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You're listening to the Mind Over Murder
podcast. My name is Bill Thomas.

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I'm a writer, consulting, producer, and now podcaster. I am now

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trying to use my experience as the
brother of a murder victim to help other

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victims of violent crime. I'm working
on a book on the unsolved Colonial Parkway

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murders and I'm the co administrator of
the Colonial Parkway Murders Facebook group together with

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Kristin Dilley. My name is Kristin
Dilley. I'm a writer, a researcher,

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a teacher, and a victim's advocate, as well as the social media

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manager and co administrator for the Colonial
Parkway Murders Facebook page with my partner in

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crime, Bill Thomas. Welcome to
mind Over Murder. I'm Kristin Dilley and

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I'm Bill Thomas. Today we're discussing
the new HBO series Burden of Proof,

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which dropped on June sixth, and
we're very excited to be talking about this

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case. So let's go ahead and
dive right in. Bill, do you

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remember how this case came onto our
radar. It's interesting. The case,

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which involves the disappearance of a fifteen
year old girl Jennifer Pandos took place in

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February nineteen eighty seven, just a
few months after my sister Kathy Thomas and

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her girlfriend Rebecca Doowski were murdered in
Williamsburg. Really wasn't on our radar.

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Yeah, I have the fuzziest of
recollections that I had heard Jennifer Pando's name

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before, but it was about it, and it's only a couple of weeks

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ago. When listeners to Mind over
Murder asked us, have we seen this

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new HBO documentary Burden of Proof about
the Jennifer Pandos case. You and I

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both look babe each other and said, why the heck don't we know more

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about this case? It was very
odd because you would think that this is

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something we would be hyper aware of, especially a karina as close as it

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did to Kathy and Becky murders.
The only way that I was in any

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way familiar with it was when some
of our listeners reached out and said,

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Hey, you guys watching this.
I had heard that there was an HBO

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series about a case from this area. My dad sent me a little something,

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But my dad doesn't typically write long, prolific messages to me. He

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was like, you're watching this HBO
thing and I said about what. He

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goes, I don't know some case
here in Williamsburg. I was like,

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you're gonna have to narrow that down
down. He's like, I don't know

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some girl named Jennifer. And I
was like, okay, this doesn't hell.

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Thank you, Dad, But I
just put it out of my mind.

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And then when somebody wrote to us
instead of you paying attention to the

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Jennifer Pandos documentary that, I was
like, oh, that's what my dad

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was talking about. The mystery of
your dad's clipped message becomes a little clearer.

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It still baffled both of us.
He said, wait a minute.

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This is a few miles away from
the Colonial Parkway where it appears that Kathy

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and Becky and the other victims in
the Colonial Parkway murders, least some of

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them were killed. And it's only
a few months after the first incident in

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October nineteen eighty six Kathy and Becky's
murder, and it's just a matter of

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months then before September nineteen eighty seven, when Robin Edwards and David Nobbling are

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murdered. So it's right in between
two of the Colonial Parkway murders. As

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near as we can figure, one
of the reasons why we didn't know much

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about the Jennifer Pando's case was because
it was so low profile at the time

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in February nineteen eighty seven. And
as the show unfolds, it becomes clearer

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that the case was always treated as
a missing person's case and as a teenage

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runaway. Jennifer's only fifteen years old
at the time. Excuse me for making

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you feel old for one second,
but I would like to put in context

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for our viewers that in nineteen eighty
seven, I was six years old,

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so I would have had no reason
to reflect on that is anything other than

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I was six. But I did
wonder why, in all of the reporting

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that we've read over the years,
no one had ever mentioned, at least

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not within the stuff that I read
or the stuff that you've read. In

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addition to Colonial Parkway murders happenings,
there was also a teenager who witnessing.

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I just assumed that we would have
come across that at some point, but

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we haven't, or at least I
haven't. No, it feels a little

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odd, it does, and given
the fact that we've discussed, and you

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and I have researched, along with
the Colonial Parkway murders, families and others,

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a significant amount on people involved in
the Colonial Parkway murders, and then

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as what you've christened the Colonial Parkway
murders, adjacent cases, cases that are

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just as serious, just as heartbreaking, but weren't considered part of the core

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for double homicides and disappearances in what
we call the Colonial Parkway murders, mostly

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murders of individuals as opposed to couples, and a number of those cases,

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some of which are right smack dab
in middle of the series that make up

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the Colonial Parkway murders, are also
unsolved, and several of them are quite

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possibly linked through the liberty security connection
that we've discussed here on mind Over Murder.

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Jennifer Pandos was never part of that
mix. Oh m, it's so

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odd, and especially once I processed
what my dad was saying about, Hey

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have you heard about this HBO series? It really did get me thinking,

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if this case is serious enough for
an HBO series, why the hell haven't

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I heard about it before? And
the only reason I can think of,

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And I was discussing this with my
roommate who does remember the case. She

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said she felt like what was going
on the Parkway kind of sucked all the

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air out of the room. And
I suppose that's one way of looking at

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it. But really, at this
point, it was just Kathy and Becky's

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murder that had happened. It wasn't
like the whole entire series of cases had

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happened. So I'm not really sure
what accounts for this other than the fact,

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but I think a lot of people
looked at it as a missing persons

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case, teenager runaway, and we
haven't heard a whole lot about it since

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then. So this HBO series Burden
of Proof focuses on the February nineteen eighty

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seven disappearance of Jennifer pandos so walk
us through what we know about what happened.

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So, Jennifer Pando's fifteen year old
girl. She went to my alma

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mater, Lafayette High School, which
at that point was one of only two

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high schools in Williamsburg. There was
Lafayette and there was Britain. There are

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more now. So Jennifer was fifteen
years old, went to Lafayette High School.

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She had a boyfriend at the time, sounds like they were on again,

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off again, and at that point
of her disappearance, it sounded like

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they were off again. It wasn't
really made explicitly clear in the series,

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but she did have a boyfriend at
the time, Tony Tobler. She's just

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this pretty standard fifteen year old girl. She had friends, she had school,

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she babysat for somebody, and that
person who baby set for would actually

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come into play a little bit later
as a suspect in her disappearance John An

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Evening in February nineteen eighty seven,
Jennifer was last seen talking on the phone

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in her room, as teenagers are
wont to do. Her father came in

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to tell her to get off the
phone. They had words of the heated

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variety, and then that was the
last time that anybody heard of Jennifer Pandos.

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She was talking to her friend Corey. Dad said get off the phone.

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She got off the phone, and
the next morning, when Jennifer's mother,

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Margie, came downstairs to Jen's room, she found the door locked.

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She asked her husband Ron to break
it down because she couldn't get a response

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from Jennifer, and when she walked
into the room, was absolutely immaculate,

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nothing seemed to be missing. Bed
was made, and on the bed was

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a rather suspicious and odd I don't
want to call it a ransom note because

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it doesn't ask for money. How
should we characterize this note? Bill?

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It's a very strangely written note.
It's very prominently featured in the series,

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and actually, having reached out now
to some of the family members and others

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who are much more expert in the
case, it's actually one of the most

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essential pieces of evidence remaining in the
Pendo's case. I'm running away note as

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if written by a third party,
by another person. The note is extremely

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odd and goes into some length about
Jennifer needs to get away and she needs

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a break, and that she's going
to be with an older man who represents

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a father figure to her. The
note is truly bizarre, and a significant

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amount of analysis has gone into looking
at the note, and there have been

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a number of people whose names have
been mentioned as possible authors of the note.

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It does appear that someone has made
an attempt to disguise their handwriting,

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perhaps writing with their non dominant in
hand. I'm right handed, therefore,

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I don't even know if I could
do it. No. I was looking

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at that. I'm like, I
couldn't write that with my left hand.

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No way. I don't think I've
ever tried to write anything more than a

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character or two with my left hand. I'm not sure I could do it.

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I know some people that can.
It does seem to be this very

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oddly written note on a piece of
notebook paper, Yeah, ripped that one

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journal torn from a notebook in red
ink. If I'm not mistaken yet,

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in it offers this very odd syntax, and then it feels like part of

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it's written from the perspective of the
person she's going to be running away with.

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In the latter part of the note, it shifts back, almost as

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if it's in Jennifer's voice, asking
them to put the money they owe her

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into her bank account, which they
did not do, to not contact the

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police. They did not contact the
police, which is one of the first

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of a number of odd decisions that
the Pando's family made. Further that,

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it reminds them to please cancel her
doctor's appointment four yeah later on that following

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week. So it's got this odd
mix of responsible fifteen year old reminding them,

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Oh, since I'm running away,
please cancel my doctor's appointment, to

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please put the money you won't me
in my account and oh, by the

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way, I'm running away with an
older man. The whole thing is just

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very weird, and the way it
goes back and forth between appearing to have

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been written by the companion but also
by Jennifer herself. Yeah, it starts

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in third person, and let me
pull up the text of it here.

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It starts with mister and missus pandos, your daughter's with me. She's fine,

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she's having some problems and needs time
away. And then it shifts to

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I'm fine. I just need time
to think. Both of you. Please

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go to work tomorrow because I will
try to call you. I won't call

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you at home, only at one
of y'all's work. Do you not call

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the police? Say y'all? She
says, y'alls. And by the way,

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they did do that. They did
go to work. Yeah, they

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went to work. Do you not
call the police? I can easily find

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out if you do. I may
never come back home. Don't tell my

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friends about this, Just tell them
that I'm sick. And that's not all

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of the note, that's only a
portion of it. The only thing that

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I'm seeing and all this reporting is
the portions of the note that I read.

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That is not the entirety of the
note. That is a portion of

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it. But you'll notice it starts
in third person and then switches to first

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which is interesting. Yeah, as
you had mentioned earlier, Bill, the

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parents followed some of but not all, of the instructions listed in the note.

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For example, they did go to
work, they did not call the

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police immediately, but they didn't put
money in her account. And Stephen,

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Jennifer's brother, actually made a point
of actually asking his parents about that later

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in the documentary why did you follow
some of the instructions but not all of

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the instructions? Like why did you
wait to call the police? So there's

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definitely some questions that come up the
first time that you see the note,

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and then the parents' response really is
quite odd. Now, granted I don't

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have kids, and because you're the
parent of the two of us, you're

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better equipped to answer the question of
what you would do if you found such

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a note from your child. I
don't think you would delay calling the police,

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am I right on that. There's
so many things that mister and missus

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Pandos did at the time of Jennifer's
disappearance, which makes no sense, and

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a good portion of the first couple
of episodes of Burden Approved focus on Stephen

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Pandos, Jennifer's brother, who's about
three to four years older than she is.

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He was a college dude at the
time of her disappearance. He is

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actually the protagonist of most of the
story that unfolds over four episodes, and

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a lot of the questions that are
being asked are being put forward by Stephen.

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He is incredibly frustrated and even suspicious. He believes that it's quite possible

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that his father may have been involved
in Jennifer's disappearance and that his mother may

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have been involved in a cover up. He really bears down hard and understandably

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on all the very odd decisions that
they made at the time of her disappearance,

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and even afterward he's constantly asking his
mother, and then later he confronts

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his father as well, why did
you do these things? I had mentioned

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to you over the weekend, Kristen, when we were discussing the series as

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we both watched it. There are
plenty of times when I look back on

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my parents' reaction to my sister Cathy's
murder, and I have said on Mind

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over Murder and elsewhere that there are
significant mistakes that my family, that Thomas

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family made in the follow up to
my sister's murder investigation, which obviously is

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still unsuccessful to date, including how
my father interacted with the FBI and other

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issues. My point is not to
throw my parents under the bus. They

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did the best they could under incredibly
difficult circumstances. But I think we failed

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to be as aggressive as we needed
to be with the FBI, and I

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think we placed too much faith in
law enforcement only until we moved forward to

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two thousand and nine when I got
much more involved in the case. And

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I'm not one hundred percent certain every
move I've made has been as smart as

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it could have been, either,
because there's been lots of moments of frustration.

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Stephen Pandos finds himself reviewing these very
profoundly odd decisions that his parents made,

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information they shared with law enforcement,
and then also key pieces of information

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they did not share with law enforcement, and some of the things that unfold

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over the four episodes. You end
up shocked, like what they only brought

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these things forward thirty something years later
when the case is beyond cold, and

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their daughter's been missing for three decades. Interesting because now that we know so

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many profilers, police experts and psychologists
and experts in this field. I try

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to be very mindful about the fact
that, as you have said as well,

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not everybody reacts the same way to
grief and to trauma and various other

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things, and I try to keep
that in mind when I'm evaluating the way

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that other people respond to crimes.
As much as I was sitting there telling

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myself, Okay, you can't judge
them for these decisions because you don't know

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what you would do if you were
in that same situation, and there's a

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certain amount of leeway in that for
me, Like I try very hard not

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to be judgmental about things like that, but definitely, as you're seeing Stephen

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Pandos on the screen interacting with his
parents and trying to come to his own

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sort of conclusions about why someone acted
the way they did, I would find

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myself going, Okay, I think
that is really weird. I think it's

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strange that they responded to some of
the instructions in the note but not all

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of them, and that one of
the instructions they followed was, don't call

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the police. It is really hard
knowing everybody that we know who says don't

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second guess people and the way that
they respond, because not everybody responds in

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the same way. I'm also sitting
here watching this as a connoisseur of true

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crime and going that was a stupid
way to respond. It's an interesting push

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pull to have in your head to
respond as a viewer in one way,

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but also to try to be understanding
as a victim's advocate in another. I

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don't feel like I was very successful
when I was watching this series in being

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as mindful of how the parents were
responding as maybe I should have been agreed,

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but I was struggling mightily. Actually
found myself, I don't do this

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all that often. Were you yelling
at the TV at the DNA because I

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couldn't believe the idea that you're not
going to reach out to law enforcement.

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Your fifteen year old daughter has disappeared, and there's a bizarre no way around

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this bizarre note left. The way
the note is structured, it appears to

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have been written by two different people. You could make a case that either

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your daughter is trying to mislead you, or someone else is trying to throw

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you off the scent. Either way, it's not good. And the idea

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that they didn't immediately pick up the
phone and call law enforcement. In this

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case, this would have been the
James City County Police Department. The idea

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that they wouldn't call them immediately is
just mind blowing. And then we don't

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want to reveal all the twists and
turns that happen in burden approof because we

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do urge you to watch it.
If you don't have HBO, I'll say,

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find a friend with HBO and say
we need to have a watch party

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here at your because this television series
is very much worth watching. Stephen Pandos'

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journey asking these questions and looking for
answers and over the course of four episodes,

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and it's actually amazingly shot over a
seven year period. That was crazy

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to me. This whole series started
when Stephen Pandos reached out to a documentary

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filmmaker, Cynthia Hill, who's the
director of this series. He saw another

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television series she'd done on domestic violence, which was quite good and then had

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come out in twenty fourteen. He
reached out to her in two fifteen,

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and then they finally connected discussed the
case, and so the first interviews.

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The layout of the show follows roughly
their interviews in chronological order, but the

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interviews start in two sixteen. He's
highly suspicious of his father. He believes

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his father may be involved in his
sister's disappearance, and he believes that the

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mother knows more than she's sang.
They are only two kids in that family,

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so he's the only surviving offspring.
He has dedicated himself to searching for

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answers. You actually experience his own
journey, and you see his thinking change

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over the years. He starts off
in one place and then ends up learning

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a lot more about his sister's disappearance. There's a lot of frustrating moments for

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Stephen Pandos, who struggles, I'm
sure off camera, but on camera as

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well with Cynthia Hill and her crew
there recording his interactions with law enforcement,

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current investigators, retired investigators, forensics
people, the Commonwealth attorney. And there's

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a lot of very interesting twists and
turns in the case. But I think

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the most compelling aspect of Burden of
Proof is watching his thinking change as he

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learns more about the circumstances of his
younger sister's disappearance. By the time I

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got to the end of the first
episode, all I could think was,

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oh my god, there are so
many similarities between Bill and Stephen. Honest

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to god. I reached the end
of the first episode and I was like,

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Wow, these guys have a lot
to bond over. And actually,

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what I mean You've said before it
is the club that nobody wants to join.

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And of course, like that is
so true. Nobody would ever want

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to join this club. But the
two of you have so much in common

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it's eerie. And actually, when
I reached out to the filmmaker to see

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if she wanted to appear on the
podcast, the first thing she said was

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Wow, Bill and Stephen have a
lot in common. It was like,

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yes, they do. They have
a ton in common. You've got two

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brothers who lost their sisters within months
of each other. I feel awful for

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Stephen because he doesn't have his sister's
remains, he doesn't know where she is,

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he doesn't know what happened to her. I feel just horrible for him

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going through that. And both of
you guys are going through this process of

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navigating the criminal justice system. And
the more that I was watching, the

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more that I was like, he's
going through the same thing Bill has been

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through. Oh look at that.
Oh look law enforcement stonewalling. That's familiar.

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Oh look there's it's taking forever to
get lab results. Boy, that's

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familiar. It's I felt like I
was sitting there ticking off boxes. Yeah,

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going yep, watched Bill go through
this, Yep, watch that too,

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Yep, I've seen this as well. It's sad to note that's a

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common denominator of your experiences, but
also is it almost comforting a little bit

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to know that you're not the only
person who's gone through it to the level

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that you have? Not exactly A
yeah, I say, I don't think

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comforting is a writ word. I
watched the show with Pamela, my partner,

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who is not a big true crime
fan. She'll watch it occasionally,

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she's not as dedicated to true crime
and true crime media as I am.

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I said several times, and so
did she out loud as we watched the

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series. That sounds familiar. Where
have we heard that before? For there's

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so much and there's the lost evidence, and then there's the misfiled evidence,

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and what appears to be foot dragging
by law enforcement, lack of information sharing,

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a rotation of case agents through the
process. Several different agents speak on

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camera and actually are quite good.
What happens in law enforcement is that people

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move on, or they retire or
whatever. So much of it sounded so

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familiar, and Steven's frustrations are just
so on display for you. His personal

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journey is among the most interesting things
that happen in the series. You're listening

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00:22:44,079 --> 00:22:48,200
to mind Over Murder, will be
right back after this word from our sponsors.

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We're back here at mind Over Murder. Something that we've never talked about

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with the Colonial Parkway murders, and
this occurs in the Burden of Proof documentary,

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is that Stephen becomes aware of the
fact that a grand jury proceeding has

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taken place. Grand jury proceedings are
a secret. He finds it incredibly frustrating,

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as do I, that grand jury
proceedings have taken place in our respective

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cases, but no information is shared, so that until someone's actually charged in

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a court of law, which is
an open process, the grand jury step

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is secret, and that means secret
from family members as well. And Stephen

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Pando says something to the filmmaker through
gritted teeth. I think I wish someone

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had told me that. Even when
he says it, I realized he's not

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just talking about law enforcement when he
says that. It turns out that Cynthia

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Hill and her team had become aware
of this as filmmakers that obviously to tip

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from a source, and they were
able to track who some of the participants

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were in this grand jury proceeding.
Yes, and Stephen says, I wish

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someone had told me that. Now
I understand where he's coming from. And

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at the same time, his criticism, if you will, isn't just a

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law enforcement at that point, he
actually seems to be criticizing the documentary film

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crew because they haven't even shared the
fact that they are aware of the fact

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that a grand jury proceeding has taken
place in relation to his sister's disappearance,

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which means at that point they're at
least exploring the idea of suspects being identified

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and perhaps charged in the Jennifer Pando's
disappearance. There's some very striking moments,

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and watching his journey was very interesting
for me on a personal level. But

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I think anyone who has a heart
is going to identify with all that this

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man has gone through. And it's
interesting too because the two of us,

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as well as all the other family
members in the Colonial Parkway case, we

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also have gone through the process of
having a documentary made about this case.

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What was it? It was about
three I want to say three months of

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shooting, but it wasn't that like
it was. I do remember we had

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a very busy time when the filmmakers
were here in Williamsburg. Because you and

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I attended as much of the shooting
as was allowable by our schedules. You

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were there for more of it than
I was, and it's an intense experience.

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I cannot imagine what it is like
to be shooting a documentary for seven

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years, to have this be a
part of your life, to have a

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film crew following you as you were
going through what is a very personal and

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emotional time, as you are having
to have some pretty uncomfortable conversations with your

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parents and your significant others, and
as you're trying to interview people and talk

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about your beloved sister who is now
gone and you have no idea about who

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what actually happened to her. That's
got to be very difficult and to have

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a film crew watching your every move. That's got to be rough. We

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didn't have that exact experience. We
had times where we had to be at

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a set. Okay, sit down
on the chair, talk to us about

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this. They're asking questions. We
never had anything as candid as that boy.

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I felt for him, though.
That's got to be so tough to

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be going through this really traumatic,
awful experience and you're doing it on camera

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for everyone to see. Yeah,
and Stephen Pandos is also going through a

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very unique experience in that a good
portion of the first couple of episodes,

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he strongly suspects his father is directly
responsible for his sister's disappearance. He believes

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his father, who is a man
who has issues, is a Vietnam bat,

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he has PTSD and was very abusive
towards Stephen himself, who's, as

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I mentioned, nearly four years older
than his sister. A significant portion of

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Stephen's efforts are trying to convince his
mother to step forward and provide information which

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he believes in his heart of hearts, that she has that she knows what

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00:27:18,119 --> 00:27:22,880
happened to Jennifer, that she helped
cover it up, or at a minimum,

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has much more knowledge of her disappearance
than she's ever said. He is

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pressuring her. And so those moments
which occur in one on one scenes with

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Stephen and his mother, Margie,
as well as through police interrogation, those

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00:27:41,519 --> 00:27:48,680
on camera moments are just riveting because
you keep thinking Margie's going to step forward

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00:27:48,839 --> 00:27:56,279
and admit that her abusive ex husband
they are now divorced, is directly responsible

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for their daughter's disappearance, and you
keep thinking Stephen's going to convince her.

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Lead investigator, Wendy Reid, who's
now retired, is going to push the

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mother to the point where she confesses, yes, I know what happened.

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Yeah. And there are some very
odd things that Stephen and Jennifer's mother says

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that lead you to believe that she
knows more than she's saying. And then

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at the same time, their father, Ron is quoted and then later shows

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up in the documentary, and some
of the things he said sound like they're

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right up to the edge of a
confession. He's saying, theoretically, if

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I killed my daughter, who says
these kind of things, yeah, the

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hypothetically I pushed her down, she
hit her head and she died. I

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00:28:45,920 --> 00:28:51,880
was like what the who says that? Who says that? Who puts that

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forward to their son? Hypothetically?
I shoved her, I hit her,

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she hit her head. She like, oh my god. I felt awful

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00:29:00,599 --> 00:29:03,240
for Stephen. And that really is
just an emotion that I continue to feel

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00:29:03,240 --> 00:29:07,440
through the whole entire four episodes.
What must it be like not only to

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have lost your sister, but to
think that your parents did it, or

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that one parent did it and the
others complicit in it. And he says

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at one point to Cynthia Hill,
he's in a car at some point or

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another after talking to his mom,
and she asked, how did you feel

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about that? And he says,
I feel like I don't have a family.

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00:29:26,599 --> 00:29:30,880
Yeah. That's God. That's got
to be rough. That's got to

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00:29:30,880 --> 00:29:36,759
be wrenching. That's awful. He's
lost his sister and he thinks his parents

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had something to do with it.
That's got to be just the worst feeling

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00:29:38,519 --> 00:29:42,200
in the world. I can't even
begin to come to any sort of point

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00:29:42,200 --> 00:29:45,599
of comparison for that, what that
must feel like. I spend a lot

377
00:29:45,599 --> 00:29:51,160
of time watching this documentary and going, my god, I just feel so

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00:29:51,200 --> 00:29:55,279
awful for him, and I just
hope that there is something over the next

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00:29:55,480 --> 00:29:59,720
couple of months or years that eventually
gives him the answers that he is looking

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00:29:59,759 --> 00:30:03,920
for for Jennifer, and I wish
that for everybody who currently has a missing

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00:30:03,960 --> 00:30:06,799
family member, because the not knowing, we know that it's the not knowing

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00:30:06,839 --> 00:30:10,920
that's the worst. One of the
challenges I think with this case is that

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00:30:11,039 --> 00:30:15,279
there's so little information. One of
the things you and I discussed off air

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00:30:15,359 --> 00:30:19,880
that I think is worth getting into, Kristen, is there's so little evidence

385
00:30:21,480 --> 00:30:26,920
in this case. There is a
short list of potential suspects beyond Ron Pandos

386
00:30:27,000 --> 00:30:33,519
the father. One of the things
that becomes key here is that at the

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00:30:33,599 --> 00:30:38,160
time of Jennifer's disappearance, the family
was renting a very nice condo in a

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00:30:38,359 --> 00:30:45,680
complex called the Kingsmill Resorts in Williamsburg. I'd heard it referenced when we were

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00:30:45,720 --> 00:30:51,880
down there shooting the television series for
the Lover's Lane Murders covering the Colonial Parkway

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00:30:51,920 --> 00:30:59,920
case. I didn't quite understand how
their life in this gated community with god

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00:31:00,000 --> 00:31:04,880
words and a limited number of points
of ingress and egress could be so significant,

392
00:31:06,000 --> 00:31:10,359
and I actually thought they should have
covered more of this in the documentary.

393
00:31:10,960 --> 00:31:14,960
Talk to us a little bit about
Kingsmill and why it would be difficult

394
00:31:15,400 --> 00:31:18,920
to get in and out of there
to do harm to Jennifer or to assist

395
00:31:19,000 --> 00:31:23,519
Jennifer in running away. Kingsmill is
and its referenced in the documentary. It

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00:31:23,640 --> 00:31:27,799
is the premier gated community in Williamsburg. And there are a couple of these

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00:31:27,960 --> 00:31:33,440
communities where you are only able to
access the people who live in it by

398
00:31:33,480 --> 00:31:37,200
going through regard gate. That Kingsmill
is definitely the biggest of those and the

399
00:31:37,240 --> 00:31:42,240
best established of those. Everybody's favorite
hometown musician Bruce Hornsby, for example,

400
00:31:42,480 --> 00:31:48,880
lives in Kingsmill. Would be Presidential
assassin John Hinckley lived in Kingsmill with his

401
00:31:48,960 --> 00:31:53,480
parents before the assassination and moved back
in with them after the attempted assassination.

402
00:31:53,920 --> 00:31:59,400
It is the home to the very
wealthy in Williamsburg, and there are only

403
00:31:59,440 --> 00:32:04,839
two ways is to get into Kingsmell. You access kings Mill through a guard

404
00:32:04,920 --> 00:32:07,480
gate. There are two entrances.
One is on Route one ninety nine and

405
00:32:07,559 --> 00:32:10,920
one is on Route sixty near to
Bush Gardens, which is our theme park

406
00:32:12,000 --> 00:32:15,599
here in Williamsburg. Next to the
Unhiser Bush Brewery. So to get into

407
00:32:15,680 --> 00:32:20,480
kings Mill, and I know this
because my family has friends in kings Mill,

408
00:32:20,559 --> 00:32:22,160
so I spent a great deal of
time in there over the years.

409
00:32:22,599 --> 00:32:27,319
The way that you get into Kingsmell
is you pull up to the guard gate

410
00:32:27,480 --> 00:32:30,359
and they ask you where are you
going? And you have to give a

411
00:32:30,440 --> 00:32:35,440
specific not only name, but also
the address. So I'm going to go

412
00:32:35,480 --> 00:32:38,920
see Jennifer pandos in Archer's need,
I believe is where they were. You

413
00:32:38,960 --> 00:32:44,559
would have to give an address and
they would call up to the house and

414
00:32:44,640 --> 00:32:47,680
say thus and such as waiting for
you at the gate. Are you expecting

415
00:32:47,759 --> 00:32:52,599
them? Can we send them up? And you have to get confirmation from

416
00:32:52,599 --> 00:32:54,960
inside the house, Yes, we
are expecting that person. You can send

417
00:32:54,960 --> 00:33:00,279
them in. At that point,
the guard will this phone call that they

418
00:33:00,319 --> 00:33:06,519
make. Is it on a conventional
phone or is there some sort of intercom

419
00:33:06,720 --> 00:33:10,599
set out or do they phone the
person's unit and say, to the best

420
00:33:10,680 --> 00:33:15,839
of my memory, it's just actual
conventional landline phone. Got it. So

421
00:33:15,920 --> 00:33:20,599
they call and they say, Kristin
Dilley's here to see. The men has

422
00:33:20,680 --> 00:33:23,880
to say yes, please send her
on in. Yes, yes, exactly.

423
00:33:23,920 --> 00:33:28,480
So you have to get confirmation from
someone you know. I remember this,

424
00:33:28,599 --> 00:33:31,279
Like I said, my parents had
friends in said the Kingsmel community,

425
00:33:31,359 --> 00:33:36,680
and so if we were going to
go to see X person or by person,

426
00:33:36,920 --> 00:33:39,359
we would go through the gate.
The guard actually gives you it's a

427
00:33:39,480 --> 00:33:45,279
paper pass and they write where you're
going, and they write the date and

428
00:33:45,440 --> 00:33:50,400
time, and you have to display
the pass at all times in your car.

429
00:33:50,920 --> 00:33:53,599
And if you don't have a pass, the people inside of Kingsmil,

430
00:33:53,720 --> 00:33:59,759
meaning the guards, the Kingsmil police, essentially they will find you if you

431
00:33:59,799 --> 00:34:01,920
don't have a pass in your car
and they'll pull you over. What are

432
00:34:01,920 --> 00:34:06,319
you doing here? That's true of
whether or not you're going to visit a

433
00:34:06,319 --> 00:34:09,480
friend, or whether you're going to
the resort to play golf or to go

434
00:34:09,679 --> 00:34:14,360
for a meal or a sail at
the marina or whatever else. You always

435
00:34:14,360 --> 00:34:17,639
have to have a pass whenever you
go into Kingsmel by car. So it

436
00:34:17,760 --> 00:34:22,000
is very secure. And there are
only the two ways in the one ninety

437
00:34:22,079 --> 00:34:25,639
nine guard gate and the Route sixty
guard gate. There is no way to

438
00:34:25,840 --> 00:34:30,760
there's no side roads, there's no
way to like sneak in under the radar

439
00:34:30,079 --> 00:34:32,440
that I'm aware of. I'm sure
that there are people who live in the

440
00:34:32,480 --> 00:34:35,840
resort who could say, oh,
yeah, you could probably get in or

441
00:34:35,880 --> 00:34:38,400
out this way, But to my
knowledge, there is no other way to

442
00:34:38,440 --> 00:34:43,199
get inner out of King's Mill beyond
those two guard gates, and you have

443
00:34:43,239 --> 00:34:45,440
to have a pass with you at
all times. I don't want to go

444
00:34:45,559 --> 00:34:51,280
too far down this rabbit hole.
But good portion of King's Mill is along

445
00:34:51,280 --> 00:34:55,400
the James River though, so you
could come in by water. There are

446
00:34:55,400 --> 00:34:59,800
people who have boats and there is
a marina there. Yeah, I feel

447
00:34:59,840 --> 00:35:05,039
like that is a rabbit hole,
though I imagining a potential kidnapper on a

448
00:35:05,079 --> 00:35:09,679
boat, I'm not seeing that as
a great potential possibility for what happened to

449
00:35:09,760 --> 00:35:14,280
Jennifer. But yes, so Kingsmill
does back up to the James. The

450
00:35:14,320 --> 00:35:17,519
resort is actually called Kingsmel on the
James and for many years it was the

451
00:35:17,559 --> 00:35:22,400
home of the PGA Tour, so
it's well known in the area and you

452
00:35:22,440 --> 00:35:27,599
can go in to play at the
golf course to meet up. I had

453
00:35:27,599 --> 00:35:30,360
a friend who just had her baby
shower in the resort at kings Mill,

454
00:35:30,440 --> 00:35:34,599
and so I was able to go
in for the day. But same thing,

455
00:35:34,639 --> 00:35:37,280
you have to go to the guard
gate, say what you're there for,

456
00:35:37,599 --> 00:35:39,119
They write you the pass, and
then you go to where you're going.

457
00:35:39,880 --> 00:35:44,920
Now. The reason I asked about
the telephone was because the evening that

458
00:35:45,039 --> 00:35:49,880
she disappeared, Jennifer, teenage girl
age fifteen, was on the phone a

459
00:35:49,960 --> 00:35:52,760
lot, to the point where her
dad got on her case about it.

460
00:35:52,840 --> 00:36:00,400
Yeah, this documentary does include some
reenactments with actors performing the parts of Jennifer

461
00:36:00,519 --> 00:36:06,880
and her parents and some other key
players. It might be possible for Jennifer

462
00:36:07,199 --> 00:36:12,119
to answer the phone the evening she
disappeared and say yes, send them on

463
00:36:12,239 --> 00:36:16,239
in. Yeah, I would say
that's definitely possible. They had discussed the

464
00:36:16,320 --> 00:36:22,440
possibility in the documentary of maybe somebody
walked in to the house rather than bringing

465
00:36:22,440 --> 00:36:27,920
a car. I suppose that's possible, But Kingsmill is it's very large,

466
00:36:27,920 --> 00:36:34,559
expansive community. I don't see somebody
parking their car outside of Kingsmill and then

467
00:36:34,679 --> 00:36:38,280
walking through, sneaking into the woods
by Jen's house so that they could sneak

468
00:36:38,280 --> 00:36:42,920
into her bedroom and then have her
walk out with them. Like, I

469
00:36:42,920 --> 00:36:45,360
don't see that as a possibility,
even though it was put out as hey,

470
00:36:45,440 --> 00:36:49,639
maybe this is a thing that happened. I don't know. There's one

471
00:36:49,639 --> 00:36:53,679
other possibility as well, which was
discussed in the documentary, which is could

472
00:36:54,320 --> 00:37:00,960
Jennifer have left her parents home and
walked out of Archer's Meat the road where

473
00:37:01,320 --> 00:37:06,880
her parents rented condo was located,
and make her way to the edge of

474
00:37:06,920 --> 00:37:10,639
the property and go out through one
of the gates, although that's at least

475
00:37:10,639 --> 00:37:15,119
a mile in and of itself,
and that would be say, a twenty

476
00:37:15,199 --> 00:37:21,199
minute walk. One of the striking
things about Jennifer's disappearances she took virtually nothing

477
00:37:21,360 --> 00:37:24,119
with her, not even a jacket
as far as they can tell, given

478
00:37:24,159 --> 00:37:29,800
the fact that it was February.
I know it's not freezing cold in Williamsburg

479
00:37:29,880 --> 00:37:32,760
in February, it's still chilly enough
that you would absolutely want to take a

480
00:37:32,840 --> 00:37:37,400
jacket with you, And she didn't
seem to take much in terms of her

481
00:37:37,519 --> 00:37:46,440
personal items. That struck everyone,
investigators and family alike as odd. And

482
00:37:46,559 --> 00:37:52,519
it's interesting. The opening shot of
the documentary is of the actress playing Jennifer

483
00:37:52,599 --> 00:37:57,519
on a little scooter scooting around King's
Mill, and then we never hear about

484
00:37:57,559 --> 00:38:00,199
that again. I wonder, if
you're going to on away, why not

485
00:38:00,360 --> 00:38:05,280
at least take your bike, take
your scooter to wherever you're meeting this person.

486
00:38:05,400 --> 00:38:08,079
If you are planning on running off
with this older father figure as referenced

487
00:38:08,079 --> 00:38:10,599
in the note, if he's not
going to drive in to come get you,

488
00:38:12,880 --> 00:38:15,039
why not at least take your scooter, your bike, you're whatever else?

489
00:38:15,199 --> 00:38:20,679
Why make yourself walk a mile at
least in the dark, in the

490
00:38:20,719 --> 00:38:24,599
freezing cold temperatures of February without a
coat. It doesn't make a ton of

491
00:38:24,679 --> 00:38:29,239
sense to me that if someone is
going to run off, even for just

492
00:38:29,320 --> 00:38:31,000
a couple of days, why do
you not take anything with you? And

493
00:38:31,079 --> 00:38:37,239
how do you get to where you're
going? Those first two episodes mostly focus

494
00:38:37,440 --> 00:38:45,239
on these issues, discussions between Steven
Pandos and the investigators and other experts whom

495
00:38:45,239 --> 00:38:52,800
we referenced, as well as pushing
his mother and ultimately his father for answers

496
00:38:52,039 --> 00:38:58,000
and his sister's disappearance. What we
find is we head into episode two is

497
00:38:58,599 --> 00:39:02,880
there are twists and turns earns in
the second half of the documentary. We

498
00:39:02,880 --> 00:39:07,920
don't want to give all of those
away, because it's certainly very interesting to

499
00:39:08,239 --> 00:39:14,079
see those things unfold, But as
we head into the second half of the

500
00:39:14,159 --> 00:39:19,880
four episodes, our view of the
case begins to change. Yeah, that's

501
00:39:19,920 --> 00:39:24,159
definitely a more than fair assessment of
the situation. I could not binge this.

502
00:39:25,119 --> 00:39:30,039
I'm trying to be very mindful of
how much crime I'm feeding myself during

503
00:39:30,039 --> 00:39:34,320
the day, and so I watched
the first two episodes and then I was

504
00:39:34,360 --> 00:39:37,440
like, you know what, I
can't do all for tonight. I just

505
00:39:37,559 --> 00:39:42,960
can't. So I stopped after two, and then I returned two, episode

506
00:39:43,000 --> 00:39:45,599
three, and four the next day
about as early as I could just find

507
00:39:45,599 --> 00:39:49,119
getting on the TV. I don't
watch it. I don't want to be

508
00:39:49,159 --> 00:39:51,880
like, it's six am and I'm
watching crime. I didn't want to do

509
00:39:51,920 --> 00:39:53,920
that, so I waited a decent
hour. Nine am is a good time

510
00:39:53,920 --> 00:39:58,760
to start watching crime. But definitely
after the first two episodes, I was

511
00:39:58,840 --> 00:40:01,719
left thinking one thing. And then
we get to episodes three and four and

512
00:40:01,760 --> 00:40:07,639
it's listens a whole other Oh my
goodness. Funny. We ended up watching

513
00:40:07,880 --> 00:40:12,599
one episode per night, but by
the time we got to episode three,

514
00:40:12,639 --> 00:40:15,000
we couldn't wait then to jump into
episode four. Yeah, I was gonna

515
00:40:15,000 --> 00:40:22,000
say, I don't know how you
waited, And we may have to hold

516
00:40:22,360 --> 00:40:27,280
some of our observations for our next
episode as well. I think that's probably

517
00:40:27,280 --> 00:40:30,400
a good idea. We would encourage
you if you have not already watched Burden

518
00:40:30,440 --> 00:40:34,920
of Proof on HBO or I guess
they're just calling it Max now and not

519
00:40:35,119 --> 00:40:40,000
HBO Max. If you haven't watched
Burden of Proof on Max, please make

520
00:40:40,039 --> 00:40:44,840
sure you do check that out so
you can better appreciate our discussion here on

521
00:40:44,920 --> 00:40:47,840
mind Over Murder. We will continue
our discussion in our next episode. I

522
00:40:47,960 --> 00:40:51,760
was going to do it for this
episode of mind Over Murder. Thank you

523
00:40:51,800 --> 00:41:05,719
so much for listening. We'll see
you next time. Mind Over Murder is

524
00:41:05,719 --> 00:41:10,880
a production of Absolute Zero and Another
Dog Productions. Our executive producers are Bill

525
00:41:10,960 --> 00:41:16,280
Thomas and Kristin Dilley. Our logo
art is by Pamela Arnois. Our theme

526
00:41:16,360 --> 00:41:22,480
music is by Kevin McLeod. Mind
Over Murder is distributed in partnership with Coral

527
00:41:22,559 --> 00:41:27,440
Space Media. You can follow us
on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram.

528
00:41:27,480 --> 00:41:30,920
You can also follow our page on
the Colonial Parkway Murders on Facebook, and

529
00:41:30,960 --> 00:41:36,400
finally, you can follow Bill Thomas
on Twitter at Bill Thomas five six.

530
00:41:36,920 --> 00:42:00,079
Thank you for listening to mind Over
Murder. M