help Sandy and my kids all
you can. You've always been a good

403
00:30:03.519 --> 00:30:07.920
friend and I know I can count
on you. Thanks Ed Baker end quote.

404
00:30:08.680 --> 00:30:12.279
Indeed, Ed didn't close a second
letter, which he asked us to

405
00:30:12.319 --> 00:30:17.319
give to Sandy, though the contents
of the second letter have never been revealed

406
00:30:17.359 --> 00:30:23.640
publicly. WHOA, that's so heavy. It's heavy for both circumstances, like

407
00:30:25.200 --> 00:30:29.559
ooh, I just got chills if
he was going to complete suicide. The

408
00:30:29.640 --> 00:30:33.720
fact that this man was able to
sit back and say, Okay, I'm

409
00:30:33.720 --> 00:30:37.359
going to go ahead and set this
up, so that's my family to be

410
00:30:37.400 --> 00:30:40.440
taking care of financially. I'm going
to write my attorney letter. But then

411
00:30:40.480 --> 00:30:44.400
he sits there. I can't imagine
what it would take to say goodbye to

412
00:30:44.480 --> 00:30:47.839
rebel or like, think about,
you know, if I got to say

413
00:30:47.839 --> 00:30:49.720
goodbye to buddy, Like, what
would you actually say? What would you

414
00:30:49.799 --> 00:30:53.720
put in something that's that important?
So having to sit down and write something

415
00:30:53.759 --> 00:30:59.000
like that would be so overwhelming,
and then to pretend to function afterwards if

416
00:30:59.039 --> 00:31:02.720
you knew you were going to complete
suicide would be one of the most just

417
00:31:02.920 --> 00:31:06.960
bizarre, heavy things I think you
could do in life. I don't even

418
00:31:07.000 --> 00:31:11.160
know where that's going, but that's
heavy. And then imagine if this is

419
00:31:11.279 --> 00:31:15.519
legit. Imagine if he knows he
got in with the wrong people, he

420
00:31:15.599 --> 00:31:18.960
has a massive debt to pay.
There's only one option, and it's make

421
00:31:18.000 --> 00:31:22.640
a deal with the devil, and
he knows the devil's incredibly dangerous, and

422
00:31:22.920 --> 00:31:26.759
this devil has basically told him you'll
never be able to repay this debt.

423
00:31:26.839 --> 00:31:29.680
In fact, I'm just going to
take your life for it. And he's

424
00:31:29.720 --> 00:31:33.279
having to prepare for like when is
that going to happen to me? Also

425
00:31:33.440 --> 00:31:38.759
a horrific heavy burden to be carrying
around. Yeah, we know that Ed

426
00:31:40.359 --> 00:31:42.480
mailed it to buc like a short
time before his death, but it didn't

427
00:31:42.559 --> 00:31:47.519
arrive until after Ed was already dead. So you could construe this as a

428
00:31:47.519 --> 00:31:51.799
setup where if he was planning suicide, he's just planting the seeds by sending

429
00:31:51.799 --> 00:31:55.200
this final letter to say I want
you to take care of my family because

430
00:31:55.240 --> 00:31:57.079
my life is in danger. But
on the other hand, it could be

431
00:31:57.119 --> 00:32:01.119
authentic where he wasn't planning to kill
himself, but he felt that, oh,

432
00:32:01.240 --> 00:32:05.079
I'm not long for this world.
I may be murdered soon, so

433
00:32:05.119 --> 00:32:07.200
I better send this letter to my
attorney to get my affairs in orders.

434
00:32:07.240 --> 00:32:10.599
So I know that war Busy we'll
talk about it later, has his own

435
00:32:10.640 --> 00:32:15.680
ideas about what happened to Ed,
but I cannot imagine his reaction getting that

436
00:32:15.759 --> 00:32:19.799
letter after finding out that this close
friend of yours has just been killed under

437
00:32:19.799 --> 00:32:25.200
strange circumstances. So, following her
husband's death, Sandy immediately started expressing her

438
00:32:25.200 --> 00:32:30.160
belief that her husband had been murdered. She suspected that he was the victim

439
00:32:30.200 --> 00:32:32.720
of a mafia hit because he owed
a two hundred and fifty thousand dollars loan

440
00:32:32.759 --> 00:32:37.519
to some organized crime figures. Sandy
claimed that six weeks before Ed was killed,

441
00:32:37.720 --> 00:32:40.920
she accompanied him on a trip to
Miami, and while he never shared

442
00:32:40.960 --> 00:32:45.640
specific details about what was going on, Sandy suspected that the reason Ed went

443
00:32:45.720 --> 00:32:50.839
down there was to meet with these
organized crime figures and try to arrange another

444
00:32:50.880 --> 00:32:53.039
way to pay off the loan,
since he had already spent all the money.

445
00:32:53.480 --> 00:32:58.279
It would also turn out that Ed
over fifty thousand dollars in gambling debts

446
00:32:58.319 --> 00:33:01.640
to at least two casinos in Las
Figter Vegas. Investigators would soon discover that

447
00:33:01.720 --> 00:33:06.400
in the days prior to his death, Ed called his life insurance agents.

448
00:33:06.920 --> 00:33:09.279
He inquired about whether any of the
policies he had taken out would still be

449
00:33:09.359 --> 00:33:13.720
paid to his family in the event
of a suicide, and was told that

450
00:33:13.720 --> 00:33:19.079
at least one policy valued at five
hundred thousand dollars when not two days after

451
00:33:19.279 --> 00:33:22.359
Ed's body was found, his twenty
three year old son, Blake Edward Baker

452
00:33:22.640 --> 00:33:28.240
would be arrested and charged with making
a terrorist threat after he allegedly phoned up

453
00:33:28.279 --> 00:33:30.759
Sandy and threatened to kill her if
she did not pay him the two hundred

454
00:33:30.759 --> 00:33:36.279
thousand dollars he felt he was entitled
to from his father's estate. In spite

455
00:33:36.319 --> 00:33:39.240
of this, Blake passed a polygraph
when questioned about his father's death and was

456
00:33:39.240 --> 00:33:44.720
not considered to be a suspect.
Yikes, that's heavy too. You have

457
00:33:44.759 --> 00:33:46.519
a dead man and the son's like, here we are, I'm going after

458
00:33:46.759 --> 00:33:52.960
wife number four. See what happens
here. It's very bizarre, very bizarre

459
00:33:53.599 --> 00:34:00.920
that Ed calls and says, does
suicide count on my policy? I mean,

460
00:34:00.279 --> 00:34:04.240
for me, when you're thinking about, like, oh I might be

461
00:34:04.440 --> 00:34:07.759
sick, I want to check and
see if cancer is covered. I might

462
00:34:07.800 --> 00:34:10.159
you know, we're going on a
big trip. I want to see if

463
00:34:10.159 --> 00:34:15.639
a plane crash is covered. But
I don't need to know if suicide's covered

464
00:34:15.679 --> 00:34:22.840
because that's not in my repertoire of
possibilities. So unless that is something that's

465
00:34:22.880 --> 00:34:27.039
crossed your mind and something that you
think your family may need protection from and

466
00:34:27.519 --> 00:34:30.920
care for after your death. Why
would you ask that question? Like,

467
00:34:31.280 --> 00:34:36.119
I have done quite a bit to
get life in terms, especially after Buddy

468
00:34:36.119 --> 00:34:38.840
passed away. You go through a
lot if you're trying to get your family

469
00:34:38.880 --> 00:34:45.320
protected, And I don't know if
my policy covers that or what the stipulations

470
00:34:45.320 --> 00:34:49.079
are, like, I don't need
to know that. A lot of times,

471
00:34:49.119 --> 00:34:52.000
after a certain number of years,
they will pay out, but they

472
00:34:52.039 --> 00:34:53.800
won't do it in like the short
term. I think there's like a suicide

473
00:34:53.840 --> 00:34:59.960
indemnity clause that a lot of them
have, Like after five years it's fine

474
00:35:00.039 --> 00:35:01.840
and you would be paid out for
that, but they don't want people who

475
00:35:01.840 --> 00:35:07.119
are intending to complete suicide to buy
a policy and then you know, six

476
00:35:07.159 --> 00:35:10.000
months later they've got to pay out. Or wonder if in the eighties,

477
00:35:10.079 --> 00:35:15.360
Jules, do you think in the
eighties it was too I'm unsure, but

478
00:35:15.360 --> 00:35:20.039
if this policy for five hundred thousand
wouldn't pay out and then he ends up

479
00:35:20.079 --> 00:35:23.320
dead shortly thereafter, I believe that
both things can be true. That he

480
00:35:23.400 --> 00:35:29.119
could be paranoid because he's under threat, But I think in a situation like

481
00:35:29.159 --> 00:35:34.039
that you might be looking to be
able to control your own fate rather than

482
00:35:34.079 --> 00:35:37.039
waiting to be murdered or you know, something terrible done to you. If

483
00:35:37.039 --> 00:35:42.119
they're asking you questions, trying to
figure something out, maybe trying to tell

484
00:35:42.159 --> 00:35:45.360
you that, like your loved one
may take on your debt, that he

485
00:35:45.400 --> 00:35:49.119
may choose to exit this world on
his own terms, and he wants to

486
00:35:49.119 --> 00:35:52.280
make sure his family is protected.
Because it's just so strange that just before

487
00:35:52.320 --> 00:35:58.679
he dies he's asking insurance companies about
suicide, because why else would he be

488
00:35:58.800 --> 00:36:01.800
concerned if he worried that they're going
to stage it to look like a suicide

489
00:36:01.800 --> 00:36:07.159
if he's murdered. That just doesn't
really sound plausible to me personally, Yeah,

490
00:36:07.199 --> 00:36:09.639
exactly. It just seems like too
much of a coincidence, Like on

491
00:36:09.679 --> 00:36:13.679
its own, someone wanting to know
if their policy will pay out in the

492
00:36:13.719 --> 00:36:15.800
event of a suicide. I could
see someone calling them to ask that.

493
00:36:16.199 --> 00:36:22.039
But then a few days later he's
found dead in a circumstance where there's ambiguity

494
00:36:22.079 --> 00:36:25.119
about whether his death was a homicide
or a suicide. So you think he

495
00:36:25.239 --> 00:36:29.639
heard that from his insurance company and
realized, well, if I kill myself,

496
00:36:29.679 --> 00:36:31.920
I have to do whatever I can
to make it not look like suicide

497
00:36:32.119 --> 00:36:37.360
so that the policy will pay out. On November sixth, shortly before he

498
00:36:37.400 --> 00:36:44.320
went missing, Ed officially revised his
will, removing Vanguard Group International from his

499
00:36:44.400 --> 00:36:50.119
life insurance policies and making his family
the beneficiaries. According to his updated will,

500
00:36:50.519 --> 00:36:54.039
Sandy would receive five hundred thousand dollars
and her daughter fifty thousand, while

501
00:36:54.199 --> 00:36:59.880
Ed's owned two daughters received two hundred
and twenty five thousand dollars each and Blake

502
00:37:00.000 --> 00:37:04.239
one hundred and fifty thousand. His
ex wife, Mary would receive five hundred

503
00:37:04.239 --> 00:37:07.960
thousand from an insurance policy that she
had as collateral on a ten year alimony

504
00:37:08.000 --> 00:37:13.960
agreement, but one of the insurance
carriers refused to pay out any death benefits

505
00:37:14.360 --> 00:37:19.039
since it could not be conclusively proven
that Ed's death was not a suicide.

506
00:37:19.159 --> 00:37:23.400
Indeed, the fact that Edd inquired
about whether these policies would pay out convince

507
00:37:23.519 --> 00:37:28.400
some of the investigators, as well
as Ward Beaucy, that Ed could have

508
00:37:28.440 --> 00:37:31.679
taken his own life. The theory
was bolstered by the fact that a gun

509
00:37:31.760 --> 00:37:37.159
had been found on the floorboard beneath
Ed's feet, leading his speculation that he

510
00:37:37.199 --> 00:37:40.840
shot himself. While investigators found it
unlikely that Ed would have been able to

511
00:37:40.880 --> 00:37:45.360
pour gasoline over his body and set
himself on fire before pulling the trigger,

512
00:37:45.800 --> 00:37:51.440
they could not discount the possibility of
Ed bringing an accomplice to the scene who

513
00:37:51.440 --> 00:37:54.920
poured the gasoline in and around the
vehicle and then started the fire after Ed

514
00:37:55.000 --> 00:38:00.760
shot himself in order to make his
death look like a homicide. Ward Beauty

515
00:38:00.880 --> 00:38:04.719
believed that when Ed revised his will
and sent him the letter about taking care

516
00:38:04.760 --> 00:38:07.679
of his family, he already knew
he was planning to kill himself in order

517
00:38:07.719 --> 00:38:13.760
to escape his financial and legal problem, so he intentionally sent Sandy out of

518
00:38:13.800 --> 00:38:16.880
town before he went through with his
juicide in order to give her a plausible

519
00:38:16.880 --> 00:38:22.280
deniability. Sandy refused to accept the
idea that Ed took his own life and

520
00:38:22.360 --> 00:38:28.000
hired her own independent private investigator,
who concluded that his death was not a

521
00:38:28.039 --> 00:38:32.119
suicide. Sandy did agree to take
a polygraph test, but the result seemed

522
00:38:32.159 --> 00:38:37.039
to indicate that she was withholding information. One month later, she agreed to

523
00:38:37.039 --> 00:38:42.639
take a second polygraph, but we
were unable to find out how those results

524
00:38:42.679 --> 00:38:47.639
turned out, and Sandy eventually moved
to Europe. So she fails the first

525
00:38:47.639 --> 00:38:51.679
polygraph, right, it says that
she might be with holing information, but

526
00:38:51.719 --> 00:38:55.840
then she agrees while she's hired a
private investigator to take a second polygraph.

527
00:38:57.360 --> 00:39:01.800
That's bizarre. You would think at
some point she'd be consulting with her private

528
00:39:01.800 --> 00:39:07.280
investigator or trying to talk to an
attorney or something somebody and they'd be like,

529
00:39:07.320 --> 00:39:09.840
wait a minute, the police said
you failed a polygraph test. Don't

530
00:39:09.840 --> 00:39:14.360
go back in there, Like,
do not talk to them anymore. They're

531
00:39:14.360 --> 00:39:20.239
setting you up to be roped into
this case, It's very likely that Ed

532
00:39:20.679 --> 00:39:24.800
did send Sandy away. We know
he did for her quote safety will to

533
00:39:24.920 --> 00:39:30.920
spare me from discovering a body or
being in the immediate scene when I'm discovered

534
00:39:30.960 --> 00:39:35.079
as a deceased individual. That's protecting
her too, right, getting her away

535
00:39:35.079 --> 00:39:39.199
from the scene, it's helping her
not have any culpability. And he's already

536
00:39:39.599 --> 00:39:44.760
possibly set up this letter that'll be
sent to her as well. So did

537
00:39:44.840 --> 00:39:47.199
she know what was going on?
We don't know what their marriage was like.

538
00:39:47.320 --> 00:39:52.679
If I'm a young new bride,
maybe she wasn't, maybe she was

539
00:39:52.719 --> 00:39:54.599
older than him. But I was
a young new bride married to a man

540
00:39:54.639 --> 00:39:59.960
who claimed he was a multi millionaire
even if he was having financial problems,

541
00:40:00.039 --> 00:40:05.280
he likely would have you fallen in
love with Sandy under this pretense that he

542
00:40:05.320 --> 00:40:07.599
was going to provide her with the
world and they were going to have these

543
00:40:07.599 --> 00:40:12.840
amazing moments together. If he was
going to end his life and I was

544
00:40:12.880 --> 00:40:15.599
going to get his life insurance,
like, would I be willing to go

545
00:40:15.639 --> 00:40:19.760
stay with my daughter and come home
and have all of my worries gone and

546
00:40:19.840 --> 00:40:24.719
money? Possibly? Could I also
have been so stressed and overwhelmed or not

547
00:40:24.800 --> 00:40:30.000
understood a question, failed at first
polygraph Eve and tried to prove my innocence

548
00:40:30.039 --> 00:40:34.039
with the second one. Yeah.
Also, it would not be smart legally,

549
00:40:34.400 --> 00:40:37.880
but I could see both sides of
the coin here. Yeah. It's

550
00:40:37.920 --> 00:40:42.000
never been conclusively established if she took
the second polygraph because I was unable to

551
00:40:42.000 --> 00:40:45.920
find that information. So it's possible
that maybe her attorneys talked her out of

552
00:40:45.960 --> 00:40:50.920
doing it. But there has been
speculation that the reason that she failed the

553
00:40:50.920 --> 00:40:53.360
first one and they thought she was
withholding information is that even if she was

554
00:40:53.400 --> 00:40:58.480
not directly involved in Ed's death,
maybe she knew that when I go to

555
00:40:58.519 --> 00:41:00.880
Austin and I'm away from town,
and he's going to go kill himself and

556
00:41:00.960 --> 00:41:05.719
ensure that I'm taking care of financially, which is not something she would want

557
00:41:05.760 --> 00:41:08.519
to admit. But like I mentioned
earlier, Sandy has not exactly been an

558
00:41:08.519 --> 00:41:13.320
advocate for Ed. She pretty much
stayed out of the spotlight. Whereas Mary,

559
00:41:13.920 --> 00:41:16.559
his ex wife, was the one
who appearing on unsaw mysteries doing interviews

560
00:41:16.639 --> 00:41:21.800
and seemed a lot more concerned about
finding out what happened to him, whereas

561
00:41:21.840 --> 00:41:24.239
Sandy was off just living her life
in Europe. So this could be an

562
00:41:24.239 --> 00:41:28.960
indication that she knew Ed's death was
a suicide and all she cared about was

563
00:41:29.000 --> 00:41:32.280
living off the life insurance money.
And it might have been that she didn't

564
00:41:32.480 --> 00:41:37.800
know exactly, but she might have
strongly suspected it based on his actions.

565
00:41:37.800 --> 00:41:42.239
And I think if you're taking a
polygraph and they're asking these questions about whether

566
00:41:42.280 --> 00:41:44.960
you knew he was going to end
his own life, and you had strong

567
00:41:45.000 --> 00:41:50.239
suspicions based on behavior and evidence that
could come up as you're withholding information,

568
00:41:50.480 --> 00:41:54.039
I would think and I mean they
weren't married for that long at that point,

569
00:41:54.119 --> 00:41:58.960
were they not? Really? No, only a few years at most?

570
00:41:59.199 --> 00:42:02.000
Yeah, son know, like exactly
like ash had said, maybe they

571
00:42:02.000 --> 00:42:06.199
were married under the pretense that,
you know, he was this wealthy guy.

572
00:42:06.360 --> 00:42:08.159
And I don't know why we think
that he's probably older than her.

573
00:42:08.199 --> 00:42:12.400
He might not be. They could
be the same age, but it seems

574
00:42:12.440 --> 00:42:16.880
like that would have been something given
his midlife crisis type behavior, he would

575
00:42:16.880 --> 00:42:21.960
have been dangling in front of her
like a carrot. So when the walls

576
00:42:21.960 --> 00:42:27.639
started to come crashing down and she's
going, WHOA, this isn't what I

577
00:42:27.719 --> 00:42:30.719
signed up for, and then realizing
that he's in debt to these people that

578
00:42:30.760 --> 00:42:36.480
are potentially dangerous and this could be
her life. I mean, we don't

579
00:42:36.519 --> 00:42:39.599
know how in love she was or
she wasn't, but we do know like

580
00:42:39.639 --> 00:42:45.320
you'd mentioned that, she wasn't an
advocate for finding out what happened to Ed,

581
00:42:45.719 --> 00:42:49.079
Well, she's staying out of the
spotlight. She just wants results,

582
00:42:49.239 --> 00:42:53.559
the support the conclusion of murder or
not being a suicide, potentially because it's

583
00:42:53.679 --> 00:42:59.000
financially advantageous for her to do so, because if it's found to be a

584
00:42:59.039 --> 00:43:02.199
suicide, then nobody he gets paid
anything, correct or at least the one

585
00:43:02.239 --> 00:43:06.800
policy, right, Yeah, they
didn't get other money paid out from other

586
00:43:06.840 --> 00:43:08.840
policies, but I think the most
expensive one of the five hundred thousand dollars

587
00:43:08.840 --> 00:43:12.480
one was the one where you would
not get it paid out if it was

588
00:43:12.480 --> 00:43:15.719
proven to be suicide. Well,
even though the burned body found in the

589
00:43:15.800 --> 00:43:22.480
Jaguar was officially identified as Ed Baker, some people, including Ed's private investigator

590
00:43:22.519 --> 00:43:25.239
Bob Gail, had an additional theory
about what might have happened to him.

591
00:43:25.719 --> 00:43:30.639
They wondered if perhaps the remains did
not actually belong to Baker, and consider

592
00:43:30.719 --> 00:43:34.679
the possibility that he may have killed
an unidentified victim before placing their body in

593
00:43:34.719 --> 00:43:37.320
the Jaguar and then setting fire to
it in order to fake his own debt.

594
00:43:37.920 --> 00:43:42.280
He then escaped his troubles by fleeing
the country and living off the money

595
00:43:42.280 --> 00:43:46.360
he had embezzled from his investors.
Indeed, when Vanguard Group's International filed for

596
00:43:46.400 --> 00:43:52.039
bankruptcy following Baker's death, at least
ten million dollars could not be accounted for.

597
00:43:52.760 --> 00:43:55.559
Whatever happened, The investigation soon hit
a standstill, and even though the

598
00:43:55.559 --> 00:44:00.599
story was featured on an episode of
Unsolved Mysteries in October of nineteen ninety two,

599
00:44:00.960 --> 00:44:04.639
it failed to bring the case any
closer to a resolution. So after

600
00:44:04.679 --> 00:44:08.280
thirty eight years, the exact circumstances
behind the death of Ed Baker are still

601
00:44:08.360 --> 00:44:14.159
unclear. So I guess you could
say the path went chili. So when

602
00:44:14.159 --> 00:44:16.840
you say Robin, at at least
ten million dollars couldn't be accounted for,

603
00:44:17.119 --> 00:44:21.599
even though we know there was a
formal filing of bankruptcy and things like that.

604
00:44:22.000 --> 00:44:24.280
Is it something that he had simply
embezzled. Do we think it's deeper

605
00:44:24.320 --> 00:44:28.880
with some kind of illegal trade that
would have no record? Is it the

606
00:44:28.920 --> 00:44:31.679
gambling debts? Like, what's the
assumption of where that ten million dollars would

607
00:44:31.760 --> 00:44:36.400
be? We really don't know.
I mean, it's possible that he could

608
00:44:36.440 --> 00:44:38.920
have embezzled it and already spent it
by that point so it was gone,

609
00:44:39.199 --> 00:44:44.159
or he could have given it to
some criminal figures. But there has been

610
00:44:44.159 --> 00:44:47.519
speculation that maybe he put it in
a secret bank account somewhere as his emergency

611
00:44:47.559 --> 00:44:52.840
fund, and that after he faked
his death he just disappeared and lived off

612
00:44:52.840 --> 00:44:58.360
this money. We really don't know. Anyway. This is a pretty unique

613
00:44:58.400 --> 00:45:00.880
case, as you're not going to
find two many mysteries about unexplained deaths in

614
00:45:00.880 --> 00:45:07.000
which there are three possible solutions homicide, suicide, or faking their own debt.

615
00:45:07.800 --> 00:45:10.159
Usually, when a deceased person is
found inside the remains of a torchtout

616
00:45:10.239 --> 00:45:15.360
vehicle and they've been burned so badly
that the remains only weighed thirty two pounds,

617
00:45:15.800 --> 00:45:19.039
you're not going to assume that a
suicide took place, but in this

618
00:45:19.159 --> 00:45:23.320
case you can't completely discount that possibility. While the idea of Ed Baker faking

619
00:45:23.320 --> 00:45:28.280
his own death and disappearing to start
a new life might seem unlikely, this

620
00:45:28.480 --> 00:45:31.039
is not the first case we've covered
on this podcast in which someone has attempted

621
00:45:31.079 --> 00:45:35.920
to do this. You might be
familiar with our episode about Clarence Roberts,

622
00:45:36.079 --> 00:45:39.199
who was also featured on Unsolved Mysteries, and you can see some parallels between

623
00:45:39.199 --> 00:45:45.320
Clarence and Ed Baker. Clarence had
also got himself into serious financial trouble before

624
00:45:45.360 --> 00:45:49.440
his body was found inside a burning
barn in what appeared to be a suicide,

625
00:45:49.880 --> 00:45:52.119
but it soon became obvious that the
burned body found in the rubble did

626
00:45:52.199 --> 00:45:57.480
not belong to Clarence, and that
he likely killed an unidentified vagrant in order

627
00:45:57.519 --> 00:46:00.840
to fake his own debt. Clarence
is a pair. Plan was for his

628
00:46:00.880 --> 00:46:04.400
wife, Geneva, to collect on
his life insurance policies and they could go

629
00:46:04.440 --> 00:46:07.280
off to live somewhere on the money. But since the insurance companies did not

630
00:46:07.320 --> 00:46:12.400
believe Clarence was dead, they refused
to pay out, So Clarence was presumably

631
00:46:12.440 --> 00:46:15.960
forced to spend an entire decade in
hiding before he died for real in another

632
00:46:16.000 --> 00:46:21.280
fire. We're going to talk more
about this later on, but some suspected

633
00:46:21.280 --> 00:46:24.280
that Ed Baker was attempting a similar
scheme with his wife. Do you remember

634
00:46:24.360 --> 00:46:27.880
when we covered that on the Pathway
Chili? While say, okay, first

635
00:46:27.920 --> 00:46:30.559
of all, what kind of karma
is that? Well, that is carbon

636
00:46:30.639 --> 00:46:36.639
It's possible that Clarence killed a poor, homeless person and sets their body on

637
00:46:36.800 --> 00:46:40.280
fire, is stuck, miserable and
poor, waiting for his wife that's never

638
00:46:40.360 --> 00:46:46.079
going to come, and then he
dies in a fire. Karma. Oh

639
00:46:46.119 --> 00:46:50.719
it's so great. That is seriously
what I was thinking about when you talked

640
00:46:50.719 --> 00:46:54.599
about Sandy and eventually moves to Europe. I mean, listen, I've definitely

641
00:46:54.679 --> 00:47:00.039
moved to leave behind emotions and things
like that, but I don't need to

642
00:47:00.079 --> 00:47:05.679
go to Europe, right like a
hop and skip from Texas to Arkansas's fine,

643
00:47:05.800 --> 00:47:08.800
but you know Sandy goes to Europe
after she fails a polygraph test,

644
00:47:08.960 --> 00:47:14.920
and we know that somebney was paid
out to her or to somebody in the

645
00:47:14.960 --> 00:47:19.159
family. So is it possible that
Ed was setting her up to meet him

646
00:47:19.159 --> 00:47:22.320
over in Europe. That's a heavy, heavy, elaborate, detailed scheme,

647
00:47:22.400 --> 00:47:30.000
But it's not unthinkable if we knew
more about the probability of those dental records,

648
00:47:30.039 --> 00:47:32.719
Like what does a sixty point match
mean? Does that mean that you

649
00:47:32.800 --> 00:47:38.440
know, it's an eighty percent probability
that you can positively identify the body,

650
00:47:39.119 --> 00:47:45.280
or is it like these are sixty
points that are on fifty percent of the

651
00:47:45.280 --> 00:47:49.880
population. It just is so vague, and until we have more context there,

652
00:47:49.920 --> 00:47:53.079
it's really hard to know. Now, I'll stay right up front that

653
00:47:53.320 --> 00:47:58.159
Robin does not believe at Baker faked
his own death, and I happened to

654
00:47:58.239 --> 00:48:01.639
agree with him. They were able
to make a pretty close match between Baker's

655
00:48:01.719 --> 00:48:06.760
dental records and what was left of
the burn victim's teeth, as well as

656
00:48:06.760 --> 00:48:09.760
his jawbone, as I just mentioned. But the only reason that they could

657
00:48:09.880 --> 00:48:15.559
not say with absolute one hundred percent
certainty that it was him was because it

658
00:48:15.599 --> 00:48:21.079
took place during a time period before
DNA profiling became a common practice in criminal

659
00:48:21.119 --> 00:48:27.880
investigations. Interestingly enough, Unsolved Mysteries
would later produce another segment about a man

660
00:48:27.960 --> 00:48:31.239
named John Rubis, who was the
leader of a multi million dollar drug network

661
00:48:31.280 --> 00:48:37.159
in Puerto Rico. Much like the
Baker case, Rubus's charred remains were found

662
00:48:37.159 --> 00:48:40.360
inside a burnt out car in a
remote field in San Juan, and all

663
00:48:40.400 --> 00:48:45.119
they could use for identification was some
loose teeth and a fragment of jawbone.

664
00:48:45.159 --> 00:48:49.920
However, there were a number of
witnesses who had supposedly seen or talked to

665
00:48:50.000 --> 00:48:54.119
Rubus after he was killed and given
his immense wealth and power, this led

666
00:48:54.119 --> 00:48:59.440
to speculation that he faked his own
death and the remains in the vehicle belonged

667
00:48:59.480 --> 00:49:04.440
to someone else. However, DNA
testing was eventually performed on the jaw fragment

668
00:49:04.880 --> 00:49:07.440
and it proved beyond a shadow of
a doubt that the victim was Rubis.

669
00:49:07.599 --> 00:49:12.760
Maybe he pulled out his own teeth
it was a dire jaw though, Yeah,

670
00:49:13.079 --> 00:49:15.039
probably not. No, I mean, if it was teeth then maybe,

671
00:49:15.079 --> 00:49:21.119
but hid entre job owed seems like
much. Yeah, and I'd wager

672
00:49:21.199 --> 00:49:25.159
that if ed Baker's remains were exzuomed
today and subject to DNA testing, the

673
00:49:25.239 --> 00:49:29.960
exact same thing would happen. Though
I'm not sure this will ever be done,

674
00:49:30.039 --> 00:49:32.400
since I don't know if anyone is
still actively working on this case,

675
00:49:32.760 --> 00:49:37.519
but I definitely think that we can
rule out the entire fake death theory,

676
00:49:37.079 --> 00:49:42.519
and our next episode will focus on
the debate between Baker's death being a homicide

677
00:49:42.679 --> 00:49:45.000
or a suicide. Let me just
ask this question, because Ash, you

678
00:49:45.119 --> 00:49:52.039
might know, you've done a lot
of homicide investigations with teeth. Isn't there

679
00:49:52.639 --> 00:49:58.639
not always the material that you can
test for DNA? Like after many many

680
00:49:58.719 --> 00:50:01.440
years when they find bodies and stuff, they can't always test for DNA?

681
00:50:01.599 --> 00:50:06.039
Can they based on the material left
and teeth, like, if there's enough

682
00:50:06.119 --> 00:50:07.920
or not? All right, give
me one second, let me google this

683
00:50:07.960 --> 00:50:14.960
while you asked me directly, hold
on your own death, and we want

684
00:50:15.000 --> 00:50:19.480
you to check for us if you
pull out our teeth. Yeah, yeah,

685
00:50:20.519 --> 00:50:24.840
No, it's not always possible.
It says that teeth are usually successful

686
00:50:24.840 --> 00:50:30.599
samples of DNA, but intact teeth
and the proper parts of the teeth that

687
00:50:30.719 --> 00:50:36.960
contain the best possible quantities. The
richest quantities of DNA not always available,

688
00:50:37.000 --> 00:50:42.599
So it depends on the decomposition of
the corpses and the damage done to the

689
00:50:42.599 --> 00:50:45.480
teeth more so than decomposition. So
if a shotgun had, you know,

690
00:50:45.639 --> 00:50:51.320
ruined all the teeth of all the
yeah, it is possible that a tooth

691
00:50:51.400 --> 00:50:54.719
fragment may not have what's needed to
make as good of a match. And

692
00:50:54.760 --> 00:50:58.599
of course, with odentology and bite
marks and things like that, if you're

693
00:50:58.599 --> 00:51:00.960
trying to test with the jaw from
that, we all know that that has

694
00:51:00.960 --> 00:51:06.280
been proven to be a subjective science. It's not as reliable. So there's

695
00:51:06.280 --> 00:51:08.400
a whole lot of problems when you're
trying to rely on teeth in general in

696
00:51:08.800 --> 00:51:14.039
murder cases. Okay, I am
definitely going to agree with you guys.

697
00:51:14.079 --> 00:51:17.320
I don't think Sandy got to reunite
with Ed over in Europe. I definitely

698
00:51:17.320 --> 00:51:22.480
don't think that that's the case.
But what I felt uneasy about this entire

699
00:51:22.599 --> 00:51:28.360
time was Ed in his own car, Ed inquiring about the suicide on his

700
00:51:28.360 --> 00:51:34.159
insurance policy, Ed writing that letter, Ed sending Sandy away, and Ed's

701
00:51:34.199 --> 00:51:39.199
shotgun missing and found on the floorboard
or close to his body in his car.

702
00:51:39.599 --> 00:51:45.960
Again, if I was someone in
the mafia going to make a hit

703
00:51:45.039 --> 00:51:49.760
on you, I don't know that
I would take you out of the house,

704
00:51:50.239 --> 00:51:53.280
into the car to a remote place, shoot you, light the car

705
00:51:53.360 --> 00:51:58.360
on fire, and risk so many
opportunities for people to see us in transport

706
00:51:58.840 --> 00:52:04.960
and in that field killing you.
So it seems like his shotgun being present

707
00:52:05.039 --> 00:52:07.719
is a massive red flag. But
those gas cans and the fire burning to

708
00:52:07.760 --> 00:52:15.800
that extent is really questionable because how
did he set that fire and then also

709
00:52:15.920 --> 00:52:20.480
shoot himself those don't you know,
It's very difficult to have both those happen,

710
00:52:20.880 --> 00:52:24.079
So that's bizarre. I think it's
possible, and I think it's most

711
00:52:24.239 --> 00:52:30.440
likely a suicide. But I'm excited
about the next episode because I need more

712
00:52:30.559 --> 00:52:34.280
facts to make a better conclusion.
Yes, I think this would be a

713
00:52:34.280 --> 00:52:37.199
good time to bring it into part
one. But join us next week as

714
00:52:37.239 --> 00:52:40.000
we present part two of our series
about the Unexplained depth of Ed Baker.

715
00:52:42.159 --> 00:52:44.679
Robin, do you want to tell
us a little bit about the Trailment Cold

716
00:52:44.679 --> 00:52:47.840
Patreon. Yes, the Trail Cold
Patreon has been around for three years now,

717
00:52:47.920 --> 00:52:52.840
and we offer these standard bonus features
like early ad free episodes, and

718
00:52:52.880 --> 00:52:58.400
I also send out stickers and sign
thank you cards to anyone who signs up

719
00:52:58.400 --> 00:53:01.199
with us on Patreon. If you
join our five dollars tier Tier two,

720
00:53:01.679 --> 00:53:07.599
we also offer monthly bonus episodes in
which I talk about cases which are not

721
00:53:07.719 --> 00:53:12.039
featured on the Trail went Cold's original
feed, so they're exclusive to Patreon and

722
00:53:12.079 --> 00:53:15.000
if you join our highest tier tier
three, the ten dollar tier. One

723
00:53:15.039 --> 00:53:21.280
of the features we offer is a
audio commentary track over classic episodes of UNSAWD

724
00:53:21.320 --> 00:53:24.679
Mysteries, where you can download an
audio file and then boot up the original

725
00:53:24.760 --> 00:53:30.320
Unsolved Mysteries episode on Amazon Prime or
YouTube and play it with my audio commentary

726
00:53:30.360 --> 00:53:35.400
playing in the background, where I
just provide trivia and factoids about the cases

727
00:53:35.440 --> 00:53:38.559
featured in this episode. And incidentally, the very first episode that I did

728
00:53:38.599 --> 00:53:43.880
a commentary track over was the episode
featuring this case. So if you want

729
00:53:43.920 --> 00:53:47.000
to download a commentary track in which
I make more smart ass remarks about Jewel

730
00:53:47.039 --> 00:53:51.440
Kaylor, then be sure to join
Tier three. So I want to let

731
00:53:51.519 --> 00:53:54.000
you know a little bit about the
Jewles and Nashy Patreons. So there's early

732
00:53:54.039 --> 00:53:58.920
ad free episodes of the Path Went
Chili. We've got our Path Went Chili

733
00:53:59.000 --> 00:54:01.400
Vini's which are always over an hour, so they're not very many, but

734
00:54:01.400 --> 00:54:06.000
they're just too short to turn into
a series, and we're really enjoying doing

735
00:54:06.039 --> 00:54:08.199
those, so we hope you'll check
out those patreons. We'll link them in

736
00:54:08.280 --> 00:54:12.480
the show notes. So I want
to thank you all for listening, and

737
00:54:12.559 --> 00:54:15.039
any chance you have to share us
on social media with a friend or to

738
00:54:15.119 --> 00:54:20.119
rate and review is greatly appreciated.
You can email us at The Pathwentchili at

739
00:54:20.119 --> 00:54:23.079
gmail dot com. You can reach
us on Twitter at the Pathwink. So

740
00:54:23.199 --> 00:54:28.159
until next time, be sure to
bundle up because cold trails and chili pass

741
00:54:28.239 --> 00:54:31.679
call for warm clothing. Music by
Paul Rich from the podcast Cold Callers Comedy